This article is about the phonology of Modern Standard Arabic primarily, with some notes on the phonologies of regional dialects. For a more detailed treatment of the phonologies of regional dialects, see Varieties of Arabic. For the phonology of the medieval language, see Classical Arabic §Phonology.
For assistance with IPA transcriptions of Arabic for Wikipedia articles, see Help:IPA/Arabic.
While many languages have numerous dialects that differ in phonology, the contemporary spoken Arabic language is more properly described as a continuum of varieties.[1] This article deals primarily with Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), which is the standard variety shared by educated speakers throughout Arabic-speaking regions. MSA is used in writing in formal print media and orally in newscasts, speeches and formal declarations of numerous types.[2]
Modern Standard Arabic has 28 consonantphonemes and 6 vowel phonemes. All phonemes contrast between "emphatic" (pharyngealized) consonants and non-emphatic ones. Some of these phonemes have coalesced in the various modern dialects, while new phonemes have been introduced through borrowing or phonemic splits. A "phonemic quality of length" applies to consonants as well as vowels.[3]
Vowels
Vowel chart representing the pronunciation of long vowels by a Palestinian speaker educated in Beirut. From Thelwall (1990:38). (These values vary between regions across North Africa and West Asia.)Vowel chart representing the pronunciation of diphthongs by a Palestinian speaker educated in Beirut. From Thelwall (1990:38)
Modern Standard Arabic has six vowel phonemes forming three pairs of corresponding short and long vowels (/a,aː,i,iː,u,uː/). Many spoken varieties also include /oː/ and /eː/. Modern Standard Arabic has two diphthongs (formed by a combination of short /a/ with the semivowels /j/ and /w/). Allophony in different dialects of Arabic can occur and is partially conditioned by neighboring consonants within the same word. The following are some general rules:
Across North Africa and West Asia, /i/ may be realized as [ɪ ~ e ~ ɨ] before or adjacent to emphatic consonants and [q], [r], [ħ], [ʕ]. /u/ can also have different realizations, i.e. [ʊ ~ o ~ ʉ]. Sometimes with one value for each vowel in both short and long lengths or two different values for each short and long lengths. They can be distinct phonemes in loanwords for a number of speakers.
In Egypt, close vowels have different values; short initial or medial: [e],[o] ← instead of /i,u/. /i~ɪ/ and /u~ʊ/ completely become [e] and [o] respectively in some other particular dialects. Unstressed final long /aː,iː,uː/ are most often shortened or reduced: /aː/→[æ~ɑ], /iː/→[i], /uː/→[o~u].
However, the actual rules governing vowel-retraction are a good deal more complex and have relatively little in the way of an agreed-upon standard, as there are often competing notions of what constitutes a "prestige" form.[7] Often, even highly proficient speakers will import the vowel-retraction rules from their native dialects.[8] Thus, for example, in the Arabic of someone from Cairo, emphatic consonants will affect every vowel between word boundaries, whereas certain Saudi speakers exhibit emphasis only on the vowels adjacent to an emphatic consonant.[9] Certain speakers (most notably Levantine speakers) exhibit a degree of asymmetry in leftward vs. rightward spread of vowel-retraction.[9][10]
The short vowels [u,ʊ,o,o̞,ɔ] are all possible allophones of /u/ across different dialects; e.g., قُلْت/ˈqult/ ('I said') is pronounced [ˈqʊlt] or [ˈqolt] or [ˈqɔlt], since the difference between the short mid vowels[o,o̞,ɔ] and [u,ʊ] is never phonemic, and they are mostly found in complementary distribution, except for a number of speakers where they can be phonemic but only in foreign words.
The short vowels [i,ɪ,e,e̞,ɛ] are all possible allophones of /i/ across different dialects; e.g., مِن/ˈmin/ ('from') is pronounced [ˈmɪn] or [ˈmen] or [ˈmɛn] since the difference between the short mid vowels [e,e̞,ɛ] and [i,ɪ] is never phonemic, and they are mostly found in complementary distribution, except for a number of speakers where they can be phonemic but only in foreign words.
The long mid vowels /oː/ and /eː/ appear to be phonemic in most varieties of Arabic except in general Maghrebi Arabic, where they merge with /uː/ and /iː/. For example, لون ('color') is generally pronounced /loːn/ in Mashriqi dialects but /luːn/ in most Maghrebi Arabic. The long mid vowels can be used in Modern Standard Arabic in dialectal words or in some stable loanwords or foreign names,[11] as in روما/ˈroːma/ ('Rome') and شيك/ˈʃeːk/ ('cheque').
