Course Description
Study in Hebrew grammar with attention to its historical development and dialects and to its structural relations with other Semitic languages. Focuses may include comparison to Arabic, Aramaic, Phoenician and Punic, Ethiopic, and Akkadian. No prior knowledge assumed.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Undergraduate evaluation in the course will be examination-based. Graduate students will, in addition to examinations, be required to write a (10-15 pp) research paper on an aspect of historical evolution: either the date of a significant change to the morphology or a discussion of the nature of a significant evolution in the semiosis of a morphological or syntactic arrangement, in light of the professional literature on the subject.
Athena Title
Hebrew Essentials
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
Systematic Hebrew grammar in concentrated form, exploring structural similarities to and differences with other Semitic languages, especially the Northwest Semitic group (Phoenician, Aramaic, Punic, Canaanite, Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite). Examination of the effects of, and linguistic influences on, Hebrew as an artificially-revived spoken daily language in the 20th century. Examination of the pre-modern embedment of Hebrew in devotional contexts and literatures. Overview of linguistic evolution in its historical and comparative dimensions. Assessing language registers, innovation and conservatism, contact and infra-Hebrew dialectal change, as from classical (older Biblical) to Second-Temple, to Middle Hebrew and medieval, and into the revival of Hebrew in the modern era. Attention is devoted for historical and comparative purposes to parallel developments in a variety of Hebrew and Semitic dialects and languages. Intended to serve students both of Historical Linguistics and of Modern and/or Biblical Hebrew, the latter as an intensive introduction to the structure of the language.
Topical Outline
1. Modern Hebrew grammar verbal system nominal system particles and prepositions syntax phonology 2. Hebrew in its linguistic matrix general Semitic language structure (East, North Semitic) Northwest Semitic languages phonology degrees of interference in non-Hebrew Jewish languages 3. Development of Hebrew historically pre-Classical Biblical Hebrew and Northwest Semitic Late Biblical Hebrew Early rabbinic Hebrew Middle Hebrew dialects Modern Hebrew dialects 4. Conventions of language registers in Hebrew Epigraphs and literature from the Classical period Epigraphs and literature from the Intertestamental period Epigraphs and literature from Middle Hebrew Modern epistolography, literature, graffiti, and conversation 5. History of Hebrew orthography