Serbo-Croatian Basic Course

Rating:
Summary: If you're serious
Review: I agree with most of what Chris McGrath has to say. Note: this course actually has two parts; Part 1 and Part 2 EACH have a 630 page book and 22 audio cassettes. I think Amazon.com is just offering Part 1. If you decide to do this get both parts.

The State Department Foreign Language Institute courses (this is one), created with your tax dollars at the height of the cold war, are all excellent. This course is for those who are serious about being able to live and work in the countries of ex-Jugoslavia. If you are just going to visit don't waste your time here; it's way overkill. This is definitely the brute force method. The thing is, unless learning languages is a snap for you, and unless you have some exposure to Slavic languages, the brute force method is the only way to go. This course is incredible: it is extremely well done, both in explaining the structure of the language and in the exercises that gradually re-progam your brain for this new structure. It is very thorough. You HAVE to get the audio cassettes; don't waste your time without them. I would add that there is one other mandatory addition for those going down this path: the Morton Benson full edition English-Serbo Croatian and Serbo Croatian-English dictionaries. The combination of this course and the Morton Benson is the way to go.

Rating:
Summary: The blood, sweat and tears way to learn Bosnian / Croatian
Review: This book was produced by the Foreign Service Department in 1965. Although it's old, it's extremely comprehensive. It's 600 pages long and comes with about 20 audio cassettes.

After completing 6 of the 25 lessons, I went to Bosnia for two weeks and was able to struggle by with the help of a pocket dictionary. Nothing helped my language skills like that two weeks in Bosnia--you can't beat total immersion--but this is the next best thing. It's helped me far more than any other course in a classroom setting (I've taken two) and any other textbook I've studied (I've tried three other textbooks). It forces you to drill with the new vocabulary and new concepts out loud, over and over again, until it's permanently imprinted on your gray matter.

I'd estimate that this course takes 200-300 hours to complete, and you will be able to speak basic Bosnian/ Croatian/ Serbian quite well by the end.

The course has a Serbian bent to it, because it was written when Belgrade was at the helm of Yugoslavia. It includes some cyrillic text in addition to roman, and many words are spelt the Serbian way. Some of the Serbian vocabulary introduced is not in common use in Bosnia or Croatia. However, I think this is only a minor drawback for those wishing to learn Bosnian or Croatian. If you actually travel there, the minor differences in Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian pronunciation and vocabulary will become readily apparent.

I'm still looking for a course that doesn't require the raw, brute effort that this one does--I've been looking at James Asher's TPR learning method--but for the time being, this is the best thing I've come across.