|
 |
Stephenk’s Gujarati Journey | ||
Tags: Gujarati | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| stephenk Newbie United States Joined 5750 days ago 28 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Gujarati | Message 1 of 12 16 March 2009 at 9:22pm | IP Logged |
|
Hello!
Upon searching this forum for posts relevant to the Gujarati language, I've found that there are a few others here who have some sort of an interest with the language, but no one seems to have started a learning log for Gujarati (or Hindi, for that matter!) I've decided to keep a log of my trials and tribulations for any future learners of the Gujarati language. As there is a lack of materials readily available for this language, it can sometimes be very difficult to remain motivated to learn Gujarati. I hope that by writing this, I can inspire future learners of Gujarati or an Indian language in general to continue, or at the very least, have something to compare their situations to. In this first post, I'll give you a little information about me and why I've chosen to learn Gujarati. First off, I am an American university student studying international banking and finance. For a long time, I've been actively interested in the cultures, languages, and people of India. I am an avid lover of Bollywood films and music. I suppose it would have been more appropriate that I start with Hindi, given my love for the films and music. However, my fiancee and the love of my life is a native Gujarati speaker. Her dad speaks English very well, but her mother does not. Because of this, Gujarati would be much more useful for me. I do have a pretty good background in language learning. I speak French pretty well and Afrikaans to a good extent, so Gujarati will not be my first foreign language. It will, however, be the first language that I have learned with a non-latin script. I have collected a few resources that I will use throughout my learning of Gujarati. The first two methods that I will be using are pretty well known for lesser-known languages. The first, Teach Yourself Gujarati, is available for free on the website of Dr. Rachel Dwyer. Professor Dwyer is a very lovely lady and is also very knowledgable on the subject of Gujarati and India in general. For those also interested in Indian culture, especially in film, I suggest her books about Bollywood. The second, Colloquial Gujarati, has recently been updated. I am still waiting for this book via post, but it does look promising. The third method I will be using is most likely relatively unknown to most of you: The CIIL courses. The CIIL(Central Institute of Indian Languages) have three books on Gujarati. The first is An Intensive Course In Gujarati. The second is An Intermediate Course in Gujarati. The third is An Advanced Course in Gujarati. The only course with audio is the intensive course. The audio seems to be only available on cassette. These books were written with an audience of Indian origin in mind. For this reason, it does assume some prior knowledge of at least another Indian language. I think I will be using these courses only when I have progressed through the other two and can read the script pretty fluently. In addition to this, I have many 'native' materials available to me once I have progressed through the language well enough. I have a subscription to Gujarat Samachar, I have quite a few movies (which lack greatly in comparison to Bollywood films, but still have some of the same charm) and I recently got the first Harry Potter book written in Gujarati (THAT was very difficult to find). Obviously, the most important practice aid I have is my fiancee. Even more so, her mother, who does not speak English. Anyway, I have blabbered on enough. I do hope that some of you check back quite often. This blog can be an inspiration not only for the learner of Gujarati or an Indian language, but also to inspire all of us here who learn a language that is 'off the beaten path' and has only a small selection of resources. I will update you when I receive Colloquial Gujarati Edited by stephenk on 16 March 2009 at 9:26pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| stephenk Newbie United States Joined 5750 days ago 28 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Gujarati | Message 2 of 12 18 March 2009 at 3:58pm | IP Logged |
|
Well, I just received Colloquial Gujarati. It seems to be the same as the 1995 version that has been reprinted with an updated cover and audio CDs in lieu of cassettes. I may be wrong and there could be minor changes, but it looks the same to me. Rachel Dwyer, the author of TY Gujarati has told me that Routledge will be updating the Gujarati course. Whether this is the update she referred to or Routledge is working on a second edition, I don't know.
The book does seem to accomplish the job quite well, but I've only had the book for 10 minutes and I already have something to complain about. The first bit of the book is in transliterated, per usual. The vocabulary section in these chapters don't have the words written in the Gujarati script. It's all transliterated! It seems the only place to get the script versions are in the glossary in the back of the book. While this is only a minor inconvenience, it'll significantly slow down the process of flash card making while I constantly have to look up a word rather than have it in the vocabulary list. Maybe they were trying to save page space. In any case, it's an annoyance. I'm going to work through the book a bit after I have lunch and I'll update this post with further impressions. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| stephenk Newbie United States Joined 5750 days ago 28 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Gujarati | Message 3 of 12 01 April 2009 at 2:50am | IP Logged |
|
Well, I haven't updated in a while mostly because I've been doing work on learning to read the script and I don't have any fascinating news on that. It's a bit easier since I already read devanagari pretty well. I've found the writing a bit more challenging because I feel apt to use devanagari instead and in the places where the letters are very similar, I sometimes write the Devanagari character instead.
Tomorrow, I hope to begin the first lesson of TY Gujarati. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| maya_star17 Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5919 days ago 269 posts - 291 votes  Speaks: English*, Russian*, French, Spanish Studies: Japanese | Message 4 of 12 01 April 2009 at 6:02am | IP Logged |
|
Good luck! Gujarati is a beautiful language :)
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| kaushals Newbie United States Joined 5711 days ago 3 posts - 4 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 12 10 April 2009 at 12:39am | IP Logged |
|
Wow what a great journey Stephen!
I too am beginning a quest to learn Gujarati. It's frustrating, because as you mentioned it's hard to find very good educational resources for this language (especially when compared to say Hindi) I went to Rachel Dwyer's website and clicked the link which I thought would let me download the Teach Yourself course however it took me to her universities' website with no apparent link to download it. Do you mind pointing to exactly where on her website you downloaded this course. I would LOVE to use this as a starting point (it's not even for sale on Amazon anymore) Thanks! Kaushal 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| kaushals Newbie United States Joined 5711 days ago 3 posts - 4 votes Speaks: English* | Message 6 of 12 12 April 2009 at 7:52am | IP Logged |
|
Okay I found the Teach Yourself Gujarati link, it's not directly linked from her site anymore but I was able to hunt it down from google...
http://www.soas.ac.uk/courseunits/155900496.php 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| stephenk Newbie United States Joined 5750 days ago 28 posts - 33 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Gujarati | Message 7 of 12 16 April 2009 at 4:15am | IP Logged |
|
It's also good to get a rip of the audio. You can Google to find out how to rip the real media files. How are your studies going?
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| kaushals Newbie United States Joined 5711 days ago 3 posts - 4 votes Speaks: English* | Message 8 of 12 17 April 2009 at 3:21am | IP Logged |
|
Actually, I did just that after downloading the course (I used FlashGet to do the ripping).
As for my studies, so far it's going pretty well. I am actually a first generation Indian-American (Gujarati). I was a stubborn little child, so even though my parents spoke to me in Gujarati all the time growing up, I never actually learned how to speak it myself (always responded in English). My Grandmother is getting older now and doesn't speak any English. I feel terrible as I'm really the only one in the family who doesn't speak Gujarati and have never really had a in-depth conversation with her....so that's what's really driving me to do this (My brother learned recently while spending many months in India) Being able to understand the language fairly well and having 2 native speakers only a phone call away is making this process a lot easier. With that said..it still amazes how much effort goes into learning a language as an adult. It definitely takes a lot of discipline and determination. I'll probably start my own thread similar to this to track my own progress learning Gujarati, which is going good so far. I'll be sure to check in on this thread often and see how things are going in your own Gujarati quest! Good luck!! 2 persons have voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
