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Outline:
I. Definitions
II. Old English
III. Middle English
IV. Early Modern English
V. Present-Day English
Focus on Phrasal-prepositional Verbs
VI. Syntactic Tests of Phrasal Verbs
VII. Summary
VIII. For Further Reading
XI. Glossary
I. Definition of the Phrasal Verb and Similar Concepts
A phrasal verb in Present-Day English is a verb that takes a complementary particle, in other
words, an adverb resembling a preposition, necessary to complete a sentence. A common example
is the verb to fix up: He fixed up the car. The word up here is a particle, not a preposition,
because up can move: He fixed the car up. This movement of the particle up quickly
distinguishes it from the preposition up. Because the forms of the particle and the preposition are
themselves identical, it is easy to confuse phrasal verbs with a very similar-looking type of verb:
the prepositional verb. A prepositional verb takes a complementary prepositional phrase.
Movement verbs are readily identifiable examples. For example, the verb to go isintransitive, and
without the benefit of context, it cannot operate in a complete sentence only accompanied by a
subject. One cannot say, I went, and expect to satisfy a listener without including a prepositional
phrase of place, such as I went to the store. Prepositional verbs are immediately distinguishable
from phrasal verbs in terms of movement, as prepositions cannot move after their objects. It is not
possible to say, I went the store to, and so went is a prepositional verb. There are, in fact,
severalsyntactic tests to distinguish phrasal from prepositional verbs, and these will be discussed in
detail in the final section. It is also necessary to understand that the term verb phrase refers not
to phrasal verbs, but more generally to a sentence verb, its complements, and matters of
tense, aspect, mood, voice and so on.
II. The Ancestors of Phrasal Verbs in Old English
Old English generally did not possess phrasal verbs as they are found in Present-Day English. They
did exist, although they were rare. Much more common in Old English was the inseparable-prefix
verb, a form in which the particle was attached to the beginning of the verb. These Old English
prefixed verbs are directly comparable to current phrasal forms. For example, in Present-Day
English, there is the monotransitive verb to burn and then the phrasal monotransitive to burn
up. Old English hadbrnan (to burn) and forbrnan (to burn up). The prefix for-
remained affixed to the verb and could not move as modern particles can. Such Old English
compound verbs were also highly idiomatic, in that the meaning of the compound form did not
necessarily reflect the meaning of the root. Denison provides berdan as an example because it
meant to dispossess, while its root verb, rdan, meant to advise. The phenomenon still
survives today in the participle forlorn, as well as the verb understandan, which does not in
Present-Day English mean to stand underneath (something), but idiomatically to comprehend.
Akimoto suggests that Old English prefixes often remained before the verb because Old English
had strong object-before-verb (OV) tendencies, whereas Present-Day English is largely a VO
language, which has made it possible for particles to travel to post-verbal positions. Some Old
English verbs did function as modern phrasal verbs do. Denison (English 36) points out that
Koopman finds and analyses examples of Old English phrasal verbs with post-verbal particles. In
the Chronicles of England, the speaker says, ac he teah for a his ealdan wrenceas (but he drew
forth his old tricks). Hence, there was in Old English the rare incidence of phrasal verbs with postverbal particles. However, Denison notes about such examples that the meaning of post-verbal
particles in this period was still often very directional, in close relationship with a prepositional
meaning. Therefore, applications of the particle up in Old English conveyed a sense of direction
upward, as in to grow up(ward), rather than the completive sense, as in to break up
(completely), that would become more common in Middle English and beyond (Denison,
Origins, 39, 41, 43). He argues that not until the Peterborough Chronicle did the completive
sense appear (46).
