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Definition of sum up phrasal verb from the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary

sum up

phrasal verb
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sum up | sum something up
  1. to state the main points of something in a short and clear form synonym summarize
    • To sum up, there are three main ways of tackling the problem…
    • The report attempts to sum up recent economic trends.
    • The storyline can be summed up in a few sentences.
    • sum up what… Can I just sum up what we've agreed so far?
    language bank at conclusionTopics Opinion and argumentb2
  2. (of a judge) to give a summary of the main facts and arguments in a legal case, near the end of a trial related noun summing-upTopics Opinion and argumentc1
sum somebody/something up
  1. to describe or show the most typical characteristics of somebody/something, especially in a few words
    • Totally lazy—that just about sums him up.
    • One young mother summed up the feelings of many parents when she said:…
    Extra Examples
    • ‘So we're stuck in this place with no food?’ ‘That just about sums it up.’
    • Her whole philosophy can be summed up as ‘so what?’.
    • The appeal of this charming little town is hard to sum up.
    • She summed it up as ‘the most brilliant lecture I've ever attended’.
    • For me, the novel summed up the major problems of human existence.
  2. to form or express an opinion of somebody/something synonym size up
    • She quickly summed up the situation and took control.
    related noun summing-upTopics Opinion and argumentb2
See sum up in the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary
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adverb
 
 
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