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FSI Korean. Has anyone used it??

PostPosted: April 9th, 2010, 6:47 am
by liddytime2
Has anyone tried to learn Korean from the FSI course?

I have heard mixed reviews. I actually enjoy the "drill to kill" method of the FSI courses and am not put off by
that aspect of the course. I'm also not afraid of the odd romanization system that is used. :ugeek:

What worries me a bit is the reported "outdated formality" of the material. I have heard that the course is much
too stiff and formal for anyone wanting to actually communicate with people in Korea today.

The DLI course from 1965 looks great but I can't find the audio anywhere... :(

Any thoughts??

THANKS!!

Re: FSI Korean. Has anyone used it??

PostPosted: April 12th, 2010, 6:31 am
by Matematik
I haven't actually used the course, but in regard to the formality issue, I wouldn't worry about it too much to be honest. Formal Korean as spoken now isn't much different to formal Korean when the course was written, of course, slang has changed, and amongst strangers, much formality has been dropped so yes, speaking in the way this course teaches may seem stilted, but no one is going to care that a foreigner is speaking in a stilted manner.

It all depends on your intention, if you want to achieve a good grounding in Standard Korean, then your best bet is to definately stay formal, you do not want courses that teach you informal, slangy language, and then struggle listening to and reading formal language.

However, if your intention is to merely become proficient in the spoken, coloquial language, then I would avoid this course and go for a more informal one. But as I said before, if you really want to become good at the language, then I would definately start off with formal, even stilted language, and once you get good at that, then branch out into colloquialism.

Re: FSI Korean. Has anyone used it??

PostPosted: April 12th, 2010, 9:26 am
by liddytime2
Thanks!

That's kind of what I figured!

Re: FSI Korean. Has anyone used it??

PostPosted: April 24th, 2010, 7:27 am
by pr3c1pit0us
Just as Matematik was saying, it's better to just learn the formal stuff and pick up the slang later when you actually understand the basics of the language. Most signs, maps, etc. are going to be in the formal language.

I've been learning Korean for a little while now using various (but crappy) books I can find in the bookstores, not wanting to drop the money for classes (not that there are any around me!). But, just listening to some of the audio, this is crazy and I can't believe I just now knew about this place. I've always knew the internet to be a good place, but I'm always underestimating it.