Used to describe an action that began in the past, has continued continuously, and is still in progress.
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
And unions have been printing and distributing signs, organizing pickets and mega-rallies.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 12, 2026
I like to think the labor of the writers involved is worth something, but the biggest cost to getting a publication out there in the 1800s would have been printing it.
From Slate ● Jan. 15, 2021
Written in Hausa, these romantic novels are the work of mostly female authors, who have been printing their own works in Kano since Nigeria’s publishing industry fell apart in the 1980s.
From Economist ● Oct. 6, 2016
Perhaps other big publishers who have been printing copy "out of the safe" for the past year will soon reach the bottom of their reserves, be compelled to buy again.
From Time Magazine Archive
And the newspapers have been printing all sorts of things, and hinting that young Mr. Blaisdell’s appointment as director, after his father wrecked the bank, was a scandal.
From Cap'n Warren's Wards by Joseph Crosby Lincoln
