Academic literature on the topic 'English and Arabic'

In Saudi Arabia, English is taught starting from kindergarten at National Public and Private Schools. At International schools, English is the medium of instruction. This study aims to explore how parents promote children’s language development, their evaluation of their children’s proficiency level, which language the children use in communicating with family members and on WhatsApp. Surveys with parents revealed that English is stronger and preferred by children in International Schools and many children in Private Schools. More parents worry about their children’s proficiency level in English than Arabic and promote English more than Arabic. Watching English cartoons and movies, using English educational and entertainment apps/programs, playing English games, and enrolling the children in English courses during holidays are common home-based activities. To promote Arabic, some parents hire a tutor. Others encourage their children to read Arabic stories and watch Arabic cartoons. Results and recommendations are given in detail.

In Saudi Arabia, there are several school types where children go and learn both English and Arabic: (i) Public (government) and Quranic schools; (ii) private schools where Arabic is the medium of instruction with an intensive English course; (iii) international schools where English is the medium of instruction, and one course is allocated to Arabic and Islamic Studies. This study surveyed a sample of parents to find out the number of hours allocated to English; kinds of textbooks used and whether parents consider them sufficient; parents’ views of their children’s proficiency level in the different English language skills; which language is stronger in children: English or Arabic; which language children use in communicating with their siblings, parents and relatives; the effects of learning English (L2) on Arabic (L1); and the optimal age for starting to learn English. Results showed that at government and Quranic schools, students take 1-2 hours of English a week which parents think are insufficient. At private schools, hours allocated to English vary (between 5-10). At international schools, English is the medium of instruction in all courses. Most parents prefer that children start learning English in kindergarten or first grade. English is the stronger and preferred language for international school students. Private School students have a good command of English and Arabic. Arabic is the stronger and preferred language for Government and Quranic School children. Some parents think that the textbook used at Government School are good, but some teachers are incompetent in their instructional techniques. Some Public Schools (in remote areas or small towns) are understaffed which results in reducing the teaching hours from 2 to 1 hour per week. Parents’ views on the status and quality of foreign/second language education in each type of elementary school in Saudi Arabia are reported in detail.

The aim of this study was to investigate and analyse teachers’ and students’ views towards using Arabic in teaching English in secondary schools in Oneizah Province, Saudi Arabia. The data were collected by means of two questionnaires: one for teachers and the other for students. The subjects were 43 teachers of English, 12 were female. 120 male students from four different secondary schools in Oneizah. The results of the study showed that Arabic language (The students’ mother tongue) could be used during English language lessons although teachers’ responses gave less support for using Arabic. Also, the results revealed that Arabic has positive roles to play in teaching English besides facilitating learning process. The recommendations emphasize and encourage teachers and supervisors to pay attention to their learners need in using their mother tongue. Moreover, Arabic language can be a means of facilitation not a hindrance so it can be used in many activities inside the classroom without affecting students’ exposure to English language. Also, there should be a place for learners’ mother tongue in the syllabus, e.g. in translation exercises and bilingual dictionaries.

Abstract This paper examines the history and development of Machine Translation (MT) applications for the Arabic language in the context of the history and machine translation in general. It starts with a discussion of the beginnings of MT in the US and then, depending on the work of MT historians, surveys the decline of the work on MT and drying up of funding; then the revival with globalization, development of information technology and the rising needs for breaking the language barriers in the world; and last on the dramatic developments that came with the advances in computer technology. The paper also examined some of the major approaches for MT within a historical perspective. The case of Arabic is treated along the same lines focusing on the work that was done on Arabic by Western research institutes and Western profit motivated companies. Special attention is given to the work of the one Arab company, Sakr of Al-Alamiyya Group, which was established in 1982 and has seriously since then worked on developing software applications for Arabic under the umbrella of natural language processing for the Arabic language. Major available software applications for Arabic/English Arabic MT as well as MT related software were surveyed within a historical framework.

With the development of globalization and the emergence of global English, numerous studies have been concerned with the ways Arabic is influenced by English, the adoption of many English loanwords by Arab speakers and the dominance of English as a lingua franca in different Arab countries including Saudi Arabia. These studies generally investigate the effects of global English on the Arab linguistic and cultural identity. The majority of these studies tend to list what they refer to as risks of the dominance of English loanwords in Arabic and assert the importance of keeping Arabic pure from these words which are described asدخيل dakhil (literally meaning strange and outsider). Very few studies have been done on exploring the ways English loanwords are used in Saudi Colloquial Arabic (SCA) and the relationship between the use of English loanwords and some sociolinguistic variables such as sex, age, geographic location, and education. In the face of this, this article is concerned with exploring the relationship between sex and the use of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic (SCA). In order to do this, the study is based on a corpus of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic (SCA) with the purpose of investigating the frequency of English loanwords in the speeches of male and female speakers and describing the morphological adaptations used by male and female speakers. Results indicate that there are significant differences between Saudi male and female speakers in the use of English loanwords in terms of frequency, topics, and morphological adaptations. The sex or gender of the speaker is an important factor in determining the frequency, distribution, and the morphological adaptations of English loanwords in SCA.

