The Arabic Language

13.5 Variation and intrapersonal variables
In the preceding paragraphs we have looked at variation from the point of view of 
extra-personal factors, such as topic, setting and interlocutors, which determine 
language choice in a situation of diglossia. We have also looked at the resulting 
language attitudes and the possibilities of manipulating language choice for polit
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ical or religious purposes. While there are some studies relating the use of certain 
speech variables to such extra-personal variables, there is much less material on 
the correlation between linguistic variables and intrapersonal variables, such as 
socioeconomic class, education, religious affiliation, gender and age.
The discussion thus far has focused on the relationship between the high and 
the low variety and the influence of the (written) standard on the speech behav-
iour of the speakers. This influence of the standard has always been a feature of 
the linguistic history of Arabic, but at the same time the spoken dialects have 
generated their own dynamic. Processes like urbanisation and koineisation have 
led to the emergence of prestige varieties, whose features are not necessarily 
identical with those of Standard Arabic. We have seen above (Chapter 11, p. 196) 
that in Bahrain the Sunnite dialect exhibits features that are non-standard, 
whereas some features of the Shiʿite dialect are identical with those of Standard 
Arabic. Nonetheless, the Sunnite dialect represents the prestige variety (see also 
below). This has led some researchers to maintain that language change in the 
Arab world is never related to the influence of Classical Arabic. Al Wer (2002: 46) 
goes so far as to state that:
linguistic change in Arabic is determined by the relative status of native spoken 
varieties (which is determined by the relative status of their speakers); in this 
domain, the status of the linguistic features vis-à-vis Classical Arabic is irrelevant.
Identifying those variables that lead to a prestigious status in the Arabic-
speaking world is still in its infancy. Since we do not have enough data to set up 
full-scale correlations between socioeconomic class and the use of H/L variants, 
it would be premature to try to define sociolectal varieties with some measure of 
independent status. In her study of linguistic variation in two neighbourhoods in 
Damascus, Ismail (2007) attempted to set up a social class index, but she conceded 
that the situation was too complicated to reach a satisfactory result. In the end, 
residence in a certain neighbourhood with its own social network turned out to 

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The Arabic Language
be the most reliable variable to correlate with linguistic variation. The impor
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tance of social networks is also underscored by Al Wer (2002), who points out 
that we need to look at the interdependence of the variables. ‘Level of education’ 
or ‘literacy’, for instance, cannot be regarded as independent variables, but are 
indicators of the speaker’s social network. Al Wer (2002) investigated the variant 
/t/ ~ /ṯ/ in the Jordanian provincial town of Sult, 25 km north-west of the capital 
Amman. From her research, it became clear that the highest educated (female) 
speakers predominantly (59 per cent) opted for /t/, while the lowest score (7 per 
cent) was exhibited by those who had the lowest level of education. In this case, 
/t/ represented the urban variety of Amman, while /ṯ/ represented the rural 
lifestyle of Sult, in spite of the fact that it is the variant of Standard Arabic. Educa
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tion in this case correlated with contact with a larger urban social network, which 
resulted in the adoption of the variant /t/. In Al Wer’s research, all informants 
were female and there is a chance that this may have influenced the preference 
for the urban forms.
A similar result is given by Gibson (2002) in his investigation of levelling in 
Tunisian Arabic. Gibson found that speakers of Bedouin dialects with the variant 
/g/ tend to adopt /q/, which looks like a change towards Classical Arabic. But he 
concludes that it is more likely that the change is caused by the attraction of urban 
Tunisian Arabic (which also has /q/), since in other variables Bedouin speakers 
adopt the urban variant even if it is less similar to Classical Arabic, for instance, 
when they switch from