Moroccan Arabic

Moroccan Arabic (الهجة مغربية láhja maġribiya), also called Maghrebi or Dáriya (الدارجة), It is the language that comes from the set of varieties of dialectal Arabic spoken in Morocco, and that present a multitude of common features with the modalities spoken in Algeria, Tunisia and some areas of Libya. It is an oral language with numerous groups of mutually intelligible dialect varieties originating from the Arabic language, and extending from the westernmost part of Libya. Dariya (Moroccan Arabic dialect) was formerly called "hilali dialect", because the most famous Moroccan Arabic tribe is the "Bani Hilal" tribe, the first to speak this dialect, which later became extended to all of Morocco. There are two types of dariya (civilized dariya and Bedouin dariya). "Dariya" means in Arabic "simplified words" or "simplified dialect". It is the mother tongue for 75% of Moroccan Arabs. This spoken language is most popular in the north and center of Morocco and a bit in the south of Morocco. In southern Morocco there is another oral Arabic language called "hassaniya".

Maghrebi is also the language of a part of the population of Maghrebi origin in the city of Ceuta, whose speakers use a variant called "Ceuta Arabic", after the tenured professor of the area of Arab and Islamic studies and head of the department of Arabic from the UAM, Francisco Moscoso, and the Caballas Coalition. Other authors such as A. Giménez Reíllo (Abu Ilyás), professor and sworn translator of Arabic, defend it as "darija from Ceuta".

Historical, social and cultural aspects

General information

Maghrebi is the native Arabic dialect of the majority of the population of the entire Maghreb, which includes Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and part of Libya.

Within the linguistic branch of Maghrebi Arabic that covers all of North-West Africa, it is possible to distinguish different varieties of oral languages such as: Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian and Libyan, which present their own characteristics, but share many linguistic features allowing sometimes a certain level of intercommunication, especially at the most educated levels of the language. Also the Maltese language belongs to the Maghrebi branch of Arabic.

The Moroccan oral language is known in Morocco as dariya, a word that can have a certain pejorative connotation, since it means "dialect" or "talk" to differentiate it from standard Arabic or classical Arabic which is the official language of education and administration.

7th century.

The Moroccan language developed on a strong Berber substratum, which has left a visible imprint on Moroccan vocabulary, phonetics and grammar. The influence of Andalusian Arabic is also palpable and, already in modern times, of French and (5% of French words in Moroccan dialect), to a lesser extent and especially in the northern varieties, of Spanish (there are 2% of words in Spanish in the dariya). Unlike other Arabic languages, Moroccan Arabic hardly has Turkish influences, since Morocco never belonged to the Ottoman Empire.

According to the theories of specialists in the subject such as Abdou Elimam, the origin of this language would go back more than 3000 years of history, actually being an evolution of the Punic language spoken by the Phoenicians in North Africa and Punic is a very old Arabic dialect.

Information: Half of the Arabic dialects are in Standard Arabic and the other half are colloquial Arabic. There is no Arabic dialect close to standard Arabic... All Arabic dialects today are a mixture of classical Arabic words and colloquial Arabic words (Urban Words/Slang Words). Scholars consider Moroccan to contain very old and standard Arabic words. And letter outputs in Moroccan dialect (dariya) differ from letter outputs in other Arabic dialects because Moroccans speak very fast AND shorten words. Example: the word "Ahlan" what does hello mean In the Moroccan dialect, the letter "a"، is dropped This is how the word "Ahln" instead of "Ahlan". Therefore, the word is shortened and pronounced quickly to save time, but the meaning of the word remains the same. And this applies to all the grammar rules in the Moroccan Arabic (dariya) dialect, so the Moroccan dialect is known to speak fast for a reason, which is (to shorten speech and say useful things in a very short time). Arabic dialects are not subject to any law. That is why they are called dialects because they differ from tribe to tribe and region to region, and each region and tribe has its own unique dialect...

Sociolinguistics

There is a situation of diglossia between the Moroccan language that predominates in oral communication, advertising, and in informal media such as the Internet, social networks, and mobile messaging, and the modern standard Arabic that predominates in written media formal as the press, administration or literature. Both languages have differences comparable to those that could exist between modern Romance languages and Vulgar Latin of late antiquity.

Modern Standard Arabic is an official vehicle of communication between Arab nations, but it is almost never used in inter-Arab and spontaneous communication occasions, in which native dialects are used, which are more or less mutually intelligible depending on the distance geographical location and the notoriety they enjoy in the pan-Arab media.

