EThos
A Students’ Magazine by the
English and Translation Department
Learn how to write in
Japanese
The basics of Japanese
orthography
Digital journalism bogs down
print media
Do you have what it takes to be a journalist?
Fingerprinting machines delay
students from classes
Students demanding more gates and more
machines.
Coffee Break at Effat
Transmitting Culture”
“Enhancing Linguistic Expression and
The English and Translation
Department
Clubs At Effat - A Student Venture
4
Students Delayed From Their Classes
8
A Conversation with the new Effat SG President
9
Ethics of Journalism
10
LITERARY BITES
A Bookworm’s Online Heaven
11
“The Hunger Games” Boovie review
12
Book Blabber: “A Thousand Splendid Suns”
13
Cafe Terrace At Night
14
LING WING
Linguistics Connects
15
Turkish Language and Identity
16
Writing In Japanese
17
The Sea of Pearls
18
2
A Message from the Chair: Dr. Sanna Dhahir
Having a new issue of EThos has always been a source of deep
satisfaction to me, for each of these issues brings along a fresh layer of
Effat students’ accomplishments. Student activities and achievements
are indeed an integral part of our University’s rapid growth and advancements, witnessed everywhere around campus: in new facilities
rising right in front of our eyes; in classrooms full of eager individuals
wanting the best for themselves and their future; in various student
clubs that seek, above all, to complement Effat’s plan for a holistic education; in new accreditation efforts that set out to consolidate the quality
of education and boost the name of our institution; and, importantly, in
faculty members who are forever desirous to give their best to the noble
profession of directing to the light of knowledge all those who seek it.
Editorial: Afnan Linjawi & Sumayya Naseem
For the first issue of 2013, we have presented you, dear reader,
with a revamped image of Ethos Magazine. In this issue we celebrate the
great magic of literature, linguistics, and translation through various sections. Ethos Magazine is not only a magazine for the English and Translation Department. It is for all of Effat University students. In our section of
cover story we tackle very important issues and project the voice of the students. I’ll end my message with a quote I hold dear “Journalism is literature
in a hurry.” Matthew Arnold.
We hope you find the articles of this issue useful and enlightening. We’re welcoming creative students to contribute their original poetry, prose or essays for the magazine. I’d like to mention that for the
future issues we are introducing a new section called “Effat Squirrels”
where you can squeak about whatever is on your mind! Blabber and
squeak to us and we’ll give your words a platform! The cool part is that
anyone can report for us! So, if you are interested, please don’t hesitate to contact us through e-mail or in person.
At Ethos we value creativity, and hope to evolve this student magazine
into a long term success of Effat University
3
Clubs at Effat: A Student Venture
Clubs are at the heart of Effat University‘s student activities. The Clubs at the university are one of the three
Student Organizations at the Student Life Office with the other two being the Student Shura and the Student
Government. With well over 20 clubs, one would wonder what the clubs are up to for the academic year of
2013-2014. Let‘s see what the club leaders have to say.
Leader: Shaima AlBugami
Major: IS
Level: Sophomore
Health And Fitness Club:
When asked about the club, Shaima explained that ―Health and Fitness Club was found to alter lives for the
benefit of the community and improve our understanding of health and fitness (and) to make it our lifestyle
rather than it being just a destination.‖ She also believes that by impacting a single individual, it‘s possible to
impact an entire society.
When asked about the challenges she might face, she says ―It‘s inevitable to achieve great things without facing difficulties.‖ Describing her current challenge, she adds, ―The continuity and the success of the club is a
challenge in itself, and the bigger challenge is to make health and fitness a lifestyle that every individual
should be privileged to have.‖
Amongst her aspirations for the club are goals like contributing to the community as a helping hand, spreading
Islamic values among students to live healthy lives, promoting integrity and the spirit of cooperation and driving students to achieve through mental and physical positive energy.
