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.