Unpointed Hebrew Research Articles

Learning to Read a Semitic Abjad: The Triplex Model of Hebrew Reading Development

We introduce a model of Hebrew reading development that emphasizes both the universal and script-specific aspects of learning to read a Semitic abjad. At the universal level, the study of Hebrew reading acquisition offers valuable insights into the fundamental dilemmas of all writing systems—balancing the competing needs of the novice versus the expert reader (Share, 2008). At the script-specific level, pointed Hebrew initially employs supplementary vowel signs, providing the beginning reader a consistent, phonologically well-specified script while helping the expert-to-be unitize words and morphemes via (consonantal) spelling constancy. A major challenge for the developing Hebrew reader is negotiating the transition from pointed to unpointed Hebrew, with its abundance of homographs. Our triplex model emphasizes three phases of early Hebrew reading development: a progression from lower-order, phonological (sublexical) sequential spelling-to-sound translation (Phase 1, Grade 1) to higher-order, string-level (lexical) lexico-morpho-orthographic processing (Phase 2, Grade 2) followed, in the upper elementary grades, by a supralexical contextual level (Phase 3) essential for dealing with the pervasive homography of unpointed Hebrew.

Context effects on heterophonic-homography resolution in learning to read hebrew

The paper examines the role of context in reading unpointed Hebrew, demonstrating the changing nature of reliance on context during the course of reading acquisition. We analyze the reading-aloud of sentences with heterographic-homographic ambiguity, aiming to shed light on the development of ambiguity resolution processes in typically developing schoolaged and adult populations. 171 Hebrew-speaking children and adolescents in seven age/schooling groups (beginning and end of second grade, third, fourth, seventh, and eleventh grade), and a group of adults, participated in the study. Using homographic garden-path and non-Garden-path sentences, we demonstrate the cumulative effect of context as well as processes of monitoring cum reanalysis. Two hypotheses are borne out in the present research: First, context effect is inherent to reading; it is present throughout all age/grade groups, becoming more efficient with age/grade level. Second, monitoring and reanalysis lag far behind context effects, appearing only as age and reading experience increase.

The impact of pointing on the short-term memory (STM) of heterophonic homographs

This study entailed two short-term memory (STM) experiments investigating the importance of vowel diacritics for the temporary retention of three distinct Hebrew word list types: heterophonic homographs, non-homographs and homophonic homographs. Eighty university students participated in each experiment, with half of them tested with word lists presented in fully pointed (voweled) Hebrew and the other half given the word lists in unpointed Hebrew (with vowel diacritics removed). In Experiment 1, all stimulus materials were presented in print script. Experiment 2 was an exact replication, except that stimulus materials were in cursive Hebrew. Findings from both experiments indicated that, overall, the presence of vowel diacritics had no facilitating effect on participants’ quantitative or qualitative STM performance. In fact, when reading print script, pointing was found to be detrimental to STM recall for all three investigated word categories. Findings are discussed with respect to a dual-route reading model.

Differences in the reading of shallow and deep orthography: developmental evidence from Hebrew and Turkish readers

The present study investigates differences in the word‐reading process between individuals reading in a deep (unpointed Hebrew) and a shallow orthography (Turkish). The participants were 120 students evenly and randomly recruited from three levels of education (primary = 3rd–4th graders; middle = 6th–7th graders; high = 9th–10th graders). The students were tested with a computerised paradigm that assessed their efficiency in determining the identicalness of real word (RW) pairs and nonsense word (NW) pairs under perceptual and conceptual conditions. Based on a strong orthographic depth hypothesis, Turkish readers were hypothesised to manifest superior word‐processing skills in comparison to Hebrew readers, both for RWs and NWs. Evidence obtained from the analysis of the quantitative and qualitative performance of the participants failed to support this prediction. Findings are discussed with reference to a single‐route grain‐size‐based word‐reading model and a modified dual‐route word‐reading model.

The importance of vowel diacritics for the temporary retention of high and low frequency Hebrew words of varying syllabic length

This study investigates the importance of vowel diacritics for the retention of Hebrew word lists, with word lists being manipulated along the dimension of word frequency and syllabic length. Eighty university students participated in the study. Half of the participants (40) were tested with the word lists presented in fully-pointed (voweled) Hebrew while the other half (40) were given the word lists in unpointed Hebrew (with vowel diacritics removed). Analyses of each group's recall rates and recall-order accuracy indicate that, overall, the presence of vowel diacritics had no facilitating effect on the participants' quantitative and qualitative Short Term Memory (STM) performance. This was found to be true whether word frequency (high vs. medium to low) or syllabic length (mono vs. trisyllabic) were computed as within-subject factors. Attempts to adequately interpret the absence of a pointing effect on STM performance based upon Orthographic Depth Hypothesis (ODH) and Grain Size Theory (GST) proved unfruitful. The authors propose an adaptation of the GST to the peculiarities of Hebrew orthography and discuss a morphology-centered grain-size theory (MGST).

