Arabic II

URL study guide

https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2024-2025/G_BATRSAL024

Course Objective

After finishing this course, the student:
- has developed reading, writing and communication skills in Arabic;
- is able to consolidate the achievements of Arabic I (one);
- has acquired new grammatical rules and new elementary vocabulary to understand simple Classical Arabic texts as well as Modern Standard Arabic;
- is able to form and understand sentences with grammatical structures;
- is able to understand and translate a simple Arabic text;
- is able to product a short text in Arabic from the material studied during the courses.

Course Content

In Arabic II, we will study: the regular and irregular plural, the declension, the nominal and verb sentence, the present tense, the past tense, the negation, the agreement between particles and suffix pronouns. In addition, simple reading texts are regularly distributed in the lessons to prepare at home and to read together in class. The programme is provisional and is susceptible to change according the circumstances.

Teaching Methods

The course is part of the Bachelor Theology and Religious Studies: track Islam, and of the Minor Arabic and Sources of Islam. For complete language acquisition, the student must be exposed to all elements of the language, including: reading, writing, listening and speaking. This is crucial to gaining an overall competency and fluency in Arabic. In class, Arabic is used as the language of instruction as much as possible. In addition, short dialogue exercises are offered.

Method of Assessment

Translations, grammatical exercises, short essays and other works are regularly distributed in the lessons to do at home and correct in class. In addition, short dialogue exercises are offered. Homework will be given for each next course and have to be sent to the teacher before the course. Seriousness, rigour and attendance result in a bonus for the student in his global average at the end of the period. Regarding the grading, it consists of:
- Assignment (25%)
- Oral exam (25%)
- Final exam of 3 hours consisting of oral/listening comprehension and written expression/comprehension (50%)
- Oral participation and homework (bonus)

Literature

There is no book to purchase for this course. All teaching material will be provided by the teacher.

Custom Course Registration

You can only register for this course if you are enrolled in the minor Arabic and Sources of Islam, or if you are taking the Islam track (part of the bachelor of Theology and Religious Studies), the Free Choice track (part of the bachelor of Theology and Religious Studies) or the History and International Studies track (part of the bachelor History).

Additional Information

After three absences without justification, the student will automatically fail the final exam and will have to take the resit to complete this course.

Recommended background knowledge

The student must have successfully completed the course Arabic I.