Passing it on from emidala...

[darcydodo]

BLOGGERS! Enter for a chance to win a free book! Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece by Debra Hamel Neaira (pronounced "neh-EYE-ruh") grew up in a brothel in Corinth in the early fourth century B.C. and became one of the city-state's higher-priced courtesans while still a teenager. Read about her life as a prostitute and about the larger world of fourth-century Athens in which her drama played itself out. A "gripping story of politics, sex and sleaze in ancient Athens...." --The Sunday Telegraph amazon | more information | Bloggers! Enter to win a free book! (drawing 8/1/04)

Comments

[kwokj.livejournal.com]

Interesting... The Toronto Public Library system only has one copy and it looks like it's only for in library use :(

[darcydodo]

The actual speech that it's based on is one of the most common for students to read while they're learning Greek. If you're at all curious, it's by Demosthenes—"Against Neaira."

[greenelephant.livejournal.com]

...is one of the most common for students to read while they're learning Greek

Really?! I can't say I know anyone who has read it. Strange (must be a regional thing)

[darcydodo]

Well, it (or at least an adaptation of it) is in the JACT books. So anyone who uses those is going to encounter it.

Oh, did you like the pictures of Ahmed's? :)

[greenelephant.livejournal.com]

Do many people use JACT over here? Everyone I know uses H&Q, Athenaze, Mastronarde or (in Canada) Alpha to Omega. Interesting.

Oh, did you like the pictures of Ahmed's? :)
YES! They're so cute (Ahmed and Aziz). Makes me awfully nostalgic, and I was only there for a few months!

[darcydodo]

Do many people use JACT over here?

Maybe it's dying out, I don't know. We used Athenaze in high school (it's my favorite, so far), but our teacher brought in JACT stuff for the last couple of years. I think they use JACT at UCLA, or at least used to, 'cause they sold it in the bookstore there. Maybe I'm just completely confused, but I've definitely got the impression that lots of people use it. Maybe they did in England, and it's warping my brain.

[pseudomonas.livejournal.com]

I used Athenaze, and I've a vague idea that livredor did as well, though I may be thinking of New A.

[liv]

No, though my brothers did. My textbook was something from my teacher's schooldays, I think the editor was a guy called Ritchie but I could be wrong.

JACT, how I loathe you.

[wageslave.livejournal.com]

I was originally "taught" Greek from JACT, but found it to be pretty much worthless. The text's philosophy -- presenting Greek in a way that gets you reading right off the bat without having to immediately memporize a whole bunch of verb and noun paradigms -- is something that I can get behind in theory (it's my experience that many students become frustrated with the slow progress of a non-intensive memorization-based system) this text doesn't really deliver a sensical alternative to the paradigm system. Among its major faults: the desire to treat every instance of irregularity in nouns as if it constituted its own declension (by the middle of the book you need to be able to remember at least ten variants of the first declension identified by a letter following the number -- 1a, 1b, etc.); the witholding of the genitive until the middle of the text, at which point they are presented "sub-declension" by "sub-declension" in a chart which spans two full pages; the with holding of the dative until the following chapter at which point the student is greeted with a similar chart; a table of contents which does not include the material covered in each chapter (If you want to review the uses of genitive absolute, you'd better remember if that was presented in "Unit 6" or "Unit 8" since this is as descriptive as the contents page ever gets). The only good thing about the book is its cover illustration -- an ancient woman (possibly Athena, I forget) looking quizzically at a wax tablet -- it seems that not even she can divine why the editors chose to organize their book so poorly.

Incidentally, Debra Hamel, author of the book listed above, taught the second half of that course. She hadn't been involved in selection of the text and spent the entire semester poking fun at it and bringing us photocopies from Mastronarde's text. (Also, she's a big Buffy fan.)

In the end I had to spend the following summer teaching myself Greek, first from the Groton text, and then again from H&Q.

Re: JACT, how I loathe you.

[darcydodo]

I agree that JACT is loathsome. I just thought its use was much more widely spread than it apparently actually is. But I really like Athenaze, and if we didn't have Mastronarde here, I'd toy with the idea of asking that we use it.

[gelliaclodiana]

I was taught Greek (in high school) on JACT and still have awful Neaira-related flashbacks. No wonder I don't like social history...

[greenelephant.livejournal.com]

You had Greek in high school?! Lucky you. Sorry about the Neaira flashbacks, though. I feel icky when I think of Athenaze, since my professor came to class most days, and there were students opening the book and all, but somehow I didn't manage to learn anything in three semesters with that book. Yuck.

Happily, I now get to choose which books to use :)

[darcydodo]

I'm kind of surprised that Athenaze was that evil to you, but to each her own. What's your text of choice, then?

[greenelephant.livejournal.com]

Strangely enough, I'm dying to try out your very own Mastronarde. It's what they use at UWO already, and (in theory, at least) I like his approach. Online exercises never hurt anyone either :)

Did you use the new edition of Athenaze? The main thing I dislike about it (wacko profs aside) is the half-assed way they introduce the principal parts and the moods. Grammar is better un-sugar-coated, I think. But I did quite like poor old Dicaeopolis!

[darcydodo]

I don't think it was the new edition. When did the new edition come out?

But I did quite like poor old Dicaeopolis!

I remember a girl in my carpool, who was taking Greek and was three years ahead of me, telling me that the family in Athenaze was entirely fucked up. Though I don't think I ever figured out what was wrong with Melissa. Philip going blind, though — what a hoot. ;)