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Am I Being Watched? The
Continuous Passive Form |
In his popular 1980s song, American singer Rockwell sang
the words, “I always feel like somebody’s watching me.”
He doesn’t know who is watching him. And, I suppose that
makes it even more frightening.
In English, when we don’t know who is performing the
action of the verb, or when the subject of a sentence is
not very important, we often use the passive voice. In
that case, Rockwell could have sung:
I always feel like I’m being watched by somebody.
But…I suspect it wouldn’t have sounded as good.
Still, the structure works great in movie dialogue. In
fact, spy movies and crime films often make reference to
“being watched” and “being followed.” Both are examples
of the passive voice.
And, when we make passive sentences with a continuous
verb tense, we call it the “continuous passive.” In an
earlier program we told you about the passive voice. You
may remember that, in active sentences, the subject
performs the action of the verb. In passive sentences,
the subject receives the action of the verb.
Today, we’ll discuss the continuous passive form.
The most commonly used verb tenses for this form are
present continuous and past continuous. For now, let’s
keep going with the present continuous.
Present Continuous Passive
We don’t need a theatrical example. There are plenty of
real life situations where we use present continuous
passive. Here are just a few:
Let’s say you’re in a busy electronics store. Several
people are looking at products. And, workers are walking
around helping them. One comes to you and says:
Good afternoon, are you being helped?
You answer:
No, not yet. Thanks. Can you show me your three most
popular sound systems?
In the United States, you will hear the question “Are
you being helped?” at busy stores, markets and
restaurants.
Another situation where this form is useful is when
something has been sent for repair. Suppose your car
breaks down on your way to work. You take it to an auto
shop. Then, you call your boss and say:
My car is being fixed. I’ll order a taxi to get to work.
The structure for the present continuous passive is:
subject + is/are + BEING + the past participle.
Note that the person who is fixing the car is not
mentioned in the sentence “My car is being fixed.”
Leaving out the person or thing doing the action is
common in passive statements.
Past Continuous Passive
OK, now imagine that your car has been fixed. How can
you say it with the past continuous passive form? Let’s
listen:
My car was being fixed. But I have it back now.
The only word we changed in the sentence about the car
was “is.” We changed it to the past tense “was.” Nothing
else changes.
So, the structure for past continuous passive is:
subject + was or were + BEING + past participle.
Notice that, in the continuous passive, the word “being”
is always present – no matter what the verb tense is.
Another place we often see the continuous passive is in
news reporting. Here’s an example:
Hundreds of children are being held at detention
centers.
Yet, suppose the children were reunited with their
families. How might we change the example to past
continuous passive? Let’s listen:
Hundreds of children were being held at detention
centers.
We simply changed the word “are” to “were.” Nothing else
changed. Easy, so far? Good!
How to Make Continuous Passive
To make it even simpler, let’s look at it in steps.
We’ll start with an active sentence with a present
continuous verb and change it to passive voice. The
first step is to locate the subject, verb and object.
Take a listen and give it a try:
The men are cleaning the boats.
Did you find the subject, verb and object? “The men” is
the subject. “Are cleaning” is the verb. And “the boats”
is the object.
Once we’ve identified the object, we can make our
passive sentence. To do this, the object becomes the
subject, so we put it first. The verb is next and the
new object (the men) is last. Here’s how it sounds:
The boats are being cleaned by the men.
Pay close attention to how the verb changed. It went
from the active “are cleaning” to the passive “are being
cleaned.” Notice that the word “cleaning” changes to the
past participle: “cleaned.”
Remove the person or thing doing the action.
Earlier in the program, we told you that, in a passive
sentence, the person or thing doing the action is often
not important so, in this example, we’ll remove it.
Let’s listen:
The boats are being cleaned.
Now, we’ll change it to the past continuous passive.
Listen:
The boats were being cleaned.
The “are” changes to “were.” There are no other changes.
Being vs. Getting
In casual American English, we sometimes replace the
word “being” with “getting” for the continuous passive
form. Here’s how one of our earlier examples sounds with
“getting:”
My car is getting fixed.
My car was getting fixed.
But this form is not acceptable for formal, written
English. So, we won’t use it in our practice today.
Now, you try it!
OK, now it’s your turn. Make the following active
sentences into passive ones. For this exercise, be sure
to remove the person or thing doing the action. For
example, the active sentence “The restaurant is serving
dinner on the patio” would be “Dinner is being served on
the patio” in the passive form. The words “the
restaurant” have been removed.
Here are your sentences:
She was painting the living room red.
They are driving the girls to the soccer match.
They were negotiating for more territory.
Were you recording me without permission?
Write your answers in the Facebook Comments section
below.
I’m Alice Bryant. |
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Words in This Story |
- passive
– adj. showing that the
subject of a sentence is acted on or affected by the
verb
- dialogue
– n. the things that
are said by the characters in a story, movie, play,
etc.
- mention
– v. to talk about,
write about or refer to something or someone,
especially in a brief way
- casual
– adj. not formal or
official
- practice
– n. the activity of
doing something again and again in order to become
better at it
- patio
– n. a flat area of
ground, usually behind a house or restaurant, that
is used for sitting and relaxing
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