The Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics

3206 Pages·2006·33.73 MB·English

by  Kees Versteegh

Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics
Volume I
A-Ed
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
General Editor
Kees Versteegh
(University of Nijmegen)
Associate Editors
Mushira Eid
(University of Utah)
Alaa Elgibali
(University of Maryland)
Manfred Woidich
(University of Amsterdam)
Andrzej Zaborski
(University of Cracow)
Advisory Board
Ramzi Baalbaki (American University in Beirut)
Elsaid Badawi (American University in Cairo)
Dominique Caubet (INALCO, France)
Clive Holes (University of Oxford)
Manfred Kropp (Orient-Institut Der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft)
Jérôme Lentin (Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales)
John McCarthy (University of Massachussetts)
Jamal Ouhalla (University College Dublin)
Jan Retsö (Göteborg University)
Sabah Safi (King Abdulaziz University)
Copy Editor
Margaret Owen
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF
ARABIC LANGUAGE
AND LINGUISTICS
VOLUME I
A-Ed
General Editor
Kees Versteegh
Associate Editors
Mushira Eid
Alaa Elgibali
Manfred Woidich
Andrzej Zaborski
brill
Leiden – Boston
2006
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
Illustrations to ‘Arabic Alphabet: Origin’
The President and Fellows of Harvard College:
Ia - Ib: from HOLLIS # 001008865, IIa - IIb: from HOLLIS # 000605524, IIIa - IIIb: from HOLLIS #
002238303, IVa - IVb: from HOLLIS # 005292920, V: from HOLLIS # 003062799, VIa - VIb: from
HOLLIS # 001350425

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Introduction
1. Reference tools for Arabic (1st vol. 2001, 2003), which is in the process of
linguistics being published.
In the field of → lexicography the situation
For many disciplines within the field of Arabic has improved as well, although the great project
studies major reference tools exist. The Ency- of an etymological dictionary of Arabic (→lan-
clopaedia of Islam, especially useful for histori- guage academies) has never materialized. The
cal matters, with an emphasis on persons and dictionary of the Deutsche Morgenländische
places, has now embarked on its third edition. Gesellschaft is moving slowly from the letter kàf
The Encyclopaedia of the Qur±àn covers the toward the end of the alphabet, and there is still
entire domain of Qur±ànic studies and has only a need for an authoritative dictionary of Classi-
one more volume to go to completion. For Ara- cal Arabic. For Qur±ànic Arabic the old diction-
bic literature there is the Encyclopedia of Arabic ary of Penrice (1873) has finally found a
literature, as well as the Cambridge history of successor in the form of a new dictionary by
Arabic literature. For written production in Badawi and Abdelhalim (to be published in
Classical Arabic Brockelmann’s Geschichte der 2006); a concise dictionary was published by
arabischen Literatur has been superseded for the Procházka and Ambros (2004). Arabic/Arabic
period up until 430 A.H. by Sezgin’s Geschichte dictionaries are being published in the Arab
des arabischen Schrifttums (1967–2000). For world, for instance the Wasì†of the Arabic Lan-
Islamic history the Cambridge history of Islamis guage Academy in Cairo. Large-scale diction-
a comprehensive source. There are bibliograph- aries of Modern Standard Arabic now exist for
ical and biographical manuals, such as the Index all major Western languages.
Islamicus. For dialectology there is the Handbuch der
Yet, for Arabic linguistics comparable refer- arabischen Dialekte by Fischer and Jastrow
ence tools are lacking. The literature before (1980), which however does not deal with socio-
1983 has been recorded in Bakalla’s bibliogra- linguistic topics, nor with the external history
phy (1983), but there has been no follow-up for of the language, while the coverage of the inter-
the literature since then, although the general nal development of the language and the periph-
Bibliographie linguistique makes up for this eral dialects is not comprehensive. Dialect
to some extent. The standard reference gram- atlases exist for some of the major areas (Egypt
mars of → Classical Arabic (such as Howell by Behnstedt and Woidich 1985–1999; Yemen
1883–1911; Wright 1859–1862; Reckendorff by Behnstedt 1985–1987; and Syria by Behnst-
1898–1898; Blachère and Gaudefroy-Demom- edt 1997), and the introduction to Arabic dialect
bynes 1952; and Fleisch 1961, 1979) are in need geography by Behnstedt and Woidich (2005) has
of revision because they are outdated; Fischer’s just appeared (→ dialect geography). For indi-
(2002) more recent grammar is not meant to be vidual dialects the situation varies considerably.
a complete reference grammar but rather a text- For a long time Bateson (1967) was the only
book for students. For the standard handbooks handbook that could serve as an introduction to
on varieties of Middle Arabic see the entries the entire field; it was republished in 2003 as a
on → Middle Arabic, → Christian Arabic, and classic reference work but is obviously outdated.
