The Nakba Lexicon: Building a Comprehensive Dataset from Palestinian Literature (2025)

Abstract: This paper introduces the Nakba Lexicon, a comprehensive dataset derived from the poetry collection Asifa ‘Ala al-Iz‘aj (Sorry for the Disturbance) by Istiqlal Eid, a Palestinian poet from El-Birweh. Eid’s work poignantly reflects on themes of Palestinian identity, displacement, and resilience, serving as a resource for preserving linguistic and cultural heritage in the context of post-Nakba literature. The dataset is structured into ten thematic domains, including political terminology, memory and preservation, sensory and emotional lexicon, toponyms, nature, and external linguistic influences such as Hebrew, French, and English, thereby capturing the socio-political, emotional, and cultural dimensions of the Nakba. The Nakba Lexicon uniquely emphasises the contributions of women to Palestinian literary traditions, shedding light on often-overlooked narratives of resilience and cultural continuity. Advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques were employed to analyse the dataset, with fine-tuned pre-trained models such as ARABERT and MARBERT achieving F1-scores of 0.87 and 0.68 in language and lexical classification tasks, respectively, significantly outperforming traditional machine learning models. These results highlight the potential of domain-specific computational models to effectively analyse complex datasets, facilitating the preservation of marginalised voices. By bridging computational methods with cultural preservation, this study enhances the understanding of Palestinian linguistic heritage and contributes to broader efforts in documenting and analysing endangered narratives. The Nakba Lexicon paves the way for future interdisciplinary research, showcasing the role of NLP in addressing historical trauma, resilience, and cultural identity.

## introduction the nakba, meaning "catastrophe" in arabic, marks a significant chapter in palestinian history, signifying the mass displacement and loss of homeland that followed the establishment of the state of israel in 1948. this event not only reshaped palestinian society but also deeply affected its linguistic, cultural, and political landscapes. palestinian literature has since played a vital role in documenting and preserving the memory, identity, and collective experiences of palestinians across generations. within this literary tradition, the works of poets such as istiqlal eid serve as essential records of the palestinian narrative, capturing the nuanced emotional and socio-political complexities faced by palestinian communities (sa'di and @xcite . istiqlal eid (? 1 ), a palestinian poet from el-birweh 2 , uses her poetry to convey a powerful perspective on identity, exile, and resistance. her collection, asifa 'ala al-iz'aj (sorry for the disturbance), weaves a tapestry of themes central to the palestinian experience, from cultural memory to the impact of displacement. as a female poet writing in both modern standard arabic and palestinian dialect, eid's work provides a unique vantage point into the resilience of palestinian identity, amplified by her familial connection to the iconic poet mahmoud darwish. this connection grounds her in the cultural and historical heritage of her homeland while navigating the challenges of being a refugee within her own country @xcite . this study builds on eid's poetry to cre1 the author refuses to disclose her birthdate or age, and thus it is represented as "?" in respect of her wishes 2 el-birweh, also spelled as al-birwa, was a palestinian village, located 10.5 kilometres (6.5 miles) east of acre (akka). the village was depopulated during the 1948 arab-israeli conflict and subsequent wars. through this project, we highlight the significant yet often overlooked contributions of female voices in palestinian literature, emphasising the importance of diverse perspectives in documenting historical trauma and resilience. the nakba lexicon stands as a resource for analysing the linguistic, emotional, and cultural dimensions of palestinian literary works, enabling a more nuanced understanding of the lasting impact of the nakba on palestinian identity and memory. ## related work research on the linguistic and cultural preservation within palestinian literature has gained traction in recent years, particularly as scholars explore the ways in which language and literature document and sustain collective memory. palestinian authors and poets have frequently employed their work as a form of resistance and preservation, capturing the personal and collective traumas associated with displacement and cultural erasure @xcite . much of this research underscores the role of poetry and narrative in retaining pre-nakba identities, toponyms, and cultural references, emphasising literature as a safeguard against the loss of heritage @xcite . the influence of mahmoud darwish is central to studies on palestinian poetry, with his works providing foundational insights into themes of exile, memory, and identity. darwish's poetry is widely cited as a significant source of inspiration for palestinian authors, including istiqlal eid, who not only shares darwish's geographic roots but also his commitment to documenting palestinian heritage @xcite . scholars have examined darwish's impact on modern palestinian literature and how his style of prose poetry has been adapted by subsequent generations of palestinian poets who seek to articulate their own experiences of statelessness and longing @xcite . in the field of natural language processing (nlp), efforts to develop language models and datasets for low-resource languages, particularly dialects, are also relevant to this study @xcite . research on arabic dialects and low-resource nlp applications provides insights into the complexities of handling linguistic diversity within palestinian literature, especially given the mixture of modern standard arabic and palestinian dialect in @xcite . projects focusing on the creation of lexicons and domain-specific terminologies have demonstrated the potential for computational approaches to capture unique linguistic and cultural expressions, facilitating further analysis and preservation of marginalised narratives @xcite . work on thematic and emotional lexicons has also been explored in nlp, particularly