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Subject ENGLISH - Prof: Edgardo S Berg

The Passive Voice - La voz pasiva

Hasta ahora hemos hablado de la voz activa donde enfocamos la acción del verbo en el sujeto. Pero cuando queremos

dar más importancia a la acción y no a quien la ha realizado, utilizamos la voz pasiva.

Ejemplos:

La voz activa

He ate all of the cookies.(Comió todas las galletas.)

La voz pasiva

All of the cookies were eaten.(Todas las galletas fueron comidas.)

Grammatical Rules (Reglas gramaticales)

Se forma la voz pasiva con el verbo auxiliar “to be” y el participio pasado del verbo.

Sujeto + verbo auxiliar (to be) + participio pasado…

Ejemplos:

The speech is written for the president.(El discurso está escrito para el presidente.)

The house was built in 1975.(La casa fue construida en 1975.)

My wallet has been stolen.(Ha sido robada mi cartera.)

The room will be cleaned while we are out.(Se limpiará la habitación mientras estemos fuera.)

Para transformar una oración activa a pasiva tenemos en cuenta los siguientes puntos:

1. El objeto de la oración activa pasa a ser el sujeto de la pasiva.

2. El verbo principal se sustituye por el auxiliar “to be”, en su mismo tiempo, junto al verbo principal en participio.

3. El sujeto de la oración principal pasa a ser complemento agente de la pasiva.

4. Si hacemos mención en la oración del sujeto que realiza la acción (sujeto agente), este irá normalmente precedido

por la preposición “by”.

Ejemplos:

La voz activa:

Mark Twain wrote the book.(Mark Twain escribió el libro.)

La voz pasiva:

The book was written by Mark Twain.(El libro fue escrito por Mark Twain.)

La voz activa:

The housekeeper will clean the room.(La ama de casa limpiará la habitación.)

La voz pasiva:

The room will be cleaned by the housekeeper.(La habitación será limpiada por la ama de casa.)

Uses (Usos)

1. Usamos la voz pasiva cuando no sabemos quien ha realizado la acción.

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Ejemplos:

A civilian has been killed.(Un civil ha sido asesinado.)

The car was stolen.(El coche fue robado.)

2. Usamos la voz pasiva cuando queremos dar más importancia a lo que pasó, que a quién realizó la acción o cuando no

queremos decir quien la realizó.

Ejemplos:

The letter was delivered yesterday.(La carta fue entregada ayer.)

A mistake was made.(Un error fue cometido.)

Nota: No podemos usar la voz pasiva con verbos intransitivos como “die”, “arrive” o “go”. Verbos intransitivos son

verbos que no llevan un objeto directo.

Source: https://www.curso-ingles.com/aprender/cursos/nivel-avanzado/passive-voice/the-passive-voice

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Fuente: https://www.aprendeinglessila.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/00png.png

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Mixed Exercise on Passive Voice

Rewrite the sentences in passive voice.

1. John collects money. -

2. Anna opened the window. -

3. We have done our homework. -

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4. I will ask a question. -

5. He can cut out the picture. -

6. The sheep ate a lot. -

7. We do not clean our rooms. -

8. William will not repair the car. -

9. Did Sue draw this circle? -

10. Could you feed the dog? -

Source: www.ego4u.com/en/cram-up/grammar/passive/exercises?06

Newspaper Headlines – Active or Passive?

Headlines in newspapers are very short. They usually do not include punctuation, articles, and auxiliary verbs.

Can you understand the headline here? Which of the below sentences is correct form of the headline?

1. “Cameron accused as troubled charity fails” (the active voice, where Cameron is the agent doing the

verb.)

2. “Cameron is accused as troubled charity fails” (a passive voice, where Cameron is the object of the

verb accused.)

The answer is… #2 — passive voice! The full sentence, written grammatically (with articles and punctuation)

would be the following:

Camera is accused as his/the trouble charity fails.

Headlines are tricky, aren’t they? They can also be a great way to study the passive voice.

Task: Some of the headlines below are in the active voice and some are in the passive voice. Rewrite the

headlines so that they are grammatically correct. This means inserting articles (a/an/the), punctuation (.,!),

and the be verb if the sentence is passive. Good luck!

Note: To review the grammar for the passive voice, please visit our page on the passive voice and when to

use it.

