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Hejazi Arabic or Hijazi Arabic (HA) ( ar, حجازي, ḥijāzī), also known as West Arabian Arabic, is a
variety of Arabic The varieties (or dialects or vernacular languages) of Arabic, a Semitic language within the Afroasiatic family originating in the Arabian Peninsula, are the linguistic systems that Arabic speakers speak natively. There are considerable variati ...
spoken in the
Hejaz The Hejaz (, also ; ar, ٱلْحِجَاز, al-Ḥijāz, lit=the Barrier, ) is a region in the west of Saudi Arabia. It includes the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif, and Baljurashi. It is also known as the "Western Pro ...
region in
Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries by area, fifth-largest country in Asia ...
. Strictly speaking, there are two main groups of dialects spoken in the
Hejaz The Hejaz (, also ; ar, ٱلْحِجَاز, al-Ḥijāz, lit=the Barrier, ) is a region in the west of Saudi Arabia. It includes the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif, and Baljurashi. It is also known as the "Western Pro ...
region, one by the urban population, originally spoken mainly in the cities of
Jeddah Jeddah ( ), also spelled Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; ar, , Jidda, ), is a city in the Hejaz region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the country's commercial center. Established in the 6th century BC as a fishing village, Jeddah's promi ...
,
Mecca Mecca (; officially Makkah al-Mukarramah, commonly shortened to Makkah ()) is a city and administrative center of the Mecca Province of Saudi Arabia, and the holiest city in Islam. It is inland from Jeddah on the Red Sea, in a narrow val ...
,
Medina Medina,, ', "the radiant city"; or , ', (), "the city" officially Al Madinah Al Munawwarah (, , Turkish: Medine-i Münevvere) and also commonly simplified as Madīnah or Madinah (, ), is the Holiest sites in Islam, second-holiest city in Islam, ...
and partially in
Ta'if Taif ( ar, , translit=aṭ-Ṭāʾif, lit=The circulated or encircled, ) is a city and governorate in the Makkan Region of Saudi Arabia. Located at an elevation of in the slopes of the Hijaz Mountains, which themselves are part of the Sarat M ...
and another dialect by the urbanized rural and
bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu (; , singular ) are nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia. The Bedouin originated in the Syrian Desert and ...
populations. However, the term most often applies to the urban variety which is discussed in this article. In antiquity, the Hejaz was home to the Old Hejazi dialect of Arabic recorded in the consonantal text of the Qur'an. Old Hejazi is distinct from modern Hejazi Arabic, and represents an older linguistic layer wiped out by centuries of migration, but which happens to share the imperative prefix vowel /a-/ with the modern dialect.


Classification

Also referred to as the sedentary Hejazi dialect, this is the form most commonly associated with the term "Hejazi Arabic", and is spoken in the urban centers of the region, such as Jeddah, Mecca, and Medina. With respect to the axis of
bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu (; , singular ) are nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia. The Bedouin originated in the Syrian Desert and ...
versus sedentary dialects of the Arabic language, this dialect group exhibits features of both. Like other sedentary dialects, the urban Hejazi dialect is less conservative than the bedouin varieties in some aspects and has therefore shed some Classical forms and features that are still present in bedouin dialects, these include gender-number disagreement, and the feminine marker ''-n'' (see
Varieties of Arabic The varieties (or dialects or vernacular languages) of Arabic, a Semitic language within the Afroasiatic family originating in the Arabian Peninsula, are the linguistic systems that Arabic speakers speak natively. There are considerable variat ...
). But in contrast to bedouin dialects, the constant use of full vowels and the absence of
vowel reduction In phonetics, vowel reduction is any of various changes in the acoustic ''quality'' of vowels as a result of changes in stress, sonority, duration, loudness, articulation, or position in the word (e.g. for the Creek language), and which are ...
plus the distinction between the emphatic letters and is generally retained.


Innovative features

# The present progressive tense is marked by the prefix or or as in or or ("he is studying"). # The future tense is marked by the prefix or as in or ("he will study"). # the internal passive form, which in Hejazi, is replaced by the pattern ( , ) or ( , ). # Loss of the final sound in the 3rd person masculine singular pronoun . For example, ("his house"), ("I know him"), ("they said it"), ("on him") and ("we saw him") vs. ("we saw") . #All numbers have no gender except for the number "one" which is ''m.'' and ''f.'' . #The pronunciation of the interdental letters ,, and . (See
Hejazi Arabic Phonology The phonological system of the Hejazi Arabic consists of approximately 26 to 28 native consonant phonemes and 8 vowel phonemes: , in addition to 2 diphthongs: . Consonant length and vowel length are both distinctive in Hejazi. Strictly speakin ...
) #loss of gender-specificity in plural verb forms, e.g. instead of ''masculine'' and ''feminine'' . #loss of gender-specificity in plural adjectives, e.g. "bored" can be used to describe both feminine and masculine plural nouns. #The verb forms V, VI and IIQ have an additional initial , e.g. "it shattered" (V), "she worked" (VI) and "they babbled" (IIQ).


