220115P - THE ISLAMIZATION OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE: Multicultural and Global Perspective

Presented at the IIUM International Postgraduate Webinar on Islamization of Knowledge on January 15, 2022. By Professor Omar Hasan Kasule Sr. MB ChB (MUK). MPH (Harvard), DrPH (Harvard)

ORIGIN OF LANGUAGES:

• Diversity of languages is a sign of Allah. Rum 22
• Human language started with Allah teaching Adam the names of all things. Baqara 31
• Allah taught humans communication (bayaan). Rahman 4
• Did all human languages diversify from one primordial language or were different languages created at different times?
• Why is the word for mother and father similar in many diverse languages?
• Is language from ‘ilm aqli or ilm naqli or both?.

SOCIO-LINGUISTICS:

• Socio-linguistics investigates the relationship between language and society. In its present form, it is very secularized.
• Dr Syed Sayied called for the Islamization of linguistics which includes thought and world-view because these are tied to language
• Islamization of linguistics requires integration of the Islamic worldview. A lot of work remains to be done in this area

RELIGION and LANGUAGE:

• Religions have claimed divine languages such as Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit. (Syed Sayied AJISS Vol 3 No 1 1986).
• Why do Muslims object to the use of the word Allah by non-Muslims?
• Why did Hindus refuse a Muslim to register in a Masters course on Sanskrit?
• Words convey religious values. The word ‘Allah’ conveys more than worship
• Attas sees the Islamization of language as the start of Islamization of knowledge

ISLAMIZATION = ARABIZATION?

• The concept of the ‘language of the Qur’an’ as the Islamic language
• The Yemenis are the origin of Arabs but many spoke Himyaric languages before the spread of Islam
• Arabic spread after Islam to Syria, Egypt, North Africa and Sudan and displaced local languages. Many practicing Christians in the Middle East use Arabic as their liturgical language
• Arabic spread to Asia and Africa, modified local languages or led to new hybrid languages like Malay and Swahili
• Attas considered Islamization of language as the first step to the Islamization of knowledge

SECULARIZATION AND DE-ARABIZATION:

• Change of the alphabet and removal of Arabic words from the Othmani language to create modern Turkish under Kamal Ataturk
• Change of the alphabet of Swahili and setting up institutes for language development that sometimes removed Arabic words but also borrowed from modern Arabic
• Marginalization of Jawi in SouthEast Asia with attempts to remove some words with imperfect romanization why use ‘k’ when you have ‘q’

ISLAMIZATION OF LANGUAGE IN THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO:

• ‘Islamization of Malay Language and its Role in the Development of Islam in Malaya ‘ by Mabruroh and Rosyidatul Khoiriyah Universitas Darussalam Gontor 2019
• According to Attas the Malay language has been Islamized by absorbing Arabic words and Islamic concepts
• Jawi written in a distinctive script has letters in addition to Arabic ones to accommodate Malay phonetics
• 1971 Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka set up a committee that produced a dictionary with 1255 Islamized Malay words
• Islamization of the language d thinking and culture. According to Al Attas the world view of Islam starts with the Islamization of language

STRATEGIC WISDOM BEHIND UMMATIC LINGUISTIC UNITY:

• The majority of Muslims speak languages derived from or influenced by Arabic creating a huge language community
• Qur’an is never translated it is the Arabic original with the translation beside it.
• Millions read and memorize the Qur’an and hadith without understanding but are familiar with the words.
• Millions memorize Arabic poetry.
• Acts of ibadat are in Arabic, universality of Islamic worship.
• Listening to Qur’an for non-Arabic speakers has a profound impact.

LANGUAGE CARRIES CONCEPTS, CULTURE, AND THOUGHTS:

• The Arabic language is an agent of Islamization because it carries the Quranic message.
• Christian missionaries in Uganda opposed Swahili a lingua franca derived from Arabic because they feared its Islamization potential.
• Kamal Ataturk changed the vocabulary and alphabet of the Othmani language to create modern Turkish in a de-Islamization drive.
• Change of the Malay alphabet from Jawi to Latin.
• Change of Swahili alphabet from Arabic to Latin.
• Ismail Faruqi’s concept of ‘Islamic English.’

ARABIC LANGUAGE:

• Arabic is the religious language of 1.8 billion Muslims.
• Arabic is spoken by 422 million native and non-native speakers.
• Arabic spread with the spread of Islam and is a measure of Islamization.
• Arabic has influenced/created languages: Persian, Turkish, Hindustani, Urdu, Kashmiri, Kurdish, Bosnian, Kazakh, Bengali, Malay, Maldivian, Pashto, Punjabi, Albanian, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Sicilian, Maltese, Spanish, Greek, Bulgarian, Tagalog, Sindhi, Odia, Hausa, Swahili, etc.
• Arabic is a single standard language based on the Qur’an or the standard Arabic taught in schools. It however has many dialects some mutually unintelligible.

