California .State University, Northridge a Phonological Analysis of Bedouin

Home , Arabia Petraea, Damascus Arabic, Old Arabic, Old South Arabian, Palestinian Arabic, Turkish phonology

CALIFORNIA .STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE

A PHONOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF

BEDOUIN PALESTINIAN ARABIC

IN RELATION TO ARABIA PETRAEA BEDOUIN DIALECTS

A graduate thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in

Linguistics

Ali Abu Wadi

May 1989 The thesis of Ali Abu Wadi is approved:

Dr. Rei R. Nogucffi

Dr. Iris S. Shah

Dr. Paul'L. Kirk Committee Chairman

California State University, Northridge

; ; ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am particularly indebted to Professor Paul Kirk, chair of my thesis committee, for the hours he dedicated to my thesis, and for his invaluable help and guidance. I would also like to thank Dr.

Rei Noguchi and Dr. Iris Shah, whose advice and encouragement helped me immeasurably.

I am thankful to Misha Schutt for typing the thesis, and to

Jim Box for making the maps.

My thanks are also due to my many friends and informants among my Bedouin tribe, al-Tayaha of the Naqab, and in particular the al

Ramadin subtribe, for their valuable help.

Last but not least, thanks to my mother, who went out into the wilderness somewhere east of the Mediterranean one dark night, col lected firewood and started a fire in our tent, to provide me with enough light to do my homework. TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments iii

Symbols and Abbreviations viii

Abstract xi

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

1.1 The Study 1

1.2 The Diglossic Nature of Arabic 3

1.3 The Arabic Dialects 5

1.4 The Bedouin Palestinian Dialects 6

1.5 The Bedouins of the al-Naqab Desert 7

Chapter 2 The Sound System of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic 8

2.1 The Consonants 9

2.1.1 The Obstruents 11

2.1.2 The Pharyngeal Segmental Phonemes 14

2.1.3 The Sonorant Segmental Phonemes 16

2.1.4 The Emphatic "Pharyngealized" Segmental Phonemes 17

2.1.5 Other Emphatic Consonants 19

2.1.6 /x/, /g/, and /g/ in Relation to Emphasis 23

2.2 The Vowel System of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic 27

2.2.1 The Short Vowels 28

2.2.2 The Long Vowels 29

2.2.3 The Diphthongs 33

iv Chapter 3 . The Phonology of Bedouin·Palestinian Arabic 36

3.1 The Consonants 38

3.1.1 Assimilation 38

(A) Lateral Assimilation of the Prefixed Article al- 38

(B) Final Lateral Assimilation 39

(D) Complete or Optional t- Assimilation 40 (E) Devoicing Assimilation of Final /d/ and /g/ 41

3.1.2 Emphasis Revisited 42

3.1.3 The Effect of Pharyngeal Sounds on Syllable Structure 47 3.2 The Vowels 52

3.2.1 The Status of Short Vowels in Open Unstressed Syllables 53

3.2.2 Vowel Harmony 57

3.2.3 The Diphthongization of Long Vowels in Final Position 63

3.3 The Diphthongs 69

3.3.1 The Retention of the Diphthongs 69

3.3.2 The Monophthongization of the Diphthongs 70

3.4 Stress 75

V Chapter 4 . The Arabia Petraea Dia;ect Group 79 4.1.1 Ge-neral Phonological Features of Bedouin Dialects · 80

4.1.2 General Classification of Bedouin Dialecta 83

(A) North Arabian Dialect Group 83

(B) The Syro-Mesopotamian Dialect Group 83

(D) The Southern Mesopotamian Dialect Group 85

(E) The South Arabian Dialect Group 86 (F) The Hijazi. Dialects 86 (G) North African Bedouin Dialects 88

(H) The Ma cc-azah Dialect of Egypt ' s Eastern Desert 88

4.2 The Arabia Petraea Dialect Group 90 4.2.1 A Proposed Classification of the Dialects of Arabia Petraea 91

(A) The Western Arabia Petraea Dialect Area 92

(B) The Eastern Arabia Petraea Dialect Area 93

4.3 Some Common Phonological Distinguishing Features of the Arabia Petraea Dialect Group 96

4.3.1 The Absence of Affrication of /k/ and /g/ 96

4.3.2 The Effect of Pharyngeal Sounds on Syllable Structure 99

4.3.3 Low Vowel Deletion 100 4.3.4 The Retention of the Long Vowel /I/ of the First Person Pronominal Suffix 102

vi 4.3.5 Other Common Features 104

(A) The .emphatic sounds lOl•

(B) Trochaic versus a trochaic syllable structure 104

(D) The low vowel /a/ in open syllables 107

4.4 Some Phonological Distinguishing Features of the Western Arabia Petraea Dialect Slightly Confirmed for the Eastern Sub-Variety 110

4.4.1 The diphthongization of the long vowels in final position 110

4.4.2 The monophthongized vowel /e/ < OA /ay/ 113

4.4.3 Stress 116

:hapter 5 :onclusions 120

Bibliography 127

!\ppendix A Maps 132

vii SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS

Consonants

b voiced ~ilabial stop

b emphatic voiced bilabial stop

m bilabial nasal

m emphatic bilabial nasal

w bilabial glide f voiceless labiodental fricative

t voiceless dental stop

t voiceless dental ejective stop

t emphatic voiceless dental stop

d voiced dental stop

d emphatic voiced dental stop

t voiceless interdental fricative

d voiced interdental fricative

d emphatic voiced interdental fricative T r alveolar trill

r emphatic alveolar trill

1 alveolar lateral

1 emphatic alveolar lateral

n alveolar nasal

s voiceless alveolar fricative

~ C voiceless alveolar affricate

s emphatic voiceless alveolar fricative

z voiced alveolar fricative

viii voiced' alveolar affricate

voiceless palatal fricative

V z voiced palatal fricative voiced palatal stop

voiceless palato-alveolar affricate

voiced palato-alveolar affricate

y palatal glide

k voiceless velar stop

g voiced velar stop

X voiceless velar fricative

g voiced velar fricative

h voiceless pharyngeal fricative

C voiced pharyngeal fricative

h voiceless glottal fricative

? glottal stop

Vowels

i short high front unrounded vowel r long high front unrounded vowel e long mid front unrounded vowel

a short low vowel -a long low vowel

-0 long mid back rounded vowel

u short high back rounded vowel

-u long high back rounded vowel

ix Other Symbols

C any consonant

c any emphatic "pharyngealized" consonant (except h) . . V any vowel

V any long vowel

> becomes, is realized as

< is derived from

/ / underlying representation

[ ] surface phonetic representation

+ morpheme boundary

Abbreviations

rn. masculine

f. feminine

sg. singular

pl. plural

dim. diminutive

OA Old Arabic

SR surface representation

UR underlying representation

X ABSTRACT

A PHONOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF BEDOUIN PALESTINIAN ARABIC

IN RELATION TO ARABIA PETRAEA BEDOUIN DIALECTS

Ali Abu Wadi

Master of Arts in Linguistics

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 Des ert (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.

The data I collected indicate that the diphthongization of the long vowels in final position, the monophthongized variants of the diphthong /ay/, and the placement of stress are some of the main distinguishing features of this dialect. The study also indicates the occurrence of those same features in the Bedouin dialects of the Sinai, Araba Valley, and to a lesser degree southern Jordan and

xi , . northwestern Saudi Arabia; this region is designated as Arabia

Petraea in this stu9y.

This study demonstrates that in view of the overall character

istics of Bedouin dialects, the Arabia Petraea dialects are the

primary representatives of the gahawah type, their syllable struc

ture is clearly atrochaic, and their velars are never affricated.

Finally, in view of my findings of the com.mon features of this

group of Bedouin dialects, I propose the establishment of an inde

pendent Arabia Petraea dialect group with two regional varieties: a

Western, which includes the Bedouin dialects of the Naqab, Sinai

and parts of the Araba Valley, and an Eastern, consisting of south

ern Jordan and northwestern Saudi Arabia.

xii CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

This study presents a phonological analysis of the writer's

Bedouin dialect, that of the al-Ramadhin subtribe of the al-Tayaha, spoken in the northern part of the al-Naqab Desert (southern Isra el). The main distinguishing features of the dialect are examined to determine its regional character along with other dialects of the Bedouins in the Sinai, southern Jordan and the northwestern parts of Saudi Arabia. The overall goal is to provide a classifi cation for the Bedouin dialects of this area among the ranks of other major Bedouin dialect groups.

1.1 The Study

Recent research focuses on regional grouping of dialect groups

(Johnstone 1967, Ingham 1982, Palva 1984a and Woidich 1987).

Rather than concentrating on the dialects of individual speech com munities, these studies have been directed towards an areal exami nation in terms of their placement in large regional units which share common linguistic features. After giving a brief phonological description of the dialect of the al-Naqab Bedouins, the main distinguishing features of this dialect are traced throughout the whole area to determine its general place among the Bedouin dia lects of Arabic.

1 The sources for this study are the writer's collected data, as well as data from ?ublished sources. The data for the Naqab part of this study was tape-recorded over a period of three months in the summer of 19.81. The recordings were made by speakers of the writer's tribe, Al-Ramadhin, who reside 30 miles southwest of the city of Hebron (10 miles southwest of the village of al-Dhahriyya).

The eight informants represent the main clans of the tribal unit: five males between the ages of 35 and 60, and three females between the ages of 40 and 55. This age group was chosen because they were considered to be true representatives of the community's dialect, while informants of a younger age were rejected because employment or schooling might have carried them outside their dia lect area, and their speech was possibly influenced by other dia lect groups, such as the Qaysiyyah of the Hebron, of Southern Pale stinian Arabic.

The data consist of a total of twelve tapes, of sixty minutes each. The recordings comprise anecdotes, tales, personal narra tives, and local popular songs. Some data also include narratives about Bedouin marriage traditions, their legal code, their tribal history of past wars, and folk poetry.

Selective segments of the recordingst consisting of 20 minutes of each informant's recording, were phonetically transcribed in de tail, The rest of the data was used as supporting material where additional information was needed.

2 Other published ·data from the neighboring Bedouin regions are incorporated· in this study, in order to determine the regional classification of this Bedouin Palestinian Arabic dialect. Some of the studies which will play a role in this regional classification are Blanc (1970), "The Arabic dialect of the Negev Bedouins," on the al-Dhullam of central Naqab; Stewart (1987), "A Bedouin nar rative from central Sinai," on the Ahaywat;. Bani-Yasin (1984), "The Bdul dialect of Jordan" on the Bdul of Petra; and Palva (1984a,

1984b), "A general classification for the Arabic dialects spoken in

Palestine and Transjordan," and "Further notes on the descriptive imperative of narrative style in spoken Arabic," on the ~uway~at and Bani cAtiyya of southern Jordan and northwestern Saudi Arabia.

The main distinguishing features of this dialect group are thus projected against features of other Bedouin dialect groups in order to point out areas of similarity or difference. Not only does this study offer a better understanding of Bedouin dialects, it also enhances cross-dialect comparisons.

1.2 The Diglossic Nature of Arabic

The differences between Classical Arabic and Colloquial Ara bic, as reflected in a number of different dialects, are widely recognized. Classical Arabic is the official standard language of all the Arab countries, and its prestige and continuity stem from being the language of the Koran and of Islam. This highly respec ted standard form of the language has a long uninterrupted history of literature and records. Classical Arabic is used in books, mag-

3 azines, newspaper~, and radio and television. It also functions as the language·o£ education in schools, colleges and universities.

Over a considerable period of time, the phonology, morphology and syntax of Classical Arabic have changed very little. However, the lexicon has been changing and now incorporates a number of words found in the vocabulary of the colloquial language.

Colloquial Arabic, on the other hand, is used for everyday communication purposes and is looked upon by non-linguist Arabs as a corrupted form of language lacking prestige and rules. Collo quial Arabic is spoken in homes and markets, used for daily conver sations, and in the movies. It is not uniform and varies from one area to another. There are many Arabic dialects, reflected in dif ferences in phonology, syntax and lexicon, that are divided along social, geographical and generational lines.

Finally, it should be pointed out that, as a result of the widespread use of television, colloquial Arabic has now gained ground as the primary idiom used in drama, fiction, and works ad dressing social problems (Al-Toma 1969:114).

1.3 The Arabic Dialects

Arabic dialects have long been divided into Eastern and West ern Arabic. Traditionally, the Nile River has been taken as the approximate dividing line. The dialects in the area west of the

Nile (commonly known as al-Maghrib) are referred to as Western Ara bic and those east of the Nile as Eastern Arabic.

4 Eastern Arabic ·includes the Arabian, Mesopotamian, Syro-Pales tinian, Egyptian and Sudanese dialects. In this Eastern group, many regional as well as social subdialects are distinguished.

Eastern Arabic qas a set of common features which differentiate it from Western Arabic. At the phonological level, the urban dialects of this group have lost the Old Arabic (henceforth OA) interdentals

/~/ and /d/, the rural dialects have conditioned affricated vari- y ants of OA /k/ as [c], and the Bedouin dialects have preserved the interdentals and have the segment /g/ corresponding to OA /q/.

Western Arabic includes the dialects of present-day North Af rica. It is spoken in Egypt's Western and Libyan Deserts, Libya,

Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco and Mauritania. Bakalla (1984:89) ob serves that the unity of the dialects spoken west of the Nile River has been recognized since the early days of Arab and Muslim geogra phers and historians.

The Maghrib dialects are distinguished by a drastic reduction of the vocalic elements in a large number of words. As Zawadowsky

(1978:29) points out, the vowelless words such as [xt] 'sister' and

[rzl]~ 'foot', and initial clusters of two, three or four consonants

(e.g. [llqa] 'chip', [bsmllah] 'in the name of God'), are typical features of the Maghrib dialects. In contrast to the Eastern branch, studies of the dialects in the Maghrib area are sketchy.

5 1.4 The Bedouin Palestinian Dialects

Two varieties- of Bedouin dialects within Palestinian Arabic, a

branch of Eastern Arabic, can be identified:

(1) The Bedouin (semi-nomadic) dialect

This is represented by the spoken Arabic of the Bedouins in

the al-Naqab Desert, the subject of this study.

(2) Sedentarized Bedouin dialects.

This northern variety of the Bedouin dialects is spoken in the western Jordan Valley, starting from the city of Jericho northward, and the northern and northeastern parts of Israel up to the Leba nese border and the Golan Heights. This group of dialects is a member of the Syro-Mesopotamian Bedouin dialects, or Group C in

Cantineau's (1936,1:33-39) classification.

As observed by the writer among the al-Masacid tribe of al

Jiftlik (north of Jericho), the velars /k/ and /g/ have the phonet ically conditioned voiceless and voiced palato-alveolar affricated variants[~] [t:J'] and [1] [d3] respectively, as in [~ibir] 'old' and [liddam] 'in front of'.

The Bedouin dialects of the north of Israel are facing tremen dous external linguistic pressure from the dialects of the peasant communities surrounding them (Rosenhouse 1984:146-170). Similarly, the dialects of the Jordan Valley come under the influence of other non-Syro-Mesopo~amian Bedouin dialects; large groups of Bedouins from the al~Naqab Desert and other areas settled in this valley af ter the 1948 war.

1.5 The Bedouins of the al-Nagab Desert

The al-Naqab Desert is located in the southern part of pre sent-day Israel, with an estimated size of 7,600 square miles (Abu

Khusa 1979:15). It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, the Sinai Desert to the south, the Araba Valley and the Gulf of Aqaba to the east, and the mountains of Hebron to the north.

Four major tribes make up the bulk of the Bedouin population in the desert: al-Tayaha,- al-Djabarat,-- al-C Azazimah, - and al-Tarabin.-- They are estimated to number 31,650, according to the Central Bureau of

Statistics of 1972 in Jerusalem (Richter 1985:56). This semi-no madic population is made up of goat and sheep herders and, to a lesser degree, camel herders.

As for language, some of the older generation speak just enough Hebrew to get by in local affairs and government-related ac tivities. Most women speak very little Hebrew. The younger gener ation of males learn both Hebrew and Arabic in school, and general ly their Hebrew is good; however, very few make it to high school, and still fewer graduate from college.

7 CHAPTER 2

THE SOUND SYSTEM OF BEDOUIN PALESTINIAN ARABIC

Bedouin Palestinian Arabic contains 38 underlying segmental phonemes: 30 consonants and 8 vowels. This chapter presents the consonantal and vocalic phonemes and describes the allophones and distribution of these segmental phonemes, along with the diph thongs.

Before reviewing the individual segmental phonemes of this di alect, some clarifications concerning the notational conventions of this study are given below:

1) In CVC forms, all final consonants are phonetically long: thus, /rab/ is realized as [rabb] 'lord'; while geminated segments in medial position constitute true consonant clusters, as in

/iarrad/ 'he let someone escape'.

2) Except for specific sections where stress is treated as a distinguishing feature of the dialect, in general it is not marked.

3) The non-contrastive epenthetic vowel in initial position is isnored in parts of this study: thus, /klab/ stands for either

[klab] or [iklab] 'dogs'.

4) The optional non-contrastive phonetic glottal stop found in final position following a stressed /a/ is not indicated in this study: thus, /gada/ stands for either [gada] or [gada?] 'lunch'.

8 S) The fi~al optional [h] of some nouns, of the third person masculine singular_ suffix and/or the possessive pronominal suffix is ignored in most parts of this study: thus, /bagara/ stands for either [bigara] .or [bigarah] 'cow'; /masakna/ + [misakna] or

[misaknah] 'we caught him'; and [cammi/ + [cammi] or [cammih] 'my paternal uncle'.

6) In general, emphasis is marked for /t/, /s/ and /d/ • • T throughout the study, and in some specific sections dealing di rectly with this topic, other emphatic sounds are also marked. But due to the controversial character of this phenomenon, it is pho netically ignored in some sections where it has no bearing on the discussion at hand.

2.1 The Consonants

The chart on p. 10 lists the underlying consonantal phonemes of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic. (See pp. viii-x for a full repre sentation of all symbols used.)

