RE: What is a Greek Sentence?

From: Clayton Bartholomew (c.s.bartholomew@worldnet.att.net)
Date: Wed Jun 04 1997 - 07:42:05 EDT


Professor Conrad Wrote:

>>>>>>>>>
 . . .it's
always seemed to me that the unit of discourse in written Greek (even
granting that ancient Greek was written to be spoken and heard, not read
silently) is what we call the PARAGRAPH, a grouping of clauses that has an organic unity
wherein the interrelationship of the clauses, however complex, is nevertheless
perspicuous . . .
>>>>>>>>>

Carl has pinpointed exactly what I am trying to get at. If I were describing the levels of
discourse in K. Greek I would jump from *clause* to *paragraph* and just forget about
*sentence* altogether. I am starting to question whether the concept of *sentence* is
useful for discourse analysis.

*******************

Off the subject.

A minor note of clarification. Now that I understand what elliptical means, it is not related
in any way to self referencing or recursive. Elliptical simply means that the subject or
some other component of a subordinate clause is not explicitly stated. Correct?

Self referencing or recursive is a characteristic of clauses where one clause is embedded
in another clause. The structural definition of a K. Greek clause is self referencing
because the definition includes the term *clause*. This indicates that a clause can contain
clauses down to N levels. Jonathan and Andrew should understand this terminology.

Clay Bartholomew
Three Tree Point



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