A beginner's interactive multimedia course to teach the South African language of Zulu. The interactive CD-ROM incorporates sound, video, graphics, a course dictionary and exercises providing immediate feedback to the learner. The CD-ROM is accompanied by a comprehensive coursebook providing detailed grammatical explanations and additional exercises.
FREE Two-Day Shipping for Students. Learn more |
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Review
A sequel is a sequel is a sequel, right? Following on from their highly acclaimed CD-ROM Xhosa language tutor African Voices have released Speak Zulu With Us sporting a new interface, navigation system and revised course structure. What the user will once again be pleased to discover is a well thought out, well presented interactive language program demonstrating the fundamental precepts of the Zulu language. Kicking off the course is an extensive lesson on pronunciation. By the authors own admission, this section is "long and detailed", owing to the somewhat complex and subtle nature of Zulu pronunciation. A detailed breakdown of each of the vowel and consonant sounds, as well as the 'clicks' and 'click variants', are provided by means of an in-depth textual explanation. Supporting this is an easy-to-use function which allows the user to listen to each of the sounds being uttered by a native Zulu speaker. (Daily Mail & Guardian - 26-November-1999 (SA Newspaper)) -- Daily Mail & Guardian - 26-November-1999, SA Newspaper
African Voices has followed up its impressive Speak Xhosa With Us CD-ROM with an equally awe-inspiring Zulu multimedia course. And, what's more, it's both PC and Mac compatible, so people with iMacs aren't left out in the cold. Speak Zulu With Us offers a beginner's course in South Africa's most widely spoken African language. It's divided into five lessons that start with basic greetings and cover a range of other handy scenarios, including an amorous advance at a party that will set you on your way to a basic understanding of Zulu. With a catchy soundtrack of indigenous tunes, each lesson is divided into five sections. The "conversation" sections contain video clips of real Zulu-speakers in action. A handy feature lets you record yourself emulating these Zulu speakers, so you can hear just how bad your pronunciation really is. (I-Technology November 16 1999 (SA Newspaper)) -- I-Technology November 16 1999, SA Newspaper
African Voices has followed up its impressive Speak Xhosa With Us CD-ROM with an equally awe-inspiring Zulu multimedia course. And, what's more, it's both PC and Mac compatible, so people with iMacs aren't left out in the cold. Speak Zulu With Us offers a beginner's course in South Africa's most widely spoken African language. It's divided into five lessons that start with basic greetings and cover a range of other handy scenarios, including an amorous advance at a party that will set you on your way to a basic understanding of Zulu. With a catchy soundtrack of indigenous tunes, each lesson is divided into five sections. The "conversation" sections contain video clips of real Zulu-speakers in action. A handy feature lets you record yourself emulating these Zulu speakers, so you can hear just how bad your pronunciation really is. (I-Technology November 16 1999 (SA Newspaper)) -- I-Technology November 16 1999, SA Newspaper
About the Author
Derek Gowlett MA (African Languages) WITS, South Africa Derek Gowlett received his MA in African Languages at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa and a Diploma in Applied Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh. He has taught Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho and Lozi, and written numerous academic articles on comparative African Linguistics and Literature. He is editor of the book Contributions to African Linguistics (published by Via Afrika) and is currently doing research on Yeyi and UMbundu (languages of the Caprivi/ Botswana and Angola).
Khethiwe Ngwenya BA Dip Prim Ed (University of Cape Town, SA) Khethiwe Ngwenya grew up in a small farming community outside Newcastle in KwaZulu-Natal. After completing a BA in Primary Education at the University of Cape Town (where she received the Class Medal for African Languages) Khethiwe taught in KwaZulu-Natal and then returned to Cape Town to pursue work as a freelance lecturer, writer and editor for Juta Publishing and Cambridge University Press.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Here's wishing all lessons could be like this!,
By A Customer
This review is from: Speak Zulu With Us (Book & CD-Rom edition) (Paperback)
Learning the language most South Africans speak as a first-language has always been my aim, but I have never been able to find a course that combines both conversational practice with grammatical thoroughness.Speak Zulu With Us by African Voices has, at last, filled this most important gap. Exploiting all the features of multimedia (video, sound, record-self, interactive exercises, graphics etc) this CD-ROM is so well-written and beautifully designed you just don't want to leave it alone! You can move easily from any one of the activities - conversation, grammar, exercises, dictionary, culture - within a lesson or even skip happily between lessons - for there is also a simple way to access the program map and access particular lessons or parts of lessons. Each lesson starts with a number of videos of Zulu speakers - mostly represented by members of two families - the Hlophes who live in Johannesburg and the Mthethwas who live in rural KwaZulu-Natal. I liked the different personalities and humour as well as the cultural detail - the section on greetings has at least 4 different greetings depending on age, rank and degree of conservatism. All of this is explained in the culture section but it is really nice to see the videos which give you an idea of body-language and eye-contact etc. After watching and listening to the videos (all with optional text and English translations) you get to practice your own pronunciation and conversational ability via the self-record function. There are also lots of listening comprehensions which are an excellent way of getting that ear to pick out the new sounds and make sense of them. There seems to be a very clear methodology behind this course because once you finish the practical exercises you really feel that you can say something! The grammar sections are detailed, but what makes it excellent is that you get sound on all text and the many grammar exercises are all meaningful, useful sentences. I really enjoyed doing these exercises because even if you don't immediately know the answer you can click on the "sound help" button and actually hear the sentence being pronounced" and then you attempt your answer. You can repeat the exercises as much as you want, but if you are really tired and fed-up you can get the answers straight away. The dictionary is great but only covers the words seen or heard in the course. There is also a great way to practise your vocabulary - you can switch off the English or Zulu and see if you can come up with the right word. Again, what is great is getting the correct Zulu pronunciation on every word. I found the course-workbook that comes with the CD very helpful - it tracks all the multimedia lessons and gives you a chance to do some more exercises (as if you hadn't had enough!) What a pity this is just a Beginners course - albeit a very thorough one!
2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Language learning experience,
By Rick (Fairbanks, Alaska USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Speak Zulu With Us (Book & CD-Rom edition) (Paperback)
This is a wonderful production, marrying the best of modern multimedia interface, langauge instution and cultural information. If you want an introduction to Zulu and have the correct computer hardware, this is well worth the (steep) price-tag!
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
