Pimsleur Icelandic Level 1 Lessons 16-20

Learn to Speak and Understand Icelandic with Pimsleur Language Programs

By: Pimsleur

Narrated by: Pimsleur

Length: 2 hrs and 49 mins

Publisher's summary

The Pimsleur® Method: the easiest, fastest way to learn a new language. Completely portable, easily downloadable, and lots of fun. You'll be speaking and understanding in no time flat!

This course includes lessons 16 through 20 from the Icelandic level 1 program, featuring 2.5 hours of language instruction. Each lesson provides 30 minutes of spoken language practice, with an introductory conversation and new vocabulary and structures. Detailed instructions enable you to understand and participate in the conversation. Practice for vocabulary introduced in previous lessons is included in each lesson. The emphasis is on pronunciation and comprehension and on learning to speak Icelandic.

Reading instruction is included at the end of each lesson to provide you with an introduction to reading Icelandic. A reading booklet is included with your download.

Icelandic, the official language of Iceland, is spoken by the island nation's entire population of just over 330,000. In addition, approximately 8,000 speakers live in Denmark and 6,500 in North America. Descended from Old Norse, Icelandic is one of the Nordic languages belonging to a subgroup of Northern Germanic languages that also includes Norwegian and Faroese (spoken in the remote Faroe Islands off the coast of Denmark). The insular Icelandic language has not changed significantly since the Middle Ages and is considered a part of the country's national identity. The government's Icelandic Language Committee, charged with maintaining linguistic purism, keeps foreign words from influencing the language by coining new terms (usually constructed by combining old words) to describe modern concepts. For example, the word computer did not exist in Icelandic, so a new word, tölva, was created. Tölva is a combination of two existing words, tala (number) and völva (a prophetess or magical seer), so it means, literally, "number prophet".

Download the accompanying reference guide.

©2016 Simon & Schuster (P)2016 Simon & Schuster

Critic reviews

"Pimsleur programs provide plenty of positive reinforcement that will keep learners on track, and we found that Pimsleur gave us more proficiency and confidence in speaking the new language than any of the other language programs we reviewed." (AudioFile magazine)

Not all there

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

Yes. For a language learning program it's easy to use, convenient, and I'm picking things up quickly.

What do you think your next listen will be?

The next installment, lessons 21 - 25.

Have you listened to any of Pimsleur’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

This one is only worse in one regard, mentioned below in "Any additional comments" but it's a doozy.

Any additional comments?

A PDF comes with this program. In addition to listening, you are meant to read as well. The problem is that the PDF was difficult to find, impossible for some reason to save, and now entirely unavailable. In other words, an integral part of the product is unusable.