→ Judaeo-Arabic. For → Modern Standard A small number of handbooks fill part of the
Arabic the situation has improved now that gap, such as the Grundriß der arabischen
the survey in three volumes by Cantarino Philologie, whose first volume, edited by Fischer
(1974–1975) has been replaced by the reference (1982), focuses on the history and the structure
grammar by Badawi, Carter, and Gully (2004), of the language and on the philological study of
and by the large-scale syntax of Modern Stan- the written documents. More recent textbooks,
dard Arabic by El-Ayoubi, Fischer, and Langer like the ones by Anghelescu (1995), Versteegh
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
vi introduction
(2001), Ferrando (2001), and Holes (2004), are tions has been avoided as much as possible;
intended for use by students, they are not names of varieties of Arabic, for instance, are
exhaustive, and they deal only with selected per- always written out in full, and even in grammat-
spectives on the Arabic language. ical contexts the use of abbreviations has been
In short, there is no major reference tool to restricted, except in morph-by-morph transla-
represent the state of the art in all aspects of Ara- tions, where standard coding has been used.
bic linguistics. Not all relevant linguistic topics
are included in the Encyclopaedia of Islam, and 2. Scope and approach of the
for those that are, the treatments vary in depth. Encyclopedia of Arabic language
Many aspects of the history and structure of and linguistics
Arabic are not covered in either the first or the
second edition. Given the progress in several The EALLis an encyclopedic handbook cover-
fields of Arabic linguistics (in particular in soci- ing all relevant aspects of the study of Arabic
olinguistics, structural analysis of Standard Ara- and dealing with all levels of the language (pre-
bic, and dialect studies) and the proliferation of Classical Arabic, Classical Arabic, Modern
publications, a new comprehensive reference Standard Arabic, Arabic vernaculars, mixed
tool is needed. More than other disciplines, the varieties of Arabic), both synchronically and
study of the Arabic language is characterized by diachronically. It will be published in four
a fragmentation of the efforts of scholars, both volumes with a total of two million words,
between the Arab and the Western countries and distributed over approximately 500 entries. The
between Europe and the United States. As a treatment includes both the external and the
result, scholars often are not aware of the work internal history of the language, as well as
done by colleagues elsewhere. the structural analysis of the different varieties of
The Encyclopedia of Arabic language and lin- the language, the interaction between varieties
guistics, the first volume of which is presented in mixed levels (such as Middle Arabic), the lin-
here, fills the gaps. It is intended in the first place guistic contacts between Arabic and other lan-
as a reference tool for linguists working with Ara- guages, and the place of Arabic within larger
bic, but also for scholars from many other disci- language groups.
