This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 229, Take or Bring.
Avoid this common English mistake. Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English.
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Hello, Lindsay. How are you today? Feeling great, Aubrey.
How are you? How's it going? I'm excellent.
I'm very excited for this episode. We are sharing a very common mistake, but first I have a question for you, Lindsay.
Oh, okay. I'm ready. I'm ready. How often do you order food delivery, like from Grubhub, Uber Eats, something like that?
Well, it's almost lunchtime, Aubrey. How can you speak about food delivery right now?
How could you do this to me? I do sometimes.
Not super often. Maybe once a month. It is expensive, right?
But yeah, certainly I would love for someone to just bring me my meal every day.
It would be a dream. And I would just order ice cream sundaes every day.
I don't know how people afford to do it all the time.
I feel like it's really ramped up how often people do that.
Lots of teenagers. I've noticed my daughter was working and she said a lot of the coworkers, they're all kind of teenagers.
They would order Grubhub delivered while they're working. wow lots of them all the time like how do they afford that save your money that's a that's a new thing i think well obviously it's new i mean these these businesses have cropped up with delivery that i know when you and i were working we had to send some like what somebody would run to the sandwich place and grab food for everybody right we didn't have the option of ordering food delivery or you bring your little brown paper bag you know or you bring your own lunch exactly even cheaper which is great too i've done that a lot as well so we are going to give results for a poll at the end of today's episode right aubry we're going to get it yes we have a key poll for today so stay to the end we are going to ask you guys a really interesting question about today's episode if you listen in spotify so we'll share that at the end but we used an interesting verb here in this little intro conversation bring you said i'd love for someone to bring me food every day yes and there's a very common error that language learners make in english which is differentiating between take and bring and we know this is common because in a lot of languages it's the same verb in french there's one verb and in english we split it and it's take and bring and so this can be very confusing for language learners Oh, yes.
This is very subtle, right? So we're going to teach you guys the subtleties today.
Was there another episode? Did we mention that other episode where this came from?
Did we mention that? No, we haven't yet.
And yes, we were recording an episode of All Ears English about the verb get and all of the verbs that we replace with get.
And this came up, right, Lindsay? You were like, we need to do a follow up about bring and take.
Yes. Because these sometimes we use get instead of bring.
And there's a common error that we see. We want to make sure you guys are aware of it so that you can confidently use both of these verbs in English.
So make sure, first of all, go ahead and open up your search bar right now, guys.
Type in All Ears English and that will get you over to All Ears English.
Go ahead and hit that follow button immediately.
Yes. And check out episode 2121 if you missed it.
That's sort of part one of this. It was called Almost 177 Ways to Use Get in English because there are 177 phrasal verbs with get.
Crazy. Yes. But this is sort of a follow up focusing in on take and bring and this common error that we see.
All right, so let's guide our listeners right into this topic.
Again, we're going into nuance, we're going into subtleties, but our listeners are ready for it, Aubrey.
Yes, exactly. So let's talk about this error that we see, right?
Like I mentioned, this verb error. These two verbs are often one verb in other languages.
So we might hear a mistake like, can you take me that report?
Or can you bring this to his office? And today we're going to dive in.
Why is that an error? You guys listening out there, you might be like, wait, what's the mistake?
That sounds good to me. These are used for specific, especially when we're talking about something being delivered, like food being delivered to you, papers being delivered to an office.
We use these all the time at work and it's really easy to mix them up.
Yeah. I mean, certainly, can you take me that report?
It feels like nails on a chalkboard, right?
So that doesn't feel right. But can you bring this to his office?
I feel like we say that colloquially. Yes.
This is a colloquial English thing. That might not sound as incorrect to you.
But for our purposes, to make sure you always get it right, we'll share.
When you should use bring... and when you should use take.
We'll separate them out so that you make sure you get it right always.
Because when it's colloquial English, there may be places in the U.S. or other English-speaking country where that's nails on a chalkboard to them.
Interesting. Okay. All right. Well, I'm excited to learn something here today too then.
