Industry Arabic scholarships
Our scholarship program is currently suspended and no scholarships will be awarded for the 2026–2027 academic year. We appreciate all the wonderful submissions we’ve received over the years and will post any updates here if circumstances change.
Supporting future linguists in mastering Arabic
Learning Arabic is hard and, unfortunately, only getting harder. Regional wars have reduced opportunities to learn in places like Syria and Yemen while programs like CASA have had their funding cut. With so many of our own translators coming from U.S. Arabic language programs, we decided it’s time to do our part to support the next generation of linguists working to master this beautiful and challenging language.
About the scholarship
- Each year, Industry Arabic will award scholarships of $2,000 to support tuition and living expenses for 1-2 students pursuing advanced, immersive Arabic study.
- Scholarship funds may be used for private study or applied to a program such as CASA and may be combined with other funding sources.
- Eligibility is limited to U.S. citizens who are currently enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate degree program that incorporates advanced Arabic language skills (a major / concentration in Arabic language is not necessary).
- We are looking to support the next generation of superior Arabic linguists regardless of field (linguistics, area studies, literature, anthropology, political science, etc).
- Scholarships will be awarded on the basis of practical skill as demonstrated in the sample translation, as well as overall academic merit.
How to apply
Applications are due 31 May of each year, with winners announced on 30 June. To apply, please complete the form (all fields are required). Questions? Please email: translations@industryarabic.com.
FAQs
“Currently enrolled” means you are enrolled in a program as of the date that applications close each year (May 31). For example if you are college senior graduating in June, you would still be eligible to apply in the May before you graduate.
We do not take into consideration genre or time period of the source text. We do however consider overall text difficulty. For example, if we are comparing a flawless translation of a basic newspaper article to a flawless translation of a difficult literary text we would weight the latter more heavily. For this reason, we advise you to select the most difficult text that you can do an excellent translation of.
Past Winners
Caroline Benson is an Arabic-English literary translator and researcher and a master’s candidate in Arabic Language and Literature at the American University in Cairo. Their work has been published with ArabLit, Mada Masr, and Goethe Institut, and they plan to continue translating literature while pursuing a doctoral degree in comparative literature.
Caroline Benson
(2024 awardee)
Juan Ramirez graduated from Georgetown’s Master of Arts in Arab Studies (MAAS) program in 2022, and is currently a PhD student in history at Georgetown, where his research focuses on the history of colonial North Africa. He will spend the next year as a fellow at the Center for Arabic Study Abroad (CASA) program in Meknes, Morocco.
Juan Ramirez
(2023 awardee)
Olivia Odell is a recent MA graduate from the department of Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Arizona, where she focused on migration scholarship and human rights issues. She will spend the next year improving her Arabic proficiency through the Center for Arabic Study Abroad (CASA) program in Amman, Jordan. Olivia plans to use her Arabic to work with refugee resettlement agencies and international NGOs.
Olivia Odell
(2022 awardee)
Joshua Wainner obtained his MA from UT-Austin in Linguistic Anthropology in Spring 2019, where he now pursues a doctorate in the same department. He is drawn to the study of Arabic poetry and its role in religious life amongst the public sphere. This interest is primarily grounded in ethnographic contexts of Sufi communities, and revolves around topics of charisma, affect, ethnopoetics, and novel social formations. He plans to eventually apply to study in Cairo with the CASA program, and to ultimately become a professor of Linguistic Anthropology after completing his doctorate.
Joshua Wainner
(2019 awardee)
Eleanor Ellis is an AM candidate in Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University, and is currently studying Arabic in Cairo, where she was a 2017-2018 fellow at the Center for Arabic Study Abroad (CASA). Her interests include translation, collective memory, migration, and urban space. Eleanor hopes to pursue a Ph.D. in History and Middle East Studies, and to continue to work in Arabic-English translation.
Eleanor Ellis
(2018 awardee)
Jermaine Butler is currently a Master’s student at Indiana University in the departments of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures & Central Eurasian Studies. Upon completing a year of study in Cairo with the CASA program, he plans to return to IU to complete a Doctorate in Arabic Literature and Ethnomusicology. He ultimately hopes to become a professor of Arabic and Persian in his home state of Louisiana.
Jermaine Butler
(2018 awardee)
Betty Rosen earned her AB in Comparative Literature from Harvard and her MA in Arabic Literature from SOAS. She is currently a Ph.D. student in Near Eastern Studies at UC-Berkeley, where she focuses on the role of the public intellectual in classical and modern Arabic literary-intellectual culture. She will be spending the coming year in Cairo as a fellow through the Center for Arabic Study Abroad (CASA), where she will intensively study advanced Modern Standard and Egyptian Colloquial Arabic. After CASA, she plans to return to Berkeley to complete her doctorate and subsequently become a professor of Arabic Literature.
Betty Rosen
(2017 awardee)
Laura is a recent graduate of the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in Middle Eastern Studies. She is currently in Meknes, Morocco completing her capstone year with the Arabic Flagship Program. After this year, she hopes to work with refugees before attending law school, with the goal of using her Arabic and Persian skills as an immigration attorney.
Laura Y. Catterson
(2017 awardee)