As for what Effat students should expect from Health and Fitness Club, Shaima hints, ―There will be many
activities, campaigns, competitions and more during this semester. I won't talk about it. It will be a surprise!‖
4
Clubs at Effat: A Student Venture (continued)
Leader: Afnan Linjawi
Major: E&T
English and Translation Club:
The English and Translation Club is diverse in its activities and scope, Afnan Linjawi explains: ―The club empowers the academic pursuit of the E&T Department. It also acts as a platform for students who aspire to become writers, journalists, or employees in the publishing industry (through our magazine EThos); for students
who wish to become actresses and experience the magic of words into actions as we perform dramatic plays;
and for translation juniors and seniors who would like to have some real experience in translation (by joining
our Translation Unit).‖ Being an active student at the University, owing to the various positions she‘s held as a
responsible student, Afnan wishes to ―add a sense of pride and prestige to the department and give the students
of Effat University and my members alike a chance to be a part of some pioneering projects.‖ Afnan took the
initiative to lead the club and shows great promise for its future under her lead. Her experience at different
student positions at Effat University, including club member, SG assistant, club vice leader, SG Vice President, and currently club leader, has helped Afnan understand how she can manage people in different ways and
she is confident about her acquired skill. When asked about the challenges she finds herself facing, she confessed, ―Finance and Public Relations are my biggest weaknesses and I worry about how I will support my
club. But hopefully I‘ll find the right person who can help me.‖ Talking about her hopes and aspirations for the
club, Afnan points out the nature and scope of the club – ―English and Translation Department Club is a very
new club. Effat university student body should know and understand the importance of translation, literature,
and linguistics towards the betterment of society. Our club is based on talent! We are a group of writers, actresses, and designers who come together to produce professional, interesting, and enjoyable works and projects.‖
5
Clubs at Effat: A Student Venture (continued)
Leader: Nouf Wazna
Major: Arch
Level: Senior
The Architecture Club:
Nouf Wazna is the leader of the Architecture Club where the club hopes to link the Architecture department to
the university. The leader hopes to―fulfill our agendas, and prove that Architects will always have the time and
energy to contribute—big or small, we will contribute. In fact, it is the theme of our club this year.‖
Without a doubt Effat University has a lot of hidden talents and leaders who just need a platform to come up
and take charge and build a community of high achieving Effateez. We thank the club leaders who took out the
time from their busy schedules to respond to our interview request, and we wish them great success with their
work. All students have to do is believe in themselves and their capabilities and come out and take part in making the most of their time here at Effat.
Leader: Farah
Shamrokh
Media Club:
Farah Shamrokh is extremely passionate about digital media, film-making and writing. She aspires to be a
novel writer in the future, and explains that the Media Club aims at developing students‘ talents in film making. When asked about what the students should expect from the club, Farah Shamrokh replied that they are
working on ―blowing away‖ Effat students‘ minds by creating a song video, a short movie of 10-20 minute
duration and a video clip about some important issue. She encourages students to pursue what their hearts believe in and to understand that it‘s not easy and simple to achieve great things without putting in a lot of hard
work.
6
Clubs at Effat: A Student Venture (continued)
Leader: Rehma Asghar
Major: IS
Level: Freshman
Debate Club:
Rehma Ashgar is a Freshman at Effat University who moved to Jeddah about eight months ago from the US,
where she was born and raised. Her hobbies include playing soccer, swimming, art, cooking, and, of course,
debating. Rehma explains, ―I love debating, and as soon as I heard that there was a debate club at Effat, I knew
I had to be a part of it. Alhamdulillah, I am thrilled to have the honor of being the leader of this club, and I really look forward to a fun, eventful year! Debating is all about expressing your thoughts and opinions in a logical and eloquent manner‖. She is experienced when it comes to leading clubs with her prior involvements at
high school and points out that ―it might sound very cliché but with leadership comes much responsibility, and
even though everyone knows of this fact and that I've been a leader in clubs in my high school; I've truly experienced what this means during my time as a leader.‖ The biggest challenge she finds herself facing right now
is ―bringing a group of people together for a meeting or other such purposes. Finding a specific time that is
suitable for everyone is more difficult than I imagined.‖ Rahma Ashgar is confident as a leader and has a lot of
aspirations for her Debate Club. She adds that, ―The one thing I wish to achieve through this club is that at the
end of the day, everyone is able to take something back home with them. Although I am the leader, I know I
will learn many things from the club members and all other participants as I hope they will learn from me. I
also specifically hope to hone people's debating and public speaking skills through debates that we will be
hosted in campus for everyone to participate.‖
We encourage the clubs to contact Ethos magazine in publicizing for their events and activities in the future. We also
look forward to collaborating in reporting these events and giving the clubs a platform here at Ethos for expanding their
reach.
