Dubai: The importance of protecting and preserving Arabic Language was highlighted at an event organised by The Dubai Culture and Arts Authority to mark International Arabic Language Day.

The celebrations, held on Thursday at the Arabian Centre, combined workshops, interactive activities, competitions and theatrical performances, which were all focused on building on the integral aesthetics and value of the letters that make up the Arabic language.

International Arabic Language Day is commemorated each year on December 18.

A huge crowd of children gathered at Arabian Centre, all eager to participate in the activities and learn more about the beauty of the language.

Aliah Al Murr, manager of the Arabic Centre at the Dubai Culture and Arts Authority, said that the primary goal of the event was to build on the talents of the audience and encourage them to get attached to their language a bit more.

“This event follows a decree made by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai to celebrate the Arabic language and to place it in the forefront. Our aim behind the event is to promote the daily use of the Arabic language in everything,” she said.

Aliah said there would be other activities organised regularly by the department, which was established recently to strengthen children’s skills with respect to Arabic language. She said it was an important step since the English language has become so dominant and has somehow edged out the Arabic language.

“Due to the many diverse nationalities living in the UAE, the English language naturally became the common language spoken between everybody. It became a language everyone had to use to understand each other, but regardless of that, the Arabic language still has its own value,” she said.

Aliah said there are government decisions mandating that all correspondence between government bodies be in the Arabic language, but “efforts are needed to fully implement those decisions.”

Badriya Abdullah Ali, an Arabic language teacher who took part in the interactive activities by bringing in a board game she had created in an effort to improve children’s skills in reading, writing, and speaking, said that such entertaining games are sometimes needed when it comes to revising certain things children had learned in previous grades.

“I invented my own game with a similar concept to Monopoly, but this one uses Arabic letters instead and follows different rules. I thought my students needed this because they tend to forget what they had learnt in an earlier grade and so, by playing this game, they get a chance to revise everything in their books, but in a more entertaining way,” she said.

Ali also believes that more should be done to strengthen students’ language skills in the Arabic Language at schools “because recently everyone has been relying on the English language to communicate.”

Calligrapher, Uday Al’araj, from Iraq, who volunteered to teach some techniques in calligraphy, said that the Arabic language itself is not threatened and remains a powerful language that has great value.

“Arabic is a language that was born complete and will never die, and this was confirmed by many. This event itself is great because the Arabic language appeals to many people and many westerners are keen on learning it,” he said.

Al’araj said that the only thing he sees threatening his language in the future is the use of informal phrases within classical Arabic speech. “People tend to accidently mix informal phrases when speaking or writing in classical Arabic, and this is the only thing that could really hurt the language in the future,” he said.

A mother of two, Maysa Kholouqi from Syria, who brought her children to the event to recite some Arabic poems to the audience, said that “Arabic should come first, before any other language, and parents should make sure their children master the language properly before teaching them other languages.”

The event was held in collaboration with Dubai Municipality, Dubai Education Zone, Erqa’a Centre for Arabic Language and ambassadors from the Dubai Youth Club.