Challenges and Barriers in Learning Mahārah al-Kalām among Non-Pesantren Alumni Students of the Arabic Language Education Study Program at IAIN Ternate

Abstract

This study examines the linguistic challenges and systemic barriers in learning mahārah al-kalām (Arabic speaking skill) among non-pesantren alumni students in the Arabic Language Education Study Program at IAIN Ternate, and distinguishes conceptually between the two as a basis for targeted intervention. Using a qualitative phenomenological design, data were collected through in-depth interviews, participatory observation, and documentation study involving 17 informants (13 students, 3 lecturers, and 1 study program coordinator), analyzed with the interactive model of Miles, Huberman, and Saldaña. The findings show, first, that linguistic challenges are inherent and compounding: limited mufradāt mastery, stemming from the absence of prior Arabic foundations, combines with the complexity of nahwu-sharaf, which, through a monitor overuse mechanism, paradoxically inhibits spontaneous oral production. Second, systemic barriers comprise three mutually reinforcing dimensions: psychological barriers in the form of foreign language anxiety socially constructed through social comparison pressure in mixed classrooms; pedagogical barriers stemming from a disproportionate curriculum; and sociocultural barriers marked by the absence of an Arabic-speaking ecosystem. This study contributes a conceptual distinction between linguistic challenges and systemic barriers, identifies social comparison pressure as a new dimension of foreign language anxiety in Islamic higher education, and fills a geographic gap in Indonesian Arabic education literature that has thus far been centered on the western and central regions of the country.