'Been' - past participle of GO?

Status
Not open for further replies.

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic


In another thread, engee30 and I were discussing sentences such as: Have you ever been backpacking? Have you ever been to Japan?

Here are a couple of the points we made:

engee30: The verb is not be, but go - and its past participle form in this case is been.

5jj: The past participle form of GO is never been.

Engee30: NOTE: Been is the past participle of be: I've never been seriously ill. It is also the past participle of go: I've never been to London. Gone is also a past participle of go: They've been to the cinema means that they went but they have now returned. They've gone to the cinema means that they went and are still there now. - [FONT=&quot](c) Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary[/FONT]

5jj: This is one of those rare occasions when I think the OALD is wrong. This is, in my opinion, an idiomatic use of the perfect tense of BE. To call been (+ to) a past participle of GO with the meaning of 'gone to and returned from' is stretching things a little.



I'd be interested to hear what others have to say on this.
 

BobK

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 29, 2006
Location
Spencers Wood, near Reading, UK
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
:up: - indeed. If you go to an office and ask 'Can I speak to Fred Nurk', the answer is 'No, he's gone to New York.' However, when Fred was planning his trip he might have asked 'Has anyone here been to New York?' In my view the OALDCE is basing an invalid generalization on an incomplete set of examples - and even less 'advanced' learners need to understand this difference. (On my CELTA course I said '"Been" is the ppl of "Go"' and was shot down in flames. ;-))

b
 
  • Like
Reactions: 5jj

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
(On my CELTA course I said '"Been" is the ppl of "Go"' and was shot down in flames. )
I don't remember training you. ;-)

In my view the OALDCE is basing an invalid generalization on an incomplete set of examples - and even less 'advanced' learners need to understand this difference.
I agree, but even Quirk et al appear to imply strongly that been is a past participle of GO:

"The two perfective constructions for the verb go, namely have gone and have been, differ ..." (p 194)

"Of the two -ed participle forms of go [...] both gone and been occur in pseudo-coordination in BrE,..." (p 979)

However, in their table of verbs, they give only gone. (p116).

That's why I started this thread. I was wondering if I was alone in my view.

[FONT=&quot]Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey and Svartik, Jan (1985) A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, London: Longman[/FONT]
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
I am pleased to see that Huddleston and Pullum (p 685) support the view held by Bob and me:

“The verb be can have a motional sense in construction with the perfect. Compare:

..i.a. Jill has been to Moscow. …...b. Jill has gone to Moscow.
ii. a. *Jill was to Moscow twice. ….b. Jill went to Moscow twice.

The difference between be and go (apart from the restriction of be to the perfect, as shown in [iia]) is that be entails subsequent departure from the goal location.”

Huddleston, Rodney & Pullum, Geoffrey K (2002) The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, Cambridge: CUP
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
I am pleased to see that Huddleston and Pullum (p 685) support the view held by Bob and me:

“The verb be can have a motional sense in construction with the perfect. Compare:

..i.a. Jill has been to Moscow. …...b. Jill has gone to Moscow.
ii. a. *Jill was to Moscow twice. ….b. Jill went to Moscow twice.

The difference between be and go (apart from the restriction of be to the perfect, as shown in [iia]) is that be entails subsequent departure from the goal location.”

Huddleston, Rodney & Pullum, Geoffrey K (2002) The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, Cambridge: CUP

How inconsistent that is! :) I've got a copy of CALD in which you can find this:

been /bi:n/
past participle of
1 be
2 used to mean 'visited', 'travelled' or 'arrived':
I've never been to Kenya, but I hope to visit it next year.
The postman hasn't been here yet.
The doctor's just been (= has arrived and left).
3 used as the past participle of 'go' when the action referred to is finished:
She's been to the hairdresser's (= and now she has returned).

(c) Cambridge University Press 2003
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
How inconsistent that is! :) I've got a copy of CALD in which you can find this:[...]

3 used as the past participle of 'go' when the action referred to is finished:
She's been to the hairdresser's (= and now she has returned).
So, we clearly cannot rely on the authorities to decide the issue.

I was about to write more, but I'd only be repeating myself, so I'll wait to see if anybody else has any thoughts.
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
What I'd also like to find out is whether the use of have gone in the following sentence is common in the USA:

I've never gone to Egypt. (meaning the BrE I've never been to Egypt)
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
I was about to write more, but I'd only be repeating myself, so I'll wait to see if anybody else has any thoughts.

:up: Same here.

