Impersonal report

structures
Impersonal report structures
• passive structures used to show what people generally think

It can be used for number of reasons:

• when we are more interested in the statement than who made it:
The economy is expected to improve....

• the people who are referred to are not important or obvious

It is now known that the prisoner escaped through a tunnel.

• to make some statement more formal and impersonal:

It has been said that this government is doing a bad job.
The structure is used with verbs such as:

Say Think Believe Know

Claim Expect Agree

 FIRST:

IT + PASSIVE + THAT
There are 2
ways of
It is believed that Italian men are talkative.
forming this
type of It has been said that students study less
structure before the end of school year.
It was expected that the Brazilians would
win the 2006 football World Cup
THE SECOND:

SUBJECT + PASSIVE + INFINITIVE

Italian men are believed to be talkative.

Students have been said to study less

before the end of school year.
The Brazilian were expected to win
theWorld Cup.
 Things happening within the same time frame
use INIFITIVE structure:

When competition started, the Brazilians were expected to win...

 Events happening before the time it was
reported

• The disease is believed to have killed more than 10,000 people.

( a present belief about the past event)

FORM: subject + passive + perfect infinitive (to have + past

participle)
 EXAMPLE

A woman is expected to be elected President of...

FORM is the same: S + Passive (expect) + Infinitive
To report on
future events If sth is happening at the same time what
we can use structure??

verb expect
They are thought to be preparing for war...
S+Passive+Infinitive + gerund