עִבְרִית לְעוֹלָם וָעֶד

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Deinonysus
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עִבְרִית לְעוֹלָם וָעֶד

Postby Deinonysus » Thu Jan 13, 2022 3:34 pm

This is probably at least my third or fourth log related to Hebrew, but I figure, new year, new log. I've been bouncing between a few languages and I was planning on working seriously on French this year, but then a sibling of one of my parents was diagnosed with dementia and that increased my sense of urgency to maximize the amount of time that I can spend speaking Hebrew with my parents. I started working on Hebrew on January 2nd and I estimate that the learning materials I have selected will take me around a year to get through, so I think it makes sense to plan on dedicating the year to Modern Hebrew.

I was very frustrated by the large number of consonant mergers in Modern Hebrew, rendering it very difficult to remember the spellings of Modern Hebrew words. So my initial plan was to get Arabic to an advanced level and leverage that to learn the spellings of Hebrew cognates, and from there learn Biblical Hebrew with reconstructed pronunciation, and only then learn Modern Hebrew. But I decided that my current beginner level of Arabic is enough to get me to the point where Hebrew spelling is no longer frustrating. I do have a lot of cognates that help me remember the spellings of Hebrew words, but even for words where I don't know a cognate, I have found that I have developed strong enough associations with the different letters that I am having a much easier time remembering Hebrew spellings. I was initially trying to learn an Arabic cognate for each new Hebrew word with ambiguous spelling, but I quickly realized that that wasn't necessary.

Resources

The materials I plan on using now are:
: 25 / 504 Duolingo Hebrew
: 11 / 85 Assimil Hebrew
: 4 / 90 Pimsleur Hebrew
: 0 / 40 FSI Basic Hebrew (after completing Pimsleur & Assimil)

My goal is to do two crown levels of Duolingo a day, one Assimil lesson every night, and five Pimsleur lessons a week. I'll figure out a schedule for the FSI course when I get there.

The Duolingo course is quite big, almost twice the size of the Arabic course (which I nearly finished). I decided to reset my progress and start from scratch. They seem to have added a lot more audio than the last time I studied it, which is great.

Even though I'm not putting my main focus on French, I do want to make it a bigger part of my life. I switched the main language of my phone to French, and as a side effect, a lot of my accounts on websites have also switched to French, which is great! So for example, on Chess.com I am getting used to the different letters for notation, such as D for dame (queen), T for tour (rook, literally tower), and F for fou (meaning jester, but it was derived as a sound-alike of the Spanish alfil, from the Arabic الفيل al-fīl, meaning "the elephant"). I also had the plan of watching the news in French every day on France24.fr, although that hasn't panned out.

Anyway, because of this focus on French, I decided to buy the French book for the Assimil Hebrew course. I already had the Superpack with the English book so I didn't need to buy the audio again. Having both books available means it's essentially a trilingual text, so I don't need to use a dictionary to look up unknown French words.

Chess

Speaking of chess, it's been my main obsession lately so it's been limiting the time and energy that I've been able to devote to language learning. Thankfully, I've been able to mostly keep up with my daily goals for my Hebrew resources. Hebrew is a bit easier than Arabic and I've had a lot of exposure to Hebrew so it's more familiar and takes less brain power to process. I've been working on chess for around two months and it hasn't showed any signs of slowing down. I'm scrambling to try and get a strong command of opening theory as quickly as possible. I bought four lifetime repertoires from Chessable: for black, The Queen's Gambit Declined by Alex Colovic and 1.e4 e5 by S.P. Sethuraman, and for white, the two-part 1.e4 course by US champion and Fischer Random Chess world champion Wesley So. Each of these courses starts with a "Quickstarter Guide" featuring the most frequent and critical lines, so I'm trying to finish off the Quickstarter Guides to my four courses. So far I've finished the one for Sethu's course and I'm about half-way through the ones for the QGD course and part 1 of So's course, and part 2 (dedicated to the Sicilian, Caro-Kann, and French) has a pre-Quickstarter intro section which I have completed.

