Learn how to use gentile nouns
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Becky: Hello everyone and welcome back to GreekPod101.com. This is Lower Intermediate, Season 1, lesson 9, A Multicultural Greek City. I’m Becky. |
| Stefania: And I’m Stefania. |
| Becky: In this lesson, you’ll learn more about word formation in Greek, with a focus on gentile nouns. |
| Stefania: The conversation takes place at Monastiráki square, in the center of Athens. |
| Becky: It is between Antonia and Vasilis. |
| Stefania: The characters know each other well, so they’re using informal Greek. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Αντωνία: Πού θα αφήσεις το μηχανάκι; |
| Βασίλης: Έλεγα κοντά στην πλατεία. |
| Αντωνία: Από εκεί που είναι οι πάγκοι με τους Αφρικανούς μικροπωλητές; |
| Βασίλης: Ναι, δίπλα. Ρε παιδί μου, τόσα χρόνια ζουν αυτοί οι άνθρωποι στην Ελλάδα και ακόμα εντυπωσιάζομαι! |
| Αντωνία: Τι εννοείς; |
| Βασίλης: Θέλω να πω, ότι όταν είχα πάει για πρώτη φορά στην Ευρώπη, πριν από είκοσι χρόνια, έβλεπα όλους αυτούς τους πολιτισμούς μαζί και έλεγα «αυτό δεν θα γίνει ποτέ στην Ελλάδα». Και όμως έγινε τελικά! |
| Αντωνία: Έχεις δίκιο, το έχω σκεφτεί κι εγώ. |
| Βασίλης: Και τώρα είμαστε στο Μοναστηράκι, στην καρδιά της Αθήνας και βλέπεις δίπλα-δίπλα Κενυάτες, Κογκολέζους, Αλγερινούς, Αιγύπτιους, Πακιστανούς συν τους Βαλκάνιους και τους Ανατολικοευρωπαίους. Εκπληκτικό! |
| Αντωνία: Και αν προσθέσεις και τους τουρίστες, το πράγμα γίνεται ακόμα πιο πολύχρωμο! |
| Βασίλης: Ναι, ναι! Βάλε και αυτούς τους Περουβιανούς που παίζουν μουσική εκεί πέρα! Έχουμε γίνει εντελώς μούλτι-κούλτι! |
| Αντωνία: Είδες; Δεν έχεις λόγο να μένεις στο εξωτερικό! |
| Βασίλης: Πράγματι! |
| Antonia: Where are you going to leave the motorbike? |
| Vasilis: I was thinking near the square. |
| Antonia: Near the stands with the African street vendors? |
| Vasilis: Yeah, right next to them. You know, all these years that these people have been living in Greece and I still get impressed! |
| Antonia: What do you mean? |
| Vasilis: I mean, when I first went to Europe, twenty years ago, I saw all these cultures mixed together and I used to think "this will never happen in Greece." But finally it did! |
| Antonia: You're right. I've thought of that too. |
| Vasilis: And now we are in Monastiraki, in the heart of Athens and you can see Kenyans living alongside Congolese, Algerians, Egyptians and Pakistanis, not to mention people from the Balkans and the Eastern Europeans. It's amazing! |
| Antonia: Add the tourists and it becomes even more colorful! |
| Vasilis: Right, right! Add also those Peruvians playing music down there! We have turned completely cosmopolitan! |
| Antonia: See? You have no reason to stay abroad! |
| Vasilis: Indeed! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Becky: So Greek society has become multicultural? |
| Stefania: It’s getting there! The truth is that there are many foreigners living in Greece today. |
| Becky: How many? |
| Stefania: Around 10% of the population. |
| Becky: Well, that’s not so many – compared to, say, the US. |
| Stefania: No. But it is a rather new phenomenon in Greece. It has happened within the last 10 years or so. |
| Becky: I see. That must be interesting. |
| Stefania: Oh it is! It just takes time for people to get accustomed to so many different attitudes and lifestyles. |
| Becky: I think it will work out in the end. This is how it happened pretty much everywhere. |
| Stefania: I agree. But in the meantime, shall we move on? |
| Becky: Sure. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Becky: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| Stefania: πλατεία [natural native speed] |
| Becky: plaza, square |
| Stefania: πλατεία [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: πλατεία [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: πάγκος [natural native speed] |
| Becky: bench, stand |
| Stefania: πάγκος [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: πάγκος [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: δίπλα [natural native speed] |
| Becky: next to |
| Stefania: δίπλα [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: δίπλα [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: εννοώ [natural native speed] |
| Becky: to mean |
| Stefania: εννοώ [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: εννοώ [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: πολιτισμός [natural native speed] |
| Becky: civilization, culture |
| Stefania: πολιτισμός [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: πολιτισμός [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: τελικά [natural native speed] |
| Becky: finally |
| Stefania: τελικά [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: τελικά [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: σκέφτομαι [natural native speed] |
| Becky: to think |
| Stefania: σκέφτομαι [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: σκέφτομαι [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: λόγος [natural native speed] |
| Becky: reason, speech, word |
