Transcript Passive Voice - penola12englang

Information Flow
English Language
Unit 4
…remember this…
A passive voice is when the OBJECT of the
sentence is in SUBJECT position.
A passive voice is formed with an auxiliary verb to be or to get
“Brutus stabbed Caesar”
“Caesar was stabbed by Brutus”
…consider this…
It is often the case that the OBJECT will be in SUBJECT
position and the SUBJECT will not be present at all!!
“The mixture was heated to 300 degrees”
What is the subject??
“The door was closed”
What (who) is the subject?
…nominalisation…
Nominalisation is a feature of formal written texts
particularly in bureaucratic language.
When verbs are turned into nouns, actions become
things and the content seems much more
abstract.
“Ignorance was shown in response to the inquiry on
the whereabouts of the Welfare Housing Policy”
Think of conversion – if a noun phrase has been reworded and converted into a verb phrase
…given before new…
GIVEN information is information that is already
familiar to the reader – it can refer to
something that ahs appeared earlier in the
text, or it can be assumes as common
knowledge
NEW information is what drives the discourse
forward – its where writers expect their
audiences to pay special attention
GIVEN information comes before NEW
Since the NEW information is the more
important, this basic organisation means that
we want important information at the end of
the sentence.
The beginning of a sentence is reserved for old
and unsurprising material (GIVEN information)
– information that has lower communicative
value.
What’s the most important information in the
following sentence?
“There was a large jar of Fleetwood’s HighFinish Handle Polish, a pair of gleaming silver
Tail-Twig Clippers, a tiny brass compass to
clip onto your broom for long journeys, and a
Handbook of Do-it-Yourself Broomcare”
What’s the most important information in the
following sentence?
“There was a large jar of Fleetwood’s HighFinish Handle Polish, a pair of gleaming silver
Tail-Twig Clippers, a tiny brass compass to
clip onto your broom for long journeys, and a
Handbook of Do-it-Yourself Broomcare”
…there-construction…
The there acts as a dummy subject pronoun in
order to allow the new and exciting
information to appear later.
“There was a large jar of Fleetwood’s HighFinish Handle Polish, a pair of gleaming silver
Tail-Twig Clippers, a tiny brass compass to clip
onto your broom for long journeys, and a
Handbook of Do-it-Yourself Broomcare”
…anaphoric reference…
Pronouns or expressions that refer back to
something that has already been mentioned
“And then there were these Azkaban guards
everyone kept talking about. They seemed to
scare most people senseless.”
…anaphoric reference…
Pronouns or expressions that refer back to
something that has already been mentioned
“And then there were these Azkaban guards
everyone kept talking about. They seemed to
scare most people senseless.”
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old,
routine or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included
in as great a detail.
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old,
routine or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included
in as great a detail. (pronouns)
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old,
routine or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included
in as great a detail. (pronouns)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by totally omitting it.
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old,
routine or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included
in as great a detail. (pronouns)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by totally omitting it. (ellipsis)
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old, routine
or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included in as
great a detail. (pronouns)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by totally omitting it. (ellipsis)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by substituting a word or words
with another.
OLD vs NEW
Information that is new, interesting or out of the
ordinary is typically a lot longer than old, routine
or unremarkable information.
Given information doesn’t need to be included in as
great a detail. (pronouns)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by totally omitting it. (ellipsis)
Another way of giving Given information less
prominence is by substituting a word or words
with another. (substitution)
…ellipsis…
“Have you read Harry Potter?”
“No, I haven’t”
“No, I haven’t read it”
“No, I haven’t read Harry Potter”
Ellipsis leads to economy of expression - being
efficient.
…subsititution…
“I don’t have a pen. Do you have one?”
…subsititution…
“I don’t have a pen. Do you have one?”
Front-focus vs End-focus
The ends of sentences are important for
communication – they contain what is of
special significance.
However, beginnings of sentences can be
positions of special focus.
By bringing important information forward, it is
given greater prominence – it gains the
audience’s attention.
Cohesion and Coherence
As writing is a solitary act, cohesive ties and
connections are a much bigger deal than with
speech.
Writing is also deprived of situational context so
vagueness and ambiguity can present more of a
problem.
Space and time expressions (by then, sometimes,
nowadays) and connectors (first, however) can be
used to indicate links between sentences.
Cohesion and Coherence
As writing is a solitary act, cohesive ties and
connections are a much bigger deal than with
speech.
Writing is also deprived of situational context so
vagueness and ambiguity can present more of a
problem.
Space and time expressions (by then, sometimes,
nowadays) and connectors (first, however) can be
used to indicate links between sentences. (e.g. on
page 201)
…inference…
Readers can supply all kinds of additional
information to supply any missing links
Australia Day Activity on page 212