to take your hat off
- idiom
:
quitarse el sombrero
- You gotta take your hat off to both teams, ladies and gentlemen.
Examples
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You have to take your hat off to Daniel Dravot.
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I thought you always took your hat off to a lady.
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Now, there's a man you've got to take your hat off to.
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Not only did it not work, but you have to take your hat off to the people of America—who, despite a barrage of ads and over a billion dollars in attack ads on Obama, handed Obama another term.
Blog text (11) -
You really have to take your hat off to her; she worked tirelessly to achieve her goals.
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It's polite to take your hat off when entering a place of worship.
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Whenever his team wins, he always takes his hat off to the players for their hard work.
Synonyms
22
5.8
Show deep respect to someone or something, often in public
5
6.6
To show respect and praise for someone and their achievements
Take off your hat to show respect or greet someone
Antonyms
How Respectful
21
6.7
743
1.6
95
1.6
286
3.9
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase literally composes as 'take' + 'your' + 'hat' + 'off' (remove a hat), so a B1 learner who knows the words can infer the physical action. However, the intended meaning of 'show respect or admiration' is a conventional, culturally based extension of that action — cross-linguistically common but not fully predictable from the words alone, so it is only partially transparent.
Etymology
The idiom take your hat off comes from the old habit of actually taking a hat off when you met someone important. Taking the hat off was a sign of respect, so today we say it to mean 'to show respect or admiration'.