Transcript The Passive Voice Ed McCorduck English 402--Grammar SUNY Cortland

The Passive Voice
Ed McCorduck
English 402--Grammar
SUNY Cortland
http://mccorduck.cortland.edu
slide 2: the theory of the transformation
An important concept in modern grammatical analysis is
the notion of the transformation. Taken from mathematics
(as are many of the features of contemporary linguistics), a
transformation performs some operation, often just simple
reordering of elements, on one string (see slide 7 of the
“Verbs and Verb Phrases” lecture) which results in another
string, or in other words it “transforms” one string into
another. The basic form of the representation of a
grammatical transformation is illustrated below:
XYZ ⇒ XZY
string
string
English 402: Grammar
slide 3: the active voice and the passive voice
One of the earliest transformations to be recognized was
the passive transformation. To understand this
transformation, it is necessary to understand the
distinction between the two main voices in English, namely
the active voice and the passive voice. The active voice is
the “default” voice for English sentences in which there is
an “actor” or “agent,” realized as the subject of the
sentence, who “performs” the action signified by the verb
and the action of the verb is “acted on” or “performed on”
another entity, often called the “patient,” who or that is
realized as the direct object of the sentence. For example,
in the active (voice) sentence Mrs. Janner the Hammer
tames those juvenile delinquents, the noun phrase Mrs.
Janner the Hammer is the agent or actor that does the
action of teaching the recipient of the action, those juvenile
delinquents.
English 402: Grammar
slide 4: relative order of participants in a passive sentence
In the passive voice, by contrast, what corresponds to the
agent in the active voice is no longer realized as the
subject of the sentence as in the active voice. Instead, the
subject of a passive sentence is actually what corresponds
to the patient in the active voice. That is, the passive
equivalent of Mrs. Janner the Hammer tames those juvenile
delinquents is Those juvenile delinquents are tamed by Mrs.
Janner the Hammer in which the NP those juvenile
delinquents, which is the direct object of the transitive verb
tames, becomes the subject of the passive sentence.
English 402: Grammar
slide 5: position of the agent in a passive sentence
Notice also that what was the agent in the active voice
sentence, the NP Mrs. Janner the Hammer, is still present
in the passive equivalent but now is no longer the
grammatical subject (again, the NP those juvenile
delinquents is). Instead, Mrs. Janner the Hammer occurs
in the passive as part of the prepositional phrase by Mrs.
Janner the Hammer, i.e., this PP is headed by the
preposition by which “governs” the NP Mrs. Janner the
Hammer.
English 402: Grammar
slide 6: possibility for subject/verb agreement conflict between the active and the passive
And finally, note that the verb phrase in the active
consists only of the third person singular present tense
verb tames but in the passive the VP consists of both the
present tense of the auxiliary be for the third person
plural (to agree with those juvenile delinquents), namely
are, followed by the past participle of the verb tame,
namely tamed.
English 402: Grammar
slide 7: formulation of the passive transformation
We can therefore state the relation between the active voice
and the passive voice in terms of a transformation that
changes (“transforms”) an active sentence into a passive
sentence. We can formulate this passive transformation
like so:
active:
subj
MV(V-tr)
dir obj
⇒
passive:
dir obj be + -en
MV
English 402: Grammar
(by subj)
slide 8: what kinds of verbs may undergo the passive transformation
Note that this formulation stipulates that the main verb of
an active sentence that undergoes this transformation
must be transitive (“V-tr”), that is, if the verb of an active
sentence is not transitive, i.e., if the active sentence is not
Patterns VII through X, the sentence cannot be put into the
active voice.
English 402: Grammar
slide 9: possibility of omitting the by phrase
Note also that the so-called “by-phrase” which indicates the
active agent is in parentheses. As we have seen before (e.g.,
slide 8 of the “Verbs and Verb Phrases” lecture), this
convention indicates that the prepositional phrase headed
by by is actually not required to be in (most) passive
sentences, in which case these passives are often termed
“agentless passives” (see the lecture “Agentless Passives
and Diagramming the Passive” below).
