Active/Passive Voice

[E.G. Gammon]

Today, I stumbled upon some of my old English notebooks from high school while I was doing some cleaning and I saw some work with active and passive voice. I remembered that back in high school, I had trouble with differentiating the two. Can anyone help me understand the differences? I looked in an old grammar book I accidentally kept from my high school days, but the only thing in there was a small paragraph with no examples at all. Thanks to anyone who helps.

[maestrowork]

He sang a song -- active voice.
A song was sung -- passive voice.

Someone pushed me down the stairs -- active voice.
I was pushed down the stairs -- passive voice.

The boss assembled a team to address the issue. They solved the problem -- active voice.
A team was assembled to address the issue. The problem was solved. -- passive voice.

A writer should use active voice to write fiction -- active voice.
Academic and technical documents are usually written in passive voice -- passive voice.


Oh, Lord. I used to write a lot of technical documents, thus using passive voice a lot. Now, I have to actually think hard to write a sentence in active voice. Writing fiction has tinted me!!!

[tjwriter]

Okay, here is what The Basics by Buscemi, Nicolai, and Strugala has to say:

There are four reasons to prefer active over passive voice:

1. The active voice is more direct.
Examples:
Active voice: The scientist completed the experiment.
The subject, scientist, does the action.
Passive voice: The experiment was completed by the scientist.
The subject, experiment, receives the action.
2. The active voice usually produces a smoother and more natural sentence structure.
Examples:
Active voice: Several students from my high school graduating class chose to enter the military rather than to attend college.
Passive voice: Entering the military rather that attending college was chosen by several students from my high school graduating class.
3. Using the passive voice sometimes creates a dangling or misplaced modifier problem.
Examples:
Active voice: Voting overwhelmingly for Proposition 227, Californians decreased support for bilingual education in public schools.
Passive voice: Voting overwhelmingly for Proposition 227, support for bilingual education was significantly decreased in California.
4. Using the passive voice sometimes results in forgetting to mention the doer of an action, thereby leaving out important information.
Passive voice: The mayor was criticized for being insensitive to the problems of the poor.
Active voice: The mayor's political opponents criticized her for being insensitive to the problems of the poor.
OR
Active voice: The newspaper editorial criticized the mayor for being insensitive to the problems of the poor.
The exceptions are:

When the agent (doer of an action) is unknown or nonexistent.
When the action is more important than the agent or when the agent is obvious.
When using the passive voice makes the sentence more natural or shorter.
I hope this helps.

[katee]

I think it's also helpful to know how to recognise passive voice, for editing.

In English (hopefully it's a safe assumption that this is the language you're writing in!), passive voice can be recognised by the use of the very "to be" plus the past participle of the verb. Another good indicator is the use of "by".

I played a game = active voice
I was playing a game = active voice because was +ing not was +ed
The game was played by me = passive voice, was +ed
The game could have been played = passive voice, could have been +ed

Of course, not all English verbs make their past participle by adding ed, but hopefully once you get used to looking for the pattern it will be a piece of cake.

[Winston Smith]

I teach high school English, and much of what the passive voice means in writing is innuendo. Most students do not understand the nuance between active and passive. I've been writing for years, and have taught for nearly 10, and trying to explain the difference in a way students can use is difficult.

Active: I teach English
Passive: English is taught by me.

[Jamesaritchie]

Today, I stumbled upon some of my old English notebooks from high school while I was doing some cleaning and I saw some work with active and passive voice. I remembered that back in high school, I had trouble with differentiating the two. Can anyone help me understand the differences? I looked in an old grammar book I accidentally kept from my high school days, but the only thing in there was a small paragraph with no examples at all. Thanks to anyone who helps.

If you can identiofy the subject of the sentence, active/passive usually becomes much easier. If the action is being done to the subject, it's passive, if the subject is causing the action, it's active.

[maestrowork]

There are times when you want to use passive voice, as outlined by tjwriter. Passive voice makes the action, well, passive, and also shifts the focus to the person/thing acted on:

I was surprised by her generosity.

In many cases the sentence above would sound better than:

Her generosity surprised me.


Sometimes passive voice is not that "visible" with the "to be," especially in complex sentences with mixed voices:

She fidgeted, trapped by her fear of crowds.

Trapped inside the elevator, she paced back and forth.

She jumped, surprised by the loud noise.

[Medievalist]

Sometimes passive voice is not that "visible" with the "to be," especially in complex sentences with mixed voices:

She fidgeted, trapped by her fear of crowds.

Trapped inside the elevator, she paced back and forth.

She jumped, surprised by the loud noise.

Maybe I'm missing your point; these last three are examples of intransitive verbs, and not passive voice.

[maestrowork]

What intransitive verbs?

If you take away the active clause, you will get:

She jumped. She was surprised by the loud noise. (as opposed to A loud noise surprised her, and she jumped.)

Is that not passive?

[reph]

Maybe I'm missing your point; these last three are examples of intransitive verbs, and not passive voice.

"She fidgeted, trapped by her fear of crowds."

I call "trapped" a participial adjective, not a passive verb. Sure, you can say "She was trapped by her fear of crowds," and then "was trapped" is a verb in passive voice, but you didn't say that in the "fidgeted" sentence.

Compare "She fidgeted, afraid she'd flunked the test" or "She fidgeted, thinking she'd left the door unlocked." "Afraid..." and "thinking..." are adjective clauses that modify "she." So is "trapped...crowds." No, it's a phrase, not a clause, but it does the same job in the structure of the sentence that those clauses do.

[tjwriter]

The exceptions are:



When the agent (doer of an action) is unknown or nonexistent.
When the action is more important than the agent or when the agent is obvious.
When using the passive voice makes the sentence more natural or shorter.
I left out examples for these but here they are:

For the first one
Not: Someone abandoned an infant on the church steps.
But: The infant was abandoned on the church steps.

Not: No one can repair the computer.
But: The computer cannot be repaired.
For the second one
Not: The government repealed the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, the "Prohibition Amendment", in 1933, when it passed the 21st Amendment.
But: The 18th Amendment to the Constitution, the "Prohibition Amendment", was repealed in 1933, when the 21st Amendment was passesd.
For the third one
Not: The Turkish city of Istanbul once had the name Constantinople.
But: The Turkish city of Istanbul was once called Constantinople.

[Medievalist]

What intransitive verbs?

If you take away the active clause, you will get:

She jumped. She was surprised by the loud noise. (as opposed to A loud noise surprised her, and she jumped.)

Is that not passive?

No; you must have all three of these to have passive voice:

1. Main verb in past tense
2. Helping verb; usually a form of "be" but have is possible in earlier forms of English, as is "get." (In modern English, it's going to be a form of be, 99.9 percent of the time. Maybe always.)
3. The grammatical subject functions as the object of the verb/action, and receives the "effect" of the verb.

She was surprised by the loud noise. Passive voice. You've got the subject buried in a prepositional phrase, and the main verbe, surprised in past tense, and a helping verb "was" that's a form of passive voice.

A loud noise surprised her, and she jumped. Not passive voice. The grammatical subject is clear; a loud voice. You have the main verb, surprised in the past tense, but no helping verb.

[maestrowork]

Yes, that's what I mean, the first one is passive, but the second is active (I was trying to illustrate the same sentence written in either voice).

But here:

She jumped, surprised by a loud noise... the "to be" is implied as in She jumped because she was surprised by a loud noise.


So in my original example, the clause "surprised by a loud noise" is considered passive?

[Medievalist]

Here's a handout about passive voice--it's not meant for this particular audience, so for heaven's sake don't feel like I'm dumbing down. It's not really designed for y'all.

Verbs are words of action (run, jump, think, speak, eat, laugh, love, sing).
Voice describes the form a verb takes depending on whether the subject of the verb acts or is acted upon. If the subject of the verb performs the action, the verb is in active voice. If the subject of the verb receives the action, then the verb is in passive voice.

