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Why do we use up as adverbs for verbs? For example, 'wake up', 'throw up', etc.

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This question seems silly to me, "up" doesn't have any special status: get on, wait on, go on, etc. – delete Sep 14 '10 at 8:38
The one that puzzles me more is "one up" as in "One up on Wall Street" – 動靜能量 Sep 14 '10 at 9:16
@Jian: maybe you could make that a separate question? – delete Sep 14 '10 at 14:20
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Looking at the answers, especially the accepted one, I think that this question simply needs rewording along the lines of "Is there a difference between 'wake up' and 'wake', 'throw up' and 'throw'?" or something like that. – RegDwighт♦ Sep 14 '10 at 23:48

3 Answers

up vote 7 down vote accepted

"wake up" and "throw up" are phrasal verbs.

A phrasal verb is a combination of a verb and a preposition, a verb and an adverb, or a verb with both an adverb and a preposition, any of which are part of the syntax of the sentence, and so are a complete semantic unit. Sentences may contain direct and indirect objects in addition to the phrasal verb. Phrasal verbs are particularly frequent in the English language. A phrasal verb often has a meaning which is different from the original verb.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrasal_verbs

Notice that "throw up" and "throw" have different meanings. "Throw up" means to "vomit", while "throw" means "to propel through the air by a forward motion of the hand and arm".

And "wake" means "to be or remain awake", while "wake up" means to "stop sleeping".

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Thank you for your answer! – input Sep 14 '10 at 10:00
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I think these two have the images of moving our body up, rising the upper body from the bed. Throw up has an image of having the food going from the stomach up to the throat and give it out.

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Yep, that must be the case, most probably. – input Sep 14 '10 at 10:00
What about speed up, lie up, fatten up, whip up? – delete Sep 14 '10 at 12:29
Eat up, toughen up, "man up". – Mike Pope Oct 11 '10 at 2:37
Most of those have the connotation of "more": faster, bigger, more excited. The exceptions are "eat up", where means "completely", parallelled in "finish up" and "break up"; and "lie up", which I cannot explain. – Colin Fine Nov 12 '10 at 15:30
@Colin imagine holding a 3 foot wooden stick by both hands and then bend it to break it... you will see it break "up" – 動靜能量 Apr 15 '11 at 13:30
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up vote 5 down vote

Bruno's right, they're phrasal verbs. Just think of how many phrasal verbs you can construct from "to get": get up, get down, get on, get off, get over, get under, get by, get through ...etc.

I imagine it must be tough for non-native speakers of English to learn these. I suppose you just have get down to work and put up with it.

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Gosh, this isn't really an answer and yet it has got two upvotes. – delete Sep 14 '10 at 14:20

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