Well, after some trial and error I am proud to announce that the Arabic letters application is now online. Please head over to the website and try it out as soon as you can. I am sure that this will help all Arabic learners to get a good grasp of the Arabic letters and their sounds.

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Physical Arabic Dictionaries

Al-Mawrid

Arabic Dictionary: al-Mawrid

Hans Wehr

Arabic Dictionary: Hans Wehr

Generally speaking, al-Mawrid is more up-to-date than the Hans Wehr dictionary, but the latter just as frequently contains words that are not included in al-Mawrid. I’d recommend getting both actually. They are both incredibly useful Arabic dictionaries.

Arabic-English Thematic Lexicon

Arabic Dictionary: Thematic Lexicon

Online Arabic Dictionaries

Sakhr

Arabic Dictionary: Sakhr

Apart from English it also translates from/to Turkish, French and German. Sometimes there is no entry for a word in Arabic-English, but a match in one of the other languages. So if you know any of the other languages try those too.

Google Translate

Arabic Dictionary: Google Translate

Make Frequent Use Of Your Arabic Dictionary

Whichever Arabic dictionary you prefer (or a combination), make sure that you get to know its structure so that you can look up unknown Arabic words fast. If you have the time, it’s a great idea to take a look at related words under the same root. This way maybe one of them will stick in your memory. And remember that nothing can replace a native Arabic speaker who explains the word to you with some examples – not even an Arabic dictionary.

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Note that the following sentences have been caught “in the wild” and they do not all conform to grammatical and orthographical standards.

Example: a conversation between friends

A: wlah emta 5atbti? wlah ma 7d 5abrni 2lf mabruk ya 7lwe!
B: katrin 7bebty alah ebarek fiki 3orsi fi 21-5 anshlh

Now for the “translation” or transliteration into Arabic script:

A: ولله امت خطبت؟ ولله ما احد خبرني. ألف مبروك يا حلوة
A: By god when did you get engaged? No one tolde me. Congratulations honey!

B: كترين حبيبتي الله يبارك فيك. عرسي في 5 21 إن شاء الله
B: Katrin darling, thank you for your wishes. My wedding is on the 21st of May God willing.

As you can see it’s really not that difficult to understand the Arabic chat alphabet once you get the hang of the numbers representing certain letters. Of course, often it might take you some time to decode the message if it’s written in a dicalect you are not familiar with.

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As you read this article you’ll discover exactly how you can use your knowledge of Arabic to pick up Persian extremely fast.

Let’s look at a brief paragraph taken from an article on the BBC’s Persian website. Try to identify the words you already know from Arabic and guess the general meaning of the text.

حامد کرزی رئیس جمهوری افغانستان فردا برای یک سفر پنج روزه به آمریکا می رود. مقامهای افغان می گویند که این سفر اهمیت زیادی برای آینده روابط دو کشور و امنیت منطقه دارد. ده وزیر افغان حامد کرزی را در سفر به آمریکا همراهی می کنند. مبارزه مشترک با تروریسم از جمله مسائل مهم مطرح در این سفر خواهد بود

Here’s the same Persian text again, this time with some help:

In the extract I have indicated names of countries and persons in green, words of Western origin in turquoise and words that Arabic speakers will recognize in yellow. Of the 60 words, 27 are already familiar to someone with knowledge of Arabic. Of course, the remaining 23 words make up a huge part of the text and without knowing their meaning it is difficult to gain a complete understanding. Nevertheless, the yellow, green and turquoise words alone should be enough to get the gist of what’s going on.

Hamid Karzai, president, republic, Afghanistan, journey, America
position, Afghan, journey, importance, relations, and, safety, region
minister, Afghan, Hamid Karzai, journey, America
duel, shared, terrorism, sum, questions, important, discussed (think: maTrooH)

As can be seen from the example of maTraH, words of Arabic origin need not mean exactly the same in Persian. However, it is always a good idea to look back at the roots and think of possible alternative usages. For instance, maTraH clearly derives from TaRaHa and has as one of its root meanings “to bring up (an issue) for discussion”.

The words of non-Arabic origin in the extract are in fact relatively simple:

With this help you should be able to understand almost everything. Of course, some of the finer grammatical points will not be immediately clear, but this does not impact the meaning too much:

“The president of the Afghan republic, Hamid Karzai, is going on a five-day trip to America. Afghan sources say that this trip has great importance for the future of the two countries’ relations and for regional security. Ten Afghan ministers accompany Hamid Karzai on the trip. The joint fight against terrorism will be one of a number of important issues that will be raised in this trip.”

So how can you take advantage of your Arabic vocabulary when learning Persian? The first step is to engage with short Persian texts that deal with topics you are at least somewhat familiar with. Highlight the words you recognize and try to get the gist of the text. After a while you might notice that a few Persian words seem to appear very frequently (e.g. yek – “one”). Look these words up in a dictionary and see if you remember them later on.

In a second step you should get hold of a few Persian language courses to learn the basic words that are in common usage and to learn a few basic grammar rules (e.g. verbs generally go at the end of a sentence, basic conjugations etc.). Then you will be equipped to have a very good reading knowledge of Persian.

