Alif Baa: Introduction to Arabic Letters and Sounds - Book & Audio CD Edition

This book is a wonderful introduction to how Arabic is pronounced and written. I myself studied the full content of this books over a month of diligent daily study, at the end of which I had a solid base upond which establish any further study of the arabic language. The books covers all the sounds and provide a wealth of exercises to master them, often comparing them to sounds present in English or in other European languages, which helps considerably to make the articulation of some difficult sounds attainable. Similarly, it gives plenty of opportunity to practice the arabic writting. I myself enjoyed it so much I wish I could have a book like this as a first textbook for every language.

I used this book, as well as the accompanying audio cassettes, video cassette, and answer key, with a group of about ten beginning students. I've never seen such a lucid presentation, appealing to various learning styles. The text is a workbook, with exercises in reading, writing, discrete sound identification, and dictation. Though it is not designed to teach much vocabulary, grammar, or conversation (the focus is on phonology and orthography), the dialogs on the video cassette are all transcribed (in Arabic, of course!) in the appendix. And even though I've been studying Arabic for a decade, this book helped fill in some of the gaps in my knowledge.

good condition

Great resource.

While only a beginner attempting to learn the basics of the writing system in a self-taught mode, I am extremely pleased with the quality of this material. The CD is surprisingly crisp and clear, and the text is well-organized and written in a very motivational style.

This work has its strengths. First, it comes with 3 audio CDs; and in learning to pronounce correctly at least some of the Arabic letters that have no equivalent in our alphabet, audio demonstration is indispensable. (Written description will not do.) Second, no one can say that this work is not basic enough. It is about as basic as basic can be; and this will surely make it seem attractive to anyone intending self-instruction and having no prior education in Arabic.Why, then, am I not inclined to recommend this work enthusiastically? Put bluntly, ALIF BAA IS A POOR VALUE FOR ANYONE INTENDING TO UNDERTAKE A COMPLETE SELF-DIRECTED STUDY OF ARABIC. Unless you buy Alif Baa directly from the publisher, the book does NOT come with an answer-key. Purchasing the key separately will require you either to deal with used-book sellers or to deal directly with the publisher. The former course may require you to pay nearly half the price of Alif Baa just for the 12-page key. The latter course will involve either paying a small price for the key (plus shipping, I imagine) or else paying more than the price of Alif Baa in order to obtain the associated videotape, with which comes a free answer-key. That's right: part of each lesson in Alif Baa involves watching items on the video, which must be purchased separately. You could buy the cheap key and avoid the video and still learn the Arabic alphabet; but given how much you've already paid for Alif Baa, isn't it distressing to learn after you've already bought the book that you must then either pay a lot more or else restrict the use to which you put it?Moreover, you can buy THE ARABIC ALPHABET: HOW TO READ AND WRITE IT (by Awde and Samano) for about a quarter of the cost of Alif Baa. Its lower cost is due largely, no doubt, to its lack of any audio supplement. In spite of this notable deficiency, however, this less expensive book is quite instructive; and its deficiency will ultimately be remedied by the fact that you'll need to supplement whatever grammar / vocabulary text you eventually select with some audio material. With these, you can then hone your pronunciation-skills as you would have done by using Alif Baa. (And if you intend later to study Qur'aanic Arabic, then you'll find this little book superior to Alif Baa, since it treats two features of Qur'aanic notation that Alif Baa completely ignores -- namely the use of letter-fusions known as "ligatures," and the representation of long vowel sounds by joint use of short and long vowel symbols.)Therefore, if your plan is to teach yourself Arabic (i.e., to carry out a complete course of self-directed study), and you don't want to waste money, then don't get taken in by Alif Baa. There's a less expensive, but no less effective, way to go.

Recognize that Alif Baa is a college textbook designed as part of a three-year Arabic program. It is very detailed, but includes a lot of linguistic information that a beginner doesn't want. Al-Batal designed this as the definitive text on the Arabic Alphabet, and it is, but if you just want to learn how to read and pronounce Arabic in order to start studying, then you should go for a simpler text. Awde's "The Arabic Alphabet" is the one to choose.Alif Baa will tell you all the different regional pronunciations of each letter, different handwriting variations, etc. IMHO, that is too distracting for the beginner who just wants to unscramble the script and distinguish k from m, and so forth. The problem is that this book doesn't identify what is essential and what is nice to know, so people come out confused about three different regional pronunciations of one letter, rather than learning jiim = j, etc. These differences don't become important until you have progressed well into Arabic.Also, the Al-Batal series seems to guard the answer keys to their textbooks like state secrets, one of the biggest student complaints.And of course, $40 is a lot to plunk down if you can get what you want out of an $8 book (like Awde's).