Active to passive

[Stephen Jones]

What gives these examples their high vomitability-quotient is how completely representative they are of decades of Chomskyan(-esque) linguistic theorizing.

Chomskyan theoriziing has nothing to do with this whatsoever. You appear obsessed. It's therapy you need, not theory.

Actually, having been informed of yet another potential break in at home last night, I have just thought of a situation where the offending phrase would make perfect sense.

The local chief of police was inspecting my window and announced "The shutter was broken by the thief with the edge of a hoe".

I'm sure an anthology of detective stories will yield a situation where that phrase will change to "The window was broken by Debra with a bat".

The basic principles still hold however; we only use the passive with an agent when the subject of the passive sentence is the theme, and we wish to stress the agent.

[sonya]

passivization doesn't stress the agent, it stresses the patient or theme which is moved to the front of the sentence and given emphasis.

note: passivization can't occur when a patient or theme is the subject in the active sentence (google unaccusative verbs). *it can only occur when there is an agent that it -can- throw out.*

I climbed the mountain - I is the agent, mountain is the patient.
The mountain is climbed. - the agent is thrown out, mountain moves up to emphasize what we're talking about.

I died. - I is the patient.
*I am died