Job Discussion Forums

[sheeba]

Ok grammar heads.

Tommorow I'm going to get the students to sell to their classmates holidays. They will be like travel agents selling holidays.

I've looked on th SAGA website for the kind of language used in this situation and as I expected they seem to use a lot of the present simple for narratives- like- On the second day you visit the Great Wall blah blah blah.

But as I suspected also they use the passive 'you will be met by----at the arport' and 'you will be staying at -----hotel'

Now the inconsistency in grammar I feel may confuse my students and they may demand explanation. I at least feel they deserve explanation.

My feeling is that when travel agents use 'you will be met at ....' this is to sell the holiday. When the words 'you will be ....' are uttered does this not almost sell the holiday straight away?

I don't know. I also feel that some holiday agents use 'you are met' which is the simple passive. Maybe the will future passive is stronger in that it throws the idea of actually doing this into the customer's head. Maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree.

Could anyone throw some light my way so I can explain to students why we use these different forms - present simple/present passive/will passive - in different areas in the travel industry.

[jwbhomer]

It's not a question of grammar, but of style. Advertising copywriters are trained to place the emphasis on the target of the sales pitch. That's YOU. So the example you gave puts the reader first. It's better to say "YOU will be met by a tour guide" rather than "A tour guide will meet you."

Hope this helps.

PS - Are you a native speaker?

[dmb]

[mdk]

The passive voice is commonly used when the subject is not germane to the meaning of the sentence

For example, "the passengers will be met at the airport". In this case who the actual passengers are is not at issue.

The example you gave is active voice because the subject is identified.


In british english there is a semantic difference between "will" and "going to".

In American usage this point has largely disappeared in common usage, but may perhaps be at issue in something like a TOEFL. An American would tend to use "will" and "going to" interchangeabley....I reckon.

This all leads back to the question of whether you are teaching descriptive as opposed to prescriptive grammar to the student. Both approaches have their merits, but you should be all on the same page about what you are doing, I think.

[Stephen Jones]

[sheeba]

you will be staying at -----hotel'


pssst that's active.

Yeah sorry. My mistake there. That one is future continuous right? It still seems strange that they throw this tense in on the SAGA website considering most of the time they stick to present simple. Any ideas? They could just say 'you stay at the Hilton' . I still think this future continuous usage might have something to do with selling. When I hear the words 'you will be ---ing' it seems more certain that I will buy that ticket(or I have already bought it)

'you will be met' features as a passive in Teaching Tenses as 'predicting future processes'. Rosemary Aitken categorises this as a complex passive.
So at least I got that right

Thanks for the pointers about the agent guys.

Homer. I am a native speaker. British.[/b]