to bring down
78
4.6
- phrasal verb
- /brɪŋ daʊn/
- But the idea that you can stop people bringing down the government by changing their language is thankfully just fiction.
- bring down the government
- bring down the regime
- bring down a ruler
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Watch on YouTubeYou know, they want to bring down Catherine and William.
- You know, they want to bring down Catherine and William.
- We've been tasked with bringing down the empire of Aaron Coughlin.
- And the best example I can give is the bringing down of the Berlin Wall.
- So what was the process of bringing down Ross and the Silk Road?
- In their zeal to bring down the Italian mafia, they look the other way.
- All I said was it's a Marxist organization designed to bring down Western civilisation and capitalism.
- They're mad at you for they see it as an attempt to tar their guy, the one guy who could bring down a man they loathe.
- Never have I gone to the police with false information from criminals to try and bring down one of my enemies.
- And it was what triggered Reagan to to have that famous statement with Gorbachev bring down that wall.
Examples
-
The people brought down the regime, it's done.
-
The unions' efforts helped bring down the BSP government in early 1997.
Academic text (1998) -
We're going to be the newspaper that brings down the government.
-
Corporate divestiture from South Africa helped bring down the apartheid regime.
Academic text (2003) -
The citizens united their efforts to bring down the corrupt government.
-
Protests erupted across the country, aiming to bring down the ruling party.
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The investigation revealed evidence that could bring down the current administration.
Synonyms
123
5.1
To remove a leader or government from power, often by force
70
6.2
To remove someone from power, often suddenly or by force
46
8.1
To secretly weaken a government, system, or its power
38
7.4
To remove a leader from office, often by force
19
6.2
Remove someone from a position of power, often in politics
16
6.5
To make a person, company or system stop working
11
6.7
To remove a king or queen from power and their position
4
6.3
Remove a leader or government from power, often by force
1
9.7
To remove someone, especially a king or queen, from power
Antonyms
How Removed
26
6.1
38
7.4
78
4.6
19
6.2
304
6.8
78
6.3
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense 'to elicit enthusiastic applause' cannot be derived from the literal meanings of 'bring' (to cause or convey) and 'down' (to lower or defeat); those constituents normally indicate reduction, movement, or defeat rather than approval. This meaning arises idiomatically in the phrase 'bring down the house' and is culturally specific, so a B1 learner who knows the words but has not encountered the idiom would not predict this sense.
Etymology
Bring down comes from the image of people pulling a ruler or a flag from a high place, dragging them physically 'down' from power, so it means 'to defeat or remove someone in authority'.