Diplomacy Arabic: An Essential Vocabulary by Elisabeth Kendall and Yehia A. Mohamed (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Diplomacy Arabic: An Essential Vocabulary by Elisabeth Kendall and Yehia A. Mohamed Mouloud Siber Elisabeth Kendall and Yehia A. Mohamed. Diplomacy Arabic: An Essential Vocabulary. Georgetown UP, 2020. 96 p. An Arabic-English dictionary, Diplomatic Arabic: An Essential Vocabulary encompasses most of the specific vocabulary used in diplomatic communication. Each entry begins with Arabic followed by its English translation. In their introduction, the authors acknowledge the growing, even urgent, need for publishing this type of material and follow it with a brief overview of its ten chapters, which are "internally ordered according to semantic field" (1). The first chapter, labeled "General," introduces a list of the principal vocabulary used in diplomacy. Some of these include diplomacy, the international order, principle/doctrine, colonialism, Arab World, The Middle East. This general listing continues in "Concepts and Practices," which is mostly theoretical. It deals with terminology commonly used in political science and philosophy: populism, neo-liberalism, Marxism, racism, utopianism, and others. The authors return to these chapters by dividing the words and expressions among the following chapters based on their lexical fields. "Diplomatic Service and Protocol" breaks away from theory and enumerates terminology mostly connected to diplomatic practice like diplomatic corps, ambassador, chief of protocol, form of address, diplomatic invitation. The "Organizations" chapter lists lexis endemic to inter/national and regional diplomatic organizations and entities and includes generic words like institution, organ, agency. As well, there are more specific terms like United Nations Organization, World Bank, United Nations Children's Fund, Amnesty International, European Union. The fifth chapter is devoted to vocabulary that connects diplomacy to "Elections and Government". It embodies a list of terms and phrases pertaining to government and the electoral process, including election, referendum, candidate, absolute majority, [End Page 231] Parliament. This chapter mostly relates to internal political affairs of countries. The sixth, however, is directly linked to a major objective of diplomacy, namely holding "Negotiations" among countries. It includes an informed list of words and expressions that describe negotiation as a major practice in diplomacy. Among these are negotiations, building consensus, consultation, mediation. "Treaties and Agreements" is allocated to the end-result of negotiations, namely reaching agreements and signing treaties and includes: agreement/treaty, declaration, commercial treaty, Free Trade Agreement, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and Geneva Convention. The seventh chapter, "Conflict Resolution and Defense," deals with another result of the diplomatic practice related to implementing peace within and among conflicting countries. It begins with the semantic of field of conflict with vocabulary like armed conflict, war crime, genocide, prisoner of war and moves to terms associated with their resolution like conflict mediation, dispute settlement, disarmament/demilitarization, peace keeping forces and so on. The last two, "Civil Society and Human Rights" and "Globalization and Economic Development" embody vocabulary related to a world where people enjoy fundamental human rights and economic prosperity or suffer the absence thereof. The lexis of the former is related to standards of civility and human rights like civil society, non-profit, volunteerism, human rights, United Nations Human Rights Programme, in contrast to their opposites, like human rights violations and crimes against humanity. "Globalization and Economic Development" includes globalization, global village, free market economy and their counter-parts like anti-globalization, cultural relativism along with words that describe world economic growth. At the end of Diplomacy Arabic, the authors include an Index in English of most of the entries to facilitate its use. The ten chapters offer an exhaustive list of words and expressions commonly used in diplomacy. The audience is not limited [End Page 232] to people who work in this area and "students [and scholars] of international affairs" (1). Reporters, human rights activists, business people, and others, whose practices are closely connected to the Arabspeaking world, can also use it. Since the entries start with Arabic and the Index is in English, Diplomacy Arabic is accessible to both English speakers using or learning Arabic and Arabic speakers using or learning English. It is devoted to communication contexts where relations are negotiated and agreements are reached, so it can help its users to avoid getting "lost in translation". Mouloud Siber Mouloud Mammeri University of Tizi-Ouzou Copyright © 2020 Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association...