‘covered IN a film’ vs ‘covered WITH forests’

[northpath]

Why do we say “Everything in the room was covered IN a fine film of dust.” but “The whole island is covered WITH tropical forests.”?

 

[jutfrank]

Please cite the sources of those two sentences before we answer.

 

[northpath]

First sentence I cited form the Cambridge Dictionary (noun 'film'), the second one from the documentary “A Life on Our Planet” by David Attenborough.

 

[Tarheel]

I think the thing to keep in mind is that dust and trees are quite different. If a room is covered in a fine film of dust the dust is everywhere although it's not very thick. (You could probably use "with" there and nobody would notice.) As for the island covered with forests, the trees are everywhere.

Hm. I'm going to have to think about this one some more.

 

[jutfrank]

I'll give you the short and easy answer—there really isn't a definitive difference in meaning in this particular context.

If you want to see differences between 'covered in' and 'covered with', you'll need different examples.

 

[teechar]

“Everything in the room was covered IN a fine film of dust.”

Here, "covered in" suggests a layer of dust sits on top of the items/furniture in the room.

“The whole island is covered WITH tropical forests.”?

Here, "covered with" just means there were a lot of forest areas spread all over the island.

You might find it helpful to get a grasp of those usages to look at the examples in the links below:

Improve Your Writing skills

Improve your writing skills, learn from professional writers.

fraze.it

Improve Your Writing skills

Improve your writing skills, learn from professional writers.

fraze.it