Linguistic Videos for Bible Translation

SIL International recently began producing a series of linguistic videos for translation. Each video aims to explain in about 6 minutes a specific language construction in non-technical terms and what difference understanding this construction can make for Scripture translation. The first video is about participant reference and can be viewed at this link on YouTube.

Although this video can be informative as a stand-alone presentation, it is envisioned as being used by trainers with supplemental material in academic courses, workshops, consultant sessions and other training environments, such as with specific languages with application to specific Scripture passages. here are plans to produce 10 or more of this type of video in the coming months. These may include some of the following topics:

1. What is a Passive? (*for example, 'be baptised')*
2. Functions of Passives (*how these are used in Scripture*)
3. Deixis *(including words like 'here', 'there', 'this', 'that')*
4. Types of Participants: Major, Minor, VIP (*how important are different characters in a story, and how do you know?)*
5. Participant Reference Rhythm *(how characters are referred to throughout a story)*
6. Relative clauses: restrictive vs. descriptive *(does 'this my Son whom I love' mean there is also another one who is unloved?) *
7. Serial Verb Constructions (*verb chains in some languages like 'I went-cut-brought')*
8. Grammar of motion *('He went' vs 'He came')*
9. Types of Focus *("Then a man named Jirus arrived" vs "Then arrived a man named Jirus")*
10. Tense patterns *(a long time ago, yesterday, now, tomorrow, far future) *

SIL would like your help in several ways. Please use this questionnaire to give your comments about any or all of this input. 

- Your ideas of how to improve this first video on participant reference and in which training contexts you might use it.
- Your suggestions for which additional videos to produce that might be helpful with common translation issues.
- Who you know that could contribute content for these videos, such as write the scripts or give appropriate language examples.
- Which major languages of the world these videos should be translated into to be useful for those you work with.
- Who you know that could assist with the translation of these videos into the major languages.

Please address questions to phil_king@sil.org or tim_stirtz@sil.org.