Posted: 12:03 a.m. 11/7/09 | Updated: 7:46 p.m. 11/7/09

Editor's note: The following contains themes that some may find vulgar and objectionable.

A late 1980s video recording of Nidal Malik Hasan shows the suspected Fort Hood shooter as a teenager in a Roanoke Valley classroom telling a dirty joke in Arabic to a small group of friends.

Hasan is delivering a profanity-laced tale that, according to various interpretations, is about a young man who commits incest in the process of selling a chicken to earn money for marriage.

This much can be deduced: Hasan, who was born to Palestinian parents in Arlington, was a poor Arabic speaker. And he enjoyed playing with friends, in this case telling an off-color joke to four or five classmates at William Fleming High School, where according to a school spokeswoman he spent his senior year in 1988.

"You have to understand that Hasan was a very weak Arabic speaker," said Ahmad Azzam, a Radford University professor who watched the video at The Roanoke Times' request. "Hasan was trying to tell a dirty Arabic joke. However, his language was so weak that he could not say it right."

One of his classmates, James Jordan, studied Advanced Placement history with Hasan, and filmed this video with a rented camera while four or five friends hung out after school.

In the video, Hasan wears a blue T-shirt, a full head of hair and a mustache. He paces about the room, at times laughing, switching between English and Arabic spoken with a rural Palestinian accent.

According to Azzam, the story Hasan tells goes like this:

A young man tells his father he wants to get married, and sets off to sell a chicken so he can get money for the wedding. Along the way, the young man runs into his grandmother. When the father later inquires where the young man went, the young man tells him he had intercourse with his grandmother. The father is surprised, and the young man explained he did it because his father has intercourse with the young man's mother every day.

Hasan laughed and the video ended there, according to Azzam's interpretation. He said Hasan used profane language to refer to marriage throughout the gag.

The joke was not entirely incoherent, but culturally dissonant, according to Nasser Isleem, an Arabic professor at Duke University.

"It is an Arabic joke," he said. "I can relate to it. But to the American public, it makes no sense."

Isleem said he had not heard the joke before.

Mohammed Sawaie, an Arabic professor at the University of Virginia, agreed with Azaam's general interpretation of the video, but said it is not clear whether the young man says he had intercourse with his grandmother.

Sawaie said the video showed a teenager telling a dirty joke and having fun with friends, much like a typical American high schooler would.

That's the way Jordan remembered the day he recorded the video of his high school friend.

"I think he told us at the time what it was, but I can't remember for the life of me what it was about," Jordan said. "Of course, being high school kids ... we lapped it right up.

"He [was] obviously reveling in the moment, having a good time," Jordan said. "Now things are so much different."

-- Jorge Valencia and Jordan Fifer | The Roanoke Times

Read the story: Fort Hood shooting suspect left few impressions in schools he attended

Complete coverage: Fort Hood shooting suspect: Ties to Vinton, Virginia Tech