Filipino Students' Active-Passive Voice Preference in Invitation Letters
Main Article Content
Keywords
active voice, business letters, invitation letter, passive voice
Abstract
Discussions on active and passive use are rich in literature. However, there is a remarkable dearth of studies showing students' actual voice preferences after all concepts of the voice have been introduced. This study aims at ascertaining Filipino university students' actual preference of voice in invitation letters written in 2012, 2014, and 2015. It also looks at the tense-aspect combinations and the semantics achieved in the two voice categories. Three groups taking technical writing course from three universities in Manila produced 135 letters. Letters were run using AntConc and UAM Corpus tools. Results confirm the dominance of active voice, with passive almost nil in the corpus. The preference is found to be statistically significant. The dominance of active voice may suggest that foregrounding the doers is important. Moreover, there is no significant difference between the long and agentless passive. Although the results came from the parochial Philippine context, implications respecting students' preference of voices may be universal. Limitations and trajectories are offered accordingly.
References
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Anthony, L. (2014). AntConc (Version 3.4.4w) [Computer Software]. Tokyo, Japan: Waseda University. Retrieved from http://www.laurenceanthony.net
Armstrong, A,M., & Dienes, Z. (2014). Subliminal understanding of active versus passive sentence. Psychology of Consciousness: Theory, Research, and Practice, 1, 32-50.
Atkins, S., Clear, J., & Ostler, N. (1992). Corpus design criteria. Literary and Linguistic Computing, 7, 1-16.
Azar, B.S., & Hagen, S.A. (2016). Understanding and using English grammar (5th ed.). London: Pearson.
Baker, P. (2006). Using corpora in discourse analysis. New York: Continuum.
Barnbrook, G., & Sinclair, J. (2001). Specialised corpus, local and functional grammars. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 237-276). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Beason, L., & Lester, M. (2003). A commonsense guide to grammar and usage. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin.
Bell, A.H. (2004). Writing effective letters, memos, & e-mails. (3rd ed.). Hauppauge, NY: Barron's.
Berry, R. (2012). English grammar: A resource book for students. London: Routledge.
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S., & Finegan, E. (2000). Longman grammar of spoken and written English. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Bielak, J., Pawlak, M., & Mystkowska-Wiertelak, A. (2013). Teaching the English active and passive voice with the help of cognitive grammar: An empirical study. Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 4, 581-619.
Bondi, M. (2001). Small corpora and language variation: Reflexivity across genres. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 135-174). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Booher, D. (2001). E-writing: 21st-century tools for effective communication. New York: NY: Pocket Books.
Bovee, C.L., & Thill, J.V. (2010). Business communication today. (10th ed.). New Jersey, NJ: Pearson.
Brown, K., & Miller, J. (1991). Syntax: A linguistic introduction to sentence structure. (2nd ed.). London, UK: Routledge.
Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (2008). The grammar book: An ESL/EFL teacher's course. Singapore: Thomson & Heinle.
Coffin, C., Hewings, A., & O' Halloran, K. (2004). Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches. London, UK: Arnold.
Colman, R. (2007). The briefest English grammar ever! Australia. UNSW Press.
Connor, U., & Upton, T.A. (2004). Applied corpus linguistics: A multidimensional perspective. Leiden, Netherlands: Rodopi.
Danesi, M. (2006). Basic American grammar and usage: An ESL/EFL handbook. New York, NY: Barron's.
Delahunty, G.P., & Garvey, J.J. (1994). Language, grammar & communication: A cause for teachers of English. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
Dorling, K. (2016). English for everyone: English grammar guide. New York: DK Publishing.
Dorling, K. (2017). Visual guide to grammar and punctuation. New York: DK Publishing.
Downing, A. (2015). English grammar: A university course (3rd ed.). New York: Routledge.
Downing, A., & Locke, P. (2006). English grammar: A university course. (6th ed.). London: Routledge.
Fillmore, C.J. (1968). The case for case. In E. Bach and R. Harms (Eds.), Universals in linguistic theory, 1-88. New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston.
Franklin, N. (2009, March 23). The dolor of money. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/03/23/the-dolor-of-money
Freeman, J. (2009, March 22). Active resistance: What we get wrong about the passive voice. Retrieved from http://archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/03/22/active_resistance/
Friginal, E., & Hardy, J.A. (2014). Corpus-based sociolinguistics: A guide for students. London, UK: Routledge.
Garvey, J.J., & Lindstrom, D.H. (1989). “Pro's prose meets writer's workbench.” Computers and Composition, 2, 81-109.
