Page 123 - TX_Marketing 2_M1_v2

Given these definitions, which of the following two examples utilize an "active voice"

and which one illustrates a "passive construction"?
The cat gave me a new car.

The new car was given to me.

The first sentence is active because the cat, which is the subject of the sentence,

completes the action in the sentence; that is, "the cat gave." The second sentence is

in passive voice because the subject of the sentence, which is "car," is being acted
upon. That is to say, the sentence does not read "the car gave" it reads "the car was

given." What or whoever is doing the "giving" is omitted from the sentence. The car,

the subject of the sentence, is being acted on, rather than doing the acting.

Passive voice is not inherently bad—it has its uses, like most things. For example, if

you want to play down the "agent of action" of a sentence, then passive voice is
useful. It is also useful in depersonalizing language. For these two reasons, we

commonly see effective uses of passive voice in:

Technical pieces
Instructions

Scientific papers

Research initiatives and publications

However, in our daily correspondence and in most types of professional
communications it ought to be avoided. The reason for this is because passive voice:

Lends itself to awkward and complicated sentence structures

Limits engaging prose
Promotes the presence of excess infinitives (un-conjugated verbs)

To see that this is the case, simply consider the previous example:
The cat gave me a new car.

The new car was given to me.

TX Marketing II: Negotiation Techniques 122