Скачать или смотреть "Beat Around the Bush" Idiom Meaning, Origin & History | Superduper English Idioms

0:00 - How to Say, “Beat Around the Bush.”
0:21 - Meaning of “Beat Around the Bush.”
1:43 - Origin of “Beat Around the Bush.”
2:51 - Examples of “Beat Around the Bush.”
3:24 - Conclusion

“Beat Around the Bush.”

You’ve no doubt heard someone use the idiom, “beat around the bush,” during a conversation when one person is not saying something that should be said.

To “beat around the bush” means to stall, to waste time, to not get directly to the main point.

If two people are talking and one person has bad news for the other, they might “beat around the bush” by not mentioning this bad news directly.

Or maybe the person feels uncomfortable with what they have to say, so they delay it by “beating around the bush”.

Of course, the intended receiver of the news will ask the other person not to “beat around the bush”, because they already have an idea that something is being left unsaid.

Someone might also be “beating around the bush” if they procrastinate; that is, if they dread doing a task and delay it by doing other things.

The idiom originates with hunting during European medieval times, where hunters hired people to literally use sticks to beat around bushes.

These hired hands would accompany the hunter and if game (the hunted animal) hid in bushes, they would beat the area around the bush, trying to flush out the animal.

The hired hands would not beat the bush directly, however, as it could prove dangerous. What if there was a wasp’s nest hidden within that they unintentionally hit?

Nowadays, thankfully most people don’t have to go out hunting, and physically beating around bushes has been replaced by metaphorically beating around bushes.

Here’s an example usage of “beat around the bush”:

Miranda is talking to Phillip and she has bad news for him - their pet cat ran away from home - but she has not yet directly mentioned it.

Phillip might say, “Miranda, please stop beating around the bush. What is the bad news you want to tell me?”

Beating around the bush is not always a bad thing, as you might want to be gentle if you’ve got bad news to share.

If you’ve got good news, however, it probably isn’t necessary to beat around the bush at all!

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