Patricia,

        Keep in mind that, when we discuss weak passives or
overnominalization, we are talking about style preferences rather than
grammatical or nongrammatical sentences.  There can be no sound judgment of
the effectiveness of a particular sentence unless it is in a larger context.
Sorry! I can't give you good or bad illustrations without that larger context.

        The problem we are battling is not one of style preference.  Rather,
it is that fewer and fewer native English speakers are able to discuss
English grammatical constructions effectively.  The main reason for this is
that we have abandoned the teaching of systematic grammar (except for that
universally hated, well-intentioned, poorly conceived, semester-long, long,
long middle-school grammar course) in our schools. I know from experience as
a teacher educator that we are sending many elementary teachers and
secondary English teachers into the field who cannot identify a passive
construction--indeed, many of them cannot identify a prepositional phrase.
That isn't to say that they cannot use such structures effectively.  Some
can.  Some can't.  They just can't talk about them using grammatical
terminology.  Is it not obvious why they either resist teaching systematic
grammar at all or, if they are bold enough to try, do it poorly?

        I'm doing my best to provide new teachers with, at least, a
thumbnail sketch of systematic grammar to use in their instruction.  If
enough other teacher educators do the same, this problem of ours might be
solved over the next generation or two.

Jeff Glauner

At 02:19 AM 5/28/00 +0200, you wrote:
>Battling over here in Germany to teach my students the use of the passive, I'm
>beginning to wonder if it is worth the effort! Could someone  give some
examples
>of misused passives and  cludgy, overnominalized sentences with weak
passives. I
>can't imagine what a weak passive is and, although I'm quite used to seeing
>overnominalization because of German interference, I'd be interested in seeing
>what your students do to their mother tongue.
>
>By the way, Of-genetives haven't been completely abolished, have they?
>I'm beginning to wonder if I'm not missing out in some issues.
>
>Patricia Reeve- De Becker.
>Max Morenberg wrote...
>
>>  And he/she (The advanced comp teacher) also could have pointed out that such
>> > writing ( academic and business writing) often misuses passives and that
>> writers should be careful about
>> > both-cludgy, overnominalized sentences and weak passives.  It wouldn't take
>> > much for a student to confuse the issues.
>> ...
>> >
>> > Max Morenberg
>> > English Department
>> > Miami University
>> > Oxford, OH 45056
>