Comments on: Happy birthday, UAE!

By: Buy Balloons Dubai - Baloons & Parties

Buy Balloons Dubai - Baloons & Parties — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 23:18:30 +0000

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By: Peyman Purya

Peyman Purya — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 09:34:06 +0000

I am glad that noone can congratulate me for my countrys birthday.
It is older than the history.

By: vahid

vahid — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 06:35:26 +0000

In reply to Mahmoud Almahmoud.

Dear Mahmoud,

As a regular reader of languageonthemove, I just came across your comment and thought you might be interested in the following link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Gulf

As you might have noticed, in Ingrid’s original text, Gulf (in ‘gulf arabs’) has been used as an adjective which does not have any problem but you have modified the noun “gulf” with the adjective “arab” which is simply wrong.

best,
vahid

By: Mahmoud Almahmoud

Mahmoud Almahmoud — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 03:32:55 +0000

Really interesting topic. As you said the GCC countries have witness dramatic changes in regards to the position of Arabic and English languages. However, in my personal observation the situation in the GCC countries is not same. The former GCC British colonials with the small population like Qatar and UAE are more affected in language shift than the other like Saudi Arabia. Yet, all the Arab Gulf states in an urgent need of clear language policy that maintains the position of Arabic and plans the place of foreign languages.
In my opinion the Arab Gulf counties don’t fit the typical patterns of societal language shift because it four decades ago experienced significant economic changes after the discovery of oil witch moved the GCC countries from low-income and indigent countries to rich countries. This financial boom has produced many projects which had a reflection on language and identity in all GCC countries.