03.20.08
The language we speak
Halo! Hows it going? Hope everyone’s enjoying the extended weekend! ^_^
I’m sure all of you heard about Government’s resignation and dissolving of the Parliament! At first when I read the message from Barlamani (Don’t get me started on that messaging service! They drill you with messages you can’t cancel!) I thought it was a joke! Have you ever heard of a country without a Government nor a Parliament?! Quite disturbing! Don’t know how long we’ll be like this, but I’m guessing we’d better get used to it!
Anyway,
Most of us speak Arabic and its our native-tongue, right? But do most of us know the origins of this language? Me no tink so!
Okay first thing you need to know is that our awesome language descended from the Semitic Languages, which are - according to Wiki - a family of languages mostly originated in Northern Africa and the Horn of Africa. Other family members of the Semitic Languages are Amharic, Tigrinya and Hebrew among some others. What’s cool about the Semitic Languages (Thus Arabic) is that its one of the earliest languages to get a written form. And Arabic is considered the largest Semitic Language alive, also, Ancient North Arabian - the earliest Proto-Arabic dates back to 6th Century B.C (whoooa!!) - did not use normal alphabets, but used epigraphic Musnad alphabets!
Can you believe that Arabic is a major source of vocabulary for languages such as Berber, Kurdish, Persian, Swahili, Urdu, Hindi, Turkish, Malay and Indonesian? Even Spanish and Portuguese have a large amount of loan words!
“Many words in English and other European languages are derived from Arabic, often through other European languages, especially Spanish and Italian. Among them are commonly-used words like “sugar” (sukkar), “cotton” (quṭn) and “magazine” (maḫāzin). English words more recognizably of Arabic origin include “algebra”, “alcohol”, “alchemy”, “alkali” and “zenith.” Some words in common use, such as “intention” and “information”, were originally calques of Arabic philosophical terms.” - Wiki.
Another cool fact is that Arabic is considered to be the most Semitic language in which it preserved its features completely through time!
So you can say that the language we speak is one of the oldest and influential languages of the world… So proud I am!!
I can’t believe many Arabians are neglecting this amazing language!
Linus said,
March 21, 2008 at 1:06 am
When I got here to the states, I saw that english isn’t that fun lol!
I wish people back home would start using Arabic more since arabic is our native tongues and our identity.
If you loose your arabic your not an Arab nor European lol!
Linus said,
March 21, 2008 at 1:14 am
By the way, Arabic comes from Aramaic
::: ShoSho ::: said,
March 21, 2008 at 1:23 am
Oh I soo agree! Alot of people in Kuwait don’t care about their kids learning arabic as much as English and this is soo sad! English can easily be learned IMO but Arabic needs to be learned from an early age.. I always worry about my kids’ Arabic because of living abroad and people think ma 3indi salfa!
Olórin said,
March 21, 2008 at 6:35 am
Linus:
Same here! When we went to the US I noticed the difference between English and Arabic! Speaking it 24/7 was a bore!
Hhmm I must disagree with you here. Arabic is related to Aramaic but it doesn’t come from it. While Arabic is one of the major Semitic family members, Aramaic is a subfamily. You might’ve thought so because Aramaic’s Nabataean script might be a possible source of the Arabic alphabet. Or because Aramaic was replaced by Arabic from the lingua franca of the middle east.
Shosho:
I agree with you 100%. There is a need for concern!
outkasty said,
March 21, 2008 at 2:45 pm
il-3arabi lughat il-Quraan
Olórin said,
March 21, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Yup! Allah y7afith’ha ^_^
Amethyst said,
March 21, 2008 at 8:34 pm
I called 107 to cancel the Barlamani service;\
As for my bad Arabic, I blame my parents;p
Fadidra said,
March 22, 2008 at 3:03 pm
haha kash5a 6la3at mo hayna “il lo’3a il 3arabiya” ;p
interesting info thanks
G and L said,
March 22, 2008 at 4:39 pm
I love arabic. it’s so much more beautiful than english. i wish i was better in arabic than i was in english instead of the other way around :/
Olórin said,
March 22, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Amethyst:
O_O smart!
Fadidra:
Shiftay shloun! 6ala3na ja’7! Most welcome!
G and L:
I know! A9lan ilmafro’9 manqarin! hathee malatna! It’s not too late to enrich your Arabic more!
Nicole said,
March 24, 2008 at 5:11 am
If more people would speak Arabic, I probably would have learned at least the basics by now
I was surprised the other day when a 6 year “old” Kuwaiti girl talked to me in fluent English.
I guess my face expression would have been worth a picture.
zainoba said,
March 24, 2008 at 11:11 am
Shosho is right, kids should be taught arabic from an early stage while they can catch with english as school. Im proud too!
KJ said,
March 24, 2008 at 7:30 pm
w00t! What do you expect from a language preserved by the Holy Quran
Olórin said,
March 26, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Nicole:
That’s just the begining!
zainoba:
I’m glad =D
KJ:
Nothing less!
