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Colloquial Arabic | ||
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| daristani Senior Member United States Joined 7147 days ago 752 posts - 1661 votes  Studies: Uzbek | Message 1 of 5 13 June 2009 at 3:35pm | IP Logged |
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A while ago I found a two-part commentary on colloquial Arabic in a newsletter affiliated with the US Defense Language Institute (DLI). I copied the text, but later saw that, evidently, it isn't normally accessible without a password. As far as I can tell, there's nothing remotely sensitive in it, and so I've decided to post it here in the hope it will be useful to students of Arabic. (It's more detailed than some of the rather simplistic comments on this issue sometimes seen on-line, and it includes some brief comments on some of the materials available for studying the major dialects.)
------------------------------------------------- Colloquial Arabic: What Is It and How Does One Learn It? Editor's Note: This first of a two part article will deal with Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). by Howard D. Rowland* *Graduate of 18-month DLI Russian course (1961-62), DLI Russian instructor (1973-77), DLI Arabic instructor (1984-87, 1990-99), Ph.D. in Arabic studies from U. of Michigan at Ann Arbor (1971) Anyone who has studied Arabic and been familiar with it for any length of time definitely knows the following two things about it: 1) It is quite a difficult language to learn, and 2) It differs sharply from most other languages in that it is characterized by what is known as “diglossia,” that is, its literate native speakers use one form of Arabic as their written language, but quite a different form of Arabic as their everyday spoken language. Of course, virtually all the world’s major languages have a gap of this sort, especially between the educated classes and those on the lower social, economic, and educational levels of society. But in nearly all cases the educated natives of the languages fluently and habitually speak—either normally or, if required by circumstances—the high-level, educated version of their language which is used for literary purposes. Thus political affairs pundits in the U.S. being interviewed on American TV speak almost exactly the same educated standard American English that is found in the books that they write and most U.S. college graduates speak, to a reasonable degree, a form of literate, grammatically correct, educated American English that is quite uniform throughout the country and differs only slightly in terms of regional pronunciation and intonation. Arabic, however, because of its unique and very long history as a major world language, and because its speakers are dispersed over a very big area of the Earth’s surface, has evolved quite differently in terms of the forms of the language used in response to the situations in which they are employed. There is, first of all, the written Arabic language which Arabs generally call al-lugha al-fusha (the eloquent language) and which is usually known in English as Classical Arabic (the language of the Koran, pre-Islamic poetry, and medieval and pre-modern writings) or Modern Standard Arabic (“MSA” for short) which, in terms of its grammar and vocabulary, is basically the same as Classical Arabic, but with more modern vocabulary, usages, and styles of expression. This written language, in a highly standardized form, has been in use for all literary purposes throughout the Arab world since early medieval times and is essentially the same language today as it was 1,500 years ago. And this same ancient language is still used today for all written and official oral communication in nearly all situations that call for the use of “formal” language in an organized presentation. But in addition to this written Arabic language, which all educated Arabs have at their command, there also exist the spoken Arabic colloquial dialects. These varieties of spoken Arabic all differ greatly from the written language and also differ from each other to a greater or lesser degree, depending on how geographically distant the native speakers are from each other. Thus a Syrian from Damascus will have no problem at all talking to a Jordanian from Amman or a Lebanese from Beirut. However, if this same Syrian has never met an Iraqi or an Egyptian before, he will have some some problems understanding the speech of someone from Baghdad or Cairo, but in general will be able to successfully communicate with him. But if he tries talking his Syrian dialect to someone from Casablanca, Morocco who speaks only the Moroccan Arabic dialect, he will certainly either find it quite difficult to understand him or throw up his hands and give up, realizing that they simply cannot understand each other’s dialect and have to resort to speaking in MSA, if they both can speak