Because I am inevitably asked every time I speak publicly or translate for others, I figure I'd talk a little about how I learned the Arabic language in this thread https://twitter.com/joebradford/status/1111948220459028481

I accepted Islam a month after my 15th birthday. I then attended Sunday school at ICNEF in Jacksonville FL. I started off in the 8yr old Halaqa, learning from this book. I want to sit there, I said pointing to the teen circle "When you can read better than these kids you can."

So in about 6 months I picked up reading and writing the Arabic language. Seeing this, the Imam at that time, Dr. Zulfiqar Ali Shah, started to teach me the basics of Arabic grammar. We went over nouns, pronouns, verbs and verb conjugation, etc.

Alongside this, I was accompanying community members to dinners where people were speaking Arabic. Tired of translating every thing for me, one Egyptian brother said out of frustration "Why are we translating all this?! Joe, come sit here, just listen, & learn like out kids do."

So I'd carry pen and pad, take notes, and with a ten yr old by my side translating for me the words I could recognize, I started to document all those words. This exposed me to numerous dialects, allowed me pick up nuance, and learn context early on.

Dr. Zulfiqar (who I will always affectionately call Hafiz Saheb ) then bought me this book so I could keep up with phrases. The transliterated phrases were Masri, but the Arabic inside was in MSA, so it was another lesson in colloquial vs classical Arabic.

Around the same time I started at a new High school, and unlike my previous HS there was at least 1 other Muslim there. We became friends & his father took me in as a 5th son. He'd introduce me as "my son from my American wife" lol. May Allah have mercy on him, He passed in 2012.

I'd stay all day w my new adopted family, picking up words and phrases, watching Arabic movies and TV, being exposed to media. I was about 16-17 at that time. We are all still very good friends until today and I cherish them as family.

I was attending extra classes in the evenings with the imam along with my friend Musaddiq, who had accepted Islam at that time (he passed away last year, Allah accept him) where we would sit together and review the Arabic phrases of prayer.

I'd also go and spend days with a group of Libyan asylees, who were relocated by Lutheran Services to Jacksonville. Bc most couldn't speak English, I was able to immerse myself in Arabic and learn from them as well. We'd play soccer (they'd play well, I'd play badly) and talk.

Now that I was reading, writing, and speaking (if you could call it that) my dear friend and brother Ahmed from Palestine gave me a copies of Al-Ājarūmiyya, Matn al-Izza, and al-Maqsūd, and we'd read through them.

Another Dr. in the community gave me a copy of AlHāshemi's and alGhäyālīnis books on Arabic. I'd take these books and a copy of the Quran and a copy of the Arab News and translate surahs and articles, searching for grammatical structures, and try to understand what I was reading

I got to a level of proficiency that made one brother half-jokingly say
اذا كتبت تقريرك الليلة اذكرني بخير
this was shocking at the time a Palestinian brother rightfully chided him for this snide remark, but I look back w pride at being the youngest CIA convert to learn Arabic ;)

Listening to cassette tapes was a huge help as well. I listened to AbdulHameed Kishk, Muhammad al-Mukhtar al-Shinqeeti, Ibn Uthaymin, & others. Listening to tapes allowed me to immerse myself in the language while doing mundane tasks, driving, eating, etc.

Back & forth to Orlando at this time, looking for new resources. An older sister who was a Quran teacher in the Goldenrod community gave me a copy of Hans-Wehr dictionary. I tore that thing up, and had to replace it several times. See this link https://www.joebradford.net/eat-dictionary-teachinglearning-arabic-2/

A summer trip to Toronto took me to Gerard street and a bookstore there, and I bought Nadwis "Language of the Quran" set.
The whole time I was attending Hifz classes, and the study of the Quran and it's recitation was core to learning Arabic as well.

Stacking print, audio/visual, and immersion I was able to reach level of proficiency that when I finally got an interview for the Islamic University of Medina, I was accepted unconditionally to the Faculty of Shariah without being required to attend the Arabic language program

All this is to say, I learned the Arabic language in Florida before ever even applying for a passport, and you can too. Leverage your local resources before thinking you *have* to travel to the magical, mystical land of "Islamica" to learn Arabic and the basic of your faith.

I'll tweet about my experiences with learning Arabic formally in Medina another time, and my takeaways from meeting Senegalese and Malaysian classmates while there.

End of thread.

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