In addition to my opening courses, I'm also trying to improve my tactics (currently 1/4 of the way through the Checkmate Patterns Manual), and I'm also working on my endgame theory using a dead tree copy of Silman's Complete Endgame Course (which unfortunately isn't available on Chessable, but it's the best endgame course for beginners there is). I'm almost done with chapter 2, and by the time I'm through with chapter 4 I should be ready to move on to 100 Endgames You Must Know, which is available on Chessable.
Last edited by Deinonysus on Sun Jan 01, 2023 9:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Thu Jan 27, 2022 2:06 pm

Well, it's been a while so it's time for an update. My progress is the usual: I've been doing Duolingo almost every day but not always a lot of it. I stopped doing Assimil and because I haven't had a commute (we've been keeping the kid home from daycare to avoid the holiday covid spike), I haven't been doing Pimsleur either.

I have actually gotten pretty interested in Biblical Hebrew in addition to Modern Hebrew and I've been reviewing my Anki decks for it. I've decided to switch to an archaic Hebrew pronunciation (more accurate to the Biblical period) rather than the medieval Tiberian pronunciation that I had been using before. A few major differences that occurred in medieval Hebrew are:
  • Phonemic vowel length was lost.
  • Soft versions of the non-emphatic stops were gained (the BeGeD KeFeT consonants).
  • The Proto-Semitic ghayin and khet sounds were merged with ayin and het. This distinction is not marked in writing so telling them apart requires some detective work. You need to find an Arabic or Ugaritic cognate and see what sound they use. For proper nouns, the English names are actually a good general guide, since they tend to ultimately come from the Septuagint, a very old Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from a time when the distinction was maintained. Words with ghayin and khet would be transliterated with a gamma or chi (respectively), while an ayin or het would not be written at all. Examples are Gaza and Gomorrah, which are spelled with an ayin and don't have a g-like sound in Modern Hebrew but would have been pronounced with a gh in the 3rd century BC when the Septuagint was written.
Unfortunately, I haven't had much time or energy to dedicate to Hebrew. First, chess has overtaken language learning as my main hobby, so that limits how much I can put into language learning. Second, since the final episodes of Attack on Titan are coming out, I've decided to spend a bit of time on Japanese using a new dabbling strategy. I'll address that in my Tackling the Sinosphere log.
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Fri Feb 11, 2022 3:18 pm

I spent a couple of weeks on Japanese (and a bit of Classical Chinese) and I'm very pleased with my strategy. I'll likely post a detailed update in my other log about it. But I think I've gotten it out of my system enough that I am able to return to Hebrew now. I'm almost caught up with my rewatch of Attack on Titan and I should have it completed by Sunday, when the penultimate episode comes out. So it's only a matter of time until my allocation of time is freed up again. That said, Duolingo's Haitian Creole course is coming out soon and I may not be able to resist it. I guess it depends how long the course is; if it's short and I can finish it within a couple of months I'll be more likely to go for it, whereas if it's long I'll be more likely to hold off until later.

I picked up with Hebrew right where I left off. It's all review anyway. And in fact, it'll probably be at least a month or two of dedicated work before I get to any material that isn't review. But although it will start out as a slog, it won't be a long slog. I should be able to finish Assimil and Pimsleur within four months if I can stick to my schedule. After that I'll just need to finish Duolingo Hebrew and begin FSI. The reward is high for just a little bit of consistency. As they say in Attack on Titan, 心臓を捧げよ! (shinzō o sasageyo, dedicate your heart!)

: 40 / 504 Duolingo Hebrew
: 14 / 85 Assimil Hebrew
: 7 / 90 Pimsleur Hebrew

Chess

My Chessable reviews have been piling up due to the time put into Japanese studies and my AOT rewatch. But soon I should be able to catch up and start learning new opening lines again. I've started learning lines against the London System (a very popular opening at the intermediate level!) as well as some sidelines such as the Trompowsky. I'm also hoping to finish the Quickstarter guides vs. the Sicilian and French soon. I have finished most of the Quickstarter lines in part 1 of So's course, including the Scandi and Petroff. I just have the Pirc and Modern lines left which aren't that popular at the intermediate level so I might save them for last.
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby lavengro » Tue Feb 22, 2022 4:21 am

Deinonysus wrote:.... That said, Duolingo's Haitian Creole course is coming out soon and I may not be able to resist it. I guess it depends how long the course is; if it's short and I can finish it within a couple of months I'll be more likely to go for it, whereas if it's long I'll be more likely to hold off until later.

