Archive for 'Culture'
Story tellers around the Arab world Posted by aziza on May 12, 2009
Stories (الحكايات) form a very important part of all cultures, and storytelling (السرد) is one of the oldest arts known to human beings. Storytelling is an integral part of Arabic popular culture (الثقافة الشعبية). In all parts of the Arab world, storytelling has been a very popular and much-appreciated form of entertainment for the general…
Swine flu -translation Posted by aziza on Apr 29, 2009
This posting is part 2 of my previous posting about swine flu. In the previous post, I cited a section from the BBC Arabic website about swine flu to give some useful vocabulary and timely expressions about this important topic. in this post, I present my translation of the information presented in the previous post…
Swine flu Posted by aziza on Apr 28, 2009
News media is nowadays dominated by swine flu (انفلونزا الخنازير). The World Health Organization (منظمة الصحة العالمية) has issued alerts and raised the level of alert in response to the increasing number of people contracting the disease and dying by it. It is tragic and worrying! In this posting, I present an excerpt from the…
“But where are the camels?!!!” Posted by aziza on Apr 21, 2009
The other day I was giving a presentation about the Arab world, and I showed my audiences some images of different Arab countries, but then one of them exclaimed, “But where are the camels!” She was really surprised to see how modern Arab cities are. I think that a lot of people in the West…
Happy Easter! Posted by aziza on Apr 12, 2009
Easter is a very special occasion for Christians and non-Christians alike in Egypt. For Christians, it celebrates Jesus Christ’s resurrection (عيد القيامة). It comes at the end of a 50-days fasting for Eastern Christians. Celebrating Easter typically lasts for a whole week, i.e. the last week of fasting, including celebrating Good Friday (الجمعة الحزينة), Ash…
Egyptian Arabic Proverbs Posted by aziza on Mar 27, 2009
Proverbs (الأمثال الشعبية) are an integral and a very prominent aspect of Arab culture. Each country has its own proverbs which reflect people’s nature and their beliefs. Proverbs are related to people’s everyday life and reflect their distinctive way of thinking about various situations. They have an important role in passing wisdom from one generation…
Colloquial poetry Posted by aziza on Mar 24, 2009
Arabic poetry is not only written in standard Arabic, but also in colloquial dialects. Colloquial poetry sometimes becomes songs. I believe that it is a very interesting genre, as it is closer to people’s lives, worries, dreams and trouble than Standard poetry, at least for me. In Egypt, colloquial poetry has been an integral part…