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The Emphatic l in Arabic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Charles A. Ferguson
Charles A. Ferguson*
Affiliation:
Harvard University
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Extract

The existence of an ‘emphatic’ or velarized in Classical Arabic and the modern dialects has often been noted and the sound has been carefully described. Descriptions which have been made from a structural point of view have generally regarded this emphatic as an allophone of the usual l, not an independent phoneme, both in the Classical language and in the dialects. The purpose of this note is to make clear why the emphatic must be regarded as an independent phoneme in Classical Arabic and in most if not all the modern dialects.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 32 , Issue 3: July-September , September 1956 , pp. 446 - 452
Copyright
Copyright © 1956 by the Linguistic Society of America

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References

1 For a description of the sound and full references to previous literature see K. Petráček, Zur Artikulation des sogenannten emphatischen l im Arabischen, Archiv orientální 20.509–23 (1952).

2 For example J. Cantineau, Esquisse d'une phonologie de l'arabe classique, BSL 43.93–140 (1946), esp. 113; id., Les parlers arabes du Hōrân 106–11 (1946) ; id., Analyse phonologique du parler arabe d'el-Hâmma de Gabès, BSL 47.64–105 (1951), esp. 70; H. el-Hajjé, Le parler arabe de Tripoli 14, 15 (Paris, 1954); K. Petráček, op. cit. (fn. 1). For the other view see W. H. T. Gairdner, The phonetics of Arabic 17–9 (London, 1925) ; Z. S. Harris, The phonemes of Moroccan Arabic, JAOS 62.309–18 (1942), esp. 313; H. Blanc, Studies in North Palestinian Arabic 62, 63 (Jerusalem, 1952).

3 As suggested by Petráček 510.

4 Cf. N. S. Troubetzkoy, Principes de phonologie 48–9 (transi. J. Cantineau; Paris, 1949); H. L. Smith Jr., An outline of metalinguistic analysis, Monograph series on linguistics and language teaching 2.61 (Washington, 1952).

5 Cf. Mary R. Haas, Tunica 17 (New York, 1940). An even closer parallel is the Russian voiced velar spirant, which for some speakers is a separate phoneme occurring in only a few words—including the word for God. Cf. S. C. Boyanus, Russian pronunciation and Russian phonetic reader 1.13 (Cambridge, 1955).

6 Cf. Troubetzkoy 245–6.

7 For clear recent statements on the need for minimal pairs, see H.A. Gleason Jr., An introduction to descriptive linguistics 25–6 (New York, 1955); C. F. Hockett, Manual of phonology 212–3 (Baltimore, 1955).

8 Cf. Troubetzkoy 247.

9 Cf. J. Krámský, N. S. Troubetzkoy and oriental linguistics, Archiv orientální 16.244 (1949).

10 Cf. Troubetzkoy 53. This process can be seen in action by observing a native speaker of Moroccan Arabic talking English. Unless he has mastered English extremely well, he will pronounce English but as //, simply because the only position in which a sound like the English vowel occurs in his speech is next to an emphatic consonant. Examples of the process in Arabic loanwords are legion. Occasionally the result is a minimal pair, e.g. kalbak ‘your dog’ : kalbak ‘kalpak’ (kind of hat formerly worn by Palestinian police), a pair fairly widespread in Palestinian Arabic.

11 Cf. K. L. Pike, Grammatical prerequisites to phonemic analysis, Word 3.155–72 (1947).

12 Cf. Harris, JAOS 62.316. A similar analysis is suggested, without details, by J. R. Firth, Sounds and prosodies, TPS 1948.141.