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Grammar Questions
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 3:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dear gaijinalways,
Here we are, arguing about a construction that, in all probability, will never be written or spoken. We are truly grammar nuts.

If you write/say, " . . . your towels will have been washed for twenty minutes," the meaning would be that the washing was completed twenty minutes ago and (presumably) your wet clothes are sitting in the washing machine (waiting to be put into the dryer, I imagine.)

Regards,
John
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Stephen Jones



Joined: 21 Feb 2003
Posts: 4124

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 5:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
The first be (been) is part of the perfect progressive or perfect continuous if you prefer (I have been doing X). The second is the passive.
Somewhat moot as almost nobody would ever say any of the OP's phrases.
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Littlebird



Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 82
Location: UK

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 8:54 pm    Post subject: Grammar Questions Reply with quote

What have I started ?

Why don't we all write to English Club and tell them their site is rubbish !! Some of it is good BUT if they have useless examples like that in it this could lead a lot of learners up the creek without a paddle. They would think that this was correct when obviously it is not. Who the hell wrote that, 'will have been being washed,' I now have doubts about the rest of the site.
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 9:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dear Littlebird,

I think you can hardly blame the site for having a construction that is perfectly correct - if hardly ever used.

Regards,
John
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MO39



Joined: 28 Jan 2004
Posts: 1970
Location: El ombligo de la Rep�blica Mexicana

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 9:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

johnslat wrote:
Dear Littlebird,

I think you can hardly blame the site for having a construction that is perfectly correct - if hardly ever used.

Regards,
John


It would be useful if the site indicated which verb forms were in common use and which ones existed more in theory than in practice.
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Sun Dec 07, 2008 10:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dear MO39,
True - which is something I like to do in class. When I tell students that, although there are many tenses, some are hardly ever used, and they really need to know only five or six.
Then I enjoy showing them some of the "useless" tenses.

Regards,
John
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rusmeister



Joined: 15 Jun 2006
Posts: 867
Location: Russia

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 3:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I teach that any of those uses may be possible - in a science fiction or fantasy context.
next summer I will have been teaching for over 14 years.

Conan the Barbarian, on a cell phone: "Nope, sorry, can't make it at 7(pm), Thulsa. I'll be killing barbarians then."

If you come up with the right context, the unusual form can suddenly make sense.
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 4:18 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dear rusmeister,
Context is all - true enough. But I don't think anyone's likely to encounter a plethora of contexts in which the future perfect progressive passive is called for.
Regards,
John
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Stephen Jones



Joined: 21 Feb 2003
Posts: 4124

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 8:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I agree with Littlebird on this one. If it's almost never used then it's farcical to consider it 'correct'.

There is one example of the perfect continuous passive in the British National Corpus (the other is a false flag where 'being brought' is the noun complement of 'had been'). For your delectation I append the whole quote and leave it for you to decide whether the person involved was speaking coherent English (hint; he's a politician).

Source information:

Date (1985-1994)
Title Wiltshire County Council: committee meeting (Pub/instit). Rec. on 25 Jan 1994 with 10 partics, 241 utts

Expanded context:

being developed and needs to be erm, needs to be brought into play. Erm, there is a need, as said, to make staff away of the authorities environmental policies. Erm, I dare say, on all our staff, our staff could make us more aware of environmental policies, and you know, are aware of erm, the need for the environmental action, erm than, erm than the action we are taking ourselves. That er, er, little action has been taken in the last thirty forty years since this has been being discussed , erm, I think the first international conference erm, produced their own report in nineteen sixty. Erm, we had the Rio conference in nineteen ninety-three, erm, we'll still doing very little about it. We the local authority, I think people of Wiltshire expect us to be the lead agency in promoting sustainability and environmental, highlighting environmental issues, throughout the county. Erm, not just taking a back seat, we need to actually promote these. Erm, I recognise that erm

There seems to be a rule in English that says the verb phrase shall not have more than three constituent parts. Perhaps somebody has access to research on this.
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 2:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's what Dave's ESL Cafe has to say on the subject:


Future Perfect Progressive*
(will + past participle for present perfect, BE + -ing verb for
progressive, BE + past participle for passive):


In March, 2002, these Hints will have been being written
for more than four years.


