The Arabic Alphabet: How to Read & Write It

This was the first book I ever got on the Arabic script, and I love it. I lost the first copy I had, and was happy to find it here. The book isn't very long or dense. It's light, it tells you what you need to know, and explains things pretty well. The Arabic script can look daunting, but isn't as much once you get a good look at it. My favorite part in it is the part where they explain the word patterns that Semitic languages like Arabic use to form words. The basis for many words is a 3-consonant root. From that root, you can get a sizeable catalog of words with similar meanings just from adding vowels and particles in different combinations. This book is the first place I discovered this. I think this could make learning any of the Semitic languages—including the ancient ones—a lot easier. Good luck in your studies!

When I bought this book it was with the goal of being able to read and write Arabic. I can honestly say that over the course of a week and a half I was able to both read and write Arabic with no more than about 8-10 hours of study. What I did was read the explanations in the book and simply write every example given for two full lines (right to left) on a standard notebook paper. By the time I was done with every example in the book, I was basically able to read and write with very little difficulty. Of course this doesn't make my pronunciation perfect and it doesn't mean I know what things MEAN when I read them, but this book did exactly what I wanted it to do and that is guide me through the alphabet. I read a guy's blog that said a book is not necessary when learning the Arabic alphabet. I agree this is true. The same can be said of Japanese hiragana/katakana, and Korean Hangeul. Indeed, I learned those writing systems both with and without the aid of books. In my opinion, a little guidance and reassurance is nice when first learning a language and I chose to pay the premium on having my information given to me in a handy form of small, paperback book. If you want to learn the Arabic Alphabet and are willing to spend some money for convenience, this book is great and it can work for you.

This an excellent entry level and first book book to learn the Arabic alphabet, and a great value. I bought this book to teach my US born son my native (Arabic) language alphabet and script at home, and find it book very helpful and easy to use as guide to teach him the Arabic alphabet. This book is exactly how I rated it, 5 stars, because it is well designed for a student just starting to study Arabic. It is a very good book for building basic understanding of the Arabic language alphabet.It's the best way introduce and learn the language to non-Arabic speakers. An awesome buy and highly recommended 1st Grade learning Arabic Language Step - By - Step Approach Workbook Part 1 Third Edition: This book has everything you need to know to teach First ... children or students Arabic. (Arabic Edition) 1st Grade learning Arabic Language Step - By - Step Approach Workbook Part 2,Third Edition: This book has everything you need to teach children the ... to teach your children or students Arabic.

This book starts out fantastically as a guide to someone wanting to learn the Arabic alphabet. It is very well organized and very effective in its methods. The first 30 or so pages describe how to use this book and help the reader gain an understanding of how the letters are pronounced and how words are formed and so on. In the section where it describes each letter and how it is written in each of its forms, Awde doesn't go through the alphabet in order, but rather goes by the simplest and most common used letters first, such as baa, taa, and thaa. With each letter, the pronunciation is briefly reviewed and how it is written in each of the four possible positions is shown. However, as the book progresses further into the letters, it seems the editing fell apart a bit. With some letters, the guiding arrows that help direct the reader in a step by step formation of the letter are missing. Now, the few times where this is the case, it can usually be figured out, but is still a little annoying. The one letter family I thought was poorly executed was the jiim, Haa', and khaa' family. The way to write the initial and medial forms is shown in a way that is never used, and the way that I have always seen it written is not shown. It is close to it, but not the same. However, despite these couple minor hiccups, the book is definitely helpful in gaining a better understanding of the Arabic alphabet. But by no means is this book where you should stop if you are looking to learn the language at any level.

