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Speaking MSA To Dialect Speakers | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| neok Newbie United Kingdom Joined 4208 days ago 14 posts - 17 votes Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 9 29 May 2014 at 9:12pm | IP Logged | |||||
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After I learn Egyptian Arabic I would like to move on to MSA. Although I do have a couple
questions about the language. 1. Is it true that if I spoke MSA to somebody in, let's say Syria, they would laugh at me? This may sound silly but I've read in several places that speaking MSA to people who speak dialect is similar to speaking old English to a modern English speaker. I'm not really sure if that is true though. 2. If I spoke to somebody that speaks their local dialect in MSA and they understood and were nice enough not to laugh at me would they respond in MSA or their local dialect? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Luso Hexaglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6062 days ago 819 posts - 1812 votes  Speaks: Portuguese*, French, EnglishC2, GermanB1, Italian, Spanish Studies: Sanskrit, Arabic (classical) | Message 2 of 9 30 May 2014 at 11:45am | IP Logged | |||||
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In my experience, Arabs in general are very proud of their language (and culture), and they treat anyone making an attempt to learn and speak it with utmost respect. After five minutes of conversation with my very poor command of the language, most people usually make an effort to accomodate me in any way they can.
The answers to your questions are: 1. Probably not. Especially in Syria. They are very proud of their role in the expansion of Arab culture (the Umayyads, and all that). This makes them particularly receptive to people speaking "proper" Arabic. 2. If they can (which is likely), they'll respond in MSA. Overall, this "laughing at" you mention (like with anything else in life) is not impossible, but highly unlikely. Edited by Luso on 30 May 2014 at 12:30pm 7 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| fiolmattias Triglot Groupie Sweden geocities.com/fiolmaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6690 days ago 62 posts - 129 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, Arabic (Written) | Message 3 of 9 30 May 2014 at 4:22pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have skyped with arabs in Tunis, Marocco, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria
and Jordan in MSA and no one has laughed at me. Some have asked why I "only" speak MSA and not their dialect, but no one seems to mind me speaking MSA with them. Most replay in MSA, but even if it is in regional dialects they try to speak combine it with MSA and are preyy easy to understand for someone like me that only knows MSA. 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| aspie.sharaf Tetraglot Newbie Denmark Joined 4369 days ago 21 posts - 39 votes Speaks: Danish*, English, Serbo-Croatian, Dutch Studies: Persian, German, Russian, Arabic (Written), Turkish, Thai, Polish, Bulgarian, Pashto, Urdu, French | Message 4 of 9 31 May 2014 at 12:04am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have spoken MSA to a lot of arabs. None of them have ever laughed at me.
It is my experience that arabs generally are very positive and treat you with respect if you know just some MSA. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Zireael Triglot Senior Member Poland Joined 4652 days ago 518 posts - 636 votes Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, Spanish Studies: German, Sign Language, Tok Pisin, Arabic (Yemeni), Old English | Message 5 of 9 31 May 2014 at 2:28pm | IP Logged | |||||
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The Arabic (Yemeni) listed in my profile, by all accounts, seems to be Yemeni-colored MSA (i.e. a Yemeni word or two thrown in sometimes and Yemeni pronunciation) and not Yemeni itself.
I've been able to communicate with Tunisians in this Yemeni-pronunciation MSA with no problems. That means combining regional dialects with MSA is very likely to happen and won't deter your understanding nor production. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6598 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 6 of 9 31 May 2014 at 10:47pm | IP Logged | |||||
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Luso Hexaglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6062 days ago 819 posts - 1812 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, French, EnglishC2, GermanB1, Italian, Spanish Studies: Sanskrit, Arabic (classical) | Message 7 of 9 01 June 2014 at 1:46am | IP Logged | |||||
Using the word "still" makes no sense in this context. Modern Standard Arabic is... well... modern. In fact, since the 19th century it has incorporated some features of Western Indo-European languages that were not acceptable before. Perhaps you were thinking of Classical Arabic. Edited by Luso on 01 June 2014 at 1:46am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Martien Heptaglot Senior Member Netherlands martienvanwanrooij.n Joined 7106 days ago 134 posts - 148 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, French Studies: Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Latin, Swedish, Arabic (Written) | Message 8 of 9 01 June 2014 at 2:00am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have been working many years as a social worker for Moroccan, Spanish and Turkish
immigrants. I am fluent at Spanish and as good as fluent at Turkish. As for Moroccan immigrants, when I started to learn their language almost 40 years ago they seemed to have a kind of double standard, or anyway they didn't know very well what to think about the topic that is discussed here. I bought S. Tritton's Teach Yourself Arabic and some immigrants told me that they appreciated my efforts to learn their language but that it was not very practical to communicate with a lot of immigrants as most of them were illiterate. A Moroccan teacher started a course of Moroccan Arabic (especially for tourist visiting Morocco) and then a lot of Moroccans told me that I shouldn't learn a dialect. Some years later I started to work as a social worker and since that time I didn't get a lot of such comments, probably because they realised that it was a good thing that I could communicate with people who didn't understand Dutch. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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