Hebrew-schmebrew
In Israel this summer, for the first time, I really felt that I should know Hebrew and was embarassed on many occasions for my total ignorance of the language. As it looks more and more like I will be spending rather significant amounts of my life in that country, the more I think this is a necessary thing for me to do. Specifically, at Kedesh, we have local workman who speak mainly Hebrew and Arabic (the younger ones speak English, but try getting a 17 year old boy of any culture to do something helpful like translate). My biggest problems this summer resulted from my lack of ability to communicate with my workers, who are experienced, skilled, and very sweet. I'd like to be able to talk with them, to interact successfully on a professional level, but also a basic human one. There's something very wrong about working side by side with someone for two months and not being able to talk to each other. Additionally, reading Hebrew becomes increasingly necessary as I move forward in scholarship; there are articles in Hebrew I'd like to be able to read. It's not as important as, say, French or German, and not many people do it, but it'd be a nice thing to be able to do.
So, the question becomes how best to accomplish these goals of basic conversation and reading by next summer. The modern Hebrew classes at the U don't really fit my schedule, and I'm afraid they'll be too time consuming. JCCs offer classes for a couple hundred dollars. I could buy a book and try to study on my own, but I think that might prove impossible on top of Greek and Latin this semester, and just make me want to poke my eyes out and I won't get very far. I've heard really good things about Rosetta Stone, and I like that there aren't vocabulary lists and things to memorize, because, ew, I do enough of that. It also teaches some reading and actually uses Hebrew letters, which lots of the really basic books don't. The drawback is the $300-odd pricetag, which, admittedly, isn't that much more expensive than taking a course would be. But, I mean... I could buy an IPod for that amount of money!
Thoughts? Has anyone used Rosetta or know someone who has? On top of a full class schedule, working on my thesis paper, and applying to PhD programs, will I really have the time or energy to commit to this right now?