[B-Greek] Semantic Space (was Charts of Forms should be real words)
Randall Buth
randallbuth at gmail.com
Sat Sep 26 13:36:25 EDT 2009
I suspect we agree or will agree on what is defined similarly.
Markos egrapse:
>
> Randall egrapse:
>> For me, the main concern is to cover 'central semantic space' in a
>> language and then to branch out into special areas. I listed the
>> above because I think that a basic reader of 1st century Greek NT
>> needs to have these words in their 'semantic space' in their brains
>> and to be able to network with them (i.e. to use the items in
>> communication so that it is a language that is sitting in the brain.)
>> then we can read the GNT with understanding and feeling like when
>> we read any piece of literature in any language.>
>
>
> Our Dialogos e-mailing-in-Greek forum, which is still in its infancy
> (if not prenatal) illustrates you can never predict what words will
> wind up in ones central semantic space. When you use Greek to
> communicate, you find that you tend to use the same words over and over
> again, ANAGIGNWSW perhaps predictably, but I've been surprised how
> often we use XAIRW and XRAOMAI. Whether these words are common
> in the NT, or what forms are found and what are not, quicky becomes
> besides the point.
We agree,
especially on the artificial statistics on something as small as the
NT corpus. When a larger corpus is taken of language, then quite a few words
will typically show up in the most common 1000, most common 2000, etc.,
that are perhaps rare or did not make it into the NT.
Languages tend to use 5000-7000 words fairly commonly and a reader needs
to know these in order to start absorbing new vocabulary directly from
the context
of writings. Of the 5000 vocab items in the GNT maybe only 4000 would qualify
as part of this expected 'core language'. Then another 1500 to 3000 words needs
to be added.
However, I am not sure that the concept 'real word' or its antonym
'artificial word' has been communicated or perceived as intended:
e.g. the XRAOMAI that you list as a word is not a "real word". It is
an artifiical construct
that requires the application of a ruled change in order to be used in Greek.
The real word is XRWMAI. χρῶμαι, that is what one says and what one would hear.
When writing and reading, though, there is a split second of extra time where
the brain can apply the rule without too much trouble. The problem comes when
that 'rule application' becomes an ingrained extra process so that it slows
down speech and distracts thinking.
That is what I referred to as an 'unreal word'. χράομαι is not a real word,
χρῶμαι is.
> Necessity, but also a teacher like Buth or Rico
> can influence what words wind up in Semantic Space.
Only at the beginning. A language has a way of taking over. After one reads
a million words things tend to 'bell curve' into congruence.
> A number of
> us on the list are reading and listening to Rico, and I find that his
> words tend to show up, whether because he chose them or because Necessity dictates.
>
> Writing Greek (and listening to it) does not go as far as
> Randall does in speaking, but it does at least for me
> obliterate the concept of real versus non real words.
See above, I'm not sure you're talking about
what I was talking about.
> Any word that is used and understood in Greek is real,
> whether written in the first or the twenty first century. What
> we do on Dialogos may be (and in fact is) bad Greek but
> it is just as real as anything.
You don't write *XRAOMAI *χραομαι do you,
instead of XRWMAI. χρῶμαι?
nor old Ionic POIEOMEQA ποιεόμεθα
for POIOYMEQA ποιούμεθα ?
ERRWSO
(I would include as a common, core word,
despite 2xx (plural) in GNT)
IWANHS
> From: Randall Buth <randallbuth at gmail.com>
> Subject: [B-Greek] Charts of Forms should be real words
> To: "B Greek" <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
> Date: Friday, September 25, 2009, 2:58 AM
>
> Thank you for the question. I think it may help clarify some issues.
>
> Eddie egrapse (and we can see him smiling between the lines)
> >
> Yea, . . .
> >Real B-Greek words like...
