With + gerund

[Mr. Silva]

Hi, everyone!
I work as a translator in a news agency. My job is translating into English very poorly written texts in Portuguese. One of the most used vices of language here involves the preposition with. Finding no better way to introduce a new sentence, some adopt the preposition with + a verb in the gerund to solve all their problems. Examples:

“The domestic market was bullish, with (the) investors betting on (…)”
“Prices fell sharply in August, with (the) quotes hitting 9-month lows (…)”
“Exporters stayed on the defensive, with (the) export differentials falling again.”

So, I ask:
1) Is such a use of with + gerund acceptable, or should I rewrite the text whenever possible?
2) What about the use of the definite article after with? Does that depend on whether the noun (investors/quotes/export) was mentioned before? (I definitely lack some security about definite articles…)

Thanks a lot for any help
Mr. Silva

[Alan]

Hi Mr Silva,

Thanks for your posting. I would say that the construction of using with + present participle is acceptable in the examples you give but obviously variations would probably be useful. You could for example introduce conjunctions like as/since and make a new clause or if there is a contrast in the participle part, you could use whereas.

On the question of the definite article i could refer you to some notes I've written which you can see on the main site under esl lessons. If you look through the index, you will see 'the' vs. 'a/an' where there are some grammar notes and then a short story illustrating the use of the articles.

Hope this helps

Alan
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English as a Second Language
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