Originally roped in to avoid knowledge getting wasted (8)
I believe the answer is:
shrunken
'wasted' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'originally roped in to avoid knowledge getting' is the wordplay.
'originally' indicates taking the first letters.
'in' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'to avoid' becomes 'shun' (shunning is a kind of avoiding).
'knowledge getting' becomes 'ken' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should believe this answer much more).
The initial letter of 'roped' is 'r'.
'r' going inside 'shun' is 'shrun'.
'shrun'+'ken'='SHRUNKEN'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for shrunken that I've seen before include "Having become smaller" , "Wizened" , "Shun kern to be made small" , "Contracted, shrivelled" , "Shrivelled, withered" .)