By Sumaiyya Naseem/ Literature/ Sophomore
7
Students Delayed From Their Classes
The year 2013-2014 has started at Effat University. Each year, new students arrive and are ready to
begin their journey in higher education. Schedules have been organized and classes have started, but a new
problems emerged this year. Many students arrive late to their 8:00 am classes and this time it is not the driver‘s fault.
Gate 4, the students‘ gate, is always congested around 7:30 am due to the university‘s policy for all students to
sign in and out by the fingerprints machine. An average of 25 students lined up
in a queue extending to outside for their turn over only 4-5 fingerprinting machines. As a desperate measure the university opened Gate 3, known as the
faculty gate, for students and the faculty entrance was moved to Gate 20, but
“
The fingerprinting
line is taking too long
and it’s tiring
”
said Sarah Sultan,
the problem has not been solved from its roots. PSYCH student.
“
The students feel that this process is time con-
The fingerprinting
device needs to be up- suming and better solutions must be applied. They continue to be irritated, and
dated. Humans get tired the fingerprinting issue is currently the talk of the month.
and so do machines
”
said Lubnah, CS student
Students have suggested that there should be a gate to every college in the university. This will facilitate the entrance to the university and will make it easier
for the students to reach their classes and for the security ladies to monitor the students and ensure their safety.
Dr. Rania Ibrahim, Dean for Students Affair, has confirmed that the University is well aware of this issue and
is taking serious measures to be available after Eid. They are working on opening new gates for the students.
Article by: Siham Abdulwahab/ Translation/ Junior
8
A Conversation with the Effat SG President
The Student Government is an active student body that aims towards focusing on the culture at Effat University. But perhaps the most important role is served by the President of the Student Government. I was fortunate
enough to interview the new SG President , Israa Al Qassas. She is an ECE major at the Senior Level. Known
for her hard working and determined attitude, Israa shows great promise as the new leader of this student organization. Continue reading to know more about Israa, her work ethics and plans for SG.
1. What are your aspirations as the President of the Effat SG?
I hope I can help students THINK of ideas for the betterment of Effat, CONSTRUCT them to see them in reality and thus INSPIRE others to do the same.
2. What should the Effat family expect from you regarding the Presidency?
As president, I really hope I can reach out to the students, hear their concerns and be able to help them make
the change they want to see in Effat together.
3. How do you hope to benefit from the experience of working for the SG?
Being a member of Student Government comes with so much gaining and learning of new skills and discovering of talents you never knew you had. Qualities of leadership, communication and teamwork will hopefully
be benefited not only by myself as SG president but hopefully by the entire team working with SG.
4. How do you keep yourself motivated? Tell us about your attitude towards work and it's ethics.
Knowing that this position of presidency is a huge responsibility keeps me going. Knowing that I have a duty
to fulfill to the friends and family I have at Effat pushes me forth. And of course, I really would have to say
that my biggest source of inspiration is my wonderful team who just have great spirits and want better change
for Effat as much as I do!
I try my best with my attitude towards work to treat everyone on the team like they are leaders; because they
really are. Trusting them, giving them tasks that require much responsibility and appreciating their hard work
afterwards is what I try my best to do to keep the spirit of the team alive.
