Arabic Language Day falls on December 18th in celebration of the
day the UN adopted Arabic as its 6th official language in 1973.
Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) is the standardized version of Arabic used in books, television, newspapers, etc. But the dialects can differ significantly from region to region. For example, words used in a spoken dialect can be completely different than a written word with the same definition. So someone trained in only MSA may have difficulties communicating with Arabic speakers in some regions.
But can all Arabic
speakers
understand each
other?
It depends! There will always be some understanding, but some dialects are closer to each other than others. For example, the Moroccan dialect varies a lot more than other varieties to such a degree that some Moroccans may find it easier to communicate with French speakers than with other Arabic speakers. This is why Arabic interpreters and translators continually immerse themselves in various regional dialects.
– Arabic is the 5th most spoken language in the world!
– Spoken by over 313 million people!
– The majority of Arabic speakers are located in the Middle East, North Africa, and the Arabian Peninsula. But there are pockets of Arabic speakers all over the world.
-There are over 1 million Arabic speakers in the US!
There are no capital letters, but the letters look different depending on their position in a word (beginning, middle, or end) and sometimes on the letters around them.
For example…
There is singular, dual, and plural! So you would use the dual ending of a word instead of plural when there is two of something. There is no equivalent in the English language!
In Arabic, root words are tied to the consonants. So the root K-T-B that references writing would be used to form other related words such as…
kataba : “he wrote”
katib : “writer”
kutub : “books”
maktaba : “library”
The Arabic language has influenced many varied languages, such as Spanish, Amharic, German, Hindi, Somali, Hausa, Turkish, Bosnian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Italian, Kazakh, etc.
But did you know Arabic has also influenced English vocabulary? Words like…
Candy from qand/qandi
Alcohol from
al-kuhl
Typhoon
from tūfān
Traffic from tafriq
And, of course, it is widely known of the Arabic influence on math regarding more than just vocabulary, such as algebra (from al-jabr) and zero or cipher (from sifr).
There is a lot to celebrate about the Arabic language, from the beautiful poetry to the artful script, to its influence across the world. And if you need an expert, our knowledgeable Arabic interpreters and translators are ready to tackle projects and assignments in any dialect
