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I surprised a friend living in Hong Kong with my accurate pronunciation and beginner's understanding of the language. The program warns against using other language programs while using Pimsleur, especially printed material with Americanized spellings, suggesting that this will lead to incorrect pronunciation.
If you hope to use any printed resource to help you learn Cantonese, you'll likely have to learn Yale romanization. While I'm sure this is a risk, most other Cantonese language resources use Yale romanization, which is almost as much of a standard for the language as pinyin is for Mandarin.
The Pimsleur method is the best language program that I've used, especially for the beginner. The downside is that this program spends a lot of time teaching a limited amount of material, and it's expensive, especially if you purchase subsequent lessons.
I don't know that there's any perfect language program, but this product is very effective. I tried other products with other languages and just recently began learning Cantonese.
To be sure, the language is evolving and the way some words are pronounced has changed - something that is described in the Teach Yourself book, which is another excellent product.
It's a real shame that there is only 1 volume of the comprehensive set - I would buy the others in a heartbeat (publisher please note). This is a great product, the comprehensive set is better.
A rubber band around the cards keeps them together: As an example, the English on one side might be: 1."Do you want to go to my place to eat." The Romanized Cantonese on the other side will be something like: 1."Neih surng mh surng hoih ngoh doh sik ah." There are many variations of Yale Romanization; however, I have found that the easiest way is to simply write the Cantonese phonetically--the way it sounds to YOU--without adding tone marks. Anyone listening at Pimsleur. I am able to get five sentences/vocabulary items on each card, with the front side in English and the flip side in Cantonese Romanization. Maybe a Part II, with 30 more lessons is in the works at Pimsleur.
Since Cantonese is such a tonal language, the tones used for each sound are also explained as the lesson progresses so you are aware that tone changes can change the meaning of what seem to be similar sounds. In summary: the success or failure of any program like Pimsleur Cantonese is a direct reflection of the work you are willing to put into it. I find that by having small stacks of flash cards that I have made myself, I have put the necessary work into condensing the program into a useable form. You can carry the iPod Nano and earphones, or you may just carry a stack of cards with you wherever you go. Working to learn my wife's native language, Cantonese, without learning the written language, Pimsleur is the best program I've found so far. With 30 lessons on CDs, plus a number of cultural lessons to boot, this is the easiest, most practical approach to becoming conversational in Cantonese, without learning the very difficult Chinese characters. Repeating after the native speakers allows you to imitate the tones. I use Yale Romanization (the phonetic sound) for each character and write each sentence on a card after hearing the Cantonese, then putting the iPod in pause mode.
To begin with, I listen to each lesson at home with a stack of 3" by 5" lined index cards, and I use a 0.9mm mechanical pencil (#2 and harder to break "lead" than 0.7mm or 0.5mm). In others words: keep it simple. Good luck. No matter, it's what works for you. Anyhow, here's my learning system and it could be used with any Pimsleur language--not just Cantonese: I downloaded the CDs to a 4GB iPod Nano that I use ONLY for Cantonese learning. I might write "mh" for "not" or "don't"; you may write "um".
My only complaint is that there aren't more lessons. Using this system, each lesson is condensed to 10-15 cards which I carry with me. You simply listen to the English, then the Cantonese, press the pause button to allow time to repeat the Cantonese, then press play again. The reason Pimsleur works where others fall short is that an English-speaking moderator says everything in English, then two different native Cantonese speakers (one male, one female) translate the English into Cantonese and repeat the statement several times. Any MP3 player can be used, but I find that the original iPod Nano is the ideal compact size for sticking in a pocket with small earphones.
I am almost done with it, and have really learned a lot within a month. Look no further.
I think this is perfect for the beginner. I have some cantonese experience prior to this, and although there were some terms I already knew, this really helped me put everything together.
I usually don't write reviews, but this is worthy of one:I was surprised with the instant results I got from using this. This is it.
There is plenty of review in each lesson, so that it really sticks.5 stars. I have used other language programs in the past, and this was definitely the best I have used.
If you are looking to learn cantonese.
Pimsleur does well in teaching this in an organized, understandable manner. I didn't expect Pimsleur to make me fluent, but rather I wanted to be able to understand simple phrases, vocab, and grammar. I recommend highly, especially since there is no Rosetta Stone or other program of this quality out there for learning Cantonese. For an extremely complex language like Cantonese, Pimsleur does a great job at slowly immersing you into the language without overwhelming you.I am so far through 14 of the 30 lessons and I am feeling more confident with each one. I got the CD's because I am visiting my girlfriend's family in Guangdong and want to be able to communicate in some way, rather than look like a fool (mistake I made the first time).
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