Sentences in Greek, possibles
waldo slusher
waldoslusher at yahoo.com
Thu Aug 8 16:57:58 EDT 2002
On this....
> are you fluent in any other language besides
> English? I would
> enjoy hearing testimony from people who are fluent
> in a second language
> and have spent significant time in the culture which
> surrounds the
> second language.
I think you have somewhat identified the problem here.
I learned Portuguese before serving in Joao Pessoa,
Brasil for seven years. Before I moved there, the
language was associative to me (what was the English
counterpart). After I lived there for many years,
spending a "significant time in the culture", I would
say that I was able to respond in Portuguese without
having to do any conversions from English. I was able
to think in Portuguese. But I've been studying
Hellenistic/KOINE Greek for 16 or so years and cannot
say with any sense of honesty that I think in Greek,
although I feel I understand it quite well. The reason
being is that I can't enter the ancient Greek culture
and become an integral participant of it. I think that
is the difference between a dead and living
language/culture. I agree with Mark's earlier post
that we can't think in KOINE Greek, but we can acquire
multiple native languages, if time permits. Age is not
a factor in attaining "native" status of a language or
culture; it has to do with personal exposure over time
to the very elements of a society. After time, when I
heard jokes (with play on words) in Portuguese, I
found myself able to "get it" on occasion.... but I
will add this... I was way behind those who had been
there all their lives. I was attaining upwards of 10
percent (that's a random guess) of the culture, the
locals owned 90 percent (another educated guess).
Can anyone here think in Hieroglyphics?
=====
Waldo Slusher
Calgary, AL
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