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This tool helps you to understand Al Jazeera better

The first frustrating experience of many Arabic students is usually the moment when the teacher turns Al-Jazeera or Al-Arabiya on. Most of the time, teachers have to pause after each sentence and ask which words were actually understood. But there is hope: a great audio option on al-Jazeera.

Last updated: 1 year ago

First the good news:

is pretty simple regarding the grammar. The sentences often even follow a Western syntax (subject plus verb plus object).

That is also true for vocab and phrases because you will encounter them in many articles. So, there is nothing to worry about. It is not a lot of work.

However, there is indeed a big problem: the speed. Arabic news moderators often pronounce sentences like a machine gun. And when it comes to newspapers, most students simply need too much time to read articles – especially because they do not know how to pronounce the words, and thus falter.

That is also the reason why students are not so much into reading newspapers because it is more or less like a guessing game as the vowels are not written.

But there is help:

Al-Jazeera offers a great service – listen to the article! There is an audio option on their website.

  • The words are pronounced in a natural way (with correct vowels).
  • It shows you the word which is currently pronounced (by highlighting it with a different color).
  • You can download the audio file at the end to listen to it in one go.

How does it work?

STEP 1: Go to the Arabic site of Al-Jazeera – https://aljazeera.net

Notice the domain .net because .com usually directs you to the English site.

STEP 2: Click on any article.

STEP 3: Under the headline, you should now see a loudspeaker symbol:

aljazeera loudspeaker button

STEP 4: Click on it.

STEP 5: You should now be able to listen to the text. The AI highlights the word that is currently pronounced.

aljazeera play button
aljazeera audio

Here is how it sounds (Video):

REMARK: This also works on your mobile. You don't even have to use the app. Just use your browser and go to aljazeera.net

By the way: I have interviewed an employee of the company which develops the AI for text to speech – you can read it here. Furthermore, if you want to know the “real” and authentic pronunciation – try out this tool.


Don't miss the latest posts on useful tools:

picture credit: pixabay by Karolina Grabowska 

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Mido
Mido
1 year ago

Hi. I was trying to study media arabic through aljazeera news, but it seems that aljazeera does not support article listeing service anymore. Could you please check again?

Badrul Aini Shaari
Badrul Aini Shaari
5 years ago

In the future, I would like to suggest you to write a book on media Arabic, especially on the stylistics, and the common terms and expression usage.

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