Active voice: Jane Austen wrote Northanger Abbey.
Passive voice: Northanger Abbey was written by Jane Austen.

Normally the person or thing who performs the action of the verb is a noun or noun phrase. In a sentence that uses passive voice, you can't tell who or what specifically performed the action of the verb. You just know that it happened. The subject may be buried in a prepositional phrase (by Jane Austen)

Passive voice: The ball was kicked.
• You can't tell who “did” the kicking.

Active voice: John kicked the ball.
• John “did” the “kicking.”
John is the grammatical subject of the sentence.

You can think of passive voice as an equation, or a recipe, if you like:

Passive voice = was, is, being, or has been + a verb in the past tense

• You always have a form of “be” in a sentence in passive voice (was, is, being, or has been).

• The be verb is always followed by a verb in the past tense.

• You can't tell from the sentence who “did” the action of the verb.

Passive voice, in and of itself, is not evil. It's often very useful, particularly in writing in the sciences or social sciences, where quite often the writer truly doesn't know who is responsible for an action.

• You might want to use passive voice to emphasize an action or the recipient of that action, rather than the “doer.”

Driving tests are given to all employees.

• Sometimes you want to “soften” bad news.

Your watch can not be repaired under warranty.

• Sometimes you want to avoid responsibility.

An error was made on your tax return.

But in other sorts of writing passive voice sounds like you are not sure of yourself, and thus weakens your argument. Unless you have a good reason to use passive voice, avoid it. Revise sentences in which you do not explicitly state who is doing what to whom so that you have strong declarative statements built around an active verb.

[reph]

No; you must have all three of these to have passive voice:

1. Main verb in past tense
The past participle.

see, saw, seen
write, wrote, written

Hats with feathers are rarely seen these days.

The book was written in 1980.

[reph]

But here:

She jumped, surprised by a loud noise... the "to be" is implied as in She jumped because she was surprised by a loud noise.


So in my original example, the clause "surprised by a loud noise" is considered passive?
No, it's neither passive nor active. It isn't a clause at all. Look at my earlier post.

[Medievalist]

I often use this anecdote to illustrate passive voice.

You're playing ball; the ball breaks the neighbor's window. Depending on your age and your relationship with your parents, you might say:

The window was broken.

It isn't clear who or what broke the window. There's a good verb there, broken, the past tense of break.

There's a helping verb there as well, a form of be, was. Thata's two of the three ingredients for passive voice.

The third ingredient? Is the grammatical subject of the verb, the "doer" clear?

No; the window apparently spontaneously broke. You didn't do it, it umm, just happened . . .

Passive voice is useful when you either want to mask the "doer," or you aren't clear who, or what, initiated or performed the action of the verb.

I have a great Life in Hell cartoon showing a trembling rabbit, crouched before a giant throne. The caption reads:

"Mistakes may have been made."

Passive voice, plus the subjunctive (may)! What a way to avoid responsibility!

[maestrowork]

OK, we know what the simple passive/active voices are. But again, let me give you a complex sentence:


The book A Time To Kill, written in 1992 by John Grisham, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

What would you call "written in 1992 by John Grisham"? Participial adjective? I think it's when we write in complex sentences that the passive/active voice thing gets murky. I mean, if you say, don't write passive voice, is the above sentence active? I'd say yes, because the main clause is "The book shares striking similiarities with...."

That's why English is so confusing!

The book A Time To Kill -- it was written in 1992 by John Grisham -- shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.


To rewrite that in totally active voice, one can do:

John Grisham wrote A Time To Kill, which shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird,in 1992.

But the emphasis of these two sentences are now different, I believe...

[Medievalist]

But here:

She jumped, surprised by a loud noise... the "to be" is implied as in She jumped because she was surprised by a loud noise.


So in my original example, the clause "surprised by a loud noise" is considered passive?

First, it's not a clause. A clause is a group of related words that includes a subject and a predicate (predicate is traditional grammer terminology; Chomsyites call it a main verb.)

Secondly, no, it's not passive voice; there's no "understood" in passive voice, it's purely determined by the words that are present. I bet Reph is answering this too . . .

[Medievalist]

OK, we know what the simple passive/active voices are. But again, let me give you a complex sentence:

Wait a second--do you mean "complex" versus compound, or complex as in complicated?

The book A Time To Kill, written in 1992 by John Grisham, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

What would you call "written in 1992 by John Grisham"? Participial adjective? I think it's when we write in complex sentences that the passive/active voice thing gets murky. I mean, if you say, don't write passive voice, is the above sentence active? I'd say yes, because the main clause is "The book shares striking similiarities with...."

It's a adjectival prepositional phrase. Or you could call it an appostive, in traditional grammar. It modifies, describes, and refers back to the nominal, the subject The book . . ."

But you note there's no helping verb, no form of be, so it's not passive voice.


That's why English is so confusing!

Nah, English is confusing because in 1066 the Normans screwed it up :)


To rewrite that in totally active voice, one can do:

John Grisham wrote A Time To Kill, which shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird,in 1992.

But the emphasis of these two sentences are now different, I believe...

Yes, it is different, but not because of active or passive voice, but because of direct and indirect structure and syntax. Passive refers, in terms of grammar and linguistics, to passive voice, and that requires all three ingredients; unclear subject or "doer", main verb in the past tense (past participle), and a helping verb that's usually a form of "be".

[reph]

OK, we know what the simple passive/active voices are. But again, let me give you a complex sentence:

The book A Time To Kill, written in 1992 by John Grisham, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

What would you call "written in 1992 by John Grisham"? Participial adjective?
Ray, that's not a complex sentence! It's a simple sentence with a participial adjectival phrase modifying the subject.

It's equivalent to this one: "Written in 1992 by John Grisham, the book A Time to Kill shares [etc.]," in which it's easier to see that "written in 1992 by JG" isn't a clause, only a modifier.

And "shares similarities" is partly redundant, but let's not start on that. We have enough to deal with right here.

[maestrowork]

Now how about:

The Book A Time to Kill, which was written by John Grisham in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

vs.

The Book A Time to kill, which John Grisham wrote in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

;)

I think w're totally confusing EGGammon now.


And guys, I'm just throwing all this at the drop of a hat. I'm no linguist or grammatist so you don't have to keep correcting my use of terms like "complex" vs. "compound" or "clause" vs. "whatever" ;) ;)

My point is (after we get high tossing all these terminologies) it is easy to spot passive/active in simple sentences. But once you deal with compound sentences, it gets more difficult. I can't get this clause, modifier, participial adjective, blah blah blah straight.

The difference between "she jumped, surprised by a loud noise" and "she jumped, and was surprised by a loud noise" is not always easy.


I'm like one of these software power users. I know how to use them, I just don't know what they're called...

[reph]

Wait a second--do you mean "complex" versus compound, or complex as in complicated?
I tried to take care of that for him.

It's a adjectival prepositional phrase. Or you could call it an appostive, in traditional grammar.
It's not a prepositional phrase, although it contains two prepositional phrases.

I've been told (rather sharply) on another language-connected message board that nothing but a noun or a noun phrase can be an appositive. I can't swear to the expertise of the poster who told me, but I can't swear to my own expertise about terminology, either. I've been out of school too long. However, I do know a phrase from a clause.

[Medievalist]

Now how about:

The Book A Time to Kill, which was written by John Grisham in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

Dude that is totally passive voice! You've got it--the verb or past participle is written, there's a helping verb that's a form of be, was, and the subject of written, the person doing the writing, is unclear, buried in a prepositional phrase.

You are now ready to be a social scientist.

vs.

The Book A Time to kill, which John Grisham wrote in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

Gah. John Grisham's A Time to Kill (1992) shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

There's still more to do there, but the problem wasn't that the sentence was using passive voice, because it wasn't. But it's got a wimpy relative pronoun, and too many prepositional phrases, making it wimpy.

