Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics: Papers from the Annual Symposium on Arabic Linguistics. Volume I: Salt Lake City, Utah 1987

308 Pages·1990·25.49 MB·English

by  Mushira Eid (Ed.)

PERSPECTIVES ON ARABIC LINGUISTICS I
AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND
HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE
General Editor
E.F. KONRAD KOERNER
(University of Ottawa)
Series IV - CURRENT ISSUES IN LINGUISTIC THEORY
Advisory Editorial Board
Henning Andersen (Los Angeles); Raimo Anttila (Los Angeles)
Thomas V. Gamkrelidze (Tbilisi); Hans-Heinrich Lieb (Berlin)
J. Peter Maher (Chicago); Ernst Pulgram (Ann Arbor, Mich.)
E. Wyn Roberts (Vancouver, B.C.); Danny Steinberg (Tokyo)
Volume 63
Mushira Eid (ed.)
Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics I
PERSPECTIVES ON
ARABIC LINGUISTICS I
PAPERS FROM
THE FIRST ANNUAL SYMPOSIUM
ON ARABIC LINGUISTICS
Edited by
MUSHIRA EID
University of Utah
Salt Lake City
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
1990
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Symposium on Arabic Linguistics (1st : 1987 : University of Utah)
Perspectives on Arabic linguistics I : papers from the First Annual Symposium on
Arabic Linguistics / edited by Mushira Eid.
p. cm. -- (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science.
Series IV, Current issues in linguistic theory, ISSN 0304-0763; v. 63)
Papers from a symposium held Apr. 24-25, 1987 at the University of Utah.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Arabic language--Grammar--Congresses. 2. Arabic language--Semantics--Congres-
ses. I. Eid. Mushira. II. Title. III. Title: Perspectives on Arabic linguistics 1. IV. Title:
Perspectives on Arabic linguistics one.
PJ6106.S9884 1987
492'.75--dc20 90-959
ISBN 90 272 3560 0 (alk. paper) CIP
© Copyright 1990 - John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or
any other means, without written permission from the publisher.
To Gerald Sanders,
Teacher and Friend

Table of Contents
Preface ix
I. Overview
Arabic Linguistics: The Current Scene 3
Mushira Eid
"Come Forth with a Surah Like It": Arabic as a Measure of Arab
Society 39
Charles Ferguson
II. Grammatical Perspectives
Sound Plural and Broken Plural Assignment in Classical Arabic 55
Mohamad Z. Abd-Rabbo
The Problem of Subject-Verb Agreement in Arabic: Towards a
Solution 95
M.A. Mohammad
Word Order and Proper Government in Classical Arabic 127
Basim Majdi
Bound Anaphora in Egyptian Arabic 155
Mariam H. Osman
Time Reference, Tense, and Formal Aspect in Cairene Arabic 173
John Eisele
III. Textual Analysis Perspectives
'Orality' and Discourse Structure in Modern Standard Arabic 215
Barbara Johnstone
Loss of Nominal Case Endings in the Modern Arabic Dialects:
Evidence from Southern Palestinian Christian Middle Arabic Texts 235
Ann M. Gruber-Miller
viii TABLE OF CONTENTS
IV. Psycholinguistic Perspectives
Bilingual Linguistic Memory 257
Shadia A. Tel
Slips of the Tongue in Arabic 271
Sabah Safi-Stagni
Index of Subjects 291
Preface
The papers in this volume, with the exception of two (Eid and Safi), have
been selected from the First Annual Symposium on Arabic Linguistics held
at the University of Utah, April 24-25,1987. The purpose of the symposium
was to provide a forum for scholars interested in current linguistic
approaches to the study of Arabic. To my knowledge, this has been the first
event of its kind in the US. The symposium was initially planned to be an
annual event; and in view of the success that the first symposium has had,
the original plans have been implemented with the Second Annual Sym­
posium held in 1988 and the Third Annual Symposium being planned for
1989.
The motivation for starting an annual symposium has come from two
sources: first, the realization on my part and on the part of other linguists of
how much Arabic has to offer to the general linguist and how much insight
current approaches to linguistics can offer to all aspects of the study of the
Arabic language; and second, the realization that a large body of research
has been done in recent years on Arabic but that researchers in this field
have little or no chance to meet and focus their discussion on Arabic. These
annual symposiums, then, have been planned to fill in this gap and to pro­
mote further interest and research in Arabic linguistics.
The purpose of this book, then, is to disseminate research on Arabic
from various areas of current linguistics to as wide an audience as possible.
By not restricting the scope of the book to any one area of linguistics or its
related fields, it is hoped that the book will provide a more general perspec­
tive on aspects of Arabic in relation to various areas of linguistics and that
it will be a source of information for both the general linguist and the
Arabic linguist alike. To the general linguist, it will provide information
and data on Arabic analyzed within current models of analysis; to the
Arabic linguist, it will provide, in addition, current analyses of at times
familiar data, at other times data not so familiar.
The book is divided into three sections, each providing one or more