Gareth King - Colloquial English - A Complete English Language Course

means:

carry (a thing) or lead (a person) away from the speaker

In Dialogue 5, Su says to Neil:

Why don’t you bring her to see the Stones?

This shows that Su will be at the Stones concert herself, and she is imagining Neil and Fiona coming to join her there – otherwise she would have said:

Why don’t you take her to see the Stones?

Then Neil says to Su:

I’m going to take Fiona out somewhere

because he is imagining himself going with Fiona somewhere.

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The important thing with bringand takeis the attitude or view-point of the person speaking. In the following examples, Fiona is the person speaking, so it is her position relative to the kitchen (where the plates are going) that decides whether she uses bringor take:

(Fiona is in the kitchen, Neil is in the living room) Neil, could you bring the plates into the kitchen?

(Fiona and Neil are both in the living room)

Neil, could you take the plates into the kitchen?

Bringand takealso form a number of very common PHRASAL VERBS

(Language point 44):

bring in

take away

bring out

take off

bring up

take over

bring round

take out

bring over

take on

Some of these have obvious meanings – take away, for example –

but others are less easy to work out and should be learnt: The plane is going to take off in ten

minutes

(leave the ground)

Jane’s bringing up the children on her

own

(raise)

Babies often bring up their food

(vomit)

I’m going to bring that point up at the

next meeting

(raise)

Simon’s taking on too much work

(undertake)

Exercise 8

Decide whether to use bringor takein the following sentences.

1 Could you (bring/take) those bags over here?

2 We’re going to (bring/take) the children on holiday to Orlando.

3 Shall I (bring/take) a curry back with me when I come home?

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4 Bert and Fiona are coming, and they’re (bringing/taking) the kids.

5 (Bring/Take) those keys over to me.

6 The food’s already here – who’s (bringing/taking) the drinks?

7 Shall we (bring/take) some wine to the party?

8 Would you like me to (bring/take) you home?

9 I want you to (bring/take) these papers over to Henry.

10 Please (bring/take) your computer off my desk.

Exercise 9

We’ve seen ordinal numbers in some of the dialogues in this unit –

first(1st), second(2nd) and third(3rd) are irregular, but the others are easy to recognise and end in -th. See if you can spot them in this exercise. Listen to the audio of these different people telling you their names and their birthdays. Then match the names to the dates.

Liam

10 May

Sally

20 March

Adam

1 October

Edward

2 November

Monica

17 July

Keith

8 February

Anthea

7 December

Greg

22 September

Susan

10 November

Carl

17 June

Phrasal verbs

come up– when we say Something’s come up, we mean that something unexpected has happened which will have an effect on our plans.

do up– ‘redecorate’. When we do things up, we improve them or make them look better or newer. It doesn’t mean tidy up– if you say I’m doing up the living room, you mean that you’re making permanent changes to the room.

get together– ‘meet by arrangement’. We must get together soonmeans

‘We must arrange to meet soon’.

knock down– ‘demolish’, ‘destroy’. We use this phrasal verb mostly about buildings – things which are standing and which fall down when they are destroyed.

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look up– when we look for a word in a dictionary, we say that we’re looking the word up.

put down (for)– when you put someone down for a specific time, it means that you make an appointment for them at that time: I’ll put you down for ten o’clock.

start up– we sometimes use start upwhen we talk about starting engines or other machinery; it means that we switch it on to make it start.

turn off– ‘switch off’ (Unit 6).

turn on– ‘switch on’ (Unit 6).

Life and living – seasons and weather

In Dialogue 3 we saw Hannah and Simon doing what a lot of people do in Britain a lot of the time – talking about the weather!

Because of their geographical positionon the north-western edge of the continentof Europe, the British Islesexperience a wide varietyof types of weather, with weather systems constantlyblowing in off the Atlantic and bringing meteorological conditionsthat are not only changeablebut often also dramatic. In addition, there are four well-definedseasons, each with its own typical weather patterns.

Winter is usually cold, especially in the north of England and in Scotland, and you can expect snow, sometimes heavy, at any time from December to February. Southern areas tend to getless snow, sometimes none at all, but snow is very unpredictableand even the south can wake up toa white landscape. Spring is characterised by mildertemperatures, windy weather and showersall over the country, with more rain in the west than in the east generally.

Summer can be quite hot and sunny, especially in July and August, with record temperaturesduring long spellsof fine weather. At the end of September the summer heat abatesand autumn arrives, with its mistyweather and the changing colours of the leaves on the trees signallingthe approach of winteronce more.

Of course, the day-to-day picture is much more complicated than that in a country like Britain, and its probably not surprising that we have a lot of weather words. Rain can come as showers, drizzleor a downpour, for example; and snow can appear as flurriesor a blizzardor in drifts(and don’t forget hailand sleet!). One day you can experience a heatwave, and the next day can be watching the spectacleof a violent thunderstorm.

But whatever the weather when you’re in Britain, you’ll always have something to talk about. And don’t forget your umbrella!

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