El pasivo

1. El pasivo

2. Use of ser • The house was bought by my friend • La casa fue comprada por mi amiga • The elections were won by the government • Las elecciones fueron ganadas por el gobierno

3. NOTE • The past participle agrees with what has now become the subject (i.e. la casa) – • (when it was active my friend was the subject and the house was the object: mi amiga compró la casa) • The passive is used mostly to change the emphasis from object to subject – i.e. the emphasis is now on the house and not on my friend)

4. Avoiding the passive • When possible it is more elegant to avoid using the passive • You can make it active (mi amiga compró la casa) • Or you can keep it active but change the order (La casa la vendió mi amiga – note the use of reinforcement by the object pronoun)

5. Avoiding the passive • OR you can make the verb reflexive la casa se vendió • but when you do this you can´t say who did the action • When you do this the verb is plural when the subject is plural las ventanas se rompieron

6. Avoiding the passive • It is difficult to use the reflexive form when the subject is a person el guerrillero se mató would be suicide • so you use the personal a and a pronoun al guerrillero se le mató A Roberto se le vio en la calle • The personal a also helps you to know who did what to who • For this the verb remains singular even when there are more than one person a Roberto y Ana se lesvio en la calle

7. Avoiding the passive • You can also use the third person plural in an impersonal way (like English) a Roberto le vieron en la calle Roberto was seen in the street (they saw Roberto in the street)

8. Use of estar • Estar is used with the past participle to indicate the resultant state after the action, rather than the action itself los documentos fueron firmados (somebody signed them) los documentos estaban firmados (the signature was on them)