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| souley Senior Member Joined 7242 days ago 178 posts - 177 votes  Speaks: Swedish* Studies: Arabic (Written), French | Message 17 of 49 24 February 2005 at 6:52am | IP Logged | ||
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I can give my thoughts.
* Does the vowels-are-not-written problem present a permanent challenge, or is it just a matter of having heard the word once? Well when you first start out learning arabic, you depend on harakat (means movement literally) and they show you wheter a letter has a A vowel (called fattha) a I vowel (called Kasrah) or a U / O vowel (called dammah). But after a while these harakat disappear, and you have learnt the rules, so you pretty much know which vowel is where, even though you havent read the word before. But the harakat are still written out in childrens book and most importantly, in the Quran. Like so the first chapter of the Quran: 
The harakat are the lines above (fattah) under (kasrah) and the thing written over with two lines going together (dammah) the text. Edited by administrator on 24 February 2005 at 7:31am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ProfArguelles Moderator United States foreignlanguageexper Joined 7257 days ago 609 posts - 2102 votes | Message 18 of 49 28 February 2005 at 2:34am | IP Logged | ||
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* Is it fair to say that for the sole purpose of travel and cultural considerations apart, the most useful language to know in Arab countries is not MSA but either the local dialect or French or English?
I really only have experience of Beirut, a cosmpolitan capital, where both French and English are indeed widely spoken. I've heard that English is widely spoken in the Gulf and that French is widely spoken in North Africa, though I do not actually know exactly what "widely" means there. I think that a very practical person whose only concern is to communicate orally with those around him or her and who knows that he or she will be stationed to a specific post in a specific Arab land would probably be best served by learning that local dialect. However, I think that anyone with a general interest, philological or cultural or any other kind for that matter, would be best served by learning MSA. I've never heard an opinion dissenting from the fact that MSA is the base for all dialects, which can be swiftly learned if one knows it well first. I myself am consciously avoiding Lebanese dialect for the time while I try to really master MSA. On those occasions when I find myself interacting with a monolingual Arab, it serves me just fine. Again, if you know MSA you can make yourself understood, though understanding is a bit more difficult. I don't know what goes on when I converse - do they make some effort to speak MSA to me, or in face to face contact with a known context am I able to decipher their dialect? In any case, MSA serves me quite well as a communicative vehicle, even for daily life, when the need arises. Last week I bought some furniture from a place way across town. There are no real street addresses here, so you have to give directions by sequences of landmarks. Though I gave directions to my place, I fully expected the delivery man to call for clarification, but he showed up without hitch. * What are the biggest obstacles in grammar and vocabulary that an English speaker needs to overcome when learning Arabic? Arabic grammar is not as "objectively" complex as is sometimes made out, but it is still formidable, for it is full of irregularities. The plural form of most nouns bears little if any resemblance to the singular, and the written long vowel of many verbs either drops out or is altered when it is conjugated, so you can spend a long time looking things up in a dictionary, either in vain, or ultimately to discover that you already knew the word but just did not recognize it in this form. As a Semitic language, Arabic is organized by a priniple "root" system in which a series of consonants (usually 3) are rearranged in specific patterns to give meaning to words. After you are advanced enough with the system, this is a help to recognizing new forms, but in the beginning it is both alien and difficult because dictionaries are not strictly alphabetical but rather alphabetical within this root sequence, so looking up unknown words is very hard. Then there is the number system, which an otherwise straightforward and humorless older TYS book introduces by saying: "The numerals are the nightmare of a bankrupt financier." Arabic vocabularly is quite a hurdle as well because the language a) belongs to an entirely different family from any European language and b) has always had a "purist" streak that prevents it from having many loan words. Thus there are no cognates to English or any other Western language, and only a few familiar signposts, mainly a) very recent international words such as "computer," b) Greek words such as "philosophy" that both langauges have borrowed, and c) words that Arabic loaned first to Spanish then to English and others about 1000 years ago, such as "surgery." In the main, however, a Western learner has to start from scratch in order to build up an Arabic vocabularly. * Is the grammar of Colloquial