Learn English – Present perfect continuous in passive voice

passive-voiceprogressive-aspect

As I was teaching to my students the passive voice, we were talking about present or current problems in a company,
I said to my students as follow:

e.g Management have been ignoring complaints/suggestions.

but one of my students argued that this is not passive voice.
What is the explanation for this case?

Best Answer

Management have been ignoring complaints/suggestions.

If I were your student, I would argue the toss too.

This is clearly an active voice because there is no form of BE+Past participle1 to indicate passive voice. "Been" in this example marks a progressive aspect.

The progressive passive form should be,

Complaints/suggestions have been being ignored by the management.


1 This is the typical form of passive. But actually, not all passive constructions are marked by BE because we have bare passive and get-passive. There is also a form of passive that doesn't need a past participle; it's concealed passive.

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