The BA and Brill Collaborate in Boosting Arabic Digitization
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In the framework of celebrating the 400th anniversary of the Leiden Chair of Arabic, Brill and the BA have recently conducted a training workshop on digitization of Arabic texts in Leiden, the Netherlands.
The Workshop brought together participants from Lebanon, Turkey, Tunisia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Russia and various European libraries and institutes. Being the ambassador of promoting the Arabic language digitally, the BA brought its well-forged expertise in the field of digitizing Arabic text into action. Participants were introduced to the latest digitization techniques developed at the BA through sessions on image processing and using optical character recognition (OCR) with Arabic texts, complemented by hands-on practical training.
The sponsorship of this workshop is an extension to Brill’s rich quest to endorse the publishing of Arabic and Middle Eastern cultural content, which it has done since 1683. Brill has published hundreds of titles featuring the Middle East, Egypt and Islamic Studies, most notably the Encyclopaedia of Islam, the Index Islamicus and Middle Eastern Manuscripts Online.
This workshop is one of the series of workshops on digitizing Arabic texts provided by the BA since 2007 to many partners including digitization specialists from Yale University, the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR), Municipal Administration Modernization Syrian team, and the American University of Beirut.
Founded in 1683 in Leiden, the Netherlands, Brill is a leading international academic publisher in 20 main subject areas.
In the year 1613, Leiden University established one of Europe's very first chairs of Arabic Language and Culture.