Meaning of “erase” in the English Dictionary

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"erase" in English

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eraseverb [ T ]

uk ​ /ɪˈreɪz/ us ​ /ɪˈreɪs/

erase verb [ T ] (SOMETHING PAST)

› to cause a feeling, memory, or period of time to be completely forgotten:

He is determined to erase the memory of a disappointing debut two years ago.
Woods wants a convincing victory to erase doubts about his team's ability to reach the World Cup finals.
One election cannot erase 65 years of a corrupt one-party political process.

› literary to remove or destroy something, especially something that shows that that person or thing ever existed or happened:

The president said NATO expansion would finally erase the boundary line in Europe artificially created by the Cold War.
Years of hard living had blurred but not erased her girlhood beauty.
He was a man of mystery - erased from the history books.

Thesaurus: synonyms and related words

erasure
noun [ C or U ] uk ​ /ɪˈreɪ.ʒər/ us ​ /ɪˈreɪ.ʒɚ/

› the act of erasing something:

the nuclear erasure of entire populations
the erasure of police audiotapes

(Definition of “erase” from the Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

"erase" in American English

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eraseverb [ T ]

us ​ /ɪˈreɪs/

erase verb [ T ] (DESTROY)

› to destroy or remove something completely:

A subdirectory filled with precious data can be erased if you are not careful.

erase verb [ T ] (RUB AWAY)

› to remove something written or a mark by rubbing:

I kept changing my mind and erasing my answers on the test.

(Definition of “erase” from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

"erase" in Business English

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eraseverb [ T ]

uk ​ /ɪˈreɪz/ us ​ /ɪˈreɪs/

› to cancel the effect of an increase or fall in something such as an amount of debt, the price of shares, etc.:

erase a deficit/debt/loss To erase the budget deficit through cuts alone would mean extreme measures such as shutting prisons and college campuses.
erase a profit/gain

› to remove information or data from the place where it was stored:

erase sth from sth Fraudulent accounts had been erased from the records.
All personal data is securely erased in accordance with our data protection policy.

(Definition of “erase” from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

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