Expressing actions in progress (full form)
You may have learned that 在 (zài) and 正在 (zhèngzài) can be used as an auxiliary verb to express that an action is ongoing or in progress. They are used to create the Mandarin equivalent of present continuous in English. But that pattern is actually a part of a longer, fuller pattern. It's rarely used in its full form, but bits and pieces of it are frequently used in everyday speech, so it's important to know the full form, even if you don't use it regularly yourself.
The structure is:
Subject + 正在 + Verb + 着 + Object + 呢
It's important to remember that virtually every part of the above pattern is optional, so you're going to see all sorts of variations of it. The most common variation is just the "在 + V" pattern that you probably learned already long ago.
Some examples:
- 她 在 看 报纸。
- 她 正在 看 报纸。
- 她 正 看 着 报纸 呢。
- 我 在 喝 啤酒。
- 我 正 喝 啤酒 呢。
- 我 在 喝 着 啤酒。
- 我们 正在 学习 中文。
- 我们 学习 中文 呢。
- 我们 学习 着 中文。
- 他们 正在 跳舞。
- 他们 跳 着 舞。
- 他们 跳 着 舞 呢。
See also
- Aspect particle "zhe"
- Expressing actions in progress (simpler form)
