pull up

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See also: pullup and pull-up

English[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

  • Audio (AU)
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Verb[edit]

pull up (third-person singular simple present pulls up, present participle pulling up, simple past and past participle pulled up)

  1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see pull,‎ up.
    1. (transitive, intransitive) To lift upwards or vertically.
      I pull up the lever when I want to make my car go into first gear.
    2. To pull forward.
      Pull up a bench and have a seat.
      Pull the car up a little so you don't block his driveway.
      Pull up a little so you don't block his driveway.
    3. (intransitive, aviation) To raise the nose of an aircraft.
      Terrain ahead! Pull up!
  2. (idiomatic) To fetch for display on a screen.
    Pull up that website for me; it sounds quite interesting.
  3. (idiomatic) (Of a vehicle, animal, or person) to arrive at a halt; to stop.
    Pull up to that curb slowly; you don't want to scratch that other car.
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter 5, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., OCLC 222716698:
      We expressed our readiness, and in ten minutes were in the station wagon, rolling rapidly down the long drive, for it was then after nine. […] As we reached the lodge we heard the whistle, and we backed up against one side of the platform as the train pulled up at the other.
    • 1932, Delos W. Lovelace, King Kong, published 1965, page 12:
      "Taxi," he called. And when one pulled up to the curb with screeching brakes he ordered, "The nearest restaurant."
    • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, Sydney: Ure Smith, published 1962, page 217:
      The horse had galloped over the sand-ridge to the beach and there pulled up, nostrils quivering at an insult to its trained intelligence.
    • 2009, Kesha, Tik Tok
      I'm talking pedicure on our toes, toes / Trying on all our clothes, clothes / Boys blowing up our phones, phones / Drop-topping, playing our favorite CD / Pulling up to the parties / Trying to get a little bit tipsy.
  4. (idiomatic) To cause (a horse) to stop when riding.
  5. (idiomatic) To cause (a person) to stop.
    • 2021 February 1, The Road Ahead, page 16, column 3:
      "People pull me up in the street to ask if I have room for their son, daughter, sister or cousin to come down to go to school[.]"
  6. (horseracing) (Of a jockey) to illegally hold back a horse so as to keep it from winning.
  7. (informal, transitive) To admonish or criticize (a person) for their actions.
    • 1992 June 24, Edwina Currie, Diary:
      At 4pm, the phone went. It was The Sun: 'We hear your daughter's been expelled for cheating at her school exams...'
      She'd made a remark to a friend at the end of the German exam and had been pulled up for talking.
      As they left the exam room, she muttered that the teacher was a 'twat'. He heard and flipped—a pretty stupid thing to do, knowing the kids were tired and tense after exams. Instead of dropping it, the teacher complained to the Head and Deb was carpeted.
    • 2014, April De Angelis, Wild East:
      My coursework began to suffer and my parents pulled me up on it and said we are not paying for you to get off your head every night.
    • 2021 May 5, Christian Wolmar, “Scheme available to any victims of domestic abuse”, in RAIL, number 930, page 44:
      I was pulled up by a male reader who had been a victim of domestic abuse, for using the word 'women' instead of 'victims'. He rightly pointed out that men are victims of abuse too.
  8. (rare) To improve; to get better; to lift one's game.
    • 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, Sydney: Ure Smith, published 1962, page 17:
      A local doctor had bought one canvas and but for that lucky chance he would have been out of pocket. Now he was muttering grumpily at Edmund, "Have to get something better this trip, Edmund. Got to pull up somehow or buyers will be turnin' us down. Sales been gettin' worse and worse these last years."

Derived terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

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