[B-Greek] Classroom metalanguage
Randall Buth
randallbuth at gmail.com
Mon Feb 22 12:09:12 EST 2010
On 02/19/2010 11:45 AM, Randall Buth wrote:
>> 3. Many English grammar terms do not have any meaning in everyday
>> English. "Accusative" means nothing in everyday English. It is only an
>> otherwise empty, English grammar label, a transcription of a Latin
>> accusativus, which itself was a translation of the Greek αἰτιατική.
>
>
>True enough. But these terms do mean something to anyone who learns
>other languages.
>
>A student of most modern languages knows what Accusative means. My
>German teacher never used the term αἰτιατική.
>
>When I first started using older Greek grammars, one huge and difficult
>task was simply learning the vocabulary and concepts they used for
>grammar, because they are no longer used when teaching most other languages.
>
>Jonathan
But a good German teacher would be speaking in German
and would use 'akkusativ' as a German word.
I have no problem with the word in German, or in English, Spanish, or
French when doing linguistics.
(These latter languages don't really have 'accusatives' so they wouldn't need
the word for teaching English, Spanish, or French.) And in German
I would not want the teacher to use AITIATIKH and to switch into Greek
in order to explain German! German for German, Greek for Greek.
The problem comes when the grammar word throws the conversation
into a language other than Greek. That is counterproductive. The more
that a language can be used in class in meaningful, understandable
communication the more rapidly the students will be learning the
language.
Randall Buth
--
Randall Buth, PhD
www.biblicalulpan.org
randallbuth at gmail.com
Biblical Language Center
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