PROFESORES DE SECUNDARIA-INGLÉS

TOPIC 22: MULTI-WORD VERBS.

CENTRO DE OPOSICIONES
UNIT 22
MULTI-WORD VERBS

0. Introduction
1. Form and meaning
2. Definition of phrasal verbs and
prepositional verbs
3. Characteristics of phrasal verbs and www.e-ducalia.com
prepositional verbs
4. Meaning of phrasal verbs
5. Meaning of some particles
6. Phrasal-prepositional verbs
7. Style
8. Other aspects related to multi-word verbs
8. Conclusion
9. Bibliography

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0. INTRODUCTION

This topic number 22 deals with multi-word verbs being this important part of the teaching-
learning process of English.

Always taking into account this academic knowledge is linked to the didactic aspects found in
the curriculum of both the previous educative system LOGSE (Organic Law for the Quality of
Education) established on March 8th 2002 and the current one LOE (Organic Law of Education),
2/2006, May 3rd BOE n.106 May 4th, 2006 which regulates our present educative organisation: ESO,
Bachillerato and Vocational Training.

The grammar part of a language contains its structure that is the heart of the language so, its
knowledge is essential to learn a language. And it is through the acquisition of grammar that our
students will be able to achieve a right level of accuracy on the English language.

As we know, the teaching of grammar has undergone a change, and what along ago was
considered to be the most important task of our teaching process, nowadays is just consider one
part of our teaching-learning task. Before, grammar was thought to be a set of rules and norms
which students had to memorise and at the moment there exists funny and motivating ways to
introduce those hard grammatical aspects. Thus, we have the task of providing this essential
information in contextualised situations to allow our students get some of the basic and
indispensable competences such as: linguistic competence, competence to learn how to learn and
autonomous competence.

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TOPIC 22: MULTI-WORD VERBS.
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All grammatical topics are interrelated and they will always be treated as a whole. For example,
to understand multi-word verbs a knowledge of prepositions (unit 15, 17), adverbs (14) and structure
of sentences (23), among others, are necessary.

Finally, I am going to divide this topic in four general parts: starting with a description of multi-
words verbs regarding both their form and their meaning; Besides, I will also include the differences
between prepositional verbs and phrasal verbs; Then, I will analyse phrasal verbs in depth; to finish
with other aspects related to verbs, prepositions and adverbs.

1. FORM AND MEANING

To start with I would like to define multi-words

verbs both regarding their form and meaning.

Regarding their FORM, verbs combine with one

or two particles: a preposition and /or an adverb
as we can appreciate in:

PREPOSITION: BBC stands for British

Broadcasting Corporation.
ADVERB: The milk tastes awful. He thought it
had gone off.
ADVERB + PREPOSITION: He couldn’t
attend the meeting so his secretary stood
in for him.

Regarding their MEANING, multi-word verbs can posses:

NON-LITERARY MEANING: if the addition of particles changes the meaning of the verb in
some way, it is a phrasal verb, because it has an idiomatic meaning. The meaning of phrasal
verbs cannot be predicted from its individual parts.

He usually runs up large telephone bills

LITERARY MEANING when the individual meaning of the verb and the adverb or preposition
is retained:

He sat down on the director’s chair

SEMI-LITERARY MEANING: when the basic meaning of the verb remained the same but the
particle adds extra meaning.

After stopping for fuel in New York, he flew to Los Angeles (here the particle gives idea
of continuing to fly)
FORM
PREPOSITION: he read BBC standing for British Broadcasting Corporation
ADVERB: The milk tastes awful. He thought it had gone off.
ADVERB + PREPOSITION: He couldn’t attend the meeting so his secretary stood in for him.
MEANING
NON-LITERARY MEANING: He usually runs up large telephone bills
LITERARY MEANING: He sat down on the director’s chair
SEMI-LITERARY MEANING: After stopping for fuel in New York, he flew to Los Angeles

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2. DEFINITION OF PHRASAL AND PREPOSITIONAL VERB

Following the idea that grammar must be taught in context I will use a situation in which
Woody Allen, the famous director, visits the doctor as he does not feel very well. From a theoretical
point of view I will follow particularly Quirk, Eastwood and Thomson and Martinet’s grammatical
works.

A verb can combine with one of two particles (adjectives or adverbs) to form “multi-word
verbs”. When a verb is followed by a preposition, this combination is called “prepositional verb”.
We can say that:
PREPOSITONAL VERBS verb + preposition
Woody Allen suffers from pains in his chest because he Woody Allen suffers from pains in his chest
smokes too much. That is why he is waiting for the doctor.
because he smokes too much. That is why he is
PHRASAL VERBS verb + adverb waiting for the doctor.
Woody passed out yesterday while working in his film
studio but soon he came round. In this example, the preposition from and
for follow the verbs suffer and wait forming
prepositional verbs.

On the other hand, the combination between a verb and an adverb is called phrasal verb
and it is defined by Quirk in Comprehensive Grammar of English Language as a mixture of a “lexical
verb and a particle that form a whole unit”, they are sums of meaning.

