Dari-English/English-Dari Practical Dictionary, Second Edition

This dictionary includes the present stems of verbs, which are indispensable. (It also includes past stems, though these are entirely predictable from the infinitive.) The transliteration of the Dari on the Dari-English side is indispensable for providing the vowels.The dictionary includes a number of helpful appendices: (1) Provinces and Districts, (2) Ministries, (3) Dari Proverbs & Expressions, (4) Musical Terms, (5) Flora & Fauna, (6) Forms of Address, (7) Tribes, and (8) Verb Basics & Sample Conjugations.My only serious complaint is that the font is rather small. I would appreciate an edition of this book in trade size with a larger font. A hardback with high-quality paper, rather than the newsprint of this paperback, would also be nice. I would be willing to pay more for it.

This dictionary is outstanding. I almost didn't buy it because of the reviews that said it wasn't in alphabetical order, but I ordered it because it was essentially the only option. When I received it I saw that it is in alphabetical order. The reason people think it isn't is because the first part of the book is Dari to English, and so the words are in alphabetical order according to the Dari language. It just appears that it is the English to Dari section because the English words appear first. However, this is because the Dari language reads right to left. For an English speaker who doesn't know this, it appears that it's an English to Dari dictionary that is completely out of order. If you turn to the second half of the book you'll find the English to Dari dictionary, which is in alphabetical order according to the English language. This dictionary has been invaluable for communication with my Afghan friends and for them with other Americans.

This book is really only helpful if you have someone around who can read the farsi script, otherwise it's pretty inaccessible for anyone trying to learn to speak Dari, but has limited resources. The supplemental information about Afghanistan is great, as is the section in the back with common idioms / phrases in Dari. As for it being a functional dictionary, it is pretty poorly formatted and only useful if you can read the phonetic alphabet or the farsi script. The back of the book says the publisher does print a romanized version, which would be way better if you are still learning.

Nice to have. Trying to teach folks from Afghanistan English. Half or less of the English words show how to say the word in Dari. Otherwise worthless for my purposes since I only know how to speak and read English

You need to learn the Farsi/Dari alphabet to be able to fully use this. My interpreters found this resource to be as valuable as I did.

Good book

I read a lot of reviews about this book before I purchased it. The 1st edition reviews said a lot about knowing the english word and wanting to find the Dari word but the dictionary is backwards and it's hard to find the correct Dari word because of how everything is organized. I figured the second edition would have corrected that but it didn't. I wanted to look up an English word or phrase that would be in alphabetical order and have the corresponding Dari word or phrase next to it. Unfortunately the book is not like that. The English phrases seem to be in no particular order so if I want to know how to say bathroom or food or whatever I can't find the english word to get the Dari word that goes with it.The second half of the dictionary does have English words in alphabetical order but the Dari word that is with it is written in Dari making the book pert near useless. This is a complete fail by the publisher and considering the book is in its second edition it should be a double fail.

Helpful dictionary. Best available to date.

Arrived on time and very useful.

単語の引きやすさは素晴らしい。また、語彙数が多く、ダリ語学習には十分対応できる。　簡単な英語表記なので苦痛にならない。

This is a very good dictionary, It is not for the absolute beginners of the language or students of no previous knowledge of this afghan dialect of Persian. But if you know a little of the language and grammar (I started among other basic introductions with Nicholas Awde who has written an excellent small basic dictionary and phrasebook and only then proceeded to Bulkin) then it will be an invaluable and entertaining (yes, language studying can be entertaining, too!) source of learning and inspiration to look out words and expressions for to ease your way of communicating with Afghan people. You can also learn writing Dari with the help of Bulkin but I must admit that it is not an easy task. But once You master the letters you can begin stydying Arabic, too because most of the letters are the same in both languages - and also about 40% of Dari words are of Arabic origin.What I miss in the dictionary is more examples and sentences of everyday life. Bulkin rarely gives examples of how to use words in different contexts. Helpful hints are far and scarce between. That is why one star is missing from the overall rating.!من سفارش می کنم

Good basic Dictionary of almost pocket size. Words in Dari Alfabet could be in bigger font for practical use of dictionary.

The Dari - English part is read from right to left, but atleast it has transcriptions to roman letters. Unfortunately the English - Dari section does NOT have transcriptions to latin alphabet. So as a language learner this unfortunately wasn't what I was looking for. It should however some use if I one day attempt to read Dari texts.As it stands now I can't give it more than a two star rating. However, if in the next edition they provide latin alphabet transcriptions for the English-Dari section I will increase my rating.The good thing it seems to be fairly comprehensive at a bit more than 700 pages, at least compared to some of the very thin pocket dictionaries and phrasebooks that are almost useless because of their limited scope. Having said that, in my experience, if you're gonna study a language seriously 700 pages is not enough, probably double that is needed. Unfortunately this was one of the few dictionaries I could find for Dari.