wake-up call
18
3.4
- noun
- /ˈweɪkˌʌp kɔl/
:
llamada de atención
- The sudden rise in pollution levels was a wake-up call for the community to take action on environmental issues.
If ever science was a wake up call, it's in this article.
- If ever science was a wake up call, it's in this article.
- And sometimes those wake up calls are exactly what we need.
- It was a little bit of a, a wake up call for me.
- So hopefully this will be the wake up call he needs.
- And so, you know, this has been kind of a good wake up call for me.
- So that's, that's a very important wake up call.
- That was a wake up call too far and it induced panic.
- Wow, really big perspective shift and wake up call.
- The second time it happens, please view it as a wake up call.
- And then moving to Dartford, it's a wake up call.
- And I think this is where we are today, that wake up call where we've been deceived.
- And he needs, I think, a little bit of a wake up call and some remorse and some truth.
- You bought the story and this is the wake up call.
Examples
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Hopefully, the school shooting that just happened in Ohio will be a wake-up call to millions of parents out there.
Blog text (5) -
The world needs a wake-up call.
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And sometimes those wake up calls are exactly what we need.
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And that was a wake up call for me.
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So that was a wake up call for the world.
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And so, you know, this has been kind of a good wake up call for me.
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So hopefully this will be the wake up call he needs.
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This is a real wake-up call for me.
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We all need a wake-up call sometimes.
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The close 2004 elections should have been a wake-up call, but what did they do?
Blog text (12)
Synonyms
54
4.4
A new understanding that makes you see things differently
52
6.6
A sudden clear idea that gives you new understanding
26
3.9
An experience that makes you see the true situation
16
4.4
An experience that makes you see something in a new way
1
8.9
A time when someone faces a hard truth and decides to change what they do
Antonyms
31
7.2
A feeling of being too satisfied with yourself that makes you ignore possible problems
How Urgent
Surface Forms
Morphology
wake-up + call
The meaning is directly compositional: a 'wake-up call' is literally a 'call' whose function is to 'wake (someone) up'. Even though 'wake-up' is hyphenated here, a B1 learner who knows 'wake', 'up', and 'call' can readily infer the service-of-calling-to-wake-someone meaning. This construction is cross-linguistically common and follows straightforward English noun+modifier composition, so it is transparent.
Etymology
Wake-up call comes from the image of a sudden alarm that wakes a sleeping person. So a wake-up call is an event that makes people 'wake up' to a problem and realize they must change or act.