Abstract
Diglossia, as a dominant socio-linguistic phenomenon in the Arabic-speaking regions, has a multi-layered impact on Arabic teaching strategies. The Arabic department of National Chengchi University, Taiwan, which include only Modern Standard Arabic, and the undergraduate program of the University of Oslo, Norway, which implement Spoken Arabic varieties in the teaching, have significantly different curricula designs. The research treats exclusion or inclusion of Spoken Arabic varieties as the higher education institutions’ reactions to Arabic diglossia. Similarly, the students’ learning outcomes at both universities can be discussed as results of in/direct effects of Arabic diglossia through the curricula, in joint of the learners’ empirical understanding of the socio-linguistic realities in the Arabic-speaking world. By interviewing the learners who have attended the Arabic programs at these two universities and traveled to an Arabic-speaking country and the teachers who participated in the initial linguistic training of these students, the thesis investigates how diglossia affects teachers’ instructing approaches and students’ learning outcomes. The findings of the research aim to provide a more profound understanding of how Arabic programs have been designed in response to Arabic diglossia in the unique contexts of Taiwan and Norway, and to offer insights for Arabic programs worldwide with similar social circumstances to these two countries.