Languages of Morocco..?

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Languages of Morocco..?

Postby Cainntear » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:26 pm

So there's no ink on paper yet, but it looks like I'll be heading to Morocco after the summer to teach English. Does anyone have any experience of learning Arabic and Berber? What resources are available focusing on the local varieties?
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby reineke » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:35 pm

Cainntear wrote:So there's no ink on paper yet, but it looks like I'll be heading to Morocco after the summer to teach English. Does anyone have any experience of learning Arabic and Berber? What resources are available focusing on the local varieties?


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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby stelingo » Mon Apr 24, 2017 6:44 pm

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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby tarvos » Mon Apr 24, 2017 6:53 pm

Your knowledge of French will come in handy. Berber is spoken in certain regions only - what languages you will need depend on which area of Morocco you will be in.
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby nooj » Tue Apr 25, 2017 3:56 pm

Bring all your material from overseas.

Online shipping into morocco is shit and there is shit all available inside the country for any indigenous language - buy everything now.

If you know spanish or french, there is some good material for darija. im not on my computer so i cant give you the names of them, but they can be quite pricey. scan them from your university library or ship them from Europe.

Darija is a catchall term (like all languages) for idiolects / dialects. the variety you learn in one part will be different from another. There are regional koines. One could even speak of an emerging national koine due to the media bsed in casablanca or rabat. Unlike other languages you may know already, there is no standard dialect, so it is pluricentric de facto.

Berber languages differ significantly from region to region. Rif is different from chleuh. There is very little pedagogic material available for any berber language, especially in english.

As for darija, learn it from the people around you. Here more than anywhere you have to put yourself out there and rely on your own. There are very few books, dictionaries, textbooks, grammars. content is limited. Some Tv dramas, music, movies.

Otherwise you will literally not get anything out of it. There are foreign people who have been living here for decades and dont learn darija, let alone berber languages. Heck a lot of arabophone moroccans dont bother learning them either even when in berber country. Be disciplined. It is very easy for you to not learn darija even while living in the country.

French, spanish and english should NOT be considered givens in morocco anyway. Depending on the social circle you develop. The poor people i speak to have no other languages other than the moroccan ones whatsoever, not even standard arabic. On the other hand, rich people might be your best informants, because they can at least compare between a language you do know and their language.

Create your own resources or grammar. For example asking how do you say "if i had money, i would..." and a couple of other sentences of that type and you now know how to create unreal conditionals.

This is not available info online. This is primarily how i learn darija beyond the written material that i carried with me.
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby Cainntear » Wed Apr 26, 2017 10:37 am

Thanks all.

I'm going to be in a bit of a funny spot, to be honest. I'm teaching in a small town in the mountains, but it's a university town -- Ifrane. That means there will be a heck of a lot of non-locals about, so what I'm exposed to is likely to be something of a mélange...

Thanks again. I'll see what I can find.
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby nooj » Wed Apr 26, 2017 3:31 pm

Ifrane is beautiful.

Mar7aba bik! (Welcome)!
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby zenmonkey » Wed Apr 26, 2017 4:08 pm

You might find these useful

http://bewilderedinmorocco.com/books-to ... of-arabic/

I looked into classes in-country at one point and found few that I felt would meet with a short immersion trip so I gave up. But today, if I wanted to focus on a dialect and not MSA I'd go to italki and find a few locals for tandems or a tutor. You can search by country of residence there.
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby ancient forest » Thu Apr 27, 2017 2:42 pm

I tried using 'A Basic Course in Moroccan Arabic' by Georgetown University Press a bit. It is pretty easy to use, and I think it would be beneficial even if the audio isn't the greatest of quality, the method of learning is a bit boring, and some of the phrases are outdated.

Afterwards, I would try 'An Introduction to Moroccan Arabic and Culture' also by Georgetown University Press. It is a better book in general, but it might be easier as a second text.

I would supplement these with the Moroccan Arabic Phrasebook by Lonely Planet.

Also, you would want to learn at least a little bit of Standard Arabic for basic reading. I would suggest 'Mastering Arabic 1 & 2' by Jane Wightwick and Mahmoud Gaafar. These books come with cds and are good for learning the Arabic alphabet. Even though they are called Mastering Arabic, they are really for beginners and use a simple approach to grammar.
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Re: Languages of Morocco..?

Postby ancient forest » Thu Apr 27, 2017 2:44 pm

Cainntear wrote:I'm going to be in a bit of a funny spot, to be honest. I'm teaching in a small town in the mountains, but it's a university town -- Ifrane.


I just realized that you will be in Ifrane. Berber is spoken more predominately in that area, so you might be better off learning Berber than Moroccan Arabic.
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