Foreign words often have a liberal sprinkling of long vowels, as vowels tend to be written as long vowels in foreign loans, under the influence of European-language orthographies which write down every vowel with a letter.[12] The long mid vowels /eː/ and /oː/ are always rendered with the letters ي and و, respectively, accompanied by a preceding hamzah sitting above (أ) and below (إ) an alif (ا) respectively word-initially. In general, the pronunciation of loanwords is highly dependent on the speaker's native variety.
Even in the most formal of conventions, pronunciation depends upon a speaker's background.[13] Nevertheless, the number and phonetic character of most of the 28 consonants has a broad degree of regularity among Arabic-speaking regions. Note that Arabic is particularly rich in uvular, pharyngeal, and pharyngealized ("emphatic") sounds. The emphatic coronals (/sˤ/, /dˤ/, /tˤ/, and /ðˤ/) cause assimilation of emphasis to adjacent non-emphatic coronal consonants.[citation needed] The standard pronunciation of ⟨ج⟩ /d͡ʒ/ varies regionally, most prominently [d͡ʒ] in the Arabian Peninsula, parts of the Levant, Iraq, and northern Algeria, it is also considered as the predominant pronunciation of Literary Arabic outside the Arab world, [ʒ] in most of Northwest Africa and the Levant, [ɡ] in Egypt, coastal Yemen, and south coastal Oman, as well as [ɟ] in Sudan.
Note: the table and notes below discuss the phonology of Modern Standard Arabic among Arabic speakers and not regional dialects.
↑ Emphatic consonants are pronounced with the back of the tongue approaching the pharynx (see pharyngealization). They are pronounced with velarization by the Iraqi and Arabic Gulf speakers.[citation needed]/q/, /ħ/, and /ʕ/ can be considered the emphatic counterparts to /k/, /h/, and /ʔ/ respectively.[14]
↑ /t/ and /k/ are aspirated[tʰ] and [kʰ], whereas /tˤ/ and /q/ are unaspirated.[15]
1 2 Depending on the region, the plosives are either alveolar or dental.
↑ The Sudanese usually pronounce /q/ (ق) as [ɢ] even in Literary Arabic.
↑ ض[dˤ] was historically [ɮˤ], a value it retains among older speakers in a few isolated dialects.[16]
↑ When speaking Modern Standard Arabic, the phoneme represented by the Arabic letter ǧīm (ج) is pronounced [d͡ʒ], [ʒ], [ɡ], or [ɟ] depending on the speaker's native dialect.[17] Outside the Arab League, [d͡ʒ] is the preferred taught variant.
↑ In Modern Standard Arabic /ɡ/ is either the standard pronunciation[18] for ǧīm (ج) or is used in foreign words which may be transcribed more commonly with ج, غ, ق or ك or less commonly ݣ (used in Morocco) or ڨ (used in Tunisia and Algeria), mainly depending on the regional spoken variety of Arabic or the commonly diacriticized Arabic letter.
1 2 /θ/ and /ð/ may be approximated to [t] and [d] or [s] and [z], respectively.
1 2 In most regions, uvular fricatives of the classical period have become velar or post-velar.[19]
1 2 The "voiced pharyngeal fricative" /ʕ/ (ع) is described as neither pharyngeal nor fricative, but a creaky-voicedepiglottalapproximant.[20] Its unvoiced counterpart /ħ/ (ح) is likewise epiglottal, although it is a true fricative. Thelwall asserts that the sound of ع is actually a pharyngealized glottal stop[ʔˤ].[21] Similarly, McCarthy (1994) points to dialectal and idiolectal variation between stop and continuant variations of /ʕ/ in Iraq and Kuwait, noting that the distinction is superficial for Arabic speakers and carries "no phonological consequences."[22]
↑ The voiced emphatic dental fricative ظ[ðˤ] is mostly pronounced as a voiced emphatic alveolar fricative [zˤ] in Egypt and Lebanon.[23]
↑ Emphatic [rˤ] exists in Northwestern African pronunciations and in Egypt when accompanied by /a/ or /u/ and plain when accompanied by /i/ or /j/; in closed syllables, then it is plain when the first preceding voweled consonant has /i/ or if /j/ is present, but emphatic if the first preceding voweled letter is accompanied by /a/ or /u/. The trill /r/ is sometimes reduced to a single vibration when single, but it remains potentially a trill, not a flap[ɾ]: the pronunciation of this single trill is between a trill [r] and a flap [ɾ]. ⟨r⟩ is in free variation between a trill[r] and a flap[ɾ] in Egypt and the Levant.
