The continuous and progressive aspects are grammatical aspects that express incomplete action in progress at a specific time: they are non-habitual, imperfective aspects. Most languages treat continuous and progressive aspects as the same and use the two terms interchangeably, but there are languages that distinguish them. In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb defines the temporal flow (or lack thereof) in the described event or state. ... The imperfective aspect, sometimes known as the continuous or progressive aspect, is a grammatical aspect. ...

As with other grammatical categories, the precise semantics of the aspects vary from language to language, and from grammarian to grammarian. For example, G.L. Lewis's grammar of Turkish counts the -iyor form as a present tense; Robert Underhill's as a progressive tense; and Jacklin Kornfilt's as both a continuous (nonhabitual imperfective) and a progressive (continuous non-stative) aspect.

Continuous vs. progressive

The difference between the continuous and progressive aspects is often hard to grasp because they are not generally distinguished in many languages (including English). In general, the progressive aspect expresses the dynamic quality of actions that are in progress while the continuous aspect expresses the state of the subject that is continuing the action. For instance, the English sentence "Tom is walking" can express the active movement of Tom's legs (progressive aspect), or Tom's current state, the fact that Tom is walking rather than doing something else at the moment (continuous aspect).

The relationship between the progressive and continuous aspects is not quite clear. Some linguists consider the progressive aspect to be a kind of continuous aspect, one that merely emphasizes the action already conveyed by the continuous. However, some other linguists consider the continuous aspect to be a kind of progressive aspect, because in many languages that distinguish the two, the formal progressive aspect can convey a semantic continuous aspect, but not the reverse. Additionally, the continuous and progressive aspects (whatever the relationship between them) are both sometimes considered to be kinds of durative aspect.

Continuous and progressive in various languages

Unless otherwise indicated, the following languages treat continuous and progressive aspects the same, in which case the term continuous is used to refer to both.

English

History

One hypothesis regarding the origin of the development of the English progressive aspect was the Old English construction that used a form of beon/wesan (to be/to become) with a present participle (-ende). Although there is some debate among scholars, it is generally thought that such a construction in Old English was not analogous to progressive aspect signaled in present-day-English (a more modern development), but rather carried the meaning of a simple stative verb, where the past participle functioned as an adjective, and was predominantly used for translating the corresponding construction in Latin texts (Brinton, 1988, p. 109).

The likely source of the English's current progressive aspect is the Celtic languages that were spoken in Britain during much of English's history, all of which formed it similarly; this would explain why English is the only Germanic language with this feature. [1]

Formation

The continuous aspect is expressed with a regularly conjugated form of to be, together with the present participle of the main verb. For example, in the sentence "I was going to the store," the verb phrase was going is in the past continuous tense - that is, in the continuous aspect and the past tense. In linguistics, a participle is an adjective derived from a verb. ...

The continuous aspect can be applied with any mood, voice, and tense, and in combination or not with the perfect aspect, although for obvious semantic reasons, some combinations are less common than others. Some examples of the continuous aspect include: In linguistics, many grammars have the concept of grammatical mood (or mode), which describes the relationship of a verb with reality and intent. ... In grammar, the voice of a verb describes the relationship between the action (or state) that the verb expresses and the participants identified by its arguments (subject, object, etc. ... The perfect aspect is a grammatical aspect, which refers to a state resulting from a previous action (also described as a previous action with relevance to a particular time, or a previous action viewed from the perspective of a later time). ...

• We had been talking for hours. (indicative mood, active voice, past tense, perfect continuous aspect)
• If you're not going to be working on it the whole time, … (indicative mood, active voice, present tense, continuous aspect)
• … then I recommend you at least be working on it when the teacher gets back. (present subjunctive mood, active voice, continuous aspect)
• I wish I were being given more interesting tasks. (past subjunctive mood, passive voice, continuous aspect)

Use

The continuous is generally used with actions that are actively on-going at the time in question, and does not focus on the larger time-scale. For example, the sentence "John was playing tennis when Jane called him" indicates what John was in the middle of doing when Jane called him, but does not indicate for how long John played, nor how often he plays; for that, the simple past would be used: "John played tennis three hours every day for several years."

