Present Perfect Continuous tense
od dragonsgift, 10. októbra 2007
Príspevky: 14
Jazyk: English
dragonsgift (Zobraziť profil) 10. októbra 2007 19:17:32
How do you construct the Present Perfect Continuous tense in Esperanto?
As in "I have been ...-ing".
"I have been studying Esperanto for a month."
"I have been working in England for three years."
"I have been seeing her every day."
What "helper" verb do you use? I think not "havi"...
Thanks in advance.
Gxejson
taneli (Zobraziť profil) 13. októbra 2007 3:31:30
dragonsgift:How do you construct the Present Perfect Continuous tense in Esperanto?You don't.
As in "I have been ...-ing".Normally, you use "-is" for actions that have already finished, "-os" for ones that haven't started yet, and "-as" for the rest. Anything else that you express with tenses in English is done with adverbs, prepositional phrases etc.
"I have been studying Esperanto for a month."
"I have been working in England for three years."
"I have been seeing her every day."
If the focus is clearly on when something started, you simple use "ekde" and -as:
Mi studas Esperanton ekde antaŭ monato.
Mi laboras en Anglio ekde antaŭ tri jaroj.
As far as I understand, the tense in your third example puts the focus on the immediate past either because you don't know about the future, or because you know the situation is about to change. In Esperanto, you have to choose:
Mi renkontas ŝin ĉiutage.
Ĝis nun mi renkontis ŝin ĉiutage, sed...
awake (Zobraziť profil) 13. októbra 2007 4:15:35
Other (only subtly different) constructions you can use are "jam de" (already from) or just "de" (from) which puts the focus more on the entire duration of the action.
Mi lernas Esperanton jam de du jaroj. = I've been learning Esperanto for 2 years
Mi lernas Esperanton ekde du jaroj = I've been learning Esperanto beginning from two years ago.
In practice, these different choices are basically interchangeable.
Stefano B (Zobraziť profil) 13. októbra 2007 4:31:06
awake (Zobraziť profil) 13. októbra 2007 5:22:33
If you say "Mi estas lerninta" That really means "I have learned (and I've finished learning).
Stefano B:Why can't you say: "Mi estas lerninta Esperanton antaŭ monato."?
stel-rigardadanto (Zobraziť profil) 20. októbra 2007 23:51:33
kinghajj (Zobraziť profil) 21. októbra 2007 2:55:46
taneli (Zobraziť profil) 22. októbra 2007 17:11:03
stel-rigardadanto:What about something like: Mi estas lernanta Esperanton dum monato?That's something you'd be likely to say if you were on a one-month Esperanto course and didn't plan to continue learning afterwards, no matter whether the course started yesterday or would end tomorrow.
In general, I believe you learn best if you at first refrain from using the complex tenses, but, when needed, use adverbs to express the relevant information contained in the tenses of English. That way you can more easily unlearn the habit of adding superfluous information that's obligatory in English but not in Esperanto. Once it feels natural to use only three tenses, you're much less likely to overuse the remaining ones.
Stefano B (Zobraziť profil) 23. októbra 2007 3:28:43
What if you say: "Mi estas estinta lernanta Esperanton dum unu monato".
I think that gets everything, right? "Mi estas" ..I have.. "estinta".. been .. "learning".. lernanta .. "Esperanton dum unu monato".
I think it's important to be able to express an an going action that started some time ago and is still going on. "Mi eklernis Esperanton antaŭ unu monato" doesn't really have the same meaning.
mnlg (Zobraziť profil) 23. októbra 2007 6:21:36
Stefano B:I think it's important to be able to express an an going action that started some time ago and is still going on."Mi lernas esperanton de monato".
Which is also the simplest, and possibly most common form.