This past Saturday, I was down in Khan el-Khalili (the medieval bazaar) in Islamic Cairo for a few hours. I wasn’t specifically there to look at Arabic scripts. My daughter was doing a photo shoot for some high school graduates, and I was the equipment carrier. Over my 32 years in Egypt, I have no idea how many times I have walked through those alleys, but it never gets old for me!

One thing that caught my eye this time was the wide range of interesting Arabic scripts used in signs in the area. So I decided to grab some quick photos as I went. Take a look at these pics and see if you can read the Arabic in them (some of them have English also on the sign, but just read the Arabic!).

I’m not a great photographer by any standards, and my phone is an iPhone Xr, so lots of mediocre in the photos as photos! But hopefully the Arabic fonts are as interesting to you as they were to me.

If you are interested in Arabic calligraphy and fonts, you might find my PDF “Timeless Beauty” interesting. You can access it on the Arabic Calligraphy page of this site.

Mohsen’s jewelry | مصوغات محسن مجوهرات

As a prominent and vital part of our global linguistic landscape, the Arabic language plays a significant role in global communication, culture, and politics. With a rich history and evolution, the Arabic language has been shaped by its use in religious, cultural, and political contexts.

The Origin of the Arabic Language

Arabic has its roots in the Semitic languages spoken by people in the Arabian Peninsula around the 1st century CE (Versteegh, 2014). Other Semitic languages, including Aramaic, Akkadian, and Canaanite, influenced the earliest forms of Arabic. Inscriptions dating back to the 4th century CE contain some of the oldest written records of the Arabic language.

These early forms can be grouped into Old Arabic and Old North Arabian. People spoke Old Arabic in the central and southern parts of the Arabian Peninsula, while Old North Arabian was spoken in the northern part (Al-Jallad, 2018). Over time, trade and cultural exchanges led to the evolution of these early forms, and other languages such as Persian and Greek influenced their development.

Hi everyone,

Just a quick note to let you know that from Wednesday September 7 to Saturday September 10, 2022, you can get a copy of my book Fifteen Essential Skills of an Arabic Learner for free.

Happy start of your academic year!

What makes some people who try to learn Arabic succeed, while others fail? What will help you become fluent, where others have not been able to? This short book is based on the ideas shared by six internationally recognized leaders in the field of Arabic language learning as they were asked these questions. Their ideas are organized into four different categories: mindset, habits, systems, and interactions. As you launch your journey of learning Arabic, or continue to press forward in it, these skills will prove invaluable to you as you work towards fluency in the Arabic language. It is not a technical book about the Arabic language (which most aspiring Arabic learners usually start with). It is a book about how you can learn Arabic successfully. If you incorporate these 15 skills into your Arabic-learning approach, you will become fluent much more quickly.

I am pleased to announce that my book 15 Essential Skills of an Arabic Leaner has now been published on Amazon!

For the coming 5 days (Jan. 27-31), the book will be available for free.

(The button takes you to Amazon.com. You can also access it on Amazon in the UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, India, Netherlands, Japan, Brazil , and Mexico.)

What makes some people who try to learn Arabic succeed, while others fail? What will help you become fluent, where others have not been able to? This short book is based on the ideas shared by six internationally recognized leaders in the field of Arabic language learning as they were asked these questions. Their ideas are organized into four different categories: mindset, habits, systems, and interactions. As you launch your journey of learning Arabic, or continue to press forward in it, these skills will prove invaluable to you as you work towards fluency in the Arabic language.

It is not a technical book about the Arabic language (which most aspiring Arabic learners usually start with). It is a book about how you can learn Arabic successfully. If you incorporate these 15 skills into your Arabic-learning approach, you will become fluent much more quickly.

This book has been a long time in coming. I did the interviews for it in 2016. I guess life has been busy! I hope that this is helpful for some of you Arabic Learners out there.

Please feel free to grab the book while it is free, from January 27-31. It’s only 110 pages, so it doesn’t take long to read. If you had a chance to read it and leave a review, I would love that!