Note sulla funzione della diatesi passiva in italiano e in inglese a livello della prospettiva funzionale dell’enunciato (PFE)

Notes on the function of the passive in Italian and in English from the Functional Sentence Perspective (FSP) point of view The article deals with the passive in Italian and in English from the Functional Sentence Perspective point of view. While all the other verbal categories perform a function within the communicative units of the theme and the transition proper, the function of the passive is different: it may be observed as a means of changes within the syntactic structure of the sentence and, at the same time, as a means of changes in the sentence perspective. The conclusion is that the passive is more often used in English with the aim to change the fixed, i.e. grammaticalized word order. As a result the sentence prospective changes as well. In Italian the word order is more flexible and the passive is used especially with the aim to make anonymous the agent