In this mini episode, you will learn how to use the common expression “Come on.”
Episode 271 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you how to use the common expression “Come on.” 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
“Hello, this is Carla, from Brazil. And you’re listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 271 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
In this episode, I want to teach you how to use a very common and natural-sounding expression. The expression is “Come on.” Come on. That’s come: c-o-m-e, on: o-n. Come on.
Before I talk to you about some of the meanings that this expression can have, I need to tell you some important things. The first is that often when we use this expression, we stress the word on. And so, often you will hear “come ON” instead of “COME on.”
It is also important to know that we use this expression as an exclamation and as a command. Do you remember what an exclamation is? An exclamation is kind of like a sudden expression of some kind of feeling. And we can use “Come on” as a sudden expression of frustration or anger, or maybe some other feelings like that. And like I said, we can also use “Come on” as a command.
Because it is used as an exclamation and a command, it does not change shape. What do I mean by that? I mean, you do not need to worry about changing the tense. We never use this form of “Come on” in the past tense. And so you will never hear anybody use this expression as “Came on” because it’s used as a command. Commands are never in the past tense. It’s always about telling somebody to do something now.
And exclamations don’t really have a tense at all. If you bump your head on something, you might say, “Ouch!” or “Ow!” or “Oh!” There is no tense there. It’s an unchanging expression.
And that’s how this form of “Come on” works.
Okay. So what does it mean? What does “Come on” mean? “Come on” means more than one thing. I’m going to talk about two or maybe three ways that we use this expression.
The simplest way that we use “Come on” is to mean “Come forward, come toward me.” Imagine that you have met a dog somewhere. You’re out walking, and you meet a dog. And the dog is lost, or you think the dog needs help. So you are asking the dog to come toward you. You might say to the dog, “Come on! Come on!” In other words, “Come toward me.”
The next meaning, I think, comes from that meaning. The next meaning of “Come on” is “Hurry” or “hurry up.” Or “Don’t be so slow” or “Stop hesitating.” Let’s say that you are getting ready to go to see a movie with your friends, but your friends are taking so long. They’re choosing what clothes they’re going to wear. They’re just taking their time. They don’t seem to care that the movie starts soon. And if you are getting frustrated with your friends, you might say, “Come on! The movie starts soon.” What you are saying when you say, “Come on,” is “Hurry up! Stop taking so long. We need to move. Let’s go!”
The last meaning of “Come on” that I’m going to talk about is, I think, the most interesting. Often, when we use “Come on,” what we mean is something like this: “Stop being ridiculous. Stop being silly. It’s time to be reasonable. It’s time to be serious.” That is often what we mean when we say, “Come on.”
Let’s go back to this idea of getting ready to see a movie with your friends. Let’s say the movie begins in 10 minutes, but now all of your other friends—everybody else—has said, “We changed our minds. We don’t want to go to the movie anymore.” This was your plan, but now everyone else has changed their minds. This might make you very frustrated. And if it does, you might say, “Oh, come on.” Come on. Do you hear how frustrated I sound? “Oh, come on.”
And what you are saying to your friends is “Stop being unreasonable. This doesn’t make sense. I need you to start being serious” (or practical or reasonable). “I need you to do the right thing. I need you to be sensible. “It’s too late to say that you don’t want to go to the movies,” so I say, “Come on.” That means “Don’t do this. Don’t be so unreasonable.” I think this is probably the most common way that people use “Come on.” You will hear this in movies. You will hear this in TV shows. You will hear this in conversations. I think it is very common.
There is one more thing I want to tell you about this expression. And that is that it sounds very informal. Because it often conveys this feeling of impatience or frustration or judgment or anger, it is not the kind of expression that we usually use with strangers. It’s something that we usually use with friends or people we know very well. It can sound rude.
And that is “Come on,” a very useful expression that I think you should know.
Outro
This is the end of episode 271 of Everybody ESL. Remember: if you have questions about English, or if you have comments or suggestions for the podcast, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can play at the beginning of future episodes—the same way Carla recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode—send an email to everybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with a new episode, and until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. Goodbye! I’ll see you soon.