Unfortunately, I came across an author of silly book (Arabic for Dummies) called Amine Bouchentouf. He was on C-Span in some book festival. After two sentences, I knew that he was going to annoy me. He made such an effort to impress the American viewer, I felt--in accent and more. But then he talked about his book, Arabic for Dummies. He said that after 10 minutes of his book, you will be able to speak Arabic. I kid you not. He apparently is a teacher of Arabic, although he was--by his admission--a student at Middlebury College in Arabic as recently as few years ago. He said that mispronunciation of Arabic word in US media bothers him. He was asked to give examples: he said the word Shi`ite. He went on on why that is such an inaccurate rendition (Personally, I find it a better one than Shi`i or Shia). The second example he gave was Zarqawi. I don't get it. It is Zarqawi in Arabic, and in US media it also is pronounced Zarqawi. He said that the word means the blue one. OK, Bouchentouf. I went to his website and was more displeased: he is recommending Thomas Friedman and Fromkin to learn about the Middle East. On C-Span he explained that Karen Hughes is merely trying to make Arabs and Muslims understand the US better. How nice of her. She is seen above (wearing a Persian carpet--in Arab culture, people put rugs not on the floor but on their heads, in case you did not know).
Saturday, February 17, 2007
Unfortunately, I came across an author of silly book (Arabic for Dummies) called Amine Bouchentouf. He was on C-Span in some book festival. After two sentences, I knew that he was going to annoy me. He made such an effort to impress the American viewer, I felt--in accent and more. But then he talked about his book, Arabic for Dummies. He said that after 10 minutes of his book, you will be able to speak Arabic. I kid you not. He apparently is a teacher of Arabic, although he was--by his admission--a student at Middlebury College in Arabic as recently as few years ago. He said that mispronunciation of Arabic word in US media bothers him. He was asked to give examples: he said the word Shi`ite. He went on on why that is such an inaccurate rendition (Personally, I find it a better one than Shi`i or Shia). The second example he gave was Zarqawi. I don't get it. It is Zarqawi in Arabic, and in US media it also is pronounced Zarqawi. He said that the word means the blue one. OK, Bouchentouf. I went to his website and was more displeased: he is recommending Thomas Friedman and Fromkin to learn about the Middle East. On C-Span he explained that Karen Hughes is merely trying to make Arabs and Muslims understand the US better. How nice of her. She is seen above (wearing a Persian carpet--in Arab culture, people put rugs not on the floor but on their heads, in case you did not know).
