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Dari Grammar and Phrase Book
"Dari Grammar & Phrasebook is the result of many years research and teaching. It has two parts. Part one (grammar) is a systematic presentation of Dari sound system(phonology, word formation (morphology) and sentence structure (syntax). Each chapter begins with an introduction. This is followed by analysis of the new concepts providing plenty of examples and illustrations. Next comes the chapter summary. Each chapter in part one ends with exercises.
Part two (phrasebook) is about how to communicate with Afghans on a variety of situations(topics). This part first discusses language functions such as asking, ordering, requesting, apologizing, persuading, and so on. The second part is about topics or situations involving shopping, health, transportation, security, government and so on. The relevant vocabulary under each topic are listed into nouns, verbs and adjectives. The topics also include cross-cultural notes and proverbs.
"
Part two (phrasebook) is about how to communicate with Afghans on a variety of situations(topics). This part first discusses language functions such as asking, ordering, requesting, apologizing, persuading, and so on. The second part is about topics or situations involving shopping, health, transportation, security, government and so on. The relevant vocabulary under each topic are listed into nouns, verbs and adjectives. The topics also include cross-cultural notes and proverbs.
"
164 pages, Paperback
First published June 4, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
February 25, 2019
TL;DR - good book with only English and maybe too much grammar information for beginners, but can be useful if you want to start speaking Dari. Also includes some cultural notes on Afghanistan.
I purchased this book on Amazon, where I saw a review indicating that the average learner doesn't need to know all of its grammar details. I agree that the author provides a lot of information, but I will always take too much over too little. On that note, it may be a little more difficult for the average reader to make sense of some of the information unless they know a little about linguistics - my extent of linguistics knowledge is having completed a Udemy course on the topic, and I found that to be enough for my own casual purposes.
Grammatical issues aside, the purpose of this book is to act as a primer for Dari learners. More specifically, this book was written for Peace Corps volunteers to Afghanistan.
In order for volunteers to be most effective in the shortest amount of time, I understand that speech must be emphasized. But my biggest qualm about the book is that everything is in English. To be fair, the author outlines his own 'romanization' system for Dari sounds. But always relying on English can lead to problems down the road.
I can speak, read, and write Mandarin at an intermediate level. The reason I bring this up is because Mandarin also does not use the Latin alphabet. However, Mandarin has a fairly consistent and standard romanization system (Pinyin*) which Dari does not have.
*yes I know there are others, but most resources and teachers for Mandarin today use Pinyin.
This means that [mostly] unlike Mandarin, different people might romanize the same word differently in Dari. For example, خوب in Dari means 'good' or 'well'. Without referring to a standard pronunciation system (for example, the International Phonetic Alphabet, or IPA), some may write this as 'khoob', others 'khub', and this can lead to pronunciation confusion for beginners. This is why I personally like referring to the Persian script, as I feel this leaves less room for ambiguity.
I am just a beginner in Dari, but I should also mention that I have a native Dari tutor. He thinks that a lot of the phrases in the book are casual. Not that this is necessarily bad - in some ways, it's beneficial and can help you sound more colloquial. For example, من (man) means 'I', and a lot of times this gets shortened to 'ma' in speech. This is a point that the author mentions. However, other than when the author explicitly points it out, it's hard to know which phrases sound more casual to a native ear.
Additionally, this is a rather minor issue when the information is there, but the editing is a little poor for a language focused book (especially in regard to spelling errors).
Overall, glad I have the book and will be adding my own Dari notes in the margins.
I purchased this book on Amazon, where I saw a review indicating that the average learner doesn't need to know all of its grammar details. I agree that the author provides a lot of information, but I will always take too much over too little. On that note, it may be a little more difficult for the average reader to make sense of some of the information unless they know a little about linguistics - my extent of linguistics knowledge is having completed a Udemy course on the topic, and I found that to be enough for my own casual purposes.
Grammatical issues aside, the purpose of this book is to act as a primer for Dari learners. More specifically, this book was written for Peace Corps volunteers to Afghanistan.
In order for volunteers to be most effective in the shortest amount of time, I understand that speech must be emphasized. But my biggest qualm about the book is that everything is in English. To be fair, the author outlines his own 'romanization' system for Dari sounds. But always relying on English can lead to problems down the road.
I can speak, read, and write Mandarin at an intermediate level. The reason I bring this up is because Mandarin also does not use the Latin alphabet. However, Mandarin has a fairly consistent and standard romanization system (Pinyin*) which Dari does not have.
*yes I know there are others, but most resources and teachers for Mandarin today use Pinyin.
This means that [mostly] unlike Mandarin, different people might romanize the same word differently in Dari. For example, خوب in Dari means 'good' or 'well'. Without referring to a standard pronunciation system (for example, the International Phonetic Alphabet, or IPA), some may write this as 'khoob', others 'khub', and this can lead to pronunciation confusion for beginners. This is why I personally like referring to the Persian script, as I feel this leaves less room for ambiguity.
I am just a beginner in Dari, but I should also mention that I have a native Dari tutor. He thinks that a lot of the phrases in the book are casual. Not that this is necessarily bad - in some ways, it's beneficial and can help you sound more colloquial. For example, من (man) means 'I', and a lot of times this gets shortened to 'ma' in speech. This is a point that the author mentions. However, other than when the author explicitly points it out, it's hard to know which phrases sound more casual to a native ear.
Additionally, this is a rather minor issue when the information is there, but the editing is a little poor for a language focused book (especially in regard to spelling errors).
Overall, glad I have the book and will be adding my own Dari notes in the margins.
February 13, 2018
Fine introduction to Afghan "Persian" (Dari). Experienced teacher.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews