LONDON: While many teenagers at UK schools are typically learning how to conjugate French verbs or practicing how to order a cheese sandwich in Spanish, young people in a Northern Irish grammar school are busy perfecting their Arabic calligraphy skills.
For the past year, the Belfast Royal Academy has been trialing Arabic lessons in an effort to encourage students to see the potential benefits of speaking non-European languages for their future careers. All pupils in Year 1 (11-12-year-olds) are required to study Arabic alongside their other subjects.
With the UK’s departure from the EU looming, the need for the next generation to speak languages such as Arabic and Mandarin Chinese could become even more urgent as the country looks to forge closer trade ties with non-EU countries.
The ‘Global Britain’ UK politicians are currently so eager to espouse will need to speak global languages.
“Post-Brexit, they might need languages that they haven’t thought of before,” said Paul Porter, head of modern and classical languages at the Belfast Royal Academy.
Porter led the initial efforts two years ago to obtain funding for the school’s Arabic program from the British Council. A total of nine schools in Northern Ireland won funding last September.
To engage students in the language, Porter said it was important to show them how relevant Arabic could be in running a business.
“We are known for green pastures, butter and potatoes — and we export that and it is bought by people living in places that are not so green — we are trying to show the students that we need those languages to go to that market,” he said.
Government organizations such as InvestNI have also given talks to the students to explain how Arabic can be a useful business tool.
Porter’s comments come after the British Council released a report in early November which drew up a list of what it considered the top five most important languages for the UK’s post-Brexit strategic interests.
Arabic was ranked in fourth place, with Mandarin in second place, alongside French, Spanish and German.
The report said that the UK was at a turning point, recommending that it was time to put into place “a bold new policy to improve foreign language learning for a transformed global Britain”.
It specifically called for UK governments to take a “strategic approach to building capacity in Arabic and Mandarin Chinese.”
Commenting on the report, Vicky Gough, schools adviser at the British Council, said: “It highlights that Arabic is not only one of the 10 most significant languages for international education — in response to economic growth and expanding political influence in a number of countries in the Middle East — but it is a key language for international diplomatic postings.”
While Arabic will have benefits for the UK’s economic future, said Porter, the language has offered far more than that to his students. It has opened them up to a culture that may be quite alien to their day-to-day existence and often misunderstood due some of the “negative connotations” students might see in the media.
“We had to change that. Change the whole mindset so we decided to use calligraphy to change that to show how beautiful the language is,” he said. “The whole school is decorated in Arabic calligraphy.”
He explained that the school opted to teach Arabic through art as well as via its culture and food as a way of engaging and exciting students about a language that can be difficult to learn for those used to Latin-based languages.
“We make it attractive for the children and we sow seeds that it is a beautiful language, a language that people use all over the world,” he said, adding that the school is non-denominational and had no religious or other reasons to teach Arabic apart from the language being “rich, varied and beautiful.”
The achievements at Belfast Royal Academy stand in contrast to the fairly limited teaching of Arabic seen in the rest of the UK. Just five or six percent of English secondary schools teach Arabic, though usually as an extra-curricular subject, according to the British Council report last month.
Arabic is often taught as a language option where a large proportion of the school is considered Muslim, and while Arabic may not be their first language, many of the students might be exposed to it at home or in mosques.
Arabic was first offered as a GCSE option in 1995 with 1,182 entries rising to 4,211 entries by 2016, according to the British Council report.
Research cited by the report suggested the growth in Arabic learning is likely mainly due to the expansion of Muslim faith schools, with few non-Muslim children having the opportunity to learn the language.
The way in which Arabic is taught in the UK needs improving, said Rabab Hamiduddin, teacher of Arabic and a research associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
She also runs the Arabic Club for Kids which runs Arabic classes on weekends across the UK capital. She said that when she first opened the school in 2007 she found that the Arabic teaching resources available to teachers were inadequate.
