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Criticised Assimil programs | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4290 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes  Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 33 of 67 16 March 2014 at 9:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have also heard "breakfast", "dinner", and "tea", whilst in Australia. My mother has a
Melbournian friend with whom she has travelled, who asks about where to "have tea" (i.e. eat dinner) around 21h00 or 22h00. Edited by 1e4e6 on 16 March 2014 at 10:16pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| alang Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 7221 days ago 563 posts - 757 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 34 of 67 16 March 2014 at 9:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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I know these recent posts are off topic, but I will participate. I personally have used the term dinner interchangeably with lunch and supper. At first growing up it was for lunch, as my classmates and teachers asked during the afternoon if I had dinner. Afterwards, I heard others asking if I wanted to have dinner in the late afternoon or early evening. I have asked do you mean supper and the reply was, that it means the same thing. I have heard Canadians use both, but Americans only for supper. By context a person actually is used to it and I think both are correct usage. More now for supper, than lunch for some reason. Odd note, as for Spanish el desayuno, el almuerzo and la cena were the standard. Last year a woman from Mexico asked if I wanted to have lunchar with her. I informed her, "Oh you mean almorzar." She said that was wrong, and el almuerzo is brunch at 10:00 a.m. I did bring this up with other people from Chile and Columbia and they were confused. Plausible explanation, she lives close to the border between the U.S.A. and Mexico. She is exposed to English, so the specific Mexicans in that area made the verb lunchar mean to lunch and almorzar as to brunch exclusively for that region. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Lykeio Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4244 days ago 120 posts - 357 votes | Message 35 of 67 16 March 2014 at 10:32pm | IP Logged | ||
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You know this kind of quarrelling just shows how meaningless the debate is for
classical languages for those without training. I've never got the sense of entitlement people feel based solely on their own aesthetics! "I DISLIKE THIS THEREFORE IT IS NOT ACCURATE" meanwhile they have little Latin and less Greek and think apophany is the hip new drug the kids are trying... Say you dislike something. Say you're disinterested in learning. No big deal. But don't pretend your taste amounts to anything more than that. The ancient Greek everyone online is complaining about having a French accent is largely voiced by a...German. Stefan Hagel, an absolutely phenomenal scholar and charming gent. Is it perfect? No, it is quite evidently Germanophonic (so much for the ears of detractors) and doesn't sound very Mediterranean to my ears but it attempts things like pitch accentuation. Would I use it as a model? no, it is better than most commercial things I've heard though. Note how nobody has enough Greek to critique the oddities in idiom etc that occasionally appear in the book. Magically experts on phonology, however. Wherever did they learn in such a manner? Sanskrit is another one I've heard people complain about it. I've limited exposure to the book/CD but from what I've seen/heard the audio is pretty good. Whoever the speakers are they're able to hit some of the difficult phonemes for European speakers, however some of the assimilations sound more Dravidian than Aryan but ok. The text samples I've seen are idiomatic Sanskrit however and whoever wrote it has a fantastic grasp of the tongue. I've seen words than must have been good Sanskrit but only appear in commentaries on texts and in later Indo-Aryan languages so I'd bet £50 there's a Sanskrit scholar behind it. This thread would be more valuable if people stuck to critiquing text for languages they know well I think. 7 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| oldearth Groupie United States Joined 4895 days ago 72 posts - 173 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto | Message 36 of 67 16 March 2014 at 10:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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I compiled the responses so far into one list because I was having trouble keeping all the similar
courses discussed straight in my mind. Maybe it'll be helpful to some of you. STRANGE OR BORING DIALOGS Name: Le nouveau Grec sans peine Base: English Generation: 2 nd ed Criticism: Stilted and strange dialogues. Reviewer: Solfrid Cristin Name: Le grec ancien Base: French Generation: newest Criticism: (1) Ancient Greek has 9236 different ways to conjugate or decline any word (give or take 1500); this might be too much to "assimilate" naturally, much less without pain. Or lots of pain. (2) The dialogues follow a spunky school boy through his day. Greek, the language of gods and heroes, is reduced to telling wacky tales from the gymnasium. Good parts: I like the way the Greek sounds, though others have said the accent is "too French" Reviewer: kanewai Name: Le coreen Base: French Criticsm: boring dialogues, relies too much on romanization rather than hangul, I think. Reviewer: sillygoose1 POOR AUDIO Name: Arabic with Ease Base: English Criticism: boring dialogues and extremely slow audio Reviewer: sillygoose1 Name: L'arabe Base: French Generation: 2006 Criticism: Speakers on the CD sound like cats being tortured. Good parts: Nothing that makes up for the horror of listening to those recordings. Reviewer: kanewai Name: L'Esperanto Sans Peine Base: French Generation: 2nd? Criticism: Heavy French accent Reviewer: alang Name: Hungarian with Ease Base: English Generation: 2nd? Criticism: Poor quality audio at parts. Speaker mumbles. Reviewer: DaraghM Name: Le Latin Sans Peine Base: French Generation: 2nd Criticism: Heavy French accent on audio Reviewer: alang SERIOUS TYPOGRAPHIC ERRORS Name: Inglés perfeccionamiento Base: Spanish Generation: 3rd Criticism: Lack of proof-reading and copy-editing. Chunks of FRENCH texts left untranslated, Spanish words in the middle of English text, exercises messed up. Spanish adaptor absolute incompetent. DO NOT BUY IT. TOTAL RUBBISH! Reviewer: Hungringo .... reply: sluicideo has used a different edition this course (2nd?) and did not remember these problems. Name: Italian With Ease Base: English Generation: newest Criticism: More typos than it seems like there should be. Even having no prior experience with Italian, I was able to notice most. Not a deal-breaker and still a fun enough course! Reviewer: ericblair Name: Latina senza sforzo Base: Italian Generation 2nd? Criticism: Many typographical errors in the book, errata sheet available, instead of printing corrections in the book Reviewer: alang Name: Schwedisch ohne Mühe Base: German Generation: 2nd (2003 "corrected" version) Criticism: Lots of typos, like mixing a/ä/å up, especially in the explanations and grammar lessons, or cutting the last few characters of a sentence in many of the translation exercises. Additionally, no glossary at the end (afaik the French base has one?). Explanations sometimes on the wrong page. Reviewer: daegga TRANSLATION ERRORS Name: Dänisch ohne Mühe Base: German Generation: 2nd Criticism: Many grammar errors in the glossary (like getting gender or plural of nouns wrong), unnaturally clear audio (more so than in your average Assimil course). Some typos and errors during the course, I don't remember what exactly. Reviewer: daegga Name: El Nuevo Italiano Sin Esfuerzo Base: Spanish Generation: 2nd Criticism: Bad translations Reviewer: alang Name: Norwegisch ohne Mühe Base: German Generation: 2nd? Criticism: Many translation and grammar errors Reviewer: alang Name: Using Spanish Base: English Generation: 2nd? Criticism: Many translation errors Reviewer: alang Name: Le turc Base: French Generation: newest Criticism: The French seems more of an interpretation than a translation of the Turkish dialogues. Assimil might not be a great fit for an agglutinative language. It's hard to match up the Turkish dialogues with the idiomatic French, and you spend a lot of your time with the dictionary to figure out which words mean what. Good parts: Recordings are nice, and you get a sense of how the complete language works. This might be a good course for those who are already approaching a B-1 level in Turkish. Reviewer: kanewai 11 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| alang Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 7221 days ago 563 posts - 757 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 37 of 67 16 March 2014 at 11:58pm | IP Logged | ||
Not always the case, as this thread is to relay critiques about Assimil programs from other sources who have heard, used or know about all types of errors. (Be it written or spoken.) I look for reviews from others and relay it here. Concerning the Ancient Greek, the audio was noticeably odd to some people, but you wrote about oddities in idiom etc. in the book. Why did you not list and write these down on your post? Can you list them please? This is what the thread is about. It would help the other people who would be considering using the program. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4665 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 38 of 67 17 March 2014 at 12:32am | IP Logged | ||
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As far as the "dinner / supper" question, a majority of Americans either use the words synonymously (for the evening meal, I'm assuming) or do not use the word "supper." Interestingly, there doesn't seem to be a clear regional pattern to the usage.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Emme Triglot Senior Member Italy Joined 5347 days ago 980 posts - 1594 votes Speaks: Italian*, English, German Studies: Russian, Swedish, French | Message 39 of 67 17 March 2014 at 9:59am | IP Logged | ||
I’ve looked up “dinner” in the Collins Cobuild English Language Dictionary (1987; 1993) and there seems to be a social/class aspect to the difference in usage, at least in British English. Unfortunately, in this instance they don’t delve into American usage as well.
Now I wish that sillygoose1 or someone else could tell us the context where “colazione” and “pranzo” occur in Italian With Ease so that we can go back at criticizing Assimil as necessary. Sorry if my post no. 29 has derailed the thread leading it into a debate about “dinner” in English. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5334 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 40 of 67 17 March 2014 at 10:07am | IP Logged | ||
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@emme - I have learned that 'colazione' is lunch, and 'prima colazione' is breakfast. Is that wrong?
1 person has voted this message useful |
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