↑ In most pronunciations, /ɫ/ as a phoneme occurs in a handful of loanwords. It also occurs in اللهAllah/ʔaɫˈɫaːh/, the name of God,[17] except when it follows long or short /i/ when it is not emphatic: بسم اللهbismi l-lāh/bis.milˈlaːh/ ("in the name of God").[24] However, /ɫ/ is absent in many regions, such as the Nile Valley, and is more widespread in certain regions, such as Iraq, where the uvulars have velarized surrounding instances of /l/ in the environment of emphatic consonants when the two are not separated by /i/.[25]
Long (geminate or double) consonants are pronounced exactly like short consonants, but last longer. In Arabic, they are called mushaddadah ("strengthened", marked with a shaddah). Between a long consonant and a pause, an epenthetic[ə] occurs,[6] but this is only common across regions in West Asia.
The foreign sounds /p/ﭖ and /v/ﭪ (usually transcribed as ب/b/ and ف/f/ respectively) are not necessarily pronounced by all Arabic speakers and their usage is optional. As these letters are not present on standard keyboards, they are simply written with ب/b/ and ف/f/, e.g. باكستان or پاکستان/pa(ː)kistaːn,ba(ː)kistaːn/ "Pakistan", فيروس or ڤيروس/vi(ː)ru(ː)s,vajru(ː)s,fi(ː)ru(ː)s,fajru(ː)s/ "virus", etc.[12][26]
Phonotactics
Standard Arabic syllables come in only five forms:[27]
C V (light)
C V V (heavy)
C V C (heavy)
C V V C (super-heavy)
C V C C (super-heavy)
Arabic syllable structure does not allow syllables to start with a vowel or with a consonant cluster.[27] In cases where a word starts with a consonant cluster it is preceded by an epenthetic /ʔi/ utterance initially or /i/ when preceded by a word that ends with a consonant; there are however exceptions like من/min/ and ـهم/-hum/ that connect with a following word-initial consonant cluster with /a/ and /u/ respectively, if the preceding word ends with a long vowel that vowel is then shortened.
Super-heavy syllables are usually not allowed except word finally,[27] with the exception of CVV- before geminates creating non-final CVVC- syllables, these can be found in the active participles of geminate Form I verbs, like in مادة/maːd.da/ ('substance, matter'), كافة/kaːf.fa/ ('entirely'). In the pausal form, the final geminates behave as a single consonant, only when preceding another word or with vocalization, the geminates start appearing, belonging to two separate syllables. E.g.: سام/saːm(.m)/ ('poisonous'), جاف/d͡ʒaːf(.f)/ ('dry'), عام/ʕaːm(.m)/ ('public, general'), خاص/χaːsˤ(.sˤ)/ ('private, special'), and حار/ħaːr(.r)/ ('hot, spicy').[27]
Loanwords can break some phonotactic rules like allowing initial consonant clusters (with an initial epenthetic /i/ or often another repeated vowel from the word being optional inserted after the first consonant) like in پلوتو/pluː.toː,bu.luː.toː "Pluto" and پراج/praːɡ,be.raːɡ/ "Prague" or allowing CVVC syllables non-finally without geminates like in روسيا/ruːs.jaː "Russia" and سوريا/suːr.jaː/ "Syria", which can be modified to /ruː.si.jaː,suː.ri.jaː/ to fit the phonotactics better.[27]
Word stress
The placement of word stress in Arabic varies considerably from one dialect to another, and has been the focus of extensive research and debate.
