Lesson: English Grammar - 16

A Related Issue: The Passive Voice

A passive construction occurs when you make the object of an action into the subject of a sentence. That is, whoever or whatever is performing the action is not the grammatical subject of the sentence.

Your test-makers tend to focus on grammatical errors that English speakers commonly make, and this next error is a very popular one. Nevertheless, it's easy to fix; the challenge comes in learning how to identify it.

The easiest way to explain the passive voice is to use an example. Compare the following three sentences:

Example 1: Elaine purchased new software for the company.
Example 2: New software was purchased for the company by Elaine.
Example 3: New software was purchased for the company.

The first sentence uses the active voice, which means that subject of the sentence (Elaine) performs the action (purchasing some software). The second sentence uses the passive voice, because the subject of the sentence (Elaine) no longer creates the action. Instead, the original object (software), which had received the action of the sentence, becomes its subject. Through the third sentence, you can see that the passive voice allows you completely to remove the subject: the action is done, and we don't know by whom.

You can always identify the passive voice by the verb: a passive verb will begin with a form of the verb "to be" and end with a different verb in the past tense (hence, "was purchased").

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