Customer Reviews

Kallimni 'Arabi Bishweesh: A Beginners' Course in Spoken Egyptian Arabic 1

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As with the rest of the books in this series, the present volume lays out a very useful course for the practical study of the Egyptian dialect of Arabic. The vocabulary is high-frequency, and the expressions taught are those in common use.

The book appears to be primarily designed for use in the courses taught in the International Languages Institute (ILI) in Cairo; so only a minimal amount of support (one CD, no answers to exercises, no explanation in English) is provided. Thus the book would probably be excellent if used with a teacher, but is unlikely to be helpful to someone working on his/her own. I would give it four stars if used with a teacher, but only two for use in self-study.

I had mixed feelings about this book. Maybe two stars is too generous. Although it seems to cover Egyptian Arabic topics that would be good in a text book, it's hard to tell, because all of the instructions are in Arabic as well! I know that this is a tactic used by many who write foreign language texts. I should know; I own literally hundreds, and speak many of the languages. But in this instance, for me, nothing was intuitive enough to even know where to begin. I needed it for a class and the teacher was somewhat fit to be tied, as well. She was openly frustrated by this fact and would have to translate the instructions for every single exercise she wanted us to do in the book. Just this one fact can take a five star book to nothing pretty fast. No sense in buying a "good" book you can't use. Save your money, if you can.

I read the other reviews before I purchased the book but I saw english words in the "look inside" feature so I thought I could swing it. I am at an intermediate level in MSA and I still felt like there was too much Arabic to figure out what's going on without digging. Turns out some of the (english) words are at the back, and some of the words are given right after the unit. But she's selective about which she translates even in the same phrase. Huh??? I mean besides the translation issue the setup is just weird. And I can see why there are so many volumes of Kallimni, you don't get through that much in the first book and I imagine the others are the same. I know now it's not intended for self study but I think they count on people finding that out AFTER they've spent the money which is not right. Why not have the back cover written in all Arabic??? Since you're really targeting Arabic speaking teachers and tutors!

I certainly prefer the Spoken Arabic of Cairo by Maurice Salib though I'm just starting it. So far it's waaaay better just older (copyright 1981). As a supplement the lonley planet phrase book is awesome as well. The Kallimni however is a waste of time.