In this mini episode, you will learn one meaning of the suffix “-ful.”
Episode 276 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you one meaning of the suffix “-ful.” 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 Lucas, from Chile. And you’re listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 276 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 am going to teach you about a certain suffix. Do you remember what a suffix is? A suffix is a little piece that goes on the end of a word. And the suffix that I’m going to talk about today is -ful: f-u-l. -ful.
This suffix has more than one meaning. And today we are going to talk about one of the meanings of the suffix -ful.
This meaning is “the amount of something that is required to fill something. The amount of something that is required to make something full.” That probably sounds a little bit complicated.
Let me give you an example of a word that uses this suffix, a word that you might have heard before.
And the word is spoonful. Spoonful: s-p-o-o-n-f-u-l. A spoonful is the amount of something that will fill a spoon. The amount of something that can fit in a spoon. So you might have a spoonful of medicine. Or a recipe might tell you to add a spoonful of water.
There are many words that work like this. For instance, cupful. That is the amount of something needed to fill a cup. Or the amount of something that a cup can hold.
Or bowlful, the amount of something that a bowl can hold.
Or even mouthful, the amount of something that can fill your mouth.
There’s also handful. A handful is an amount or number of something that you can hold in one hand. The amount of something that will fill your hand. It’s not a specific number of things. It’s just the number of things that you can fit in one hand. For instance, a handful of cookies. Depending on the size of the cookie, that might be three cookies or four or five or six. Or who knows?
You can even talk about a roomful. That means the amount of something—or maybe the number of people—that will fill a room. The number of people that will make a room full.
I also want to tell you today about another one of these -ful words, because I think it is a little more interesting than all of those other words I mentioned, like spoonful or cupful or handful.
The word I’m thinking of is earful. Earful. That’s spelled e-a-r-f-u-l. Earful.
Now that you know this one meaning of the -ful suffix, what do you think earful means? You are probably thinking that it means the amount of something that can fill an ear. But that’s kind of strange. We don’t usually think about filling an ear with something. We don’t usually think about an ear as a container that holds something.
This is what earful means. It means “a lot of anger or angry talk or gossip.”
In other words, it means the amount of angry talk or complaining or gossip that can fill your ear. And so it means the maximum you can hear. The most gossip or complaining that you can hear. Your ear cannot hold any more. An earful is a lot of complaining or angry talk or gossip.
We often use this noun, earful, with the verb get. And so we might say something like this:
“Yesterday, my friend got fired, and he is so angry. Today, I’m going to meet him at a coffee shop, and I think I will get an earful.” I think I will get an earful. In other words, I think I will hear a lot of complaining or angry talk. I think I will hear as much complaining and angry talk as my ear can hold. My ear will not be able to hold any more. My friend is going to fill up my ear with complaining or angry talk.
And so, earful is another one of these -ful words. It’s a little bit like spoonful or handful or roomful. But it has a meaning that you might not have predicted.
Outro
This is the end of episode 276 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 Lucas 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.