Greetings

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Melanie Marthaler
Posts: 2
Joined: August 21st, 2014, 3:02 pm
Location: USA

Greetings

Post by Melanie Marthaler »

Greetings,

My name is Melanie. I love studying languages. My favorite language so far is Greek. That is why I am on here.
I took 3 semesters of Greek at a Bible college a couple of years ago. Before that I studied it on my own for about a year.
Greek was definitely my favorite class at college.

Other languages I am currently studying are American Sign Language (ASL) and Biblical Hebrew.

I am not an expert in Greek. I still have much to learn. My goal is to be able to read the Greek New Testament fluently.
Any advice or help would be much appreciated.

Thank you,
Melanie
Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith;
who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 12:2
RandallButh
Posts: 1105
Joined: May 13th, 2011, 4:01 am

Re: Greetings

Post by RandallButh »

My goal is to be able to read the Greek New Testament fluently.
Welcome.

I don't know how you studied Greek but you may be interested in knowing about learning to read a language fluently.

People improve their reading fluency by learning to speak the language fluently.
If you're interested in why a person needs to speak fluently in order to read fluently, see:
Phonology in Second Language Reading: Not an Optional Extra
Author(s): Catherine Walter
Source: TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 42, No. 3, Psycholinguistics for TESOL (Sep., 2008), pp. 455-474
Published by: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40264478 .

Naturally, the same is true of Hebrew, maybe even more so because of the non-European alphabet that slow down initial comprehensible input.
Mason Barge
Posts: 18
Joined: August 16th, 2014, 1:52 pm

Re: Greetings

Post by Mason Barge »

Hi Melanie,

We should be BB friends! I just finished my fourth semester of Greek and really enjoy it, and am determined to learn it. My program has me scheduled to translate much of the New Testament over the next several years and I work at it for at least several hours every day. Right now I'm starting on 1 John, which is harder than it looks - it looks like a piece of cake because the vocabulary and parsing is really simple, but making the concepts come out in English, or even understanding exactly what John in his peculiar style means to say, is proving a bit hard.

Anyway, I think I'll post in the Beginners' section even though I'd call myself "intermediate" as a student; but afaik there's no topic in between Beginners and sections for people with Ph. D.'s who teach.
Wes Wood
Posts: 692
Joined: September 20th, 2013, 8:18 pm

Re: Greetings

Post by Wes Wood »

Mason Barge wrote:there's no topic in between Beginners and sections for people with Ph. D.'s who teach.
Things aren't quite as black and white as this. The forum outside of the Beginners section requires a deeper knowledge of Greek to be sure, but the members will help everyone who is making earnest efforts to improve his or her Greek, no matter what the learner's level may be. I would recommend that asking relevant questions about the texts that you are working through and jumping in if you see a topic or project that interests you.

Check out the Lysias thread under Greek Texts>Other Greek Texts for an example of one of the opportunities that become available on the forum. I am certainly no Ph.D candidate, and I have received a great deal of help and feedback from many forum members. If you are willing to put yourself out there, you will benefit greatly from the help of many who are more knowledgable.

I hope you both you and Melanie Marthaler enjoy being a part of the forum!
Ἀσπάζομαι μὲν καὶ φιλῶ, πείσομαι δὲ μᾶλλον τῷ θεῷ ἢ ὑμῖν.-Ἀπολογία Σωκράτους 29δ
Melanie Marthaler
Posts: 2
Joined: August 21st, 2014, 3:02 pm
Location: USA

Re: Greetings

Post by Melanie Marthaler »

RandallButh wrote:If you're interested in why a person needs to speak fluently in order to read fluently, see:
Phonology in Second Language Reading: Not an Optional Extra
Author(s): Catherine Walter
Source: TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 42, No. 3, Psycholinguistics for TESOL (Sep., 2008), pp. 455-474
Published by: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40264478 .
I am definitely going to read this. Thank you for suggesting it.

Like I said, I took Greek classes at college. We mostly learned vocabulary, conjugations, and declensions. We also did some translating from 1 John.
It seemed like the class was more focused on writing and reading Greek than it was on speaking it.
Mason Barge wrote:Right now I'm starting on 1 John, which is harder than it looks
Your right. Translating 1 John is harder than it looks. My third semester of Greek we translated the first chapter of 1 John.


Thank you all for the welcome. I think I am really going to enjoy being a part of this forum.
Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith;
who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 12:2
RandallButh
Posts: 1105
Joined: May 13th, 2011, 4:01 am

Re: Greetings

Post by RandallButh »


Melanie Marthaler » August 25th, 2014, 9:44 pm

RandallButh wrote:If you're interested in why a person needs to speak fluently in order to read fluently, see:
Phonology in Second Language Reading: Not an Optional Extra
Author(s): Catherine Walter
Source: TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 42, No. 3, Psycholinguistics for TESOL (Sep., 2008), pp. 455-474
Published by: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40264478 .


I am definitely going to read this. Thank you for suggesting it.
Be prepared for an article written for other researchers on second language reading. It's not written to students, so some of the article may seem distracting or getting bogged down in details. But it is an excellent article that explains part of why people should learn to speak a language fluently if they want to read a language fluently.
Stephen Carlson
Posts: 3351
Joined: May 11th, 2011, 10:51 am
Location: Melbourne
Contact:

Re: Greetings

Post by Stephen Carlson »

I can only read the abstract to this article. What is meant by "(un)reliable L2 phonological inventory"? Getting the phonemes right? Getting the phonetics right?
Stephen C. Carlson, Ph.D.
Melbourne, Australia
RandallButh
Posts: 1105
Joined: May 13th, 2011, 4:01 am

Re: Greetings

Post by RandallButh »

I think that it refers to phonological deficiences in general, whether blurring the correct phonological loop pattern or not automatically producing the phonological loop pattern.
Can't remember.
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