in the context of trauma and cultural resilience @xcite . studies have shown that by structuring lexicons around themes such as political terminology, sensory language, and cultural references, researchers can gain a more profound understanding of how language embodies historical events and communal identity @xcite . the categorisation approach proposed in this study builds on these foundations by organising terms specific to the nakba within distinct domains, enabling a targeted nlp analysis that respects the cultural context of the lexicon. this work contributes to these existing efforts by developing a nakba-focused lexicon within palestinian literature, which aims to support both linguistic preservation and nuanced computational analysis. through a female poet's perspective, our research not only enhances existing nlp applications but also addresses the gendered aspects of cultural documentation, highlighting the significant yet often underrepresented contributions of women in post-nakba literary production. ## overview of the author istiqlal eid (?-), a poet originally from el-birweh, incorporates the term "biladna" (meaning "our country") into her identity, referring to herself as "bint el-birweh" (the daughter of el-birweh). currently residing in tamra and working as an english teacher, her name, meaning "independence," was chosen by her father in hope of palestinian autonomy after the nakba of 1948. later, eid added "biladna" to signify her desire for freedom from oppression and corruption in arab lands. el-birweh, her birthplace, is also significant as it is the hometown of celebrated poet mahmoud darwish, her maternal uncle. eid identifies as a refugee in her own homeland. her family, despite remaining in what is now israel's 1948 territories, cannot reside in el-birweh, which has since become a jewish settlement. eid's main publication, a poetry collection titled ʾāsifa ʿalā el-ʾizʿāj ( ‫ﺁ‬ ‫س‬ ِ ‫ف‬ ‫ة‬ ‫ع‬ ‫ل‬ ‫ى‬ ‫ﺍ‬ ‫ل‬ ‫إ‬ ‫ﺯ‬ ‫ع‬ ‫ا‬ ‫ﺝ‬ , sorry for the disturbance), was released in 2017. she is also working on a collection of short stories titled šḥār wimšaḥāra ( ‫ش‬ ‫اح‬ ‫ﺭ‬ ‫و‬ ‫م‬ ‫ش‬ ‫ح‬ ّ � ‫ر‬ ‫ﺓ‬ eid's prose poetry style often adopts a sarcastic tone, written in a blend of modern standard arabic and palestinian dialect. her work reflects an effort to safeguard the palestinian narrative, documenting pre-nakba names, figures, and places, and preserving palestinian history and nakba memories. ## the linguistic context of palestinians in israel the declaration of israel in 1948 reshaped not only the territorial but also the linguistic landscape, transforming palestinian citizens from a majority into a minority with a marginalized language. the shift placed arabic in a subordinate position relative to hebrew, reflecting the asymmetrical political and social power dynamics between the palestinian minority and the jewish israeli majority @xcite . after 1948, arabic was increasingly perceived within israel as a language of opposition, while hebrew was elevated as the cornerstone of the nation-building process @xcite . for palestinian citizens of israel, proficiency in hebrew became essential for navigating official and social settings, while arabic faced reduced support in public institutions. in jewish israeli schools, arabic instruction was often limited to military contexts, highlighting the asymmetrical status of the two languages @xcite . this bilingual reality reflects a linguistic hierarchy, where arabic serves as both a practical language and a symbol of cultural resilience. in literature and cultural expression, language plays a critical role in maintaining and asserting palestinian identity. despite its marginalized status, arabic serves as a medium for exploring themes of identity, resistance, and cultural continuity. given these influences, the arabic of the '48 palestinians occupies a distinct position in the landscape of palestinian dialectology. the continuous interaction with hebrew and the isolation from other palestinian dialects contribute to a rich, hybrid linguistic identity that reflects the historical and social complexities of palestinian communities within israel @xcite . ## methodology and dataset classification eid's work provides a rich source of nakbarelated terminology, facilitating the creation of a comprehensive dataset for natural language processing (nlp) applications. by focusing on a female voice, we aim to create an inclusive dataset that captures diverse experiences in palestinian literature, while emphasising the significant yet often overlooked contributions of women. this approach enables nuanced nlp analyses of language and themes in post-nakba literary works. the dataset is structured into thematic categories, capturing linguistic adaptations to evolving palestinian identity and socio-political realities: ## experiments building upon the methodology and thematic classification discussed earlier, we conducted experiments to analyse the linguistic and cultural nuances embedded in the dataset. the dataset comprises 222 sentences, each carefully annotated with a word or phrase that reflects its language type and lexical class. these annotations aim to capture the complex interplay of linguistic elements present in istiqlal eid's work, including modern standard arabic, palestinian dialect, and hebrew influences. the annotated data is categorised into ten distinct lexical classes, as illustrated in figure 1 . the distribution highlights the diversity of terms used in post-nakba literature, with notable proportions allocated to categories such as toponyms (27.5%), names of people (21.7%), and politics (18.3%). smaller but significant categories include culture (9.2%), nature (7.9%), memory (7.9%), and sensory and emotional lexicon (5.0%). external linguistic influences, including hebrew (1.3%), french (0.8%), and english (0.8%), reflect the historical and sociopolitical interactions shaping the linguistic landscape. these classifications provide insight into the thematic emphasis of the nakba lexicon, illustrating how language is used to articulate identity, resistance, and memory. to complement this analysis, each sentence has also been identified in terms of its language type, classified into six categories, as detailed in this experiment provides a foundation for exploring how language is used in palestinian