9 Bila- Labio- Inter- Dental Pala- Velar Uvular Phar- Lar- bial dental dental /Alv. tal vngeal vngeal Obstruents Stops voiceless t t. k ? . voiced b b d j g Fricatives . 'V voiceless f -t s s. s X h. h voiced d d z g C - T Sonorants trill r r. lateral 1 1. nasal mm. n glide w y

Table 1. Consonant Phonemes of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic 2 •.1 1 The,Obstruents

The class of obstruent segmental phonemes includes the follow ing members:

/b/ voiced bilabial stop

[babJ 'door'

[sibar] 'he was patient'

[rabb] 'God'

/d/ voiced dental stop [dar] 'he turned around'

[nidar] 'became rare'

[radd] 'he held back'

/g/ voiced velar stop

[gam] 'he got up'

[nigar] 'he knocked'

[ragg] 'he showed sympathy'

/t/ voiceless dental stop

[tab] 'he repented'

[sitar] 'he covered'

[fatt] (type of food)

/k/ voiceless velar stop

[ka1J 'he measured'

[nikad] 'misery'

[fakk] 'he untied'

11 The voiceless stops /t/ and /k/ are slightly aspirated in ini- ·h h tial position: [t aff] 'he spat', [k alb] 'dog'.

/f/ voiceless labiodental fricative [fa1J 'good omen' [nifar] 'individual'

[raff] 'shelf'

/s/ voiceless dental fricative [sal] 'it poured'

[jisar] 'he dared'

[cass] 'he examined by touching'

/z/ voiced dental fricative [zal] 'he disappeared'

[jizar] 'carrots'

[cazz] 'he cared'

ill voiceless palatal fricative [la1J 'he moved' [ni~ar] 'he exposed'

[ra1!] 'he sprinkled'

The segmental phoneme /s/ occasionally alternates with its em phati~ ~QYnterpart when a~ja~~nt tQ th~ ~mph~ti~ /t/. 1 while/~/ 1~ slightly voiced before voiced stops.

12 most urban Palestinian· dialects, and in Northeast Arabian, Southern

Mesopotamian,·and th~ island of Ba~rain (Holes 1980:72). /j/ may optionally alternate with the glide /y/, as in [ja] ~ [ya] 'he came'. It must b~ pointed out that among the obstruents, the in terdentals /t/ and /d/ have a low rate of frequency.

2.1.2 The Pharyngeal Segmental Phonemes

The class of pharyngeal sounds has the following members:

/x/ voiceless uvular fricative

[xayyar] 'he gave someone a choice'

[maxamum] 'being hugged'

[farrax] 'it hatched'

/g/ voiced uvular fricative

[gayyar] 'he changed'

[magamum] 'being sad (m.)'

[farrag] 'he emptied'

/h/ voiceless pharyngeal fricative

[hayyar] 'he made someone hesitate'

[bahar] 'sea'

[jarah] 'he wounded'

/cl voiced pharyngeal fricative

[cayyar] 'he shamed someone'

'animal droppings'

'he swallowed'

14 /h/ voiceless laryngeal fricative [hamm] 'problem'

[habu] 'heat of fire' (Xi bah] 'similarity'

/?/ laryngeal "glottal" stop [?amm] 'mother'

[?abu] 'father'

The production of the pharyngeal sounds involves the retrac tion and then lowering of the root of the tongue, along with a low narrow constriction made with the back wall of the pharynx in the laryngeal cavity. It also involves the raising of the larynx.

There are no instrumental phonetic measurements available for the pharyngeals of this dialect. However, El Halees (1985:288) notes that the raising of the larynx during the production of the pharyn geal sounds is about 10mm in Tunisian Arabic, as measured by Al

Ghazeli (1977:37), and about 13mm in Iraqi Arabic. It must also be added that despite the widely held belief that the pharyngeal /cl is a voiced fricative, Al-Ani (1970:62) reports that the most com mon allophone of /c/ in spoken Iraqi Arabic is a voiceless stop.

/y/ voiced palatal glide

[yisir] 'prisoner of war'

[cayyil] 1 Child I

[galiy] 'frying'

It should be pointed out that the segmental phonemes /w/ and

/y/ are considered to be true consonants, because in phonological words like [wajid] 'plenty' and [yimin] 'oath', /w/ and /y/ act as the first segments of the triconsonantal stem which form the con sonantal margin of the syllable. Yet in the syllabic nucleus, /w/ and /y/ function as glides and thus are recognized as such for the dialect under investigation.

2.1.4 The Emphatic "Pharyngealized" Segmental Phonemes

The class of emphatic sounds has the following members:

/ti voiceless emphatic dental stop [tabb]. 'he arrived' [mitar]. 'rain' [matt] 'he stretched'

Isl. voiceless emphatic dental fricative [sabb]. 'he poured' [bisar]. 'sight' [mass].. 'he sucked'

17 ldl voiced emphatic interdental fricative T [dabb] 'he hid (something)' T [nidar] 'eyesight' ..... [fadd] 'he ran away' TT

Like the pharyngeal group, the production of the emphatic sounds involves the lowering as well as the retraction of the root of the tongue, making a narrowing along the pharyngeal cavity (El

Halees 1985:289). The back of the tongue is also raised toward the velum (Blanc 1953:53). While Jakobson (1957:270) notes the con traction of the upper pharynx, Cantineau (1934:57) emphasizes the greater muscular tension and glottal constriction by which emphatic sounds are produced. Furthermore, during the production of em phatic sounds the lips are slightly advanced and rounded, but as

Harrell (1957:69-70) notes, the lip protrusion does not result in

"rounded" allophones of the vowels. In general, the high front vowels are centralized, high back vowels are lowered, and the low vowels are backed in contiguity with emphatic sounds. In addition, emphatic sounds are often associated with lower pitch than their plain counterparts.

The three primary emphatic sounds and contrast ltl, Isl ldl..... with their non-emphatic counterparts in all positions and occur with all vowels; examples are abundant, as in the following:

/s/ and Isl

[sus] 'moth' [sus] 'bird'

[nisib] 'in-law' [nisib] 'lot, share, fate'

18 /t/ and/!/

[taff] 'he spat' [ taf f ] ' peak '

[batt] 'he ruled' [ batt] 'geese'

/d/ and /d/ - T [~iwa] '(dog) came home' [diwa] 'he lit' T [im~ab~ab] 'two-faced person' [imdabdab] 'organized' T T

2.1.5 Other Emphatic Consonants

The consonantal system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic possesses another group of emphatic "pharyngealized" sounds which differ in distribution from the above listed emphatic sounds but are similar in nature as well as in influence on neighboring sounds. They are

/b/, /m/, /1/ and /r/, and with the exception of /r/, these emphatic sounds are limited in occurrence. In fact, outside of envi ronments adjacent to the above-listed emphatic sounds and /x/, /g/ and /g/, the emphatic /b/, /m/ and /1/ can be confirmed only from a small number of words. Furthermore, unlike the foregoing emphatic sounds, which occur with all vowels and in all positions, the em phatic /b/, /m/, /1/ and /r/ occur in most cases with the low vowels.

Th@ emphatic /1/ ig limited to the lexical item for 'God', as in:

[ ?allah] 'God'

[wallah] 'by God'

[smallal] 'by the name of God'

19 The emphati~ bilabial /b/ is also restricted to the lexical

item for 'baby', as in:

[baba] 'baby'

[bubiy] 'baby (dim.)'

The emphatic nasal /m/ is also restricted to the lexical item

for 'mother', as in:

[?amm] 'mother'

[yumma] 'mommy'

In contrast, the emphatic /r/ has a higher rate of frequency,

but is restricted in distribution in that it must be contiguous with low vowels, as in:

[ras] 'head'

[ c-ora] 'woman'

[ C arab] 'Bedouins, Arabs'

[farr] 'he jumped'

[far] 'rat'

Despite the limited occurrence of the emphatic /b/, /m/, /1/ and /r/,. they are treated as separate phonemes because they have an emphatic-like effect on adjacent segments, like the emphatic /t/,

Isl or /d/, and often maintain their emphatic phonetic structure in • T their inflections and derivations. The spread of emphasis to adja cent segments caused by/~/ and /r/ is stronger in the sense that it affects more distant syllables within an item than do /b/ and Im/. •

20 The C-like effe~t of /b/, /m/, /1/ and /r/ is noted in the following: · ·

(a) [smallah]. . .. 'by the name of God' C ._ [balla. .. alek] 'by God on you'

(b) [carab] 'Bedouins' [ruffa]. .. 'back part of a tent'

C (c) [gotir. ammak] 'go to your mother' (d) [zaguh-t. al-baba] 'the baby's cradle'

In the above examples, the C-like effect is clearly spread to neighboring vowels even though this influence is not graphically indicated here. In examples (a), /1/ is the source of emphasis for

/b/, /s/ and /m/. In (b), the C-like effect of /r/ spreads to /b/ and /f/, while in (c), the effect of /m/ spreads to the vowels and to /c/ and /k/, but to a lesser degree. Although if one is to com pare [cammak] 'to your mother' with the non-emphatic [cammak] 'your uncle', one can clearly perceive emphasis in the former throughout the whole word and its complete absence in the latter. Finally, in

(d), the C-like effect of /b/ proceeds leftward to cover the pre fixed article [al] (compare [al-baba 'the baby' and [al-bab] 'the door'),

21 The emphattc character of the above-mentioned sounds is also maintained· across derivations, as in:

c- C - [ ora] 'woman' [ wira] 'woman (dim.) I

[ C arab] 'Bedouins' [ C urban] - 'individual B. tribes'

[?amm]. 'mother' [?arrnnahat]. .. . 'mothers'

In this dialect, one can also find traces of an emphatic glot tal[?] as in [?a] 'yes', but this can be analyzed as an optional variant of [?aywa] 'yes' where emphasis is absent.

Earlier scholars who posited /b/, /m/, /1/ and /r/ as separate phonemes, rather than allophonic variants of their respective non emphatic counterparts, have relied heavily on the minimal-pair technique. Blanc (1953:53-66), Ferguson (1956 and 1957), and Har rell (1957:72-78) all argued for the independent status of such phonemes, based on their contrastive character with their non-em phatic counterparts. In Bedouin Palestinian, contrasting sets of words for such sounds are very rare, but one can find:

[lallah] 'for God' [lallih] 'no, by God'

[ C arnmak] 'to your mother' [ C ammak] 'your uncle'

Blanc (1970:116) assigns the emphatic /b/, /m/, /f/ and /r/ to the dialect he studied and reports the emphatic /1/ near /x/, /g/ and /g/. However, [f] should not qualify as an independent em phatic sound because it cannot be confirmed in a situation outside the environment of /x/, /g/ and /g/, which has been the criterion

22 of selection in:the present analysis. But there is one occurrence of emphatic·[!] i~ the relatively frequent item [?a!a], as in [?afa calek] which roughly translates to 'I'm your man', although in this particular occu~rence it is not known whether [f] or[?] is the source of emphasis, since they are both emphatic. Furthermore, based on the above [?afa] as well as [?a] '(informal) yes', one might argue for an independent/?/ and /f/ of a very marginal na ture, as called for in Harrell (1957:75-78).

Although the separate-phoneme analysis of the emphatic sounds has been adopted in this study, the allophonic model continues to have its supporters. Cantineau (1953 and 1956), Palva (1966), and more recently Palva (1976:8) and Talmoudi (1980:50) have all sup ported the allophonic model. However, Heath (1987:298) points out that there is synchronic evidence for the productive continuity of both models, but the separate-phoneme model is gradually displacing the allophonic one.

2.1.6 /x/, /g/, and /g/ in Relation to Emphasis

In Bedouin Palestinian Arabic, the pharyngeals /x/ and /g/ as well as the velar /g/ have a C-like effect on the neighboring vow els and consonants. The spread of emphasis to a group of target sounds, not only to the emphatic group of the previous section, [b],. [m],. [1], [r], but also to others such as [f], [w], [n], [?], causing their pronunciation to be marked with greater muscular ten sion and lower pitch, as well as lip protrusion.

23 Although pr~cise description of this phenomenon has not been made, some ·general .observations can be stated. It seems that, sim ilar to the C-like effect described in the previous section, /x/,

/g/ and /g/ co-occur with the low vowels, especially the long vowel

/a/. Furthermore, the non-phonemic short anaptyctic vowels [i],

[u] do allow the ~-like effect of the above triggers to spread, while the non-low vowels /i/, /u/, !I/, /u/, le/, lo/ block such spread. In addition, it appears that among the target sounds, /b/,

/ml, /r/, /1/ not only absorb a higher degree of the ~-like effect, but also have a higher rate of frequency in comparison to /f/, /w/,

/n/ and/?/. Moreover, the C-like effect proceeds progressively and regressively, covering all parts of a lexical item, including suffixes and prefixes, once the right conditions are met. Finally, the composite of these C-like. triggers deserves comment. The pharyngeal triggers /x/, /g/ are well documented for initiating such phenomena in most Arabic dialects, while the full participation of the Bedouin /g/ is possibly unique to Bedouin dialects. In this dialect /g/ corresponds systematically to OA /q/, which is known for initiating such effect, and it also seems that this is the only process wherein /g/ joins submembers of the pharyngeal group. In the following examples, the C-like. effect of /x/, /~/, and /g/ spreads rightward; also note the lack of emphasis in some of the minimal pairs:

24 [ga~~] · ''he drank' [xa!t] · 'became light' [xiff] 'hurry!' [xall] 'he patched' [xill] 'patch!' [gall].. 'he lifted' [gill] 1 lift! I

The C-like effect of these triggers seems to penetrate consonant clusters, as in:

[xfaf] 'light (pl.)' [xwar] 'sheep's cry' [hwar]. 'baby camel (m.)' [galb] 'heart' [kalb] 'dog'

[grab] 'crow' [hrab] 'arrows'

The short anaptyctic vowel [i] does permit the C-like effect of the triggers to proceed, as in:

[gabir] 'grave'

[xamir] 'wine'

[gamil] 'lice'

The C-like effect of /x/, /g/, /g/ spreads rightward and leftward, covering both suffixes and prefixes, as in:

• [xa~a~] 'uncles' [magara]. . .'cave' [faxx]. 'bird trap' [?axx]. 'ouch' [?agala]. 'more expensive' [maxafa]. 'fear' [magbara]. . . 'cemetery' [?angalab]. . . . 'he was defeated' [?angala] 'it was fried' [ganam]. . 'sheep or goats' [[?alaxu] 'the brother'

[ga1!1] + -aw [gamaw] 'they (m.) got up'

[xaf] + -an [xafan] 'they (f.) feared'

Despite the overall accuracy of the above comments, there seem to be a few cases where /x, /g/ and /g/ do not appear to have any

C-like effect, as in:

[xlal] 'wooden pin'

[xlaf] as in [ma calek xlaf] 'you can't be blamed' [81a1J 'season with good pasture' [bag] 'he cheated' [fasJ 'he woke up'

[lagga] 'he went'

[laga] 'he met'

26 1:2 The Vowel ·system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic

The spoken dialect of the Bedouins in the al-Naqab Desert has three short segmental vowels /i/, /u/, /a/, and five long vowels

/i/,/ /u/, /e/, /o/, /a/. All vowels are voiced and as Al-Ani

(1970:23) points out, the duration of the long vowels is approxi mately twice the length of the short vowels (600 vs. 300 duration units). The long vowels, when present, have the capacity to carry stress, and the syllables which contain any of the long vowels are often more prominent than others. All vowels, short or long, are phonemically independent. The short vowels contrast with their long counterparts, with the exception of /e/ and /o/, which lack short counterparts. The allophonic variations of these vowels are fairly limited, with the exception of the central low vowels /a/ and /a/, which have a back or front variety depending on the neigh boring sounds.

The following vowel chart accounts for all of the vocalic seg ments found in Bedouin Palestinian Arabic:

Front Unrounded Back Rounded

High i u

u Mid \e 0 \ \ \ Low \ - \ a a \ \ --·-M--•·•••·----

27 2 ..2 1 The Short Vowels

The three vowels /i/, /u/, /a/ contrast in most closed sylla-

bles, as in:

[farr] 'he jumped'

[firr] '[type of desert bird]'

[furr] 'jump!'

Although it has been pointed out that the contrast between /i/ and /u/ is neutralized in open unstressed syllables (Palva 1980:117 and Blanc 1970:116), it does seem that SR [i] and [u] are phonetic realizations of UR /a/ as in:

/xaruf/ + /xiruf/ '\, /xuruf/ 'lamb (m.)'

/ga1Il/ + /gi1Il/ 'little (m.)'

Furthermore, final short vowels may optionally be devoiced following voiceless consonants, as in:

[jibti] 'I brought it' 0 [maku] 'your (pl.) water' 0 [satta] 'he spent the winter' 0

28 -2.2.2 The Long Vowels The five long vowels /i/, /u/, /e/, /o/, /a/ all contrast with each other, as in:

[gir] 1 !'Un! I

[ger] 'except'

[gur] 'disappear! ' [gar] 'low land' (gar] 'he ran'

While it must be admitted that among the above examples, [gur] may alternate with [gurr] 'disappear!', nevertheless if one is to consider the pairs:

[suff] 'stand in line!'

[suf] 'wool' [tub]. 'arrive! 1 [tub]. 'bricks' the contrast can be clearly established. In addition, most long vowels contrast with their short counterparts, although /e/ and /o/ lack short counterparts, as in:

[jib] 'pocket'

[jibb] 'type of waterhole'

[jebJ 'bringing'

[ga1J 'he said'

[gall] 'he lifted'

[go1 J 'saying'

29 The two lci~g mid vowels /e/ and /o/ have the occasional variants [ey] an·d [ow] respectively in the proximity of the pharyn- C geals, as in [xeyr] 'blessing' and [ owra] 'woman 1 , but it must be emphasized that the pure vowel !el and lo! variants are far more frequent. Another feature of the long mid vowels is their limited occurrence in comparison with the rest of the long vowels. The mid vowels do not occur in the pattern CVCVC in closed syllables, where the rest of the vowels are very frequent, as in:

[zilit] 'kid'

[dulul] 'thoroughbred camel'

[salam] 'peace'

On the other hand, the vowel /e/ is frequent in some causative verb forms and diminutive nominal forms, and both /e/ and /o/ are found in some initial open syllables of some nominal forms, as in:

[gaddet] 'I gave lunch'

[sammet] 'I named' [jhes]. 'donkey (dim,)' [glebJ 'heart (dim.)'

