up. The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. 1993

Kenneth G. Wilson (1923–). The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. 1993.

up (adv., prep., v.)


The adverb and preposition regularly combine with verbs, and up is usually not extraneous or redundant in such use: to walk up is different from to walk, to run up a bill or a set of table napkins or a hill is different from to run such things, and to sign and to sign up differ semantically too. Nearly all such uses are Standard, although occasionally one will be thought inappropriate in Edited English. Up distributes itself differently in relation to direct objects: you may add up the bill or add the bill up, but you must always add it up. Consult the entries for particular verbs for other Standard combinations with the preposition and adverb up.	1
The verb up is Conversational and Informal when used to mean “to increase or raise,” as in They decided to up my wages; it is likely to be inappropriate in most Edited English and in all other Formal and Oratorical contexts.	2