Arabic much simpler than that of MSA? I've heard from many sources that this is the case, but I do not have direct experience that can confirm this. * Is the pronunciation of Arabic a source of permanent difficulties, or do people overcome this after a few months of study? Arabic pronunciation is indeed hard. In addition to the "regular" "s," "d," "t," and "dh," there is a series of another four letters that are pronouned in a "hollow" fashion by depressing the middle of the tongue while articulating them. Then there are number of "h" sounds that have to be distingushed and some of which are pronounced very deep down in the throat. Then there is a violent and tense glottal stop that is made with the same muscles one uses for vomiting. Sometimes all or most of these sounds come together in a single word. When I mimic my tutor's correct pronunciation, I feel as if my entire mouth is melting after having been hit by a laser gun. It is still a struggle for me, but on the other hand I cannot really recall an occasion when I was misunderstood because of bad prounciation. * How tolerant are Arabs of mistakes you make in Arabic? Do they welcome your trying to speak to them in 'Mexican'? What about the local dialect? I find them to be quite tolerant of mistakes - at any rate, I know that my spoken sentences are full of them, and yet when I am in a communicative situation, I have never sensed anything but good will for my efforts. So yes, monolingual Lebanese are quite welcoming of my efforts to speak Mexican to them. However, people proficient in either French or English are not very willing to speak Arabic with me. There are a few happy exceptions, but most clearly find it to be an odd concept due to their own social-psycho-linguistic complex. Everyone at my university knows that I am here for the sake of the language, and they tell other people that I know it well, but they won't speak it to me themselves. I am not sure, but I do believe they might be a bit more accomdating if I were trying to learn their dialect rather than MSA. * Does the vowels-are-not-written problem present a permanent challenge, or is it just a matter of having heard the word once? It is not a permanent challenge, but neither is it so simple as hearing the word once. Native speakers read texts that have all the vowels written in until they are about 12, and that are at least partially filled in until they are about 15. Presuming they learn to read when they are about 5, that's 10 years of exposure to texts with vowels, at the same time they are hearing the words frequently from the educational environment around them. In that context, it makes no sense to me that most textbooks for teaching Arabic to adult foreigners take a sink-or-swim attitude and expect you simply to manage as adult Arabs do. You can certainly learn to associate the meaning of a word with its shape, but unless the vowels are there, you won't know how to read it aloud, and thus to "hear" it, and thus to add it to your active vocabulary. * Do I understand correctly that MSA is a language that, practically, you will use mostly passively to read and listen to the medias? Most Arabs use MSA passively, but as a foreigner you can certainly speak it actively, though you may well be answered in dialect. * Is there any good learning material for learning Colloquial Arabic(s)? I have this problem with Swiss german, another case of diglossia, where almost no written material exists and only spartan language programs. Routledge Colloquial Series has three or four modules (Gulf, Levantine, Egyptian, North African), and TYS is coming out with some as well. Egyptian is probably the best represented. The Audioforum catalogue offers a good number of such courses for only 2 or 3 times the list price that you could pay if you could find the original publisher. * For those who would want to learn MSA with an eye on business, is there any sense in this regard, or in practice all you can use is some small talk and then move on to English or French? I assume this is probably the case in Lebanon, but what about in other countries? I can't answer this one, as I'm neither a businessman nor do I have experience with other countries. * What language programs would you recommend for learning Arabic (I assume you will recommend the reader starts with MSA) ? Linguaphone's "Arabic Course" (1977) is far and away the single best course for getting started. Assimil's "l'arabe sans peine" is also good, particularly tome 2. Anyone who wants to ignore writing for the time being and concentrate on learning to speak MSA as swiftly and as practically as possible should get Harald Funk und Shehata Yasien, "Kommunikationskurs Arabisch Sprechen" (Max Hueber Verlag 1990). All of the above come with lots of good recorded material. As a teaching grammar, J.R. Smart's currenly available "TYS Arabic" (1986) is not bad, and it does come with some tapes, though they are very short. The older out-of-print TYS Arabic (by A.S. Tritton), though it has dry translation exercises, is much more thorough. Even better, though even drier, is "Langenscheidts Praktisches Lehrbuch Arabisch" von Harald Funk (1985). This also had some taped material suitable for the pure beginner as it is done at very slow speed. However, the best and most