PERSIAN LANGUAGE (Farsi):

• There are 110 million Muslim speakers of Farsi (Persephone).
• Spoken in Iran, South, and Central Asia and written in a modified Arabic script.
• Farsi was used as an official court language in Central and South Asia.
• Farsi borrows a lot from Arabic and also gives words to Arabic. Maybe one-fourth of Persian words are of Arabic origin.
• Farsi is an old language that was Islamized with the spread of Islam in Iran starting in the 7th century AD.
• Iranians because great scholars of Islam.
• Farsi influenced other languages spoken by Muslims: Othmani Turkish, Punjabi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bengali, etc.

TURKIC LANGUAGES:

• Turkic languages are spoken by 170 million Muslims extending from Southern Europe, through Anatolia to Central Asia.
• Turkic languages originated near Mongolia and moved westwards with Turkic immigration until they reached the Balkans and the Mediterranean.
• Many languages belong to the Turkic group: Othmani Turkish, modern Turkish, Azerbaijani, Turkman, Tatar, Kazak, Uzbek etc.

KURDISH LANGUAGE:

• Kurdish is spoken in Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora (Turkey, Iran, Syria, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan).
• The Kumanji dialect (written in a modified Latin script) is spoken by 15-20 million Muslims and the Sorani dialect (written in the Arabic dialect) is spoken by 7 million Muslims. The Sorani dialect is written in the Arabic alphabet.

URDU LANGUAGE:

• Urdu is Arabised/Persianised Hindustani with over 200 million Muslim speakers in South Asia and the diaspora. Hindustani itself was affected by Arabic. Urdu borrows from Arabic but through Persian.
• Urdu is the official language of Pakistan and is recognized by the Indian constitution.

HAUSA:

• Hausa is spoken by 150 million people in West Africa. It is the lingua France used for trading.
• Hausa is written in the Latin alphabet and also an Arabic alphabet called AJAMI.

SWAHILI:

• A mixture of Bantu and Arabic languages is spoken in East Africa and surrounding areas.
• Spoken by 150 million.
• Originally written in the Arabic script it is now written in the Latin alphabet.
• Borrowing of technical words from Arabic is continuing.

MALAY:

• Spoken by 290 million Muslims in Southeast Asia.
• Developed as the lingua franca of the Malacca Sultanate with Arabic infusions and influence by Islamic literature.
• Written in Jawi and Latin alphabet.

TOWARDS ISLAMIC ENGLISH - by Al-Faruqi - 1:

• English has many loan words from Arabic: admiral, adobe, alchemy, alcohol, algebra, algorithm, alkaline, almanac, amber, arsenal, assassin, candy, carat, cipher, coffee, cotton, ghoul, hazard, jar, kismet, lemon, loofah, magazine, mattress, sherbet, sofa, sumac, tariff, and zenith.
• Use of Arabic/Islamic terminology in English because it is untranslatable.
• Phonetic transliteration of Arabic words into Latin alphabet may change meaning in the long run: e.g. do we write arabiyah or arabiyat, taqwah or taqwat, tarbiyah or tarbiyat.
• If English-speaking Muslims produce a lot of literature with untranslated terms they can Islamize English.

TOWARDS ISLAMIC ENGLISH- by Al-Faruqi - 2:

• AlFaruqi defined Islamic English as the English language modified to enable it to carry Islamic proper nouns and meanings without distortion, and thus serve the linguistic needs of English-speaking Muslims
• The number of English-speaking Muslims in Asia, Africa, and America is several millions. There are also English speakers in Muslim countries who are learning English for various purposes
• I want to add to the modest strategy of AlFaruqi: the aim is to enrich the English language with Islamic terminology and concepts so that even non-Muslim English speakers can appreciate Islam and this will contribute to civilizational dialog. This can be achieved by Muslims producing more material in popular art.

READINGS FROM TOWARD ISLAMIC ENGLISH - 4^th ed 1995 - 1

• Who are the Muslim users of the English language?
• The nature of the distortion
• Distortion through transliteration
• Distortion through translation
• The needed rectification in Transliteration
• Transliteration of letters
• Transliteration of words
• The needed rectification in Translation

READINGS FROM TOWARD ISLAMIC ENGLISH - 4^th ed 1995 - 2

• The needed rectification in translation
• General rules
• List of Islamic words/concepts
• List of terms/expressions relevant to the Islamic social sciences
• List of Islamic devotional and social terms/expressions

ISLAMIZATION OF ENGLISH BEYOND AL-FARUQI

• Islamization will go beyond transliteration and translation
• We need research on current popular English literature to understand the underlying worldview, history, and philosophy of the words used and critique them from the Islamic epistemological perspective. Wide publication of such research will enable better communication and understanding
• We need writers of popular English literature to introduce terms, concepts, and motifs that reflect the Islamic world-view