Talk:Maghrebi Arabic

Jebli Arabic and Jijel Arabic

What do these terms mean ? Sarcelles (talk) 18:24, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Good luck finding somebody capable of answering: you're better off using Google :D the roof of this court is too high to be yours (talk) 06:22, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Jebli arabic & jijel arabic

JEBLI ARABIC : is the arabic dialect spoken in THE NORTH OF MOROCCO (where I'm from) we call it also SHAMALIYA (northern ) it's very different from the other dialect in morocco ! it's very semilar to the arabic that was spoken in Al-Andalus ! we use sometimes some Spanish words JIJEL ARABIC : all what i know is JIJEL is a region in ALGERIA !! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 197.128.168.80 (talk) 22:43, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Upper Arabic

Is the taught Classical Arabic that was spoken in Granada by the Arabesque Iberian cultural population that settled Granada escaping the Almohad (Berber) and Reconquest (Latin) until the Morisco expulsions. It differs greatly from Andalusian because the last days of the smaller Emirate of Granada had a more Ethnic concentrated Arabic speaking population that distanced themselves from the Latin and Berber populations (both replaced Arab dynasties all over Iberia from the 13th century). The last rural lands to speak Arabic (Moriscos) were the highlands between Granada and Rabita. Those were expelled into Iberia and eventually most ended up in North Africa 16th-17th century and naturally a more distinguished Arabic, especially at that time when education was still limited and classical Arabic didn't penetrate as far as it does today, due to modern technology and 20th century Arabism and Islamism. Outerbulbs (talk) 06:21, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Merge?

It's hard to see why there is both a Darija and Maghrebi Arabic article. If there is indeed some strong distinction then the articles should be edited to clarify that - but otherwise they should be merged. Snori (talk) 15:57, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, no need to have two articles about the same thing. --Tachfin (talk) 12:49, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I also agree. The current article only talks about Maghrebi Arabic, and there's already an article for that. --Article editor (talk) 22:42, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Same thing with two articles, i agree with merge.--Oldstoneage (talk) 00:27, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Agree, definitely merge. There is no difference between both concepts, as far as I know, or if there is any, it can be mentioned in the same article. Ilyacadiz (talk) 11:00, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Agree, Darija is a stub post anyway, compared to all the information on Moroccan Arabic and Maghrebi Arabic. Anyone who wants to learn about "Darija" would not really find what they're looking for by reading that page. Users would be better served if this were merged, and Darija is only used with the Maghrebi dialects, not in the Middle East. Arabicdarija (talk) 10:50, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

On Jebli and Berber influence

Speakers of Darija will know that the Berber influence is marginal except in Jebli and perhaps Jijel Arabic (the latter one I have never heard). Jebli is pre-bedouin and is influenced by the original arabic spoken by the only berbers to be arabized in the region prior to the mass arrival of the banu hilal and possibly Andalusi Arabic. There is an influence in terms of pronounciation and manner of speech and expressions directly translated from berber but linguistically it is largely based on Hilali Arabic, who come from somewhere in the Hijaaz I believe. Because the pronounciation is difficult to understand by eastern arabs (except perhaps those who have had some contact with it and have a rich understanding of classical arabic), there is a myth that it is largely based on Berber and this should be dispelled in this article. There is also a political undertone and element of xenophobia to this belief. There are very few berber words in the large majority of Maghrebi dialects and it is firmly rooted in Bedouin Arabic. Strangely Mauritanians and Libyans are believed by mashreq arabs to speak a very pure form of arabic, when they just speak another variant of Darija. French or Spanish loan words are not always used and one can speak correct Darija without barely using any and substituting most of them with either Darija or Fus7a. This is purely attributed to code switching. I think this should be made clear with the relevant sources. Asilah1981 (talk) 10:59, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I agree inasmuch as, at least in Morocco, the Berber influence on the vocabulary of Darija, even in regions inhabited nowadays by Berbers, is not very high and in any case much smaller than French or even Spanish (the influence in phonetics or grammar is another issue). But it's not true that - at least in Morocco - you can "speak correctly Darija" substituting French or Spanish words with other Darija words. Of course one can use Fus7a words, but than it's not longer "correct Darija" but a mixture. The correct word for Week in Moroccan Darija is "semana", never usbu'a, which is Fus7a. The correct word for "long distance bus" is lkar, (plural kiran), never "hafila". If one says he's taking the hafila every usbu'a, he's not longer speaking Darija and would immediately be recognized as a stranger or somebody trying to show off. (That might be different in Algeria, where decades of Arabization with Egyptian teachers have taken place) Ilyacadiz (talk) 11:12, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Ilyacadiz The use of loanwords from European languages is prevalent in both Eastern and Western dialects of Arabic. What I´m saying is that normal Darija can be spoken with no more loanwords from French than Syrian or Lebanese. The use of "simana" or "lkar" is not the reason for which it will not be understood by Mashreq speakers. It is the way Arabic is spoken which is inherently different and the more complex syntax which they don´t understand. They won´t pick up on expressions which are 100% Arabic: Basic phrases like "ch bghit ddiri?", "thella frask", "kayddini n3as" etc... That is the barrier in communication, not random loanwords.Asilah1981 (talk) 15:58, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Ilyacadiz Another thing, there are words which are completely different in meaning such as 7out, which in the Maghreb is the common word for fish and in eastern Arabic means whale. Or 3yyan which in darija invariably means tired whereas in eastern countries it means sick. Basic words of Arabic origin: "mzyan/mzyana/mzyanine" "kayn/kayna/kaynine", "bzaf", "b7al" or "f7al". I also have a feeling North African Arabic is a more verbal based language where verb conjugation plays a stronger role in conveying meaning. Then there are words which consistently lose or change letters. A Jordanian or Egyptian won't understand "9otlek" or "chti?" for example. An example from Algerian Darija: "Dork" (now) originally comes from "had el waqt" transformed to "derwek" and eventually "dork". A similar to the Egyptian Dilwa'ti, which everyone understands due to the international projection of this dialect. Another confounding factor people often ignore: in spoken darija, articles are often dropped altogether out of convenience which makes the language more fluid and harder to follow for non-native speakers.Asilah1981 (talk) 06:06, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Substrate includes Punic, Greek, Latin

Afro Asiatic Berber is obviously the major substrate, but the article should cover the Derja Arabic including all non-Berber influence Punic, Greek and Latin are part of the substrate, especially when Tunisia is the origin of Derja, the non-Arabic influence in Tunisia was more diverse than in Atlas. Atlas Arabic is the result of the big Berber population adding Arabic, while preserving their own language, that variant is more Berber bordering a Creole than a dialect, it didn't expand much outside of the Atlas. When Berbers ruled other parts outside of Atlas in various periods of history they achieved prestige by conquering Tunis, they used Classical Arabic as the language of prestige, even when the demographic majority was Berber from foot soldiers to the Palace. Contrast this with Punic, Greek and Latin speakers who introduced their language when they had political control. Outerbulbs (talk) 06:04, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Atlas-Centric Creolization

If the Derja disintegrates into a full-fledged Creole then the center of this Creole is the predominately Berber Atlas. Outerbulbs (talk) 06:04, 14 February 2023 (UTC)