Resources by languages

  • Semitic languages - Standard Arabic and Arabic dialects

    The Semitic languages family represented in SOAS  Library’s Middle East section  includes Arabic and other Arabic dialects (Egyptian, Iraqi, Moroccan, Maltese, etc.) .

    Online dictionaries
    Teaching methods, etc.
    • Handbook for Students of Arabic
      This online handbook is an introduction to strategies and resources that can help students in their study of the Arabic language. It has been developed under the auspices of the National Middle East Language Resource Center (NMELRC)
    • Arabic Gateway
      Introductory material for learning Arabic.
    • Arabistan
      Web resources for learning materials in Arabic.
    • LookLex Arabic Course
      Free online Arabic course teaching basic sentences, how to write, count and introduces to grammar.
    • Arabic Without Walls
      Arabic 1AW or "Arabic Without Walls," is a first-year Arabic instruction in a distance-learning format taught through UC Berkeley. It is based on the textbook Al-Kitaab fii Ta`alum al-Arabiyya (Brustad et al., 2nd ed., Georgetown University Press, 2004).
    • Arabic language
      This online free encyclopaedia is a source of very good articles. This article gives an interesting family tree of dialects and a brief table of their phonological variations.
    • BYU Independent Study
    • NaturalArabic - A collection of topical news stories (updated weekly) from Arabic newspapers, with parallel English translations and recordings by native Arabic speakers. Users can click on any word to hear it read aloud and see the translation highlighted or they can play the whole recording to hear it read at natural speed.
    • Arab Academy
    • DalilUSA.com
    • BABEL:arabic
    • The Arabic Cyberclassroom
    • schoolarabia.net
    • Almedia
    Linguistics corpuses
    • SemArch - Semitisches Tonarchiv
      This online archive created by the University of Heidelberg (Germany) contains audio recordings for Arabic, Aramaic, Hebrew, Ethiopian and Neo-South Arabic languages and dialects, divided into: 2077 Audio-documents / 527 Speakers ;  20 Countries / 60 Regions / 224 Places ; 43 Editors and 51 Types of documents.

    • The Quranic Arabic Corpus
      This is an annotated linguistic resource which shows the Arabic grammar, syntax and morphology for each word in the Holy Quran. The corpus provides three levels of analysis: morphological annotation , a syntactic treebank and a semantic ontology .

    • Corpus Linguistics
      This website, created and maintained by an academic linguist Dr Ayman Eddakrouri, is designed as a directory to Arabic linguistic corpora. Three mains sections are available:
      1. Arabic corpora: Web-based (Searchable) corpora and Textual corpora (Text Files)
      2. Centers/Institutions.
      3. Software/Tools.
    Literatures
    • Al-Waraq
      Provides over a million pages of Arabic and Islamic works (the whole site is in Arabic). This is a very good site that provides extensive information on Arabic literature and humanities (philosophy, theology...) and also full-text version of a number of texts for free, you just need to register first.
    • Al-Mawsuah al-shamilah provides 5000 ebooks in Arabic, searchable and downloadable. Mainly on religious topics and Islamic law, but also contains some works of classical literature.
    • International Prize for Arabic Fiction IPAF  is an annual literary run with the support of the Booker Prize Foundation in London and funded by the TCA Abu Dhabi in the UAE. The website provides information and numerous links on contemporary Arabic literature.
    • American Association of Teachers of Arabic (AATA) links to Arabic resources
    • National Library of Israel Digital Library
      Much of this site is in Hebrew, but it also has material accessible to English speakers. It contains over 400 digital books, historic newspapers (mainly Jewish European publications from the 19th and early 20th centuries), 1,500 maps and 6,500 photographs of Jerusalem and the Land of Israel, the National Sound Archives recordings and YouTube videos of cultural events at the National Library.
    • The Arab Writers Union
      A site which has well developed since 1999. It gives a useful repertory of contemporary Syrian writers who are or were members of this organization, and a full text version of numbers of their most recent literary works (essays in Arabic literature or society, novels, plays, short stories…)
    • Arabic story
      A site devoted to modern Arabic short story and its criticism. There is a brief biography of each author and a sample of his/her work in full text version most of the time. Each section (authors’ repertory, stories, essays in criticism…) is classified by country.
    • Home of Egyptian & Arab authors on the Web
      A user maintained webpage, but it seems to be quite reliable and pretty extensive. It is worth to look at when searching for primary information on less well-known Egyptian authors.
    • Moroccan Writers Union
      This site gives a useful repertory of contemporary Moroccan writers who are or were members of this organization, and a full text version of numbers of their most recent literary works (essays in Arabic literature or society, novels, plays, short stories...)
    • Tunisian Writers' Union
      Site in French and Arabic. Provides short bio-bibliographies of Tunisian contemporary writers.
    • Union of Syrian Men of Letters
      Provides good samples (full text) of contemporary Syrian literature
    • International Prize for Arabic Fiction
      IPAF  is an annual literary run with the support of the Booker Prize Foundation in London and funded by the TCA Abu Dhabi in the UAE. The website provides information and numerous links on contemporary Arabic literature.
    • Rashf
      Has over 38,000 Arabic ebooks available for free download. The books cover a variety of subjects and can be searched by book title or author’s name.Users need to register first via their Facebook or Twitter account to access the full-text version.
    • Hindawi Books
      The Hindawi Association offers nearly a thousand Arabic ebooks to download (as PDF, PUB or Kindle format) in a variety of subjects and be searched by keyword, authors' name or title.
    • Arabic Literature (In English)
      This fresh and well-documented blog about contemporary Arabic literature is edited by Marcia Lynx Qualey, a writer and reader based in Cairo, Egypt. It is supported and contributed by several Arabic-speaking and English-speaking writers.
    • Middle East/North African Lit
      The books discussion group is part of Goodreads , one of the largest site for readers and book recommendations. This group is for those who enjoy reading books written by those who originate from the Middle East/North Africa. Books include fiction and non-fiction. Registration is free.
    • Layla the Chaste
    • Digital archive of Arabic cultural and literary journals = أرشيف المجلات الأدبية والثقافية العربية
      This website was created by Marlé Hammond, Senior Lecturer in Arabic Popular Literature and Culture at SOAS University of London, and is devoted to the topic of the Arabic epic of Layla Bint Lukayz, a supposedly pre-Islamic woman poet also known as Layla al-'Afifa (Layla the Chaste). All aspects of her epic related in modern popular songs and films are explored in this website, which provides a great insight in Arabic popular literature and culture.http://archive.sakhrit.co/

