Appendix:Collocations of do, have, make, and take

This appendix lists collocations of the verbs make, do, take, and have.

In many of these usages the verbs are "light verbs" that lend relatively little semantic content. Other light verbs include: give, pay, put, raise, offer.

For people who are learning English, or even who speak it moderately well, these four verbs present difficulties when it comes to many collocations. For example, what about the shopping? Is it do the shopping, or make the shopping? How about photograph (see picture)? Do a photograph or make a photograph? Neither! You should take a photograph... and so on. This appendix is an attempt to clear up some of the most common doubts and errors.

This is not a definitive list. The intention is orientative. All the following nouns and expressions can, of course, take other verbs. The four options do, make, take, have are in the sense of doing the activity. Have, for instance, normally indicates possession, but that is not the sense of the verb as used in each of the collocations listed in this table. To have a bath, for example, does NOT normally mean to possess a bath. In each case, the idea of the verb is to do the activity.

Readers of this appendix are strongly recommended to read the main entry for the noun or expression to check for correct usage and meaning.

Contributors are encouraged to place Usage notes into this appendix similarly, and also into the collocate's main entry, such as:

• We normally do the shopping.
• We normally make or take a (tele)phone call.

...and so on, along with the Appendix: link to this page.

In light-verb constructions "make" implies an active role by the subject, who causes something new to occur or come into existence from pre-existing material or a pre-existing situation or the normal course of events.

"Take" implies an active role by the subject, but no change in the object except for its ownership.

"Do" implies that the subject is active, but fitting into a pre-existing role. In addition do is often used when someone performs an action, activity or task.

"Have" implies a greater degree of passivity and no causation.

When used with a participle, it implies a change from a state without the action of the verb to a state with it. For the present participle that means starting to do the (intransitive, continuous) action of the verb. For the past participle that means receiving the action of the verb.

When used with an infinitive, it means that one is allowed to perform the action of the verb, or to assume the state of a stative verb.

When have is followed by got and an infinitive, it means that one must perform the action of the verb, or to assume the state of a stative verb. In other words, it's exactly equivalent to have and the infinitive. In informal, proscribed usage, the word have is left out in the present tense. In such cases, the only way to tell this from the past tense of the get-and-infinitive construction above is through the context.

"Give" implies a degree of activity by the subject, but also the involvement of a recipient.