A group for academics interested in vernacular Arabic varieties spoken in the Levant, in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Turkey (historically in Adana, Mersin & Hatay), & in diaspora.
Files List
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A phonological analysis of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic in relation to Arabia Petraea Bedouin dialects
The aim of this study is to fill a considerable gap in Bedouin dialectology by providing a phonological analysis of the Bedouin dialect of the al-Ramadhin subtribe of al-Tayaha in the Naqab Desert (southern Israel) in order to determine the presence of some specific distinguishing features of the Bedouin dialects of the Sinai, southern Jordan, and parts of northwestern Saudi Arabia.
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The Morphosyntax of Negation in Rural Palestinian Arabic
This paper explores the morphosyntactic properties of the sentential negation in Rural Palestinian Arabic (RPA) and how it is related to Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) morphosyntax. The study shows that the negative markers ma: and – iš are used to negate perfective and imperfective verbs, while muš is a head element where the negative precedes non-verbal predicates such as adjectives, prepositional phrases (PP) and participles. The main predicate in negative phrase does not need the noun phrase (NP) to raise to T if there is no need to merge with the negative element. The study also investigates the differences between RPA and Urban Palestinian Arabic (UPA). The main difference is that the use of –iš as a post verbal clitic in both perfective and imperfective tense is more common in the Rural dialect.
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The Emergence of a Mixed Type Dialect: The Example of the Dialect of the Bani ˁAbbād Tribe (Jordan)
The present article aims at questioning the status of the šāwi dialect of the Bani ʕAbbād tribe by providing a new analysis of the main distinctive phonological, morphological, and syntactical traits which may hint at dialect mixing. The data provided by the field research, based on a functional framework that relies on descriptive linguistics and a typological approach, show that this dialect is deeply affected by a koineizing tendency due to increasing contacts with the populations of the neighboring areas (especially ʕAmmān and Salṭ) which, in turn, leads to the gradual loss of its authentic features. Finally, this paper discusses whether the dialect of the Bani ʕAbbād should still be considered as belonging to the yigūl group (recently renamed Central Bedouin ygūlu) of the Syro-Mesopotamian sheep-raising tribes or if a new typology of mixed type dialects should eventually be adopted for the dialects displaying important markers of both Bedouin and sedentary types.
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The Classification of Bedouin Arabic: Insights from Northern Jordan
The goal of the present paper is to provide a revaluation of the classification of the Bedouin dialects of Northern Arabia and the Southern Levant, based on published or publicly available data and on first-hand data recently collected amongst some Bedouin tribes in Northern Jordan. We suggest extending previous classifications that identify three types of dialects, namely A (ʿnizi), B (šammari), and C (šāwi). Although intermediary or mixed types combining šammari features with šāwi features were already noted, our data suggest that further combinations are possible, either because they had so far been unnoticed or because recent levelling and dialect mixing have blurred the boundaries between some of the varieties.
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(Syllabus) Palestinian Arabic Dialects
Students will develop awareness and sensitivity to diversity and variation in Arabic dialects and will acquire basic tools to define the differences, using scientific terminology. They will be acquainted with prominent scholars and works in the field of Arabic dialectology, and will be able to consult the relevant scientific literature.
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A general classification for the Arabic dialects spoken in Palestine and Transjordan
The Arabic dialects spoken in Palestine and Transjordan do not constitute one more or less homogeneous linguistic unit, but, owing to geographical, historical and socio-economic factors, a great variety of dialects belonging to several typologically different groups. It is a fact well known to all students of Arabic dialectology that in many geogrâphical areas there are considerable differences, not only between Sedendary and Bedouin dialects, but also inside these two major dialect types as well.
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The Vitality of the Arabic Language in Israel from a Sociolinguistic Perspective
At its founding, Israel was declared an ethnic national state. The definition and perception of Israel as an ethnic Jewish State is reflected in its monolingual ideology and institutional disregard for the multicultural reality. Arabic in Israel is a unique case. It was the main language of the area until the establishment of the State of Israel, after which, because of the changing political circumstances, it became a secondary language. Despite Arabic being legally recognized as an official language in Israel, it is not a competing partner in a dyadic bilingual state, according to the classification posited by Lambert (199).
