Grammar of the Pontic dialect

This book by Alkmeni Theodoridou, with the modest title “Drawing of the grammar of the Pontian dialect”, is certainly an ambitious yet solid contribution to the bibliography of Pontian grammar. For it is well known that authors have appeared in this field who cannot claim laurels of scholarship. Of course, I exclude the two authors. And I exclude them, because these two authors, written by the most experts in the field of Pontian, are still, even today, reference points for every researcher of the dialect. However, apart from the fact that these works are purely scientific and do not lend themselves to didactic exploitation, scientific research in the meantime, as is the case with all scientific works of earlier times, has differed in several respects from the grammatical account of these works. The “Grammatical Drawing” by Alkmeni Theodoridou retains those elements of these grammars that are still valid today, but differs in those elements that have been modified by scientific research to date.

The “Grammar Sketch” was written for a special purpose: to serve as a grammatical supplement to the current teaching of Pontian, which in recent years has been attempted (with great success, I learn) by the “Panhellenic Association of Pontian Teachers”, through the “Manual for teaching the Pontian dialect to adults”. I must note that the role of grammar in this case is essential. For it is not just a reference book, i.e. a book to which the learner can, if he wishes, refer, as would be the case if the language form taught were spoken by the learners, but a book equal and equivalent to the teaching manual, which the grammar supplements in a systematic way. For this reason, the requirement of correctness of the grammatical material provided is a condition necessary for the success of teaching.

And this term is adequately met, from a scientific and didactic point of view, by the writing of Alkmini Theodoridou.

DEMETRIS TOBAIDIS

Professor Emeritus of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.