Hi! I am sure you’ve been asked this question quite a lot but it genuinely intrigues me. As an Iraqi, I’ve always hated Arabic classes (a very popular feeling among students here in Iraq) and switched to English-medium schools from 7th grade; never used MSA beside mandatory schoolwork, and almost never in med school beside a few tiny mandatory modules required from the ministry for things unrelated to medicine anyway. I have C1 English, C1 French and started learning German so all my consumption of social media, literature, poetry, news, pop-culture etc are in either English, French or both. Not only out of convenience but even as a native I never understood MSA poetry and could never read more than 10 pages without losing the thread. Don’t get me wrong, I am a proud Iraqi but I only find comfort in my own dialect 😅

So, out of curiosity, why would someone look for learning Arabic where the only things he can’t find in non-Arabic outlets are virtually always religious (Quran, Hadith, etc) ? Please don’t judge me I am genuinely curious, and I know Arab-purists would eat me alive for this 😅

For example that in the word سُؤَالٌ you don't pronounce ؤَ. How am I supposed to know if she doesn't tell me? Nobody every mentions these things.

I recently discovered this sub and as a native speaker I’m just realizing how difficult it is for you all 💀 I have a question, do you learn إعراب (I’rab) and قواعد (Kawa’ed) at all? Those used to make me contemplate death at school
And how did you start to learn? I know Arabic is a very different system from most other languages but I would never imagine myself re-learning all that, although it’s a beautiful language.

Do you know the difference between a مفعول به and مفعول فيه, and do you bother with grammatical endings at all? Or is your approach different in a way that you learn just what you need in order to speak your dialect? I’m interested to know how that experience is for you

Hey everyone,
I’m looking for some advice on how to get past a massive wall I’ve hit with my Arabic.

A bit of background: I was born in Jordan to Arab parents but have lived most of my life in Portugal (went to Portuguese schools, now in uni here). I speak Levantine Arabic with my parents and extended family every single day. I literally think in the language. But I never actually learned how to read or write it.
A couple of years ago, I tried learning via Duolingo. I managed to learn the alphabet and read/write a few basic words, but I hit two huge roadblocks:

1. No Harakat: Whenever I try to read anything outside of an app (the news, WhatsApp messages, books, Twitter), there are no vowels.

2. Fusha vs. Ammiya: The MSA (Fusha) taught in apps or used in the news feels like a totally different language compared to the Jordanian Arabic I speak daily. Because the vocabulary is different, I can’t rely on my spoken knowledge to guess the unvoweled words through context.

I currently have free access to Duolingo Super, and Gemini Pro in case they’re helpful.

My questions for you all and specially to anyone who was in a similar situation are:

How did you actually make the jump to reading without harakat? What was your step-by-step process?

And what suggestions do you have for me

I’m seeing so many options - what’s the easiest or most common way to say “I struggle with” in Levantine Arabic, preferably Lebanese?

I’ve been using تتعذّب (تتعذّب مع الصحة النفسية) but not sure if it’s correct, I guess that’s more like “she suffers from mental health” correct?

Ex.
“She struggled with her mental health”
“He struggles with math”
“I struggled to complete the hike”

Thank you!

Hey there, I'm Iranian and i'm thinking of learning arabic as something to do on the side seeing as i already know very barebones basic arabic from the iranian school curriculum, and that i already speak 4 languages

but i was wondering if it'd actually be worth it? from what i know, arabs can't communicate easily with different flavors of arab and it seems a bit extra, and the talk about different dialects seems to complicate it even more. can one learn conversational arabic from western sources? if i learn say levantine arabic, can i speak with my tunisian friends? can i use the standard arabic they teach in books for casual conversation?

i was wondering if it's worth it? if i learnt a dialect of arabic, could i actually put it to use somehow?

i always struggle with remembering/finding all of the arabic stuff like ای، من، عن، کان، لکن، هذا، جئت، لیس، عند، etc.

is there a list of just these words in specific? the ones you can't go without using in like almost every sentence? also, i'd be glad to know what they're called because i'm a bit dumb

I know it's supposed to be masculine but I feel like people who use it in English generally use it more neutrally. Is it common among Arabic speakers? Not really learning Arabic just curious

اخواتي انا مصري واتعرفت على حد أجنبي وبعلمه العربية

طلب مني مسلسل أو برنامج يتفرج عليه ويكون بالعربي ومعاه subtitles عربي وانجليزي بحيث يشوف الكلام العربي مكتوب وكمان يفهم بالانجليزي

حد يعرف حاجة زي كده ضروري ؟؟

Disclaimer: using images are clearly superior to “nativize” the word from the beginning , but here I’m talking about those words which cannot be conveyed by image alone.

I’ve seen quite a few people speak against word for word literal translation however :

1: How else is an absolute beginner supposed to learn vocabulary? Going through an entire Sarf course and then being given root letters to figure it out by intuition ? (The potential meanings of roots would have to be presented with translation anyway)

2: After enough repetition the translation fades away over time , and you can start intuitively making connections with other words derived from the same root. The initial translation was just a bridge , nothing more .

I'm not trying to disrespect any particular influencer or claim my Arabic is better.

But I've noticed that when I listen to Arabic-speaking polyglot influencers, they sound noticeably different from native speakers. It's not just incorrect pronunciation and grammar but the entire word order and cadence feels off. A bit robot-like.

Furthermore, most of them do scripted videos with lots of cuts and rarely speak live. Or when they do speak live, it's something extremely basic like saying "hi" on Omegle or ordering at a restaurant where the conversation can be anticipated and planned ahead of time.

Are there any non-native speakers who have done a live interview in Arabic on something technical beyond just "this is who I am and this is how I learned Arabic"? Personally, I can't name a single one. Perhaps I'm just being too harsh though. Can anyone more well-versed confirm?

I am currently having 3 lessons per week learning Arabic (specifically the Palestinian dialect).

I am currently A1-A2 level and Alhamdulillah I have not found it too hard learning so far as I have been exposed to Arabic speakers etc.

One thing I'm really struggling with is reading the Arabic alphabet. I'm really struggling to recognise what the letters are when they start / connect / end, and even if I can read the word I read extremely slow. It's like I have a block in my brain (generally in English I am very good at reading/writing/spelling)

Any advice or tips on how to improve this? I am planning to ask my tutor for a lesson dedicated on reading and writing as we haven't had any.

Thank you

I am fluent in urdu and english, and want to expand my languages to include Arabic. I already have a very rudimentary understanding of Arabic, and want to learn fusha and maybe some dialect. Is there any good online apps or programs with which I can learn Arabic tailor made for my abilities? (an online teacher would be amazing)

Hello I’m trying to learn Arabic and I’m trying to find apps that don’t require you to use a subscription to learn the language and I want something that’s accurate and more useful for making conversations! Please let me know🙏🙏 and im