To put on or dress as correct in the past. Correct use of the verbs “put on” and “dress”
The Russian language is great, powerful and complex. Even the majority of its speakers do not know its rules and regulations very well. For example, “dress” or “put on” - which is the correct way to say it. Not everyone can give examples, much less apply them in practice. Let's figure it out.
“Dress” and “put on”: rules of use
Both words, as parts of speech, belong to verbs, but are used in different cases:
- Verb " dress» used in relation to an animate being : person, man or woman, boy or girl, etc. It is also used in combination with words denoting inanimate likenesses of a person, e.g. doll, toy;
- This verb answers the question: whom? What? For example: " Grandmotherdressedgrandson for a walk", « Store workersdressedmannequin and put it on display";
- Word " put on» applied to an inanimate object and answers the question: “what?” For example: " Put on a coat (fur coat, jacket) »;
- The same rules apply to slightly modified verbs of this type, such as “ dress" or " put on»;
- There are so-called “test” expressions for the correct use of one or another verb from this series. Special vocabulary pairs are formed related to the concept of “antonym”, i.e. the opposite of semantic meanings, namely: “ put on - take off», « put on - undress" A suit, for example, cannot be “undressed.”
What do you study in a linguistics course?
To know and understand a language, it is necessary to study both the pronunciation of words and their structure and rules of speech presentation:
- Sections such as phonetics, graphics, orthoepy will help us understand the sound structure of words, the placement of stress, the display of sounds on paper in the form of written speech;
- The rules for the formation of words and their composition are studied by a branch of science called word formation;
- One of the main sections is grammar. This science includes such sections as morphology, which studies parts of speech: noun, adjective, verb, numeral, etc. and syntax. The latter, translated from Greek as composition, deals with the study of sentences composed of words and their combinations;
- Spelling and punctuation determine the rules of spelling and punctuation;
- Lexicology and phraseology are studies that help to study the meanings of words used in speech and the use of the most stable expressions;
The style and culture of speech are decisive in the practice of applying the norms of the literary language in communication.
Difference between "put on" and "put on"
The simplest explanation of how two very similar words differ is as follows:
- The expression “dress/dress” is someone in something: a baby in diapers, a daughter in a dress. “Put on/put on” - something on someone: a coat on a mother, boots on a son, etc.;
- The first verb is associated, as a rule, with an animate object or its likeness (in the form of a mannequin or stuffed animal), the second - with an inanimate one, for example, in relation to clothes or shoes;
- You can use these parts of speech more widely, especially if you include fantasy, for example, “dressing a summer meadow with flowers” or “a winter field with snow.” The woman “dresses with taste,” but there is “a riddle about the grandfather who is dressed in a hundred fur coats, and who undresses him...” - everyone knows the answer. You can put a collar on a dog, a saddle on a horse, or a pillowcase on a pillow;
- Figurative thinking will also help explain the difference between these two words. Boots can be put on your feet, or you can simply decorate them with colored ribbons or a scarf, i.e. “put it on,” and everything will immediately become clear.
There are some disagreements between individual philologists regarding the use of these verbs, but this is a matter for science.
Are shoes worn or worn?
Shoes putting on shoes. But this option is, so to speak, “conversational”, and the rule remains the same:
- The commonly used word is “put” (on a person’s feet) shoes, sandals, sandals, boots, but put on shoes (yourself) or put on a child’s shoes, i.e. put his feet in some kind of shoes, which is confirmed by V.I. Dahl’s dictionary. In conversational terms, this is acceptable. Along with the “dress-undress” pair, there is a “shoe-undress” pair;
- The expression “put shoes on someone” also has a figurative semantic meaning, in terms of carry out, deceive;
- They also say “shod from boots into bast shoes,” i.e. it became worse than it was;
- The term put on shoes is used in figurative everyday colloquial speech, sayings and proverbs: the expression “puts on shoes and clothes” has the meaning of material support. To live “without shoes or shoes” means: neither this nor that, this way and that.
