At first, the term “voices of the verb” may seem a little strange to you, but as you get to know the subject of the what we are going to deal with, everything will be very clear and, consequently, you will find that it is a simple and easy to understand subject.
First, to make our understanding easier, let's remember a little more about the subject, analyzing the following sentence:
Paulo read the book.
We have that "Paul" expresses the subject of the prayer, and that "read the book", indicates the predicate.
So far no doubt, right?
Now let's find out who practices the action, that is, reading the book: Do you agree that it was Paul?
Yes, that's him.
Let us now return to the concept of what voices of the verb really mean:
Verb voices are characterized by the relationship between the subject and the action expressed by the verb.
Therefore, we have four of them:
There are four verbal voices: active, passive, reflective and reciprocal reflexive
Active voice
It is the one that occurs when the subject is the one who performs the action.
In this case, in the example we have just seen, we see that it is the active voice, as it was Paulo, the subject, who performed the action (reading the book). Know that for this reason he is also called an agent.
passive voice
It is characterized when the subject receives the action expressed by the verb, thus becoming a patient subject. Let's take advantage of the same prayer, only now expressed in the passive voice, observe:
The book was read by Paul.
We note that the subject, now expressed as “the book”, receives the action of having been read by someone, which in this case is Paulo.
reflective voice
It is when the subject practices and receives the action expressed by the verb at the same time. Sound complicated? None of this, note the example:
The boy was injured with the sharp object.
When we analyze it well, we realize that the boy performed the action – that of injuring using the sharp object. What is the consequence of this?
the of if to hurt as that same object, that is, he also receives the action – to hurt himself. Do you understand now why it is so called?
reciprocal reflective voice
It occurs when the action expressed by the verb refers to the two elements of the subject, occurring in a reciprocal, alternate way. To clarify, let's look at the example together:
The two friends greeted each other.
We deduced that both one friend and the other greeted each other.
By Vânia Duarte
Graduated in Letters
Brazil School Team