Conservative features

# Hejazi Arabic does not employ
double negation In propositional logic, double negation is the theorem that states that "If a statement is true, then it is not the case that the statement is not true." This is expressed by saying that a proposition ''A'' is logically equivalent to ''not (not ...
, nor does it append the negation particles ''-sh'' to negate verbs: Hejazi ("I don't know"), as opposed to Egyptian and
Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
. #The habitual present tense is not marked by any prefixes as in ("he studies") and ("I love you"), as opposed to Egyptian and . # The prohibitive mood of Classical Arabic is preserved in the imperative: ("don't go"). # The possessive suffixes are generally preserved in their Classical forms. For example, "your (pl) house". # The plural first person pronoun is / or , as opposed to the bedouin or . # When indicating a location, the preposition (also written as a prefix ) is preferred to as in or ("in Medina"). #The pronunciation of the is as in
Modern Standard Arabic Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; occasionally, it also re ...
as in ("
Riyadh Riyadh (, ar, الرياض, 'ar-Riyāḍ, lit.: 'The Gardens' Najdi pronunciation: ), formerly known as Hajr al-Yamamah, is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of the ...
"). # The hamzated verbs like and keep their classical form as opposed to and . # The use of in form 1 verbs is retained as in or as opposed to and in Najdi and Gulf Arabic. # The glottal stop can be added to final syllables ending in a vowel as a way of emphasising. #the definite article is always pronounced as opposed to Egyptian or Kuwaiti and the final is always pronounced . # Compared to neighboring dialects, urban Hejazi retains most of the short vowels of
Classical Arabic Classical Arabic ( ar, links=no, ٱلْعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ, al-ʿarabīyah al-fuṣḥā) or Quranic Arabic is the standardized literary form of Arabic used from the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, most notab ...
with no
vowel reduction In phonetics, vowel reduction is any of various changes in the acoustic ''quality'' of vowels as a result of changes in stress, sonority, duration, loudness, articulation, or position in the word (e.g. for the Creek language), and which are ...
( ghawa syndrome), for example: :: ("fish"), as opposed to bedouin , and ("pronunciation"), as opposed to bedouin :: ("our pocket"), as opposed to bedouin and Egyptian . :: ("she hit him"), as opposed to bedouin . :: ("his son"), as opposed to bedouin . :: ("in your possession" pl.), as opposed to bedouin , Egyptian , and Levantine . :: ("on me"), as opposed to bedouin .


History

The Arabic of today is derived principally from the old dialects of Central and North Arabia which were divided by the classical Arab grammarians into three groups:
Hejaz The Hejaz (, also ; ar, ٱلْحِجَاز, al-Ḥijāz, lit=the Barrier, ) is a region in the west of Saudi Arabia. It includes the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif, and Baljurashi. It is also known as the "Western Pro ...
,
Najd Najd ( ar, نَجْدٌ, ), or the Nejd, forms the geographic center of Saudi Arabia, accounting for about a third of the country's modern population and, since the Emirate of Diriyah, acting as the base for all unification campaigns by the H ...
, and the language of the tribes in adjoining areas. Though the modern Hejazi dialects has developed markedly since the development of Classical Arabic, and Modern Standard Arabic is quite distinct from the modern dialect of Hejaz. Standard Arabic now differs considerably from modern Hejazi Arabic in terms of its phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon, such diglossia in Arabic began to emerge at the latest in the sixth century CE when oral poets recited their poetry in a proto-Classical Arabic based on archaic dialects which differed greatly from their own. Urban Hejazi Arabic belongs to the western Peninsular Arabic branch of the
Arabic language Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
, which itself is a Semitic language. It includes features of both urban and bedouin dialects given its development in the historical cities of Jeddah, Medina and Mecca in proximity to the bedouin tribes that lived on the outskirts of these cities, in addition to a minimal influence in vocabulary from other urban Arabic dialects and
Modern Standard Arabic Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; occasionally, it also re ...
, and more recently the influence of the other dialects of Saudi Arabia, all of which made Urban Hejazi a dialect that is distinctly unique but close to peninsular dialects on one hand and urban Arabic dialects on the other. Historically, it is not well known in which stage of Arabic the shift from the
Proto-Semitic Proto-Semitic is the hypothetical reconstructed proto-language ancestral to the Semitic languages. There is no consensus regarding the location of the Proto-Semitic ''Urheimat''; scholars hypothesize that it may have originated in the Levant (m ...
pair qāf and gīm came to be Hejazi gāf and jīm , although it has been attested as early as the eighth century CE, and it can be explained by a
chain shift In historical linguistics, a chain shift is a set of sound changes in which the change in pronunciation of one speech sound (typically, a phoneme) is linked to, and presumably causes, a change in pronunciation of other sounds as well. The soun ...
* → → that occurred in one of two ways: # Drag Chain: Proto-Semitic gīm palatalized to Hejazi jīm first, opening up a space at the position of , which qāf * then moved to fill the empty space resulting in Hejazi gāf, restoring structural symmetrical relationships present in the pre-Arabic system. # Push Chain: Proto-Semitic qāf * changed to Hejazi gāf first, which resulted in pushing the original gīm forward in articulation to become Hejazi jīm, but since most modern qāf dialects as well as standard Arabic also have jīm, hence the push-chain of qāf to gāf first can be discredited, although there are good grounds for believing that old Arabic qāf had both voiced and voiceless allophones; and after that gīm was fronted to jīm, possibly as a result of pressure from the allophones. The development of to have also been observed in languages like
Azeri Azerbaijanis (; az, Azərbaycanlılar, ), Azeris ( az, Azərilər, ), or Azerbaijani Turks ( az, Azərbaycan Türkləri, ) are a Turkic people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan. They are the second-most nume ...
in which the
Old Turkic Old Turkic (also East Old Turkic, Orkhon Turkic language, Old Uyghur) is the earliest attested form of the Turkic languages, found in Göktürk and Uyghur Khaganate inscriptions dating from about the eighth to the 13th century. It is the old ...
is pronounced as a velar ; e.g. ''قال'' / ''qal'' 'stay' is pronounced , rather than as in Turkish or in Bashkir, Uyghur, Kazakh, etc. * The original value of Proto-Semitic qāf was probably an emphatic not .


