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  • From: yochanan bitan <ButhFam AT compuserve.com>
  • To: "Bryan Rocine" <brocine AT earthlink.net>
  • Cc: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: parsing, taxonomy vs. process (was:Expository discourse "profile")
  • Date: Fri, 15 Oct 1999 03:10:33 -0400


shalom bryan,

actually, i suspect we agree or will agree on the point of disagreement
after we clarify what we're talking about.
see below.

>About the very high level of language competence that you
>maintain is necessary for discourse analysis: I disagree
>entirely! Very great exposure to a language is necessary to
>do discourse analysis ONLY IF one learns a language
>naturally/informally. However, one may be armed with
>pragmatic, rhetorical, poetic rules of a language from DAY
>ONE of *formal* instruction and be effectively and
>independently doing discourse analysis after one year of
>study. This is exactly the approach of my text.

i also maintain that discourse analysis can be done from the start.
ABSOLUTELY. but the grammar, syntax and discourse signals of a language are
only a skeleton, a framework, not the meat or full body.

great exposure to the language is ABSOLUTELY necessary if one will know why
one synonym was used and not another. why one word, structure, or phrase is
more rhetorical, restrained and less direct. tu as pige'? (french,
colloquial--do you get the point?)
in short, reading a text requires processing what was said against what
could have been said. that processing gets started from the beginning of
language learning, as well as all levels of discourse

e.g. if you greeted me somewhere, "hey, randy, how are you, good to see
you!" i would respond normally. if, on the other hand, you said, "how do
you do?" i would wonder what is behind the formalism. puttin' me on?
offended? you have a surprise/joke up your sleeve? knowing where one is in
any text is multidimensional. any great literature is multidimensional.

>In addition, the great exposure to a language that is
>prerequisite to discourse analysis when one learns
>naturally/informally can be substituted for by the
>translations most of us have available in our first
>languages. I.e. since discourse analysis, IMO, makes use of
>poetics, rhetoric, literary criticism, we are aided by our
>English translations in which we can process a lot of text
>quickly if we cannot do the same in Hebrew.

(ps-as stated above--i believe in learning discourse structures from the
beginning, before 'great exposure'. my first semester students read jona
with notes pointing out the various discourse structures, strategies and
stylistic/rhetorical features.)
i would disagree that translations can provide the background or data for a
full, correct processing of a text. ** in translation a person does not
know where to ask the right questions. **
the reader does not get to see a bump in the road that was forcibly
smoothed out, etc. and the reader does not get to hear where the author
waxes a wee bit lyrical-- veha'oniah Hishva lehishaver ... veyona yarad ...
vayyeradam. you don't see obvious plays like 'jacob jacobed me' and you
don't see the choice of words and synonyms from within the source language
as mentioned above.
e.g., additionally, why does ruth get called moavia, over and over? this is
not simply a question of participant reference of discourse grammar and the
distribution of name + gentilic. (that is certainly important, especially
when 'otiose, unecessary' for disambiguation. just inadequate for
interpretation.)
ruth must be read against the story of the daughters of lot. everyone knew
the import of 'moavia'. lot's daughters got children in their own way. the
nation was cursed and excluded from israel. yet ruth was so noble a
daughter of lot (proven in chapter 3) that she could be included in the
geneology of david. she redeemed herself from her heritage by reversing the
"lot's daughter syndrome" (which is why chapter three was included in the
book [this is worth pondering]). discourse grammar can describe the
transition 'long form' ruth ha-moavia at the end of chapter one. but a true
'reading' only comes with the whole culture/language that are intertwined.
i think you agree.

braxot
randall buth



  • Re: parsing, taxonomy vs. process (was:Expository discourse "profile"), yochanan bitan, 10/15/1999

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