Will GOING TO overtake WILL?
From this interesting article on English in Toronto:
http://individual.utoronto.ca/tagliamonte/new_TE.html
''Will and going to are in competition across the board. However, among younger speakers going to is rising. Will going to overtake will? Only time will tell.''
I thought WILL and GOING TO were not interchangeable.
If this is true, how can GOING TO be preferred by younger speakers?
Why do we learn all those 101 rules WHEN TO USE WILL (and not GOING TO) and WHEN TO USE GOING TO (and not WILL)...
It's confusing for us foreign speakers.
"Going to" refer to near future. "Will" has no time limit as such. This was the rule I was taught by grammar books. I am not fully sure how they are interchangeable in the first place never mind replacing each other.
I'd say that thy are largely interchangeable but not completely. As for "be going to"'s being going to take over "will", I reckon the author was just playing with words here. In comparision to most of the other trends discussed here these seem relatively stable, eh ... or whatever.
Lilly:
<<I thought WILL and GOING TO were not interchangeable.
If this is true, how can GOING TO be preferred by younger speakers?
Why do we learn all those 101 rules WHEN TO USE WILL (and not GOING TO) and WHEN TO USE GOING TO (and not WILL)... >>
"Going to" is probably preferred by younger speakers in colloquial English, as opposed to more formal usage. So following the rules just means that your English will sound more formal. That's fine.
Guest:
<<"Going to" refer to near future. "Will" has no time limit as such. This was the rule I was taught by grammar books. I am not fully sure how they are interchangeable in the first place never mind replacing each other.>>
Interesting, because if the phone rings or there is a knock at the door, I am most likely to say, "I'll get it!" and then go answer it. "I'm going to get it" just sounds ridiculous, rule or no rule.
''Interesting, because if the phone rings or there is a knock at the door, I am most likely to say, "I'll get it!" and then go answer it. "I'm going to get it" just sounds ridiculous, rule or no rule.''
But, we're gonna have more on this later. [1]
But, we'll have more on this later. [2]
Tomorrow, it's gonna be cloudy, 25 oC in Toronto, 30 oC in Windsor [1]
Tomorrow, it will be cloudy, 25 oC in Toronto, 30 oC in Windsor...[2]
I've heard [1] on CBC News
JP:
Interesting observation there. It just shows that grammar rules are not written on stones and they are probably not the best way to master the language. They are full of holes, I must say. They don't fit well to every instance.
''So following the rules just means that your English will sound more formal. That's fine. ''
Not that fine, Americans will find you ''arrogant'' if you stick to formal forms.
<''Will and going to are in competition across the board. However, among younger speakers going to is rising. Will going to overtake will? Only time will tell.'' >
As usual, we have a bunch of speakers who do not know how to distinguish between "will" and "going to" and so, as a result, tend to conflate usage. It usually happens with American English speakers, but now it seems Canadians have also got the laziness bug.
<"Going to" refer to near future. "Will" has no time limit as such. >
One day, I'm going to buy a big house with a swimming pool.
C'mon folks, work hard to use and learn a language. distinctions bring richness to usage. Don't be lazy!
Here:
TENSES
FUTURE FORMS
Introduction
There are a number of different ways of referring to the future in English. It is important to remember that we are expressing more than simply the time of the action or event. Obviously, any 'future' tense will always refer to a time 'later than now', but it may also express our attitude to the future event.
All of the following ideas can be expressed using different tenses:
a. Simple prediction
b. Arrangements
c. Plans and intentions
d. Time-tabled events
e. Prediction based on present evidence
f. Willingness
g. An action in progress in the future
h. An action or event that is a matter of routine
i. Obligation
j. An action or event that will take place immediately or very soon
k. Projecting ourselves into the future and looking back at a completed action.
The example sentences below correspond to the ideas above:
a. There will be snow in many areas tomorrow.
b. I'm meeting Jim at the airport.
c. We're going to spend the summer abroad.
d. The plane takes off at 3 a.m.
e. I think it's going to rain!
f. We'll give you a lift to the cinema.
g. This time next week I'll be sun-bathing.
h. You'll be seeing John in the office tomorrow, won't you?
i. You are to travel directly to London.
j. The train is about to leave.
k. A month from now he will have finished all his exams.
It is clear from these examples that several tenses are used to express the future. The sections that follow show the form and function of each of these tenses.
The thing is that the difference between "will" and "be going to" is not really all that fixed. While in formal usage "will" is preferred, "be going to" may still show up in *spoken* media content, as mentioned earlier. Similarly, while "be going to" tends to be more informal, "will" still very readily shows up in informal usage. Likewise, while "be going to" tends to be used to refer to the near future while "will" is unspecified with respect to distance in time, "be going to" may still be used to refer to the distant future at times, as mentioned before.
Aside from "be going to" not being used in formal writing, the difference between the two is that "will" just refers to the simple future, whereas "be going to" tends to more indicate things being on a path towards an action's occurring. "It will happen", for instance, just indicates that something will happen at some point in the future, without saying anything about the present with respect to said future event, whereas "It is going to happen" indicates that, at the present, something is set up to happen unless something else changes said course. This is shown by how one can say "It was going to happen", which indicates that something was set up to occur, but was prevented in one way or another.
I don't think "will" is in any danger of dying out anytime soon, but I can imagine it happening in a couple hundred years, perhaps. There are many cases where "will", although not grammatically obligatory, is universal. The example of "I'll get it!" with a telephone is a good one... I'd never say "I'm gonna get it."
<< Not that fine, Americans will find you ''arrogant'' if you stick to formal forms. >>
Not arrogant so much as pretentious or snobbish, I think. Similar ideas, but not the same. But I don't think many people will notice if you never use "going to" and always use "will", at least if you normally contract it. If you always say "I will", "he will", etc. instead of "I'll", "he'll", etc. in spontaneous speech, it will sound a bit odd. It's OK to not contract it sometimes, especially for emphasis or when it's awkward to contract it, but not all the time.
Going off on a bit of a tangent here, one thing that's funny is that Spanish has the same situation with "will" versus "going to", except that I think their equivalent of "will" is less common than in English.
For instance, you could say either "Lo haré" (I will do it) or "Voy a hacerlo" (I'm going to do it), but the first one is somewhat more formal, and less common in spontaneous speech. Funny enough, "voy" literally means "I'm going" ("voy al parque" -- "I'm going to the park"), so both English and Spanish have the same construction... that's always amused me.
- Kef
>>''So following the rules just means that your English will sound more formal. That's fine. ''
Not that fine, Americans will find you ''arrogant'' if you stick to formal forms.<<
Note, though, that, on the other hand, one does not necessarily use informal speech in all social situations either at least here. In particular, in interactions between customers and employees here one normally uses quite formal speech, to the point that one will very regularly hear the use of words like "may" and "shall" and formal greetings like "have a good day" (but generally not particularly formal greetings like "I wish you good luck"). Note that such is generally far more formal than in interactions between employees of the same company, who generally use informal speech, unlike in some places where formal speech is expected in the workplace.
Et que dire de <will be going to> ?
Actually, "will be going to" is a current usage. It simply means that at some point in the future, conditions will be present which will set up something's happening later. Note that it does not actually mean that such will actually occur (which is an important difference between "will" and "be going to").
(Modern quasimodal constructions are nice in that they are so flexible thanks to being usable as normal verbs, so that one can use all the auxiliary and modal constructions that you can use with normal verbs with them, and furthermore that you can nest multiple quasimodal constructions; for instance, one can actually say things like "will have been going to" and "be going to have had to" thanks to them.)