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Yemeni Arabic
Yemeni Arabic is a cluster of varieties of Arabic spoken in Yemen, southwestern Saudi Arabia and the Horn of Africa. It is generally considered a very conservative dialect cluster, having many classical features not found across most of the Arabic-speaking world. Yemeni Arabic can be divided roughly into several main dialect groups, each with its own distinctive vocabulary and phonology Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a .... The most important four groups are San'ani in the North and Center and Hadhrami in the East, where is pronounced and is or (except in coastal Hadhrami where is ), in addition to Ta'izzi-Adeni in the South and Tihami in the West, where is and is . Yemeni Arabic is used for daily communications and has no official status; Modern Stan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yemen
Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and Oman to the Oman–Yemen border, northeast and shares maritime borders with Eritrea, Djibouti, and Somalia. Yemen is the second-largest Arabs, Arab sovereign state in the peninsula, occupying , with a coastline stretching about . Its constitutionally stated Capital city, capital, and largest city, is Sanaa. As of 2021, Yemen has an estimated population of some 30.4 million. In ancient times, Yemen was the home of the Sabaeans, a trading state that included parts of modern-day Ethiopia and Eritrea. Later in 275 AD, the Himyarite Kingdom was influenced by Judaism. Christianity arrived in the fourth century. Islam spread quickly in the seventh century and Yemenite troops were crucial in the early Islamic conquests. Several Dynasty, dynasties ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Egyptian Arabic
Egyptian Arabic, locally known as Colloquial Egyptian ( ar, العامية المصرية, ), or simply Masri (also Masry) (), is the most widely spoken vernacular Arabic dialect in Egypt. It is part of the Afro-Asiatic language family, and originated in the Nile Delta in Lower Egypt. The ca. 100 million Egyptians speak a continuum of dialects, among which Cairene is the most prominent. It is also understood across most of the Arabic-speaking countries due to broad Egyptian influence in the region, including through Egyptian cinema and Egyptian music. These factors help to make it the most widely spoken and by far the most widely studied variety of Arabic. While it is primarily a spoken language, the written form is used in novels, plays and poems ( vernacular literature), as well as in comics, advertising, some newspapers and transcriptions of popular songs. In most other written media and in radio and television news reporting, literary Arabic is used. Literary Arabic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Substratum
In linguistics, a stratum (Latin for "layer") or strate is a language that influences or is influenced by another through contact. A substratum or substrate is a language that has lower power or prestige than another, while a superstratum or superstrate is the language that has higher power or prestige. Both substratum and superstratum languages influence each other, but in different ways. An adstratum or adstrate is a language that is in contact with another language in a neighbor population without having identifiably higher or lower prestige. The notion of "strata" was first developed by the Italian linguist Graziadio Isaia Ascoli (1829–1907), and became known in the English-speaking world through the work of two different authors in 1932. Thus, both concepts apply to a situation where an intrusive language establishes itself in the territory of another, typically as the result of migration. Whether the superstratum case (the local language persists and the intrusive langu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Modern South Arabian
The Modern South Arabian languages (MSALs), also known as Eastern South Semitic languages, are a group of endangered languages spoken by small populations inhabiting the Arabian Peninsula, in Yemen and Oman, and Socotra Island. Together with the modern Ethiopian Semitic languages, the Western branch, they form the South Semitic sub-branch of the Afroasiatic language family's Semitic branch. Classification In his glottochronology-based classification, Alexander Militarev presents the Modern South Arabian languages as a South Semitic branch opposed to a North Semitic branch that includes all the other Semitic languages. They are no longer considered to be descendants of the Old South Arabian language, as was once thought, but instead "nephews". Despite the name, they are not closely related to the Arabic language. Languages * Mehri: the largest Modern South Arabian language, with over 165,000 speakers. Most Mehri speakers, around 76,000, live in Oman, but around 50,000 live i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Himyaritic
Himyaritic is an unattested or sparsely attested Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Yemen, by the Himyarite tribal confederacy. It was a Semitic language but either did not belong to the Old South Arabian (''Sayhadic'') languages according to Christian Robin or was, as more widely accepted, not a distinct language from Sabaic. The precise position inside Semitic is unknown because of the limited knowledge of the language if it is indeed a distinct language from Sabaic. Although the Himyar kingdom was an important power in South Arabia since the 1st century B.C., the knowledge of the supposed Himyaritic language is very limited if at all a distinct language, because all known Himyarite inscriptions were written in Sabaic, an Old South Arabian language. The three Himyaritic texts appeared to be rhymed (''sigla ZI 11, Ja 2353 and the Hymn of Qāniya''). Himyaritic is only known from statements of Arab scholars from the first centuries after the rise of Islam. According to t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Faifi Language
