Library / English Dictionary

CRAM

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected forms: crammed    , cramming   

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Prepare (students) hastily for an impending exam

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Hypernyms (to "cram" is one way to...):

fix; gear up; prepare; ready; set; set up (make ready or suitable or equip in advance for a particular purpose or for some use, event, etc)

Verb group:

bone; bone up; cram; drum; get up; grind away; mug up; swot; swot up (study intensively, as before an exam)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

crammer (a textbook designed for cramming)

crammer (a special school where students are crammed)

crammer (a teacher who is paid to cram students for examinations)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Study intensively, as before an exam

Example:

I had to bone up on my Latin verbs before the final exam

Synonyms:

bone; bone up; cram; drum; get up; grind away; mug up; swot; swot up

Classified under:

Verbs of thinking, judging, analyzing, doubting

Hypernyms (to "cram" is one way to...):

hit the books; study (learn by reading books)

Verb group:

cram (prepare (students) hastily for an impending exam)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s something PP

Derivation:

crammer (a textbook designed for cramming)

crammer (a student who crams)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Crowd or pack to capacity

Example:

the theater was jampacked

Synonyms:

chock up; cram; jam; jampack; ram; wad

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "cram" is one way to...):

stuff (cram into a cavity)

Verb group:

cram (put something somewhere so that the space is completely filled)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s something PP
Somebody ----s something with something

Sentence example:

They cram the books into the box

Sense 4

Meaning:

Put something somewhere so that the space is completely filled

Example:

cram books into the suitcase

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "cram" is one way to...):

lay; place; pose; position; put; set (put into a certain place or abstract location)

Verb group:

chock up; cram; jam; jampack; ram; wad (crowd or pack to capacity)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "cram"):

stuff (cram into a cavity)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something PP

Sentence example:

They cram the books into the box

Credits

 Context examples: 

In truth, they were children together, so far as love was concerned, and they were as naive and immature in the expression of their love as a pair of children, and this despite the fact that she was crammed with a university education and that his head was full of scientific philosophy and the hard facts of life.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

I was almost choked with the filthy stuff the monkey had crammed down my throat: but my dear little nurse picked it out of my mouth with a small needle, and then I fell a-vomiting, which gave me great relief.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Releasing one of her arms, she put it down in her pocket to the elbow, and brought out some paper bags of cakes which she crammed into my pockets, and a purse which she put into my hand, but not one word did she say.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I, who had lived my life in quiet places, only to enter at the age of thirty-five upon a course of the most irrational adventure I could have imagined, never had more incident and excitement crammed into any forty hours of my experience.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

I could earn a dollar and a half a day, common labor, and I might get in as instructor in Hanley's cramming joint—I say might, mind you, and I might be chucked out at the end of the week for sheer inability.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Nay, sometimes the floor is strewed with dust on purpose, when the person to be admitted happens to have powerful enemies at court; and I have seen a great lord with his mouth so crammed, that when he had crept to the proper distance from the throne; he was not able to speak a word.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Shortly afterwards, we were very high up in a very hot theatre, looking down into a large pit, that seemed to me to smoke; the people with whom it was crammed were so indistinct.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I replied, with all due deference to his experience (but with more deference, I am afraid, to his being Dora's father), that perhaps it was a little nonsensical that the Registry of that Court, containing the original wills of all persons leaving effects within the immense province of Canterbury, for three whole centuries, should be an accidental building, never designed for the purpose, leased by the registrars for their Own private emolument, unsafe, not even ascertained to be fire-proof, choked with the important documents it held, and positively, from the roof to the basement, a mercenary speculation of the registrars, who took great fees from the public, and crammed the public's wills away anyhow and anywhere, having no other object than to get rid of them cheaply.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)