A Contrastive Study on the Semantic Essences of “Be + V-ing” and “Be + Prep. + V-ness” in English

Abstract

Both “be + v-ing” and “be + prep. + v-ness” can mean the ongoingness of the “action,” many Chinese learners just take them as the same in their acquisition of English. But the semantic essences of them are different. This paper is a contrastive study on the semantic essences of two forms from a cognitive perspective. The former is progressive aspect with an aspectual meaning: a dynamic process which contains both beginning and end, but excludes them and it highlights the situational changes at a certain point or period of time within the process. However, the latter is a kind of state description of the verb event, and it underlines the real-time existence of the event, without including the situational changes of it.