The perfect continuous (have been doing), as a special case, implies that the action being described was interrupted at the time in question, and does not clarify whether the action resumed. For example, "John had been playing tennis when Jane called him" suggests that Jane's calling him interrupted his tennis-playing (whereas in the former example, it was possible that he simply ignored her call), and leaves open the possibility that what she told him required such urgent action that he forfeited his match and left.

In the present tense, the continuous aspect can be used to describe actions that have not begun yet; and in any tense, a similar effect can be achieved with the auxiliary "go" in its continuous aspect. An example of the former is "I'm taking three classes next semester"; of the latter, "I was going to do it if I had time, and then I didn't have time." In this use, this construction has a temporal (tense-like) quality in additional to its usual aspectual one.

Chinese

The Chinese language is one family of languages that makes a distinction between the continuous and progressive aspects. Ruby characters are small, annotative characters that can be placed above or to the side of a character when writing logographic languages such as Chinese or Japanese to show the pronunciation. ... Mozilla is a computer term which has had many different uses, though all of them have been related to the now-defunct Netscape Communications Corporation and its related application software. ... Chinese (written) language (pinyin: zhōngw n) written in Chinese characters The Chinese language (汉语/漢語, 华语/華語, or 中文; Pinyin: H nyǔ, Hu yǔ, or Zhōngw n) is a member of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. ...

Cantonese

Cantonese has a very regular system for expressing aspects via verb suffixes. 緊 is typically used to express progressive aspect while 住 is used to express continuous aspect. Take the following example: Cantonese is a major dialect group or language of the Chinese language, a member of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. ...

In the example, the progressive aspect expresses the fact that the subject is actively putting on clothes rather than merely wearing them as in the continuous aspect. This example is useful for showing English speakers the difference between continuous and progressive because "wearing" in English never conveys the progressive aspect (instead "putting on" must be used).

In Cantonese, the progressive marker 緊 can express the continuous aspect as well, depending on the context (so the example above could also mean "I'm wearing clothes" in addition to "I'm putting on clothes"), but in general, the progressive aspect is assumed. In order to emphasize the progressive aspect rather than the continuous, 喺度 (literally meaning "at here") can be used in front of the verb:

我(I) 喺度(at here) 著(wear) 緊(PROG) 衫(clothes) 。(.)

喺度 can also be used without 緊 to indicate the progressive aspect.

Mandarin

Unlike Cantonese, Mandarin does not have a verb suffix for expressing the progressive aspect, but it can use 正在 (or simply just 在), which also translates to "at [here]", similar to how Cantonese uses 喺度 in front of the verb. Mandarin (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: ; pinyin: ; literally speech of officials), or Beifanghua (Simplified Chinese: ; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ; literally Northern Dialect(s)), is a category of related Chinese dialects spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. ...

The continuous aspect does have a verb suffix, 著, which is cognate with the Cantonese 住 in this context. Incidentally, 著 is also used for the Cantonese word for "wear", but is actually not related since it's one of those words that has multiple meanings in Chinese. Cognate (Latin: cognatus co+gnatus, ie. ...

French

French does not have a continuous aspect per se; events that English would describe using its continuous aspect, French would describe using a neutral aspect. That being said, French can express a continuous sense using the periphrastic construction être en train de ("to be in the middle of"); for example, English's "we were eating" might be expressed in French either as nous étions en train de manger, or as simply nous mangions. Periphrasis is a figure of speech where the meaning of a word or phrase is expressed by many or several words. ...

Quebec French often expresses a continuous sense using the periphrastic construction être après (lit. "to be after"); for example, English's "we were eating" might be expressed in Quebec French either as nous étions après manger, or as simply nous mangions. Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Periphrasis is a figure of speech where the meaning of a word or phrase is expressed by many or several words. ...

German

There is no continuous aspect in standard German; however, certain regional dialects, such as those of the Rhineland, the Ruhr Area, and Westphalia, form a continuous aspect using the verb sein (to be), the preposition am (short for an dem) (at the or on the), and a gerund. For example, ich bin am Lesen, ich bin beim Lesen (literally I am on/at the reading) means I am reading. Known as the rheinische Verlaufsform (roughly Rhenish progressive form), it has become increasingly common in the casual speech of many speakers of standard German, although it is still frowned upon in formal and literary contexts. The Rhineland (Rheinland in German) is the general name for the land on both sides of the river Rhine in the west of Germany. ... Map of the Ruhr Area The Ruhr Area (German Ruhrgebiet, colloquially Ruhrpott or Kohlenpott or simply Pott) is an urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, consisting of a number of large (former) industrial cities bordered by the rivers Ruhr to the south, Rhine to the west, and Lippe to... Westphalia (German: Westfalen) is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen, Münster, Bielefeld, and Osnabrück and included in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony. ...

