BenS writes: There has been some discussion about the choice of English words to represent the vocalisation/pronunciation of the Hebrew (ie in the Tutorial and in the Listening Skills videos).

When creating the material I thought - why not use the International Phonetic Alphabet? After you see it, you'll agree that instead of one problem, there is now two. So I used something familiar to most readers, but not as accurate.

Now what is the big deal about correct pronunciation?

Consider an international language, like English. Every English speaker has an accent, that is often perceptable only when you're talking to a foreigner. However, most times we can all still communicate perfectly.

Even if you speak Hebrew, you may speak with a Sephardic (used in Israel) or an Ashkenazic accent.

If you decide - I want to speak as Hebrew was spoken during the compilation of the Bible. Well - who knows exactly what that was like, we have no recordings. See LinguisticsAndBiblicalHebrew_Bodine1992 for an academic treatment of this problem.

Don't let the idea of 100% accurate pronunciation prevent you from starting, somewhere. Many people became fixated with their inability to get the niqudot (vowel pointing) 100% right. This happens to particular personality types. Fixation means you can’t move on quickly, and at that point the correct niqudot came without any real effort. Also, a lot of Israel native speakers have trouble putting the pointing on - it's not a big deal. Getting the consonants right is of course, that would be bad spelling (orthography).

In other major language courses (eg The RosettaStone), there is often a pronunciation module which encourages people to record their voice, and compare it to the a native speaker. This has some application. However, taken too far, it encourages Fixation. Aim simply to make yourself understood.