“I saw problems in Arabic when I first opened my school. There’s just no ability to rely on academic high-level solutions for literacy. Whereas there are for English and other languages, there definitely aren’t for Arabic.
“The resources fail in terms of providing what children learn from and enjoy. Many children come to our school and... (the parents) said my child used to hate Arabic and now they love it.”
With the need for better resources in mind, Hamiduddin spearheaded a research group that produced The Arabic Club for Kids Guided Reading Scheme, a series of 80 banded guided reading books in Arabic for children.
Sue Bodman, an expert from the international literacy center, Institute of Education at the University of London, also worked on the project.
“It is very effective and very child-centric. Its philosophy is based on how children acquire language. They are very colorful books and have a very strong semiotic value,” she said.
“We think our scheme has made the first step. Teachers want to do things but have nothing to latch on to. They want to inspire but they are dragged down by the resources,” she added.
She is currently working on a proposal to open a new bilingual school in Kensington, London next year to offer bilingual education in both Arabic and English to children aged between three and five years.
To further support the expansion of Arabic in schools, the British Council has recommended that governments and schools draw from the successes of the existing Mandarin Excellence Programme in England and the China strategy in Scotland.
The Mandarin program — which is funded by the government and delivered by the UCL Institute of Education with the British Council — has just started its second year of operation.
It will see 5,000 school pupils in England on track to gain fluency in Mandarin Chinese by 2020, said Katharine Carruthers, director of the UCL Institute of Education (IOE) Confucius Institute.
“What makes the program unique is that, on average, students will study eight hours of Mandarin — including four hours of taught lessons — every week,” she said.
“Feedback from students and teachers has indicated that studying Mandarin for an average of eight hours a week has really allowed them to explore the language in more depth — and pupils can see their own progress much quicker than usual, which appears to be very motivating.”
“Having advanced Mandarin skills will be a great asset for a young person to be able to put on their CV — both now and in the years ahead,” she said.
If the efforts seen in schools in Northern Ireland so far are replicated across the whole of the UK, Arabic language skills could join Mandarin Chinese as another skill young people are able to put on their CV, making themselves stand out in an increasingly competitive global job market.
Why Brexit means Brits should learn Arabic
Why Brexit means Brits should learn Arabic
The 2025 Grammy Award nominations are about to arrive. Here’s what to know
- The 2025 Grammy Awards will air Feb. 2 live on CBS and Paramount+ from the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles
NEW YORK: The 2025 Grammy Award nominations are just around the corner — who will compete for the top prizes?
Nominees will be announced during a video stream live on the Grammy website and the Recording Academy’s YouTube channel on Friday at 8 a.m. Pacific and 11 a.m. Eastern, kicking off with a pre-show 15 minutes earlier.
A host of talent is on deck to announce the nominees, including Gayle King, Jim Gaffigan and a long list of past Grammy winners: Brandy Clark, Kirk Franklin, David Frost, Robert Gordon, Kylie Minogue, Gaby Moreno, Deanie Parker, Ben Platt, Mark Ronson, Hayley Williams and last year’s best new artist recipient, Victoria Monét.
Only recordings commercially released in the US between Sept. 16, 2023 through Aug. 30, 2024 are eligible for nominations, so don’t expect to see album nods for Future’s “Mixtape Pluto” (though Future and Metro Boomin’s “We Don’t Trust You” is very likely to score a nomination), George Strait’s “Cowboys and Dreamers,” Tyler, the Creator’s “Chromakopia,” or “Warriors,” Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first full post-“Hamilton” musical with Pulitzer finalist Eisa Davis.
There’s plenty of unknowns going into the announcements: Will Beyoncé and Post Malone receive nominations in the country music categories following the success of their massive albums “Cowboy Carter” and “F-1 Trillion,” respectively, even though they are megastars previously not directly associated with the genre?
Will Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” the biggest song of the year that combines his country twang with the familiar sample of J Kwon’s 2004 rap hit “Tipsy” dominate?
