A Basic Course in Iraqi Arabic: With Audio MP3 Files [With CDROM]

OK, so you're one of the 200 million or so Americans who want to meet the Iraqi shoe thrower- to shake his hand and take him out to lunch. What is available in the way of materials for learning to speak Iraqi Arabic? This book is an outstanding contribution to a very limited and underserved area of Arabic dialectology. Although it may seem to take forever to get through the introductory sections on pronunciation, they are worth the time and effort required. From there the lessons move on with very thorough treatment of grammar and particularly rigorous treatment of the Iraqi verb. There are some mutations that take place in Iraqi Arabic that affect the basic verbal paradigm (particularly in the imperfect tense), but the many drills are excellent and persistence does pay off. A buyer of this book should be advised that in this book, which dates from the 1960's era of language tutelage, "drill" means exactly that- there is a lot of repetition. My one quibble (a small one) is that the book could use some translation exercises- but of course there is nothing to stop a learner from trying to do some of this on their own. This course provides a first-rate foundation. The MP3's are also fine- and a serious student will practice with them on a daily basis. Wallace Erwin, by the way, was one of the real pioneers of Arabic education- he was a prominent contributor to 'the Big Orange Book', which was the leading (and almost the only) resourse for Standard Arabic for a generation or more.

This is an absolutely wonderful text and audio files. I have learned so much about Iraqi Arabic from these materials. The main thing is the excellent presentation of verb forms so that the learner becomes completely familiar with both perfect and imperfect verb forms. I have seen so many Arabic language books and materials where the imperfect "tense" (essentially the present tense) is "shied away from" (for some unknown reason,) or as if the imperfect tense were "too difficult" for the beginning learner. Here, the author is completely upfront about it, and one learns these forms right away. This is exactly what is needed! I gave up on "Modern Standard Arabic" because the authors in all the books on the subject that I read refused to discuss the imperfect tense! Other positive aspects of these materials are: the audio files are extremely professional, and most, if not all of the exercises are not only interesting, but very useful for the learner. I originally began my study of Iraqi Arabic just to learn enough to satisfy my curiosity about the language, but I have found that once into the materials, I could not stop learning! I have been a lifelong foreign language learner, and these are some of the best language materials I have ever encountered for ANY language. I like to write out the dialogues and exercises on big sheets of paper to help reinforce my learning, and I found the romanized Arabic system that the author uses to be excellent. There are only some slight variations in the script that I use. For example, instead of the author's more "linguistic" use of "x" for the gutteral sound, I always transpose this into "kh" which to me is a better representation of the sound. But aside from certain minor variations that I prefer, the romanization is a great asset to helping the learner learn the aural-oral aspects of the language without being encumbered by the Arabic writing system at the beginning. I feel the writing system, because it is basically phonetic, can be learned later, or separately, if need be. But for the learner, studying the language at the beginning, in particular, in a familiar orthography ensures faster progress. I highly recommend Iraqi, in general, as a dialect choice for Arabic, and to a great extent, I owe that to these great materials.

I am a US army Captain intent on teaching myself Arabic....What I quickly found out through discovery learning is there are many dialects. I started with several other MSA resources, but Iraqi is very different. If you are going to Iraq, you need this book or at least a book that solely focuses on the Iraqi dialect. I have a Syrian interpreter and sometimes he has difficulty with some words and phrases here. He can communicate very clearly with the Iraqi people, but even I can notice the dialectal differences. There are a lot of ways to say things in Arabic and although they can understand each they simply say things differently. It may not be that confusing for a native non-Iraqi speaker to communicate, but for the non-native speaker who is just learning, it can sound like a different language sometimes. I am currently in Iraq, 6 months into my tour and I am about half way through the book. Already I am able to have very basic conversations and I can pick out a lot of words in any conversation. The outstanding drills do eventually take hold. I'll hear a conjugation of a word and I'll know what it means. Its my lack of vocabulary that is holding me back, but that should come with some more time. The drills must be listened to, not read. You have to train you brain to hear and comprehend it. The MP3s that come with the book really make it a complete package. It takes a while to understand, but you'll start to understand it. It makes it worthwhile when you can pick up even a few words out of a conversation. Don't expect to learn the script with this book. It isn't in it. The intent of this book is listening and understanding and responding, not reading and writing. The phonics section is outstanding, it tells you exactly how to hold you tongue to make all the sounds. BTW there are 31 consanants in Iraqi Arabic, a couple more than MSA. Not a big deal, the book will have you pronouncing the sounds almost like a native.

Ten chapters, 77 pages, just on the phonology of the Iraqi dialect! The author is very gifted at explaining in exquisite detail how each consonant, vowel and diphthong is to be produced, and strangely enough he actually made this subject interesting and comprehensible, something no one else has done in my lifetime. No highbrow "linguist only" babble, but all of that detail in a pleasant straight forward style. A CD with 665 Megs of MP3 files covers the entire text. The grammar notes on each new pattern are extensive. All in all, this course seems far superior to others I have bought. No introduction to the Arabic script in this text.