Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Spoken Levantine Arabic Wikipedia (ID: 23749274)
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Applicant Details
[edit]- Main Wikimedia username. (required)
TheJoyfulTentmaker
- Organization
N/A
- If you are a group or organization leader, board member, president, executive director, or staff member at any Wikimedia group, affiliate, or Wikimedia Foundation, you are required to self-identify and present all roles. (required)
N/A
- Describe all relevant roles with the name of the group or organization and description of the role. (required)
Main Proposal
[edit]- 1. Please state the title of your proposal. This will also be the Meta-Wiki page title.
Spoken Levantine Arabic Wikipedia
- 2. and 3. Proposed start and end dates for the proposal.
2026-04-05 - 2027-04-04
- 4. Where will this proposal be implemented? (required)
International (more than one country across continents or regions) The project coordination will be based in the United State, but the professional narrators who will participate can be based in anywhere in the world as long as they can record their voice and narrate Levantine Arabic Wikipedia Articles.
- 5. Are your activities part of a Wikimedia movement campaign, project, or event? If so, please select the relevant project or campaign. (required)
Not applicable
- 6. What is the change you are trying to bring? What are the main challenges or problems you are trying to solve? Describe this change or challenges, as well as main approaches to achieve it. (required)
Levantine Arabic is the largest language community in the world that still does not have its own Wikipedia. According to Ethnologue, it is spoken by approximately 70 million people.
One of the main challenges facing this language is its primarily oral nature. Levantine Arabic is widely used in everyday speech, and its speakers are generally very comfortable speaking and understanding it, but far less accustomed to reading and writing it. This gap has limited participation in written knowledge projects despite strong interest from native speakers.
This project aims to establish a “spoken Wikipedia” model for Levantine Arabic by building upon the existing Levantine Arabic articles already developed in the Wikimedia Incubator. At present, hundreds of articles have been written or edited by native speakers, demonstrating clear community engagement and linguistic viability.
By emphasizing spoken content—such as audio-based access and oral knowledge sharing—this initiative will increase momentum and visibility for the Levantine Arabic Wikipedia. More importantly, it will make encyclopedic knowledge accessible to millions of people who are not comfortable using other forms of Arabic.
Such users exist in significant numbers. Ethnologue notes that Modern Standard Arabic is accessible primarily to a fortunate, well-educated segment of Arabic speakers, leaving many others excluded from written knowledge platforms. A spoken-focused Levantine Arabic Wikipedia would directly address this inequality and significantly expand access to free knowledge.
- 7. What are the planned activities? (required) Please provide a list of main activities. You can also add a link to the public page for your project where details about your project can be found. Alternatively, you can upload a timeline document. When the activities include partnerships, include details about your partners and planned partnerships.
The project will involve outreach to individuals who can professionally narrate Wikipedia articles in Levantine Arabic. Preference will be given to speakers with an existing social media presence, as their participation can help increase the project’s visibility, attract wider public interest, and encourage new contributors to join.
- 8. Describe your team. Please provide their roles, Wikimedia Usernames and other details. (required) Include more details of the team, including their roles, usernames, Wikimedia group, and whether they are salaried, volunteers, consultants/contractors, etc. Team members involved in the grant application need to be aware of their involvement in the project.
TheJoyfulTentmaker
- 9. Who are the target participants and from which community? How will you engage participants before and during the activities? How will you follow up with participants after the activities? (required)
This project does not involve open community participants. Instead, it will work exclusively with professional Levantine Arabic speakers, such as voice artists, media presenters, podcasters, or experienced narrators, who are native speakers of Levantine Arabic. These professionals come from the broader Levantine Arabic–speaking community and are selected based on language proficiency, clarity of speech, and ability to deliver high-quality audio content.
- 10. Does your project involve work with children or youth? (required)
No
- 10.1. Please provide a link to your Youth Safety Policy. (required) If the proposal indicates direct contact with children or youth, you are required to outline compliance with international and local laws for working with children and youth, and provide a youth safety policy aligned with these laws. Read more here.
N/A
- 11. How did you discuss the idea of your project with your community members and/or any relevant groups? Please describe steps taken and provide links to any on-wiki community discussion(s) about the proposal. (required) You need to inform the community and/or group, discuss the project with them, and involve them in planning this proposal. You also need to align the activities with other projects happening in the planned area of implementation to ensure collaboration within the community.
