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Are older Assimil courses outdated? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5992 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes  Studies: Mandarin | Message 9 of 72 13 August 2013 at 1:28am | IP Logged |
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The difficulty lies in what exactly is the definition of "the right habit"? I've encountered 4 different words for tangerine used by native Mandarin speakers in daily speech. And I've heard native Mandarin speakers use phrases which are in the FSI Standard Chinese course (from the late 1970's) when talking with other native speakers, phrases which some people on this forum have said are no longer used. It goes back to how long someone has been working with a language and how deeply they delve in. Edited by Snowflake on 13 August 2013 at 1:54am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Kronos Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5294 days ago 186 posts - 452 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 10 of 72 14 August 2013 at 10:10pm | IP Logged |
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The old Assimil course for German was actually written in the early 1930s. I read through some of the chapters of the English-based version 'German without Toil' and found the language surprisingly fresh. Maybe a bit formal in places, but IMO still suited even for getting straight into contemporary colloquial speech.
German (the structure and commonly shared vocabulary at least) has not changed much for about a century, and after some controversy even the recent orthography reform has been scaled back to a degree where there is hardly any difference to what it looked like before. About Russian I don't know, but much depends on what you want to do with the language. A lot of classic Russian literature was written roughly about 1850, while some of the current lingo may have emerged only after the end of the Soviet Union. 1971 sounds fairly recent - and one should also take into account that this course was prepared by a number of language experts from the University of Leningrad, whereas the old Russian without Toil goes back to 1948 and even then was to a greater extent based on old literature. The 1971 course was written for people who wanted to learn Russian or go to Russia in the 1970s, which is not that long ago. Almost a decade after From Russia with Love hit the movie houses, just to illustrate this. But I have made a funny experience with old Assimil courses. For instance, when I was learning some Italian with their 1930s Italian course I sometimes thought, "Aw, this expression/pronunciation sounds quirky, it must be outdated for decades now." Invariably, almost immediately afterwards the same phrase with the very same pronunciation would crop up in some current youtube video I would be watching. This happened a number of times, and finally I disregarded any misgivings I may have had about what I was learning being outdated. With some languages one has to be a bit careful. The old 1940 French course, while still being a great resource, has its share of archaisms that would sound overly polite or stilted if used today, and every time 1960s Greek resources are mentioned, some natives ring the alarm bells. But it is not so with German. Edited by Kronos on 14 August 2013 at 10:17pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| ericblair Senior Member United States Joined 4744 days ago 480 posts - 700 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 11 of 72 15 August 2013 at 1:02am | IP Logged |
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It really is pretty incredible to think this German Without Toil course has stood the
test of time so well. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5598 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 12 of 72 15 August 2013 at 2:24pm | IP Logged |
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This was discussed a few years ago and the opposite conclusion was reached - that
German Without Toil was outdated. I remember that the main problems was outdated vocabulary - e.g. the use of leidend for sick, instead of krank, the use of old fashioned idioms and the almost complete omission of the du form. I have learned a huge amount from GwT and never found the obsolete aspects to be a problem - I find that Germans are always quick to correct any such oddities and so you learn to avoid the obsolete words you pick up from courses. As to French without Toil - I would say that has aged more fundamentally - especially in its use of grammar, which as Kronos says, gets you some funny looks and a long hesitation if used today (as I know from experience). It is still a great course to go through, so long as it is not one's primary course. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Kronos Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5294 days ago 186 posts - 452 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 13 of 72 15 August 2013 at 3:58pm | IP Logged |
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Right, I found "leidend" in Lesson 25:
