Recommended Spanish textbooks?

October 3, 2005 2:28 PM

Looking for an intermediate-advanced Spanish textbook...

I've been self-studying Spanish for two years and I'm looking for a more structured textbook focusing on grammar and conversation. Something around a 2nd or 3rd year college textbook would be good. Recommendations, anyone?

posted by Jeanne to Writing & Language (5 answers total)

Of the several series of Spanish books I've gone through over the years, the only one I've kept is the Manual de gramática: Grammar reference for students of Spanish (Dozier & Iguina). It covers everything, but especially the grammar issues that are hard for English speakers like choosing between two similar phrases; the nuances of "little words" like prepositions and conjunctions; and expressions/idioms. Also, it's a relatively inexpensive book - bonus! The only thing that I didn't like in using it in class is that it is organized by parts of speech (e.g. chapter 2 is nouns and noun determiners), so the "necessary" or "fundamental" parts may or may not be towards the front or together.

I'm not sure how to go about conversation from a book, because the audio tape experience is so inferior to actual speakers. If you could find a "conversation" text and use it to discuss articles with another learner or a native speaker, it would be optimal. Puntos de Vista (Birón and Koike) has a nice conversation book (as well as lectura and redacción) with diverse topics. Pasajes (Bretz) is good but sounds like it might be lower level than you're looking for. If it's not, it becomes a topic issue, since they're both good series. Puntos has more classical and literary discussions, Pasajes more contemporary culture, music, travel...
posted by whatzit at 5:28 PM on October 3, 2005

My girlfriend seconds Pasajes for a good potential study of Spanish conversation.
posted by JJ86 at 12:40 AM on October 4, 2005

screw books for learning a language and spend a month in a spanish-speaking country.
posted by libertaduno at 8:23 AM on October 4, 2005

libertaduno, that's clearly the "best" way of learning conversation in a second language, but isn't what was asked, and probably not because the poster failed to consider it'd be a good way to learn.

The halfway, of course, is finding people to practice with. Craigslist, meetup.com, and local adult education centers can help you find people to actually talk with. Additionally, if you're in a city with a significant Spanish-speaking population, you may also be able to find volunteer opportunities where knowing and using Spanish are part of the job.
posted by whatzit at 9:36 AM on October 4, 2005

I got to say, rosetta stone is really good. Online isnt so expensive for three months. also, i was working on a page that i havent done much with in a while: spanishlesson.blogspot.com - I have a lot of good links worth checking out.
posted by BigBrownBear at 12:17 PM on October 4, 2005