[heza- C a] 'fight'

[zoba- C a] 'sandstorm' [?ogad] 'h@ lit'

[?ojah] 'he approached'

30 Also, the i~ng vowels /I/, /ii/, /a/ are shortened (half-long,

[V']) in uris~resse~ final position, and often alternate with their short counterparts in contiguity with other stressed vowels. The following are examples:

I [minha] + [minha'] 'from her' I [minhii] + [minhu'] 'who (m,) I I (f.) I [minhI], + [minhi'] 'who [barudi], '\, [barudi] 'rifle' [sulafi], '\, [sulafi] 'story' [sifen] '\, [sifen] 'two swords'

In Bedouin Palestinian Arabic, the high front vowels are cen tralized, the back vowels are lowered, and low vowels are backed in contiguity with the emphatic "pharyngealized" consonants and the pharyngeals, as in:

[si>n] 'listen' [tii"l]. 'length' [xa,-f] 'he feared'

While the allophonic varieties of the nonlow vowels are of a minor nature, the low vowels deserve a closer look. Two varieties of low vowels occur: a back variety [a], [a] following the emphatic

/t/, Is/, /d/, /r/ and the C-like triggers /x/, /g/, /g/; and a • • T front variety [a], [a] everywhere else. The back varieties of [a],

[~] are exemplified by:

31 [tabJ · 'be recovered'

[sabb] 'he poured'

[ dall] 'he remained' •• [gadJ. 'over there' [ga1J. 'he said' [xal] 'uncle'

The fronted varieties [a], [a], are found in most other environments, as in:

[ tall] 'hill' [sah]. 'it melted' [kalJ 'he weighed' [has]. 'he went around'

Although the above two varieties (front and back) are divided along the lines of emphasis or pharyngealization, a recent trend views such varieties as separate phonemes rather than as allophonic variants (Younes 1984:l'.~5 footnote 3; Bani Yasin & Owen 198!}:203).

This has meant the addition of two extra vowels to the largely uni form vowel systems of Arabic dialects. Moreover, Heath (1987:15) has echoed this view but stopped short of adopting it. The present study holds that the separate-phoneme solution may suggest a struc- tur3l reinter~retetion of the whole voeelie gygtem, end beeauge it is closely correlated with the still controversial issue of empha sis, this analysis is not followed in this study.

32 1.2.3 The Diphthongs.

The traditional view of the diphthongs consisting of a vowel and a glide is held in this study. There are three diphthongs of considerable frequency in this dialect, /aw/, /ay/ and /iy/. These diphthongs are also considered as long vowels, because they behave as such with regard to stress. Furthermore, they do not occur word-initially and are often found prior to a geminated segment of their second component, as in:

/ay/:

[mayyit] 'dead'

[cayyil] 1 child I

/aw/:

[?awwal] 'first' [rawwah]. 'he went home'

/iy/:

[miyyih] 'one hundred'

[jiyyid] 'brave'

The diphthongs also occur word-medially in both stressed and unstressed positions, as in:

, [?awla] 'having priority' , [?aysar] 'easier' , [graybat] 'they (f.) are close' ., [jiydat J 'they (f.) are brave'

33 The diphtho~g /ay/ is frequent in diminutive forms, both stressed and unstressed, as in:

[hwayyir]"' 'newborn camel' "' [grayyat], '(dim.) villages' [bnayyat] '(dim.) girls'

All diphthongs occur word-finally at the SR level, and are also found stressed or unstressed, as in:

[zay]"' 'as, like' , [jaw] 'climate' ,,, [miy] 'water' V / 'winter' [stiy],, [ciliy], 'Ali (proper name)' [galaw],, 'they (m.) said' [namay] 'go to sleep! (f.)'

Although Blanc (1970:118) adds the diphthong [uw], according to the observations of the writer it is very rare and is found to alternate with [iw] in some instances, as in [cduw] ~ [cdiw]

'enemy' and [daluw] ~ [daliw] 'pail'. The vocalic element of this diphthong can easily be dismissed as epenthetic.

34 To conclude; the.sound system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic . has retained 'the Old Arabic interdentals /~/and/~/, while OA /?/ and /d/ have merged into /d/, and the emphatic sounds /b/, Ir/, /1/ T T • • • and /ml are given. phonemic status. Like the primary emphatic sounds, the 9-like effect of lxl, Iii, /g/ often spreads emphasis to the whole item including suffixes and prefixes. Although a phonemic status is not recognized, two varieties of the low vowels are noted. In addition to the traditional [ay] and [aw], the diph thong [iy] is unique to this dialect and very frequent in final position.

35 CHAPTER 3

THE PRONOLOGY OF BEDOUIN PALESTINIAN ARABIC

This chapter discusses some selected topics in the phonologi cal system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic having relevance for the overall goal of identifying the regional character of this dialect.

The phonotactics as well as the effect of pharyngeal sounds on syl lable structure are briefly examined. Furthermore, within the vo calic system of this dialect, there exist three areas of prime im portance: vowel harmony, short vowels in open unstressed syllables, and long vowels in final position. A close examination of the mon ophthongization of the diphthongs, as well as of the stress system of this dialect, are presented.

Since dialects ought not to be treated as a self-contained system, some comparative and historical evidence is invoked when needed to offer increased understanding of some unique phenomena such as stress in this dialect. In addition, although the individ ual characteristics of each dialect determine its ultimate assign ment to membership in a particular dialect group, traditionally there have been some well-established linguistic criteria for clas sification (Cleveland 1963:56-63, Palva 1984a:5-14), such as the reflexes of Old Arabic /k/ and /q/. Some selected areas of such linguistic criteria as they relate to phonology are also employed.

36 Therefore, t?e majority of the issues discussed in this sec tion, as well. as th~ following one, concern the most distinguishing phonological features of this dialect and have direct relevance for the identificatiou of its regional character, as well as its clas sification among other major Bedouin dialects.

37 3. 1 The Consonants

Although there are no large-scale sound changes with respect to consonants in this dialect, there are some important features of assimilation, emphasis, and the effect of pharyngeal sounds on syl labic structure.

3.1.1 Assimilation

Various cases of assimilation occur in Bedouin Palestinian

Arabic, whereby a given segment may change some of its feature val ues to conform with the feature values of the following or to a lesser extent the preceding segment. These cases of assimilation often range from a change of a single feature value to changes in more than one feature as exemplified below. Furthermore, most of the following cases of assimilation occur across morpheme bound aries within single items, and sometimes across item boundaries.

(A) Lateral Assimilation of the Prefixed Article al-

The [+lat] component of the definite article al- may assimi late completely with the following [+cor] initial segment of the item to which it is prefixed. The only exceptions to this general 9tat~m~nt are the palatal /j/ And Ir! 0£ the toron~l ~roup, whith, along with the labials, velars and pharyngeals, resist such assim ilation. The lateral assimilation of the prefixed article is shown by the following examples:

38 al- + din + [addin] 'the religion' al- + sef + [assef].. 'the summer' al- + naga + [annaga] 'the she-camel'

al- + rih ·+ [arrih] 'the wind'

Meanwhile, assimilation does not take place in:

al- + bab + [albab] 'the door'

al- + gen.- + [algen] 'the clouds' ,7V al- + JlS + [a1jIK1 'the army'

While the above type of regressive assimilation is prevalent in most dialects of Arabic, there seems to be a highly dialect-spe cific type of progressive assimilation involving the prefixed arti cle al- and glottal-initial items. When al- is attached to a noun form beginning with the glottal stop/?/, the glottal is either deleted or progressively assimilated with the preceding /1/, as in the following examples:

al-+ ?asad + [allisad] ~ [alasad] 'the lion'

al-+ ?ahal + [allahal] ~ [alahal] 'the family'

(B) Final Lateral Assimilation

An item-rinal lateral in some noun and verb rorms is assimi lated with the following nasal of the morphemes -na 'our/we', as in the following examples: gul + -na + [g~nna] 'we said'

jimal + -na ~ [jimanna] 'our camel'

cayyil + -na + Tcayyinna] 'our Child I

An item-final nasal often assimilates with the initial /r/ of the following item, as in the following examples:

tan+ rayyid... + [tar rayyid]... 'let us wait' min+ riha + [mir riha] 'from Jericho'

(D) Complete or Optional t- Assimilation

When t- of the reflexive prefix -it- is attached to items with

[+cor -son] initial segments, either it is assimilated to the fol lowing segment, or such assimilation is avoided by the introduction of an anaptyctic vowel between the t- and the following segment.

(The reflexive -it- is preceded by a person/number prefix in the forms shown.)

mit- + j + [mijjawwiz] '(he is) married'

yit- + j + [yijjawwaz] ~ [?itijawwaz] 'getting married'

?it-+ j + [?ijjawwaz] ~ [tijawwaz] 'he got married'

mit- + d + [middaffi] '(he is) warm'

yit- + d + [yiddaffa] ~ [?itidaffa] 'getting warm'

?it-+ d + [?iddaffa] ~ [tidaffa] 'he got warm'

40 (E) Devoic~ng Assimilation of Final /d/ and /g/

Final /d/ and /g/ are devoiced before morphemes beginning with

~- and k- respectively, as in the following examples:

ga C ad + t + [gacatt] 'I sat' C cabad + t + [ abatt] 'I worshipped'

bag + ku + [bakku] 'he cheated you (pl.) I cifig + kin + [cifikkin] 'your (f.pl.) dry cheese'

41 -3.1.2 Emphasis Eevisited In previous sections (2.1.4 - 2.1.6), it has been determined that Bedouin Palestinian Arabic has, besides the expected emphatic

/t/, /~/and/~/, the emphatic /b/, /m/, /r/ and /1/, which are given a phonemic status at the underlying (UR) and surface (SR) levels of this dialect, despite their limited occurrence. Further more, it has also been asserted that the segmental phonemes /x/,

/g/ and /g/ have a C-like effect on the neighboring consonants and vowels (although the vowels are not marked for emphasis because one can confirm such an effect only at the SR level). In addition, no attempt is made to capture this process by a form or forms of pho nological rules.

This section focuses on emphasis as a phonological process which can be governed by rules, and also discusses the factors which either enhance or diminish this phenomenon.

One can see the rightward spread of emphasis in the following examples:

/talab/ + [talab] 'he requested'

/ganam/ + [ganam] 'sheep or goat'

And also the multiple directionality of this process in the follow ing examples:

/ma tr a ban/ + [matraban]...... 'jar' /?angalab/ + [?angalab]...... 'he was defeated'

42 This spread pf emphasis can be stated by the following rule,

which makes ·use of the mirror-image notation of Sommerstein (1977:

141-142):

Rule 1: Emphasis Spreading

N + [+emph] II C [-emph] [+emph (trigg)]

Conditions: N = any string of one or more segments

There are various restrictions which affect the spread of em

phasis. First, if one is to examine the vocalic segments of the above examples, one can conclude that the [+low] vowels provide the most appropriate environment for the spread of emphasis. However,

despite the availability of such environments in the examples be

low, emphasis seems to be hindered and somewhat weakened when a

string of segments contains certain consonantal elements, such as

le/, /h/, /h/, /j/ or /y/. Within this group, /h/ and /cl seem to exert a higher degree of pressure over the spread of emphasis. In the following examples, emphasis is drastically reduced in compari son to the above examples:

/mahabat/ + [mahabat] '\, [mahabat] 'downhill slope'

/dahar/ + [dahar] '\, [dahar] 'back' T T T

/madbac;.a/ 1 1 .... + [madbaca] [madbaca] hyena den • eT • "' ..• C /tacam/ + [tacam] '\, [ta am] 'taste'

I jaraf/ + [jaraf] '\, [jaraf] 'he scraped' /matrah/ + [matrah]. . . . '\, [matrah] 'place' C /Casar/ + [Casar]... '\, [ asar] 'he squeezed'

43 Second, it ·seems .that the [+round] vowels /o/ and /u/ restrict the spread of' empha~is more than does the short vowel /u/, which allows a certain degree of emphasis to be transmitted but on a lower scale than the [+low] vowels. Compare the spread of emphasis in:

/talab/ + [talab] 'he requested'

/matlub/ + [matlub] '\, [matlub] '(being) requested'

/tulba/ + [tulba] '\, [tulba] 'request for marriage'

/tobar/ + [tobar] '\, [tobar] 'he piled'

/turfa/ + [turfa] '\, [turfa] 'rare'

Third, the unstressed epenthetic vowels [i] and [u] show some restrictions on the spread of emphasis; nonetheless, they do not block such spread completely, as can be seen from the following ex amples:

/sabr/ + [sabir] '\, [sabir] 'patience'

/gaml/ + [gamil] '\, [gamil] 'lice'

/dulm/ + [dulum] '\, [dulum] 'tyranny' T T • • T /subh/ + [subuh]. . . '\, [subuh] 'morning'

Fourth, the vowel !el restricts the spread of emphasis. Com- pare the following:

/gar/ + [gar] 'he ran'

/fer I + [ger] 'except'

/tar/ + [tar] 'it flew'

/ter/ + [ter] 'bird'

44 In addition:, in sharp contrast to the facilitating role which the [+low] ·vowels provide for emphasis, the stressed high front vowels /i/ and /I/ appear to restrict the spread of emphasis se verely. Compare.the following SR forms:

[g~~i~] 'before' [gibil] 'he accepted' [ tifar]. . .. 'poverty' [tifir] 'he became poor' [zalat]. . . 'animal dropping' [zilit]. 'kid' [sibah]. . .. 'he came early [sibihi] (woman's name) in the morning'

Furthermore, there seems to be a unique case of de-emphasis of the lateral /1/,. wherein the mere presence of the high front /i/ diminishes emphasis completely when the emphatic /1/ occurs inLmedi- • ately before or after it. However, it does seem that this de-em phasis process extends well beyond the immediate vicinity of the

/i/ and spreads over the whole item, as can be seen below. Compare the emphatic and non-emphatic items:

[lalla]..... 'for God' [ lalli] 'no, by God' [gulla]... 'bomb' [gulli] 1 tell him! 1 [galla].... 'he lifted it' [gilli] 1 lift it! I

also:

[balla].... '\, [billa] 'by God' [xalaf].... '\, [xilfi] 'children' [galla].... '\, [galli] 'season's harvest'

45 The above de-emph,asis ,process involving /~/ can be roughly

captured by the ~ollowing rule, following Bakalla (1979: 496), which makes use of the mirror-image notation:

Rule 2: /1/ De-Emphasis

+ [-emph] II i

where C1 2 = C or CC and only where C = 1 and cc= 11

Finally, while it has been indicated earlier that emphasis of

ten spreads across morpheme boundaries, as in the case of the ini

tial ?an- of the prefixed passive, [?anxarag] 'he developed diar rhea'; ma- '(morpheme indicating a place)', [marbat]; and b- of the imperfective verb tense, [bamrug].... 'I will pass by', there are also cases where emphasis appears to cease right before the morpheme

boundary, or right before the consonantal element of the morpheme itself, and/or emphasis is blocked by the introduction of the epenthetic vowel [i]. Compare the following:

/malas/ + [malas] 'he escaped'

+ -t + [malast] 'I escaped' + -at + [malasat]...... 'she escaped' /mallas/ + -ak + [mallasak]...... 'he let you escape' + t- + [timallas]...... 'he tried to escape' t t>- t -ak + [bima.lsak].... 'be will let you escape'

46 -3.1.3 The Effect.of Pharyngeal Sounds on Syllable Structure The pharyngeal sounds play an important role in the phonolog ical system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic. The raising of the low vowel /a/ in open unstressed syllables is not permitted before or after pharyngeal sounds (Section 3.2.1), and the raised variant /i/ of the monophthongized vowel /e/ is often found in non-pharyngeal environments (Section 3.3.2). Furthermore, the effect of pharyn geal /x/, /g/, /~/, /cl and /h/ represents one of the most clearly distinguishing features of BPA, and although this feature can only be explained as a diachronic phenomenon, its synchronic implica tions are tremendous. This process involves the separation of any sequence consisting of a pharyngeal sound and any other consonant, by the insertion of a low vowel /a/, when any such sequence is immediately preceded by the vowel /a/ (aC aC < OA aC C, where C X X X = [ +phar]; /gahawah/ < OA /qahwah/ 'coffee').

This feature of BPA does not necessarily constitute a recent development, and is found at the UR as well as the SR levels of this dialect. Furthermore, following Blanc (1970:125), this phe nomenon has come to be known as the "gahawah complex" in Arabic di alectology. By the same token, one can document three types of

Arabic dialects of which BPA represents one major group:

(1) The gahawah dialects, represented mainly if not exclu sively by BPA and the surrounding Bedouin areas, collectively re ferred to in a later section of this study as "Arabia Petraea":

/gahawah/ 'coffee'.

47 (2) The gh~wah dialects include the Bedouin dialects from as far west as North Africa and to as far east as the last continuous

Arabic-speaking outpost of the northeastern areas of Khuzistan,

Iran: /ghawah/ 'coffee'.

(3) The gahwah dialects include most of the sedentary (i.e., non-Bedouin) dialects of Arabic: /gahwah/ 'coffee'.

The synchronic implications of the effect of pharyngeal sounds on the syllable structure of BPA can be seen in a few areas. Con sider the following SR forms of BPA, which at first glance seem to contradict the stress rules of this gahawah dialect: , [juhur]. 'burrow' / [hijin] 'fast breed of camel' / [gamih] 'wheat'

/ [bahar]. 'sea'

These examples show the interaction between epenthesis, stress, and pharyngeal sounds on syllable structure. In the first three examples, the second vowels are brought about by an epenthet ic rule which breaks up final clusters found in /CVCC/ forms; therefore, these vowels are non-phonemic and do not qualify to receive stress:

, / /juhr/ + [juhur] 'burrow' , , /gamh/ + [gamih] 'wheat'

Furthermore, while BPA does not differ from the ghawah and gahwah dialects with regard to the interaction between stress and

48 epenthesis in /CVCC/ + [CVCVC], the last example, [ba~ar] 'sea', shows an important feature of this gahawah dialect. Its second vowel is not due to an epenthetic rule -- it carries stress, which falls on the secontl syllable of an item whenever a heavy syllable

(VCC or CVC) is not present to receive the stress; therefore, this vowel is recognized at the UR level. Admittedly, this phenomenon is restricted to items of the type CaC aC, where C is [+phar]. X X Consequently, this has resulted in a syllable structure condition whereby a final -aC C# is not permitted, where C = [+phar], in X X this gahawah dialect.

