The Phrasal Verb 'Shut Up' Explained
- Phrasal Verbs Explained
- 12 hours ago
- 10 min read
An explanation of the different meanings of the English phrasal verb 'shut up' from a native speaker, with lots of examples in context
Hello and welcome to my website for English learners all about phrasal verbs where I explain their different meanings to help you understand, learn and use them like a native.
In this post I will explaining the phrasal verb 'shut up'. I imagine that many of you will be very familiar with 'shut up' as it used a lot as a command to ask someone to be quiet, however you may be surprised to learn that it has 3 separate meanings in English! As we go through the post, I will explain each of these, including the extremely common 'shut up!' that I am sure many of you will have heard before. Additionally, I will provide you with lots of example sentences for each usage to show you how native speakers use them in every day English! So, let get started and see what 'shut up' is all about....
TABLE OF CONTENTS (Click to jump to each one)
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THE BASICS
SHUT UP: KEY INFORMATION
Usage | Common |
Number of meanings | 3 |
Past tense forms | Shut up / Shut up |
Separable? | Yes |
Before we look at the different ways to use 'shut up' in English, let's first consider its component words 'shut' and 'up' and what they mean on their own....
Shut - The verb 'to shut' is a moderately common verb in English, whose primary meaning is similar to that of the verb 'to close', i.e. to block or cover the opening to something so that it cannot be entered or accessed from outside. In addition to this, 'to shut' can also be used to mean to stop something operating, typically a business. To shut is an irregular verb and its past tense forms confusingly do not change or add '-ed' at the end.
John shut his eyes during the scary parts of the movie.
Please shut the door when you leave.
Make sure you shut the all of the windows before you go out.
The shopkeeper shut the shop early on Christmas Eve.
Up - For those of you who are regular visitors to my website and have good knowledge of phrasal verbs, you will know that 'up' is used a LOT in phrasal verb constructions. In fact, I would say that it is the most common of all prepositional particles that feature in them. It is often included to add the literal sense of a movement upwards or increase (go up, walk up) to the base verb. In addition to this, 'up' can be used in phrasal verbs to add more abstract ideas like completion (fill up), preparation (set up), appearance (turn up) and ending (wrap up), among others.
So, now that we have looked at the basics, let's now move on to the meanings of the phrasal verb 'shut up'....
MEANING 1: To stop talking
CEFR Language Level | B1 - Intermediate |
Usage | Common |
Where is it used? | Everywhere |
Potential synonyms | To hush, to be quiet |
Separable? | Sometimes |
We'll begin our journey through the different meanings of the phrasal verb 'shut up' with the one that many of you are sure to know, which is 'to stop talking or making a noise'.
We can use this first application in a number of different ways, so I will go through each one separately, starting with talking about yourself.
If you are ever in a situation in which you are talking a lot or you feel like the other person or people around you want you to be quiet, you can use 'shut up' to express the idea that you will be quiet. As with all of this first application, this is a fairly informal usage but since we are talking about ourselves, it isn't considered to be offensive in any way.
You look tired; if you want me to shut up, please tell me and I will!
I realised that I had already said too much, so I quickly shut up before I could say anything else!
Don't you dare tell me to shut up!
If you don't shut up soon, I am going to get very angry.
Let's imagine that the positions have swapped and you are now in a situation in which another person is talking too much. When this happens, we can use 'shut up' to refer to stopping the other person talking or making noise. In such cases, the phrasal verb becomes transitive (and separable), with the direct object being the person who is talking, singing, whistling etc.
You should note that we do not just use this application for loud or talkative people but also for animals (barking dogs etc), objects and sounds (music, washing machines etc.) that make a lot of noise.
Often, we can use this application to talk about simply telling someone to be quiet (more about this later), however it also serves to describe doing something to ensure that the talking or the noise stops.
For example, this might be giving a child something that they keep asking for so that they stop, or signalling to someone in a conversation that they need to be quiet as they are saying things that the other people are not supposed to know.
Sally tried to shut the kids up during the movie by giving them sweets.
The mayor raised his hand to shut the crowd up.
I ended up telling him something shocking just to shut him up.
They played music to shut the protesters outside up.
My neighbour yelled at my dog to shut him up; I am not happy!
He slammed the door to shut up the noise from the hallway.
Turning off the engine shut the rattling sound up.
Give him a biscuit; it’ll shut him up for five minutes.
I didn’t agree with the protestor, but I just nodded to shut her up.
BONUS: Shut up! - How to use it as a command
As I mentioned earlier, we can use 'shut up' to tell someone to be quiet and it is frequently used to do this. First of all though, please note that this is very informal and impolite. You can really offend someone if you tell them to 'shut up!', especially if you don't know them very well. It is often used in a less offensive way between people who do know each other well and have a good relationship; often the tone and delivery is very important here.
Shut up! You have no idea what you're talking about!
Can you shut up a minute while I do this!
Can you all please just shut up! I am sick and tired of your moaning!