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Toronto named ‘most youthful’ city in world

Taylor Swift wins top prize at American Music Awards

World’s Biggest Bookstore sold to developer

Two baby baboons born at Brooklyn zoo

Scottish government reveals independence plan

World’s first electric helicopter takes flight in Germany

Obama elected president for second term

Mothers asked nearly 300 questions a day

2000 workers laid off by Ford motor company last month

Source: https://www.englishcurrent.com/worksheets/passive-voice-newspaper-worksheet/

Headlines (both newspaper headlines and TV / radio headlines) tend to use passive voice structures. Why? Because that way:

a. you can make the relevant information the focus of information, by placing it at the beginning of the sentence: A Lidl employee is believed to have been fired for working too much. Paul McCartney is considered the “most successful songwriter in history”. b. you can be more impersonal in your statements: It is estimated that cyber crime costs global economy $445 billion a year. (*) Cybercrime is estimated to cost global economy $445 billion a year. It is now believed that dinosaurs were killed by the fallout from the impact between a comet and an asteroid. (*) Dinosaurs are now believed to have been killed by the fallout from the impact between a comet and an asteroid. (*) The “It is believed…” option tends to be used only in writing, and only in certain kinds of writing: academic writing, for example, when you want to sound “scientific”, or “impersonal / detached” from the information you’re giving. On the contrary, for headlines, the alternative option (He is believed to …) is much more common. Go to this form (opens in new tab), where you can find many examples of active sentences (which in English

may sound a bit too artificial, to be honest), and turn them into passive sentences, so that they can be more

appropriate to the context (headlines):

As you will see, some of the feedback for your answers contains clips from real news where these sentences are used. You can also find many headlines featuring passive voice on the handout below. Most of them, as headlines

typically do, omit many grammatical elements, such as articles, auxiliaries…The links and the QR codes take

you to the source of the article / headline:

Source: https://natalialzam.wordpress.com/2017/11/01/passive-voice-in-headlines/

Sometimes, newspaper headlines omit the form of the verb be (along with other function words such as articles). For

example, a headline might say Defendant found guilty by jury. This type of passive -- called a headline passive -- is

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acceptable in headlines, but it is not acceptable in any other form of writing.

Self-editing Tip: Look for all the sentences you wrote that use a verb with a past or past participle form. Ask yourself this

question: Who "did the verb"? Did the defendant find (someone) guilty? Now check to see if (the) jury found the

defendant guilty. If the defendant didn't find anyone guilty but someone (in this case the jury) found the defendant

guilty, this is a headline passive.

Computer check tip: Because the word by appears in many headline passives, use the find command in your word-

processing program to search for the word by. Then check to see if you have made any headline passives. If you have,

correct them!

Review Exercise. All of the following are headlines. Some of the headlines are active. Some are headline passives. If a

headline is a headline passive, add the correct form of the verb BE.

1. Doctors build new hospital.

2. Boy found in park.

3. Marijuana legislation approved by voters.

4. Women voters decided outcome of election.

5. Groups met to fight racisim

6. Blood alcohol level lowered for those who drink and drive.

7. Four protestors arrested at Greenpeace demonstration.

8. Hoffa wanted government to stop watching union.

9. Plane crash in Quebec killed 10.

10. Golfer named player of the year.

11. Arab countries hit by recession.

12. Serb general pleaded innocent to genocide.

NOTE: Two groups of English verbs can be either intransitive or transitive.

In the first group, the intransitive form is the same as the transitive form but without an object.

Ex: Transitive: I read the book. Intransitive: I read.

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However the verbs of the second group have different structures. The object of the transitive verb is the same as the

subject of the intransitive one.

Transitive: Someone closed the door.

Intransitive: The door closed.

Transitive: Someone broke the pencil

Intransitive: The pencil broke.

This can be confusing because the transitive version can be made passive,

Ex. The door was closed (by someone).

The pencil was broken (by someone)

which can be made into headline passives.

Ex. The door closed.

The pencil broken.

Notice that the first headline passive (ungrammatical except in headlines) is identical to the grammatical intransitive use

of closed: The door closed. However, the second headline passive (The pencil broken) uses a verb (break) whose past

participle (broken) is different from its past tense form (broke).

Consider the following headlines. Which one uses a headline passive? Which one uses an intransitive verb?

The immigration door closed by the government.

The door closed slowly.

Source: https://public.wsu.edu/~mejia/Passiveheadline.htm