The following examples are given in their SR forms only, be cause these forms are identical at both levels of representation:

[sahar]V 'month'

[?ahal] 'kin'

[naca~] 'coffin'

[baxat] 'luck'

[magas] 'stomach pain'

It must be noted that the gahwah as well as the ghawah dia lects lack this syllable structure condition, and therefore, impose no limitation on final -aC C# at the UR level; compare Central Pal x estinian 1r:hr/ + rr:herJ 'month'.

The effect of the pharyngeal sounds on nonfinal clusters has also been noticeable in this gahawah dialect. While in general there are no restrictions on intervocalic clusters in the language, the effect of pharyngeal sounds on syllable structure has elimi-

49 nated the possib~lity.of clusters of the type V1CxCV2 when V1 = /a/ and C = [+ptiar], except for a very limited number of examples. X . While items of CaCa-- structure (/darabat/ 'she hit') are found in T BPA (although somewhat limited by the nature of the third closing syllable), this gahawah complex, or the elimination of the above mentioned intervocalic clusters, has tremendously increased the number of items of CaCa-- structure in the language regardless of the nature of the following syllables. The following examples cover a wide range of utterances, given in their UR forms only:

/?ahamar/ 'red'

/?acazab/ 'bachelor'

/?ahabal/ 'stupid'

/gahawah/ 'coffee'

/nacajah/ 'ewe'

/mahalul/ 'untied'

/ma C adud/ - 'counted'

/?ahalam/ 'I dream'

/tacarif/ 'you (m.) know [or] she knows'

However, it does seem that intervocalic clusters of the above pattern (V C CV ) are maintained if the elimination of such clus- 1 x 2 ters by means of the gahawah complex creates items composed of more than a maximum of two initial open syllables, of the type CaCa--.

Note the following items with intervocalic clusters:

so 'he gave'

/mahlabah/ but not */mahalabah/ 'milk container'

/magrafa/ but not */magarafa/ 'ladle'

Furthermore, as Blanc (1970:127) points out, sequences of

V1 C CV2 are maintained if C terminates the triliteral root of an X X item and is followed by a suffix:

/'fayyac / 'he sent'

(!ayya cku/ 'he sent you (m.sg.)'

/'t.ayyackin/ 'he sent you (f.pl.)'

51 3.2 The Vowels

The vocalic system of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic is high

lighted by the non~contrastive status of its short vowels in open

unstressed syllables, an elaborate system of vowel harmony, the

diphthongization of long vowels in final position, and the monoph

thongization of the diphthongs.

Furthermore, the three dimensions of height, frontness and

roundness seem to control the vocalic system of this dialect. The

frontness and roundness components compete to control the lowness

component at the SR level (lal + {i,u} I ~CuC), though the front

ness component prevails where (lal + [i] I ~CIC).

While the length component is an important one, the long vow

els III, /ul and Ii/ are rare in final position and the vowels Iii and lo/ are restricted in occurrence and lack short counterparts.

In addition, these last two vowels are largely neutral with regard to participating in the various phonological processes such as vow el harmony and diphthongization.

Finally, it should be pointed out that, because the overall goal is to point out the most clearly distinguishing features of this Bedouin dialect in order to locate it within the ranks of Be douin dialects, certain common vocalic changes found in most Arabic dialects (Bedouin or non~Bedouin) will not be of prime importance in this section. Similarly, in his study (1970:116) Blanc borrowed

Cantineau's term differentiel to characterize the vocalic system of the dialect of a neighboring tribe, It is this very different

52 character of the vocalic system of this dialect, involving such

factors as the general raising of the low vowel in open unstressed

syllables, that is the focal point of this section.

3.2.1 The Status of Short Vowels in Open Unstressed Syllables

In sharp contrast to the phonemic character of the short vow

els /i/, /u/, /a/ in closed syllables, the contrast among these vowels has been largely neutralized in open syllables. In fact, most indications confirm only the low /a/ in open syllables, while most occurrences of short [i] and [u] found in such syllables are due to either certain phonetic conditioning or vowel harmony. The argument here is somewhat stronger than Blanc's (1970:116) and Pal va's (1980:117), who point out the neutralization of contrast only between [i] and [u] in open syllables. The short vowels seem to contrast partially only at the SR level and not the UR level, if one is to compare the following examples:

/cagab/ -+ [cagab] 'he was left behind'

/cigb/ + [cigib] 'children'

/cugb/ -+ [cugub] 'after'

In BPA as well as in most Arabic dialects, the nonlow short vowels of OA have been deleted ([blad] < OA /bilad/ 'land', [trab]

< OA /turab/ 'soil', [drub]< OA /durub/ 'trails'). Also unique to this dialect is the extension of such deletion to forms such as

[cnab] < OA /cinab/ 'grapes', [hniy] < OA /huna/ 'here', and

[bnayyi] < OA /bunayyah/ 'girl (dim.)'. Therefore, most cases of

53 initial clustering as well as initial epenthesis (e.g., /rgab/ +

[irgab] 'necks') are created by such diachronic deletion processes.

Upon examination of a large number of utterances where [i] and

[a] are frequent in open unstressed syllables preceding syllables of the types Ca, CaC, CaC, CaCa and CaC{a,i}, one may tentatively note that [a] is found before or after [+phar] sounds and/or before

/n/, /1/ or /r/, while [i] is found everywhere else. Therefore, it is highly possible that these two vowels are in a state of comple mentary distribution. Compare the phonetic environments of [a] and

[i] in the initial syllables of the following items:

[a] [i] [gada] 'lunch' [wita].. 'shoe' [hama]. 'he protected' [sima] 'sky' [?afam] 'mouth' [jimal] 'camel'

[bacaj] 'hole' [mitar] 'rain'

[ C aba]- 'cloak' [kitab] 'he wrote'

[bacara] 'dropping' [bigara] 'cow'

[?aman] 'safe' [ziman] 'a long time ago'

[magara] 'cave' ("·SJ.Jara . ] 'tree'

[ C amami]- 'turban' [sikana] 'ashes'

[bala] 'disaster' [kiman] 'also'

[sanah] 'year' [~ibah] 'similar to'

[zalama] 'man' [1imal] 'north' [baraka] 'blessing' [sibah]. . 'morning' [salam] 'peace' [ribah]. 'gaining' [sanami] 'camel 1 s hump' [ nisama.~- ] 'good men'

54 Regardless of the diachronic and comparative evidence avail

able, this highly systematic and phonetically conditioned allo

phonic variation may be represented by an underlying /a/ which is

either retained or raised in specific environments. The change of

/a/ to [a] or [i] can be represented by the following rule:

Rule 3: Non-Harmonic a-Raising

/a/ + [a] I C C V [+phar] -{ [+phar] +low {n,l,r} } ,-_+stress_-1

[i] I C C V [-phar] X +low ,-_+stress_-1

Conditions: C = any consonant other than pharyngeals or n,l,r X

The underlying /a/ of the above rule does not need to be spec

ified as [-stress] since neither [a] nor [i] are reported to be

stressed in open initial syllables. This view is contrary to Blanc

~ (1970:121), who reports the alternation of stress in [waladah]"'

[waladah]" 'his son', where the second form is dismissed as simply

borrowing from neighboring sedentary dialects (see Section 3.4).

Furthermore, the [+stress] vowel following /a/ needs to be speci

fied as [+low] so as not to contradict /a/+ [i] by vowel harmony, / ,,, as in /labis/ + [libis] 'he dressed', as will be seen in the next

section.

It also seems that the vowel [u] is very rare in the above en vironment, except for /a/+ [i] "'[u] before /w/, as in /zawala/ +

[ziwali] '\, [zuwali] 'man's shadow' and /gawad/ + [giwad] '\, [guwad]

55 'wedding gift'. In addition, there is nothing in this dialect to indicate the existence of what has been termed as labial attraction

(Lightner 1972:349), whereby /a/+ [u] before or after any of the labial consonants, a feature found in most groups of the ghawah

Bedouin dialects (compare BPA [jimal] to [jumal] 'camel' (Johnstone

1967:28)). One can also note that in some of the above examples, where a stressed /a/ is final, there is often an optional glottal stop which follows, giving the variation [rima] ~ [rima?] 'he threw'.

Finally, it must be noted that the above raising of /a/ to [i] is not confined to this Bedouin dialect alone. Signs of this fea ture are found in members of the ghawah dialects, although it is doubtful that such a process is as systematic and as strictly ap plied as in BPA.

56 3.2.2 Vowel Harmony

Vowel harmony in Bedouin Palestinian Arabic centers around two types of harmony, fronting harmony and rounding harmony, which ap ply to the epenthetic vowels as well as the short [+low] vowel in open syllables.

It should be emphasized that this vowel harmony, as it applies to the epenthetic vowels, is common to most Arabic dialects, while its application to /a/ in open syllables is not widespread in the gahwah dialects of the Syro-Palestinian type (Abu Salim 1987:1-24).

It is more prominent in the Bedouin dialects of the gahawah as well as the ghawah type. However, the faithful application of this har mony at all times in BPA is a unique feature of this dialect.

3.2.2.1 Vowel Harmony and Epenthes~s

Vowel harmony is achieved here by the insertion of an epen thetic vowel of the same frontness or roundness as the preceding stressed vowel in items of the pattern:

/CiC C/ + [CiC iC] X X /CuC C/ + [CuC uC] X X (C = any Cother than /n/, /1/, /r/) X as in the following examples:

57 /sin. C I + [sicin] 'goatskin bag'

/witr/ + [wi:!;:ir] 'camel saddle'

/kibr/ + [kibir] 'burnoose'

/dims/ + [dimis] 'stone'

C /cugb/ + [ ugub] 'after'

/xudr/ + [xudur] 'green ones' T T /cumr/ + [cumur] 'age'

The above specification of C as any Cother than /n/, /1/, X Ir! eliminates items which do not undergo epenthesis, such as:

[bint] 'girl'

[:!;:il:!;:] 'one-third' (xurj] 'saddle bag'

[burg] 'dappled'

Furthermore, the same type of harmony is found in the epen thetic vowels [i] and [u], inserted in C_CC, as in:

/turkdi/ + [turukdiy] 'you (f.) run' T T

/timski/ + [timiskiy] 'you (f.) catch'

The above type of harmony can be represented by the following phonological rule:

Rule 4: Epenthesis

0 + V I V C C# I-a back -I \-a back -I { ex -cc } I a round I I a round I _ -stress_ _+stress_

Condition: C = any C other than /n/, /1/, /r/ X

58 It should be noted that the above specification of stress is

needed to distinguish between forms such as:

[fihim] 'comprehension' [fihim] 'he understood'

[kibir] 'burnoose' [kibir] 'he grew older'

3.2.2.2 Vowel Harmony Applying to /a/ in Open Initial Syllables

(a) The fronting of /a/ in open initial syllables

This vowel harmony involves the fronting of /a/ to [i] when such vowel is followed by a stressed high front vowel. It occurs in open unstressed syllables preceding CiC, Ci, CiC, CiC-- and

Ciy-- as exemplified in the following:

V / I /sarib/ + [lirib] 'he drank'

/ / /labis/ + [libis] 'he dressed' / ., /dari/ + [diriy] 'he knew' I I /Cali/ + [ciliy] 'Ali'

,, / /samiyya/ + [simiyyi] 'family, tribe' / ,, /ha1Ib/ + [hilib] 'milk' / ,, /yamin/ + [yimin] 'oath' / / /bacir/ + [bicir] 1 camel 1

59 This fronting harmony can be represented by the following rule:

Rule 5: Harmonic a-Fronting

/a/ + V / #C C V --back-, -back 1_+high_ +high +stress

It also seems to be the case that there exists a multiple ap plication of this harmony, since a final unstressed -a#< OA -ah

(feminine gender marker) is always fronted following stressed front vowels, as shown in some of the above as well as the following ex amples:

I /diyya/" + [diyyi] 'blood money' / I /birza/ + [birzi] 'tent for newlyweds' ., I /jimca/ + [jimci] 'Friday'

(b) The Rounding of /a/ in Initial Open Syllables

In initial open syllables, the low vowel /a/ becomes [+high] and either [+round] or [-back] if the following closed syllable contains a stressed [+round +long] vowel. It must be pointed out that this type of harmony is relatively different from the previous fronting harmony, if one is to compare the following:

,, I /fadila/ + [fidili] 'virtue' 'P ,. ;I I / /camud/ + [C umud]- '\, [C imud]- 'tent-pole'

60 This type of rounding harmony is restricted in application.

It operates only in an environment prior to a closed syllable con taining the stressed vowel /u/. Furthermore, there is no multiple application of this harmony, unlike the fronting harmony which op erates on both ends of an item containing one or two open syllables

(initial and final).

In addition, while the fronting harmony has exclusive access to the [+low] vowel in open syllables without any competition, this

~ ; ; rounding harmony does not. In fact, /CaCuC/ + [CuCuC] ~ [CiCuC].

It appears that the unrestricted fronting of /a/+ [i] competes freely with the rounding harmony, as if the rounding harmony did not have enough strength to monopolize this process. Moreover, the fronting of /a/ in the alternation [i] ~ [u] operates unrestrict edly regardless of the phonetic condition. The following examples are representative:

., / I /tahur/ -+ [tuhur] 1\1 [tihur] 'circumcision' ;' I /xaruf/" + [xuruf] ~ [xiruf] 'lamb' ., ; I /dalul/ + [9:ulul] ~ [9:i1ii1 J 'she-camel' .,, ; ; /nagut/ + [nugut] ~ [nigut] 'wedding gift'

This type of fronting-as-well-as-rounding harmony can be for mulated by the following rule:

Rule 6: Harmonic a-Raising /a/ I #C C V +round +long +high -+stress-

61 Furthermore, there do seem to be cases of this alternation of

fronting along the rounding harmony where the vocalic stress as well as the length of the above rule are largely neutral, although

it happens only in cases of the prefixed morphemes ya- and bya- of the imperfective verb forms. Compare: ., /rakad/ + [rikad]" 'he ran' 7' 7' / .I .I /yarkud/ + [yurkud] [yirku~] 'for.him to run T • (subjunctive)' ,, ,,, + [byurkud]"' [byirkud] 'he is running' T T ; ; /barad/ + [barad] 'it cooled dm-m' ,, ,, + [yubrud] "' [yibrud] 'for it to cool down'

/ / + [byubrud]"' [byibrud] 'it's cooling down'

62 3.2.3 The Diphthongization of Long Vowels in Final Position

Although the contrastive character of the long vowels is well established in most Arabic dialects in nonfinal position, the gen eral trend is that they are shortened in most final positions.

This shortening tendency has been broadened to include some of the grammatical morphemes, such as the pronominal suffix -I, the imper fective 2nd person feminine -I, and the imperfective plural suffix

-u.

While observations such as these mark most sedentary dialects of Arabic, Bedouin dialects often display a further feature whereby some long vowels are diphthongized in final position. The key is sue for BPA is the extent of this diphthongization, which is found on a much larger scale than in most Bedouin dialects. Widespread diphthongization of final long vowels at the SR level of this di alect is a unique feature of this gahawah dialect. Various forms of nouns, adjectives and adverbs terminating with UR -i are diphthongized to [iy] at the SR level. This diphthongization is most clearly observed in a stressed environment where i# + [iy]; other wise the alternation [iy] ~ [i] is seen, although the diphthongized version seems to be stronger.

Before examining the diphthongization of long vowels in final position, we must look at some cases where final [a] is clearly established, although one often finds this in cases where the op tional /h/ of the feminine marker follows this vowel at the SR level. The following examples are representative:

63 + [caba(h)] 'cloak'

+ [sa(h)]v- 'goat or sheep (sing.)' Y- + [sya(h)] 'goats or sheep (pl.)'

/sala/ + [sala(h)] 'prayer'

/mixla/ + [mixla(h)] 'food container for horses'

While these cases of final [a] are common in most Arabic dia lects, the following cases are unique to BPA: , , /?anal + [?ana(h)] 'I I

(often realized in Central Palestinian with short final [a] and with stress on the first syllable [?ana])

/ ., /mata/ + [mita(h)] 'when?' ., " ,, (also realized as [mata], [wenta], and [?amet] in Urban Palestin- ian, Central Palestinian and Syro-Mesopotamian dialects, respec tively) , /widd+I/ + [widdi(h)] 'I want (lit. my necessity is)' .,, (rP~1i7.en ~R [biddi] in Urban Palestinian)

~ + [ C ammi(h)]- 'my uncle'

Among the following, the examples in (A) represent the most unique case of diphthongization in BPA, while those in (B) and (C) are found in sQme Bedouin dialects. (The initial epenthetic vowel

#~CC is omitted at the SR level of these examples.)

64 (A) Final stressed I + [iy] in some nouns and adverbs, as in:

/ y/ /!,ti/ + [stiy] 'winter' / ,, /gri/ + [griy] 'feasts' / ,I /kli/ + [kliy] 'kidneys' ., ; /lhi/ + [lhiy] 'beards' ., / /E_f{_/ + [!:giy] 'goat's cry' ,, / + /mi/,, [miy],, 'water' /hni/ + [hniy] 'here' ,, / /lhi/ + [lhiy] 'for her'

It seems that this unique synchronic development of the pat tern CCi + CCiy is different from most forms of Arabic. It is obvious that in the above examples a diachronic a# or a?# of Old

Arabic have been replaced by UR I# in this gahawah dialect; /~ti/+ [ltiy] < OA /Mita?/ 'winter', while in most Arabic dialects one finds a shortened a# corresponding to OA a# or a?#. Therefore, one might conclude that BPA has developed its own UR and SR forms with regard to this feature.

Some comparative material is helpful in determining the extent of the uniqueness of this feature in this Bedouin dialect. One might compare the above BPA [~tiy] 'winter' with [~ta] in Central / Palestinian, [~ita] in Urban Palestinian, and [1ta] in East North

African Bedouin (Woidich 1987:249). Furthermore, the frequent ad- I verb [hrtiy] 1h~te 1 < OA /hun~/ ig realized as [hina] in Cairene Egyptian, [hon] in Urban Palestinian, and [hon(e)] in Damascus Ara bic. Finally, [miy] ;water 1 < OA /ma?/ is found as [mayye] in Cen-

65 tral Palestinian, [moya] in Meccan Arabic (Bakalla 1984:82), and

[may] in the city of Baghdad.

