Learn how to express SPEED / TEMPORARY / PERMANENT in English with Mr Duncan

There are many ways in which something can happen.

The way in which it occurs.

When it happens.

How bad the effect of it is and how long it lasts.

The length of time something goes on for. It might be for a short moment, or it might go on for a long time.

The thing can be brief.

It happens fast.

It comes and goes quickly.

A flash of lightning is brief.

It happens in the blink of an eye.

Something passing by at high speed occurs briefly.

A bird might fly past your window, but you don't notice it because it is travelling fast.

That event is brief, quick, fleeting.

It happened in the blink of an eye.

Then we have the opposite.

Where something takes a long time to happen.

Something that is moving slowly will take a long time to pass by.

Something happening slowly is easy to see because there is plenty of time to notice it.

Of course, if something is happening very slowly, then we once again might be unable to see it.

The leaves growing on a tree in spring appear slowly. Much too slow for us to notice.

A person walking past your house will most likely be seen, because there is enough movement occurring for it to be noticed.

There is plenty of time for us to see that moment happening.

We often describe the length of time something takes to occur as the ‘duration’.

The duration of something is how long it takes to happen.

The duration of an employee's contract, the duration of one's sleep.

We can say that something has a duration.

The time it takes to occur from start to finish.

We can express duration as time spent doing something.

My duration as your manager.

My duration as your English teacher.

We can also express the occurrence of something that has a short time limit, or something that has no limit whatsoever.

An action or rule that will only be in place for a short time can be described as temporary.

That thing will only exist for a short time.

An agreed length of time for something to occur is done on a temporary basis.

It will only run for a certain period of time.

Then we have the opposite action, where something has no end.

A rule might be in place forever.

A type of action that never ends.

It is in place forever.

This is described as being permanent.

A permanent thing has no end in sight.

It will always be there.

It will be in place for the long-term.

We can also say that something is permanent as a fixture, which describes something that has been put in place for a long time.

It is a permanent fixture.

We can also describe something as being in place or fixed for the foreseeable future.

This phrase means that something will be held in place or enforced until a time when it is possible to change it.

A long-term change might be put in place for the foreseeable future.

So to summarise, temporary is for a short period of time.

Permanent is for a long period of time, or always.