The 2025 Grammy Awards will air Feb. 2 live on CBS and Paramount+ from the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.
Prison break: Monkeys escape from South Carolina medical research facility
- Alpha Genesis provides primates for research worldwide at its compound
- Alpha Genesis $12,600 in 2018 after dozens of primates escaped
Forty-three monkeys escaped from a compound used for medical research in South Carolina but the nearby police chief said there is “almost no danger” to the public.
“They are not infected with any disease whatsoever. They are harmless and a little skittish,” Yemassee Police Chief Gregory Alexander said Thursday morning.
The Rhesus macaque primates escaped from the Alpha Genesis facility Wednesday when a new employee didn’t fully shut an enclosure, Alexander said.
The monkeys are females weighing about 3 kilograms and are so young and small that they haven’t been used for testing, police said.
Alpha Genesis employees “currently have eyes on the primates and are working to entice them with food,” police said in a statement issued around noon Thursday.
The company usually handles escapes on site, but the monkeys got outside the compound about 1.6 kilometers from downtown Yemassee, Alexander said.
“The handlers know them well and usually can get them back with fruit or a little treat,” Alexander said by phone.
But rounding up these escapees is taking some more work. Alpha Genesis is taking the lead, setting up traps and using thermal imaging cameras to recapture the monkeys on the run, the chief said.
“There is almost no danger to the public,” Alexander said.
People living nearby need to shut their windows and doors so the monkeys can’t find a place to hide inside and if they see the primates, call 911 so company officials and police can capture them.
Alpha Genesis provides primates for research worldwide at its compound about 80 kilometers northeast of Savannah, Georgia, according to its website. The company did not respond to an email asking about Wednesday’s escape.
In 2018, federal officials fined Alpha Genesis $12,600 after dozens of primates escaped as well as for an incident that left a few others without water and other problems with how the monkeys were housed.
Officials said 26 primates escaped from the Yemassee facility in 2014 and an additional 19 got out in 2016.
The group Stop Animal Exploitation Now sent a letter to the US Department of Agriculture asking the agency to immediately send an inspector to the Alpha Genesis facility, conduct a thorough investigation and treat them as a repeated violator. The group was involved in the 2018 fine against the company.
“The clear carelessness which allowed these 40 monkeys to escape endangered not only the safety of the animals, but also put the residents of South Carolina at risk,” Michael Budkie, the executive director of the group, wrote in the Thursday morning letter.
Trump victory renews interest in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ and other fictional dystopias
- Margaret Atwood’s dystopian classic about a country in which women are brutally repressed has been high on the Amazon.com best seller list
NEW YORK: “The Handmaid’s Tale” is selling again.
Since President-elect Donald Trump clinched his return to the White House, Margaret Atwood’s dystopian classic about a country in which women are brutally repressed has been high on the Amazon.com best seller list. “The Handmaid’s Tale” was popular throughout Trump’s first term, along with such dark futuristic narratives as George Orwell’s “1984” and Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451,” both of which were in the Amazon top 40 as of Thursday afternoon. Another best-seller from Trump’s previous time in office, Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century,” was in the top 10.
Pro-Trump books also were selling well. Former first lady Melania Trump’s memoir, “Melania,” was No. 1 on the Amazon list, and Vice President-elect JD Vance’s “Hillbilly Elegy” was in the top 10. Donald Trump’s photo book “Save America” was in the top 30.
At Barnes & Noble, “Fiction and non-fiction books that feature fascism, feminism, dystopian worlds and both right-and-left leaning politics rocketed up our sales charts with the election results,” according to Shannon DeVito, the chain’s director of books. She cited “Melania,” “On Tyranny” and Bob Woodward’s latest, “War,” which covers the responses of Trump and President Joe Biden to the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.
DeVito also cited “a massive bump in dystopian fiction,” notably for “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “1984.”
