Demand removal of insulting and inaccurate definitions of 'Arab" in Roget's Dictionary. The dictionary is a free online publication of Lexico Publishing Group, LLC.
Paterson, August 19, 2005: AAF is outraged by the derogatory and insulting definitions of the word 'Arab' contained in the 2005 edition of Roget's Dictionary.
The dictionary includes eight offensive definitions of the word 'Arab', such as 'bum', 'derelict' , 'ragamuffin', and 'tramp'. Aref Assaf, President of AAF, commented that Lexico, Inc, the publisher of Dctionary.com and which is based in Los Angeles, California, USA, fails to provide any citations in which these pejorative definitions were used. We call upon Lexico, Inc not deliberately engage in such seriously false stereotyping and misrepresentation of an entire people with tremendous positive achievements in many fields of human endeavor. The cultural and scientific contributions of the Arabs to Western civilization during the Middle Ages were highly significant, especially in astronomy, mathematics, medicine, and philosophy."
“AAF joins other concerned entities in demanding the immediate removal of such outrageous, insulting and derogatory definitions and the immediate public issuance of an apology from the publisher. Because the Dictionary. Com is an online publication; we believe a timely correction is possible unless the editors believe in the validity of these definitions. Maintaining these inaccuracies only perpetuate negative castigation of the Arab people and conjure hateful and racist practices against them."
The word Arab is a name given to the ancient and present-day inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula and often applied to the peoples closely allied to them in ancestry, language, religion, and culture. Presently more than 300 million Arabs are living mainly in 22 countries.
The American Arab Forum, AAF, endeavors to provide a reliable and credible gateway of information and resources to and about the Arab American community in New Jersey and the United States. www.americanarabforum.org |
