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Cambodian Language Course

The Cambodian Language Program contains 28 hours of audio, and two textbooks in PDF file format with 820 pages.

The material of the Cambodian Language Course is arranged in groups of five units with a common theme. The first four units of each sequence are based on Dialogues, usually in the Phnom Penh dialect, and the fifth is based on a Narration, in Standard Cambodian, which reviews the immediately preceding subject matter. The text for Units 1-20 is entirely in standard style. From Unit 21 on, most of the text is given in Phnom Penh dialect (except for the Narrations), but a parallel Standard version of each Dialogue is provided in the Dialogue for Comprehension. Vocabulary lists include both forms wherever there is a difference.

Drills are recorded first for listening, then for familiarization through repetition, and finally for participation. During the participation step, when the student performs the required manipulation, his utterances are confirmed on the audio immediately following the space provided for his participation.

Drills are generally in two groups in any unit: a) variation drills on pattern sentences, which provide opportunities for the student to develop flexibility in the use of patterns already memorized, and b) grammar drills, which are intended to provide practice for the student in the operation of the patterns explained in the immediately preceding grammar notes.

About the Cambodian Language

Over five and a half million people in Cambodia speak as their mother-tongue the language called Cambodian or Khmer. The Cambodian language is a member of the Mon-Khmer language family which includes many languages and dialects spoken in Burma and Malaya as well as in Cambodia.

Cambodians vary in their speech habits as much as speakers of any other languages. Thus there are dialectal differences in the speech of Cambodians native to Siem Reap or Battambang or various other areas of Cambodia, as compared with the speakers of Phnom Penh.

There are two series of vowels and diphthongs in Cambodian, which will be called the first and second "registers." Second register vowels and diphthongs are marked by a accent.

Short vowels do not occur in native Cambodian words without a final consonant following them. When a Cambodian needs to pronounce a short vowel with no consonant following it, he closes the vowel with a glottal stop or, sometimes, with a k.