Sunday, September 19

Present Continuous

Present Continuous ( or present progressive)

The present continuous refers to:


  • actions in progress around the time of the speaking. refers to an action which is not happening at the time of the speaking, but in the period, maybe that year or season Eg.: "Singer AMY WINEHOUSE is writing a book of poems about her troubled life, according to reports." (Contact Music). She was not writting exactly when the reporter said that, still he could use the present continuous to refer to that period of time.










  • temporary situations. Eg.: "Hilton is facing a felony drug possession charge" (Radar Online).
She is facing the felony now, but the situation is temporary, as she will be free from that as soon as the judge decides her charge, and she pays it.







  • complaints. Eg.: "but my friend is always complaining about her boyfriend to me. I mean always saying how annoying he is, and how she likes to be away from him, but yet after all these years she is still together with him" (HilltopperPJ)

  • repeated actions Eg.: "Rolling, rolling, rolling on the river" (Proud Mary)

  • describing changes and development. Eg.: "I'm not an older person, I'm a person who's growing older" ( Jane Barratt)


*Some verbs do not have a continuous form, following the grammar, they are called Stative Verbs, those describe state, feelings, senses. Some of those are:



Some verbs have an active meaning and a different stative one, as:

to be, to depend, to measure, to feel, to have, to see, to taste, to measure, to think, to weight.

*It is each time more commom to see stative verbs used in the continuous form, it is said that this occurs due to the influence of other languages on English through the contact among English speaking people and other peoples.

" Because I love you" (Stevie B)













" Because I'm loving you" (Double you)

In the following poem, by Pablo Neruda, we can notice the influence from the Spanish in the English language, as the original poem was writen in Spanish, when translated to English the -ing is used in stative verbs, still it is not present continuous.


Sonnet LXVI: I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You

"I do not love you except because I love you;
I
go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I
hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly. (...)"


Be careful to distinguish verbs from nouns, a verb can be turn into a noun by using the -ing, it does not mean it is present continuous, the present continuous requires to be verb.

Compare

Eg1.: And now there's nothing I can do
Because I
'm loving you ... ( love in present continuous)



Eg2.: I
go from loving to not loving you ( love in the gerund, but it is not continuous)

Eg3.:

"Because I
love you and I’ll do anything (love as a stative verb)
I’ll give you my heart, my everything
Because I
love you, I’ll be right by your side
To be alive, to be your guy"

For more information check:

http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com/ingform/menu.php


http://www.cursoanglo.com.br/WebStander/disciplinas/index.asp?Cod=118 (in Portuguese)

Saturday, September 18

Simple Present

Present Time

Simple Present

The simple present refers to:
  • summaries of events, Eg.: Officials praise Afghan voters who defied Taliban threats to turn out to vote in a key parliamentary election. (bbc.uk)

  • historic present, (is the
    The present tense used in the narration of events set in the past.(...) When telling stories about past events, people often switch into present tense,) ( The Free Dictionary) Eg.: See Wikipedia

  • facts, Eg.: Brazilians know how to throw a party on a mammoth scale and make other festivals look like trainspotting conventions. (bbc.com)













  • states, Eg.: I am obsessed with laser hair removal! (...) my entire body is hairless." (Kim Kardashian)

















  • instructions. Eg.: To seduce the man of your dreams you don't have to be anything more than you already are (e-how.com)

Saturday, July 3

Vocabulary




Dance.

Types of dance.


Ballet

Ballet blanc - Women wears white tutus.

Ballet d'action- Has a plot, usually tragic

Ballet du le cour- Spetacles for entertainment, performed by the aristrocracy, in the 16th and 17th century. Unites music, recitatives and mimes.

flamengofc.com.br



Jazz

portiaxc.glogster.com

Tap- is a dance style in wich dancers wear socoial clothers and special shoes with metal taps, they use their feet to drum, creating a rythmic pattern.









Tony Waag - American Tap Dance Foundation


Contra-dance - is an Amercian folk dance in which couples dance in 2 parallel lines and perform a sequence of dance movements with different partners.

Ballrom dances- Social dances which include

fox-trot,

waltz,

tango,

rumba,

swing,

mambro,

samba

chacha.

Radical sports



Radical sports



Air sports


BASE jumping, "is an activity that employs an initially packed parachute to jump from fixed objects, as with paragliding. "B.A.S.E." is an acronym that stands for four categories of fixed objects from which one can jump: buildings, antennae, spans (bridge), and earth (cliff)." Wiki

bungee jumping,

gliding, "is a recreational activity and competitive air sport[1] in which pilots fly unpowered aircraft known as gliders or sailplanes using naturally occurring currents of rising air in the atmosphere to remain airborne" (Wiki)

hang gliding, "is an air sport in which a pilot flies a light and unmotorized foot-launchable aircraft called a hang glider"

high wire," is the art of walking along a thin wire or rope, usually at a great height" wiki

ski jumping, "is a sport in which skiers go down a take-off ramp, jump and attempt to land the farthest down on the hill below." Wiki

sky diving, "Parachuting, also known as skydiving, is the action of performing acrobatics during freefall, followed by deployment of a parachute. " Wiki

sky surfing,
"is a type of skydiving in which the skydiver wears a board attached to his or her feet and performs surfing-style aerobatics during freefall." wiki

sky flying.
"is the sport of flying the human body through the air using a special jumpsuit, called a wingsuit, which adds surface area to the human body to create lift" Wiki

Land sports

indoor climbing,


adventure racing,

aggressive inline skating,

BMX,

caving,

extreme motocross,


extreme skiing,

freestyle skiing,

land and ice yachting,


mountain biking,

mountain boarding,

outdoor climbing,

sandboarding,


skateboarding,

snowboarding,

snowmobiling,

speed biking,

speed skiing,

scootering

street luge.

water sports

barefoot water skiing,

cliff diving,

free-diving,

jet skiing,

open water swimming,

powerboat racing,

round the world yacht racing,

scuba diving,

snorkeling,

speed sailing,

surfing,

wakeboarding,

whitewater kayaking,

windsurfing.