Egyptian Arabic

Submitted by Vijay (United Kingdom), Jan 7, 2010 at 18:37

Hi DNM

Diglossia has been studied for the last 50 years and a good summary of that can be seen in

http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/messeas/diglossia/node3.html#SECTION00012000000000000000

When a I said a low prestige dialect in a diglossic situation has no grammar, I meant there are no formal, written grammars for everyday language with some cultural status unless done by outsiders (like Dr.Pipes). The dictionary definition of a 'langugae' you have given are products of modern Western thinking, while in traditional societies, The situation you described of the Islamists making speeches in Egyptian arabic, while it is printed in Standard Classical arabic are typical symptoms of that.

Here is a good article on Arabic diglossia

http://www.innerbrat.org/Andyf/Articles/Diglossia/digl_96.htm

OTOH, if you do not want to call it diglossia , that is fine. Semantics is not the primary concern. I exactly understand the Egyptian situation you are saying and perhaps you are right in calling Egyptian Arabic another language. Anyhow, what matters ishow they themselves percieve 'their' langauge.

My guess is that one result of this Arabic diglossia is that people compartmentalise their thinking. Classical Arabic , while productive of literatures of the past cannot cope with modern, critical, rational thinking, Spoken language has no literary status and left in an intellectual limbo. To adapt to modern science, technology, politics and governence a foreign language like English or French is chosen. Since the ideology in Arabic countries comes from the medium of Classical arabic, it is resistant to exposure to science, technology, medicine in English or French. That is why university trained professors take to jihad or a trained surgeon like al-Zawahiri heads Al-Queda

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