ARABIC LANGUAGE AND CULTURAL STUDIES MINOR

The Arabic Language and Cultural Studies program offers Arabic language and linguistic study, and classical and modern literature and cultural study.

Arabic is the language of a rich culture and civilization dating back many centuries; it is also the language of Islam and the Quran. This culture has produced such figures as Averroes, the medieval Aristotelian philosopher, Ibn Khaldun, the first social historian, and the modern poet Khalil Gibran. Between the 8th and 15th centuries the volume of literary, scholarly, and scientific book production in Arabic and the level of urban literacy among readers of Arabic were greater than any the world had even known until that time.