Colloquial Norwegian

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Reviewed by: Norris Weimer

Colloquial Norwegian
A Complete Language Course
Kari Bråtveit, W. Glyn Jones and Kirsten Gade
Routledge 1995
ISBN 0 415 11011 4 -- book and two 60 minute cassettes
ISBN 0 415 11009 2 -- book alone
ISBN 0 415 11010 6 -- cassettes alone

Here's a package that is hard to review -- it is too good. I can't find much to complain about. It's harder to explain why something is good!

"Colloquial" here is just the name of the series. If it means anything, it just means conversational. It certainly doesn't have anything to do with regional dialects. This is strictly bokmål. Again, I have to say that I know nothing about any of the other books/packages in this series. Except one thing -- they (almost) all have the following on the back of the package : "By the end of this rewarding course you will be able to communicate confidently and effectively in Norwegian in a broad range of everyday situations." Everyone knows (I hope) that this is marketing, not a guarantee !

But still, if you drop "confidently" (confidence does not come cheap!), and you translate "effectively" as "able to get by", and you interpret "everyday situations" as talking with a sympathetic and cooperative Norwegian, then I'd say this goal probably is achievable with this course!

This course will get you out of the beginning level as well as any, probably better than most. (After that, there's lots more to learn, but it does get easier). Just add work. Your results will vary according to how much time and effort you put into it, but the material here is high quality and it will tell you what you need to know, starting from nothing.

There must be a design goal for courses like this to fit in into one ordinary size paperback and two audio cassettes. It's a squeeze, but they did it. I happen to like the terse, concise style, but don't expect chatty or humourous or cute pictures; this gets right down to business, with no fluff and no wasted space. Everything is important. In particular, the exercises are not just review. There is a lot of variety and everything is well done and interesting, even the exercises. More of everything would have been nice though. I hope everyone using courses like this one knows to supplement them with everything they can get their hands on.

This course is available in three packaging forms: book alone, cassettes alone, or both together. I recommend getting the combination. You could do the book alone, but you would miss out on the pronunciation and listening aspects. Surprisingly, you could also do the cassettes without the book, since the cassettes have explanations of the Norwegian topics in addition to the verbal exercises and dialogues. However, if you thought that learning Norwegian in 200+ pages is a fast pace, you should try it from two 60 minute cassettes! Although the cassettes go through the same twenty chapters as the book, the presentation does *not* duplicate the one in the book. It's like two parallel courses which have only the dialogues in common.

I like the cassettes, but there is something I have to warn you about. But first, my standard complaint: I wish they would use CDs instead of cassettes. You need to listen to parts of these cassettes over and over again, and the rewind button on most cassette players just won't cut it, even with "music search". If it's because more cars have cassette players than CD players, they shouldn't worry because these tapes require too much concentration to use while driving anyway! Now, about these cassettes...

They've hired actors to record the dialogues, not announcers, or so it seems to me. The point I'm making here is that the dialogues show the way real people speak, they are not recordings of people speaking slowly and clearly for the beginning student (like teachers are wont to do). Naturally, the beginner won't have a clue what they are saying -- even following along in the transcript in the book -- until they have listened to the dialogue several times through. Listen to it a few more times and you find that you are starting to catch on. This might not be to everyone's taste, but I think it's great. You have to make this breakthrough sooner or later; if it's done right, it's probably easier in the long run to do it sooner. You will be glad you have the book with the transcript though!

The major complaint about the cassettes is that there are not enough of them. Think of the number of hours you spend with the book compared to the number of hours you spend with the tapes, even allowing for multiple replays. There is an imbalance here. If you were taking a classroom course, there would be much more time spent listening and speaking.

Back to the book for a second, then I'll stop. I like the way the book is organized; it works well going through it as a student. It's not so great as a reference though, partly because the table of contents is very skimpy and the index only gives chapter numbers, not page numbers.

If I had to pick one thing as being the most unusual thing about the book, I would say that it has a big emphasis on proper word order. You notice the diagrams when you flip through the book. The explanations are not the traditional ones, but they are probably better. A good explanation should show you the key that makes it all simple. I think they've succeeded, even though the diagrams give it the appearance of being more complicated.

So, at the end of this course, you will know the basic Norwegian grammar and about 2000 words. You won't know all about when to use 'i' and when to use 'på', but that is not a conversation-stopper. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.