| Stefania: λόγος [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: λόγος [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: εξωτερικό [natural native speed] |
| Becky: abroad |
| Stefania: εξωτερικό [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: εξωτερικό [natural native speed] |
| Stefania: πράγματι [natural native speed] |
| Becky: indeed, it is true |
| Stefania: πράγματι [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Stefania: πράγματι [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Becky: Let's have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Stefania: First up is the masculine noun “πολιτισμός” |
| Becky: Meaning “culture”, right? |
| Stefania: Yes. But it also means “civilization” as in our sample sentence “Ο πολιτισμός της αρχαίας Ελλάδας ήταν πολύ εξελιγμένος για την εποχή του.” |
| Becky: “The civilization of ancient Greece was very advanced for its time.” |
| Stefania: Exactly! It is used interchangeably. |
| Becky: And how do you know which is which? Context? |
| Stefania: Yes. |
| Becky: I see. What else? |
| Stefania: We have the verb “εννοώ”. |
| Becky: Meaning? |
| Stefania: Actually, it has two uses. One, is just like in our dialogue and sample sentence “Με συγχωρείς, δεν το εννοούσα.”, meaning “to mean”... |
| Becky: ...which translates to “I am sorry, I didn’t mean to.” |
| Stefania: Yes! The second use is when we have the verb in the third person singular of passive voice, as “εννοείται”, which by itself only means “of course” or “obviously”. For example: “Εννοείται πως θα τελειώσω το πανεπιστήμιο!” |
| Becky: Which means “Of course I will finish university!” Got it! And our next word? |
| Stefania: The masculine noun “λόγος” which has various meanings. |
| Becky: First it means “reason”. Let’s take an example. |
| Stefania: “Δεν υπάρχει λόγος να θυμώνεις.” |
| Becky: “There is no reason for you to get angry.” |
| Stefania: But it can also mean “speech”. Let’s see this sentence: “Ο λόγος του προέδρου ήταν συγκινητικός” |
| Becky: “The president’s speech was heartwarming”. To get more detailed information, you should definitely check the lesson notes. Now let’s move on to the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Becky: In this lesson, you will learn about gentile nouns in Greek. |
| Stefania: Yes. One more category of derivative words actually. |
| Becky: What is this category called, again? |
| Stefania: Gentiles. |
| Becky: I don’t quite get it. What are gentiles? I thought the word meant “not Jewish”! |
| Stefania: It does mean that too! But in linguistic terms, it means “nationality” or “local origins”. |
| Becky: I see. So “Jewish” is not a gentile, but “Israelite” is. |
| Stefania: Right! The words “Greek”, “American”, “Californian”, “New Yorker” are all gentiles. |
| Becky: And is there a specific way to create them in Greek? |
| Stefania: Several, actually. But the same happens in English, doesn’t it? |
| Becky: Does it? |
| Stefania: Yes! You say “Ameri-can” or “Cana-di-an” but we also say “Greek” and “New York-er”. |
| Becky: Different suffixes, you mean. |
| Stefania: Exactly! The same happens in Greek too. Gentiles are derivatives so, as we said in our previous lessons… |
| Becky: …they are created by combining the root word, or part of it, with a suffix. |
| Stefania: Right! Here, the root word is the name of the place and we add various suffixes. |
| Becky: Various? As in “many”? |
| Stefania: Actually, yes. But as usual, listeners can find them in a very handy table in our lesson notes along with corresponding examples and useful information! |
| Becky: Now let’s see a couple of examples. |
| Stefania: Certainly. We have “America”, right? In Greek, it is “Αμερική”, which is quite close. |
| Becky: Right! So the stem is… |
| Stefania: “Αμερικ-“ and we add the suffix “-άνος” for the masculine) and “-άνα” or “-ίδα” for feminine. So we have “Αμερικάνος” and “Αμερικάνα” or “Αμερικανίδα”. |
| Becky: Two suffixes for the feminine? |
| Stefania: Sometimes this is the case, but not always, so don’t worry! |
| Becky: Pheww! You had me worried there for a moment! |
| Stefania: Take “English” for example, the place is “Αγγλία”, right? |
| Becky: Yes. And the stem is… |
| Stefania: “Αγγλ-“. To which we add “-ος” and “-ίδα” as we mentioned before. |
| Becky: And we have… |
| Stefania: Άγγλος and Αγγλίδα, “Englishman” and “Englishwoman.” |
| Becky: Yes, it doesn’t sound that hard after all. |
| Stefania: It isn’t. The only problem is getting acquainted with the various suffixes, but this comes with time. |
| MARKETING PIECE |
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| Becky: Not enough time. |
| Stefania: You’re very busy. |
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Outro |
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| Becky: That’s all for this lesson, everyone! Remember, you can always leave us comments and questions on the lesson page. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next time. |
| Stefania: Γεια χαρά! |
| Becky: Bye! |
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