Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary - tear

I. [c red]CRYING (tears) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. Tears are the drops of salty liquid that come out of your eyes when you are crying. Her eyes filled with tears... I didn’t shed a single tear. N-COUNT: usu pl 2. You can use tears in expressions such as in tears, burst into tears, and close to tears to indicate that someone is crying or is almost crying. He was in floods of tears on the phone... She burst into tears and ran from the kitchen... N-PLURAL 3. see also crocodile tears II. [c red]DAMAGING OR MOVING (tears, tearing, tore, torn) Frequency: The word is one of the 1500 most common words in English. Please look at category 8 to see if the expression you are looking for is shown under another headword. 1. If you tear paper, cloth, or another material, or if it tears, you pull it into two pieces or you pull it so that a hole appears in it. She very nearly tore my overcoat... Mary Ann tore the edge off her napkin... He took a small notebook from his jacket pocket and tore out a page... Too fine a material may tear... Nancy quickly tore open the envelope... He noticed that fabric was tearing away from the plane’s wing... He went ashore leaving me to start repairing the torn sail. VERB: V n, V n prep, V n with adv, V, V n with adj, V prep/adv, V-ed • Tear up means the same as tear. She tore the letter up... Don’t you dare tear up her ticket. ...a torn up photograph. PHRASAL VERB: V n P, V P n (not pron), V-ed P 2. A tear in paper, cloth, or another material is a hole that has been made in it. I peered through a tear in the van’s curtains. N-COUNT 3. If you tear one of your muscles or ligaments, or if it tears, you injure it by accidentally moving it in the wrong way. He tore a muscle in his right thigh... If the muscle is stretched again it could even tear. ...torn ligaments. VERB: V n, V, V-ed 4. To tear something from somewhere means to remove it roughly and violently. She tore the windscreen wipers from his car... He tore down the girl’s photograph, and crumpled it into a ball. VERB: V n prep, V n with adv 5. If a person or animal tears at something, they pull it violently and try to break it into pieces. Female fans fought their way past bodyguards and tore at his clothes. = rip VERB: V at n 6. If you tear somewhere, you move there very quickly, often in an uncontrolled or dangerous way. The door flew open and Miranda tore into the room... = rush VERB: V prep/adv 7. If you say that a place is torn by particular events, you mean that unpleasant events which cause suffering and division among people are happening there. ...a country that has been torn by civil war and foreign invasion since its independence. V-PASSIVE: be V-ed by n • -torn ...the riot-torn areas of Los Angeles. COMB in ADJ 8. see also torn, wear and tear