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Interviews
47 posts
Straight from the experts. Professional translators, linguists, and authors discuss their methods, their struggles, and their obsession with mastering Arabic.
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“Arabic is a very organized and systematic language” | Mohammad Wehbe | 9273 Roots #17
He's the Lebanese language enthusiast behind the popular YouTube channel "MohCoolMan." Mohammad Wehbe discusses his "100 Songs Initiative" to subtitle popular Arabic music, his love for the novels of Ghada al-Samman and Ghassan Kanafani, and his passion for the Egyptian dialect.
“I’ve been driven half-crazy by the sheer number of untranslatable expressions” | Brian Powell | 9273 Roots #18
As the translation manager for Industry Arabic, Brian Powell has been "driven half-crazy by untranslatable expressions." He discusses the beautiful complexity of his job, why he loves the word برزخ (barzakh) for its Sufi meaning, and the "Elizabethan exuberance" of Egyptian Arabic.
“My dream is to spread the Arabic language all over the world” | Habib Kassem | 9273 Roots #15
He's the Franco-Lebanese computer engineer who inherited a love for Arabic from his professor father. Habib Kassem discusses creating his app, Assiraj Almonir, and the "nights of hard work" it took to compress one terabyte of linguistic data into just 16 megabytes.
“I am a highly motivated person, who would always go one step further” | Yassir Abbassi | 9273 Roots #14
He's the man behind the voice of Al-Jazeera. As Sales Manager for Text-to-Speech leader ReadSpeaker, Yassir Abbassi makes Arabic texts talk. The Moroccan tech expert discusses his love for his native dialect, the power of Raï music, and the drive to always go one step further.
“Even dust accumulated becomes a mountain” | Reginald Hefner | 9273 Roots #13
He's a polyglot who worked as a Chinese and Japanese interpreter for the US government and attended Middlebury's Arabic school nine times. Reginald "Reggie" Hefner discusses his lifelong addiction to languages and his fascination with Arabic's rarest verb forms.
“Every time I cried because of it, I cried for it when it’s gone” | Mahmoud Gomah | 9273 Roots #12
He's the award-winning Egyptian poet and linguist who isn't afraid to correct the common grammatical mistakes of native speakers. Mahmoud Gomah discusses his work as an editor, his love for the poetry of Ahmed Shawqi, and why he considers the Egyptian dialect a language in its own right.
“I expect to serve in the Arab world so this feels like a wise investment of my time” | Ulric Shannon | 9273 Roots #11
He's the Canadian ambassador to Egypt who has served across the Middle East. Ulric Shannon discusses why studying Arabic is a "wise investment," his experience at Middlebury College, and his love for the complex literature of Taha Hussein and the "swagger" of the Lebanese dialect.
“My happy place is when I’m mixing up Arabic and English to bring stories to life” | Sirine Demachkie | 9273 Roots #10
Her happy place is "mixing up Arabic and English (Arablish) to bring stories to life." Lebanese-Australian author Sirine Demachkie discusses creating bilingual books to help kids connect with their heritage, her love for Khalil Gibran, and her favorite childhood expression.
“My greatest fear is that I won’t go back to my country and die in exile” | Widad Nabi | 9273 Roots #9
From the heart of war-torn Syria to the vibrant literary scene of Berlin, Widad Nabi's poetry offers a powerful voice for displacement, memory, and the enduring human spirit. In this deeply personal interview, the acclaimed Kurdish-Syrian poet and author opens up about her favorite Arabic words and literature, the cities that hold her heart, and her greatest fears and hopes for the future.
“It’s not really the Arabic that I like, it’s that it can mean cheese or cowardice” | Graeme Andrews | 9273 Roots #8
Graeme Andrews discusses his development of the essential desktop application for Lane's Arabic-English Lexicon. This interview explores his Arabic learning path, favorite words, and linguistic challenges.
