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October 17, 2005
On Arabic, Training, Provincialism and Stereotypes
There is an a moderately amusing column of comments on The Washington Monthly's Political Animal blog with respect to the Arabic training arty that appeared in The Washington Post (See my earlier note On American Diplos....
Among the items that has cropped up is the "why would anyone want to study Arabic" as well as the Arabs evil.
I reproduce here for the amusement value my reply to this brilliantly provincial comment:
You know, what I missed in this whole discussion is the countries themselves. I've lived abroad in 3 countries and I have to say: There's almost nothing in this world that would convince me to live in one of the countries where we need Arabic speakers. I mean, architecture and literature and culture are great... but eventually I need to go out with my friends, get drunk, and get laid. I mean, come on -- do you know anyone dying to live in any of Pakistan, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, UAE or Saudi Arabia?Compare those to West Europe, East Europe, and South America. Why on earth would anyone want to spend the 2-4 years living in one of those countries that is required to reach a level 4 fluency when there are so many nicer, more tolerant places to live?
My dear Earl, besides being terribly provincial, I am afraid I find your comment rather silly.
Having lived across the region for somewhat over a decade, and doing business in the region, I can assure you that going out, drinking, and having fun are quite possible in Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Dubai and Lebanon.
Is it Brasil? No it is not, but different tastes and utility curves and all that.
I should also observe that in my time as a private citizen in Cairo I observed a boggling number of Westerners that very much loved living in Cairo (for all that it is the one city on the planet which I thoroughly despise, but again each to his own); the ancient monuments, the culture, the ability to whore about with belly dancers in truly strange underground (not legally, literally subterannean) clubs, etc. apparently outweighed the pollution and chaos. (Although I would advise against hitting the raki / araq too much, it does terrible things)
However, I assure you that one can have lots of 'fun' in the manner you imply in Dubai, in Beiruit, in Casablanca, a bit less so in Tunis - rather less so in Bahrain..... Contra the sad stereotypes, the Middle East and North Africa are not one big Saudi Arabia.
Now, if one is learning Arabic, in fact you bloody well should avoid these things as one needs to be working like a madman and dedicated, not fucking around like a besotted git.
Posted by The Lounsbury at October 17, 2005 03:00 PM
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MENA Region General
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Comments
When I was an undergraduate Arabic was taught by the Linguistics Department and was a graduate student-only course of study. My petition to study Arabic was denied because the department wanted to keep it that way (I was already fluent in Russian and fairly so in Chinese).
Is it surprising that there aren't a huge number of Arabic speakers here when such barriers are thrown in their way?
Ironically, that's the same department from which Juan Cole began his Arabic studies (I believe) just a few years later. Perhaps my (and my advisors') advocacy helped his way along.
Posted by: Dave Schuler at October 17, 2005 05:44 PM
Now, if one is learning Arabic, in fact you bloody well should avoid these things as one needs to be working like a madman and dedicated, not fucking around like a besotted git.
I never found the two to be mutually exclusive, at least not if one has any sort of formal grammar foundation to begin with; my favorite fluency improvement technique was always "let's fall head over heels for someone who speaks no English." But then formal grammar, etc. were always my strong point, and slang and shyness always the big barriers to sounding like a native speaker. And one must be careful of the linguistic background of the object of one's affections, or one ends up with odd regional accents and confuses the hell out of people.
Posted by: Eva Luna at October 18, 2005 04:26 AM
This is the Arab world my dear, banging about drunk as one can do in Russia doesn't work as well. It also gets in the way of learning the classical grammar, which while not as horrible as some make out, does require much memorisation.
Posted by: The Lounsbury at October 18, 2005 10:46 AM
This is the Arab world my dear, banging about drunk as one can do in Russia doesn't work as well.
Who said anyone was running around drunk? I get drunk at precise 18-year intervals; it's not my preferred form of troublemaking. But that still leaves some pretty fun ways of getting into trouble, ones which are much more conducive to actually remembering the slang one learns while thusly engaged.
Posted by: Eva Luna at October 18, 2005 03:13 PM
Gah, just looked at the comments section. Kevin Drum really, really needs to be more aggressive about banning the hell out of certain posters.
Posted by: Tom Scudder at October 21, 2005 09:13 PM
Ah, you mean Mak?
He reminds me of my fine Anglo relatives (as if I had anything else) who bang on about the evils of the Papists, who evidently do X, Y, an Z and all right thinking people hate them.
Same kind of people, really.
Posted by: The Lounsbury at October 21, 2005 10:04 PM