First artwork by humanoid robot sells for $1.3 million
REUTERS: A portrait of English mathematician Alan Turing became the first artwork by a humanoid robot to be sold at auction, fetching $1,320,000 on Thursday.
The 2.2 meter (7.5 feet) portrait “A.I. God” by “Ai-Da,” the world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist, smashed pre-sale expectations of $180,000 when it went under the hammer at London auction house Sotheby’s Digital Art Sale.
“Today’s record-breaking sale price for the first artwork by a humanoid robot artist to go up for auction marks a moment in the history of modern and contemporary art and reflects the growing intersection between A.I. technology and the global art market,” said the auction house.
Ai-Da Robot, which uses AI to speak, said: “The key value of my work is its capacity to serve as a catalyst for dialogue about emerging technologies.”
Ai-Da added that a “portrait of pioneer Alan Turing invites viewers to reflect on the god-like nature of AI and computing while considering the ethical and societal implications of these advancements.”
The ultra-realistic robot, one of the most advanced in the world, is designed to resemble a human woman with a face, large eyes and a brown wig.
Ai-Da is named after Ada Lovelace, the world’s first computer programmer and was devised by Aidan Meller, a specialist in modern and contemporary art.
“The greatest artists in history grappled with their period of time, and both celebrated and questioned society’s shifts,” said Meller.
“Ai-Da Robot as technology, is the perfect artist today to discuss the current developments with technology and its unfolding legacy,” he added.
Ai-Da generates ideas through conversations with members of the studio, and suggested creating an image of Turing during a discussion about “A.I. for good.”
The robot was then asked what style, color, content, tone and texture to use, before using cameras in its eyes to look at a picture of Turing and create the painting.
Meller led the team that created Ai-Da with artificial intelligence specialists at the universities of Oxford and Birmingham in England.
Meller said Turing, who made his name as a World War II codebreaker, mathematician and early computer scientist, had raised concerns about the use of AI in the 1950s.
The artwork’s “muted tones and broken facial planes” seemingly suggested “the struggles Turing warned we will face when it comes to managing AI,” he said.
Ai-Da’s works were “ethereal and haunting” and “continue to question where the power of AI will take us, and the global race to harness its power,” he added.
@AIGOD_Aida
A portrait of renowned English mathematician Alan Turing became the first artwork by a humanoid robot to be sold at auction, fetching $1,320,000 on Thursday. the world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist,
Three charged in One Direction singer Liam Payne’s death
BUENOS AIRES: Three people have been charged in relation to One Direction singer Liam Payne’s death in a fall from his Buenos Aires hotel balcony last month, Argentine authorities said on Thursday.
The 31-year-old’s death shocked the world, and raised questions about how he had fallen.
A 911 call from a hotel employee the day Payne died warned that he had been acting aggressively and could have been under the influence of drugs and alcohol.
An autopsy revealed the former boy band member had traces of alcohol, cocaine and a prescription antidepressant in his system when he died, a prosecutor’s office said in a statement on Thursday.
Payne’s body was handed over to his father, Geoff, over the weekend and flown back to his native England. Over the past few weeks, Geoff had been seen alongside longtime One Direction bodyguard, Paul Higgins, at the CasaSur hotel where his son died.
Those charged in Payne’s death include a suspected drug dealer, a hotel employee who may have provided Payne with the cocaine and a person who was close to the singer, the authorities said.
All are accused of playing a role in giving Payne the drugs, with the hotel employee accused of giving Payne cocaine at least twice during his stay and the alleged drug dealer believed to have provided it twice more two days before his death.
The person who was visiting with Payne is also charged with “abandonment of a person followed by death,” authorities said.
None of those charged were named, but will be notified and are prohibited from leaving the country, according to the statement.
The investigation into the circumstances of Payne’s death will continue, prosecutors said, adding that they were still trying to unlock the singer’s broken laptop.
Witnesses had told local media that they saw Payne smashing his laptop in the hotel lobby.