tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post2752974182335686798..comments2024-03-09T09:19:07.054+01:00Comments on Jabal al-Lughat: Marzouki's Tunisian language policy proposals: once more against code-switchingLameen Souag الأمين سواقhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00773164776222840428noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-61056152516739461472011-11-15T23:59:45.185+01:002011-11-15T23:59:45.185+01:001-"Creolization" is very different from ...1-"Creolization" is very different from heavy foreign influence: a look at Malta would indeed be more fruitful than a look at creoles.<br /><br />2-In the David Mack quote, "il n'est pas" should be "ce n'est pas"<br /><br />3-Claiming that the convergence of dialects towards the standard means that the dialects couldn't become separate "neo-Arab" languages is too simplistic. The rise of the (Western) Romance languages took place in a context where all borrowed very heavily from Latin.<br /><br />4-This rise of written Western Romance standards took place in (mostly) Catholic societies where Latin was closely associated with Catholicism, over a period of time (The Renaissance especially) when religious fanaticism in Europe was more extreme than anything the Muslim world ever experienced (I am a Romance-speaking Catholic myself, but I quite agree with Lameen's point). <br /><br />Hence I doubt that the status of Fusha as the language of the Qur'an would suffice, in and of itself, to ensure the status of Fusha in Tunisian society. <br /><br />5-Despite the above criticism, I agree with Lameen: Moncef Marzouki has plainly given real thought to this issue. If such thoroughness is typical of the next generation of Tunisian politicians, that country can expect a bright future.<br /><br />6-Indeed, considering how poorly some of Tunisia's Northern Mediterranean neighbors are faring, let me offer an imaginary newspaper headline from the year 2050: "Italian illegals and refugees still defeating the Tunisian navy's best efforts", and an imaginary linguistics article title: "The Arabic pidgin of Spanish guest workers in Tunis: some preliminary findings".Etiennenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-3697993967405572282011-11-14T08:57:35.288+01:002011-11-14T08:57:35.288+01:00Well, the Turks dumped their whole civilized (as o...Well, the Turks dumped their whole civilized (as opposed to nomadic) history when they switched to the Latin script and purged much (though by no means all) of the Persian and Perso-Arabic elements in their language. Perhaps that was the only way to build a modern nation out of the wreck of empire; I don't know, I wasn't there at the time.John Cowanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11452247999156925669noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-62978977719097122152011-11-12T13:05:01.541+01:002011-11-12T13:05:01.541+01:00The bridge that connects the Maghrib to the Mashri...The bridge that connects the Maghrib to the Mashriq - Fusha - is also the bridge that connects the Maghrib to the past 1400 years of its own written heritage; you can't cut yourself off from the one without cutting yourself off from the other. I don't think it's fair to dismiss his ideas as the usual Maghrebi inferiority complex either: Marzouki makes a point of criticising the same code-mixing trends in the Mashriq (and it's pretty common there too in some places - look at Lebanon or the Gulf.)<br /><br />As for the spectre of Mashriq-ization: I think you're overstating the (real) problems of the Middle East and understating those of North Africa. Despite being lucky enough not to have the kind of longstanding sectarian rivalries that the Mashriq suffers from, the Maghrib has still managed two rather bloody civil wars in the past 20 years. And in terms of bloodshed, neither the Maghrib nor the Mashriq have ever done anything to compare to what Europe managed over the past century.Lameen Souag الأمين سواقhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00773164776222840428noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-1921579275253535782011-11-12T11:10:57.077+01:002011-11-12T11:10:57.077+01:00Why is it very necessary to be able to talk to a Y...Why is it very necessary to be able to talk to a Yemeni without a translator? I don't mean to be rude, but I think we NWAs are very ungrateful to the truth that our dialect has served (in some way) to isolate us from certain negative tendencies that are prevalent in the Mashriq? What do I mean by negative tendencies? I will not be too concise about answering that question because it may unintentionally appear as racism or mean-spiritedness; so let me put it differently: Do you want Tunisia to turn into Yemen? Remember, ideas underlie the condition of a society, and a common language allows for the easy traffic of ideas: why risk allowing blood-to-their-name ideas enter our area? Glance at the state of the Middle East; bloodshed, sectocide, hate and fanaticism. I see nothing that impresses me there. (Yes there is stability and prosperity in petro-nations, but they are also the heartlands of a conservatism that an average Tunsian would recognise as backward.) Again why widen the already existing bridge to that region - what do you expect will come our direction? <br /><br />Marzouki's and his fossilized generation throughout the Maghreb is heading to the grave, and they objectively have failed society with the ideas they passed around; in my conciousness they are attached to the regime that fell, so they are disreputable even if they rise to consider the antithesis of their own positions. The Tunisian revolution was achieved not by his generation but by the youth - why does HE pontificate?! He should sit back and not criticise the communicative choices of the youth, the same choices that allowed revolutionaries to communicate and organise an effective revolution.