Word.ws English Dictionary

interpellated

interpellated is the simple past and past participle of interpellate.

Meaning of interpellate

Verb

interpellate (third-person singular simple present interpellates, present participle interpellating, simple past and past participle interpellated)

  1. (obsolete) To interrupt (someone) so as to inform or question (that person about something).
  2. To address (a person) in a way that presupposes a particular identification of them; to give (a person) an identity (which may or may not be accurate).
    • […] a Master of Ceremonies' words "Ladies and gentlemen" […] interpellates those being addressed as an audience, and one that is differentiated by gender.1996, “The Cambridge History of American Literature”, in Sacvan Bercovitch, editor, Poetry and criticism, 1940-1995, volume 8, page 408
  3. (transitive) To question (someone) formally concerning official or governmental policy or business.
    • After the gentleman and Senator [Mariano Jesús] Cuenco interpellated me, I knew already that my bill was hopeless. That is why I presented that bill on February 4th, but it slept the sleep of the just in the Committee on Education.1958 May 9, [Roseller Tarroza] Lim, “Manifestaciones del Sen. [Decoroso] Rosales”, in Republic of the Philippines Congressional Record (Senate of the Philippines), volume I, number 67, Manila...

Questions about interpellated

What is interpellated the simple past and past participle of?
Interpellated is the simple past and past participle of interpellate.

Words near interpellated in the dictionary

  1. interpeduncular
  2. interpel
  3. interpellant
  4. interpellants
  5. interpellate
  6. interpellated
  7. interpellates
  8. interpellating
  9. interpellation
  10. interpellations
  11. interpellator

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: interpellated (page history and authors); interpellate (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “interpellated.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/interpellated. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.