John Wesley's critical engagement with Hutchinsonianism 1730–1780

A study of the Hutchinsonian interests of John Wesley shows that the founder of Methodism over a long period had a recurrent engagement with this predominantly High-Church Anglican combination of Physics and Theology. The argument of this paper is that Wesley had several reasons to take an interest in Hutchinsonianism. Firstly, Wesley was dissatisfied with the systematisation of Newtonian Cosmology, in the form of Newtonianism, in its ambitions to be a scientific paradigm that tried to explain everything in its own terms. Hence Hutchinsonianism seemed to Wesley a promising alternative, and a refreshing approach to Natural Philosophy. What also interested him was the Hutchinsonian approach to biblical interpretation, heavily based on the unpointed Hebrew text of the Old Testament. By throwing into question the conventionally accepted vowel-pointing of the Old Testament text, Hutchinson and his followers had potentially opened up a rich vein for reinterpretation. While Wesley, in general, questioned a scriptural monopoly over cosmology, he was at the same time a Lockean sensationalist who believed that the human capacity to attain any kind of knowledge, let alone divine knowledge, was limited, thereby leaving an important role for the written divine revelation contained in the bible. Lastly, although Hutchinsonianism appealed mostly to certain High Church Anglicans, its attractions did extend across boundaries between different forms of Anglicanism and even to different denominations, because in many ways these different groups had common philosophical concerns in the eighteenth century. Wesley's constant evocation of Hutchinsonian teachings throughout his life, which will be illustrated through an investigation of his correspondence, journals and published works, stemmed from his struggle to negotiate his understanding of the cosmos and of the Old Testament's account of it, and from his perception that Hutchinsonian ideas represented a similar effort.

The contribution of language skills to reading fluency: A comparison of two orthographies for Hebrew

The purpose of the present study was to explore the contribution of phonological and general language skills to reading fluency of pointed and unpointed Hebrew scripts. Reading, language and memory tasks were performed by 48 fifth-grade monolingual native Hebrew speakers. Results showed that the most marked predictor for both pointed and unpointed reading texts was the morphological measure, whereas the phonological awareness measure contributed to neither of them. The semantic and syntactic measures contributed only to unpointed text reading fluency. The discussion highlights how readers in script, such as unpointed Hebrew, rely on general language skills in order to achieve fluent reading.

Processing Unpointed Hebrew: What Can We Learn from Determining the Identicalness of Monosyllabic and Bisyllabic Nouns

The aim of this study was to determine whether Hebrew readers reference phonological information for the silent processing of unpointed Hebrew nouns. A research paradigm in which participants were required to perform consecutive same/different judgments regarding the identicalness of members of stimulus pairs was used for answering this question. Twenty-eight students (mean grade 4.9) participated in the study. The nouns used in preparing the word stimulus pairs were comprised of various amounts of syllabic information (monosyllabic versus bisyllabic) and differed in the degree this information was represented by their letter graphemes. The main findings suggest that the processing of the identicalness of unpointed Hebrew words may not involve the referencing of their phonological information.

Modern Hebrew for Biblical Scholars (review)

