To coincide with the launch of its 11th cycle for the year 2016 - 2017, the Sheikh Zayed Book Award has announced that it will accept nominations in five different languages; English, French, Italian, Spanish, and German, for the category, "Arab Culture in Other Languages".

Previously in the category, the award limited nominations to works in three languages, with the English language remaining constant and the other two changing with every cycle.

Commenting on the decision, Dr. Ali Bin Tamim said, "During our various interactions with leading cultural expert institutions across Europe, we realised the considerable amount of production of works that fall within the category addressing Arabic Culture from a foreign perspective. Hence, we opted to include those five languages as a standard for every session which we believe will provide an opportunity for a wider pool of scholarly contributions to take part."

Commenting on the challenges of increasing the number of languages, Bin Tamim added, "It is inevitable that adding new languages to the nominations will amplify the workload handled by the scientific committee throughout the selection process, both in terms of quantity of works and the variety of languages to be reviewed. Yet still, we believe it is worth the challenge, as it represents a constructive step towards expanding the circle of choice and quality of works selected in each cycle."

As for the Sheikh Zayed Book Award's plans for the next phase, Saeed Hamdan, the award manager, said, "We have several participations lined up for this year, both at flagship international book fairs, and key cultural seminars around the world. Our ultimate aim remains to open new channels of communication with global cultural institutions and build our relations towards establishing strategic partnerships that help us promote Arabic culture to an ever-growing audience base."

Nominations for the eleventh award cycle will be accepted until October 1st of this year. Applicants can visit the award's website for full details on how to participate.

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