DEPARTAMENT DE TEORIA DELS LLENGUATGES I CIÈNCIES DE LA COMUNICACIÓ THE SPEECH ACTS IN MOROCCAN ARABIC: AN INTERCULTURAL APPROACH. SAIDA ANSSARI NAIM UNIVERSITAT DE VALÈNCIA Servei de Publicacions 2011 Aquesta Tesi Doctoral va ser presentada a València el dia 3 de juny de 2011 davant un tribunal format per: - Dra. Carmen Barceló Torres - Dr. Emilio Ridruejo Alonso - Dr. Joaquín García Medall - Dr. Francisco Raga Gimeno - Dra. Francisca Suau Jiménez Va ser dirigida per: Dr. Carlos Hernández Sacristán Dra. Rosana Dolón Herrero ©Copyright: Servei de Publicacions Saida Anssari Naim I.S.B.N.: 978-84-370-8514-2 Edita: Universitat de València Servei de Publicacions C/ Arts Gràfiques, 13 baix 46010 València Spain Telèfon:(0034)963864115 UNIVERSITAT DE VALENCIA Facultat de Filologia, Traducció i Comunicació Departament de Teoria dels Llenguages i de Ciències de la Comunicació TESIS DOCTORAL Speech Acts in Moroccan Arabic An Intercultural Approach Presentada por: Saida Anssari Naim Dirigida por: Dr. Carlos Hernández Sacristán Dra. Rosa Ana Dolón Herrero Valencia, 2011 - 1 - ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I would like to express my deep and sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Professor Carlos Hernandez Sacristán. His wide knowledge and his logical way of thinking have been of great value for me. His understanding, encouraging and personal guidance have provided a good basis for the present thesis. I am deeply grateful to my supervisor, Doctor Rosana Dolón, for her guiding and constructive comments, and for her valuable support throughout this work. I wish to express my warm and sincere thanks to Doctor Emilio Garcia Gomez, whose constant insistence and his encouragement during my difficult moments, were decisive for the completion of this thesis. I owe my loving thanks to my mother, sisters and brothers for their support. Special loving thanks are to my daughter Yasmin, who has been patient, and did without my attention, particularly, during the last months of the preparation of this thesis. I wish to extend my warmest thanks to all those who have directly, or indirectly helped me with my work. - 2 - To the memory of my Dad - 3 - INDEX - 4 - - 5 - INDEX Titles Pages INTRODUCTION 11 PART I Contextualization of the study Chapter 1: Moroccans in Spain 31 1.1. Brief historical account of Moroccan Migration 1.2. Brief account of the history and the economical situation of Morocco 1.2.1. History 1.2.2. The economic situation 1.3. Review of the history of Migration 1.3.1. The great migration boom (1963-1972) 1.3.2. Diversification of migration patterns 1.4. The socio economical profile of Moroccans in Spain 1.4.1. Evolution of Moroccan Immigration in Spain 1.4.2. Geographical distribution of Moroccan immigrants in Spain 1.4.3. Evolution of Moroccan Immigration in the Valencian Community 1.4.4. Distribution of Moroccan migrants in the Valencian Provinces 1.5. The socio-cultural implication of being Moroccan in Spain Chapter 2: The socio-linguistic profile of Morocco 43 2.1. Morocco as a multilingual community 2.2. Berber/Tamazight: language and history 2.2.1. A chronological account of Imazighen (Berbers) 2.2.2. Moroccan Berbers 2.3. Moroccan Arabic: Varieties and accents 2.3.1. Geo-linguistic distribution of Moroccan Arabic PART II Methodological framework and general research objectives Chapter 3: Methodological framework 61 Introduction 3.1. Intercultural communication - 6 - 3.2. Culture 3.2.1. The cultural anthropological perspective 3.2.2. The interactional/sociolinguistic and the cross-cultural pragmatic perspectives 3.2.3. The interactional/sociolinguistic approach 3.2.4. The cross-cultural pragmatic approach 3.3. Politeness as a universal variable in cross-cultural communication 3.3.1. Speech act theory 3.3.2. Early formulations of SAT 3.3.2.1. Austin 3.3.2.2. Grice 3.3.2.3. Searle 3.3.3. Revision of SAT 3.3.3.1. Approach to Illocutionary-force-indicating devices (IFIDS) 3.3.3.2. Identifying performative utterances 3.3.4. Taxonomy of illocutionary acts 3.3.5. Interpretation of illocutionary forces 3.4. Universality versus linguistic and cultural relativity of speech acts 3.4.1. The interactional act 3.4.2. Cross-linguistic/cross-cultural approach to SAT 3.5. Linguistic politeness 3.5.1. Politeness as face-saving strategy 3.5.2. Politeness and the conversational-maxim view 3.5.3. Politeness and the conversational-contract view 3.5.4. Politeness and the social-norm view 3.5.5. Politeness and the post-modern view 3.5.6. Politeness and the frame-based view 3.6. Critiques of politeness theories Chapter 4: Politeness in Moroccan Arabic and General Aims of the study 97 Introduction 4.1. Politeness in Moroccan Arabic 4.1.1. The function of Religious lexicon in the performance of politeness in Moroccan Arabic 4.1.2. Politeness and the indexical meaning of Religious lexicon 4.1.3. Authorship and agency 4.2. General research objectives of this study - 7 - PART III Qualitative experience-based analysis of Thanks/apology, Invitations and Compliments in Moroccan Arabic Chapter 5: Thanks/apology 119 5.1. The phenomenon of extrapolation of ―sorry‖ in Moroccan Arabic 5.2. Politeness and the extrapolation of Smahli ―sorry‖ in Moroccan Arabic 5.3. Issues in the interpretation of Moroccan apology 5.4.