Waddya mean wimpy isn't accepted as a technical term . . .

[reph]

Now how about:

The Book A Time to Kill, which was written by John Grisham in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

vs.

The Book A Time to kill, which John Grisham wrote in 1992, shares striking similarities with To Kill a Mockingbird.

;)

...I'm no linguist or grammatist so you don't have to keep correcting my use of terms like "complex" vs. "compound" or "clause" vs. "whatever"...I can't get this clause, modifier, participial adjective, blah blah blah straight.
There's a reason for getting clear about what's a phrase and what's a clause: The original question concerned active and passive voice. Only in a clause can the verb have either one. If you ask "Is this verb active or passive?" while pointing to a verb in a participial phrase, there's no answer.

[Medievalist]

I tried to take care of that for him.


It's not a prepositional phrase, although it contains two prepositional phrases.

I've been told (rather sharply) on another language-connected message board that nothing but a noun or a noun phrase can be an appositive. I can't swear to the expertise of the poster who told me, but I can't swear to my own expertise about terminology, either. I've been out of school too long. However, I do know a phrase from a clause.

Reph, I'm probably going to bow to your expertise at every turn. I tend to look stuff up with modern English--and I've had so many grammar seminars, using so many nomenclature systems that I can't keep them straight. I'm always having to look up the names.

[Medievalist]

And guys, I'm just throwing all this at the drop of a hat. I'm no linguist or grammatist so you don't have to keep correcting my use of terms like "complex" vs. "compound" or "clause" vs. "whatever" ;) ;)

My point is (after we get high tossing all these terminologies) it is easy to spot passive/active in simple sentences. But once you deal with compound sentences, it gets more difficult. I can't get this clause, modifier, participial adjective, blah blah blah straight.

I get that, I really do, but it's sort of like going to the doctor and saying "My thingamajig hurts."

We need to make sure we're talking about the same thing. I'm so old, and have been trying to figure out this stuff for so long, that I've been victim . . . privileged to learn every blasted nomenclature system as it came along, and so I'm always having to look up the names.


The difference between "she jumped, surprised by a loud noise" and "she jumped, and was surprised by a loud noise" is not always easy.


I'm like one of these software power users. I know how to use them, I just don't know what they're called...



Yeah I know. You're better off than a lot of people.

I sometimes wish that, before I see them, the undergraduate students hadn't been taught rules. I wish they'd been taught the names of things, but not rules. Their brains don't need them to use language; if they're exposed to the language when they're young enough, and they see and hear and write it a lot, they'll figure it out.

But by the time I see them, they're terrified of the semi-colon, aren't sure what passive voice is (but are sure it's bad), think commas are a decorative additive, and think the world will end if they begin a sentence with "and" or split an infinitive (whatever that is . . . they're not too sure. But they know splitting them is bad.)

[reph]

Reph, I'm probably going to bow your expertise at every turn.
Now if we can just get Ray to cooperate...

I've yelled at him so much tonight, it's a bit of a relief that he can take away only one rep point at a time now.

[Fractured_Chaos]

((@.@))


...


I have a headache now. >.<



Although, since using the passive voice too often is one of my biggest weaknesses, the info is going to be very helpful...




Once I can digest it, that is.

[brinkett]

Word can flag what it sees as passive sentences. It's not perfect, but it detects the obvious ones. As with all spell checking and grammar checking, though, use yer brain. Evaluate each squiggly and make up your own mind.

[maestrowork]

I hate Word's grammar and style check. I hate it. I turn it off.

[wurdwise]

I have to admit, you guys lost me on this thread when you drug out the lessons. I hate all those words, and I only learned them in school because I had to. I don't want to know them, or what they mean. All I do know is that I can tell the differerence between an active and passive voice, and that's all I need to know. No one has ever pointed out that my writing sounds passive, so I guess I must be doing something right.

[brinkett]

I hate Word's grammar and style check. I hate it. I turn it off.
To each his/her own. I find it useful for alerting me to potential problems. I usually use it to do a quick pass over a completed draft before I do a more serious edit.

[Jamesaritchie]

I hate Word's grammar and style check. I hate it. I turn it off.

I believe the options in grammar check should be set for the individual writer, but unless you're very good at grammar, I don't think turning it off is a good idea for most writers.

Word grammar check does a very good job of flagging passive sentences, and handles some other grammar problems well. What it really does well, however, is giving you the rules. Even when grammar check is wrong, if you check the rule you'll learn something, and can almost always tell from the rule whether or not grammar check got it right.

As for passive voice, I think what confuses many writers is thinking every sentence, or every part of a sentence, has to be active or passive. Passive/active is subject/verb, and simply doesn't apply to every sentence, or to each part of many sentences.

Few thngs read worse than too many passive sentences, but this is one area where many make the subject far more complicated than it really is. If you look at nothing but the subject and verb, you'll be right pretty much all the time.

[Jaws]

I believe the options in grammar check should be set for the individual writer, but unless you're very good at grammar, I don't think turning it off is a good idea for most writers.
I agree that it should be set for the individual writer, but it should not be left turned on during the writing process. For one thing, it interferes with automatic backup saves…
Word grammar check does a very good job of flagging passive sentences, and handles some other grammar problems well. What it really does well, however, is giving you the rules. Even when grammar check is wrong, if you check the rule you'll learn something, and can almost always tell from the rule whether or not grammar check got it right.
Perhaps this is true for those who don't write historical-perspective material requiring constant use of pluperfect and past-perfect constructions, but that alone would be enough to have me turn the monstrosity off. I also hate the fact that it's too stupid to exclude legal citations from the check, which might look like this:
The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed and remanded. 972 F.2d 1429, 1439 (1992). Although it assumed for the purpose of its opinion that 2 Live Crew's song [510 U.S. 569, 574] was a parody of the Orbison original, the Court of Appeals thought the District Court had put too little emphasis on the fact that "every commercial use… is presumptively… unfair," Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U. S. 417, 451 (1984), and it held that "the admittedly commercial nature" of the parody "requires the conclusion" that the first of four factors relevant under the statute weighs against a finding of fair use. 972 F.2d, at 1435, 1437.
If WordPerfect has managed to do so since 1989, surely Word could by now…

[maestrowork]

Or writing technical documents... at least turn the "passive voice" option off.

[Jamesaritchie]

I agree that it should be set for the individual writer, but it should not be left turned on during the writing process. For one thing, it interferes with automatic backup saves…



Perhaps this is true for those who don't write historical-perspective material requiring constant use of pluperfect and past-perfect constructions, but that alone would be enough to have me turn the monstrosity off. I also hate the fact that it's too stupid to exclude legal citations from the check, which might look like this:The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed and remanded. 972 F.2d 1429, 1439 (1992). Although it assumed for the purpose of its opinion that 2 Live Crew's song [510 U.S. 569, 574] was a parody of the Orbison original, the Court of Appeals thought the District Court had put too little emphasis on the fact that "every commercial use… is presumptively… unfair," Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U. S. 417, 451 (1984), and it held that "the admittedly commercial nature" of the parody "requires the conclusion" that the first of four factors relevant under the statute weighs against a finding of fair use. 972 F.2d, at 1435, 1437. If WordPerfect has managed to do so since 1989, surely Word could by now…


I do think the WordPerfect grammar check is better, but to be honest, I can find exceptions where any grammar check is stupid, including the WordPerfect version. But for general writng, I think Word's grammar check works very well.

As for automatic save, and automatic backup, I have no problem with it when using grammar check, which is turned on all the time. Automatic save really isn't even terribly important with a newer version of Word. Word XP saves in real time, even with grammar check running. I've had the power go out as I was writing, and when it came back on and I rebooted the computer, Word had saved what I was writing.

