Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

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Diomedes
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Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby Diomedes » Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:14 pm

After a bit of research, I feel I'm finally understanding a bit of the evolution (or, better saying, the transformations) of the Assimil series. The editions I own and studied are all from the so-called second generation (published in the 1980s).

Since my recent comeback as a language learner, I sometimes feel inclined to explore the older editions, as my languages are the more commonly studied (there are, basically, "figs" plus a russian still on early embryonic development). They may be less friendly, but I feel the reward could be significant in terms of grammar and vocabulary. It would not be so difficult to find some of these older books and, well, I already got the audio of them. The "outdated vocabulary" is not an issue, as I'm already a big fan of the old TY series - which are great, but sometimes the absence of audio is not great.

But there are some books that belong to an "intermediate generation". As I found out in this forum and HTLAL, they mostly overlap with the first generation, but some of them are (or at least one of them is) considered to be major improvements to their "older brothers". The "russe sans peine" from the 1970s, in particular, was almost worshipped in some older posts, even if it was/is not an unanimous feeling. I found out it was "réalisée avec le concours de Mme. Bratous [and others]", adding to the work of Chérel, who remains as the author.

To be more precise, here is my question: apart from that russian "sans peine" made by that team, are there other books from this "intermediate" period (1970s, or even 1960s) that are really worth chasing if they come up with a reasonable price? Or, if not, were at least the audio recordings of these courses remade for better, or just the russian one?

Also, I'm referring here to the more common languages (french, german, italian, spanish - perhaps dutch, just to add one more). I'm aware that there are some courses, apparently from this decade, that are also highly esteemed, but in target languages that are not on my current list (notably catalan, occitan, serbo-croatian, and perhaps portuguese), and that didn't have a previous version.
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luke
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby luke » Thu Sep 23, 2021 12:01 am

Diomedes wrote:After a bit of research, I feel I'm finally understanding a bit of the evolution (or, better saying, the transformations) of the Assimil series.

I don't know if there's a thread that gathers Assimil reviews of various generations and series, but it would be nice.

Just as an example, here's one:
Using Spanish
This is the advanced Assimil course in Spanish with English as the "teaching language".
Published 1996
The accent is peninsular Spanish. Native speed.
The same audio was used with other "teaching language" courses. (I bought the French version - Perfectionnement Espagnol because many of the English translations were so bad. It appeared to have been better cared for. The printing was modernized with colors, and Assimil, being a French company, probably did better translations into French than was done with "Using Spanish").
Other than some seriously disappointing translations (grammatically incorrect almost to the point of nonsense), it's what one might expect for an "advanced" Assimil course.
60 lessons.
I saw an Anki deck for Using Spanish and it appears the 1996 edition has been superseded (different lessons, different audio).

I know you were looking for earlier courses, but maybe someone will point us to a thread where the focus was reviewing various specific Assimil courses.
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Diomedes
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby Diomedes » Thu Sep 23, 2021 12:43 am

luke wrote:I don't know if there's a thread that gathers Assimil reviews of various generations and series, but it would be nice.

[...]

I know you were looking for earlier courses, but maybe someone will point us to a thread where the focus was reviewing various specific Assimil courses.



You're welcome. Well, most of my searchs were made in the HTLAL forum. I don't know if I'm already allowed to post links here, but some threads were named "Comprehensive List of Assimil Generations" and "Generations of Assimil". Although very informative, the information about updates between 1st and 2nd generations (besides russian) remained a bit foggy, at least to me.

However, after starting this thread, I noticed there is another HTLAL thread intitled "Assimil - 1st or 2nd generation?", in which someone suggest that, before "le nouveau français sans paine", the french course was updated only in cartoons and currencies, and other users said the italian and german course also were kept unchanged. But they could also have remade just the audio with other actors, as they did with russian.

If no meaningful change happened, I suspect that what happened back then (1971) was just a matter of promoting/improving a specific course with less success (russian), which led later generations (of people, not books :D ) - or, at least, myself - to believe that there was a whole "intermediate" generation of courses.