Phonology

In general, Hejazi native phonemic inventory consists of 26 (with no interdental ) to 28
consonant In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wi ...
phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west ...
s depending on the speaker's background and formality, in addition to the marginal phoneme and two foreign phonemes ⟨ پ⟩ and ⟨ ڤ⟩ used by a number of speakers. Furthermore, it has an eight-vowel system, consisting of three short and five long
vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (l ...
s , in addition to two diphthongs .
Consonant length In phonetics and phonology, gemination (), or consonant lengthening (from Latin 'doubling', itself from '' gemini'' 'twins'), is an articulation of a consonant for a longer period of time than that of a singleton consonant. It is distinct from ...
and
Vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, ...
are both distinctive and being a Semitic language the four
emphatic consonant In Semitic linguistics, an emphatic consonant is an obstruent consonant which originally contrasted with series of both voiced and voiceless obstruents. In specific Semitic languages, the members of this series may be realized as uvularized or ...
s are treated as separate phonemes from their plain counterparts. The main phonological feature that differentiates urban Hejazi from other peninsular dialects in regards to consonants; is the pronunciation of the letters ,, and (see Hejazi Phonology) and the pronunciation of as in
Standard Arabic Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; occasionally, it also ref ...
. Another differential feature is the lack of
palatalization Palatalization may refer to: *Palatalization (phonetics), the phonetic feature of palatal secondary articulation *Palatalization (sound change) Palatalization is a historical-linguistic sound change that results in a palatalized articulation ...
for the letters , and , unlike in other peninsular dialects where they can be palatalized in certain positions e.g. Hejazi 'new' vs.
Gulf Arabic Gulf Arabic ( ' local pronunciation: or ', local pronunciation: ) is a variety of the Arabic language spoken in Eastern Arabia around the coasts of the Persian Gulf in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, southern Iraq, eastern Sau ...
and Hejazi 'with you' vs. traditional Najdi . The marginal /ɫ/ is only used in the word 'God' /aɫːaːh/ (except when it follows an as in بسمِ الله ) and in words derived from it, It contrasts with /l/ in والله 'I swear' /waɫːa/ vs. ولَّا 'or' /walːa/. Unlike other neighboring dialects; is not velarized in certain positions, as in 'brain' pronounced with a light
Lām Lamedh or Lamed is the twelfth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Hebrew Lāmed , Aramaic Lāmadh , Syriac Lāmaḏ ܠ, Arabic , and Phoenician Lāmed . Its sound value is . The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Lambda (Λ), Latin ...
in Hejazi and velarized one in other peninsular Arabic dialects. A conservative feature that Hejazi holds is the constant use of full vowels and the absence of
vowel reduction In phonetics, vowel reduction is any of various changes in the acoustic ''quality'' of vowels as a result of changes in stress, sonority, duration, loudness, articulation, or position in the word (e.g. for the Creek language), and which are ...
, for example 'we told them', is pronounced in Hejazi with full vowels but pronounced with the reduced vowel as in Najdi, in addition to that, the absence of initial consonant cluster (known as the ghawa syndrome) as in 'cow', 'coffee', 'we count' and 'she heard' which are pronounced , , and respectively in Hejazi but , , and in other peninsular dialects.


Consonants

Phonetic notes: * due to the influence of
Modern Standard Arabic Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; occasionally, it also re ...
in the 20th century, has been introduced as an
allophone In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor '' phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in ' ...
of in a number of words and phrases as in ('Cairo') which is phonemically but can be pronounced as or less likely depending on the speaker, although older speakers prefer in all positions. *the
affricate An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation (most often coronal). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pai ...
and the trill are realised as a and a tap respectively by a number of speakers or in a number of words. *the reintroduced phoneme is partially used as an alternative phoneme, while most speakers merge it with or depending on the word. *the reintroduced phoneme is partially used as an alternative phoneme, while most speakers merge it with or depending on the word. * is an optional allophone for ⟨ ظ⟩. In general, urban Hejazi speakers merge it with or pronounce it distinctly as depending on the word. * ⟨ پ⟩ and ⟨ ڤ⟩ which exist only in foreign words, are used by a number of speakers and can be substituted by ⟨ ب⟩ and ⟨ ف⟩ respectively depending on the speaker, in general ⟨ ڤ⟩ seems to be integrated and used by most speakers. * has the velar allophone , which occurs before stop velars as in ('it spilled') and ('brazier') and is an allophone before as in ('clove') which is pronounced . *Word-Initial and other clusters like occur only in loanwords and they are not considered to be a single phoneme but a
cluster may refer to: Science and technology Astronomy * Cluster (spacecraft), constellation of four European Space Agency spacecraft * Asteroid cluster, a small asteroid family * Cluster II (spacecraft), a European Space Agency mission to study th ...
of two, e.g. ⟨ ت⟩ and ⟨ ش⟩ as in ('Chile'). This cluster has merged with in earlier loanwords that are more integrated e.g. شَيَّك ('he checked’) from English ''check''. The cluster also occurs phonetically in native words affected by syncope when connected, e.g. ('don't lift') pronounced or .


