GLOW: Grammar Lessons On the Web

For the exclusive use of employees of the U.S. Department of State--by Tillyer Associates

The Passive Voice

 

41,480 people were killed on U.S. highways in 1998.


Despite the shockingly high number of deaths on the highway, this is actually a decrease from 1997. Who killed all these people? Did cars kill them...or the highway? Did they kill themselves by driving too fast? Did bad drivers or drunk drivers kill them? The answer is that all of these things killed them.

Grammatically, we have to use the passive voice to write this statement. The important point of the statement is not that someone or something killed them, but that they were killed.
 

Forming the passive voice

Create the passive voice with a form of to be plus the past participle. The past participle is usually the verb + -ed.  Look at the list of irregular verbs for irregular past participles.

The object of an active voice sentence is the subject of a parallel passive voice sentence.
 

Active Voice

Passive Voice

A drunk driver killed Melanie's father.

Melanie's father was killed in a car crash.

The corrupt former president destroyed the country's economy.

The country's economy was destroyed.

Using the passive voice

We use the passive voice when we don't want to or can't identify the agent, the person or thing responsible for the action.

In the first sentence above, we know that a drunk driver was responsible for the car crash. But what if we didn't? We would simply say that "Melanie's father was killed" in the passive voice version and leave it at that.

In the second sentence above, we have a different reason for not mentioning the agent in the passive voice version.

Look at the active voice version of the second sentence and then at the passive voice version.

1. Which statement was made by the political opponent of the former
     president?
2. Which statement was made by a new ambassador recently posted to this
     country?

It is often more diplomatic not to mention the agent of an action.

Here are some more examples:
 

The coffee pot in the lunchroom was left on all night and it nearly caused a fire.

Why don't I say who did it? Maybe it was me. Maybe I don't want to get a friend in trouble. Maybe I don't want to embarrass my boss who forgot.

Invitations to the Ambassador's Fourth of July party were sent to the full press list instead of the select list of 50 "friends". 

This is a costly and embarrassing mistake.. The less said, the better.

Was the leader of the opposition party arrested?

We are not asking who arrested him/her; we are asking if it happened.

When was foreign aid to that country terminated? 

There are many reasons for not mentioning who cut off foreign aid.


Sometimes we don't mention the agent because we don't know who or what it was.  

My car was stolen last night from the parking lot at the restaurant.

Many threats have been sent to the consulate since the invasion.


Sometimes we don't mention the agent because the agent is not important or it is clear in the context.

The instructions for filing a claim are written in four different languages.


Sometimes we use the passive voice and mention the agent. The agent is introduced with the preposition by.

The order was signed by the president.

The ambassador was greeted at the airport by the new prime minister.

The telephone was invented by Alexander Graham Bell.


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