(Edit: typos)
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby Elexi » Fri Oct 08, 2021 11:37 am

You are correct, before 'le nouveau . . . sans peine' series of the 1970s, the Assimil courses updated the currency and the recordings to have more modern voices - but they are essentially the same as the ones published in the 1940s and 50s. In addition, a few other changes occurred - for example the advanced German course changed from black letter type to more modern type, but it is still the same words.
Last edited by Elexi on Sat Oct 09, 2021 4:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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David1917
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby David1917 » Fri Oct 08, 2021 6:34 pm

Diomedes wrote:To be more precise, here is my question: apart from that russian "sans peine" made by that team, are there other books from this "intermediate" period (1970s, or even 1960s) that are really worth chasing if they come up with a reasonable price? Or, if not, were at least the audio recordings of these courses remade for better, or just the russian one?


In my experience, the problem with finding some of these old ones is you cannot find the audio anywhere. Unless you live in Europe it might be easier to find full kits in second-hand shops, but some of the more rare ones (Serbo-Croate being the biggest thorn in my side) I've only been able to find a book - and it was a hunt at that. Even using some "unapproved methods" to get the audio, there are some that are very tough to find. Assimil does not keep an archive, so they won't be able to turn over old recordings the way Linguaphone was doing semi-recently.

Other than that, these books are excellent and infinitely preferable to the newer editions in many respects. Exceptions exist, of course, but if you look at the last handful of lessons in the same language from two generations, you'll see the older one has a lot more material. The benefits of the newer ones is they'll have more colloquialisms in them. My opinion is that if you like the Assimil approach and they make more than one for your language, get them all because they will supplement each other very nicely.
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Diomedes
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby Diomedes » Mon Oct 11, 2021 2:01 am

David1917 wrote:In my experience, the problem with finding some of these old ones is you cannot find the audio anywhere. Unless you live in Europe it might be easier to find full kits in second-hand shops, but some of the more rare ones (Serbo-Croate being the biggest thorn in my side) I've only been able to find a book - and it was a hunt at that. Even using some "unapproved methods" to get the audio, there are some that are very tough to find. Assimil does not keep an archive, so they won't be able to turn over old recordings the way Linguaphone was doing semi-recently.

Other than that, these books are excellent and infinitely preferable to the newer editions in many respects. Exceptions exist, of course, but if you look at the last handful of lessons in the same language from two generations, you'll see the older one has a lot more material. The benefits of the newer ones is they'll have more colloquialisms in them. My opinion is that if you like the Assimil approach and they make more than one for your language, get them all because they will supplement each other very nicely.



Elexi wrote:You are correct, before 'le nouveau . . . sans peine' series of the 1970s, the Assimil courses updated the currency and the recordings to have more modern voices - but they are essentially the same as the ones published in the 1940s and 50s. In addition, a few other changes occurred - for example the advanced German course changed from black letter type to more modern type, but it is still the same words.


Nice contributions. So it seems that having the original ("theatrical"?) recordings should be considered good enough.

Also, the currencies seem to be a good clue for identifying if it is a "revised recording" or not. If your "Kaffee" is "teuer" in sound than it is in the book, chances are this is a "second (or intermediate) generation" recording.

As for colloquialisms, I personally feel that it's impossible to get them all. As someone born in the 1970s, I'm biased about the "third generation" from the 1980s, because I tend to believe they are not "old" (after all, if they are, I am as well!). But being rational, I would have to admit that perhaps the only up-to-date colloquialisms are the ones in the most recent edition.

Or perhaps there are resources that can just supply the most recent colloquialisms without the need to go through a whole Assimil course again (video and podcast series like "Easy Languages" come to mind, but perhaps there is something better) ?
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David1917
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Re: Assimil - editions from the 1970s and 1960s

Postby David1917 » Tue Oct 12, 2021 12:03 am

I tend to prefer my coursebooks on the "proper" side of things and to pick up slang/usage in person. Native speakers will say "nOboDy TaLkS LiKe tHaT" but alas, they are not language teachers. The chase to find a course that teaches the most up-to-date usage is futile anyway, because of the amount of time it takes to produce a course.

Don't misunderstand me though, the 2nd & 3rd Assimil books are quite good. You could use one of the newer ones without the active wave and just add an extra 15 min onto your daily routine getting some extra input that would reinforce what you've studied in the older gen. For me, reinforcement in different contexts solidifies a language much better than constant review of the same material. YMMV, and keep costs in mind as well. An older Assimil plus a modern free podcast or something could be beneficial, too.
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