Arabic Foreigners, Signed (1 results)

First edition, first impression. A charming and practical phrase book from the Sudan Education Department, containing "some of the commoner and safer phrases for most of the situations likely to arise in which one wants to say the right thing" (p. vii). This copy has a regional provenance, with the ownership inscription of Paul Philip Howell, a district commissioner in British Sudan. Produced by the British colonial government in Sudan, this book would have been essential reading for colonial officials and administrators working in northern Sudan, where the majority population are Arabic speakers. V. L. Griffiths (1902-1984) was a civil servant and the moving force behind the progressive Institute of Education at Bakht er Ruda, a remote rural community some 195km south of Khartoum, "heralded in the Colonial office Report of 1948 as a model for the rest of the empire". Griffiths "played an outsize role in the colony's education system as a trainer of teachers, inspector of schools, and prolific author of textbooks" (Linstrum, p. 173). Foremost among his books was a trio intended as a "Good Citizen" series: Character Aims (1949), Character Training (1949), and Character: Its Psychology (1953). His co-author here, Abdel Rahman Ali Taha, was vice-principal at Bakht er Ruda and later Sudan's first Minister of Education. Consciously designed for conversing with the upper echelons of Sudanese society, this small guidebook offers a microcosm of British attitudes to and relations with Sudanese elites. The authors clearly state in their introduction that "the reader must be warned that the customs described and the phrases given are those in use in Omdurman, sophisticated areas and amongst the educated classes generally". Tailored to the Sudanese dialect of Arabic, it sets out to provide the reader with the tools required to avoid embarrassment and offence, the authors recognizing that "a lack of knowledge of their respective customs is often an unrecognised but most fruitful cause of misunderstanding between the races" (p. vii). Chapters include "Differences of Outlook", greeting and parting, "The Sick", condolences, "presents and tips", hospitality, and other essential pleasantries. Also included is an explanation of the differing customs between the English and "the Arabs", advice on talking sensitively to women, and letter writing. Howell (1917-1994) arrived in Sudan in 1938, where he served as aide-de-camp to two successive governors-general and served concurrently in several roles, as assistant district commissioner in Khartoum and subsequently southern Sudan, and as district commissioner in western Sudan from 1946 to 1948. He retired from the Sudan Political Service in 1955, a year before Sudan won its independence from Britain. Described as a "generalist in the best sense of the word", Howell was a keen anthropologist, studying for a PhD alongside his official duties (Deng, p. 69). Howell's inscription dates to his tenure as assistant district commissioner of northern Khartoum: "Paul Philip Howell, ADC, Khartoum North". Achol Deng, "Obituary: Paul Philip Howell, D.Phil, C.B.E., O.B.E.", The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology, vol. 17, no. 1, 1994, pp. 69-71. Small octavo. Original blue cloth, neatly rebacked with original gilt-lettered spine relined and laid down. Spine sunned, corners lightly worn, boards marked, minor offsetting and foxing to preliminary and end matter. A very good copy.