São Paulo – Learning a language away from the country where it is spoken can be very difficult. With that in mind, in 2012, the Lebanese-born, French-based Antoine Rizk created the website Abjadiye (Lebanese Arabic alphabet), to help his children learn the language. Now, the site has a version in Brazilian Portuguese.
The portal was originally created with English and French versions, and then Philippe Gebara, a philosophy professor from Rio de Janeiro, developed the Brazilian version. His grandparents are Lebanese and he lived in Lebanon for eight months, while studying to be a priest.
Gebara gave up priesthood, but the months spent attending Arabic classes while preparing for his religious career laid the groundwork for him to adapt the lessons to the Portuguese language. He became aware of the site while still in Lebanon, contacted Rizk and offered to create the Brazilian Portuguese version of Abjadiye.
“I am also an English and French translator. I did the translation because I realized that resources were lacking here (when it came to learning the language). I was enthusiastica bout it because I like Arabic and the Lebanese variation of it,” he says.
The website’s national version took about five months to create and was completed in the second half last year. Abjadiye contains 99 lessons divided into three modules. It teaches students to introduce themselves, talk about food, shopping, nationalities, and how to proceed at the bank, the drugstore or the doctor’s office, among other situations.
“The biggest problem of the Arab world is that people start their learning process with literary Arabic, but when the time comes to actually speak, it is useless. In the Middle East, you need dialectal Arabic,” says Gebara. He is referring to the fact that traditional language courses focus on classical Arabic, used in newspapers, books and TV newscasts, but not spoken on a daily basis by Arab populations.
Gebara points out that the site can be used by children and adults alike. “The course takes a communicative approach, with very realistic situations. It sets out to remove the obstacles for people who want to get closer to the Arabic language. It is an invitation for people to overcome the myth that Arabic is too difficult,” he claims.
Abjadiye is a paid service, but offers a few test lessons free of charge. The website’s address is www.abjadiye.com.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
