When do we use the passive voice?
Ever wondered why Luxembourgish speakers often use indirect phrasing?
One key reason is the passive voice – a powerful tool that allows you to shift focus from who is doing something to what is being done.
✅ Why use the passive voice?
- To emphasize the action rather than the person performing it
- To sound more polite and respectful, which is essential in Luxembourgish communication
- To phrase things more indirectly, often for confidentiality or diplomacy
Since Luxembourgish culture values subtlety and courtesy, mastering the passive voice will help you speak more naturally and adapt to local communication styles.
Beispill (example):
- De Büro gëtt renovéiert. – The office is being renovated.
Here we don’t know who is renovating the office and it isn’t important as well. What is important is the office that is being renovated.
So, a passive voice sentence may or may not include the “agent” (by whom something is done). If the agent is a person or an entity, it is expressed in Luxembourgish with a vun–phrase:
- D’Gebai gëtt vun der Gemeng renovéiert. – The building is being renovated by the commune.
How do you build the passive voice?
In English the passive voice is done with the verb “be” + past participle, as in our example:
The building is being renovated. – D’Gebai gëtt renovéiert.
Whereas in Luxembourgish we use the verb ginn:
ginn + past participle
Now, make sure to know the conjugation of ginn.
Present Tense Imperfect Tense
ech ginn ech gouf
du gëss du goufs
hien/hatt gëtt hien/hatt gouf
mir ginn mir goufen
dir gitt dir gouft
si ginn si goufen
Perfect Tense
The past participle of the verb ginn is ginn and it is a verb that takes sinn as an auxiliary. To build a passive sentence in the present perfect you need to respect this construction:
sinn + past participle + ginn
Beispill (example):
D’Gebai ass renovéiert ginn. – The building has been renovated.
To conjugate intransitive verbs (verbs that take an indirect object) the passive voice is built with the verb “kréien”. This will be the subject of a future lesson.
Putting the Passive Voice Together
We need to make sure to use the correct tense of the verb ginn:
For all our examples I will take as the subject D’Rechnung and as it is the passive voice, we don’t know (it is not important) who is sending the bill
Present
D’Rechnung gëtt haut geschéckt. – The invoice is being sent today.
Imperfect
D’Rechnung gouf gëschter geschéckt. – The invoice was sent yesterday.
Perfect
D’Rechnung ass e Mëttwoch geschéckt ginn. – The invoice has been sent on Wednesday.
In Luxembourgish we make no difference between the imperfect and present perfect tense.
Future
D’Rechnung gëtt muer geschéckt. – The invoice will be sent tomorrow.
Remember that there is no future tense in Luxembourgish. So we use the present tense and often an adverb of time like in our phrase muer to emphasize that the action is in the future.
Modal verbs
D’Rechnung muss haut geschéckt ginn. – The invoice must be sent today.
And if you would like to continue learning business vocabulary with me right now and you would like to expand your business vocabulary to be able to talk in meetings or with your colleagues, and, learn to talk on the phone, or give presentations in Luxembourgish then