By: Sumaiyya Naseem/ Literature/ Sophomore
9
NEWS CORNER
Journalism in Social Media
The journalist and university professor Robert Hernandez paid a visit to Effat University on the 7th of October
as a guest lecturer to speak about the ―nuts and bolts‖ of journalism and the impact of our mobile and social
media apps on our daily lives. In his talk, Mr. Hernandez focused on the ethics involved in the role of a journalist as he believes that ―With great power comes great responsibility.‖ (Well said, Uncle Ben of Spiderman!). Mr. Hernandez puts great emphasis on the importance of being a trusted source of information, because
a journalist‘s basic work is to inform and if credibility is lost, it could damage your entire career. Quoting his
ex-boss, Robert Hernandez says, ―We edit information‖ as journalists. The idea is to connect the dots without
changing what the dots mean. This is journalism‘s most basic idea. He further explained in detail the ways in
which journalism can be made into an ethical act. The Code of Ethics of journalism has been written down and
practiced by the Society of Professional Journalists, which is an organized union of journalists renowned internationally. They came up with a series of codes and ethics that can be made into a guideline by anyone who
wishes to practice journalism at a professional or personal level. As a web journalist – someone who makes the
internet his/her platform for journalism and exchanging information – Mr. Hernandez is exploring the world of
Google Glass. Some lucky Effat students got the opportunity to try this amazing technology. When asked
about the Google Glass by EThos magazine‘s reporter, Robert Hernandez says,, ―It‘s obviously not going to be
bigger than the internet, but it really is the next natural thing when we talk about Global technology. t also allows me to be experiencing life while I have digital in the corner there. The main goal is to be present in life
but not hidden behind a screen.‖
Follow Robert Hernandez‘s updates on: Twitter - @webjournalist
And his blog where he explores the Google Glass technology for
storytelling; www.glassjournalism.tumblr.com
By Sumaiyya Naseem/Literature/Freshman
10
Instagram - @webjournalist
LITERARY BITES
Literature Connect: A Bookworm’s Online Heaven
Reading books has been a debatable subject in the 21st century as the number of readers around the world has
significantly dropped down due to the technology revolution. Here at EThos, we disagree. People are reading
now more than ever before. But, it is true that people seem to have lesser time than before due to all the distractions that technology (Social media, gadgets, gaming, etc.) creates.
Goodreads.com is one of my personal favorites when it comes to reading book reviews and writing them! On
the home page of the website, it invites you to ―Meet your next favorite book!‖ and it couldn‘t be more apt
than that. At GoodReads, you create your own personal account, add your friends and even recommend books
to them! You can list books as ―Read,‖ ―To-Read,‖ or ―Currently reading‖ so that your friends know what
you‘re reading or wish to read. You also have the option to subscribe to emails which let you know when
there‘s an update from your friends. Based on the books you have rated (out of 5 stars), GoodReads recommends similar books that you might like. There are also groups and book clubs that you can join, reading challenges, trivia and quizzes that you can attempt, and quotes that you can ―Like‖ and save in your profile.
The website can be extremely useful when you want to read a book but you‘re not sure if it‘s the right book for
you. The reviews contain *Spoiler Alert* warnings so you also avoid ruining your reading experience.
The EThos team highly recommends you to join GoodReads.com if you‘re a book enthusiast and hopes you
make the most of it!
PS: Apps for GoodReads are available for Android and Apple.
By Sumaiyya Naseem/Literature/Sophomore
11
The Other Side of Imagination: Books as Movies
Everybody loves watching movies on the big screen, right? I, for one, am a big fan of watching my favorite
novels in action. But I love books too! I love the way they smell, the way they feel, and I love the feeling of
having another world in the palm of my hands. Not all movies manage to live up to our expectations or imagination. Take The Hunger Games, for example; it was extremely nerve-wracking to sit for an hour and a half
watching a well-written piece of art being brutally played before my eyes. Some of you may not agree with
me, it might be due to the fact that you haven't read the book first. Let me tell you the story behind The Hunger Games and I. I watched The Hunger Games as soon as it came out and fell in love with the movie like it
was love at first sight: the idea, the experience, the adrenalin rush - EVERYTHING about the movie spoke to
me. In other words, I felt the movie. Before you know it, I bought the books and started reading them. I carried
the work everywhere, having it on me when I went to college, restaurants, birthday parties, family gatherings
and even the bathroom! It was super-glued to my hands. After reading Catching Fire and Mocking Jay, I decided to watch the film again. Forgive me for what I'm about to say, but I hated the movie and was completely
disappointed. I had nothing to say but "Hollywood ate the novel." It didn't live up to my imagination, nor was
it pleasing to watch. All I can say is, we should never judge a book by its movie or by its cover. However, a
friendly advice is watch the movie then read the books; that way you would have the best of both worlds. If I
was asked ―What would you prefer? Movies or books?‖ My answer would be ―boovies!‖
Review by: Sommer Atraji/Literature/ Senior
12
Book Blabber: A Thousand Splendid Suns
When I went away over the summer, I took a couple of books with me and
among them was A Thousand Splendid Suns. I can safely say I have never finished a book so fast in my life. A Thousand Splendid Suns centers around the
stories of two women, whose lives come together as a result of the circumstances they were dealt.
