A LINGUISTIC STUDY ON “GET” PHRASAL VERBS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

THESIS A LINGUISTIC STUDY ON “GET” PHRASAL VERBS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS ĐẶC ĐIỂM NGÔN NGỮ CỦA ĐỘNG TỪ CỤM “GET” TRONG TIẾNG ANH VỚI SỰ LIÊN HỆ TIẾNG

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A LINGUISTIC STUDY ON “GET” PHRASAL VERBS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

(ĐẶC ĐIỂM NGÔN NGỮ CỦA ĐỘNG TỪ CỤM “GET” TRONG TIẾNG

ANH VỚI SỰ LIÊN HỆ TIẾNG VIỆT)

CHU THI THU HA

Field: English Language Code: 60220201

Hanoi, 2017

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

A LINGUISTIC STUDY ON “GET” PHRASAL VERBS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THE VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS

(ĐẶC ĐIỂM NGÔN NGỮ CỦA ĐỘNG TỪ CỤM “GET” TRONG TIẾNG

ANH VỚI SỰ LIÊN HỆ TIẾNG VIỆT)

CHU THI THU HA

Field: English Language

Code: 60220201

Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Ho Ngoc Trung

Hanoi, 2017

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

This is to certify that I am responsible for the work submitted in the thesis: “A linguistic study on “Get” phrasal verbs in English with reference to the Vietnamese equivalents”, that this submission is my own work, to the best of my knowledge and belief, it contains a little material previously published or written by another person, I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project's design

and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged

Hanoi, 2017

Chu Thi Thu Ha

Approved by SUPERVISOR

(Signature and full name)

Date:………

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank people for making the completion of this thesis possible First of all I am grateful for the continuous support that my supervisor Assoc Prof Dr Ho Ngoc Trung, who has generously given me valuable and constructive comments, advices as well as correction of my research paper

The second, I am greatly indebted to all my lectures at the Faculty of Graduate Studies at Hanoi Open University for their useful lectures, supports, encouragement and for inspiring me the love for English foreign language teaching and doing scientific research

Besides, I also thank my friends and colleagues who helped me along the way The finally, I am very thankful that my parents and my twin daughters made

me have more motivation to finish my project

ABSTRACT

This thesis is concerned with the use of the study of linguistic on “Get” Phrasal verbs in English with reference to the Vietnamese equivalents Phrasal verbs are generally claimed to have a very important function in the English language To research this project successfully, I would like to answer the following research questions

The aim of this thesis is analyzing the linguistic of ‘get’ phrasal verbs and raising Vietnamese learners’ awareness of these verbs, the use of “get” phrasal verbs has not yet been the specific focus in different researches, so that is why this thesis seeks to make a contribution and help them improve their real world communication exactly and successfully in English More detail, I also point out

some syntactic and semantics features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs with reference to the

Vietnamese equivalents; and the second one is to propose some implications for

mastering ‘get’ phrasal verbs in an effective way

The findings of this work are based on the descriptive method is utilized to

give a deep and detailed description of the ‘get’ phrasal verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents and comparative method is used to analyze the ‘get’ phrasal verbs with

reference to Vietnamese equivalents, hence pointing out the distinctive features of

‘get’ phrasal verbs which cause difficulties for Vietnamese learners and suggesting

some implications for teaching these verbs to learners at Hanoi Vocational College

of High Technology

The result of the study is expected to give some following benefits

The research result will help the lectures and students to solve part of their problems in teaching and learning ‘Get” phrasal verb

The result of the research can be used as an additional knowledge to improve the students’ mastery of vocabulary Because, the students are able to get other new meaning from the same verb if the verb is added by certain preposition In other hand, by understanding the meaning of ‘Get” phrasal verbs; students can implement them in daily conversation

They can also develop their mastery of ‘Get” phrasal verbs in speaking, listening, reading and writing By using more than one expression, they can say one idea in various ways

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 4.1: Information of the research participants……….41 Table 4.2: The learners’ acquisition levels on the syntactic features……… 44 Table 4.3: The learners’ acquisition levels on the semantic features………44

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.2 Aims And Objectives Of The Study 2

1.3 Research Questions 3

1.4 Methods Of The Study 3

1.5 Scope Of The Study 3

1.6 Significance Of The Study 4

1.7 Design Of The Study 5

Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

2.1 Previous studies 6

2.2 A History of English phrasal verbs 8

2.3 An overview of English phrasal verbs 11

2.3.1 Definition of English phrasal verbs 11

2.3.2 Classifications of English phrasal verbs 12

2.3.2.1 Intransitive phrasal verbs 14

2.3.2.2 Transitive phrasal verbs 16

2.3.3 Syntactic functions of phrasal verbs 17

2.3.4 Semantics function of phrasal verbs 20

2.3.5 The differences of phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms 22

2.4 Summary 25

Chapter 3: SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ‘GET’ PHRASAL VERBS IN ENGLISH 26

3.1 Syntactic features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs in English 26

3.1.1 Intransitive features 26

3.1.2 Transitive features 27

3.1.2.1 ‘Get’ phrasal verbs can be separated by their object 30

3.1.2.2 ‘Get’ phrasal verbs cannot be separated by their object 31

3.2 Semantic features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs in English 34

3.2.1 Non-idiomatic and literal meanings of ‘get’ phrasal verbs 34

3.2.2 Idiomatic meanings of ‘get’ phrasal verbs 35

3.2.3 Metaphorical meanings of ‘get’ phrasal verbs 36

3.3 ‘Get’ phrasal verbs and Vietnamese equivalents 37

3.4 Summary 36

Chapter 4: THE REALITY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING “GET” PHRASAL VERBS AT HANOI VOCATIONAL COLLEGE OF HIGH TECHNOLOGY AND SOME SUGGESTIONS 38

4.1 Research contextual……… …….38

4.1.1 The written test 39

4.1.2 Data analysis methods 41

4.2 Some suggestions 43

4.2.1 From teachers’ perspective 43

4.2.2 From learners’ perspective 45

2.4 Summary 47

Chapter 5: CONCLUSION 468

5.1 Recapitulation ……….48

5.2 Limitations of the study……….48

5.3 Suggestions for a further study……… 50

REFERENCES APPENDIX ……….……….52

KEY ……….……… 53

Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 RATIONALE

“While without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” (Wilkins, 1972: 111)