III. The Introduction of Phrasal Verbs in Middle English as a Productive Form
The formation of prefixed verbs in Old English was no longer productive in Middle English, and
the loss of productivity was already evident in Old English, in which certain authors added a postverbal particle to prefixed verbs, possibly because the prefix was losing meaning (Denison,
Origins, 47). Stress patterns also likely account for a shift, as prefixes in Old English compound
verbs were unstressed, while post-verbal particles carried stress, making them stronger and thus
preserving their lexical value. Middle English was also subject to the powerful forces of French
and Anglo-Norman, as well to some influence from Old Norse. Several authors on the subject
claim that Old Norse, which already had a fairly robust incidence of phrasal verbs, must have
incited the production of English phrasal verbs with post-verbal particles, although the degree to
which Old Norse is responsible for this is unclear (Smith 140, Fischer 386). The rapid borrowing of
French verbs into Middle English likely slowed the development of phrasal verbs (Baugh and
Cable 340, Fischer 386) because of competition in semantic fields, as French brought in Romance
verbs that could fill the semantic fields of the Old English prefixed verbs. For example, the French
borrowing destroy could accommodate the meaning of Old English forbrecan (break up)
(Smith 140). French forms also likely hindered phrasal verbs because of lexical register. French
was the language of status in England after the Norman Conquest, and phrasal verbs, while
common by the fourteenth century (Millward 179), were considered informal (Tanabe 123, Fischer
398). Nonetheless, phrasal verbs regained strong productivity by the fifteenth century (Fischer
386). Tanabe notes the occurrence of 162 phrasal verbs in The Paston Letters, despite the formal
quality of those letters, and the incidence of to give up in the Peterborough Chronicle. Middle
English underwent a shift in syntax from many instances of SOV to SVO as it lost many synthetic
inflections(and consequently possible word orders) from Old English, becoming a much
more analytic, or word-order based, language. The new VO word order, as Akimoto claims, likely
enabled the prefixes of Old English to become post-positioned adverbial particles. In other words,
Old English forbrecan became to break up. By late Middle English, phrasal verbs could be
divided into 3 categories: a) Old English-style inseparable particle + verb (understand, overtake);
b) phrasal verbs including verb + separable particle (take up, write up); and c) nominal compounds
derived from the first two (outcry, write-off) (Fischer 386).
IV. The Rise of the Phrasal Verb in Early Modern English
The incidence of phrasal verbs exploded in Early Modern English. Shakespeare himself applied the
form widely throughout the plays. Hiltunen cites a study by Castillo, in which 5744 phrasal verbs
have been identified within the body of the plays. Nevalainen (423) also notes Spasovs study,
which analysed 46 plays from the Renaissance to Present-Day English, finding that phrasal verbs
remained below ten per cent of the total of all verbs from his four Early Modern English
subperiods, but does exceed the five per cent level from about 1600 onwards. Hiltunen explains
that phrasal verbs were used extensively in Early Modern English dramatic texts because of their
variable shades of meaning and productive capacity to be expanded to form new idioms (161).
Akimoto notes also that phrasal verbs occur more frequently in letters and dramas than in essays
or academic writing in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (221). This confirms that phrasal
verbs occupied a lower social position in Early Modern English than, perhaps, single Latinate verbs
that could fill their semantic fields, which gives rise, incidentally, to a syntactic test for phrasal
verbs. However, phrasal verbs continued to become entrenched. Stage-three compound
nouns arose, such as breakdown and comeback. The stress on the particle in the verbal form
(we say, I have to break DOWN these boxes) moved from the particle to the verbal component
when the compound acted as a noun (as in, he had a BREAKdown). Phrasal verbs in Early
Modern English also could be formed with a noun + particle, such as to louse up (Millward 319).
It was also in this period that pronominal objects were firmly established before particles (She put
it on not *She put on it) as a standard practice, while nominal objects retained movement before
and after the particle (She put the dress on / She put on the dress).
V. Phrasal Verbs in Present-Day English, and Regional Variation
Phrasal verbs are still currently productive, and there has been the rise of a more complex form, the
three-part phrasal-prepositional verb, which includes a verb, a post-positioned particle, and a
complementary prepositional phrase. Examples of the first type include put up with and do
away with, which qualify as phrasal verbs because they can be translated by the single Latinate
verbs tolerate and abolish, although their particles are not movable: I put up with traffic every
day, not *I put with traffic up every day.