This is the absolute best place to start if you're just beginning with arabic. Every beginner's book that I've read only dedicates 2-3 pages or an appendix to the arabic alphabet, but I think a more thorough understanding is required. The book is about 30 pages and teaches you the basics of the alphabet. There are so many little rules that one never thinks about when studying a language and this book does an excellent job of desribing them. For example a beginner's English book would describe how to pronounce the letter "g" but a good book will reveal the shades of pronounciation. What happens when an English word ends with "-ough?" This book does a thorough and brief (yes this is possible) job of enumerating the rules of an alphabet that most English speaking people have never used. Letters in arabic don't precisly correspond to letters we use, there are certain restrictions and exceptions just like in English and this is a must-have for anyone who really wants to be able to understand the basics before going on. However, this book is only a starting point and does not attempt to teach any grammer, vocabulary, or conjugation.

I am a college student at a school that doesn't offer Arabic as a language, and I wanted to learn it on my own without taking away too much time from my other studies (including another language- Russian). As someone who doesn't have an incredible amount of time to devote to the subject, and as someone with absolutely no knowledge of arabic whatsoever coming into it, this book is an EXCELLENT introduction to reading and writing the language. The book is broken down very simply, devoting time to each letter and the different ways they are written. The alphabet is known as a very difficult one for Westerners to master, especially when teaching oneself, but this book made the process very easy for me without taking much time. I highly recommend it to anyone who is learning this language for the first time, as the alphabet itself is the base off of which to learn everything else about the language. Fantastic.

I have some Iraqi friends that I spend time with, and I just wasn't picking up the language verbally. I tried to write the words down phonetically in English to study, but haven't gotten very far with that either. After two evenings of focused reading of this book, I have a much better understanding of what's happening with the language, and already know 7 letters. I can read several words and see how the letters fit together. I'm excited to continue my study of this language both for work use and to be able to speak more easily with my friends. Note: Read the introduction. Read and pay attention to the first two chapters, but don't get discouraged by anything that feels complicated at first. Keep going - the book does a good job of giving you more practice and examples for a more thorough understanding. OVERALL, GREAT BOOK AND WELL WORTH THE MONEY, I would have paid more if I knew how helpful it would be.

the phonics and letter transliterations are lacking, as an example the word "Koran" spelled with a "K" is incorrect, it should be spelled with a "Q" as the Arabic letter in the word "Quran" is a Qaaf Also there is no mention of the fact that "Quranic Arabia" is Fusha and a bit different from "Classical Arabic"

Simple to understand and enriching knowledge.

This is my first review on here after years of buying from this site; I simply felt compelled to say a thing or two about this book. So, straight to the point, this book, quite simply, will teach you the Arabic alphabet, help you understand how to roughly pronounce each letter and then show you how to write each letter in all of it's forms (all letters have multiple forms, some more than others). Going beyond that, it will also teach you about extra letters and such which arn't necessarily part of the Arabic alphabet, but are commonly used anyway. If you've ever looked at any Arabic text and felt completely overwhelmed by it, by the end of this book you will, instead, be able to actually read the words you are seeing, albeit with rough pronounciation. The point being, you'll understand what's written even if you don't know the meaning of the words. It's not a big book, you could easily get through it in a couple of hours at a slowed pace to take in the information. But the information that's given ultimately serves the purpose of this book, and that makes it a fantastic starting point to learning the Arabic language. Highly recommended!

Das Buch ist eigentlich alles, was man als Anfänger braucht um sich mit der arabischen Schrift vertraut zu machen. Das Buch führt Schritt für Schritt durch das ganze arabische Alphabet inklusive Lautschrift bzw. Aussprache. Man lernt mit dem Buch sehr einfach und didaktisch arabisch zu lesen und zu schreiben. Meines Erachtens die beste Einführung in die arabische Sprache für Anfänger. Besser geht es wohl nicht.

livro muito bom, de fácil compreensao... muito bem indicado por uma amiga diplomata...recomendo tambem. chegou na data certinho e muito bem conservado.

Ottimo e conciso sussidiario per prendere confidenza nelle scrittura e lettura dell'alfabeto arabo. In poche pagine e seguende una progressione logica ma intuitiva permette di impratichirsi con il sistema di scrittura araba. E' scritto inmodo semplice, conciso e che presuppone solo un elementare conoscenza della lingua inglese. Consigliato senza dubbi.