Egyptian Dictionary

Egyptian colloquial Arabic (ECA) remains a core dialect of the Arabic speaking countries. Like all dialects, as well as al-Fusha, it has been influenced by and absorbed lexicon from other languages – including Coptic, French, Italian, and Turkish – representing the rich history the language and its people have gone through. Although most people associate the Egyptian dialect with the Cairene dialect, there are a number of sub-dialects within the country, such as the Alexandrian, Sa’idi, Sinai, and various rural dialects.

The Egyptian dictionary was, along with the al-Fusha dictionary, the first posted on this site. It is a testimony to my time as a CASA student in Egypt and to the hard work of the teachers there to give students the chance to learn the Egyptian dialect through innovative classes such as colloquial film and literature. The dictionary now contains over 20,000 unique words.