This argument has been supported by many researchers in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) who have emphasized the significance of vocabulary and agreed that vocabulary is equally, if not more, important than language structure in language acquisition

Plenty of Vietnamese learners may get accustomed to spoken English as soon as they begin learning how to write and read in their mother tongue This means that people have recognized the importance and necessity of English as well

as the advantages that English may bring about However, learning English is always a big challenge for Vietnamese native-speaker learners One of the challenging things of acquiring English is phrasal verbs, which seem to be too hard for them to master, hence inevitable errors in using the phrasal verbs in communication: both spoken and written English

In theory, phrasal verbs are generally considered to be idiomatic combinations of a verb and an adverbial particle The exact status of the latter is still being debated, scholars being divided on whether it is an adverb, prepositional adverb, postpositional prefix, special part of speech, etc Phrasal verbs are quite frequently found in the English language They convey widely varying meanings which are not always clear and often have little to do

Generally, the main function of phrasal verbs is conceptual categorization of reality in the speaker's mind They denote not only actions or states as "ordinary" verbs do, but also specify their spatial, temporal or other characteristics The ability

to describe actions or states more precisely, vividly and emotionally is determined

by the adverbial particle components of phrasal verbs By combining with these elements, verbs of broader meaning are subjected to a regular and systematic multiplication of their semantic functions While the English verb has no consistent structural representation of aspect, adverbial particles either impart an additional

meaning to the base verb (e.g the durative verb sit merges with the particle down into the terminative phrasal verb sit down) or introduce a lexical modification to its

fundamental semantics It is due to their special characteristics, learners always have

to face untold difficulties to master phrasal verbs The phrase verb has a strong

combination, the number and the use of a wide range of features, while the semantic and grammatical structure of the complex, has been an easy to grasp of English learners Because most of the phrase verbs have their fixed meaning, they cannot be inferred from the literal meaning of the whole phrase, which resulted in the difficulty of English learners

Among English phrasal verbs, the one with ‘get’ is one of the commonest

and is used in varied ways

It is common knowledge that an adequate translation requires good sense of nuances in the semantics of both the source-language and target-language texts In

my process of English teaching, ‘get’ phrasal verbs have made me pay a great

interest to, because they possess a number of syntactic and semantic features as well as other stylistic peculiarities

In order to find out a better way to acquire the ‘get’ phrasal verbs, especially

in teaching and learning English the topic relating to ‘get’ phrasal verbs with

reference to Vietnamese equivalents has been chosen for my graduation paper

1.2 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The theory is aimed at analyzing the syntactic and semantic features of ‘get’

phrasal verbs and raising Vietnamese learners’ awareness of these verbs, and to help them improve their real world communication exactly and successfully in English

There are three main objectives of this study The first is to point out

syntactic and semantics features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs in English; the second is to

explore the Vietnamese translation equivalents to English phrasal verbs; the third

one is to propose some implications for mastering ‘get’ phrasal verbs in English in

an effective way

1.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

In conducting the study, the following questions should be answered:

(i) What are the syntactic and semantic features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs? (ii) How are English Get phrasal verbs expressed equivalently in

Vietnamese?

(iii) What are the problems of learning ‘get’ phrasal verbs at Hanoi

Vocational College of High Technology and how to solve them?

1.4 METHODS OF THE STUDY

In order to study the subject effectively, a flexible combination of methods

is employed

First, the descriptive method is utilized to give a deep and detailed

description of the ‘get’ phrasal verbs and their Vietnamese equivalents Then

examples for illustrating the description will be taken from the grammar and reference books written by contemporary influential linguists in English such as

“The hobbit” J R R Tolkien J R

The second, quantitative method is used to quantify ‘get’ phrasal verbs which

are found out in the research

1.5 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

It is due to the framework of a Master thesis, this study focuses mainly on

‘get’ phrasal verbs with reference to the Vietnamese equivalents as a very

specifically characteristic trait of the English language

Comparative method is used to analyze the ‘get’ phrasal verbs to explore the

Vietnamese translation equivalents, hence pointing out the distinctive features of

‘get’ phrasal verbs which cause difficulties for Vietnamese learners and suggesting

some implications for teaching these verbs to learners at Hanoi Vocational College

of High Technology

Survey questionnaire in the form of a written test is used as one of data

collection methods to evaluate participants’ ability in understanding ‘get’ phrasal

verb in terms of syntactic and semantic features Then, the statistic method is

applied to present quantitative descriptions in a manageable form to simplify large amounts of data in a sensible way

1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

It is hoped that the overall findings of the present study will be useful to everyone involved in language, teaching, learning, doing translation of the Phrasal verbs in Vietnam because language teachers and learners in particular will be made more aware of the importance of this language feature for a more effective and efficient communication

The first, Theoretical significance

The theories used to support this analysis are the theory of phrasal verbs proposed by Brown (2002) as the main theory to know types of phrasal verbs using particles (out, up, over, in, into, back, down, and away) The types are categorized based on the particle which collocate the verb, such as particles (out, up, over, in, into, back, down, and away) and the transitivity of 9 phrasal verb The theory of shift proposed by Catford (1965) and prepositional verb are the supporting theories used to identify the existence of translation shift of phrasal verbs Category shifts are divided into four types: Structure shifts, Class shifts, Unit shifts, and Intra system shifts The theory proposed by Larson (1998) is also used as to identify the strategies of equivalence applied in translating the novel of ‘The Hobbit’ Finding the equivalence strategy is the main goal in translation

The second, practical significance

In teaching English, Phrasal verbs are an essential part of English communication and they are important for the students to know and understand Phrasal verbs are commonly used at the office, in the household and in everyday conversation They have become the beans and rice of English, so make sure the students have more than a few phrasal verbs in their English vocabulary

In learning English, when they watch movie, cartoon without translating into Vietnamese they sometimes do not understand whole the contents so students are most likely using phrasal verbs to understand, talk, share their ideas, put forward opinions and learn different perspectives using English They all want to be exceptional English communicators

