[B-Greek] "Temporary Crutches" (was "Unreasonable Effectiveness of Data, etc."
Kevin Riley
klriley100 at gmail.com
Mon Mar 29 00:12:27 EDT 2010
While I don't disagree with anything said below, it is important to keep in
mind the audience and the timing of introducing the full complexity of any
language. I remember, at some stage during upper primary school, spending a
few lessons on 'helper verbs'. Later in life I was introduced to a large
book that was a summary of how the modal verbs work in English. At that
time it was also stressed that 1) there was some discussion among the
experts on how to understand many aspects of modal verbs which could be
found in a quite large volume of literature, and 2) there was much that no
one knew with any degree of certainty. I am glad my primary school teacher
did not mention the large book or the great volume of literature available
on the 'helper verbs', or that there was much not known or uncertain about
how they work. Similarly, while I now can find an hour or two of pleasure
in trying to understand the complexity of the Greek verbal system, I am glad
that my first year Greek teacher chose not to mention almost all of that
complexity, even though he was a participant in the discussions. But
perhaps his constant refrain of 'this is how the rule usually works in
Greek' was preparing us for the knowledge that it was not how the rule
*always* worked.
I am not sure that having to learn everything 'in the middle of a process'
is something unique to language learning. Something I have learnt in the
process of doing a PhD in anthropology is that, despite a good grounding in
anthroplogy at undergradute level, so much of what I need to know about
anthropological theory, methodology and history to complete my thesis has to
be learnt in the middle of the process of researching and writing my
thesis. Just as I am grateful for my Greek teacher not dumping the full
complexity of the Greek language on me in my first (or second) year, I am
also grateful that my anthropology teachers also kept much of the complexity
from me, and equally grateful for two supervisors who are willing to now
help me deal with that complexity. Perhaps that is the greatest weakness
with the teaching of NT Greek, that too often those who use it - or should
use it - are in the position of being outside the academic world and not
having anyone to help them work through the complexity when they find it.
Kevin Riley
On 28 March 2010 23:49, Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com> wrote:
> On Mar 28, 2010, at 8:21 AM, Richard Lindeman wrote:
> > I think that there is a problem with Greek grammars generally, both
> ancient
> > and modern. And the problem is that they come off as being far too
> > authoritative. I don't see any of them entitled "Grammatical Crutches
> For
> > Learning To Read Biblical Greek". And yet that is precisely what they
> are.
> > They are "crutches" at best and their goal should be to assist a student
> to
> > actually read the Greek and then at some point throw the crutches away
> like
> > the leper hopping and dancing and praising the Lord. I think that it
> would
> > help a great deal if new grammars would incorporate this kind of "crutch"
> > mentality not only in the title but also throughout the book. Each major
> > new insight concerning Greek grammar should be introduced with a warning
> > about its limitations and an encouragement to just read more (perhaps
> with
> > an appropriate reference to specific Greek literature where the student
> can
> > advance his/her understanding of the subject at hand.) The grammar
> should
> > also encourage the student to regularly read Greek even when it makes no
> > sense at all, to just get a feel for the language and perhaps offer
> reading
> > assignments apart from itself that regularly exceed the stage at which
> the
> > learner is at. Even intermediate and advanced grammars would do well in
> > regularly reminding readers of their limitations and encouraging students
> to
> > read.
>
> I wholly support what Richard has said here, what I read as two points:
> (1) the grammar one learns in a primer is a crutch or a training wheel to
> get the learner "on one's feet and walking" or "on a two-wheeler and
> rolling on one's own"; (2) rules tend to be oversimplifications of
> authentic
> usage in the language: the student should expect to encounter contexts
> where a learned rule either does not apply or applies in a qualified
> manner.
>
> But there's a built-in problem that must be faced in every beginning
> language course and in every primer in a new language: no matter where
> one begins, it is, as is said of epic poems, "in medias res" -- i.e., in
> the
> middle of a process: the first thing you learn (after the alphabet, at
> least)
> won't make complete sense until you've learned two or three other things.
> Mounce's textbook presents all the nouns and then all the verbs (or vice
> versa?) -- but in fact, except in the case of a nominal sentence, you can't
> really use a noun to say anything meaningful without adding a verb.
> That's why most ancient Greek primers begin with first-declension
> feminine nouns and simple uncontracted omega-verbs. It is almost
> inescapable in presenting the elements of the language that anything
> new that you introduce will depend partly upon something that you
> haven't yet got to. So: to what extent should the student be warned,
> as Richard suggests, that this lesson is a sort of "stopgap" instruction
> that will need to be modified further along the course of study.
>
> I tried to do that when I was teaching Greek -- sounding the advance
> warnings about modifications that would have to be made to the
> explanation of usage now being offered. The problem is that these
> advance warnings are more confusing to some students than they are
> helpful. Many will remember the point in the course of learning
> French the point at which s/he first grasped the principle that
> "every rule has its exception" and begins learning those interminable
> lists of "verbs that take à" and "verbs that take de" and "verbs
> conjugated with avoir" and verbs conjugated with être." This is
> a fundamental pedagogical problem in sequencing the items to
> be taught in a new language. And I would add something else
> that should be obvious: students are different from each other
> and so are teachers, and the same process is probably not going
> to work as well in every situation.
>
>
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
>
>
>
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