Name: Noun + Preposition Phrases (NOT Phrasal Verbs!) with Body Parts
Uploaded: 2025-07-26T18:31:16.000Z
Duration: 10 min 26 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

In today's video, we're going to look at vocabulary, and it sort of looks like phrasal verbs, except there's a twist here.

We're not actually looking at phrasal verbs.

We're looking at nouns with prepositions that have a slightly different meaning when they're put together than the two words.

And if you'll notice, all of these combinations use a body part.

Now, the difference between these and a phrasal verb is that all of these combinations need a separate verb in order to work.

So, for example, thumbs down or thumbs up, you're going to need the verb because this by itself is not a verb.

You have the noun, thumb, you have up, you have down, regular preposition.

Remember, phrasal verbs, you have a verb and a preposition creating a different meaning.

Here, we have a noun and a preposition, and we need the extra verb.

So, give a thumbs up or give thumbs down.

Basically, when you're giving thumbs up or when you get a thumbs up, so it could be give or get, basically, it's approval.

If you give someone the thumbs up, you're giving them approval, yeah, go ahead.

If you're getting the thumbs up, it means you've received approval or permission from a higher authority, go ahead.

Thumbs down, obviously, decline, reject something, right?

So, if you want to start a new project, you go to your manager or your boss, and you say, I have a great idea for this project, can I go ahead with it?

And then you come out and your co-worker says, oh, how'd it go?

He goes, well, he gave me a thumbs down or I got a thumbs down, okay?

And that's what this means, rejection or approval.

Leg up, so basically, you have or you get, and you'll notice that a lot of these use get and have as their verb.

When you have a leg up, it means you have an advantage, you have a bit of an edge on somebody else or something else.

So, if I have a company and I'm selling a certain product, and another company has joined the market, but I'm already in the process of producing or manufacturing this product, so I have a leg up in terms of sales because I can start next year, whereas the other company will need another year and a half to enter the market.

So, by having that leg up, I can get my name recognition going, the brand recognition, etc.

If you let your hair down, it means you're relaxed or you're a little bit wild.

It means you're not too serious, you allow yourself to have a good time, relax, do whatever you want.

So, if you go on vacation, usually you're a very serious person, you go to work, you wear a tie or a shirt or whatever, sorry, and then you're always very, you know, a very conservative, very responsible person.

But then when you go on vacation, you just let your hair down, and you're drinking, and you're dancing, and you're meeting all kinds of fun people and having a good time.

To have your finger on something or to put your finger on something, okay?

So, you have your finger on something means you have your finger on the pulse of the nation or you have your finger on the situation, it means you understand it.

You understand the situation, you understand the feeling very well.

When you put your finger on it, it means you identify.

It's very similar, you identify something, so I know what this is, but I can't put my finger on it.

I can't exactly identify what this thing is, okay?

So, to keep one's eyes on, basically you just watch.

Watch carefully, make sure nobody steals it.

So, if I'm in the coffee shop and I want to go use the washroom, I say to the person next to me, can you just keep your eyes on my bag while I'm gone?

And this person will just keep an eye on, watch it, make sure nobody does anything to it.

If you keep an eye out, so keep eyes on, and notice also I have eyes, and here I have eye.

Keep an eye out, and often can be used with for.

Keep an eye out means just look carefully, make sure nothing bad is coming.

Keep an eye out for means pay attention for something specific, okay?

So, if you're doing something bad, let's say when you're a teenager, you're in the back of the plaza and you're smoking your first cigarette, so you're always, you know, keeping your eye out, make sure no adult comes or no police come.

And then if you get somebody else does something bad, like somebody does drugs, then they keep an eye out for police, so something more specific, okay?

Not promoting either of those things, just giving you an example in English.

Now, chin up can be a verb or keep your chin up as a noun.

Both of them essentially mean the same thing.

Let's say you had a basketball game and you lost, and your coach tells you, you guys played a great game, you put a good effort, keep your heads up.

Don't feel dejected, don't feel sad, don't feel upset about whatever happened.

Now, heads up, again, notice that I have the head with an S, heads.

It doesn't mean you have more than one head.

Usually when somebody shouts heads up, and usually, heads up, right, like they do it very loud, it means that something is flying in the air, everybody should look up to see where it is, and just, it's a warning.

Now, realistically, if something is flying in the air, and somebody yells heads up, most people automatically go down because they know something is in the air.

If you put heads up, then you might get hit in the head, so it's a little bit risky.

It's just a warning shout, and you're shouting it to many people, that's why many heads.

Head around, in this case, again, it could be a verb, head around the building means go around the building, but if you're talking about, as a noun, oh, sorry, I got the wrong colour here, you try to get your head around something.

It means you have a problem, or something that is very difficult to understand, you're trying to get your head around.

Wrap, so here's a puzzle, somebody did something that just doesn't make any sense, and you're just, you know, you're just trying to get your head around it, like, why did this person do that?

It doesn't make sense, so you're trying to understand.

Now, again, hand out could be a verb, the teacher hands out some assignment, but if somebody has their hand out, if someone has their hand out, it means they're asking for help, or they're asking for money, or they're asking for charity, right?

So that's what to have one's hand out means to ask for something.

To have a stomach for something means to be able to tolerate it, okay?

If you don't have the stomach for high-risk maneuvers, and like, let's say you're driving and you want to make some really fast turns, or things like that, some people don't have the stomach for it.

It means they're too afraid, or they can't stand it, or they get sick, or whatever.

If you do have the stomach for something, it means you're willing to try to do it, okay?

Back up, to have your back up, or to have your back up against, like against the wall, for example, okay?

So, again, back up could be a verb, to back up, or to back up your computer, but here, we're talking about your actual back, right?

So if you have your back up, now, think of a cat.

When a cat thinks it's about to be attacked, its back goes up, and it gets into, like, this little curve, right?

If you have your back up, it means you're defensive, you're ready to fight.

You think someone is attacking you, so you get very defensive.

If you have your back up against something, it means also you're in a very difficult position, you don't have options, right?

And you think that you're... somebody's trying to attack you as well.

So, if you have your back up against the wall, you don't really have any options, and you're probably going to attack at some point, because that's your only option.

Now, so all of these are nouns with prepositions.

This is a verb, so muscle, you have muscles all over your body.

To muscle through means to force your way through something.

So, if a door is locked, you just, you know, use a little bit of muscle power and you muscle through the door.

So, for example, if you're at the office, you want to get something done, you want your boss to sign something, you just muscle it through to his desk, he signs it, you're off.