Present continious vs. present perfect continious?

10 comments

1. The first implies that Julie plans on staying in Paris temporarily for a few months, and then she’ll go home.

   The second means she has been in Paris for a while, but makes no assumption about if or when she will go home.

2. First one: Julie is in the midst of a few months’ stay in Paris. She could be on day two of her few months’ stay, we don’t know.

   Second one:

3. Seemed like a math question at first lol.

   Anyway, r/EnglishLearning seems like a better place to post these types of questions since it’ll likely get removed by the mods here.

4. “Julie is living in Paris for a few months” could, in everyday use, mean a few different things.

   It could be that it has yet to happen. “We can’t have the wedding in July, Julie is living in Paris for a few months, we’d never get everyone in one place.” Or It could be a temporary situation (“Julie is living in Paris for a few months, then returning”).

   “Julie has been living in Paris for a few months” implies something that has already happened, is currently happening, and possibly will continue indefinitely.

5. The timing is less definite for the first scenario. Julie can be living in Paris right now or Julie could have a definite plan to be living in Paris, depending on context. My response would be, “is she there now, or no?”

   The second scenario implies that Julie is currently in Paris and has been in Paris for some indefinite time. My response would be, “how long has she been there?”

6. It depends on the context, but sometimes they both mean the same thing.

7. Damn, I actually know what these terms mean because I am currently studying Spanish and have learned how tenses work, making me reevaluate English tenses.

   For the first one, it is an ongoing thing and she is currently in Paris and will be there for the foreseeable future.

   For the second one, it is not may or may not be currently happening, but the sentence also needs more information.

   She has been living in Paris…..and? Did something happen?

   I think of the second like the imperfect Spanish tense, which can be used to describe background information.

8. The first suggests a definite end to her Paris stint but doesn’t necessarily mean she is even already there. The second on simply says she has already been living there. Could be forever or she might be leaving tomorrow.

9. Well, beyond the spelling errors in the post title? Not much. The first one indicates the current state of the subject. The second only indicates a previous state of the subject and the duration of that state, but does not imply that that state persists. “Has” is the the past tense form of the verb “be”; “is” is the present tense.

   “Continuous” is the correct spelling of the work, BTW.

10. There isn’t much of one. The first one is kind of a final statement, like there’s no where else to go and that’s all that needs to be said. The second one has a hint that there is a second part to the statement coming. Like “Julie has been living in Paris for a few months, and she might never come home.” But essentially they mean the same thing.