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bring up

phraseB22 meaningsNot compared — the two pools are counted one word at a time, so a phrase has no score

To bring up a child is to care for them until they are grown. Feeding, teaching, and being there for eighteen years.

It is the everyday British phrase, and Americans usually say raise. The passive is very common, as in she was brought up in Leeds, which tells you where somebody spent their childhood. The same phrasal verb has a second and quite unrelated sense, since to bring up a subject is to start talking about it, usually one nobody was expecting. There is a third, blunter sense meaning to vomit.

Definitions of bring up

  1. 1phrasebring upTo care for and educate a child until adulthood.B2

    “Her grandmother helped to bring up all four of them.”

  2. 2phraseintroduceTo introduce a subject into a conversation.B2

    “Nobody wanted to bring up the subject of money.”

Also accepted in games: raise

Where it comes from

  1. Middle English

    bryngen up

  2. English, today

    bring up

From Middle English bryngen up, dissimilated from Middle English upbryngen (“to bring up, raise”). a doublet of upbring.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Family & People, Phrasal Verbs, A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 5 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word