English 402: Grammar
slide 10: review of the verb expansion rule
Recall from slide 7 of the “Verbs and Verb Phrases” lecture
the verb-expansion rule that underlies the structure of the
predicating verb for all sentences:
T (M) (have + -en) (be + -ing) MV
English 402: Grammar
slide 11: the verb expansion formula for a passive sentence
Therefore, if we apply the passive transformation
described in slide 7 of this lecture, the resulting string,
which will underlie the structure of the predicating verb
for all passive sentences, will be
T (M) (have + -en) (be + -ing) be + -en MV
English 402: Grammar
slide 12: simplest passive-voice verb expansion rule
This means that in the simplest type of verb phrase, i.e.,
one where we have only the two required elements T and
MV, the application of the passive transformation will
result in the string
T be + -en MV
English 402: Grammar
slide 13: passive of a Pattern VII sentence in the present tense
ex
active:
Elves bake
subj
Keebler Cookies.
pres + MV (bake)
(Pattern VII)
dir obj
⇒
passive: Keebler Cookies are
dir obj
baked
pres + be + -en +MV (bake)
English 402: Grammar
by elves.
subj
slide 14: passive of a Pattern VII sentence in the past tense
active:
Oswald killed
subj
Kennedy in 1963.
past + MV (kill)
(Pattern VII)
dir obj
⇒
passive: Kennedy was
dir obj
killed
past + be + -en +MV (kill)
by Oswald in 1963.
subj
(Note: Because the PP in 1963 is not part of the subject NP not the object NP, it is
unaffected by the transformation of the active sentence into the passive sentence.)
English 402: Grammar
slide 15: passive of a Pattern VII sentence in the present progressive
active:
The contractors Slip and Shod are
subj
renovating
our house.
pres + be + -ing + MV(renovate)
(VII)
dir obj
⇒
passive:
Our house is
being
renovated
dir obj pres + be + -ing + be + -en +MV (renovate)
English 402: Grammar
by the contractors S & S.
subj
slide 16: passive of a Pattern VII sentence in the “future” tense
active:
The gators in my moat will
subj
consume
pres + will + MV (consume)
any trespassers.
(VII)
dir obj
⇒
passive:
Any trespassers will
subj
be
consumed
pres + will + be + -en +MV (consume)
by the gators in my moat.
subj
(Note: Because the PP in my moat is part of the subject NP the gators in my moat, it must also be part of
the by phrase in the passive sentence.)
English 402: Grammar
slide 17: passive of a Pattern VII sentence in the past perfect
active:
The slugger had
subj
taken
shots of HGH.
past + have + -en + MV (take)
(VII)
dir obj
⇒
passive:
Shots of HGH had
dir obj
been
taken
past + have + -en + be + -en + MV (take)
by the slugger.
subj
(Note: Because the PP of HGH is part of the direct object NP shots of HGH, it must also be
part of the NP subject in the passive sentence.)
English 402: Grammar
slide 18: two variations on a Pattern VIII sentence
active:
Virgil showed
subj
Hell and Purgatory.
past + MV (show) indir obj
Virgil showed
subj
Dante
past + MV (show)
dir obj
Hell and Purgatory to Dante.
dir obj
English 402: Grammar
(Pattern VIII)
indir obj
(Pattern VIII)
slide 19: the passives of the Pattern VIII sentences in slide 18
passive:
Hell and Purgatory were
dir obj
Dante
was
shown
to Dante
past + be + -en + MV (show)
shown
indir obj past + be + -en + MV (show)
indir obj
Hell and Purgatory
dir obj
English 402: Grammar
by Virgil.
subj
by Virgil.
subj
slide 20: the passive of a Pattern IX sentence
active:
Aviators call
subj
those things “gremlins.”
pres + MV (call)
dir obj
(Pattern IX)
obj comp
⇒
passive:
Those things are
dir obj
called
pres + be + -en + MV (call)
“gremlins” by aviators.
obj comp
English 402: Grammar
subj
slide 21: the passive of a Pattern X sentence
active:
The blogger has
subj
dubbed
them the Princes of Pork. (Pattern X)
pres + have + -en + MV (dub) dir obj
obj comp
⇒
passive:
They
have
been
dubbed
the Princes of Pork by the blogger.
dir obj
pres + have + -en + be + -en + MV (dub)
English 402: Grammar
obj comp
subj