South Mesopotamian Arabic

South Mesopotamian Arabic
South Iraqi Arabic
Marsh Arabic
Native toIraq
Dialects
Arabic alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-3–

South Mesopotamian Arabic (Arabic: اللهجة العراقية الجنوبية, romanized: al-lahja l-ʿirāqiyya l-janūbiyya) or Marsh Arabic or commonly known as Basrawai is a variety of Mesopotamian Arabic spoken by Southern Iraqis in Basra, Maysan, Dhi Qar, Wasit and Muthanna. This dialect differs distinctly from other dialects of Iraq and features a strong Aramaic and Sumerian influence. One of the most noticeable features of South Mesopotamian Arabic is the existence of the sounds [ɡ] (< */q/), [tʃ] (< */k/), [ʒ] (< */dʒ/) and /p/.

Phonology

The following describes the sounds of the Baṣra dialect:

Consonants

Labial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Uvular Pharyngeal Glottal
plain emph. plain emph. plain emph.
Nasal m mˤ n
Stop/
Affricate		 voiceless (p) (pˤ) t tˤ t͡ʃ k (q) ʔ
voiced b bˤ d d͡ʒ ɡ
Fricative voiceless f fˤ θ s sˤ ʃ x ħ h
voiced ð ðˤ z zˤ (ʒ) ɣ ʕ
Flap ɾ ɾˤ
Approximant l lˤ j w

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i iː u uː
Mid eː o oː
Open a aː

See also

References

  1. ↑ "In Iraq's marshlands, researchers are racing to document a disappearing dialect - Equal Times". 2022-01-19. Archived from the original on 19 January 2022. Retrieved 2022-02-09.
  2. ↑ UCL (2021-09-28). "Dictionary of Marsh Arab dialects". The Nahrein Network. Retrieved 2022-02-09.
  3. ↑ Müller-Kessler, Christa (2003). "Aramaic ?k?, lyk? and Iraqi Arabic ?aku, maku: The Mesopotamian Particles of Existence". Journal of the American Oriental Society. 123 (3): 641–646. doi:10.2307/3217756. ISSN 0003-0279. JSTOR 3217756.
  4. ↑ "الجيم العراقية: حقائق وأوهام" (in Arabic). 2022-02-08. Archived from the original on 8 February 2022. Retrieved 2022-02-09.
  5. ↑ Mahdi, Qasim R. (1985). The Spoken Arabic of Baṣra, Iraq. Exeter: University of Exeter.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  6. ↑ Alsiraih, Wasan (2021). Speech Variation in the Dialect of Basrah. University of Basrah.

 This article incorporates text by Saja Albuarabi available under the CC BY 4.0 license.