Learn how to use the verb "Give"
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| Hi, everybody. Welcome back to Know Your Verbs. My name is Alisha. And in this lesson, we're going to talk about the verb give. Let's get started. |
| Let's begin with the basic definition of the verb give. The basic definition of give is to provide someone with something, or to offer someone something. Some examples, my boss gave me a raise. Please give her this letter. |
| Now let's look at the conjugations for this verb. Present, give, gives. Past, gave. Past participle, given. Progressive, giving. |
| Now let's talk about some additional meanings for this verb. The first additional meaning is to cause something or create something. Let's look at some examples. |
| Scary movies give him nightmares. You just gave me a great idea. So this use of give doesn't refer to providing someone with something. It refers to causing something or producing, creating something. |
| In the first example sentence, we see scary movies give him nightmares. Another way to say this is scary movies cause him to have nightmares, or rather, watching scary movies causes him to have nightmares. |
| So there's this thing, in this case, scary movies, which causes this other thing or produces this other thing. So we use give to explain that relationship. |
| The second example sentence is the same. You just gave me a great idea. It doesn't mean someone provided someone else with a great idea, but rather, this use of give means you just caused me to have a great idea. It's kind of like you helped me to make this great idea. |
| So we use this when someone maybe makes an interesting comment or has an interesting suggestion, and that creates a new idea. That creates a new thought. So you can say you just gave me a great idea to express that. |
| The next additional meaning is to do an action. Let's look at some examples. Can you give me a call when you finish work? That girl is giving us a weird look. |
| Alright, so I said that the definition for this one is to do an action. It sounds quite open, but actually, there are some common sort of set phrases that we use give with. |
| So some examples of this are in these example sentences, like give me a call. Can you please give me a call when you finish work? Or that girl is giving us a weird look. |
| So it doesn't mean, again, that someone is providing something to another person. It just means that that action or that situation is happening or has happened. |
| So please give me a call means please call me, in other words. Or that girl is giving us a weird look means that girl is looking at us in a weird way. |
| So to give something means that that thing, that noun phrase in many cases, is happening. So to give a something, to give someone a something might be a pattern that you encounter, which can refer to just doing an action. |
| So some other examples might be like to give someone a push, to give someone a hand is another example, which means like to help someone. To give someone a hand means like to assist someone. |
| So give me a boost is another example, like means help me move in an upward motion. |
| So if you see this give me a something or give something a something, it might be this kind of perform an action sort of meaning. |
| The next additional meaning is to loosen or become relaxed under pressure. Some examples. Be careful, the wall looks like it's going to give. The bridge gave under the weight of all the cars. |
| So this use of give is related to pressure and related to like stretching or breaking or loosening or relaxing in some way. The first example sentence is about a wall. The wall looks like it's going to give. |
| So imagine a situation where you're leaning against a wall, maybe on a construction site or in an old building, for example. If you're leaning against a wall, an old wall, and someone says the wall looks like it's going to give, it's like the wall appears to be about to break. |
| So if the wall is perfect in this situation and a person puts pressure on the wall, the wall breaks, we use this give to talk about this happening. So the wall gave. The wall looks like it's about to give, so that means it's going to give. That's how we would express this sort of thing. |
| We could use break. We could say the wall looks like it's going to break or maybe fall, but give is another way to express that. |
| The second example sentence shows us a similar situation. This time it's with a bridge and we see the past tense use of this verb. So in this case, the bridge gave under the weight of the cars means the bridge broke or the bridge maybe like was damaged because there were so many cars. |
| So here, the bridge gave is in past tense, which refers to the bridge kind of like losing its structure because of the weight of cars. So if you see the word give paired with something like construction, building, infrastructure related, it might be related to this meaning. |
| We don't only use it. So that was bad. We don't use it only with construction or buildings, however, we can use it for fabrics as well. So like a shirt, for example, or something that stretches easily. So we can use give to talk about that kind of relaxing or like stretching of materials. So keep an eye out for this when you're reading. |
| Okay, let's move along now to some variations with this verb. Let's look at the first variation. The first variation is to give up, to give up. There are two meanings to give up. Let's look at the first one. To give up means to stop trying. Some examples, give up, she's never going to go on a date with you. We gave up trying to plan a summer party. |
| So both of these examples show situations where someone should or maybe will stop trying to do something. So in the first example sentence, give up, she's never going to go on a date with you means stop trying. So stop trying to convince this girl to go on a date with you. Give up. The second example sentence, we gave up trying to plan a summer party means we stopped trying to plan this thing. We stopped trying to make it happen. |
| Okay, now let's look at the second meaning of give up. The second meaning of give up is to stop using something, to stop using something. Some examples, I'm trying to give up cigarettes. She gave up sugar last year. So to give up here means to stop using something. We use this for bad habits often or maybe unhealthy things. The first example sentence, I'm trying to give up cigarettes means I'm trying to stop smoking cigarettes. |
| The second example sentence, she gave up sugar last year means she stopped using sugar or she stopped eating sugar last year. So when you see give up before like something unhealthy or maybe a bad habit, it probably means that that person is trying to stop using that thing. If you see it used as a command as in the first definition, it probably means that that person should stop trying to do something. |
| So these are the two meanings of give up, to stop trying to do something and to stop using something. The next variation is to give up on somebody or something. This means to stop making an effort, to expect that something will not have a good result. Some examples, I'm giving up on my business idea. Don't give up on your studies. |
| So to give up on something means to stop making an effort for something and it's because you expect the result is not going to be a good result. So please be careful, to give up on something is different from to give up something. So we talked about to give up in the first variation. |
| This to give up on something means that you have kind of a negative expectation and you're going to stop trying to do something. In the first example sentence, I'm giving up on my business idea. It means I'm going to stop working on this idea because I don't think it's going to end well. I don't think it's going to be a positive thing. It's not going to be good. I don't expect a good result. I'm going to give up on my business idea. |
| The second example sentence was don't give up on your studies. Don't give up on your studies means don't stop trying to study. So in other words, keep trying to make an effort for something because it will be good in the future. Don't give up on your studies is how we can communicate that. |
| So we can use don't before this expression to kind of give words of encouragement to something. Don't give up on this thing means continue working on this thing. So perhaps that's something many of you can think about. Don't give up on your studies. In other words, please continue your studies. |
| The next variation is to give in. This means to finally agree to something after a long time. Some examples, he gave in and bought his kids a dog. I'll keep asking him out until he gives in. So to give in to something means to finally agree to do something, usually after a long period of being requested or a long period of being asked for something. |
| The first example sentence is about a dog, a father buying a dog for his kids. He gave in and bought his kids a dog shows us that the father in this situation has been asked repeatedly probably for a long time for a dog. We know this because we see gave in, past tense. He gave in and bought his kids a dog. |
| So when we use give in or gave in as in past tense here, it shows us that there has been a history of requests prior to the action. So if you want to show that someone finally did something, you can use give in to express that. |
| The second example sentence is a present tense statement though. I'll keep asking him out until he gives in. That means I'm going to continue asking this person out on a date until he finally agrees to go on a date with me, until he finally gives in. So we're looking for that agreement there. So when you want to really emphasize a lot of requests and that you finally convince someone to do something, you can use give in to express that. |
| Alright, so I hope that you found a new way of using give with this lesson. Of course, there are lots of other ways to use give, so please check out a dictionary for some more information. If you have questions or comments or want to practice making an example sentence with this verb, please feel free to do so in the comment section of this video. Thanks very much for watching this episode of Know Your Verbs and we'll see you again soon. Bye-bye. |
| The second sentence, the second example. |
Comments
Hide