This mini episode teaches you the useful “so much for” construction.
Episode 198 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you the useful “so much for” construction. Send your questions about English and your suggestions for future episodes to EverybodyESL@gmail.com! (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Intro
“Hi! This is Kate from Korea, and you are listening to Everybody ESL. Enjoy!”
Welcome to episode 198 of Everybody ESL, the podcast for everybody who wants to improve their English, practice their English, or just learn more English. My name is Ben, and I have a mini episode for you today, where I am going to teach you about one English topic. You can subscribe to the Everybody ESL podcast at Apple podcasts, on the Stitcher app, and wherever you find your podcasts. If you like Everybody ESL, leave it a good review so other people can find out about it, too. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for me, please send an email to everybodyESL@gmail.com.
Okay! Let’s get on with this mini episode.
The episode
The phrase I’m going to teach you today is “so much for.” So much for. That’s so: s-o, much: m-u-c-h, for: f-o-r. So much for.
When we use this phrase, we always use it with a noun: so much for something, so much for this, so much for this thing.
I think this is a good expression because it sounds like very natural English, and you might not find an expression like this in a textbook or in an English class.
What does “so much for something” mean? “So much for something” means “We can stop thinking about something,” “We can stop considering something,” “Something is now over,” “The time of something is done.”
Let me give you a simple example of a sentence that uses “so much for something”: Let’s say after a beautiful summer of sunshine and clear skies, the weather has started to become cold. You might say to somebody, “So much for summer.” In other words, summer is over. There’s no point in thinking about summer anymore. We don’t need to consider summer anymore. Summer is done.
You’ll notice that this does not really look like a complete sentence, and it isn’t. There isn’t a subject and a verb. It’s just a simple phrase that can stand on its own. And it means “We don’t need to think about or consider this thing anymore because this thing is now over. This thing is now in the past.” So much for summer: summer is over now.
Let me give you a more complicated situation that uses the “so much for” construction.
Imagine that somebody is dreaming of becoming a doctor. This person has studied a lot and has finally taken an important test that will determine whether he can go to medical school, whether he can become a doctor. Well, he gets the results from the test, and he did very poorly on the test. He did not score high enough to go into medical school.
This person might say, “So much for becoming a doctor.” So much for becoming a doctor.
Remember, I said that “so much for” works with nouns. Well, “becoming a doctor” uses a noun, too: becoming. That is the gerund or noun form of the verb to become. Becoming. So that sentence, “So much for becoming a doctor,” works the same way as “So much for summer.”
In other words, the dream of becoming a doctor is now over. We can stop thinking about it. We can stop considering it. It is now done.
And that is “so much for,” a very useful construction that I think you should know.
Outro
And that’s the end of episode 198 of Everybody ESL. Remember, if you have questions about English, or if you have comments or suggestions about the podcast, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can use at the beginning of future episodes, the same way Kate recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode, send an email to everybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with another episode, and until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. Goodbye. I’ll see you soon.