I hope this section of the forum is of interest to others, especially students of English. If not, what I'm going to write will be lost, I'm afraid to think. :-(

For the sake of simplicity, I'd advise learners to take been as a past participle of be in the cases written of in this thread, that is to say went and be back. But since I am not a teacher, such advice is worth nothing, maybe at least worth hearing/seeing. :cool: Whatever else could that be if not a partciple then? :?:
 
  • Like
Reactions: 5jj

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
For the sake of simplicity, I'd advise learners to take been as a past participle of be in the cases written of in this thread, that is to say went and be back. But since I am not a teacher, such advice is worth nothing, maybe at least worth hearing/seeing.
I agree with your first sentence. And, though you and I have sometimes disagreed in other threads , I do not think your thoughts are worth nothing -far from it.

I frequently covered 'I have been to Japan' with learners when we were looking at the present perfect of GO - I suppose some of my learners might have inferred that 'been' was used as the past participle of GO in this usage. I don't really feel that that's a problem - I am far more concerned that learners use English effectively than that they can talk about it. I started this thread in the Linguistics rather than the Ask a Teacher forum precisely because I don't want learners to worry about this rather abstract point.

My rather dry, perhaps time-wastingly academic, interest stems from my personal shock on seeing 'been' described as the past participle of GO in the OALD (after you pointed this out) . When I later went searching and discovered that Quirk and (once again, after you pointed it out) the CALD went along with this, I began to doubt my own beliefs. BobK and Huddleston & Pullum have cheered me up, but I still look forward to seeing what others think.
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
This is my totally personal view on the topic I still hold after years of my enthusiastic interest in the English language.

When I first was trying to explain the issue to one of my students, I based my then thoughts on my practical reasoning only, without prior consulting a dictionary. I've thought that, since the verb be cannot be used with the preposition to, the verb that would nicely fit in place of be in such cases is go. Next, we went on to discuss the system of the tenses that could be used in such cases. Again, I arrived at the same valid conclusion that the only verb of the two in question that could easily be applied in such constructions is go (went to somewhere NOT was/were to somewhere) - in the case of the perfect tenses, have/has/had been to. And since the perfect simple tenses need a past participle to complete their meaning, to achieve the meaning of going there and back you actually need to use the verb go in its proper form, often followed by the preposition to (in the locative/goal sense) - so been (to) is the one.

That was years back. Now, I even feel stronger that such assumption of mine is really valid.
 

birdeen's call

VIP Member
Joined
Jul 15, 2010
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
Poland
This is the first time I see anybody say that "been" is the past participle of "be" in

I've never been to London.


I've never tried to search for different opinions about it, so I may be misinformed, but I believe it's usually said to be the past participle of "go", at least in Polish classrooms.
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
So, BC, what is your personal opinion on 'been' being the past participle of 'go'?
 

birdeen's call

VIP Member
Joined
Jul 15, 2010
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
Poland
I don't have one. I understand the usage and it's enough for me.
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
Actually, I never was a qualified teacher, I just had to (and later in time, loved to) do some teaching - they called me a private tutor of English. During my nearly-6-year experience in teaching English, I had the opportunity to provide tuition for around 40 people, from kids of 6 to grown-ups of 40.
But that was then, this is now - I'm not a teacher any more. Besides, it's safer for me to share my opinions and prescribe rules with that note (which I often forget to add prior to writing and submitting my posts :oops:).
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
Leech (p40) joins in on the side of engee:

There are two perfect forms of the verb go: have + gone and have + been.

[FONT=&quot]Leech, Geoffrey, (2004) Meaning and the English Verb, Harlow (3rd edn) , Pearson Longman[/FONT]
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
Michael Swan (p 95) lets me down:

Been is often used as a past participle of come and go.

[FONT=&quot]Swan, Michael (1980) Practical English Usage (3rd ed, 2005), Oxford: OUP[/FONT]
 

engee30

Key Member
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
Polish
Home Country
Poland
Current Location
England
Leech (p40) joins in on the side of engee:

There are two perfect forms of the verb go: have + gone and have + been.

[FONT=&quot]Leech, Geoffrey, (2004) Meaning and the English Verb, Harlow (3rd edn) , Pearson Longman[/FONT]

Michael Swan (p 95) lets me down:

Been is often used as a past participle of come and go.

[FONT=&quot]Swan, Michael (1980) Practical English Usage (3rd ed, 2005), Oxford: OUP[/FONT]

I'm afraid to say that you've just scored two own goals. ;-)
I don't want to let you down even more, fivejedjon, but from the very beginning, I knew that the battle over this issue between you and me (or between the ones on your side and on mine) would be unfair. :-D
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top