英语得宠引发阿拉伯世界母语危机

    今年3月，我访问了迪拜美国大学（the American University in Dubai）穆罕默德•本•拉希德传播学院（the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Communications）（我与该地区一些杰出的商界领袖同属该院顾问委员会成员）。部分学生用流利的英语向我们作了报告，随后我惊讶地听到，其他几位顾问坦率地指出他们的母语“已陷入危机”。

    事实表明，英语正在迅速成为新一代受过良好教育的阿拉伯人士所掌握的唯一语言。

    这对阿拉伯地区乃至全世界（这一点我稍后再详述）都不是一件好事。迪拜美国大学的新闻学院是中东唯一一个允许学生用阿拉伯语学习的现代教育项目。尽管如此，许多来到这里的学生阿拉伯语行文书写和正式表达能力都相当不足，需要重修阿拉伯语课程。

    根据联合国教科文组织的数据，海湾地区的识字率高达98%，可所识之字越来越多地是指的英语，而非阿拉伯语。

    偏爱英语的倾向很早就开始了，阿联酋那些私立“模范”学校的学童全部课程都采用英语授课，包括数学和科学，就连公立学校也在推行偏向英语的政策。已在阿联酋居住16年、在中东地区逗留逾30年的帕特里夏•阿布•瓦德教授惋惜地说，就连阿联酋政府资助的扎伊德大学（Zayed University）也没有一门课使用阿拉伯语授课。

    看起来，这种趋势正在向整个地区蔓延。沙特阿拉伯许多中上等阶层的家庭在家里也说英语——而不仅是在职场上，据一位知识渊博的人士分析，这是因为家长们担心阿拉伯语不够成熟完善。

    一位阿联酋首席执行官告诉我，他自己的孩子阿拉伯语都说不流利。他说，为了让他们将来能够拥有更好的职业发展前途，他送孩子们就读英语学校，但现在感到后悔，因为孩子们已不习惯说祖祖辈辈沿用的语言了。

    精英阶层为何对此感到焦虑呢？它不仅是个情感问题。该地区其他国家爆发阿拉伯之春运动的关键原因之一是贫富分化，而语言分化正是其反映。人们不断告诉我，我凭生活经验得出的感受是准确的：家庭越富裕，其成员在家说阿拉伯语的可能性就越低。如果同一个国家的人民却说这不同的语言，他们怎么可能超越阶级界限，解决就连沙特阿拉伯这种石油富国都深受困扰的高失业率问题呢？（SM咨询集团表示，即使按最保守的估计，沙特失业率也高达20%。）

    对于试图在当地大展宏图的企业高管来说，偏爱英语也会带来挑战。迪拜美国大学新闻学院院长阿里•阿尔•贾伯对我说：“如果不能与本国人民对话，就不可能成功。”MBC广播公司首席执行官皮热•达赫则表示，聘请合格的新闻记者很不容易，因为同时精通英语和阿拉伯语“是一种罕见的素质”。 

    Marhaba and hello. In March, I visited the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Communications at the American University in Dubai, where I sit on the advisory board with prominent regional business leaders. After some students presented reports to us in fluent English, I was surprised to hear my fellow board members say bluntly that their native language is "in crisis."

    It turns out English is fast becoming the only language of a new generation of educated Arabs.

    This isn't a good thing for the region or the rest of the world. (I'll get to that in a moment.) The journalism school at the AUD is the only modern program in the Middle East that allows students to study in Arabic. Still, many students arrive poorly versed in written Arabic and the formal spoken language and require refresher Arabic language courses.

    Literacy in the Gulf States is 98%, according to Unesco. But that literacy is increasingly in English, not Arabic.

    This English bias starts early, with children in private "model" schools in the United Arab Emirates studying their full curriculum, including math and science, in English. But state schools are pushing a pro-English agenda too. Professor Patricia Abu Wardeh, who has lived in the UAE for 16 years and in the region for more than three decades, laments that the UAE's government-sponsored Zayed University offers no major in Arabic.

    The trend appears to be taking hold regionwide. In Saudi Arabia, many upper-middle-class families speak English at home -- not just at work -- because, as one knowledgeable source told me, parents fear Arabic isn't sophisticated.

    One Emirati CEO told me his own children do not speak Arabic fluently. He said he put them in English schools to help ensure they'd have great career prospects. But now he says he regrets that his children don't feel comfortable speaking the language of their forefathers.

    Why the anxiety among these elites? It isn't just sentimental. The bifurcation of wealth, a key part of Arab Spring uprisings elsewhere in the region, is mirrored in the bifurcation of language. I am continually told that what I've experienced anecdotally is true: The wealthier the family, the less likely its members speak Arabic at home. If people in the same country don't speak the same language, how can they work across class lines to solve the problems of high unemployment that plague even oil-rich Saudi Arabia? (SM Advisory Group says 20% is an extremely conservative estimate for Saudi joblessness.)

    For executives trying to build local businesses, the English bias is a challenge. The dean of the AUD's school of journalism, Ali Al Jaber, told me, "If you can't address your own people, then you can't be successful." Pierre el Daher, the CEO of broadcaster MBC, says hiring journalists is a challenge because fluency in both English and Arabic "is a rare quality."