Page 1 of 9

Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 2:53 pm
by Cellar Door
Why Afrikaans
My future brother-in-law, who is an Afrikaaner, is out of the country and returns next June. Most of his family still lives in South Africa and they will be at the wedding next summer. I have always thought Afrikaans was an interesting language so I decided a few weeks ago that this year, I will devote 100% of my language learning time to Afrikaans.

Background
I am a native English speaker, (B1) Spanish, (A2) Portuguese
I learned Spanish & Portuguese following the *Fluent Forever* method, which worked out pretty well.

Resources
Books
Colloquial Afrikaans (CA) (Donaldson, 2000)
A Grammar of Afrikaans (Donaldson, 1993)
Teach Yourself Afrikaans (TYA)
Kobra - a popular novel from author Deon Meyer

Online Resources
Anki - vocabulary
Italki - planning on getting a tutor 2x per week
Open Languages Afrikaans

Challenges
There are few resources
Conflicting resources (different dictionaries will define words differently)
Pronunciation is tough

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 9:22 pm
by Lawyer&Mom
Everyone needs an Afrikaans soap opera with English subtitles, right?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/7de_Laan

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 10:00 pm
by Cellar Door
Thank you for the recommendation!

I just added another resource as well - Teach Yourself Afrikaans (TYA). After flipping through both books, it seems like Colloquial Afrikaans (CA) has a better layout and better audio. I plan to follow the subjects in order in CA and use TYA for extra dialogues, audio, and explanations.

So far, I have completed two weeks of pronunciation training. I am getting pretty good, but the diphthongs will take time to master. I have also completed chapter 1 in CA. One of the frustrating aspects of all of my resources is that there are tons of unclear explanations. For example:

Angename Kennis / Bly te Kenne = "nice to meet you"
Are these interchangeable? Which is more formal? no explanation provided

Wat is nou weer jou vrou se naam = "What is your wife's name again"
What + is + now + again + your + wife's + name (no explanation of structure, why are you using the word "nou")

Ek sal so maak = "I will do it"
I + shall + so + do (no explanation)


*Sigh* - this could be a long journey

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 10:15 pm
by eido
@Jaleel10 speaks Afrikaans. Maybe he could help you out, when he's not studying Spanish like a beast.

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 10:24 pm
by Cellar Door
I am starting with a tutor next week on Italki, so I will have a resource for a lot of these questions. However, it is unfortunate that there are no really good resources for learning Afrikaans.

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2018 1:33 am
by trui
Knowing Dutch to a decent level, there's so much I want to comment on already. :lol: Like 'nou' for example. But even when it comes to Dutch, my help can be iffy because I've far from mastered all of the nuances of the language (mastered in the sense of knowing them like a native would). Afrikaans, while very similar to Dutch, is another language and so lots of words that seem identical to Dutch might have slightly to far different nuances in certain situations. Who knows!? So I'd better keep my mouth shut. ;)

Sterkte!

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2018 11:04 am
by Jaleel10
Hey, Cellar Door. Wow, this is the first time since having joined this forum that I am seeing someone learning Afrikaans. I have to commend you haha. I'm willing to help however I can with regard to any questions you have or even if you're just looking for someone to chat or practice. I am not a smartass when it comes to grammar and stuff like that but I promise I'll try my best.

Dagsê, Kelderdeur. Wow, dit is die eerste keer sedert ek by hierdie forum aangesluit het dat ek iemand Afrikaans sien leer. Ek moet jou prys haha. Enige vrae wat jy het of selfs al soek jy net iemand om mee te gesels of te oefen, ek is bereid om te help hoe ook al ek kan! Ek is nou nie 'n boffin as dit kom by grammatika en sulke tipe goed nie, maar ek belowe ek sal my bes probeer.





Angename Kennis / Bly te Kenne = "nice to meet you"
Are these interchangeable? Which is more formal? no explanation provided


Aangename kennis and Bly te kenne are completely interchangeable. Bly te kenne is slightly more formal in the rural areas where I live but both sound perfectly natural.

