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Confessions of an Arabic Learner blog | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| translator2 Senior Member United States Joined 6918 days ago 848 posts - 1862 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 8 28 December 2009 at 10:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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Confessions of an Arabic Learner
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| apparition Octoglot Senior Member United States Joined 6649 days ago 600 posts - 667 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), French, Arabic (Iraqi), Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Pashto | Message 2 of 8 28 December 2009 at 11:01pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yep, he pretty much sums up what most people think about the difficulties of Arabic and how most of the initial hurdles end up being rather simple.
I can still remember being frustrated that I couldn't understand how to read the script as fast as others could. Rest assured, that problem is way behind me now! It's a lesson you can only really learn by doing it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cabaire Senior Member Germany Joined 5598 days ago 725 posts - 1352 votes | Message 3 of 8 29 December 2009 at 12:56am | IP Logged | ||
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I would not take the phonology so lighty as that author. It is a big challenge. Of the four “Aitches” I know خ and ه from my mother tongue, ح I find quite easy, but ع gives me headaches, but I enjoy to hear it.
The emphatic consonants are a mistery to me, I cheat by only changing the vowels around it; ق is also not easy. In every other aspect he is quite right. Arabic is not much more difficult than Hebrew. Edited by Cabaire on 29 December 2009 at 12:58am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| apparition Octoglot Senior Member United States Joined 6649 days ago 600 posts - 667 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), French, Arabic (Iraqi), Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Pashto | Message 4 of 8 29 December 2009 at 4:54am | IP Logged | ||
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That's funny, I've never considered the ع as being grouped with the خ, ه, and ح
Always seemed too different in my mind. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ANK47 Triglot Senior Member United States thearabicstudent.blo Joined 7096 days ago 188 posts - 259 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Arabic (classical) | Message 5 of 8 30 December 2009 at 3:00am | IP Logged | ||
I was reading the article and he said there were 4 'h' sounds. I read the alphabet off in my head trying to think what other letter he was talking about because I only counted 3. I guess ع was the 4th. I don't group it with the h's, but I do sometimes hear ح in words when what's being said is ع and vice versa. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| apparition Octoglot Senior Member United States Joined 6649 days ago 600 posts - 667 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), French, Arabic (Iraqi), Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Pashto | Message 6 of 8 30 December 2009 at 3:29am | IP Logged | ||
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That kind of thing seems to happen a lot. People have different ways of organizing things and making sense of things when they learn a language. I'm noticing it with Russian right now. I've been looking over the treatment of Russian verbs by three different grammarians and they all have different ideas of the classification of perfective and imperfective verbs (especially what beginners need to focus on). It's kind of frustrating, but also kind of enlightening.
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| khowaga Tetraglot Newbie United States khowaga.us/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5442 days ago 1 posts - 1 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Arabic (Egyptian) | Message 7 of 8 30 December 2009 at 3:56pm | IP Logged | ||
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Actual blogger here!
To put an end to the speculation over what the 4th H sound that I mentioned is: it's the letter غ. I've always heard it as a guttural "h", although some might classify it as an r or a g. I was thinking of all the ways that people who poke fun at Arabic try to blend together phlegmatic sounds and claim they're "words in Arabic" when I wrote it -- it's not supposed to be a serious academic piece, although I'm kind of happy you all found it and haven't ripped me a new one ;) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| apparition Octoglot Senior Member United States Joined 6649 days ago 600 posts - 667 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), French, Arabic (Iraqi), Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Pashto | Message 8 of 8 30 December 2009 at 4:20pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yeah, I was responding to Cabaire's post, which has the ع written there as one of the H's. Should have quoted it to clarify.
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