Comedy, storytelling and vowelling: Social media celebrates Arabic Language Day

Published December 19th, 2016 - 09:13 GMT
UNESCO has made December 18 Arabic Language Day (Wikipedia)
UNESCO has made December 18 Arabic Language Day (Wikipedia)

Since 2010, the UN has designated December 18 Arabic Language Day in order "to celebrate multilingualism and cultural diversity as well as to promote equal use of all six of its official working languages throughout the organization".

Spoken by at least 250 million people worldwide, and with a rich literary history, the Arabic language has much to be proud of. Here are some of the best social media posts celebrating every element of the Arabic language:

1. Its word structure:

2 Its global popularity:

Our language is our identity. 18/December International Day for the language of the Koran and the language of the "daad" [Arabic's unique letter]

The image, produced by “Infographic Saudi Arabia” includes the following facts:

Half-a-billion: The number of Arabic speakers, 6.6% of the population of the Earth.
Arabic letters are the second most commonly used after Latin letters.
Fourth place among the [most commonly spoken] languages of the world
26 countries have Arabic as an official language.

3 Its oral storytelling traditions:

Witness the beauty of the Arabic language in the story of Al-Asma'i and the Bedouin!

4 Its use in music:


Taloomni Al Donya Poem

5 The intricacies of getting it right in Arabic:

Three Arabic letters and six different meanings.

6 And the very many ways you can go wrong in this complex language, as Egyptian President Sisi demonstrates here:

The video begins: “The President made 116 mistakes during his speech”. It proceeds by showing us some of Sisi’s grammatical errors in speech, interspersed with clips from a comedy film in which a teacher decries the mistakes of his pupils.

7 Finally, of course, Arabs celebrated the beauty of their language:

My language is seas full of beauty
 
RA

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