pronouns, explained in further detail in the entries on pronouns and each individual variety of them
demonstrative, inde nite, intensi er, interrogative, personal pronoun,reciprocal pronoun, reflexive pronoun, and
relative pronoun.VERBSWords or groups of words that express actions, conditions, or the like are called
verbs. In the previous sentence there
are two verbs express and “are.” By changing their form, verbs indicate the
number and
person of
subjects acting or existing—how many people or things are involved, and whether they are you, me, or them. Verbs also show
the time when things happened (tense), whether the action was or could be extended to an
object (voice), and the speaker’s attitude, intent, or purpose
(mood). Please seethe various entries on all these aspects of verbs for more details and examples.
Passive. There are two
voices in English, active and passive. The
active voice de nes sentences in which action is transmitted directly or implicitly to another thing or person, an
object: The artist paints pictures. The artist paints Both
verbs are active,
though with the second no object is stated directly.
When
the sentence subject is the recipient of the action, and an agent of the action is stated directly in a
prepositional phrase (or implied, the sentence is said to be in the passive voice The picture was painted by the artist. The picture was slashed.”
Both verbs in these examples are passive.
A universal rule of
usage and
grammar books is that the passive should not be overused or should be avoided altogether.
The thinking behind this rule is that passives are less forceful because action is indirect, because subject and agent are not as closely and clearly connected as in the “normar” sentence pattern (active:
subject, verb, object, and because many passive sentences together create an impression of inaction or blandness. Such thinking is justi ed to some degree,
although the rule itself should not be overused anymore than passive voice should.
There are places and moments for passive constructions—for
emphasis, variety of word order, and intentional removal or obscuring of a sentence’s agent or subject.
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