I do write much historical-perspective material requiring constant use of pluperfect and past-perfect constructions, and Word Grammar check treats it more than well enough. Then again, I do have the options set for what I need and don't need.

For me, at least, leaving Word's grammar check turned on as I'm writing creates no problems, and saves me a bunch of hours on the next draft.

I do prefer the WordPerfect grammar check, but once options are set for me, I could count all the problems I've had with the Word version on the fingers of one hand, if not one foot. You do have to set the options for individual use, but I think most new writers wgho have problems with grammar should do this, and then turn grammar check on and leave it on as they write.

For those who are grammar and punctuation challenged, I've found it works better to learn and correct as they go. Waiting until the final draft can be an overwhelming process, and can mean the writing itself isn't up to snuff.

As for legal citations, Word doesn't handle them at all well, but I doubt I've had to check a legal citation twice in my writing career, so that simply isn't an issue for me.

[reph]

I'm surprised that professional writers (and some who have posted are) use a grammar check at all. I wouldn't have thought they needed one.

[SRHowen]

I use Word Perfect, spell check is a must for me---I turn off grammar checking until I am done with my draft. Then I go back and turn it on. I don't use the suggestions it comes up with, for passive voice and most other things--but it does flag them. I can ask myself, do I want an incomplete sentence here--do I want passive here?

And since it is a second draft, my first drafts are written at the speed of light -- no editing or rereading 'till I type THE END, it's an easy way to flag things I need to check without reading every word again.

Shawn

[maestrowork]

I do have spell check and grammar check turned off while I write, because they imped my process. But once I'm done with a draft or even a chapter or two, I run the check (F7 in Word). I don't have a lot of spelling errors -- mostly just unusual names or words. Some words are not in Word's dictionary. As for grammar, I find that I'd reject almost 90% of Word's suggestions unless I turn off "sentence fragment." When writing fiction, I don't use much passive voice either (maybe 3% of the time). Once in a while it will catch something that I missed.

The best spell check program won't catch homonyms. E.g, it took me more than 6 drafts and multiple edits to find I mistyped "vantage" with "vintage."

[E.G. Gammon]

I do have spell check...turned off while I write

EXCELLENT tip maestro. I have mine on and I always find myself stopping in the middle of sentences to correct a misspelled word, which sometimes makes me forget what I was typing.

[jules]

I also hate the fact that it's too stupid to exclude legal citations from the check

It's been a while since I used word's grammar checker, but I believe you can define a style for your citations (see Format / Styles) and tell it not to check anything in that style. Then you can define a keyboard shortcut to switch to that style and back to normal and everything will be just perfect.

That said, I got well and truly p*d off with the grammar checker last time I was doing technical writing, hunted down the responsible DLL and deleted it. It won't be doing *that* again. These days I just use openoffice, which doesn't even _have_ a grammar checker. :)

[jules]

3. Using the passive voice sometimes creates a dangling or misplaced modifier problem.Examples:
Active voice: Voting overwhelmingly for Proposition 227, Californians decreased support for bilingual education in public schools.
Passive voice: Voting overwhelmingly for Proposition 227, support for bilingual education was significantly decreased in California.


Hmmm... I don't think this is anything fundamentally wrong with the passive voice, it's just that that sentence is badly constructed.

Due to overwhelming voting for Proposition 227, support for bilingual education was signigicantly decreased in California.

That seems to work OK to me. It doesn't tell you who did the voting, which is important information for somebody not familiar with the subject, but other than that it is fine.

I'd say, specifically, that this problem is only really a danger if you take a sentence that's already in active voice and try to convert it to passive by changing the main clause without going back and checking that the subordinates still make sense.

[Roger J Carlson]

Word can flag what it sees as passive sentences. It's not perfect, but it detects the obvious ones. As with all spell checking and grammar checking, though, use yer brain. Evaluate each squiggly and make up your own mind.At the risk of sounding like a broken record, my Passive Word Highlighter can help identify passive sentences by highlighting passive verbs in your text. You can find it here:
http://www.rogerjcarlson.com/WritingHelp/TechTips.html

Note: it requires MS Word in order to run.

[reph]

Due to overwhelming voting for Proposition 227, support for bilingual education was signigicantly decreased in California.

That version has a new problem: misuse of "due to."

Why not "The overwhelming vote for Prop 227 significantly decreased support for bilingual ed in Calif."?

[LightShadow]

The best way to eliminate passive voice is to eliminate "to be" verbs (like was, were, have, has, etc). While you're at it, omit unneccessary words (like have and that most of the time), omit adverbs that are unneccessary, and unneccessary dialogue attribution. Granted, sometimes there is no way around having to use such words, but keep it in moderation. Why say: "He wanted a medication that was prescribed by a physician." When you can say: "He wanted a medication prescribed by a physician." See?

www.geocities.com/douglasvgibbs (http://www.geocities.com/douglasvgibbs)

[reph]

"He wanted a prescription medication."

[LightShadow]

Okay, fine, but they get the point, I hope. "to be" verbs are the culprits, usually, that turns a sentence into a passive voice, rather than active. It's a simple prescription to a simple problem.

[Gabriel]

Don't mean to dig this old thread up but I didn't want to start another one for a simple observation/question.

Would I be right in assuming from personal experience and what I have learnt here that it's easier to write in the active voice than passive?

[Medievalist]

Not sure it's easier . . . that depends on the writer. It's less words.

[Roger J Carlson]

Don't mean to dig this old thread up but I didn't want to start another one for a simple observation/question.

Would I be right in assuming from personal experience and what I have learnt here that it's easier to write in the active voice than passive?I don't find this to be true. (passive; that was my first pass at the sentence)
This is not true for me. (active voice; but it requires me to make a firm declaration rather than hedging. I like to hedge.)

I generally have to go through my writing and make it active after the fact. For me, passive voice is easier.

[Medievalist]

I don't find this to be true. (passive; that was my first pass at the sentence)
This is not true for me. (active voice; but it requires me to make a firm declaration rather than hedging. I like to hedge.)

I generally have to go through my writing and make it active after the fact. For me, passive voice is easier.

Roger . . . that first sentence? Not passive voice.


You've got a subject via the relative pronoun "this" -- so it can't be passive voice. You don't have a main verb in the past tense/past participle form -- so it can't be passive voice.

[jdparadise]

Don't mean to dig this old thread up but I didn't want to start another one for a simple observation/question.

Would I be right in assuming from personal experience and what I have learnt here that it's easier to write in the active voice than passive?

Not easier for the writer so much as sometimes more useful for the reader.

If I write "The woods were a place not liked by Jan" (edited, thanks loquax) it sets the main emphasis on the woods. If I write "Jan did not like the woods" it sets the emphasis on Jan. Sometimes I might -want- the emphasis to be on the woods, but usually since the reader engages more with character than with setting I'll want to emphasize Jan.

If I write "Mistakes were made by Robert" it gives the mistake primacy over Robert; this can be useful (and for even more utility when trying to be evasive, omit "by Robert" to leave the mistake-maker indeterminate).
But "Robert made a mistake" gives responsibility to Robert up front, which engages the reader more directly and makes the reader's job easier.

Make sense?

[loquax]

The passive voice is generally regarded as easier to write.

(edit: no problem)

[janetbellinger]

Well you know, active is considered better at this moment in time. That could change in the future though for nothing ever remains the same for long without becoming tired and active could once again one day belong to the realm of children's and YA fiction.

[Medievalist]

Please please please . . . don't think in terms of "better" and "worse" for active and passive voice.

They are part of a writer's tool kit. Use them when appropriate; understand how they work and how they're constructed and make deliberate stylistic choices.

[Roger J Carlson]

Roger . . . that first sentence? Not passive voice.I would never argue with you in your area of expertise.

[jdparadise]

(edit: jd i don't think your first example is passive either. That would be The woods were not liked by Jan)

Dagnabbit, I think there's rightness in the correction you've made...