The meaning of these verbs in Russian dictionaries
There are many of them, as well as their compilers:
- The first edition of V. I. Dahl’s dictionary was published in the 60s of the 19th century, the latest editions - already in the 21st century;
- According to the compiler, “put on” means to clothe, dress up in something, throw on: clothes, shoes, a shell. Put on a caftan, boots...a needle and a thread. The following explanations were given for the word “dress”: to dress someone with something, to put something on someone, to provide clothes, to cover for warmth... “Dress me with a sheepskin coat”, “to dress the young ladies”, “the trees are dressed with leaves”, etc. d.;
- The dictionary of S.I. Ozhegov was created on the basis of the explanatory dictionary of D.N. Ushakov. The first edition was published in 1949, the 24th edition in 2007, edited by L. I. Skvortsov;
- “Put on” has two main meanings: The first is to put on or attach something: for example, to put on glasses or a ring. The second meaning is to cover all or part of the body with some kind of clothing: “It was cold outside, and Valya decided to put on a fur coat.” The verb “to dress”, according to the author, in the first meaning seems to repeat the same meaning in terms of covering someone with something, but with the difference that it refers to a “living” object: “to cover a sick person with a blanket” or “to change clothes for a child” " In the second meaning, the essence lies in the general attitude towards someone: “Mom dressed her daughter fashionably,” or in the sense of “dressing richly,” i.e. provide someone with expensive clothes.
Language dictionaries were mainly published and are now published by the Academies of Sciences: Imperial, Soviet, Russian.
In everyday communication, we often do not attach due importance to “little things” such as the accuracy of using verbs like “dress” or “put on”, and we do not think about how to speak correctly. The examples in the article above were intended to help us understand this.
Video about the correct use of “dressing” verbs
In this video, philologist Andrei Sobolev will tell you a few more mnemonic verses for remembering the correct use of the words “put on” and “dress”:
One of the reasons for lexical errors in modern speech, oral and written, is the failure to distinguish cognate words, in particular, the verbs to dress (dress) - to put on (put on). And in live, direct communication between native speakers of the Russian language - in loose colloquial speech; and in book speech - in radio and television broadcasts, in speeches of politicians at rallies, with various kinds public statements, deputies in the State Duma, officials on one or another official occasion, quite often one can encounter incorrect, erroneous use of lexical units related from the point of view of word formation. For example, they confuse the verbs get used to and get used to, weaken and weaken, adverbs objectivistically and objectively... (see “From Monitoring violations of speech norms in the media” // Gorbanevsky M.V., Karaulov Yu.N., Shaklein V.M. Ne speak in rough language. On violations of the norms of literary speech in electronic and printed media / Edited by Yu. A. Belchikov, 2000, p. 19-137 - based on materials from television, radio broadcasts and newspapers), nouns portrait and self-portrait ( in the program “Field of Miracles”, on the ORT channel, on August 30, 2002, a participant in the game presented the presenter with his “self-portrait, which was drawn by her seven-year-old son”).
In the use of cognate words, the most “unlucky” verbs are dress (dress) - put on (put on) (these verbs belong to paronyms - see the article “Subscriber, subscriber, subscription”).
These words are used incorrectly by both the TV presenter (...what you need to wear to appear under the circus big top // “Don’t speak in rough language”, p. 29), and the radio program host (He dressed himself... // Ibid., p. 40), and a TV correspondent (...there will be a good reason to wear a dress uniform - NTV, August 29, 2002), and a journalist (Winter has come, you need to wear different shoes // Don’t speak in rough language, p. 28), and a pop star (I can’t do anything wear from this collection. // Ibid., p. 106), see in the capital’s Nezavisimaya Gazeta: dated March 12, 1999: “We put on a modernized watch on the right hand.”