Focus: The phrasal-prepositional verb and its terms explained
A second variation of phrasal-prepositional verbs (type II) in Present-Day English takes a movable
particle around a noun-phrase direct object as well as a complementary prepositional phrase, as in
she fixed her friend up with her cousin / she fixed up her friend with her cousin. The notable
distinctions from type I are (1) that the particle can move, because (2) there is an explicit direct
object. The proliferation of the various types of phrasal verbs is alleged to be more productive in
North America than in Britain. Traugott asserts that the use of phrasal verbs is a distinguishing
feature between British and American English (173). Her claim that phrasal senses of verbs are
often not cited in the OED still proves true in some cases, such as to build up meaning to
advertise or promote. The 32 intervening years between Traugotts 1972 study and the current
state of the OED have seen updates to the dictionary in this respect. The introduction to British
English of what Traugott calls Americanisms is restoring the powerful productivity of phrasal
verbs across regions. In support of this, Baugh and Cable cite an interesting fact from Kennedys
1920 study, that twenty common English verbs had at that time entered into 155 combinations with
particles, yielding 600 distinct meanings (340).
sentence, I gave up the keys can be rendered in the passive: The keys were given up by me.
However, a prepositional verb at least prescriptively resists rendering in the passive: I walked up
the stairs would not traditionally be rendered thus in the passive: The stairs were walked up by
me, even though to walk up could be translated with the transitive verb to ascend, which
could easily be rendered in the passive. However, as Denison discusses at length, and as Quirk et
al. point out (1156-7), prepositional verbs have been rendered increasingly in the passive.
Therefore, passivization is also by no means a stand-alone syntactic test of phrasal verbs.
VII. Summary
The Old English ancestors of modern phrasal verbs were generally inseparable-prefix verbs,
although some separable forms did exist. The influences of the Norman Conquest and Old Norse
on ME eroded Old English OV syntax, and this catalyzed the production of separable adverbial
particles and the phrasal verb in Middle English. In Early Modern English, phrasal verbs grew
rapidly in dramatic and less formal texts, while new nominal-derivative compounds and rules about
pronominal-object placement arose. In Present-Day English, phrasal verbs are identifiable by
particle movement (when transitive), stressed particles, incapacity for adverb intervention in the
verb phrase, translation, and passivization. Prepositions can be distinguished because they cannot
move, they are unstressed, and adverbs can intervene between the verb and the prepositional
phrase.
Akimoto, Minoji. Collocations and Idioms in Late Modern English. Collocational and Idiomatic
Aspects of Composite Predicates in the History of English. Eds. Laurel J. Brinton and Minoji
Akimoto. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1999.
Discussion of the relationship between OV/VO syntax and prefixed vs. postpositioned particles in phrasal verbs.
Denison, David. English Historical Syntax: Verbal Constructions. London and
New York: Longman, 1993.
Discussion of Willem Koopmans important analysis of separable-particle
phrasal verbs in Old English, as well as illustrative of the growth of the
prepositional passive in Middle English.
Denison, David. The Origins of Completive up in English. Neuphilologische
Mitteilungen, 86: 37-61.
Although this article focuses upon the specific particle up, Denison covers
many of the important issues of phrasal verbs in general, such as idiomaticity,
the rise of the post-verbal particle and fall of the prefix, and the evolution of
the particle from a spatial or directional sense to a completive sense.
Fischer, Olga. Syntax. The Cambridge History of the English Language. Vol 2.
Ed. Norman Blake, Gen Ed. Richard Hogg. Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 1992.
Comparison of concurrent OE prefixed and ME separable-particle verbs,
discussion of Norse and French sources phrasal-verb productivity.
Hiltunen, Risto. Verbal Phrases and Phrasal Verbs in Early Modern
English. Collocational and Idiomatic Aspects of Composite Predicates in the
History of
English. Eds. Laurel J. Brinton and Minoji Akimoto. Amsterdam and
Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1999.
Uses of phrasal verbs in dramatic texts including Shakespeare.
Nevalainen, Terttu. Early Modern English Lexis and Semantics. The
Cambridge History of the English Language. Vol 3. Ed. Roger Lass, Gen Ed.
Richard Hogg. Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 1992.
Details of incidence of phrasal verbs in texts.