Between 2013 and 2015 there was an intense debate in Moroccan society, politics and the media as a result of the proposal for an educational reform to combat the serious rates of school failure in which, among other measures,, the need to include the study of Darija or Maghrebi as a language of instruction in the early stages of education was raised, since it constitutes the true mother tongue of the majority of the population, a measure that was strongly contested by sectors and political parties. more conservative in Moroccan society, and which was finally rejected.

Without official status or protection in any Maghreb country, it is nonetheless recognized as one of the "minority languages" of France under the name of "Arab Maghrébin" (Maghrebi Arabic), and appears as such in the European Charter for Regional Languages (Charte européenne des langues régionales et minoritaires” of the European Council; B. Cerquiglini).

Despite all these obstacles to its recognition, the dariya or Moroccan already has its own version on Wikipedia that already has numerous contributions: Wikipedia in Moroccan

In Ceuta (autonomous city of Spain), the Caballas coalition proposed the creation of an "Academia del Árabe Ceutí", which linguistically speaking would be identical to Dariya or Maghrebi Arabic, as well as its co-official status. its officialization there is a debate about whether or not it is convenient to overcome school failure, highlighting as a position against the teacher and sworn interpreter of Arabic A. Giménez Reíllo (Abu Ilyás). On the contrary, professor Francisco Moscoso defends the official status of the Dariya in the Ceuta educational system.

Linguistic description

Being a peripheral speech of the dialectal continuum formed by the Neo-Arabic linguistic varieties, Moroccan Arabic differs from other colloquial varieties or languages derived from Arabic in a substantial way and is hardly intelligible with them, except with those closest varieties spoken in the other countries and regions of the Maghreb. It has integrated a large number of words from the Berber languages, Spanish and finally French.

Writing

Moroccan Arabic lacks a regulated or standardized spelling system, however, in the field of the Internet, social networks and mobile messaging, it usually uses the Latin alphabet with the use of some numbers or combinations of letters to transcribe some characteristic sounds like:

• ' - 2 = ounce "hamza" []]
• ♪ - 3 = ع " urgeayn" [ hung ]
• gh = phrase " gettingayn" [people]
• and - g = ج "yīm" [,], [8]
• kh - j - 5 = خ "jā'" [x]
• h - 7 = ح "ḥā'" []]
• q - 9 = ق "qāf" [q]
• sh - ch = ش "shīn" [ь]

Despite not having a regulated spelling system, Dariya is already a literary language in which a multitude of works have been written by authors of recognized prestige such as Youssef Amine Elalamy, author of many works in this language. There are also a good number of translations into Dariya, among which The little prince or Amir saghir stand out.

Phonology

The consonant inventory of Moroccan Arabic is made up of the following phonemes:

		Labial		Dental/Alveolar		Post-alv./ Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Faríngea	Gloss
		Simple.	emphatically	Simple.	emphatically
Nasal		m	mˁ	n
Occlusive	sorda			t̪	t̪ˁ		k	q		.
	Sonora	b	bˁ	d̪	d̪ˁ		g
Fridge	sorda	f		s	ˁ	MIN	x~χ			h
	Sonora			z	zˁ	・	
Approximately				l	lˁ	j	w
Vibrante				r	rˁ

The vowel phonemes are three long vowels /i, a, u/ and three short vowels /ĕ, ă, ŏ/. The vowel /i/ usually sounds [i] but in contact with the consonants /x, ɣ, q, ħ, ʕ/ opens in [e]. Similarly /u/ usually sounds [u], in contact with /q/ sounds [o] and in contact with /x, ɣ, q, ħ, ʕ/ sounds [ʊ]. The vowel /a/ usually sounds like [æ], together with the uvular or pharyngeal as [a] and next to emphatic words such as [ɑ]. The following table summarizes the inventory of vowel phonemes and their allophones:

	previous	central	post
closed	/i/ [i], [e]		/u/ [u], [ы], [o]
average	/e/ [ chuckles ] [ chuckles ]	/ă/ [,~ä]	/o/ [or], [.]
open	/a/ [æ], []~ä], [/25070/]

There are various transcription/transliteration systems for these phonemes:

Transcription Harrell
a	b		d	roga	e	f	g	CMP	h	ḥ	i	k	l		m		n	or	q	r	.	s	.	š	t	Δ	u	w	x	and	z	Silencio	ž	.	ع
Genetic value (AFI)
a	b	bˁ	d	dˁ	e	f		▪	h		i	k	l	lˁ	m	mˁ	n	or	q	♥	◊	s	ˁ	MIN	t	tˁ	u	w	x	j	z	zˁ		.
Other transcripts / Arabic alphabet
	b ب		d د	roga lé		f ف	g .	CMP ▸	h ه	ح		k ك	l .	.	m م		n ن		q ق	r ر	r ر	s س	. FIC	. ش	t Eighteen	Δ Target		w و	▸	and .	z .	Silencio MENT	ğ .	. ♫	日本語 ع

Historically, many words in Classical Arabic experienced syncopation or apocope of short vowels, and for this reason many words have complicated initial and middle consonant clusters made up of two or three consonants:

Certain processes of suffixation or prefixation require an epentic vowel /e/ which complicates the regularity of the morphology.

Morphology

Moroccan Arabic is an inflectional, synthetic, and essentially fusional language, making extensive use of prefixation, suffixation, and infixation. Flexion is performed by all three procedures.

Verbs

Verb conjugation is based more on grammatical aspect than tense itself. Thus the conjugated verb forms according to person forms of imperative, imperfect (used for the present and future) and perfect (usually for the past):

(1a) r'rajel mashi kbir

ART- Man. NEG large (imperfect with sense of present)

'Man is not great'

(1b) huwa mashi kbir

'He is not great' (imperfect with sense of future)

(1c) qaddam-Ø-ni lil-ek

present-3aPERF.3aSG.M.-OB.1aSG a-2aSG(perfect)

'He introduced me to you.'

(1d) b Rehabilitationhi-t hadak

want-PERF.1aSG(perfect with sense of present)

'I want that'

(1e) ddiw

'Tomad' (imperative)

The subject person marks depend on the three classes of forms mentioned above. In perfect forms the person mark is a suffix, in imperfect forms it is a prefix (sometimes with a complementary suffix), while imperative forms refer only to the second person and do not carry an explicit person mark. The following chart summarizes the person, gender, and number marks that match the subject:

			Perfect.	Imperfect	Imperative
singular	1. a		-t	- No.	__
	2nd	masc.	- Hey.	t-, te-	Ø
		fem.	- Hey.	T-, you-	-I
	3a	masc.	Ø	I-, ye-	__
		fem.	-et, -at,t	t-, te-	__
plural	1. a		- Baby.	- No.	__
	2nd		-tiw/-tu	I-I...	- Wow.
	3a		-u/-w	I-I-I-I-	__

• The basic way to cite a verb is the third singular male person of the perfect character that is characterized by no attachment, so it is considered to represent the verbal radical. Prefixes /t-/ may suffer assimilation to the next consonant (if it is emphatic or sound).
• The progressive present is formed before the prefix ka- or Ta- to the forms of imperfect. Without this prefix the form of imperfect is interpreted contextually as present, future or imperfect past.

The following table summarizes the finite forms of the verb kteb 'to write':

			Perfect.	Imperfect	Imperative
singular	1. a		ktebt 'I wrote, I wrote.'	nektob 'I write, I'll write.'	__
	2nd	masc.	ktebti 'You wrote.'	tektob 'written'	ktob! 'write!'
		fem.		tektobi 'written'	kotbi! 'write!'
	3a	masc.	kteb wrote	yektob 'write'	__
		fem.	ketbet 'wrote'	tektob 'write'	__
plural	1. a		ktebna 'We wrote.'	nektobu 'We wrote.'	__
	2nd		ktebtu 'You wrote.'	tektobu 'you write.'	ktobu! 'Write!'
	3a		ketbu 'written'	yektobu 'write'	__

Note the transformations of the root in the forms of third person of the perfect.

Pronouns

The personal pronoun has stressed and unstressed forms. The tonic or independent forms are used as emphatic subject pronouns, while the unstressed or clitic forms are used to express possessives, direct object or indirect object, which appear as clitics of other words.

