Meera

I thought Arabic shows and movies were mostly in Egyptian dialect, as I was taught that Egypt is the Hollywood of the Middle East. Where would one find material from other countries? Any good Internet sites? I live in a small town and I think I'd have to pay an arm and a leg for foreign channels.

That's true most movies and dramas are in Egyptian. Although recently many Turkish dramas are dubbed in Syrian. There are many movies in all different dialects though. Some good Lebanese movies are "West Beirut" "Caramel" and "Where do we go from here?" In Saudi Arabic, there is a movie called Wadjda which is very good. The Syrian Bride, Paradise Now, The Lemon Tree are all in Palestinian Arabic but I think are also in Hebrew.

If one has already studied MSA, what would be the easiest dialect to learn? That is, closest to MSA?  I have some experience with Iraqi and Levantine but never really picked up either.

That's a really hard question to answer because  it seems to me all Arabs will say their dialect is the closest to MSA. In my opinion I think the easiest is Levantine but especially Syrian. I'm not sure why but I find it to have the most words common with MSA. I think Egyptian, Moroccan, and Iraqi are pretty different. Of course many people also say the Saudi and Gulf dialects are the most similar too. Of course you have to go with which one interests you the most or what country you will be dealing with the most. If you don't have a particular interest in any country I'd say to go for Egyptian or Levantine because they are the most widely known. 

Like MyDigitalpoint, I find this thread interesting. I hear and read namaste often where I live and online. I especially hear it often in the spiritual, new-age, and yoga communities. It has become the way to greet and say good-bye to people. And everyone automatically knows what it means. Which then means many more people are familiar with the word...

Yeah all of my yoga classes begin and end with Namaste haha. You also find it on bags, signs, wall hangings and other things in yoga and new age stores lol

I started learning Hindi a few years ago because of my interest in the Indian culture. It's not a very popular language in the States. French and Spanish are much more spoken and taught. So, it was a bit hard to study. And getting someone to help me out even harder. I once asked some Indian co-workers and they said they didn't know how to read Hindi. But anyway, my love for Bollywood movies pushed me. I used to buy my movies at an Indo-Pak grocery store. And the owner told me that I should learn it so that I wouldn't miss out on so much of the movie by constantly looking at the subtitles.

I'm glad you started to learn Hindi. It really is a such an awarding language to learn.  :millionaire:

Yeah I agree with SpringBreeze youtube has a lot of Bollywood films with English subs! Just about every Bollywood song is on youtube too! 

Merhaba! Nasılsınız? My Turkish is kind of bad lol

Hey Brian, I think the Routledge Essential Hindi grammar is pretty considering there isn't much else. I've heard good things about the McGregor grammar  too but I personally haven't used it. Usha Jain's grammar too is supposedly very good also. The best book I think for learning Hindi is the Teach Yourself. I know the Teach Yourself series has a bad reputation but the one for Hindi is among the best I've used. Most of other books for Hindi don't go into as much depth. But to be honest it's quite hard to find good resources for Hindi/Urdu.

Yes it is available in Hindi. 

Hey AN89JX, you asked a good question but I guess it depends what your idea of fluency is and how much you put into the course. If you define fluency as being able to get around a Spanish speaking country, than yes I think two beginner classes  would be enough. But if you want to read literature, watch things without subtitles and understand everything being said to you, I would say no. It also depends how long the courses are and how intense they are. Every language course is different so you never know. While taking the class if you want to be fluent, I'd study very hard and immerse yourself in Spanish culture as much as you can

Great link megshoe! Arigato Gozaimasu.

This is an awesome thread Kandikkal! Days are super important to know!

Most of these are commercial films. I don't think it is good to watch these for the purpose of learning the language.

This is worth checking out if you want to see quality films. I am not sure whether English subtitles will be available for these movies though.

I have most of these films with English subs. Unless it is bootlegged most DVDs have english sub option

For some reason I really like the movie "Devdas" with Shah Rukh Khan and Aishwarya Rai (she's from the South and from a traditionally Hindi-speaking family). The songs are very poetic and the range of vocabulary (inspired by Urdu ghazals) is quite refined.

Aishwarya does speak Hindi, but I believe her native tounge is Tulu. I think she speaks many languages though, I have heard her say she speaks Tamil and Kannada also.  Also Im not sure if you know but Devdas was inspired by a Bengali novel. I agree it's a great movie!

Hello I am using it right now and I like it a lot!

Mine was Ameile 

I like to dance and do yoga so I have many dvds for Indian dance with a voiceover in Hindi and I have yoga videos with the same thing. I also love watching movies so I read a lot of Hindi film magazines (like the hindi ersion of filmfare). 

How diffirent is African French? If you know standard French can you understand it?

I started at fourteen with Hindi and in High School I had to take French.

Are there any links/sites to learn the Thai script?

The thing that got me about Hindi is that I am used to -o being masculine and -a being feminine with -i following on either side of gender depending on circumstance. But with Hindi -a was masculine and -i was generally always feminine and neither -e nor -o really came into it. But perhaps I should get back into the practice of studying Hindi... if nothing else I have a forum for practice.

Yes you should deffintly study it! It's a fun languae and you could practice here with us  :grin:

I agree with this, but I also want to point out that there are Americans who do want to learn a second language. All my language classes have had Americans in it, weather it was French, Japanese or Arabic. And there are many language classes offered in college and high school. Although I agree most Americans do not want to learn a second language and it definitely isn't the norm, there are some that do and I think more people have wanted to learn a second language in recent years than in the 50s, 70s and 80s. Also looks how many language programs cater to American and English speakers, Rosetta Stone, Teach Yourself, Colloquial, Living Language etc. I think Americans and English speakers are probably the least bilingual but I think (and hope) that it is slowly changing.

What a great and useful site thank you!

Yeah I have the same problem. It's because I have such a huge interest in languages and love all of them.  :cry:

कोई बात नहीं!

I use my computer to write it because I have Hindi installed. But you can use google translate, all you have to do is set it to hindi-english or any other language and let's say you wanted to spell आदमी (aadmi) you type in aadmi in the translate box and it will automatically convert it for you. If you still have any other questions or it's still confusing feel free to ask me