The Firefly French/English Visual Dictionary (English and French Edition) [Hardcover]

Jean-Claude Corbeil (Author), Ariane Archambault (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 7, 2004 | ISBN-10: 1552979504 | ISBN-13: 978-1552979501 | Edition: Bilingual

28,000 terms illustrated with 4,800 colorful pictures.

The Firefly French/English Visual Dictionary is an unparalleled reference to the world around us and an indispensable tool for language education. Its 4,800 full-color illustrations show what other dictionaries can only describe in black-and-white text. From the parts of a honeybee to the parts of a bulldozer, the scope and depth are immense.

There are 28,000 terms and phrases revealed in detailed lifelike illustrations that make identification quick and accurate. French terms are identified by gender, and two indexes make it fast and easy to find a term in either language. The 600 subjects are organized into 17 color-coded sections:

• Astronomy
• House
• Earth
• Clothing
• Vegetable kingdom
• Arts and architecture
• Animal kingdom
• Communications and office automation
• Human being
• Food and kitchen
• Transport and machinery
• Do-it-yourself and gardening
• Energy
• Science
• Personal Adornment and articles
• Society
• Sports and games.

This reference is perfect for school, work or travel. For anyone learning French or English as a second language, The Firefly French/English Visual Dictionary is fun, accurate, easy and fast.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Absolutely the best foreign language dictionary on the market. (Janet Groene Family Motor Coaching 200504)

Thousands of generalist and specialist words... a fun dictionary to look at because of the colorful pictures. (Odile Rollin Resource Links )

The pictures are wonderful -- sharp and clear, done in accurate, vivid color... a useful and beautiful resource. (Mary Anne Cree Canadian Children's Book News )

Beautifully produced and well bound in a size that is easy to handle. (Margaret Henry Quill and Quire )

About the Author

Jean-Claude Corbeil is a consultant in linguistic planning, with a worldwide reputation in the fields of comparative terminology and socio-linguistics.

Ariane Archambault is a specialist in applied linguistics who taught foreign languages before becoming a terminologist and editor of dictionaries.

(20050105)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 586 pages
• Publisher: Firefly Books; Bilingual edition (August 7, 2004)
• Language: English, French
• ISBN-10: 1552979504
• ISBN-13: 978-1552979501
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 7 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #809,503 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a great tool, August 2, 2005

By 

M. Olson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Firefly Spanish/English Visual Dictionary (English and Spanish Edition) (Hardcover)

If you are trying to learn Spanish, and not just enough to order a drink in Cancun, then this is a tool I would recommend. I have been studying this language for over seven years and I continue to learn every day. I have just completed a Spanish major at the university, which is no guarantee of fluency. I also lived in Mexico for over a year. Granted, these experiences have greatly improved my Spanish--but do not be fooled. A language is not learned in a few months, (a claim many language programs and books suggest on their covers).

One of the best examples I can think of that would illustrate what I am trying to say would be to ask someone learning Spanish if they can describe how to ride a bicycle in Spanish. This is not hard to do in a native language, but for a learner of a foreign language such a request is a true challenge. Someone like me who has read dozens of books in or about spanish still can't do it. This book has a detailed diagram of a bicycle and with its assistance I believe I could do it.

I feel strongly that in the United States foreign language instruction focuses too much attention on grammar and not nearly enough on vocabulary. Who cares if you can conjugate most verbs in the past subjunctive if you don't even know what the word for elbow is?

I enjoy looking at this book in my spare time. The pictures are lovely and clearly labeled in both Spanish and English. My girlfriend, who does not speak Spanish, even enjoys paging through the book and learing words in English that she does not know, such as the names for different types of hats. She is a doctor and she tells me that the anatomy section is very good.

One drawback of the book is that it uses formal names for things and not the common ones. This can result in an overly academic-sounding Spanish. But I suppose slang is beyond the scope of the book.

This is a book that I would recommend for people at any level of language learning.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great visual desk dictionary..., July 30, 2007

By 

B. Surkan (Marietta, GA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Firefly Spanish/English Visual Dictionary (English and Spanish Edition) (Hardcover)

I am a teacher of Spanish and own a number of visual dictionaries, including the Firefly Five Language Dictionary, the Firefly Spanish/English Dictionary, the Firefly Mini Spanish/English Dictionary, and the DK Five Language Visual Dictionary. I prefer the Firefly dictionaries because they tactfully include the gender of words as a superscript after the word rather than as an indirect article, as in the DK dictionary. The latter has the ill-effect of creating ambiguous genders in instances where the indirect article is truncated:

For example: garlic - l'ail - der Knoblauch - el ajo - l'aglio

The size of this hardcover edition make it more appropriate for use as a desk dictionary rather than a pocket edition. It does not contain any more information than the Mini edition, but the Firefly Five Language Dictionary contains almost twice as many pages and words. Given that the image layouts used in all of the Firefly dictionaries are from a common master, the page count is a very good indication of the word count. Frankly, the quantity of the words in the hardcover edition is ample for even most advanced students of Spanish. And the absence of the extra three languages makes it less cluttered and confusing.

As with any visual dictionary, this one focuses on nouns. Students of the Spanish will still want to have a quality pocket bilingual dictionary like the Larousse:

Larousse Student Dictionary Spanish-English / English-Spanish (Larousse School Dictionary)

And a quality Spanish-only dictionary like the Dictionario Practico del Estudiante:

Diccionario Practico del Estudiante/ Student Dictionary

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent dictionary -- please note that it is Canadian, November 9, 2005

By 

camcas5 "camcas5" (Hatfield, MA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Firefly French/English Visual Dictionary (English and French Edition) (Hardcover)

This is a superbly organized visual dictionary that is user-friendly and quite comprehensive. PLEASE NOTE -- and nowhere in the descriptions of the book is this mentioned -- that this is a Canadian publication, and this causes differences in vocabulary for terms used in France and other Francophone nations. Whether the omission of "feutre" as the word for a marker or the descriptions of lettuce or many other vocabulary cases, a significant number of these terms, and the items chosen (particularly for food), are NOT those that would be used or found correct in France. This is perfectly fine, of course, but it should be made clear.