Let's do it. Let's get into it, Aubrey. awesome okay let's dive into bring first and we use this to ask for something to be delivered to the speaker okay right so can you please bring me three copies so wherever i am i'm saying please bring me something okay so it's taking the point of view of the speaker and it's something that is coming to you right from someone else exactly so the mistake would be can you please take me three copies of this because if i'm saying deliver it to me i'll always use bring ah okay or for example please bring a copy of the agenda to the meeting so again this is a little trickier where it's assumed that you will be at the meeting right these copies are coming right so this is where it's not always going to be bring me this bring me that often it will be assumed the location of the speaker interesting maybe in a future time like this please bring me a copy or bring a copy of the agenda to the meeting.
This is tricky. So is this assuming that if I'm giving you instructions, but I'm not going to be at the meeting, I have to say, please take a copy of the agenda to the meeting, grammatically speaking.
Grammatically speaking, yes. Good point.
If I'm not going to be at the meeting, then I would change the way I say this.
I'd say, please take a copy of the agenda.
Because I'm saying, with you, I'm not asking you to bring anything to me to where I'll be.
Yeah, I guess that makes sense. I think a lot of native speakers would would even still say that again, like we said, even if you're not going to be there, make sure you bring a copy to the meeting.
But if we want to be 100% in line with the rules, then this is good to know, Aubrey.
Yes, this is what of those really tricky things in English where you might hear native speakers make this mistake.
Some will care a lot more than others. This might be an Americanism.
We might make the mistake more in the U.S., but if you are in another English-speaking country, they might be more clear about it or more strict about which one they use.
So when in doubt, yeah, we just want to be clear on the grammar that bring is used for to bring it to the speaker, to the location of the speaker.
All right. And so after a quick break, we're going to come over to take.
Excited to get into that. Here we go. Yes.
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Exclusions apply. See details online. Okay, Aubrey, we are back.
We're getting into take now. Now tell us about take.
Yes. So take is used when we're talking about something being delivered, right?
Because of course, for bring and take, there are lots of things you can say, but the error that we see is when something is being delivered.
And this is for something being delivered elsewhere, not to the speaker.
Right, right. It's the opposite. Right. The opposite.
Yeah. So for example, can you take this to my office?
Okay. This would be a mistake if I'm not...
If I'm in my office, it'd be strange, right?
Can you take me this paper? No, that doesn't work.
Can you take this to my office? If I'm in my office, you might be confused.
Wait, now, what do you mean, right? This would be if I'm not in my office and I'm asking you to deliver something there.
Right. Definitely in terms of a tip off of meaning, when you say that to me, automatically I think, okay, you're not there.
You've already left the office, let's say, or you haven't gotten there yet.
Exactly. Because if I say, can you bring this to my office?
Your assumption is I'm in the office and it would be strange if I wasn't.
Hmm, interesting. Okay, what else? Any other examples with take?
Yeah, and you could say, please take this delivery to our client's office, right?
Maybe you have, you're sending something via courier, you wouldn't say, you know, bring this to the client's office, because I'm only going to say bring as the speaker if you're bringing something to me.
Oh, tricky. I'm learning something today.
It is interesting, especially like you said, where colloquially we're a little more loose, a little more flexible, but some of these sound really wrong to you, right?
To say, you know, that initial mistake, you can't say, can you take me that report?
No, that feels very wrong. Very wrong. Do we have a poll to announce?
Here's our poll that we mentioned at the top of the show.
Aubrey, shall we announce that and get our listeners to take action?
Let's do it, right? If you listen in Spotify, you can answer our polls.
There's a key poll today. We want to know, Which of these verbs do you use more often at work, take or bring?
I don't know about you, Lindsay. I feel like I use take a lot more, but I don't know.
I'd have to think about it. You guys might want to think about it a little bit before you answer the poll question.
Yeah, think about it. Go ahead for a couple of days at work and maybe come back to the episode, answer it, and see what comes up the most.
We are going to announce the results a little bit later on, maybe in a few weeks, right, Aubrey?
We'll come back to that, let you know. Yes, absolutely.
