Those Darn Phrasal Verbs

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Just a second, let me extinguish my cigarette.

Now, doesn't that just sound weird? Besides the fact that smoking is bad for you, isn't it nicer to say

Just a second, let me put out my cigarette.

Phrasal verbs form a large group, consisting of verb + preposition. Put out, bring up, and work on are all part of this group. They are used to replace other, more formal words or phrases. As noted, put out is to extinguish, bring up is to raise (as in a child or a topic), and give back is to return (as in a library book or some money). 

So, how do we utilize these in the language? Well, let's divide the phrasal verbs into two sub-groups.


Separable Phrasal Verbs.

The first sub-group is the separable phrasal verb. This means the particle (the preposition) can be placed before or after the object.

Look up the word in the dictionary. / Look the word up in the dictionary.
Write down the word. / Write the word down.

See how it can move? However, if the object is a pronoun, then the particle must be placed after the pronoun.

Look it up in the dictionary.
Write it down.


Inseparable Phrasal Verbs.

The second sub-group is the inseparable phrasal verb. These verbs cannot be separated like the separable.

Watch out for the baseball!
I won't put up with his tardiness.

It functions the same way with pronouns,

Watch out for that!
I won't put up with this.

A good basic list of these verbs can be found here.

Learning Phrasal Verbs

When learning phrasal verbs, you need to memorize them as a single unit. That's because the verb by itself has a distinctly different meaning than the phrasal verb. For example the verb look is different than the phrasal verbs look out, look into, or look on.

Oh, by the way, these phrasal verbs can have more than one meaning, so you need to watch for context. For example, put out, as in

Just a second, let me put out my cigarette.

How about this?

Just a second, let me put out the dog.

Let me extinguish my dog? It has a literal meaning as well - the dog must go outside! And I would more likely change the word order to:

Just a second, let me put the dog out.

Therefore, we can say that phrasal verbs act a bit like idioms, becoming clear in context.

See my blog post on "Feel" grammar.


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