Starting off with young Mariam, a poor girl of illegitimate birth, living on the
outskirts of Herat. While the bitterness of her mother, whom she lives with,
pushes Mariam away, her rich and insincere father‘s charm draws her in on his
weekly visits. She longs to be part of his real family. However, reality quickly
hits her when she finds herself homeless and married off to a stranger, Rasheed, who takes her to Kabul, a city
unknown to her.
Hosseini now introduces us to Laila, our second heroine. Laila‘s early life is not trouble-free but her happier
times bring us some joy and relief. But of course, unimaginable circumstances change Laila‘s life forever and
she finds herself forced into a marriage with Rasheed too. We see Mariam and Laila‘s relationship evolve from
loathing to understanding and a deep friendship in the face of the horrors they experience.
The last part of the novel, you will have to read to find out. And for those of you who have, you know what
I‘m talking about when I excuse myself to break down and cry.
Hosseini is not afraid to explore the difficult topics of violence, war and marriage, but pairs it with hope to
keep us hooked. He puts a spotlight on the lives of Afghani women, during the war and the Taliban rule – not
just what we hear in the media but very real, complex characters, who we build deep connections with.
A Thousand Splendid Suns will break your heart into a thousand pieces, right up until the bittersweet end.
While I sobbed at the tragic parts, I also managed to find peace in the splendour of love, friendship and bravery our beautiful heroines demonstrate. Ultimately, Hosseini proposes the idea of a better tomorrow for Afghanistan. While it may seem too good to be true to some, I feel it is a fitting ending to a tumultuous tale.
By: Shafna Abdulmajeed/ Sophomore
13
Collector’s Post: Café Terrace at Night
Café Terrace at Night is one of the most famous paintings by
Vincent Van Gogh, who is one of my favorite PostImpressionism painters. He did this painting in Arles, France,
around mid-September, 1888. It is one of the three Starry Nights
paintings by Van Gogh. These paintings focus on the beauty and
magnificence of the night stars.
The painting shows the exterior of an actual café in France which
still stands in Arles. It was later renamed The Van Gogh Café after the painter. It was also remodeled to closely resemble the
painting which immortalized it. This is one of his most beautiful
paintings, full of the light and peace he sought but never found.
Perspective and warm complementary colors draw the viewer
into the painting and beyond. The graphic texture of the street's cobblestones invites the eye toward the little
café itself. The tiny white spherical shaped tables repeat the shape of the stars in the Prussian blue colored sky
on the ground. The walls of the café cut into the blue sky enhancing the contrasting colors.
Van Gogh firmly held his belief that the night is more striking in colors than daytime. ―I often think that the
night is more alive and more richly colored than the day. He also writes, "I have a terrible need of—dare I
say—religion . . . then I go outside at night and paint the stars." He painted this night scene on the spot, at
night, using no blacks. He knew he could easily mistake the colors but he believed in the aesthetics of the art.
His father was a preacher and Van Gogh went into the ministry for a while. It was later that the artist decided
his ministry would be to find a way to give hope and consolation to humanity through his art – something he
has managed to achieve as his paintings reach out on a more human and emotional level.
By Sumaiyya Naseem/Literature/Freshman
14
LING WING
Linguistics Connect: Linguistics Inquiry and Word Count
Any linguist in the world would admit that linguistics is the science of a natural phenomenon: languages. Nevertheless, that does not mean that linguists can‘t deal with modern day technologies in their field.