―Shukran‖ versus ―Smahly‖ and the Phenomenon of Permutability 5.5. Shukran + smahli and the ―added‖ constraint 5.6. The ―hearer´s apology‖ Chapter 6: Invitation 139 6.1. The purpose of the study of invitation 6.2. Research on Invitations 6.2.1. Ambiguous Invitations 6.2.2. Ostensible Invitations 6.3. Invitating across cultures 6.3.1. Invitation in Arabic 6.3.2. Invitations in Farsi 6.4. Invitation in Moroccan Arabic 6.4.1. Socio-cultural function of invitation in Moroccan Arabic 6.4.1.1. Official invitations 6.4.1.2. The ―imposed‖ invitee 6.4.1.3. Casual invitations 6.5. Conversational Swearing: the pragmatic strategy ―par-excellence‖ to validate invitations 6.5.1. The cultural contour of swearing 6.5.2. Form, Context and Function of Conversational Swearing in Moroccan Arabic 6.5.3. The linguistic realization of conversational swearing 6.6. Education and invitation in the speech behaviour of Moroccans 6.6.1. The socio-cultural context of code switching in Moroccan Arabic 6.6.2. The conversational meaning of ―Insha Allah‖ 6.6.3. The speech function of ―Insha Allah‖ 6.7. Age and invitation 6.8. Invitation refusal 6.8.1. The cultural aspects of the speech act of refusing 6.9. The speech act of refusal in Moroccan culture - 8 - 6.9.1. Invitation refusal in Moroccan Arabic Chapter 7: Compliments 209 7.1. Definition of compliments 7.1.1. Aspects of compliments 7.1.1.1. Lexical repertoire 7.1.1.2. Syntax of compliments 7.1.1.3. Topical patterns 7.2. Participants and complimenting behaviour 7.2.1. Gender 7.2.2. Age 7.3 Social function of compliments 7.3.1 Solidarity 7.3.2. Consolidation of desired behaviour patterns 7.4. Compliments and culture 7.4.1. Compliment in American culture 7.4.2. Compliments in New Zealand culture 7.4.3. Compliments in Japanese culture 7.4.4. Compliment in Mexican culture 7.4.5. Compliments in Egyptian culture 7.4.6. Compliments in Syrian culture 7.5. Compliments in Moroccan Arabic 7.5.. Complimenting and religion in Moroccan Arabic 7.5.2. The socio-cultural interpretation and constraints on the eye/sight 7.5.3. The eye as a nonverbal instrument in face-to-face communication 7.5.4. Eye/sight in the religious contour 7.6. Socio-cultural approach to the evil eye 7.6.1. Definition of the evil eye 7.6.2. Cultural extension of the belief in the evil eye 7.6.3. The evil-eye and religion 7.6.3.1 The evil-eye belief in the Jewish/Christian culture/religion 7.6.3.2. Islam: ―the evil-eye is a fact‖ 7.6.4. Diagnosis of the evil eye 7.6.5. Rituals and remedies to ward off the evil-eye: the case of ―ma shaa Allah‖ in Moroccan Arabic 7.7. Socio-cultural constraints on complimenting in Moroccan Arabic - 9 - 7.8. The phenomenon of speaker´s request for compliments 7.9. The phenomenon of the use of Compliment-complement as a compliment in Moroccan Arabic 7.10. Compliment responses 7.10.1. Compliment response in Moroccan Arabic 7.10.2. Compliment response in the speech behaviour of young and educated Moroccans 7.10.3. Status and compliments in Moroccan Arabic 7.10.4. Gender and compliments in Moroccan Arabic 7.10.4.1. Men versus women and the object of compliments 7.10.4.2. Men versus women and the linguistic realisation of compliments 7.10.5. Age and complimenting in Moroccan Arabic 7.11. The ―piropo‖ in Moroccan culture PART IV Quantitative analysis of Compliments, Invitations and Thanks/apology Chapter 8: Cross-cultural research and methodology 265 8.1. Design of the research 8.1.1. Instrumentation of the study 8.1.2. The selection of the language 8.1.3. Discourse Completion Test 8.1.4. The socio-cultural and the socio-linguistic variables 8.1.4.1 The socio-cultural variables: Power-P, Social Distance-D, Rank of Imposition-I 8.1.4.2. Gender 8.1.4.3. Age 8.1.4.4. The choice of aspects for compliments, invitations and thanks /apology 8.1.5. Limitations 8.2. Informants 8.2.1. Profile of respondents 8.2.1.1. Age of respondents 8.2.1.2. Gender of respondents 8.2.1.3.