"Ich bin neulich leidend gewesen; aber jetzt bin ich wieder ganz gesund." - "I have been ill recently; but now I am quite all right again." In Lesson 4 however "krank" is used: "Ich bin hier; er ist oben; sie ist krank." - "I am here; he is upstairs; she is ill." "leidend" ("suffering") for "ill" is indeed totally outdated, but it may have been so already in the 1930s. It sounds more like 18th century German, or very formal 19th century usage, like a nun reporting sick to her abbess. Perhaps more than as a (sporadic) example for an outdated expression, I would rate this as one of Assimil's famous occasional 'bloopers'. I also found some expressions in the course that might be classified as regionalisms, then as now, like "freilich", which is a common expression in southern Germany, but not often used in other regions, though understood. The use of the du form hasn't changed since the course was written, but it would be very strange if in a modern course you were not made to encounter it right in the first couple of lessons. It is the informal way of addressing people, as among friends, family or children - but a bourgeois traveller like Alphonse Chérel would have rarely been in situations where this usage was required or advisable. Learning the right procedure of borrowing a book in the most deferential manner was then worth a whole chapter and apparently of greater importance. ;) Well, now we are in the age of casual or sloppy manners, backpacking, rave parties and intercontinental business trips (although, for most of these English would be sufficient). Or texting and skyping. Getting some exposure to more current material and real life situations in addition to a yellowed Assimil course and the blaring audio surely won't hurt. But again, one should not overrate this. The structure and core vocabulary and expressions of many European languages don't seem to have changed that much for about a century now, and it is this fundamental knowledge I am after when I start to learn a language, and getting into it. It is also better to sound a bit too formal or even slightly old-fashioned in communication as a beginner rather than being too informal and making wrong use of any current lingo. Edited by Kronos on 16 August 2013 at 12:22am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5598 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 14 of 72 15 August 2013 at 5:36pm | IP Logged |
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I agree, as I say, I have found GwT very useful. For one, it gets you to nail the
accusative and dative early on and then naturalises it, a feature many courses fail to do. I would personally recommend blending it with the newest Assimil German course (L'Allemand), which is also excellent. I also agree that being slightly archaic in one's expressions is generally received very well as a foreign speaker. It can go too far, however, for example, my German mother- in-law uses the outdated English expression 'if you would be so kind as to [do X for me]', which she heard on the radio in the 1950s - this has got her into trouble on a number of occasions as some people to see this as excessively haughty and thus rude. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ericblair Senior Member United States Joined 4744 days ago 480 posts - 700 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 15 of 72 15 August 2013 at 8:33pm | IP Logged |
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I think your suggestion to use GWoT and then a newer Assimil German course is a good one.
I think that I would go through German Without Toil in the traditional two-wave approach and then use the L'Allemand course simply for shadowing and L-R to get used to the more modern idioms it would presumably contain. So Without Toil would be building the grammatical base along with the vocabulary. Then the newest course would be helping you sound more up-to-date in your word usage and such. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BlaBla Triglot Groupie Spain Joined 4162 days ago 45 posts - 72 votes Speaks: German*, English, French Studies: Nepali, Spanish, Dutch, Mandarin | Message 16 of 72 16 August 2013 at 2:28pm | IP Logged |
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After two cold starts I'm currently doing a third wave of the 1997 edition/actual version of 'Spanisch ohne
Muehe heute" but I have to admit that I like the old version from 1973 a lot more. One of the problems I have with the current edition is that it sports quite a significant amount of vocabulary I can't remember having used even once in my native language and most probably won't ever use, eg. 'Reiterumzug/ cabalgata', 'Selbstfahrer/autos de choque' or my favorite: 'Geissblatt/madreselva' (yikes!) to name but a few. Heck, this is meant to be an introductory course and no .... work of poetry or something of that sort. Of course I have a lot of other material I study in parallel but after all the praise I thought some critical words would do no harm. Regarding the outdatedness of older editions, especially the Spanish version I'm of course no expert but I doubt that apart from maybe a handful or two of outdated expressions or some examples of antiquated vocabulary the 1973 edition is still worthwile of being studied, pretty much so. If there's one thing I'm obsessed with in regard to learning languages it's core structures and from what I see the old edition is full of structures and idioms that haven't been covered in the current edition. Bottom line: For the sake of getting a better grip on those basic structures I might give the '73 edition a go, instead of "Spanisch in der Praxis" - right after having finished the last unit of 'Spanisch ohne Muehe heute'. I'd just need to look around for the accompanying compact cassettes or, Dog forbid, records. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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