44. Focus on: participle adjectives and passive phrasal verbs with the verb get

It is important to understand two different but related uses of get in forming the passive voice.

get + adjectives: get = become

It is very common in English to use get followed by an adjective. This is not the passive. In this case get is similar to become:

She got sick yesterday.

She became sick yesterday.

get + past participles: a form of the passive

It is also very common to use get in place of be to form the passive voice. The construction is the same; get is followed by the past participle:

Judy got kicked out of school.

Judy was kicked out of school.

There is a difference, however, between the passive formed with be and the passive formed with get: When the passive is formed with get, there is often (but not always) a suggestion that the subject of the sentence was somehow responsible or partially responsible for what happened:

Judy got kicked out of school.

A person hearing the sentence above might think that perhaps Judy did something wrong that resulted in her getting kicked out of school. Sometimes, to leave no doubt that the subject is responsible for what happened, a reflexive pronoun is used:

Judy got herself kicked out of school. get + participle adjectives: adjective or passive?

As we have seen, in English the past participles of many verbs are used as adjectives. When get is followed by a past participle, it is not always clear whether the sentence is passive or whether the past participle is functioning as an adjective:

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l got mixed up last week.

I became mixed up last week.

In the examples above, we can see that the past participle is clearly functioning as an adjective since get can be replaced with become, but notice that the sentence can also pass the by test (discussed in Section 13), which indicates that it is passive:

l got mixed up by all the confusing road signs last week.

Again, we see how closely related adjectives and past participles are in English and how it is not always easy to distinguish between the two. Fortunately, it is not usually very important. What is important is to be comfortable using past participles as adjectives, and the key to doing so is not to understand the differ­ence between true adjectives derived from past participles and past participles with an adjective function but instead to understand that there often is no difference.

1. beat... up p.v. [informal] When you beat people up, you hit them or kick them repeatedly.

The muggers stole my money and then beat me up.

Timmy got beaten up at school today.

beat-up part.adj. When something is in bad condition because of heavy use, it is beat-up.

My car is an old, beat-up piece of junk.

carry away carried away

1. carry away (with) p.v. [always passive] When you get carried away or carried

away with something, you do more than is necessary or proper because you enjoy it or because you think it is important.

l was going to make a dozen cupcakes for desert tonight, but I got carried away and ended up making forty.

You should always start a new exercise program slowly. If you get carried away with it, you might hurt yourself.

kick out

kick out & kicks out kicked out kicking out kicking out

1. kick... out (of) p.v. When you kick people out or kick people out of a group, place, building, room, and so on, you order them to leave. Throw out is similar to kick out.

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David drank too much and got himself kicked out of the bar.

Bob's in our car pool, but he's always arguing with the other guys about something, so we're going to kick him out.

1. lock... up p.v. When you lock all the doors and windows of a building, you lock it up.

The manager always locks up before he goes home.

We locked our house up before we went on vacation.

locked up part.adj. After all the doors and windows of a building have been locked, it is locked up.

You can't get in the house — it's locked up.

2. lock... up p.v. When you lock people up, you put them in prison.

The police locked Hank up after they caught him shoplifting.

Whoever committed that terrible crime ought to be locked up forever.

locked up part.adj. Someone who has been put in prison is locked up.

Being locked up in jail was a terrible experience.

lockup n. A prison or other place where people are locked up is a lockup.

Omar was put in the lockup after he was arrested for drunken driving.

mix up

mix up & mixes up mixing up mixed up mixed up

1. mix... up p.v. When you mix something up that has two or more ingredients, you stir it so that the ingredients will be thoroughly combined.

Put in the eggs, butter, sugar, flour, and water and then mix it up well.

An electric mixer will mix up the ingredients better than a hand mixer.

2. mix... up p.v. When you mix two things up, you confuse them with each other.

Jerry and his twin brother look exactly the same, and everyone mixes them up.

Newborn babies sometimes get mixed up in the hospital.

mixed up part.adj. When you are confused about something that you want to understand, or when you have emotional or behavioral problems, you are mixed up.

Can you help me with my calculus homework? I'm really mixed up.

Jimmy is a mixed-up kid who gets in trouble with the police a lot.

mix-up n. A mistake, misunderstanding, or confused situation is a mix-up.

Waiter, I think there's been a mix-up. I asked you for a chicken salad sandwich, but you brought me a tuna salad sandwich.

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1. piss... off p.v. [informal and offensive to some people] When you make people angry, you piss them off.

You'd better stop that! You're pissing me off.

Don't make a lot of noise when Mark is trying to study; it pisses him off.

pissed off part.adj. When you are angry, you are pissed off.

Melon ie got really pissed off at Heather for borrowing her necklace without asking and then losing it.

rip off

rip off & rips off ripping off ripped off ripped off

1. rip ...off p.v. [informal] When you rip people off, you steal something from them, cheat them, or charge them more money for something than it is worth.

Don't do business with Marvin; he rips everyone off. Hank got ripped off by the drug dealer.

rip-off n. When someone steals something from you, cheats you, or charges too much for something, this is a rip-off.

I paid nine dollars to see that awful movie? What a rip-off! stress out