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Introduction to
Basque
by
Alan R. King
©Alan King, 1997
All Rights Reserved
ii
Preface
The idea of publishing this
Introduction
came from several directions simultaneously, and it
is hoped that it will fill a certain void in a useful manner. I have not set out to write this
collection of materials from scratch, but have been content to draw from, and even reproduce,
selected passages and resources most of which I have published elsewhere previously in a
variety of places. I have endeavoured to make it clear in each case where I am recycling the
material from, and the interested reader is encouraged to refer to the original sources for fuller
information. Evidently, such a collection needn’t be read from one end to the other in the
order presented, and no chapter is a ‘prerequisite’ for reading any other.
Chapter 1
(
Frequently Asked Questions
)
has been newly written, and a similar item
is simultaneously being added to my website. The questions are authentic ones representative
of frequent queries I receive about the Basque language from a variety of people: how can I
learn Basque? where does Basque come from? and so on. While in principle I am happy to
hear from anyone with an interest in the subject, the same questions do tend to get asked
again and again, and since my time, like everyone else’s, is limited, these FAQ may help to
cut corners in the future.
Chapter 2
(
The Basque Language Today
)
is a compilation of some general facts
and information about present-day ‘social’ aspects of the language’s existence, ranging from
the country’s geography and recent political background to Basque-language media and the
contemporary music and fiesta scene. You can also find out what Basques think of foreigners
who try to speak their language, and there is a brief sketch of the present sociolinguistic
situation. This material derives from information given in
Colloquial Basque
, a language
course recently published by Begotxu Olaizola and myself, except for the sociolinguistic
section which was originally an appendix in my Ph.D. dissertation.
Chapter 3
(Getting Started
)
will lead you by the hand while allowing you to
confront your first Basque dialogue. The point here is not to learn to speak Basque in half an
hour, but just to provide a first foretaste of what this language is like. This is actually an
excerpt from my larger-scale Basque course, called
The Basque Language: A Practical
Introduction
.
Chapter 4
(
Grammatical Sketch
)
will be the meal’s main course for those with a
strong stomach for such fare, while others may well prefer to save it for reference use or just
skip it altogether. It doesn’t contain everything there is to be known about Basque grammar,
since that wouldn’t fit into twenty pages (and wouldn’t be very readable if it did!), but I dare
say it will serve to put those interested in the picture regarding the languages overall
grammatical ground pattern. Those looking for more detailed information than can be offered
here will be ready to dive into something more substantial afterwards. The better part of this
chapter is actually a very abbreviated version of a section of
The Basque Language.
Chapter 5
(
Communicative Basque
)
gives another view of the language, to be taken
on its own or in conjunction with the grammatical sketch. It consists of some very
commonplace conversational Basque sentence patterns organized according to the
communicative functions they are typically used to realize; both the organization and the
examples have been culled from my Basque Threshold Level book,
Atalase Maila
. Naturally,
there is some variation between Basque dialects regarding the precise form of the most
common phrases. Since such variation could not be accommodated within the present modest
scope, I have opted for a bias towards one dialect, the Gipuzkoan, which is in any case very
widely understood in most places these days.
Chapter 6
(
Basic Vocabulary
)
is arranged by subject and has also been derived from
the Basque Threshold Level.
There is nothing like a good old piece of text with its translation and, if possible,
accompanying notes to provide the weathered field linguist with a rough-and-ready first
picture of an unfamiliar language, and I have catered to this need, within the limited space
available, in Chapter 7
(
Sample Texts
)
. I have opted for two brief passages of Biblical
iii
narrative, using the recent and excellently translated Basque Bible. There are of course
arguments for and against using biblical passages for such purposes; while aware of both, it
seems to me that this remains a useful exercise; besides, I can vouch for the idiomatic, well-
written nature of this particular translation, which reflects the best of modern literary Basque
style at the present time. For the first passage I have chosen a personal favourite, the
Forbidden Fruit story at the beginning of Genesis. Following a hallowed tradition, I include as
the second and last passage part of the Prodigal Son parable from Luke.
In Chapter 8
(
Further Reading
)
I end with a few pointers for those who do not wish
to stop here. It is not my objective to offer a heavyweight bibliography, so please do not
expect to find one! This is, after all, merely an Introduction.
May many appetites be whetted! For those which are, I remain open to further
discussion, comments and queries via my email address (alanking@bigfoot.com) or website
(http://www.eirelink.com/alanking/).
On egin!
Alan R. King
Zarautz, 1997
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1. Frequently Asked Questions
Chapter 2. The Basque Language Today
Chapter 3. Getting Started
Chapter 4. Grammatical Sketch
Chapter 5. Communicative Basque
Chapter 6. Basic Vocabulary
Chapter 7. Sample Texts
Chapter 8. Further Reading
2
Chapter 1
Frequently Asked Questions*
Questions about learning Basque
Is Basque grammar difficult? Is it unlike anything else?
Sound like simple questions, don’t they? Yet actually a conscientious linguist can
give no simple answer.
Define difficult. Have you successfully learnt a foreign language before, and if
so, would you say it was difficult? My own opinion is that really learning
any
language is hard work. Some people nevertheless enjoy the adventure.
But is Basque
more
difficult than other languages to learn? That again
depends on which other languages you’re comparing with, and what you know before
you learn them. Generalizing, learning any Indo-European language of Europe (i.e.
almost any European language except for Basque, Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian,
Maltese or Turkish — etc., depending on how we’re defining Europe, of course) is
easy
if you already know another European language, as you probably do if you’re
reading this, and even easier still if you know more than one, as compared to learning,
say, a language from another continent. This is because European languages are pretty
similar to each other, in global terms, and also because they have a great many words,
phrases, and even grammatical devices in common.
Basque is an exception in this sense, at least to some extent. The reason is that
it is not related to all those other European languages, which unlike Basque belong to
a single language family called Indo-European. Basque is different, and different is
usually harder to learn.
So how different
is
Basque? Well actually, once we accept the basic fact that
it is a completely different kind of language from its Indo-European neighbours, it has
to be said that it does share
some
things with these. Not surprising, given that they
have been in close contact for millennia. But still, if you want a short answer: yes, it’s
pretty different.
Could you please advise me on a good beginning textbook and where to buy it
and a good source for tapes for pronunciation?
This is slightly embarassing, but the only books I can recommend at present were all
written by me. There are two to choose between: (a)
A Basque Course: A Practical
Introduction
by Alan R.. King, published by the University of Nevada Press (Reno,
Las Vegas and London), 1994; (b)
Colloquial Basque: A Complete Language Course
by Alan R. King & Begotxu Olaizola Elordi, published by Routledge (London and
New York), 1996.
Colloquial Basque
can be bought on its own or with two
accompanying 60-minute cassettes. There are no tapes to accompany
A Basque
Course
.
Where you can buy them will depend on where you are. It would be nice to
say ‘available in all good bookshops’ (if your British, or ‘bookstores’ if American).
Colloquial
is the better distributed of the two. Ridiculously (not my fault, I’m only the
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