Doing Things "Upwards"

[Mobius1]

What is the relevance in the word "up" when saying things such as:

"Washing Up" - the dishes
"Finishing Up" - the paperwork
"Tidying Up/Clearing Up" - the living room
"Fed Up" - with all the Ups

Obviously there are many more, and I'd understand any of them were they said to me, but I don't understand why I understand the use of "up" at the end of these and other such phrases, other than the fact that I've learnt it like that. What is the relevance of "up"?

[jno]

I think fed up might imply 'fed up to here' or something like that, along the lines of 'full up' (to the top) - in the sense that you've had all you can take. I'm not sure if this would apply to the other phrases you mention or not, though it might do. Quizmonster will know, if he's around.

[gen2]

Not an answer, but just to confuse the issue further:-
Crockery is washed up, but vehicles are washed down.
When traffic lights turn red, you slow down and pull up.

There are probably as many 'down' phrases where the direction is not obvious.

[kempie]

Also more often people tend to say 'button up' rather than 'button down' whereas they physically button"down" more often than they button "up".

[Mobius1]

This is partly why I find this confusing, especially when the "up" could just as easily (or even more logically) be interchanged with "down". Some are obvious, like picking something "up" off the floor for instance, whereas picking the kids "up" from school doesn't really seem to have any logical underpinning, it merely sounds better than "picking them" from school (and I imagine that's only the case, again, because we're so used to hearing "up" at the end of the phrase).

[Quizmonster]

There's not a great deal I can add, to be honest. Such 'up' phrasal verbs date back to at least the 1100s in English, with 'give up', meaning 'surrender' being the oldest recorded. There are many of them that appear to have no rhyme or reason behind them...wake up, speak up, light up, dress up and so forth all appear to have no 'directional' quality to them whatever. And there is further confusion in that, in several cases, the 'up' can be replaced by 'down', as others have said. "It's up to you" means exactly the same as "It's down to you" in modern British usage, for example.

Here's a nice quote that sums up - geddit?! - the situation...

"If you're up to it, you might try building up a list of the many ways in which 'up' is used. It may take up a lot of your time but if you don't give up, you may wind up with a thousand."

The simple answer to your question, Mobious, therefore, is that there is no real relevance other than the great god 'usage'.

[Peter Pedant]

Hi Mobius - you're the guy who invented vector notation in about 1860 arent you? and got a band named after yourself?

Anyway - up is used as an adverb.

The same difficulty is experienced by non english speaker with to go and to go away

You havent even started with to put, to put up, and to put up with....

They're all phrasal verbs and you're not alone - they cause difficulty with everyone. The English just sort of learn them so early (three or four) that we dont notice.

Good luck

[Quizmonster]

One of the major problems with 'up' is not that it is used as an adverb, but that it is used as an adverb, a preposition, an adjective, a noun and a verb! Not only that, but it has a range of applications within each of these!

[Dagman]

If you think of 'up' as 'completely' or 'completing' then that's it's meaning basically! 

[Kingaroo]

I studied German for only a few months, but I recall there are a lot of two-part verbs , one part of which is Ab.
I don't think Ab means Up, but it is used in a very similar way, and I think English colloquial speech picked up (oops) some idioms from their parallels in German.
Can any German speaker help me out here? I can't remember a single example of an Ab verb.

[Emily Ball]

Yes Kingaroo; ab can mean off, away, down, or on and numerous verbs start with the adverb ab, such abgeben(hand over) etc., so I suppose it could be Germanic in origin. The 'b' is pronounced almost as our 'p'.