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Phonetic neutralization in Palestinian Arabic vowel shortening, with implications for lexical organization
This study acoustically compares lexically short vowels in Palestinian Arabic to vowels that are underlyingly long, but have undergone closed syllable shortening, a phonological process affecting certain CV:CC sequences (as in /faːq-ʃ/ → faqʃ ‘woke-negative’; /ӡaːb-l-ak/ → ӡablak ‘brought to you’). In a study of word pairs produced by 74 speakers, the two vowel types were found to be indistinguishable in duration. Speakers differ as to the contexts in which they apply shortening: some shorten before the negative suffix /-ʃ/, but not the dative suffix /-l/, likely due to paradigm leveling. The results are compared to earlier studies finding incomplete neutralization in Arabic vowel epenthesis, to identify factors that affect completeness of neutralization.
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The Linguistic Landscape of Ramallah, Palestine: A Case Study of Analysing the Dominance of English vs. Arabic AS L1 in the Main Street of the City
The study investigates whether the Linguistic Landscape (LL) in the main street of Ramallah, Palestine should be considered a situational variable of the English language in the country or a treat-like variable and exclusive to this city. The analysed data include over 519 pictures of signage so as to determine the number of languages used on the signs, the signs genre, their taxonomies, and the number of languages. Findings evince that there are significant differences between language policies and the street reality. The linguistic landscape in the street is not abided by the official language policy regarding the state language (Arabic) nor does it employ any minority language. The results of the study may contribute to ameliorating the situation through the policymakers to rectify the state language status. Further studies are expected to arrive upon other factors that influenced the status quo.
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Dialect contact and phonological change
This chapter examines phonological and phonetic changes that have been documented and analyzed in spoken Arabic varieties, occurring as a result of dialect contact. The factors contributing to dialect contact in Arabic-speaking communities vary, from economic migration which has encouraged individuals to move into new dialect areas seeking work, to migration that stems from political violence and upheaval. These diverse factors have contributed to the large-scale migration of Arabic speakers to other parts of the Arabic speaking world. As a result, dialect contact is rampant, and decades of Arabic sociolinguistic research have shown that the phonological and phonetic effects of these contact situations have been quite profound.
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New-dialect formation: The Amman dialect
One fascinating outcome of dialect contact is the formation of totally new dialects from scratch, using linguistic stock present in the input dialects, as well as creating new combinations of features, and new features not present in the original input varieties. This chapter traces the formation of one such case from Arabic, namely the dialect of Amman, within the framework of the variationist paradigm and the principles of new-dialect formation.
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Phonetic and Phonological Variation in the Speech of Rural Migrants in a Jordanian City
This study investigates the phonetic and phonological variation in the speech of Fallahi (rural) migrants in the town of Irbid. This variationist investigation focuses on four linguistic variables: (Q), (D), (8) and (d3) across four social variables: social class, gender, education, and age. The spread of non-local urban features in the speech of the Fallahi people living within the same area and having similar kinship, social and cultural backgrounds is the focus of investigation. This kind of analysis considers the competing status of the two extreme levels of the Arabic language continuum. Therefore, it reshuffles the images associated with Standard Arabic as the most prestigious variety in Arabic.
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The Influence of Canaanite and Aramaic Languages on the Recent Palestinian Dialects
Palestine, an Arab country, was part of the Aramaic civilization as well as Canaanites who lived in Palestine for thousands of years. Canaanites remained up to the arrival of the Arab conquerors from the Arabian Peninsula. After that People converted into Islam and learned the Arabic language as it became the official language. Even though Arabic was the official language since that period, Aramaic language remained. Many of the recently used colloquial words aren’t Arabic in their origins and their roots can be found in Aramaic dictionaries. Aramaic language is present up to the day in the recent Palestinian dialects. This study sheds lights on a very interesting topic and points to the origins of the recent Palestinian dialects. The study also justifies the presence of non- Arabic words in the recent Palestinian dialects.
