3.

67VOICED CONSTRAINTS
3.68 VERB CONSTRAINTS
ACTIVE ONLY: PASSIVE ONLY: 3.69 Prepositional Verbs
-copular and intransitive Vs, With some Vs and verb constructions -Prepositional Vs can occur in
which having no object cannot only the passive is possible the passive.
take the passive. -These prepositional Vs are
-Some transitive Vs called John was said to be a good teacher verbal idioms consisting of a
middle verbs, don’t occur at Reputed (presunto/supuesto) lexical V followed by a
least in some senses in the preposition, such as look at:
passive. E.g: *They said him to be a good teacher
They have a nice house Reputed [ACTIVE]
-Other exs are: The engineers went very
He lacks confidence carefully into the problem
be born (with an irregular past (abstract noun)
The auditorium holds 5000 participle), and
people be drowned (in cases where no agent The engineers went very
is implied) carefully into the tunnel
The dress becomes her (concrete noun)
He was born in Tubingen ≠ ?His
John resembles his father mother bore him in Tubingen [PASSIVE]
The problem was very
Will this suit you? The wanted man fell into the water carefully gone into by the
and was drowned ≠ The wanted man engineers
*(have, lack, hold, become, fell into the water and someone *The tunnel (concrete
resemble, suit) drowned him noun)was very carefully gone
-All these belong to the stative into by the engineers X
class of V of ‘being’ and
‘having’. [ACTIVE]
-But other stative Vs, such as They eventually arrived at the
those of volition (voluntad) or expected result (abstract
attitude, can easily occur in the noun)
passive: The
The coat does not fit y eventually arrived at the
(quedar)you splendid stadium (concrete
*You are not fitted by the coat noun)

The police want him ~

He is wanted by the police [PASSIVE]
‘Want’ es un verbo d voluntad The expected result was
eventually arrived at
*The splendid
stadium(concrete noun) was
eventually arrived at X

-The difference in
acceptability can be stated in
terms of concrete /abstract
passive subjects.
-It’s only in the abstract,
figurative use that
go into,
arrive at,
look into, and
 many other expressions
accept the passive

3.70 OBJECT CONSTRAINTS

Transitive Vs can be followed either by a phrasal or clausal objects. With clausal objs,
however, the passive transformation is to a greater or lesser degree restricted in use:

NOUN PHRASE as object: CLAUSE as object:

John loved Mary [active] ~ Finite clause: -Coreference btw:

Mary was loved (by John) a Subject and
[passive] John thought (that) she was a NP object
attractive ACTIVE SVO blocks the passive
correspondence.
~*?That she was attractive was
thought (by john) PASSIVE OV -This constraint occurs with:
‘to be’+ ppv (by-ph) a. reflexive pronouns

Non-finite clause: b. reciprocal pronouns

-Infinitive: John hoped to meet her c. possessive pronouns

ACTIVE
WHEN COREFERENTIAL TO
~ *To meet her was hoped (by THE SUBJECT
John) PASSIVE

-Participle: A. Reflexive pronouns

John enjoyed seeing her ACTIVE
~ *Seeing her was enjoyed (by ACTIVE
John) PASSIVE John could see Paul in the mirror
[SVOA]
-The passive often becomes John could see himself in the
acceptable when the obj is a finite mirror
cl, if the clausal obj is extraposed
and replaced by the anticipatory PASSIVE
pron “it” Paul could be seen in the mirror ≠
*Himself could be seen in the
It was thought that she (subject) mirror
was attractive

? It was hoped to meet her B. Reciprocal pronouns

ACTIVE
-Or if the Subject of the object cl We could hardly see each other
is made the S of a passive in the fog
superordinate cl ≠
PASSIVE
She was thought to be attractive
*Each other could hardly be
-The construction with anticipatory seen in the fog
“it” never occurs with:
C. Possessive pronouns
ACTIVE
 Participle Clauses as SUBJECT The woman shook my hand
The woman shook
e.g. *Seeing her was enjoyed (by her head
John)
*It was enjoyed seeing her PASSIVE
My head was shaken by the
woman
≠

