Innovative Second and Foreign Language Education in the Middle East and North Africa
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INNOVATIVE SECOND AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE EDUCATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA
INTRODUCTION
The Middle East and North Africa form a vast region stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the West to Pakistan in the East and the Caucasus and/or Central Asia in the north. At present, the region comprises more than 23 independent countries, the majority of which are Arab states. With the exception of Turkey, Iran, and Israel where the predominant languages are Turkish, Farsi, and Hebrew respectively, the overwhelming majority of people in this region use Arabic. The educational systems in the region vary from country to country. As Akkari (2004, p. 144) puts it “each country’s educational past and current experiences are different, but several important similarities exist.” He adds that since each country’s experiences, culture, and history are different, each country of the region will have to devise its own plan for educational reform. As far as second language education is concerned, it can be traced back to the early decades of the twentieth century, when different parts of the region came under the British and French mandates. It is never an easy task to handle the language situation in every single country of the area; therefore, an attempt is made in this article to consider the cases of a few representative countries. E A R LY D E V E L O P M E N T S
The Middle East and North Africa are two regions that are often grouped together because they have many things in common. Historically, the region has attracted the attention of historians since early times because of its significant position. The area is believed to be inhabited by 6.3% of the world’s population. The modern history of the region has its origins in the events of the First World War and the postwar settlement (Kedouri, 1978; Longrigg, 1978). With the exception of Iran, Turkey, and Israel, the area is inhabited by the Arabs who are of Semitic origin, and who use Arabic as their native tongue. People inhabiting the Arab countries can be seen as a diglossic speech community, where two varieties of the same language are used side by N. Van Deusen-Scholl and N. H. Hornberger (eds), Encyclopedia of Language and Education, 2nd Edition, Volume 4: Second and Foreign Language Education, 227–237. #2008 Springer Science+Business Media LLC.
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side; colloquial Arabic which exists as the vernacular varieties of the major Arab-speaking countries, and classical Arabic, the language of the Qur’an, which provides a common standard written form for all vernacular variants, and a common medium for affairs of state, religion, and education throughout the Arabic-speaking countries (Al-Khatib, 2006). By the end of the nineteenth century, the whole of North Africa, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco, came in the grip of French colonization. France’s harsh occupation of these countries was a reflection of its conception of that region as an extension of itself. Algeria is a case in point where French became the official language of the c
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