A Blog by the Editor of The Middle East Journal

Putting Middle Eastern Events in Cultural and Historical Context

Monday, September 13, 2010

Return of the Death of Arabic Strikes Back Revisited, Part VII: The Next Generation

For those alarmed by the (supposed) rapid* death of Arabic, which I've frequently questioned, some new cause for alarmism: Abu Dhabi is going to require instruction in both English and Arabic, beginning with three and four year-old preschoolers. Now, it's a bilingual curriculum, beginning from the early years and phasing upward, and Abu Dhabi has a huge expatriate population from South Asia whose common lingua franca is English, and its indigenous population hopes for international jobs so this, uh, makes a lot of sense on the surface.

*And as Qifa Nabki noted, it's been rapidly dying since the great lexicographer Ibn Manzur lamented its decline in the 12th century AD.

The UAE is doing a lot to preserve its cultural heritage and traditions, and this does not strike me as a particularly bad idea, but with all the Arabic-is-dying the-sky-is-falling talk lately, this fuels the fire.

Or as Barbie might put it according to one urban legend: "Arabic is hard. Let's go shopping."

Now go back and learn those weak verbs and broken plurals.

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