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I come from Egypt,

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which is also called Umm al-Dunya,
the Mother of the World.

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It's a rich country
filled with stories of rebellion,

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stories of civilizational
triumph and downfall

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and the rich, religious,

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ethnic, cultural and linguistic diversity.

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Growing up in such an environment,

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I became a strong believer
in the power of storytelling.

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As I searched for the medium
with which to tell my story,

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I stumbled upon graphic design.

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I would like to share with you a project

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of how graphic design
can bring the Arabic language to life.

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But first, let me tell you
why I want to do this.

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I believe that graphic design
can change the world.

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At least in my very own city of Cairo,

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it helped overthrow
two separate dictators.

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As you can see from those photos,

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the power and potential of graphic design
as a tool for positive change

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is undeniably strong.

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Egypt's 2011 revolution
was also a grassroots design revolution.

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Everyone became a creator.

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People were the real designers

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and, just overnight,

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Cairo was flooded with posters,

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signage, graffiti.

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Visual communication

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was the medium that spoke
far louder than words

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when the population of over
90 million voices were suppressed

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for almost 30 years.

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It was precisely this political
and social suppression,

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coupled with decades of colonialism

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and miseducation

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that slowly eroded the significance
of the Arabic script in the region.

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All of these countries once used Arabic.

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Now it's just the green and the blue.

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To put it simply,

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the Arabic script is dying.

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In postcolonial Arab countries functioning
in an increasingly globalized world,

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it is a growing alarm

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that less and less people are using
the Arabic script to communicate.

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As I was studying my master's in Italy,
I noticed myself missing Arabic.

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I missed looking at the letters,

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digesting their meaning.

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So one day, I walked into
one of the biggest libraries in Italy

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in search of an Arabic book.

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I was surprised to find
that this is what they had

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under the category of
"Arabic/Middle Eastern books."

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(Laughter)

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Fear, terrorism and destruction.

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One word: ISIS.

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My heart ached

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that this is how we are
portrayed to the world,

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even from a literary perspective.

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I asked myself: Whatever happened
to the world-renowned writers

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like Naguib Mahfouz, Khalil Gibran,

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iconic poets like Mutanabbi,
Nizar Qabbani?

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Think about this.

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The cultural products
of an entire region of the world,

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as rich, as diverse,

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have been deemed redundant,

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if not ignored altogether.

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The cultural products
of an entire region of the world

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have been barred from imparting
any kind of real impact

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on global media productions
and contemporary social discourse.

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And then I reminded myself
of my number one belief:

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design can change the world.

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All you need is for someone
to catch a glimpse of your work,

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feel, connect.

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And so I started.

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I thought about how can I stop the world
from seeing us as evil,

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as terrorists of this planet,

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and start perceiving us as equals,

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fellow humans?

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How can I save and honor the Arabic script

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and share it with
other people, other cultures?

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And then it hit me:

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What if I combined
the two most significant symbols

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of innocence and Arab identity?

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Maybe then people could resonate.

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What's more pure,
innocent and fun as LEGO?

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It's a universal child's toy.

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You play with them, you build with them,

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and with them, you imagine
endless possibilities.

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My eureka moment was to find
a bilingual solution for Arabic education,

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because effective
communication and education

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is the road to more tolerant communities.

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However, the Arabic and Latin scripts
do not only represent different worlds

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but also create technical difficulties
for both Eastern and Western communities

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on a daily basis.

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There are so many reasons
why Arabic and Latin are different,

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but here are some of the main ones.

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Yes, both use upward and downward strokes,

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but have completely different baselines.

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Arabic tends to be more calligraphic

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and connectivity is important
to the Arabic language,

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whose letters have to be mostly joined
in order to articulate a given word.

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It also uses an entirely different
system of punctuation and diacritics.

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But most importantly,

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Arabic has no capital letters.

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Instead it has four
different letter forms:

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initial, medial, isolated and final.

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I want to introduce the Arabic language
to young learners, foreign speakers,

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but most importantly help refugees
integrate to their host societies

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through creating
a bilingual learning system,

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a two-way flow of communication.

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And I called it "Let's Play."

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The idea is to simply create
a fun and engaging way of learning

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Modern Standard Arabic through LEGO.

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These are the two words. "Let's Play."

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Every colored bar marks an Arabic letter.

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As you can see, the letter
is explained in form, sound

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and examples of words in function,

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in addition to the equivalent in Latin.

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Together, they form a fun pocket book

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with the 29 Arabic letters
and the four different forms,

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plus a 400-word dictionary.

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So this is how the page looks like.

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You have the letter,
the transliteration in Latin

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and the description underneath.

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I'll take you through the process.

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So first in my tiny studio in Florence,

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I built the letters.

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I photographed each letter separately,

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and then I retouched every letter
and chose the correct color background

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and typefaces to use.

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Ultimately, I created the full letter set,

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which is 29 letters
times four different forms.

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That's 116 letters build just in one week.

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I believe that information
should and can be fun, portable.

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This book is the final product,

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which I would eventually like to publish

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and translate into
as many languages in the world,

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so that Arabic teaching and learning
becomes fun, easy and accessible globally.

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With this book, I hope to save
my nation's beautiful script.

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(Applause)

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Thank you.

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Working on this project
was a form of visual meditation,

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like a Sufi dance,

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a prayer to a better planet.

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One set of building blocks
made two languages.

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LEGO is just a metaphor.

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It's because we are all made
of the same building unit,

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is that I can see a future

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where the barriers between people

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all come tumbling down.

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So no matter how ugly
the world around us gets,

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or how many discouraging books
on ISIS, the terrorist group,

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and not Isis, the ancient
Egyptian goddess,

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continue to be published,

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I will keep building one colorful world.

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Shukran, which means "thank you."

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(Applause)

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Thank you. Thank you so much.

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Thank you.