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FOREWORD
The following pages are the manual for the audiovisual
course of the Armenian language "Hayeren Khosink", the first
of its kind, that we are now happy and proud to present to the public.
It is the result of intense research and of technical preparation that
required more than four years. We hope that this audiovisual course will
help all those who would like to learn Armenian or to improve their elementary
knowledge of the language.
The project arose in the context of the summer intensive
courses of Armenian language and culture that have been held each year
at the University of Venice, since 1986, and were organized under the
patronge of the Department of Eurasian Studies, to which the Chair of
Armenian Studies belongs, and in close collaboration with the Interdepartamental
Center of Language Training of the University. These courses have met
with remarkable success registering 424 attendances of 341 enrolled participants.
The realization of the audiovisual course that had to face enormous technical,
financial and organizional difficulties, was made possible simply thanks
to the ever present comprehension and support of the academic authorities
of the University, to the help of some institutions, to the rich technical
possibilities of the Language Training Center and last, but not least,
to the devotion, and constant and harmonious work of a few "quasi-volunteers".
The course has been planned with special reference
to the level of the false beginners, but it may be helpful also to those
having an intermediate knowledge of the language. Mainly to spare time
and expenses, we have omitted teaching the alphabet, also taking into
consideration that it would not be difficult to learn it by other ways.
As a further help to this purpose, we inserted an essential presentation
of the alphabet at the beginning of this manual.
The course proposes the Western variant of modern
Armenian, and pays careful attention to the typical instances of a living
and evolving language as much as to the grammatical accuracy and expressive
properties. Moreover, we adopted a methodology of making the didactic
units more accessible by way of amusing, humorous and stimulating scenes,
confiding that these will challenge a major interest and will be assimilated
more easily.
The video course as well as this manual have two parts,
the first one corresponding to the first videotape and
the second part corresponding
to the second and third videotapes.
This manual, which is
indispensable for a correct and
fruitful use of the video course, is divided into three parts: 1)dialogues;
2) grammar explanations; 3) glossary.
The dialogues in the manual follow exactly
the order of the scenes of the video course and immediately precede the
grammatical units. These latter also follow the order of the scenes and
correspond with the dialogues of one or more scenes that they immediately
follow. Glossary is put at the end of the manual and gives the meaning of each
word or expression in three languages (English, French, Italian). Also
the glossary is ordered according to the scenes and each word appears
according to the sequence of its usage in the scenes. We recommend, however,
using also a good dictionary.
The meaning of all grammatical terms in the manual
is immediately given in brackets in three languages. The translations of
the titles appear on the video film at the beginning of each unity.
Taking into account the purely didactic character
of this course, the transcription of foreign names and lemmas is given
following the Western Armenian phonetism preferentially, and wherein possible,
for aspirated consonants (since these are pronounced in the same way in
both the variants of modern Armenian, Western and Eastern).
The initiative of this course is due to the
Padus-Araxes Association, founded in Venice in 1987, with the special
purpose of promoting and diffusing knowledge of the Armenian language
in the diaspora within the dynamics of a living dialogue with the surrounding
cultures - in very close collaboration with the Chair of Armenian Studies
and the Interdepartemental Center of language Training of the University
of Venice. Its realization was also
followed by the same triad with careful attention.
The names of the institutions and of the
persons that in any way have contributed to achieve this arduous and multiform
project appear in detail in the credits of the video film. To all of them
let us here once again express our sincere gratitude. Furthermore in my
functions as General Director of the project, as Chairman of Armenian
Studies at the University of Venice, and as President of the Padus-Araxes
Association, I am glad to take advantage
of this occasion to openly express my deepest thanks to the academic authorities
of the University of Venice once again, particularly to the Magnificent
Rector 1983 through 1992, Prof. Giovanni Castellani, to the actual Magnificent
Rector Prof. Paolo Costa, to the Directors, both former and present, of
the Interdepartemental Center of Language Training, Prof.s Andrea Csillaghy
and Guglielmo Cinque. Yet again a special thanks to
Gerald Papasian, to Giuliano Virgiliani and Anahid Abrahamian, to whose
careful devotion this course owes a lot.
May the crowning of these efforts with success today be the gage of further progress, a source of inspiration and a support
for new plans and new achievements.
Venice, October 21st, 1992
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This audiovisual course and
its manual, published in 1993, are today presented to the public in digital
version on CD-ROM, thanks to the generous efforts of Prof. Grigor Vahanyan,
Chair of Computer Graphics, Art Management and Advertisement of Yerevan State
Academy of Fine Arts, and of his collaborators. I wish to express my
deep gratitude for their achievement.
Yerevan, October 21st, 2000
Boghos Levon Zekiyan
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