Customer Reviews
A refreshing book 
2008-05-24
The book helps me in refreshing my memory on earlier knowledge of arabic alphabets and how they are used. It is recommended for those who want to learn arabic language from zero point.
ECELLENT BOOK! 2007-04-11
GOOD BOOK, I WOULD LIKE TO HAVE ONE ON DVD, PLUS SALHA ALSO
Mumtaaz 
2006-11-23
I think it's an excellent book for beginners. The only problem is the transliteration for the tough Arabic letters (Ayn, Ghayn, Khaa, Ha). Overall it's a solid building block.
Good place to start 2006-07-10
This is a good beginners book. If you already know the alphabet and want to incorporate some simple vocabularly this is for you.
It helps if you can already read the Arabic script, but its not necessary as the book gives the transliteration too.
I found it most useful for teaching children. The flash cards and simple exercises keep it interesting.
Works extremely well re script - not so well re sound 2005-12-17
Original review (prior to formal Arabic instruction): This book was my "ice-breaker" to learning Arabic, for personal interest in Christian-Muslim dialogue, and professional interest in Islamic world view(s). The key to this book's exceptional utility is the ease of associating sound patterns of phonetic transliteration of words for everyday objects (household items, clothing articles, etc.) with the written patterns of Arabic characters. Although I totally lacked familiarity with the Arabic alphabet, the correspondence between "sound and sight" was remarkably easy to decipher, granted the basic level of vocabulary. While I don't expect more advanced vocabulary or grammar to be nearly so easy, the book accomplishes its objective: Removing the intimidation of a completely unfamiliar alphabet. Well done!
As an aside, I've found that the ability to read music (a skill I've only recently acquired) helps significantly. It's a very short "leap" from reading pitches represented by non-Roman characters (musical notes) to reading phonemes represented by a non-Roman alphabet.
Addendum following instruction: Since writing the above review, I've completed a semester in beginning Arabic, and I now have a mild-to-moderate criticism of the book. There are basic sounds and sound patterns that simply cannot be represented by English phoneticisms, period. So for the purpose of learning the *sounds* represented by Arabic *script*, English phoneticisms are misleading in some cases, and flat out wrong in others.
For those already familiar with Arabic sounds, phoneticisms or transliterations are merely "codes" rather than representations. Unfortunately, this book gives the (often false) impression of *representing* the sounds. Readers who get a false sense of confidence in mispronunciations learned from this book (as I did) may be discouraged when they first encounter the difficulties of correct pronunciation. That's where my music reading analogy falls apart: In music training you actually hear the notes represented by the symbols, whereas the edition of this book that I reviewed did not include a CD.
The book still works very well re demystifing Arabic *script*, but the apparent representations of Arabic *sounds* should be taken with a grain of salt. For the English speaker, many Arabic sounds and ways of verbally connecting sounds are totally unfamiliar. To learn to properly pronounce Arabic on even the most basic level, inter-personal instruction is an absolute must. Recordings are good supplements for "ear training," but they cannot provide the correction essential for properly *verbalizing* Arabic sounds.
As an example of why this correction is essential, well into my first semester of very exacting instruction, I could detect the anglicized mispronunciations of acquaintances who've "picked up" Arabic overseas without benefit of intensive instruction. In contrast, on the first day of my second semester, my new teacher, a native *Saudi* Arab speaker, took me aside and remarked on the correctness of my pronunciation. Interestingly, my first teacher was a native *Sudanese* Arab speaker, indicating that modern standard Arabic really is just that - a standardized way of speaking as well as writing across nationalities.
Good - With One Problem 2005-03-18
This book is designed to teach the beginner a basic vocabulary of 100 Arabic words—covering 8 everyday topics: around the home/ clothes/ around town (including transportation)/ countryside/ essentials/ opposities/ animals/ parts of the body.
VERY GOOD BOOK... 2005-01-31
I am teaching some people Arabic and I found this book to be very useful in teaching them how to recognize Arabic letters within words and to build their vocabulary. I agree that the book Arabic for beginners is a good companion to this book according to what Elmassfar said in this review. I have both books as well.... And you don't have to worry about missing CDs when buying it....
Pair this book up with... 2004-07-17
"Read and Speak Arabic for Beginners" for the maximum benefit. I've been teaching myself Arabic off and on since I lived in Egypt in 1994, and these two are the best books for basic learning that I've found. Good basis on the fundamentals of the written language, as well as basic conversational skills. Repetition, the key to learning anything new, is the primary means in these books. However, as you progress, they reinforce the words and language skills learned earlier by forcing you to incorporate them as you get farther along.
I've also found that the Hippocrene series has several excellent Arabic resources too. "Mastering Arabic" by Wightwick and Gaafar, and the companion Arabic-English dictionary and phrasebook are particularly good.
I've yet to find the "perfect" book that combines reading/writing, vocabulary, and grammar all in one useful setting, and Amazon should know...I've bought at least a dozen different books from them in my quest...These 2 give a pretty darn good effort though.
Have fun in study Arabic!! Good for beginner!! 2004-01-13
This book will help the beginners to learn those everyday words in a funny and easy way. Strongly suggest to use the book after remembered and understood the Arabic characters and their transformations. The cons about the book is there's no words related to verbs.
A Must for the Beginner. 2003-11-07
This is the book to begin learning any language. This makes the transition to other learning methods much easier. This book gives the foundation for reading Arabic script and recognizing essential words in the Arabic language. I did have the pronunciation of some words wrong, but it was easy to make corrections. Other methods will teach the grammar and phrases, but this book should be the first to buy. This book and the "Teach Yourself Gulf Arabic" have given me a basis for expanding my knowledge of the Arabic language.