In translating, Phrasal verbs are very important for translators because they are so prevalent in everyday spoken and informal written language Not only do translators need to understand the more common phrasal verbs, but they will also need to use them themselves correctly

1.7 DESIGN OF THE STUDY

According to the format of thesis It will be divided into 5 chapters:

- Chapter 1 gives introduction

- Chapter 2 Literature review gives the previous studies, presents the theoretical background issues relating to English phrasal verbs, describes the syntactic and semantic features of phrasal verbs and gives The differences of phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms

- Chapter 3 describes the findings of the syntactic and semantic features of ‘get’

phrasal verbs in English

- Chapter 4 proposes some pedagogics of the study, especially for the target of learners at Hanoi vocational college of high technology (HHT)

- Chapter 5 Conclusion

- References come at the end of the study

Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Previous studies

The body of literature dealing with phrasal verbs is extensive, and the approaches taken are manifold, the terminological approach to multi-word verbs in this study basically follows Quirk et al.’s (1985) division of multi-word verbs into

‘phrasal verbs’, ‘prepositional verbs’, and ‘phrasal-prepositional verbs’ which in turn is essentially based on Mitchell (1958) All these multi-word verbs constitute a syntactic or lexical unit functioning like a single lexical verb; they consist of a verb and one or two additional elements, generally called particles Further subdivisions then relate to the nature of the particle The general consensus is that in phrasal verbs it is an adverb, in prepositional verbs a preposition, and in phrasal-prepositional verbs an adverb and a preposition

There are, however, a host of other definitions as to what a phrasal verb is Most phrasal-verb dictionaries, e g Sinclair and Moon (1989), Cowie and Mackin (1993), Cullen and Sargeant (1996), and Cambridge International Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs (1997), include not only phrasal verbs ‘proper’ (according to Quirk et al.’s (1985) definition), but also prepositional verbs, i.e verbs with a specified preposition such as rely on, and phrasal-prepositional verbs (such as put up with) Others (Cowie & Mackin 1975 and Courtney 1983) go so far as to incorporate verb-adjective (lie low), verb-pronoun (kid oneself), or other combinations.26 Most non-dictionary oriented linguists however draw the line more rigidly and include only verb-adverb combinations (e.g Biber et al 1999, Greenbaum 1996a, Lipka 1972, McArthur 1989, Palmer 1974), but not all of them call them ‘phrasal verbs’ (Lipka

1972 for example uses the term ‘verb-particle constructions’) As far as the verbal element of a phrasal verb is concerned, most linguists agree that this particle has adverbial status (e.g Biber et al 1999, Bolinger 1971, Cowie 1993, Greenbaum 1996a, Lipka 1972, McArthur 1989, Palmer 1974, Quirk et al 1985) Huddleston and Pullum (2002) take a different approach, calling this element an intransitive preposition They even refrain from using the expression ‘phrasal verb’ at all, on the basis that verb + particle combinations of the type put in (an application) do not form one syntactic constituent any more than do verb + unspecified preposition combinations such as carry in (the chairs), where in could be replaced by out or over

non-According to Stephens “a phrasal verb is made up of a verb and one or two

or three particles which together function as a single verb The particle may be an adverb, a preposition, or a word that can act as either an adverb or a preposition”

Stephens, Ann (2002) ed The English Phrasal Verb University of North Carolina

Press

Mortimer C (1972) Phrasal Verbs in Conversation London: Longman

Group Limited states that "The English language has hundreds of two-part verbs such as bring up, carry on and put up These are easy enough to understand when the meaning of the whole two-part verb is equal to the meaning of the sum of its two parts" However, he concedes: "But in many cases, knowing the meaning of the parts does not help us to know the meaning of the whole" Thus, to add the meaning of bring to the meaning of up will not help us to understand the meaning

of bring up in the expression “He brought up a point” Nor will it help us to understand bring up in the expression “She brought up a family”

Whether used literally or figuratively, phrasal verbs are acquired early by native speakers, but usually late by foreign learners because their grammar is difficult and their meaning cannot in many cases be deduced from the meanings of the separate words There can be no doubt that phrasal verbs have received a considerable amount of attention in recent years

According to Nguyễn Hoa Lạc, lecturer in English, “In transformational generative grammar, the verb phrase is the part of a sentence which contains the main verb and also any object(s), complement(s) and adverbial(s).” (An outline of syntax, 2004: 53) Besides, a Vietnamese linguist Diệp Quang Ban gives us another definition in Vietnamese, “Cụm động từ là tổ hợp từ tự

do không có kết từ đứng đầu, có quan hệ chính phụ giữa thành tố chính với thành tố phụ, và thành tố chính là động từ.” (Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt, 2006: 62) Or Phạm Thị

Hà, a M.A in Quang Binh University, paraphrased it into English in her paper,

“Verb phrase is a free word phrase having main – subordinate relation and containing a verb serve as the central element and many additive elements which modify the meanings for the central element.”

Up to now, although a number of research topics about phrasal verbs with reference to Vietnamese equivalents have been done In this paper, I am especially

interested in researching about the syntactic and semantic features of ‘get’ phrasal

verbs because “Get” phrasal is one of common phrasal verbs It is not easy for learners to understand deeply and clearly the manifold meaning of Get phrasal is used shown the using in English This research will be effective for us to teach English verb phrase to Vietnamese learners learning English as a second language

as well

2.2 A History of English phrasal verbs

Phrasal verbs have been presented for much of the history of the English language; they are easily traceable back to early Middle English (McArthur, 1992,

p 773) There are similar constructions in other Germanic languages, such as Dutch (Neeleman & Weerman, 1993), but such constructions are less common in other language families and can therefore be considered typologically unusual Like the phenomenon of preposition-stranding, phrasal verbs appear to occur only in the Germanic languages (Newmeyer, 2005, p 113)

(i) The Ancestors of Phrasal Verbs in Old English

According to Millward C.M.(1996) A Biography of the English Language 2nd

edition Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace pointed out that the range and importance of verb particle-constructions in the spoken language of the early stages of development is hard to be dealt with Still, Baugh Albert C and Thomas C

