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Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 9:12 pm
by Speakeasy
rdearman wrote: Just to clarify, regardless of how many copies of things there are floating around the Internet, it doesn't make them public domain. Just because everyone else on the motorway is speeding doesn't make it legal. :)
I do not dispute the legal principles involved. However, it is a fact that the holder of the copyright accorded free access to these materials for over a decade; thus, it seems logical to me that they are now de facto in the public domain. Nevertheless, I fully recognize that that which may seem "logical" to the average person, or which might appear to based in "common sense", seldom has any sway in the eyes of the law. :geek:

Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2019 2:56 am
by languagelearner
The audio for Schenker may be found on the Yale website at: https://yalebooks.yale.edu/beginning-po ... -resources.

Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2019 3:15 am
by Lysander
Speakeasy wrote:UPDATE 2: Audio Files for Alexander Schenker’s Beginning Polish
Not long after sending a request to Yale University that free, public access be restored to the audio files of Alexander Schenker’s Beginning Polish course, I received an automated reply by Email advising me that the Director, World Languages, Yale University was presently away from the office and that he would reply upon his return. That was last weekend. As we are now Wednesday afternoon and as I have not yet received a reply to my request, and giving that we are well into the Summer Vacation Period, I would imagine that the Director is presently on vacation and that, upon his return to the office, he will have to wade through a gillion Emails, decide which ones require his immediate attention and, hopefully, get around to responding to my request by Christmas. Be not dismayed, I shall not allow this matter to expire for want of attention!

PERSONAL OPINION: Free access to the above-named Audio Files
As a side note, should there have been a change of ownership of the copyrights to the above-named audio recordings and should access to these files now be restricted owing to such a change, while I am by no means an expert in such matters, I will offer my personal opinion that, given the free access to these files via the websites of at least two U.S. universities, for over a decade, they are de facto in the public domain. I reiterate, this is but a personal opinion on my part.

EDITED:
Formatting.

Hopefully he responds and it clears up this being freely available to the people. From reading the intro text to Beginning Polish (which just arrived today), the author thanks, "Prof. William S. Cornyn, of Yale University, either directly, in conversation, or indirectly, through his Beginning Russian, has influenced the general plan of the book and the formulation of many grammatical statements."

I don't recall seeing that particular book discussed anywhere, but if it also comes with 30-60 hours of audio, it might be a gem of audiolingual goodness as well. I see copies of it are available quite cheaply on amazon. Come on Yale, make it happen.

Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2019 12:29 pm
by Speakeasy
@languagelearner, welcome to the forum and … thank you very much for providing us all with the link to the Beginning Polish audio files! You seem to be endowed with the metaphysical powers of The Force, are you Jedi, are you Obi-Wan Kenobi?

Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2019 6:46 pm
by languagelearner
For those interested, there are in fact two generations of Assimil for Polish, both by Barbara Kuszmider. The German edition Polnisch ohne Muehe (1995/2007) appears to be the older French version and can still purchased online. The latest French editions (2010, 2015, 2016/2018, all with different covers though the same content) can easily be found online. The old and new editions are completely different courses. You might find it helpful to go through both.

I would also recommend checking out the Polish readers offered by LPP books (https://www.lppbooks.com/Polish/index.html; though they are currently experiencing technical difficulties). The stories are geared towards building up a core vocabulary and predicated on repetition. There is also a facing translation. The accompanying audio is solely in the target language and available for free on their website. Though the sound quality varies, the Polish books are particularly well served by clear, capable narrators. For what is it worth, they also offer readers in other languages which might be of interest to others.

Re: How would you start learning Polish? (Any tips?)

Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2019 1:21 am
by poeticsteph
I dabbled in Polish years ago and do not recommend Pimsleur or Rosetta Stone for it - and those have helped me a lot with other languages. The many letters and combinations etc. made Pimsleur ineffective for me. I’m talking trying Lesson 1 eight times - which is unheard of for me!

The Slavic languages for me were just too hard (I also tried Bulgarian, Russian, and Croatian) to study and I realized I would be better off focusing elsewhere.

Let me put it this way - Hungarian is one of the hardest languages in the world and I still remember almost all I learned in Pimsleur and Memrise years after quitting.

If I were to study Polish, I would start with an FSI or DLI course, a good textbook, and if possible even one class a week with an online tutor.

Good luck!