Class is still going well. Today we finally got the “Menorah” chart. Hebrew has seven groups of verbs, and this chart is laid out like a menorah, with seven branches. The three active verb building blocks on the right (pa’al, piel, um, I forgot the third) correspond to the three passive verb building blocks on the left, and the middle one (hitpa’el, maybe?) is used to construct active reflexive verbs. *grin* Nice, eh?
We also learned more explicitly how to use the preposition “et”. English does not have an equivalent preposition, so in my smattering of studies before this I have had a hard time understanding how to use it. But our professor was very clear. “Et”, pronounced like the end of the English word “get”, is required between a verb and a noun wherein the noun is definite or proper. That is, it is a proper noun (name), or has a definite article or deictic word (the letter “he” that translates as the English word “the”, or followed by “ha-ze” that translates as the English word “that”).
So: I go to et the store. I am going to a store. I am going to et Jerusalem. I know et Joe Smith. I know a person. I like dogs. I like et that dog. I go to school. I go to et Haifa University.
I love learning grammatical structures and such in other languages that English doesn't have. :-)
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