(1993) A History of the English Language 4thedition Eaglewood Cliffs, N.J.:

Prentice Hall., Traugott, and ElizabethC (1972) History of English Syntax New

York: Holt Rinehard and Winston has shown that the Old English ancestors of modern phrasal verbs were generally inseparable prefix verbs, although some separable forms did exist Millward states that the inseparable prefix verb was a form in which the particle was attached to the beginning of the verb These Old English prefixed verbs are comparable to current phrasal forms For example, in present day English, there is the mono-transitive verb to burn and then the phrasal mono- transitive to burn up Old English had baerman (to burn) and forbaerman (to burn up) The prefix for remained affixed to the verb and could not move as

modern particle can Millaward, C.M.(1996) A Biography of the English

Language 2nd edition Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace

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 , D (1986) English Historical Syntax: Verbal Constructions London and

New York: Longman provides beraedan as an example because it meant to dispossess, while its root verb raedan meant to advice

Akimoto M.(1999) Collocations and Idioms in Late Modern English

Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins suggests that Old English prefixes often remained before the verb because the Old English had strong object-before-verb tendencies, whereas present day English is largely a VO (verb + object) 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 Referring to the 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

(ii) Phrasal Verbs in Middle English

This section will deal with those forms of phrasal verbs that occur in Middle English Thus, the formation of prefixes 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 post-verbal particle to prefixed verbs

possible because the prefix was losing meaning [Denison, D (1986) English

Historical Syntax: Verbal Constructions London and New York: Longman:47]

The rapid borrowings of French verbs into Middle English likely showed the development of phrasal verbs because of competition in semantic fields of the Old

English prefixed verbs [Baugh, A C and Thomas C (1993) A History of the

English Language 4th edition Eaglewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall :340] For example, the French borrowing destroy could accommodate the meaning of the

Old English forbrecan (break up) [Smith, J (1996) A Historical Study of English

London and New York: Routledge:140]

French forms also likely hindered phrasal verbs because of lexical register French was the language of status in England after Norman Conquest, and phrasal verbs

were considered informal [Tanabe, H (1999) Composite Predicates and Phrasal

Verbs in the Paston Letters, Amsterdam and Philadelphia:123]

Nonetheless, phrasal verbs regained strong productivity by the 15th century Middle English underwent a shift in syntax from many instances of SOV to SVO

as it lost many synthetic inflections from Old English, becoming a much more analytic, or word-order based language The new VO word order, as Akimoto claims, likely enabled adverbial particles

In other words, Old English forbrecan became to break up By late Middle English, phrasal verbs could be divided into three categories such as Old English style inseparable particle + verb, phrasal verbs including verbs + separable particle and impounds derived from the first two

(iii)Phrasal Verbs in Early Modern English

The incidence of phrasal verbs exploded in Early Modern English Shakespeare himself applied the form widely through the plays Hiltuten explains that the 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” Akimoto also notes that “phrasal verbs occur more frequently in letters and dramas than in essays or academic writing” in the 18th and 19th centuries 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 Phrasal verbs in Early Modern English could be formed with a noun

+ particle, such as ‘to louse up’ [Millaward, C.M.(1996) A Biography of the

English Language 2ndedition Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace: 319] It was also in this period that pronominal objects were firmly established before particles (for example: She put it on But not * She put on it) as a standard practice, while nominal objects retained movement before and after the particle (for example: She put the dress on or She put on the dress)

(iv)Phrasal Verbs in present-day English:

In present-day English, phrasal verbs are identifiable by particle movement (when transitive), stressed particles, incapacity for adverb intervention in the verb phrase,

by translation and passivation A phrasal verb in present-day English is a verb that takes a complementary particle which is an adverb resembling a preposition,

necessary to complete sentence (for example: He fixed up the car)

Therefore, the earliest study that has been written about phrasal verbs dates from the 16th century, when William Bullokar wrote The Brief Grammar for

English in 1586 Following the works of William Bullokar, two other studies have been done one was A Treatise of the English Particles written by Walker Leeds in

1665 and the other was The English Grammar written by Michael Mattaire in 1729 Further on, Henry Sweet entitled his study on phrasal verbs A New English

Grammar in 1892

2.3 Theoretical framework

2.3.1 Definition of English phrasal verbs

A phrasal verb is a type of verb in English that operates more like a phrase than a word The expression phrasal verb refers, in English Grammar, to a combination of a verb and a prepositional or adverbial particle, in which the combination often takes on a meaning which is apparently not the simple sum of

its parts, for example turn up means ‘appear’

Longman Dictionary of phrasal verbs defines phrasal verb as “idiomatic combination of a verb and adverb, or a verb and preposition (or verb with both adverb and preposition)” A grammarian such as Eduard, Vlad (1998) [Eduard,

V(1998).English Group Grammar Constanta: Tipografia : 93] describes phrasal verb as “combination of a lexical verb and adverbial particle” Verbs as ‘give up’,

‘fall out’ and ‘take in’ are considered by him to be multi-words verbs that are

equivalent to one lexical item

Heaton considers that “phrasal verbs are compound verbs that results from combining a verb with an adverb or a preposition, the resulting compound verb being idiomatic”

Tom McArthur in the Oxford Companion to the English Language (1992)

notes that these verbs are also referred to by many other names such verb phrase, discontinuous verbs, compound verb, verb-adverb combination, and verb-particle construction Crystal in the Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English language calls this linguistic phenomenon a “ Multi –word verb” that is the best described as

a lexeme, a unit of meaning that may be greater than a single word

A phrasal verb is defined by Broukal and Woods as “the combination of a verb + an

adverb particle and sometimes the particle may be followed by a preposition” They

go on to say that “most of the particles look like prepositions but act as adverbs,

and usually change the meaning of the verb they are connected” The same definition is given by Kollin [Kollin, M (1982) Easy Grammar Plus Wanda

Phillips.: 12] when she states that “phrasal verbs are common structures in English They consist of a verb combined with a preposition like word, known as particle” She goes on to say that “phrasal verbs include both two-and three-word strings”

