31199 - Arab Language and Linguistics 2

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course the student has good morphosyntactic and communicative skills. He understands and produces simple texts related to familiar topics, communicates in activities that require exchange of information on different common topics and is able to express opinions, feelings, hopes and projects. He is competent in the four language skills described in the parameters set by the Council of Europe. His acquired skills are located between levels A2 and B1 of the Common European Framework of Reference.

Course contents

The course aims to develop students' intermediate-level morphosyntactic competence in Arabic and consists of two components: annual practical language classes and a semester course taught by the course instructor (Prof. Ines Peta).

Syllabus of the annual practical language classes (120 hours)

The course consists of three weekly classes and aims to guide students in expanding their communicative competence, with particular emphasis on the ability to exchange information in a more articulated manner, express opinions, feelings, and emotions, and understand texts and dialogues of increasing complexity. The main topics covered include travel, shopping, health, hobbies and leisure activities, physical and personality descriptions, descriptions of the surrounding environment, food, restaurants, and transportation.

Students will also practise newly acquired grammatical structures, with particular attention to the different verb tenses and moods (both of the basic form and the derived forms), the passive voice, indefinite pronouns, the elative (comparative/superlative), relative clauses, kāna and its "sisters", inna and its "sisters", and the use of the maṣdar.

Syllabus of the semester course (30 hours) – Second semester (Prof. Ines Peta)

The course aims to deepen students' linguistic understanding of the fundamental structures of the Arabic language, with particular emphasis on completing the verbal system through the study of the imperative, the manṣūb and majzūm verbal moods, the passive voice, and the system of derived verb forms, analysing their semantic relationships as well as their morphological and syntactic features.

The course will also further develop the study of the nominal sentence and introduce the verbal sentence, examining the main differences between the roles of the fiʿl, the fāʿil, and the mafʿūl bihi in the verbal sentence, and those of the mubtadaʾ and the khabar in the nominal sentence. The aim is to provide students with the tools needed to understand the functioning of the two principal sentence types in Arabic and to identify confidently the fundamental elements of their syntactic structure.

The overall objective is to make students increasingly aware of the internal logic underlying Arabic grammar and of its distinctive features in comparison with other languages. To this end, the analysis will draw both on the categories developed within the Arabic grammatical tradition and on the tools and perspectives of contemporary theoretical and descriptive linguistics. Explanations will be accompanied by authentic examples drawn from actual language use, in order to illustrate grammatical structures and phenomena in context.

Readings/Bibliography

Bibliography of the practical language class

- S. Darghmouni, Kalima / parola. Lezioni di scrittura e grammatica araba con esercizi, vol. 2, Mondadori, Milano 2019.

- At-Takallum: A Comprehensive Modern Arabic Course. ELEMENTARY A2 Level, Buruj Book, Cairo 2022.

- E. Baldissera, Dizionario Italiano-Arabo e Arabo-Italiano (Seconda Edizione), Zanichelli, Bologna 2014.

- Texts provided by the teacher and available on Virtuale platform.

Bibliography of the Semester course (Prof. Ines Peta)

- M. Diez, Introduzione alla lingua araba, Vita e Pensiero, Milano 2018.

- G. Mion, L. D'Anna, Grammatica di arabo standard moderno, Hoepli, Milano 2021.

- P. Larcher, Le système verbal de l'arabe classique, 2e éd. revue et augmentée, Presses Universitaires de Provence, Aix-en-Provence 2012.

- In-depth material provided by the teacher available on Virtuale platform.

Teaching methods

1) Frontal lessons

2) Interactive lessons

3) Activities in pairs and / or in groups

Assessment methods

The examination consists of:

a) a written test covering the syllabus of the practical language classes;

b) an oral examination covering both the syllabus of the practical language classes and that of the semester course.

a) The written test is structured as follows: comprehension of a short written text and a short oral text, together with exercises assessing lexical competence (50% of the final grade); a morphosyntactic test consisting of exercises assessing grammatical competence (50% of the final grade).

The written test may be taken either as a single examination lasting 3 hours at the end of the course, on the date established in the official examination calendar, or as a series of two midterm tests administered during the teaching period, divided as follows:

• first part: comprehension of a short written text and a short oral text, together with exercises assessing lexical competence. Duration: 1 hour and 30 minutes.
• second part: morphosyntactic test consisting of exercises assessing grammatical competence. Duration: 1 hour and 30 minutes.

To pass the written test, students must obtain at least 18/30 in each of its two components. Only in this case is the written test considered successfully completed and the final grade may be awarded.

The final grade corresponds to the weighted average of the marks obtained in the written and oral examinations.

Please note that students may not take this written test unless they have successfully passed Arabic Language and Linguistics 1 in all its components.

b) The oral examination consists of: b.1) for the practical language classes, reading a vocalised text, answering questions in Arabic on the text, taking part in a dialogue with the instructor on the topics covered during the course, and describing one image selected from those studied during the practical language classes; b.2) for the semester course, a number of questions designed to assess the morphosyntactic competences acquired, both through targeted exercises and the analysis of sentences of the same type as those examined during the lectures, and through theoretical questions concerning the topics covered during the course.

Please note that students may not take this oral examination unless they have successfully passed the written examination for the same course.

Please note that the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools during examinations is prohibited in any form, including chatbots, text generators, advanced machine translation tools, content synthesis systems, and AI tools integrated into electronic devices. Any use of AI constitutes a violation of the University's Academic Integrity Policy and may result in the examination being declared invalid by the instructor, who is responsible for assessing the validity of the examination.

Students with Specific Learning Disorders (SLD) or temporary or permanent disabilities: it is recommended that you contact the University office responsible (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en ) and the instructor as soon as possible in order to identify the most effective strategies for attending classes and/or preparing for the examination. Any requests for accommodations must be submitted at least 15 days before the examination date by sending an email to the instructor and copying disabilita@unibo.it (in the case of disabilities) or dsa@unibo.it (for students with Specific Learning Disorders).

Teaching tools

Audio / video texts, power-points and other materials provided by the teachers.

Office hours

See the website of Ines Peta