Okay, so roleplay time. All right. Yes. In this roleplay, I am delivering Uber Eats to your office, Lindsay.
Oh, nice. I'll start us out. Yes. Do you know where office 202A is?
I'm bringing them a food delivery. You found it.
Thanks for bringing this. No problem. Sorry.
I'm late. I took it to the building next door accidentally.
Our office is hard to find. You're not the first one to take something to the wrong office.
Oh, it makes me think of pizza delivery.
Oh, now I want pizza. And it's so funny because I, I'm seeing here that I, I wrote one colloquially and we'll say in the role play where I said, I'm bringing them a food delivery.
Because I'm not there, I should say I'm taking.
I'm taking them a food delivery. But it doesn't feel right.
It doesn't feel right. It's so interesting.
We'll often use bringing, whether it's to myself or to someone else.
But the actual, like, I should be taking.
I'm taking this to them. I think maybe, in my opinion, I think maybe this is one of the times where we give our listeners permission to break the rule.
Especially if you're in the U.S., if you're working in the U.S.
Yeah. This is a little more accepted. Also, I would change the grammar if I want to use take there.
I'm taking a food delivery to them. I would never say I'm taking them a food delivery, right?
Wouldn't you agree? And this is, it's almost like if you are going with it, it's like I'm bringing them a food delivery so that myself is going there, so that I'm going there as well.
Maybe that's why we sort of bend the grammar here. um tricky okay let's go on to the next so i said you found it thanks for bringing this so i'm saying bringing this because i'm here and it's come to me i have brought it to you yes okay and then i say i took it to the building next door accidentally and this again because i'm talking about taking it to someone other than the speaker i wouldn't say bring Because I'm the speaker, right?
I took it to the building next door accidentally.
And then you're saying our office is hard to find.
You're not the first one to take something to the wrong office.
Yes. And this would be strange to say you're not the first one to bring something to the wrong office because you're not talking about something being brought to you, but taking it elsewhere.
Right. But just in contrast, if you said you're not the first one to bring something to our office instead of the correct one, that would work.
Yes. You would want to say bring because it's coming to you, the speaker. oh interesting all right well so we've seen you know a tendency of native speakers at least in the us we might be a little more liberal as we said with bring in different ways guys always focus on connection right that's the most important thing of course what else should we come away with today think we have a pro tip for you guys as we went through this i think if you avoid saying take me right take me this thing we're always saying bring me because it's bring to me that feels like the biggest like you said sort of nails on a chalkboard mistake here right collocate that take and me together Okay.
I like that. Maybe that should be the most important takeaway.
Don't get stressed out about all these rules that maybe you haven't heard before.
Focus on the 80-20 approach, which is if you hear yourself saying, take me, what is it again, Aubrey?
Yeah. You wouldn't want to say like, can you take me my mail?
Always say, bring me. Can you bring me my mail?
Think of it as coming to the speaker. So if you just eliminate that chunk, that's really the biggest mistake, especially a lot of this is very accepted in colloquial English.
So avoid saying, take me and instead bring me.
Can you bring me my mail? Can you bring me that delivery? yeah i love it and you know when you do get meal delivery don't be afraid to engage in a little just a greeting like how's your day going you know i think uh just like as a note you know the this is a tough job meal delivery is tough uber eats it's true crop hub and doing this work people either on bikes in places like new york city or in the car running around just give them a smile have a connection moment right there and it doesn't matter.
I love that. Perfect in that moment. It's about that connection, getting them to smile.
Right. And I think a lot of us, we sort of think, well, I've tipped them.
So done check. And we don't think about that human connection, right?
It shouldn't replace the kindness. So that's really good advice.
Lindsay money can't fill up. like where there's a lack of kindness, right?
That's not something money can fill. So that's your opportunity.
Order pizza, you know, have a quick conversation with the delivery person and it makes the world a better place, right?
Absolutely. I agree. I love that. All right.
Good stuff. Aubrey, you have a good day.
I'll talk to you soon. You too. Thanks, Lindsay.
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