In my business writing and grammar
workshops, I strongly suggest avoiding passive voice when a sentence contains
all the components of an active sentence. Those are normally the ones
ending in a "by" prepositional phrase. Since people in the business world
are so darn wordy (they tell me it's a habit from trying to fill those
500-word theme requirements), I offer them the challenge of looking to save 50
cents a word for every unnecessary one they use.
So they'd save a dollar by changing
the following passive sentence to an active one:
Passive: The proposal was
proofread by the partner.
Active; The partner proofread
the proposal.
To find such passives, I have them use the Control F
("F" stands for "Find") feature in Microsoft Word to find the word
"by." They prefer that to having their grammar checkers simply
indicating "Passive" without always offering the active
version.
By the way, the Control F technique works for finding
any words students use too repetitiously. Many struggle with using "that"
unnecessarily. Also, one of my pet peeves is expletives, so I have my
participants search for "It" and "There" to identify and then eliminate
them.
I hope these tips help all of you
too.
Linda
Linda
Comerford
Comerford
Consulting
317.786.6404
Craig may well be right about Orwell's sentiments; however,
Orwell himself near the end of his essay offers a set of six "rules" (the word
is his). His fourth rule is "Never use the passive where you can use the
active." He doesn't say "where you can use the active" but not the
passive. But he uses passives in four of the first 15 sentences of
"Politics," and it's not at all difficult to substitute actives for each
them.
Hurrah for Craig's "we need a more functional orientation to language so that
choice can be built on something more than personal or group
prejudice."
Ed Schuster
**************
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