Summer Language Intensives

[newenglandshawn]

Is anyone aware of any summer intensive courses offered in the Boston area (BC, BU, Brandeis, HDS, GCTS) that are in the cognate languages - like Akkadian, Ugaritic, Aramaic, etc? I see that HDS does Hebrew, but it doesn't seem to offer any in the cognates.

[la sarar]

Is anyone aware of any summer intensive courses offered in the Boston area (BC, BU, Brandeis, HDS, GCTS) that are in the cognate languages - like Akkadian, Ugaritic, Aramaic, etc? I see that HDS does Hebrew, but it doesn't seem to offer any in the cognates.

 

Hi I'm taking 2nd year Akkadian and Ugaritic at Harvard. They are offered not by HDS but NELC, so technically not affiliated to the Div. School at all. Besides, there are only three of us in the Akkadian class and 2 of us in the Ugaritic class, so as you can imagine, I guess there is no motivation for the school to open a summer language program in these rare languages (rare compared with Greek, Hebrew, German, French, Latin and other modern languages).

How about the BTI?

Edited January 25, 2013 by ofekmei

[newenglandshawn]

... I guess there is no motivation for the school to open a summer language program in these rare languages (rare compared with Greek, Hebrew, German, French, Latin and other modern languages).

How about the BTI?

 

Very true! Not sure about the BTI, which is why I was asking on here. I know that at GCTS, at least, they offer these languages only once every two or three years, so I'm sure it would not be during the summer.

[11Q13]

yeah my Syriac class at Harvard had 6 students, and that was pretty big!

I'm convinced summer intensives are the best way to learn languages but you won't find any of those. Do you have all your modern research languages? HDS offers French, German and Spanish for reading in the summer

[sacklunch]

The only one that comes to mind is BU, at least in the last two years, offered an introduction to middle Egyptian.

 

And yes, there are not enough folks interested. Here at Duke I think we have like 7-8 in our Syriac course. Aramaic I took at BC had like 6 of us. 

[stammer]

Anyone know of good intensive summer programs for south asian languages? with funding?

 

I am aware of CLS, AIIS and UW Madison's programs

[DivSkool]

Anyone know of good intensive summer programs for south asian languages? with funding?

 

I am aware of CLS, AIIS and UW Madison's programs

 

In terms of South Asian languages, that's pretty much it.  CLS and AIIS are in effect the same thing - the CLS scholarship simply provides you with the funds to go to one of AIIS' many programs.  I've actually done all of the programs you mention so just PM me if you want more specific info.

[indefiniteintegral]

Hopefully heading into an M.Div. program in the Fall. Plan to concentrate on ethics (Christian and others). Have zero language experience except for Spanish in high school.

German during the summer sound like the best course of action?

[sacklunch]

Hopefully heading into an M.Div. program in the Fall. Plan to concentrate on ethics (Christian and others). Have zero language experience except for Spanish in high school.

German during the summer sound like the best course of action?

 

Depends. If you want to get into a top doctoral program you may want to just begin taking German early. Depending on how important it is for your field, a couple years may be useful (maybe even three years, if you could fit it in).

[indefiniteintegral]

Depends. If you want to get into a top doctoral program you may want to just begin taking German early. Depending on how important it is for your field, a couple years may be useful (maybe even three years, if you could fit it in).

Top PhD program is certainly in the plans. By "German during the summer," I meant starting the summer before I start an M.Div. program. During my three years, try to fit in French too?

[sacklunch]

Top PhD program is certainly in the plans. By "German during the summer," I meant starting the summer before I start an M.Div. program. During my three years, try to fit in French too?

Again it depends on your interests. Since you're not in bible, I wouldn't worry too much about cramming everything in; but still, it remains that most of the applicants to top schools are going to have a lot of language work (even in ethics, I think). I would plan on having both German and French under your belt, and honestly those summer intensive classes are just not enough. I think you would need at least a year of 'intensive' reading in order to actually gain some sort of ability. Sadly most schools only offer a one semester intensive course (except Harvard and Yale, the former offering I think like two full years of intensive reading....jealous). Depending on your area of ethics, you may be required to add other languages, like Latin, Greek, et cetera. 

