noun
- plural of nonpassive; verbs or constructions that are not in the passive voice, or entities that actively participate rather than remain inactive.
Usage: linguistics: used in grammatical analysis to distinguish active or middle voice constructions from passive voice; technical term; primarily used in academic and linguistic contexts
Examples
- In the sentence 'The cat chased the mouse,' 'chased' is one of the nonpassives we studied in class.
- Linguists distinguish between passives and nonpassives when analyzing sentence structure.
- Most nonpassives in English place the agent before the verb.
- The grammar textbook contrasted passives with nonpassives to clarify voice.
- Nonpassives tend to be more direct and concise than their passive counterparts.