This diphthongization is also unique in the feminine forms of some adjectives of color and physical defect, such as the following:

,.I .,, /sawdi/ + [sawdiy] 'black' / / /hawli/ + [hawliy]. 'cross-eyed' V ~ /lahabi/ + [sahabiy] 'brown' _,, C / /camyi/ + [ amyiy] 'blind' 'I/ /tar1I/ + [tarsiy] 'deaf'

Diphthongization is also unique in the following examples, wherein it operates after vowel harmony:

/ ,, /Cali/ + [ciliy] 'Ali' / ,. /bari/.,, + [biriy] 'innocent' / /kadi/ + [kiiiy] 'like this' ,, / /tali/ + [tiliy] 'kid'

Although final i# + [iy] in most cases, it is also a feature of this dialect to have the diphthong [ay] in some limited cases when the final vowel is the pronominal suffix -I#, as in the fol lowing, where it occasionally alternates with the retention of the vowel:

66 I / /£I+I/ + [fay] [fayyi] 'in me' "' ( I /1I+I/ + [lay] "' [layyi] 'for me' / /gul+lf/ + [gullay],, 'tell me' /nam+i/ + [namay] 'go to sleep (f.)!'

(B) The diphthongization of i# often alternates with simple

shortening at the SR level in unstressed position, as in the fol-

lowing:

/ I /cisi/ + [cisiy] "' [cisi] 'Jesus' / I /musi/ + [musiy] "' [musi] 'Moses' I / /gadI/ + [gadiy] [gadiJ 'judge' T T "' T I I /madmI/ + [madmiy] "' [madmi] 'person exiled because of blood feud' Iv /na~mi/ + [nasmiy]'",, "' [nasmi] 'good boy' /dugri/ + [dugriy] "' [d~gri] 'straight'

Also, the diphthongized imperfective/imperative 2nd person feminine suffix -i alternates with its short counterpart in un stressed position, as in the following:

I .I /?ims+i/" - + [?im~iy] "' (?'• J.ffiSJ. "·] 'go! I I /saw+i/ + [s~wwiy] [sawwi] 1 d0 ! I I "' I /gurn+I/ + [gurniy] "' [gurni] 'get up!'

67 (C) Finally, u# + [aw] in some nouns terminating in u#, while in verb forms with the masculine plural suffix -u, u# + [aw] in perfective tense forms and u# + [uw] in imperfective forms, as in:

/du/ + [daw] 'light' T T /su/ + [saw] 'evil'

/ja+u/ + [jaw] 'they (m.pl.) came'

/saw+u/ + [sawaw] 'they (m.pl.) did'

+ [sawwuw] 'do! (m.pl.)'

/gotar+u/ + [gotaraw] 'they went'

+ [gotruw] 'go! I

/rakib+u/ + [rikbuw] ~ [rikbu] 'they mounted'

/?im~+u/ + [?im~uw] ~ [?imiu] 'go! I

68 3.3 The Diphthongs

In general, Bedouin Palestinian Arabic has three diphthongs,

/ay/, /aw/ and /iy/, which are found in some medial and final posi tions; otherwise, the monophthongized vowels /e/ and /o/ correspond to OA diphthongs /ay/ and /aw/, respectively. The diphthongs are always maintained if their glide component is followed by another glide (identical or not), and also in some final positions. Al though the monophthongized vowel /o/ raises no problems, apart from partial monophthongization to [ow] as in [xowf] 'fear', or to a pure vowel [o] as in [lorn] 'blaming'' it is the monophthongized vowel /e/, which is sometimes raised to [i] in certain phonetic en vironments, that is the most prominent feature of this gahawah dia lect.

3.3.1 The Retention of the Diphthongs

As previously noted; the diphthongs /ay/~ /aw/ and /iy/ are generally retained in medial position if their glide component is followed by another glide (identical or not) as in the following SR forms:

[ C ayya] 'he refused'

[gawwak] 'how do you do?'

[cawwal] 'he showed displeasure by refusing to eat'

[jiyyid] 1brave/good person'

[miyyi(h)] 'hundred'

[rawyan] 'not thirsty'

69 The diphthong /ay/ is also found in some frequent diminutive

and endearing forms such as:

[cwayyil] 'little child'

[bnayyi(h)] 'little girl'

[hbayyib]. 'little darling (m,) I [mgayri(h)] 'small cave'

Most diphthongs are also found in final position, as in:

[hay]. 'alive' [zay] 'like' [§iy] < /fay/ 'something' [niy] < /nay/ 'raw, uncooked' [law] 'if'

[taw] 'just'

[daw] 'large open area'

3.3.2 The Monophthongization of the Diphthongs

The reduction of the Old Arabic diphthongs /ay/ and /aw/ to

/e/ and /o/ has added two extra vowels to the overall vocalic sys tem of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic. While most Arabic dialects are fairly similar with regard to this reduction, Bedouin Palestinian

Arabic displays a unique feature where, under certain phonetic con ditions, the vowel /e/ is either retained as [e] or raised to [i]; therefore, one might suggest a UR /e/ + [e] or [i] tentatively fol lowing or preceding certain consonantal elements. The [e] variant is found following the pharyngeals, the emphatics, and/or the sono-

70 rants, while [I] occurs everywhere else (compare [sef]. < OA /say£/. 'summer' and [sif] < OA /say£/ 'sword'. This analysis of /e/ + [e] and [i] was adopted by Ingham (1976:68 and 1982:80) in his study of a similar feature found in the Arabic of the northeastern area of

Khuzistan, Iran. It can be noted that in the following examples,

UR /e/ + [e] or [I] depending on the phonetic environment:

[i] [eJ [bit] 'house' [?es]-Y 'what' [tis] 'billy goat' [he1J. 'strength' [din] 'religion' [xer] 'blessingi

[kif] 'how' [cer] 'donkey'

[gid] 'shackle' [sed] 'hunting'

[zit] 'olive oil' [ter] 'bird'

[~ix] 'sheikh' [wel] 'woe'

[ J1S.-:--V] 'army' [ret] 'wish'

[~il] 'tail' [mel] 'inclination'

Based on the above monosyllabic items, one may tentatively formulate the following rule:

Rule 7: e-Raising

!el ->- [i] I C C [-phar] [-emph] }- { [+obstr]

+ [eJ I C C ( [+phar] '\ [+emph] { [+sonor] J

71 This highly systematic dialect-specific feature occurs with a

regularity that is often absent from most Arabic dialects. In

fact, the Bedouin speakers of this gahawah dialect are so aware of

this highly distinguishable feature that the mere presence of an

outsider (non-Bedouin) leads to a sudden shift and partial elimina

tion of the [i] variant and its replacement by the [e] variant,

which represents the pan-Arabic or the lingua franca of most Arabic

dialects. At any rate, the raising of /e/ + [i] under certain pho

netic conditions is highly consistent with the general fronting as

well as raising of the low vowel /a/, either by phonetic condition-

ing or by the vowel harmony processes discussed earlier. However,

there do seem to be a handful of apparent exceptions which contra

dict the hypothesized rule. The exceptions can best be interpreted

as due to a desire to preserve distinct phonetic realizations for

purposes of avoiding homophony. Furthermore, the very nature of

these exceptions is characterized by their relatively high degree

of frequency, since some are function words, adverbs or morphemes

(such as the invariant dual suffix -en), as in the following:

r1 - , LDenJ 'between' *[hu1IlJ7 1 [1IsJ 'why' *[1elJ (waladen] 'boys'

[giri(h)] 'jealousy' [geri(h)] 'except him'

[xiri(h) 'about time' [xeri(h)] 'his blessing'

Furthermore, the raising or retention of /e/ is also found in some instances of the very frequent and productive form or forms of the diminutive, in which /CCeC--/ + [CC eC--] and [CC iC--], where X Z

72 is a pharyngeal, an emphatic and/or /r/, while C is anything ex z else, as in the following:

[i] [eJ [hsin]. 'Husayn' [jhes]-Y 'little donkey (m.)' [kwim] 'little pile' [shel] 'star'

[cnizi] 'little goat' [nceji] 'little ewe' [hbibi]. 'little candy' [dreb] 'little trail' [hmili] 'little sheep (f.) I [sxeli] 'little she-goat'

[jwicid] 'little sheepskin, [jrew] 'little puppyi

(man's name)'

[hsini] 1 (woman's name)' [hseni] 'fox'

[klib] 'little dog' [glebJ 'little heart'

In addition, the two variants of UR /e/ can be found in some perfective verbal forms, as in:

[mi~it] 'I walked' [garet] 'I read'

[nisit] 'I forgot' [siget] 'I wandered'

[ligit] 'I found' [saret] 'I left early'

[dirit] 'I knew' [rimet] 'I threw'

[ribit] 'I was raised' [gidetJ 'I spent' T

Finally, the reduction of Old Arabic /aw/ to /o/ in BPA is fairly consistent with most Arabic dialects. However, in forms of the passive participle, UR /o/ + [o] ~ [e] ~ [a] in open unstressed syllables when immediately followed by a closed syllable containing stressed /u/, as in:

73 [molud] '\, [melud] '\, [malud] 'being born, infant' -c- -c- -c- [mo ud] '\, [me ud] '\, [ma ud] 'being promised'

[mojud] '\, [mejud] '\, [majud] 'being available'

[mogud] '\, [megud] '\, [magud] 'being burnt'

Although these alternations may seem minor, nonetheless all three variants are equally frequent, with [a] especially frequent in common fixed expressions and proverbs, as in:

[mabruk almalud] 'congratulations on the new baby'

[aljud mn almajud] 'generosity stems from what is available'

74 3.4 Stress

In most forms of Arabic, including Old Arabic, stress falls on the rightmost "heavy" syllable of an item; if there is no "heavy" syllable, stress falls on the first syllable of the item. A

"heavy" syllable is one which contains a long vowel or a vowel fol lowed by two consonants.

Although this is the norm in Arabic (Kenstowicz 1983:207), BPA is different and unique in its stress pattern. While the rightmost uheavy 11 syllable is stressed in BPA, as in most forms of Arabic, in the absence of a "heavy" syllable stress falls on the second sylla ble rather than the first.

Note the stress on the long vowels in the rightmost "heavy" syllables of the following examples: ., [hilib] 'milk' I [Camara] ipaternal uncles' .I [haraba], 'water well' [matbuxat] 'cooked things (f.)' / [?ana] 'I am'

In the absence of a long vowel, a VCC receives stress, as in:

[mag/ C ad] 'seat' /c [mar a] 'grazing area' ,, [?ankital] 'he was killed'

[gan,mna] 'our sheep'

.I [alliban] 'the yogurt'

75 However, in the absence of a V or VCC, stress falls on the

second syllable, as in:

[gad~] 'lunch' I [jimal] 'camel'

C I [ arab] 'Arabs, Bedouins'

[naca"ji(h)] 'a sheep'

V . . , ] [ siJara 'tree' ., [barakatak] 'your (m.sg.) blessing'

However, there are a few groups of items with abnormal stress, which can best be treated as exceptions:

(a) Stress falls on the first or second syllable of the fol

lowing masculine plural forms (note the existence of alternative patterns for some of them):

,I C ,,, cl C - [ ugala] I\., [ ugala] 'wise (m.pl.)' (or) [ uggal] ~ / / '\., p1 \I [juraha] [juraha]. 'wounded c-u.1. J.. • J (or) [mijarih] C ; c/ [ ulama] I\., [ ulama] 1 knowledgeable (m.pl.)'

(b) A final syllable of certain feminine adjective of color or physical defect is stressed. If one compares the SR forms

[bi~a]- 'egg' and [bi~a]- / 'white (f.)', one can see the abnormality of stress in the latter. It does seem that an appeal to the UR level might provide a satisfactory explanation, because SR a# in the following examples, where stress is on the final syllable, is represented by UR a#:

76 ,, / /beda/ + [bida] 'egg' .... ,, .... ., /beda/ + [bida] 'white (f.) I ,,.... ,,T /xadra/ + [xadra] 1 (woman I s name) 1 . ,, T / /xadra/ + [xadra] 'green (f.) 1 ... T

Other examples include: ,, -Lhamra./ ] 'type of curse' [hamra]. 'red (£.)' / ,, [zarga] '(horse name) 1 [zarga] 'blue (£.)' c-/ c- ,, [ ora] 'woman' [ ora] 'one-eyed (f.)'

/ /hawli/"' + [hawliy] 'cross-eyed (f.)' ;' . '( - V ~ /sahabi/ + [sahabiy] 'mixed colors (f.) I ;ti C .,, /camyi/ + [ amyiy] 'blind (f.) I

But, unless special treatment is given to group (c) above, one still must account for the lack of stress on final /i/ + [iy] ~ [i] in the following examples, which fall outside that semantic cate- gory:

., / / /hami/ + [hamiy] ~ [hami] 'hot'

/ - ,t / /dugri/ + [dugriy] ~ [dugri] 'straight' ,, ;' ,, /musi/ + [musiy] ~ [musi] 'Moses' ,, / / [C-:- . ] /cisi/ + J.SJ.Y ~ [cisi] 'Jesus'

77 Finally, a final stressed [a] is often followed by an optional glottal stop[?] when it occurs in isolation, as in the following

SR forms:

; ,, [ja] I"\., [ja?] 'he came'

., / [sima] I"\., [sima?] 'sky' ., / [sahaba] "v [sahaba?] 'two-year-old goat'

78 CHAPTER 4

THE ARABIA PETRAEA DIALECT GROUP

This chapter identifies the placement of the BPA dialect among the other Bedouin dialects. BPA is taken here as a dialect spoken over a large area, which covers the spoken Arabic of Bedouins in not only al-Naqab, but also the whole region of the Sinai Desert as well as the Araba Valley, southern Jordan and parts of northwestern

Saudi Arabia. Since the publication of Blanc's (1970) excellent and widely-quoted study, more data and research has been published from different parts of the above-mentioned area, which has given rise to the urgent need for an areal survey to pinpoint the main linguistic features of this dialect group. These features, while limited to phonology, will be checked against some phonological features of the already established Bedouin dialect groups in the surrounding areas.

4.1 The Bedouin Dialects

As a background for this dialect grouping, some of the main phonological features of the Bedouin dialects are reviewed briefly, as well as a list of the different Bedouin dialect groups already established for the most part by previous research.

79 4.1.1 General Phonological Features of Bedouin Dialects

The following phonological features of Bedouin dialects are neither exhaustive nor representative of all Bedouin dialects. In stead they are given to highlight some of the features which char acterize the Bedouin vernacular in contrast to other dialects of the sedentary people in the area. Because some of these features are present in several Bedouin dialect groups, these features do not uniquely characterize any one dialect.

1) The retention of /-'~_/, /d/

2) The merger of /d/ and /d/ into /d/ T .

3) The variants of the velars /k/ and /g/:

/k/ + [k] [kalb] 'dog'

[~] [taff] 'palm' / V [(] ([ts]) [cabs] 'ram'

/g/ + [g] [gilil] 'little'

[g] ( [ dJ]) [lilil] 'little' ,, ,, [g] ( [dz]) [gilil] 'littler

4) The variants of the palatal /j/:

/j/ + [j] (stop, often affricate) [jimal] 'camel'

[~] ( fricative) (°tahil] 'ignorant'

[y] (optional alternation) [ja] ~ [ya]'he came'

80 5) The low vowel lal in open syllables:

lal + [a] II [+phar] [xataf]. 'he kidnapped' I __ {l,n,r} [~arad] 1 he ran away' [i] I in open syllables other than the above environments

[misak] 'he caught'

[liban] 'yogurt' I I I [i] I __ {CiC, CiC, Ciy} (Vowel Harmony) I [fihim] 'he understood' I [gidim] 'old' I [gidiyyi] 'issue' T I [i] "' [u] I ciic / I [xiruf] '\, [xuruf] 'lamb'

[u] II [+labial] (referred to in this study as labial attraction)

[jumal] 'camel'

[bugar] 'cows' ., 1 6) The "gahawah complex '

0 + [a] I ax C X = [+phar] [gahawah] 'coffee 1

[ na C aJi/,.] 'ewe' (In this study, dialects which display this feature are

referred to as the gahawah dialects)

81 7) The "ghawah complex" [a]+~ I C CaCV / [ghawah] 'coffee' / [bsalah] 'onion' ,, [bgarah] 'cow'

(In this study, dialects which display this feature are

referred to as the ghawah dialects)

8) The "trochaic" syllable structure

0 + [a] / C +CV

/nafs +ha/+ [nafsaha] 'herself'

/mal +na] + [malana] 'our property'

(Dialects which display this vowel insertion are said

to have the trochaic syllable structure, in contrast to

dialects with atrochaic structure, wherein no such low

vowel insertion occurs:

[nafsha] 'herself'

[malna] 'our property'

82 4.1.2 General Classification of Bedouin Dialects

The majority of the Bedouin dialects belong to one of the fol lowing dialect groups:

(A) North Arabian Dialect Group (N.Arab)

The North Arabian dialect is spoken by the Shammari and cAnazi confederations in most of the Syrian Desert, eastern areas of Jor dan, and Najd in Saudi Arabia. Some of the camel-raising tribes of this dialect region are the Sirhan, the Rwala and the Bani Saxar.

Essentially, this dialect is a member of the ghawah group.

Characteristically, this group has trochaic syllable structure, and shows signs of labial attraction. The most important feature of this dialect is the affrication of the OA velars /k/ and /g/ into

, ~ [c] (ts) and [g] (dz), sounds which apparently are unique to this group.

(B) The Syro-Mesopotamian Dialect Group (Syro-Meso)

The Syro-Mesopotamian dialects are spoken by the Bedouin tribes on the periphery of the Syrian-Iraqi desert areas, which are, for the most part, the pre-cAnazi immigrant tribes (Johnstone

1967:1), such as the Haddadin,- Nu C aym, Fadl and Mawali- of Syria as well as Bani Xalid and Bani Hasan of northern Jordan, and in addi tion, the northeastern Dead Sea region (Palva 1969, Cleveland 1963:

56). Furthermore, although the dialects of the Bedouin tribes in the north of Israel are losing some of their Bedouin features, such

83 as a decrease in the use of the affricated variants of /k/ and /g/,

due to the process of becoming sedentary (Rosenhouse 1982, 1983),

they are nevertheless essentially part of this dialect group (Ro

senhouse 1984:5).

This group of dialects belongs to the ghawah group; it has a

trochaic syllable structure, and its affricated variants of the ve lars /k/ and /g/ are palato-alveolar ['(] and ['tJ respectively.

