engaged

1. 1
   adjective

   Having agreed to marry a particular person, or, of a couple, to marry each other.

   After dating for five years, the couple announced they were engaged.

   He stayed engaged to her through two years of overseas deployment.

   Similarbetrothed, affianced

2. 2
   adjective

   Busy or occupied with some activity or employment.

   She's currently engaged in a major research project and can't take new clients.

   He sent his regrets, explaining that he was otherwise engaged that evening.

   Similarbusy, occupied, involved

   Oppositefree, idle, available

   Note

   The construction to know is engaged in, with the activity named after it: engaged in research, engaged in talks, or, in Prince's "When Doves Cry" (1984), a couple engaged in kissing. Without in, the word leans formal and polite. It survives most clearly in otherwise engaged, the conventional way to decline an invitation without giving a reason.

3. 3
   adjective

   Greatly interested; giving one's full attention and involvement to something.

   An engaged audience asked questions long after the lecture ended.

   Voters who feel engaged with local issues turn out at higher rates.

   Similarinvolved, interested, attentive, absorbed

   Oppositedisengaged, uninterested, apathetic, indifferent

4. 4
   adjective

   In contact and in operation, as of gears, a clutch, or other parts that interlock to work together.

   With the clutch engaged, power flows from the engine to the wheels.

   The autopilot stayed engaged through most of the flight.

   Similaractive, on, connected

   Oppositedisengaged, off, inactive

5. 5
   adjectiveBritish

   Of a telephone or line: already in use for a call when a third party tries to get through.

   Every time he dialled the box office, the line was engaged.

   Her phone had been engaged for an hour, so I popped round instead.

   Similarbusy

   Oppositefree

   Note

   British English uses it for a line already in use, where American English says busy. Either the phone or the person can be the subject: her phone was engaged and she was engaged both work. The second can also be read as the general "occupied" sense, so making the line or the phone the subject is the clearer choice.

6. 6
   verb

   Simple past tense and past participle of engage.

   The company engaged a consultant to review its finances.

   The destroyer had engaged enemy aircraft twice before noon.

   Note

   A regular past form, so one spelling serves the simple past (the firm engaged a consultant), the perfect with have, and the passive with be. That passive is where ambiguity creeps in. The consultant was engaged means someone hired him, while she was engaged usually reads as the promise to marry. Context, or an agent introduced with by, settles which is meant.

7. 7
   adjective

   Involved in combat; attacking an enemy force or under attack by one.

   Two patrols became engaged in a brief firefight at the border.

   The carrier group remained engaged with hostile aircraft for several hours.

   Similarinvolved, locked

   Oppositedisengaged

   Note

   Military reporting uses it for the moment contact turns into combat. A unit that has merely sighted the enemy is in contact, while one exchanging fire is engaged. The word covers both sides, the attacker and the attacked. It takes with for the opponent (engaged with hostile aircraft) and in for the action (engaged in a firefight).

8. 8
   adjective

   Passionately committed to a political, social, or artistic cause.

   He remained a deeply engaged writer, devoting his novels to questions of justice.

   Her photography is engaged rather than detached, taking sides on every issue it documents.

   Similarcommitted, activist, partisan

   Oppositedetached, neutral, disengaged, apolitical

   Note

   The English rendering of the French engagé describes writers, artists and thinkers who put their work in the service of a cause. Maria Lauret's Liberating Literature (2002) pairs "engaged writers" with "cultural and political critics." Keep the cause in view, as in engaged writer or engaged art, or the phrase may read as simply "very interested".

9. 9
   adjective

   Of a column or similar element: attached to a wall or partly sunk into it, rather than freestanding.

   Engaged columns articulate the facade without actually supporting it.

   The nave walls feature engaged shafts that rise to meet the vault ribs.

   Similarattached, applied

   Oppositefreestanding, detached

   Note

   An architect's word for a column that belongs to the wall instead of standing free of it, bonded in or sunk to about half its depth. Engaged columns, piers and shafts usually articulate a facade more than they carry its weight. Engaged column is the fixed phrase, and freestanding is the word for the opposite.

10. 10
    adjective

    Of a fetus, having its widest presenting part, usually the head, descended into the pelvic brim or inlet.

    By the thirty-eighth week, the fetus was fully engaged and labor seemed imminent.

    First babies often become engaged several weeks before delivery, while later babies may not drop until labor begins.

    Note

    Obstetrics uses it for a milestone of late pregnancy: the widest diameter of the leading part has passed the plane of the pelvic inlet. When the head leads, that is the biparietal diameter. Clinicians check engagement by feeling the abdomen and recording how many fifths of the head can still be felt, or by station on vaginal examination.

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