Objectives:

- Enable non-natives to learn Arabic in a standardized, systematic and user-friendly manner.

- Eliminate the need for non-natives to physically attend a course or seek the help of an instructor to learn Arabic.

- Help non-natives break the ice and feel more comfortable when interacting with Arabs.

- Allow non-natives to gain cultural insights into their host countries.

- Enable those who speak broken Arabic to fix the issues with their spoken language in terms of grammatical rules, structural patterns and appropriate words based on the context.

- Allow native Arabic speakers to find the English equivalents of common Arabic expressions and phrases.

- Provide a window for host countries including Kuwait and the UAE to promote their culture, landmarks and tourist attractions.

- Provide a learning aid for beginners, students, early learners and their parents to help them identify and read Arabic letters by using illustrative examples from their surroundings.

- Phase out the phenomenon of using broken Arabic among non-natives living in Arab countries.

- Promote the standard Arabic (formal Arabic) among advanced learners.

Methodology:

LearnArabic uses expressions and phrases closer to real life scenarios and relevant to everyday situations. Additional information on related conversational contexts is provided to optimize the reusability of lessons. All our lessons are easily adaptable to different formal and informal contexts. For the added convenience of our most users, we have paid special attention to tailor our lessons to the career development needs of our users assuming that most people would practise these lessons with their Arab colleagues at work place and in corporate office settings.

For beginners, LearnArabic has pioneered an innovative approach that would allow them to keep exploring and identifying Arabic alphabets when they are offline, making it easier for them to recall the letters as well as the common names and phrases associated with them. To explain each letter and its consonants, we use examples from our surroundings such as street name boards and well-known brand names since people in this part of the world spend long hours on roads which they can otherwise utilise to recall the letters they have learnt through our website and Facebook page as they look around for street / area names that they are familiar with.

Why Learn Arabic:

To avoid repeating work that had already been done in this domain, and maximize the usefulness of our lessons, the expressions and phrases used across our lessons have been extracted from varied real-life examples and situations as well as different conversational contexts.

Unlike similar websites that often ask users to pay for their online lessons, LearnArabic lessons are offered absolutely free.

Terms of Use:

Learn Arabic is for everyone wishing to learn Arabic. It has taken its founder more than two years of diligent work and quality time to single handedly develop the website from its concept to designing, to coding, to content development, to the final deployment. Therefore, using, copying, reproducing its lessons or any other content of the website for any purposes other than personal development and non-commercial use are strictly prohibited in any or, or by an means. 

It was in such a setting that I learned to speak Arabic and later got better exposure to Kuwaiti dialect during the later leg of my high school and at Kuwait University, where the native students made the majority in my class. While it may not sound challenging to learn a new language in a tender age like that of mine when I first arrived in Kuwait, especially when you have a plethora of compelling reasons to learn a new second language, I still encounter unnerving situations when I have to switch between different dialects depending on the person I converse with. Like any foreign language speaker, this is the challenge that puts my conversational ability to a real test due to the sheer variety of spoken Arabic dialects after nearly two-decades of my experiment with “the language of Dhad” as Arabic is known, and might also leave the prospective learners of this website puzzled when they want to learn and communicate in Arabic as a second language.

For historical reasons, Indians make up a sizeable non-Arab expatriate community in Kuwait and other GCC countries, majority of who are either unskilled or semi-skilled workforce. These expatriates, unlike their western counterparts, often show immense interest and enthusiasm to speak Arabic, or are desperate to do so due to the nature of their jobs, but mostly learn it from their countrymen who speak Arabic in their own style and tone. Needless to say, this resulted in the creation of an altered version of broken-Arabic infused with words and sentence structures from the languages of non-native speakers, who pay little or no attention to the rules, structures and particularities of Arabic language. Unfortunately, native speakers also conveniently resort to this version of Arabic when speaking to Indian or other non-Arab nationals, depriving the latter of an unparalleled opportunity to learn the conversational language of the hosting country and explore its culture.

Personally, I would often get annoyed by people who insist to respond to me in broken Arabic – simply because I am a non-Arab - although I would start with them in a very fluent way. The rudeness of some native speakers would even go to the extent that while studying in Kuwait University, security guards from a particular Arab nationality would deliberately stop and interrogate me at the entrance of my colleges by asking that very awkward broken Arabic question "صديق واين يروح أنت" (Where are you going, friend?) due to my apparent Indian features, while some others would seldom show the courtesy to respond in proper Arabic. It goes without saying that I would often feel offended by this utterly impolite and racial behaviour for singling me out for identity verification. This prompted me to dedicate a whole section in this website to help those who already speak broken Arabic fix such conversational errors.

