[NABS-L] Hebrew and Greek?

[Justin Heard]

Hi there.

I studied Ancient Greek for five semesters. For all your transcription 
needs and help, contact Sara Blake Larose. Here is her email.

sarah at sarahblakelarose.com

I don't think it's any more visual than any other language. Your 
professor probably thinks its visual because it uses the Greek alphabet 
instead of the Latin one. Beyond that, s/he is probably worried about 
the charts and paradigms that they use, but Sara or another transcriber 
can make those in a table format for you. Both of my universities paid 
for it, but if they refuse for some reason, talk to her and she will 
work it out with you.

Just make sure you have double time on any evaluations. It will most 
likely take you longer to do the assignments, not because Greek will be 
harder for you, but navigating between the charts, the text your 
reading, and looking up vocab words I think is harder for us. There's 
just a lot to juggle. Sighted people have to do this too, but they can 
more easily browse dictionaries by flipping through pages. Unless you 
get everything in hardcopy braille, which I don't recommend, you'll 
either have to browse through .brf files, or use an online dictionary. 
With an online dictionary, you have to type in a word in the format that 
it wants, which I never figured out. I depended on websites like Perseus 
and TLG. Both had the texts that I was reading, and I could click on a 
word to look it up. Perseus, though, is less dependable with definitions 
than TLG. Additionally, some professors won't let students use Perseus 
and TLG on exams because they both provide grammatical information, 
which kind of defeats the point.

Sighted people also have a easier time browsing charts because they can 
travel straight down the column. Because these are .brf files, there's 
not an easy way to do that. There are jaws scripts that allow you to 
read Ancient Greek on the computer with a braille display, which makes 
navigating charts easier, but I liked using the .brf charts better, 
despite the fact that they were slower. If you know computer braille, or 
can pick up a few easy tricks like I had to do, then it makes searching 
through .brf files in notepad on your computer. Why would you read them 
on your computer and not a braille display? Because if you're using 
Perseus or TLG, or your professor didn't send the assignment off in time 
for it to be transcribed, then it ends up being a hybrid situation.

If your professors send you digital Greek assignments, they cannot send 
you scanned files. As of now, no screenreader recognizes Ancient Greek 
with OCR. they have to be typed out. I never had a professor send me 
scanned Greek, but I did warn them ahead of time so maybe that's why.

You do have some advantages over your sighted peers. Because UEB braille 
relies on the Latin alphabet, the Greek alphabet translates more easily. 
For example, the a symbol is alpha, b for beta, k for kappa, etc. The 
tricky part is accents. All of Ancient Greek braille is uncontracted, so 
the contractions serve as accents, or in some cases letters. For 
example, the th sign is for theta. Your class will spend maybe a week on 
the alphabet, and most students will still be looking at charts for a 
couple weeks after that. It took me about three days to get it. The 
accents were trickier for me than they were for my sighted peers, but it 
still didn't take me long.

I hope this is helpful. Sara is around to answer questions, even if she 
can't help transcribe for some reason. You can always reach out to me if 
you have questions or need help. Or if you just want to rant. Trust me, 
Greek will probably make you angry, frustrated, and you might ask 
yourself if it's really worth it. You might have weeks where you want to 
throw it all a way, or have panic attacks. Luckily, it's not because 
your a blind person learning Greek. It's because Greek is hard, and your 
sighted peers will be having the same experiences. I did my best in 
Greek when I partnered up with a sighted person, and when we 
complemented each other. Where I was weak, she was strong, and vice 
versa. We could also look up things faster that way. I often focused on 
grammar and she would look up vocab. Hopefully, you can find a good 
partner.

I hope this helps. I know this probably wasn't comforting, but you're 
taking Greek, so you must be okay with discomfort.




On 3/18/2022 4:26 PM, Mike Gilmore via NABS-L wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> I'm writing to see if there's anyone on the listserv who have or are currently taking Hebrew and/or Greek at a Bible college or seminary. I've spoken with a former seminary professor who told me the languages are very visual. How visual are they? What types of accommodations have you requested and gotten for these classes? Any recommendations and suggestions about how I can successfully take these courses and do well would be very much appreciated. I know there's a way; I just have to figure out how as I did with Logic a few years ago.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Mike
>
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