Vowels

Phonetic notes: * and are pronounced either as an open front vowel or an open central vowel depending on the speaker, even when adjacent to
emphatic consonant In Semitic linguistics, an emphatic consonant is an obstruent consonant which originally contrasted with series of both voiced and voiceless obstruents. In specific Semitic languages, the members of this series may be realized as uvularized or ...
s, except in some words such as ('Germany'), ('Japan') and ('dad') where they are pronounced with the back vowel . * and are pronounced as true
mid vowel A mid vowel (or a true-mid vowel) is any in a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned midway between an open vowel and a close vowel. Other names for a mid ...
s and respectively. *short (also analyzed as ) is pronounced allophonically as or less likely in word initial or medial syllables e.g. ('Ukraine') and ('comb') and strictly as at the end of words e.g. ('they saw') or before as in ('he') or when isolate. *short (also analyzed as ) is pronounced allophonically as or less likely in word initial or medial syllables e.g. ('Islam') and ('section') and strictly as at the end of words e.g. ('I have') or before as in ('he') or when isolate. *the close vowels can be distinguished by tenseness with and being more tense in articulation than their short counterparts and , except at the end of words where they are all tense even in loanwords, e.g. ('Chicago') which is less likely to be pronounced .


Monophthongization

Most of the occurrences of the two diphthongs and in the
Classical Arabic Classical Arabic ( ar, links=no, ٱلْعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ, al-ʿarabīyah al-fuṣḥā) or Quranic Arabic is the standardized literary form of Arabic used from the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, most notab ...
period underwent
monophthongization Monophthongization is a sound change by which a diphthong becomes a monophthong, a type of vowel shift. It is also known as ungliding, as diphthongs are also known as gliding vowels. In languages that have undergone monophthongization, digraphs ...
in Hejazi, and are realized as the long vowels and respectively, but they are still preserved as diphthongs in a number of words which created a contrast with the long vowels , , and . Not all instances of mid vowels are a result of monophthongization, some are from grammatical processes 'they said' → 'they said to her' (opposed to Classical Arabic ), and some occur in modern Portmanteau words e.g. 'why?' (from Classical Arabic 'for what' and 'thing').


Vocabulary

Hejazi vocabulary derives primarily from Arabic Semitic roots. The urban Hejazi vocabulary differs in some respect from that of other dialects in the Arabian Peninsula. For example, there are fewer specialized terms related to desert life, and more terms related to seafaring and fishing. Loanwords are uncommon and they are mainly of French,
Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional It ...
,
Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
, Turkish and most recently of
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...
origins, and due to the diverse origins of the inhabitants of Hejazi cities, some loanwords are only used by some families. Some old loanwords are fading or became obsolete due to the influence of
Modern Standard Arabic Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that developed in the Arab world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; occasionally, it also re ...
and their association with lower social class and education, e.g. "
air conditioner Air conditioning, often abbreviated as A/C or AC, is the process of removing heat from an enclosed space to achieve a more comfortable interior environment (sometimes referred to as 'comfort cooling') and in some cases also strictly controlling ...
" (from English ''Condition'') was replaced by Standard Arabic . Most of the loanwords tend to be nouns e.g. "Bicycle", "lipstick" and "shrimp", and sometimes with a change of meaning as in: "
overpass An overpass (called an overbridge or flyover in the United Kingdom and some other Commonwealth countries) is a bridge, road, railway or similar structure that crosses over another road or railway. An ''overpass'' and ''underpass A t ...
" from Turkish originally meaning " bridge" and "water
tanker truck Tanker may refer to: Transportation * Tanker, a tank crewman (US) * Tanker (ship), a ship designed to carry bulk liquids ** Chemical tanker, a type of tanker designed to transport chemicals in bulk ** Oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanke ...
" from English and "
shoe A shoe is an item of footwear intended to protect and comfort the human foot. They are often worn with a sock. Shoes are also used as an item of decoration and fashion. The design of shoes has varied enormously through time and from culture t ...
" from Turkish originally meaning "
boot A boot is a type of footwear. Most boots mainly cover the foot and the ankle, while some also cover some part of the lower calf. Some boots extend up the leg, sometimes as far as the knee or even the hip. Most boots have a heel that is clear ...
", loaned verbs which are less common include "to hack" from English "" and "to agitate" from French "" or English "". words that are distinctly of Hejazi origin include or "now", "yes", "what?", "I want", "breast" (used with the more formal ), "hiccup", and or "already", Other general vocabulary includes "to leave" with its synonyms and , "to call over" with its synonym and "good luck". (see vocabulary list)


Portmanteau

A common feature in Hejazi vocabulary is portmanteau words (also called a '' blend'' in linguistics); in which parts of multiple
word A word is a basic element of language that carries an objective or practical meaning, can be used on its own, and is uninterruptible. Despite the fact that language speakers often have an intuitive grasp of what a word is, there is no conse ...
s or their phones (sounds) are combined into a new word, it is especially innovative in making Interrogative words, examples include: * (, "yes"): from (, "yes") and (, "and") and (, "god"). * (, is it ok?/sorry): from (, nothing) and (, on him) and (, thing). * (, "what?"): from (, "which") and (, "thing"). * (, "why?"): from (, for what) and (, "thing"). * (, where?): from (, in) and (, where). * (, "until"): from (, "to") and (, "that"). * ( or , "now"): from (, "this") and (, part of time). * (, later): from (baʕd, after) and (ʔayn, part of time). * or ( or , "in order to"): from (, "on") and (, "matter"). * (, "also"): from (, "like") and (, "that"). * (, come on): from (, "o!") and (, "god"). * or (, not yet, still): from (, "to the hour") also used as in ("he is still young")


