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GoldenQN Posted 18 years ago
Grammar
Past and Present Tenses
I have a problem with often switching tenses in paragraphs. Is this allow? Here's an example of a passage below. Would this passage be considered incorrect?
"Founded on the early years of his life, he realized the possibilities and opportunities are available for anybody to rise from poverty. This shaped his perspective of the lower class and developed into hostility against charity and the socialist movement. The lower class in the story is subjected to the authority of the privileged few and kept impoverished and disempowered with the use of fear tactics. The government ignores the suffering of the poor and forces them to survive on their own in the capitalist economy. Without much hope for the poor, members in the Trueba family became sympathetic toward them and devoted their lives to supporting them."
"Founded on the early years of his life, he realized the possibilities and opportunities are available for anybody to rise from poverty. This shaped his perspective of the lower class and developed into hostility against charity and the socialist movement. The lower class in the story is subjected to the authority of the privileged few and kept impoverished and disempowered with the use of fear tactics. The government ignores the suffering of the poor and forces them to survive on their own in the capitalist economy. Without much hope for the poor, members in the Trueba family became sympathetic toward them and devoted their lives to supporting them."
Top answer
You should not switch tenses in the narrative like this.
- You should not switch tenses in the narrative like this.
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5 Answers
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You should not switch tenses in the narrative like this.
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You should not switch tenses in the narrative like this.
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Hi,
Would you say the following adjectives, impoverished and disempowered, could be used to refer to people of those types in general?
a sentence from the original poster's passage:
The lower class in the story is subjected to javascript:void(0) of the privileged few and kept impoverished and disempowered with the use of fear tactics.
Would you say the following adjectives, impoverished and disempowered, could be used to refer to people of those types in general?
a sentence from the original poster's passage:
The lower class in the story is subjected to javascript:void(0) of the privileged few and kept impoverished and disempowered with the use of fear tactics.
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I guess that someone with a better knowledge of English grammar could pick fault with it but, as a native English speaker, I can't see anything wrong with it. It reads OK and it makes sense. The tenses look right to me.
I think it's possible to be too pedantic!
I think it's possible to be too pedantic!
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The same tense is not demanded throughout a narrative, but there must be good internal reasons for the shift; here there does not seem to be:
This shaped his perspective...and developed into hostility.... The lower class...is subjected to...and kept impoverished and disempowered.... The government ignores the suffering...and forces them.... [M]embers in the Trueba family became
The same tense is not demanded throughout a narrative, but there must be good internal reasons for the shift; here there does not seem to be:
This shaped his perspective...and developed into hostility.... The lower class...is subjected to...and kept impoverished and disempowered.... The government ignores the suffering...and forces them.... [M]embers in the Trueba family became
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