  • Iranian Languages [Persian and other Iranian languages and dialects (Pahlevi, Avestan, Dari, etc.)]

    Baluchi

    Online dictionaries
    Teaching methods, etc

    Kurdish

    Teaching methods, etc

    Persian

    Literature
    • Ensani : Portal jami' ulum insani پرتال جامع علوم انسانی
      This portal [in Persian only]  offers free search and access to journal articles in social sciences and humanities fields ( literature, economics, history, education, geography, law, psychology, linguistics, social sciences, Islamic science, political science, library science, philosophy and logic, management, women studies, art studies ). Most articles are available as full-text and can be freely downloaded.
    Online dictionaries
    Teaching methods, etc

    Pushto

    Online dictionaries
    Teaching methods, etc
  • Turkic languages [Turkish and other Turkic languages (Uzbek, Uighur, Kazakh, Chagatai, Kyrgyz…)]

    Turkish

    Online dictionaries
    Literatures
    • Turkish Poetry
      Full text selection of poems from early 20th century to present, along with bio-bibliographic information on authors. Site created by a young assistant professor in Turkish literature, Sibel Adali.

    • The Online Bibliography of Ottoman-Turkish  literature
      Is a free and extensive database of references to theses, books, articles, papers and projects relating to research into Ottoman-Turkish culture. Available both in English and Turkish.

    • Open Access Bibliographies: National Library of Turkey​
      In Turkish. A bibliography of Turkish publications ​kept at ​ the National Library of Turkey ​
      since 1946 to present.​ Among others, this portal features a few dedicated bibliographies of major Turkish authors, a searchable database of Turkish articles (for the period 1923-1999) and a database of Greek and Armenian publications published in Turkey. A monthly bibliography of​​
      the National Library of Turkey is downloadable in PDF format.
    • Reading with Atatürk
      In Turkish. Tour the IU Library of Rare Works where users can download and choose books to read from among 175 works read by Atatürk.​

    Turkic Languages

    Online dictionaries
  • Caucasian languages [Georgian and other Caucasian languages]
    Teaching methods, etc.
  • Armenian language
    Teaching methods, etc.
    • Armenian lessons online
      Beginning Armenian lessons for English speakers. Includes pronunciation (in both Eastern and Western Armenian), the alphabet, some introductory vocabulary and grammar. Includes link to free Armenian fonts for Windows and an Armenian dictionary