NON REVESIBLE IN ACTIVE AND PASSIVE

INTRODUCTION

If we talk about active and passive sentences, of course this will not be
separated from linguistic complexity. According to reports, adults need more
time to understand passive sentences with active sentences. According to
(Olson and Filby, 1972), passive sentences are very rare in casual conversations
and even a little small using keywords in everyday conversation. So all signs
point to predictions that young people will find passive sentences more difficult
to understand than active sentences.
Schmitt (1968) investigated the understanding of deaf children and
passive sound production using multiple choice tests that involved matching
passive sentences that could be restored to images. He found that deaf children
were quite difficult to understand and produce passive sentences until the age
of 14 years, and even many 17-year-old children still did not master this
construction. The results of his analysis led him to conclude that until elderly
children who are deaf process passive sentences as if they are active. For
example; "The girl was pushed by the boy" interpreted as “The girl pushing the
boy ".

But in my writing now, I will discuss "Passive non-reversible". Passive

non-reversible is a passive sentence construction in which a subject cannot be
exchanged with an agent in a sentence and still leaves the correct logical
sentence. For non-revesible sentences, for example; (a). The whole mainframe
system was destroyed by a young hacker. And (b). A young hacker was destroyed
by the whole mainframe system.
So from the example sentence above we can conclude that there are
two sentences that have different meanings. For the first example is the form of

1
passive sentences, where the meaning of the first sentence can still be accepted
by a child. But it is different from the second sentence, where the second
sentence cannot be accepted by a child because the second sentence is non-
reversible.

DISCUSSION

After I did the research, I took samples for children aged 8 to 10 years,
where I used the theory of Slobin trying to apply from the age of 6 to 12 years.
This study hypothesizes that there is a level of complexity of sentences,
determined by semantic and syntactic factors, and I try to apply at the age of 8
to 10 years to understand active and passive (non-reversible) sentences. I
choose active and passive sentences because the two sentence forms differ
mainly in terms of structural forms but not in the general meaning of the
sentence. I gave the pictures and the childrens was told to describe into the
active sentence to passive sentence.

a) The farmer drives the tractor (Petani menggerakkan traktor).

b) The farmer is driven by a tractor (Traktor menggerakan petani).

2
a) The boy kicks the ball (Anak lelai itu mennedang bola).
b) The boy is kicked by the ball (Anak laki-laki itu ditendang bola).

a) The girl rides the pony (Gadis itu mengendarai kuda poni.

b) The girl was driven by a pony (gadis itu dikendarai oleh kuda poni).

a) The girl is watering flowers (Gadis itu sedang menyiram bunga).

b) The flowers are watering the girl (Bunganya meyiram gadis itu).

3
 From 4 pictures and sentences, it can be concluded that each first
sentence in each picture can still be understand by the childrens but different
with the second sentence, where childrens feel confused in the second
sentences because it is not able to be by children's common sense. On the other
hand, the meaning of the second sentence is very strange. So it can be indicated
by the sentences in the pictures above included in the sentence that cannot be
recovered (non-revesible).

In addition to making the data more accurate about how childrens

understand and produce passive sentences onto non-revesible, then I try to
have a direct conversations with the childrens ages 8 to 10 who fail to
understand in the first stage in describing each pictures into passive sentences
that cannot be restored. In retrieving data I used a random method to get more
accurate results. For further explanations will be explained below.

First correspondent conversation

Researcher : Hi Najwa, how are you today?

Najwa : Alhamdulillah, I'm fine.
Researcher : What do you go to school every day using?
Najwa : I ride a bicycle when I go to school every day.
Researcher : Can you tell us about your activities during school?
Najwa : At 7:00 a.m. I and my friends usually clean up the
rubbish in front of the class. After the bell rang at 7:30 a.m. I immediately
got ready to enter the class to take lessons. During the lesson I and my
friends always focused on listening to what the teacher conveyed.

4
 In the first conversations, the researcher found that respondent named
Najwa used and produced active sentences more often than passive sentences.
Can be seen in the phrase "I ride a bicycle" and "I and my friends usually clean
up rubbish" it can be concluded that the first respondent produces more active
sentences than passive sentences in conversation every day.

Second correspondent's conversation

Researcher : Can I borrow your pencil tami?

Tami : Sorry sir, my pencil is used by Rayhan.
Rayhan : Oh yes sir, I am using Tami’s pencil?
Researcher : Can I borrow and activate it?
Rayhan : Yes, it's very necessary, sir.

In the conversations above, we can find some passive sentences

produced by respondent named Tami. While respondent named Rayhan are
seen using active sentences. So this proves that respondents often produce
passive sentences because they often learn and practice forming these
sentences. I did this research when I was teaching in class with still applying at
the age of 8 to 10 years.

CONCLUSION

Thus in non-reversible passive construction, the subject cannot be

exchanged for key words that have meaning but are not real. Semantic and
syntactic factors greatly influence a person to enjoy active and passive

5
sentences. On the other hand, the childrens will not use non-reversible because
basically the childrens rarely use passive sentences in everyday conversations.

REFERENCES

Elliot, Alison J. 1981. Child Language. Cambridge University Press

Turner, Elizabeth Ann and Ragnar, Rommetveit. (2016). The acquisition of
sentence voice and reversibility. Harvard University. 38(3)

Internet Source

https://www.ntid.rit.edu/sea/processes/passive/research/subtypes