JAM Basic Verbs Learn English Grammar

jam okay hi everybody welcome back to

know your verbs my name is alicia and in

this lesson we’re going to talk about

the verb

jam let’s get started

let’s start with the basic definition of

this verb the basic definition of

jam is to cause something to be blocked

to cause something to be blocked

examples

i jammed the printer somehow we jammed

the shredder with paper

now let’s look at the conjugations for

this verb

present jam jams

passed jammed past participle

jammed progressive jamming

now let’s talk about some additional

meanings for this verb the first

additional meaning

is to push or force something into a

space

examples he jammed himself onto the

packed train

the moving company is jamming boxes into

trucks

so here we see examples of someone or

something

being pushed or forced into something

it’s like something that’s difficult to

get into or maybe there’s not enough

space

in the first example we see he pushed

himself

into a packed train that means that the

train is full of people already

but he pushes himself he jams himself

in forcefully pushing in order to get on

the train

in the second example sentence we see it

in reference to

boxes a moving company is jamming boxes

into trucks which means

there’s maybe not a lot of space in the

truck however

he needs he or she the moving person

needs to get these boxes in so they’re

forcefully pushing we use

jam to talk about that to describe that

act

all right let’s go on to the second

additional meaning for this verb

the second additional meaning is to play

music

informally or to improvise music in a

group

examples the group jams a few times a

month

i think the neighbors are jamming again

so this use of

jam refers to practicing music or

playing music in a group of people so

there’s a group of people

usually different instruments and

there’s no

song specifically there’s no like goal

really

they’re just making music together so

you might have heard this called a

jam session actually um to me it sounds

a little strange to use the word

jam if you yourself are not a musician

like it feels strange to me to say

they’re jamming

because i’m not really the kind of

person who uses that word

but it might sound more natural coming

from a musician

so if you’re a musician and you like to

improvise music with people

you might be able to use this word quite

naturally to talk about your practice

sessions

so again it’s just practice it’s just

kind of enjoying and feeling the music

it’s not really playing with a goal in

mind

you’re improvising improvising so you

can also use it in general kind of to

talk about other ways of enjoying music

like with dance

or even just enjoying music and kind of

moving your head a little bit too

we sometimes use the word jam to mean

just like

improvising and enjoying music in some

way

um so that’s another way kind of related

to this meaning

that we can sometimes use jam the third

additional meaning for this verb is to

cause a part of the body to be crushed

or

injured somehow usually crushed examples

my friend jammed his finger in a door a

few years ago

i jammed my toe on my bed

okay so jammed in these cases usually

refers to some kind of like

crushing motion or some like like hard

impact something like this so in the

first example sentence

my friend jammed his finger in a door a

few years ago

it means in the open door so maybe

there’s the door

and the space between the door and the

wall this person’s finger

went in between those two and the door

closed that’s a perfect example of when

we

would use jam this actually happened to

my friend this is true

and his finger was jammed in the door so

this crushing motion this crushing

injury

we use jam to refer to that we can also

use it to refer to other kind of similar

small

injuries usually to like fingers and

toes as in the second example sentence

i jammed my toe on my bed that refers to

like

against a hard object you’re walking

walking walking and you

touch or you jam your

finger or you jam your toe into an

object like a table

or sofa or bed or something it’s quite

painful and it feels like you just

pushed it forcefully into that object we

can say jammed another verb we use in

this case is stub i stub my toe

but you can say jammed or stubbed

depending on what you like

people use both okay let’s go on to the

next additional meaning then

the next additional meaning is to

interfere with a broadcast to interfere

with a broadcast let’s go to some

example sentences

they’re jamming our signal the signal

from the satellite has been jammed

so this means that some thing or someone

or some kind of

like machine or data or something is

blocking

some signal so this could be blocking

like a wi-fi signal like

satellite tv radio signal something is

causing the signal to be disrupted the

broadcast to be disrupted there’s some

problem there so we use the word jam to

talk about this

you will see this a lot in like spy and

police

and suspense movies relating to

technology

like you can jam your enemy’s signal and

they can’t get any communications out

for example

so you block someone’s communication or

you block someone’s ability to broadcast

information we use jam to refer to that

okay now let’s look at a variation for

this verb

this variation is to jam on the brakes

to jam on the brakes quite specific

this expression means to push quickly

and with

force on the brakes of a vehicle

examples

he jammed on the brakes when the child

stepped into the road

don’t jam the brakes so to jam the

brakes or jamming the brakes is usually

like a very

quick and fast and very uncomfortable

motion very uncomfortable like results

actually

so you push the brakes and the car

quickly comes to a stop or the car

jerks very fast so the people inside the

car feel uncomfortable

and it can be bad for the car’s braking

system

um maybe it can also like damage items

in the car

so it’s considered typically to be not a

good

thing to do so it’s typically not

recommended to

jam the brakes you’ll hear jam the

brakes and also jam

on the brakes both of them are in use so

you can choose which you prefer they

have the same

meaning okay so those are a few

different ways that you can use the verb

jam i hope that you found something new

of course if you have questions comments

or other ways to use the word jam

please let us know in the comment

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thanks very much for watching this

episode of know your verbs and we’ll see

you again next time bye bye

jam