Sentences in Greek, possibles

Randall Buth ButhFam at compuserve.com
Thu Aug 8 08:13:49 EDT 2002


shalom Mark 
KAI CAIRIN
TOIS AITAIROIS

>No one "thinks KOINE Greek" today. If that is
>your objective or hope, you are sure to fall short.
>Linguistically, that can not happen.

That's an interesting proposition. 
"Cannot happen."

Would that mean that if I said 
'je voudrai du cafe'
in a French cafe
that I was not thinking in French -- 
if I had not been born there?
(NB: French spelling mistake is intentional, reflecting pronunciation.)

Does that mean that a person cannot learn a second language?
We know about language interference, and mistakes by second 
language learners. But when speaking fluently are they not 
thinking in that language? Even with mistakes? 

Or could that mean that when one writes in any language, even 
his/her mothertongue, that they are not trully thinking in that language 
because the time elapse in writing allows them to artificially 
re-phrase things according to some pattern learned as a 'norm', 
like when someone rephrases a sentence when worried about 
how it might end up? umm ... "how it might end?" or (let's see,
don't end with a preposition, but maybe an adverb is OK?) 

I think there is alot more to be said on both sides, but at much 
different levels of language use than that which is normally 
considered 'adequate' in Koine Greek studies. 

AIRROSQAI 
Randall Buth
EN TOIS IGERWSOLOIMOIS
(a Koine spelling, non-pretentious)






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