This textbook is designed to cover the first year of instruction in Modern Standard Arabic. Accompanied by an instructor's manual and an audio program, it will teach students to read, speak, and write Arabic.

The text presents an engaging story that involves Adnan, a Syrian student studying in the U.S., and Michael, an American student studying in Cairo. In diaries, letters, and postcards, the two students describe their thoughts and activities, revealing how a non-American views American culture and how the Arabic culture is experienced by an American student. The text also provides information about the geography of the Arab world, prominent characters in history, festivities in Arab culture, the media, daily life, and the family. Exercises in comprehension, vocabulary, grammar, and writing attend to both form and meaning and develop functional abilities and knowledge about the Arabic sound, writing, and language systems.