Why is Greek considered a critical language?

Question

Among other critical languages such as Chinese, Arabic, etc.

Note: I'm asking about modern Greek and not ancient/classical Greek

Also, I should clarify the context of "critical language." I was curious why the U.S. government considers Greek a critical language (I saw this in an article somewhere). I realize now my question was vague and probably should have been in a political category. I might repost it later. Thanks

Answer 1

In a military/govt. context, Greek might be critical because Greece is a NATO ally but Greek proficiency is less common among military applicants. Inter-NATO operations certainly requires fluent speakers to communicate and cooperate with US allies.

Answer 2

in a large part, when your thinking in English you're deploying greek concepts. Think about a couple of pieces of English syntax:

(1) the privative a- the negation of alot of words is achieved by adding 'a' to the front. Consider the difference between a theist and an atheist
(2) the prefix 'dyn-' think of words like dynamite, dynamic, this comes from the greek meaning 'ability or potential'
(3) Addressing somebody with 'O..' or 'Oh..' I know it sounds very archaic to say 'O friend' or something like that, but if you listen, more people do it than you think, "oh friend, why did you do that?"
(4) '-ology' the suffix comes from logos which is calculation, principle, or reason
(5) 'sta-' this is all over in English: 'stand', 'stable,' 'withstand,' 'stasis,' 'statistic'

The point is that when using these parts of English syntax, the rules for correct usage are derived from rules of Greek grammar. So, calling it a 'parent language' obscures the fact that your following rules that Ancient Greeks did. Learning greek just makes your more attentive to it.

I hope we were talking about ancient greek, because if the question was about modern greek, then I have no idea why its a critical language.

Answer 3

Greece is the cradle of civilization in many ways, although that title has also gone to Egypt. But hieroglyphics are REALLY hard to read, while Greek is mostly an intellectual exercise.

Used to be you were not considered well educated if you could not read both Latin and Greek. That's why the fraternities and sororities use Greek letters to represent themselves. It was considered snob appeal, as the "peasants" would not know what the letters were.

Answer 4

a great deal of recorded history for western civilization is written in greek because a lot of the ideas that we see as fundemental to that civilization were purposed and work out by the greeks. there is a trememdous amount of written information about the history of the western world that is in greek so therefore it is considered to be critical, along with Latin, hebrew and german.

Answer 5

It is one of the parent languages of Modern English along with Latin and Anglo-Saxon.

Answer 6

don;t know