The verbs dress and put on are ambiguous. The meanings in which actions towards a person are indicated are as follows:
Dress - who, what. 1. To clothe someone. to some clothes. Dress a child, the sick, the wounded; Wed dress a doll, mannequin...
Put on - what. 1. To pull, push (clothes, shoes, covers, etc.), covering, enveloping something. Put on a suit, skirt, coat, jacket, shoes, mask, gas mask...
The verb to dress combines with animate nouns (and with a small number of inanimate ones, denoting the likeness of a person: doll, mannequin, skeleton); put on - with inanimate.
To complete the description of the lexical-syntactic connections of our verbs, it should be noted that the verb to dress is included (within the 1st meaning) in combinations with inanimate nouns denoting parts of the body, but through the mediation of an animate noun (whom) and necessarily with a prepositional-case combination of an inanimate a noun (in what - in a new form) or with an inanimate noun in the indirect case (in what - a blanket, a shawl) according to the principle of indirect control. Put on (within the 1st meaning) has syntactic connections according to the same principle with animate nouns: put (coat) on someone: on a grandfather, on a child) and with inanimate nouns: put on something (on a hand, on a neck), on top what (over a shirt), under what (under a coat).
The difference in the semantics of these words is emphasized by the fact that they form different antonymic pairs: put on - take off, put on - undress.
The semantic originality of each of the verbs is especially clearly revealed when they occur within the same context. In this regard, poetic texts dedicated to the words in question are of great interest. One of the poems was written in late XIX century, by the now forgotten poet V. Krylov, another by our contemporary N. Matveeva.
Here is the first poem:
Dear friend, do not forget,
What to wear does not mean to wear;
There is no need to confuse these expressions,
Each of them has its own meaning.
You can easily remember this:
We use the verb “to dress” when
We put clothes on something,
Or we cover something with clothes,
Otherwise we dress in clothes.
Do you want to dress yourself more elegantly?
So you should put on a new dress,
And you put on a glove on your hand,
When you put a glove on your hand.
You will dress the child in his dress,
When you put the dress on him.
To whom the native language is both sweet and dear,
He will not tolerate even a trace of mistakes,
And therefore, my friend, never
Don't make such reservations.
As we can see, even more than a hundred years ago, the use of the verbs put on and dress was for native speakers of the Russian language big problem, and then the serious attention of the guardians of correctness was already paid to this native language. It is also obvious that these humorous (at the same time linguistically quite reasonable) poems are still relevant today.
This is confirmed by Novella Matveeva:
“Put on”, “put on”... Two words
We confuse so stupidly!
It was a frosty dawn,
The old grandfather dressed in a fur coat.
And the fur coat, therefore, is on.
“Put it on”, “put it on”... Let’s take a look:
When to wear and what to wear.
I believe that on my grandfather
Three fur coats can be worn.
But I don't think that grandfather
Can be worn on a fur coat!
Distinguish
Confusion in the use of the verbs “put on” and “dress” arose due to the fact that in everyday speech they are used as interchangeable forms. However, this is not a reason to neglect the norms of the Russian literary language, which determine the correctness and accuracy of word usage.
The words “dress” and “put on” have differences in lexical meaning, on which their semantic connection with other words in the sentence depends.
Verb " dress" means an action performed by a person towards another person or an inanimate object:
dress the child
dress the old man
dress the bride in a wedding dress
dress the doll
In speech, the verb “to dress” is connected by a method of control with a noun that names the object of action. This means that the noun in the sentence is a direct object: from the verb “to dress” you can ask the question whom? or what?
dress (who?) little brother in a clean shirt
dress (who?) a girl in a squirrel fur coat
dress (what?) a stuffed animal in an old robe
The verb “to dress” belongs to the category of reflexive verbs, that is, it can be used with the postfix –sya if the action of the subject of speech is directed towards himself:
dressed in everything new
dress in a fashion salon
dress for the season
Verb " put on" denotes an action that is performed in relation to oneself:
I need to wear a new suit
I'll wear something brighter
put on my favorite dress
Only in constructions with the preposition “on” the verb “put on” denotes an action directed at another person or object, most often inanimate:
put a robe on the patient
put glasses on nose
put a cover on the chair
put tires on wheels
A simple hint for the correct use in speech of the verb forms “dress” and “put on” can be the formula: they put on themselves or on something, they “dress” someone, they “dress” themselves.