it, or even try communicating in English or French. These regional or local spoken Arabic dialects are used by Arabs of all walks of life—regardless of class or educational level—for all informal communication situations in everyday life. However, utterances in the dialects are almost never found in writing, except in the case of satirical political cartoons in newspapers or occasionally in the dialogue portion of works of fiction by certain writers, particularly Egyptians. Sometimes the two versions of Arabic get “mixed up” with each other. For example, an educated Arab having an informal discussion with his peers, normally in colloquial Arabic, might occasionally resort to using expressions or even entire sentences or utterances in MSA in order to add emphasis to what he is saying, making it sound more like an “official statement.” Or a person on TV being interviewed may not have such a good oral command of MSA, so he might “throw in” a lot of colloquialisms or usages from the spoken language which, strictly speaking, are not customarily allowed in a formal interview situation. The more educated the discourse or the more “literary,” “scientific,” or “academic” the topic of discussion is, the fewer differences there will be in the forms and vocabulary of the written and colloquial versions of the utterances involved. For example, the newspaper headline I’m looking at right now, which is from the January, 2008 issue of The New York Times, reads as follows: “U.S. Announces Criminal Inquiry into CIA Tapes” I would translate that into Arabic (MSA, of course!) as: “tu’lin al-wilayat al-muttahida tahqiqan jina’iyan fi shara’it wakalat al-mukhabarat al-markaziya” If an Iraqi journalist wanted to orally pass this information on to a colleague, his colloquial version would hardly differ from what the headline in MSA would be, that is, he might well say: “il-wilayat il-muttahida ti’lin tahqiq jina’i b-shara’it wakalt il-mukhabarat il-markaziya” But then his colleague might reply in the Iraqi dialect, saying something like: “sh-gilit? sudug rah yisawwun tahqiq hassa? khal-da-nfukk ir-radyo. yimkin rah-nisma’ fadd khabar jidid ‘ala hash-shi” Which means: “What did you say? Is it true that they are going to do an inquiry now? Let’s turn on the radio. Maybe we’ll hear some (new) news item about this matter.” But if this reply were rendered in writing in Arabic, it would have to be something like the following, in MSA: “madha qulta? hal sahih annahum sa-yaf’alun tahqiqan al-aan? fal-naftah ar-radyo. Rubbama sa-nasma’ khabaran jadidan ma fi hadha l-mawdu’” When comparing the two versions of the colleague’s reply, you can certainly make a good case for saying that you are dealing with two different languages. For an American linguist studying Arabic who aspires to be generally proficient in the language as a whole, there is unfortunately only one option: You are forced to, in effect, learn two languages: 1) MSA, in order to read Arabic in the media, in books, and elsewhere, and in order to understand anything presented orally—over the media or otherwise—which is official in nature, and 2) one of the major regional spoken Arabic dialects (such as Egyptian, Syrian, Iraqi, Saudi, Tunisian, or Moroccan) in order to take part in all manner of normal informal everyday conversations with the native speakers of a given dialect area, no matter who they are and what their social or educational level is. Furthermore, if you plan on going to different parts of the Arab world, you will have to be prepared to at least be familiar with the different vocabulary items, slightly different grammatical structures, and widely-varying pronunciations and intonations that you will hear. Quite a daunting task, all in all, you might say. Indeed it is, but perhaps not so tough as it appears at first. Here’s why: 1. Arabs are very patient and forgiving when non-Arabs try to learn their language, and are usually quite happy if foreigners have learned any type of Arabic, wherever they have learned it. And if you can put together a sentence of three words or more in their language, either in speech or in writing, they are generally very favorably impressed. 2. If you have studied MSA before attempting to learn to speak a dialect (as is usually the case with foreign learners of Arabic), you’ll be happy to know that the dialects are generally far less complicated in terms of grammar and usage than the written language. It will be like learning a greatly simplified version of MSA, and thus will seem easy. 3. Most of the vocabulary of MSA and spoken Arabic is the same, although the “low-level,” practical, everyday vocabulary is often quite different. But this frequently-used body of vocabulary is something that you are likely to learn quickly and well, since it is used so often and you will hear it constantly from the native speakers. 