Arabic

**Arabic** (العربية*al-ʻarabīyah* or عربي/عربى*ʻarabī* ) ([1] [al ʕarabijja] (help·info) or ([2] [ʕarabi] (help·info)) is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century CE. This includes both the literary language and the spoken Arabic varieties.

The literary language is called Modern Standard Arabic or *Literary Arabic*. It is currently the only official form of Arabic, used in most written documents as well as in formal spoken occasions, such as lectures and news broadcasts. In 1912, Moroccan Arabic was official in Morocco for some time, before Morocco joined the Arab League.

The spoken Arabic varieties are spoken in a wide arc of territory stretching across the Middle East and North Africa.

Arabic languages are Central Semitic languages, most closely related to Hebrew, Aramaic, Ugaritic and Phoenician. The standardized written Arabic is distinct from and more conservative than all of the spoken varieties, and the two exist in a state known as diglossia, used side-by-side for different societal functions.

Some of the spoken varieties are mutually unintelligible, and the varieties as a whole constitute a sociolinguistic language. This means that on purely linguistic grounds they would likely be considered to constitute more than one language, but are commonly grouped together as a single language for political and/or ethnic reasons, (look below). If considered multiple languages, it is unclear how many languages there would be, as the spoken varieties form a dialect chain with no clear boundaries. If Arabic is considered a single language, it may be spoken by as many as 280 million first language speakers, making it one of the half dozen most populous languages in the world. If considered separate languages, the most-spoken variety would most likely be Egyptian Arabic, with 95 million native speakers— still greater than any other Semitic language.

The modern written language (Modern Standard Arabic) is derived from the language of the Quran (known as Classical Arabic or Quranic Arabic). It is widely taught in schools, universities, and used to varying degrees in workplaces, government and the media. The two formal varieties are grouped together as *Literary Arabic*, which is the official language of 26 states and the liturgical language of Islam. Modern Standard Arabic largely follows the grammatical standards of Quranic Arabic and uses much of the same vocabulary. However, it has discarded some grammatical constructions and vocabulary that no longer have any counterpoint in the spoken varieties, and adopted certain new constructions and vocabulary from the spoken varieties. Much of the new vocabulary is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the post-Quranic era, especially in modern times.

Arabic is the only surviving member of the Old North Arabian dialect group, attested in Pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions dating back to the 4th century. Arabic is written with the Arabic alphabet, which is an abjad script, and is written from right-to-left. Although, the spoken varieties are often written in ASCII Latin with no standardized forms.

Arabic has lent many words to other languages of the Islamic world, like Persian, Turkish, Kazakh, Bengali, Urdu, Hindi, Malay and Hausa. During the Middle Ages, Literary Arabic was a major vehicle of culture in Europe, especially in science, mathematics and philosophy. As a result, many European languages have also borrowed many words from it. Arabic influence is seen in Romance languages, particularly Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan and Sicilian, owing to both the proximity of European and Arab civilizations and 700 years of Muslim (Moorish) rule in some parts of the Iberian Peninsula referred to as Al-Andalus.

Arabic has also borrowed words from many languages, including Hebrew, Greek, Persian and Syriac in early centuries, Turkish in medieval times and contemporary European languages in modern times, mostly from English and French.

## Resources

**Rosetta Stone**

* 3 levels available.
* Recommended as a beginning tool
* **Strongly not recommended to be used as the only tool.**
* Covers pronunciation, reading, listening, vocabulary, writing.
* Very poor for grammar.
* Easy to use. Shouldn't take more than an hour to set up and begin using.
* More expensive than it's worth. Can be acquired under suspicious circumstances ;)

### **​Pimsleur**

* Eastern Arabic
* Egyptian Arabic
* Recommended as a learning tool.
* **Strongly not recommended to be used as the only tool.**
* Covers mainly speaking and being able to hold a conversation.
* Easy to use, just open the audio file and repeat.
* Much more expensive than it's worth. Can be acquired under suspicious circumstances ;)

### **FSI Arabic**

* Made by the Foreign Service Institute
* Oldie but a goodie (written in the late 1960s)
* Great if you're interested in politics.
* Not everyday vocabulary; primarily written for foreign service workers
* Written Arabic,Levantine Arabic,Saudi Arabic,and Comparative Arabic courses.

### **Al Jazeera Learning Arabic**

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-“Ask the Teacher”, to send questions and receive answers.