Masha put on her mother’s beads and looked in the mirror.
The old man put the bait on the hook and cast out the fishing rod.
Anna Andreevna hastily dressed her son in a quilted jacket and went to the door.
The boy woke up, reluctantly got dressed and looked out the window.
the site determined that the difference between the verbs “put on” and “dress” is as follows:
- The verb “put on” means that the action is directed towards oneself. The verb “to dress” is used if the action is directed towards another person or an inanimate object.
- The verb “put on” forms constructions with the preposition “on”. In this case, it denotes an action directed at another person or thing. The verb “to dress” is not used with the preposition “on”.
- The verb “to dress” in a sentence is connected by means of control with a noun that acts as a direct object. The verb “put on” does not have such a stable connection.
- The verb “dress” can be used with the postfix –sya and denote an action directed at oneself. The verb "put on" does not refer to reflexive verbs and with the postfix -sya is not used.
Answered by Yesenia Pavlotski, linguist-morphologist, expert at the Institute of Philology, Mass Information and Psychology of Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University.
Native speakers have made such an issue out of misuse of these words that it's hard to believe anyone's ignorance of the differences dress And put on. And yet the norm for using these words remains a relevant and frequent request in search engines.
Dress And put on, of course, are not variants of the norm, but two different words with different lexical meanings. At least for now.
Dress— who, what, means to clothe someone in some kind of clothing. Dress the child.
Put on — What, means to pull, push (clothes, shoes, covers), covering, enveloping something in something. Put on a suit and headphones.
How else to tell the differences: word dress combines with animate nouns, and put on with the inanimate. We just need to remember that in addition to the current consciousness, we also have an ancient consciousness, which, like instincts, lies dormant, but is always somewhere nearby. Therefore, our language also considers anthropomorphic, human-like objects to be animate. So we also dress a doll and a mannequin, although in general, for the same reason, we can also dress less human-like objects that the language “confuses” with living things: a dead person, an oyster, a microbe.
More words dress And put on enter into different systemic relationships: antonyms put on - take off opposed to antonyms dress - undress .
But if everything is so harmonious and obvious, why do native speakers constantly confuse these words in the flow of speech, even if they know everything about the differences between these paronyms?
The fact is that the language simultaneously strives both to accumulate resources and to cleanse the system of unnecessary things. Language as a living system is characterized by a “shuttle movement” along the base - up and down. He takes the necessary resources, sorts them and gets rid of what has not taken root, is not useful or has worn out. This way it is constantly updated, while at the same time maintaining harmony and consistency.
It happens that the system is fragmented and complicated in certain areas for the needs of the language, and it happens that such fragmentation becomes obsolete. In vocabulary, the result of this process can be generalization: one word covers all other words with other meanings or shades of meaning. For example, today the system perceives the words dress And put on as a fragmentation that has lost its meaning. Now the word dress absorbs words put on And put on shoes. When this absorption is complete, the word dress how the stronger one will have three meanings that once belonged to different words. The phenomena of reality will not go away, but the language will save resources, and this is normal.
Now we see how this process manifests itself: glitches occur in the speech of native speakers. People who know the difference between dress And put on, they say something like this: “Now I’ll put on... oh, I’ll put on a jacket.”. This does not mean that they are not literate enough - it is just that one word absorbs another word and its meaning.
So, today's paronyms dress And put on strictly differ in meaning, but very soon overlapping meanings of these words may become the norm.
The difference between put on and put on confuses many. Their incorrect use is designated as a speech error. These words are paronyms; they are similar in sound and spelling, but they have different meanings. Like any other paronyms, this pair of words is often misused.
