Afikra’s latest episode asks what AI actually does with Arabic — and the answer is complicated

👂 In a world where AI is reshaping how we read, write, and publish, Arabic sits in an unusually complicated position: A language split between a written formal register and dozens of spoken dialects. Afikra podcast takes that question on in one of its latest episodes, with Lebanese host Mikey Muhanna exploring the intersections of language, culture, and identity with Nizar Habash, professor of computer science at NYU Abu Dhabi.

An overview: The Podcast Network is one of the region’s most prominent cultural and intellectual digital initiatives, dedicated to exploring Arab history, culture, arts, and identity beyond surface-level treatment — bringing together academics, researchers, and artists to unpack complex questions about Arab heritage on the basis of rigorous research.

Arabic and AI: The latest episode examines the challenges of building AI models in Arabic: the scarcity of high-quality Arabic training data, the diversity of dialects, spelling ambiguity, the absence of diacritics, and overlapping morphological structures. It also covers the key problems language model developers — Habash himself being one — encounter when working with Arabic, and what the language’s future looks like amid rapid technological change.

What we liked: Muhanna is a strong moderator: he gives guests room to develop their thinking rather than running through questions in a conventional format, keeping the conversation accessible without dumbing it down. The episode’s production also deserves credit for the questions it chooses — questions that open up the subject rather than close it down.

The verdict: Afikra is one of the most important Arabic cultural spaces around, and one worth returning to regularly. It goes deep on its subjects, consistently, with a younger, cross-background audience in mind. The range of topics it covers is one of its strongest draws, regardless of where your interests lie.

WHERE TO LISTEN- You can tune in on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Anghami | YouTube.