Talk:Egyptian Arabic phonology

Phonology section—contradiction

(Egyptian Arabic consonant phonemes:)

^5 If /dˤ, q/ are pronounced, it would be only in Literary Arabic.

Below:

/ðˤ/ > /d/: /dufr/, "nail", from */ðˤufr/ ظفر and never /zˤufr/. Likewise /ðˤ/ > /dˤ/: /dˤalma/, "darkness", from */ðˤulma/ ظلمة.

The latter seems more probable in light of the rest of the paragraph, but I don't have sufficient sources at hand. 46.186.36.102 (talk) 02:42, 16 February 2013 (UTC)

While the /ðˤ/ becomes /d/, it retains its emphatic spread properties, and since the author used the broader /a/ instead of specifying /ɑ/, they pharyngealized the /d/. In actual pronunciation, though, the /d/ itself wouldn't be pharygealized, but the vowel following it would be retracted. 197.38.139.229 (talk) 16:55, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

Actually, the text was inaccurate when it said that /ðˤ/ lost pharyngealization, and I corrected it. — Eru·tuon 07:46, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Clarity issue in Prosody section

The basic rule is that, preceding from right to left in a word, the stress goes on the first encountered syllable ...

It's not clear whether counting the syllables "from right to left" applies to the word written in the Arabic script (where the right marks the start of the word) or its transliteration (where the right marks the end of the word). Perhaps it would be better to rephrase this to "preceding from the start to the end of a word" or vice versa. I'm not sure which one it is meant to be so I'm appealing for the help of the original editor or another expert. --Elban91 (talk) 20:00, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

From the end to the beginning. The English transliteration was meant. 197.38.139.229 (talk) 16:55, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

Ethnologue's name

@Kwamikagami:[1] Can't you see that the main title of Ethnologue's page is  "Arabic, Egyptian Spoken"? --Mahmudmasri (talk) 03:28, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

Do you have any evidence that that name is used in the literature? — kwami (talk) 03:31, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

What evidence? The pages calls it so. --Mahmudmasri (talk)

And this page calls it something else. Why do we have to call it what Ethnologue calls it? Why call it "Egyptian Spoken Arabic" when there is no such thing as "Egyptian Written Arabic"? When Arabic is written in Egypt, is just standard Arabic or (less often) a direct transcription of Egyptian Spoken Arabic, but there is no specific standard used for writing Egyptian Arabic. 197.38.139.229 (talk) 16:55, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

Raising of [ɑː] and [æː]

What accent does this lady speak: [2]? I'm not Egyptian, but it sounds like normal Egyptian to me, except that she raises the above vowels to a degree which is known from other dialects, but which I didn't know existed in Egyptian. She says [neːs] for nās ("people") and something close to [woːqɑʕ] for wāqi‘ ("reality"). Unless this is just her idiosyncracy it should probably be mentioned in the article, because the difference in articulation is great. There's also the question whether these raised vowels might merge with ē and ō from classical diphthongs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.204.104.206 (talk) 14:00, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

I listened to some of her speech. It's her way. She tenses pronunciation more. It's rather [nɛːs, ˈwɑ̝ːqɜʕ]. I don't think this should be mentioned (and finding an appropriate source, if ever, is problematic), because each vowel has a region, not pronounced exactly the same by all people and the same person 100% the same all the time. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 12:04, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Oh, thank you for your answer. (I'd forgotten that I'd posted this.) Well, yes. It definitely sounds like at least [e̞ː] to me, though. It's sounds pretty much the same as in Lebanese Arabic. The back variant may not be quite as raised, but nevertheless [ɔː] or [ʌː] (the rounding is hard to judge because the preceding [w]). Since then I've also heard this raising more often. However, exclusively among females. But okay, I did't mean to say that you absolutely had to put in the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.4.151.28 (talk) 03:53, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

Palatilisation

A notable feature in contemporary Egyptian Arabic is the strong palatilsation of alveolars before /i/, yielding [tʲi], [dʲi], [nʲi], etc. (or probably even [ci], [ɟi], [ɲi]). This is perhaps not a general thing, but it is very common, particularly among female speakers. These palatalised consonants even seem to be developing into phonemes, because word-finally the [i]-vowel may at times be articulated so weakly that it is actually dropped. Thereby /binti/ ("my daughter") sounds like [bentʲ] or [benc]. The comedy figure Abla Fahita does it a lot. But it's not an act. It's actually very common among the people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.4.151.28 (talk) 03:34, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

Section #Letter names

Could we move the section #Letter names to the main article Egyptian Arabic? This does not belong into an article on the phonology IMHO. Best, --Marsupium (talk) 16:02, 8 June 2022 (UTC)

epenthesis of final consonants?

Wondering, does Hudā Quṭb have epenthesis at the end? That seems like it would be quite difficult to pronounce otherwise, especially with no assimilation. — kwami (talk) 03:02, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

For Egyptians, it's pronounced ordinarily without any assimilation or epenthesis. It's just she eased it for Americans who could not utter it since English lacks the syllable end cluster /tb/. For comparison, Levantine Arabic typically breaks such clusters, e.g. Fatah, actually fatħ in Literary Arabic and Egyptian Arabic. Classical Arabic adds a final vowel a(n), i(n), u(n), though it still permitted the pausal pronunciation in some cases. On the other hand, Levantine Arabic could mostly start a word with two consinants while that's not the case in Egyptian Arabic. --Esperfulmo (talk) 06:26, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, but do we really get a transition from a voiced /u/ to a voiceless /ṭ/ to a voiced /b/? Doesn't the /ṭ/ voice or the /b/ devoice? — kwami (talk) 06:28, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

While voicing assimilation exists, it is rare at word ends and is normally considered inarticulate pronunciation. It was mentioned in the article, but not as a general rule and not by everybody. It's like the velar nasal you added at some point to Arabic pronunciations, even though Arabic speakers pronounce clear [n] before [g], [k], as well as other velar and uvular consonants. The only Arabic speaking editor to add it was Arabi22 for Hejazi Arabic, without sourcing it who was banned and we may never know where he got it from. --Esperfulmo (talk) 06:38, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Another example and explanation: Pepsi is pronounced [ˈbebsi], often shortened to [bebs] though it is one voiced consonant next to a voiceless one, because Egyptian Arabic lacks /p/ natively and who pronounce it are careful speakers, pronouncing the original English consonant [ˈpepsi], not due to lazily devoicing to a non-native consonant. --Esperfulmo (talk) 14:05, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the clarification. — kwami (talk) 19:26, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Familiarity with the topic

User:Fragrant Peony, you made a comment (unsourced hearsay, completely different languages and letters pronunciations, they have J, Q, Th..etc) while deleting a sentences. I have to ask, how familiar are you with the topics, Egyptian Arabic, Arabic dialects, Ottoman Turkish, and the alphabet names in Ottoman Turkish?

The Ottoman Empire actually ruled and influenced parts of what we know now as the Middle East. Many words and grammatical structures were absorbed in the region's dialects, including the Egyptian Arabic dialect. They used to use the Arabic alphabet with some different names that happen to be in the clip I was sourcing. It was not simply entertainment shows, this is how they are taught in schools and commonly said in Egypt.

If you have a source that refutes the aforementioned, which I'm sure you won't find, please add it. Otherwise, please, don't remove the mentions of Ottoman Turkish. --Esperfulmo (talk) 02:12, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

Except that you are the one adding completely unsourced content claiming that two different languages share the the exact same letters pronunciations, so please follow WP:Guidelines and stop spamming with unsourced and unacademic material. Fragrant Peony (talk) 08:22, 23 December 2023 (UTC)