Arabic is one of the most widely spoken languages ββin the world, which is gaining popularity every year. The study of the Arabic language has its own characteristics, which is associated with the structure of the language itself, as well as pronunciation and writing. This must be considered when choosing a program for training.
Prevalence
Arabic belongs to the Semitic group. In terms of the number of native speakers for whom it is native, Arabic takes the second place in the world after Chinese.
About 350 million people speak Arabic in 23 countries around the world, where the language is considered official. These countries include Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Palestine and many others. Also, the language is one of the official in Israel. Given this factor, the study of the Arabic language involves a preliminary choice of the dialect that will be used in a particular country, because, despite many similar elements, in different countries the language has its own distinctive features.
Dialects
Modern Arabic can be divided into 5 large groups of dialects, which from a linguistic point of view can almost be called different languages. The fact is that the lexical and grammatical differences in languages ββare so great that people who speak different dialects and do not speak the literary language can hardly understand each other. The following groups of dialects are distinguished:
- Maghrib.
- Egyptian-Sudanese.
- Syro-Mesopotamian.
- Arabian.
- Central Asian.
A separate niche is occupied by the modern standard Arabic language, which, however, is practically not used in colloquial speech.
Study Features
Learning Arabic from scratch is not an easy task, because after Chinese it is considered one of the most difficult in the world. To learn Arabic, you need a lot more time than to learn any European language. This applies to both independent work and classes with teachers.
Independent study of the Arabic language is a difficult path, which is better to abandon at first. This is due to several factors. Firstly, the letter is very difficult, which does not resemble either Latin or Cyrillic, which is written from right to left, and also does not provide for the use of vowels. Secondly, the very structure of the language differs in complexity, in particular morphology and grammar.
What to look for before starting a study?
The program for learning Arabic should be built taking into account the following factors:
- Having enough time. It takes several times longer to learn a language than to learn other languages.
- Opportunities both for independent work, and for classes in a group or with a private teacher. Learning the Arabic language in Moscow makes it possible to combine different options.
- The inclusion in the process of studying various aspects: writing, reading, listening and, of course, speaking.
We must not forget that you need to decide on the choice of a specific dialect. Learning Arabic differs depending on this factor. In particular, the dialects in Egypt and Iraq are so different that their speakers can not always understand each other. The way out of this situation is to study the Arabic literary language, which has a more complex structure, but is understandable in all countries of the Arab world, since dialects traditionally have a more simplified form. Despite this, this option has its own negative aspects. Although the literary language is understood by all countries, it is practically not spoken. It may happen that a person who speaks a literary language cannot understand people who speak a certain dialect. In this case, the choice depends on the objectives of the study. If there is a desire to use the language in different countries, then the choice should be made in the direction of the literary option. If the language is studied for work in a certain Arab country, but preference should be given to the corresponding dialect.
Language vocabulary
Learning the Arabic language is impossible without the use of words and phrases, which in this case have characteristic differences in comparison with European languages. This is due to the fact that in Europe languages ββwere intertwined and strongly influenced each other, due to which they have many common lexical units. Almost all the vocabulary of the Arabic language has its original origin, which can hardly be connected with others. The number of borrowings from other languages ββis present, but it takes no more than one percent of the dictionary.
The difficulty of learning also lies in the fact that the Arabic language is characterized by the presence of synonyms, homonyms and ambiguous words, which can seriously confuse people who begin to learn the language. In Arabic, both newer words and very old ones are intertwined, which at the same time have no definite connections between themselves, but they mean almost identical objects and phenomena.
Phonetics and pronunciation
The literary Arabic language and its many dialects are characterized by the presence of a very developed phonetic system, in particular, it concerns the consonants: larynx, interdental and emphatic. All sorts of combinatorial pronunciation possibilities are also difficult to learn.
Many Arab countries are trying to bring colloquial pronunciation of words to the literary language. This is due primarily to the religious context, in particular to the correct reading of the Koran. Despite this, at the moment there is no single point of view on how to read certain endings correctly, since ancient texts do not have vocalizations - signs to indicate vowels, which does not allow one to correctly state how to pronounce one or another word.
Arabic is one of the most common, as well as one of the most difficult to learn languages ββin the world. The difficulty lies in the special writing without vowels, multi-level morphology and grammar, as well as the special pronunciation. An important factor in language learning is also the choice of dialect, since in different countries the Arabic language sounds very different.