It is then up to you to decide whether you want to learn how to speak in Persian, to understand spoken Persian and to write Persian. Whatever you decide to do you will have a huge advantage.

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1. First of all, let me make it clear that there are no fast fixes for vocabulary, perhaps with the exception of so-called “cognates” – words of English origin that have become a part of the Arabic language. If you haven’t doen so already I suggest you download my free report on over 200 such words here: Arabic Words.

2. You need to understand that Arabic is based on a system of roots. For example, the three letters K -T – B (كتب) can be used to form a vast number of words, such as kaatib - writer, kitaab - book, istiktaab - dictation, maktoob - written, kitaaba - writing etc. Most of these derivations are formed according to rules that can be learned easily. Once you have mastered these grammatical rules you will be able not only to guess the meaning of many unknown words, but to “invent” or “guess” new words yourself. So a good place to start your campaign to increase your Arabic vocabulary would be to take a good look at the grammatical forms that can be derived from a root.

3. Read extensively. What I mean by this is that you should try to read as much and as widely as possible. Only be seeing an Arabic word in multiple contexts repeatedly will you be able to build up the required connections in your brain to recognize it and remember its meaning accurately at a later point. Learning vocabulary from lists is very inefficient, as it strips the word from its meaningful context.

4. Read intensively. This is the counterpart to step 3: often, you should try to read a single piece of writing multiple times. Read it silently at first and then try to read it out aloud. A third pass through the text could have you trying to emphasise words for meaning, like in a theatre play.

5. Use audio whenever you can get hold of it. Using an audio recording of a text in conjunction with the text itself is not only good for Arabic pronunciation, but it also gives your brain another chance to absorb the new words.

6. Use memory techniques to remember stubborn words. As you know (see my method for learning the Arabic alphabet) I’m a big fan of mnemonics, or memory techniques that speed up learning. An example of such a technique for remembering Arabic vocabulary words would be this: “black” in Arabic is aswad. Visualize spilling dark black ink on a swot (a geek) in a classroom back at school. This little story allows you to associate the sound of the word aswad with its meaning black.

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Remember that the best way to improve your pronunciation is through listening. And I mean a lot of listening. Start by listening to recordings of the individual sounds and then proceed to listening to recordings of individual words, before listening to whole sentences.

To make learning the Arabic sounds easier I have divided them into three groups, easy, medium and hard:

1. Easy Arabic Sounds

The following Arabic letters are pronounced more or less like in English:

ا           ā          long <a> sound like in the English word “mad”

ء          ’           a glottal stop; depending on where it’s put it can be a short “u”, “a”, or “i” sound

ب         b          the same as our English “b” in “bread”

ت          t           the same as our English “t” in “tea”

ث          th         like the “th”-sound in “three”; but not like the <th> in “there”!

ج           dj         as in the <j>-sound in the name “John”

د           d          the same as our English “d” in “door”

ذ            dh        like the <th> sound in “there”; but not like the <th> in “three”!

ز           z          the same as our English “z” in “zoo”

س          s          the same as our English “s” in “serpent”

ش          sh        the same as our English “sh” in “shine”

ف          f          the same as our English “f” in “ferry”

ك          k          the same as our English “k” in “kilo”

ل          l           the same as our English “l” in “look”

ن          n          the same as our English “n” in “nose”

م            m         the same as our English “m” in “mouse”

ه            h          the same as our English “h” in “hurricane”

و           w         the same as our English “w” in “water”

و           ū          a long “u”-sound as in our English word “boom”

ي          y          the same as our English “y” in “year”

ي          ī           a long “i”-sound, like the two “e”s in “three”

2. Medium Arabic Sounds

Arabic sounds that are slightly different from English:

ر           r           similar to the English “r”- sound at the beginning of a word, e.g. in “road”, but more towards the front of the tongue and trilled like the Spanish “r”

ح          H         similar to the English letter “h”, but stronger and more from the throat

ص       S          similar to the English letter “s”, but more emphatic and “darker”

ض       D         similar to the English letter “d”, but more emphatic and “darker”

ط           T          similar to the English letter “t”, but more emphatic and “darker”

ظ          Z         sounds like a “darker” version of the Arabic “dh” sound

3. Hard Arabic Sounds

These Arabic sounds have no direct equivalent in the English language and they are difficult to pronounce at first.

خ           kh        like the <ch> sound in the English word “loch”; if you know German, it’s the <ch> sound in the word “Sprache” or the “j” in the Spanish word “jamón”.

ع          c          this sounds like a high-pitched version of the English <a> sound, but squeezed from the back of the throat

غ          gh        the same position of the throat as above, but the tongue touches the roof of the mouth; like a French “r”

ق          q          like the English letter “k”, but produced from much further back the throat and much “darker”

I hope this short blog post helps you get to grips with the sounds in the Arabic alphabet. If you want to learn how to read and write Arabic, then please check out my digital book The Magic Key To The Arabic Alphabet.

