"keep at arm's length" meaning in English

See keep at arm's length in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: En-au-keep at arm's length.ogg [Australia]
Head templates: {{head|en|verb|head=keep at arm's length}} keep at arm's length
  1. (transitive) Keep at a distance, away from one's body. Tags: transitive Translations (Translations): distantsi hoidma (Estonian), sich vom Leibe halten (German), sich vom Halse halten (German), távol tart magától (Hungarian), megtartja a három lépés távolságot (Hungarian), hålla på armlängds avstånd (Swedish)
    Sense id: en-keep_at_arm's_length-en-verb-yDQsFsDk Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 74 9 16 Disambiguation of 'Translations': 77 11 12
  2. (transitive, figuratively) Avoid direct confrontation or struggle. Tags: figuratively, transitive
    Sense id: en-keep_at_arm's_length-en-verb-jYfHY34b
  3. (transitive, figuratively) Avoid a close relationship. Tags: figuratively, transitive
    Sense id: en-keep_at_arm's_length-en-verb-k4H-82Jf

Download JSON data for keep at arm's length meaning in English (2.7kB)

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  "pos": "verb",
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          "_dis": "74 9 16",
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          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
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        "Keep at a distance, away from one's body."
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      "id": "en-keep_at_arm's_length-en-verb-yDQsFsDk",
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(transitive) Keep at a distance, away from one's body."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "transitive"
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      "translations": [
        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "et",
          "lang": "Estonian",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "distantsi hoidma"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "sich vom Leibe halten"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "sich vom Halse halten"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "távol tart magától"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "megtartja a három lépés távolságot"
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        {
          "_dis1": "77 11 12",
          "code": "sv",
          "lang": "Swedish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "hålla på armlängds avstånd"
        }
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        {
          "ref": "2013 November 6, Chris Bevan, “Borussia Dortmund 0-1 Arsenal”, in BBC Sport",
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        "(transitive, figuratively) Avoid direct confrontation or struggle."
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          "text": "She's been keeping me at arm's length all the time. She doesn't want to get involved.",
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        "Avoid a close relationship."
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        "(transitive, figuratively) Avoid a close relationship."
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
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      "categories": [
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      "glosses": [
        "Keep at a distance, away from one's body."
      ],
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        "(transitive) Keep at a distance, away from one's body."
      ],
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          "type": "quotation"
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      "glosses": [
        "Avoid direct confrontation or struggle."
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        "(transitive, figuratively) Avoid direct confrontation or struggle."
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        "transitive"
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          "type": "example"
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        "(transitive, figuratively) Avoid a close relationship."
      ],
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      "tags": [
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "et",
      "lang": "Estonian",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "distantsi hoidma"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "sich vom Leibe halten"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "sich vom Halse halten"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "távol tart magától"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "megtartja a három lépés távolságot"
    },
    {
      "code": "sv",
      "lang": "Swedish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "hålla på armlängds avstånd"
    }
  ],
  "word": "keep at arm's length"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.