You can understand the differences between them, as well as learn the rules of how to use them correctly, using simple ways to memorize them.
This pair of words was highlighted back in 1843 in the “Reference Place of the Russian Word”.
Already there, attention was focused on the complexity of using these words, it was indicated how each word is written, it was described what the difference between them is, when to write and say put on, and when to put on.
The words are similar in morphemic composition and sound; these are verbs. But they differ in the following characteristics:
- they have different prefixes (o- and na-);
- different lexical meaning.
Enshrined in explanatory dictionaries. To dress means to put some clothes on someone, to cover someone, to help. Putting on is an action directed at oneself, at the one who speaks.
But even understanding the lexical differences between these words does not always help you choose the right option.
Important! Rules, tables, examples and “memos” come to the rescue - ways to memorize the rules for using words.
How to choose the right word
You can use the table to select a word:
Examples can be used for better understanding. For the word put on:
- The girl put on a beautiful snow-white dress.
- I put on a hat because it’s cold outside.
- A cool wind blew in the evening, don't forget to wear a warm coat.
- I put on the new jewelry you gave me.
- Put the ring on, I like it so much!
- When putting on pants, don't forget to take out the belt.
- We wore the same overalls completely by accident.
For the word dress:
- I can’t get ready so quickly, I still have three children to dress!
- Dressing children for walks is the responsibility of educators.
- Dress warmly, it's freezing outside!
- Don't wear that skirt on her, it doesn't match her tights!
- It seems strange to me to dress a dog in so many clothes.
- Put glasses on her, she can't see well!
There is a vivid example of a “memory” with a glove. A worn glove is one that has something on it: a hat or scarf. And a glove on is a glove on the hand.
If these methods are not enough, you can use other options.
How to remember the difference forever
Not only rules, but also “memories” help to remember the difference between words and not make mistakes when using them: associative short poems, rhyming lines, short sentences, comic sketches. For example:
- Mommy was dressing her son, and he put on the wrong pants again.
- I will put on a red coat, and I will dress you in a blue coat.
- I dressed according to the new fashion, wearing a dress from the chest of drawers.
- I dressed Maruska in a jacket and put on boots for myself.
- Dress the doll in boots, put on those pants for yourself!
Advice!“They dress in something, put it on themselves!”, “Put it on themselves, dress someone” - sometimes it’s enough to remember these simple phrases for the correct use of words in the future.
You can come up with your own phrase. It should be simple and rhythmic, easy to remember.
Antonymous pairs help you choose between words:
- put on/take off;
- dress/undress.
If you are in doubt about the use of these words, you can replace them. For example, which usage is correct: “put on gloves” or “put on gloves”? If you replace the word with an antonym in the second case, you will get an incorrect phrase: “Take off your gloves.”
Is there a difference?
Disputes continue among Russian language researchers regarding the normative use of these words.
Some argue that there is not much difference, and modern language changes.
This leads to the fact that there is no longer a need to monitor word usage so strictly.
For example, even in explanatory dictionary Ushakova in the meaning of the word “dress” allows the use instead of “put on”.
And in 1973, in the reference book “Difficulties of Word Usage and Variants of Norms of the Russian Literary Language,” it was allowed to use both words freely without distinction, and this was not considered an error.
So you still have to think about how to say: dress or put on? Or let everyone speak as they please?
Modern researchers are divided: some defend the variability of the Russian language and advocate the preservation of shades of meaning behind each word.
Another part supports changes and the tendency of the language to simplify. This question comes up often, but consensus there is no such thing yet.
Useful video
Let's sum it up
When using one of the two words, you should consider target audience text: if this is an academic text, then it is advisable to write in accordance with the accepted norms of the Russian language.
In live speech, some mistakes may be made, but in any case you should always be able to argue your position. To do this, you need to arm yourself with rules, excerpts from dictionaries, and vivid examples and views on this problem from different linguists.