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Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) is a variant of the Arabic language that is used mainly in writing and in formal situations. It developed out of Classical Arabic, but differs in a number of respects from it; especially in the field of vocabulary. Nevertheless, the two variants of Arabic, (MSA) and Classical, are very close and are considered by many Arabs to be essentially the same. Arabs refer to both as اللغة العربية الفصحى (al-lugha al-3arabiyya al-fuS-Ha) or simply as الفصحى (al-fuS-Ha) or فصحى (fus-Ha).

Modern Standard Arabic And The Arabic Dialects

The Modern Arabic language is characterized by diglossia: MSA is used in writing and in official or formal communication and the Arabic colloquial dialects are used in everyday life. The dialects can differ drastically from Modern Standard Arabic and vary widely from one country to another. In all Arab countries, the national language is composed of various local dialects more or less distant from the Modern Standard Arabic.

However, with rising levels of education and modernization of lifestyles, the gap between the written standard and spoken vernaculars tends to decrease. Given the reality of linguistic exchange, there is no watertight separation between written Arabic and spoken Arabic, but a continuum dominated by mixed forms. Arabic speakers combine to varying degrees depending on the context elements unique to their colloquial dialect and others borrowed from the written language.

Generally speaking, the colloquial Arabic dialects are not written and Modern Standard Arabic is used instead. However, of late, more and more colloquial dialects are represented in e.g. newspaper interviews, comic strips and dialogues in novels.

Dialect Or Modern Standard Arabic – What Should You Learn?

Many Arabic learners are surprised by the fact that just learning e.g. Egyptian Arabic will not allow them to understand media from other Arab countries or read Arabic books. Likewise, only knowing Modern Standard Arabic without at least some knowledge of the Arabic dialects will make it difficult to communicate with every Arab.

As a rule of thumb, every Arab understands Modern Standard Arabic, due to its importance as the language used in the media and in religious and state education. The Arabic learner who acquires a sound foundation in MSA will have no problem making himself understood anywhere in the Arab world. However, many Arabs only have a passive knowledge of MSA and will not be able to answer you in MSA, replying instead in their own dialect.

Learning an Arabic dialect is much easier with a thorough knowledge of Modern Standard Arabic, as many dialect words and expressions derive from Classical Arabic. Of course, the reverse also holds true. However, just learning a particular dialect will not allow you to appreciate much of the Arab media and Arabic literature. Nor will it allow you to communicate fully with Arabs from other countries.

My advice is to learn both Modern Standard Arabic and at least one dialect. After mastering both, you are almost at the level of native Arabic speakers who also know at least their own dialect and some degree of MSA.

A good place to start learning MSA would be with the Arabic script.

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There are a number of reasons for this. I explain the three most common problems and show you how to overcome them.

Problem 1: Arabic letters are different

The most important reason is probably that the letters of the Arabic alphabet do not look anything like our letters. We have not been exposed to the intricate Arabic shapes before, so there is nothing stored in our brains with which to associate the letters. Many Arabic learners who just start out get increasingly frustrated as they try to memorize the shapes of some new Arabic letter just to discover that they have forgotten the shape of the Arabic letters they had learned before.

Solution: You need to find something familiar that you can relate the new shapes and sounds to. I developed a method that does just that. In my book The Magic Key To The Arabic Alphabet I give you a memory image (mnemonic) for each of the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet that will help you remember those shapes and associate them with their sounds without need for rote learning.

Problem 2: Short vowels are not written

In the Arabic script the short vowels, such as “a”, “i”, and “u” are not usually written. So a word like “could” would be written as just “cd” and a word such as “think” would be “thnk”. This can cause a lot of problems, especially early on when you stil don’t know that many Arabic words. For example, the letters “ktb” could mean “he wrote” or “book”, depending on the missing short vowels.

Solution: Start with familiar words first. Using the unique method in my book you will be writing English words using the Arabic alphabet letters first until you are completely comfortable with the Arabic script. Only then will I teach you how to write Arabic words. This way you will learn the Arabic alphabet much faster than with traditional methods.

Problem 3: Arabic letters change their shape

The Arabic letters change their shapes according to whether or not they are connected to adjoining letters. Sometimes the changes are so drastic that it seems that there is hardly any relationships between the two shapes. This can be extremely confusing.

Solution: The key is to understand why the Arabic letters change their shapes when they are connected to adjoining letters. And contrary to what many Arabic teachers will have you believe, there really are logical reasons for why the shapes change. For example, the letter “meem” (م) has a very long “tail”. But, it would be difficult to connect “meem” to another letter on the left if the tail was kept. So it’s only logical that the tail would be cut to make it easier to join with the next letter. In my book I show you exactly how the shapes of the letters of the Arabic alphabet change and why.

Learning the Arabic alphabet is easy with the right method

So, in conclusion, while the Arabic alphabet really does have its difficulties, I strongly believe that with the right method anyone can learn to read and write Arabic and master the Arabic alphabet. So, check out my book on the Arabic alphabet.

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These resources are completely free to use!

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