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Can you get a degree in Egyptian Arabic? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| neok Newbie United Kingdom Joined 4152 days ago 14 posts - 17 votes Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 6 26 April 2014 at 12:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm using an online course to learn Egyptian Arabic and at the end of the course you can
take a test on everything you have learnt and if you pass you can print out a certificate proving this. I would like to know if this certificate would be enough to show for a job. For example, lets say I wanted to get a job translating documents from English to Egyptian Arabic, would this certificate be enough to get me that job? Would it count as an official degree? Or would I need to take an official examination on Egyptian Arabic? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5265 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes  Speaks: German*, English | Message 2 of 6 26 April 2014 at 2:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
Unless it's an online course provided by an accredited university, the certificate is most likely absolutely worthless. I.e., before you spend lots of money on this course, you may want to do some serious googling about the course provider and the course. At the very least, the online course should allow you to earn college credit. While you're at it, you also may want to check the starting salaries for translators and the average word prices for English Arabic translations.
First of all, there are hardly any jobs translating documents into Egyptian Arabic, because, unlike MSA, it's primarily a spoken language. Also most Western translation agencies, still require a college or university degree. At a bare minimum, you'd need a universally recognized third-party certification, for example an IOL certification. tl;dr No, unless you want to specialize into teaching Egyptian Arabic. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Iwwersetzerin Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member Luxembourg Joined 5614 days ago 259 posts - 513 votes Speaks: French*, Luxembourgish*, GermanC2, EnglishC2, SpanishC2, DutchC1, ItalianC1 Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 3 of 6 27 April 2014 at 11:09am | IP Logged | |||||
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I agree with Doitsujin above and would also like to add that professional translators translate primarily from their foreign language(s) into their mother tongue. If your Arabic is not at a native or near-native level, then nobody is going to hire you to translate into Arabic. You should focus on translating from Arabic into English. It is an interesting combination with high demand, because not a lot of native English speakers master Arabic to the point of being able to translate it professionally. However, unless you want to work freelance, a university degree is generally required to work as a translator in a company, government agency or international organization.
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6542 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 4 of 6 27 April 2014 at 2:12pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Also, most online courses barely take you to the intermediate level. And of course you can't prove that you didn't use dictionaries or reference books while taking the online test.
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| Al-Malik Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member United Kingdom arabicgenie.com Joined 7079 days ago 221 posts - 294 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Dutch, French, Arabic (classical) Studies: Mandarin, Persian | Message 5 of 6 29 April 2014 at 10:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
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For translation and even interpreting the most useful flavour of Arabic to learn would be Modern Standard Arabic, as this essentially is the only written form of the language in use. Of course, if you're planning to do interpreting then you should also specialise in one or more of the various dialects. As far as I'm aware, there aren't any officially-recognised exams/certificates for Arabic dialects.
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| yantai_scot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4747 days ago 157 posts - 214 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 6 of 6 02 May 2014 at 11:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Firstly, may I recommend David Bellos' brilliant book, 'Is that a Fish in Your Ear?' It
introduces some themes within translation to the non-linguist in an interesting way. It's not an academic book as such. You could learn via the internet/Skype/further education college/local mosque/local Arabic speakers and acquire a working knowledge of Arabic but you'd be limited to pretty limited ad-hoc work e.g writing formal letters on behalf of people to UK government departments such as the Borders Agency.It wouldn't be anything more than a paying hobby at best. If you decided you really want to be a translation professional, it does generally mean a university degree. THEN a translation or interpreter course as a post-graduate. 5+ years of study. Your undergraduate degree needn't be 100% Arabic. Indeed, courses in business or legal subjects alongside a language can be very useful. But, you'd really be looking to spend a year (at least) in an Arabic speaking country- Egypt if that's your main interest- in order to build up a basic fluency and cultural knowledge. This is standard for UK language degrees. You don't need to have a background in Arabic to study it at uni. They look for evidence of prior language learning ability e.g. a GCSE in a language with a decent grade and an interest in the language and culture you want to study. As ever, the more popular the university and the degree course, the higher the qualifications they'll ask for. If there's no particular reason for picking Egyptian Arabic, aside from the availability of the online course then the following may be of interest: Central Lancaster- Arabic Language and Studies- 1 year work or study placement in Oman. Durham Uni- Modern Languages (Arabic) Edinburgh Exeter Leeds (1 year in Egypt or Morocco) Manchester SOAS, London Westminster, London St Andrews (1 year in Egypt or Lebanon) Further afield, you could look into courses (taught in English) at: U of Southern Denmark Stolkholm University Leiden University Edited by yantai_scot on 03 May 2014 at 12:02am 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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