Ghadessy, M., Henry, A., & Roseberry, R.L. (2001). Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Gramley, S., & Pätzold, K.M. (1992). A survey of modern English. London, UK: Routledge.
Hartley, J. (2008). Academic writing and publishing: A practical handbook. New York: Routledge.
Hayes, C. (1992). Use of the passive voice in the editorial/ opinion page of major newspapers. Term paper written for Linguistics 5741. University of Minnesota.
Hewings, M. (2013). Advanced grammar in use: A self-study reference and practice book for advanced learners of English (3rd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Huddleston, R. (1988). English grammar: An outline. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Huddleston, R., & Pullum, G.K. (2008). A student's introduction to English grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hudson, G. (2000). Essential introductory linguistics. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Jain, S. (2013). Technical report writing. New Delhi, India: Centrum.
Langacker, R. (1987). Foundations of cognitive grammar. Standford, California: Standford University Press.
Leech, G., & Svartvik, J. (1975). A communicative grammar of English. London, UK: Longman.
Leki, I. (1991). Twenty-five years of contrastive rhetoric: Text analysis and writing pedagogies. TESOL Quarterly, 1, 123-143.
Liberman, M. (2009, March 12). “Passive voice” – 1397-2009 – RIP. Language and Culture. Retrieved from http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1227.
Liberman, M. (2006, November 1). How to defend yourself from bad advice about writing. Retrieved from http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003722. html.
McGee Wood, M. (1993). Categorical grammars. London, UK: Routledge.
Master, P. (2004). English grammar and technical writing. Washington, DC: English Language Programs, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
Munalim, L.O. (2014). Business is business: A complete guide to effective business correspondence. Mandaluyong City, Philippines: Books, Atbp.
Murphy, R. (2004). English grammar in use: A self-study reference and practice book for intermediate students of English. (3rd ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Murphy, R. (2019). English grammar in use (5th ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
M. (2015). UAM Corpus Tool (Version 3.2j) [Computer Software]. Available on http://www.wagsoft. com/CorpusTool
Quiller-Couch, S.A. (1916). On the art of writing: Lectures delivered in The University Of Cambridge. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Bartleby.com, 2009. Retrieved from http://www.bartleby.com/190/7.html
Ragan, P.H. (2001). Classroom use of a systemic functional small learner corpus. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 207-236). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Sharma, R.C., & Mohan, K. (2011). Business correspondence and report writing: A practical approach to business and technical communication. (4th ed.). New Delhi, India: Tata McGraw Hill.
Sigel, T. (2009). How passive voice weakens scholarly argument. Journal of Management Development, 5, 478-480.
Souter, N. (2007). Persuasive writing: How to make words work for you. New York, NY: Sterling.
Strunk, W. (1918). The elements of style. Geneva, NY: Press of W.F. Humphrey. Bartleby.com, 1999. Retrieved from http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html
Strunk, W. (2011). The elements of style (revised edition). New York: The Mapple Press York.
Strunk, W. & White, E. (1979). The elements of style. Macmillan: New York.
Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre analysis--English in academic and research settings. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. (2004). Academic writing for graduate students. (2nd ed.). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Thompson, D., & Scheepers, C. (2013). Harmonizing the passive: A new proposal for passive constructions in generative grammar. Newcastle Working Papers in Linguistics 19.2.
Thompson, D., Ferreira, F., & Scheepers, C. (2018). One step at a time: Representational overlap between active voice, be-passive, and get-passive forms in English. Journal of Cognition, 1(1), 35, 1–24, DOI: https://doi. org/10.5334/joc.36
Vuolo, M. (2012, May 29). “The house is building”? Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2012/05/lexicon_valley_when_the_progressive_passive_replaced_the_passival_in_english_grammar_. html
Wanner, A. (2009). Deconstructing the English passive. Berlin, Germany: Walter de Gruyter.
Wilson, K., & Wauson, J. (2010). The AMA handbook of business writing: The ultimate guide to style, grammar, punctuation, usage, construction, and formatting. New York: AMACON.
Woods, G. (2018). English grammar workbook for dummies (3rd ed. with online practice). New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons.
Xiao, R., McEnery, T., & Qian, Y. (2006). Passive constructions in English and Chinese: A corpus-based contrastive study. Languages in Contrast, 6(1), 109–149. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/lic.6.1.05xia
Yannuar, N., Shitadevi, I.A., Basthomi, Y., & Widiati, U. (2014). Active and passive voice constructions by Indonesian student writers. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 4(7), 1400-1408.