4. As a foreign, non-native of Arabic, you can always “throw in” vocabulary and forms typical of MSA as you speak in dialect, and this will not greatly disturb the Arabs you are talking to, since they don’t normally expect you to have command of their spoken language. In other words, whatever you say when you speak with them is OK with them, as long as they understand it. Furthermore, there really are no official or accepted “grammatical rules” for speaking any form of colloquial Arabic, and their attitude toward foreigners learning to speak Arabic is much the same as that of Americans when listening to foreigners trying to speak English—that is, anything goes as long as it can be understood. 5. If you are able to speak MSA (using inflectional endings on nouns, verbs, etc. is not necessary), nearly all Arabs everywhere will be able to understand you—but not necessarily be able to reply to you in MSA. Educated Arabs, however, generally can reply in MSA, although sometimes only haltingly, since normally they only write and read in MSA and never speak it spontaneously in everyday conversation. Colloquial Arabic: What Is It and How Does One Learn It? - Second Part Editor's Note: This is a two part article. The first part appeared in Newsletter XVII and dealt with Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). This second part will deal with colloquial Arabic. by Howard D. Rowland, PhD* *Graduate of 18-month DLI Russian course (1961-62), DLI Russian instructor (1973-77), DLI Arabic instructor (1984-87, 1990-99), Ph.D. in Arabic studies from U. of Michigan at Ann Arbor (1971) Now, assuming that you want to learn to speak colloquial Arabic and perhaps have a real need for doing this, the best approach to doing so would, I believe, be as follows: 1. You have to pick the dialect that is most relevant to you and fits your needs—whether Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian, or perhaps Saudi, Tunisian, Moroccan, or some other one. If you have no preference or obvious need for any particular dialect, then it would be a good idea to focus on the Egyptian dialect since it is native to such a large number of speakers and is the dialect most widely understood throughout the Arab world due to the influence of Egyptian movies, works of literature, and other media. 2. If you have already spent a year or more learning MSA and have a good command of its basic vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and script, you’ve already won half the battle, because that knowledge will make matters much easier for you. However, even if you do not know any MSA at all, you can still learn to function in an Arabic dialect without having to have previous knowledge of Arabic. In any case, when you study one of the Arabic dialects, the really important thing is to treat the dialect as a language unto itself and entirely separate from MSA. The reason for this is that the dialects have their own characteristic grammar structures, vocabulary, and pronunciation of certain letters that differ—sometimes substantially—from those of MSA and you want to target your efforts in the direction of acquiring knowledge of, and proficiency in, the dialect without being confused by interference from MSA. 3. Most of the commercial dialect-teaching books present the spoken Arabic in the form of some sort of transliteration in the Latin alphabet. Be sure to study the given transliteration system well and learn to read and use it easily, because the rendering of Arabic dialect words in transliteration is usually more fully accurate than Arabic script as a means of representing the sounds and pronunciation of the dialect. Remember, the important thing is to learn how to speak colloquial Arabic rather than to read it, because spoken Arabic is almost never used as a written medium. 4. A good dialect course or instructional book will always have an accompanying CD or cassette tape, hopefully sounding out all the dialogues and, if possible, the exercises contained in the book. 5. Be sure to find a native Arab speaker of the dialect to coach and help you with pronunciation and with whom you can practice speaking, especially at the beginning of your efforts to learn the dialect. 6. If at all possible, try to make a trip to one or more of the Arab immigrant communities in the U.S. (such as Detroit or Dearborn in Michigan, Los Angeles, San Diego, or San Francisco in California, or New York City or the Washington, DC area) and visit small newsstands, grocery stores, restaurants, and delicatessens owned by Arabs there and practice speaking with the locals. They’ll be pleased to hear Arabic from you. 7. Finally, if possible, make a trip to the country whose dialect you have studied and wander around its capital city and maybe other towns there and speak Arabic to everybody whom you deal with. Keep on speaking Arabic even if people initially reply in English (or French, for example), and before long they will “yield” since they will see that you are serious about speaking their language. As for materials to use to learn some of the Arabic dialects, below is a list that I have compiled of some of those that I am familiar with: Iraqi Dialect Probably due to the heavy U.S. involvement in Iraq during the last few years, several quite good books for teaching the Iraqi dialect have appeared on the market, and they teach the standard Baghdad dialect. They are: 1. A Basic Course in Iraqi Arabic, by Wallace Erwin, with CD, $39.95. Although first published in 1969, it still sets the standard for Iraqi dialect courses and is excellent in terms of its methodology and thoroughness. Can be ordered through the Georgetown University Press. 