Bashar said,
March 27, 2008 at 10:18 am
[Can you believe that Arabic is a major source of vocabulary for languages such as Berber, Kurdish, Persian]
I thought they said in sif al-3rab “Atharaw 3alikom al hnod wel 3ajam” not vice versa
suspic said,
March 27, 2008 at 1:20 pm
We don’t actually speak Arabic, nor do we know how to. Our lowest grades were always in Arabic, and what brought us down was the grammar each and every time.
When I read Arabic literature, whether its poetry or anything, it’s really awesome. It carries a lot of meanings, and it’s truly beautiful, phonetic and deep.
Still, we don’t know our Arabic. We blog in English under the lame excuse of “practice”, if we make an Arabic post we struggle to to stay within the boundries of Arabic Arabic and not stray into slang.
In the old days they used to speak with perfect grammar(ما يلحنون بالكلام) and pronunciation, they understood the quran with no need for explanations and definitions for words, and now we struggle to make one grammatically proper sentence.
I remember in one lesson they told us that they mastered it to a point where they could have 100+ names for one thing, for example the sword : السيف \ الابيض \ ..الخ and so on. Now we can’t name one thing in Arabic Arabic, and most of the newer generations don’t even like it.
For the love of God, some Arabs can explain themselves more fluently in English than Arabic. That is truly and purely backward.
suspic said,
March 27, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Oh shit..
Sorry about that long post. I didn’t realize it was that long.. =O
Olórin said,
March 27, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Bashar:
LOOOL!
suspic:
Zat vas long! But good long.
Al7en i7na zaineen tara..wait 10 more years and Arabic Arabic 3ala goltik will be a foreign language to youngsters while our generation would fruitlessly try to educate them with it. Allah yastir, I say build up your grammer skills now 3ashan your kids may yinsal’7oon 100%!
F. said,
March 28, 2008 at 11:36 pm
It’s a lovely language indeed.
Thanks for the rich info
Amu said,
March 31, 2008 at 2:55 pm
need a new post
avocat said,
April 1, 2008 at 2:46 pm
i demand an update ! ilyawm kammalt ALF marra gareeita .. yella hemmitich
Olórin said,
April 1, 2008 at 9:15 pm
F.:
Most welcome you are!
Amu:
No time! =[
avocat:
How did you escape comment moderation?!
avocat said,
April 3, 2008 at 12:27 am
never underestimate wut am capable of . muwa7a7a
Olórin said,
April 3, 2008 at 3:28 pm
00;
…freaky!
::: ShoSho ::: said,
April 4, 2008 at 12:16 pm
LooooL at avocat!
New Post!!! Yallaaa!!!!
shahad said,
April 4, 2008 at 2:43 pm
I can’t believe many Arabians are neglecting this amazing language!
and i cant help noticing u being so proud of ur arabic language with english words!
u cant blame ppl for neglecting our arabic language most of our q8i bloggers are writting with “english qechaaaaa”
bss thank you 4 all the info its very proudful to to be able to understand the arabic hard languge and not use it when others are dieng to understand it
one thing to add ….. kilmat bo6el in itali the say bootaih or smthing this way
Olórin said,
April 4, 2008 at 9:23 pm
Shosho:
Halo! I’ll try my best to post something as soon as I can!
Shahad:
I write in English instead of Arabic because many of my readers don’t speak Arabic.
Thanks for your visit and the italian bo6el info, be no stranger to this blog!
ren_crow said,
April 7, 2008 at 6:39 am
Yea i’ve always been personally fascinated with the middle-eastern languages. Syriac (eastern aramaic) and arabic to be specific. Reading arabic is a piece of cake and i’ve learnt alot of arabic but i still have problems with grammer…
Kenneth Leong said,
April 7, 2008 at 9:28 am
If you’re keen on languages and language learning I think you’ll like our blog.
http://blog.euroasia.co.nz/
Olórin said,
April 7, 2008 at 5:11 pm
ren-crow:
Welcome!
You can get rid of grammer problems with time!
Kenneth Leong:
Wow your blog is lovely! Thank you for the recommendation and welcome!
hamad said,
April 12, 2008 at 9:57 am
i have some suggestions for those wanting to both update/improve their Arabic language skills as well as help foster a community of interest in this field:
- participate in Arabic Wikipedia and add entries. It surprises me that the Turkish Wikipedia has much more entries than the Arabic one even though that language is spoken by much fewer people.
- create professional and enticing online forums for people interested in learning more with resources, discussions and proper guidance and make sure its mostly in arabic (not transliterated english)
- use services such as http://www.Yamli.com to put Arabic when it needs to be somewhere even when you dont have an arabic keyboard. (it works on facebook too)
There are many other ways beyond the above but I suggest someone starts to rally support in this area. I was surprised to see only one page addressing arabic usage on the mac and how to fix fonts etc (http://www.smi.uib.no/ksv/ArabicFonts.html).
There’s much to be done.
Olórin said,
April 12, 2008 at 11:12 am
True!
Don’t worry, a lot of people think the way you do.