Speakers of Iraqi Arabic will have most of the same problems in learning English that all Arabs do.

Writing

First, they will have difficulty with legible handwriting. In Arabic handwriting, it is not necessary for the letters to be written on the line, as English letters are. Arabs therefore have to be given a lot of practice in writing so that their letters are all the same size and all written more or less on the line. Arabs also have great difficulty with capitalization and punctuation, a predictable result of the lack of capitalization in the Arabic alphabet and the very different punctuation conventions.

Pronunciation

The most famous pronunciation problem Arabs have in pronouncing English—the confusion of p and b—is not a problem for Iraqis, who have a p in their dialect.

A feature you will probably notice when you hear Arabs (including Iraqis) speaking English is their pronunciation of r. The Arabic r is made with the tip of the tongue, and the double rr is a strong trill, as in Spanish or Italian. As Arabs tend to use their tongue-tip r in speaking English, the effect may be striking, although it probably will not impede understanding.

Arabs have difficulty with many of the vowel sounds, for several reasons. There are relatively few vowels in Arabic and relatively many vowels in English (fourteen of them!). Also, the English spelling system is inconsistent and at best gives only subtle clues as to how a vowel is pronounced. Arabs will probably have difficulty hearing and pronouncing the different vowels of "sit" and "seat," "bet" and "bat," "shut" and "shot," "boat" and "boot," and "bait" and "beet."

Grammar

Questions in English will cause problems, as they do for most learners of English, because they involve changes in word order—for example, "He is studying" vs. "Is he studying?" In Arabic, the difference between a sentence and its parallel question is carried only by the tone of voice, as it is in English with "He's studying" vs. "He's studying?"

Another potential problem are the words should and would, often used in English. Arabic sentences that express the ideas conveyed by should and would have very different structures.

A third problem is the be verb in present-tense sentences. In Arabic, there are no parallels to is and are, and so the Arab learner of English is likely to say, "I Iraqi" or "He from Iraq" or "What your name?" instead of "I am Iraqi," "He is from Iraq," or "What is your name?"

The Cultural Orientation Project--http://www.culturalorientation.net, for more information contact sanja@cal.org
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