This mini episode is all about the expression “to go over someone’s head.” What does this mean—and why?
Episode 210 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that introduces and explains the expression “to go over someone’s head.” 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, everyone! This is Mohadeseh from Iran, and you are listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 210 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
Today, I want to teach you an interesting and common expression that you might have heard, but maybe you did not understand it. And that expression is “to go over someone’s head” or “to be over someone’s head.” What does it mean if something goes (or is) over your head? If something is or goes over your head, that means you don’t or can’t understand it.
It might be an idea or a fact or a conversation or a joke. If you hear something like this and you just do not know what it means—maybe it’s just too complicated, maybe you don’t have enough information to understand it—if something like that happens, you can say, “That went over my head” or “That is over my head.”
Why do you think we use this expression to describe something that we don’t or cannot understand? You can think about it like this: imagine that this fact or idea or conversation is traveling toward you. And instead of going into your head—going into your brain, where you can understand it—instead of that, it travels above your head. It flies toward you, it goes over your head, and it keeps going. And then it is gone, and you never had a chance to grab it. You never had a chance to catch it in your mind, where you could understand it. An idea or a thought or a conversation like that has gone over your head. It has gone above you, and there it goes. It’s gone.
There’s one more thing I want to teach you about this idea, because we can say, “To be (or to go) over someone’s head” with one single word. Sometimes you will hear people use the word whoosh—w-h-o-o-s-h, whoosh—to mean to go over someone’s head. Whoosh means “to travel fast, to go fast, or to fly fast.” And it’s also a word that means the sound of something going or flying fast. So, people will sometimes just use the word whoosh to mean, “Ah! That idea or that fact or that conversation went over someone’s head. It flew past quickly.”
That is “To be (or to go) over someone’s head” and also whoosh. And these are common and very useful expressions that I think you should know.
Outro
And that’s the end of episode 210 of Everybody ESL. Remember: if you have any 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 Mohadeseh 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.