TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Urdu)

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-04-28, 4:51

voron wrote:May I suggest something though? I will be on vacation with no computer until May 10 so you guys can start without me... and then I really want to do MSA (because we'll be in Ramadan), so can we perhaps transcribe something in MSA?

Tbh I wasn't planning on posting in the Arabic forum for quite a while even though I do look at it sometimes now that Eskandar's sort of back. :para:
eskandar wrote:I'd be happy to do MSA, whether a video or a text. Fus7a is my real interest, moreso than 3ammiyya. I'm not super interested in the Omar series per se but I wouldn't mind doing it.

The Arabic Student has some suggestions for media in MSA. Most of these are news reports or things along those lines, but he also once included a short clip from a TV travelogue on MBC called عيشها مرة, hosted by a British guy (not Irish as The Arabic Student states) named Sean Redmond who apparently speaks MSA really well but occasionally also speaks Saudi Arabic on the show. This is the first out of four parts of the episode that clip comes from, starting where The Arabic Student left off. So maybe we could do something like that, or maybe this CNBC Arabia TV report on Islamic banking in China(?):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFBaoFcgYsY
Or this documentary about Islam in China:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuSbEimAcLw
Or something else.
eskandar wrote:The one Hebrew word I could find sharing the N-D-L root was nadal (centipede), which is probably unrelated to the Arabic root. Not sure what its etymology is.

Turns out they're related after all! The Hebrew word comes from the Syriac word naddala. (It's present in the Gemara which is in Aramaic, which must be how the word entered Hebrew). In turn the Syriac word is from a root nadala "he moved", related to the Arabic ندل "he carried over, transported, transferred" - whence نادل, the carrier-over or transporter [of food], viz. "waiter" :!:

All roads lead to...living off tips?
HELP I'M FALLING IN LOVE WITH SEMITIC PHILOLOGY

Isn't etymology so much fun? :) Meanwhile, I have to say while Persian music may be my one true musical love, I've been discovering just how wide-ranging music in Arabic is, and I'm impressed. I've found (and bookmarked) clips of songs in Arabic from all kinds of countries from Senegal to Indonesia.

Btw that Yemeni(?) song I posted in the Arabic music thread is apparently a translation into Arabic of this Persian song!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPwqhJ8BFNM
I think I saw a comment that claimed the people featured in the other video I posted were medical students at the University of Tunis (dunno how it might have gone from Yemen/Oman to Tunisia. Maybe Moein is just super-popular in the Arab World or something :P). Around the same time I saw all this, I also discovered Leila Forouhar's cover of a patriotic Egyptian pop song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O6tN4gTTIE

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-04-29, 6:13

vijayjohn wrote:Sean Redmond who apparently speaks MSA really well but occasionally also speaks Saudi Arabic on the show. This is the first out of four parts of the episode that clip comes from, starting where The Arabic Student left off.

The guy seems to speak Saudi dialect in most or all of that clip, albeit a cleaned-up media version of the dialect that is pretty easy to follow.
Or this documentary about Islam in China:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuSbEimAcLw

Ding ding ding, we have a winner! None of the other stuff seemed interesting enough to be worth it, but I would very gladly work on this video. Chinese Islam is a major interest of mine (both personally and academically).

I've been discovering just how wide-ranging music in Arabic is, and I'm impressed. I've found (and bookmarked) clips of songs in Arabic from all kinds of countries from Senegal to Indonesia.

Personally I love this Arabic song by the famous Somali singer Ahmed Naaji:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KCEbtRZE2o
I also have a big Youtube collection of Arabic songs and poetry (mostly Muslim praise poems and the like) from sub-Saharan Africa.

Btw that Yemeni(?) song I posted in the Arabic music thread is apparently a translation into Arabic of this Persian song! ...

Nice finds! There's a very well-known Persian song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49fGHj12FUs
which is adapted from Fairuz's البنت الشلبية :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U36XXexk8No
I know there are many others but this is the example that comes to mind. Oh, and this chain, which is my favorite example:
Kourosh Yaghmaei - Havaar Havaar (Iran, 1974)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLiN--_f5Rk
Hasan Jahangir - Hawaa Hawaa (Pakistan, 1987)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psYgmvgTJuw
Govinda - Javaan Javaan (India, 1989)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TPhnVJB_TE
Promit - O Tunir Ma (Bangladesh, 2000s)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWRefg3YIQM
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-04-29, 8:10

Seems a bit tedious to keep track of my everyday language practice/study here but I'll try to keep at it, in hopes that it will keep me focused and diligent. I won't keep mentioning Anki stats though--too boring.

