Baghdadi Arabic is the

Arabic 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 ...

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety of a language that is ...

spoken in

Baghdad Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon ...

, the capital of

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...

. During the last century, Baghdadi Arabic has become the

lingua franca A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, vehicular language, or link language, is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups ...

of Iraq, and the language of commerce and education. It is considered a subset of

Iraqi Arabic Mesopotamian Arabic, ( ar, لهجة بلاد ما بين النهرين) also known as Iraqi Arabic ( ar, اللهجة العراقية), or Gilit Mesopotamian Arabic (as opposed to Qeltu Mesopotamian Arabic) is a continuum of mutually intelligib ...

Phonology

Vowels

The vowel phoneme (from standard Arabic ) is usually realised as an opening diphthong, for most speakers only slightly diphthongised , but for others a more noticeable , such that, for instance, ''lēš'' hywill sound like ''leeyesh'', much like a drawl in English. There's a vowel phoneme that evolved from the diphthong () to resemble more of a long () sound, as in words such as ''kaun'' niverseshifting to ''kōn''. A schwa sound is mainly heard in unstressed and stressed open and closed syllables.

Consonants

Even in the most formal of conventions, pronunciation depends upon a speaker's background. Nevertheless, the number and phonetic character of most of the 28 consonants has a broad degree of regularity among Arabic-speaking regions. Note that Arabic is particularly rich in uvular, pharyngeal, and

pharyngealized Pharyngealization is a secondary articulation of consonants or vowels by which the pharynx or epiglottis is constricted during the articulation of the sound. IPA symbols In the International Phonetic Alphabet, pharyngealization can be indic ...

(" emphatic") sounds. The emphatic coronals (, , and ) cause

assimilation Assimilation may refer to: Culture * Cultural assimilation, the process whereby a minority group gradually adapts to the customs and attitudes of the prevailing culture and customs ** Language shift, also known as language assimilation, the prog ...

of emphasis to adjacent non-emphatic coronal consonants. The phonemes ⟨ پ⟩ and ⟨ ڤ⟩ (not used by all speakers) are not considered to be part of the phonemic inventory, as they exist only in foreign words and they can be pronounced as ⟨ ب⟩ and ⟨ ف⟩ respectively depending on the speaker.Teach Yourself Arabic, by Jack Smart (Author), Frances Altorfer (Author)Hans Wehr, '' Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic'' (transl. of ''Arabisches Wörterbuch für die Schriftsprache der Gegenwart'', 1952) Phonetic notes: * and occur mostly in borrowings from Persian, and may be assimilated to or in some speakers. * is heard in borrowings of non-Arabic languages. * is pronunciation of // in Baghdad Arabic and the rest of southern Mesopotamian dialects. *The gemination of the flap /ɾ/ results in a trill /r/.

References

Sources

* Kees Versteegh, et al. ''Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics'', BRILL, 2006. * *

Phonology

Vowels

Consonants

See also

References

Sources

Further reading