Customer Reviews

The Oxford-Duden Pictorial German and English Dictionary (English and German Edition)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Having lived in Germany for five years I found this book extremely helpful. You can look up the area you may need information on and "voila" there is the picture and you can see what it is called in English and German. It has every situation. It has the following sections and then subsections under these. Atom, Universe, Earth Man and his Social Environment Nature as Environment, Agriculture, and Forestry Trades, Crafts and Industry and More, More and More. If you need your car fixed in Germany and you have questions on what you call a part you just go to this book and look in the automobile section and you will see very detailed pictures of a car and you find your part, the English word for it and the German word for it. If you are still having troule communicating just show them the picture. This book well deserves six stars

This is the most comprehensive vocabulary book for nouns - even in technical areas - that I have ever encountered. I have not seen another book like it. The bulk of the book is arranged by subject and the back contains all the vocabulary words arranged alphabetically cross-referencing with the subject section. This book is a must-have. It is a reference book. An earlier review mentions it is English not American. In my version (2nd Ed.), the American translations are in parentheses next to the English where there is a difference. There is no problem.

The Duden pictorial dictionary is a phenomenon. Instead of embracing the look-up-a-word style of conventional dictionaries, Duden allows you to browse by subject. If your topic is, say, the mechanical parts of an automobile, you turn to that page and you see an in-depth illustration with numbers, and on the bottom half of the page is a list with the word in German and English for what the number corresponds to. This book is indispensible for learning technical terms not found in most dictionaries, and includes many subjects...sports (even fencing), gambling, automotive, general knowledge, etc...anyone who is going to work for a German firm or wants to increase their vocabulary on an every-day basis should get this book....it is truly exceptional.

Extremely helpful for technical as well as misc entries that can be extremely hard to look up in a traditional dictionary. Being organized by subject is very helpful. Illustrations are somewhat dated (Especially with computers which may want to see an update since there are now more components to a computer which did not exist when this book was published). This book is a fantastic resource for anyone learning German and is essential for those who find themselves using technical terms.

A great noun builder for intermediate to advanced students of German (or German-speaking students of English), this book will help you attain a degree of precision in your vocabulary that would be difficult to achieve any other way without a substantial investment of time. The dictionary is arranged by subject areas varying from the highly technical (e.g. precision instrument parts) to the everyday (e.g. tableware). About one-fourth of the volume is taken up by the index which is eminently helpful if you want to quickly find the translation of a particular word without having to wade through the many subject areas. This edition did not incorporate the recent German spelling reform (Rechtschreibreform) which effected only a small proportion ofthe German vocabulary and for most purposes is a relatively minor distraction. Well-suited for browsing (a rare quality for a dictionary) and very different from most other language learning resources, consider this book a must-have for the serious language student.

Unlike a dictionary, this book presents a vocabulary associated with a topic. Example topics are animals, plants, woodworking, construction, ships, cars, planes, etc. As a result, if you want to build your vocabulary in order to discuss some topic with someone, you can learn that vocabulary much more quickly than by skipping all over a dictionary.

I recommend it.

For anyone who has no patience for looking up alphbatized words, The Oxford Duden Pictorial is a must. What a wonderful idea to be able to look up a category (the furniture in the living room, the names of sport items.etc) and find them all on one page. These dictionaties aren't being sold in the big chain stores but Amazon lists many. The use of this dictionary is endless.

I have some pen pals in Germany and write to them in German. I also like techical things.

The index materials in this book make it easy to use, whether going from German to English or vice versa. Sometimes the book scores a direct hit. Sometimes the information is too general to be of much use. I have often done as well with careful use of a good German-English/English-German dictionary.

If I cannot find what I want in print, I search the German version of Amazon for the item and see what word(s) are used in describing it. Often there are German-English glossaries available for download to give more detailed technical terms for a subject. I have used this for photographic and for computer terms. More than once I have been surprised to find the Germans have simply borrowed English terms, often without really "germanizing" them, even though there may be an actual legitimate German term for the item.

Since this book contains only nouns that can be illustrated, it is not useful for general work. For engineers and others with specific needs, it would be fine.

The name and says it all "Oxford-Druden". However, this is an indispensable dictionary. Every page has a picture on it with numbers pointing to objects. The opposing page has the numbers pointing to words written in German and English. The English takes a little getting used to (suspenders = braces, elevator = lift, and so on. Can you say exposure control device in German (die Belichtungssteuereinrichtung.) tried that without pictures?

The dictionary is being continuously updated. However this is the copy that supported me through German Class and I still use it today when navigating German language books