thorough and rich and entertaining teaching grammar is certainly G.W. Thatcher's classic "Arabic Grammar of the Written Language," probably more than a 100 years old now but still in print or at least widely available. * For the student who would like to practice his Arabic in his home, there must be hundreds of ways to do so. What would be the principal source of newspaper article on the Internet? Are there many books you can read in Arabic? Are they easy to get from the West? Can you understand all that is said on Al-Jazeera with a knowledge of MSA and no Colloquial Arabic? I personally don't read newspapers in any language, but I know that Arabic ones are widely available on the Internet. Arabic has been a cultural and literary language for going on 1500 years now, so there are certainly lots of books in it, but they are not always the most available things in the West. The Librarie du Liban (http://www.ldlp.com/cgi-bin/ldlp.storefront) has an international order page, but I haven't tried it since I only discovered it after coming here. They would be a great source of texts at the native adolescent level, with all vowels written in. Another good source of reading material is a series of Contemporary Arabic Readers (vol. 1 newspapers, vol. 2 "formal" Arabic, vol. 3 essays, vol. 4. short stories, and vol. 5 poetry) put out by the University of Michigan Press in the 1960's but still around. As for understanding what is broadcast on Al-Jazeera or elsewhere, what you hear should certainly be at least 99% in MSA, though an occasional live interview with someone on a street somewhere might be in dialect. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| administrator Hexaglot Forum Admin Switzerland FXcuisine.com Joined 7377 days ago 3094 posts - 2987 votes 12 sounds Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian Personal Language Map | Message 19 of 49 03 March 2005 at 3:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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Ardaschir, your post is so good it takes me a whole week to digest it. Please excuse the lack of feedback, I just need the time to assimilate it and digest it into the language profile. Thanks!
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| CheetoOfDoom Newbie United States Joined 7174 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes | Message 20 of 49 05 April 2005 at 5:41am | IP Logged | ||
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Hey all, i've been learning arabic for a scant few months now but i've gone through a LOT of resources, so i thought i'd put in my 2 cents...
Ardaschir's awesome post said most of what i was thinking, although much more authoritatively (and grammatically) presented, kudos, you certainly have my respect =P. I've spoken to quite a few arabs from different countries (my city has a good sized arab community) and i notice that while they of course prefer thier dialects, they all understand my MSA vocabulary just fine (Granted virtually everyone i've spoken to is educated and would be considered upper middle or upper class back home). From my experience the suggestion that Arabic is less neccessary due to bilinguality is simply untrue, becuase the education systems of only the most westernized countries (Jordan, Egypt, UAE, etc) teach competent english, and even then it's nowhere near as widespread as in Europe, where before i found my love of language i got around most of the continent just fine on English alone (again a Caveat: this is all secondhand, but from multiple discussions with both Americans who learned Arabic and native speakers). On the learning end the best books i've found are The Arabic Alphabet by Awde/Samano for learning to decipher the script, which actually comes very quickly, at least it did to me. And "A New Arabic Grammar of the Written Language" and it's corresponding answer key by J.A. Haywood as the holy grail of MST grammar, which is actually a more modern update of the previously mentioned thatcher's, especially if you can find the 1960's first printing (good luck though, each book goes for over $100 bucks online, although it's been reprinted in a normally priced edition, with slightlier shoddy image quality, or so i hear) Despite its noted exceptions, and its BEAST of a plural form, Arabic is very strong in following many of its rules, and not NEARLY as bad as people think to learn once you get over the written system, and start to get the 'flow' of the language and how unvowelled words will likely work out. I've practiced for an average of about 45 minutes a day for 8mo or, and i'm starting to competently guess vowelling of undenoted words, and even when i can't it rarely keeps me from deciphering the meaning of the text (granted in my very small, very proper source universe) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Al-Malik Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member United Kingdom arabicgenie.com Joined 7135 days ago 221 posts - 294 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Dutch, French, Arabic (classical) Studies: Mandarin, Persian | Message 21 of 49 14 May 2005 at 10:54am | IP Logged | ||
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"* Is the grammar of Colloquial Arabic much simpler than that of MSA?
