hoover

«hoover» in Mova's school dictionary: To clean a floor or carpet with a vacuum cleaner — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 2 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

verb (hoover, hoovers, hoovered, hoovering — UK, Ireland, Australia, NZ); noun (a Hoover, Hoovers)

meaning for a pupil

1) (UK, informal) To clean a floor or carpet with a vacuum cleaner. tree →

2) (UK) A vacuum cleaner, from the brand name Hoover. tree →

3) (informal) To eat or take in something very fast, as in «He hoovered up his dinner». tree →

sense in the lessons

In everyday life at home: «Can you hoover your room?» It is a chore word. In Britain and Ireland people use «hoover» for any vacuum cleaner, whatever the brand. Phrase: hoover up — to suck up or to eat quickly.

examples

• Please hoover the living room before Nan comes. tree →
• I hoovered under my bed and found my missing sock. tree →
• The hoover is in the cupboard under the stairs. tree →
• The dog hoovered up the crumbs. tree →
• He hoovered up three slices of pizza. tree →
• Dad was hoovering the stairs when the doorbell rang. tree →
• Our new hoover is very loud. tree →

note

Regular verb: hoovered. As a brand the noun takes a capital (Hoover), but as an everyday word many write it small. In the USA people say «vacuum» instead. Same meaning: vacuum, vacuum cleaner.

In the corpora

• Mum plays along: «Tell Rab tae hoover, then.» Imaginary brothers and friends are common and healthy.
• She helps with the hoovering, and tells her teacher when Nana seems poorly.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «hoover» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.