Losing the language of the Koran

been a party just for Westerners. Young men snogged in the corridor. Girls downed tumblers of wine. The real shock, though, was the hubbub of voices. Though this was a gathering of young Emiratis, almost everyone was chatting in English. Nowadays it is becoming the dominant tongue of the Gulf.On paper Arabic is one of the world’s most successful languages. Over 400m people speak it. But Arabs speak a plethora of dialects. Poor education in Arabic is eroding its purity, as English spreads. Many primary-school children chatter in a hybrid of English and Arabic. “Within a century it may be a dead language,” laments a British former diplomat who is expert in Arabic.