Hey English learners, welcome to another phrasal verb episode.
I hope you're doing excellent and that you're ready to learn a couple new phrasal verbs today.
We're going to look at two.
The first one is border on. and the other one is boss around.
So first, let's define these two phrasal verbs and see an example of each one.
What does border on mean?
This means to be very close to being something.
If we say that something borders on something else, we're saying this thing is very close to being that other thing.
For example, I could say the way they treat their servant borders on abuse.
This means that the way that they treat their servant borders resembles abuse.
It's very close to abuse.
It might not be exactly at that level, but it's pretty close to abuse.
It borders on abuse.
Okay.
All right.
The other phrasal verb is boss around.
So what does this mean?
When someone bosses someone around, it means that they tell that person what to do and they give them orders in an annoying way.
They're like happy that they have this authority over this other person and they order them around and tell them what to do, and all of that.
For example, I could say In this sentence I'm saying that in that job the man's co-workers were ordering him to do things and trying to act like his boss and tell him what to do.
And they weren't even his superiors.
They weren't his manager or his boss.
They were supposedly equal to him, but they bossed him around.
So that's boss around.
Now let me talk about a couple different things, and I'm going to use these phrasal verbs again and again in different sentences, while you listen.
And if you need the transcript for this episode, you can also find that in the description below this episode.
So this is also listening practice for you.
So let me first talk about some different work situations that are somewhat extreme.
When I think of extreme work situations, the first thing that comes to mind is when people are working in conditions, and these conditions are really hard, really tough.
The hours are just so, so long and it's really hard work.
The pay is really low.
So these people's work situation borders on slavery.
It's really close to just how slaves are treated.
Obviously, this is not the case in most businesses around the U.S., thankfully.
But there are places in the world where, if we were to look at the conditions and how these people are treated, some people might say that it borders on slavery.
It's really close to that.
And people might wonder how can people continue to work in these conditions, in this situation that borders on slavery?
And maybe those workers have no choice.
They just have to feed their family.
They need that money.
They don't have any other option other.
We don't really know everyone's individual situation, but of course this happens in a lot of places.
Another situation I thought of, which is less extreme probably, is that some people dedicate their whole life to their work, to the point that it borders on addiction.
Some people might even say that they are addicted to working.
Their fascination, their passion for their job borders on addiction, and it's probably even unhealthy.
I don't know if you know someone like this who just lives every second of their day for their work, their job, and it's not like the first situation that I mentioned where it borders on slavery.
This one is more like the person themselves is addicted to this work.
They're choosing to spend every moment of their waking life doing this thing.
Some people have an addiction to work and other people might think that that's pretty strange, because a lot of people don't want to work.
They have the opposite problem they're too lazy or they need to work harder or they're irresponsible or whatever.
So it might seem a little strange for some people that other people are so into their work that it borders on addiction.
So that's another situation.
Another situation I thought of is when some workers are so relaxed in their job and they're so casual about their job and how they treat it.
And maybe they even have an important role.
They're so relaxed and casual about things that that it borders on negligence.
Negligence just means that you fail to take the proper care to do something.
So these workers work in such a relaxed and casual way in important roles?
Perhaps that that it borders on negligence like they should be fired, probably.
They're not taking enough care to do things that they're supposed to do, important things.
Maybe they're even putting people's lives at risk.
Maybe in their role, they have to do really important things.
And if they don't do them, it puts people in danger.
But maybe some people in these roles are so relaxed about their job that that they don't really place the proper importance on all of the different tasks they're supposed to do and they don't pay as much attention as they're supposed to.
And this borders on negligence, and it can be a serious thing.
It can be something that puts people at risk or puts the company at risk.
So that's another one.
One other situation I thought of is when some people are so casual when talking to their boss or another person in authority.
They're so casual that it borders on disrespect.
Like people often want to be casual when they talk to other people.
And even some bosses, like when their workers are a little bit more casual in the way they talk to them.
But sometimes it can go too far and the workers can almost disrespect, or really disrespect their authority, their boss, their manager, because of how casual they're being.
Like they're not even recognizing that the person has a superior position and is their authority in that specific domain.
So that can border on disrespect sometimes.