2. Modern Iraqi Arabic, by Yasin Alkalesi, with CD, $49.95. An excellent, interesting, newly-published Iraqi dialect course, using both transliteration and Arabic script. Can be ordered through the Georgetown University Press. 3. Beginner’s Iraqi Arabic, by Nasrallah and Hassani, with CD, $29.95. Also a well-written, newly-published work that handles the fundamentals of the dialect quite well. Can be ordered through Hippocrene Books. Syrian Dialect “Syrian dialect” is a term that customarily covers all the spoken forms of Arabic in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and the Palestinian areas. There is no standard “Syrian” dialect, although the Damascus dialect is sometimes regarded by linguists as a standard type of speech for the area. 1. Eastern Arabic, by Rice and Said, with CD, $44.95. This is by far the best work in print dealing with the Syrian dialect (presenting the Lebanese-Palestinian version), even though it was first published nearly 50 years ago. It presents the language in a simple, entertaining form with interesting dialogues and useful exercises. Anyone learning its material will be in good shape to speak to Arabs in the whole “Syrian dialect area” described above. Can be ordered through the Georgetown University Press. 2. Other books have appeared, and gone out of print, which deal with teaching the dialects of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine, but with the exception of Damascus Arabic by Ferguson and Ani they are not on the level of Eastern Arabic. Egyptian Dialect “Egyptian dialect” always means the dialect of Cairo, and it is the best-known dialect of the Arab world. This being true, there are a number of commercially-produced works that deal with teaching it, most of which are small and just teach phrases for tourists. Examples of these are the following: 1. Arabic at a Glance: Now You’re Talking Arabic in No Time, by H. Wise, with cassette tape, $16.95. An excellent booklet for learning Egyptian dialect vocabulary and phrases in a short time. A new version is expected to appear in February of 2008. Can be ordered through Barron’s Educational Series. 2. Say It in Arabic, by Dover, $4.95. A very small and handy booklet that teaches Egyptian dialect vocabulary and phrases. Can be ordered through Amazon.com or The Dover Bookshop. Recently a series of three books has appeared that teaches the Egyptian dialect from the basic to the upper intermediate level and they can all be ordered through the American University of Cairo Press. They are the following: 4. Kullu Tamam [Everything Is OK], by Woidich and Nasr, with CD, $29.50. This book is an introduction to the Egyptian dialect and presents the material at first in transliteration in the Latin alphabet, then later in Arabic script. 5. Kallimni Arabi [Talk Arabic to Me], by Samia Louis, with CD, $29.95. An intermediate course book for Egyptian dialect that uses only Arabic script, this book is probably best used with a teacher rather than as material for self-study, and it covers all sorts of everyday situations quite thoroughly. 6. Kallimni Arabi Aktar [Talk More Arabic to Me], by Samia Louis, with CD, $24.95. A more advanced version of Kallimni Arabi, following a similar design. Saudi Dialect There are actually three major dialects in Saudi Arabia—the Hijazi dialect of Mecca, Medina, and Jidda, the Najdi dialect of central Arabia, and the eastern dialect near the Gulf. The Hijazi dialect is very similar to Jordanian and Egyptian speech in many regards, the Najdi dialect is a Bedouin dialect spoken by the Saudi royal family, and the eastern dialect is very much like the Iraqi dialect and those of the Gulf states. 1. Saudi Arabic Basic Course, by Margaret Nydell, at various prices offered by used bookstore dealers through Amazon.com (from $4.08 to $42.82). This book, a classic which was published in 1975 and teaches so-called “Urban Hijazi Arabic,” is one of the best Arabic-dialect-teaching books in existence in terms of its methodology, its numerous explanatory notes, and the ease with which it enables a student to learn the language. 