Alternate Names: Al-’Arabiyya, Al-Fusha, Literary Arabic
Dialects: Classical Arabic (Koranic Arabic, Quranic Arabic), Modern Standard Arabic (Modern Literary Arabic). Preserves the ancient grammar. A member of macrolanguage Arabic ,.
Genealogy:
Demographics: 206,000,000 L1 speakers of all Arabic varieties (Wiesenfeld 1999). 246,000,000 L2 speakers of all Arabic varieties (Wiesenfeld 1999).
Language Use: Not an L1. In most Arab countries only the well-educated have adequate proficiency in Standard Arabic, while over 100,500,000 do not. Education, official purposes, written materials, and formal speeches. Classical Arabic, with archaic vocabulary, is used for religion and ceremonial purposes.
Language Development: Fully developed. Bible: 1865–2008.
Typology: VSO.
Spoken In: Qatar, Algeria, Bahrain, Chad, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Western Sahara, Yemen, Mauritania
Writing System: Arabic, Braille
Nation of Origin: Saudi Arabia, Somaliland, Lebanon
Other Comments: Modern Standard Arabic is modernized Classical Arabic.