The paper aims at pinpointing the defects in three unabridged Arabic­ English dictionaries: Modern Written Arabic (MWA) ( 1961), al-Mawrid (1988) and the latest one al-Mughni (1999). My hope is to remedy certain defects and help produce a dictionary that may assist the Arabic-English translator. It is true that the three dictionaries do not specifically set out the targeted readers or the functions they serve. MWA states that the targeted readers are not only 'English and American users but also orientalists throughout the world who are more at home with English than with German'. Al-Mawrid is totally silent about the targeted reader and the purpose it serves. Al-Mughni "aims to help in teaching Arabic through English, to help the reader through equivalents understand the Arabic language" (the preface). Though none of the compilers thinks of "translator" as a category of users, the three dictionaries, in the absence of an Arabic-English dictionary specially tailored for translators, are the only tools available for Arabic-English translators, whether native or non-native speakers. To improve the quality of these dictionaries and to benefit from the long and rich experience of their compilers, we shall illustrate different types of translation problems encountered by Arab university students as well as by translators and how these dictionaries could be used to solve them. We shall also provide suggestions for the improvement of certain lexicographic features directly related to translation..

This research aimed to examine cohesive connectivity in Arabic-English translated text by English as foreign language students at the University of Tabuk for the academic year 2022/2023. The theoretical framework of the study is based on Halliday and Hasan's (1976) theory of coherence and cohesion shifts in translation. This qualitative study included 15 participants in their third-year English as foreign language students from the Department of Languages and Translation at the University of Tabuk in Saudi Arabia. Participants were selected purposively. Translated texts were the instrument used to collect data in this study. Results showed that students encountered cohesion and coherence problems in achieving written texts’ unity, particularly in assigning their concepts and implementing appropriate cohesive signals, punctuation, and spelling issues in their Arabic-English text.

This study aimed to analyze a sample of Arabic transliterations of foreign shop names in Saudi Arabia; to identify the inaccuracies, and inconsistencies in the Arabic transliterations; the causes of the Arabic inconsistent and erroneous transliterations; whether shoppers (who do not know English) can decode and pronounce a sample Arabic transliterations of shop names; and the factors that should be taken into consideration in transliterating foreign shop names to Arabic. Results of the data analysis showed that 52% of the inaccurate transliterations are in the vowels and diphthongs; 36% are inaccurate and inconsistent transliterations of consonants. In 11.6% of the shop names, ch was reduced to sh; and /g/ was transliterated in 3 ways. 13% of the consonant transliteration deviations occurred in words containing a silent letter. In 6%, the Arabic vowel was double. In 8%, compound shop names were spelled together (blended) in the Arabic transliteration; In 7%, foreign names from French, Italian, Japanese, and Turkish were transliterated as they are pronounced in English, not in the original language. Findings also showed variant spellings of the same name shop names especially from French, Italian and Turkish (Parfois بارفواه بافويس; Spring سبرينق سبرينج; Semit Sarai سميت/سيميت; Chocolate شوكلت/شوكليت). Results of a decoding test given to a sample of college students and faculty who have a low proficiency level in English showed that the subjects could decode shop names such as ماكدونالدر، بيرغر كينج، هارديز، كوستا، ساربكس.. نسكافيه بيرجر كينج، تويز ار اص، but had difficulty decoding , دولس قوستو, أدفنتورا, جارليشوز لاونج, أميريكان إيجل أوتفترز, أكسسوريز, بايليس, باربكيوتونايت, لولو سلبريت, ذا تشيلدرنز بليس and other. The students and faculty had difficulty decoding Arabic transliterations because they are not familiar with the shop name in the foreign language, and because of the absence of short vowels in the transliteration, which makes it difficult to pronounce the transliterated names correctly. Deviant transliterations are attributed to transliterators who are non-native speakers of Arabic, English and other foreign languages. Recommendations for accurate Arabic transliterations of foreign shop names in Saudi Arabia are given.