Arabic language day

It is supposed that the mentioned initiative served as the strengthening of multicultural dialogue and development of multilanguage world.

The date of the 18-th of December has been chosen for Arabic language day in the international calendar. This day in 1973 General Assembly of United Nations included Arabic language in the list of official and functioning languages of United Nations Organization.

Currently the number of people speaking Arabic language and its variants is nearly 300 million. For more than 240 million of them Arabic language is native, nearly 50 million of people use is as the second language. In religious purposes the classic Arabia language of Quran is used by the followers of Islam all over the world (while the number of Muslims exceeds 1.5 billion people).

During the century Arabic language has constantly changed. Mainly, it touched the pronunciation of vowels. However, these changes weren’t reflected in writing because the short vowels are not usually written in the text except for Quran.

Nowadays the classic or, as it is widely accepted, high Arabic cannot be called as the language of communication as it is not used in the colloquial speech. Though, it is used in writing while producing books or even modern newspapers. In the scientific and technical literature with the lack of concepts French language is used (in Tunis, Morocco and Algeria) or English (in other Arabic countries). It is well-known that in Turkey the first printed book with Arabic font was published in 1729.

Arabic language is included in the list of official and functioning languages of General assembly and several other authorities of United Nations. It is the official language of all Arabic countries as well as one of the official languages in Israel, Eritrea, Chad, Somali, and Djibouti. On the 18-th of December in secretariat of United Nations there are different events that allow to get familiar with Arabic language and culture.