go through the motions
to do something without any interest
TRANSLATION
go through the motions = etwas hinter sich bringen, etwas mechanisch erledigen, so tun, als ob --- GOOGLE INDEX go through the motions: approximately 675,000 Google hits
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
"He throws everything into each performance. There is never the sense of him GOING THROUGH THE MOTIONS."
(BBC News)
---
Instead of crafting a detailed recovery program and working intensely to push it through Congress, Clinton opted instead to GO THROUGH THE MOTIONS…
(The New York Observer)
(BBC News)
---
Instead of crafting a detailed recovery program and working intensely to push it through Congress, Clinton opted instead to GO THROUGH THE MOTIONS…
(The New York Observer)
Did you
know?
go through the motions
idiom
- to do something without caring very much about it or having much interest in it
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
---
WORD ORIGIN
If someone is "going through the motions," they are performing a task with little or no enthusiasm.
A football player who lacks intensity on the pitch could be said to be just "going through the motions." The worker who has been laid off or fired might just go through the motions the last few days at the company. A student who only puts enough effort in school to get a passing grade is going through the motions.
Another form of going through the motions is called "lip-synching", which is moving the lips to a recorded song without actually singing it. At the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin Italy for instance, tenor great Luciano Pavarotti lip-synched his performance at the opening ceremony because it was too cold to sing. In addition, Pavarotti was ill with cancer at the time.
At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Peking, a 7-year-old Chinese girl was not good-looking enough for the Olympics opening ceremony, so another little girl with a pixie smile lip-synched "Ode to the Motherland," a ceremony official said. While the rest of the world seemed to be dismayed at being tricked, the ceremony's chief music director, Chen Qigang, said in an interview, "The audience will understand that it's in the national interest."
---
SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"If I find myself just going through the motions, then I try to change the routine."
idiom
- to do something without caring very much about it or having much interest in it
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
---
WORD ORIGIN
If someone is "going through the motions," they are performing a task with little or no enthusiasm.
A football player who lacks intensity on the pitch could be said to be just "going through the motions." The worker who has been laid off or fired might just go through the motions the last few days at the company. A student who only puts enough effort in school to get a passing grade is going through the motions.
Another form of going through the motions is called "lip-synching", which is moving the lips to a recorded song without actually singing it. At the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin Italy for instance, tenor great Luciano Pavarotti lip-synched his performance at the opening ceremony because it was too cold to sing. In addition, Pavarotti was ill with cancer at the time.
At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Peking, a 7-year-old Chinese girl was not good-looking enough for the Olympics opening ceremony, so another little girl with a pixie smile lip-synched "Ode to the Motherland," a ceremony official said. While the rest of the world seemed to be dismayed at being tricked, the ceremony's chief music director, Chen Qigang, said in an interview, "The audience will understand that it's in the national interest."
---
SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"If I find myself just going through the motions, then I try to change the routine."
