From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishmonopolizemo‧nop‧o‧lize (also monopolise British English) /məˈnɒpəlaɪz $ -ˈnɑː-/ verb [transitive] 1 CONTROLto have complete control over something so that other people cannot share it or take part in it The company has monopolized the soft drinks market. He monopolized the conversation all evening.2 ASK FOR something/ASK somebody TO DO somethingto use a lot of someone’s time or attention Virtually all her time and energy is now monopolized by the children. —monopolist noun [countable]→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
monopolize• The wife and the mistress would both have done better had each monopolized a male rather than shared him.• All this had been achieved at the expense of the Liberal Party which had monopolized all three areas before 1910.• Susan's children monopolize her time and energy.• The rulers promptly monopolized it for their own regalia and as a medium for bestowing honour and obligations on their retainers.• He was doing nothing more dreadful than lingering, making light-hearted conversation and monopolizing Linda's attention.• Chun, who by that stage of his presidency often monopolized meetings with visitors, this time listened intently.• As production has increasingly monopolized our economic attitudes, the business executive has grown in esteem.• The 49ers monopolized the ball in the third period.• Forsyth set out to monopolize the best view of the Falls for his personal gain.• The company has monopolized the building market in this area.• All night he monopolized the conversation, not letting anyone else get a word in.• In Russia, Intourist no longer monopolizes the foreign tourism business.From Longman Business Dictionarymonopolizemo‧nop‧o‧lize /məˈnɒpəlaɪzməˈnɑː-/ (also monopolise British English) verb [transitive]ECONOMICS if a single company or a government monopolizes an industry, it gets control of all or most of it so that there is little or no competition from other companies or countriesThe company sold below cost in order to drive out competition and monopolize the Los Angeles-area market.→ See Verb table 