Faifi is a possible Old South Arabian language spoken by about 50,000 people in the vicinity of Mount Faifa (Jebel Fayfa) in the southwestern corner of Saudi Arabia, and across the border in Jebel Minabbih, Yemen. Along with Razihi, it is possibly the only other possible surviving descendant of the Old South Arabian branch of Central Semitic. Speakers Faifi is spoken in an area of roughly 600 km² (232 m²) along the Saudi border known as Jabal Fayfa by some estimated 50,000 people primarily living in the upper part of the mountains. Until 35 years ago no major roads entered Jabal Fayfa and thus it is speculated that speakers of the language older than 60 may be monolingual while younger speakers of the language have tended to take up speaking varieties of Hejazi, Nejdi, and Standard Arabic alongside their own language due to prolonged contact with Arabic language media, education, etc. Education in Jabal Fayfa tends to be bilingual due to the difficulties students experie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Razihi Language
Razihi (), originally known to linguists as "''Naẓīri''", is a Central Semitic language spoken by at least 62,900 people in the vicinity of Mount Razih (Jabal Razih) in the far northwestern corner of Yemen.Watson, Glover-Stalls, Al-razihi, & Weir (2006), "The language of Jabal Rāziḥ: Arabic or something else?", ''Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies'' 36:35–41 Along with Faifi, it is possibly the only surviving descendant of the Old South Arabian languages. Speakers Razihi is spoken on Jabal Razih, a mountain lying west of the town Sa'dah, whose highest summit, Jabal Hurum, is high. The population of Jabal Razih was approximately 25,000 in the 1970s and is estimated to be much more now. The number of Razihi speakers is reported by ''Ethnologue'' to have been 62,900 in 2004. A comprehensive study of the speakers, including their written tradition, was the topic of the book "''A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen''" (2007) by Shelagh Weir. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Old South Arabian
Old South Arabian (or Ṣayhadic or Yemenite) is a group of four closely related extinct languages spoken in the far southern portion of the Arabian Peninsula. They were written in the Ancient South Arabian script. There were a number of other Old South Arabian languages (e.g. Awsānian), of which very little evidence has survived, however. A pair of possible surviving Sayhadic languages is attested in the Razihi language and Faifi language spoken in far north-west of Yemen, though these varieties of speech have both Arabic and Sayhadic features, and it is difficult to classify them as either Arabic dialects with a Sayhadic substratum, or Sayhadic languages that have been restructured under pressure of Arabic. Classification issues It was originally thought that all four members of this group were dialects of one Old South Arabian language, but in the mid-twentieth century, linguist A.F.L. Beeston finally proved that they did in fact constitute independent languages. The O ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soqotri Language
Soqotri (also spelt Socotri, Sokotri, or Suqutri; autonym: ماتڸ دسقطري, ''mɛ́taḷ di-saḳɔ́ṭri''; , ''al-luḡah al-suquṭriyyah'') is a South Semitic language spoken by the Soqotri people on the island of Socotra and the two nearby islands of Abd al Kuri and Samhah, in the Socotra archipelago, in the Guardafui Channel. Soqotri is one of six languages that form a group called Modern South Arabian languages (MSAL). These additional languages include Mehri, Shehri, Bathari, Harsusi and Hobyot. All are spoken in different regions of Southern Arabia. Classification Soqotri is often mistaken as a variety of Arabic but is officially classified as an Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, South Semitic and South Arabian language. Status Soqotra is still somewhat of a mystery. The island has had minimal contact with the outside world and the inhabitants of Socotra have no written history. What is known of the islands is gathered from references found in records from t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mehri Language
Mehri or Mahri ( مهريّت ) is the most spoken of the Modern South Arabian languages (MSALs), a subgroup of the Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic family. It is spoken by the Mehri tribes, who inhabit isolated areas of the eastern part of Yemen, western Oman, particularly the Al Mahrah Governorate, with a small number in Saudi Arabia near the Yemeni and Omani borders. Up to the 19th century, speakers lived as far north as the central part of Oman. Mehri and its sister MSALs were spoken in the southern Arabian Peninsula before the spread of Arabic along with Islam in the 7th century CE. Today it is also spoken by Mehri residents in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, as well as in Kuwait by guest workers originally from South Arabia, as well as nationals with a South Arabian heritage. Given the dominance of Arabic in the region over the past 1400 years and the frequent bilingualism with Arabic among Mehri speakers, Mehri is at some risk of extinction. It is primarily a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Modern South Arabian Languages
The Modern South Arabian languages (MSALs), also known as Eastern South Semitic languages, are a group of endangered languages spoken by small populations inhabiting the Arabian Peninsula, in Yemen and Oman, and Socotra Island. Together with the modern Ethiopian Semitic languages, the Western branch, they form the South Semitic sub-branch of the Afroasiatic language family's Semitic branch. Classification In his glottochronology-based classification, Alexander Militarev presents the Modern South Arabian languages as a South Semitic branch opposed to a North Semitic branch that includes all the other Semitic languages. They are no longer considered to be descendants of the Old South Arabian language, as was once thought, but instead "nephews". Despite the name, they are not closely related to the Arabic language. Languages * Mehri: the largest Modern South Arabian language, with over 165,000 speakers. Most Mehri speakers, around 76,000, live in Oman, but around 50,000 live ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