Examples of such phrasal verbs are ‘give up’, ‘look after’, ‘hand in’ which include two strings while ‘put up with’, ‘give in to’ and ‘put up for’ include three strings

Phrasal verbs are considered by Graver as “semi-compounds” whereas

Palmer [Palmer, F R.(1998) The English Verb London, New York: Longman:

180] regards them as “single units in the grammar” He gives reasons for naming

them like that by saying that “there are several collocation restrictions We can give

up but not give down We can look after someone but not look before him” He

adds that phrasal verbs are “obviously semantic units” because ‘give in’ equals

‘yield’, ‘look after’ may be replaced by the literary ‘tend’, ‘put up’ has the

meaning of ‘invent’, and ‘put up with’ means ‘tolerate’ What has been stated by

Palmer concerning the treatment of phrasal verbs as single units is quite true and has a solid basis simply because we have to place certain prepositions or adverbs after certain verbs in order to convey meanings or concepts All these definitions lead to another aspect proposed for discussion, which is the classification of phrasal verbs in English language In addition to this, it is necessary to distinguish between phrasal and prepositional verbs

2.3.2 Classifications of English phrasal verbs

According to Green Baum and Quirk (1990: 148) there are four different types of verb particle combinations:

a If the verb is intransitive, the particle is a prepositional-adverb, functioning as adjunct Thus, it is a phrasal verb

b If the verb is transitive, and the particle is not mobile it is a prepositional verb

c If the verb is transitive, but the particle is mobile, it is also a phrasal verb

d If two particles follow, then, it is a phrasal-prepositional verb

Complex verbs are a variety of verbal compounds made up of a principal verb and an adverbial particle (up, in, out) which usually modifies and sometimes only determines the meaning of the former For example ‘to bring about’ means ‘to

determine, to cause’, ‘to bring up’ means ‘to educate’, ‘to fall out’ means ‘to argue’ As it has been demonstrated in the first part of this chapter, since Renaissance Period, complex verbs have gone a long way developing steadily and giving rise to ever newer form as a rule on the basic of Old English one-syllable verbs Many of these complex forms have developed an astonishing polysemy

A complex verb of the type ‘to give up’, ‘to take in’, ‘to take off’, ‘to bring out’, though a variety of compound verbs proper (‘to broadcast’, ‘to whitewash’), differs from the latter in that it behaves differently in a sentence the verb may be separated from its adverbial particle by a direct object Complex verbs such as ‘to break loose’, ‘to leave alone’ behave like ‘to give up’, but they differ from them in that loose, home, alone are not adverbial particles but adverbs and adjectives, bearers of a far greater semantic weight than adverbial particles, although as

indissolubly linked with the verb proper.[Levitchi, D Leon (1970), Limba Engleza

Contemperana-Lexicologie, Editura Didactica si Pedagogica, Bucuresti: 67]

An aspect related to compound verbs is that compounds, as hold off are not

to be confused with combinations as ‘to come in’ or ‘to go out’ or ‘to look up’, in which in, out, up are adverbs forming answers to such questions as: ‘where?’,

‘where to?’, ‘in what directions?’

Let’s see the following examples:

The boy went in (Where did the boy go?)

The rain held off (No such question is possible: What is said

about the rain or What did the rain do?)

The exemplifications support the fact that complex verb is a special category of

compounds [Levitchi, D.Leon (1970), Limba Engleza Contemperana-Lexicologie,

Editura Didactica si Pedagogica, Bucuresti: 69] So far, all these classifications and comments have shown that phrasal verbs are considered and called ‘complex verbs’ in Leon Levitchi’s point of view, but they are also called as ‘multi-word verbs’ and ‘phrasal-prepositional verbs by Greenbaum, Sidney and Quirk,

Randolph Rosemary, [C (1993) Longman Dictionary of Phrasal verbs England:

Longman House.]

Basing upon the origin of the particle that follows the main verb, Rosemary Courtney distinguished three types of phrasal verbs

(i) Verb + adverb

The old lady was taken in (‘deceived’) by the salesman

(ii) Verb + preposition

She sat about (‘started’) making a new dress

(iii) Verb + adverb + preposition

I cannot put up with (‘bear’) him because he is always complaining

On the other hand, the Oxford English Grammar distinguishes seven types of

phrasal verbs in English according to transitivity Intransitive phrasal verbs (give in)

(i) Transitive phrasal verbs (find out)

(ii) Mono-Transitive prepositional verb (Look after)

(iii) Doubly transitive prepositional verb (Put up with)

(iv) Copular prepositional verb (serve as)

(vi) Mono-transitive phrasal prepositional verbs (look up = ‘respect’)

(vii) Doubly transitive phrasal prepositional verbs (put something down

to someone = ‘attribute to’)

[Oxford English Grammar, 1983 London: Oxford University Press:145]

In short, phrasal verbs can be classified into 4 kinds: phrasal verbs

(intransitive and transitive), prepositional phrasal verbs, verbs with prepositional adverbs, verbs with particles and preposition, and the ‘get’ phrasal verbs can serve

as all kinds

So far, is the most comprehensive because other grammarians like Quirk, R.[ Quirk,

R (1973) A University Grammar of English Burnt Mill, Essex: Longman House] Veres, Grigore Veres, Andriescu, Luliana, Cehan, Ancs (1998) A Dictionary of

English Grammar: Lasi: University of Al.L Cuza and V Eduard,V.(1998).English

Group Grammar.Constanta:Tipografia divide phrasal verbs into transitive and

intransitive ones I would like to use the following classification to analyze my

research because It is not only short but also coherent Base on this theory, It is easier for me to develop my thesis

2.3.2.1 Intransitive phrasal verbs

According to J.B Heaton (2004), intransitive phrasal verbs (Vintr) cannot

be followed by an object They have the structure as follows:

Intransitive phrasal verb = Verb + Particle (Vintr + Part.)

Let’s see the following examples:

The students were standing up

Sit down, please!

Drink quickly up!

The Jet has just taken off

Get up at once!

Did he catch on?