Numerals

The Cardinal number system in Hejazi is much more simplified than the Classical Arabic A system similar to the German numbers system is used for other numbers between 20 and above: 21 is which literally mean ('one and twenty') and 485 is which literally mean ('four hundred and five and eighty'). Unlike Classical Arabic, the only number that is gender specific in Hejazi is "one" which has two forms ''m.'' and ''f.'' as in ('one book') or ('one car'), with being a masculine noun and a feminine noun. * for 2 as in 'two cars' 'two years' 'two houses' etc. the dual form is used instead of the number with the suffix ēn or tēn (if the noun ends with a feminine ) as in ('two books') or ('two cars'), for emphasis they can be said as or . * for numbers 3 to 10 the noun following the number is in plural form as in ('4 books') or ('10 cars'). * for numbers 11 and above the noun following the number is in singular form as in:- ** from 11 to 19 an ris added to the end of the numbers as in ('14 books') or ('11 cars'). ** for 100s a is added to the end of the numbers before the counted nouns as in ('300 cars'). ** other numbers are simply added to the singular form of the noun ('21 books').


Grammar


Subject pronouns

In Hejazi Arabic,
personal pronoun Personal pronouns are pronouns that are associated primarily with a particular grammatical person – first person (as ''I''), second person (as ''you''), or third person (as ''he'', ''she'', ''it'', ''they''). Personal pronouns may also take dif ...
s have eight forms. In singular, the 2nd and 3rd persons differentiate gender, while the 1st person and plural do not. The negative articles include as in ('do not write!'), as in ('he is not talking') and as in ('not like this')


Verbs

Hejazi Arabic verbs, as with the verbs in other
Semitic languages The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They are spoken by more than 330 million people across much of West Asia, the Horn of Africa, and latterly North Africa, Malta, West Africa, Chad, and in large immigrant a ...
, and the entire vocabulary in those languages, are based on a set of three, four, or even five consonants (but mainly three consonants) called a
root In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the sur ...
(''triliteral'' or ''quadriliteral'' according to the number of consonants). The root communicates the basic meaning of the verb, e.g. ' 'to write', ' 'to eat'. Changes to the vowels in between the consonants, along with prefixes or suffixes, specify grammatical functions such as : * Two tenses (past, present; present progressive is indicated by the prefix (bi-), future is indicated by the prefix (ħa-)) * Two voices (active, passive) * Two genders (masculine, feminine) * Three persons (first, second, third) * Two numbers (singular, plural) Hejazi has two grammatical number in verbs (Singular and Plural) instead of the Classical (Singular, Dual and Plural), in addition to a present progressive tense which was not part of the Classical Arabic grammar. In contrast to other urban dialects the prefix (b-) is only used for present continuous as in "he is writing" while the habitual tense is without a prefix as in "I love you" ''f.'' unlike in Egyptian and Levantine dialects and the future tense is indicated by the prefix (ħa-) as in "we will run".


Regular verbs

The most common verbs in Hejazi have a given vowel pattern for past (a and i) to present (a or u or i). Combinations of each exist: According to Arab grammarians, verbs are divided into three categories; Past ماضي, Present and Imperative . An example from the root ' the verb ''katabt/ʼaktub'' 'i wrote/i write' (which is a regular sound verb): While present progressive and future are indicated by adding the prefix (b-) and (ħa-) respectively to the present (indicative) : ** The verbs highlighted in silver sometimes come in irregular forms e.g. حبيت (ħabbē)-t "i loved", حبينا (ħabbē)-na "we loved" but ّحب (ħabb) "he loved" and حبُّوا (ħabb)-u "they loved". ** additional final ا to ـوا in all plural verbs is silent. *The Active Participles , and can be used instead of the prefix -as in ('i'm writing') instead of بأكتب or بكتب ('i'm writing') without any change in the meaning. The active participles , and are used in the same way. *The past tenses of the verbs ('he sat/remained') or ('he sat') can be used before present verbs to express a past continuous tense which is similar to the English usage of ''"kept"'' as in ('he kept writing about him'). *A way of emphasizing the past tense is by adding the verbs ('he stood') or ('went') and its derivatives before the past verbs which is similar to the English usage of ''"went"'', as in ('he went and ran to him') and ('he went and wrote about him'). *the 3rd person past plural suffix -/u/ turns into -/oː/ (long o) instead of before pronouns, as in ('they went') → ('they went to him'), or it can be originally an -/oː/ as in ('they came') and in its
homophone A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same (to varying extent) as another word but differs in meaning. A ''homophone'' may also differ in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (p ...
('they came to him') since the word-final 3rd person masculine singular pronoun is silent. *word-final hollow verbs have a unique conjugation of either or , if a verb ends in ـي in its past simple form as in nisi 'he forgot' (present yinsa 'he forgets') it becomes nisīt 'I forgot' and nisyat 'she forgot' and nisyu 'they forgot'. While if the verb ends in ـى or ـا in its past simple form as in šawa 'he grilled' (present yišwi 'he grills') it becomes šawēt 'I grilled' and šawat 'she grilled and šawu 'they grilled'. Most of these verbs correspond to their Classical Arabic forms like , , , , and but some exceptions include biki 'he cried', jiri 'he ran', miši 'he walked' and diri 'he knew' as opposed to the Classical baka, جرى jara, maša, dara. Example: katabt/aktub "write": non-finite forms Active participles act as adjectives, and so they must agree with their subject. An active participle can be used in several ways: # to describe a state of being (understanding; knowing). # to describe what someone is doing right now (going, leaving) as in some verbs like ("i went") the active participle ("i'm going") is used instead of present continuous form to give the same meaning of an ongoing action. # to indicate that someone/something is in a state of having done something (having put something somewhere, having lived somewhere for a period of time).