plines (Islamic studies, Arabic literature, social The terminology with which the varieties of
sciences), whose fields of research frequently Arabic and the various stages in its history are
intersect with that of linguistics, if only because indicated is notoriously complicated (→history
Arabic as the language of the Qur±ànplays such a of Arabic). In principle, the term ‘Old Arabic’ is
pervasive role in the entire Arab and Islamic used to cover the pre-Islamic period for which
world. Beyond this, the EALL will also be a ref- the sources are the earliest inscriptions in a lan-
erence tool for general linguists. In an article on guage that is recognizably Arabic, the language
the importance of Arabic for → general linguis- of the Qur±àn, pre-Islamic poetry, and informa-
tics, Comrie (1991:29) points out that Arabic tion culled from the dialects of the Bedouin
incorporates “a wealth of fascinating data relat- tribes by the Arab grammarians. Earlier forms
ing to the variation among the many vernacu- of a language closely resembling Arabic are
lars”. Yet, this material is underrepresented in called ‘Proto-Arabic’, while ‘Ancient North Ara-
general linguistics because of the lack of authori- bian’ is used as the term for the languages of the
tative and accessible sources. By bringing together North Arabian inscriptions that were related to
data on all varieties of Arabic, the EALL con- Arabic. ‘Classical Arabic’ is used for the lan-
tributes to the dissemination of knowledge about guage as it was codified by the Arab grammari-
one of the world’s major languages. ans. ‘Modern Standard Arabic’ is the modern
Perhaps the most important category of users form of this language. The term ‘Arabic dialects’
targeted by the EALL is that of students, espe- is used freely without any connotation of lesser
cially those at the graduate and the postgraduate status; it is the common phrase for the vernacu-
levels. For this reason, when presented with a lar varieties of Arabic. Terms like ‘Colloquial
choice between succinctness and a surplus of Arabic’ and ‘Educated Arabic’ (and the many
information, the editors have accepted the result- variants of these terms), on the other hand, indi-
ing overlaps. Another aspect of the didactic side cate sociolinguistic levels of the language. ‘Mid-
of this policy decision is that the use of abbrevia- dle Arabic’, finally, is used to indicate a category
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
introduction vii
of texts written in mixed varieties, rather than a theory, →poetic koine). As long as these views
stage in the history of the language. As termi- are clearly presented as such, the readers of the
nology is usually connected closely with the the- encyclopedia deserve a chance to become
oretical views of individual researchers, authors acquainted with innovatory, sometimes even
have been given considerable latitude in their controversial, views.
use of terms. In some cases the editors have In such an approach overlap is unavoidable
refrained from interfering, even if an author’s and perhaps even desirable: on basic topics of
terminology did not agree exactly with the terms Arabic structure the reader will find side by side
preferred by the editors. in the EALL traditional philological treatment
With regard to the relationship between and modern syntactic analysis of the same lin-
dialectal forms and standard forms, any termi- guistic facts. As a result, the same data are some-
nology presupposes a theoretical stance on the times repeated in several entries, but from
development of the language. In order to avoid different angles. Unfortunately, it turned out to
as much as possible taking a position in the be impossible to cover all topics originally envis-
debate about this relationship, the editors have aged, simply because authors could not be found
chosen to refer to the dialectal forms as reflexes for all topics. The extensive index that will be
of either the codified form of Arabic, i.e. Classi- published in Volume IV will make it possible to
cal Arabic, or the historical predecessors of this find information about those items which do not
codified form, i.e. Old Arabic. This is meant as a have their own entry.
neutral way of referring to related forms, which Cross-references in the entries have been used
does not suggest any genetic or evolutionary sparingly. A few terms without their own entry
relationship between the two varieties. are cross-referred to a more general entry (e.g.,
The EALLwas set up as a meeting place for a ‘plural’ and ‘singular’ are cross-referred to
wide variety of theoretical approaches, and the ‘number’). The index at the end of Volume IV
editors have made no effort at all to harmonize will cover the entire encyclopedia and allow
these approaches. Rather than selecting one readers to find all relevant loci.
descriptive model, they believe that alternative Some special features of the EALL deserve to
analyses, whether traditional, functionalist, gen- be mentioned. In the first place, the indigenous
erativist, minimalist, or reflective of any other linguistic tradition, not always represented in
linguistic school, should all be represented. The analyses of Arabic, has been included here.
indigenous Arabic tradition, too, is covered Another feature is the inclusion of dialect
extensively, primarily in the entries with an Ara- sketches of more than 40 dialects, described
bic title (e.g. →±i≠ràb, →ism, →fà≠il). according to a predetermined format, which
For each topic a synthesis of the most recent allows the user to make quick cross-dialectal
research is given, with the emphasis on adequate comparisons. For all Arabic-speaking countries
bibliographical coverage. This applies in partic- a linguistic profile has been included that
ular to what the editors regard as the central sketches the sociolinguistic and dialectological
articles (e.g. → syntax, → morphology, → make-up of these countries. The relations
diglossia, → multilingualism), which are between Arabic and the other Semitic (and Afro-
intended as general introductions to the field. Asiatic) languages are dealt with in separate
Other entries are more in the nature of essays entries (→ South Semitic languages, → North-
(e.g. → language and culture, → language and west Semitic languages, →Semitic languages, →
ethnicity, → language and nationalism). Still Afro-Asiatic languages). The relations between
others are more technical (e.g. → prosody, → Arabic and other languages in the Islamic world
X-bar syntax). (e.g. → Persian, → Indonesian/Malay, →
All entries are written from an encyclopedic Swahili, → Hausa) are dealt with in two ways:
point of view, which means that authors were entries with the name of a language as their title
requested to ‘objectify’ their views. This is not to deal with the Arabic influence in these lan-
say that they were discouraged from presenting guages, whereas entries with the term ‘loan-
novel ideas. In fact, for some entries authors words’ in their title deal with the influence of
were asked and permitted to give their own the- these languages on Arabic (where ‘loanwords’
ories, even when these were not universally has been chosen as a blanket term, covering all
accepted (e.g. → ≠Arab, → matrix and etymon levels of interference).