literature to articulate themes of displacement, memory, and resilience, while also enabling computational analysis of these themes within natural language processing applications. the primary technique employed for this task was the term frequency-inverse document frequency (tf-idf) embedding approach, which represents texts as numerical vectors based on their significance within the dataset. these vectors were used as input to train four traditional machine learning models: support vector machines (svm), logistic regression, random forest, and naïve bayes. these models were selected for their proven effectiveness in text classification tasks, where svm excels at finding optimal hyperplanes for classification, logistic regression provides interpretability, random forest is robust against overfitting, and naïve bayes is efficient for small datasets. to address the limited size of the dataset, bigram features were incorporated (@xmath0, 2)) to enhance representation by capturing contextual relationships between words. in addition to these traditional approaches, two state-of-the-art pre-trained language models, @xcite and marbert @xcite , were utilised to classify the lexical classes. these models were chosen for their specialised design, which caters to the unique linguistic characteristics of arabic, including morphology, syntax, and dialectal variations. arabert is tailored for modern standard arabic tasks, while mar-bert focuses on arabic dialects, making both models well-suited to handle the mix of standard arabic, palestinian dialect, and hebrew influences present in the dataset. both models were evaluated in two settings: first, as-is without additional training, to assess their generalisation capabilities, and second, fine-tuned on our dataset to adapt them to the specific nuances of post-nakba literature. fine-tuning was conducted with early stopping criteria to prevent overfitting, halting training after three consecutive evaluation epochs without validation loss improvement. model checkpoints were saved after each epoch to ensure the best possible performance. preprocessing was applied to standardise the input data, including steps such as diacritisation removal, extra space trimming, stop word elimination, symbol cleaning, and character normalisation. these steps ensured the dataset was consistent and suitable for effective computational analysis. this classification effort not only provides insights into the dataset's linguistic diversity but also highlights the potential of machine learning and large language models in analysing post-nakba literature. by bridging traditional and modern nlp techniques, the experiments showcase a comprehensive approach to understanding and preserving palestinian linguistic and cultural heritage. ## results and discussion the experimental results highlight the linguistic diversity captured in the nakba lexicon dataset, which is essential for understanding the interplay of language types in post-nakba literature. the lexical classification task assesses the ability of models to categorise words and phrases into predefined lexical classes, reflecting the diverse linguistic elements of the nakba lexicon. the language classification task evaluates the ability of models to identify the language type of each sentence within the dataset, reflecting its multilingual and dialectal diversity. ## conclusion and future work this study introduced the nakba lexicon, a comprehensive dataset derived from the poetic works of istiqlal eid, capturing the linguistic, cultural, and emotional dimensions of palestinian post-nakba literature. by categorising the dataset into thematic domains and leveraging computational methods, we demonstrated how advanced natural language processing (nlp) techniques can preserve and analyse marginalised linguistic and cultural narratives. the lexicon serves as a bridge between computational tools and cultural studies, offering a resource for exploring the nuanced interplay of identity, memory, and resilience in the face of historical trauma. the experimental results underline the challenges inherent in processing such a linguistically rich and contextually complex dataset. traditional machine learning models, while providing baseline insights, struggled to fully capture the intricate dynamics of palestinian literature, especially the interplay of modern standard arabic, palestinian dialects, and hebrew influences. in contrast, pre-trained language models like arabert and marbert significantly outperformed these models, with marbert excelling in lexical classification and arabert achieving state-of-the-art results in language classification. these findings highlight the potential of domain-specific models to address the unique demands of datasets that blend linguistic, cultural, and historical layers. the nakba lexicon is more than a computational dataset; it is a testament to the enduring power of language as a medium for resistance, memory preservation, and cultural continuity. by amplifying the voices embedded in palestinian literature, this research not only contributes to the documentation of palestinian heritage but also underscores the role of nlp in safeguarding endangered narratives. these efforts align with a broader vision of using technology to amplify the stories of marginalised communities and preserve their cultural identities for future generations. future work will expand the nakba lexicon to include additional texts from palestinian authors and poets, aiming to enhance its representativeness and robustness. we also intend to explore cross-dialectal adaptations, capturing the linguistic diversity across arabic-speaking regions affected by the nakba. integrating context-aware models, such as transformerbased architectures, will enable deeper analysis of the interplay between language, culture, and history. furthermore, collaborative efforts with historians, linguists, and cultural preservationists will enrich the lexicon's applications, fostering interdisciplinary approaches to understanding and preserving cultural heritage. once this paper is accepted, the nakba lexicon will be released publicly, providing researchers and practitioners with a valuable resource for computational analysis and a meaningful contribution to preserving the narratives of resilience and resistance within palestinian literature.