In determining stress, Arabic distinguishes three types of syllables:[28]:2991
Light:
An open syllable containing a short vowel (i.e. CV), such as وَwa'and'
Heavy:
An open syllable containing a long vowel (i.e. CVV), such as سَافَرَsā.fara'he travelled'
A closed syllable containing a short vowel followed by one consonant (i.e. CVC), such as مِنmin'from' or كَتَبْتُka.tab.tu'I wrote'
Super-heavy:
A closed syllable containing a long vowel followed by one consonant (i.e. CVVC), such as بابbāb'door' or مادٌّmād.dun'stretching (NOM)'
A closed syllable containing a short vowel followed by two consonants (i.e. CVCC), such as بِنْتbint'girl', or a long vowel followed by a geminate consonant (i.e. CVVCiCi), such as مادّmādd'stretching'
The word stress of Classical Arabic has been the subject of debate. However, there is consensus as to the general rule, even though there are some exceptions. A simple rule of thumb is that word-stress falls on the penultimate syllable of a word if that syllable is closed, and otherwise on the antepenultimate.[29]
A more precise description is J. C. E. Watson's. Here the stressed syllable follows the marker ' and variant rules are in brackets:[28]:3003
Stress a pre-pausal superheavy (CVVC, CVVCC, or CVCC) syllable: كِتاب[kiˈtāb]'book', مادّ[ˈmādd]'stretching (MASCSG)', شَرِبْت[ʃaˈribt]'I/you (MASCSG) drank'.
Otherwise, stress the rightmost non-final heavy (CVV or CVC) syllable: دَرَسْنا[daˈrasnā]'we learnt', صابُونٌ[ṣāˈbūnun]'soap (NOM)', مَكْتَبة[ˈmaktabah]'library', مادٌّ[ˈmāddun]'stretching (NOM)', مَكْتَبةٌ[ˈmaktabatun]'library'.
Otherwise, stress the antepenult (or leftmost syllable if there is no antepenult): كَتَبَ[ˈkataba]'he wrote'.
Modern Arabic dialects all maintain rules (1) and (2). But if there is neither a final superheavy syllable nor a heavy penultimate syllable, their behaviour varies. Thus in Palestinian, rule (3) is instead 'otherwise stress the first syllable (up to the antepenult): كَتَب[ˈkatab]'he wrote', زَلَمة[ˈzalamah]'man', whereas the basic rules of Cairene (to which there are exceptions) are:[28]:2993,3004
Stress a superheavy ultima.
Otherwise, stress a heavy penult.
Otherwise, stress the penult or antepenult, whichever is separated by an even number of syllables from the rightmost non-final heavy syllable, or, if there is no non-final heavy syllable, from the left boundary of the word.
Local variations of Modern Standard Arabic
Spoken varieties differ from Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic not only in grammar but also in pronunciation. Outside of the Arabian peninsula, a major linguistic division is between sedentary, largely urban, varieties and rural varieties. Inside the Arabian peninsula and in Iraq, the two types are less distinct; but the language of the urbanized Hejaz, at least, strongly looks like a conservative sedentary variety.[citation needed]
Some examples of variation:
Consonants
In Modern Standard Arabic (not in Egypt's use), /ɡ/ is used as a marginal phoneme to pronounce some dialectal and loan words. On the other hand, it is considered a native phoneme or allophone in most modern Arabic dialects, mostly as a variant of ق/q/ (as in Arabian Peninsula and Northwest African dialects) or as a variant of /d͡ʒ/ج (as in Egyptian and a number of Yemeni and Omani dialects). It is also considered a separate foreign phoneme that appears only in loanwords, as in most urban Levantine dialects where ق is /ʔ/ and ج is /d͡ʒ~ʒ/.
The phoneme represented by the Arabic letter ǧīm (ج) has many standard pronunciations: [d͡ʒ] in most of the Arabian Peninsula and as the predominant pronunciation of Literary Arabic outside the Arab world, [ɡ] in most of Egypt and some regions in southern Yemen and southwestern Oman. This is also a characteristic of colloquial Egyptian and southern Yemeni dialects.[17] In Morocco and western Algeria, it is pronounced as [ɡ] in some words, especially colloquially. In most north Africa and most of the Levant, the standard is pronounced [ʒ], and in certain regions of the Persian Gulf colloquially with [j]. In some Sudanese and Yemeni dialects, it may be either [ɡʲ] or [ɟ] as it used to be in Classical Arabic.
The foreign phonemes /p/ and /v/ are not necessarily pronounced by all Arabic speakers, but are often pronounced in names and loanwords. /p/ and /v/ are usually transcribed with their own letters ﭖ/p/ and ﭪ/v/ but as these letters are not present on standard keyboards, they are simply written with ب/b/ and ف/f/, e.g. both نوفمبر and نوڤمبر/nu(ː)fambar/, /novambar,-ber/ or /nofember/ "November", both كاپريس and كابريس/ka(ː)pri(ː)s,ka(ː)bri(ː)s/ "caprice" can be used.[12][26] The use of both sounds may be considered marginal and Arabs may pronounce the words interchangeably; besides, many loanwords have become Arabized, e.g. باكستان or پاکستان/pa(ː)kistaːn,ba(ː)kistaːn/ "Pakistan", فيروس or ڤيروس/vi(ː)ru(ː)s,vajru(ː)s/ "virus".