I had to go out looking after this one. Here's a link I found:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/grammar/g_passive.html

[lfraser]

Once again, the Aw forums teach me something valuable about writing.

Thanks!

[maestrowork]

Passive voice is considered to norm in technical writing and, often, non-fiction.

In fiction, it's generally more exciting, especially with action, to write in active voice. There are times when passive voice is favored, depending on POV, focus, mood, etc. But try to use strong, active verbs when possible.

[jdparadise]

Passive voice is considered to norm in technical writing...

I can't speak for other aspects of tech writing, but for software documentation I've never run into a situation where this is true.

From Microsoft's style guide:
In general, use the active voice, which tells who or what is performing the action of the sentence.

Avoid the passive voice except when necessary to avoid a wordy or awkward construction...

[Medievalist]

I've been doing technical writing since 1989, much of which you can find in your local Barnes and Noble, or software package.

Passive voice is usually not acceptable. Both Apple and Microsoft's style guides explicitly forbid it; I can't think of any consumer technical book publisher that favors it either, and my last two major software developer clients also consider passive voice verbotten.

This is Apple's statement from their Publications Style Guide (http://developer.apple.com/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/APStyleGuide/AppleStyleGuide2006.pdf):

passive voice Avoid when possible and use active voice. Passive voice is sometimes
appropriate and necessary—when using the active voice would require highly
convoluted sentence structure or excessive anthropomorphism, for example—but
rewrite to avoid passive voice if you can.
In tutorials, a passive construction might be appropriate to avoid miscuing the
reader—that is, when you describe an action that the user is not supposed to try yet.
Explanation screen: An icon is selected by clicking it.
User-try screen: You try it. Click the icon.

[maestrowork]

News to me. I am not talking about instructional manuals. I am talking about white papers, etc. Engineers write in passive voice all the time -- "After the server has started up, software will be installed before released to the general public. Backups are run nightly."

Rarely do I see:

"After we start the server, we will install the software before releasing it to the general public. We run backups nightly."


Manuals and instructions and CBTs are exceptions: "click on the button, then move the mouse..." I know, I used to develop CBT materials and knowledgeware. I've also published a few white papers. Passive voice was definitely favored in technical papers while I was at IBM.

[PeeDee]

I use passive voice in my fiction all the time. BUT, I use it consciously for a given effect, or because it's what fits that particular scene. If I find that I've used passive voice without intending to, I usually cut it. Not because I go "Ah! Passive Voice! Evil!" but because if I rephrase it into active voice, it sounds stronger and takes fewer words, something I'm always aiming for.

[lfraser]

I've always used passive voice with caution, but I wasn't always aware that I'd used it at all. Some passive writing is obvious; some is not so obvious. I've just run through part of my current WIP and rewritten a number of sentences that seemed fine until I took a closer look. I'll have to pay more attention to that MS Word passive-voice-o-meter.

[Rich]

Reph? How you doin'? Did you dump that husband of yours yet?

Outside of the grammatical ramifications I've always liked Gertrude Steins words when a waiter was pouring her some tea. He was a bit shaky and spilled the tea. Her words were something like. "Sir, if you are going to pour, pour boldly."

[scarletpeaches]

My headache was caused by this thread.

[Hillgate]

This thread is a fantastic example of something, but I'm not sure what, exactly. I always thought active meant you got a sweat up, and passive meant she was doing all the work. Am I missing something? I did go to a very posh university after all... ;)

[Medievalist]

News to me. I am not talking about instructional manuals. I am talking about white papers, etc. Engineers write in passive voice all the time -- "After the server has started up, software will be installed before released to the general public. Backups are run nightly."

Sure, in informal internal docs for engineers -- and, more often than not, they shouldn't be using passive voice. That example, however, is not the register or diction one usually sees in White papers; it's far too informal.


Manuals and instructions and CBTs are exceptions: "click on the button, then move the mouse..." I know, I used to develop CBT materials and knowledgeware. I've also published a few white papers. Passive voice was definitely favored in technical papers while I was at IBM.

I give you the IBM Style Guide (http://www-03.ibm.com/easy/page/1387/$File/IBM_Style.pdf):

IBM Style
Active voice or passive voice
__________________________________
Overview: Use active voice wherever possible
Details:
As much as possible, use active voice, which tells who or what is performing the action.
Examples that convey the same information in active and passive voice
Active: Use the Name window to enter your name and address.
Passive: The Name window is used to enter your name and address.
Active: You can store up to 500 files in the database.
Passive: Up to 500 files can be stored in the database.
Passive voice is acceptable when any of these conditions are true:
It is clear that the system performs the action.
You are writing about something that happens without the user controlling the action.
The subject is not the focus of the sentence.
You want to avoid blaming the user for an error.
Examples that demonstrate appropriate use of passive voice
The file is saved when you press Enter.
When you use the recover command, any lost data is recovered.

[Gabriel]

I only wanted a question answered! I never dreamed it would come to this.
*Puts gun to head*
Nah I'm joking, this is really informative.
You guys make me feel so dum.

[scarletpeaches]

Don't you mean, "I am made to feel dumb by you guys?"

[Gabriel]

You've upstaged me scarlet! This will not be stood for by I!

[IrishScribbler]

I thought I knew the difference between active and passive better than I do.

This clarifies things immensely! Thank you to all!

[maestrowork]

Style guides are seldom followed -- at least at IBM. I don't know about guidelines -- but as a practitioner, I can tell you passive voice is very much alive in technical papers, reports, references, requirements, business analysis, etc. I am not saying it's right or wrong, and there are absolutely an abundance of papers and reports written in mostly active voice. But we will be remiss to disregard the fact that many, in practice, are also written in passive voice (although not exclusively, of course).

A sampling of white papers gives me something like this:


In September 1993, the IBM RS/6000 Division announced three RS/6000 servers based on the first implementation of the POWER2 architecture. This implementation is referred to as the original POWER2 in this paper. The September announcement was well received by IBM customers, many of them requested a desktop implementation and greater commercial transaction processing capacity. Satisfying these two requests was a major challenge for the May 1994 IBM announcement.

Several design trade-offs were made to meet the stringent packaging and price targets in a desktop implementation. In this paper, the POWER2 architecture implementation for the desktop is referred to as the new-desktop POWER2. Another set of design trade-offs were required to achieve greater commercial transaction processing capacity at a reasonable cost. This effort led to a new POWER2 architecture implementation for the server models, referred to as the new-server POWER2. The three implementations of the POWER2 architecture and the corresponding RS/6000 model numbers are summarized in Table 1.

Changing the highlighted texts to active voice would feel odd in such documents.

[JeanneTGC]

Style guides are seldom followed -- at least at IBM. I don't know about guidelines -- but as a practitioner, I can tell you passive voice is very much alive in technical papers, reports, references, requirements, business analysis, etc. I worked at IBM for 8 years -- I stand by every word I say here.
Being currently at IBM, I can back Maestrowork up here. We use passive voice for everything. A friend outside the company calls them "weasel words" -- the words you use to avoid making a strong statement that can get your company sued.

It affected my fiction writing for certain -- said friend had to go through an entire 100 pages and point out the weasel words for me so I could see what they were, because I couldn't recognize them as passive any more (been in Corporate America 11+ years now, and it does rub off).

Business requires weasel words and passive voice because you have to be diplomatic in all things. Your own writing does not, but it's hard to break the passive voice habit for the active voice.

[maestrowork]

Right -- unless you have a clear audience (such as manuals or instructions), who is this "you" or "we"? Like Jeanne said, companies need to be very careful about using "subjects" in these documents unless it's clearly identified (such as "IBM customers" in my quoted text).

There's nothing wrong with "our customers required the system to achieve greater transaction integrity" but in most cases, it's actually advised to say "the system is required to achieve greater transaction integrity." A compromise would be: "It is a requirement for the system to achieve greater transaction integrity" by introducing generic active voice ("It is..."). In many cases, passive voice is much more natural for documents like these without a specific "subject."

