Revisiting the Passive Voice

The Chronicle contains an article that criticizes the absolute rule against using the passive voice.  The author declares:

"But this is where modern American writing instruction has brought us. Totally unmotivated warnings against sentences that have nothing wrong with them are handed out by people who (unwittingly) often use such sentences more than the people they criticize. And the warnings are consumed by people who don’t know enough grammar to evaluate them (which is why the percentage of passives in published prose continues basically unchanged over time). The blind warning the blind about a danger that isn’t there."

I basically agree.  The rule I teach my students is that a writer should always use the active voice unless the writer has a specific reason to use passive.  For example, the passive is useful for hiding the actor, which is often useful in persuasive writing.

The more basic point is that writers should never just blindly apply the rules, but they should always consider how that rule works in context.  For example, I tell my students that they should always think about every word they write to make sure that every word has the meaning and emotion intended.

For more on the active and passive voices, see my exercises at http://ssrn.com/abstract=1715702 .

(esf)