Arabic

Feeling guilty that I've been neglecting fuS7a, which is the real goal. Need to get back to it. Watched a lot of Kuwaiti media today which sort of fluctuates between Kuwaiti dialect and fuS7a. I'm realizing that after watching so many Kuwaiti programs (I always watch Fahad al-Kandari's Youtube shows during Ramadan, for example) I can understand Kuwaiti pretty well - or at least "media Kuwaiti." Anyway, Youtube stuff is fun but doesn't count as real Arabic work - what I need to do is find the resolve to start reading difficult stuff again.

Hebrew
-Pimsleur II: 15 and 16
-Transcribed and translated another minute. Less than a minute left to go!
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-04-29, 18:54

eskandar wrote:The guy seems to speak Saudi dialect in most or all of that clip, albeit a cleaned-up media version of the dialect that is pretty easy to follow.

Oh, well, there goes that option then. :P
Ding ding ding, we have a winner! None of the other stuff seemed interesting enough to be worth it, but I would very gladly work on this video. Chinese Islam is a major interest of mine (both personally and academically).

Yay, I found something! :mrgreen: I wonder whether I could help with the Chinese parts, too (and if I can, then certainly I'm fine with anyone else who knows any amount of Chinese trying to help with them, too). For example, the first part in Chinese I hear is from 5:13 to 5:19, which I think is something like this:

最早的穆斯林显明在中国的文献人吧, 他就叫番客。
Zuì zǎo de Mùsīlín xiǎnmíng zài Zhōngguó de wénxiàn rén ba, tā jiù jiào Fān Kè.
As for the earliest documented Muslim to appear in China, he was called a Fān Kè. (See here)

The Arabic subtitles, if I'm reading them correctly, say:

."أطلق على أسلاف المسلمين الصينيين الأوائل في كتب التاريخ الصينية اسم "فان كه

Which I guess would mean something like:

The first Chinese Muslims in Chinese history books were called "Fan Ke."
I also have a big Youtube collection of Arabic songs and poetry (mostly Muslim praise poems and the like) from sub-Saharan Africa.

Nice! I have to admit mine is much smaller for the time being and still mostly from the Middle East. :P The last two (Arabic songs!) I bookmarked were a Senegalese qasida by Amadou Bamba and a Nigerian song dedicated to him. (You may already know who he is, but I've included a link for anyone who doesn't. I didn't know who he was until recently myself :P).
Nice finds!

Thanks! I like your songs, too. :) I'm curious about the one from Somalia. What variety of Arabic is it in? What's it about? (My Arabic is still too bad for me to tell :lol:).
Havaar Havaar
Hawaa Hawaa
Javaan Javaan

:lol: All this reminds me of this. :P
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82UbT557auA

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby Yasna » 2018-04-29, 20:33

vijayjohn wrote:Yay, I found something! :mrgreen: I wonder whether I could help with the Chinese parts, too (and if I can, then certainly I'm fine with anyone else who knows any amount of Chinese trying to help with them, too). For example, the first part in Chinese I hear is from 5:13 to 5:19, which I think is something like this:

最早的穆斯林显明在中国的文献人吧, 他就叫番客。
Zuì zǎo de Mùsīlín xiǎnmíng zài Zhōngguó de wénxiàn rén ba, tā jiù jiào Fān Kè.
As for the earliest documented Muslim to appear in China, he was called a Fān Kè. (See here)

I think it's 先民, not 显明.
Ein Buch muß die Axt sein für das gefrorene Meer in uns. - Kafka

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-04-29, 20:37

Yasna wrote:I think it's 先民, not 显明.

So that's what that word was! (Well, in all likelihood, anyway). Thanks, Yasna! :)

EDIT: So I guess that would make it more like:

As for the earliest documented ancient Muslim in China...

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-04-30, 8:07

vijayjohn wrote:The Arabic subtitles, if I'm reading them correctly, say:
."أطلق على أسلاف المسلمين الصينيين الأوائل في كتب التاريخ الصينية اسم "فان كه
Which I guess would mean something like:
The first Chinese Muslims in Chinese history books were called "Fan Ke."

Your transcription and translation are correct! Maybe more literally, "the first ancestors of the Chinese Muslims were called Fan Ke".

