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As one of the largest microblogging websites in the world, Twitter generates a huge amount of information daily. The massive size of the generated data increases the difficulty for humans to follow and receive information relevant to their interests. Therefore, Twitter allows users to annotate and categorize their tweets using appropriate hashtags. However, finding an appropriate hashtag for a tweet is not always straightforward. Furthermore, many users violate the hashtag flow by posting irrelevant content to the hashtag topic. These problems increase the need for a hashtag recommendation and classification system. This topic has received considerable attention from researchers in some languages, such as English and Chinese. However, this problem has not yet been explored for the Arabic language owing to the lack of datasets. In this study, we bridge this gap by proposing WASM, an Arabic Twitter hashtag recommendation dataset consisting of more than 100,000 tweets annotated with 87 hashtags. The proposed dataset is subjected to several rounds of automatic and manual filtrations to ensure that it is suitable for tasks related to tweets and hashtags. Further, we propose three systems for hashtag recommendation and classification. Each of these systems approaches the task differently by considering it as classification, generation, and named entity recognition problems. The results obtained using these systems are promising and can be used to benchmark the WASM dataset. The data and code are available at https://github.com/Hamzah-Luqman/wasm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neural machine translation (NMT) is a complex process that deals with many grammatical complexities. Today, transfer learning (TL) has emerged as a leading method in machine translation, enhancing accuracy with ample source data for limited target data. Yet, low-resource languages such as Arabic dialects lack substantial source data. This study aims to enable an NMT model, trained on a sparse Arabic dialect corpus, to translate a precise dialect with a limited corpus, addressing this gap. This paper introduces an incremental transfer learning approach tailored for translating low-resource language. The method utilizes various related language corpora, employing an incremental fine-tuning strategy to transfer linguistic features from a grand-parent model to a child model. In our case, Knowledge is transferred from a broad set of Arabic dialects to the Maghrebi dialects subset and then to specific low-resource dialects such as Algerian, Tunisian, and Moroccan, employing Transformer and attentional sequence-to-sequence models. The evaluation of the proposed strategy on Algerian, Tunisian, and Moroccan dialects demonstrates superior translation performance compared to traditional TL methods. Using the Transformer model, it shows improvements of 80%, 62%, and 58% for Algerian, Tunisian, and Moroccan dialects, respectively. Similarly, with the Attentional seq2seq model, there's an enhancement of 98% in BLEU score results for Algerian, Tunisian, and Moroccan dialects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates how Chinese Hui Muslim internal migrants navigate the complexities of ethnic capital and ethnic penalty in their engagement with China-Arab international trade. On one hand, Hui Muslims leverage Arabic language learning opportunities within their community and benefit from religious affinity with foreign Muslims, enhancing their employment and entrepreneurial prospects. On the other hand, they face discrimination from the Han majority, Arab Muslims, and non-Muslim foreigners. Women, seen as “submissive” and “trustworthy”, find more expanded employment opportunities as interpreters for Arab merchants but face overt discrimination due to their Muslim attire. Notably, the Hui’s ethnic capital in the international trade market has diminished in recent years due to Arab merchants’ globalization efforts, such as adopting English for communication. This study contributes to the understanding of Chinese Muslims’ experiences in upward mobility amidst regional disparities and economic globalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the impact of the lexico-phonological diglossic distance of story reading (a scaffolded storybook intervention, informed by Vygotsky's theory of scaffolding and fading) on Arabic-speaking preschool children's comprehension and receptive and productive vocabulary. Method: The participants were 139 Israeli-Palestinian kindergartners: 71 composed an intervention group and 68 composed a comparison group. The intervention group heard stories gradually from the SpA, identical, cognate, and unique word forms, whereas the comparison group heard traditional stories unrelated to their lexico-phonological distances. Story 1 was read in unique spoken Arabic (SpA) form, stories 2 and 3 were read in 58 and 45% identical and cognate word forms, respectively, and story 4 was read in 70% unique word forms. Results: The results clearly showed that children's vocabulary and story understanding was significantly higher after the intervention, especially noticeable in stories that contained a higher proportion of Standard Arabic (StA). Interestingly, the stories told entirely in Spoken Arabic (SpA) were the most effective, yielding the highest scores in both comprehension and vocabulary. Stories that mixed different word forms also performed well, though not as strongly as the SpA stories, while those solely in StA were the least effective. Conclusion: The findings of the study suggest that scaffolded storybook intervention may enhance the receptive vocabulary and comprehension skills of children. This study shows that, in the context of diglossia, stories should be read to children systematically and gradually according to the lexical-phonological distance of words in the stories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The detection of toxic language in the Arabic language has emerged as an active area of research in recent years, and reviewing the existing datasets employed for training the developed solutions has become a pressing need. This paper offers a comprehensive survey of Arabic datasets focused on online toxic language. We systematically gathered a total of 54 available datasets and their corresponding papers and conducted a thorough analysis, considering 18 criteria across four primary dimensions: availability details, content, annotation process, and reusability. This analysis enabled us to identify existing gaps and make recommendations for future research works. For the convenience of the research community, the list of the analysed datasets is maintained in a GitHub repository. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study examined the relationship between children's explicit knowledge and awareness of diglossia (EKAD) and learning Arabic in school. Additionally, this study addresses the interrelationships between EKAD and oral comprehension, lexical, phonological, and morphosyntactic awareness upon the transition to reading to learn. Thirty typicaly developing Arabic speaking fifth and sixth graders were randomly recruited (n = 18 males). The Arabic diglossic Knowledge and Awareness test (ADAT) was administered to examine the interrelationships between diglossic awareness and children's Arabic reading and mathematical abilities. Results showed that children depicted varying diglossic knowledge and awareness with no significant effect of gender, age, or academic grade. Children's EKAD scores significantly predicted their scores on Arabic reading and writing test but not their math scores. The contribution of EKAD was beyond that of phonological awareness. Significant corelation was also found between EKAD and phonological awareness. These results indicate that children's academic success at advanced stages of Arabic learning is related to explicit knowledge and awareness of diglossia. In turn, this provides support for the role of diglossic/bidialectal awareness as an independent emergent skill during literacy acquisition in diglossic communities and the need to incorporate it into the educational and clinical assessment of emergent literacy among diglossic communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides evidence from Arabic (namely Modern Standard Arabic and Jordanian Arabic) that ɸ‐Agree with an element which undergoes a phonological deletion at PF, i.e., a pro, results in the occurrence of a ɸ‐inflection of the goal on the relevant probe. This occurrence is imposed by the effects of a suggested interface condition, named as The Agree Identification Condition, which requires a phonologically null goal to be ɸ‐identified through a co‐varying ɸ‐inflection on its probe. Such an analysis directly accounts for the intriguing observation that ɸ‐inflections in Arabic do not occur on heads (e.g., verbs and prepositions) when the latter ɸ‐agree with an overt DP. Additionally, this article shows that the effects of this condition do not arise when the Agree relation occurs between a probe and an unpronounced goal which is a member of a movement chain. When one link of the chain (e.g., the higher copy) is overt, no ɸ‐inflection of the goal would appear on the probe. This suggests that when a probe ɸ‐agrees with a goal which constitutes one link of a movement chain, the Agree relation holds between the probe and the whole chain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Arabic language is one of the living languages that grows and develops. It is the most eloquent language and the richest because of its vocabulary that exceeds other languages. The Holy Qur’an is credited with keeping the Arabic language alive until it is monitored, and it bears witness to the Arabs as a nation whose Arabic language and pronunciation are in accordance with the Book of our Lord, and the Holy Qur’an has meanings. Primary, which are the meanings of his words and sentences, and second meanings, which have meanings together from his wonderful system, so presenting a word in one verse and its last in another gives a second meaning other than the meaning given by words, and introducing a word or delaying a delay is only for a reason and for its purposes, and likewise deletion is not in vain. It comes to the existence of benefits such as exaggeration and greatness, brevity and abbreviation, and other benefits of eloquence, so I decided to study in this research the significance of deletion, precedence, and delay in Surat Al-Sajdah. This is to clarify the explanatory meanings that prominent commentators have noticed by explaining their value and impact in enriching the interpretive meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines how the phonetic realisation of the phoneme /sˤ/ and its orthographic form ص is surfacing as the variant [s] in speaking and as س in writing in Ammani Arabic (AA), which is a variety of Jordanian Arabic (JA), and how this relates to language variation. We look at instances where certain Ammani Arabic speakers, particularly females, pronounce and write words containing /sˤ/ ص as [s] س, despite both /sˤ/ and /s/ being phonemes in JA in general and in AA in particular. We used a quantitative corpus-based approach, where we obtained written data from Facebook, and elicited spoken tokens and qualitative data through interviews. Our findings reveal that females in our two corpora [spoken and written] use and prefer [s] and س more than males, and our interviews revealed that female interviewees also prefer this pronunciation and writing. We suggest that the use of [s] س instead of [sˤ] ص by females can be seen as a direct index for femininity within their community of practice, and that this pronunciation/writing can indirectly index female gender in daily conversations and on social media websites, based on orders of indexicality (Silverstein, Michael. 2003. Indexical order and the dialectics of sociolinguistic life. Language & Communication 23. 193–229). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined the relationships between word reading and rapid automatized naming (RAN) for objects and letters in Arabic-speaking children with and without dyslexia to determine potential modulating effects of color on naming by comparing children's performance on color and black–white RAN plates. Participants were 114 Arabic-speaking third graders who were tested for word and pseudoword reading accuracy, word reading fluency, rapid automatic naming, and letter scanning and searching abilities. Comparative analyses showed that while children with dyslexia did not differ from controls on the RAN object color task, they did show slower average naming speeds than the controls on the black–white version of the objects task. Similarly, the children with dyslexia showed slower average naming speeds than controls on both the color and black–white versions of the RAN letters task. In addition, hierarchical regression analyses showed that word reading accuracy, word reading fluency and pseudoword reading were significantly predicted by RAN black-white objects and RAN letters both versions after controlling for Age, IQ and visual search. Furthermore, group predicted the interference in letter RAN but not in object RAN. Findings of the current study have implications for the positive impact of color on object-naming tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research explores the language attitudes of second-generation Arabic speakers in Italy, examining their perspectives on both Italian and Arabic. The study assesses these attitudes within the complex sociolinguistic environment of Arabic, which is heavily influenced by a diglossic view between Standard Arabic and Arabic dialects. The findings highlight nuanced attitudes toward Italian, Standard Arabic, and Arabic dialects, influenced by factors such as social integration, communicative utility, and cultural identity. Italian is perceived as a tool for social advancement and integration. In contrast, Arabic dialects are essential for maintaining cultural and familial ties, yet they often face marginalization in formal education settings and encounter social stigma. Conversely, Standard Arabic is esteemed in formal and religious settings despite its limited everyday use. This analysis reveals a dynamic interplay of attitudinal responses to these languages, illustrating a rich mosaic of multilingual and multicultural identities. The results call for policies that acknowledge and promote linguistic diversity in Italy, aiming to enhance social integration and protect linguistic rights. These policies should include educational reforms that treat Standard Arabic and Arabic dialects equitably, supporting their role in fostering inclusive and comprehensive linguistic-cultural integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides evidence from Arabic (namely Modern Standard Arabic and Jordanian Arabic) that ɸ‐Agree with an element which undergoes a phonological deletion at PF, i.e., a pro, results in the occurrence of a ɸ‐inflection of the goal on the relevant probe. This occurrence is imposed by the effects of a suggested interface condition, named as The Agree Identification Condition, which requires a phonologically null goal to be ɸ‐identified through a co‐varying ɸ‐inflection on its probe. Such an analysis directly accounts for the intriguing observation that ɸ‐inflections in Arabic do not occur on heads (e.g., verbs and prepositions) when the latter ɸ‐agree with an overt DP. Additionally, this article shows that the effects of this condition do not arise when the Agree relation occurs between a probe and an unpronounced goal which is a member of a movement chain. When one link of the chain (e.g., the higher copy) is overt, no ɸ‐inflection of the goal would appear on the probe. This suggests that when a probe ɸ‐agrees with a goal which constitutes one link of a movement chain, the Agree relation holds between the probe and the whole chain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The abstract presents a new hybrid approach for automatically extracting spatial information from Arabic text documents in geographic information systems. The main objective is to automate and enhance the performance of GIS systems by making certain tasks explicit and improving the resources for Arabic Natural Language Processing (ANLP). The first step of the study involves the construction of a spatial ontology to index, annotate and extract spatial information from Arabic texts. In the subsequent step, JAPE rules are developed and employed to disambiguate and classify different types of spatial information. The evaluation of the proposed system demonstrates promising performance, with a precision rate of 93.8% and a recall rate of 95.2%. Overall, this hybrid approach presents a significant contribution to automating spatial information extraction from Arabic texts, enhancing GIS systems, and improving ANLP resources. The positive experimental results highlight its potential for various practical applications in geographic information retrieval and natural language processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Community Service & Empowerment is the property of Journal of Community Service & Empowerment and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Arts & Social Sciences (JASS) is the property of Sultan Qaboos University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Automatic personality recognition is a task that attempts to automatically infer personality traits from a variety of data sources, including Text. Our words, whether spoken or written, reveal a lot about who we are. As people speak different languages, each with its own set of characteristics and level of complexity, identifying their personalities automatically might be language-dependent. This task requires an annotated text corpus with personality traits. However, the lack of corpora for languages other than English makes the task extremely challenging. We concentrated our efforts in this paper on the Arabic language in particular because it is understudied and lacks a corpus, despite being one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. Our primary goal was constructing our "MSAPersonality" dataset, which consists of 267 texts in modern standard Arabic that have been annotated with the Big Five personality traits. To evaluate the dataset and its potential for classification and regression, we used text preprocessing techniques, feature extraction, and machine learning algorithms. We obtained promising experimental results. Therefore, further research into predicting personality from Arabic text can be conducted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the metaphorical representations of physical pain amongst Algerian Arabic speakers. To uncover these conceptualisations, an oral Discourse Completion Test (DCT) was administered to 30 Algerian university students. A qualitative approach was used to analyse the data and generate the conceptual metaphors used. Grounded in Kövecses model of metaphorical conceptualisations, this research unveils that Algerian Arabic speakers utilise nine distinct metaphorical conceptualisations when portraying physical pain/discomfort: evaluative metaphors, fire metaphors, sharp object metaphors, container metaphors, animal metaphors, creeping insect metaphors, burden metaphors, swing metaphors, and physical force metaphors. These metaphors are further explicated in light of linguistic and cultural backgrounds to shed light on the intricate weave of metaphors in Algerian Arabic, underscoring their pivotal role in encapsulating physical and emotional experiences. The study recommends further scholarly research into the manifold metaphorical renderings of diverse emotional states across Arab communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Technological developments over the past few decades have changed the way people communicate, with platforms like social media and blogs becoming vital channels for international conversation. Even though hate speech is vigorously suppressed on social media, it is still a concern that needs to be constantly recognized and observed. The Arabic language poses particular difficulties in the detection of hate speech, despite the considerable efforts made in this area for English-language social media content. Arabic calls for particular consideration when it comes to hate speech detection because of its many dialects and linguistic nuances. Another degree of complication is added by the widespread practice of "code-mixing," in which users merge various languages smoothly. Recognizing this research vacuum, the study aims to close it by examining how well machine learning models containing variation features can detect hate speech, especially when it comes to Arabic tweets featuring code-mixing. Therefore, the objective of this study is to assess and compare the effectiveness of different features and machine learning models for hate speech detection on Arabic hate speech and code-mixing hate speech datasets. To achieve the objectives, the methodology used includes data collection, data pre-processing, feature extraction, the construction of classification models, and the evaluation of the constructed classification models. The findings from the analysis revealed that the TF-IDF feature, when employed with the SGD model, attained the highest accuracy, reaching 98.21%. Subsequently, these results were contrasted with outcomes from three existing studies, and the proposed method outperformed them, underscoring the significance of the proposed method. Consequently, our study carries practical implications and serves as a foundational exploration in the realm of automated hate speech detection in text. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Arab world is one of the global regions the most directly concerned by, and suffering from climate change's adverse consequences. As such, there appears to be a strong need for an understanding of how Arab people may emotionally respond to climate change. Providing valid and reliable measures of climate change anxiety (CCA) can help gain a clear overview of the situation in Arab countries, and allow to intervene timely and effectively to mitigate any adverse effects on Arab people's mental health. To this end, the present study sought to validate the Arabic language version of the Climate Change Anxiety Scale (CCAS) in a sample of native Arabic-speaking adults from the general population of Lebanon. Methods: This study adopted a cross-sectional approach and enrolled 763 adults between July and September 2023. Results: A confirmatory analysis of the one-factor model showed poor fit indices as follows: CFI = 0.90, GFI = 0.83, SRMR = 0.048 and RMSEA 0.131 [90% CI 0.123, 0.138). The two-factor model showed a satisfactory fit with a high CFI of and a GFI of 0.91 and a SRMR of 0.04 and RMSEA of 0.05 [90% CI 0.04, 0.06]. Both McDonald's omega and Cronbach alpha values were high for the overall CCAS score (α = 0.96 and ω = 0.96) in the whole sample. Configural, metric and scalar invariance across gender was demonstrated. No significant difference was found between males and females in terms of total CCAS scores (24.53 ± 10.59 vs. 26.03 ± 11.17, t(761) = -1.82, p =.069). Higher CCA, functional impairment and cognitive impairment scores were significantly associated with higher depression, anxiety and stress. Conclusion: The reliability and validity of the CCAS in its Arabic version were proven. The availability of this self-report measure could offer a chance to assess CCA among Adults speaking Arabic, and to spread its future use for screening and research purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The clinical learning environment (CLE) plays a crucial role in shaping the learning experiences and professional development of medical professionals. Understanding and optimising this environment is essential for improving doctors' knowledge acquisition, clinical skills, and overall well-being. The development of the Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure (PHEEM) and its translation to numerous languages has been a milestone in clinical education. Even though PHEEM was recently translated into Arabic, its psychometric properties in this form remain unevaluated. Therefore, this study aims to conduct a comprehensive psychometric analysis of the Arabic version of the PHEEM questionnaire. Methods: This is a cross-sectional questionnaire survey validation study. The defined population were medical residents in Damascus, Syria. A paper-based survey as well as an online-based one were conducted using several non-probability sampling methods namely, convenience, river and, snowball sampling between June 15, 2023, and June 21, 2023. Both exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory (CFA) factor analyses were conducted. Several psychometric criteria were applied including scree plot, eigenvalue > 1.5 and the 'proportion of variance accounted for' criterion. Results: A total of 543 participants completed the questionnaire (56.9% female). Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure for sample adequacy was high (0.937) and the P-value for Bartlett's test was < 0.001. EFA revealed five meaningful factors which were labelled: perception of teachers, learner's engagement and social participation, external regulation, work culture, and living conditions. These factors had the following eigenvalues: 12.6, 2.18, 2.03, 1.86, and 1.41 respectively, with a total explained variance of 43.45%. Cronbach's Alpha was 0.938. CFA confirmed the model structure of EFA (SRMR = 0.067 and RMSEA = 0.066). The Average Variance Explained (AVE) value of any given factor was > 0.7. Discussion: The Arabic PHEEM inventory demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties. The extracted domains are of theoretical relevance to the psychosocial-material conceptual framework for learning environment. Nonetheless, this validation was performed in the Syrian context; therefore, future studies in other Arabic countries are recommended to support the applicability of Arabic PHEEM in the wide Arab World. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how the English language was and is today perceived within Saudi Arabia, with the help of a historical analysis and qualitative content analysis of the Human Capability Development Programme (HCDP) of the Saudi Vision 2030. Based on historical analysis of Saudi-British relations, and works of Tzvetan Todorov and Jacques Lacan, it is concluded that the English language, as a part of the Western culture, is potentially experienced in Saudi Arabia in the intersection of the mirroring dimensions of Idealisation-Demonisation and Mimicry-Disgust. The content analysis of the HCDP yielded the following conclusions: Islam has a place in the Saudi future as long as it is moderate and non-extreme; the preservation of Saudi culture will rely heavily on the preservation of Arabic language, and it will be a carrier of national identity. The Programme is for the most part silent with respect to the English language. It is hypothesised that this conflict is removed from the official discourse, but still might be present in the Saudi culture. Future studies should examine this issue by conducting interviews and analysing relevant social media content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As studies of second language (L2) learning and motivation typically focus on English as a foreign language (EFL), L2 motivation for Arabic has been less studied. Instruments measuring two sources of L2 Arabic motivation, identity-related motivation, and motivation arising from the L2 learning environment (L2LE), were developed and piloted among L2 Arabic learners. Pilot study results showed strong motivation due to Islamic identity and desire for cultural exposure, but also revealed speaking anxiety in the L2LE. In this study, the objectives were to determine: a) What evidence exists for or against the validity of the subscale measurements from these instruments? and b) how this evidence can be used to explain what appear to be contradictions in the pilot study results. In this mixed-methods study, instruments were administered twice to learners at an L2 Arabic learning institute in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), and a sample was interviewed. Quantitative analysis showed evidence of instrument reliability, and analysis of interview data revealed several findings. First, consistent with pilot data, we found that learners, who were all Muslim, were motivated to learn L2 Arabic as part of desiring cultural and social exposure in KSA and to become closer to Islam. Interview data revealed that these learners aimed to adopt the customs and lifestyle of those in KSA as part of becoming closer to Islam, some of which they did through social interaction. Second, L2 Arabic learning of Classical Arabic (CA) at the institute was impeded by the learners' lack of knowledge of the conversational Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) dialect, which made practical communication with those in KSA difficult. Recommendations are made for instrument improvement, as well as a strategy to incorporate some MSA instruction into the CA curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research on Arab Jewishness in the Middle East has developed in recent years across the disciplines of cultural and intellectual history and cultural studies. In this article, I present a unique Arab Jewishness, as expressed in North-African Jewish communities during the colonial period, through the case of Elie Malka, ethnographer, interpreter, legal expert and lexicographer from Morocco. The article discusses Malka's overall endeavour and shows the centrality of Arabic language and culture in it. Malka conducted linguistic, ethnographic and legal studies, translated Latin-language texts into Arabic and Judeo-Arabic and vice versa, edited French-Arabic dictionaries, and taught Arabic to certain Jewish community sectors. I posit that Malka's Arab Jewishness was unlike the Arab Jewishness that developed organically in the Middle East, but rather constituted a mutation within the general colonial mutation that evolved in North Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analysed the language used as the medium of communication in 114 Saudi Arabian television advertisements and found that 46% used a foreign language and 54% used Arabic exclusively. The foreign language most used was English, and a link was established between English and connotations of prestige, modernity, and its position as a global language. Italian was also used to some extent. The study explored the concept of language contact and how language is 'commodified' to increase consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Arabian Gulf countries, including but not limited to Kuwait, digital library metadata education is currently in its early stages. Empirical data assessing student learning outcomes of metadata instruction would allow for data-driven curriculum development as the courses and academic programs that are intended to provide such education evolve in the region. The study presented in this article provides these much-needed data from an undergraduate library and information science program in Kuwait. In this project, we examined the metadata records created to represent Arabic-language eBooks as part of individual and group assignments. A total of 187 student-created Dublin Core metadata records were collected from multiple sections of the metadata course (including female-only and male-only sections) over four semesters in 2021 and 2022. The dataset included 177 individually created records, and 10 records created by student teams. Accuracy and completeness of these metadata records were evaluated and compared across sections and between individual and team projects. The study's findings are presented and discussed in the context of metadata teaching practices in this Kuwaiti undergraduate program, and specifically with regard to activities and assessments intended to develop the Dublin Core record-creation skills. The study results demonstrate that students overall experience the most problems with representing copyright and intellectual rights and source information, describing what times and locations the information resource is about, and representing those who made non-major contributions to the information resource. Substantial differences were also observed in the patterns of metadata accuracy and completeness between individual work and teamwork, and between the metadata created by students in female-only and male-only course sections. Ideas for future research projects that would collectively allow forming a robust understanding of current metadata education and its outcomes in the Arabian Gulf region, as well as suggested curriculum enhancements, are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The linguistic diversity of France is a highly discussed topic, particularly in relation to the French state's (lack of) support for regional and minority languages (RMLs). There are approximately 200,000 speakers of the regional language Breton, while Arabic is the second-most widely spoken language in France with an estimated 3–4 million speakers. Recent studies have called for comparative analyses and this research seeks to fill this gap, focusing on individual speakers and their social experiences as they relate to language(s), diversity, and identity. This paper discusses findings of fieldwork conducted in Brittany with Breton and Arabic language users, examining how Breton and Arabic language users describe their language experiences, and how identity can be shaped by language practices. This research also explores how such language practices relate to diversity and multilingualism across France more broadly, and how individuals understand the multifaceted nature of identity using terms such as 'double culture' and 'mélange'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on an empirical study on cognitive processes [i.e. (dis) fluency, temporal management of the translation process, and revision] and their relationship with fluency and adequacy. Based on Jakobsen and Schou's (1999) computational model of human translation, the author utilizes keylogging data retrieved from a Translog-II-based task to investigate the cognitive processes behind Arab translator trainees' translations of an English news article into Arabic and unfold whether these processes predict fluency and adequacy (N = 32). Results demonstrate trainees' segmentation of a news article into frequent short lexical segments manifested in the mean translation units (M = 141.34, SD = 44.37), reliance on online revision over end revision, and temporal delay in the drafting stage. Multiple-line regression analysis shows that translation quality is predicted by revision time, orientation time, and translation speed in addition to a positive association between translation units and translation adequacy. According to the findings, translation trainees should be equipped with ST comprehension, and TT production and revision skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have developed in this paper a morphological disambiguation hybrid system for the Arabic language that identifies the stem, lemma and root of a given sentence words. Following an out-of-context analysis performed by the morphological analyser Alkhalil Morpho Sys, the system first identifies all the potential tags of each word of the sentence. Then, a disambiguation phase is carried out to choose for each word the right solution among those obtained during the first phase. This problem has been solved by equating the disambiguation issue with a surface optimization problem of spline functions. Tests have shown the interest of this approach and the superiority of its performances compared to those of the state of the art. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to adapt the organizational intelligence scale, originally created by Erçetin, Potas ve Açıkalın between 2001 to 2010, to Arabic language. The original scale consists of 7 domains and 67 items in the Turkish language. To translate the scale into Arabic, first the researcher translated it, then asked three colleagues who are proficient in the two languages, to check the translation, later it was presented to a sworn translation office to get the final approval stating that the translation matches the original copy of the scale, see appendix (1). The study sample included 400 secondary school teachers in the Gaza Strip during the academic year 2018- 2019. To assess the internal consistency of the scale, the Cronbach Alpha reliability coefficient was computed for all fields of the scale, as it showed a high degree of reliability (0.977). Subsequently, construct validity was evaluated using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), and the Average Variance Extracted (AVE). The findings demonstrate that the Arabic version of the organizational intelligence scale is both valid and reliable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigates the concept of false friends in two genetically unrelated languages: Arabic and English. It provides explanations for the source of possible confusion and misunderstanding caused by false friends in contemporary Arabic and English. It also highlights the nomenclature related to false friends where they can be classified into two categories: absolute false friends and partial false friends. The study explicates how false friendship, as a linguistic phenomenon, can be a real hurdle to communication among the learners and teachers of a certain language. The etymological development of some words is very important to explain how false friendship occurs. Morphologically, some special cases of intralingual morphological false friends are explored in so far as they are related to the concept of false friendship to put them into a certain linguistic framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Jordanian Educational Journal is the property of Association of Arab Universities and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Humanities & Educational Sciences Journal is the property of Humanities & Educational Sciences Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Humanities & Educational Sciences Journal is the property of Humanities & Educational Sciences Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Pretrained language models have achieved great success in various natural language understanding (NLU) tasks due to their capacity to capture deep contextualized information in text using pretraining on large-scale corpora. Tokenization plays a significant role in the process of lexical analysis. Tokens become the input for other natural language processing (NLP) tasks, like semantic parsing and language modeling. However, there is a lack of research on the evaluation of the impact of tokenization on the Arabic language model. Therefore, this study aims to address this gap in the literature by evaluating the performance of various tokenizers on Arabic large language models (LLMs). In this paper, we analyze the differences between WordPiece, SentencePiece, and BBPE tokenizers by pretraining three BERT models using each tokenizer while measuring the performance of each model on seven different NLP tasks using 29 different datasets. Overall, the model pretrained with text tokenized using the SentencePiece tokenizer significantly outperforms the other two models that utilize WordPiece and BBPE tokenizers. The results of this paper will assist researchers in developing better models, making better decisions in selecting the best tokenizers, improving feature engineering, and making models more efficient, thus ultimately leading to advancements in various NLP applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the increasing demand for learning foreign languages such as Arabic, approaches to teaching this language remain under-explored. The increasing complexity of classrooms renders the task of ensuring that learners with diverse backgrounds and experiences attain the stated objectives, challenging. To address this challenge, this study proposes the 3Cs approach, which combines communicative language teaching, collaborative learning and social constructivist theory, to improve the teaching and learning of Arabic. This approach integrates communicative techniques based on social constructivist theory and is implemented through the acquisition of shared knowledge of the environment. The 3Cs-based approach, which promotes students' active involvement, has the potential to facilitate comprehensive learning and real-world applications, offering new opportunities for both teachers and students to improve outcomes and address classroom difficulties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Kırıkkale University Journal of Social Sciences is the property of Kirikkale University Journal of Social Science (KUJSS) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study examines the relationship between language and identity in Kuwait, focusing on the implications of diglossia amongst generations X and Z (those born between 1960-1980 and 1997-2012). The use of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and Kuwaiti Arabic in different settings is a prevalent feature of Kuwait's linguistic landscape. Some voices call for the standardization of Arabic dialects to obtain national independent identities, disassociating from Arabs and the Arabic language. This research explores whether this linguistic duality creates an identity dilemma for Kuwaitis within the aforementioned generations. An anonymous survey was conducted to gather data on attitudes, perceptions, stereotypes, and emotional responses. The findings suggest that diglossia in Kuwait is not creating an identity crisis or disconnect for either generation. Despite the generational differences, both groups exhibited more similarities than anticipated across the four studied themes. The study aims to contribute to understanding language and identity in a diglossic context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article enhances the application of Pierre Bourdieu's social field as a heuristic conceptual tool for delineating the boundaries of translations as fields of cultural production, integrated with bibliographical research. This approach provides insights into the boundaries, agents, production, practices, and socio-historical context of the respective translation fields. Through the integration of Bourdieu's field as a theoretical framework and bibliographical research as a methodological framework, this article assesses the quality of the application of each of them in the sociological investigation of translation fields. This article uses the postulated field of "Arabic Translations of English self-help books in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (henceforth KSA) from 1982 to 2016" as a showcase through which this combination of theoretical and methodological frameworks can be advanced to study other fields of translation across different temporal and geographical locations and among various language pairs. Through the compilation of a bibliographical database of 993 self-help translations, this article provides an example of how fields of translation can be theoretically and methodologically bounded and mapped in sociological investigations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social media platforms have become essential for disseminating news and expressing individual sentiments on various life topics. Arabic, widely used in the Middle East, presents unique challenges for sentiment analysis due to its complexity and multiple dialects. Motivated by the need to address these challenges, this article develops methods to overcome the lack of topic-based labeling techniques, compares different approaches for preparing extensive, annotated datasets, and analyzes the efficacy of machine learning (ML), deep learning (DL), and large language models (LLMs) in classifying Arabic textual data. Our research utilizes the topic-modeling technique to build a topic-based sentiment dataset of Arabic texts aimed at enhancing our understanding and processing capabilities. We present a comprehensive evaluation of dataset balancing techniques, including under-sampling, over-sampling, and using imbalanced datasets, providing insights into how these approaches impact classification outcomes. Additionally, we explore the influence of dataset sizes on the performance of various ML models, highlighting the importance of dataset scale in developing effective Arabic NLP applications. A further focus of our study is the comparative analysis of generative artificial intelligence (AI) models, including the emerging ChatGPT LLM, assessing their effectiveness in managing the complexities of Arabic language classification tasks. Our results show that support vector machines (SVM) achieved the highest performance, with F1-scores of 0.97 and 0.96 in classifying sentiment and topic, respectively, in Arabic tweets. This research not only benchmarks existing methodologies but also paves the way for more nuanced and robust models in the future, enhancing the application of generative AI in Arabic topic-based sentiment analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Difficulties in learning Arabic become an obstacle in the learning process, such as lack of time, place and learning methods. This research aims to determine the Arabic language learning process in Arabic extracurriculars and to determine the role of Arabic extracurriculars in Arabic language learning at MAN 1 Langkat. The method used in this research uses a qualitative approach with descriptive methods through observation, interviews and documentation and data analysis techniques using the Miles & Huberman theory, namely data reduction, data presentation and drawing conclusions. The results of this research are that the Arabic language learning process in the MAN 1 Langkat Arabic extracurricular is carried out once a week with several activities such as Arabic content, Arabic games, Imla', Muhadharah, Muhadatsah, Drama and questions and answers at the Arabic language olympiad using the discussion method through learning media in the form of cellphones, dictionaries and books. The existence of the Arabic extracurricular role makes students interested in learning Arabic and makes it easier for students to understand Arabic language learning as well as improving learning outcomes and achieving many achievements in several branches of Arabic language competitions.

This research aims to analyze Arabic language learning strategies and the factors that influence them among foreign learners at UIN Imam Bonjol Padang. The research approach used is a case study with data collection techniques including observation, interviews to 6 foreign learners and documentation, while the data analysis technique used data triangulation techniques. The research results show that the Arabic language learning strategy for foreign learners is media digital, media social, film, telphone, reading materials while the influencing factors are information media-based infrastructure and collaborative peer review by peers. Research findings inform that the integration of the use of eclectic strategies can accelerate the achievement of foreign language learning for non-native speakers. This research is limited in the methods and samples used, so the researcher recommends further research to identify other variables.

Abstract Background The clinical learning environment (CLE) plays a crucial role in shaping the learning experiences and professional development of medical professionals. Understanding and optimising this environment is essential for improving doctors’ knowledge acquisition, clinical skills, and overall well-being. The development of the Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure (PHEEM) and its translation to numerous languages has been a milestone in clinical education. Even though PHEEM was recently translated into Arabic, its psychometric properties in this form remain unevaluated. Therefore, this study aims to conduct a comprehensive psychometric analysis of the Arabic version of the PHEEM questionnaire. Methods This is a cross-sectional questionnaire survey validation study. The defined population were medical residents in Damascus, Syria. A paper-based survey as well as an online-based one were conducted using several non-probability sampling methods namely, convenience, river and, snowball sampling between June 15, 2023, and June 21, 2023. Both exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory (CFA) factor analyses were conducted. Several psychometric criteria were applied including scree plot, eigenvalue > 1.5 and the ‘proportion of variance accounted for’ criterion. Results A total of 543 participants completed the questionnaire (56.9% female). Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure for sample adequacy was high (0.937) and the P-value for Bartlett’s test was 0.7. Discussion The Arabic PHEEM inventory demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties. The extracted domains are of theoretical relevance to the psychosocial-material conceptual framework for learning environment. Nonetheless, this validation was performed in the Syrian context; therefore, future studies in other Arabic countries are recommended to support the applicability of Arabic PHEEM in the wide Arab World.