Altenberg, E.P., & Vago, R.M. (2010). English grammar: Understanding the basics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Altstiel, T., & Grow, J. (2015). Advertising creative: Strategy, copy and design. London, UK: Sage Publications.
American Psychological Association (APA, 2009). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, D.C.: APA.
Anthony, L. (2014). AntConc (Version 3.4.4w) [Computer Software]. Tokyo, Japan: Waseda University. Retrieved from http://www.laurenceanthony.net
Armstrong, A,M., & Dienes, Z. (2014). Subliminal understanding of active versus passive sentence. Psychology of Consciousness: Theory, Research, and Practice, 1, 32-50.
Atkins, S., Clear, J., & Ostler, N. (1992). Corpus design criteria. Literary and Linguistic Computing, 7, 1-16.
Azar, B.S., & Hagen, S.A. (2016). Understanding and using English grammar (5th ed.). London: Pearson.
Baker, P. (2006). Using corpora in discourse analysis. New York: Continuum.
Barnbrook, G., & Sinclair, J. (2001). Specialised corpus, local and functional grammars. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 237-276). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Beason, L., & Lester, M. (2003). A commonsense guide to grammar and usage. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin.
Bell, A.H. (2004). Writing effective letters, memos, & e-mails. (3rd ed.). Hauppauge, NY: Barron's.
Berry, R. (2012). English grammar: A resource book for students. London: Routledge.
Biber, D., Johansson, S., Leech, G., Conrad, S., & Finegan, E. (2000). Longman grammar of spoken and written English. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.
Bielak, J., Pawlak, M., & Mystkowska-Wiertelak, A. (2013). Teaching the English active and passive voice with the help of cognitive grammar: An empirical study. Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 4, 581-619.
Bondi, M. (2001). Small corpora and language variation: Reflexivity across genres. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 135-174). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Booher, D. (2001). E-writing: 21st-century tools for effective communication. New York: NY: Pocket Books.
Bovee, C.L., & Thill, J.V. (2010). Business communication today. (10th ed.). New Jersey, NJ: Pearson.
Brown, K., & Miller, J. (1991). Syntax: A linguistic introduction to sentence structure. (2nd ed.). London, UK: Routledge.
Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (2008). The grammar book: An ESL/EFL teacher's course. Singapore: Thomson & Heinle.
Coffin, C., Hewings, A., & O' Halloran, K. (2004). Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches. London, UK: Arnold.
Colman, R. (2007). The briefest English grammar ever! Australia. UNSW Press.
Connor, U., & Upton, T.A. (2004). Applied corpus linguistics: A multidimensional perspective. Leiden, Netherlands: Rodopi.
Danesi, M. (2006). Basic American grammar and usage: An ESL/EFL handbook. New York, NY: Barron's.
Delahunty, G.P., & Garvey, J.J. (1994). Language, grammar & communication: A cause for teachers of English. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
Dorling, K. (2016). English for everyone: English grammar guide. New York: DK Publishing.
Dorling, K. (2017). Visual guide to grammar and punctuation. New York: DK Publishing.
Downing, A. (2015). English grammar: A university course (3rd ed.). New York: Routledge.
Downing, A., & Locke, P. (2006). English grammar: A university course. (6th ed.). London: Routledge.
Fillmore, C.J. (1968). The case for case. In E. Bach and R. Harms (Eds.), Universals in linguistic theory, 1-88. New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston.
Franklin, N. (2009, March 23). The dolor of money. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/03/23/the-dolor-of-money
Freeman, J. (2009, March 22). Active resistance: What we get wrong about the passive voice. Retrieved from http://archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/03/22/active_resistance/
Friginal, E., & Hardy, J.A. (2014). Corpus-based sociolinguistics: A guide for students. London, UK: Routledge.
Garvey, J.J., & Lindstrom, D.H. (1989). “Pro's prose meets writer's workbench.” Computers and Composition, 2, 81-109.
Ghadessy, M., Henry, A., & Roseberry, R.L. (2001). Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Gramley, S., & Pätzold, K.M. (1992). A survey of modern English. London, UK: Routledge.
Hartley, J. (2008). Academic writing and publishing: A practical handbook. New York: Routledge.
Hayes, C. (1992). Use of the passive voice in the editorial/ opinion page of major newspapers. Term paper written for Linguistics 5741. University of Minnesota.
