What types of prepositions make Phrasal Verbs.

Introduction

The function and usage of preposition are a problem for adults learning English. English preposition can form complex unit with verbs; these are commonly known referred to as phrasal verbs. In this paper I aim to study what type of preposition make the phrasal verbs.

Phrasal verbs can be considered as a special kind of verbs (Celce, 1983, 12-36). Different linguists have given different definitions to illustrate their understanding about phrasal verbs. Randolph Quirk in A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Quirk, 1972, Pp. 99-103) states that “A phrasal verb belongs to multi-word verbs”. The main category of multi-word verbs consists of such combinations as drink up, dispose of, and get away with, which are called phrasal verb, prepositional verb, and phrasal-prepositional verb respectively. However, these combinations are considered multi-word verbs only where they behave as a single unit. Thus a phrasal verb consists of a verb plus an adverb and functions as a single unit. The meaning of the combination manifestly cannot be predicted from the meanings of verb and particle in isolation (Erickson, 1984, 99-105).

F. R. Palmer in The English Verb (Matsui, 1979, 109-121) states that “A phrasal verb consists of two elements, a verb and an adverbial particle”. An adverbial particle is an adverb which follows a verb and is regarded and parsed as a part of the verb. The adverbial particle is treated like a suffix of the verb stem. In a phrasal verb with a literal meaning, there is a verb of notion. The particle indicates the direction of motion. The phrasal verb as a whole occupies a final resultant position. In a phrasal verb with a purely idiomatic meaning, it would be difficult to see what kind of direction could be implied by the particle (Hasegawa, 1982, 14-39). Some grammarians, such as Martha Kolln (1996) in Understanding English Grammar, take the view that phrasal verbs define only those combinations that form an idiom, a phrase whose meaning cannot be predicted from the meaning of its parts. This is the holistic or semantic view, which focuses mainly on the meaning of the verb combination

From the above definitions, we can see that there are mainly two views on phrasal verbs. One is the broad sense of phrasal verbs; therefore a phrasal verb consists of a verb and an adverb or a verb and preposition (or verb with both adverb and preposition). The other is the narrow sense of phrasal verbs, so that phrasal verbs are verb plus adverb constructions. (Jespersen, 1933, 74-89)

Discussion

English prepositional verbs

Although we may simply classify verbs as transitive or intransitive or both, it should be obvious that verbs will have to be subcategorized with respect to the full range of complements which they permit. For example, some verbs permit one or more PP complements; as we see from (1) below, different verbs take different PP complements headed by different prepositions:

(1) a. John waited [for/to/after/from the taxi].

b. You cannot totally rely [on/by/with/from/to him].

c. Nothing can ...