Wat is nou weer jou vrou se naam = "What is your wife's name again"
What + is + now + again + your + wife's + name (no explanation of structure, why are you using the word "nou")


It's more natural to say: Wat is jou vrou se naam nou weer? [What is your wife's name again], again = nou weer in this context. The phrase your using is a bit archaic. When again means nou weer, it usually comes at the end of the question. I will try to find a grammar rule that explains this.


Ek sal so maak = "I will do it"
I + shall + so + do (no explanation)


Well this is just one of those time where you are gonna have to treat Afrikaans as Afrikaans and English as English ;) . But a tip I can give you, ignore the botched grammar terms :lol: :

Ek = I
Sal maak = will do
so = so, like that.

In any Afrikaans sentence where a verb (sal maak) has two separate elements, in the case the auxilary verb sal and the infinitve maak. The infinite ALWAYS (iirc lol) comes at the end of the sentence. The auxiliary verb usually comes after the pronoun.

Ek het dit al reeds gedoen - I had already done it.
Sy sal dit vir u skep - She will create it for you.


Sterkte!

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2018 12:04 pm
by Speakeasy
Hello, Cellar Door, welcome to the forum! Now then, while I have never studied Afrikaans, given the paucity of resources for learning this language, you might wish to consider the following:

Learn with Lonweb Parallel Texts - Languages on the Web
"Crystal Jones and Robert Behar Casiraghi are the team that brings you languages-on-the-web, or lonweb for short, the site that teaches all languages using the Daisy/Opal/Arranger Stories through the parallel text format." http://www.lonweb.org/
http://www.lonweb.org/links/link-afrikaans.htm

Linguaphone Afrikaans
Linguaphone used to publish a CEFR A2 level course for the self-study of Afrikaans. I suspect that the course dates from the mid-1950's and that, while it may have been reissued through to the mid-1990's, the materials themselves were never revised. Although it is out-of-print, copies can still be found in public libraries and on the internet. There is also the remote possibility that publisher might be able to sell you a reprinted copy from their archives (a service that they do, indeed, offer). Linguaphone: https://www.linguaphone.co.uk/

I wish you much success with your language-learning project!

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2018 4:19 pm
by Cellar Door
Jaleel10 wrote:Hey, Cellar Door. Wow, this is the first time since having joined this forum that I am seeing someone learning Afrikaans. I have to commend you haha. I'm willing to help however I can with regard to any questions you have or even if you're just looking for someone to chat or practice. I am not a smartass when it comes to grammar and stuff like that but I promise I'll try my best.


This is great, I really appreciate it! The main thing you can help me with is just to make sure that what I am learning is contemporary. I don't want to sound like I am from the 1960's :D

Re: Cellar Door - Afrikaans in 1 year

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2018 4:45 pm
by Cellar Door
The past few days I have been going over the first three introductory dialogues, continuing to memorize vocab from my frequency list, and reviewing a couple basic grammar rules.

Definitive articles
die = the
'n = a/an

Demonstratives
hierdie = this/these
daardie = that/those
dié = not sure about this one, further research needed

Pronouns
memorizing the list

Possession
the English 's becomes "se"



Goeiemôre, Hennie, hoe gaan dit?
Dit gaan baie goed, en met jou?
Nee, uitstekend, dankie. Hoe gaan dit met jou vrou en die kinders?
Ook goed. Wat is jou vrou se naam nou weer, Koos?
Hildegard
Ag ja, dis reg. Waarvandaan kom sy?
Sy kom van Duitsland af.
My vrou is ook ’n buitelander, weet jy?
Is sy? Van watter land kom sy?
Van Nederland. Koos, weet jy, ek moet die kinders by die skool oplaai. Ek sien jou.
Tot siens, Hennie. Sê groete vir jou vrou.
Ja, ek sal so maak. Sê ook groete vir joune. Tot siens.