> >
> >κατεπηδήσαμεν
> >
> >ἡ ἡμῶν ἄμαξα ἐπάγη ἐν βορβόρῳ
> >τό μου ἄρμα ἐπάγη ἐν βορβόρῳ
> >
> >πτησόμεθα εις Τελ Αβιβ αὔριον
>
> Well, let's look at the pedigree of these fine words:
>
> PETESQAI 'to be flying' is even in the NT.
> Don't we want to know the whole word? A word is more than
> participles and subjunctives.
>
> and
> PHKSAI 'to fix something in place' is in the NT
> Don't we want to know the whole word, PHGNYMI and all,
> at least as much as is in idiomatic, common use?
>
> and
> AMAKSA 'wagon, cart [modern Greek amaksi is one word for 'car']'
> is 27xx in LXX, not to mention Josephus, et al.
> So let's include it.
> [And you will note my great restraint in not using
> DITROXON δίτροχον 'two-wheeler' as 'bicycle',
> though I wouldn't be against it]
>
> and
> BORBOROS is in the NT.
>
> and
> KATAPHDAN 'to be jumping down' has PHDAN 'to jump, leap' in the NT
> and KATAPHDAN in the Apocryphal Gospels.
>
> So everything is card-carrying b-Greek.
>
> If we were going to teach someone '20th century biblical English'
> wouldn't the students expect to know forms that didn't happen to
> occur in the Bible, wouldn't they expect to be able to think with forms
> outside the particular Bible version? And wouldn't they still think
> of the whole resulting network as the same language?
>
> That is one of the problems with many NT morphologies, Mounce
> included. They take 1/4 of a language and then present 'swiss
> cheese' out of the remains (only attested forms in GNT +/- ApFath).
> (my copy of Mounce Morphology is in storage boxes, and I would
> like to be able to re-check what is written in it. Howard
> [Moulton Howard, v 2] was more reliable with the papyri and actual
> language. But it too is limited by the canon, not common language
> use.)
>
> And more importantly, if someone were really going to understand the
> English Bible, wouldn't they need to know the common synonyms of
> attested words, that is, the common words that were NOT chosen,
> in order to more precisely know where the attested words and
> structures and idioms fit into the semantic space of the language?
>
> For me, the main concern is to cover 'central semantic space' in a
> language and then to branch out into special areas. I listed the
> above because I think that a basic reader of 1st century Greek NT
> needs to have these words in their 'semantic space' in their brains
> and to be able to network with them (i.e. to use the items in
> communication so that it is a language that is sitting in the brain.)
> then we can read the GNT with understanding and feeling like when
> we read any piece of literature in any language.
>
> Yes, there are languages where this is impossible because the
> remains of the language are too fragmentary, like Phoenician and
> Ugaritic, even 'biblical Hebrew' on the vocabulary side, but 1st
> century Greek is well-enough attested to provide ample excecise
> space for those wanting to develop the cognitive network (i.e., learn
> the language fluently). If we let the window open up a bit, say
> attested texts 2BCE to 2CE, then I think we're looking at a total
> vocab of 50,000+ entries. I would think that students specializing
> in the language would want to control 15,000 of these in order to
> feel comfortable as a specialist. We can always leave a few words
> for 'fuzzy fog', just like we do when reading in any other language
> that we know well.
>
> And we should start with covering basic, concrete words that a 5 year
> old would be expected to know. My list covered words that I expect
> someone to know with only a five-year old's control of the language.
> Yes, we want more, too, but one should start at the center and branch
> out.
>
> E.g., a word like KATHFEIA ''gloom and despair' needs to be included
> in order to cover the NT, and thus would probably be in the first 7000
> items learned, but I wouldn't list it at the core, nor expect a 5yr old to
> know it.
>
> Hopefully, this little glimpse shows how a language 'turns inside out'
> when one tries to use it and develop fluency, and then the existing
> 'tools' for students become viewed in a different light, something
> like seeing a set for a TV western that lacks dimensions.
>
> ERRWSO
> Randall
>
--
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicalulpan.org
randallbuth at gmail.com
Biblical Language Center
Learn Easily - Progress Further - Remember for Life
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