French For Reading Knowledge

Programmed text for acquisition of reading skills for beginning courses or rapid review.

This textbook teaches the basics of French grammar, reinforcing its lessons with exercises and key practice translations. A systematic guide, the volume is a critical companion for university-level students learning to read and translate written French into English; for graduate scholars learning to do research in French or prepping for proficiency exams; and for any interested readers who want to improve their facility with the French language. In addition, A Short Course in Reading French exposes readers to a broad range of French texts from the humanities and social sciences, including writings by distinguished francophone authors from around the world. The book begins with French pronunciation and cognates and moves through nouns, articles, and prepositions; verbs, adjectives, and adverbs; a graduated presentation of all the indicative and subjunctive tenses; object, relative, and other pronouns; the passive voice; common idiomatic constructions; and other fundamental building blocks of the French language. Chapters contain translation passages from such authors as Pascal, Montesquieu, Proust, Sartre, Bourdieu, Senghor, Césaire, de Certeau, de Beauvoir, Barthes, and Kristeva. Drawn from more than two decades of experience teaching French to students from academic and nonacademic backgrounds, Celia Brickman's clear, accessible, and time-tested format enables even beginners to develop a sophisticated grasp of the language and become adept readers of French. There is an answer key for translation exercises and for non-copyrighted translation passages available to professors and teachers who have assigned this title in a class. Please provide your name, title, institution, and number of students in the course in an email to [email protected].

French for Reading and Translation is a comprehensive introduction to French grammar and vocabulary for those who want to learn to read and understand French, either to conduct academic research or to experience French literature in its original form. Rather than explaining every grammatical concept in tedious detail, the book gives easy-to-follow explanations followed by abundant examples and opportunities to see the language in use. It encourages readers to learn vocabulary by showing them how to break it down and how to recognize related words. It gives learners the opportunity to use various reading strategies as they apply this newfound knowledge to the French passages provided. An engaging guide that will help readers decode the intricacies of the French language, this is an ideal resource for graduate students and researchers consulting French sources.

"French for Reading Knowledge presents a plan to teach the reading of French directly and economically. This book is not intended for those interested in acquiring a practical speaking knowledge. It is meant to reach that large number of students, college freshment or graduates, who would like to acquire a reading knowledge of French if they could only have the time. It fills a gap. It replaces no other text. French for Reading Knowledge differs from the traditional, as well as the current oral-aural type of text. It differs in aim, approach, teaching technique, vocabulary, reading material, etc. How it differs cannot be told here because a short description would be inadequate, and a long one would be read only by those who do not need to read it. In view of this, we should like to make but one brief comment: the basic vocabulary, basic for reading only and extremely small, includes those words which the student will need for further reading in any field. There are a few words, though, which are not generally basic. Obviously, they had to be included for practical purposes. We wish to thank Professor Casimir D. Zdanowicz, who foresaw in an Extension reading course the development of a new method and offered valuable suggestions for the preparation of this book. We are grateful to Dr. Lorentz H. Adolfson, Director of the Extension Division, and to Dr. W. M. Hanley, also of the Extension Division, for continous professional support and encouragement. We are greatful, too, to Mlle Germaine Mercier and to Mme Francoise Jankowski (nee Cusin) for reading the manuscript and making valuable suggestions, and to Miss Ethel A. Schenk, Specialist in charge of Placement and Attainment Examinations at the University of Wisconsion, who was consulted on various matters." [from preface by Joseph Palmeri, E. E. Milligan]

This book offers a tested method for teaching yourself to become proficient in reading French, quickly building your vocabulary, and enabling you to extract meaning without word-for-word translation. If you have had two years of high school or one year of college French, it will enable you to read with ease and enjoyment French periodicals and newspapers, or works in your special field of interest. Designed for auxiliary use outside the classroom, the book offers systematic training in those special skills and techniques which promote efficient reading. It can be used independently by the student who has acquired a modest vocabulary, and a rudimentary knowledge of grammar and sentence structure. "This book is not another reader, but rather a reading manual, new in its approach, tested and tried in the classroom. It aims to give systematic training in the skills and techniques necessary for reading French—skills that are not taught by any of the usual readers."—from the Foreword

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • For anyone who wants to learn a foreign language, this is the method that will finally make the words stick. “A brilliant and thoroughly modern guide to learning new languages.”—Gary Marcus, cognitive psychologist and author of the New York Times bestseller Guitar Zero At thirty years old, Gabriel Wyner speaks six languages fluently. He didn’t learn them in school—who does? Rather, he learned them in the past few years, working on his own and practicing on the subway, using simple techniques and free online resources—and here he wants to show others what he’s discovered. Starting with pronunciation, you’ll learn how to rewire your ears and turn foreign sounds into familiar sounds. You’ll retrain your tongue to produce those sounds accurately, using tricks from opera singers and actors. Next, you’ll begin to tackle words, and connect sounds and spellings to imagery rather than translations, which will enable you to think in a foreign language. And with the help of sophisticated spaced-repetition techniques, you’ll be able to memorize hundreds of words a month in minutes every day. This is brain hacking at its most exciting, taking what we know about neuroscience and linguistics and using it to create the most efficient and enjoyable way to learn a foreign language in the spare minutes of your day.

A unique approach to Spanish reading comprehension, Spanish for Reading can be used as a textbook supplement in classrooms or by anybody who is teaching himself Spanish. It begins by demonstrating similarities between words and parts of words in Spanish and English, and proceeds to offer practical instruction that will help readers broaden recognition of words and phrases. Each of the book's fifteen chapters concludes with a reading passage, the first of them quite easy to comprehend, and successive passages increasingly complex and sophisticated. Early passages are simple essays on Spain's and the Spanish-speaking world's language, geography, and culture. Later passages are excerpts from well-known works by world renowned Spanish writers, including Jorge Luis Borges, Pablo Neruda, and Gabriel Garcia-Marquez. Students who use this volume methodically will ultimately be reading and understanding these passages in their original, unedited Spanish, without need to seek outside help. Short of spending time in Spain or Latin America, here is as good an introduction to Spanish culture as a student will be able to find anywhere. Photos and line drawings.