THE PASSIVE

The active voice describes what somebody or something

does.
The passive voice in English is used when we want to
emphasize the action that is performed on the object of the
sentence, rather than who performs the action.

Let's look at some examples:

FORMS:
· Subject + auxiliary verb - Active voice: Tom writes a letter
"to be" + past participle of (Tom is the subject and performs the
the main verb + agent action).
complement (optional)
- Passive voice: A letter is written by Tom
· Irregular verb 3rd column (the action is focused on the letter, not
Tom).

- Subject: A letter
- Auxiliary verb "to be": is (in third In this example, the
passive voice structure
person singular because the subject is
singular)
- Past participle of the main verb: is as follows:
written (escrito)
- Agent complement: by Tom (por Tom)
- this complement is optional, but is
used to specify who performed the
action.

1. Present simple:
- Active: They clean the house every day.
- Passive: They clean the house every day.
2. Past simple:
- Active: She wrote the letter yesterday.
- Passive: The letter was written yesterday.
ACTIVE-PASSIVE
TRANSFORMATIONS
the object of the active voice becomes the subject of
the passive voice, and the subject of the active voice
becomes the agent complement (when mentioning
who performs the action) or is omitted altogether. In
addition, the preposition "by" is used to introduce the
agent of the action when it is mentioned.

3. Present continuous:
- Active: They are painting the walls right now.
- Passive: They are painting the walls right now.
4. Past continuous:
- Active: He was repairing the car when the accident
happened.
- Passive: The car was being repaired when the accident
happened.
5. Present perfect:
- Active: They have delivered the package.
- Passive: They have delivered the package.
6. Past perfect:
- Active: He had finished the project before the deadline.
- Passive: The project had been finished before the deadline.
7. Future simple:
- Active: They will build a new house next year.
- Passive: A new house will be built next year.

8. Modals:
- Active: They must finish the project by Friday.
- Passive: The project must be finished by Friday.

IMPERSONAL
PASSIVE

The impersonal passive in English is formed using "it" as the

subject and the verb in the third person singular in the past
or present tense. This type of construction is used to
emphasize the action itself rather than who performs it.

Example in the present tense:

It is said that English is a difficult language to learn.

Example in the past tense:

It was reported that the company had laid off a hundred

workers.