A Question about Analysis Method

[testsuda]

Dear all language-friends!

I have taught myself several old Indo-european language such as Latin, New Testament Greek, Pāḷi etc. Now I am teaching Pāḷi - my holy religious language - for both buddhists and lay men. Cause what I have learnt is from English resources: textbooks, books, articles... I teach the analysis method as I have taken from those resources. In summary, that is: identifying every word with its basic grammatical information such as: word-category (noun, verb...); its declension/conjugation... and meaning; then analyzing contexts and identify the word's function, such as: Nominative as Subject, Accusative of Aim, Ablative of Cause, Genetive as Subject etc... and finally synthesizing into the whole meaning.

My question is in other European as Germany, France... is this method applied (at least in universities/colleges)?

Sincerely yours,

Khanh

[will.dawe]

Hello, Khanh.

There are several teaching methods, and your way is similar to Structural Approach. It is popular in my place too. The National Latin Exam (US) is based more on Grammar-Translation method. I heard that Direct method, focused on oral skill (also called Conversational method), has become very popular in Europe in last 5 years.

Popular Latin courses:

• Grammar-Translation method: Wheelock's Latin
• Natural approach: Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata (by Hans Ørberg).

Ancient Greek:

• Natural approach: A Greek boy at home (or its modern reprints, such as Athenaze or Alexandros)
• Direct method: Speaking Ancient Greek as a Living Language

There are other good courses not popular yet, or I'm not familiar with.

P.S. In fact, most of the teachers use some combination of these methods, and very seldom follow a strict methodology.

[testsuda]

Thanks so much. It is very interesting! Even in Pāḷi the grammar-translation is still prevalent.

[will.dawe]

In Second Language Acquisition, there is an intensive opposition between Grammar-Translation and Natural methods. You can easily find something like this.

Among other, their proponents argue how to supply the students with grammar. I read somewhere that the idea to concentrate on the grammar arose about XV or XVI century, (and from that moment pupils stopped speaking Latin fluently.)

Evidently, Grammar-Translation followers demands that the students have to memorize all declension/conjugation rules. Prominent examples are Dowling’s Wheel or Ranieri-Dowling Method. Wheelock's course teaches the same rules step by step.

Direct method supposes that the students don't have grammar tables, but infer all rules by themselves, simply reading (well-prepared) texts. For example, here is how Polis' Ancient Greek textbook (page 27) introduces the verb εἰμί (to be) in present time:



Some teachers say that it's more important to memorize vocabulary. If you know every word in a sentence, then you can understand its meaning. In case of poetry with very lax word order, it can be tricky. For example, Boethius, Metrum XII:

Quae sontes agitant metu
Ultrices scelerum Deae,
Jam maestae lacrimis madent.

We can take a paraphrase of these lines made by Callyus for the edition ‘In usum Delphini’:

Deae vindices criminum, quae timore concutiunt nocentes, tristes hument fletibus.

Now, it's much easier. Reading the original text and its simplified versions, you can accustom to the Latin word order.

In LLPSI, Ørber utilizes both approaches. He gives tables with rules, but also extensively practice them on reading big texts.

Students are different as well. Some are prone to rote-learning, some are better in perception of audio, or learning through action. I personally prefer to read interesting stories (i.e., Graded Readers in the beginning level).

Correct grammar is needed only in Writing. Other three skills—Reading, Listening, and Speaking—do not depend on it much. In spoken language, even in our mother tongue, we make many mistakes but still understand each other.

[MattK]

Some interesting points made so far. Regarding correct grammar, I'd say there are cases where it's fundamental for all skills. In a pro-drop language like Spanish (or Latin or Greek) you absolutely have to get the verb conjugations right in order to understand or formulate even simple sentences. For example, "No quiero" and "No quieren" mean different things, and it's the grammar that tells you the difference.

In English, on the other hand, learners can get away with saying things like "He want" because the mistake doesn't affect the meaning.

Conditional sentences are an interesting example. I remember spending ages on them when learning Greek, only to discover that when reading real texts the context normally makes the meaning clear anyway.

[testsuda]

Thanks all

I have both Wheelock's & Hans H. Ørberg's textbook; so I get the point about difference between the 2 methods - Grammar/Translation & Natural.

The thing, however, makes me a little bit confused is the difference between the Structural Approach & the Grammar/Translation Approach (Method). Both of them are about grammar-rules. In my opinion, the Grammar/Translation has all the rules available and the learners just memorize as well as apply by doing exercise of translation. They know the rules and use the rules, but knot aware HOW THE RULES ARE FORMED; they do not analyze the rules.

For example:

Caesar venit Athenam vincere Graecos.

The Grammar/Translation learners just render 'Caesar come to Athens to conquer the Greeks' due to the rules they already memorized.

But the Structural Approach learners must parse the sentence in details:

Caesar: nominative as subject of the verb 'Venit'
Venit: 3rd present indicative active: narrates the action 'go'
Athenam: accusative of Destiny for 'venit'
Vincere: infinitive of Purpose for the verb 'venit'
Graecos: direct object of 'vincere'

So, all those above make the meaning 'Caesar come to Athens to conquer the Greeks' possible and plausible.

Am I right?

I have read many books, articles about the Structural Linguistics. But till now, I usually ask myself: what are the things of Structural Linguistics in modern grammar textbooks/books; or how do I know that this or that book was written under/by the influence of Structural Lingtuistics?