[gp101]

And guys, I'm just throwing all this at the drop of a hat. I'm no linguist or grammatist so you don't have to keep correcting my use of terms like "complex" vs. "compound" or "clause" vs. "whatever" ;) ;)


Maestro, you would get a pass on not being a linguist or grammatist, if you had not boldly professed your feelings on "passive" vs "active", which, after reading rebuttal posts from Reph and Medievalist, show that you should have (at most) "suggested" your opinion, not offered them up as fact. I think that may be why you're getting hammered in this thread.

And throwing all this "at the drop of a hat" may be all well and good, but there are very green newbies here who may stumble upon your comments, take them at face value, and cause them to start off with incorrect info.

No, I'm not picking on you, I just think you should stop being so defensive; granted, I realize now that this thread is nearly two years old.

We all like you, and we're a generously forgiving lot.

[Roger J Carlson]

I'm no grammarian either. However, I found this link (http://jerz.setonhill.edu/writing/grammar/act-pass.htm)to be generally enlightening, not only about passive voice vs. active voice, but also passive tense. It also talks about sentences that are neither active nor passive, but just describe a state of being. I have always considered these latter to be passive. As you can see, I use that "to be" construction quite a lot and have to guard against it in my writing. While it may not technically be passive voice, it is certainly not active either and makes my writing bland and wimpy.

Otherwise, I apologize for interjecting my limited knowledge into this thread.

[maestrowork]

GP, this is a 2-year-old thread and I did say I wasn't a linguist and never claimed to be one (besides, it was a topic posted in Novel Writing in the pre-Grammar board days). Everything said in these threads are opinions until presented as "facts." I don't think I ever said mine were irrefutable "facts." In fact, I always avoid telling people what I'm saying are facts. I only offered my opinions as a practitioner -- one who writes for a living; besides, I didn't realize only experts could post in these threads. I am not sure why you believe that green newbies would take my words as gospel, because I know they don't, not necessarily. In fact, I caution any newbie to take anyone's words here as truth -- I encourage them to do research to find out for themselves. People here are very helpful, but they're not necessarily or always right.

I find your post somewhat sanctimonious. Why, do you think I need forgiveness? ;)

[jdparadise]

There's nothing wrong with "our customers required the system to achieve greater transaction integrity" but in most cases, it's actually advised to say "the system is required to achieve greater transaction integrity." A compromise would be: "It is a requirement for the system to achieve greater transaction integrity" by introducing generic active voice ("It is...").

I vastly prefer reading active voice and simplifying things as much as possible, and I assume the generic audience gets more out of it when I do so. I'd probably phrase the above (the past tense in "required" above indicates to me that the snippet explains a customer departure?) as:

Our customers required greater transaction integrity than the system delivered.

...there are one and twenty ways/to recite a tribal lay/and each and every one of them is right...

[Medievalist]

I'm no grammarian either. However, I found this link (http://jerz.setonhill.edu/writing/grammar/act-pass.htm)to be generally enlightening, not only about passive voice vs. active voice, but also passive tense.

Jerz is good -- I've been bugging him about putting some of his online materials, and the handouts he used -- as a very compact guide.

[Judg]

I'm no grammarian either. However, I found this link (http://jerz.setonhill.edu/writing/grammar/act-pass.htm)to be generally enlightening, not only about passive voice vs. active voice, but also passive tense. It also talks about sentences that are neither active nor passive, but just describe a state of being. I have always considered these latter to be passive. As you can see, I use that "to be" construction quite a lot and have to guard against it in my writing. While it may not technically be passive voice, it is certainly not active either and makes my writing bland and wimpy.

Otherwise, I apologize for interjecting my limited knowledge into this thread.
Um, Roger, I hate to be difficult, but there is no such thing as a passive tense and that link made no such claim. It talked about how people confuse the passive voice with the [sic] past tense. Maybe that was just a typo on your part, but there's no point in intensifying the confusion.

The passive voice is a very precise grammatical term which refers to a verb construction that uses the verb to be + past participle to indicate that the subject of the verb is the "recipient" of the action described by the verb and not the agent.

I hit the ball. Sentence in the active voice.
The ball was hit by me. The above sentence transformed into the passive voice.

I was hitting home runs all day. Progressive past tense, active voice. The verb "to be" doesn't make it passive unless it's followed by a past participle, which isn't the case here. I've seen critiques on this forum calling writers to task for using such a passive construction, but that is sheer ignorance speaking. There is nothing passive, either grammatically or figuratively, about this sentence.

The passive voice is very useful for indicating than an action took place while hiding the agent. The decision was made at two o'clock. In the real world, often used for evading responsibility.

End of mini-lesson. For the benefit of anyone who was getting confused again. I'll go back to being anal in private.

[Medievalist]

Um, Roger, I hate to be difficult, but there is no such thing as a passive tense and that link made no such claim. It talked about how people confuse the passive voice with the [sic] past tense. Maybe that was just a typo on your part, but there's no point in intensifying the confusion.

The passive voice is a very precise grammatical term which refers to a verb construction that uses the verb to be + past participle to indicate that the subject of the verb is the "recipient" of the action described by the verb and not the agent.

I hit the ball. Sentence in the active voice.
The ball was hit by me. The above sentence transformed into the passive voice.



For passive voice, the main verb must also lack a grammatical subject.

And if I sound . . . angsty, I do apologize. It's just that this question keeps coming up over and over . . . and it's really not that complicated.

[Judg]

For passive voice, the main verb must also lack a grammatical subject.

And if I sound . . . angsty, I do apologize. It's just that this question keeps coming up over and over . . . and it's really not that complicated.
Would you care to illustrate? What you've said sounds just plain wrong to me, but maybe we're just not connecting. Any finite verb (as opposed to participles and infinitives) has a subject, with the debatable exception of the imperative.

[loquax]

This thread reminds me of this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HJxOiRoeEI). It's a "who wants to be a millionaire" question, which was up on the internet a while ago, making fun of the "idiot" who got the question wrong. Funnily enough, I'm almost positive the show got the question wrong, and that the guy was rightly confused. Obviously the show doesn't know the difference between "passive voice" and "past tense"

[Judg]

This thread reminds me of this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HJxOiRoeEI). It's a "who wants to be a millionaire" question, which was up on the internet a while ago, making fun of the "idiot" who got the question wrong. Funnily enough, I'm almost positive the show got the question wrong, and that the guy was rightly confused. Obviously the show doesn't know the difference between "passive voice" and "past tense"
Not at all. The question was clear and correct and the contestant wrong.

[loquax]

Okay, here's a verb - "kick"

Tell me if that's in passive voice or active voice.



My assumption is that the passive voice affects the order of words, not the words themselves.

And besides, for a 300 dollar question, it's far too difficult. Most people on this board, which is devoted to writing, are still a little unsure (otherwise this thread wouldn't exist)

I'm certain they meant "present tense" or "past tense".

[Judg]

Okay, here's a verb - "kick"

Tell me if that's in passive voice or active voice.



My assumption is that the passive voice affects the order of words, not the words themselves.

Neither. It's an infinitive. A voice can only be applied to the "finite" part of the verb. And voice is something that only refers to verbs, never to any other part of speech. It is independent of tense, incidentally. Any tense can be expressed in the active or passive voice, although that can get pretty cumbersome in compound tenses.

[blacbird]

Why, Lord, is this concept so difficult for so many?

The door was opened by me. passive
The door is opened by me. passive
The door will be opened by me. passive
I opened the door. active
I open the door. active
I will open the door. active
The door hit me on the ass as it closed. active
I was hit on the ass by the door as it closed. passive

Active vs. passive voice is a sentence construction matter, not one of choice of verb. And it has nothing whatever to do with tense, or POV.

caw

[Medievalist]

Would you care to illustrate?