/t͡ʃ/ is another possible loanword phoneme, as in the word سندوتش or ساندوتش (sandawitš or sāndwitš 'sandwich'), though a number of varieties instead break up the [t] and [ʃ] sounds with an epenthetic vowel.[30] Egyptian Arabic treats /t͡ʃ/ as two consonants ([tʃ]) and inserts [e], as [teʃC] or [Cetʃ], when it occurs before or after another consonant. /t͡ʃ/ is found as normal in Iraqi Arabic and Gulf Arabic.[31] Normally the combination تش (tā’-shīn) is used to transliterate the [tʃ], while in rural Levantine dialects /k/ is usually substituted with /t͡ʃ/ while speaking and would be written as ك. Otherwise Arabic usually substitutes other letters in the transliteration of names and loanwords like the Persian character چ which is used for writing [tʃ].
Loss of the glottal stop in places where it is historically attested, as in سماء /samaːʔ/ → /sama/.[citation needed]
Vowels
Development of highly distinctive allophones of /a/ and /aː/, with highly fronted [a(ː)], [æ(ː)] or [ɛ(ː)] in non-emphatic contexts, and retracted [ɑ(ː)] in emphatic contexts.[citation needed] The more extreme distinctions are characteristic of sedentary varieties, while Bedouin and conservative Arabian-peninsula varieties have much closer allophones. In some of the sedentary varieties, the allophones are gradually splitting into new phonemes under the influence of loanwords, where the allophone closest in sound to the source-language vowel often appears regardless of the presence or absence of nearby emphatic consonants.[citation needed]
Spread of "emphasis", visible in the backing of phonemic /a(ː)/. In conservative varieties of the Arabic peninsula, only /a/ adjacent to emphatic consonants is affected, while in Cairo, an emphatic consonant anywhere in a word tends to trigger emphatic allophones throughout the entire word.[citation needed] Dialects of the Levant are somewhere in between. Moroccan Arabic is unusual in that /i/ and /u/ have clear emphatic allophones as well (typically lowered, e.g. to [e] and [o]).[citation needed]
Monophthongization of diphthongs such as /aj/ and /aw/ to /eː/ and /oː/, respectively (/iː/ and /uː/ in parts of the Maghrib, such as in Moroccan Arabic). Mid vowels may also be present in loanwords such as ملبورن (/milboːrn/Melbourne), سكرتير (/sikriteːr/ '(male) secretary') and دكتور (/duktoːr/ 'doctor').[11]
Raising of word final /a/ to [e]. In some parts of Levant, also word-medial /aː/ to [eː]. See Lebanese Arabic.
Loss of final short vowels (with /i/ sometimes remaining), and shortening of final long vowels. This triggered the loss of most Classical Arabic case and mood distinctions.[citation needed]
Collapse and deletion of short vowels. In many varieties, such as North Mesopotamian, many Levantine dialects, many Bedouin dialects of the Maghrib, and Mauritanian, short /i/ and /u/ have collapsed to schwa and exhibit very little distinction so that such dialects have two short vowels, /a/ and /ə/.[citation needed] Many Levantine dialects show partial collapse of /i/ and /u/, which appear as such only in the next-to-last phoneme of a word (i.e. followed by a single word-final consonant), and merge to /ə/ elsewhere.[citation needed] A number of dialects that still allow three short vowels /a//i//u/ in all positions, such as Egyptian Arabic, nevertheless show little functional contrast between /i/ and /u/ as a result of past sound changes converting one sound into the other.[32] Arabic varieties everywhere have a tendency to delete short vowels (especially other than /a/) in many phonological contexts. When combined with the operation of inflectional morphology, disallowed consonant clusters often result, which are broken up by epenthetic short vowels, automatically inserted by phonological rules. In these respects (as in many others), Moroccan Arabic has the most extreme changes, with all three short vowels /a/, /i/, /u/ collapsing to a schwa /ə/, which is then deleted in nearly all contexts.