The Dictionary of Economics and Commerce English/French/Arabic

The user of this glossary cannot fail to realize quickly how much Arab economic terminology owes to both English and French. The linkage in this process of borrowing from these two main international languages in the different parts of the Arab world reflects the colonial traditions of the past several decades. Usually trained in Anglo-Saxon or French universities, Arab scholars in the modern sciences, especially those that relate to social evolution, have displayed a considerable degree of imagination in Arabic word formation which has helped to enrich and modernize one of the few classical languages that is still a living medium of communication. However, we in the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development, out of experience in working together with Arabs drawn from different cultural and historical backgrounds, have found that the process of word formation in economics was still in a fluid state. The need to coordinate and consolidate this process seemed therefore a pressing objective not only for better communication but also in order to enable Arab social scientists to concentrate on the more substantive, rather than semantic, aspects of cultural evolution. Arabic, to be sure, has not always been at the receiving end of semantic interchange and it is a wellknown fact that, during a good part of the Middle Ages and well into the Renaissance, Western European languages, including medieval Latin in particular, translated and borrowed from Arabic. 1 Such semantic interchange between different cultures is a natural process that goes on all the time and it is only to be expected that the more advanced culture would lend more than it borrows, though it should also be expected that other cultures would try to resist and preserve their own material. With time attitudes become more tolerant and foreign guest words more welcome, especially when they lose their identity and melt in the crucible of the host language's life. There is no doubt that the present order of the day in the Arab world is before anything else economic, social and technological development, but one can harldy expect that this can ever proceed in isolation from other interacting aspects of the nation's modernisation efforts. Given the stakes involved there is in fact no escape from the necessity to launch strenuous efforts on the various fronts simultaneously, in the linguistic field no less than on construction sites. I believe Dr. Nasr's impressive attempt in this glossary should be welcomed in the light of such an inevitable and protracted task. Better communication and understanding among the Arab countries in the field of economic cooperation will no doubt benefit from his work. It was often a pleasure indeed at the Kuwait Fund to accompany Dr. Nasr sometimes in a typically Arab intellectual quest: more knowledge of the heritage and of the possibilities of our own language. Front Matter....Pages i-xii A....Pages 1-12 B....Pages 12-21 C....Pages 21-44 D....Pages 44-56 E....Pages 56-68 F....Pages 69-81 G....Pages 81-85 H....Pages 86-89 I....Pages 89-104 J....Pages 104-105 K....Pages 105-105 L....Pages 106-114 M....Pages 114-127 N....Pages 127-131 O....Pages 131-137 P....Pages 137-158 Q....Pages 158-159 R....Pages 159-171 S....Pages 171-191 T....Pages 191-201 U....Pages 201-205 V....Pages 205-207 W....Pages 207-211 X....Pages 212-212 Y....Pages 212-212 Z....Pages 212-212