The Northeast Arabian dialect group is spoken in Kuwait, al

Hasa, the northeastern parts of Saudi Arabia, and the littoral Gulf

States. Although the dialects of the island of Bahrain are divided along sectarian lines (Holes 1983:7, 1984:26-67), the dialect of the Sunni population is a member of this group, while the Shici dialect seems to form a subgroup along with the Shici communities of the neighboring areas.

Like the two dialect groups presented previously, this group is a member of the ghawah dialects and its syllable structure is essentially trochaic. Similar to the Syro-Mesopotamian dialects, its velars /k/ and /g/ are conditionally affricated to [t] and [g], respectively. However, this dialect group is best known for the optional alternation of [j] ~ [y] (Johnstone 1965:234) and for la bial attraction: [jarab] ~ [yarab] 'mange', [busal] < /basal/

'onions'.

84 (D) The Southern Mesopotamian Dialect Group

The Southern Mesopotamian dialect group is spoken in the southern parts of Iraq, and by the Arabic-speaking population of

Khuzistan or Arabistan in Iran. Originally, the area of lower Iraq has been proposed by Blanc (1964:5-6) as the gelet group. One might note that this dialect group is spoken not only by the Bedou ins of the region, but the vernacular of large urban population centers is also marked with Bedouin features. The whole area came under the influence of the Bedouins in what Ingham (1982:11) termed nomadization, that is, the gradual movement of the nomadic tribes from Najd and surrounding areas. Furthermore, while the dialects of Khuzistan are divided among urban and rural lines (Ingham

1973:533), in general they share many of the features of lower

Iraq.

This dialect group is also a member of the ghawah dialects, but its syllable structure is not trochaic. As in NnrrhPASt ArH bian, the affricated variants of the OA velars /k/ and /g/ are [t] and [g] respectively. Furthermore, the optional alternation of

[j] ~ [y], as well as labial attraction, are present in this dia lect group, although at a lower frequency than in Northeast Ara bian. In addition, the vernacular of large urban population cen ters is also marked with Bedouin features, as noted by Abu Haidar

(1987:42-43) for the Muslim population of the city of Baghdad:

[~irib] 'near', [bi~ir] 'first-born'.

85 (E) The South Arabian Dialect Group (S. Arab)

The South Arabian dialect group spreads over the Arabian coast south of Hijaz in Yemen, cAdan, Hadramawt, and Dofar. While this

~ dialect group is in much need of further study, these dialects in general came under the influence of the old South Arabian langua ges, such as Mehri.

Some of the features of this dialect group are the occurrence of ejectives (Prochazka 1987:59), the replacement of /c/ by the glottal/?/ in the North Yemeni dialect of Zabid, and the lowering of /i/ to [e] in the neighborhood of emphatic sounds in the central

Tihama dialect of Yemen (Greenberg 1978:23): [t/ayyib] 'good', [?en] 'eye', [tawel]. 'long' •

(F) The Hijazi Dialects

The Hijazi dialect area extends northward along the Red Sea from as far as the fringes of Tihama and cAsir in the south, possi bly as far as a point just south of al-Tahama, where the Gulf of

Aqaba meets the Red Sea. Essentially, the Hijazi dialects can be divided into two dialect groups, Northern and Southern.

(a) The Northern Hijazi Dialect

The Northern Hijazi dialect is spoken in the area between Mec ca, in the south, and the southern edge of al-Tahama, in the north.

Various tribes such as Beli, Juhaynah, and Harb reside in this area. Although two unpublished Ph.D. dissertations have been writ-

86 ten on this variety of Hijazi Arabic by natives of the Harb tribe

(al-Hazmy 1975 and al-Mozainy 1981, both works inaccessible to the

author at the time of this writing), this dialect area remains in

need of further study.

However, we do know that this dialect is essentially one of

the ghawah dialects ([nxalah] 'palm tree'), and its syllable struc

ture is trochaic ([malana] 'our property') (al-Mozainy 1985:136).

Furthermore, no affricated variants of the velars /k/ and /g/ are

found, and the fricative[¥] is the most common allophone of /j/

([1ahil] 'ignorant') (Ingham 1982:112). There are also signs of

labial attraction, although at a lower scale than in Northeast Ara bian ([kuman] < /kaman/ 'also').

(b) The Southern Hijazi Dialect

The Southern Hijazi. dialect is spoken in the area south of Mecca, southward possibly as far as Tiharna and cAsir. This coastal area is inhabited by tribes such as Thagif, Bani Sacd and Bani Ma lik.

Although this dialect area is still practically unknown, in

Palva's (1985:172-4) review of Christopher Toll's Notes on Hija.zi dialects (Gamidi 1983) of Bilad gamid, he discusses this dialect, which is located at the southern edge of the Hijazi, area. He confirms the affrication of /k/ and /g/ into (~] and [i], respective ly, and the vocabulary items [~int] 'I was' and [di~ir] 'flour'

(1985:173). However, one might dismiss this dialect's membership

87 in the ghawah group based on the fact that [ragabate] 'my neck' oc curs (1985:174). The information available is inadequate to con firm its membership among the gahawah dialects.

(G) North African Bedouin Dialects

The Bedouin dialects in the area lying west of the Nile River can be divided roughly into two large dialect groups: a western group spoken in parts of Algeria, Morocco and Mauretania, and an eastern one spoken in southern Tunisia, Libya and Egypt's Western

Desert.

The eastern branch of the North African Bedouin dialects is a member of the ghawah dialects ([nxala 'palm tree') (Woidich 1987:

246); its velars are not affricated (Matar 1967:47-48). Further more, the most common allophone of /j/ is the fricative/~/

([~imal] 'camel') (Woidich 1987:246). One can also add that the most remarkable feature of this dialect is the presence of what has been termed internal imala ("inclination") of a+ e: [nes] < /nas/ 'people' and [terir] < /tajir/ 'merchant' (Matar. 1967:55) •

(H) The Ma CC-azah Dialect of Egypt ! s Eastern Desert

The dialect of the Bedouins along the Egyptian side of the Red

Sea, between the Gulf of Suez and the Nubian Desert is largely un knm·m, and as Rosenhouse ( 1984: 6) notes, the researchers who have studied the sedentary dialects in the neighboring areas have only indirectly referred to this dialect. However, Rosenhouse's sugges-

88 tion that the Maccazah dialects are more closely related to the

Syro-Palestinian dialects is in fact inaccurate, on the basis of many factors. Musil (1926:45) and Oppenheim (1943:277) both report that the Bani cAtiyya of the northwestern parts of Saudi Arabia are cc- - commonly referred to as the Ma azah by the Huwaytat and other tribes of Arabia. Furthermore, the Ma CC-azah (literally I goat rais- ers') are shown by Al-Jawhary (1965:map between p.128-129) to re side on both sides of the Red Sea, raising the possibility of a common genealogy and a common geographical origin. In addition, since it is a widely held belief that a common geographical origin is often reflected in a uniform dialect, it is highly unlikely that the dialects of the Ma CC-azah of Egypt I s Eastern Desert are related to the Syro-Palestinian dialects. Rather, it could be the case that such dialects are an important member of what Palva (1987:139) calls the Hijazi-Red Sea group of dialects.

89 4.2 The Arabia Petraea Dialect Group

It was in Palva's (1984a) classification of the Arabic dia

lects in Palestine and Transjordan that the dialects of the Bedou

ins in Arabia Petraea were first introduced. The Arabia Petraea

Bedouins are the various subtribes of the Huwaytat confederation, which reside in the territory of the southern part of Jordan (south of al-Karak), the southern edge of the Araba Valley, the area east of the Gulf of Aqaba, and the area west of Tabuk in Saudi Arabia.

The Bani cAtiyya tribe south of Tabuk are also members of this division.

Palva's personal observations on these dialects has led him to classify them as an independent group alongside the major divi sions, such as North Arabian or Syro-Mesopotamian. In his study of the descriptive imperative of narrative style in spoken Arabic based on some data from the Naqab Bedouins, Palva (1984b) offers some valuable commentary on these dialects, especially in the area of similarities with the Naqab dialect.

In the same year, Bani Yasin and Owen (1984) published their study of the Bdul dialect, whose speakers reside near the old ruins of Petra and are said to be members of the Huwaytat tribe (Musil

1926:69, Oppenheim 1943:302). The Bdul dialect is very similar to those of the Naqab. Finally, Stewart (1987:47) confirmed the long held belief that the dialects of the Bedouins of the Sinai are identical to those of the Naqab.

90 The essential picture which emerges from these studies is that

the dialects of the Bedouins of southern Jordan, northwestern areas

of Saudi Arabia, the Araba Valley, the Sinai, and the Naqab Desert

are very closely interrelated. This relationship has been deter

mined by a uniform and uninterrupted span of geography; the settle

ment of major divisions of some tribes in various known locations,

and a two-way system of long-term or temporary migration to and

from various areas, due to droughts and sometimes local feuds. Al

though most of Palva's observations on the dialects of Arabia Pe

traea Bedouins are largely personal, and further systematic exami

nation has yet to appear in comparison to those of the Naqab, many

common features make it possible to combine these dialects into one

dialect area group called the Arabia Petraea dialect group.

4.2.1 A Proposed Classification of the Dialects of Arabia Petraea

The term Arabia Petraea dialect area is used hereafter to

cover the territory of southern Jordan, parts of northwestern Saudi

Arabia, and the Naqab and Sinai Deserts. Furthermore, two signifi cant subdivisions of this area are recognized: a Western subdivi sion covering the Naqab, Sinai, and north and central Araba Valley, and an Eastern subdivision covering parts of southern Jordan and the southern Araba Valley, the area east of the Gulf of Aqaba, and the Tabuk area of Saudi Arabia (see Map 1, p. 132).

91 (A) The Western Arabia Petraea Dialect Area

This dialect area includes the spoken Arabic of the Bedouin tribes of the Naqab, the tribes of Tarabin, Ahaywat, the Huwaytat, and the Tawara of the Sinai (see Map 2, p. 133). Furthermore, the dialect of a small subtribe of the Huwaytat. . tribe (Oppenheim 1943: 154), which resides along the Suez Canal between Ismailiyya and the city of Suez in Egypt, also belongs to this dialect group.

The northern and northeastern frontier of this group includes the northern area of the Naqab, with an approximate line extending north of the Hebron District to a point east of Jerusalem and the northern tip of the Dead Sea, including the area of the Djahalin tribe. Although Blanc (1970:114) observes that the Djahalin tribe seems to belong to the Hebron District rather than to the Naqab, their spoken Arabic is no different from that of the Naqab. From the northern tip of the Dead Sea, the approximate dialect line extends to its southern end, where it shifts eastward to follow the

Sharah mountain range, and continues south along the north and cen tral Araba Valley. A small group of the Bani cAtiyya tribe and the

Sacidiyyun reside within the northern and central areas of the

Araba Valley. From the southern end of the Sharah mountains the line continues southwest as far as the tip of the Gulf of Aqaba, leaving the major clans of the Huwaytat to the east.

Finally, it should be pointed out that the Western Arabia Pe traea dialect group is better documented than its eastern counterpart.

92 (B) The Eastern Arabia Petraea Dialect Area

This dialect area includes mainly the dialects of the Huway-. tat, the Bani cAtiyya, and possibly other tribes. The approximate line starts south of the Jordanian city of al-Karak and extends along the Sharah mountain range in an almost straight line to the tip of the Gulf of Aqaba. The Huwaytat. . Ibn Djazi inhabit the territory extending between the Sharah mountain range and the city of

Macan, while the CAlawin subtribe of the Huwaytat inhabit the southern area of the Araba Valley. The line continues in a south- erly direction from the tip of the Gulf of Aqaba further south along the eastern side of the Gulf and the Red Sea, up to the southern edge of the Tahama region. This area houses the cimran subtribe of the Huwaytat along the Gulf, centering around the northernmost Saudi town of Haql on the Red Sea.

The major branch of the Huwaytat, known as the Huwaytat al

Tahama, inhabit the region which extends from al-Bade (Musil 1926:

139), in the area where the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba meet, to the Marra Valley in the south, and stops before the territory of the Beli tribe, the most northern of the Hijazi tribes. Further more, the eastern Arabia Petraea dialect area stretches from the southern edge of Tahama in a northeasterly direction, passes east of the city of Tabuk, and continues north until it ends north of the area called al-Tubayq. The tribe of BelI, south of Tahama (a member of the northern Hijazi group), is excluded by this line, as are the tribes of Weld CAli, Fugara, and Weld Sliman (members of the North Arabian dialect group), to the east of Tabuk and Tubayq.

93 The Bani- C Atiyya of the Tabuk- area and the Huwaytat- of Tubayq form the most eastern members of this dialect group. In addition, from north of Tubayq the line moves directly west until it reaches the southera end of the Dead Sea. While the line includes the Jor danian city of al-Karak, this dialect area could possibly penetrate territory north of this city as well.

This last area represents the northern frontier of the Eastern

Arabia Petraea dialect area, leaving the Beni Saxar tribe (a member of the North Arabian dialect group) (Palva 1980:115), and the Ha jaya as well as Hamayda (membership unknown) tribes outside this dialect area.

It must be pointed out that the spoken Arabic of the sedentary population of the major towns of this Eastern area is very similar to that of the Bedouins. The cities of al-Karak, at-Tafilah, Macan and al-cAqaba in Jordan, and Tabuk and Haql in Saudi Arabia, are all dominated by the Bedouins of the surrounding territory.

To reiterate, one principal issue which must be emphasized re garding the nature of this type of dialect grouping is that it is based on an areal linguistic study in which dialectal features are projected through their spread over a large geographical span, crossing political boundaries. Furthermore, the broadening of Pal va1s (1984a) "Arabia Petraea" dialect area to cover the dialects of the Sinai and Naqab Deserts as well as those of the Araba Valley is made possible by the common linguistic features which characterize the dialects of the Bedouins of the whole area.

94 In addition, the study of this area fills the gap in informa

tion needed to determine the general identity of this dialect group

and give it a classification of its own, equal in size and signifi

cance to the surrounding established Bedouin dialect groups such as

the Syro-Mesopotamian or North Arabian. This classification is made possible by the incorporation of the already published litera

ture as well as the writer's own native knowledge and data of a Be douin dialect of the al-Naqab Desert.

However, it must be admitted that, while the branching of the

Arabia Petraea dialect group into Eastern and Western subgroups is highly valid, the exact differences between the two branches are somewhat ambiguous. The information available on the Eastern dia lect consists of personal linguistic observations made by Palva

(1984a, 1984b), whose comments suggest that one should attempt to combine the two dialects into one, based on his remarks about the similarities of the Eastern dialect with the Western one. Also, the excellent study by Bani Yasin and Owen (1984) of the Bdul dia lect of Petra, although included in the Eastern dialect, is in many respects similar if not identical to the Western dialect, because it is located on the border area between the two. Therefore, it is very difficult to determine how far such features of the Bdul dia lect have spread through the heart of the Eastern area. Nonethe less, such division of the dialect group into two regional dialects is maintained until further research, based on systematic observa tion, indicates otherwise.

95 4.3 Some Common Phonological Distinguishing Features of the Arabia

Petraea Dialect Group

4.3.1 The Absence of Affrication of /k/ and /g/

In the Arabia Petraea dialect group, /k/ and /g/ are never af fricated throughout the whole area. This highly marked feature spreads from the tribal territory of Bani cAtiyya, in the far east ern corner, to the small group of the Huwaytat tribe across the

Suez Canal, in the far western end. The lack of affrication of the velars /k/, /g/ is confirmed by numerous works. My own observa tions of the northern Naqab, Blanc's (1970:116) on the dialect of al-Dhullam in the same area, and Stewart's (1987: '• 7) on the dialect of the Ahaywat. of central Sinai all confirm this feature for the Western dialect of this area.

As to the Eastern dialect, studies such as Bani Yasin and

Owen's (1984:228) analysis of the dialect of the Bilul in Petra, Palva's (1984a:6, 1987:140) comments on the dialect of the Huwaytat. . and Bani cAtiyya tribes in southern Jordan and the northwestern re gions of Saudi Arabia, all indicate a lack of affrication in this area. It can further be added that in this Bedouin-dominated area, the lack of affrication is also noted for the spoken Arabic dia lects in the major towns, such as those of the northern Sinai; al- Karak, al-Tafilah,. Ma e-an and al-C Aqaba in Jordan; and Tabuk- and Haql in Saudi Arabia.

96 The lack of affrication in the two dialects of Arabia Petraea is held to be true despite Musil's (1926:34-5) report of two items with the affricated [c]: the place name [al-cabd] and the plant

[caff maryam]. However, Musil (1926:79) says that the spoken Ara bic of the Cimran (subtribe of the Huwaytat), who reside east of the Gulf of Aqaba, have a clear and distinct pronunciation of /g/,

/k/ and /j/; and that their/~/ is nearer to /d/. While there is difficulty in interpreting Musil's statement, one can rule out af frication of /k/ and /g/, since Musil himself must have been famil iar with it, yet Musil's comments may prove to be quite helpful for future research.

Furthermore, one can add that this distinguishing feature, the absence of affrication in the Arabia Petraea dialect group, is shared by other major dialect groups such as Northern Hijazi (Al

Mozainy, McCarthy, et al, 1985), East North African Bedouin (Canti neau 1960:210, Woidich 1987:245), and smaller and scattered pockets such as the spoken dialect of the C Ajman- and Al-Murra of the northern Empty Quarter area of Saudi Arabia (Ingham 1986:278).

In contrast to this absence of affrication in Arabia Petraea, ,, / the dental affrication of /k/ and /g/ as [c] [ts] and [g] [dz], respectively, marks the North Arabian dialect group (Abboud 1979:

408), while the palato-alveolar affricates[~] and [g] mark the Sy ro-Mesopotamian (Johnstone 1967:2), Northeast Arabian (Johnstone

1967:30-1), Southern Mesopotamian (Blanc 1964:25), and Southern Hijazi. (Palva 1987:173) dialect groups. The fronting of the velars

97 is a distinguishing feature of the above dialects and often realized contiguous to front vowels.

The following examples indicate the affrication or the lack of it in some of the dialect groups mentioned above:

Arabia Petraea [kibir] 'old'

[gilil] 'little'

Syro-Mesopotamian [d:il] 'rooster' (Johnstone 1964:4)

[siian] 'legs'

,/- North Arabian [incan] 'if' (Palva 1980:114)

[~acid] 'sitting'

East N. African [kalib] 'dog' (Woidich 1987:247)

Bedouin [yakilJ 'eating'

The following table shows the affrication, or lack of it, in major dialect groups:

,I / /k/+[k] /g/+[g] /k/-+[ C] /g/+[g] /k/+[~] /g/+[g]

Arabia Petraea + + N. Hijazi + + E. .N. African + +

N. Arabian + -1- + + Syro-Meso + + + +

s. Meso -1- + + + ,., .:) . Hijazi + + + + cc- Ma azah + + ? ? ? ?

98 It should be noted that all dialects are marked[+] for [k]

and [g], while some also have fronted variants and others do not.

4.3.2 The Effect of Pharyngeal Sounds on Syllable Structure

The effect of pharyngeal sounds on syllable structure involves

the insertion of a low [a] between the pharyngeal sound and another

consonant, when both of them are preceded by /a/. This process

creates forms such as [nacaji] 'ewe' and [gahawah] 'coffee'.

What is interesting about this feature is its wide range of application, covering nominal, verbal and adjectival forms, as well as places and proper names. It produces dissyllables, as in

[sahar]~ 'month', and trisyllables, all of which could be open, or

the first two open and the third closed: [yahama] 'to be heated',

[rnahamud] 'Mahmoud (proper name)'. However, its domain of applica tion ceases if it creates items of four continuous open syllables, e.g. [mahkama]. 'court' •

This phenomenon is widespread in the Western dialect of Arabia

Petraea, confirmed for the Bdul of Petra of the Eastern dialect

(BanI Yasin et al. 1984:203), and seems most likely to be spread throughout the rest of the Eastern area, as will be seen below.

Furthermore, the effect of pharyngeal sounds broadens the applica bility of what came to be known, also following Blanc, as the ghawah complex, a process by which the first of two /a/ vowels in initial open syllables is dropped when followed by another open syllable containing /a/.

99 4.3.3 Low Vowel Deletion

/a/ + / C_CV1CV2

V1 =/a/or /a/+ [i]

This process of eliding the short /a/ from an open syllable when followed by a short /a/ in another open syllable is a distin guishing feature of some Bedouin dialects. Numerous Bedouin

'onion' (Matar 1967:82), to as far east as Khuzistan, Iran [n~idat]

'she asked' (Ingham 1976:73). Al-Mozainy, McCarthy et al. (1985:

142) explain this low vowel deletion for the Northern Hijazi dia lect as follows:

it deletes only the most sonorous low vowel and then only when a low vowel follows in an open syllable. It is not governed solely by phonotactic considerations (conspiracies), but rather it appears to function as a fairly abstract kind of dissimilation, eliminating an underlying configuration of two successive identical nuclei by deleting the first of them.

By all accounts the Arabia Petraea dialect group seems to re-

1 1 1 tain such low vowels: [ bisala] onion , [ galabat] she overt urned' , despite Palva's (1984a:6) claim that the deletion or retention of such low vowels is in a state of free variation in the Eastern dialect, without offering any examples.

Furthermore, although the present level of research makes it difficult to dispute Palva's claim about the Eastern dialect, early extensive travel and exploration surveys of the area's plant and place names, recorded by Musil (1908:58, 345) and (1926:47, 144),

100 show numerous instances of the sequence CVCaCV and only two cases of the sequence CCaCV (1908:345, 1926:235).

Therefore, one might conclude that in general, this low vowel is retained in most of the Arabia Petraea area, while its deletion is optional in the peripheral regions, where this Eastern dialect comes into contact with other dialects such as Northern Hijazi,

North Arabian, or Syro-Mesopotamian. Expectedly, in some of the remote areas of the Eastern dialect, the deletion of the low vowel among the Bani cAtiyya or the Huwaytat. . west of Tubayg . could possibly be due to the exposure of these tribes to speakers of other di alects such as Northern Hijazi. or North Arabian, where such deletion is obligatory rather than optional.

The following table shows the major Bedouin dialect groups as either of the gahawah or ghawah types:

gahawah ghawah

w. Arabia Petraea +

E. Arabia Petraea + '\, ?

N. L\raoian1 -- - 1.. ~ - - +

Syro-Mesopotarnian +

N. East Arabian + N. Hijazi + s. Hijazi ? ?

E. North African +

101 The retention or deletion of the low vowel, as well as the ef

fect of pharyngeal sounds on syllable structure, is exemplified in

the following:

w. Arabia Petraea [gahawah] 'coffee' [bidawi] 'Bedouin' E. Arabia Petraea [gahawah] "'[ghawah] (?) 'coffee'

N. Arabian [bduwi] 'Bedouin' (Palva 1980:119)

N. East Arabian [yhalif] 'he swears' (Ingham 1986:276) Syro-Mesopotamian [zlirna J 1 man 1 (Rosenhouse 1982:19)

S. Mesopotamian [skitan] 'they (f.) became silent'

(Ingham 1973:540) N. Hijazi. [nxalah] 'palm tree' (Al-Mozainy et al. 1985:136)

1i' J..'.J. North African [bgara] 'cow' (Woidich et al. 1987:247)

4.3.4 The Retention of the Long Vowel /i/ of the First Person Pronominal Suffix

Although in most cases final long vowels are diphthongized or

shortened under different phonetic conditions, the long stressed /i/ of the first-person pronominal suffix -i or -nl is retained in most cases in the dialect group of Arabia Petraea. One might note:

[canzi] 'my goat'' [~ugli] 'mine'' [xallani] 'he left me''

1 1 [ garatni] he threw me •

This retention of the final stressed long vowel is confirmed for the Western dialect, the Petra Bdul (Beni Yasin et al. 1984:

228), and the Bani cAtiyya of the Eastern dialect (Palva 1984b:7

102 footnote 8). Although Palva reports the retention of the long vowel side by side with its short counterpart, as in [marati] ~

[marati] 'my wife', it is believed that the -i/-ni versions are more characteristic of the Bedouin dialects of Arabia Petraea.

Traces of this feature are also found in areas of the Southern

Arabian dialect group, e.g., [Cindi] 'with me' (Prochazka 1987:59),

In contrast, most other major groups of Bedouin dialects seem to have only the short vowel -i/-ni, or other variants (Palva 1980:

120). Compare the following:

Arabia Petraea [jari] 'my neighbor' [~afoni] 'they saw me'

N. Arabian [ jari] II II [lafonan] II II II

(Abboud 1979:495)

103 4.3.5 Other Common Features

(A) The emphatic sounds

The Arabia Petraea dialect group possesses the major emphatic sounds [ts d]. The Western dialect is also confirmed to have [b m T 1 r], while the Eastern dialect is confirmed to possess [m] as re ported by Bani Yasin et al. (1984:203) for the Bdul of Petra, and by Palva (1984b:7-footnote 7) for the Huwaytat. . and Bani cAtiyya. . It is interesting to note that Palva reports the emphatic [m]. in [yumma] 'mother (vocative)', which is identical to the correspond ing form in the Western dialect. Although neither Palva nor Beni

Yasin reports the emphatic [b] for the Eastern dialect, it is be lieved that further systematic observation of this dialect will more likely reveal an emphatic [b], making the two dialects of Ara bia Petraea identical with regard to these emphatic consonants.

(B) Trochaic versus atrochaic syllable structure

+ a IC #~+C

A distinguishing feature of some of the Bedouin dialects is the insertion of an epenthetic low vowel /a/ (or a variant of it) between a word-final consonant and any of the consonant-initial suffixes, as in the Northern ~ijazi [mal+na] + [malana] 'our prop erty' (Al-Mozainy et al. 1985:137). This type of structure is called by Cantineau (1936:114-5) the trochaic syllable structure.

104 Although the Arabia Petraea dialect group has forms with

traces of this phenomenon, as in [cind+na] + [cindana] 'with us',

this dialect group has the "atrochaic" syllable structure, where in

most cases no such vowel is introduced even if its absence will

create a triconsonantal cluster, as in [kalb+na] + [kalbna] 'our

dog', [darb+hin] + [darbhin] 'their (f.) trails'. The atrochaic nature of the syllable structure of the two dialects of Arabia Pe

traea can be confirmed with a good deal of certainty. It is a well-established feature of the Western dialect and has been con firmed for the Petra Bdul of the Eastern dialect (Bani Yasin et al.

1984:217). Furthermore, although no conclusive evidence is avail able from the core area of the Eastern dialect, in a poem attribu ted to the Huwaytat. . tribe (Musil 1908:241-2), one may find the atrochaic syllable structure in [xelhum] 'their (m.) horses',

[gitichum] 'their (m.) herds' (p. 242), and [glathum] 'their (m.) argument to win the honor of treating the guest' (p. 241).

Therefore, one can say that this feature has spread throughout the whole area of Arabia Petraea, in comparison to the trochaic na ture of the neighboring North Arabian or Syro-Mesopotamian dia lects. Although the exact nature of the vowel introduced in the trochaic-oriented dialect groups is much more complicated and can take many forms, the following examples from a variety of Bedouin dialect groups should indicate either the atrochaic or the trochaic character of each:

105 Arabia Petraea [benhum] 'between them'

[minha] 'from her'

N. Arabian [simictana] 'you (m.) heard us'

(Abboud 1979:493)

S. Arabian [safana]'V 'he saw us'

(Prochazka 1987:66)

Syro-Mesopotamian [minneha] 'from her'

(Rosenhouse 1982:23)

S. Mesopotamian [?ahuthum] 'I put them'

(Abu-Haidar 1987:49)

E. North African [binathum] 'between them'

(Cantineau 1960:228)

In some Arabic dialects there are limited cases of deleted initial glottal stops, as in [camam] < OA /?acmam/ 'paternal un cles' and [xawal] < OA /?axwal/ 'maternal uncles'. However, in some Bedouin dialects, this deletion has been extended to cover some verbal, nominal and adjectival forms, as in [kalat] 'she ate'

< OA /?akalat/, in the Gulf area (Johnstone 1967:45). In contrast, in the Arabia Petraea dialect, there is a strong tendency to pre serve such forms with initial glottal stop, as in [?axadar] • 'green', [?akal] 'he ate', and [?ahali] 'my kin' in the Western di alect. Furthermore, although there is no conclusive evidence available on the Eastern dialect, the situation is probably similar to that of its Western counterpart. Bani Yasin (1984:212) provides

106 few examples of words with initial/?/ maintained, and only one ex

ample of an alternation between the deletion of/?/ and its reten

tion, in [?axaiat] ~ [xaiat] 'she took'.

This retention of#? in Arabia Petraea dialects, versus its

deletion in most Bedouin dialects, is exemplified by the following:

Arabia Petraea [?a C ta] 'he gave'

[?acama] 'blind'

[?ahal] 'kin'

N. Arabian [kala] 'he ate'

[xaia] 'he took' (Abboud 1979:487) N.E. Arabian [hamar] 'red'

[camay] 'blind' (Johnstone 1967:59)

Syro-Mesopotamian [kala] 'he ate'

[xaia] 'he took' (Palva 1976:37)

S. Mesopotamian [xaiet] 'I took' (Ingham 1982:80)

E. North African [xadar] 'green' T [hamar]. 'red' (Woidich 1987:245)

(D) The low vowel /a/ in open syllables

As previously noted (Section 3.2.1), only /a/ can be confirmed in open unstressed syllables, and most occurrences of [i] and [u] in such syllables are due to various phonological processes, such as the raising of /a/ by phonetic conditioning and/or raising by vowel harmony, as in:

107 /xataf/ + [xataf] 'he kidnapped'

/jamal/ + [jimal] 'camel'

/labis/ + [libis] 'he dressed'

/~agil/ + [~igil] 'heavy'

/gadiyya/ + [gidiyyi] 'issue' 'T 'T C - C - /camud/ + [ umud] I\., [ imud] 'tent-pole'

These surface changes of /a/ seem to be shared by most Bedouin

dialects, the only difference being whether the above phonological

processes are strictly applied at all times, or in a somewhat re

laxed situation. For example, such changes are strictly applied in

the Western dialect of Arabia Petraea, while in the Eastern dialect they are partly,, observed. Bani Yasin (1984:205) gives [~irib] 'he drank' , ( ki bir] 'big' with clear vowel harmony, and at the sam.e ,,; time reports (carid] 'wide' without such harmony. Also, Palva 'T (1984a:6) gives [~agil] 'heavy', without harmony, for the same dia

lect area. Furthermore, partial application of such surface chan

ges are noted for the East North African Bedouin dialect. Woidich

(1987: 245) reports ( iigig] I brother I 1 ( ~idid] I IleW I , but al SO

(hakim] 'doctor'. In addition, one can also see a great deal of

variation with regard to the above SR changes in the Muslim dialect

of Baghdad, which is a member of the Southern Mesopotamian group

and which also came under the influence of Bedouin dialects. For

example, Abu Haidar (1987:41) reports a variation of [garib] I\.,

(girib] I\., (grib] 'near'.

The unstressed low vowel /a/, or [i] < /a/, is often realized as [u] before or after the labial consonants. This is a distin-

108 guishing feature of the Northeast Arabian and the Gulf area dia

lects (Johnstone 1967:28), as in [jumal] 'camel', and traces of

this feature exist in the North Arabian group (Palva 1980:120):

[glumi] 'my pen'. As to the Arabia Petraea dialect group, the

Western dialect seems to lack this feature, while the Eastern dia

lect does have it in a small number of items. Palva (1984b:ll

footnote 19) confirms [kuman] 'also' for Bani cAtiyya of the East

ern dialect, and Bani Yasin (1984:205) reports [wudku] 'you (m.pl.) want' (cf. Western [widku]), [tuwil]. 'tall' (1984:210), [bugar] 'cows', and [gabul] 'before' (1984:209) in the Eastern dialect of

the Bdul of Petra. Interestingly, the [u] in [gabul] 'before' is actually an epenthetic vowel, which might indicate that this fea ture is stronger than predicted in this dialect if one is to com pare it to [gabur] 'grave' and [cadum] 'bone' in the dialect of -;- Mecca (Bakalla 1979:500). Meanwhile, in the Western dialect this epenthetic vowel is always [i] and such items are realized as

[gabil] 'before', [gabir] 'grave' and [cadim] 'bone'. -;-

109 4.4 Some Phonological Distinguishing Features of the Western

Arabia Petraea Dialect Slightly Confirmed for the Eastern Sub

Variety

This section is limited to three areas of interest: the diph thongization of final long vowels, the variants of the monophthon gized vowel /e/ < OA /ay/, and stress. These three areas represent the most salient features of the Arabia Petraea dialect group, es pecially the Western dialect.

4.4.1 The diphthongization of the long vowels in final position

One of the unique features of the Western dialect of the Ara bia Petraea dialect group is the diphthongization of the final long vowel /I/+ [iy] in some nouns and feminine forms of adjectives of color and physical defect, as was shown in Section 3.2.3 above.

Forms such as /jhi/ + [jhiy] 'Juha (a comic character)' and /camyi/

+ [carnyiy] 'blind (f.)' are representative. This type of SR diph thongization distinctively belongs to the Arabia Petraea dialect group, especially its Western dialect. As to its Eastern variety, the situation is possibly similar. The Bdul dialect of Petra is identical to that of the Western dialect (Bani Yasin 1984: 203); however, the degree of the spread of final /i/ + [iy] into the rest of the Eastern area is not clear. Musil (1908:53) reports the tri bal name [cyal ibn musi], where /musi/ + [musi] 'Moses', in which final /I/ is shortened, as in the Western dialect, due to lack of stress, and which possibly alternates with [musiy] for the area of

Macan, which is considered the heart of the Eastern dialect.

110 Therefore, one might conclude that this feature is found in the

Eastern dialect with a lower degree of frequency, or that future research will determine the accuracy of this statement.

It is important to note here that most other groups of Bedouin dialects have preserved OA final /a/+ [a], while in Arabia Petraea it has been replaced by /i/ + [iy], if one is to compare /~ti/+

[itiy] with East North African Bedouin /~ta/+ [rta] 'winter'.

This is a basic difference where UR i# + [iy] in Arabia Petraea corresponds to UR a#+ [a] in other Bedouin dialects. Furthermore, while the shortening of long vowels in final position is the norm in most Arabic dialects, the diphthongization as seen in Arabia

Petraea is remarkably rare, and the writer has not been able to confirm it for any other Arabic dialect.

The following are selected SR forms from various Bedouin di alects, showing the diphthongization of the final /i/ in Arabia

Petraea dialects and its absence in other Bedouin dialects;

111 W. Arabia Petraea [jhiy] 'Juha' ['ttiy] 'winter' [hawliy]. 'cross-eyed (f.)' [cisiy] 'Jesus' [miy] 'water'

E. Arabia Petraea [~tiy] 'winter' [hniy] 'here'

(Bani Yasin 1984:203)

N. Arabian [moya] 'water' (private conversation with

a native of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia) Syro-Mesopotamian [tar~a]. 'deaf (f.)' [soda] 'black (f.)' (Rosenhouse 1984:72)

[mayya] 'water' (Palva 1976:23)

S. Mesopotamian [hana] ~ [hna] 'here' (Ingham 1982:170)

E. North African [~ta] 'winter' (Woidich 1987:249)

In addition, the diphthongization and shortening, as well as the deletion of the second person feminine singular imperfective suffix -i + [iy] ~ [i] ~ 0, as in /?imlI/ + [?im~iy] ~ [?im~i] ~

[?iml] 'go! (f.sg.)' is reported for the whole area of Arabia Pe traea. However, according to my observations, the i# + [iy] va riety is far more dominant in the Western dialect, although Blanc

(1970:137) reports a few cases of [iy] ~ [i]. Furthermore, Stewart

(1987:48) reports that among the Ahaywat tribe of Central Sinai, the [iy] variant is exclusively reserved for the feminine singular imperfective, with the [i] variant for the masculine singular form.

As for the Eastern dialect, the Bdul of Petra (Bani Yasin 1984:212) and the Huwaytat. . and Bani cAtiyya tribes (Palva 1984b:10 footnote 17) all have the 0 variant for the masculine singular imperfective

112 form, a feature which this Eastern Arabia Petraea dialect shares with many Bedouin dialects of the ghawah type.

4.4.2 The monophthongized vowel /e/ < OA /ay/

As previously noted (Section 3.3.2), the vowel /e/, which as a rule corresponds to the Old Arabic diphthong /ay/, has the variants

[e] and [I] in what is apparently a highly systematic and phoneti cally conditioned process. The pattern /CeC/-+ [CeC] or [CIC], as in (sef] 'summer' and [sif] 'sword', is by far one of the most sa lient features of the Arabia Petraea dialect group, especially the

Western dialect.