I'm curious about the one from Somalia. What variety of Arabic is it in? What's it about?

It's in MSA and it's about Somalia. I don't get every word but the gist is about lamenting the state of Somalia, wishing for security and peace, etc.

Since you mentioned a Senegalse qasida, here's another one in praise of the prophet, with subtitles giving the Arabic plus transliteration and French translation:
https://youtu.be/SPhHg7kt7I8

Hebrew
-Pimsleur II: 17
-Finished transcribing and translating the video, but there's still a bunch of words I couldn't make out. Those will have to wait til I can get some more feedback.

I can't remember the last time I learned a language this quickly without immersion. I spend anywhere from 10 minutes to maybe an hour or two max on Hebrew, and only got serious about doing that every day in the past weeks. What I haven't noted here is that I've been watching 2-4 hours per week of TV in Hebrew with English subtitles, which is a ton for someone like me who doesn't normally watch TV. I have to admit it's helped a lot. I write down as much vocab as I can while watching and have started sentence mining, too; afterwards I look things up and create Anki flashcards. I'm getting close to 1000 cards, with about 75% mature.
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby dEhiN » 2018-04-30, 19:51

eskandar wrote:I'm getting close to 1000 cards, with about 75% mature.

One thousand in total, or just for Hebrew? In total I think I have about 4600, though only about half of those I've learned or are learning. The rest are from languages I was studying at one point, but have stopped now, so I suspend them and put them in a special deck I call "Stored Languages".
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-04-30, 20:33

Thanks for the feedback and the song, Eskandar Bhai! I've also started finding a few Muslim song videos in Arabic from India on YouTube. :!: This one is apparently a takbir song from Kerala:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgUh37ZZ7M0
I've also started looking at a few Andalusi songs and Judeo-Arabic songs.

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-04-30, 22:45

dEhiN wrote:
eskandar wrote:I'm getting close to 1000 cards, with about 75% mature.

One thousand in total, or just for Hebrew?

Just for Hebrew. I have ~8400 cards total (Arabic, English, French, Hebrew, Persian, Spanish, Turkish, and Urdu) and 92.23% of all my cards are mature.

vijayjohn wrote:This one is apparently a takbir song from Kerala:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgUh37ZZ7M0
I've also started looking at a few Andalusi songs and Judeo-Arabic songs.

Cool song! Do share some Judeo-Arabic ones, that's something I know much less about and am curious.
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-01, 2:56

Thanks! The very first Jewish song from the Arab World I ever heard when I was growing up was (a short excerpt from the very beginning of) this one, courtesy of Encarta 1996:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykawp66lwlg
Encarta says the following about this song:
A large segment of Israel's population consists of Jews who have returned to the country after hundreds of years in Yemen. According to tradition, these settlers emigrated to Yemen following the destruction of the First Temple in 586BC. The music of the Yemenite Jews remains an integral part of their everyday life and the Diwan, heard here, comes from a collection of devotional poetry sung exclusively by males in Hebrew, Arabic, and Aramaic. The lyrics cover both religious and secular subjects, and are sung on many different festive occasions. The shira heard in this example is sung as a central part of a seven-day wedding celebration and its lyrics tell of friendship and love in alternating verses of Hebrew and Arabic.

This one by an Israeli Yemenite Jewish singer named Gila Beshari is purely in (northern) Yemenite Arabic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC-foUOrLN4
الا يا نجم يا سامر يا سامر من فوق داري
قول للحبيب ما انساه انا ما انساه مساء و بدري
قول للحبيب يذكر الا يذكر حنين فؤادي
الا و سلوة الخاطر الخطر في كل وادي
قول للحبيب انا ما انساه
راعيت لك ساعات لك ساعات عشاء و باكر
و اديت لك روحي لك روحي بكل ظاهر
قول للحبيب انا ما انساه

And this is "واحد جدي," the Damascene (Judeo-)Arabic version of Chad Gadya, a traditional Jewish Passover song and cumulative tale (compare "This Is The House That Jack Built"), with the lyrics written in both Arabic and Hebrew scripts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed-nl2bQmC8
These are a few songs in the Syrian and Tunisian Jewish traditions sung in Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_S3txptISo

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-05-01, 5:20

Haven't had a chance to listen to these yet (looking forward to it) but I just noticed that the last video is of Yochai Cohen - the same guy speaking in the Hebrew video I translated. :D

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Pimsleur II: 18
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-02, 2:35

Nice! :D I listened to the first three songs in your chain of songs at work today. :P The Bengali composer Salil Chowdhury is probably my favorite source of song chains, probably just because he composed so many Malayalam movie songs, usually (but not always) by recycling tunes he'd already used in other languages. One chain of songs he made was in Bengali, Malayalam, Gujarati, and Oriya, in that order.