This project is part of our small Levantine Arabic Wikimedia community’s ongoing work, which has been active for more than two years. During this time, there have been countless discussions within the community about how to bring the Levantine Arabic Wikipedia to life and make it more accessible. The idea for a spoken-focused approach came naturally from these conversations, especially as many community members highlighted that while Levantine Arabic is widely spoken, not everyone is comfortable reading or writing it.
These discussions and coordination mainly take place through our continuous work on the Wikimedia Incubator, where native speakers have been actively creating and improving articles. This proposal builds directly on that existing momentum and aligns with the community’s long-term goals. https://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wp/apc/%D8%B4%D8%A7%D9%85%D9%8A
- 12. Does your proposal aim to work to bridge any of the content knowledge gaps (Knowledge Inequity)? Select one option that most apply to your work. (required)
Language
- 13. Does your proposal include any of these areas or thematic focus? Select one option that most applies to your work. (required)
Other
- 14. Will your work focus on involving participants from any underrepresented communities? Select one option that most apply to your work. (required)
Linguistic / Language
- 15. In what ways do you think your proposal most contributes to the Movement Strategy 2030 recommendations. Select one that most applies. (required)
Innovate in Free Knowledge
Learning and metrics
[edit]- 17. What do you hope to learn from your work in this project or proposal? (required)
We hope to learn how effective spoken content can be in increasing access to knowledge for Levantine Arabic speakers who are not comfortable with written Arabic. The project will help us better understand best practices for producing and organizing spoken Wikipedia content. We also aim to learn how professional narration can support community growth and visibility. These insights will guide future development of the Levantine Arabic Wikipedia.
- 18. What are your Wikimedia project targets in numbers (metrics)? (required)
| Other Metrics | Target | Optional description |
|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 3 | |
| Number of editors | 3 | |
| Number of organizers | 1 |
| Wikimedia project | Number of content created or improved |
|---|---|
| Wikipedia | |
| Wikimedia Commons | |
| Wikidata | |
| Wiktionary | |
| Wikisource | |
| Wikimedia Incubator | 3 |
| Translatewiki | |
| MediaWiki | |
| Wikiquote | |
| Wikivoyage | |
| Wikibooks | |
| Wikiversity | |
| Wikinews | |
| Wikispecies | |
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
- Optional description for content contributions.
N/A
- 19. Do you have any other project targets in numbers (metrics)? (optional)
Yes
| Main Open Metrics | Description | Target |
|---|---|---|
| views | How many times the produced audio material are listened to | 10000 |
| New contributors | How many new contributors joined to the Wikimedia Incubator in Levantine Arabic | 3 |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
- 20. What tools would you use to measure each metrics? Please refer to the guide for a list of tools. You can also write that you are not sure and need support. (required)
Existing tools that measure view counts and Incubator activity
Financial proposal
[edit]- 21. Please upload your budget for this proposal or indicate the link to it. (required)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19p0jLyiMQmgJnego-q640utvmdH-czsCxs6L77oS0Bk/edit?gid=0#gid=0
- 22. and 22.1. What is the amount you are requesting for this proposal? Please provide the amount in your local currency. (required)
2200 USD
- 22.2. Convert the amount requested into USD using the Oanda converter. This is done only to help you assess the USD equivalent of the requested amount. Your request should be between 500 - 5,000 USD.
2200 USD
- We/I have read the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and Universal Code of Conduct.
Yes
Endorsements and Feedback
[edit]Please add endorsements and feedback to the grant discussion page only. Endorsements added here will be removed automatically.
Community members are invited to share meaningful feedback on the proposal and include reasons why they endorse the proposal. Consider the following:
- Stating why the proposal is important for the communities involved and why they think the strategies chosen will achieve the results that are expected.
- Highlighting any aspects they think are particularly well developed: for instance, the strategies and activities proposed, the levels of community engagement, outreach to underrepresented groups, addressing knowledge gaps, partnerships, the overall budget and learning and evaluation section of the proposal, etc.
- Highlighting if the proposal focuses on any interesting research, learning or innovation, etc. Also if it builds on learning from past proposals developed by the individual or organization, or other Wikimedia communities.
- Analyzing if the proposal is going to contribute in any way to important developments around specific Wikimedia projects or Movement Strategy.
- Analysing if the proposal is coherent in terms of the objectives, strategies, budget, and expected results (metrics).