You need to have three things to have a passive voice construction. All three of these must be true:

1. A main verb in the past tense/past participle form.

2. A helping verb, almost always, in modern English, a form of be

3. The main verb of the sentence does not have a grammatical subject.

The ball was kicked.

1. Kick is the main verb. It is the past tense/past participle form. (Irregular verbs may have a past participle that is not the same as the past tense form.)

2. The helping verb, "was" is a form of be.

3. The main verb "kick" does not have a subject; it is not clear who did the kicking.

If a prepositional phrase is tacked on, "by me," for instance, it still isn't the subject of the verb kick, so the sentence is still in passive voice.

[maestrowork]

Would you care to illustrate? What you've said sounds just plain wrong to me, but maybe we're just not connecting. Any finite verb (as opposed to participles and infinitives) has a subject, with the debatable exception of the imperative.

This is what I found from englishforums.com:

In a sentence in the passive voice, the receiver of the action is both the grammatical/formal subject and the real/notional subject.

In "A new art gallery was opened last Saturday"
"a new art gallery" is the only possible subject of the sentence. It is both the grammatical and the notional subject.

Grammatical and notional subjects don't depend on voice. In "the book was written by John", "John" is not the notional subject for several reasons:
1. "John" is a noun, but it is only part of a prepositional phrase, you can't separate the noun from the preposition and make it the subject of the sentence.
2. Even if you could separate the prepositional phrase, "John" still wouldn't work as the subject of the verb in the passive voice.
3. "by John" is recognised, as a modifier in the predicate, as the "agent". It appears only in passive sentences.
4. The subject of a sentence is not necessarily the "doer" of the action expressed by the verb; it can also be the "receiver" of the action.

In certain types of sentences, you have both a grammatical and a notional subject, as in cleft and pseudo-cleft sentences:
"It was John who wrote the book."

In the example above, "it" is the grammatical subject because it is only "filling" the usual place of the subject. And "John" is the notional/real subject.

One possible way of analysing this sentence is the following:
"It": grammatical/formal subject (called "anticipatory it").
"John": notional/real subject.
"was who wrote the book": predicate, in which "was" is the head and "who wrote the book" is the predicative/subject complement.

Emphasis mine.

Further confused? :D

[loquax]

okay, here's the question for those who haven't watched the video:

What parts of speech are usually classified as being in the "active voice" or "passive voice"?


Adverbs, verbs, nouns, adjectives


The selectable answer is "verbs". Not "finite verbs", but "verbs". Here's a sentence:

"I wanted to kick him."

to kick is infinitive, but it's still a verb. And as you rightly stated, you cannot classify it as either passive or active. I suppose this is where the get out clause of the show using "usually" comes in.

But I stand by my belief that the question is faulty, and FAR too hard for $300. We're not all english teachers!

[maestrowork]

And this one's from wikipedia:

In grammar, the voice of a verb describes the relationship between the action (or state) that the verb expresses and the participants identified by its arguments (subject, object, etc.). When the subject is the agent or actor of the verb, the verb is in the active voice. When the subject is the patient, target or undergoer of the action, it is said to be in the passive voice.

For example, in the sentence:

The cat ate the mouse

the verb "ate" is in the active voice, but in the sentence:

The mouse was eaten by the cat

the verbal phrase "was eaten" is passive.

[Judg]

You need to have three things to have a passive voice construction. All three of these must be true:

1. A main verb in the past tense/past participle form.

2. A helping verb, almost always, in modern English, a form of be

3. The main verb of the sentence does not have a grammatical subject.

The ball was kicked.

1. Kick is the main verb. It is the past tense/past participle form. (Irregular verbs may have a past participle that is not the same as the past tense form.)

2. The helping verb, "was" is a form of be.

3. The main verb "kick" does not have a subject; it is not clear who did the kicking.

If a prepositional phrase is tacked on, "by me," for instance, it still isn't the subject of the verb kick, so the sentence is still in passive voice.
I'm sorry, that is quite simply incorrect. The subject of the verb is "ball." To prove the point, if we make the subject plural, the verb follows suit and takes the plural form. The balls were kicked.

To further make the point, a passive verb can be conjugated.

I was kicked.
You were kicked.
He was kicked.
We were kicked.
You were kicked.
They were kicked.

A conjugation is showing a verb with all the different subject combinations (persons and number) possible in a given tense.

You are confusing subject and agent.

Do you have any authoritative source that makes this claim? I suspect that what is happening here is that your memory has made a small error in terminology. I can not imagine any reputable reference stating it thus.

ETA: See Ray's reference above from Wikipedia, especially the part referring to agent and subject.

[blacbird]

"I wanted to kick him."


That's an active sentence, pure and simple. Subject does X.

caw

[jdparadise]

That's an active sentence, pure and simple. Subject does X.

Just to stir up trouble, is this one passive or active?

He wanted kicking.

[loquax]

Just to stir up trouble, is this one passive or active?

He wanted kicking.active

(passive = a kicking was wanted by him)

[jdparadise]

active

Is it? Because he seems to be the actee of "wanted", not the actor.

[Roger J Carlson]

Why, Lord, is this concept so difficult for so many?

The following should give you a clue:

Neither. It's an infinitive. A voice can only be applied to the "finite" part of the verb. And voice is something that only refers to verbs, never to any other part of speech. It is independent of tense, incidentally. Any tense can be expressed in the active or passive voice, although that can get pretty cumbersome in compound tenses.

The passive voice is a very precise grammatical term which refers to a verb construction that uses the verb to be + past participle to indicate that the subject of the verb is the "recipient" of the action described by the verb and not the agent.

A conjugation is showing a verb with all the different subject combinations (persons and number) possible in a given tense.

[blacbird]

I'm going to have a drink.

A drink is going to be had by me.

Now.

caw

[maestrowork]

I'm going to have a drink.

Active.

A drink is going to be had by me.


Passive.


Now.

Fragment.


caw

Cows Allowed Within.

[Judg]

The following should give you a clue:

Roger, that was not a post explaining the difference between the active and the passive, it was a post proving a point about technical terminology. The difference between the active and the passive is still a very simple one.

I would not be able to walk through the steps of proving a geometric theorem (haven't looked at that stuff in 30 years), but I still know the difference between a triangle and a square.

[Medievalist]

You are confusing subject and agent.

Do you have any authoritative source that makes this claim? I suspect that what is happening here is that your memory has made a small error in terminology. I can not imagine any reputable reference stating it thus.

ETA: See Ray's reference above from Wikipedia, especially the part referring to agent and subject.

I was trying to avoid jargon and was, I suppose, confusing. Yes, in your terms, I was confusing subject and agent.

It was also in part my desire to avoid the potential difficulties of the use of a prepositional phrase like "by x" which sometimes makes writers think that the sentence isn't passive voice, when it is.

The definition of subject I'm using is this one. It's the sixth here (http://www.bartleby.com/61/17/S0841700.html).

6. Grammar The noun, noun phrase, or pronoun in a sentence or clause that denotes the doer of the action or what is described by the predicate.

You can not tell in the sentence

The ball was kicked

who performed the action of the verb kicked; it isn't clear.

The distinction I am making is in an active voice construction, the subject does the action, in a passive construction the subject (like the ball) receives the action of the verb.

Better?

[Roger J Carlson]

Roger, that was not a post explaining the difference between the active and the passive, it was a post proving a point about technical terminology. The difference between the active and the passive is still a very simple one.

I would not be able to walk through the steps of proving a geometric theorem (haven't looked at that stuff in 30 years), but I still know the difference between a triangle and a square.My point was that using exact technical jargon is often more confusing than it is helpful. That's why the concept is so difficult for so many.

[blacbird]

I had the drink. The drink was had by me. It was a good drink. I will go to bed now. The bed will be gone to by me.

caw

[maestrowork]

My point was that using exact technical jargon is often more confusing than it is helpful. That's why the concept is so difficult for so many.

