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Glite Dictionary
to knock someone up

to knock someone up

15 9.9
To make someone pregnant, said informally
  • phrasal verb
  • /nɑk ˈsʌmˌwʌn ʌp/
  • NSFW
translation icon : embarazar a
  • You think, getting knocked up counts?
  • get knocked up
  • knocked up a woman

Examples

  • So who do you think knocked her up?

    Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)

  • Marry that doctor fast and get knocked up before you're too old to give him some kids.

    Fiction book (1999)

  • Well, that and I knocked her up.

    Whip It (2009)

  • Strike two, he knocked her up.

    Old Fashioned (2014)

  • Said I knocked her up.

    In Cold Blood (1967)

  • I knocked up her daughter.

    Lovesick (1983)

  • - If his girlfriend was knocked up.

    Casino (1995)

  • He knocked her up and left.

    Kidnapped (2021)

  • "So what finally happened was Bree got herself another boyfriend, got knocked up, and was going to marry him.

    Fiction book (1999)

  • He knocked her up, and now they're planning to get married.

Synonyms

to knock up
vsto knock someone up
  • NSFW
35 9.9

To make a woman pregnant

applies to any person who becomes pregnant rather than only women
to bang up
vsto knock someone up
  • Offensive
9.9

Make someone pregnant, usually by accident

is general and does not imply it was unplanned

Surface Forms

knock someone up infinitive
knocked someone up past
knocked someone up past participle
knocking someone up present participle
knocks someone up third person singular

Morphology

knock + someone + up

The sense 'to make someone pregnant' cannot be derived from the literal meanings of 'knock' (strike), 'someone' (a person) and 'up' (direction/particle); this is an informal/idiomatic slang sense and therefore unpredictable. The expression is polysemous (other senses like 'wake someone by knocking' exist) and shows regional variation, so a B1 learner who knows the parts would not reliably infer the pregnancy meaning.

Etymology

Knock someone up comes from a simple, sharp image: a quick knock — a sudden sexual act — that results in a pregnancy. One popular story says 'knock' was crude slang for sex, so to knock someone up came to mean 'to make someone pregnant'.