The Master’s degree program AIS (Arabic-Islamic-Semitic studies) at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität focuses on Arabic as a language and textual culture. In particular, this approach acknowledges the role of Arabic as the linguistic-literary cradle of Islam. Students explore the subject from various different angles:

• Looking at the linguistic family to which Arabic belongs (semitic), and the cultures of semitic languages (e.g. Aramaic, Hebrew) with which the intellectual Arabic world has had changing relationships over the course of history, and exploring the impact this has had on the emergence and development of Islam.
• Looking at the Qur’an and the historical context of its origin, Qur’an hermeneutics and Qur’an interpretation (traditional and modern).
• Looking at texts and literature to explore Arabic-Islamic culture as a whole, focusing in particular on prose literature and poetry that are not classed as religious Islamic works in the true sense of the word. Particular attention is paid to Arabic philosophy and the textual culture of Christian and Jewish texts written in Arabic.

The AIS Master’s degree program covers the following specializations, that can largely be combined via what is known as “contextualization modules”:

• Arabic literature (obligatory module): The philology of classical and modern Arabic poetry and prose, cultural history and political frameworks, textual history and textual criticism.
• Arabic-semitic studies (elective module): Vernacular Arabic grammar and modern linguistic approaches to Arabic; the Arabic language in its semitic and Afroasiatic context; introduction to Hebrew (biblical and modern) and comparison of the Arabic and Hebrew languages; Jewish-Arabic language and culture.
• Islamic studies (elective module): Qur’an and Qur’an hermeneutics – philological analysis of the Qur’an text and its historical-critical context; historical and modern interpretations of the Qur’an; social and cultural history of the Arabic-Islamic world with particular attention to Arabic philosophy; training in mediation between the internal Islamic perspective and the external secular or academic perspective during interdisciplinary teaching units.