Dutch

There are various methods of forming a continuous in Dutch: one is the same as in English: zijn (to be) with the present participle, e.g. Het schip is zinkende (The ship is sinking). This is usually used to give some dramatic overtone and is not normally used. The second method of forming is as in the German dialects above: zijn, the preposition aan, and the gerund (verb used as a noun), e.g. De man is aan het eten (literally The man is at the eating), meaning The man is eating. The third method is by using the verb zitten (to sit), staan (to stand) or liggen (to lie), e.g. Hij zit te lezen (litt. He sits to read), meaning He is reading, Zij ligt te slapen (litt. She lies to sleep), meaning She is sleeping. Both of the latter two forms are mainly (and extensively) used in colloquial speech, but not in official writing. A fourth method, also available in English, is using the adverb bezig (busy), e.g. Ik ben bezig met lezen (litt. I am busy with reading), meaning I am busy reading.

Jèrriais

Formed exactly as in Rhenish German, Jèrriais constructs the continuous with verb êt' (be) + à (preposition) + infinitive. For example, j'têmes à mangi translates as we were eating. Jèrriais is the form of the Norman language spoken in Jersey, in the Channel Islands. ...

Russian

In the Russian language the continuous aspect may be expressed using reduplication.^{[citation needed]} Russian ( , tr. ...

Spanish

In Spanish, the continuous is constructed much as in English, using a conjugated form of estar (to be) plus the gerundio (gerund/gerundive/adverbial participle) of the main verb; for example, estar haciendo means to be doing (haciendo being the gerundio of hacer, to do). Unlike in English, the continuous cannot be used to describe an action that has not yet begun at the time of interest; however, in the present tense, the simple present suffices for this, and in any tense, a similar effect can be achieved with the auxiliary ir a ("to go to") in its non-continuous aspect. In linguistics, a gerund is a kind of verbal noun that exists in some languages. ... Be sure to check the discussion page (and feel free to remove this tag if this article is updated). ...

Like English, Spanish also has a few related constructions with similar structures and related meanings; for example, seguir haciendo means to keep doing (seguir being to continue).

Hindi and Urdu

Hindi and Urdu has a definite progressive/continuous aspect, marked by auxiliaries, for past, present, and future. It is distinguished from the simple aspect, and is widely used in everyday speech. Like English, it is also used to denote an immediate future action. For a complete conjugation of the continuous tenses, see Hindi grammar. Hindi (Devanagari: हिन्दी or हिंदी; IPA: ), an Indo-European language spoken mainly in northern and central India, is the official language of the Union government of India [1][2]. It is part of a dialect continuum of the Indic family, bounded on the northwest and west by Punjabi, Sindhi, Urdu, and Gujarati... (اردو), historically spelled Ordu, is an Indo-Aryan language of the Indo-Iranian branch, belonging to Indo-European family of languages. ... Hindi grammar (Hindi: ) is the grammar of Hindi language. ...

References

• Matthews, Stephen and Yip, Virginia (1994). Cantonese: A Comprehensive Grammar. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-08945-X. 
• Yip, Po-Ching and Rimmington, Don (2004). Chinese: A Comprehensive Grammar. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-15032-9. 

Stephen Matthews Stephen Matthews, a linguist and typologist, specialises in language typology, syntax and semantics. ...

See also

• Frequentative
• Grammatical aspect
• Imperfective aspect
• Grammar of the Breton language

In grammar, a frequentative form of a word is one which indicates repeated action. ... In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb defines the temporal flow (or lack thereof) in the described event or state. ... The imperfective aspect, sometimes known as the continuous or progressive aspect, is a grammatical aspect. ... Breton (Breton: Brezhoneg) is a Celtic language spoken by some of the inhabitants of Brittany (Breizh) and Loire-Atlantique (historically part of Brittany) in France. ...

External links

• What is continuous aspect?
• What is progressive aspect?
• The Present Progressives in the European Parliament Proceedings