3. CHARACTERISTICS OF PHRASAL VERBS AND PREPOSITIONAL VERBS

CHARACTERISTICS OF PHRASAL VERBS
Phrasal verbs accept the following conditions:

Phrasal verbs can be intransitive -verbs without object - like in:

Woody passed out yesterday while working in his film studio but soon he came round.

And they can also be transitive –with an object- which occupies an order according to its
nature

Object inversion is possible: If it is a noun, it can be both before and after the adverb.
For instance, we can say:

The doctor will write out a prescription for Woody or the doctor will write a prescription
out for him.

When the noun is long it is preferred after the adverb:

He will write out a prescription that includes extra iron and vitamins

On the contrary, if the object is a pronoun it is always placed before the adverb.

The doctor will write it out.

An adverb cannot be inserted.

…write quietly out a prescription

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CHARACTERISTICS OF PREPOSITIONAL VERBS

Can only be transitive

Woody Allen suffers from pains in his chest because he smokes too much. That is why
he is waiting for the doctor.

Object inversion is not possible:

…waiting the doctor for.

An adverb can be inserted.

…waiting impatiently for the doctor

A particle can precede a relative pronoun

The doctor for whom he waited

PHRASAL VERBS PREPOSITIONAL VERBS

Intransitive
Always transitive

transitive
Object inversion is not possible:

Object inversion is possible:
Adverb can be inserted.

a noun: before and after the adverb
Long nouns: after
A particle can precede a relative pronoun

Pronouns: before

An adverb cannot be inserted.
The verb is stressed

The adverb is stressed

According to Eastwood in Oxford Practise grammar, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish

between phrasal verbs and prepositional verbs as although there are some words that are always
adverbs like: away, back and out and other words that are always prepositions: for and from.
Moreover, there are others that can be both adverbs and prepositions: down, in, on or up.
Stress may be useful to make this distinction as in phrasal verbs it is the adverb the element
that receives the stress whereas in prepositional verbs the stressed element is the verbs not he
preposition. We can compare the emphasis in:

Suffers from pains…. and he passed out

4. MEANING OF PHRASAL VERBS

After describing both phrasal and prepositional verbs, I will analyse the meaning of phrasal
verbs according to Eastwood, fact that has become one major problem for Spanish students of
English language due to its frequency of use and its difficulties as in Spanish there are not verbs
made up of two words. For this reason, we must pay attention to them and present them frequently
in class in contextualised situations for our students to become familiar with them and selecting them
according to our student’s level of competence.

Although some phrasal verbs are easy to understand if we know the meaning of its elements like in

The doctor put down his medical instrument

Most of them possess an idiomatic meaning. The utterance

Woody must give up smoking

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It will not be understood even if we know the meaning of give and up separately. We need to know
that this combination implies stop.

Sometimes there is one-word verb with the same meaning as the phrasal verb that is normally used
in more informal situations. Then we can read in newspapers that

Woody has to put off or postpone his travel to Spain due to health problems

Many phrasal verbs have more than one meaning. In the sentence

o Woody has picked up a virus

It means to catch an illness. But, in other contexts its meaning varies a lot. For instance:

o Woody picked up some Spanish during his stay in Barcelona.

That is, he leant some basic words up to get by.

PICK UP:
o Woody likes to be picked by his friend o catch an illness.
o learn some basic words up to get by
o be collected by a car
To be collected by a car, or o recover
o was arrested
o Woody picked up the script from the floors o make acquaintance with a view to
having sexual relationships
o improving
Meaning, he recovered it

o In 1998 Woody was picked up for drink-driving

Meaning he was arrested

o He usually writes stories of men who pick some girls up

Who make acquaintance with a view to having sexual relationships, or

o Woody’s reputation is picking up

That is, improving.

Some phrasal verbs can be used both with “someone” or “something” without altering the
meaning like in:

Penélope Cruz turned down Woody’s offer or

She turned down Javier Bardem when he asked her to marry him

In both situations it means refuse or reject. However, other verbs can change their meaning. This is
the case of offering accommodation and put something up meaning to increase the price or cost.

Woody enjoys putting his friends up when they come on holidays, and
Woody’s videos have been put up since two years ago.

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We must also consider that some phrasal verbs can combine with some nouns, this is called
collocation. For example we can say that milk, eggs, fish and meat goes off while it is not possible to
say that bead and vegetables go off as they do not collocate.
Good dictionaries help with collocation since they give examples of words that are often
used with certain verbs. For example: run up (increase the amount of money you give), collocates
with: a bill, a debt, an account, a deficit, an overdraft.

