Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verbs are verbs with prepositions or adverbs attached to them. They are easy to understand if they are used literally, but many have completely different meanings from the normal sense of the verb being used and can, therefore, be very confusing for students of English as a foreign language.

For example, everyone will understand the phrasal verb in the following sentence because the meaning is literal and obvious:

"He was looking down at the floor while the teacher was shouting at him."

But what about the same phrasal verb used in a more idiomatic way?

"She looks down on all her colleagues at work."

This means she thinks she is better than and has no respect for her colleagues. When phrasal verbs are not used literally, they are idioms just like all other English idioms. There are many books on phrasal verbs, but because most of them only deal with phrasal verbs, they can be very boring and intimidating for students. Phrasal verbs should be learnt together with other useful vocabulary and not in isolation.