Customer Reviews

Standard Arabic: An Elementary-Intermediate Course

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I wrote the first review of this book above, before I started using it for study, and I've had to abandon it midway through. It is extremely academic in terms of introducing grammar and syntax points, and almost unreadable unless you're a linguist with a firm command of linguistic terms. It is extremely thorough in terms of grammar, syntax and even some prounciation notes, but more of a reference than a text for self-study, given the very dry tone. Also, lessons have extremely long word lists (sometimes as many as 100 new words in a lesson) which can be impossible to memorize in one large chunk, and very overwhelming. Without knowing the word lists, you can't even read the example texts or do the exercises, making study of one lesson very long. Some of the words on the lists are absolutely useless or mind-boggling as to why they included them... Good as a reference text to have on hand, but for actual study, stick with the Munther Younes books (Cornell prof, Yale Publishing.)

This is a 5-star book, but basically all that means is it's the best on the market for general needs. This has been adapated from a German text, and the perfect Arabic textbook for English speakers doesn't appear to exist yet, but Standard is very close. Follow it up with the advanced version in the series (mostly texts but very good selections). This is what classrooms should be using, most opt for either the Big Orange Book or Al-kitaab fii Ta'allum Al-'Arabiyya. With a teacher, this book is better than either.
Moreover Standard Arabic is most likely the best tool for self-study out there, and this is the context in which I've used it. However I recommend the reader have some exposure to arabic beforehand, especially with script as Standard's biggest shortcoming is a lack of transliteration (which has created ambiguities such as whether a waaw is to be read as a consonant or a vowel)

This is NOT a straight grammar, and there are probably better reference texts for MSA out there, however one of the appendices is devoted to 47-pages of paradigms, and there are comprehensive subject indices in Arabic and English but you will have to do a lot of flipping.
The only audio available with this book is cassettes (unless there is a new edition somewhere). This is simply a very concice lesson book in the modern style of language teaching.
For self-study, Al-Kitab will get you there (books 1 and 2), however the only advantage are the DVDs, and the Advanced Standard goes places the second Al-Kitab doesn't. Also Al-Kitab gets far more revisions so it is possible it will be improved, at the moment Standard is much more complete, contains more excercies, and is half the price.
For self-study there are several places to begin before using the Standard, namely:

J.R. Smart's Arabic from the Teach Yourself Series
An Introduction to Modern Arabic by Ziadeh/Winder from Dover
Mastering Arabic from Hippocrene (this is really a introductory course and Hippocrene's 'Beginning Arabic' is useful only for the 60 pages of Arabic literature for the very advanced student and the inclusion of F.E. Sommer's 'The Arabic Writing in Five Lessons with a Key' which is still the best short introduction to the script for the absolute beginner)
Or of course Book I of Al-Kitab, but both Standard Books are half the price of both Al-Kitab books

In summation I recommend the Elementary-Intermediate SA book for the following reasons:
1) It is a far better course book than Al-Kitab except for the added multimedia that Al-Kitab brings; and both are better than the Orange Books
2) For self-study it is comparatively more complete and up-to-date than anything from Dover, Hippocrene, or TY
3) The vocabulary lists are extensive
4) There are more excercises than in any other Arabic Textbook I've seen
5) Correct grammatical terms are used throughout - AND are given in Arabic and referred to as such throughout, so if one has a problem an Arabic speaker will immediately understand what one is asking
6) The Advanced SA follow-up is the furthest text in subject matter for English speakers
7) Very durable paper and a larger type-setting for Arabic characters than many other texts

Caveat: Other viewers have described this text as "dry" as there are very few pictures taking up space and there is a good deal of political and economic subject matter in the excercises and word choices; however, I can guarantee no text exists with both a complete treatment of the language AND pictures on every page, nor is likely to ever be published in English. Also the glossary is only Arabic-English and is ordered by roots (but this is also the case with the best Arabic-English dictionary by Hans Wehr, which should complement SA, though its own glossary is self-contained) Remember this is MSA, and though many colloquialisms are included it is understood that many conversations will be in dialect and require exposure from some other source.

"A noun cannot only be defined more closely by an attributive adjective, but also by a subsequent noun in the genitive. The relation of both nouns to each other is that of a governing noun (nomen regens) to an attributive adjunct(nomen rectum) in the function..."

