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Asian language translations: Arabic

Asia is a land boasting a wealth of languages that are both wonderful and wonderfully complex, languages that have retained an air of mystery throughout the ages.
Here at Soget Est, we have been specializing in the translation of Asian languages for years and look to the East with great fondness. Over the years, we have developed specific expertise in professional translation from and into the three most widely used languages in Asia: Chinese, Japanese and Arabic.

This short guide is designed to provide a little insight into the history, main linguistic characteristics and the various aspects that make Arabic such a fascinating language.

ARABIC: A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY

The Arabic language (al-ʿarabiyya, or simply ʿarabī) is Semitic in origin. First appearing in north-western Arabia during the Iron Age, it is now the lingua franca of the Arab world.
Despite numerous changes over the course of history, which have resulted in a language seemingly very different to Latin, Arabic writing also stems from the Phoenician alphabet.
On top of this, another interesting aspect of Arabic — one that further narrows the gap between this language and its western counterparts — is its influence on Italian, which can be traced back to the Middle Ages.
Over this period, numerous Arabic words were assimilated into everyday Italian, especially in fields in which the Arabs excelled: navigation, trade, mathematics and astronomy. n many cases, there are historical records tracing the origin of the terms back to the exact period in history when they were first adopted.

So how many people speak Arabic today? And what do we mean by the Arab people?

THERE ARE CURRENTLY AN ESTIMATED 422 MILLION OR SO PEOPLE WHO SPEAK ARABIC, WHICH HENCE RANKS AS THE FIFTH MOST WIDELY SPOKEN LANGUAGE IN THE WORLD AND ONE OF THE SIX OFFICIAL UNITED NATIONS LANGUAGES. IN ADDITION, CLASSICAL ARABIC IS THE PRAYER LANGUAGE OF 1.7 BILLION MUSLIMS.

The term Arab people, on the other hand, refers to individuals who live in regions stretching from Mesopotamia in the east to the mountains of Lebanon in the west, across the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa.
Today, Arabic is divided into a number of dialects, which are not always mutually understood. It is Classical Arabic, though, that is recognized as the official language for use in the media, publications, education, religion and international relations.

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS

Arabic features highly complex grammar and has an abundance of uvular, fricative and pharyngeal consonants that make it hard to pronounce, especially for Europeans. Nonetheless, it has proved to be a language that lends itself beautifully to poetry.

The main linguistic characteristics of Arabic are listed below:

  • Arabic is written and read from right to left.
    An exception to this rule are numbers that — in both western and traditional digits — are written from left to right.
  • The pages of a book are turned the opposite way to books written in Latin characters, while lines are read from top to bottom.
  • The 28 letters making up the alphabet have 4 different forms depending on whether they are located at the beginning of a word, in the middle, at the end or stand on their own.
  • There are no capital letters, nor is there any clear distinction between italic characters and their printed equivalents.

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Arabic translation