Author Topic: Do people travel for work or to work?  (Read 15539 times)

Miss Mae

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Do people travel for work or to work?
« on: June 09, 2019, 05:22:44 PM »
I wonder which is correct: "I travel for work a lot" or "I travel to work a lot". I think it should be the latter, though. Right?

Joe Carillo

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Re: Do people travel for work or to work?
« Reply #1 on: June 10, 2019, 07:21:31 PM »
Hi, Miss Mae, glad to hear from you again after quite a long while!

Both of the sentences "I travel for work a lot" and "I travel to work a lot" are grammatically and semantically correct, but they mean different things altogether. They dramatically illustrate the power of particular prepositions to give a different sense or meaning to a prepositional phrase using the same operative verb.

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In the case of "I travel for work a lot," the sense is that the speaker's regular job demands a lot of trips, transport, or vehicular movements to get to so many different destinations and then to get back home afterwards, as the job of a route salesman who has to make many sales calls every day.

On the other hand, the sense of "I travel to work a lot" is that the speaker's regular workplace is so far out from his or her residence that he or she has to make several changes of transport to get there (cab or jeepney or tricycle, then by bus or train or place, then back by cab or jeepney or tricycle again), as in a workplace like a suburban or provincial factory scores or hundreds of kilometers away.

It might take several seconds or even a few minutes for that difference in sense to sink in, of course, but there it is.
« Last Edit: June 11, 2019, 07:27:13 AM by Joe Carillo »

Miss Mae

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Re: Do people travel for work or to work?
« Reply #2 on: June 10, 2019, 08:47:10 PM »
Thank you for your reply, Sir! I'm also glad that I was able to visit your site again.

I checked the recent activities of the celebrity who had delivered that line in a commercial. It did not entail "a lot of trips, transport, or vehicular movements to get to so many different destinations" on her part.
« Last Edit: June 11, 2019, 07:01:54 AM by Miss Mae »