foul
part of speech
adjective (foul, fouler, foulest); noun (a foul, fouls); verb (foul, fouls, fouled, fouling)
meaning for a pupil
1) Very dirty, smelly or unpleasant: «a foul smell». tree →
2) (in sport) An action that breaks the rules, like tripping or pushing another player. tree →
3) (verb) To break a rule against a player in a game. tree →
4) (verb) To make something dirty: «Dogs must not foul the park». tree →
5) (of weather or mood) Very bad: «foul weather», «a foul temper». tree →
6) Rude: «foul language». tree →
sense in the lessons
In sport (football/soccer, basketball, netball) a foul gives the other team a free kick, a free throw or a penalty. In everyday safety: a foul smell can warn of rotten food or gas. Phrases: «commit a foul», «foul play» (cheating, or a crime), «foul weather», «foul language», «fall foul of» (get into trouble with).
examples
- The rubbish bin has a foul smell. tree →
- The referee blew the whistle for a foul. tree →
- He was fouled just outside the box. tree →
- Please clean up after your dog so it does not foul the path. tree →
- We stayed inside because of the foul weather. tree →
- Foul language is not allowed in class. tree →
- She was in a foul mood after losing her keys. tree →
- In basketball, after five fouls a player must leave the game. tree →
- The foul vapour of the beast and horror at its strangeness now overcame the prince, and he fainted. tree →
note
Homophone: «fowl» (a bird like a chicken) sounds the same — «foul» is bad/dirty, «fowl» is a bird. Comparative: fouler, foulest. In baseball «a foul ball» is a ball hit outside the lines.
In the corpora
- Faking a foul in sport (diving) is cheating and can get a yellow card.
- And the rivers shall become foul; the streams of Egypt shall be minished and dried up; the reeds and flags shall wither.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «foul» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.