This week, we\u2019re going to look at some words about edges\u2014the far ends, away from the center. If you\u2019re on the edge of something, you might be very, very close to it, but not quite in it, or you might be just barely inside, near leaving.<\/p>\n
For example, you might be driving away from downtown, at the edge of the city.<\/em> In that case, you\u2019re almost outside of the city, but not quite. Or maybe you just left the city limits a second ago.<\/p>\n Or you might be on the edge of crying<\/em>. In that case, you\u2019re not actually crying, but you\u2019re close to it.<\/p>\n And just like those two different meanings of \u201cedge\u201d above, there are some real-world edges and some metaphorical ones below.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This one is pretty easy. The \u201cverge\u201d is, as I described with \u201cedge\u201d above, just the outside limit of something. It is more often used metaphorically, though, whereas the \u201cedge\u201d is often a physical, real thing.<\/p>\n Sometimes it is used as a verb, paired with the word \u201con.\u201d To \u201cverge on something\u201d means that you are nearing something. Again, it\u2019s mostly metaphorical. A country might be verging on war, <\/em>for example, meaning that it\u2019s becoming dangerous, and they might go to war soon.<\/p>\n TOEFL example: In the middle of the 1800s, the world was on the verge<\/strong> of a major advance in technology, as electricity would soon become an important part of the average person\u2019s day.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n In many cases, we could use \u201cbrink\u201d in the same sentences as we would use \u201cverge\u201d; it\u2019s usually metaphorical, and it means some situation is very close, possibly going to happen quite soon.<\/p>\n But a physical \u201cbrink\u201d is the edge of a cliff, specifically. So then, it\u2019s not surprising that a metaphorical brink is often a dangerous place to be. Both words can<\/em> be either positive or negative, but a \u201cbrink\u201d is often the edge of something bad.<\/p>\n TOEFL example: For decades after the creation of the atomic bomb, many Americans felt that we were on the brink<\/strong> of world destruction.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n While the two words above are usually metaphorical, a \u201cboundary\u201d can be a concrete, real thing. It is similar to the word \u201cborder,\u201d and is often used in the same contexts. The land of a country has boundaries, for example. If you cross that, then you will be in another country.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t mean to say that there are no metaphorical boundaries. Parents must set boundaries for their children, for instance. Those are rules that the children should not break\u2014metaphorical \u201clines\u201d that they should not cross.<\/p>\n TOEFL example: Between the core of the earth, which is liquid, and the mantle, the solid layer that surrounds the core, there is a boundary<\/strong> which we still know surprisingly little about.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The biggest difference between the boundary and the periphery is that a periphery is actually an area, whereas a boundary is just a line. So things can actually be in<\/em> a periphery, not just on, inside, <\/em>or outside <\/em>like a boundary.<\/p>\n For example, your friend\u2019s friend whose name you know is in the periphery of your social group. And something that you can only see if you look to your left is in the periphery of your vision.<\/p>\n The adjective \u201cperipheral\u201d is an important word, too: it means \u201cfar from the center\u201d or, metaphorically, \u201cnot very important.\u201d TOEFL reading passages include many details that are peripheral to the main points, for instance.<\/p>\n TOEFL example: Many lesser known jazz musicians of the 1920s who created music in the periphery<\/strong> of popular culture were never recorded, and their music is now lost.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Maybe you noticed that all four nouns above often have \u201cthe\u201d before them. It\u2019s possible to use \u201ca\u201d before each, but when we talk about edges, we often talk about the<\/strong> edge of<\/strong> [something]. Because we know what that \u201csomething\u201d is, we know which specific edge<\/em> we are referring to, since most things only have one edge. It is a single, defined, understood edge because of the words \u201cof<\/strong> [something].\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This week, we\u2019re going to look at some words about edges\u2014the far ends, away from the center. If you\u2019re on the edge of something, you might be very, very close to it, but not quite in it, or you might be just barely inside, near leaving. For example, you might be driving away from downtown, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13604],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[13628],"class_list":["post-609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vocab"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n(the) Verge<\/h2>\n
(the) Brink<\/h2>\n
(the) Boundary<\/h2>\n
(the) Periphery<\/h2>\n
Why \u201cthe\u201d?<\/h2>\n