{"id":140,"date":"2025-08-13T06:31:27","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T06:31:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/abjad\/?page_id=140"},"modified":"2026-01-07T05:24:43","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T05:24:43","slug":"abjad2025","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/abjad\/abjad2025\/","title":{"rendered":"AbjadNLP 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 1st Workshop on NLP for Languages Using Arabic Script<\/b><\/p>\n

(AbjadNLP 2025)<\/b><\/p>\n

Abu Dhabi, UAE<\/p>\n

19 January 2025 (in person)<\/p>\n

Submission URL: https:\/\/softconf.com\/coling2025\/AbjadNLP25\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Co-located with COLING 2025 Conference, Abu Dhabi, UAE (19 January 2025)<\/strong><\/p>\n

NEW<\/strong><\/span>: The workshop’s proceedings are now online at: https:\/\/aclanthology.org\/volumes\/2025.abjadnlp-1\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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AbjadNLP<\/strong> is dedicated to advancing innovation and gaining deeper insights into Natural Language Processing (NLP) for languages that use the Arabic script. Our primary focus is on Abjad and Ajami languages that utilise the Arabic script or its variations. Traditionally associated with Semitic languages, Abjad scripts represent consonants in every syllable. In contrast, Ajami scripts denote the alphabetic use of the Arabic script in various African contexts, representing non-Arabic languages. We are interested in research on languages that fall under the Abjad or Ajami categories that use the Arabic script or any variations of it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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We invite contributions, discussions, and explorations that delve deep into the unique linguistic structures, resources, challenges, and untapped potential presented by Abjad and Ajami languages within the realm of NLP and language resources. Our goal is to create synergies among researchers by addressing the diverse phenomena and challenges inherent in these rich linguistic traditions.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The workshop is proud to highlight our connections with the Masakhane NLP community and collaborations with institutions worldwide, such as COMSATS on Urdu, and the long-standing UCREL NLP Group at Lancaster University, whose work encompasses over 20 languages worldwide, including Abjad and Ajami languages.<\/p>\n

Note:<\/strong> We chose the name Abjad for simplicity, but our focus includes Abjad and other languages that have adopted the Arabic and Perso-Arabic scripts, as well as Ajami languages. We acknowledge that Sorani Kurdish, when written in Arabic script, follows an alphabet style rather than an Abjad style.<\/p>\n

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Workshop Description:<\/b><\/p>\n

We welcome contributions, discussions, and explorations that thoroughly investigate the distinctive linguistic structures, resources, challenges, and untapped potential of Abjad and Ajami languages within the field of NLP and language resources. Our aim is to foster collaboration among researchers by addressing the varied phenomena and challenges inherent in these rich linguistic traditions.<\/p>\n

Ajami languages, representing a myriad of African languages that have adopted the Arabic script, span at least 43 distinct languages, including Hausa, Fulfulde, Mandingo, Swahili, Wolof, Kanuri, and Tamazight. The combined number of speakers of these languages is estimated to exceed 200 million within Africa alone. Although Abjad has been traditionally associated with Semitic languages such as Arabic, Hebrew and Syriac, it has been adopted for writing by many other language communities as in Perso-Arabic scripts used in Persian, Urdu, Pashto, Sorani Kurdish, Azeri Turkish, Sindhi, and Uyghur, with a collective estimated speaker population exceeding 500 million. Altogether, these languages represent an approximate global aggregate of 1 billion speakers.
\nThe adoption of the Arabic script across diverse linguistic landscapes highlights its expansive and varied application, transcending genres such as governmental correspondences, poetic compositions, religious texts, and journalistic pursuits. This widespread use underscores the imperative need to enhance digital infrastructure, tools, and resources for these under-resourced languages. Advancing such resources is crucial to nurturing linguistic diversity and resilience in both digital and print media, ensuring the preservation of linguistic heritage in the digital age.
\nCurrently, there is an increasing interest in various NLP communities, both in academia and industry, in writing systems. However, there is a lack of initiatives focusing on the diverse phenomena and challenges of the languages using an Abjad script. The AbjadNLP workshop aims to fill this gap, fostering collaboration and innovation in this vital area of study.<\/p>\n

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Motivation<\/b><\/p>\n

Languages employing an Abjad script signify a pivotal and diverse fragment of the global linguistic mosaic, traversing numerous countries and regions and embodying a considerable populace of speakers. The linguistic wealth and geographical diffusion of languages covered by AbjadNLP present a prolific environment for exploration and advancement in NLP. By channeling attention towards these languages, the realm of NLP is poised to unlock access to an expansive and varied array of linguistic constructions, subtleties, and cultural contexts, pivotal for bolstering the versatility and adaptability of NLP models and applications. The extensive spectrum of these languages not only unfolds a valuable opportunity to amplify multilingualism and multiculturalism in NLP research but also forges pathways for addressing the requisites and challenges intrinsic to a diverse and extensive speaker population.
\nThe broad adoption of Abjad scripts transcends diverse genres, including governmental correspondences, poetic compositions, religious texts, and journalistic pursuits. The sustained use of such scripts underscores the imperative need to enhance digital infrastructure, tools, and resources that elucidate the varied writing systems inherent to under-resourced languages. Such advancement is crucial to nurturing linguistic diversity and resilience in both digital and print media, ensuring that the linguistic heritage does not diminish in the digital age.
\nThis workshop can contribute to more inclusive and equitable progressions in NLP, accommodating a broader assortment of languages and dialects and promoting enhanced comprehension and interconnectivity amongst varied linguistic communities. The assimilation and prioritization of these linguistically affluent and diverse languages are indispensable for the comprehensive progression and the universal adaptability of NLP technologies. While our workshop primarily targets languages using an Abjad script, we recognize that many historical languages such as Aramaic , Sogdian, Parthian and Phoenician employed such a writing system. As such, we believe that our workshop can enforce links with researchers working on endangered languages as well.<\/p>\n

We are proud to highlight our existing connections with the Masakhane NLP community (www.masakhane.io) and collaborations with institutions worldwide, such as COMSAT on Urdu (www.comsats.edu.pk), and the long-standing UCREL NLP Group at Lancaster University, whose work encompasses over 20 languages worldwide, including Abjad and Ajami languages (<\/span>http:\/\/ucrel-web-dev.lancs.ac.uk\/ucrelng\/<\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\n

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P<\/strong>rorgramme<\/strong><\/p>\n

The workshop’s programme (schedule) is available at: https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/abjad\/programme\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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Team<\/b><\/p>\n

Our team is uniquely diverse and gender-balanced, comprising individuals from a wide range of ethnic backgrounds. We represent a spectrum of languages that use the Arabic script and include researchers from both Linguistics and NLP, enriching the ever-needed collaboration between these two fields. With expertise in language technology, Unicode, NLP, resources, and multilingual text analysis, together, we aim to foster a dynamic and inclusive environment for research and collaboration in the field of NLP.<\/span><\/p>\n

Call for papers<\/b><\/p>\n

We invite submissions on topics that include, but are not limited to, the following:
\n\u2022 Enabling core technologies: morphological analysis, disambiguation, tokenisation, POS tagging, named entity detection, chunking, parsing, semantic role labelling, sentiment analysis, language modelling, etc.
\n\u2022 Applications: machine translation, speech recognition, speech synthesis, optical character recognition, pedagogy, assistive technologies, social media, etc.
\n\u2022 Resources: dictionaries, annotated data, corpus, etc.<\/p>\n

In addition, we extend a warm invitation to researchers and stakeholders across the spectrum to contribute papers focusing on, but not limited to, the following dimensions:<\/p>\n