Customer Reviews

Teach Yourself Beginner's Urdu Script

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

 

 

Good Urdu learning material can be hard to come by. Delacy hits the mark with a self-contained introduction that serves as an ideal base for launching into further studies of Urdu. The book presents Urdu letters in bite-size units with the emphasis on character recognition and handwriting. There are lots of reading and writing exercises, all with the answers provided. You'll learn about how, like Arabic, these letters change depending on if the letter is first or last in a word or somewhere in between. You'll also learn how to read and compose simple words.

Here are a few assorted findings. There are two styles of Urdu script: nasta'liq and naskh. Nasta'liq is a bit more intimidating than naskh although the latter is also common to Arabic and Persian. Delacy utilizes the nasta'liq in his text which may cause you to curse at first but in the end you'll be glad that the book is presented that way. Not only is nasta'liq is the more common Urdu script but its compact, slanted form gives written Urdu a distinct character compared to other languages that utilize Perso-Arabic scripts. Also, the letters are not presented in the order of the Urdu alphabet nor are letters which appear similar in shape presented together as a group, as intuition would suggest, but rather spread out throughout the book. This arrangement is a bit weird but it works. If you already know Arabic you'll simultaneously find a lot of commonality and difference with Urdu. For example, you'll find many of the same letters in Arabic as well as some letters that look the same but aren't. There are also different rules for connecting letters when constructing a word.

One of the book's chief benefits is that it will give you a head start when undertaking more advanced studies in Urdu. You will already know how to read the language and will not have to bother with messy transliteration schemes that use the roman alphabet (along with funky tildes, macrons, and umlauts) to teach pronunciation. The author does employ such a scheme but you'll need a native speaker to help you correctly pronounce Urdu. The chief benefit, however, is that this inexpensive book fulfills its purpose of teaching you how to read and write Urdu in an easy to follow manner.

I am a university student who's studied Arabic for the last few years and am now thinking about learning Urdu. Because I know the Arabic script already, I figured this book might be a good way to teach myself the Urdu script before going on to learn to speak and read. I have to admit I was slightly skeptical about the whole teach yourself thing, but this book turned out to be a great resource! The author does a good job of teaching how to form the letters step-by-step in each of their positions, and how to link them together. It was especially important for me that this part be clear, as there are several key differences from Arabic. The whole book is easy to follow, but doesn't condescend to the reader. What was most helpful, though, is that it allowed me to deal with one part of the language at a time. Now that I feel comfortable with the script, I feel like I can go on to learn to read and speak. I would also guess that this would be an especially useful tool for native speakers who may not have learned to write in the Urdu script.

(...) This is an unbelievable useful resource. The sections are very well organised and structured, slowly building up knowledge of the letters and how to write and combine them in initial, medial and final position (see how much I've learned already!). Take a look at the pages that you can view through Amazon and you will see how the book shows you how to write Urdu letters stroke by stroke, and then combine letters to forms words.
If you want to learn to write Urdu by yourself - this is the one!

There is no secret to learning another form of writing. Not that it needs to be hard. After completing a chapter of this book per night (one hour per night for ten nights), I found that I have a good understanding of the Nasta'liq script.

If you diligently work through the exercises this book will rapidly get you to a point where you can read and write Nasta'liq. However, this book will not advance you past this point. Any further advancement requires other learning aids.

This book simply does what it tries to do, and it does it well. I highly recomend it to people learning the Urdu script.

Richard Delacy taught Hindi-Urdu at UIC in Chicago for several semesters.
I was honored to take his classes for three consecutive levels on the topic. He was the best teacher at the university period. We did use this book in class, and it was an excellent resource. I have lost the book and am ordering it again. He also has a textbook he co-wrote for learning Hindi script and grammar. It is the best on the market and I highly recommend it.

This is an excellent book if you want to learn how to read and write in Urdu. Unless you are a native speaker, you might need to consult someone who can speak a North Indian language to help with the pronounciations. The exercises are excellent-they are not only designed to test your reading skills, but they also test you on your writing abilities. All in all, it is highly recommended if you want to learn how to read & write Urdu.

I agree with the other reviewer. This book is terrible if you want to learn how to write naturally. Everything is computerized and the characters are all in bold thick print as though a marker drew it. It makes it impossible to see how to write a letter and/or word naturally. Everything seems to just blend together. There are NO examples of actual handwriting whatsoever. I think the author could have done a much better job. Also he really doesn't tie the ideas in together to move from one point to another. Definitely would not recommend this book to anyone else. There simply must be something better out there.

What I was looking for with this book was illustrations of how to WRITE Urdu- in short, Urdu handwriting. Since there aren't any, doesn't that make this book a waste of money?