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  • From: Naama Zahavi-Ely <nxzaha AT wm.edu>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [b-hebrew] Chomsky and Hebrew
  • Date: Wed, 17 Jun 2009 17:12:54 -0400 (EDT)

With all due respect to Chomsky, may I suggest that he was writing at a time
that (modern) Hebrew was spoken primarily by people who studied it as a
second language? This is no longer the case. I am a third-generation native
Hebrew speaker, and I can tell you that my sense of grammar and language is
quite different from the Indo-European one.

Obviously I am not claiming that modern Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew are the
same. Neither are modern and Shakespearian English -- or, for that matter,
everyday spoken and formal written English of our own time.

Best wishes

Naama Zahavi-Ely




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