Made Simple: Foreign Language Learning Series Reviews
Alexander Arguelles presents a series of video reviews and demonstrations of those foreign language learning series that he has found most useful in his own studies. For further information about the series, please refer to www.foreignlanguageexpertise.com
With such a glossy and marketable name such as “X Made Easy” I was not expecting this series to have such a coherence. I will definitely check this out.
So, for somebody who would like to learn many languages, and study linguistics as a whole, I must ask; Would you recommend learning (hypothetically) Latin before studying something a Romance language? Or rather, would you recommend just going in and studying a modern language, without a preliminary classical root language?
I concur, it is a terrible name, but what was “made easy” 50 years ago is still quite sophisticated by today’s standards, and, all in all, these books provide a more straightforward and comprehensive overview of the grammar of these languages than do many TYS/Colloquial type manuals.
There is no set answer. If you are interested in polyglottery, you should emphatically learn both classical and contemporary languages, but there is no set order in which everyone should learn them. A knowledge of modern Romance languages will facilitate the study of Latin just as much a knowledge of Latin will facilitate the learning of modern Romance languages. It depends upon your interests, resources, and opportunities for study.
Ok, thanks a lot. I’m currently studying German, and I’m considering studying a Romance language soon, probably French, Spanish, or Romanian.
Professor, Have you noticed many typos in these books? The reviews on Amazon seem to indicate an unacceptable level of errors.
I would recommend French because the Assimil courses and a lot of other language material is written in French. Or Spanish, because so many people speak it.
No, I have not noticed this at all, so I find this a very surprising report. Perhaps the reviews may be refering to a recent wave of revisions that may have been sloppily done…
I followed up on this and you are right – there does seem to be a damning consensus about typos in the revised Latin and French books in particular. Well, as I already said in the video, these should probably not be your primary or sole source for actively learning a language, but they are helpful for a comprehensive review – paricularly, given their parallel cohesiveness across the four living languages, for those who are studying more than one of them.
How many languages have you studied?
“Studied” = any degree of investigation : ~120
“Studied” = more protracted research : ~60
“Studied” = developed deeper knowledge : ~30
“Studied” = attained active command : ~15
Very impressive. I have only “studied”=developed deeper knowledge: 8
That is very impressive as well – in fact, given your age, you are far ahead of me! If you love languages, keep studying thus, and you can be better versed than I am when you are my age.
Thank you for reviewing this series. You do such a outstanding job.
Dude, you are a genius…accept that fact lol.
There is also a Russian version of this series which I used in the late 80s and which came with audio. It was one of the first courses I used to learn Russian and I found it very useful.
Are you aware of a difference between the books published circa 1960s (all seem to have photo on cover) and the ones published in the 1980s?
It is mostly cosmetic, although in some books there has been some editing – not always for the better.
I just got one in spanish. It is muy bueno. With the audio it would have been perfect. I know it will help and I love the format.
I taught myself Spanish with the Spanish Made Simple. It is a wonderful method. I eventually skipped first year college Spanish and became a elementary bilingual and secondary Spanish teacher. The story line makes the method interesting.
Actually I just got all of them except Latin a few months ago.
I have a Russian Made Simple book. It looks a lot like those, has a rainy day chapter, and was printed in 1964. It was printed and sold in the UK, though. You might be looking at the American versions.
The Italian is not in bilingual text format.