I agreed to meet Peter at the basketball game, but he never showed up

“Grammar back 2004”

Most of the particles are place adjuncts or can function as such Heaton claims that

normally, the particle cannot be separated from its verbs (Drink quickly up!)

though particles used as intensifiers or perfectives or referring to direction can be

modified by intensifiers (Go right on)

Some intransitive patterns can become transitive by the addition of a direct object Let’s see the following examples:

The driver slowed down (Intransitive)

The driver slowed the car down (Transitive)

Note however that the patterns are not always related in meaning, as with take off,

take something off and take someone off

The Jet took off (It left the ground)

My father took his hat off (He removed his hat)

She took Mr Bean off (She imitated Mr Bean.)

When the intransitive phrasal verb is in isolation, the stress is always on the particle Within a sentence the stress is also on the particle when the phrasal verb stands alone at the end of a sentence (or clause) as in the following:

The lorry slowed down and came to a halt

Do you and your girls get on?

When did your flight eventually take off?

In other cases, especially when an adverb follows the phrasal verb the usual rules for sentence stress apply

The lorry slowed down immediately

You and your girls get on well?

“Grammar back 2004”

2.3.2.2 Transitive phrasal verbs

Transitive phrasal verbs (Vtr), in Heaton’s opinion, are those that always take a direct object The position of the direct object varies They have the

structures as follows:

Transitive Phrasal verb = Verb + Direct object + Particle (Vtr + Od + Part.) Transitive Phrasal verb = Verb + Particle + Direct object(Vtr+ Part + Od)

A phrasal verb can be transitive when it takes a direct object

Let’s see the following examples:

You need to fill out this form to register for the course (fill out = complete) I’m going to cut down on fast food this year (cut down on = reduce)

Check out that website – it’s really great! (check out = look at, go to)

Transitive phrasal verbs can be separable or inseparable If a phrasal verb

is separable, it means you can separate the two words and put the direct object in the middle If it is inseparable, then you can not do this

Separable Phrasal Verb

Let’s see the following examples:

TURN OFF

Please turn off the TV

Please turn the TV off

Inseparable Phrasal Verb

Let’s see the following examples:

LOOK AFTER

I will look after your dog while you’re on vacation

I will look your dog after while you’re on vacation – incorrect

When the direct object is the specific name of a thing or person, it can be located after the phrasal verb or in the middle:

I threw away the old pizza

= I threw the old pizza away

However, when the direct object is a pronoun (me, you, him, her, us, them, it), then

it MUST go in the middle:

I threw it away

I threw away it – Incorrect

Here’s an example with a person:

They will pick up John from the airport

= They will pick John up from the airport

= They will pick him up from the airport

They will pick up him from the airport – Incorrect

“Grammar back 2004”

In this chapter, the related literature has been reviewed and theoretical framework relating general overview of phrasal verbs has been presented Phrasal verb has had a long history of development and attracted a great attention of researchers and linguists domestic and overseas

There have seen a number of definitions of phrasal verb, but the easiest way to understand what a phrasal verb is that it is made up of a verb and adverbial particle(s) One obvious fact about phrasal verbs is that their meaning is usually idiomatic in that it is not straightforwardly computed from the meaning of the verb and the meaning of the adverbial particle combined There is no difficulty in distinguishing between intransitive phrasal verbs and prepositional verbs since all prepositional verbs have prepositional objects

Despite different ways of classification, phrasal verbs are mainly categorized by basing on their syntactic and semantic features These features will

be analyzed more thoroughly in the third chapter with the cases of ‘get’ phrasal verbs with reference to their Vietnamese equivalent

2.3.3 Syntactic functions of phrasal verbs

According to Form of English phrasal verbs O’ Dowd (1994) syntactic analysis of phrasal verbs phrasal verbs defined A phrasal verb (PV) is made up of two or more parts that function as a single verb They are sometimes called two-

word verbs because they usually consist of a verb plus a second word

The second part of the phrasal verb is a particle; this shows close association with

the verb and its distinction with prepositions and other adverbs

The PV category is then expanded in a new phrase structure rule as a verb and particle(Prt) The particle is part of the verb phrase but it need not to be contiguous

about it Here is the basic structure of a sentence in which the particle follows the verb directly:

Jamie turned out the light

Subj (N) + V + Prt + det N

Transitive phrasal verbs Like single-word verbs, phrasal verbs can be transitive:

Harold turned on the radio

Barbara passed out the new assignment

I called of the meeting

Other examples

Do over (repeat) look over (examine)

fill out (complete) find out (discover)

Intransitive phrasal verbs

My car broke down

He really took off

The boys were playing around in the yard

Other examples:

come back ( return ) come over ( visit )

make up ( reconcile ) pass out ( faint )

Transitive/intransitive phrasal verbs

Just like some regular ergative or change-of-state verbs (e.g open, increase) may either be transitive or intransitive depending on the role of the agent, some phrasal verbs can have this dual function:

An arsonist burned down the hotel (transitive)

The hotel burned down (intransitive)

Phrasal verbs that require prepositions

Like single-word verbs, adjectives and nouns, many phrasal verbs take a specific preposition In these expressions the phrasal verb and the preposition must be

learned as a unit:

Look down on Get along with Cut down on Pick up on

Get away with Check up on Catch up with Close in on

Get back to Check out of Stand up for Make up for

The separability of phrasal verbs; share characteristics however, there is with one

regular syntactic characteristic peculiar to transitive phrasal verbs: sometimes the particle can be separated from the verb by the direct object and sometimes it cannot Separation is obligatory when it is a pronoun

Separable phrasal verbs

Mark threw away the ball *Mark threw away it

Mark threw the ball away Mark threw it away

Rachel looked up the info *Rachel looked up it

Rachel looked the info up Rachel looked it up

Other examples:

Take up (discuss)

Leave out (omit)

Pass out (distribute)

Bring back (return)

Turn down (refuse)

Inseparable phrasal verbs

I came across an interesting article last night

*I came an interesting article across last night - incorrect

I came across it last night

*I came it across last night - incorrect

Josh ran into an old friend Josh ran into him

Josh ran an old friend into *Josh ran him into - incorrect

Other examples:

Get over (recover) go over (review)

Look into (investigate) go for (attack)

Verbs phrasal verbs that are always separated

A few phrasal verbs that seem to occur only with the verb and particle separated: Let’s see the following examples:

How can I get the message through him? (get… through= convey; transmit)

*How can I get through the message to him? - incorrect

We will see this ordeal through together (see… through= survive)

*We will see through this ordeal together.- incorrect

The reason for obligatory separation is to avoid the ambiguity with the inseparable phrasal verbs that have the same form but a different meaning:

I will get through the lesson next week (finish)

You have to see through his excuse (not deceived by)

Distinguishing phrasal verbs from verb + preposition sequences

Syntactic tests

Only prepositions (not particles ) allow:

Adverb insertion

We turned quickly off the road

*We turned quickly off the light - incorrect

Phrase fronting

Up the hill John ran

*Up the bill John ran - incorrect

Wh - fronting

About what does he write?

*Up what does he write? - incorrect

Syntactic analysis of phrasal verbs

Only particles in separable phrasal verbs ( not prepositions ) allow:

Passivation

The light was turned off

*The road was turned off - incorrect

Verb substitution

The light was extinguished = the light was turned off

Np insertion

We turned the light off

*We turned the road off - incorrect

“Form of English phrasal verbs O’ Dowd (1994)”

2.3.4 Semantics function of phrasal verbs

According to Form of English phrasal verbs O’ Dowd (1994) meaning of English phrasal verbs

Semantic categories of phrasal verbs Literal Phrasal Verbs

This is comprised of verb that appears to be a combination of a verb and a directional preposition They function syntactically like verb-particle constructions Since the particle retains its prepositional meaning, the result is a phrasal verb whose meaning is fully compositional

Some examples of Literal Phrasal Verbs

Sit down, stand up, hand out, carry out, throw away, climb up, fall down, and pass through

Aspectual Phrasal Verbs

The meaning is not as transparent but not idiomatic either This category consists of verbs to which certain particles contribute consistent aspectual meaning This can

be subdivided depending on the semantic contribution of the particle

Inceptive (to signal a beginning state)

Example: John took off

Others: set out, start up

Continuative (to show that the action continues)

- use of on and along with activity verbs

Example: Her speech ran on and on

Hurry along now

others: Carry on, keep on, hang on, come along, play along

- use of away with activity verbs with the nuance that the activity is “heedless”

Example: They danced the night away

others: work away, sleep away, fritter away

-use of around with activity verbs to express absence of purpose

Example: They goofed around all afternoon

others: mess around, play around, travel around

-use of through with activity verbs to mean from beginning to end

Example: She read through her lines in the play for the audition

others: think through, skim through, sing through

Iterative (use of over with activity verbs to show repetition)

Example: He did it over and over again until he got it right

others: write over, think over, type over

Completive ( uses particles up, out, off, and down to show that the action is complete)

-turns an activity verb into an accomplishment

Example: He drank the milk up

others: burn down, mix up, wear out, turn off, blow out

- Reinforces the sense of goal orientation in an accomplishment verb

Example: He closed the suitcase up

others: wind out, fade out, cut off, clean up

- adds durativity to a punctual achievement verb

Example: He found why they were missing

others: check over, win over, catch up

Idiomatic Phrasal Verbs

Many phrasal verbs are idiomatic, such as chew out, tune out, catch up, put off It seems difficult, if not impossible to figure out the meaning of the verb by combining the separate meaning of its part rather by understanding the underlying logic of the language Thus, it would behoove teachers to guide ESL/EFL students through some idiomatic phrasal verbs by analyzing their components parts and then looking for a logical relationship within a specific context

2.3.5 The differences of phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms

Based on the theory of phrasal verb proposed by Brown (2002), phrasal verbs are compound verbs (more than one word) that result from combinations of verbs with adverbs or adverbial particle When a verb is used with an adverb particle, the combination is called a phrasal verb The meaning of a phrasal verb is often very different from the meanings of the two words taken separately (Swan,1980 :18) The resulting compound verb is idiomatic Due to its meaning is idiomatic, there is

no logical pattern or formula for learning it Many phrasal verbs have more than one idiomatic meaning There are two kinds of phrasal verbs Based on the construction

of phrasal verbs, Brown divided phrasal verbs into 2 forms They are transitive and intransitive phrasal verb Transitive phrasal verbs are those that can take direct objects Some transitive phrasal verbs are separable They can be separated from the preposition by a direct object If the direct object is a noun it may or may not come between the verb and preposition; 10 however, if the direct object is pronoun, it must come between the verb and the preposition

Collocations

Collocations represent something new in the way human mind perceive and understand the language

A collocation can be defined in many ways For instance in The English Oxford Dictionary published between 1884 and 1928 the word, collocation is described as the action of setting in a place or position, esp of placing together with, or side by side with something else Furthermore, this explanation is connected with the arrangement of a word in a sentence‟ which partly clarifies the main use of

a collocation A com prehensive definition can be found in the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary where a collocation is viewed as a word or phrase that is often used with another word or phrase, in a way that sounds correct to people who have spoken the language all their lives, but might not be expected from the meaning‟ This is an explanation of the fact that collocations can be problematic

to the nonnative speakers

because for them is hard to distinguish if a combination of words sounds better than another combination of words Other dictionaries simply notice the main property

of a collocation which is the fact a word collocates with other words or just contain

an incomplete definition such as a grouping together of things in a certain order, as

of the words in a sentence (Macmillan Dictionary)

This second definition can be easily misunderstood, because the readers may believe that a collocation is in fact a group of any things that are organized in a certainorder Moreover, not only the words can co-locate but also the numbers so creating a direct connection between collocations and the study of language is practically impossible specially for the unexperienced language learners It is to be noticed that a proper explanation of a collocation can only be found in the

comprehensive, advanced or technical version of a dictionary

- A collocation (also collocate) is a word or phrase which is frequently used with another word or phrase, in a way that sounds correct to speakers of the language

For example: heavy rain

- An expression consisting of two or more words that correspond to some conventional way of saying things

- The words together can mean more than their sum of parts

For example: disk drive

Collocations: An arrangement or juxtaposition of words or other elements, especially those that commonly used together

For example: bright idea, or dead serious etc

Idioms

Despite numerous linguistic works that have been written on idioms, there is no general agreement on the exact definition of idiomatic expressions According to Fellbaum (349) idioms are a class of multi-word units „which pose a challenge to our understanding of grammar and lexis that has not yet been fully met“

The first part of this chapter provides definitions of idioms that are given in dictionaries, the second part then focuses on idioms as they are understood and defined by linguists

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English (533) gives the following

definition: idiom is a “peculiarity of phraseology approved by usage though having meaning not deducible from those of the separate words.”

A more detailed description is given in Webster’s New World Dictionary (670): idiom is “a phrase, construction, or expression that is recognized as a unit in the usage of a given language and either differs from the usual syntactic patterns or has a meaning that differs from the literal meaning of its parts taken together”

The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language (163) relates to an

idiom as an expression the meaning of which “cannot be deduced by examining the meanings of the constituent lexemes“, the expression being both grammatically and lexically fixed

Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms (vii) suggests that one of the

problems with idioms is that it is often impossible to guess the meaning of an idiom from the words that it contains, emphasizing the fact that idioms often have a stronger meaning than non-idiomatic phrases

Collins COBUILD English Language Dictionary (qtd in Kavka 5) describes

an idiom as a group of words, which when used together in a particular combination, have a different meaning from the one they would have if the meaning

of all the individual words in the group was taken

Dictionaries provide rather general and brief descriptions of idioms Linguistic works, on the other hand, which specialize in this particular field of idioms, take into consideration various aspects of idioms and thus can appear to be

more descriptive A set expression of two or more words that means something other than the literal meanings of its individual words Idioms are colloquialisms or expressions that people say

Example: to have your feet on the ground is an idiom meaning to be sensible

Phrasal verbs

A combination of words that is used like a verb and consists of a verb and an adverb

or preposition, resulting in a new word/phrase

Example: Give in or Come up with

A new meaning is different from the two separate words

Example: Peter asked Jane out to dinner

(Peter invited Jane to go on a date)

Any long English text, spoken or written, will contain many examples of the three Often, intermediate students who cannot go beyond intermediate level struggle to deal with how dense a language can become once we have learned the simple grammatical structures and have mastered a large set of vocabulary

2.4 Summary

To sum up, this chapter has presented the history of English phrasal verbs Through the time Phrasal verbs are expanded researching In addition, the definition of English phrasal verbs are also presented very clearly and deeply The syntactic and semantic features of phrasal verbs with illustration of examples taken from selective material They are very important for me and other researchers and practitioners When the differences of phrasal verbs, collocations and idioms are showed which help me have recommendations for my research about the following “Get” phrasal verbs

of extracts taken from a famous story “THE HOBBIT” J R R Tolkien J R

More examples are also taken from some dictionaries such as Longman Dictionary

of Phrasal Verbs by Rosemary Courtney, Oxford English Dictionary

3.1 Syntactic features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs in English

It is due to the fact that phrasal verb structures present quite a few obstacles for learners of English as a foreign language Further on this matter, it is very important to shed light on the syntactic features of ‘get’ phrasal verbs in particular According to the definitions of phrasal verbs mentioned in the chapter 1, it can

be noticed that phrasal verbs are composed of two elements: a verbal element and a particle The second element of the phrasal verbs – the particle – can be connected with both the transitive and intransitive verbs The ‘get’ phrasal verbs are not

exceptional, they also have similar features respectively For example, ‘get

over’, ‘get across’, ‘get down’, ‘get into’ are of transitivity, and ‘get up’, ‘get away’, ‘get at’, ‘get across’, ‘get through’, ‘get over’, ‘get by’ are of intransitivity,

while some others can be of both transitivity and intransitivity

3.1.1 Intransitive features

Similar to other phrasal verbs, ‘get’ phrasal verbs normally have intransitive

feature, that is to say they cannot take a direct object and their elements are

inseparable Examples: get ahead (make progress), get along (have a friendly

relationship), get around (circulate, move about), get away (escape), get by (manage; either just barely or with a minimum of effort), get in (enter), get off (descend from leave), get on (enter (a vehicle); mount (a horse, etc.) Look at these

‘get’ phrasal verbs in full sentence examples in the “HOBBIT” J R R Tolkien J R

And Bilbo? He could not get into any tree, and was scuttling about from

trunk to trunk, like a rabbit that has lost its hole and has a dog after it

(the Hobbit:169)

Còn Bilbo của chúng ta thì sao nhỉ? Gã vẫn chưa leo được lên cây, hổi hả

chạy từ thân cây này sang thân cây khác, hệt như con thỏ bị lạc ổ bị chó săn

“Good-bye! If you won’t come with us, you had better get off without any

more talk!”

( the Hobbit:227)

Tạm biệt! Nếu anh không muốn tới với chúng tôi, anh nên biến đi và không

cần nói thêm điều gì nữa

Due to their intransitive feature, the particles in ‘get’ phrasal verbs are unable to be separated from ‘get’ to create idiomatic meanings, i.e they cannot

be guessed from the meaning of words within the phrasal verbs Examples:

I am like a burglar that cannot get away, but must go on miserably

burgling the same house day after day,” he thought

(the Hobbit:282)

“Mình giống như một gã kẻ trộm không thể thoát ra ngoài được mà cứ

phải ăn trộm đến khốn khổ mãi tại cùng một ngôi nhà hết ngày này sang ngày

khác,” anh chàng nghĩ bụng

(The Hobbit)

In above sentences, the particles get off create the meaning of to leave;

‘away’ in the phrasal verbs ‘get away’ is particle It is not movable because It has

to combine with ‘get’ to create the meaning of ‘to escape’

3.1.2 Transitive features

Another prominent feature of ‘get’ phrasal verbs is their transitivity, that is to say they can take an object Examples of such phrasal verbs are get on with

(to start or continue doing something) get something across/over (communicate,

make understandable), get along/on (like each other), get around (have mobility),