READ Basic Verbs Learn English Grammar
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hi everybody my name is Alisha welcome
back to know your verbs in this episode
we’re going to talk about the verb read
let’s get started
the basic definition of the verb read is
to take in information using letters or
symbols through your eyes or through
touch people can read through touch
also in example sentences I’ve been
reading interesting books recently I
read a great article yesterday let’s
look at the conjugations of this verb
present read reads past read past
participle read progressive reading
so let’s look at some additional
meanings for this verb the first meaning
is to interpret something as if you are
reading it so that means you’re
interpreting something that is not a
symbol it’s not letters but you
interpret it as though you can read it
in some way let’s look at some examples
he’s really hard to read my best
friend’s can read me like a book okay so
the first example he’s really hard to
read means he’s really hard to interpret
he’s really hard to understand so maybe
someone that you know their emotions are
not very clear always or it’s not easy
to know what they’re thinking we can say
that person is hard to read like it’s
hard to interpret their thinking it’s
hard to interpret them in the second
example sentence I said my friends can
read me like a book
so that means my friends think I’m easy
to understand I’m easy to interpret
through my body language or my face or
the sound of my voice it’s really easy
to read me it’s really easy to interpret
me so easy it’s like reading a book so
I’m very easy to understand is the
meaning there so this kind of read we
can use for people or maybe even we can
use for like situations too so to read
something like it’s symbols even though
it’s not safe the second meaning for
this verb is to assign meaning to
something else to assign a meaning to
something else so to give a meaning to
something so examples of this this
passage can be read totally differently
how did you read that message so here
read doesn’t mean like physically taking
in the information in a message or in a
book it means understanding or giving a
certain meaning to something so in the
first example it was this passage can be
read totally differently means this
passage or the meaning of this passage
could be understood in a different way
so that doesn’t mean there’s a different
way to read like physically take the
information in it means there’s a
different way to understand the me
of that of that passage in the second
example sentence how did you read that
message it means how did you understand
that message or what was the true
meaning you understood in that message
what did you get from that how did you
read that message so read doesn’t only
mean looking at the symbols and letters
even if it seems like it here in these
sorts of situations it means how do you
assign meaning to that text let’s go to
a third meaning of the verb read then so
we can also use read to mean to indicate
to indicate something as with like signs
or time let’s look at some examples the
clock reads - the sign reads visitors
not permitted so here I’m using the
present tense for both of these example
sentences the clock reads means the
clock indicates two o’clock or the clock
says two o’clock so when there’s some
indication there’s some sort of message
from a sign from a clock from I don’t
know bulletin board maybe whatever it’s
indication it’s we can use the verb read
to talk about them so the sign reads two
o’clock the sign reads visitors not
permitted to indicate
let’s look at some variations now for
this verb the first one is to read into
to read into something this means to
believe in a deeper meaning of something
however in some cases there’s there’s no
deeper meaning
it’s like weed we think there’s deeper
meaning for something but there really
isn’t let’s look at some examples of
this she’s being extra nice to him
I’m trying not to read into it but I
wonder if they’re dating don’t read into
his comments okay so both of these mean
like actually in both of these i’ve
given kind of a negative situation in
the first one I’m trying not to read
into it means I’m trying not to see a
deeper meaning in this situation but I
wonder if they’re dating because she’s
being extra nice to him hmm
so there’s a little bit of curiosity
there in the second example sentence
don’t read into his comments means don’t
imagine there’s a deeper meaning there
don’t read into his comments there’s not
anything else for you to be concerned
about here it’s just this comment that’s
all so don’t think there’s something
behind to the comment okay let’s go to
the second variation for read today the
second variation is to read between the
lines to read between the lines this
means to understand something that’s not
directly stated this is a very important
skill and so many think countries have
different ways of expressing this
concept but in English we say to read
between the lines to see or to see or to
understand something that people don’t
explicitly say examples the manager said
he was happy with last month’s
performance but reading between the
lines I think he wishes we had done
better and I think if you read between
the lines you’ll see that the company is
not doing so well so in the first
example sentence we see this
presentation the manager was happy with
the performance but reading between the
lines I think he wishes we had done
better that suggests that maybe there is
a comment or there’s some information
there that makes the speaker think the
manager is actually hiding some
appointment so there’s something about
the managers behavior that maybe
indicates his true feelings are
different from his happy kind of
presentation in the second example
sentence I think if you read between the
lines you’ll see that the company is not
doing so well again that means that
there’s something the speaker has
noticed or has sense or has heard that
suggests that actually the company is
not doing so well even though it seems
that they are this is a useful
expression for social situations like if
someone doesn’t quite understand like
the feeling of a conversation or like
the sort of sense in a room we can say
like oh that person can’t really read
between the lines canny here so that’s
how we use it so those are a few new
ways of using the verb read I hope if
you have any other uses that you know of
or if you have any questions or comments
or want to try to make a sentence with
this verb please feel free to do so of
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for other good stuff too thanks very
much for watching this episode of know
your verbs and we’ll see you again next
time
bye Mike in the second it happens
happens happens
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