I'm not sure if it appears in other textbooks, but I don't think it's widespread, at least not in print. I have, though, had students who reported that their high-school English teachers told them something of the sort, and I had always assumed that this was the sort of misapprehension derived from in-class attempts to provide handy rules of thumb without considering the full consequences of those rules. It may will be a muddled generalization based on observing awkward active-to-passive shifts such as the following: "Woodward helped to expose the Watergate scandal, and since then many other important stories have been reported by him." In such cases, of course, the passive, though, is only a symptom of the underlying flaw: the inappropriate shift of topic. It's the topic shift that forces the passive. Karl Spruiell, William C wrote: > Dear All: > > I teach a course for future English teachers on teaching grammar. As one > of the course assignments, I have them pick a topic in grammar or > punctuation relevant to their intended grade levels and do a > comparison/contrast of how the topic is treated in K-12 textbooks for > that grade level, and in reference grammars (I'm trying to get them to > practice "comparison shopping" for textbooks, with the idea that they'll > have input into the process in their school districts at some point). > Reading their essays, of course, gives me an idea of what kinds of > definitions and rules are popping up frequently in the textbooks they > examine (my university has an educational materials library). > > One of the students this time around was looking at treatments of > passive voice, and one of the texts admonished students never to mix > active and passive in the same sentence - apparently, sentences like > "Sven applied to college and was accepted" are verboten, and will cause > the polar ice caps to melt, or lead to the birth of two-headed calves. I > had never heard of that particular application of parallel structure > before. I'm almost certain no editor applies such a rule - for one > thing, it counteracts the kind of thoughtful management of sentence > topic that the passive is good for -- but I don't know if it's one of > the old, bad rules (zombie), or that textbook author's recent invention > (Frankenstein). Has anyone run into this one before? > > Thanks in advance --- Bill Spruiell > > > > > > > To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: > http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html > and select "Join or leave the list" > > Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/ > To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/