All 11 Uses of
contract
in
The Poisonwood Bible
- We had to sit so close to other people there wasn't room to breathe, if you even wanted to, being in the position to contract every kind of a germ there was.
Chpt 1 *contract = to get (of a disease)
- My contract expires in June. ... We will stay through July to help welcome the Reverend and Mrs. Minor when they
come.Chpt 2 *contract = formal agreement
- We were still ten kilometers from the village when my chronic backache spread to a deep, rock-hard contraction across my lower belly, and I understood with horror that I was in labor.
Chpt 5 *contraction = tightening (shrinking) of muscles
- Chained to the porch by Mother's instructions, like grumpy twin bears in captivity, we enviously watched Nelson as he went about his business, free to go back and forth to the village and contract the kakakaka any time he had a mind to.†
Chpt 2
- The Minors have declined their contract, on our advice.†
Chpt 2
- Our Father tries to make them understand the batiza is no fetish but a contract with Jesus Christ.†
Chpt 3
- There was something I needed to explain to Anatole, but I couldn't be bothered with it at the peak of a contraction.†
Chpt 5
- The contraction subsided.†
Chpt 5
- I have had very bad female problems on account of an infection I contracted from Eeben Axelroot.†
Chpt 6
- I could not accept the contract: that every child born human upon this earth comes with a guarantee of perfect health and old age clutched in its small fist.†
Chpt 6
- She still suffers from the effects of several diseases she contracted in the Congo, including schistosomiasis, Guinea worms, and probably tuberculosis.†
Chpt 6
Definitions:
-
(1)
(contract as in: legal contract) an agreement - typically written and enforceable by law
-
(2)
(contract as in: contract the disease) to get -- especially in reference to a disease
-
(3)
(contract as in: the metal contracted) when something gets shorter or smaller
-
(4)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
A grammatical sense of the word form contraction describes can't as a shortened form of can not.