today we're doing phrasal verbs with off
first what is a phrasal verb a phrasal
verb is a verb and a preposition put
together to mean something crazy lots of
people ask me how can I learn phrasal
verbs there are thousands of them
English is ridiculous
yes I agree with you English is
ridiculous there are thousands of
phrasal verbs how can you learn them all
well the good news is that usually the
preposition can have a general meaning
so if you understand what the
preposition means in general you can
understand a lot of different phrasal
verbs just from understanding the
preposition or at least have a good
guess so we're going to do this in two
parts one will show the common meanings
of off and in the second part I'll show
you some more phrasal verbs with off
which don't have that common meaning but
are quite useful so the common meaning
of off in a phrasal verb means to
separate something let me give you an
example what is the verb if I do this we
can say tear or rip in a sentence I
ripped the paper I tore the paper in a
past tense but the paper is still
together it's still one piece right so
what then if I separated the paper by
tearing it well now we can use that
preposition off remember that that
preposition off means to separate
something right
so I separated the paper by ripping it
or by tearing it we can make a phrasal
verb with this so the prepositions off
it's separated
the method was ripping or tearing so we
can say as a sentence I ripped or tore
the paper off can I say the other way
yes I ripped off the paper I ripped the
paper off okay so you get the idea the
preposition shows what happened the verb
shows how it happened
this is dangerous don't do this okay
what's this verb
cut right it's still together so we
don't use the preposition off in this
sentence I cut the paper past cut cut
cut but ah what did I do
I cut the paper off other ways we can
use this you know the phrasal verb to
take off for example you get home and
you take off your shoes
separate the shoes from your feet maybe
you're very tired and you just want to
kick off your shoes the method kick and
your hat you could take off your hat or
you could throw off your hat because
you're dramatic and your life is a mess
ok so we get that that common meaning is
to separate from something right so how
about another example let's say you're
with your friend you're talking you're
having a good time right but then your
friend says this yeah you're a normal
person so this should be your reaction
you want to separate from your friend by
walking you probably guessed it remember
separate off what's the method of
separating from your friend walking so
the verb to walk off you could say walk
away that's fine too
but let's be good and make the sentence
this is past so I walked off it's a
regular verb I walked off if your friend
says I love Donald Trump and Justin
Bieber you don't need to walk off you
need to run off positive run is ramped I
ran off so just remember that this the
preposition can not always but can show
you what happened separation and the
verb shows you how it happened you can
walk off run off you could even drive
off
but of course you must remember that is
a general meaning of off that doesn't
mean that every phrasal verb with off
implies separation generally yes and
sometimes you can understand the meaning
if you understand that preposition but
some just have random meanings and you
just need to remember them from contexts
and examples so the random ones which
don't imply separation are these ones
pay off in some countries you can pay
off the police what does it mean let's
imagine you're driving too fast and the
police stop you you could give them
money and they'll say okay fine you can
go in this example he paid off the
policemen or he paid the policemen off
you can separate this phrasal verb he
paid the police off or he paid off the
police a super common one that you will
use every day this one everyone uses
every day because it means a machine or
an alarm or something
makes a sound so for example what just
happened my phone went past off my phone
went off so this is a machine an alarm
notification sound so a fire alarm could
go off your phone could go off
maybe it's the alarm in the morning
maybe someone's calling you both ways
it's a notification sound your phone
goes off the alarm goes off but it also
could be an explosion for example a bomb
goes off
important thing to remember with this
phrasal verb there's no object it's
reflexive so we don't need anything
there my phone went it off no my phone
went off it in here no none of that my
phone went off the alarm went off okay
next one to put something off let's
imagine it's your wedding day ah look
how happy she is I think we should put
off the wedding what does he mean put
off the wedding is he not happy to put
off something or to put something off
means to delay it postpone it do it
later he's saying let's not get married
today maybe tomorrow maybe next week
maybe maybe next year that bastard well
her response to this is this she's
saying let's just call off the wedding
so remember he asked let's put off the
wedding make it later she's now saying
let's call off the wedding I think you
guessed what call off means it means to
just cancel an event so you can call off
a wedding you can call off a meeting
same with put off for example I can't
meet you today let's put off the meeting
until tomorrow let's put off the meeting
until next week so to clarify put off to
delay something to call off to cancel an
event or a meeting another pretty common
phrasal verb is to to show off this is
to flaunt what you have to say look at
this thing I have it is so cool and I'm
so cool because I have it now of course
it has that negative feeling when
someone is showing off it's not a good
thing you would say to someone stop
showing off for example
if you're one of those people that says
look at my car it's worth 1 million
pounds then you're an idiot
and you should stop showing off showing
off is annoying whole sentence he is
showing off you'll notice it doesn't
have an object but it could we could say
he is showing his car off or he's
showing off his car you have a choice
you don't have to use the object only
with expensive things you buy no but you
want to say look at me I'm cool because
I have it if you're one of the people
who does this on Instagram takes a
selfie after a gym rat
look at my muscles look how sexy I am
this guy is showing off again we could
separate it showing his muscles off or
showing off his muscles or without an
object he's showing off thank you for
watching today's class if you want to
see more phrasal verbs and how to
understand phrasal verbs you can see our
zombie-themed lesson here also for
Walking Dead fans or for another phrasal
verb preposition explainer video
we've got phrasal verbs with overhear
and phrasal verbs with get here we're
adding more all the time subscribe if
you want to see more videos and I'll see
you in the next class peace out