Absolutely. Many of us, like me, are not linguists or grammatists -- that was what got me in trouble before, when I messed up my technical terms even though I thought I knew what I was talking about.

For most of us, "subject" is the doer and "object" is the receiver. Most people don't even know what an "agent" is. So in passive voice -- "the ball was kicked by John" -- many people would think "the ball" is the object and John is the subject, and in "the ball was kicked" there is no subject!! Of course, we now know that the subject is the ball (recipient of the action), the agent is John (or unknown in the second case), but it gets really confusing. Intuitively, active/passive voice is very simple. I can understand the frustration when this question comes up from time to time, even after two years. ;)

[Judg]

Yup, Medievalist, that's better. I think you're on thin ice using that definition, personally, but I don't think it will do anybody any good to belabour the point.

Roger, using technical terms can be confusing, but using technical terms incorrectly generates even more confusion. Better to find another way of saying it altogether.

Grammar is often very poorly taught in English-speaking schools. I acquired most of my grammar in second language courses, where teachers were known to spend entire classes teaching us English grammar so we'd be able to comprehend what they were trying to teach us. Usually with the requisite rant about the state of education... ;) It has got worse, not better. English grammar is relatively simple, meaning most native speakers can use it intuitively and produce text which is mostly correct.

The main problem on these boards arises because people start calling weak constructions like "There were a lot of people in the room" passive, and then start calling them the passive voice, when it's really just anemic writing. Then they make the jump to thinking that the passive voice is poor writing, which it isn't necessarily, and we end up going in circles. I think it's a great idea to avoid technical jargon for the most part, and most especially avoid using it incorrectly, precisely to avoid this kind of confusion.

[Medievalist]

Actually, I'd say there are at least two other problems . . . people with religious issues regarding grammar, and people who think there's only one system of nomenclature.

Yeah, I teach too. I hear there's a twelve-step program . . .

[blacbird]

I woke up. Up was awakened by me. Did I miss anything? Was anything missed by me? I must have more of that substance I drank. More of that substance I drank must be had by me.

caw

[Dawnstorm]

Absolutely. Many of us, like me, are not linguists or grammatists -- that was what got me in trouble before, when I messed up my technical terms even though I thought I knew what I was talking about.

You didn't really mess up your terminology. You can't take terms for granted in linguistics.

"Participial adjective" vs. "non-finite verb forms" isn't a clear-cut issue. As a rule of thumb, linguists who would use the term "modifier" would probably also describe "written in 1992 by John Grisham" as a "non-finite verb in the passive voice". It's not necessary to go into details here. An example:

Mark Lieberman, from Language Log (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000991.html):


The actual passive in the AP's lede is in the phrase
a man put in a choke hold during a shoplifting investigation
It's also not uncommon to interpret "participial phrases" as "non-finite clauses". Look here[/quote] and search for "Spurred on by the crowd, they won the match."

The great passive voice confusion, I think, is this:

The passive voice is one of the indicators of a passive writing voice.

It took me almost a year to find that out. What finally tipped me off was an amateur site whose grammar section asked me whether I was writing "in a passive voice". We have two ambiguities, here:

1. "voice": There's a grammatic concept (the relation of the subject to the verb), and a stylistic concept (the way an author writes).

2. "passive": depending on the meaning of "voice", passive either means "verb's subject=patient" (grammar) or "dull, uninteresting, un-engaging" (stylistics).

These ambiguities aren't usually made explicit, and they are rarely resolved, so many people who are talking about style think they're talking about grammar. Many people would call the present continous tense "passive voice". They're grammatically wrong, but that doesn't really matter since their focus is on stylistics. Confusion occurs primarily when a stylistically orientated writer puts the "passive-question" to a grammarian. (It's a bit like a lawyer asking a psychologist for the definition of "person" and then applying it in legal contexts, only less precise.)

If your head's hurting now, I suggest taking a break, because I'm about to go into detail. A very popular source of the prejudice against the passive voice, I think, is Elements of Style. For the purpose of what follows, I use the free online edition of Stunk's 1918 booklet, [url=http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html#11]here (http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/dick/tta/sentence/sentence.htm#fin).

EoS contains a "rule" that concerns the passive voice. Strunk advises against it, but isn't vehemently opposed to it (he uses it himself in a key sentence I'll quote later). In fact, the rule isn't called "Don't use the passive voice", but "Use the active voice". This is a significant difference.

The key difference is apparant in this sentence (look for a passive verb in this one):

Many a tame sentence of description or exposition can be made lively and emphatic by substituting a transitive in the active voice for some such perfunctory expression as there is, or could be heard.

The key phrase, here, is "a transitive in the active voice". Of the four examples that follow, only one is in the passive voice:

"The sound of the falls could still be heard." - passive voice (almost the same construction as "can be made lively and emphatic" in Strunk's sentence above.)

The other three examples:

"There were a great number of dead leaves lying on the ground." - there + inversion:present continuous tense (other interpretetations are possible; passive voice is not one of them)

"The reason that he left college was that his health became impaired." - linking verb

"It was not long before he was very sorry that he had said what he had." - linking verbs, past perfect tenses (once with omission of the main verb)

None of these sentences contain a transitive verb, i.e. one that takes an object. All of Strunk's re-writes do: "covered", "reached", "compelled", "repented". What Strunk is offering here is not a "grammatical rule", but a technique, that could be summarised as such:

If you come across an intransitive or a passive transitive one, and the sentence reads awkward, then see if you can come up with a transitive verb to structure your sentence around (or to recast the passive sentence in the active voice).

This is not a bad technique. It's just not clear when to apply it, and how. There's lot of opportunity for writer's intuition in there.

Sometime during the twentieth century, this advice has transformed into "Don't use the passive voice", no longer a technique, but a silly rule no-one can really follow. [Aside: Strunk's rhetorics didn't help: "The latter sentence is less direct, less bold, and less concise." - This is polemic in style, rather than a fair assessment. The examples are chosen with an "agenda", too.]

So, when Stephen King picks up from Strunk almost a century later, we get in On Writing:

The timid fellow writes The meeting will be held at seven o'clock because that somehow says to him, 'Put it this way and people will believe you really know.' Purge this quisling thought! Don't be a muggle! Throw back your shoulders, stick out your chin, and put that meeting in charge! Write The meeting's at seven. There, by God! Don't you feel better?

The funny thing, here, is that I'm not sure how hiding behind the meeting is more bold than hiding behind the passive voice. The difference I see is one of formality (notice the omission of "o'clock"), rather than one of "timidity". Surely, the least timid sentence is: "We'll hold the meeting at seven o'clock."

The other thing is that, despite King supporting his claims with EoS ("I'm not the only one who says so; you can find the same advise in The Elements of Style."), he's actually not applying Strunk's "rule" at all:

The meeting will be held at seven o'clock. - passive voice
The meeting's at seven. - linking verb

Neither sentence contains a "transitive in the active voice". Despite what he might have been thinking, King did not apply Strunk's rule.

Don't-do-that rules are rarely helpful and often confusing. Read how-to books, extract techniques you find helpful, ignore rhetorics, move on. Personally, I'm not that fond of Elements of Style. I don't really want to sound like a bold American frontiersman.

[janetbellinger]

I agree that active is usually better than passive but I think that it has to be good active. I shudder when I read some of the active descriptions of body language, for example, such as people's hearts performing all kinds of gymnastics in their chests. I am sorry, but there just are not any new active ways of describing a heart skipping a beat and it is best just left out altogether. Active is good but we have to really think about what we are saying. One good thing to be said for passive, not that anybody will agree with me, is that it generally respects the intelligence of the reader, whereas active does not always do so. Do we really need to be shown every little bodily motion that a person can make? I'm sorry to sound so negative, but I have just read so much really awkward active sentences lately.