10.8 Focusing on the thing affected: the passive voice

Many actions involve two people or things --- one that performs the action and one that is affected by the action. These actions are typically referred to using transitive verbs.

In English the person or thing you want to talk about is usually put first as the subject of the clause. So, when you want to talk about someone or something that is the performer of an action (the agent), you make them the subject of the verb and you use an active form of the verb. The other person or thing is made the object of the verb.

However, you may want to focus on the person or thing affected by an action, which would be the object of an active form of the verb. In that case, you make that person or thing the subject of a passive form of the verb.

For example, you could report the same event by using an active form of a verb, as in 'The dog's eaten our dinner' or by using a passive form of a verb, as in 'Our dinner's been eaten by the dog', depending on whether you wanted to talk about the dog or your dinner.

Clauses which contain an active form of a verb are in the active voice and clauses with a passive form of a verb are in the passive voice.