Passive Voice

The passive voice is expressed through two patterns; ( , ) or ( , ), while most verbs can take either pattern as in or "it was written" and or "it is being written", other verbs can only have one of the two patterns as in "he was stopped" and "he is being stopped".


Adjectives

In Hejazi, adjectives, demonstratives and verbs fully agree in gender and number, e.g. "big boy" and "big girl". But there are two exceptions; First, there is no agreement in dual number; e.g. "two girls" takes the plural adjective as in "two big girls". Second, and more importantly, gender agreement is syncretic in the plural, in which inanimate plural nouns take a feminine singular adjective e.g. "big cars" instead of the plural adjective, while animate plural nouns take the plural adjective as in "big girls". The plural feminine adjective can be used as well but it is rather archaic.


Pronouns


Enclitic pronouns

Enclitic In morphology and syntax, a clitic (, backformed from Greek "leaning" or "enclitic"Crystal, David. ''A First Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics''. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1980. Print.) is a morpheme that has syntactic characteristics of a w ...
forms of personal pronouns are suffixes that are affixed to various parts of speech, with varying meanings: * To the
construct state In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin ''status constructus''). For example, in Arab ...
of nouns, where they have the meaning of possessive demonstratives, e.g. "my, your, his". * To verbs, where they have the meaning of direct object pronouns, e.g. "me, you, him". * To verbs, where they have the meaning of indirect object pronouns, e.g. "(to/for) me,(to/for) you, (to/for) him". * To prepositions. Unlike
Egyptian Arabic Egyptian Arabic, locally known as Colloquial Egyptian ( ar, العامية المصرية, ), or simply Masri (also Masry) (), is the most widely spoken vernacular Arabic dialect in Egypt. It is part of the Afro-Asiatic language family, and ...
, in Hejazi no more than one pronoun can be suffixed to a word. * if a noun ends with a vowel (other than the of the feminine nouns) that is or then the suffix (-ya) is used as in ('father') becomes ('my father') but if it ends with an then the suffix (-yya) is added as in ('my chair') from ('chair'). * the colon between the parentheses - indicates that the final vowel of a word is lengthened as in ('chair') → ('his chair'), since the word-final is silent in this position. although in general it is uncommon for Hejazi nouns to end in a vowel other than the of the feminine nouns. *The indirect object pronouns are written separately from the verbs as per Classical Arabic convention, but they are pronounced as if they are fused with the verbs. They are still written separately by many writers as in ('i wrote to him') but they can be written intact since Hejazi does not have a written standard. General Modifications:- * When a noun ends in a feminine vowel as in ('school') : a is added before the suffixes as in → ('my school'), ('his school'), ('her school') and so on. * After a word ends in a vowel (other than the of the feminine nouns), the vowel is lengthened, and the pronouns in (vowel+) are used instead of their original counterparts :- ** as in the noun ('chair') → ('his chair'), ('our chair'), ('your chair' f.) and the verb ('we followed') → ('we followed him'), ('we followed you' feminine). ** the indirect object pronouns ('we went') → ('we went to him'). * After a word that ends in two consonants, or which has a long vowel in the last syllable, is inserted before the 5 suffixes which begin with a consonant , , , , . ** as in the noun ('book') → ('her book'), ('their book'), ('your book' plural), ('our book') or the verb ('you knew') → ('you knew me'), ('you knew us'), ('you knew her'), ('you knew them'). ** When a verb ends in two consonants as in ('i went' or 'you went') : an is added before the Indirect object pronoun suffixes → ('i went to him') or in ('I wrote' or 'you wrote') becomes ('i wrote to him'), ('i wrote to them'). *the 3rd person past plural suffix -/u/ turns into -/oː/ (long o) before pronouns, as in ('they knew') → ('they knew me'), ('they went') → ('they went to him') or ('they wrote') → ('they wrote to me')


Hollow Verbs vowel shortening

Medial vowel shortening occurs in Hollow verbs (verbs with medial vowels ā, ū, ō, ē, ī) when added to Indirect object pronouns: *when a verb has a long vowel in the last syllable (shown in silver in the main example) as in ('I go'), (he goes) or (''we go'); the vowel is shortened before the suffixes as in (I go to him), (he goes to him) and (we go to him) with the verbs resembling the Jussive (مجزوم majzūm) mood conjugation in Classical Arabic (shown in gold in the example), original forms as in or can be used depending on the writer but the vowels are still shortened in pronunciation. *This does effect past verbs as well but the form of the word does not change, as in ''rāḥ'' ('he went') which is pronounced ('he went to him!') after adding a pronoun. *Other hollow verbs include ('I repeat') or ('say!') which become / ('I repeat for you') and / ('tell her!')