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby dEhiN » 2018-05-02, 2:38

What's a chain of songs - a song written by a composer and then translated/ported into other languages?
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-02, 2:47

I mean like what eskandar posted upthread: songs with the same tune in Persian, Urdu, Hindi ( :P ), and Bengali. So basically, just the same tune used to make songs in different languages.

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby dEhiN » 2018-05-02, 2:52

Ahh ok!
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby eskandar » 2018-06-18, 17:41

Time for an update, I guess!

Arabic

I've neglected active skills in Arabic for so long now that they've started to deteriorate... :cry: Just a few years ago when I was in Cairo, I could have pretty long conversations about most subjects in Arabic. Yes, I would fumble for words quite a bit, and I would speak a weird mix of MSA and dialect(s), but I could speak... The other day I was in an Arabic-speaking setting for an hour or so and my speaking (as well as listening comprehension) was pretty awful. Embarrassing! Eventually I'll get back to reading in Arabic, but I want to start learning to speak and understand Palestinian Arabic as well. Does anyone have any favorite materials for Palestinian? I wish I could read Hebrew better (not that I'm willing to put the work into learning to read...) because there are pretty excellent materials in Hebrew for Palestinian Arabic, as you might expect.

Hebrew

On the other hand my Hebrew speaking has progressed in leaps and bounds. I finished Disc 2 of Pimsleur and am up to the 11th lesson of Disc 3. Have been using Assimil Hebrew and Colloquial Hebrew, though I'm dismayed that Assimil doesn't mark stress. (I guess if you have the CDs it's less necessary, but I didn't get them). I'd say my vocabulary is somewhere around ~1500 words. I feel like I can hit B1 in speaking relatively soon, which would be great. I don't intend to ever learn Hebrew beyond a solid B2 level, but who knows. Israelis have been telling me I have a perfect accent, which is very flattering. :D

Turkish

All my language-learning efforts have been on Hebrew, so I haven't done anything with Turkish, but I met a Turkish guy the other day and exchanged a few sentences - he was very encouraging, but I felt shy about my bad Turkish. I'll have to force myself to practice some when I go to Istanbul next month!
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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-06-18, 18:38

eskandar wrote:Does anyone have any favorite materials for Palestinian?

LangMedia. I tend to use materials from a whole bunch of Levantine varieties, though, and personally don't care that much about whether they're Palestinian vs. Jordanian vs. Lebanese vs. Syrian (or Damascene vs. North Levantine Arabic or whatever).

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby Saim » 2018-06-24, 6:41

eskandar wrote: I wish I could read Hebrew better (not that I'm willing to put the work into learning to read...)


Why not? Once you're good at speaking it shouldn't be too hard to learn to read. The Hebrew script is pretty close to the Arabic script as well.

I'm dismayed that Assimil doesn't mark stress. (I guess if you have the CDs it's less necessary, but I didn't get them).


I don't think you need to worry that much about stress. The stress is always either on the ultimate or penultimate syllable, except in loanwords. IME when you make a mistake it's pretty easy to learn from because it's like "oh ok, it's the other one".

I'd say my vocabulary is somewhere around ~1500 words. I feel like I can hit B1 in speaking relatively soon, which would be great. I don't intend to ever learn Hebrew beyond a solid B2 level, but who knows. Israelis have been telling me I have a perfect accent, which is very flattering. :D


Awesome!

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Re: TAC eskandar (Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, others)

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-06-24, 8:03

Saim wrote:
eskandar wrote: I wish I could read Hebrew better (not that I'm willing to put the work into learning to read...)


Why not? Once you're good at speaking it shouldn't be too hard to learn to read. The Hebrew script is pretty close to the Arabic script as well.

Because the only scripts he knows are Roman, Cyrillic, and Arabic and he's scared to have to learn another one. I've sort of tried having this conversation with him before. :lol:

Eskandar bhai, have you ever considered learning Malay or Indonesian? :idea: EDIT: Or an African language? Maybe Swahili?


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