LIWC or Linguistics Inquiry and Word Count website is a website which has an automatic and analytical
search engine where you can enter any piece of text (email, stories, speeches, poems, etc.) and it will categorize for you the sets of words that are in the text you entered. I have tried with one of my poems and this is the
result I got:
LIWC Results
Details of Writer: 21 year old Female
Date/Time: 14 October 2013, 2:27 am
Your
Personal
Formal
Data
Texts
Texts
Self-references (I, me, my)
4.05
11.4
4.2
Social words
Positive emotions
Negative emotions
12.42
2.70
1.62
9.5
2.7
2.6
8.0
2.6
1.6
Overall cognitive words
5.26
7.8
5.4
Articles (a, an, the)
7.42
5.0
7.2
Big words (> 6 letters)
9.99
13.1
19.6
LIWC Dimension
The text you submitted was 741 words in length.
This website is helpful for linguists who are doing research in morphology and literature. But it doesn‘t work
as well for languages other than English.
To check it out visit the website: www.liwc.net
Review by: Afnan Linjawi/Senior/Translation
15
The Story Behind: Turkish Language and Identity
The Turks were only one of many ethnic groups living in the time the Ottoman State ruling in Turkey. The official language used was the Ottoman Turkish. Back then, that language was written in Arabic script, besides it
being a mixture of Arabic and Persian, it not only borrowed vocabulary but also contained expressions and
syntactic structures out of them. Arabic was the language of Islam whereas Persian was more related to arts
and refined literature. The Turkish army commander Mustafa Kemal Atatürk established the new Republic of
Turkey. Atatürk decided to make a language reform by passing a law to start using the Latin Alphabet instead
of the Arabic in 1928. All of this was done aiming for a more modern, more Turkish (taken from his surname;
as he was called the father of Turks), less Arabic, and amongst all, less Islamic identity of the citizens. By
making Turkish more ‗modern‘, he meant making the language plus the people‘s identity more related to the
European‘s. Hence Turkish has eventually borrowed many words from French, Italian, Greek and of course
English, while it still uses many from Arabic and Persian. Nowadays, there are three major identities: there are
those who identify themselves with their religion, Islam, so they may borrow words from the Ottoman Turkish
or Arabic. Then there are who identify themselves with Turkish identity, those try to be loyal to the ―pure
Turkish lexicon‖ so they do not use any borrowed words. The last group are those who believe in modernization and westernization, so they keep themselves away from both Islamic and Turkish nationalism, and they
borrow words from European languages. As an example, to mean ―specific‖ Turkish you have the following
variations: the first group would say ―muhaddad‖ the second ―ozel‖ and the latter ―spesifik‖. What we understand from this brief background is that language is an inseparable element of identity, once it has changed, it
also plays a role in changing people‘s ideology. Simply because they are using many words from languages
with different backgrounds, which makes them think they have something of that other identity linked to the
other language, and accordingly should start acting differently.
By: Fadhia Maghrabi/ Literature/ Senior
16
Orthography: Writing in Japanese
Writing in Japanese might be one of the most difficult, but also fun, parts of learning Japanese. One thing known for sure is that Japanese people don't use the Germanic alphabets (or more commonly known as the English alphabet) at all.
There are three types of scripts in Japanese (writing systems):
Kanji 漢字
Hiragana ひらがな
Katakana
カタカナ
*The combination of all three is used for writing.
Kanji 漢字
This system‘s origin is Chinese. Kanji represents blocks of meaning (symbols for nouns, stems of adjectives and verbs) as shown in figure 1
Hiragana ひらがな
Hiragana mainly expresses the grammatical relationship between them (endings of adjectives and
verbs, particles). One interesting fact is that Japanese kids learn Hiragana way before starting their
Figure 1
elementary schooling. Figure 2 shows how Hiragana is different from Kanji.
Katakana
カタカナ
Katakana is mainly used for foreign names, the names of foreign places and words of
foreign origin. Figure 3 shows katakana writings.
Q. Can I survive in Japan without knowing any Japanese writing?
A. You definitely do not need to know Japanese writing to speak the lan-
Figure 2
guage, but you will need to learn it if you want to read novels or newspapers.
