GRAMMAR

Question

Hello1- In the image below,isn't it better to write "being DJ" or "to be DJ" instead of "to be DJing" ??What's difference between them?I mean the 5th line!2-I've never seen such a phrase : "to be wearing ..." could you give me some explanation about that?Why have we used "to be" before wearing?Grateful!

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

The grammatical pattern goes thus:

IT'S [unusual / not right / strange / great / interesting / ...]
FOR [me / a woman / someone / ... ]
[TO [ do this / act like this /... ] .......................... simple infinitive
or
TO BE [doing this / acting like this / ...] ]. ...... continuous infinitive

Just as we have simple tenses and continuous tenses, we also have simple infinitives and continuous infinitives.

George goes to school. .................. present simple tense
George is going to school. ........... present continuous tense

to go .................. simple infinitive
to be going ..... continuous infinitive

Remember: is, are, was, were, and am are all parts of the same verb as be and being, just as goes and went are parts of the same verb as go and going.

The difference in meaning for the two kinds of infinitives is the same as the difference in meaning for the two kinds of tenses.

The simple forms tend to mean that an action occurs habitually, regularly, or repetitively. The continuous forms tend to mean that an action is going on, is in progress, is happening now.

Vidreneh1- In the image above, isn't it better to write "being DJ" or "to be DJ" instead of "to be DJing"?

You can use DJ as a noun or as a verb.

As a noun you need "a DJ". As you see from the grammatical pattern I gave you above, you need an infinitive before this noun, so you can use "to be a DJ" (but not "being a DJ").

It's unusual for a woman of your age to be a DJ in clubs.

As a verb (DJ), you can use either the simple or the continuous form of the infinitive.

It's unusual for a woman of your age to DJ in clubs.
It's unusual for a woman of your age to be DJing in clubs.

Those are the only three possibilities.

Vidreneh2-I've never seen such a phrase : "to be wearing ..." could you give me some explanation about that?Why have we used "to be" before wearing?

This is the same structure again. Here there is no noun form we can use as we did with "a DJ" above. So there are two possibilities:

It is not right for a woman my age to wear these clothes.
It is not right for a woman my age to be wearing these clothes.

CJ

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