. 103-122 , TranscUlturAl, vol. 1, (4) 2011 http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/TC The Other Side of the Coin of Lexical Borrowing From Arabic into English Mohammad Ahmad Thawabteh Al-Quds University 1. Introduction Translation is recognised as a device for overcoming the various linguistic and cultural obstacles that emerge in any intercultural exchange between different languages and cultures and that, throughout history, have made such exchanges so complicated. Translating across languages and cultures enhances the interactive dimension and facilitates the search for and invention of new lexicons to develop the meaning of the receptor language in a new signifying context. Kelly as cited in Hermans (1999: 37) aptly remarks, “Western Europe owes its civilization to translators” (1). For instance, the flood of foreign borrowings into English has greatly influenced the language, to the point that approximately sixty percent of English lexicon is due to borrowing (Daher 2003). Many cultures such as Arab, Spanish, and English (to mention only a few) have gained impetus through translation. Qasim writes: “Translation represented a milestone in Islamic and Arab culture and enabled the Muslims and Arabs to become well-versed in other cultures” (Qasim 23). It is certain that, in the words of Mouakket, “the Arabs owed the Greeks the initiative and the starting point towards reasoning. But no sooner had they taken the first step, than their vigorous and earnest desire for knowledge surpassed that of Greeks in many fields” (25). Arabic was then a lingua franca of Europe. Salloum and Peters argue that: “Arabic was the intellectual and scientific language of the entire scholastic world. The men of letters and science had to know Arabic if they wanted to produce works of arts and science […]. Arab Andalusia by itself produced more works in Arabic than were produced in all the languages of Europe.” (23) For Salloum and Peters, Spanish absorbed and then kept over 8000 words from Arabic, of which 2300 are place names (23; see also Thawabteh, 6). In the same vein, Versteegh states 103 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License