Writing system

Hejazi does not have a standardized form of writing and mostly follows
Classical Arabic Classical Arabic ( ar, links=no, ٱلْعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ, al-ʿarabīyah al-fuṣḥā) or Quranic Arabic is the standardized literary form of Arabic used from the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, most notab ...
rules of writing. The main difference between classical Arabic and Hejazi are the alternations of the
Hamza Hamza ( ar, همزة ') () is a letter in the Arabic alphabet, representing the glottal stop . Hamza is not one of the 28 "full" letters and owes its existence to historical inconsistencies in the standard writing system. It is derived from ...
, some verb forms and the final long vowels, this alternation happened since most word-final short vowels from the classical period have been omitted and most word-final unstressed long vowel have been shortened in Hejazi. Another alternation is writing the words according to the phoneme used while pronouncing them, rather than their etymology which mainly has an effect on the three letters and , for example writing "thick, fat" instead of or "tail" instead of although this alternation in writing is not considered acceptable by many or most Hejazi speakers. The alphabet still uses the same set of letters as Classical Arabic in addition to two letters ⟨ پ⟩ and ⟨ ڤ⟩ which are only used in writing loanwords and they can be substituted by and respectively depending on the writer, in addition to that the vowels and which were not part of the CA phonemic inventory are represented by the letters and respectively. Differences Between Classical and Hejazi writing * Hamza : ** Initial hamza holds no phonemic value in Hejazi but it can be used as per Classical Arabic convention, e.g. "readiness" or "he took" can be written as or but long initial is more important to indicate, e.g. "sorry" to differentiate it from / "regret". ** Medial hamza is merged with the semi-vowels and as in "going" from and "pearl" from , or it can be completely elided as in "she came" from or "they came" from , but other words keep the medial hamza as in "responsible" and "issues". ** Final hamza is deleted in most Hejazi words as in "lunch" from , "green" from , but some words keep the final hamza as in "beginner" and "slowness". * Added medial long vowels : ** some words have elongated medial vowels in Hejazi as in "with you" from , "to you, for you" which could be from the classical or , and "who" from . ** 2nd person masculine singular imperative in ''hollow'' verbs keep their long vowels as روح "go!" as opposed to classical and "see!" as opposed to classical . * Final added appears in: ** Masculine singular imperative in ''final-weak'' verbs, as in "go!, walk!" as opposed to classical . The classical pair (feminine) and (masculine) merged into used as a masculine and feminine singular imperative verb in Hejazi. ** 2nd person feminine singular past verbs, as in "you forgot" as opposed to classical . The classical pair (feminine) and (masculine) became (feminine) and (masculine). ** Feminine possessive and object pronoun which occurs after a long vowel, as in "he gives you" as opposed to classical . The classical pair (feminine) and (masculine) became (feminine) and (masculine). ** Feminine pronouns, as in "you", as opposed to classical . The classical pair (feminine) and (masculine) became (feminine) and (masculine), but the classical form can still be used in Hejazi. * Innovative forms: ** Some verb forms are innovative and differ from their classical equivalents as in the common plural verb "you saw" ''pl.'' as opposed to classical (masculine) and (feminine), or the ''final-weak'' verbs as in "they ran" as opposed to classical and the ''doubled'' verbs "I loved" opposed to classical . ** The verb forms V, VI and IIQ have an additional initial before , so that Hejazi forms , and correspond to classical forms , and , e.g. "he spoke" (form V), "she worked" (form VI) and "they babbled" (form IIQ). ** Portmanteau words have the most alternatives in their spelling since they did not occur in Classical Arabic, so the word for "still" can be written or depending on the writer, all of these forms stemming from the classical (, "to the hour"). ** Loanwords can have multiple spellings as well, which is the case for the word "also" which can be written as or . Mistakes in Hejazi spelling * Final silent : ** Writing instead of final pronoun as in "his book" which is mistakenly written . ** Mixing final and as in "opening" ( in
construct state In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin ''status constructus''). For example, in Arab ...
) and "he opened it". ** Missing the final masculine pronoun which often indicates a final long vowel as "you hurt" vs. "you hurt him", this can cause an ambiguity for the reader as in the homophones "he came" and "he came to him" if both were written mistakenly as . * Final : ** Mixing final and as in the word "by the way" which is mistakenly written . ** Mixing final and as in the word "time, once" which is mistakenly written . ** Adding a final to final 1st person singular possessive pronoun as in "on me" written mistakenly written as even though Classical Arabic have the same form and pronunciation as in عَلَيَّ , other examples include "with me", "to me", "my father" and "in me". ** Missing final silent in plural verbs as in "you threw" or "they hanged" even though this practice is no longer needed but it follows the Classical Arabic form. The table below shows the Arabic alphabet letters and their corresponding phonemes in Hejazi: Notes: * words with word-medial long vowels that are pronounced short include words before the indirect object pronouns e.g. لي ,له ,لها as in عاد "he repeated" becomes عاد لهم "he repeated to them" and "going to him" becomes with a shortened or rarely , outside of this rule only few words have vowel-shortening, e.g. جاي "I'm coming" pronounced /d͡ʒaj/ or less likely /d͡ʒaːj/ which stems from classical . * is only used at the end of words and mainly to mark
feminine gender In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
for
noun A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for: * Living creatures (including people, alive, ...
s and
adjective In linguistics, an adjective ( abbreviated ) is a word that generally modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun. Traditionally, adjectives were considered one of the m ...
s with few exceptions (e.g. ; a male noun). phonemically it is silent indicating final /-a/, except when in
construct state In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin ''status constructus''). For example, in Arab ...
it is a /t/, which leads to the word-final /-at/. e.g. 'message' → 'Ahmad's message'. * is silent in word-final in 3rd person masculine singular pronouns and some words, as in "we saw him" and "he has" or the heteronym pronounced 'why?' or 'for him, but it is still maintained in most other nouns as in "fruits", "hate" and "idiot" where it is differentiated from أبلة "''f.'' teacher". In writing the silent helps in distinguishing
minimal pair In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, spoken or signed, that differ in only one phonological element, such as a phoneme, toneme or chroneme, and have distinct meanings. They are used to demonstrate ...
s with word-final vowel length contrast 'you want ''f.'' vs. 'you want him ''f.''. * and are sometimes used to transcribe in foreign words. is especially used in city/state names as in "Belgrade" pronounced or , this ambiguity arose due to Standard Arabic not having a letter that transcribes distinctively, which created doublets like كتلوق vs. كتلوج "catalog" and قالون vs. جالون "gallon". newer terms are more likely to be transcribed using the native as in إنستقرام "Instagram" and قروب "group chat". * is pronounced only in few words from the two trilateral roots and , as in ("it worked") pronounced and not . * The interdental consonants: ** represents as in ثوب & ثواب or as in ثابت , but the classical phoneme is still used as well depending on the speaker especially in words of English origin. ** represents as in ذيل & ذكر or as in ذكي , but the classical phoneme is still used as well depending on the speaker especially in words of English origin. ** represents as in ظفر & ظل or as in ظرف , but the classical is still used as an allophone depending on the speaker.


