Reddit reviews Al-Kitaab fii Ta'allum al-'Arabiyya with DVDs: A Textbook for Beginning Arabic, Part One Second Edition (Arabic Edition)

This is all assuming that you are a complete beginner.

First, decide which dialect of Arabic you want to learn. Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) is the one you will normally find taught in the US. MSA is generally used as the written language by Arabic speaking people.

Here's where it get's weird:
Arabic is more of a family of languages than a single language. Arabs speak colloquial Arabic. These different spoken languages vary quite considerably- to the point where my Palestinian Arabic teacher cannot understand Moroccan spoken Arabic. The most common form of spoken Arabic is Egyptian, which happens to be the largest Arab country. Many songs and movies are in Egyptian. However, MSA is widely spoken among educated Arabs and used as a lingua franca. In formal settings, such as a political speech, or on the news, MSA will be spoken.

Unless you have specific plans to go somewhere or do something in the Middle East, you should probably start with learning MSA. The default textbook is Al-Kitab.

http://www.amazon.com/Al-Kitaab-allum-Arabiyya-Second-Edition/dp/158901104X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1405039432&sr=8-2&keywords=al-kitaab

One more general tip would be to start by learning the alphabet. It looks super scary and complicated, but you can learn it quite quickly if you try. Once you know it, Arabic doesn't look nearly as difficult.

That being said, Arabic is a difficult language for English speakers to learn because of many differences in grammar. It requires a lot of practice, but in my opinion is worth it.

Wall of text incoming:

Al-Kitaab fii Ta'allum Al-'Arabiyya (al-Kitaab generally) is nearly universal for beginning and intermediate Arabic learning in the States. There are three books, and it teaches fusha, which is media Arabic. All educated Arabs are proficient in this dialect, though it is rarely used outside formal settings.

Only one dictionary you'll need: Hans Wehr is the Arabic student's bible. You won't find much use for it off the bat because it's not strictly alphabetical, it's alphabetical by root. So until you learn to spot the root of a word it'll be hard to look anything up. It's also only Arabic-to-English, but al-Kitaab provides more than enough vocab to get you on your feet and Google Translate can fill in gaps (ONLY use Google Translate for individual words, then Hans Wehr to verify; Google Translate will botch sentences).

The most widely understood dialect would most likely be Egyptian, though oddly it is also one of the weirdest/most divergent from Classical Arabic due to Coptic influence. Fortunately, because it's so popular, there are lots of materials out there. That said, probably best to start with fusha, and branch out into dialects after you have a good handle on it. It'll help you understand where a lot of dialectical words come from. Additionally, al-Kitaab has a small Egyptian lesson at the end of each chapter, so you can get some basic exposure without having to functionally learn two languages at once.

Farther down the line, you can get Media Arabic, which is a collection of short articles by topic, with little exercises and loads of really useful vocab. Not strictly necessary if understanding the news isn't in your wheelhouse, but if you're serious about learning Arabic it's a really good intermediate/advanced step.

If you get serious about Egyptian, Pimsleur's Egyptian course is a good jump start, but also not really necessary and hard to do right because of the time commitment. It gets expensive, too, so make sure you're going to use it.

Some of my favorite books for Egyptian come from the American University in Cairo Press:

the Kallimni Arabi series is basically al-Kitaab for Egyptian Arabic. Very useful place to start.

the Arabi Liblib series
gets really into the weeds of how Egyptian speakers communicate. They're basically dictionaries of dialectical adjectives, idioms, and proverbs.

In addition to books, check out Memrise. It's a great vocab tool, and entirely user-generated, so there's a lot of content.

I also like to listen to BBC Arabic Radio. It's 24/7 so you can just pick it up whenever. Both fusha and various dialects. Exposure is extremely important in language learning, and even moreso when learning a language as alien to English as Arabic is.

On top of all this, just putz around on YouTube and Twitter. Arabs are all over social media and it's not hard to get exposure there.

Learning arabic isn't the only way to learn about Islam. So many books are translated to english these days that you could learn endlessly and still have more to read. There are tons of great online courses, podcasts, and other resources that teach tons of great subjects. That said, learning arabic for me was a way to help motivate me and for me to get closer to the Quran, basically, it just worked for me.

> Arabic is really not taught where I live

If you still want to learn arabic then I would recommend buying one of the books off amazon and finding a sister you trust and ask her to go through the book with you (offer to pay her if you have the means). Learning at the masjid can often be ineffective because they may not be trained teachers. Just invite your tutor to your place, a library, their place, etc. Exams can be stressful, I totally get that so work through the book but at your own pace. If you're just starting out practice by reading 1 page of Quran everyday, even if it takes 10-20 minutes, I promise you'll speed up later.

I've used both of the books listed below, one at uni and one at community college. They both are really good and used extensively.

1. Al-Kitab
   
   
2. Arabic for Lfe
   
   if you really can't afford them but are really interested I'd be willing to ship you a used one (or find a way to get you copy that you're comfortable with, like through the mods or something)
   
   
   hope this helps and may Allah make your learning easy for you

first:
http://www.amazon.com/Alif-Baa-DVDs-Introduction-Letters/dp/1589011023

then:

Part 1
http://www.amazon.com/Al-Kitaab-allum-Arabiyya-Second-Edition/dp/158901104X/ref=pd_sim_b_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=0XFC00PPHWRN4Z51YCYP

Part 2
http://www.amazon.com/Al-Kitaab-allum-Arabiyya-Second-Edition/dp/1589010965/ref=pd_sim_b_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=1GYJ3QZN9FWG128CG4QG

Part 3
http://www.amazon.com/Al-Kitaab-fii-Taallum-al-Arabiyya-Textbook/dp/158901149X/ref=pd_sim_b_7?ie=UTF8&refRID=1GYJ3QZN9FWG128CG4QG