While this feature is highly frequent in the Western dialect, it is slightly less so in the Eastern variety. Although the Bdul of Petra have the variant [e] in nominal and verbal forms, [bet] rather than [bit] 'house', [mitet] rather than [mi~it] 'I walked'

(Bani Yasin 1984;206), these members of the Eastern variety have extensively used the [i] variant in diminutive forms, in identical fashion to those of the Western dialect, as in [cyinih] 'small wa tering hole', [zlimih] 'small man', and, interestingly, [bet]

'house' and [byit] 'small house' (1984:209). One might conclude, then, that the Eastern dialect of the Bdul is basically similar to the Western dialect. The [I] variant of /e/ is possibly somewhat suppressed in the Bdul dialect because of their exposure to out siders, being located in the immediate vicinity of the Roman ruins of Petra, a popular tourist site.

113 As to the rest of the Eastern area, it his likely that besides

the expected /e/ + [e], cases of /e/ + [i] exist. In Musil (1908:56

and 1924:210), one finds the [i] variant in the frequent Bedouin

proper name [sliman] < /sleman/ 'Suleyman', and Musil's guide is

said to be [ctiwi] < /ctewi/ 'small man' from the Bani cAtiyya

tribe (1924:208). However, research is needed to ascertain whether

such raising is in any way similar to or as systematic as that of

the Western dialect.

Furthermore, in the greatest majority of Arabic dialects, one

finds /e/ corresponding to OA /ay/ and only in a very limited num

ber of cases is /e/ raised to [i], such as the frequent [kif]<

/kef/ 'how' and the borrowed word [~itan] < /1etan/ 'Satan'. Ex

tensive research in this area has indicated that [e] is the only

variant found in the rural and urban dialects of the whole Syro

Palestinian dialect group (Palva 1967:4). Although the [e] variant

is the only variant found in most major Bedouin dialect groups, a

few isolated cases of the raised [I] variant exist in the North

Arabian. dialect group, such as [zin]- < /zen/- I good', [sin]<'/- /sen/'/-

jbad;, and [gid] < /ged/ 1 swnmer 1 (Ingham 1982:80 footnote 1). - ""i" T Palva (1976:20) asserts also that in a limited number of cases the

variants [e] ~ [I] alternate almost freely among the Syro-Mesopota mian cAjarmah at the northeastern corner of the Dead Sea, although

one must not dismiss the possibility of the exposure of this group

to speakers of Arabia Petraea to the west and south.

Finally, while this highly distinguishing and highly system atic process involving the monophthongized vowel /e/ + [e] and [I]

114 is very rare in Arabic dialects, there does exist at least one case of significant similarity in the Khuzistan area of Iran. This up per variety of Southern Mesopotamian of the cAmara area (northern and eastern Khuzistan, which represents the easternmost frontier of the Arabic language) has UR /e/ which is either retained as [e] in verbal forms or raised to [i] in non-verbal forms (Ingham 1976:68).

While the choice of the [e] or [I] variants is highly conditioned by the phonetic environment in the Arabia Petraea dialect group

([sef] 'summer' vs. [sif] 'sword'), the Mesopotamian variants are chosen by morphological factors (nominal [sif] 'sword', [xil] 'hor ses', but [liget] 'I walked'. This difference can be seen in the following comparative examples between the use of the variants [e] and [i] in Western Arabia Petraea and upper Southern Mesopotamian:

Western Arabia Petraea Upper Southern Mesopotamian

[bit] [bit] 'house' [hsin]. [hsin]. 'Husayn' [kif] [~If] 'how' (Ingham 1982:80)

[sif] [sif] 'sword' (Ingham 1976:68)

[bani htit] 'Bani Hutayt'

[bani skin] 'Bani Sukayn'

[mdina] 'Mudayna' (1976:69)

115 But note that [e] appears only in verbal forms in Upper South-

ern Mesopotamian:

Western Arabia Petraea Upper Southern Mesopotamian

[xel] [xil] 'horses'

[wen] [win] 'where'

C -V [ ales] [calil] 'why' (Ingham 1982:80) [mhesin]. [mhisin]. '(proper name)' (Ingham 1976:68)

[ligit] [HgetJ 'I found' [Xa£et] 'I took'

[kiletJ 'I ate' (Ingham 1982:80)

4.4.3 Stress

The unique feature of stress in the Arabia Petraea dialects is displayed in the assignment of stress to the second syllable rather than the first in the absence of a heavy syllable, and in stressing the final syllable of feminine forms of certain adjectives of color and physical defect. One might note the stress assignment on ,. " .I' [haraba] 'water well', [jimal] 'camel', [bida]... 'white (f.)' and [camyiy]" 'blind (f.)'. In contrast, in most forms of Arabic, stress falls on the first syllable of an item in the absence of a heavy syllable in most monosyllabic and dissyllabic items; other wise it falls on the antepenultimate syllable of items of three or more syllables (Brame 1971:556).

116 The above pattern of stress assignment in Arabia Petraea is widespread throughout the Western dialect and can be confirmed for parts of the Eastern dialect, based on the Bani Yasin (1984:210) study of the Bdul dialect of Petra. For the rest of the Eastern area, i.e., the dialect of the Huwaytat- and Bani- C Atiyya tribes, no reliable information is available on the stress patterns. Palva's

(1984a:6) assignment of stress on the first syllable of the alter- ; ., nating-syllable structures CVCaCV ~ CCaCV, and also his stress as-

~ ~ / signment on the words [marati] ~ [marati] 'my woman' and [jamali] ~

[jamali]" 'my camel' (1984a:7 footnote 8) might be interpreted as showing that the dialect of these Eastern tribes displays a totally different stress pattern from those of the Bdul of Petra and West ern Arabia Petraea. However, in the case above CVCaCV ~ CCaCV al ternating syllable structures, the issue is whether the dialect is of the gahawah or ghawah type; as indicated earlier, the ghawah theory is dismissed for lack of evidence, while the gahawah theory has been adopted although one expects the syllable structure CVCaCV to have the stress on the second syllable, rather than the first as

Palva indicates.

,;' Furthermore, in the above CVCaCV and examples such as [jamali]

'my camel', these forms involve the presence of more than two light syllables. In such a case it is widely reported that stress fluc tuates between the first and second syllable. This fluctuation of stress is reported for the Bdul of Petra (Bani Yasin 1984:210): .,, ,,, u .,, v' [baraka] ~ [baraka] 'blessing' and [libaka] ~ [sibaka] 'net', and

/ / for Western Arabia Petraea (Blanc 1970:121): [waladah] ~ [waladah]

117 'his son'. Therefore, Palva's examples, although the only ones available, are not sufficient to determine the stress pattern for the important dialect of the Huwaytat. . and Bani cAtiyya tribes, which represent the core of Eastern Arabia Petraea. Furthermore, a reasonable judgment about the fluctuation of the stress between the first and second syllable in the above examples is that it is not necessarily a genuine feature of this gahawah dialect. The writer has noted that stressing the second syllable in the items with so called fluctuation of stress is far more frequent than stressing the first syllable, which is most likely to be due to pressure from neighboring dialects. In addition, -the other unique feature of stressing the final syllable of certain feminine adjectival forms can be confirmed for the Western dialect and for the Bdul of the

Eastern area, but for this, no information is available on the

Huwaytat and Bani cAtiyya dialects.

The stress pattern of the Arabia Petraea dialect group is not shared by many Bedouin dialects, which follow the usual stress pat tern of Arabic. However, in the Eastern North African Bedouin di alect, there does seem to be a partial similarity. Woidich (1987:

247) assigns stress to the second syllable (as is the case in Ara- ,, ; ,, bia Petraea) in [bahar]. 'sea', [nixal] 'palm', [misak] 'he caught', / / [nizal] 'he dismounted' and [jimal] 'camel' (1987:246). Mitchell

(1960:345) reports this feature of second-syllable stress for syl

)1 C / lables with pharyngeal sounds: [su ar] 'hair', among the Libyan

Bedouins of Cyrenaica. Although Matar (1967:101) assigns stress to

/ the first syllable in some of the same examples ([bahar]. 'sea',

118 [sa"'c ar] Thair'), he shows agreement with the Arabia Petraea stress pattern in second-syllable stress in [catt] The gave' and [cam:]

The blinded' (1967:102) for the Bedouins of Egypt's Western Desert.

Furthermore, this North African variety does not share with Arabia

Petraea the stress feature for feminine adjectives of color and physical defect. Mitchell (1960:345) assigns stress to the first ,, syllable in [hajla] '(horse color) having white hair on the fore- • legs' and [hamra]/ 'red (f.) 1 rather than the last syllable as in the case of Arabia Petraea.

Finally, most of the neighboring Bedouin dialects adjacent to

Arabia Petraea follow the familiar stress pattern, where in the ab sence of a heavy syllable stress falls on the initial syllable.

Kenstowicz (1984b:170) confirms this for the Syro-Mesopotarnian dia lect of the Bani Hasan tribe, Johnstone (1967:29) for Northeast Arabian, and Al-Mozainy (1985:137) for Northern Hijazi. •

119 CHAPTER 5

CONCLUSIONS

In this study the basic features of Bedouin Palestinian Arabic as spoken in the Northern Naqab Desert have been presented through a brief analysis of its sound system. These features have been traced over a large neighboring geographical area in order to de termine the regional character of this dialect and, further, to determine its place within the ranks of Bedouin dialects.

A) Some of the significant findings of this study can be sum marized as follows:

1) The emphatic ltl, Isl and /di in this Arabic dialect con- • . .- trast with their non-emphatic counterparts in all positions and oc cur with all vowels,

The emphatic lbl, 1ml, lrl and Ill were given a phonemic sta tus, despite their limited occurrence (mainly before or after the low vowels) and despite their lack of contrast with their plain counterparts. These sounds are also frequent in contiguity with Ix/, lg/ and lgl. Like the emphatic It/, Isl and ldl, this second T set of emphatic sounds were found to have an emphatic-like effect on adjacent segments and often maintain their emphatic phonetic structure in their inflections and derivations.

120 Furthermore, the pharyngeal /x/ and /g/ as well as the velar

/g/ add momentum to emphasis by triggering a C-like effect on the

neighboring consonants and vowels. This C-like effect not only in

creases the occurrence of the emphatic /b/, /m/, /r/ and /1/ tre mendously, but also marks consonants such as /f/, /w/, /n/ and/?/ with emphasis.

In addition, the emphatic effect created by /x/, /g/ and /g/ seems to represent a major feature distinguishing this dialect, and

Bedouin dialects in general, from the neighboring sedentary dia lects which often lack this effect. It is hoped that the present analysis of emphasis, one of only very few analyses of emphasis available for any Bedouin dialect, will assist future researchers to come to a better understanding of this still controversial issue in Arabic linguistics, particularly with respect to possible phono logical carriers of emphasis, the number of emphatic sounds, and the number of low vowel phonemes.

2) Other significant findings of this study concern the vo calic system and the stress assignment of Bedouin Palestinian Ara bic. While the short vowels contrast in most closed syllables, only /a/ can be confirmed in open unstressed syllables. The long vowel /I/, which in most cases replaces Old Arabic final /a/ or

/ a?,- I ' is often diphthongized to [iy] in final position; the monophthongized vowel /e/ < OA /ay/ is often raised to [i]; and when all syllables of an item are light, stress falls on the second syllable rather than the first, as is the case in most Arabic dialects.

These unique features provide rich ground for further researchers

121 of Arabic dialectology, since some of them are so rare that they cannot be confirmed for other Arabic dialects.

3) Most of the above findings about the northern Naqab dia lect of the al-Ramadin subtribe of the al-Tayaha were confirmed to T be shared by the Bedouins of the rest of the Naqab, Sinai, Araba

Valley, southern Jordan, and northwestern parts of Saudi Arabia.

As a result, the dialects of this large geographical territory were collectively grouped as the Arabia Petraea group. This grouping, which includes Bedouin dialects which have previously been largely unclassified, adds a major group to the already established Bedouin dialect groups.

Furthermore, two regional varieties of the Arabia Petraea dia lects were recognized. In view of the overall characteristics of the Bedouin dialects, the Arabia Petraea dialect group was found to be the chief representative of the gahawah group of Bedouin dialects. Its syllable structure is clearly atrochaic, and its velars are never affricated. Most other major Bedouin dialect groups, such as the Syro-Mesopotamian, North Arabian, and Southern Mesopo tamian, were found to belong to the ghawah group of Bedouin dia lects, their syllable structure is atrochaic, and their velars are often affricated before or after front vowels.

122 B) The findings of this study have the following implica tions:

1) Assuming that the present analysis is correct, the estab lishment of the Arabia Petraea dialect group may help to fill a considerable gap in Bedouin dialectology. The Bedouin dialects to the north and northeast of the Great Syrian Desert have been large ly classified since 1936, while the first study of a Bedouin dia lect in the Western Arabia Petraea of the Naqab was first intro duced in 1970 by Blanc, and although no systematic observation was made of the Eastern area of Arabia Petraea, a tentative grouping was suggested by Palva in 1984 for southern Jordan and northwestern

Saudi Arabia. However, the Western section of the Naqab and Sinai remained largely unclassified. It is hoped that this study will help narrow this gap and further facilitate the classification of the Hijazi dialects to the south and the Maccazah dialects of

Egypt 1 s Eastern Desert, across the Red Sea.

2) This study may also have methodological implications for

Bedouin dialect grouping. While traditionally standard criteria have been used for the classification of Arabic dialects, Bedouin and non-Bedouin alike, this study has emphasized the development of criteria peculiar to Bedouin dialects. Such criteria, while lim ited to phonology, included some distinguishing features such as the gahawah-versus-ghawah typology, the trochaic versus atrochaic syllable structures, and the presence or absence of affrication of the velars. By following such criteria, typological analyses of

123 Bedouin dialects may be conveniently made by drawing attention to what could be concentrated on in future research.

3) This study may also have some historical implications for the overall development of Bedouin dialects. For example, the study seems to indicate the importance of linguistic conservatism due to geographic and social isolation.

Despite the fact that the Arabic dialects are largely similar, the rare features of the Arabia Petraea dialect group suggest that due to isolation, some dialect features of this area may have been preserved and resisted the normal course of dialect leveling and change which have occurred in many Arabic dialects.

This is especially true of the Western dialect of the Arabia

Petraea area, and to a lesser extent of its Eastern counterpart, where some of the distinguishing features are not found in most

Bedouin dialects. The strong presence of the [i] variant of the monophthongized vowel, the diphthongization of the final vowel /I/, and the assignment of stress to the second syllable in the absence of a heavy syllable, all indicate the conservative character of this dialect. However, the three or four cases of the [I] variant of /e/ in the North Arabian group seem to indicate that some lin guistic leveling must have occurred in this dialect. Also, the traces of second-syllable stress found in East North African Be douin is an indication that this feature may have had a stronger presence in this dialect group.

124 Future studies are still needed to clear up such issues of di

alect relationships. For example, an examination of the stress

system of this North African Bedouin dialect might reveal a closer

relationship or similarity with that of Arabia Petraea, especially

the Western dialect, since it is well documented that some of the

Bedouin groups in the northern Sinai Desert have actually migrated

back from this North African area. The [I] variant of /e/ has a

strong presence in the upper areas of the Southern Mesopotamian

group of Khuzistan (Arabistan) in Iran, although this raising of

/e/is different in its conditioning from the Arabia Petraea case.

However, more research is needed to confirm whether this phenomenon

is an indication of a deeper relationship. This Khuzistani variety

of Arabic has a high degree of isolation, being the last continuous

outpost of Arabic language in the eastern frontiers.

Palva (1984a:footnote 41) notes that the dialects of Arabia Petraea (Eastern and Western) are of the Hijazi. type. While this statement requires further clarification, there are some basic dif

ferences between Northern Hijazi and the Arabia Petraea dialect

group.

This study shows that the Arabia Petraea dialects are of the gahawah type, with an essentially atrochaic syllable structure, while Northern Hijazi, or Bedouin ~ijazi Arabic, is shown by al

Mozainy (1985) to be a member of the ghawah type with a clearly trochaic syllable structure. Although these differences are impor tant, the velars /k/ and /g/ are not affricated in both dialect groups, a fact which represents an essential common feature.

125 It also remains to be seen whether al-Mozainy's "Bedouin Hi

jazi Arabic" is representative of the whole Northern Hijazi area,

or simply of his own particular Harb tribe, which occupies the cen

tral area of Hijaz. Many tribes whose dialects are largely unknown

reside further north from the Harb territories. Also, Palva's

scattered, although important, comments on the dialects of the Hu waytat. and Bani cAtiyya tribes of Eastern Arabia Petraea are not sufficient to describe this dialect. Once there is better documen

tation for the Hijazi dialect as well as the Eastern variety of

Arabia Petraea, one may be able to argue for a possible etymologi

cal relationship between these two dialect groups.

Palva (1987:139) further suggests a major Hijazi-Red Sea group of dialects connecting the dialects of Arabia Petraea, the Hijazi

dialects, and the unknown dialect of the Ma cc-azah, which is spoken in the Arabian Desert along the Egyptian side of the Red Sea. This study may provide partial support for a possible relationship be tween the dialects of the Maccazah and those of Arabia Petraea, based on common genealogy and common geographical origin. In view of the overall characteristics of the Bedouin dialects of Eastern

Arabic, one may conceive of two giant groups of Bedouin dialects: the Hijazi-Red Sea group suggested by Palva and another group con taining the Syro-Mesopotamian, North Arabian, Northeast Arabian, and Southern Mesopotamian.

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131 Mediterranean Sea ~1~- North Arabian • ,, es1tern II ~ Arabia Ma'an ( • ~ Petraea. ~ 1-c:J Ill t,::1 'd z Eastern t:J t--' ~ ( t--' C/l H w North Arabian N :x: Arabia :i> \ ~- N ~~ ~ ~tl"P-:., Petraea %~ t ~t- { \ Dialect Groups of '> Arabia Petraea and I North Arabian Surrounding Areas Red

0 50 100 Sea Miles Map 2

Nl editerranean

Sea

Red Sea Bedouin Tribes of Arabia Petraea and Surrounding Areas

Miles 0 50 100 C.u1011npl'lr, Jim Bi:a, 1919

133