5. MEANING OF PARTICLES
All those features regarding meaning of phrasal verbs are some of the reasons for the
necessity to present in class phrasal verbs in context and not in isolation in an attempt to help our
students to become familiar with them.
Another important aid will be the learning of the general meaning that some adverbs have.
Particles often have particular meanings which they contribute to a variety of combinations, and
which are productive. That is, these fixed meanings are used in order to create new combinations.
For instance:
 OUT, suggests something stopping completely: this species of bird died out last century
(became extinct, stop existing), the room was so hot that the actress passed out (stop being
conscious)
 BACK, that means in return in verbs like get, invite, phone, go, pay, come…back
 ON, continuity, movement forward: go on, carry, drive on

But it is very common that the same particle can have different general meaning when used
with different groups of verbs. Some examples are:

 DOWN, can mean to the ground as in pull down or knock down or in paper as in write, put,
copy or note down or stop completely as in close or break down.
 OFF, may have the idea of departure or movement away from somewhere: the plane took
off, the thieves made off on car; or the idea of disconnection or stopping something: switch
off the lights. I must ring off. I smell something burning.
 OVER, referring to a destination: bring, come over; or something falling or being pushed to
the ground: the wind blew over the garden wall, the cat was run over by a lorry.
 UP, meaning completely, thoroughly: eat up, fill up; or into small pieces: tear up, cut, break
up.

MEANING OF PARTICLES
 OUT something stopping completely
 BACK in return
 ON continuity, movement forward
 DOW, to the ground
in paper
stop completely
 OFF idea of departure or movement away from somewhere
the idea of disconnection or stopping something
 OVER referring to a destination:
something falling or being pushed to the ground:
 UP completely, thoroughly
into small pieces.

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6. PHRASAL-PREPOSITIONAL VERBS
I would like to mention some other aspects related to the combination of prepositions with
other elements.
I must point out the existence of what has been called by Quirk and Eastwood phrasal-
prepositional verbs. As its name implies it is a combination of a verb and a preposition together with a
verb.
This type of verb can have simple meaning as in

At the doctor’s Woody had to look up a red light to check his vision.

Its meaning can be deduced from the meaning of its elements alone. But, on the contrary, we may
find combinations with an idiomatic meaning like:

Woody must cut down on the amount of cigarettes he smokes, or

He has gone down with a severe virus and he is looking forwards to recovering in order to go
on filming.

7. OTHER ASPECTS
On the one hand, we find some verbs followed by an object that require to be followed by a
specific preposition, as in

The doctors want to prevent Woody Allen from smoking

On the other, there are some idiomatic expressions combining a verb plus a noun and a defined
preposition like in

Woody should take care of his health or

He pays attention to what the doctors says.

In addition, according to Eastwood, some nouns and adjectives are formed from phrasal verbs.
Joining the verb break and the adverb down it results in

Wood may have suffered a breakdown

Or in doing the reverse with the adverb out and the verb break we get

Doctors are worried about the severe outbreak of Asian flu in the city

Or an adjective can also be formed with a passive participle plus and adverb

Finally, after leaving the doctor’s surgery woody put the folded-up prescription in his pocket

8. STYLE
As far as style is concerned, multi-word verbs are frequently used in everyday spoken and
written English. It is often said that phrasal verbs tend to be rather colloquial or informal and more
appropriate to spoken English than written and even that is better to avoid them and chose single-
word equivalents or synonyms instead. But we have to say that in many cases phrasal verbs and

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their synonyms have different ranges of use, meaning or location, although single-word synonyms
are often much more formal in style than phrasal verbs

Can we put off the meeting till next Friday?

Multi-word verbs can be replaced by a Latin-based word. That is, instead of using put off, the word
postpone gives a more formal context; or tolerate instead of put up.
There are also formal expressions with the same meaning of some multi-word verbs: provide
accommodation instead of put somebody up for the night.
But there are some expressions and verbs which have the same level of formality, for example:

Woody Allen picked up a cold or He caught a cold

9. CONCLUSION
As a conclusion, the study of phrasal verbs becomes primary a problem of vocabulary for our
Spanish students. Then list of these verbs is quiet long and it is constantly being growing and
changing, new combinations appear and spread. Some will disappear after a while from active
usage, while others will be retained and become permanent vocabulary items.

Multi-word verbs are a sign of the productivity of the English language and its richness.

After dealing with some of the general features of multi-word verbs we can conclude it is a
basic communicative element in the English
language. It is evident that this topic could
be treated throughout the teaching-
learning process in the English language
classroom not only by means of individual
activities but also by pair-work and group
BIBLIOGRAPHY
work always using all four communicative
skills: reading, writing, listening and Alcaraz and Moody. Morfosintaxis Inglesa
speaking. Para Hispanohablantes. Marfil. Alcoy.1990

We must not avoid highlighting the Quirk, Randolf. A Contemporary English

most important feature of English as an Grammar. Longman. 1998
international language. Thus, we must
transmit the idea that English is an Thomson and Martinet. A Practical English
instrument of communication necessary for Grammar. Oxford. 1969
the labour work, business, researches,
negotiation, politics, tourism… Onions, C.T. A Modern English Syntax.
Longman. 1974
Our students will need English at a
Eastwood, John. Oxford Practise Grammar.
certain moment of their lives: to read
information on the instruction of a machine, Oxford. 1999
to understand any website when surfing the
Hewings, Martin. Advanced Grammar In
Internet, to communicate with other people
Use. Cambrige University Press.1996
either native English speakers or people
from other countries who do not speak
www.phrasalverbdemon.com
Spanish, to travel around the world or to
understand their favourite English lyrics.

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