2. Many years ago Aramco published quite a good book, in Latin alphabet transliteration, which taught the basics of the Saudi eastern dialect and was designed to teach American oil personnel to communicate with Saudi workers in the eastern, oil-producing area of Saudi Arabia. I have forgotten its title and do not know if it is still available for purchase anywhere. Moroccan Arabic 1. A Basic Course in Moroccan Arabic, by Richard Harrell, with CD, $39.95. First published in the 1960’s, this book is extremely well designed and similar in quality and approach to Erwin’s A Basic Course in Iraqi Arabic. Can be ordered through the Georgetown University Press. Other Arabic Dialect Materials – The above-mentioned works are not an exhaustive list, and there are new books and courses on CDs that are starting to come out. Also, DLI Arabic students and graduates of the DLI Arabic program may have access to other special materials designed to teach them various Arabic dialects, possibly even targeting their anticipated needs on the job following their assignment to DLI. Two courses which I can also suggest are the following, which I personally worked on and produced, together with others, while employed at DLI. Copies of them may or may not still be available for use by DLI graduates and others associated with DLI and the U.S. military. They are the following: 1. Saudi Arabic Headstart, by Howard Rowland, Siham Munir, and others. Produced at DLI in 1980. A package consisting of a booklet containing eight modules (16 lessons) that teaches the dialect of central Saudi Arabia to officers and others assigned to that country, accompanied by 15 cassette tapes and a Cultural Notes booklet. 2. Sinai Orientation Program, by Howard Rowland and Milad Rizkallah. Produced at DLI in 1987. A set of two booklets, one of which is designed to teach the basics of the Egyptian dialect to all members of the Peacekeeping Forces deployed to the Sinai Peninsula and the second of which specifically targets the language needs of MPs and officers who are assigned there. Both booklets are oriented toward the probable basic spoken language needs in accordance with the situations most likely to be encountered by U.S. military personnel in which communication with Egyptians is necessary. Editor's Note: The fist part of this article appeared in our Newsletter XVII. 15 persons have voted this message useful | |
| staf250 Pentaglot Senior Member Belgium emmerick.be Joined 5700 days ago 352 posts - 414 votes Speaks: French, Dutch*, Italian, English, German Studies: Arabic (Written) | Message 2 of 5 13 June 2009 at 4:50pm | IP Logged |
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A very clear and helpful explanation,
Thank You 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7018 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 3 of 5 14 June 2009 at 2:34am | IP Logged |
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Thank you for the interesting article.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| ANK47 Triglot Senior Member United States thearabicstudent.blo Joined 7100 days ago 188 posts - 259 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Arabic (classical) | Message 4 of 5 15 June 2009 at 5:01am | IP Logged |
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That guy hits the nail on the head. Anything that is high level language such as economics, law, science is going to be the same in the dialects and MSA. It's the common everyday words and phrases that will be different. Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How are going to be different as well as anything that has been used frequently and has been repeated enough over the centuries to have time to evolve.
You can see that “sh-gilit? sudug rah yisawwun tahqiq hassa? khal-da-nfukk ir-radyo. yimkin rah-nisma’ fadd khabar jidid ‘ala hash-shi” and "madha qulta? hal sahih annahum sa-yaf’alun tahqiqan al-aan? fal-naftah ar-radyo. Rubbama sa-nasma’ khabaran jadidan ma fi hadha l-mawdu’” look like totally different languages. The only common words they have are radio, hear, and new, but with the accent that the Iraqis have even the words that are spelled the same sound different. Someone who was a master in MSA but had never heard Iraqi (or any dialect for that matter) would have no idea of the meaning of what they were hearing if they were listening to a sentence like that one. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| neonqwerty Bilingual Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6166 days ago 229 posts - 239 votes Speaks: French*, English* Studies: Spanish | Message 5 of 5 15 June 2009 at 6:13pm | IP Logged |
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This is a wonderful article, and the best "advertisement" for learning Arabic that I have ever read. It really demystified a lot, while at the same time making it clear that it is still a tough and at times messy process.
Thanks a lot, OP. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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