[citation needed] This variety, in fact, has essentially lost the quantitative distinction between short and long vowels in favor of a new qualitative distinction between unstable "reduced" vowels (especially /ə/) and stable, half-long "full" vowels /a/, /i/, /u/ (the reflexes of original long vowels).[citation needed]Classical Arabic words borrowed into Moroccan Arabic are pronounced entirely with "full" vowels regardless of the length of the original vowel.[citation needed]
Phonologies of different Arabic dialects
The main dialectal variations in Arabic consonants revolve around the six consonants; ⟨ج⟩, ⟨ق⟩, ⟨ث⟩, ⟨ذ⟩, ⟨ض⟩ and ⟨ظ⟩:
The Arabic of Cairo (often called "Egyptian Arabic" or more correctly "Cairene Arabic") is a typical sedentary variety and a de facto standard variety among certain segments of the Arabic-speaking population, due to the dominance of Egyptian media. Watson adds emphatic labials [mˤ] and [bˤ][33] and emphatic [rˤ][17] to Cairene Arabic with marginal phonemic status. Cairene has also merged the interdental consonants with the dental plosives (e.g., ثلاثة/θalaːθa/ → [tæˈlæːtæ]'three') except in loanwords from Classical Arabic where they are nativized as sibilant fricatives (e.g., ثانوية/θaːnawijja/ → [sænæˈwejja], 'secondary school'). Cairene speakers pronounce /d͡ʒ/ as [ɡ] and debuccalized/q/ to [ʔ] (again, loanwords from Classical Arabic have reintroduced the earlier sound[32] or approximated to [k] with the front vowel around it [æ] changed to the back vowel [ɑ]). Classical Arabic diphthongs /aj/ and /aw/ became realized as [eː] and [oː] respectively. Still, Egyptian Arabic sometimes has minimal pairs like شايلة[ˈʃæjlæ]'carrying FEMSG' vs. شيلة[ˈʃeːlæ]'burden'. جيب[ɡeːb]'pocket' + -نا[næ]'our' → collapsing with [ˈɡebnæ] which means (جبنة'cheese' or جيبنا'our pocket'),[34] because Cairene phonology cannot have long vowels before two consonants. Cairene also has [ʒ] as a marginal phoneme from loanwords from languages other than Classical Arabic.[35]
Varieties such as that of Sanaa, Yemen, are more conservative and retain most phonemic contrasts of Classical Arabic. Sanaani possesses [ɡ] as a reflex of Classical /q/ (which still functions as an emphatic consonant).[34] In unstressed syllables, Sanaani short vowels may be reduced to [ə].[36]/tˤ/ is voiced to [dˤ] in initial and intervocalic positions.[33]
Distribution
The most frequent consonant phoneme is /r/, the rarest is /ðˤ/. The frequency distribution of the 28 consonant phonemes, based on the 2,967 triliteral roots listed by Wehr[26] is (with the percentage of roots in which each phoneme occurs):
Phoneme
Frequency
Phoneme
Frequency
/r/
24%
/w/
18%
/l/
17%
/m/
17%
/n/
17%
/b/
16%
/f/
14%
/ʕ/
13%
/q/
13%
/d/
13%
/s/
13%
/ħ/
12%
/j/
12%
/ʃ/
11%
/d͡ʒ/
10%
/k/
9%
/h/
8%
/z/
8%
/tˤ/
8%
/χ/
8%
/sˤ/
7%
/ʔ/
7%
/t/
6%
/dˤ/
5%
/ʁ/
5%
/θ/
3%
/ð/
3%
/ðˤ/
1%
This distribution does not necessarily reflect the actual frequency of occurrence of the phonemes in speech, since pronouns, prepositions and suffixes are not taken into account, and the roots themselves will occur with varying frequency. In particular, /t/ occurs in several extremely common affixes (occurring in the marker for second-person or feminine third-person as a prefix, the marker for first-person or feminine third-person as a suffix, and as the second element of Forms VIII and X as an infix) despite being fifth from last on Wehr's list. The list does give, however, an idea of which phonemes are more marginal than others. Note that the five least frequent letters are among the six letters added to those inherited from the Phoenician alphabet, namely, ḍād, ṯāʾ, ḫāʾ, ẓāʾ, ḏāl and ġayn.
