1

Arabization and Translation: Focus on Lexical Issues

Abdelaziz KESBI
University Hassan II Mohammedia

Abstract
This article addresses the issue of Arabization and translation with a focus on the
lexicographic deficiencies noted in Arabic dictionaries. These factors negatively
affect the success of the translation process. Exploring some dictionaries reveals
clearly some weaknesses and deficiencies in the Arabic terminology. In this article
we give some examples and propose some solutions that would hopefully promote
the field of translation, a condition sine qua non of any development in the Arab
world.
Cet a ti le t aite la uestio de la a isatio et de la t adu tio ave fo alisatio
sur les insuffisances lexicographiques notes dans les dictionnaires arabes.
Fa teu s e t ava t la ussite du p o essus de t adu tio . Lexplo atio de
e tai s di tio ai es dvoile lvide e les fai lesses et les a e es do t
souff e la te i ologie a a e. La ti le e do e uel ues illust atio s et p opose
des solutions qui seraient mme de permettre la promotion du domaine de la
traduction, condition sine qua non de tout dveloppement du monde arabe.

Throughout the literature, the concept of Arabization has had different meanings and
interpretations according to the perspective from which it was looked at. Indeed, one of its
important goals was, and still is, translation. This was mainly the result of the Arabs contact
with other cultures and languages. One of the main aims of Arabization was to adopt and
adapt western sciences through the coining of new Arabic terminologies. Yet throughout
history, Arab translators have faced many obstacles reflected in one of their important tools,
namely dictionaries. In fact, Arabic dictionaries reveal many deficiencies and weaknesses
such as the lack of indications of the etymology, neologism, references and contexts of the
translated terms. Besides, there are no delimitations between contemporary, classical, and
dialectal use of words. Last but not least, the reliance of Arab translators on different source
languages results in different translations for the same concept. Consequently, the users of
Arabic dictionaries encounter many problems related to terminological gaps. Translations
vary not only from one translator to another, from a country to another but even within the
same country. All of these problems have a great impact on the transmission of the language,
hence of knowledge. To make matters worse is the unawareness of many Arabic specialists,
as they are multilingual, of the necessity to develop Arabic terminology (Massoud, 2005).

Arabization and translation

The contact between Arabs and other foreign speech communities has led to the
flourishing of translation of the respective foreign sciences into Arabic. This included both
the form and the content. In the process of adopting western sciences, hence creating new
Arabic terminology, the Arabs devised different methods. When the Arabs influence was
great, they found new scientific information and data in the invaded countries. During the
Abbassid era, Arabs wrote in all the scientific domains with the help of translations of Greek
and Persian books. The technical words used had two origins: Arabic and those borrowed
from foreign languages. The procedure of Arabization in the past is illustrated in the work of
El Beirouni who used to follow different steps:
1- He used the new word once in its original language in order to make it known.
2 - If an equivalent word in Arabic existed, he used it.
3 - In some cases, he used the foreign term even if an equivalent one in Arabic
existed, if the foreign word were easier to use and nearer to the given thing.
4 - If the term were a widely used symbol, he used it (Abou Abdou, 1984).
Corpus Arabization is not a new notion, as it dates back to the pre-Islamic period.
Its main task is to develop Arabic through processes such as derivation /ichtiqa:q/,
compounding /nat/, metaphor /maa:z/, translation /tarama/, and borrowing /isti a:ra/
or /iqtira:D/ (Elbiad, 1985) (Al-Kasimi, 1987) 1.
Abou Abdou (ibid.) believes that Arabic is the language whose structure allows it to
coin many words via the process of derivation. From the simple root of three letters, a
number of new words can be formed. As an example, from the simple root /f

l/ many word

types such as, /fi l/, /fa u:l/, /fa ala:n/, /fa alah/ can be derived e.g. /k t b/: /kataba/ to write,
/ka:tib/ writer etc. Yet, before proceeding to the creation of new words, the competent
institutions of Arabization2 should define precisely the meaning of each word type in order
the derivation of words should not be done in a haphazard way.

Compounding is to make

up a word from two words or more in an attempt to shorten them, e.g. /zamaka:n/ space-time
from /zama:n/ time and /maka:n/ space. Metaphor is the process whereby the original
1
2

Al-Kasimi, A. was the head of the Bureau of Co-ordination of Arabization (1978-1982).

IERA and the Bureau of Co-ordination of Arabization.

meaning of a word is shifted to a new one e.g. /qa:Tera/ used to mean a she-camel which
leads a caravan; now the same word is used to mean a locomotive. Translation is the
transfer of the meaning of a foreign term into Arabic. However, a term like telephone can
be translated twice: in its original term, e.g. /tilifu:n/ or its meaning, e.g. /ha:tif/. Finally,
Borrowing means the adoption of a foreign term either as it is or after being adapted to the
phonetic and phonemic inventory of Arabic. An example of the former would be /tilifu:n/
telephone and /falsafah/ philosophy for the latter (Al-Kasimi, ibid.).
In this sense, Corpus Arabization can be equated with linguistic Arabization, which
has as a guiding principle: quality; hence its qualification as an Arabisation de niveau. This
linguistic Arabization also includes a lexical and a conceptual level. The former consists in
the assimilation and adaptation of foreign words into Arabic, while the latter consists in the
assimilation of foreign concepts using typically Arabic lexical items (Elbiad, 1985).
Corpus Arabization, in general, was a success, as thousands of new Arabic terms were
coined in different fields. Consequently, Arabic, since independence, has been used more and
more in new domains. Nowadays, it is used as the unique language of scientific instruction in
both the primary and secondary schools.
Problems of dictionaries
It is true that the Arabs were a leading nation in a number of sciences during the
Middle Ages. To assume this leading role, Arabic had developed considerably during this
period. Yet, the decadence of the Arabs for nearly six centuries (from the thirteenth to the
nineteenth century) led to the degradation and degeneration of their language. Afterwards, the
period of the Arab renaissance /nahDa/ was not enough to make up for the big loss of Arabic.
To make matters worse, the Arab renaissance coincided with the onset of the colonisation of
many Arab countries.

Hence, this contributed in the weakening of Arabic, which was

relegated to a secondary position for the benefit of the language of the colonisers (Elbiad,
ibid.).
In the Arab world, the movement of translation is facing many obstacles, which
hinder it from performing the leading role it played during the flourishing period of the
Islamic Arab civilisation. Today, with all the rapid changes that the world is undergoing, this
movement, instead of relying on mere individual initiatives, should be organised and
institutionalised (Alaskari, 2001; Ennaji, 2002, 2005).

In the nineties, an ambitious project was founded in Egypt, namely the National
Translation Project. Another one was created in Lebanon, namely the Arabic Institution of
Translation. The goal of this institution is to translate the worlds most important scientific
books, periodicals, encyclopaedias and co-ordinate all the efforts of the Arabs in the field of
translation via the Internet (Alaskari, ibid.).
Yet, those rare projects are vain attempts to face the huge number of scientific
publications, which need to be translated into Arabic. There is no dictionary of the present
technological and scientific terminology with linguistic indications, for example: origins,
neologism formations, references, context, etc.

Bilingual dictionaries refer more to a

translation rather than to a linguistic definition. In the dictionary /lisa:n/, for example, the
definition of scientific terms is followed by their translation in English and French. In this
way, the meaning of these scientific terms is determined by their translation without any
linguistic justification (Lakhdar-Ghazal, 1977.)
Another disadvantage of the existing dictionaries is that there is no delimitation
between an old and contemporary use of language; or between a classical and a dialectal use.
This leads to confusion in communication. Besides, the analysis of these dictionaries reveals
many lexical differences due to the reference to different languages in the Arab world. Some
authors refer to French while others to English, leading to a growing confusion (LakhdarGhazal, ibid.).
The situation gets more complicated when you consult bilingual dictionaries in which
authors give the same concept different terms, which are not synonyms, as they serve to label
other things. An example of the translation of the French word cheville (ankle) illustrates
this clearly:

DICTIONARIES

SUGGESTED TRANSLATIONS

Arabic-French Belot (1952).

[ka b]

Arabic-French Elias (1952).

[ka:il, ka b]

Manhal, (1970).

[ urqu:b]

Mawrid, (1967).

[ka:il]

Mazhar, Nahda Dictionary, Cairo (without a date).

[ka b, ka:il, kursu: ]

Dictionary of Medicine, Damascus (1956).

[ urqu:b]

The unified military Dictionary, Cairo (1970).

[ urqu:b, ka b]

(Lakhdar-Ghazal, 1977: 23)

The researcher notices that for the same French concept cheville four terms are
provided in different dictionaries. The problem is that these terms are not synonyms, as it is
shown in the following table:
Arabic

English
-Part of the ankle. Dictionary of Medicine of Damascus.

1 ka b
-Part of the ankle, heel. (Edouard Ghaleb, Dictionary of Nature Sciences, 1965.

2 urqu:b

-Hock, the middle joint of an animals back leg Dictionary of agricultural terms (M.
Chehabi and Edouard Ghaleb, 1975.
-Exterior bone of the wrist, (Arabic-French Elias and French-Arabic Belot). The last

3 kursu:

meaning is confirmed by the Dictionary matn lluRa, (1958). It does mean a part of the
foot only in the case of the species of sheep and bulls.

4 ka:il

-Not found in classical dictionaries, it is pointed out to in the French-Arabic Belot as a

probably dialectal Syrian term ,
(Lakhdar-Ghazal: 1977: 24)

Other illustrations of the existence of different translations for the same concept are
stated in the Moroccan version of the dictionary of Physics.
FRENCH

ARABIC

Ballon

awalah; awqalah; minTa:d

Etalonnage

Tadri:; mu a:yarah

(Ministre de lEducation Nationale, 1989)

Indeed, the French word ballon used in physics means a flask used in the laboratory.
Yet, according to the dictionary of Al Boustani (1983) MuhiT Al MuhiT, the first Arabic
word namely awalah means a bottle with a large base or surprisingly a small bottle with a
large top. In addition, the next suggested translation viz. awqalah according to the same
dictionary means a long-necked bottle. Last but not least, the word minTa:d means only an
air balloon.
The main problem of Arabization stated in the literature is that of terminology.
Indeed, the situation of bilingualism gives birth to the problem of Arabization from the angle
of translation; in other words, the need to express in Arabic all that is expressed in foreign
languages. At all levels of translation emerges one of the important handicaps of Arabic. By
way of illustration, there are numerous gaps in terminology, the used vocabulary is not stable
and translations vary from one author to another, from one country to another and even inside
the same country (Lakhdar-Ghazal, 1959, 1977).
A confusing factor is explicit in the wide gaps in the Arabic terminology. These gaps
can be partial or total (Lakhdar-Ghazal, ibid.). For example, the translation of a group of
French words illustrates this:

Effigie, figure, gravure, illustration, image,

photographie, portrait and reprsentation. All these words have a single equivalent in
Arabic, namely/Su:rah/.3

This problem is solved by online translators as they refer to many dictionaries at once.

French

English

Arabic

figure

Figure

Effigy

effigie
gravure

illustration

carving

illustration

image

Image

/Su:rah/

Photographie

portrait

Reprsentation

photograph

portrait

Representation

Total gaps are illustrated in the big number of English or French words, which have no
respective translations in Arabic. These gaps concern especially the language of science and
technology, creating the double problem of borrowing and neologism.
Paradoxically, in some studies about the capacity of pupils to acquire new terms,
Elbachir (1983) remarked that the Arab child learns many words, to express the same notion.
For example, /alfaSl/, /aSSaf/ /alorah ddira:siya/ and /qa: at ddars/, all meaning
classroom. This situation can be a sign of Arabic richness. Yet, this is made to the
detriment of the information that the child has to learn. If researchers suppose that the pupil
in a school has to learn 1500 words, they find that s/he learns in fact only 900 and the rest are
synonyms; on the contrary, when the European child learns 1500 words these equals 1500
concepts (El Bachir interviewed by Chante, 1983)4.

Mohamed Elbachir was the General Secretary of the Union of the Islamic Universities.

Arabic resists direct borrowing of foreign words for different reasons mainly structural
ones. It accepts up to six consonants in arabized foreign words, for example /sakanabir/
(ginger).

Foreign words, which contain more than this number of consonants, such as

lectroencphalogramme will yield unacceptable word if it is transcribed as it is in Arabic.

Another difficulty is that Arabic contains only these vowels, namely /a/, /u/ and /i/, which
creates a problem in transcribing other vowels, which exist in European languages. An
example would be the transliteration in Arabic of French words (Lakhdar-Ghazal, ibid.).
French

English

Arabic transiliteration

Cur

heart

Cure

treatment
/ku:r/

Cours

Course

Corps

body
Another problem is the transliteration of some French consonants which have no

counterparts in Arabic such as /g/ and /v/. Indeed, /g/ is pronounced in Arabic as / R/, /k/ or
/q/; while /v/ is pronounced as /b/ or /f/. These different forms make their Arabization not
relying on clear or definite rules.
ENGLISH

FRENCH

ARABIC

Manganese

Manganse

manRani:z

Granite

Granite

kra:ni:t

Reg

Reg

Riq

lava

Lave

La:fah

Lava flow

Coule de lave

Tadaffuq la:bi:

(Tbatou, 1994: 14-15)

The fact that Arabic resists direct borrowing creates the problem of neologism. The
process of creation of words in European languages is different from that in Arabic. French,
for example, borrows not only roots from Greek and Latin but also derivational elements,
which combine in complex lexical entities like: anthropomorphologie.

This type of

agglutination cannot be done in Arabic.

The last point tackled by Lakhdar-Ghazal (ibid.) is the fact that the Arabic terminology
is lagging behind the European one.

A simple comparison between a French-Arabic

dictionary and a French one shows the big difference in the number of entries lacking in the
former. The situation is getting worse and worse since thousands of words are newly coined
in the world in the different fields of science, while only a hundred appear in the Arab world;
in a vain attempt to make up for the lost time.
It is a truism that a language is the privileged instrument of knowledge. Any scientific
or technical innovation is automatically accompanied with the creation of new terms. As /.../
It is necessary to name in order to distinguish, recognise and finally know (Rey, 1979) (in
Richert 1987: 17). Therefore, the great increase of the technical and scientific information
correlates with the great increase of the techno-scientific vocabulary. Facing this multilingual
knowledge, each language should be equipped with an adequate terminology if it aspires to
accomplish its essential function of a means of knowledge.
The scientific progress of a linguistic community leads to the supremacy of the
language it uses. Languages are not equal with respect to science, as it is shown by the
evaluation done by the UNISIST5. According to this study, English and Russian are classified
first followed by French and German as being members of the closed club of the languages
of science. However
Any serious research is practically forbidden for the specialists in the French
and German languages if they have not a good knowledge of English or
Russian. The difference is only a question of degree if their mother tongue is
one of the Romance, Germanic or Slavonic even Japanese or Chinese
languages. // However, the heaviest handicap is witnessed in the case of
developing countries, where the numerous years spent in the learning of a
mother tongue are practically lost concerning the access to scientific
information. Indeed, Semitic, African or Indo-Malaya languages do not
constitute, in anyway, a means of exchange, in any direction whatsoever, with
the scientific community of the North Hemisphere.
Etude sur la ralisation dun systme mondial dinformation scientifique et technique. (Study on the realisation
of a worldwide system of scientific and technical information).

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(Cited in Richert, 1987: 17-18).

This leads us to talk about technical Arabization. If administrative, judiciary and

social Arabization is relatively easy, the problem gets complicated when researchers deal with
technical Arabization. This is mainly due to the rapid progress of science.
Conclusion
During the Arabs golden period, the development of Arabs was correlated with the
flourishing of translation of science from the Greeks and Romans etc.

However, the

decadence and underdevelopment of Arabs led to the deterioration of their language. Hence,
we are convinced that translation can contribute to development. Nevertheless, the movement
of translation should be institutionalized, instead of relying on mere individual and sparse
efforts, in an attempt to keep up with the huge amount of foreign scientific publications.
Besides, Arabic dictionaries should overcome their weaknesses and deficiencies so that they
can fully play their important role of simplifying and easing the process of knowledge
acquisition. Additional efforts should be invested to make uniform the translations of the
same concepts in the Arab world. Consequently, the role of institutions like the bureau of
coordination of Arabization or the mujamma allugha alaarabiya should be more
strengthened to produce not Moroccan, Egyptian etc. dictionaries, but rather Standard Arabic
ones! In brief, the multilingual science specialists should be aware of the necessity of making
Arabic a tool of scientific acquisition and transmission to contribute to the development and
revival of Arabs language and culture.

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Dictionaries
Ministre De Leducation Nationale (1989) Lexique Franais-Arabe De
Sciences Physiques. Edition Najah, Casablanca.

Butros Al Boustani (1983) MuhiT Al MuhiT, Lebanon Library, Beyrouth.

Elias Modern Dictionary English-Arabic Elias modern publishing house

(1986).

Elias Modern Dictionary Arabic-English Elias modern publishing house

(1987).

Larousse (1989) Dictionnaire de la langue franaise Lexis, Librairie

Larousse Canada.