I've heard from many sources that this is the case, but I do not have direct experience that can confirm this." Dialect grammar is simpler but not much simpler than MSA grammar. E.g. in Syrian dialect the endings corresponding to feminine cases sound (almost) the same as masculine endings. E.g. I-love-u: Bhibek (for f. & m.) as opposed to Uhibuki (f.) Uhibuka (m.) Generally speaking, endings in dialect are shortened compared with MSA, but it doesn't make learning a dialect THAT much easier. "* Is the pronunciation of Arabic a source of permanent difficulties, or do people overcome this after a few months of study? Arabic pronunciation is indeed hard. In addition to the "regular" "s," "d," "t," and "dh," there is a series of another four letters that are pronouned in a "hollow" fashion by depressing the middle of the tongue while articulating them. Then there are number of "h" sounds that have to be distingushed and some of which are pronounced very deep down in the throat. Then there is a violent and tense glottal stop that is made with the same muscles one uses for vomiting. Sometimes all or most of these sounds come together in a single word. When I mimic my tutor's correct pronunciation, I feel as if my entire mouth is melting after having been hit by a laser gun. It is still a struggle for me, but on the other hand I cannot really recall an occasion when I was misunderstood because of bad prounciation." Once you have got past that stage where you have to force these horrible sounds out of your throat it becomes second nature to you. Now, I even take pride in pronouncing the qalf and 3ain, despite the fact that in most dialects locals who pronounce these are regarded as coming "from the countryside" and laughed at. Not so if you are a foreigner though. "* Is there any good learning material for learning Colloquial Arabic(s)? I have this problem with Swiss german, another case of diglossia, where almost no written material exists and only spartan language programs. Routledge Colloquial Series has three or four modules (Gulf, Levantine, Egyptian, North African), and TYS is coming out with some as well. Egyptian is probably the best represented. The Audioforum catalogue offers a good number of such courses for only 2 or 3 times the list price that you could pay if you could find the original publisher." Coincidentally, Pimsleur has a course for egyptian and levantine dialects. A friend of mine owns the levantine course and I have listened to it and must say that it is quite the way people speak there (i.e. Syria, Palestine, Lebanon). If you want to learn a dialect which is gonna be useful (that is you can make urself understood in most Arab countries), it would probably be best to learn either Levantine or Egyptian dialect. The latter, because a great many popular movies and TV series come from Egypt. Don't be fooled into thinking that Gulf Arabic is the "purest" dialect. In fact, it borrows heavily from Hindi/Urdu and Persian, due to its geographical position and immigration from these countries. As regards MSA language learnign materials, I believe that Assimil's "L'Arabe sans peine" is a good course. However, I only own "tome 2" and not the first part. @Ardaschir If you are planning to live in the country for a long period of time, then it is incomprehensible to me why you wouldn't want to learn the local dialect. I am living proof that you can learn MSA and a dialect at the same time, without having too muh interference from the dialect, i.e. your MSA will stay "pure", since you can sepperate or switch between these two forms of Arabic. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| morprussell Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7164 days ago 272 posts - 285 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 22 of 49 14 May 2005 at 12:03pm | IP Logged | ||
Is the Levantine dialect what Pimsleur refers to as "Eastern Arabic"? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Al-Malik Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member United Kingdom arabicgenie.com Joined 7135 days ago 221 posts - 294 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Dutch, French, Arabic (classical) Studies: Mandarin, Persian | Message 23 of 49 14 May 2005 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | ||
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@morprussel
yes, they call it Eastern Arabic. This is sinonymous with Levantine Dialect. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Al-Malik Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member United Kingdom arabicgenie.com Joined 7135 days ago 221 posts - 294 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Dutch, French, Arabic (classical) Studies: Mandarin, Persian | Message 24 of 49 14 May 2005 at 1:01pm | IP Logged | ||
My advise: record web-radio broadcasts and use an editor to make three modified versions. 1) 50% slower 2) 50% faster 3) 100% faster I know that when you use software to make files slower /faster the sound quality is not that great, but still acceptable. First listen to the slow version 1) until you understand everything when they say it. Then listen to version 2) until you understand everything immediately and then do the same with version 3). 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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