Judeo-Tripolitanian Arabic (also known as Tripolitanian Judeo-Arabic, Jewish Tripolitanian-Libyan Arabic, Tripolita'it, Yudi) 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 varia ...
spoken by
Jews formerly living in
Libya. Judeo-Tripolitanian Arabic differs from standard
Libyan Arabic in that it closely resembles the original dialect of the sedentary population, whereas much of Libya's population now speaks
Bedouin-influenced varieties of Arabic. A reference grammar is available.
The vast majority of
Libyan Jews have
relocated to Israel and have
switched Switched may refer to:
* Switched (band)
Switched (previously depicted as Sw1tched) was a nu metal band from Cleveland, Ohio.
History
Forming in 1999 as Sw1tch, the band played shows around Ohio and released a demo entitled ''Fuckin' Demo''. T ...
to using Hebrew in as their
home language. Those in Italy typically use Italian as their first language.
Demographics
In ca. 1994 there were 35,000 speakers of Judeo-Tripolitanian Arabic, mostly in
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
(30,000) and
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
(5,000). As of 2014, those in Israel are mostly over the age of 60 and are bilingual in Hebrew.
[Estimate of mostly over the age of 40 cited from 1994.]
History
There were 20,000 Jews living in
Tripoli, Libya
Tripoli (; ar, طرابلس الغرب, translit= Ṭarābulus al-Gharb , translation=Western Tripoli) is the capital and largest city of Libya, with a population of about 1.1 million people in 2019. It is located in the northwest of Libya o ...
in 1948. About 14,000 migrated to Israel and Italy in 1948-1952, following two riots. After riots during the
Six-Day War
The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states (primarily Egypt, Syria, and Jordan) from 5 to 10 ...
in
1967, most of the remaining 6,000 Jews emigrated; there were only a few dozen Jews living in Tripoli in 1970.
[
]
See also
*History of the Jews in Libya
The history of the Jews in Libya stretches back to the 3rd century BCE, when Cyrenaica was under Greek rule. The Jewish population of Libya, a part of the Sephardi- Maghrebi Jewish community continued to populate the area continuously until the ...
* Jewish languages
* Judeo-Arabic languages
References
Further reading
*
*Goldberg, H. (1983) Language and culture of the Jews of Tripolitania. Mediterranean language review 1. (?).
*Spolsky, B. (2014). The languages of the Jews: A sociolinguistic history.
External links
''Judeo-Arabic''
at endangeredlanguages.com
Endangered Afroasiatic languages
Jews and Judaism in Libya
Judeo-Arabic languages
Languages of Israel
{{Israel-stub