Like It's sometimes cool to be a little casual, but if you take it too far the boss, the superior, the authority they might actually feel that that person is being disrespectful to them.
Being too casual with your authority can border on disrespect in different situations.
The other thing I wanted to talk about is how my son interacts with other kids.
My son, as many of you know, is extremely shy.
He's not just one of the shy kids.
He's one of those shy kids that takes like months and months to finally feel comfortable with a person.
I might be exaggerating a little bit, but just a little bit.
He's very shy.
He's very timid.
He doesn't like to approach other kids.
He is very submissive.
That's another big thing.
When he does play with kids, and thankfully, he's starting to play with more kids now.
It's really fun to watch.
He's still really shy, but he's at least made a couple friends, thankfully.
When he does play with other kids, he's very submissive.
He allows these other kids to boss him around.
And it happens constantly, because one thing to know about many kids is that it's a natural thing for them to want to boss other kids around.
I'm not saying every kid does this, but it is a common thing.
It's something that you have to train them not to do.
Hey, stop bossing your sister around.
Hey, stop bossing your friends around.
If you're a parent of young children, you might know what I'm talking about.
Or if you're a teacher of young children, you might see this on a regular basis.
Kids often boss around other kids.
People like to feel like they're in authority and they like to tell other people what to do.
Even adults get like this.
Some adults love bossing other people around.
It gives them so much pleasure.
So if some adults like this, you can imagine that many kids act this way.
And my son, like I said, is very submissive and it's usually not a problem for him because he actually likes being led by other people.
He is not a kid that is going to go up and start to lead the other group of kids to go play somewhere and he's going to tell them what they should do.
Not at all.
My son actually likes when another kid can actually start the fun, the game or whatever, and he likes when the other kid tells him what to do usually.
So other kids tend to like my son because they can boss him around.
They don't really clash, they don't really fight when that happens, whereas when these kids boss around Other kids that often ends in a fight, an argument that is a little more complicated.
But because my son really likes when another kid takes charge, that actually works really well.
My son rarely has problems with other kids because of this.
But even my son gets sick of being bossed around sometimes.
In general, he likes when he is led around.
By the other person.
But there comes a point when the other kid just takes it too far.
I've seen this.
I've observed how he plays with some other kids, and some other kids can be really bossy, extremely bossy.
And I'm a parent, so I'm very patient with this.
But even I start to get really annoyed listening to some of these kids boss my son around and tell him everything he's supposed to do and say that he's doing it wrong and taking the block out of his hand and saying no, don't do it like that.
You're doing it wrong.
Do it like this.
Do it like that.
I even get annoyed and I'm an adult and I'm supposed to have a lot more patience than a kid.
But trust me, some of these kids can get pretty annoying with how much they boss other kids around.
And so my son, of course, sometimes gets tired of this, and they just boss him around too much, to the point where he stops playing with them.
I remember him doing this a couple times where he just gives up.
It's like, this person won't let me do anything that I want to do.
I'm going to stop playing with them.
And when that happens the other kid gets really upset because my son stopped playing with them and They don't even realize why my son stopped.
So this is something that kids just have to learn.
They need to learn that other people do not appreciate being bossed around a lot.
Even people like my son, who likes taking orders, There's a certain point where it becomes annoying and it just prevents the kids from having any fun.
But this is a common thing.
This is something that happens a lot.
Kids boss other kids around.
I'm not saying this is a huge problem if it happens.
It's just something we need to address and tell our kids not to do and teach them how to better interact with other kids and teach them not to boss other people around, teach them how to cooperate with other kids and play nicely and give other kids the chance to make decisions and do things differently and And let other kids do things the way they want.
That really is one of the biggest things that causes kids to boss other kids around.
Like kids want other kids to do things the way they want them done.
So if they can understand that, it's important to let other kids do things the way they want to do them when playing, or sometimes the kids just need to play separately for a while because there's just too much ordering around and bossing around going on.
So in summary, I think it's important to teach our kids not to boss around other kids.
I hope that as I was talking, you were able to hear these phrasal verbs repeated many times and that you now feel more comfortable with these phrasal verbs and maybe you can even try to use them in your own sentences.
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All right, thank you so much for listening to this phrasal verb episode and I'll talk to you in the next one.
