take it upon oneself
take it upon oneself verb: to assume personal responsibility for a task or action.
Verb
take it upon oneself (third-person singular simple present takes it upon oneself, present participle taking it upon oneself, simple past took it upon oneself, past participle taken it upon oneself)
- To assume personal responsibility for a task or action.
- She took it upon herself to manage the project.
- The home secretary of the day, the bumptious Sir William Joynson-Hicks, took it upon himself to attend the house, a formality dating from the 17th century to ensure no impostors were substituted, ostensibly to ensure all was well, and he proclaimed the news publicly, even though the government was...September 8 2022, Stephen Bates, “Queen Elizabeth II obituary”, in The Guardian
Forms of take it upon oneself
| third-person singular present | takes it upon oneself |
|---|---|
| present participle | taking it upon oneself |
| past | took it upon oneself |
| past participle | taken it upon oneself |
Questions about take it upon oneself
- What does take it upon oneself mean?
- Take it upon oneself means to assume personal responsibility for a task or action.
- What part of speech is take it upon oneself?
- Take it upon oneself is a verb.
- What is the past tense of take it upon oneself?
- The past tense of take it upon oneself is took it upon oneself.
Words near take it upon oneself in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: take it upon oneself (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-take it upon oneself.ogg.
Cite this entry: “take it upon oneself.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/take_it_upon_oneself. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
