Re: live discussions???

From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Wed Apr 07 1999 - 06:42:00 EDT


At 10:32 PM -0300 4/6/99, Antonio Eduardo Costa Pereira wrote:
>"Carl W. Conrad" wrote:
>> IMHO = "in my humble opinion" = "hWS EMOIGE DOKEI"
>
>Carl, comprendes portugues? Obstupesco! Eca de
>Queiroz, escriptor lusitano, afirma: portugues est tumulo de
>pensamento
>(penso em portugues, ergo desisto).
>Agradecido por responder me.

No, I cannot honestly say that I "understand" Portuguese; I certainly can't
write it, although I can often make sense, more or less, of 75% of it, as
with Spanish. Some facility with Latin and Italian does make this possible,
but I don't think I'd want to risk my life on this sort of guessing; I find
it considerably easier to understand Dutch from knowing English and German,
but I couldn't write Dutch any more than I could Spanish or Portuguese. In
order to write a language, I think one has to be able, to some extent, to
think in it--and that goes far beyond making educated guesses even of the
sort that we make in the earlier stages of learning Greek or any other
language that is not our native language.

I must say, however, that I am gratified to see a readiness of list-members
who are not really comfortable in WRITING English--although I think they
probably understand the gist of the English well enough to read it--to
compose in their native language; this IS an international and internet
list--and we have no right, I think, to suppose that a list-member should
be able to write English.
Where it's helpful or necessary, someone else can usually offer
interpretation. If I may paraphrase without, I hope, irreverence, PANTA
PROS OIKODOMHN GINESQW; EITE GLWSSHi TIS *GRAFEI* ... hEIS DIERMHNEUETW (1
Cor 14:26f.). And that, I hope, may make for "live discussions" on a
broader scale, even in B-Greek list correspondence.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/

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