*her head was shaken by the

woman

Note:
-the passive of the sent with a
reciprocal pronoun can be made
acceptable if the pronoun is split
into 2 parts:
Each could hardly be seen by the
other
-since reflexive and reciprocal
pronouns are objective case
replacements, we would in any
case not expect them to take S
position in a passive sent., or for
that matter in other sent
-the passive is not possible for
many idioms in which the V and
the O form a close unit:
The ship set (v) sail (o) ~ * Sail
was set
We changed buses ~ *Buses
were changed

3.71AGENT CONSTRAINTS

Unlike the S, the agent-by phrase is grally optional.

This omission occurs when:

-THE AGENT IS IRRELEVANT OR UNKNOWN:

e.g. The Prime Minister has often been criticized recently

-THE AGENT IS LEFT OUT AS REDUNDANT:

e.g. Jack fought Michael last night, and Jack was beaten

-Note: in some sentences the agent is not optional:

e.g. The music was followed by a short interval

* The music was followed

The rebels were actuated by both religious and political motives
* The rebels were actuated
3.72MEANING CONSTRAINTS
The difference order brought about by changing an active sent into the passive or vice versa
may well make a difference not only in emphasis, but also to the scope of negatives and
quantifiers

1-Every schoolboy knows one joke at least ACTIVE [SVO (A)]

2-One joke at least is known by every schoolboy PASSIVE [O (A)V ‘to be’ + pstpleV by-
phrase]

1. It favours the reading “each schoolboy knows “at least one joke or other”

2.It favours the reading “there is one particular joke which is known to every schoolboy”

-A shift of modal meaning may accompany a shift of voice in VPs containing modal
auxiliaries:
John cannot do it ACTIVE (ability)

~ It cannot be done (by John) PASSIVE (possibibilty)

Active.in the active can will be interpreted as expressing ability

Passive.in the passive can is interpreted as expressing possibility

-Even when it might be argued that can retains the same meaning in both active and passive, a
shift of meaning is detectable:
John can’t be taught PASSIVE [it’s impossible to teach him]
She can’t teach John ACTIVE [she is unable to teach John]

Examples with other modal auxiliaries:

Every one of them must be reprimanded [Every one of them is to blame] PASS
You must reprimand every one of them [it’s your duty to do so] ACT

Why wouldn’t Miranda ride the grey mare? [why did Miranda refuse]
~Why wouldn’t the grey mare be ridden by Miranda? [why did the mare refuse?]
Note:
The shift from the active to passive may change the meaning not only the meaning of a modal
construction, but also of the perfective aspect:
Winston Churchill has twice visited Harvard ACTIVE [svo]
Harvard has twice been visited by Winston Churchill PASSIVE [ov ‘to be’ + ppv by-ph]

-it has been claimed that the active sent can only be appropriately used in the lifetime of
Churchill, since the S of the sent determines the interpretability of the perfective in terms of
period of time leading up to the present
-the passive sent, could appropriately said, after Churchill’s death. Since Harvard University is
still in existence

_Some difference btw the meaning of an active sent and its passive counterpart has also been
noted in the foll sents, where S and O of the active are generic.

Beavers1 build dams ≠ Dams2 are built by beavers

Excessive drinking causes high blood pressure ≠ High blood pressure is caused by excessive
drinking

-it’s a diff of preferred interpretation only

-it arises from the fact that in S position, a generic phrase tends to be interpreted universally
-in O or Agent position, this universal meaning disappears
-the S Beavers1 is likely to mean approximately ‘all beavers’
-Dams2 have a similarly generic meaning in the passive counterpart

3.73FREQUENCY CONSTRAINTS
The passive is grally more common used in informative than in imaginative writing, and is
notably more frequent in the objective , impersonal style of scientific articles and news
reporting