			Forms Independent (tonics)	Forms dependient (Atones critiques)	Reflective	Positive
singular	1. a		ana	-I, uh,	ras-i	dyal-i
	2nd	masc.	anta, (i)nta	-k, -ek	ras-ek	dyal-ek
		fem.	(i)nti	-k, -ek	ras-ek	dyal-ek
	3a	masc.	huwa	-Oh, yeah.	rasu	dyal-u
		fem.	hiya	-ha.	ras-a	dyal-a
plural	1. a		ḥna, iḥna	- Baby.	ras-na	dyal-na
	2nd		antuma	-kum	ras-kum	dyal-kum
	3a		huma	- Smoke.	ras-(h)om	dyal-om

Examples:

rasi 'my head.ras 'head', -I 1ap.sg.)

rasek 'You Head

šuffia 'Motherme'

Articles and demonstratives

The demonstrative article in Moroccan Arabic is phonologically a clitic /l-/, although it should be borne in mind that it is easily assimilated to the following consonant, specifically before one of the coronal consonants /t, d, s, z, l, r; n; š, ž; ḍ, ṭ, ṣ, ẓ, ḷ, ṛ/ its form changes to t-, d-, s-, z-, l-, r-; n-; š-, ž-; ḍ-, ṭ-, ṣ-, ẓ-, ḷ-, ṛ- becoming identical to the initial consonant.

In Moroccan Arabic there are two types of indefinite article. The potential indefinite article has a single invariant form for masculine and feminine: ši- equals 'some/some/some/some' + the name in singular or plural:

ši kalb 'some dog'

ši krasi 'Some chairs'

The indefinite article of quantity uses the numeral waḥed 'uno/una' plus the definite article:

waḥed l kalb 'a dog'

waḥed l kursi 'a chair'.

As for the demonstratives, there are three degrees of deixis:

		[+speaking] [-hearing]	[-speaking] [+hearing]	[-speaking] [-hearing]
Singular	Male	had-a ' East'	d-ak 'ese'	had-ak 'that one'
	female	had-i 'this'	d-ik 'That's it.'	had-ik 'Aquella'
Plural		had-o 'these, these'	d-ok 'That, those'	had-ok 'Those, those'

Nouns and adjectives

Nouns and adjectives change their form according to the inflection of gender and number. Nouns and adjectives can be masculine or feminine, and singular, dual or plural (some authors consider the unitary and collective forms separately as "different numbers" although although they are morphologically different, syntactically they require singular or plural concordances)..

Women's training.

Generally, and in this it coincides with Spanish, most nouns and adjectives (including participles) form the feminine by suffixing -a to the masculine form. Examples:

ayib, aiba (/xeib-/) 'faith, ugly':

Tuil, Tuela 'high, high'

amin, amina Faithful (f.)

However, as in Spanish, not all nouns ending in -a are feminine words, there are also masculine nouns ending in an -a, Examples:

baba 'father'; Ma 'water'; ra 'hez'

Formation of the plural.

There are two main ways to form the plural: a) by adding suffixes; b) by internal transformation of the word (plural fractos):

• Suffixation. The main suffixes are: - In.; - Yeah.-(a)t. Certain Spanish collective names finished in a (rechosen of the 'oliva') originate in this Arabic plural. Examples:

ain (eyes); neyar  neyara (carpenters); biro  biroat (offices)

• Plurales fractos. The Moroccan Arab also contemplates three ways of indicating the number of the substantives: collective, unity and dual. Collectives include many male names that have no explicit plural mark but refer to an undetermined number of objects. Examples:

Hut (fishing)

Some examples of masculine plural formation are the following:

Type		Scheme singular	Scheme plural	Examples
Suffocated	1	mo-__	mo-__in	mohandis 'ingeniero' / mohandisin 'engineers' moḥami 'a lawyer' / moḥamiyin 'advocates' muattil 'actor' / muattilin 'actors'
	2	(Hispanism) -	(Hispanism) -	Yeah. 'sello' / Yeah. 'sellos' bag / handbags side 'healed' / sides "helmed"
	3	C1♫C2C2aC3	C1♫C2C2aC3a	cerbba 'tintorer' / rogationbba 'tintoreros' cedebba 'curitor' / rogances 'curtidores' šøffar 'ladron' / šøffara 'ladrones'
Fractions	4	C1C2aC3	C1C2orC3a	b 'mula' / b 'mules' ktab 'book' / ktoba 'books' sṭal 'cover' / sṭola 'covers'
	5	C1VC2C3	C1C2orC3	qalb 'heart' / qlob 'heart.' dars 'reading' / dros 'lections' dørb 'callejón' / drob(a) 'callejones'
	6a	C1VC2C3VC4	C1C2aC3♫C4	měftaḥ 'llave' / mfatambiḥ 'llaves' kabboṭ 'abrigo' / kbabθ 'cooters' měsmar 'slave' / msamθr 'slaves'
	6b	C1C2C3C4-a	C1C2aC3♫C4	madrasa 'school' / mdar margins 'schools' m emerging 'Blood' / m developing 'Cucharones' karrusa 'carretilla' / krar 'carretillas'
	7	C1C2C3-a	C1C2aC3i	and circle 'injection' / and 'injections' taqba 'A hole' / tqabi "holes" zarbiya 'alfombra' / zrabi 'alfombras'
Joint	8	C1aC2	C1iC2+an	kar 'autocar' / kiran 'autocares' žar "baby" / žiran Neighbors. kas 'vaso' / kisan 'vasos'
Other types				♪ 'niño' / Olad 'children' naḥla 'bee' / nḥal Bees. roḥ 'soul' / arwaḥ 'souls'

