room

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
room /ruːm, rʊm/

▶noun

• 1 space viewed in terms of its capacity to accommodate contents or allow action: she was trapped without room to move.

• 2 a part of a building enclosed by walls, floor, and ceiling.

  ■ (rooms) Brit. a set of rooms rented out to lodgers.

• 3 opportunity or scope: room for improvement.

▶verb chiefly N. Amer. share lodgings, especially at a college or similar institution.

– phrases
no (or not) room to swing a cat humorous used in reference to a very confined space. [cat in the sense ‘cat-o'-nine-tails’.]

– derivatives
-roomed adjective,
roomful noun (pl. roomfuls).

– origin OE rūm, of Gmc origin.