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Sashadroogie
Joined: 17 Apr 2007
Posts: 11061
Location: Moskva, The Workers' Paradise
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 Posted: Thu Nov 22, 2012 6:08 pm Post subject: |
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| LH123 wrote: |
Oh and Sasha - I'm pretty sure that 'was/were going to' is covered in one of the grammar-in-uses; but you're right, it doesn't receive much attention as a structure in mainstream coursebooks.
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Don't have access to a whopping big corpora database thingy, but I hear tell, and choose to believe for no other reason than to state a almost baseless belief firmly, that 'was going' to is almost as common in spoken English as 'is going to'. Yet there are not too many course books that even mention the former, whereas the latter seems to be pasted into every damn book unit these days and contrasted with all other future forms - quite pointlessly most of the time. Hic! So one entry in Murphy really isn't anything to write home about hic is it?... |
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smithrn1983
Joined: 23 Jul 2010
Posts: 320
Location: Moscow
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| Posted: Thu Nov 22, 2012 6:39 pm Post subject: |
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| LH123 wrote: |
...informal online written genres...
.."heeeeey wen u gona cal me"
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I hereby move that people who write this way also be shipped off to the east and shot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzDCH_MGQXI |
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johnslat
Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
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| Posted: Thu Nov 22, 2012 7:32 pm Post subject: |
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The "Future in the Past" has always been one of my favorites. A lot of the time, of course, it's used to tell about a planned action that was never consummated:
"I was going to write The Great American Novel, but . . . ."
but it can also tell about completed actions:
I knew he was going to/would fail to write The Great American Novel.
Back to the Future, comrades.
Regards,
John |
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Sashadroogie
Joined: 17 Apr 2007
Posts: 11061
Location: Moskva, The Workers' Paradise
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| Posted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 8:23 am Post subject: |
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| smithrn1983 wrote: |
| LH123 wrote: |
...informal online written genres...
.."heeeeey wen u gona cal me"
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I hereby move that people who write this way also be shipped off to the east and shot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzDCH_MGQXI |
Many offenders have already been rounded up and are being sent off for re-education. Though in a lot of cases, this is their first real educational experience....
Justice will prevail! |
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