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Product Description
Product Description
Colloquial Cambodian is easy to use and Completely key guide. Specially written by an experienced teacher for self-study and class use the course offers you a step-by-step approach to written and spoken Cambodian.
From the Back Cover
Colloquial Cambodian is easy to use and a necessary guide that is specially written by experienced teachers for self-study or class use. The course offers you a step-by-step approach to written and spoken Cambodian and no prior knowledge of the language is required.
What makes Colloquial Cambodian your best choice in personal language learning?
* interactive - lots of dialogues and exercises for regular practice
* clear - concise grammar notes
* practical - useful vocabulary and pronunciation guide
* complete - including answer key and special reference section
By the end of this rewarding course you will be able to communicate confidently and effectively in a broad range of situations. --This text refers to the Ring-bound edition.
What makes Colloquial Cambodian your best choice in personal language learning?
* interactive - lots of dialogues and exercises for regular practice
* clear - concise grammar notes
* practical - useful vocabulary and pronunciation guide
* complete - including answer key and special reference section
By the end of this rewarding course you will be able to communicate confidently and effectively in a broad range of situations. --This text refers to the Ring-bound edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio Cassette
But why, oh why, did the text not get proof read. There are many spelling errors in the exercises. It is easier to learn something correctly first time than have to unlearn and then relearn correctly. Having said that, though the approach is useful - with some interesting material and generally the choice of vocabulary and the explanatory notes are good. The pace is easy and the style light. I liked the introduction of the script at an early stage - given the fairly poor transliteration system (but, OK, I know there is no easy solution) it should have been used more extensively. The tapes are good and they are clear. I would recommend this as a reasonable text to use for someone starting out and with a couple of weeks to spare. It will help anyone get their feet. However, keep an open mind about the grammar as it is presented - it is good for the pieces in the text, but should not be taken as a full grammatical analysis. For anybody with more than a tiny smattering of Khmer, this is not the book.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I bought this for a few weeks of self-study in preparation for a 10-day trip to Cambodia. I had no previous knowledge of the language, though I do speak Thai, which helps, since the grammars are quite similar, and there are lots of cognates. Without any knowledge of Thai, it would have been heavy going.
Good points:
1. The vocabulary is well thought-out: mostly useful and usable words, and one is not overloaded.
2. The recording on the CD is very clear - the speakers are easy to understand, including for the parts which are not in the written text.
Bad points:
1. The transliteration is useless. To have done it in IPA would have made pronunciation so much more accessible.
2. While it's a good idea to introduce the script for those who choose to learn it, it's a bad idea to take away the option of not learning it. Different learners will have different priorities. Unfortunately, much of the text is in Cambodian script only, leaving those who choose not to learn the script reliant on the CD alone.
3. In the explanations of language use, there are too few examples for each point. To have had several more carefully thought-out examples would have enhanced the book greatly.
Given the lack of alternatives, one is grateful the book exists at all. It certainly is usable, but a little more thought put into the production would have made it far better.
Good points:
1. The vocabulary is well thought-out: mostly useful and usable words, and one is not overloaded.
2. The recording on the CD is very clear - the speakers are easy to understand, including for the parts which are not in the written text.
Bad points:
1. The transliteration is useless. To have done it in IPA would have made pronunciation so much more accessible.
2. While it's a good idea to introduce the script for those who choose to learn it, it's a bad idea to take away the option of not learning it. Different learners will have different priorities. Unfortunately, much of the text is in Cambodian script only, leaving those who choose not to learn the script reliant on the CD alone.
3. In the explanations of language use, there are too few examples for each point. To have had several more carefully thought-out examples would have enhanced the book greatly.
Given the lack of alternatives, one is grateful the book exists at all. It certainly is usable, but a little more thought put into the production would have made it far better.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
21 reviews
26 of 26 people found the following review helpful
a good beginning book and tape
23 July 2001
Format:Audio CD
This is a good starting point for someone who doesn't know any Cambodian. It is certainly the most affordable course and the easiest to obtain. From the very first lesson, you get real sentences with real content instead of just formulas- Hello, Good morning, how are you?- which is where so many language courses start. So from the opening bell you can get a sense of how the language works and how sentences are put together. The grammatical explanations are good, although some of them could be more detailed.
Another feather in the author's cap is that the material on the tapes really does follow the book. The speakers are quite easy to follow and one can get into the flow of the language very quickly. I suppose you could buy the book without the tapes, but would you feel very confident saying a words like "t'ngai" or "g'baal" for instance? In a lot of language courses (including some in the "Colloquial's" series) the material on the tapes does not coordinate well with the printed text. This one does.
The major minus in this book is its system of transcription. Given the choice between trying to represent Cambodian phonemes accurately (especially the vowels) and approximating what is now a very unphonetic system of writing, the author has come up with system that does a poor job of both. I really believe that he should have used Huffman's system which is much more precise in representing phonemes that differ only very slightly to a Westerner's ear. It would certainly help someone who also wants to consult Huffman's text. The author makes no bones about the fact that he wants to wean the learner away from transcription, and he succeeds, but mostly because his system is too inaccurate to be any help. He does introduce the writing system gradually and there are illustrations in the book showing how the letters are handwritten- which is another feature not every language book has when there is a writing system different from our own.
So- I'll give it four stars. I'd give five stars to a future edition if the author found a better solution to his transcription problems.
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
good language book
28 Nov 1999
Format:Audio CD
Tha roman-alphabet renderings of the Khmer words is misleading, but for most aspects of the course only good things can be said. The exercises are well-chosen and paced in a way that makes learning Khmer about as painless as it can be, which is still pretty painful.
This book supposes no prior knowledge of Khmer. The other Khmer book I have seen, by Huffman, is very technical and seems to suppose a level of training in structural linguistics and phonetics that is beyond what most people have.
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful
A quick look at the language that may draw you more inside.
24 Jan 2001
Format:Audio Cassette
This package is probably as good as it gets for a broadbrush presentation of Khmer. Those with several languages behind them realize that for most people it takes two thousand hours or so of study to develop a working foundation in most languages. Khmer may seem intimidating in the initial stages, but it really is an achievable goal for those who have a deep interest in the country and its people. Try "Colloquial Cambodian" on for size, and if you become infected with the Cambodia bug you can always order the full Foreign Service Institute course and pursue Khmer to the hilt. A new language gives you a new life, a new identity. A good investment! Even if you just master the material presented in Colloquial Cambodian, you'll come away with more than many official Americans assigned to the country in recent years did.
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