In case you are interested Deinonysus, Duolingo has finally released its Haitian Creole course. It is presently quite short (36 skill units, 125 lessons), but I see from this link (http://ardslot.com/haitiancreole.txt) that the next iteration (without a stated release date) is anticipated to expand this to 113 skill units, 407 lessons.

I ran through a couple of units just now out of interest. No Tips yet (at least for the first four skill units) which is not great, and as the tree is shiny new, it is not yet populated with what I find the most value in - the sometimes lengthy and usually very helpful sentence discussions.
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Fri Jun 10, 2022 6:22 pm

Well, it's been quite a while since I posted in a log, so I'll do a general update. I was into Taiwanese and Japanese for a while but didn't make much progress. I've gotten back into Hebrew over the last month or two, but languages haven't been my main focus. I've been playing Risk online and it's quickly become my main hobby. It was my favorite board game growing up. Unlike chess, you don't need to memorize anything to reach a high level. I reached Master rank pretty quickly (it's the second highest rank, after Grandmaster), so I'm in the top 2 or 3% of active players.

Despite languages being on the backburner, I've still made some progress with Hebrew, particularly with Pimsleur. I started from the beginning and I'm almost through unit 1. I've gotten about half-way through unit 2 in the past, so I have a few more weeks before I start learning new material that isn't review. I haven't had much luck with Assimil or Duolingo, but I have regained my strong interest in Biblical Hebrew within the past couple of weeks, so I've been reviewing my Anki decks for The First Hebrew Primer and I've been reading through it a bit at night.

My biggest road block for Modern Hebrew is that I like to type my answers in Duolingo on a computer, but the Hebrew keyboard layout is abysmal and provides a very poor typing experience. I have been meaning to learn to use genetic algorithms in Python, which is required to create a top-tier keyboard layout. But I haven't had the energy to get started. Hopefully I can do that soon and then get back to Duolingo for Modern Hebrew. Until then, hopefully I can keep on chugging along with Biblical Hebrew and Pimsleur Modern Hebrew.
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Thu Jun 16, 2022 5:23 pm

I'm still going strong with Biblical Hebrew. The last time I got pretty far and dropped it was when I first decided to study Arabic, because I was struggling with taking a while to form Biblical Hebrew sentences quickly in my head, and I thought it would be helpful to get some conversational skills in a more conservative Semitic language and make the sounds and syntax more comfortable. Well, this time around I have already wrapped my head around beginner-level Arabic, so that should no longer be a stopping point.

My current plan is to continue to work on spoken Modern Hebrew in the car. I am almost done with the first of Pimsleur's three units. After that I'll see if I can do FSI Basic Hebrew in the car without looking at the manual. The rest of my Hebrew study time will be focused on Biblical Hebrew. I'll keep going with First Hebrew Primer and then if I finish that I can move on to Seow's A Grammar for Biblical Hebrew.

I'm continuing to use my best attempt at Archaic Hebrew pronunciation, which is a huge help in remembering how to spell Hebrew words (Modern Hebrew is almost no help at all). One recent change I've made is that I'm starting to pronounce the vowels ḥolem /o/ and ḥīreq /i/ as always short unless there is a vowel letter after it, and qibbūṣ /u/ as always short as well. This is not the standard pronunciation, but it helps me remember whether there's a vowel letter or not, and it also feels a bit more natural. Without this change, there are too many long vowels and a lot of words feel mechanical, so I'm comfortable with this artistic license.

I've written a good bit about my pronunciation of Biblical Hebrew but I don't know if I've ever uploaded any recordings, so here are a couple of demonstrations:

The aleph-bet (including both pronunciations of ע ,ח, and ש).
https://voca.ro/1kynvSeC0aXb

And here is the first verse of Genesis:
https://voca.ro/1cKjTyMXhpQZ
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księżycowy
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby księżycowy » Thu Jun 16, 2022 6:53 pm

!מזל טוב

Deinonysus wrote:I'm still going strong with Biblical Hebrew. The last time I got pretty far and dropped it was when I first decided to study Arabic, because I was struggling with taking a while to form Biblical Hebrew sentences quickly in my head, and I thought it would be helpful to get some conversational skills in a more conservative Semitic language and make the sounds and syntax more comfortable. Well, this time around I have already wrapped my head around beginner-level Arabic, so that should no longer be a stopping point.

