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  • From: "Barry" <nebarry AT verizon.net>
  • To: "James Christian" <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>, <dwashbur AT nyx.net>
  • Cc: b-hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Generation grammar and b-hebrew
  • Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2010 07:02:25 -0400


----- Original Message ----- From: "James Christian" <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>
To: <dwashbur AT nyx.net>
Cc: "b-hebrew" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 20, 2010 3:47 AM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Generation grammar and b-hebrew


Hi Eric,

in my honest opinion there is no such thing as a free word order language.
Yes. It is true that when we compare English word order with that of Koine
Greek then the Koine Greek does exhibit more 'freedom' in its word order.
But just what exactly do we mean by 'freedom'. Were the composers of Koine
Greek documents just randomly throwing out declined noun phrases? Hardly!
There are clearly patterns which are more dominant and patterns which are
less dominant and guided decisions were made when these documents were
generated. We even see similar phenomenon in English, a language we consider
to not have free word order. Consider the following:

Both ancient Greek and Latin display certain combinations which rarely vary, such as postpositive particles and prepositional phrases, in the case of Greek, the placement of the article with regard to attributive or predicate positions. Latin has a fairly fiixed (about 60 % of the time) prose word order subject-predicate-verb. Greek doesn't really do this, but individual authors will often have a preferred order. The result is that a great deal can be done with word order in terms of stylistic emphasis.

N.E. Barry Hofstetter
Classics and Bible Instructor, TAA
http://www.theamericanacademy.net
(2010 Savatori Excellence in Education Winner)
Mentor, TNARS
http://www.tnars.net

http://my.opera.com/barryhofstetter/blog
http://mysite.verizon.net/nebarry





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