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
viii introduction
3. Transcription – suffixes -hu,-hà, etc. and clitics bi-, li-, wa-
etc. are written attached to the word to
Transcription is always a problem, especially in which they belong, optionally with hyphen
the case of an encyclopedia that brings together – endings are written when relevant; other-
data from Standard Arabic and dialects. The wise, nouns are given in their pausal form
transcription follows in the main the one without case endings and connecting vow-
adopted by Fischer and Jastrow in the Hand- els, thus min al-bayt, hum al-mu±minùna,
buch der arabischen Dialekte(1980:11–14), but but verbs retain the last short vowel, thus
with some adaptations. The editors have kataba, yaktubu; suffixes always retain their
decided to use Ú (not Ω) throughout, except in connected form, thus kitàbu-hu, not
proper names (thus Úuhr, but Ibn ManΩùr). kitàbuh
– the feminine ending is transcribed –a (not
Table 1: Transcription of the Arabic alphabet
–ah), except in genitive constructions, thus
al-madìna, but madìnat an-nabì
A ±
b b For the Arabic dialects a standardized phono-
t t logical transcription is used (without slashes and
- µ in italics), unless phonetic detail is at issue. In the
j j standardized transcription articles are always
\ ™ assimilated and written without hyphen, like-
' x wise the pronominal suffixes; words like wi,
~ d bi, and li are written as separate words. When
N ≈ phonetic transcription is needed, this is given
r r in square brackets using IPA signs (see
z z www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA). When it is necessary
s s to indicate phonological transcription explicitly,
= “ this is given between slashes using the standard
v ß transcription signs rather than IPA signs. For
w ∂ morphological notation straight lines are some-
; † times used.
/ Ú The following signs are used in standard
e ≠ phonological transcription:
q ÿ
f f obstruents: p,b,fl,t,†,d,∂,k,˚, g,g,q,±
c q affricates: ts,ƒ,g´,∑,j .
k k stridents: f,f,v,v, µ,µ, ≈,Ú,x,ÿ,™,≠,h
. . .
l l sibilants: s,ß,z,Ω,«, ´z,“,∆
m m laterals and vibrants: l,fi,r, ®
n n nasals: m,¤,n,ñ,ŋ,õ,ñ
h h semivowels/glides: w,w,y
u w vowels: i,ì,e,è,a,à,ä,.…,å,å-,u,ù,o,ò,ö
ˆ y diphthongs: ay,ày,aw,àw
In the transcription of Modern Standard Arabic
To indicate short vowels the vowel sign + breve
and Classical Arabic, the following rules have
is used (a˘, e˘, etc.); superscript vowel signs are
been followed:
used to indicate ultrashort/epenthetic vowels;
– hamza at the beginning of the word is subscript dot (a, e., etc.) is used to indicate open
vowels outside phonetic notation, rather than
always transcribed
the IPA signs; to indicate nasalized vowels tilde
– the article is transcribed in its assimilated
is used (ã, e˜, etc.).
form (as-sikka, etc.) and written with a
For primary stress the vowel sign + acute is
hyphen; the waßla is not transcribed, thus
used (á, é, etc.); for secondary stress the vowel
wa-l-faras
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.
introduction ix
sign + gravis is used (à, è, etc.); alternatively, and port, especially in the formative stages of the
always so in phonetic transcription, stress is project, and for agreeing to write some of the
indicated by an apostrophe ' before the tonic syl- articles. The first invitations to authors were
lable. To indicate palatalization superscript yis sent out in 2003.
