2. WHAT IS THE PASSIVE VOICE ?
PASSIVE VOICE IS USED WHEN THE FOCUS
IS ON THE ACTION. IT IS NOT IMPORTANT
OR NOT KNOWN, HOWEVER, WHO OR WHAT IS
PERFORMING THE ACTION.
3. Passive voice has three
characteristics:
•THERE IS ALWAYS A FORM OF THE
VERB TO BE.
THERE IS ALWAYS A PAST
PARTICIPLE.
THE SUBJECT IS BEING ACTED
UPON; THE SUBJECT IS NOT ACTING.
4. The first characteristic
THE FIRST CHARACTERISTIC OF PASSIVE VOICE
IS A FORM OF THE VERB TO BE. HERE ARE THE
COMMON FORMS OF THE VERB TO BE:
To Be Verbs
be
is
am
are
was
were
has/have been
will be/will have been
is/are/was/were being
5. The second characteristic :
The second characteristic of passive voice is the past
participle. Past participles, in the simplest sense, are
simply verbs that usually end in –ed or –en, such as
baked, walked, fired, created, weaken, shaken, taken.
There are some past participles that don't end in –ed
or –en. They are considered irregular verbs, such as
make, made, begun, left, lent, sold.
When you put a form of the verb to be together with a
past participle, the passive construction looks like the
examples in the following table: a form of to
be followed directly by the past participle.
6. To Be Verbs Past Participles
be provided, allotted
is anticipated, created
am taken, classified
are shaken, made
was broken, affected
were found, sold
has/have been received, elected
will be/will have been finished, awoken
is/are/was/were being driven, proven
7. Finally
Finally, with passive voice, the subject of the
sentence is being acted upon, it is not acting. In
other words, something is happening to the
subject of the sentence; the subject of the
sentence is not doing anything.
Here are some example sentences. Notice in
each of these that something is happening to the
subject; the subject is not doing anything. Use
your mouse to roll over the subjects, verbs and
past participles in the sentences below for more
information.
8. Examples
Harry ate six shrimp at dinner. (active)
At dinner, six shrimp were eaten by Harry. (passive)
Beautiful giraffes roam the savannah. (active)
The savannah is roamed by beautiful giraffes. (passive)
Sue changed the flat tire. (active)
The flat tire was changed by Sue. (passive)
We are going to watch a movie tonight. (active)
A movie is going to be watched by us tonight. (passive)
I ran the obstacle course in record time. (active)
The obstacle course was run by me in record time. (passive)
The crew paved the entire stretch of highway. (active)
The entire stretch of highway was paved by the crew. (passive)
Mom read the novel in one day. (active)
The novel was read by Mom in one day. (passive)
