30 Comments
For me these lessons are taking a bit of the fun away from learning.
I barely know the meaning of these terms nor their use in my own language, let alone English, though I consider myself quite proficient.
I don't see the point in learning them, at least not in the beginning. It doesn't feel useful.
I haven't seen 'parts of speech' lessons in the other language trees and i thought it was a great idea. Especially in the Greek Course, because it is full of ethymological roots.
not altogether sure of the purpose or value of "learning" these words in greek
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maybe so you can understand a bit from a monolingual greek dictionary
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I guess I am getting something out of this section, in that I'm analysing the words a bit where I can, but I think it might be helpful to include in this section (wherever it ends up being once the course is finalized) an example of what each one means. For example, in English we might say, "A verb is sometimes called an action word." "'To go'" is a verb." "A noun is a name for something." "'Dog'" is a noun". "An adjective helps to describe a noun." Maybe my examples aren't the best, because I'm not a grammarian, but something along those lines. That way we'll have a better chance of solidifying what these things mean, rather than simply translating or parroting something back. Just a suggestion. As it is now, I've been avoiding this section like the plague until I start feeling guilty that I need to strengthen these words.
And I've never really understood what a participle is and now I'm going to have to look it up, goshdarnit!
I am inclined to agree - a little. I am, of course, aware of the meta-language, the language that describes language, but ''It sounds Greek to me!'' And I want it to sound accessible. However, I am a great fan of Duolingo so I shall persevere!
Much as I'm inclined to agree that this metalanguage vocabulary is not that useful, as a language learner, I'm much more likely to use this metalanguage vocab in real life (especially in a classroom), than most of the other nouns I've learnt so far in this course, such as hippopotamus and giraffe.
As a language teacher, I was surprised to find this topic so close to the start of the Greek course, and in fact I think it's awesome!
When I'm in Greece of chatting with my greek neighbours here in Sydney, I want them to be able to explain to me why my phrase was wrong and understand that explanation in Greek.
For a few people it seems like not knowing these language terms is important but for me I feel like I can already start exposing myself to actual natural Greek textbooks etc
I think saw a suggestion somewhere to make these lessons a bonus skill. I think that is a great idea! Who feels it is important at the early stages can do it quite soon, who wants to wait to get some level of greek first can wait and if you don't find it important at all you just don't do it.
I know Koine Greek is ALL about the participles. I'm secretly hoping Modern Greek is too because I love it. Excited to find out!
Unfortunately not :)
The most lively one is the perfect passive participle. The present active participle also exists but has a single, invariant form which is used as an adverb, rather than also as an adjective.
The aorist participles are pretty much used only in formulaic remnants; the future (and pluperfect) as a synthetic verb form has died out along with the participles; the present passive participle is not much used and the perfect active participle is completely dead.
Thank you for crushing my dreams :'(
Just kidding. This is a great and informative summary. Thanks! Can't wait to meet our perfect passive friend in person.
I am trying to get more info about ancient Greek as I learn, so I am glad about the ancient Greek discussions in the comments.
Luckily, these are the Basics. How about "gerundial phrase", subjunctive pluperfect, adverbial objective, dangling modifier, etc.
Are participles words like 'jogging', 'boiling', and 'frightening' that are used as an adjective?
That's part of the story. Those are present participles in English. They're also used to form continuous tenses as in "I am singing" or "he wasn't listening".
English also has a past participle, which usually ends in -ed, as in "a closed door" or "he has closed the door" or "the door was closed by the wind".
Ancient Greek used to have quite a range of participles, including a past active participle (English only has a past passive participle: "the written letter" means the letter that was written (by someone); Ancient Greek would have one for "the ... man" that means "the man who had written (something)") and future participles ("the letter which will be written", "the man who will write").
You will need to learn these words if ever intending to study Greek in Greece.
Totally agree. Our teachers were explaining the grammar using these words. Really happy to find them here!
Duo lingo is great and I love it, but I see no point in trying to learn these specialised kind of words at this stage of the course. We are still very much at a beginners level and not likely to talk about conjugations and adverbs in Greek yet, probably never!
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This set of lessons is in completely the wrong place. It should be at least half way through the classes. We teach this grammar to 10 year olds, not 3 year olds. We are currently at toddler learning level in greek. Not my favourite duolingo course, sadly, despite happily studying classical greek 30 years ago.
To me this is real world experience that is kind of hard, but useful. Because often I come across unknown Greek words that are large and ponderous, that have to be figured out, pronounced, and memorized. The more I practice in the section, I realize I am getting skills that I can use right now. I thought I would have to wait a long time to be able to use the Greek that I'm learning. Thanks for including some sections that are more helpful to people who study in fields which use complicated Greek terminology, or terms which derived from Greek.
It's from Latin and means "share in" or participate. It's a corollary to Greek μετοχή, which refers to an act of sharing and taking part in (ancient Gk, including Septuagint). It's another instance in which Latin and Gk etymology helps in understanding vocab. It's a good question.