Hebrew Studies 41 (2000) 227 Reviews various constructions is analyzed and interpreted will be of considerable interest to teachers of biblical Hebrew as well as to scholars. J. Glen Taylor Toronto School o/Theology Toronto, ON Canada jgtaylor@chass.utoronto.ca MODERN HEBREW FOR BIBLICAL SCHOLARS. By Takamitsu Muraoka. Weisbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. 1998. pp. xlv + 183. Paper. 48.00DM. This book constitutes a revised and enlarged edition of a work published by the author in 1982. The first thirty pages of the book (pp. xvi-xlv) are introductory in nature. providing an outline of modern Hebrew grammar. They focus mainly on the following topics: a) the components of modern Hebrew in terms of spelling and pronunciation; b) morphology, focusing on the diverse kinds and functions of the modern Hebrew pronoun (personal . suffixal. demonstrative. relative. reflexive. emphatic, interrogative. indefmite. and comparative). the noun, the adjective, the verb. the adverb, and the preposition; c) syntax. which includes inter alia a discussion of the nominal clause and copula. word order. modal expressions. diverse kinds of clauses (relative. circumstantial. and conditional); d) rhetorics and pragmatics. including discourse markers and abbreviations. The object of this introductory grammatical outline, the author stresses. is not meant to teach basic Hebrew grammar per se, but rather to "highlight the major differences in linguistic structure between Biblical Hebrew and Modern Hebrew as is used in a specific literary genre. namely, academic and scholarly writings." (p. xi). The heart of the book constitutes a chrestomathy of 28 texts (pp. 2-137). divided into three sections: Hebrew and Semitic linguistics (13 texts). general biblical studies (10 texts). and Palestinian archaeology (5 texts). Each text is extensively annotated. They include texts of C. Rabin. Joshua Blau, H. Yalon, E. Y. Kutscher. M. H. Goshen-Gottstein. A. Hurvitz. Z. Ben-l:Iayyim. Sh. Morag. Sh. Talmon, H. Yeivin, E. Tov, J. Gutman, Y. Kaufmann, N. H. Tur-Sinai. A. Malamat, M. Haran, U. Cassuto, J. Licht, Y. Aharoni. B. Mazar, Y. Yadin, H. Tadmor and Sh. Ahituv. and P. Artzi. The texts are extensively annotated; English transla- Hebrew Studies 41 (2000) 228 Reviews tion for only three of them is provided. The first text of each of the three sections is fully vocalized, while others are partially vocalized, the extent of the vocalization decreasing gradually. The book ends with a HebrewEnglish glossary (pp. 140-183). One wonders as to the justification for yet another book on Hebrew grammar, morphology, and syntax when numerous detailed and in-depth studies in these areas have been published by Israeli scholars in Hebrew, parts of which, as the author admits, are available in West-European languages . The author seems to have anticipated such a question on the part of readers. The main objective of this work, he rationalizes, is to meet the needs of those Hebraists, Biblical scholars and Semiticists to whom "unpointed Hebrew publications remain a terra incognita." This book, he hopes, will help make these works accessible to non-Hebrew readers. Indeed, the author painstakingly and commendably takes the reader through a discussion of almost every aspect of Hebrew grammar, including its components and usage in comparison with biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew . The grammatical outline includes discussion on conjugations (binyanTm), inflection of verbs, dagesh lene and dagesh forte, distinction between shewa mobile and shewa quiescent, proclitic particles, diverse kinds of pronouns, subordinate clauses, cognate objects, asyndetic relative clauses, etc.-all with good examples from modem Hebrew. I have detected some errors in the book. Here are a few of them: In his discussion of biblical words and idioms which have fallen into disuse, the author states that the word ID'M "is only rarely used in the sense of man (= male), for which -ol is the nonnal expression" (p. xvii). I fmd this statement to be inaccurate. In addition to the meaning of male, the word ,:u carries in modem Hebrew the connotation of a person with qualities conventionally regarded as manly, such as strength and courage. The word ~R is far from being rare when referring to an adult male; in fact, it is rather common. The author's discussion of modem Hebrew pronunciation (pp. xviii-xx) seems to reflect an earlier linguistic situation...

Phonological computation and missing vowels: mapping lexical involvement in reading.

The role of assembled versus addressed phonology in reading was investigated by examining the size of the minimal phonological unit that is recovered in the reading process. Readers named words in unpointed Hebrew that had many or few missing vowels in their printed forms. Naming latencies were monotonically related to the number of missing vowels. Missing vowels had no effects on lexical decision latencies. These results support a strong phonological model of naming and suggest that even in deep orthographies, phonology is not retrieved from the mental lexicon as a holistic lexical unit but is initially computed by applying letter-to-phoneme computation rules. The partial phonological representation is shaped and completed through top-down activation.

Lateralization effects in reading pointed and unpointed Hebrew.

Hebrew has two forms of spelling, pointed and unpointed. In the pointed spelling, diacritical signs (pointing) are added to consonantal letters to convey vowel information. These are omitted in the unpointed spelling. Since pointing conveys information that is critical for the prelexical derivation of phonology, it was hypothesized that its absence would prove detrimental for left hemisphere (LH) but not for right hemisphere (RH) reading and that, for the former, pointing effects would increase with increasing word length. Three experiments, one involving lexical decision and two involving word pronunciation, yielded little support for these hypotheses; rather, pointing had an overall adverse effect on performance, and this effect tended to be more pronounced for LH reading. In general, however, the results indicated an LH advantage. Since for central vision pointing has been found to aid performance under similar conditions, the results were seen to suggest a distinction between the visual and the phonological effects of pointing: pointing may impair early stages of visual analysis but may aid in the derivation of speech codes.