Sample
The Literary Arabic sample text is a reading of The North Wind and the Sun by a speaker who was born in Safed, lived and was educated in Beirut from age 8 to 15, subsequently studied and taught in Damascus, studied phonetics in Scotland and since then has resided in Scotland and Kuwait.[37]
Normal orthographic version
كانت ريح الشمال تتجادل والشمس في أي منهما كانت أقوى من الأخرى، وإذ بمسافر يطلع متلفعا بعباءة سميكة. فاتفقتا على اعتبار السابق في إجبار المسافر على خلع عباءته الأقوى. عصفت ريح الشمال بأقصى ما استطاعت من قوة. ولكن كلما ازداد العصف ازداد المسافر تدثرا بعباءته، إلى أن أسقط في يد الريح فتخلت عن محاولتها. بعدئذ سطعت الشمس بدفئها، فما كان من المسافر إلا أن خلع عباءته على التو. وهكذا اضطرت ريح الشمال إلى الاعتراف بأن الشمس كانت هي الأقوى.
The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger, when a traveler came along wrapped in a warm cloak. They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveler take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other. Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could, but the more he blew the more closely did the traveler fold his cloak around him; and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shined out warmly, and immediately the traveler took off his cloak. And so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two.
Related Research Articles
Arabic is a Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The ISO assigns language codes to 32 varieties of Arabic, including its standard form of Literary Arabic, known as Modern Standard Arabic, which is derived from Classical Arabic. This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic, but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā or simply al-fuṣḥā (اَلْفُصْحَىٰ).
In phonology, an allophone is one of multiple possible spoken sounds – or phones – used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, the voiceless plosive and the aspirated form are allophones for the phoneme, while these two are considered to be different phonemes in some languages such as Central Thai. Similarly, in Spanish, and are allophones for the phoneme, while these two are considered to be different phonemes in English.
Modern Hebrew has 25 to 27 consonants and 5 to 10 vowels, depending on the speaker and the analysis.
The phonology of Standard German is the standard pronunciation or accent of the German language. It deals with current phonology and phonetics as well as with historical developments thereof as well as the geographical variants and the influence of German dialects.
Hassaniya Arabic is a variety of Maghrebi Arabic spoken by Mauritanian Arabs and the Sahrawi people. It was spoken by the Beni Ḥassān Bedouin tribes of Yemeni origin who extended their authority over most of Mauritania and Morocco's southeastern and Western Sahara between the 15th and 17th centuries. Hassaniya Arabic was the language spoken in the pre-modern region around Chinguetti.
Marshallese, also known as Ebon, is a Micronesian language spoken in the Marshall Islands. The language of the Marshallese people, it is spoken by nearly all of the country's population of 59,000, making it the principal language. There are also roughly 27,000 Marshallese citizens residing in the United States, nearly all of whom speak Marshallese, as well as residents in other countries such as Nauru and Kiribati.
Gulf Arabic is a variety of the Arabic language spoken in Eastern Arabia around the coasts of the Persian Gulf in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, southern Iraq, eastern Saudi Arabia, northern Oman, and by some Iranian Arabs.
English phonology is the system of speech sounds used in spoken English. Like many other languages, English has wide variation in pronunciation, both historically and from dialect to dialect. In general, however, the regional dialects of English share a largely similar phonological system. Among other things, most dialects have vowel reduction in unstressed syllables and a complex set of phonological features that distinguish fortis and lenis consonants.
Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA) is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and in some usages also the variety of spoken Arabic that approximates this written standard. MSA is the language used in literature, academia, print and mass media, law and legislation, though it is generally not spoken as a first language, similar to Contemporary Latin. It is a pluricentric standard language taught throughout the Arab world in formal education, differing significantly from many vernacular varieties of Arabic that are commonly spoken as mother tongues in the area; these are only partially mutually intelligible with both MSA and with each other depending on their proximity in the Arabic dialect continuum.
The phonology of the Persian language varies between regional dialects, standard varieties, and even from older variates of Persian. Persian is a pluricentric language and countries that have Persian as an official language have separate standard varieties, namely: Standard Dari (Afghanistan), Standard Iranian Persian and Standard Tajik (Tajikistan). The most significant differences between standard varieties of Persian are their vowel systems. Standard varieties of Persian have anywhere from 6 to 8 vowel distinctions, and similar vowels may be pronounced differently between standards. However, there are not many notable differences when comparing consonants, as all standard varieties a similar amount of consonant sounds. Though, colloquial varieties generally have more differences than their standard counterparts. Most dialects feature contrastive stress and syllable-final consonant clusters.
