That's what I teach my prospective teachers. I call it the illegitimate child of the helping verb family because it is stigmatized. To me, it doesn't seem acceptable for formal writing, but it is so prevalent, I think it's hopeless to rail against it. Janet ________________________________ From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Scott Woods Sent: Friday, February 20, 2009 7:33 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: he was run over/he got run over List, My previous message on this topic delivered itself before I had finished it. Here is the complete message. Recently, a student wrote "he got run over." This seems to be a common way of expressing the passive. Would you characterize this as a passive? Would you analyze "run" as the verb of the sentence and "got" as a modal operating like "was" in a normally constructed (was run over) passive? Scott Woods 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/