The changing verb phrase in present-day British English

FTFs and matching corpus examples for the progressive

If you have arrived at this page and are not sure what an FTF is and what it can be used for, you might find it useful to read more about them on our FTFs page before reading this page.

The Progressive

Progressive verb phrases in DCPSE are marked with the feature 'prog.' Examples can be retrieved from the corpus using the FTF in figure 1. Matching examples are shown in figures 2-4 and further examples are listed below.


Figure 1: FTF for verb phrases marked 'progressive' in DCPSE.


Figure 2: We're getting there.


Figure 3: I'm blanking.


Figure 4: Are you still having the tremor.

Examples

<DCPSE:DI-A01/ICE-GB:S1A-001 #0031:1:B> Uhm <,> and I think one of the things that I felt when I was studying dance <,> was I very much enjoyed the work that I was involved in


<DCPSE:DI-A01/ICE-GB:S1A-001 #0096:1:B> and therefore people that were coming we would expect them to pay


<DCPSE:DI-A02/ICE-GB:S1A-002 #0061:1:C> there is becoming a greater awareness far more so <,> uhm than there has ever been

<DCPSE:DI-A02/ICE-GB:S1A-002 #0138:2:B> I 'm graduating in June uhm <,> so <,> it 's given me some direction already

<DCPSE:DI-A02/ICE-GB:S1A-002 #0165:2:B> Uhm <,> yeah I wasn't doing very much I remember I wasn't there

<DCPSE:DI-A03/ICE-GB:S1A-003 #0093:1:A> we 're all of us building on that now <,> and uh <,> taking away the the obstacles I think

<DCPSE:DI-A04/ICE-GB:S1A-004 #0045:1:A> This is making too much of a racket <,>

<DCPSE:DI-A04/ICE-GB:S1A-004 #0046:1:A> Tell him we are waiting for the order <,,>

<DCPSE:DI-A04/ICE-GB:S1A-004 #0053:1:B> I was working <,> in that role at the Mike Heafy Centre <,>

<DCPSE:DI-A05/ICE-GB:S1A-024 #0072:1:A> Are you using it in the technical sense of the text grammar

<DCPSE:DI-A07/ICE-GB:S1A-034 #0159:1:A> So what kind of jobs had you mainly been applying for

Advantages of using DCPSE for studying the progressive

Using a parsed corpus like DCPSE to investigate the frequency of use of the progressive has a number of benefits. The BE GOING TO future is automatically excluded from a search using the FTF in figure 1, above, as the BE GOING TO future is not marked as 'progressive' in DCPSE. Also, it is straightforward to investigate the progressive as a proportion of non-progressive verb phrases, as non-progressive verb phrases can be retrieved using the FTF in figure 2 where the feature node is specified for 'not progressive.'


Figure 5: FTF for verb phrases not marked 'progressive' in DCPSE.

See also Findings on the progressive.

This page last modified 14 May, 2020 by |Jill Bowie.