Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Question

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: <pporta AT oham.net>
  • To: "David Kummerow" <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>, "Isaac Fried" <if AT math.bu.edu>, <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Question
  • Date: Tue, 11 Dec 2007 12:37:43 +0100

David,

I'm not Isaac's advocate, but I ask you: what do you find to be wrong or mistaken in this statement of his?:

"4. In the adjective TOBAH, 'good', -AH refers to the feminine bearer of
the attribute, but in the noun TOBAH, 'favor, goodness', -AH refers to
the thing itself."

Best regards from

Pere Porta
Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain)

_____________

Dear Isaac,

Do you not understand it all, or only one bit specifically?

In all seriousness, if you are unable to understand these simple
linguistic matters I raise, then I think you are unfit to make
statements such as the following recent ones:

"There is no such thing in Hebrew as a "vowel", except for A. The idea
of the vowel is an alien carry-over into Hebrew from Indo-European grammar."

And:

"4. In the adjective TOBAH, 'good', -AH refers to the feminine bearer of
the attribute, but in the noun TOBAH, 'favor, goodness', -AH refers to
the thing itself."

And also:

"5 The counterpart to MAR, 'mister' is MAR-AT, where -AT is surely the
personal pronoun AT, 'you'."

Everything I have raised with you is of an elementary and foundational
linguistic level. In my opinion, you really need to come to grips with
the basics before you attempt more of the "higher level" analysis of
which you are attempting. To put it in terms relevant to your own field:
you would require of someone attempting algebra to be familiar and able
in the basics of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division
else fundamental mistakes would likely be made. This principle is no
less relevant to the field of general linguistics. If you were to
present these ideas of yours on a linguistics forum they would certainly
be deemed "crackpotish".

Regards,
David.



David,

I am terribly sorry but I am unable to make sense of what you are saying.

Isaac Fried, Boston University


On Dec 10, 2007, at 11:50 PM, David Kummerow wrote:

Hi Isaac,

I take it that you did indeed deny more than one vowel. You stated
(https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/b-hebrew/2007-November/034625.html):

"There is no such thing in Hebrew as a "vowel", except for A. The idea
of the vowel is an alien carry-over into Hebrew from Indo-European
grammar."

To me this statement can only be construed to mean that you only
accept "A" as a vowel in BH -- hence only one vowel.

Do you accept that the "sounds" you list have phonemic status in BH?
If so, then a consequence of this is not every "U", "I", etc need be a
personal pronoun, which I have outlined in a previous post. This is a
by-product of accepting these vowels as phonemes.

In any case, what of my question, namely, What is your evidence for
equating what has traditionally been analysed as gender marking to
actually be speech-participant marking?

Regards,
David Kummerow.



David,
Do you really think that I am, or was, denying the existence of the
U, I, O, E sounds in Hebrew?
Isaac Fried, Boston University
On Dec 10, 2007, at 11:09 PM, David Kummerow wrote:

Hi Isaac,

It puzzles you, I think, because you seem to be unfamiliar with
basic linguistic principles and methodology, even though you
yourself propose something "linguistic".

Am am unsure what you mean by "Where is the single vowel". It was
you who proposed this idea that BH has only one vowel
(https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/b-hebrew/2007-November/034625.html).
Are you now suggesting that there are no vowels? or that there are
more than one vowel and that you are retracting your previous
assertion?

I say it is "impossible" because human language requires more
contrast for linguistic production than what a single vowel can
provide. Known human languages around the world only minimally have
two vowels, so the burden of proof rests with you. Further, not
every theoretical vowel combinations are possible, but those with
greater contrasts are preferred. See Björn Lindblom, "Phonetic
universals in vowel systems," in Experimental phonology (John Ohala
and Jeri Jaeger, eds.; Dordrecht: Foris, 1986), 13-44.

Regards,
David Kummerow.


David,
I am really puzzled by your statement:
your contention -- again without adduced evidence -- that BH has
only a
single vowel is linguistically impossible
Where is the single vowel and why is it linguistically impossible?
Isaac Fried, Boston University
On Dec 10, 2007, at 3:45 AM, David Kummerow wrote:

Hi Isaac,

You wrote this:

2. Even though -AH is in my opinion but a contracted HI) it may
refer
to various agents and objects in various relationship modes. We have
YALDAH, 'girl, child-she', YALDAH, 'she gave birth, produced-a-chid-
she' and YALDAH, 'her boy, boy-she'.

and this:

4. In the adjective TOBAH, 'good', -AH refers to the feminine bearer
of the attribute, but in the noun TOBAH, 'favor, goodness', -AH
refers to the thing itself. Incidentally it is "female", as is
autostradah.
5 The counterpart to MAR, 'mister' is MAR-AT, where -AT is surely
the
personal pronoun AT, 'you'. MARAH is 'bitter'. Such is also the
relationship between GEBER and GBER-ET.

What is the evidence for these assertions?

What is your evidence for equating what has traditionally been
analysed
as gender marking to actually be speech-participant marking? I've
already demonstrated that your methodology is without linguistic
support, viz. 1) that you eschew any essential phonemic analysis
which
allows you to basically propose anything you want to as it is then
up to
the imagination and so is without any constraints; and 2) your
contention -- again without adduced evidence -- that BH has only a
single vowel is linguistically impossible. These two issues lead
ultimately to a fanciful analysis which no one is taking seriously.

You would do well to read monographs which relate to your above
assertions such as the following:

Corbett, Greville G. 1991. Gender. Cambridge Textbooks in
Linguistics.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Corbett, Greville G. 2000. Number. Cambridge Textbooks in
Linguistics.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Siewierska, Anna. 2004. Person. Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Regards,
David Kummerow.






_______________________________________________
b-hebrew mailing list
b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew






_______________________________________________
b-hebrew mailing list
b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page