Speak Better English with Harry | Episode 541

In this episode, you'll learn useful English vocabulary to describe real-life situations when things get worse. Whether you're talking about problems at work, personal setbacks, or difficult times, it's important to use the right words and natural English phrases to express yourself clearly and confidently. This episode is ideal for intermediate to advanced English learners who want to build their English vocabulary and speak more fluently in real situations.

You’ll learn vocabulary that commonly appears in English news articles, formal writing, and advanced English exams such as IELTS and CAE. These are the kinds of words that will help you sound more accurate, fluent and professional in both spoken and written English. If you want to improve your English speaking skills, prepare for real conversations, and learn advanced English words for describing problems and decline, this lesson is for you.

Transcript

0:09

Hi there, this is Harry. Welcome back to Advanced English Lessons with Harry, where we try to help you to get a better understanding of the English language. So, this is an advanced English lesson. It's about vocabulary, and it's vocabulary that we can use when things go bad. So, alternative words to use. So, when things take a turn for the worse, then you need to know how you can express it. Okay, so let me go and give you an example or indeed situations when you can use them. So, the first is a step backwards. Well, if we have to take a backwards step or a step backwards, it means that things are not going quite as well as they should. So, if you're planning to do some additional education and you complete the documents for the university and they tell you, well, look, before you can actually do this course, you need to do an introduction course first of all. So that's going to take you six to nine months. That's the rule of the university. So you're going to have to do that first. They say, well, that's a little bit of a backward step. It's going to set me back by an extra year. So you might consider that to be a backward step or a step backwards, but you don't really know. Or indeed, if somebody is in their job, they're looking to get promoted, but nothing happens. And then out of the blue, the company announced that they are merging with another company. So they're going to be taken over. Unfortunately, when a merger happens, somebody loses out. So what happens? You get called in by your boss to say your department is going to merge with another department and they're going to be X number of managers ahead of you. So that promotion you wanted is not going to happen for some time. So you see this merger as a step backwards for you. It's a backwards step. It's not you moving forward. Perhaps the company is moving forward, but for you, it's something entirely different and you might have to consider your position. Okay, so a step backwards. To go to the dogs, very, very informal, idiomatic expression. When things go to the dogs, well, we might as well just give up. Yeah, this country has gone to the dogs. It's a very common expression when people are a little bit dissatisfied or more than a bit dissatisfied with the performance of their government or they can't do anything, they can't get anything right. So this country has gone to the dogs. So it's a real expression of frustration when you really think there's nothing left to do but pack your bags, pack your boxes and head to another country. But guess what? As we say, the grass is always greener on the other side and you'll probably find whichever country you go to, other people are sitting in their kitchens and sitting in their offices saying, oh, this government, this country, it's gone to the dogs. So gone to the dogs means, yeah, you might as well throw it to the dogs and let them pull it apart. It's not going to improve. Gone to the dogs. And for those of you and your friends or family who want one-to-one lessons, well, you know what to do. Just get in touch, www.englishlessonviaskype.com and you can apply for a free trial lesson and we'll be very happy to hear from you and very happy to help you. And then to add insult to injury. Well, when things get worse, we can use this expression and to add insult to injury. So usually it's an expression used by people who are a bit unhappy with what happened and then after that something else happens. So if we talk about the boss who calls you in and tells you that you haven't got that promotion, that somebody else is getting it or there's a freeze on the promotions, you might use the expression, and then to add insult to injury, he told me that I wasn't even going to get a salary increase. So the first bit of bad news was the fact that you weren't going to get the promotion. The second bit of bad news, which added insult to injury, was the fact that you were told you weren't going to get a salary increase. So a double blow, a real hammer blow. So to add insult to injury. And again, you can use it in lots of other situations. Your friends forgot about your birthday. And to add insult to injury, they didn't even invite me to go with them for the weekend when they were all heading off fishing or doing something else. They didn't think that you'd be interested, so they didn't ask you. So to add insult to injury, the double blow. First problem and then the second problem, to add insult to injury. Okay, and the next word, to go from bad to worse. So here's the expression when things are bad and then they get even worse. So we use that expression to go from bad to worse. So lots of situations when you can use this expression. For example, the weather. So the winter starts off cold and wet, but then as you get into the next few months, you get snow, heavy frosts, strong winds. And yeah, the weather has gone from bad to worse. So I've never known a winter like it. It started off wet and windy, but before we knew it, getting into December, it had gone from bad to worse. We couldn't drive the car because we were snowed in a couple of days. The roads are in really bad condition. It was difficult for the people gritting the roads to keep up with the level of the snowfall. So we can use that expression. Things have gone from bad to worse. And again, as we spoke previously about economic situations, well, then the economy can go from bad to worse. We get a slowdown in the economy. We get an increase in inflation. And to make matters worse, then we get increase in the price of fuel and gas and all sorts of aspects like that. So yes, we can gradually or generally say that the economy has gone from bad to worse, from bad to worse. To be all downhill, well, when you're going downhill, if you ski, you know how quickly it happens. You go from the top to the bottom in no time at all. So when things go downhill, we usually say they go from bad to worse. When it's downhill, it's like a snowball effect. Very hard to stop. Okay. So somebody might say, oh, my career has gone downhill ever since we got that new manager. He just doesn't like me. No matter what I do, he's complaining. I haven't had a promotion. I've had no salary increase, no bonus. My career is not even standing still. It's just going downhill and going downhill rapidly. So you're really a little browned off. You're