Present continuous uses and examples

Let's look at the different ways we can use the present continuous tense in English.

1) To describe something that is happening right now.

We use the present continuous in order to describe an event that is happening at that specific moment, right before our very eyes. It is the most immediate of tenses, as it deals in the here and the now. Although different time frames can be implied in the present continuous, this first use is the most commonly used and, arguably, the most important of the three. In conversation, this tense is often used with heightened expression or excitement.

Examples:

• He is stealing the car!
• They are winning the game!
• The tires are losing air!
• Jimmy is walking to school.

Notice the punctuation in the first three of the above examples; the exclamation point strengthens the tone of immediacy which is contained in the present continuous.

2) Something we think to be temporary.

When we know or believe that a certain reality will last for a pre-determined or finite period of time, that is, something we know will not be true for forever, we use the present continuous. This way we can describe different stages in our lives, what we are working on at the current moment and how things will be in the foreseeable future.

Examples:

• Jane is working in Mexico this summer.
• I am living in Wisconsin for the winter.
• Willie Nelson is touring for a while.
• Jane and Alex are hiking in the Appalachian Mountains for two months.

In each case there is a defined, expressed time frame with which the speaker is working. The only undefined time frame in the examples used above is in Example 3. The phrase for a while is by no means defining a concrete period of time, but the listener should understand that, whatever the time frame is, it will be temporary. No one is perpetually, always on tour (much less an old man like Willie Nelson).

3) Something that happens again and again.

When an event takes on a habitual nature (that is, if it happens continually, over and over again) we can use the present continuous to express that continuousness. Essentially, the speaker does not know when, or if, the event will ever cease to occur. We usually include a word which introduces the habitual action, which most often happens to be always.

Examples:

• Jennifer is always fighting with her brother.
• He is always waiting for the train.
• We are always losing matches.
• I am always arriving late to class.

As is illustrated by the above examples, the marker always is extremely important to this particular use. Without it, it would lose its meaning and purpose.

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