 

cheers

[indefiniteintegral]

Again it depends on your interests. Since you're not in bible, I wouldn't worry too much about cramming everything in; but still, it remains that most of the applicants to top schools are going to have a lot of language work (even in ethics, I think). I would plan on having both German and French under your belt, and honestly those summer intensive classes are just not enough. I think you would need at least a year of 'intensive' reading in order to actually gain some sort of ability. Sadly most schools only offer a one semester intensive course (except Harvard and Yale, the former offering I think like two full years of intensive reading....jealous). Depending on your area of ethics, you may be required to add other languages, like Latin, Greek, et cetera. 

 

cheers

Thanks! Haha, I guess I still wasn't being quite clear. I meant German the summer before I start and continue it throughout the MDiv program.

[Seatbelt Blue]

I believe students in any of the BTI schools can take language classes at any other member school, so a student could take year-long intensives at Harvard if they needed to. That's sort of my plan at present.

[sacklunch]

I believe students in any of the BTI schools can take language classes at any other member school, so a student could take year-long intensives at Harvard if they needed to. That's sort of my plan at present.

 

It's true. Def. take advantage of the BTI (I did) while you're at BC. Also, instead of looking at the BTI website look at the actual school's list of courses. There was a class I took at HDS, for instance, that wasn't on the BTI website. For whatever reason the professor didn't have it added to the BTI, but wasn't opposed to outsiders joining in. So I emailed him, he emailed HDS' registrar and they easily added it to the BTI list and it was easy enough for me to register. This will give you access to literally hundreds of courses and truly is the major benefit of attending a BTI school over any other theological school in the country (IMO). A good friend from BC is now at ND and always complains that there (ND) just isn't enough courses available. This is never the case in Boston!

 

cheers

Edited February 8, 2013 by jdmhotness

[cadences]

I know this is coming a year late into the conversation, but I have been scouring the web for schools that offer ANE languages during the summer too, and I finally found one that does it regularly - Seventh-Day Adventist Theological Seminary.* I've even managed to find a syllabus that's dated 2006, so they've been doing this for quite some time now. I just thought I'd share my findings, especially since I can't make it for their upcoming Ugaritic class - the dates just won't work for me, which is a real bummer :S

 

Ah well. At least someone else can benefit from my Googling, hopefully.

 

*It's part of Andrews University, and it's also ATS-accredited.

[newenglandshawn]

 I finally found one that does it regularly - Seventh-Day Adventist Theological Seminary.* . . . .

 

*It's part of Andrews University, and it's also ATS-accredited.

 

This is a little ironic because that is my alma mater (ironic because I had forgotten that I was the one who started this thread). I, of course, will vouch for its reputation and quality. I'm guessing that Roy Gane is the one who teaches many of the ANE languages? He did his work at UC Berkeley under Jacob Milgrom and is considered to be one of the leading scholars on the book of Leviticus.

 

Unfortunately, Andrews is in Michigan, and I am in New England!

Edited January 14, 2014 by newenglandshawn

[cadences]

This is a little ironic because that is my alma mater (ironic because I had forgotten that I was the one who started this thread). I, of course, will vouch for its reputation and quality. I'm guessing that Roy Gane is the one who teaches many of the ANE languages? He did his work at UC Berkeley under Jacob Milgrom and is considered to be one of the leading scholars on the book of Leviticus.

 

Unfortunately, Andrews is in Michigan, and I am in New England!

 

Yup, it's Roy Gane doing the teaching. Ah well, there's always a spanner in the works in one way or another, isn't there? I'm up in the Northeast too, but I can travel down...just that the dates won't work out. Bah.