If that makes sense to you, and you can use instructions like that to construct sentences, this book will be very helpful to you. It is fairly comprehensive and moves quickly. However, for the rest of us, the dense grammar terminology and the otherwise bewildering presentation of concepts require too much time deciphering the authors' English- much less utilizing it for learning Arabic! Not recommended for teaching yourself.

I want to update my interview. If you are an Arab-American with some background in Arabic, you may like this book if you want to review. If you already study a lot of Arabic and understand linguistic terms and can think in high level English, which I am trained to do in graduate school, then this would be great. Usually, very motivated learners learn languages. You must be motivated and somewhat experienced to benefit from this book. I think if you can find a tutor to help you with this book, there are many advantages to using it. However, you would have to go slowly. It could be a bit dry. I like the fact that it explains Arabic grammar using Arabic terms. I learned Arabic at the American School of Kuwait and was compelled to take it, and I was, basically, fluent, but, for some reason, I didn't understand my instructor's explanations. It's easier for me to make sense of the terms that were used in the past and learn from this book than from my teachers. I can relate more to this book than my instructors.

If you want something for learning Arabic and self-study go with:

1)Nicholas Awde and Alif Baa for mastering the alphabet

2)Don't go to Al-Kitab, it's too much of a jump. Go and use Mastering Arabic by Whightwick. There are two volumes now. If you have a tutor, use Alosh's "Ahlan Wa Sahlan" book.

If you want things geared to dialects, then go with Munther Younis for Levantine and Al Kitab for Egyptian and a mix of classical. Alosh sticks to just classical, but in a pratical way.

I love learning languages and yet this book is little fun. I compared books on the shelf at the bookstore and this one seemed to be the most complete book for learning Arabic available. It is however extremely unfriendly, and not meant for self study; this becomes eveident soon, very soon.

Purely as a reference tool it is too cumbersome, and I can't say that it is very complete. More than one example to accompany grammatical and syntactical points would be welcome.

The things that make the book unfriendly to the student are several but as a self learner these are the most salient and annoying:

(1) THE STRUCTURE OF THE INDIVIDUAL LESSONS: All new grammar in each lesson is presented first, and then followed by long vocabulary lists, followed in turn by two texts for reading, and then numerous exercises. The exercises are dry and take forever to get through. I am not sure how effective they are, given the time that they require. I find that I get bogged down in each lesson and am eager to get on to something new in the next lesson about half way through the exercises.

There is in this structure no link between the new grammar presented in the lesson and the exercises included with it. They are separate compartments grouped under a common heading, so that the student is forced to learn a bunch of grammar and syntax and then take it with him and apply his knowledge to the exercises afterwards. For instance, taking lesson 6 as an example, the student learns the genitive construction, then the affixed pronouns (which serve as personal pronouns when attached to nouns, direct objects of personal pronouns when attached to prepositions and verbs), included in the presentation of this material are peculiarities of spelling and pronunciation in their use. There is little there in the way of a focussed exercise to help you learn this new information.

(2) THE VOCAB LISTS: The book follows the principle that short vowel marks should only be included where failure to include them would obscure meaning. That's ok since one needs to learn to read unvowelled texts anyway, however, this liberty should not be taken in vocabulary lists from which a student is to learn new words. And granted that the vowels are included in the list, but not consistently, and fatHa (the short a) is not written in order to save printing. So how is the student to know whether to pronounce the word "employee"? Is it muwadhaf or muudhaf. It's the first, but you wouldn't know it without the short A written above the waaw, unless you had known the word to begin with, or you had an Arabic speaking teacher accompanying your book.

Another example from the vocab list to illustrate another problem: the phrase "How much does _____ cost? is written bkm. Now I think that it is "bikmi" but I am not sure that those little hash marks underneath the letters are meant to be short "i"s and not the "a" vowels from the word underneath it in the vocab list, which sometimes the authors are in fact printing. And in fact the word may be pronounced bikami since the fact that there is no a vowel printed there means you should pronounce one. I haven't yet studied if they are printing "sukuun" (the little circle which tells you there is no vowel) consistently or not. If they do so consistently then this is probably to be pronounced "bikami". Anyway, you get the idea, and this is a consistent problem with the vocab lists. Suggestion to the authors: don't skimp out on vowel signs in vocab lists of new words.