Libyan Arabic, also called Sulaimitian Arabic by scholars, is a variety of Arabic spoken in Libya, and neighboring countries. It can be divided into two major dialect areas; the eastern centred in Benghazi and Bayda, and the western centred in Tripoli and Misrata. The Eastern variety extends beyond the borders to the east and share the same dialect with far Western Egypt, Western Egyptian Bedawi Arabic, with between 90,000 and 474,000 speakers in Egypt. A distinctive southern variety, centered on Sabha, also exists and is more akin to the western variety. Another Southern dialect is also shared along the borders with Niger with 12,900 speakers in Niger as of 2021.
The phonology of Quebec French is more complex than that of Parisian or Continental French. Quebec French has maintained phonemic distinctions between and, and, and, and. The latter phoneme of each pair has disappeared in Parisian French, and only the last distinction has been maintained in Meridional French, yet all of these distinctions persist in Swiss and Belgian French.
Hejazi Arabic or Hijazi Arabic (HA), also known as West Arabian Arabic, is a variety of Arabic spoken in the Hejaz region in Saudi Arabia. Strictly speaking, there are two main groups of dialects spoken in the Hejaz region, one by the urban population, originally spoken mainly in the cities of Jeddah, Mecca, Medina and partially in Ta'if and another dialect by the urbanized rural and bedouin populations. However, the term most often applies to the urban variety which is discussed in this article.
The phonology of Bengali, like that of its neighbouring Eastern Indo-Aryan languages, is characterised by a wide variety of diphthongs and inherent back vowels.
Hindustani is the lingua franca of northern India and Pakistan, and through its two standardized registers, Hindi and Urdu, a co-official language of India and co-official and national language of Pakistan respectively. Phonological differences between the two standards are minimal.
Varieties of Arabic are the linguistic systems that Arabic speakers speak natively. Arabic is a Semitic language within the Afroasiatic family that originated in the Arabian Peninsula. There are considerable variations from region to region, with degrees of mutual intelligibility that are often related to geographical distance and some that are mutually unintelligible. Many aspects of the variability attested to in these modern variants can be found in the ancient Arabic dialects in the peninsula. Likewise, many of the features that characterize the various modern variants can be attributed to the original settler dialects as well as local native languages and dialects. Some organizations, such as SIL International, consider these approximately 30 different varieties to be separate languages, while others, such as the Library of Congress, consider them all to be dialects of Arabic.
Moroccan Arabic, also known as Darija, is the dialectal, vernacular form or forms of Arabic spoken in Morocco. It is part of the Maghrebi Arabic dialect continuum and as such is mutually intelligible to some extent with Algerian Arabic and to a lesser extent with Tunisian Arabic. It is spoken by 90.9% of the population of Morocco. While Modern Standard Arabic is used to varying degrees in formal situations such as religious sermons, books, newspapers, government communications, news broadcasts and political talk shows, Moroccan Arabic is the predominant spoken language of the country and has a strong presence in Moroccan television entertainment, cinema and commercial advertising. Moroccan Arabic has many regional dialects and accents as well, with its mainstream dialect being the one used in Casablanca, Rabat, Tangier, Marrakesh and Fez, and therefore it dominates the media and eclipses most of the other regional accents.
This article explains the phonology of Malay and Indonesian based on the pronunciation of Standard Malay, which is the official language of Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia, and Indonesian, which is the official language of Indonesia and a working language in Timor Leste. There are two main standards for Malay pronunciation, the Johor-Riau standard, used in Brunei and Malaysia, and the Baku, used in Indonesia and Singapore.
This article is about the phonology of Egyptian Arabic, also known as Cairene Arabic or Masri. It deals with the phonology and phonetics of Egyptian Arabic as well as the phonological development of child native speakers of the dialect. To varying degrees, it affects the pronunciation of Literary Arabic by native Egyptian Arabic speakers, as is the case for speakers of all other varieties of Arabic.
The phonological system of the Hejazi Arabic consists of approximately 26 to 28 native consonant phonemes and 8 vowel phonemes:. Consonant length and vowel length are both distinctive in Hejazi.
1 2 3 Watson, Janet C. E. (2011). "Word stress in Arabic". In Marc van Oostendorp (ed.). The Blackwell Companion to Phonology. Vol.5. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. pp.2990–3019. ISBN9781405184236.
↑ Versteegh, Kees (1997). The Arabic Language. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. p.90.
↑ Watson (2002:60–62), citing Ṣan‘ā’ni and Cairene as examples with and without this phoneme, respectively.
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