For a variety of reasons, Indians have long been subject to negative stereotyping (negative perception) in some Arab countries, and the word hindee (which means Indian in Arabic) would interchangeably symbolize foolishness and bewilderment for many. You would often hear natives use the world “hindee” to refer to a cleaner, domestic help, or anyone who undertakes blue collar and menial jobs. Similarly, in another Arab nation people disapprove naïve behaviour or mock at those who try to deceive them by saying: “antha fakirnee hindee” (do you think I am an Indian). A case in point, once one of our prominent lecturers at the university was explaining the term “stereotype” and he unwittingly asked the class what would be the first thing to rush to their mind when they hear the word “Hindee” (Indian) and one of my classmates replied him without giving it a second thought: "غبي" (idiot). It was a never a purposeful action or reaction, but merely a spur of the moment comment without realizing my presence in the class. Later, the lecturer, whom I still hold high respect for his generous gesture to specially mention me as one of the guests of Kuwait at a ceremony held to honour him following his appointment as the Minister of Information, and the class mate, who was also a good friend of mine, apologized to me for his unintentional comment. But the incident reflected on the bitter reality on how our country and people were widely perceived among some native Arabic speakers.

Deeply upset by the predicament caused by this state of affairs, I pioneered in April 2006, while I was still studying at Kuwait University, a website called bavabathulHind (Arabic for Gateway to India) and its news section akhbarulHind (India News). The website was aimed at bridging the vast knowledge gap about India among my Arabic speaking class mates by highlighting the bright side of the emerging India far from its infamous and widely held image of a dominantly poor and illiterate nation reeling under numerous socio-economic challenges. The website also gave me a dedicated window to publish my Arabic articles and unleash my repressed feelings. A single handedly initiated and managed venture, bavabathulHind was the talk of the town and won the laurels of many for its unique approach in delivering clear and well-focused message.

I penned the majority of its Arabic articles which lavishly shed light on the impressive achievements India has made in recent decades across various spheres including Information Technology, space technology, the socio-economic status and achievements of Indian Muslims, India’s historic links with Arab world and the success stories of Indian diaspora worldwide, among others. When Geocities ceased free hosting services in October 2009, the website became defunct for a while, but was later archived by another free-hosting provider due to the high number of visitors and it can still be visited at www.geocities.ws/indigate. Although it has been abandoned by me after my graduation in late 2007 and no update has been made since then, it makes for a good read for Arabic readers and people interested in rediscovering the emerging India. Currently the website doesn’t deliver the same look and feel it once had as some of its elements were not properly archived and some of its links are broken especially AkhbarulHind website which I created subsequently to circumvent disc space limitations of Geocities. The latter was dedicated for publishing news and special coverage about India in international media that I used to translate from English to Arabic, helping me to hone my writing skills and build a successful career trajectory as a bilingual editor.

On the other hand, in many instances I would feel high-spirited when some of my Kuwaiti professors and later many of my colleagues at work in the UAE would show deep admiration of my unique writing style in Arabic. To impart what I have learnt throughout these years to my fellow countrymen as well as the wider English speaking expatriate community in GCC, I launched LearnArabic in 2016 with a vision to make learning Arabic easier and accessible to everyone after nearly a decade of my first foray into the cyberspace with bavabathulHind. The launch also marked my comeback to cyberspace after a self-imposed exile during which I launched an e-commerce venture in 2011 that went bust without making significant progress. The failure of the e-commerce venture led me to a serious introspection on how I can build on my erstwhile success story of bavabathulHind, to empower my countrymen and other non-Arabic speakers who are eager to get their hands on the much-needed language skills.

As the slogan of the website “Learning Arabic Made Easier” signifies, in launching LearnArabic website, my aim is to create a free, easy-to-use and interactive platform which uses expressions closer to real life scenarios and situations. To ensure seamless access to our lessons for everyone, “LearnArabic” offers its lessons absolutely free unlike many similar websites which would ask you to pay for their online lessons. The website also aims to help non-native expatriates working and living in the GCC countires as well as those who search better pastures here boost their career propsects as proficiency in Arabic is becoming increasingly important for job seekers in the Gulf countries.The websit also aims to support the growing trend among regional governments to promote Arabic in government transactions.

Language is an integral part of culture and there is an inseparable relationship between both of them. By teaching others our language, we not only promote our culture, but also influence perceptions, and gather support for our just causes. As a way of saying thank you to Kuwait, my second home which enveloped me with its kindness and warmth for nearly 11 years as a scholarship student, and to the UAE, my third home which continues to overwhelm me with its efficiency, openness and expat-friendly atmosphere, I am using across LearnArabic lessons a combination of Kuwaiti conversational language as well as the names of the UAE landmarks and streets. But it doesn’t limit the usefulness of these lessons because all Gulf dialects are closer to each other which prompted me to name it GCC spoken Arabic. I have also provided colloquial variants wherever necessary, including the Levant and Egyptian dialects, alongside the modern standard Arabic, the backbone of the Arabic language.

Thank you visiting the website and I wish you all a productive journey with LearnArabic, in the same way I started my journey with this wonderful language nearly two decades ago.

Mohamed Abdul Jaleel
Founder, LearnArabic, An ownline Initiative