(3) THE EXERCISES AND CORRESPONDING ANSWER KEYS: The fact that there is an answer key is not a strength to the book, and the reason is that neither exercises or corresponding answers are numbered. So what you see when you do an exercise is for example a block of text with an instruction like "translate into Arabic" or "change the verbs from the first person singular to the second person and make them questions", and you have a block of text just like this paragraph I am typing now, only in the book there could be ten or twenty sentences at times. Then you refer to the answer key, and since the sentences of the exercise are given to you in one big chunk, as a paragraph, you will have to hunt for the answers in the corresponding paragraph chunk in the answer key. It's possible only slow and annoying to look for the spot where you left off each time.

The book is obviously meant to be used in a classroom situation with a teacher. My question then is: "why is an answer key included at all?" Anyone who has the fortitude of character and the eyesight to stick with this book will not have to rely on the answer key anyway. Numbering individual sentences in the exercises at any rate is such an obvious help that I do not understand why it was not done. To save space? I'd rather pay for paper and spare my eyesight and my patience.

If you are a self learner and this is enough to dissuade you from purchasing this book then I am content with not continuing into minutiae. If you are a student in an actual class and your teacher has chosen this text then I assume you will get the help you need from your teacher. If you are a teacher, using this book will probably make you have to work a lot harder to help your students through the material.

I am using this as my textbook in a course at a local community college. I will echo what the other reviewers' consensus seems to be: this book is not appropriate for self-study. It is a college-level textbook and is written with the assumption that a teacher will be there to guide the student.

I have learned languages before using self-teaching books. This is not one of them. Arabic is a more difficult language to learn for English speakers, and this book is definitely not for independent learning.

It would, however, make a useful reference for someone who has already learned some Arabic from another source.

I would also recommend, even if you are learning in class, supplementing this textbook with an Arabic alphabet book like "The Arabic Alphabet: How to Read and Write It" by Awde.

Self-teacher n.b.: This is Standard Arabic, not the spoken Arabic of the people, which varies widely from place to place. If you are looking to pick up a few phrases and vocabulary for a trip or something, this is definitely not the book. Try to find a book, CD set, or something that applies specifically to the area you are visiting, since spoken Arabic varies widely from place to place.

This is not a bad text by any means. It is not for individual learners, though. The student with this text needs a teacher who not only knows Arabic well but understands teaching and learning languages.

This book is the required text for a course in Arabic I am currently taking, and I must confess that I have been completely lost with it. I definitely would not recommend it for the student who has never had any introduction to Arabic. For example, the entire alphabet is covered in literally one page. Furthermore, you're never instructed on how to write the letters! There's supposed to be a tape with the book, but neither I nor any of the other students received a tape with their books, and so it's pure guesswork as to how the letters and words are supposed to be pronounced. I feel I will be much better served by a more elementary text, one that examines each letter or vowel individually and then builds from there. In retrospect, I wish I had purchased the series published by the State Department, where you get both tapes and a text in a comprehensive format; the only problem is that it's about {money}! Others have told me that the book, MASTERING ARABIC, is a very good starter book. As for this text, I wish you good luck...because you're going to need it!

Although the book is very comprehensive, it takes an extremely rigid and characterless way in teaching the Arabic language. Using this book is difficult and cumbersome. Many advanced language grammatical terms are used in the book and I found myself referring to the (english) dictionary many times while using this book. Also, the terms in the book follow the fomal format, which no one speaks. This book would be perfect for the discerning English professor or English major who wishes to learn the fromal Arabic language in its entirety, otherwise, I really don't recommend it.

If you want to learn Arabic as in novels, magazines etc this is the book. But dont start directly using this book. I recommend you study Mastering Arabic by Jane Wightwick and then come to this book. Few guys have found this book hard. Well, learning languages needs practise and this book has it. Exercises and exercises. This is the best book to learn MSA.

Perhaps I'm unfit to review this book, since I didn't finish it. After painstakingly completing two chapters, I couldn't stand it anymore and put it back on my shelf to collect dust.

I have a feeling that this book would be good for an intermediate student to review and solidify his knowledge base, but it makes for a terrible introductory text. I haven't been able to find anything much better, though, so I gave up studying MSA and began studying colloquial Eastern Arabic exclusively.

It's too bad that authors of MSA texts seem to all find the language so damn boring and want us to as well. Who wants to learn vocabulary related to taxation and municipal infrastructure when they don't even know how to order a coffee yet?