ARAB
Excerpts from Wikipedia.org
An Arab (Arabic: عربي) is a member of a complexly defined ethnic group who identifies as such on the basis of one or more of either genealogical, political, or linguistic grounds.
The Arabic language and culture began to spread in the Middle East in the 2nd century with genealogically Arab Christians such as the Ghassanids, Lakhmids and Banu Judham. The Arabic language gained importance with rise of Islam in the 7th century AD as the language of the Qur'an, which spread the Arabic language with the early Islamic expansion.
The Definition of an Arab
The definition of an Arab is heavily disputed. It is usually defined independent of religious identity. It pre-dates the rise of Islam, with historically attested Arab Christian kingdoms and Arab Jewish tribes. The earliest documented use of the word "Arab" as defining a group of people dates from the 9th century BC. Islamized but non-Arabized peoples, and therefore the majority of the world's Muslims, do not form part of the Arab World, but comprise what is the geographically larger and diverse Muslim World.
In the modern era, defining who is an Arab is done on the grounds of one or more of the following three criteria:
Genealogical: someone who can trace his or her ancestry to the tribes of Arabia - the original inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula - and the Syrian Desert. This definition covers fewer self-identified Arabs than not, and was the definition used in medieval times, for example by Ibn Khaldun. Linguistic: someone whose first language, and by extension cultural expression, is Arabic, including any of its varieties. This definition covers more than 250 million people. Certain groups that fulfill this criteria, such as many Egyptians, reject this definition on the basis of genealogy. Political: in the modern nationalist era, any person who is a citizen of a country where Arabic is either the national language or one of the official languages, or a citizen of a country which may simply be a member of the Arab League and thus having Arabic as an official government language, even if not used by the majority of the population. This definition would cover over 300 million people. It may be the most contested definition as it is the most simplistic one. It would exclude the entire Arab diaspora, but include not only those genealogically Arabs (Gulf Arabs and others, such as Bedouins, where they may exist) and those Arabized-Arab-identified, but also include Arabized non-Arab-identified groups (such as some Maronite Lebanese) and even non-Arabized indigenous ethnicities which may be non-Arabic-speaking, monolingually or otherwise (such as the Berbers in Morocco, Kurds in Iraq, or the Somali majority of Arab League member Somalia).
During the Muslim conquests of the seventh and eighth centuries, the Arabs forged an Arab Empire (under the Rashidun and Umayyads, and later the Abbasids) whose borders touched southern France in the west, China in the east, Asia Minor in the north, and the Sudan in the south. This was one of the largest land empires in history. In much of this area, the Arabs spread Islam and the Arabic language through conversion and cultural assimilation. Many groups became known as "Arabs" through this process of Arabization rather than through descent. Thus, over time, the term Arab came to carry a broader meaning than the original ethnic term: cultural Arab vs. ethnic Arab. Some native people in Sudan, Morocco and Algeria (Berbers) and in other regions became Arabized. Arab nationalism declares that Arabs are united in a shared history, culture and language. Arab nationalists believe that Arab identity encompasses more than outward physical characteristics, race or religion. A related ideology, Pan-Arabism, calls for all Arab lands to be united as one state. Arab nationalism has often competed for existence with regional nationalism in the Middle East, such as Lebanese and Egyptian.
Pre-Arabic Near East
Early Semites built civilizations in Mesopotamia and Syria, but slowly lost their political domination of the Near East due to internal turmoil and constant attacks by new nomadic Semitic and non-Semitic groups. The Arameans, Akkadians, Assyrians, Canaanites, Babylonians, Phoenicians, Philistines, Amorites, Sabaeans and Minaeans spoke closely related Semitic languages. These groups often overlapped and mixed racial lines, as did Indo-European groups. Attacks climaxed with the arrival of the Medians to east Mesopotamia and the incorporation of the Neo Babylonians. Although the Semites lost political control, the Aramaic language remained the lingua Franca of Mesopotamia and Syria. Eventually, Aramaic lost its day-to-day use with the defeat of the Persians and the arrival of the Hellenic armies around 330BC.
The Hebrew Bible occasionally refers to `Arvi peoples (or variants thereof), translated as "Arab" or "Arabian". The scope of the term at that early stage is unclear, but it seems to have referred to various desert-dwelling Semitic tribes in the Syrian Desert and Arabia. Its earliest attested use referring to the neighboring nomadic groups. Proto-Arabic, or ancient north Arabian, texts give a clearer picture of the Arabs' emergence. The earliest are written in variants of epigraphic south Arabian musnad script, including the 8th century BC Hasaean inscriptions of eastern Saudi Arabia, the 6th century BC Lihyanite texts of southeastern Saudi Arabia and the Thamudic texts found throughout Arabia and the Sinai (not in reality connected with Thamud).
The Nabateans moved into territory vacated by the Edomites -- Semites who settled the region centuries before them. The Nabateans were nomadic newcomers who wrote in a vernacular Aramiac that evolved into modern Arabic and modern Arabic script around the 4th century. This process included Safaitic inscriptions (beginning in the 1st century BC) and the many Arabic personal names in Nabataean inscriptions in Aramaic. From about the 2nd century BC, a few inscriptions from Qaryat al-Faw (near Sulayyil) reveal a dialect which is no longer considered "proto-Arabic", but pre-classical Arabic.
Map of Arab League states in dark green with non-Arab areas in light green and Mauritania, Somalia and Djibouti in striped green due to their Arab League membership but non-Arab population
Arab League
The Arab League, officially called the League of Arab States, is a regional organization of Arab states in Southwest Asia, and North and Northeast Africa. It was formed in Cairo on March 22, 1945 with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan (renamed Jordan after 1946), Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Yemen joined as a member on May 5, 1945. The Arab League currently has 22 members.
The Arab League is involved in political, economic, cultural, and social programs designed to promote the interests of its member states. It has served as a forum for the member states to coordinate their policy positions, to deliberate on matters of common concern, to settle some Arab disputes, and to limit conflicts such as the 1958 Lebanon crisis.
The Crusades Through Arab Eyes
Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean
Arab Seafaring