The plural of most feminine nouns is formed by suffixation. Feminines ending in -a form the plural in -at although there are some additional ways to make the plural for feminines not ending in -a.

Type		Scheme singular	Scheme plural	Examples
Suffocated	1a	___-a	___-a+t	kambilba 'perra' / kambilbat 'perras' nibira 'nevera' / nibirat 'neveras'
	1b	___	___+at	kamyun 'camion' / kamyunat 'camiones'
	1c	___V	___+w-at	radyo 'radio' / radyowat 'radios' biro 'unpaid' / birowat 'Outs'
Fractions		___C		nafs 'soul' / Nophos 'souls' ḥarb 'war' / ḥorob 'wars' give 'house' / dyor 'houses běnt 'hija' / bnat 'daughters' kørš 'tripa / kroš 'tripas'
Joint		___C		bab 'door' / biban 'doors' Δriq 'camino' / γorqan 'caminos'

3.2.5 These collective names have a corresponding unitary name ending in "-a".

Examples:

Huta (a fish) in this case in turn a plural in "-at" Hutat (diverse/various fish)

3.2.5 Dual: Moroccan Arabic has preserved remnants of dual from Classical Arabic -(a)in, in various names of measures and objects that almost always appear in pairs. Examples:

Ain, ainin (eye, eyes); mia, miatin (six hundred)

3.2.6 Special case for adjectives: It is common to use the masculine plural for the feminine plural.

Examples:

bnt seghera (small girl) bnat segharat or more usual bnat sghar (small girls).

3.3 Indeterminacy / Determination

3.3.2 Determination is expressed in the following ways:

a) with the help of the article "l" which is equivalent to "el"/+ the noun in the singular; The article is assimilated to the initial consonant of the name when it is sh, d, n, r, s, t, y, z (the so-called solar letters). Examples:

L kalb (the dog); l kursi (l chair)

Sh shims (the sun).

b) with the help of a complement of the name. Examples:

Dar l kalb (doghouse).

Syntax

Moroccan Arabic is a head initial language, the determiner precedes the noun, the verb usually precedes the object, the verb precedes the object, the preposition precedes the noun phrase, etc. It also has numerous concordances, of gender and number within the noun phrase and the determining phrase. Of number, person and gender between the subject and the verb.

Words of non-Arabic origin

All Moroccan dialect words are in Standard Arabic and Colloquial Urban Arabic AND some Old Punic words and some Old Yemeni Arabic words. There are no Berber words in the Moroccan Arabic dialect.

Some words of French origin

• forchita: FourchetteHolder [fork]≤30,000]
• took it: automobilecar [t] omobil]
• telfaza: televisionTelevision [t]◆.]
• radio: radio [r]♪
• partma: appartement) apartment [b∧]
• Tobes: busbus [t] obis]
• camera: caméraCamera [k∧]
• portable: portable) mobile phone/cell phone [portɑ›bl]
• tilifun: telephonetelephone [tilifu:(n)
• brika: briquet) lighter [bri’ke.]

Some words of Spanish origin

These words may have come by way of Andalusian Arabic and Castilian brought by the Moors when they were expelled from Spain after the Reconquest or they may have been incorporated in the time of the Protectorate (1912-1956).

• wheel: wheel [rwed]ɑ›]
• Cuzina: kitchen [kuzin]
• Simana: week [sim∧]
• blanket: blanket [m⋅]