Passives

Do you know how to use the passive voice to change the focus of a sentence?

Look at these examples to see how the passive voice is used.

• A lot of olive oil is produced in Italy.

• This book was written by Angela Davis.

• The suspect will be released tomorrow.

• This product has not been tested on animals.

Explanation

The passive voice is used to show interest in the person or object that experiences an action rather than the person or object that performs the action.

We use the passive voice to change the focus of the sentence.

• My bike was stolen. (passive – focus on my bike)

• Someone stole my bike. (active – focus on someone)

We often use the passive:

• when we prefer not to mention who or what does the action (for example, it's not known, it's obvious or we don't want to say)

• so that we can start a sentence with the most important or most logical information

• in more formal or scientific writing.

How we make the passive

We make the passive using the verb be + past participle. We start the sentence with the object.

It is not always necessary to add who or what did the action.

Only the form of be changes to make the tense. The past participle stays the same. Here are examples of the passive in its most common tenses.