Lastly, there is another way to use 'shut up' as a command but in a much less offensive way. Namely, this is when one person tells another something shocking or surprising and the person receiving the news then says "shut up!" as a way of expressing their disbelief. Typically, when used this way, the word 'up' is lengthened by the speaker to sound like 'uuuuuup', or sometimes both even words are extended: "shuuuuut uuuuup!".
John and Marie are in a relationship?! Shut up! No way!
Shut up! You're not moving to New York?!
MEANING 2: To close (business)
CEFR Language Level | C1 - Advanced |
Usage | Medium |
Where is it used? | Everywhere |
Potential synonyms | To close, to shut |
Separable? | Yes |
Our second application of the phrasal verb 'shut up' is one that is mainly used to refer to businesses and shops and means 'to close'.
Nouns commonly used with this application....
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To clarify, with this usage we can talk about when a business or shop closes both temporarily (e.g. at the end of the day) and permanently.
It is much more common to hear it being used with the former, i.e. to close temporarily and when it is used this way, it can either be to mean that the business is closed to customers or that the building is closed and locked, so that no one can enter it. Most commonly, we use it in reference to shops and business that close overnight and therefore need to be locked and secured while no employees are on site.
On a grammatical note, this is a separable usage with the direct object (the thing that is shut) able to go between 'shut' and 'up' or after them.
I need to shut up the shop at six.
Let’s shut up for the night and go home.
George shut the café up early because it was so quiet.
We shut up the office over the holidays.
Can you shut the store up while I run to the bank?
The bartenders shut the pub up after last orders.
I’ll shut the place up while you lock the back gate.
Patty stayed late to shut up and set the alarm.
As I mentioned, we can also use this application of 'shut up' to talk about when a business or organisation closes permanently. You should note though that this is quite an old-fashioned usage and one that was heard more in British English in years gone by. Nowadays, it is more common to use the phrasal verb 'shut down' or 'close' when talking about a permanent closure.
They were forced to shut up the factory during the strike.
The owners decided to shut up the shop at the end of the year.
The war shut many small businesses in the region up.
Rising rent levels finally shut the bookstore up.
MEANING 3: To lock in an enclosed space
CEFR Language Level | C1 - Advanced |
Usage | Medium |
Where is it used? | Everywhere |
Potential synonyms | To coop up, to lock up, to shut in |
Separable? | Yes |
We have now come to our third and final meaning of the phrasal verb 'shut up', which again is another one that involves the idea of closure and means 'to lock in an enclosed space'.
With this application, if someone or something is 'shut up', they are put and kept in an internal space like a room, cage or a container. Furthermore, the person or thing that is 'shut up' is usually prevented from being able to leave or escape the confinement.
Of course, this does sound like quite a negative and unpleasant situation for the people or things involved and that is true most of the time. However, you should note that we can also use it to describe less unfortunate situations. For example, if someone has been working in an office all day and has not left, you may hear them say that they have been "shut up in the office all day". Of course, they were able to leave it if they wanted but it conveys the idea that they were so busy that they did not have a chance to leave.
On a grammatical note, this usage is often used in a passive sense. When used in an active way, it is also separable.
Claire was shut up in her room for over a week when she got Covid-19.
The police shut the criminal up in a safe house until the trial.
The children were shut up indoors all day because of the bad storm.
Terry felt shut up and isolated in his small apartment.
The farmer shut up the livestock for the night.
The files were shut up in a locked cabinet and forgotten about.
Mary lived shut up from the world, rarely seeing visitors.
BONUS: Some extra information about 'shut up'
As a final note in our exploration of the phrasal verb 'shut up', I just want to make you aware of some additional uses of it that you may come across in your English reading and conversations....
The idiom 'to shut up shop'
This informal idiomatic expression is one that is found mainly in British English and links directly back to the second application that we looked at in the post as it means 'to close a business or to stop working'. This can either be at the end of a working day or permanently and the context is key here to determine this.
After years of declining sales, the family decided to shut up shop and retire.
The café shuts up shop at 6pm during the winter months.
STFU!
Acronyms are a very common form of expressing certain words and expressions in a quick way on the internet and via messaging apps and 'shut up' has its very own! You may have seen 'STFU' in online comments or chats before and it simply means shut up with some rude words in the middle (this is a respectable website, so I will leave it to your imagination). Nevertheless, this acronym is very rude and offensive, so I would avoid using it if I were you!
The variation 'shaddap!'
Lastly, you may at some point or another come across the rather strange looking word 'shaddap'. It is actually just a very informal and casual form of the command 'shut up!' for when you want someone to stop talking and it is often used humorously. It originates from the way that some speakers pronounce 'shut up' in certain accents. It was brought into mainstream focus in the early 1980s by a song called "Shaddap You Face" which was inspired by the way that the singer's Italian grandparents spoke.
We have now reached the end of this post and I just want to say thank you for clicking on my post and reading it. I hope that you've enjoyed it and have been able to learn something new about the phrasal verb 'shut up'. If you enjoyed this post, please go ahead and check out some of my other posts.
Now it is YOUR turn. Can you think of a sentence yourself using 'shut up'. Write it in the comments section below if you can, or alternatively any comments, suggestions or feedback that you may have....don't be shy!!!
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