You can also use Romaji, which is a sub writing system that allows you to
write Japanese without knowing Japanese writing. That is because the Romaji
system uses the Germanic alphabets to phonetically represent the sounds of
the Japanese language. Native Japanese can read Romaji, though they don‘t
Figure 3
use it unless they are communicating with foreigners. If you want to learn Japanese writing, it‘s better to start first with
hiragana and katakana, then kanji. Hiragana and katakana are way simpler than kanji, and have only 46 characters each.
It is also possible to write an entire Japanese sentence in hiragana. For example, many children's books are written in
hiragana only. Japanese children start to read and write in hiragana before making an attempt to learn some of the two
thousand kanji.
Article by: Marwa Al-Sobaihi/Senior/Architecture
17
The Sea of Pearls
Every language in the world has a unique specialty to it, adding to its beauty and eloquence. The Arabic language is one of the famous languages worldwide. It has challenged many languages phonetically, syntactically,
and morphologically. Here we will talk about the morphological wonders of Arabic.
Arabic has what is known among linguists as a stem-root structure to its words. This means that each word in
the Arabic language can be traced back to a root. In other words, a single root in the Arabic language can produce many stems.
What‘s all this talk about stems and roots?
Roots in morphology are the basic form of a word without adding any affixes to it. A stem is the result of a
basic form of a word (root) plus an affix.
An example:
The word ‗count‘ is a root word in the English language. But the word ‗countless‘ is a stem word in English, as
there is the root ‗count‘ plus ‗-less,‘ an added affix. Such is the case with the word ‗countable‘ and ‗counted‘.
However, English roots are much more limited than Arabic roots. The Arabic language can form up to 30 different stems or more. That is how much it can form from only one root. That is why it earned the title ‗a rich
language‘, because it can make so much from so little. The classical Egyptian poet Ibrahim Hafiz was right in
his metaphor of the Arabic language as a sea of pearls.
Article by: Afnan Linjawi/Senior/Translation
18
Get to know . . .!
In the first issue of this segment, Ethos interviewed a specialist in audiovisual translation. He has around 30
years of experience in his field. He worked for renowned places like Al-Jazeerah and MBC TV. He is our one
and only Dr Ahmad Khuddro.
It is a pleasure to have you in our magazine Dr. Ahmad. We know that you recently published your book
―Arabic/English syntax in translation: equivalence at word and sentence levels‖. What was the inspiration behind your book?
Well, I have written this book for two reasons, the fact that there is no such book on translation which has its
conceptual framework from Arabic grammar – i.e. its chapters are divided according to the Arabic grammar. The other point is that it is for everyone to benefit from my relatively long experience in the field.
Tell us about your target readers for the book and how do you think the book will be of value to them?
My target readers are both students and junior translators of Arabic into English translation. The book focuses
on Arabic grammar and explains the function and way of translation of grammatical devices such as the objective complement with distinction “‫ ‖التمييز‬or the absolute object “‫”المفعول المطلق‬
The main feature of the book is the abundant number of examples in all the chapters with the translation and
analysis of each example. The book also shows that once a student identifies the correct function of the word
in a sentence and the structure of the Arabic sentence, then her/his translation would be easier to do as a task.
In your opinion, is syntax the most problematic aspect in translating English into Arabic or Arabic into English
text?
Syntax is one of the issues which requires careful attention. It is in fact the second issue, after understanding
the meaning of words. Let me explain how the whole process of translation works when analyzing the source
text.
You need to understand the meaning of the individual words first in a good monolingual dictionary,
Then their meaning in a phrase, and then in a sentence and its syntactic function in that sentence
Then their position within the text as a whole.
Then understand the terminology in a certain field in a specialized dictionary.
Then you need to know the context of situation in which the text has been written and perhaps the context
of culture before attempting to produce a good translation.
Thank you for your time. We are proud to have a professor like you!
Interview by: Siham Abdulwahab/Senior/Translation
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Credits
Cover poem: Afnan Linjawi
Design: Rahma Asghar
Editors in-Chief: Afnan Linjawi & Sumayya Naseem
Issue Supervisor: Dr. Sanna Dhahir
Ethos welcomes your literary creativity from poems, creative essays, or short stories. If you
want to be featured in Ethos please send us an email via:
E-mail: [email protected]
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