<br />Tunsia for some odd reason suffers a few who harbour this inferiority complex vis a vis the Mashriq. Marzouki exemplifies it. That, in my estimation is what spurs people like him to advocate for the "purification" of the language. Embedded there is the calumny that implies that our region, its history, peoples, and interactions etc are filthy! Once again an inferiority complex. <br />Please, people, take the opposite view. And that goes for those who wish to wipe the word 'Arab' out of our history - it is self-hate too. <br />Notwithstanding the argument for standardisation is very convincing, but its scope should only concern the Maghreb countries.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-75712991775790906022011-11-12T10:48:43.790+01:002011-11-12T10:48:43.790+01:00Oh yeah, forgot to post this wonderfully illustrat...Oh yeah, forgot to post this wonderfully illustrative comment from <a href="http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=22261571&postID=7712035532175721844" rel="nofollow">David Mack, at MEI Editor</a>:<br /><br />"The younger generation of Tunisians has a much better education in Arabic and, I suspect, less of an education in French than was true of the elite when I served there from 1979-1982. Coming from Baghdad, where intensive use had honed my Arabic and being years away from my one academic year of French, I though erroneously that I could get away with speaking Arabic. At my first diplomatic reception, a Tunisian lady put that idea to rest: "Monsieur Mack: Nous ne parlons pas l'Arabe. Il n'est pas une langue serieuse." Even in those days, however, younger Tusisians veiled political criticism of the regime by allegations like, "All the ministers are married to French women, and they keep us down by not speaking to us in Arabic.""Lameen Souag الأمين سواقhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00773164776222840428noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-36121212966797460742011-11-12T10:47:00.459+01:002011-11-12T10:47:00.459+01:00JC: "nearly Fusha" is of course an exagg...JC: "nearly Fusha" is of course an exaggeration, but I think it is fair to say that the southern dialects preserve all sorts of Fusha features (eg feminine plural subject agreement) lost in the northern ones, and that the rural dialects in general are less heavily influenced by French.<br /><br />Phoenix: Yes, creoles are wonderfully fascinating languages in their own right, and arguably they're the most efficient ones around. But I think he's still right to be scared of them. The thing about creoles is that their emergence invariably reflects a profound identity shift among their speakers, in which a vast amount of their original culture(s) is lost - which is precisely what he's afraid of.Lameen Souag الأمين سواقhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00773164776222840428noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-59231611195506916662011-11-11T22:49:38.128+01:002011-11-11T22:49:38.128+01:00I'm a big opponent of prescriptivism, and I fe...I'm a big opponent of prescriptivism, and I feel that every language should have a more laissez-faire approach to language regulation, but I actually think that: "do laissez-faire language policies simply amount to letting the rich impose their language preferences on the rest of us?"<br /><br />is one the best arguments I've ever read in defense of language regulation. People usually don't get much farther than 'the language will become an incomprehensible garble of words!', which, as a comparative linguist, is hilariously wrong.<br /><br />I take a bit of offense at his almost racist view on the 'quality' or 'legitimacy' of creoles and pidgins. At best such mixed languages give us a wonderful view how features of both languages can continue in one language (retention of tone in languages that are essentially English), At 'worst' it gives us an idea how far a language can be reduced to an incredibly simple grammar without losing any of its clarity.PhoeniXhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17627425696035152752noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13177437.post-5463018950616827792011-11-09T19:20:40.712+01:002011-11-09T19:20:40.712+01:00Well, English is stuffed full of French and Latin,...Well, English is stuffed full of French and Latin, and Maltese is essentially Tunisian Arabic stuffed full of Sicilian, Italian, French, and English, and both are doing fairly well. As for "What we hear in broadcasting is not the dialect of the northwest or the south (which are nearly Fusha)", can that really be true?<br /><br />But otherwise, a pretty progressive article from someone who is basically a prescriptivist.John Cowanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11452247999156925669noreply@blogger.com