Other forms: adopted, adopting, adopts
To adopt a child is to take someone else's child into your family and become their legal parent for good. Papers, a court date, a new surname, a bedroom that gets painted.
This is not fostering, which is temporary; adoption is permanent. The child is adopted, the parents are adoptive, and the whole process is an adoption. Shelters use the word for animals — adopt a dog rather than buy one. Away from families, adopt means to take something on and start using it as your own: adopt a new method, adopt a tone, adopt an accent, adopt a stricter policy. Councils and parliaments adopt reports and resolutions, which means approving them by a vote. You can also adopt a pose or a position — he adopted an air of complete innocence — where the whole point is that it was chosen rather than natural.
1verbadoptTo take another person's child into your family and become their legal parent.
“They adopted a boy of three and raised him as their own.”
2verbembraceTo take on a method, idea, style or attitude and start using it.
“The school adopted a new reading scheme in September.”
3verbapproveTo approve something formally, usually by a vote.
“The council adopted the plan with only one objection.”
4verbanimalTo take an animal from a shelter and give it a home.
“We adopted a cat from the rescue centre last spring.”
Also accepted in games: adoption
Adopt came through Middle French adopter from Latin adoptō, which is ad- plus optō — the optō that gives English opt. To adopt is to opt towards: to choose someone or something and bring it in to you. The choosing is the entire idea, which is why an adopted child, an adopted method and an adopted country all sound right.
Latin
adoptō
Middle French
adopter
English, today
adopt
From Middle French adopter, from Latin adoptō; ad + optō, equivalent to ad- + opt.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA