At a time where everyone is obsessed with social media and the fame that comes with it, a group of six young Emirati men from Abu Dhabi have taken to instagram to spread awareness on Arab culture and language.
Mahmoud Bin Eisa, 25, the founder of the group explained to Gulf News: “Our main aim is to preserve our culture and traditions by making simple videos to explain old sayings related to our heritage. Although there are various books that are published for the same purpose, the group feels that in this day and age, social media is the best way to reach a wider audience, and in this case, videos make a bigger impact.
As Mahmoud said, their videos are based on old Arabic sayings, which they then play out — that way even if you don’t understand the meaning of the saying, you will understand it through their acting. The process of choosing the saying to base their video on usually starts with either asking their elders, or reaching out to their followers on social media to see what old saying they would want explained. “What makes our videos stand out is the fact that it is aimed at all age groups because these are sayings that have been around for decades, and we might hear them every now and then but do not necessarily know what they stand for or the story behind it,” said Sanad Bin Juma, 23, a group member.
As for now, all videos go up on Mahmoud’s instagram account as he has the most number of followers. As a starting point, they want to reach out to as many as possible and be recognised before they move on to creating a separate account to which they would upload their videos.
Ali Al Khaja, 23, another member of the group said: “These are not just random sayings as one might think. Each and every saying in our culture comes from experiences and happenings that are related to our heritage and our role is to bring that back.”
When asked whether or not they think that there is a threat against the Arabic language, culture and traditions at a time of Western domination, especially on social media, the group firmly agreed that it is not the case, nor is it the reason why they started this movement.
Their main inspiration for pursuing the idea is Shaikh Zayed, the founding father of the UAE. “Our father once said: ‘A nation without a past is a nation without a present or a future’ and that is our main driving force,” said Rashid Hamad, 24.
Because of the nature of their videos, all are done in Arabic, with no English subtitles, but that is something that will soon change as once they have established their movement within the Arab world, the plan is to move forward and educate the West.
“We can’t deny Westernisation or the fact that the food we eat when we go out comes from some Western country or the films that we watch in a cinema — that is only a stronger reason for the need to encourage our own people first,” said Faraj Al Maini, 24.
Gulf News spoke to Professor Nasser Isleem, a senior Arabic language instructor at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) about the need to preserve the Arabic language, history and heritage.
Isleem explained: “There is an urgent need to support the Arabic language on social media, irrespective if it is slang, modern or the newer version, which is the transliteration [a conversion of Arabic into English using letters, symbols or marks].” While he tries to refrain from transliteration as much as possible, he sometimes uses it if there is a need for it, such as in case the language is too hard or the words are not commonly used.
Isleem, who is of Palestinian origin is also the co-author of the book ‘Ramsah’, the first ever published textbook on the Emirati dialect, and is now working on a similar project along the lines of what the group has been doing on social media. His new project involves looking at old Emirati proverbs that are commonly used in day-to-day activities and shedding light on them from a linguistic and cultural perspective. He believes that this is of great importance in order to keep the history or heritage of a nation alive.
“The importance is not only to put the Arabic language to use, but the Emirati dialect in specific. Because the UAE is a country of many different nationalities and languages, it is even more important for the younger generation, who tends to embrace English as it is the most widely used language, to support the Emirati dialect,” said Isleem.
According to his experience with languages in the UAE, it is clear that Arabs, whether Emirati or not, tend to lean more towards the Emirati dialect, which he thinks is positive for the preservation of the country’s heritage.
He said: “There is an urgent need and necessity to maintain and protect the official language of the region and the government has introduced laws that does that such as the fact that all main documents are to be written in Arabic.”
As for the preservation of the Emirati dialect, Mahmoud Bin Eisa added: “Our role on social media is to spread awareness about our country and its culture and traditions. We always film our videos while speaking in the Emirati dialect and even when writing our captions, they are written in proper formal Arabic as we are not just representing the UAE but the whole region.”