Hewings, M. (2013). Advanced grammar in use: A self-study reference and practice book for advanced learners of English (3rd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Huddleston, R. (1988). English grammar: An outline. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Huddleston, R., & Pullum, G.K. (2008). A student's introduction to English grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hudson, G. (2000). Essential introductory linguistics. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Jain, S. (2013). Technical report writing. New Delhi, India: Centrum.
Langacker, R. (1987). Foundations of cognitive grammar. Standford, California: Standford University Press.
Leech, G., & Svartvik, J. (1975). A communicative grammar of English. London, UK: Longman.
Leki, I. (1991). Twenty-five years of contrastive rhetoric: Text analysis and writing pedagogies. TESOL Quarterly, 1, 123-143.
Liberman, M. (2009, March 12). “Passive voice” – 1397-2009 – RIP. Language and Culture. Retrieved from http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1227.
Liberman, M. (2006, November 1). How to defend yourself from bad advice about writing. Retrieved from http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003722. html.
McGee Wood, M. (1993). Categorical grammars. London, UK: Routledge.
Master, P. (2004). English grammar and technical writing. Washington, DC: English Language Programs, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
Munalim, L.O. (2014). Business is business: A complete guide to effective business correspondence. Mandaluyong City, Philippines: Books, Atbp.
Murphy, R. (2004). English grammar in use: A self-study reference and practice book for intermediate students of English. (3rd ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Murphy, R. (2019). English grammar in use (5th ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
M. (2015). UAM Corpus Tool (Version 3.2j) [Computer Software]. Available on http://www.wagsoft. com/CorpusTool
Quiller-Couch, S.A. (1916). On the art of writing: Lectures delivered in The University Of Cambridge. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Bartleby.com, 2009. Retrieved from http://www.bartleby.com/190/7.html
Ragan, P.H. (2001). Classroom use of a systemic functional small learner corpus. In Ghadessy, M., A. Henry and R.L. Roseberry, (Eds.), Small corpus studies and ELT: Theory and practice (pp. 207-236). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Sharma, R.C., & Mohan, K. (2011). Business correspondence and report writing: A practical approach to business and technical communication. (4th ed.). New Delhi, India: Tata McGraw Hill.
Sigel, T. (2009). How passive voice weakens scholarly argument. Journal of Management Development, 5, 478-480.
Souter, N. (2007). Persuasive writing: How to make words work for you. New York, NY: Sterling.
Strunk, W. (1918). The elements of style. Geneva, NY: Press of W.F. Humphrey. Bartleby.com, 1999. Retrieved from http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html
Strunk, W. (2011). The elements of style (revised edition). New York: The Mapple Press York.
Strunk, W. & White, E. (1979). The elements of style. Macmillan: New York.
Swales, J.M. (1990). Genre analysis--English in academic and research settings. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. (2004). Academic writing for graduate students. (2nd ed.). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Thompson, D., & Scheepers, C. (2013). Harmonizing the passive: A new proposal for passive constructions in generative grammar. Newcastle Working Papers in Linguistics 19.2.
Thompson, D., Ferreira, F., & Scheepers, C. (2018). One step at a time: Representational overlap between active voice, be-passive, and get-passive forms in English. Journal of Cognition, 1(1), 35, 1–24, DOI: https://doi. org/10.5334/joc.36
Vuolo, M. (2012, May 29). “The house is building”? Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/lexicon_valley/2012/05/lexicon_valley_when_the_progressive_passive_replaced_the_passival_in_english_grammar_. html
Wanner, A. (2009). Deconstructing the English passive. Berlin, Germany: Walter de Gruyter.
Wilson, K., & Wauson, J. (2010). The AMA handbook of business writing: The ultimate guide to style, grammar, punctuation, usage, construction, and formatting. New York: AMACON.
Woods, G. (2018). English grammar workbook for dummies (3rd ed. with online practice). New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons.
Xiao, R., McEnery, T., & Qian, Y. (2006). Passive constructions in English and Chinese: A corpus-based contrastive study. Languages in Contrast, 6(1), 109–149. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1075/lic.6.1.05xia
Yannuar, N., Shitadevi, I.A., Basthomi, Y., & Widiati, U. (2014). Active and passive voice constructions by Indonesian student writers. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 4(7), 1400-1408.
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Jun 14, 2019
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How to Cite
Munalim, L. O., & Gonong, G. O. (2019). Filipino Students’ Active-Passive Voice Preference in Invitation Letters. The Normal Lights, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.56278/tnl.v13i1.1239
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Research Article
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