I'd love to get around to not just reading Biblical Hebrew. Some day I plan to take a crack at Weingreen's Composition lessons. It's cool and interesting you're trying to think in Biblical Hebrew, though.

I'll keep going with First Hebrew Primer and then if I finish that I can move on to Seow's A Grammar for Biblical Hebrew.

I absolutely love Seow so far. He takes the approach that one needs to take with Hebrew, IMO. Roots and readings. I have no clue about the Primer.

You approach sounds kinda similar to mine, only I'm not doing Pimsleur yet, and am using Assimil for the spoken language.

I've messed around with a more authentic pronunciation myself, but largely dropped it in favor of modern pronunciation.its just so much easier. :P (I'm going to have to cross that bridge sooner or later though, in regard to vowel length and certain consonants, with Arabic.)
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Fri Jun 17, 2022 4:37 pm

księżycowy wrote:!מזל טוב

Deinonysus wrote:I'm still going strong with Biblical Hebrew. The last time I got pretty far and dropped it was when I first decided to study Arabic, because I was struggling with taking a while to form Biblical Hebrew sentences quickly in my head, and I thought it would be helpful to get some conversational skills in a more conservative Semitic language and make the sounds and syntax more comfortable. Well, this time around I have already wrapped my head around beginner-level Arabic, so that should no longer be a stopping point.

I'd love to get around to not just reading Biblical Hebrew. Some day I plan to take a crack at Weingreen's Composition lessons. It's cool and interesting you're trying to think in Biblical Hebrew, though.

I'll keep going with First Hebrew Primer and then if I finish that I can move on to Seow's A Grammar for Biblical Hebrew.

I absolutely love Seow so far. He takes the approach that one needs to take with Hebrew, IMO. Roots and readings. I have no clue about the Primer.

You approach sounds kinda similar to mine, only I'm not doing Pimsleur yet, and am using Assimil for the spoken language.

I've messed around with a more authentic pronunciation myself, but largely dropped it in favor of modern pronunciation.its just so much easier. :P (I'm going to have to cross that bridge sooner or later though, in regard to vowel length and certain consonants, with Arabic.)

Nice, I hadn't heard of Weingreen's Classical Hebrew Composition but I'll keep it on my radar, it sounds interesting!

The First Hebrew Primer by Simon, Resnikoff, and Motzkin is really good. It's a pretty traditional grammar in some ways but it's kind of half-way between Assimil and Pharr's Homeric Greek, in that it has a graded text to read every chapter, and it starts with tall tales translated into Biblical Hebrew, then starts with a simplified text of the book of Ruth, until it finally starts presenting the unabridged text of Ruth and takes you through the rest of the book.
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księżycowy
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby księżycowy » Fri Jun 17, 2022 4:42 pm

Huh, that sounds useful. Thanks for giving me a lay of the land for the Primer!

As for Weingreen, it's notoriously overpriced on places like Amazon and the like. I have a used copy floating around my book collection somewhere. I get the feeling it'd take some good digging around to find it, alas. It is a series of English passages of increasing difficulty with some foot(or were they end?)notes to help with difficult parts. I can't recall if it had an actual Biblical text or not. Still, a good addition to any Hebrew library.
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Deinonysus
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Re: עברית 2022

Postby Deinonysus » Sun Jun 19, 2022 2:04 am

I forgot to mention, last weekend I met up with Xenops, Lichtrausch, and Philomath in Boston. It was great to have a long chat with like minded individuals in person, and that gave me a pretty big motivational boost to get me back into language learning! I just cleared out my main Anki deck for First Hebrew Primer for the first time since I've gotten back into Biblical Hebrew. It covers all of the vocabulary for the first third of the book (ten chapters), so now that I've refreshed the vocabulary I just need to go over the chapters. Chapter 10 is the first one that starts presenting the book of Ruth (abridged).

Now that I have the language bug again, I've had to start fighting off Wanderlust for such lovely languages as Sumerian (there's a thread about cuneiform), Portuguese (I just ate at a Brazilian Steakhouse), and Xhosa (no particular reason, it's just awesome!). But hopefully I will be able to stay the course and make good progress with Hebrew without getting derailed.
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