We're going to be late! Dinner will have been being served
long before we arrive at the restaurant!


*Special Note:

Passives for the progressive forms of perfect tenses are not
very common and are actually rather awkward. They should
be used sparingly and carefully.

http://www.eslcafe.com/grammar/using_passive_voice01.html

and, from the BBC:

Generally, we avoid using the continuous form of the passive with the future, present perfect, past perfect and future perfect, although present continuous and past continuous are quite common and sound quite natural in the passive voice.




The passive:

For the purpose of the chart below I have used the verb to clean, but there are obviously many other possibilities:

Simple Continuous
Present: It is cleaned... It is being cleaned...
Past: It was cleaned.. It was being cleaned
Future: It will be cleaned... xxxx xxxx xxxx
Present Perfect: It has been cleaned... xxxx xxxx xxxx
Past Perfect: It had been cleaned... xxxx xxxx xxxx
Future Perfect: It will have been cleaned xxxx xxxx xxxx

Study these further examples of use and note how we avoid using the continuous form of the passive in the final four tenses listed:

This toilet at Terminal One is in frequent use and is cleaned every four hours. It is being cleaned now, so you'll have to use the one that is situated opposite the British Airways check-in desk.
My daughter's portrait was delivered to my house in London before I arrived home. I didn't expect this to happen as it was still being painted when I began my journey back.
You will be told when to board the plane in due course. An announcement will be made, don't worry. And one of my colleagues will be accompanying you all the way to Guadalajara. (NOT: You will be being accompanied...)
The initial enquiry into the accident has been completed.
The full enquiry has been in progress (NOT: has been
being conducted) for six months and will be completed by Christmas.
I had no idea why I had been chosen to represent my country. I was aware that people had been watching me (NOT: I had been being watched), but it still came as a surprise.
The inspection will have been carried out and the report will have been written by the time Charles gets back from America. When he gets on that plane in New York, the inspectors will be holding a press conference to report their findings (NOT: their findings will have been being reported)

We avoid using the continuous form of the passive in these examples by switching to the active voice or by using people to refer to no person in particular.

Note that in informal English we can also use you or they to refer to people in general and also in this way avoid using the passive. Compare the following:

They're going to build another runway at Heathrow Airport.
A new runway will be built at Heathrow Airport some time next year.

You can buy all kinds of exotic food in Soho.
All kinds of exotic food can be bought in Soho.

You have to leave all your valuables and jewellery in the lockers that they provide in the changing rooms. You can't take valuables into the sports centre itself.
All valuables and jewellery must be left in the lockers that are provided in the changing rooms. Valuables may not be taken into the sports centre itself.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv119.shtml
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gaijinalways



Joined: 29 Nov 2005
Posts: 2279

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 3:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Impressive work John, I guess someone might use it, it just won't be me Cool .

Quote:
Passives for the progressive forms of perfect tenses are not
very common and are actually rather awkward. They should
be used sparingly and carefully.


No kidding.
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johnslat



Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 3:57 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dear gaijinalways,

"I guess someone might use it, it just won't be me."

Nor I. I mean, hell will have been being frozen over for eons before I'll use it.

Regards,
John
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stillnosheep



Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 2068
Location: eslcafe

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 5:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So, if when hell freezes over it won't have been being used by Johnslat at all, might it have been being used by him for a while some time after that?
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Teacher in Rome



Joined: 09 Jul 2003
Posts: 1286

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thank you (especially FH) for the interesting comments on the use of corpora. I was working for Longman at the time of their innovative Spoken Corpus, which was used (in part) for dictionary examples. The Corpus also produced some very interesting evidence as to how English can be used and adapted. The recordings were completely compelling, too, as all of us in a presentation eavesdropped in on a conversation about changing lightbulbs, that gave us such gems as "the sausagey one".

But the Longman dictionary editors also made up examples if the corpus-derived samples were unhelpful in illustrating meaning (as opposed to COBUILD who, I think, only used examples from the corpus.)
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Chancellor



Joined: 31 Oct 2005
Posts: 1337
Location: Ji'an, China - if you're willing to send me cigars, I accept donations :)

PostPosted: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm not comfortable with the phrase "been being" in that sentence.
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