COMMON AMERICAN PHRASES in Everyday Contexts

Collected by NTU

Here are some phrases frequently used by American in daily life:

what for?

why? For what reason?

e.g A: I want you to clean your room.

B: What for? It’s clean enough.

what goes around, comes around

the result of things that one has done will someday come back to bother one.

e.g Now he is the victim of his own policies. Whatever goes around comes around.

they (just) don’t make them like they used to

good are not as well made now as they were in the past.

e.g A: Look at this flimsy door!

B: They don’t meke ‘em like they used to.

tongue-in-cheek

insincere; joking.

e.g They play seemed very serious at first, but then everyone saw that it was tongue-in-
cheek, and they began laughing.

twist someone’s words (around)

to restate someone’s words inaccurately when quoting them or trying to understand them.

e.g Stop twisting my words around! Listen to what I am telling you!

under oath
bound by an oath; having taken an oath.

e.g I was placed under oath before I could testify in the trial

wake the dead

to be so loud as to wake those who are “sleeping” the most soundly: the dead.

e.g Stop hollering! You’ll wake the dead!