Form

1. Form Phrase Structure: pass be . . . –en Long Passive: the agent is expressed in the by-phrase Short Passive: the agent is unexpressed

2. The Passive with Tense and Aspect Simple present passive: The dog is bathed outside. With Modals: The dog should be bathed outside. With Present Progressive: The dog is being bathed outside. With Present Perfect: The dog has been bathed outside. With Simple Past: The dog was bathed outside. With Past Progressive: The dog was being bathed outside. With be going to for future: The dog is going to be bathed outside.

3. Be versus Get 1. Beand get don’t function the same in questions: Was Henry arrested? Did Henry get arrested? and negatives: Henry wasn’t arrested. Henry didn’t get arrested. We must include operator addition when using GET in questions and negatives. • 2. Get-passivecan occur more readily with the perfect progressives: His plans have been getting sidetracked for years. Vs. His plans have been being sidetracked for years.

4. Have Have . . . NP . . . –en. Note the different form due to the intervening noun phrase. Mark had his appointment cancelled. This sentence can have two meanings: • Passive (Experiential):Someone else cancelled the appointment; it was beyond Mark’s control. • Causative: Mark arranged for his meeting to be cancelled.

5. Passive Only What’s the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs? Transitive: Take an object Intransitive: Don’t take an object Only transitive verbs may be in the passive voice. Some passive sentences have no active voice counterpart: President Obama was born in 1961. ? His mother bore President Obama in 1961. Other verbs that occur commonly in the passive voice include but are not limited to: be deemed, be fined, be hospitalized, be jailed, be scheduled, etc. Death row inmate is deemed mentally ill. Headlines: Extra police scheduled for occupied Tucson. Dad is jailed for putting son in oven.

6. Meaning The passive has a grammatical meaning: it focuses on putting the receiver of the action in the subject position and the subject is thus acted upon. As Shibitani (1985) states, the agent is “defocused”. The passive requires a transitive verb; however, not every passive sentence with a transitive verb is acceptable. • 1. The more definite the subject, the better • A. This car was made by Toyota. • B. Cars were made by Toyota. • 2. With stative verbs, the more indefinite the object in the by-phrase, the better • Adele’s song, Rolling in the Deep has been heard by everyone who listens to • the radio. • B. Adele’s song, Rolling in the Deep has been heard by Mary. • 3. The more the verb denotes a physical action, the better • A. The boy was given an award by the principal. • B. The award was desired by the boy.

7. Meaning difference between Active and Passive Everyone in the room speaks two languages. vs. Two languages are spoken by everyone in the room. Few people read many books. Vs. Many books are read by few people. Moles dig tunnels. Vs. Tunnels are dug by moles.

8. Be versus Get Get-passive, like Japanese passive, tends to be used adversely. Get slapped, hit, whacked, trapped, snatched, punished, etc. Get-passive tends to be used with verbs semantically related to: Physical assault – get hit Hindrance – get trapped Transference – get snatched Emotional or Mental strain – get punished Get has lack of expressed agent and cannot replace be-passives with non-dynamic verbs. This bed had not been slept in. vs. This bed had not got slept in. Get is usually associated with verbs that emphasize actions or processes and are more likely to occur with adverbs of frequency. The man continually got wiped out.

9. Middle Voice • The middle voice allows the subject of a sentence to be • the recipient of the action, but the morphology of the • verb to be in the active voice. A. Her high C shattered the glass. (active voice) B. The glass was shattered by her high C. (passive voice) C. The glass shattered. (middle voice) • English allows a representation of processes in terms of actions (active or passive voice) and happenings (middle voice). • English uses ergative, or change-of-state verbs • (shatter) to express spontaneous occurrences. • Ergative verbs can occur in the passive, active, or • middle voice.

10. Use (1/4) The function of the passive is to defocus the agent. The passive is most frequently used when it is not known or not important to know exactly who performs an action. Rice is grown in India. Our house was built in 1980. This olive oil was imported from Crete. Sometimes, we use the passive with the agent because we want to focus attention on the subject of the sentence. This rug was made by my aunt. That rug was made by my mother. The focus of attention is on two rugs.

11. Use (2/4) The passive is used when the agent is not to be mentioned because: • It is redundant or easy to supply – Over 2,000 different varieties of potato are grown in Peru. • It is unknown – Julie’s car was stolen yesterday. • The speaker/writer is being tactful – Apparently, we were given the wrong information. • The speaker is being evasive – A huge error was made on the report, so our group received a poor letter grade.

12. Use (3/4) The passive is used when the nonagent (recipient of the action) is: - more closely related than the agent to the theme of the text e.g. scientific writing - a participant in the immediately preceding sentence Lorenzo arrived in Paris as a down-at-heel political refugee without friends or money; luckily for him, France at that time was ruled by an Italian . . . ** The passive is used more in some genres than others. Passives are more frequent with scientific or journalistic writing than it is with fictional and conversational English.

13. Use (4/4) Include the agent when: It is new information – Sam’s house was robbed by the man who escaped from prison. It is nonhuman – The pool is cleaned throughout the day by the vacuum. It is a well-known personage and should be included as propositional information – The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was written by Mark Twain.

14. Activity With a partner, discuss why the agent is or is not included in the following sentences. • My shoes were made in Italy. • The Mona Lisa was painted by de Vinci. • While Marty was walking down the street, her purse was snatched by a young man. • The bank was robbed yesterday. • Margaret was given some bad advice about selecting courses.