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Language as a reflection of society: Examples from Palestinian Arabic
It is this third insight that I wish to illustrate. In my work, currently supported by a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship, I study the effects of social forces on the grammar of Palestinian Arabic. In particular, I have identified three such forces, which are likely to (and in some cases, are proven to) have an effect on variation amongst speakers of the language: • contact between speakers of different languages • religious affiliation • urbanisation
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A sociophonetic account of morphophonemic variation in Palestinian Arabic
This study presents findings from sociolinguistic fieldwork on Palestinian Arabic conducted in the Gaza Strip. The sample includes 15 speakers who are indigenous residents of Gaza City, representing three age groups and both genders. Linear mixed effects analyses are presented on the vowel raising of the Arabic feminine gender marker; a word final vocalic morpheme. The traditional dialect of Gaza City is reported to realize this morpheme consistently as [a] (Bergsträßer 1915), with all other Levantine city dialects raising the feminine ending to [ɛ, e] or [i] except after back consonants (Al-Wer 2007). Results indicate robust sociophonetic variation in the realization of this vowel across age generations. In comparison to the elderly generation in the sample, younger speakers realize this vowel significantly lower and backer in their casual speech. These results reflect what appears to be a change in progress happening across generations in the traditional dialect of Gaza City as a result of dialect contact happening in the Gaza Strip between speakers of difference varieties of Palestinian Arabic.
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Dialect contact and change in an Arabic morpheme: The feminine ending in Jordan and Palestine
In this short presentation the authors explain the history of feminine ending in Semitic, Arabic varieties & levantine vernaculars focusing on Jordan & Palestinian varieties.
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The future marker in palestinian arabic: an internal or contact–induced change?
The current paper explores expressions of future time reference in Palestinian Arabic (PA). Different speakers of PA spoken in Gaza City express future time reference in morphologically distinct ways; further, these differences correlate with speakers’ dialect background and age. The pilot study described here is designed to answer the following research questions: does the variation in the expression of future time reference represent a case of ongoing grammatical change in PA?
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A pragmatic analysis of diminutives in Palestinian society
This study explores the pragmatic functions of diminutives as used in Palestinian Arabic. Brown and Levinson's model of linguistic politeness is considered as a theoretical framework of the study. Discussion and analysis of naturally occurring data of diminutive use shows that, as an extension of their central use with children, diminutives in Palestinian Arabic have taken on the pragmatic functions of minimizing imposition, “hedging an utterance, expressing a pejorative attitude, showing affection and endearment, intensifying the speaker's emotions, showing modesty and avoiding bragging”, and expressing intimacy and connectedness (Badarneh, 2010, P. 153). The diminutive in Palestinian Arabic is thus used both as a positive politeness strategy, oriented toward showing solidarity, expressing affection and endearment and establishing a friendly context for the interaction, and as a negative politeness strategy aimed at minimizing imposition and softening negative statements.
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Code-Switching Practices in Palestinian Arabic
Code-switching (CS) is known as an ubiquitous phenomenon in multilingual societies and countries. Vernacular Palestinian Arabic variety spoken in Israel is among these languages, informally used for day-to-day conversations only. Such conversations appear to contain code— switched instances from Hebrew, the formal and dominant language of the country, even in settings where the need for CS seems to be unnecessary. This study examines the CS practices in PA and investigates the reason behind these CS instances in controlled settings and the correlation between bilingual dominance and CS. In the production-task interviews and Bilingual Language Profile test (BLP), there was a correlation between language dominance and CS; 13 participants were interviewed to elicit and analyze natural speech containing CS instances, along with undergoing a BLP test. The acceptability judgment task observed the limits and boundaries of different code-switched linguistic structures. Keywords: code-switching, Palestinian-Arabic, Hebrew, Israel, vernacular
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The Manner of Articulation of the emphatic /dˁ/in both Saudi and Palestinian dialects
This study aims at investigatingthe manner of articulation of the emphatic /dˁ/ sound in both the Saudi and Palestinian dialects. The subjects’ sound recordings have been digitized on a PC and analyzed via Praat.The results reveal that the Saudis produce /dˁ/ as an emphatic fricative, whereas the Palestinians as an emphatic plosive. The implications of this study suggest that /ðˁ/ (the fricative emphatic sound) and /dˁ/ (the plosive emphatic sound) merge into /ðˁ/ in Saudi Arabic, whereas they are distinct from one another in Palestinian Arabic. This is similar to Alani’s (1970: 46) finding that the /dˁ/ sound is pronounced as /ðˁ/ (emphatic fricative), but not as /dˁ/ (pharyngealized plosive) in Iraqi dialects except in the dialects of Iraqi Christians despite its orthographical representation as /dˁ/ in the writing system. Keywords: Emphatic, Fricative, Plosive