Doha – Asdaf News:
On February 24, 2024, a conference titled “Arabic as a Heritage Language: Problems and Approaches” will be hosted by the Language Center at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.
The two-day conference intends to add something unique to the area of Arabic as a heritage language by addressing concerns that heritage Arabic learners who live both inside and outside Arabic-speaking countries find troubling.
Director of the Language Center Dr. Alaa Eljebali emphasized that the conference has a special value due to the “particularity of the heritage Arabic learners and their needs which are absent to many of the workers in the field of teaching Arabic. The conference, we hope, will provide a platform to provide effective solutions and theoretical answers that can benefit the workers of the field and have a positive impact on motivating heritage Arabic learners to learn Arabic or continue to learn it”.
Dr. Eljebali encouraged researchers and scholars from inside and outside Qatar to participate in the conference by submitting research papers which they need to send the abstract for before the middle of May 2023.
Instructor in the Language Center Dr. Ran Siblini has expressed her belief that “it is about time to discuss this phenomenon as the number of Heritage Arabic learners is increasing due to the rise of migration to foreign countries from one side, and the tendency to enroll Arab children in international schools rather than local ones, particularly in the Arab Gulf countries from the other side.”
It is important to highlight the role that the Language Center at the DI plays in promoting the skills of the community as well as the DI students in communication, functional writing and Academic writing through a series of programs, training programs and curricula in both Arabic and English.