used (ty,dy, etc.); to indicate labialization super- The entire project would have been impossi-
scriptwis used (mw, etc.). ble without the support of Brill. Special mention
For the transcription of Persian and Ottoman must be made of Ingrid Heijckers, without
Turkish a phonological transcription has been whom the project would literally have been
the preferred option (thus, for instance, in Per- impossible. Thanks to her meticulous manage-
sian vaÿtis written rather than waqt); for Mod- ment of the EALL database and her unfailing
ern Turkish the standard orthography has been common sense and good humor, this first vol-
used. For other languages standard orthography ume could be realized according to schedule.
is used when this exists, for instance for Indone- The tireless copy editors Margaret Owen (Vol-
sian, Hausa (including ejectives such as (cid:3),(cid:4),(cid:5), ume I) and Carolyn Russ (later volumes) did a
etc.), and Swahili.Otherwise, scholarly practice wonderful job of harmonizing the text and
in the field is followed, for instance in the tran- improving the style.
scription of glottalized consonants in Ethiopian Finally, of course, the authors of the entries
languages as k‘,t‘, etc. are to be thanked for their enthusiastic coopera-
tion, especially at a time when many research
4. Acknowledgments assessment organizations refuse to take into
account articles written for encyclopedias and to
The idea for an encyclopedia of Arabic was first recognize the value such articles have for the
suggested to Brill by Andrzej Zaborski in the scholarly community. The editors hope to bring
early 1990s, and was later developed by a group out the remaining three volumes in the years
of linguists during a meeting of the Association 2006 and 2007.
Internationale de Dialectologie Arabe in Cam-
bridge in 1995. After the initial stages, Brill October 2005
enthusiastically accepted the idea, under the
responsibility first of Albert Hoffstädt, then of Mushira Eid
Olaf Köndgen. In the final stages of Volume I, Alaa Elgibali
the project was taken over by Joed Elich. The Kees Versteegh
editorial committee convened for the first time in Manfred Woidich
2000 and set about to establish a list of entries. Andrzej Zaborski
A list of more than 2,000 terms was compiled
covering all subdomains (morphology, phonol-
Bibliographical references
ogy, semantics, historical linguistics, syntax, Anghelescu, Nadia. 1995. Langage et culture dans la
language contacts, indigenous grammar, soci- civilisation arabe. Paris: L’Harmattan.
olinguistics, psycholinguistics, and dialectol- Badawi, Elsaid, Michael G. Carter, and Adrian Gully.
2004. Modern written Arabic: A comprehensive
ogy). Subsequently, 500 terms were selected as
grammar. London and New York: Routledge.
individual entries to represent the major topics. Bakalla, Muhammad. 1983. Arabic linguistics: An
About 35 entries were chosen for general survey introduction and bibliography. London: Mansell.
Bateson, Mary Catherine. 1967. Arabic language
articles.
handbook. Washington, D.C.: Center for Applied
Once the project was underway, an Advisory
Linguistics. (Repr., Washington, D.C.: Georgetown
Committee was appointed to assist the editors University Press, 2003.)
in their work, consisting of Ramzi Baalbaki Behnstedt, Peter. 1985–1987. Die nordjemenitischen
Dialekte.2 vols.Wiesbaden: L. Reichert.
(Beirut), Elsaid Badawi (Cairo), Dominique
——. 1997. Sprachatlas von Syrien. Kartenband +
Caubet (Paris), Clive Holes (Oxford), Manfred
Beiheft.Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz.
Kropp (Beirut), Jérôme Lentin (Paris), John Behnstedt, Peter and Manfred Woidich. 1985–1999.
McCarthy (Amherst), Jamal Ouhalla (Dublin), Die ägyptisch-arabischen Dialekte. 5 vols. Wies-
baden: L. Reichert.
Jan Retsö (Göteborg), and Sabah Safi (Jedda).
——. 2005. Einleitung in die arabische Dialektgeo-
The editors wish to thank the members of the graphie. Leiden: E.J. Brill.
Advisory Committee for their advice and sup- Blachère, Régis and Maurice Gaudefroy-Demom-
(c) 2011 Koninklijke Brill NV. All Rights Reserved.