Classical Arabic
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Template:Cleanup-date Image:Large Koran.jpg Classical Arabic is the form of the Arabic language used in the Qur'an as well as in numerous literary texts from the same period. Modern Standard Arabic is a modern version, differing minimally in morphology and only to a small degree in its syntax and lexicon.
Classical Arabic is often believed to be the parent language of all the spoken varieties of Arabic, but recent scholarship, such as Clive Holes (2004), questions this view, showing that other dialects were extant at the time and may be the origin of current spoken varieties.
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The History of Classical Arabic
Classical Arabic spread with the spread of Islam, becoming a language of scholarship and religious devotion as the language of the Qur'an. Its relation to modern dialects is somewhat analogous to the relationship of Latin and the Romance Languages or Middle Chinese and the modern Chinese languages.
Morphology
Classical Arabic is one of the Semitic Languages, and therefore has many similarities in conjugation and pronunciation to Hebrew, Akkadian, Aramaic, and Amharaic. It possesses similar conjugation to biblical Hebrew in its use of vowels to modify a base group of consonants. For example, k-t-b means "write", so out of this cluster, we get:
- kataba, "to write"
- ya'k'tubu, "he writes"
- kitāb, "book"
- kutub, "some books"
- maktaba, "library"
- mi'k'tāb, "Writing Machine"
Phonology
There are three short vowels and three long vowels in Arabic, being A, I, and U in two different lengths each. The following table illustrates this:
There are as many constanant phonemes in Classical Arabic as there are in the modern form. They are:
| Bilabial | Inter- dental | Dental | Post- alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Pharyn- geal | Glottal | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | emphatic | ||||||||||
| Stop | voiceless | [[voiceless alveolar stop|Template:IPA]] | Template:IPA | [[voiceless velar stop|Template:IPA]] | [[voiceless uvular stop|Template:IPA]] | [[Glottal stop|Template:IPA]] | |||||
| voiced | [[voiced bilabial plosive|Template:IPA]] | [[voiced alveolar plosive|Template:IPA]] | Template:IPA | Template:IPA¹ | |||||||
| Fricative | voiceless | [[voiceless labiodental fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[voiceless dental fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[voiceless alveolar fricative|Template:IPA]] | Template:IPA | [[voiceless postalveolar fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[voiceless velar fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[Voiceless pharyngeal fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[Voiceless glottal fricative|Template:IPA]] | ||
| voiced | [[voiced dental fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[voiced alveolar fricative|Template:IPA]] | Template:IPA | [[Voiced velar fricative|Template:IPA]] | [[Voiced pharyngeal fricative|Template:IPA]] | ||||||
| Nasal | [[Bilabial nasal|Template:IPA]] | [[Alveolar nasal|Template:IPA]] | |||||||||
| Lateral | [[Alveolar lateral approximant|Template:IPA]] ² | ||||||||||
| Trill | Template:IPA | ||||||||||
| Approximant | [[Voiced labial-velar approximant|Template:IPA]] | Template:IPA | |||||||||
See Arabic alphabet for further explanation of the IPA phonetic symbols found in this chart.
- In modern arabic, Template:IPA is pronounced as Template:IPA by some speakers. This is especially characteristic of the Egyptian and southern Yemeni dialects. In many parts of North Africa and in the Levant, it is pronounced as Template:IPA. However, the true classical pronunciation is Template:IPA.
- Template:IPA is pronounced Template:IPA only in Template:IPA, the name of God, i.e. Allah, when the word follows a, ā, u or ū (after i or ī it is unvelarised: bismi l-lāh Template:IPA).
- Template:IPA is usually a phonetic approximant.
- In many varieties (if not most), Template:IPA are actually epiglottal Template:IPA (despite what is reported in many earlier works). However, in classical arabic, they are pronounced as pharyngeals.
The consonants traditionally termed "emphatic" Template:IPA are either velarised Template:IPA or pharyngealised Template:IPA. In some transcription systems, emphasis is shown by capitalizing the letter e.g. Template:IPA is written ‹D›; in others the letter is underlined or has a dot below it e.g. ‹ḍ›.
Prounciation of Saad
The main difference of pronunciation between classical arabic and modern arabic is in the pronunciation of 'Saad', which is the emphatic "s" in Arabic. In Classical Arabic 'saad' was sometimes voiced making it an emphatic "z". The emphatic "z" is widely used in pronouncing the constanant 'DHaa', which in classical usage is correctly an emphatic "dh" sound.
Classical Pronunciation
To make an utterance sound like Classical Arabic take an Arabic sentence and abide by the following rules:
- Pronounce every letter correctly, do not elide any sounds.
- always pronounce the "an" case ending at the end of an utterance (sentence) with an "aa"
- Do not pronounce certain letters. For example, in the words baḥr (بحر) and ǧisr (جسر) the r at the end should be silent, due to complex pronunciation rules.
- nasalize "n" sounds where appropriate (this is goverened by certain rules).
- Talk slowly. The main reason many arabic-language cartoons don't sound like classical arabic is because the words are pronounced quickly.
- pronounce ǧīm (ﺝ) properly. It can be pronounced as /g/ in classicalisms but usually this pronunciation is attributed to the non-traditional-arabs (example: Spanish characters in Andalus related dramas OR Byzantine king). Never pronounce it as /ʒ/.
- Allow kāf (ﻙ) to be pronounced (voiced) as the /g/ sound sometimes, provided that ǧīm is not pronounced /g/ sound already.
Bibliography
- Holes, Clive (2004) Modern Arabic: Structures, Functions, and Varieties Georgetown University Press. ISBN 1589010221
- Versteegh, Kees (2001) The Arabic Language Edinburgh University Press ISBN 0748614362 (Ch.5 available in link below)