Re: Is "is" a verb?

From: Dylan Nicholson (wizofaus_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 06/14/04


Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2004 09:29:31 +1000


"DE781" <de781@aol.com> wrote in message
news:c98b1ba0.0406141453.2e330253@posting.google.com...

> I am indeed a native speaker of English. I challenge ANYONE to tell
> me that "I'm being well" is not a correct English sentence!

Plenty of things in English are arguably 'correct' - in that you wouldn't be
able to find printed anywhere a specific rule stating that the sentence is
grammatically wrong. But 'correctness' is only half of what matters when
speaking/writing a language. "I'm being well" is not idiomatic as part of
Standard English in any major English-speaking country. It may be used in
certain dialects, and I would expect some pidgin varieties.
But it's the sort of thing that would instantly give you away as being not a
native speaker of garden-variety English.



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