Learning Coptic

eshpheri

I am teaching myself Bohairic Coptic online, and want to be able to understand the liturgy. I am half-way through Sameh Younan's 'So, you want to learn Coptic?', and to judge from the contents pages, I think it will give a pretty complete grammatical formation. The problem is that I can't hear the words I'm learning. I teach myself by reading out loud, and I am afraid that I might be pronouncing some things incorrectly. Does anyone know of texts that I can both see and hear so that I can learn good pronunciation? I have downloaded a copy of the Coptic liturgy, so if there was an audio recording of it available online that would be something. But ideally I would like to start with something shorter, like some prayers or hymns that I could have the words to, and also be able to listen to.

Thank you to anyone who can advise me.

ElGawly

I haven'y used this book myself, but from all the references I used to learn and teach from, next to each letter rule, they usually give examples of words that follow the rule of the letter's pronunciation.

Get the list of those words (to make sure you've covered all rules) or just a simple paragraph from anywhere, and ask someone who knows Coptic well (as most deacons just know the pronunciation how they've heard it in hymns recording, not necessarily accurate) to read for him and let him correct you. I am pretty sure there will be a servant who's more than happy to help you out.

Good job!