Rissanen, Matti. Syntax. The Cambridge History of the English Language. Vol
3. Ed. Roger Lass, Gen Ed. Richard Hogg. Cambridge: Cambridge U P, 1992.
Discussion of preposition stranding and the prepositional passive,
placement of pronominal objects with phrasal verbs.
Introductory Discussions
Baugh, Albert C. and Thomas Cable. A History of the English Language. 4th ed. Englewood Cliffs,
NJ: Prentice Hall, 1993.
Millward, C. M. A Biography of the English Language. 2nd ed. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace, 1996.
Smith, Jeremy. A Historical Study of English. London and New York: Routledge, 1996.
Traugott, Elizabeth C. The History of English Syntax. New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston,
1972.
intransitive the root transit means goes across in Latin. A transitive verb sends across its
action to a direct object: I broke the glass. The action of breaking goes across to the glass, which
receives that action. An intransitive verb does not require a direct object. There are two main kinds:
movement verbs with a complementary adverbial (I went to the store), and other action verbs that
do not require an adverbial (I cried. I slept).
syntactic tests ways of testing different grammatical structures to determine whether they are
what we think they are. For an example of a syntactic test, we can test whether a verb is transitive
by asking whether we feel it must be followed by a noun: I broke. If we ask, broke what?, then
the verb is likely transitive.
aspect an element of analysing verbs. Aspect shows how much an action is completed. I am
swimming progressive aspect (incomplete, still happening). I was swimming imperfect
aspect (incomplete in past, also called past progressive, still happening in past at time of context).
I have swum (perfect aspect perfect means done through all the way in Latin, means totally
finished). I had swum (pluperfect or more than perfect aspect, completed before another action
in the past).
mood another element of analysing verbs. Mood shows factuality. Indicative I am a man
indicates something believed by the speaker to be true. Subjunctive If I were a man, describes
a hypothetical situation, often found in conditional (if) sentences. Imperative Be a man! is a
command (imperare in Latin means to order).
post-verbal after the verb, whereas the Old English compound verbs had particles prefixed.
productive able to take on new words in the pattern or existing words in new uses as the
language evolves. Imagine if we acquired the verb *to blork. Because prefixed verbs are no
longer productive, its extremely unlikely English speakers would then develop the form to
forblork, but very likely we would come up with to blork (something) up.
semantic fields a semantic field is an area of meaning for a word. Many words have more than
one. For example, to fix means to repair in one semantic field, but also to castrate, such as
with pets, in another semantic field. As English acquires new words, existing words may lose a
semantic field if the new word has the same meaning, or competes in the same semantic field.
lexical register Lexics or lexical things are words with meaning. However, economic class or
education can lead native speakers in the same neighbourhood to use different words. A lexical
register refers to the specific sets of words within a language that members of such sub-groups use.
A lexical register commonly mentioned in speech is upper-class English.
syntax Syntax is the matter of word arrangement. Very often, the syntax (word order) can differ
from the actual meaning of a structure or sentence. This is easily visible in the passive voice. We
can say, He broke the window and that he is the subject (doer) of the sentence. However, if we
change the syntax to passive, we can say, The window was broken by him and that the window
is the subject of the sentence. Syntactically (in terms of its position in the sentence), it is the
subject. But semantically (in actual meaning), he is the subject.
synthetic inflections These are all but lost in English. They are endings on nouns, pronouns,
adjectives, and verbs that demonstrate grammatical information now largely communicated
through syntax (word order). Old English had them, as did Latin, as does German. Latin words still
used in their original forms in English demonstrate the role of inflections. Consider graduates from
a university. A single, male one is an alumnus (-us = single, male, subject of sentence). A single,
female one is an alumna (-a = single, female, subject). Two or more males are alumni. Two or more
females are alumnae. One surviving example of an inflection in Present-Day English is the variant
spelling of people with blond hair. Used as a noun, a man with blond hair is a blond; a female a
blonde. The final (-e) reflects the French inflection for feminine. This is not consistent among
English speakers, but we do have inflections such as s to mark the plural, -s for the possessive,
as well as -s in the third-person singular. English pronouns also retain evidence of inflection. We
say I for the subject of a sentence and me for an object. These -s endings on nouns and
variant spellings of present-day pronouns constitute the last vestiges of synthetic inflections in
Present-Day English.
analytic This is the effective opposite of synthetic inflections. An analytic language (such as
Present-Day English) relies on the order of words to preserve the intended meaning of a sentence.
