DISCONNECTED

Pronunciation (US):

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does disconnected mean? 

• DISCONNECTED (adjective)
  The adjective DISCONNECTED has 5 senses:

1. (music) marked by or composed of disconnected parts or sounds; cut short crisply

2. having been divided; having the unity destroyed

3. marked by sudden changes in subject and sharp transitions

4. not plugged in or connected to a power source

5. lacking orderly continuity

  Familiarity information: DISCONNECTED used as an adjective is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DISCONNECTED (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

(music) marked by or composed of disconnected parts or sounds; cut short crisply

Synonyms:

disconnected; staccato

Context example:

staccato notes

Similar:

abrupt; disconnected (marked by sudden changes in subject and sharp transitions)

Domain category:

music (an artistic form of auditory communication incorporating instrumental or vocal tones in a structured and continuous manner)

Derivation:

disconnectedness (state of being disconnected)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Having been divided; having the unity destroyed

Synonyms:

disconnected; disunited; fragmented; split

Context example:

a split group

Similar:

divided (separated into parts or pieces)

Derivation:

disconnectedness (state of being disconnected)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Marked by sudden changes in subject and sharp transitions

Synonyms:

abrupt; disconnected

Context example:

abrupt prose

Similar:

disconnected; staccato ((music) marked by or composed of disconnected parts or sounds; cut short crisply)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Not plugged in or connected to a power source

Context example:

the iron is disconnected

Similar:

off (not in operation or operational)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Lacking orderly continuity

Synonyms:

confused; disconnected; disjointed; disordered; garbled; illogical; scattered; unconnected

Context example:

scattered thoughts

Similar:

incoherent (without logical or meaningful connection)

Derivation:

disconnectedness (state of being disconnected)

 Context examples 

The situation when there is a disconnected event or divergent incident.

(Discordant, NCI Thesaurus)

At last the lecture came to an end—I am inclined to think that it was a premature one, as the peroration was hurried and disconnected.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

You will find it rather disconnected, I fear, and there may prove to be little relation between the different incidents of which I speak.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

European guidelines on cardiovascular prevention state that people who are isolated or disconnected from others are at increased risk of developing and dying prematurely from coronary artery disease.

(Loneliness Is Bad for Heart, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

His changes of mood did not offend me, because I saw that I had nothing to do with their alternation; the ebb and flow depended on causes quite disconnected with me.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Everything which had been disconnected before began at once to assume its true place, and I had a shadowy presentiment of the whole sequence of events.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Listen, then, Jane Eyre, to your sentence: to-morrow, place the glass before you, and draw in chalk your own picture, faithfully, without softening one defect; omit no harsh line, smooth away no displeasing irregularity; write under it, 'Portrait of a Governess, disconnected, poor, and plain.'

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

But there was the reference to David, and there was the known affection of the Colonel for his wife, to weigh against it, to say nothing of the tragic intrusion of this other man, which might, of course, be entirely disconnected with what had gone before.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)