Customer Reviews

Somali Textbook

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This thick, heavy work (modeled after Foreigh Service Institute courses) will definitely give a beginning student of Somali a lot to work with. Important concepts of grammar are introduced one at a time (and the authors do not ask students to figure out sentences that have grammar that they have not introduced yet), there are lots of example sentences given that illustrate these concepts very well, and extensive vocabulary is offered so that a student can simply plug in at will to the sentences given as illustrations.

In the latter half of the book there are actual, authentic texts (Somali folktales, which offer some interesting insights into Somali culture as well as putting newly acquired vocabulary and grammar to work) and short, 'survival' dialogues that offer a running start into everyday interactions with Somali speakers. But there are things this book doesn't have that it really should- audio should definitely be available, a key to the exercises would be a great help (even if it had to be sold separately) and there is nowhere to be found any explanation (other than the occasional hint that such a phenomenon exists) of the stress-tone patterns that play such an all-important role in Somali grammar, other than that it is covered in 'Somali Reference Grammar', also published by Dunwoody Press. Now it is possible, if you have 'Colloquial Somali' to look in the back of this book, find out which noun declension or verb class a noun or verb belongs to, and figure out the correct stress-tone that way. But this is a lot of extra work and learners of Somali certainly have enough on their plate without having to be put to unnecessary trouble. Still, resources on this exotic language are so hard to find that maybe these flaws should be forgiven. Make your $85 donation to Dunwoody Press (a wonderful company that specializes in publishing works on less commonly taught languages, and go get after it. Once you have a teacher.

I began to study Somali simultaneously using both this textbook and Martin Orwin's Colloquial Somali. Of the two, this text is much lengthier - 681 pages vs Orwin's 306. From the Dunwoody Press (the publisher's) website: "Fifty lessons in this course bring a student to a practical proficiency in Somali grammar and Somali-English translation techniques. Actual texts (thirty folktales) are emphasized from Chapter 21 onwards. Comprehensive grammatical notes (crossreferenced to the Somali Reference Grammar) and exercises are found in each chapter. Oral fluency is covered in an appendix of survival dialogues. A glossary of over 6,000 word forms and a detailed grammatical index are included."

All in all, and especially considering that this book and Orwin's are pretty much the only two works resembling modern textbooks of the Somali language, this book isn't very bad at all. I've certainly worked with worse textbooks for more frequently taught languages.

The survival dialogues are just that - brief dialogues, and provide nowhere near the amount of practice in using real-world, essential vocabulary that is presented in depth in Orwin's text. Zorc does, however, provide much more material than Orwin overall. Where Orwin may present a grammatical feature and illustrate it once in a dialogue and once in a short exercise, Zorc may devote an entire chapter to it and provide the student with numerous exercises. Zorc does not provide an answer key for for the exercises at the end of his book like Orwin does, however.

My overall impression is that this book is more comprehensive than Orwin's, and in the later chapters certainly provides much more material (mainly in the form of folk-tales) with which to work, but that the manner in which the material is presented is less accessible and effective (i.e. frequently unclear explanations followed by lists of words as examples, rather than Orwin's clear and effective grammatical explanations) manner than in Orwin. Overall, I continue to find both books useful for different reasons, but I suspect that after having worked my way completely through Orwin I will be grateful for the sheer amount of Somali language material available in this work.

On a practical note, I purchased this book new for $85 on the Dunwoody Press website, as I was unable to find anyone offering a used copy for less than $100 anywhere else. The book is hardcover and does not come with CDs or cassettes. It is expensive, yes, but ultimately an invaluable resource for a more serious study of the language than Orwin's book can provide, regardless of how well written it may be.