In Latin, the sentence, Amicus meus illam feminam amat means My friend loves that woman,
almost no matter how the words are arranged, because the endings, or synthetic inflections,
communicate enough grammatical information that we know which is the subject and which is the
object. In English, toying with the word order in sentences such as this is dangerous, and likely to
end up in a loss of meaning. We know that a subject generally comes first, then the verb, and then
the direct object after the verb. This is a characteristic of an analytic language.
nominal means noun
compound nouns English, as a Germanic language, has a tremendous tendency and potential to
form two nouns together to describe a more specific concept, by placing one noun in front, much
like an adjective. Consider the word snack time. Snack is a noun; so is time. But if snack
makes time more specific, is snack an adjective? No. This is a compound noun, just like
mailbox, schoolyard, and policeman. Compound nouns undergo three predictable stages,
although the second is sometimes skipped. Stage one: mail box. Stage two: mail-box (hyphenation
common with merged last names). Stage three: mailbox (complete compounding).
pronominal means pronoun
direct object the noun or noun phrase that directly receives the action of a transitive verb. See
the note on illocutionary force for a more detailed look at types of objects and how to tell among
them.
illocutionary force applied to verbs, this describes the transitivity of the verb and determines the
necessary complements. There are 3 categories, broken down into 11 common types (there are
actually a few more)
Transitive: all take a direct object. But many take something more.
monotransitive takes a direct object (mono = Greek one one type of object). Ex. I broke
the glass.
monotransitive phrasal takes a direct object as well as a particle. Ex. I broke down the boxes / I
broke the boxes down.
monotransitive phrasal-prepositional takes a direct object, a moveable particle, and a
prepositional phrase. Ex. I set up my friend with my sisters friend / I set my friend up with my
sisters friend.
ditransitive takes two (di) types of objects: direct and indirect. Ex. I gave a present to my
mother. Direct objects are almost always objects; indirect objects are almost always people (or
animals) that receive the direct object.
complex-transitive takes a direct object and an object complement (something that is equal to the
direct object). Ex. I consider him my friend. This can be broken down into two sentence
complements, the second connected by a form of to be: I consider him. He is my friend.
Intransitive:
pure intransitive Action verbs that do not require any complement at all (this is the only kind).
Ex. I cried. I slept.
intransitive prepositional Usually verbs of motion that require an adverbial prepositional phrase
indicating where the motion is going. Ex. I went to the store.
intransitive diprepositional The rarest of all types, requiring two prepositional phrases in order
for the sentence to be complete. Ex. I confer with my colleague about every decision.
Copular (also called Intensive or Linking) connects ideas (Copula = Latin connection)
Be verbs can take nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and adjectival prepositional phrases as
complements. Ex. I am a man. It is I (very often in speech used with me, although this is
technically incorrect). I am short. I am in the basement.
pseudo-copular verbs like appear, become, seem. Each takes it own idiomatic set of
complements used by true be verbs.
sense verbs The transitive set of sense verbs (see, smell, hear, feel, taste) has also taken on a
copular force. See in the copular is replaced by look. Compare the examples: I see the man.
The man looks strange (The man is strange). This pair-comparison works for all five sense verbs.
passive one of the two voices in Present-Day English verbs. Active voice is a way of
constructing a sentence so that the semantic (real) subject is the also the syntactic (word-order or
also called grammatical) subject. Ex. I broke the glass (I is the actual subject, and the
grammatical subject). The passive voice is a method of writing sentences in which the lexical verb
(one that carries the real action he semantic verb) is converted to a participle (a verb acting like
an adjective) while a form of to be or sometimes to get is inserted as the syntactic verb. The
passive voice is favourable to the active when the true subject is not known or is not important, or
when the direct object is considered more important information than the true subject.
Ex. The glass (grammatical subject but semantic direct object) was (Verb) broken (lexical verb
written as participle) by me (prepositional phrase showing the agent or real subject).