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Is the Spanish imperfect progressive "Yo estaba siendo" redundant?
I thought the imperfect indicative translated to "was (verb)ing", or "used to (verb)"; would this translate to "I was being being" or merely "I was being"? If the latter, why can't we use "Yo estaba"?
In fact, when you can use the imperfect indicative at all in a way that makes sense? All the other progressive compound tenses make sense (I am doing, I was doing, I would be doing, I will be doing) except this one?
Yeah, I understand ser is a more permanent form of "to be", estar is somewhat less permanent, and hacer= "to do." That's not what I was asking. I want to know how the imperfect progressive is used in general.
1 Answer
- ?Lv 73 years agoFavorite Answer
It's incorrect because you're saying you were *temporarily* [estar] *permanently* [ser] being .
The progressive tenses are used much less frequently in Spanish because of the existence of the imperfect tense.
And, yes, you could use "estaba" unless you wanted to emphasize for some reason.
