Gerunds and Present Participles

Question

Hi everyone,I'm having trouble determining gerunds, present participles, and progressive/continuous tense.  Here are the following sentences:1) Because swimming is a "low-impact" sport, most people enjoy participating in this activity without fear of injury to bones or muscles.Question:  swimming is a gerund while participating is a present participle?2) Last year while I was jogging, I injured my right knee.Question:  jogging is a progressive/continuous tense?3) I don't go jogging anymore.Question:  jogging is a gerund?4) I stopped running and switched to water sports.Question:  running is a gerund?5) I'm now considering joining a swimming team and competing in races.Question:  considering joining are progressive/continuous tenses while swimming is a gerund?

Grammarfreak · Accepted Answer

ccHi everyone,I'm having trouble determining gerunds, present participles, and progressive/continuous tense. Here are the following sentences:1) Because swimming is a "low-impact" sport, most people enjoy participating in this activity without fear of injury to bones or muscles. Question: swimming is a gerund while participating is a present participle? Correct!

2) Last year while I was jogging, I injured my right knee.Question: jogging is a progressive/continuous tense? Bravo !

3) I don't go jogging anymore.Question: jogging is a gerund? 3 for 3

4) I stopped running and switched to water sports.Question: running is a gerund?5) I'm now considering joining a swimming team and competing in races.Question: considering joining are progressive/continuous tenses while swimming is a gerund?

Well, only part is true. I am considering .... Here " be considiering" together form the present progressive. Swimming - is a present partciple adject; i.e. " A washing machine ". Lastly, joining and competing are gerunds.

Cool Breeze · Answer

Just to show you that there is often disagreement about grammar, I'll tell you the Scandinavian view about your sentences.

1) Because swimming is a "low-impact" sport, most people enjoy participating in this activity without fear of injury to bones or muscles.

Question: swimming is a gerund while participating is a present participle?
Both are gerunds. Enjoy is followed by a gerund.

2) Last year while I was jogging, I injured my right knee.

Question: jogging is a progressive/continuous tense?
Jogging in itself is a present participle. Was jogging is a progressive/continuous tense.

3) I don't go jogging anymore.

Question: jogging is a gerund?
Go is followed by a present participle, not a gerund.

4) I stopped running and switched to water sports.

Question: running is a gerund?
Right. Stop is followed by a gerund, just like enjoy.

5) I'm now considering joining a swimming team and competing in races.

Question: considering joining are progressive/continuous tenses while swimming is a gerund?
Considering is a present participle, which together with am (I'm) forms a continuous tense. Joining and competing are gerunds due to considering.

A swimming team would be a compound in other Germanic languages and my native Finnish, but as the adjectivally used swimming does not necessarily indicate a team which is swimming right now, I would call swimming a gerund in this context.

CB

RandomGuy · Answer

ccI'm having trouble determining gerunds, present participles, and progressive/continuous tense.

All verbs in the progressive aspect are present participles. However, I don’t find the terms “gerund” and “present participle” very useful. A more practical approach is to identify the verb’s function in the sentence and to apply the term “gerund-participle” or (“·ing form”, if you prefer) to all verbs ending in ·ing.

ccBecause swimming is a "low-impact" sport

Here, swimming is a gerundial noun functioning as subject of its clause. This is a case where historical change led to a word taking on the properties of a noun in addition to its original verbal properties so that it now belongs to both the noun and verb categories, as indicated by dictionaries.

ccLast year while I was jogging, I injured my right knee. Is jogging a progressive/continuous tense?

Yes, hence the preceding linking verb. Its function is predicator of the main clause.

Your last three sentences and the main clause of the first are similar in that they all contain catenative constructions, where a verb is complemented by a non-finite clause. Below, the catenative verbs are in bold, and their complements are underlined:

1) Most people enjoy participating in this activity without fear of injury to bones or muscles.
3) I don’t go jogging anymore.
4) I stopped running and switched to water sports.
5) I'm now considering joining a swimming team and competing in races.

Participating, jogging, running, joining, and competing each function as head and predicator of their clauses.

In [5], the main verb considering, not joining, is marked as progressive, and its function is predicator of the main clause. Swimming again is a gerundial noun, this time functioning as modifier of the noun team.

None of them are gerunds.

Cc · Answer

Hi grammarfreak, thanks so much for your help!  Much appreciated <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' alt='Emotion: smile'/> !

Cc · Answer

Thanks for your help Cool Breeze!  Much appreciated <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' alt='Emotion: smile'/> !

Cc · Answer

Thanks so much for your help Aspara Gus!  Much appreciated <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' alt='Emotion: smile'/> !

Grammarfreak · Answer

These links may be very helpful for learners with partciple and gerunds question :
http://faculty.washington.edu/marynell/grammar/partadj.html

http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/what-gerund?page=all

Cc · Answer

Thank you for the link, grammarfreak <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/1.gif' alt='Emotion: smile'/>

Gerunds and Present Participles

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