The Teaching of Arabic as a Heritage Language in Yoruba Muslim Households in Ibadan

Heritage language maintenance represents a significant challenge for Muslim families in southwestern Nigeria where Arabic occupies a unique position as both a religious heritage language and an academic subject with instrumental value. This study examines the practices and challenges of Arabic heritage language teaching in Yoruba Muslim households in Ibadan, investigating the informal instructional strategies families use to transmit Arabic literacy across generations. Using a qualitative ethnographic approach, the research conducts in-depth interviews and home observation sessions with 30 Muslim families in Ibadan North, Ibadan South-East, and Egbeda local government areas, selected through purposive and snowball sampling. The study documents the frequency and content of home Arabic instruction, the materials used, the roles of different family members in instruction, and the outcomes in terms of children's Arabic competence at school entry. Findings reveal a wide spectrum of home Arabic transmission practices, ranging from intensive daily Quranic recitation sessions to minimal incidental exposure. Families with a tradition of formal Islamic scholarship demonstrate the most systematic home Arabic transmission, while nuclear families with no scholarly background rely almost entirely on mosque schools. The study recommends community-based Arabic literacy support programmes to supplement household transmission in urban Yoruba Muslim communities. Keywords: Heritage language, Arabic, Yoruba Muslims, Ibadan, household language transmission.