Rural dialects

The varieties of Arabic spoken in the smaller towns and by the bedouin tribes in the Hejaz region are relatively under-studied. However, the speech of some tribes shows much closer affinity to other bedouin dialects, particularly those of neighboring
Najd Najd ( ar, نَجْدٌ, ), or the Nejd, forms the geographic center of Saudi Arabia, accounting for about a third of the country's modern population and, since the Emirate of Diriyah, acting as the base for all unification campaigns by the H ...
, than to those of the urban Hejazi cities. The dialects of northern Hejazi tribes
merge Merge, merging, or merger may refer to: Concepts * Merge (traffic), the reduction of the number of lanes on a road * Merge (linguistics), a basic syntactic operation in generative syntax in the Minimalist Program * Merger (politics), the com ...
into those of
Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
and Sinai, while the dialects in the south
merge Merge, merging, or merger may refer to: Concepts * Merge (traffic), the reduction of the number of lanes on a road * Merge (linguistics), a basic syntactic operation in generative syntax in the Minimalist Program * Merger (politics), the com ...
with those of
'Asir The ʿAsir Region ( ar, عَسِيرٌ, ʿAsīr, lit=difficult) is a region of Saudi Arabia located in the southwest of the country that is named after the ʿAsīr tribe. It has an area of and an estimated population of 2,211,875 (2017). It is ...
and
Najd Najd ( ar, نَجْدٌ, ), or the Nejd, forms the geographic center of Saudi Arabia, accounting for about a third of the country's modern population and, since the Emirate of Diriyah, acting as the base for all unification campaigns by the H ...
. Also, not all speakers of these bedouin dialects are figuratively
nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the pop ...
bedouins; some are simply sedentary sections that live in rural areas, and thus speak dialects similar to those of their bedouin neighbors.


Al-'Ula

The dialect of
Al-'Ula Al-'Ula ( ar, ٱلْعُلَا '), is a city of the Medina Region in north- western Saudi Arabia. Historically located on the incense route, the city lies within the Governorate of 'Ula ( ar, مُحَافَظَة ٱلْعُلَا, Muḥāfathat ...
governorate in the northern part of the Madinah region. Although understudied, it is considered to be unique among the Hejazi dialects, it is known for its pronunciation of Classical Arabic as a (e.g. becomes ), the dialect also shows a tendency to pronounce long as (e.g. Classical becomes eːʔ, in some instances the Classical becomes a as in becomes , also the second person singular feminine pronoun tends to be pronounced as /i ʃ/ (e.g. ('your foot') becomes .


Badr

The dialect of Badr governorate in the western part of the Madinah region is mainly noted for its lengthening of word-final syllables and its alternative pronunciation of some phonemes as in which is pronounced as , it also shares some features with the general urban dialect in which modern standard Arabic is pronounced , another unique feature of the dialect is its similarity to the Arabic dialects of
Bahrain Bahrain ( ; ; ar, البحرين, al-Bahrayn, locally ), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, ' is an island country in Western Asia. It is situated on the Persian Gulf, and comprises a small archipelago made up of 50 natural islands and an a ...
.


See also

*
Varieties of Arabic The varieties (or dialects or vernacular languages) of Arabic, a Semitic language within the Afroasiatic family originating in the Arabian Peninsula, are the linguistic systems that Arabic speakers speak natively. There are considerable variat ...
* Peninsular Arabic


References

*
Kees Versteegh Cornelis Henricus Maria "Kees" Versteegh (; born 1947) is a Dutch academic linguist. He served as a professor of Islamic studies and the Arabic language at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands until April 2011. Versteegh graduated from R ...
, ''The Arabic Language'', NITLE Arab World Project, by the permission of Edinburgh University Press

*


Bibliography

* * * * * *


External links


Hijazi Arabic course with audio files
{{Authority control Hejazi Arabic, Arabic languages Languages of Saudi Arabia Languages of Eritrea Hejaz Mashriqi Arabic Peninsular Arabic