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Prepositions: It's Idiomatic

George woke up Martha in the morning

No matter how many terms and concepts one masters, every alleged authority on language use is bound to be asked questions about quirks of English for which he or she has no good explanation. When confronted with such questions, one phrase will serve you well: "It's idiomatic." Spoken with the correct amount of bored assurance, this suggests that the listener should have known that, whereas with any luck the listener will be unclear on the meaning of idiomatic itself. If you are unclear yourself, then remember that an idiom is an expression whose meaning in a given language community cannot be derived from the normal meanings of its constitent parts. Why, for example, are baked goods thought to be so simple that we say something is "a piece of cake" or "easy as pie"? Why? It's idiomatic.

A particular problem in English is the use of prepositions. Some prepositions carry meanings of their own and are more or less specialized. Some suggest directions and are often used to head place adverbials (above, along, around, behind, below, beside, down, from, in, into, near, off, toward, on, under, up. Others are particularly used for time adverbials (after, before, during, since). But some of the most common prepositions (at, by, to, with) have very diverse uses. All in all, prepositions are a tricky category. If you have trouble recognizing prepositions, you may have to memorize them; the list is not that long.

One reason why prepositions (and those adverbs which also function as prepositions) are tricky is that their use is often linked closely with preceding verbs, nouns, or adjectives. These links often seem arbitrary, and errors in such idiomatic uses are fairly common even with native speakers. The effect is rather like that of using a big word one does not quite understand; it suggests that the writer is trying a little too hard to impress. Most good dictionaries provide help with these expressions, and it is a good idea to consult them when using an idiom one is not entirely familiar with. In the long run, of course, it is worth mastering these combinations for oneself. Questions involving such combinations do crop up on sentence correction sections of tests like the GMAT.

Verbs-Particle Combinations. If simply calling them idiomatic fails to satisfy, notice that many verb and particle combinations function very much like verbs--i.e. two-word or three-word verbs. In sentence (1), the word with certainly looks like the beginning of a prepositional phrase. On is also normally either an adverb or a preposition, but what is it doing here?

(1) Carry on with your work.
The easiest answer is that carry on is a multi-word verb, one whose meaning ("continue") is not easily predicted from the meaning of either carry or on. We can then say that either that (a) with is an optional part of this verb, changing the intransitive carry on to the transitive carry on with or (b) that with is a preposition idiomatically used with carry on. Unfortunately, this is one of those areas in which linguistic approaches (even traditionalist ones) diverge from school grammars. In dealing with analytic questions asked from a traditional school grammar perspective, it might be safer to treat on as either an adverb or another preposition, and it would certainly be wise to treat with as a preposition.

Some people call all multi-word verbs phrasal verbs. Others prefer to save that term for those cases in which the verb-particle combination includes an adverb. Some memorable examples (useful for teaching) are shut up, throw up, and pick up. The tricky thing about phrasal verbs of this sort is that those which are transitive can usually (not always) move the direct object in between the verb and the particle:

(2) George threw up his lunch.
(3) George threw his lunch up.

With many verbs, this movement is obligatory when the direct object is a preposition. Sentences (2) and (3) are both acceptable, but only (4)(b) is Standard English:

(4) (a) *George picked up her at the bar.
(b) George picked her up at the bar.

When diagramming cases in which the verb particle has been moved to the other side of the direct object, we might want to show a trace, just as we do in WH-questions after WH-MOVEMENT. In the phrase structure tree below, WH-MOVEMENT has efffectively cancelled out INVERSION, so no movement is show for the tense itself.

Other multi-word verbs are prepositional verbs, like look at. These can also be analyzed as cases where verbs take prepositional phrases headed by particular prepositions, but the prepositions are tied much more closely to the verb than to the following noun phrase. Notice how much more idiomatic it feels to leave the preposition behind when WH-MOVEMENT is applied to sentences with such verbs:

(5) (a) What did the committee look at?
(b) ?At what did the committee look?
(6) (a) What were you taking care of?
(b) ??Of what were you taking care?.
As (6) shows, at is not the only preposition that is used in such expressions, but it is a particularly frequent one, often used to mark objects of otherwise intransitive verbs:
(7) (a) The dog barks.
(b) The dogs barks at strangers.
(8) (a) The grandmother beamed.
(b) The grandmother beamed at her grandson.
(9) (a) George frowned.
(b) George frowned at Edgar.
Similar verbs include gasp, giggle, glare, glower, grin, groan, growl, grumble, grunt, hoot, laugh, leer, nod, peer, scowl, shudder, sigh, smile, smirk, stare, and wink. Notice that some verbs are able to use more than one preposition for the purpose, a point which makes clear the arbitrary character of such idioms:
(10) (a) George pointed at the blackboard.
(b) George pointed to the blackboard.
(11) (a) Martha waved at George.
(b) Martha waved to George.

Here are some other common verb and preposition combinations you should be familiar with--get appears in many such:

(12) I agree with you.
(13) The nurse will attend to him.
(14) His victory was attributed to dumb luck.
(15) The debate centers on his use of money.
(16) The product conforms to government specifications.
(17) We differ from them on this point.
(18) She can always get around her father's rules.
(19) His ideas always result in disaster.

There are also verbs with two particles, one adverb and one preposition--like put up with or face up to. Finally, there are some cases in which there is more than one verb in a multi-word verb, like make do or make do with. Distinguishing such cases from normal prepositional or adverbial uses requires paying attention to the meaning.

Exercise 1: Multi-Word Verbs

Can you say which of the following have multi-word verbs?
1.01 Who do you look up to?
1.02 George looked Martha up when he got in town.
1.03 George looked up the chimney to see if it was drawing.
1.04 Henry will end up badly.
1.05 Whether to take up arms against a sea of troubles . . .
1.06 Henry gets away with murder.
1.07 George put Henry up to it, though.
1.08 Sometimes it's hard for parents to let go.
1.09 I'd like to point out a few mistakes here.
1.10 George pointed out the window at the tree on the front lawn.

Just for the Record: Prepositions and Other Parts of Speech. English also has conventional combinations of prepositions with particular adjectives (20-25) and nouns (26-29) that you might want to master. To explain these, one can only say that they are "idiomatic":

(20) I'm aware of that.
(21) My experience has been different from yours.
(22) I'm familiar with that idiom.
(23) He is indifferent to pain.
(24) I am responsible for your safety.
(25) We are sure of that.
(26) We had a vigrous debate over that.
(27) Who can resist the fascination of grammar?
(28) We declared our independence from Britain.
(29) This was a result of his own failures.

How Much of This Will be on the Test?
If you can't recognize prepositions by this time, start memorizing. Do not assume that every small word is a preposition. You should be able to recognize multi-word verbs under various names. You should be prepared to defend yourself from people who have found exceptions to your generalizations by flourishing the word idiomatic