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- Video service, to watch and upload videos.

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https://learning.aljazeera.net/en/pages/about-us

### **Books and PDF files**

* Thackston's Koranic and Classical Arabic

### **Movies and TV**

#### Subtitle websites

* Subscene
* Findsubtitles
* Sublearning - learn languages from movie subtitles. Flash cards of movie lines in 62 languages.
* (add more if you know them)

#### Movies

* The Message: probably the most famous Arabic movie ever made, it's about the life of the prophet Mohamed, the dialogue is in formal Arabic and not in any variety.

#### TV shows

* Omar: Historical television drama miniseries-serial, it's about the life of the the second caliph Omar bin al-Khattab, the dialogue is in formal Arabic and not in any variety.

#### Anime & Cartoon

* Monster Hunter Stories: Ride On (Dubbed in Modern Standard Arabic) https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKN9GN3FBOxrddkUeVCwf\_T0g0cT1e9mT
* Hunter X Hunter (Dubbed in Modern Standard Arabic) https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLva0zKepssIkp4pQgI597690A4Po8926c
* Fist of the North Star, Hokuto No Ken, is called Saif al-Nar(the sword of fire(but his name is Saif)
	+ abic
	+ Fist of the North Star, Hokuto No Ken, is called Saif al-Nar(the sword of fire(but his name is Saif)

### **Music**

* Rachid Taha is some decent music.
* Abu Ali is good music if you don't mind the jihadic undertones (Modern Standard Arabic)
* Cairokee *alternative rock* (Egyptian Arabic)
* Mashrou Leila *alternative rock*, try song "3 minutes" first (Levantine Arabic)
* Jadal *alternative rock* (Levantine Arabic)
* Faia Younan (Modern Standard Arabic)
* Marcel Khalifa (Levantine and Modern Standard Arabic)
* Fairouz *jazz* (Levantine and Modern Standard Arabic)

### Short stories

* "That Marra" - "ذات مرة" (Modern Standard Arabic) short real stories narrated by a famous Arab novelist called As'ad Taha https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnHRpK5tGPHEoLXNGjbhJrjUqwxsj\_LkT
* وسم العودة (Modern Standard Arabic) short videos about life and its meaning https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL484D9C0096229B6E
* [./Hhttps://youtube.com/playlist%3Flist%3DPLnHRpK5tGPHEoLXNGjbhJrjUqwxs https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnHRpK5tGPHEoLXNGjbhJrjUqwxs]j\_LkT

#### **Brotips**

* When learning the Arabic script, associate the phonetics of each letter with an object to help memorize it.

#### **Other**

http://www.madinaharabic.com - Comprehensive guide to learning Arabic script and language

https://langmedia.fivecolleges.edu/Arabic - Has Content in all of the dialects, and MSA as well.

The videos are from the early 2000's not be best quality but they have transcripts and they cover a range of topics.

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### **Recommended YouTube channels**

* https://m.youtube.com/user/arabicpod101 - Good resource can be used as a learning supplement, it has tips in all of the dialects.
* https://m.youtube.com/user/LearnArabicwithMaha - Mainly focus on Palestinian dialect, it's not that bad though, but most videos are in English.
* https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCb7oMrqwZnr3ZCayqnkkb8w - Channel focusing on Levantine Arabic dialect, not native but he pronunciation is just as good as perfect. Has some very useful tips. She also uses sentences and context to explain.
* https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCkWN-yLIlPC-A7tY2WIIv9g - has mostly content for levantine Arabic from Lebanon, Not best audio quality but still some very good stories for vocabulary.
* https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLA5UIoabheFOTBS03VwXlFXQQHtp3xxiC - Easy Arabic interviews people in the streets and it has Subs in English and the spoken Dialect
* https://m.youtube.com/user/StepByStepArabic - Known as Arabic Mike, he's British who has learned Arabic, He does give tips on learning Arabic and he interviews people. He speaks MSA.
* https://m.youtube.com/user/hiibanajem - Teaches Levantine Arabic from Lebanon, most videos are in English.
* https://m.youtube.com/user/CGEJordan - Teaches Arabic in a classroom setting, very useful grammar tips, and general tips.
* https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCEmWUZanVYXEzZXYDHzD-iA/featured - Teaches traditional MSA, has some very good explanations.