really a bit annoyed and frustrated. And you're not quite sure how you're going to deal with it. But yeah, things can go downhill. So when things start going bad, they can go downhill very quickly. The football team, and as you know, by now, I really love my football. But if a team has a run of bad luck, they're losing games, players got injured, the manager is losing a bit of faith in the team and the team are losing a bit of faith in the manager, then things can go from bad to worse very quickly or downhill. So, oh, this season has been a disaster. We've gone from bad to worse. It's downhill from here. I don't think we'll actually get anywhere and we'll be very, very lucky to escape relegation. So it's all downhill. Deteriorate. Well, it's a very formal word and you have to be careful here with the pronunciation. Deteriorate. Deteriorate. So when things deteriorate, they do take a turn for the worse, but it's gradual. Okay, so it's not just a once-off thing. For example, if you have a home and you haven't painted or decorated it for some time, then if it's been a lot of rain or bad weather, then the brickwork or the wooden surrounds, they can deteriorate quite quickly. So you get water ingress and when you get water in between cracks, then you get problems with damp. So when you don't maintain the home and you don't have some upkeep and some renovations, then the condition of the house will deteriorate very quickly. So this is a good way in which you can use the word, the deterioration of the home, the condition of the home, both outside and inside. So to deteriorate. Or indeed, when we talk about somebody's health, if somebody has had an operation and everything was going okay and recovery, but then suddenly they get an infection in the hospital, then their health can deteriorate really, really quickly. So we have to be really quick and the doctor has to be told and they have to get various injections. But the report from the doctor will say, oh, well, he was recovering, but unfortunately, things have begun to deteriorate. So the next 24 hours are critical in relation to survival. So to deteriorate means health to go from bad to worse, to take a turn for the worse. Decline, this is a little bit more formal. When we say things are in decline, it means they are getting worse or they are turning bad. So for example, the economy, when it's turning bad and people are seeing real, really high inflation in their own economies, gas prices going up, petrol prices increasing, food prices increasing. So the economy is in decline. It's getting bad or it's going from bad to worse. So things have been in decline for several months. So since the turn of the year, each of the economic reports that we read shows, the indicators are very clear that we are in decline. The economy is in decline. Economic activity is in decline. Growth is in decline. So it's an expression that we use very, very seriously and significantly when we're talking about economy. So when things go bad, then yes, they're in decline. Regress. Well, this is quite a formal word. Progress is moving forward. Regress is going backwards. So if we regress in some ways, we just don't improve. We are taking backward steps. So somebody's, let's say, behavior in the classroom has regressed. So perhaps the teacher had reasons to talk to you about the performance or lack of performance of the children in school. Something has happened. So she tells you that young Billy or Johnny or Mary is not doing as well as the other people. Indeed, their behavior has really been bad for the last few weeks. And she was waiting to have the parent-teachers meeting to tell you about it. And then she says, well, indeed, in the last week, the performance has regressed again. Other kids did really well in the midterm test, but Billy or Mary or John didn't do so well. In fact, they've gone backwards. Their performance, their behavior, their attitude, all of these have regressed. So the teacher might want to know what's happening at home or what's happening with Billy or Mary. Is there something that they need to discuss? Okay, so they may be feeling worried or nervous or anxious and they're afraid of making mistakes. So their performance has regressed. It's gone backwards. Disintegrate. Well, when things disintegrate, they usually fall apart. So if there's a big explosion, a gas explosion in a building, the whole building will disintegrate. It'll just collapse and fall to pieces. Or if you drop a piece of china, very thin porcelain or something on the hard ground, it will literally disintegrate, will just fall to pieces. So when things go from bad to worse and they disintegrate, it means they just really fall apart. Relationships can disintegrate. So people start off on really, really good terms. They have great ideas about the future, but gradually the relationship gets into a little bit of difficulty, no communication, not really on the same page, on the same wavelength, as we say, and bit by bit the relationship disintegrates. Okay, so they stop talking, they stop going out, they stop trying to find out what the problem is, they ignore each other, and then finally, somebody leaves or they just decide that's it, we've had enough. So the whole relationship breaks up. So we can use the word disintegrates. Okay, so when something disintegrates, it falls apart, boom, like a big explosion. Nothing left. Nothing can be found to disintegrate. Worsen. Well, worsen is just a way to describe how things get worse. Okay, so the medical condition has worsened overnight. The weather conditions have worsened over the last few nights. The prognosis for the recovery of the economy or the business have worsened. So it's when things are bad and they anticipate them to get worse. Okay, so we can say they have worsened or they will worsen in the next few days or they will get worse before they get better. All of those types of phrases can be used when things are going bad, turning bad or going from bad to worse. We can say they will worsen, they have worsened, things will continue to worsen. So you can use it in all of those situations that I've given you as an example. Okay, so they're all expressions, 10 expressions and examples of how you can use them, where you can substitute something for going bad or when things take a turn for the worse. Okay, as I say, you know the drill by now. I'm going to go back through them and hopefully you'll then get an opportunity to practice them, to try out a few of them, see can you introduce them into your conversations. And if you need any help, I'm always here. Okay, so here they go. A step backwards or backwards step, a step backwards. To be all downhill, all downhill from here. Decline, to be in decline. Deteriorate. Remember the pronunciation, deteriorate. To go from bad to worse, to go from bad to worse. Regress, quite formal regress. So the opposite of progress, regress. Disintegrate, disintegrate, worsen. Things have gone to the dogs. This country has gone to the dogs. And then finally, add a insult to injury. Okay, so if you need more examples, come back to me, www.englishlessonbyskype.com. Very, very happy to hear from you and very, very happy to help you further. As always, I appreciate you watching. This is Harry saying goodbye. And join me for your next lesson.