RE DA and Traditional integration
Trevor Peterson
06PETERSON at cua.edu
Thu Oct 24 11:04:11 EDT 2002
>===== Original Message From Steve Raine <spraine at earthlink.net> =====
>As a newbie to DA...
>
>it sounds like it "embraces" linguistics, imparting language generalities,
>then "steps downward" toward a specific language (e.g., Koine).
More or less, although it has close ties with field linguistics/functional
grammar/text linguistics, all of which tries to deal even more directly than,
say, Chomskyan syntax with the realities of language, rather than
abstractions. The point is that DA methodology can apply to any language, but
it really only works when it's applied to real language (as opposed to an
abstract notion of linguistic essence).
>
[snipped]
>
>How might one integrate the Traditional and DA in learning NT Greek? I
>presume the answer is to just dig in and "do it to it".
Well, yes--pretty much everything is that way when it comes down to it. But I
would say there are some specific steps that can be taken. Personally, I would
like to see what would happen if students spent perhaps a semester learning
about general linguistics before starting to learn Greek. They could explore
the various facets of the field as they apply to their own native language
before trying to assimilate the oddities of a foreign language. A lot of
what's traditional to the teaching of Koine could probably remain unchanged in
the introductory grammar. You still need to learn how to analyze inflectional
forms, memorize vocabulary, etc. But another part of introductory grammar
usually involves learning how words and forms function in a sentence. Where
the function is basically equivalent to something in English, the traditional
methods usually don't work too badly. But students can easily come out of
first-year grammar with some misconceptions about less familiar features of
the language--issues related to aspect, modality, types of conditional
clauses, range of case functions, etc. Modern linguistics can provide
categories to discuss these features more completely. To take a particular
example that relates to DA (in every sense of the term), Hebrew requires a
student to learn hinne and Greek idou. Students normally learn to translate
these terms as "behold" or leave them untranslated. But they have functions,
and very interesting functions at that. DA provides a framework for discussing
what functions are served by these terms. Of course, the further students
progress in their study of the grammar, the more modern linguistics can
contribute to the discussion.
Trevor Peterson
CUA/Semitics
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