Abstract Judeo-Baghdadi Arabic is an endangered Jewish variety of Arabic (Semitic) spoken in Israel by Jews who immigrated from Baghdad. In this paper, we provide an overview of the phonological system of this variety, focusing on the interactions between its supra-segmental phonological processes. In particular, we describe new instances of opaque interactions that are known to pose a challenge to classical Optimality Theory and to some of its extensions that have been proposed to deal with opacity. In addition, we highlight an extreme case of opacity which we call “across-the-board opacity”, involving an opaque process whose regular application is never observed on the surface, raising the question of how a process of this sort would be acquired.

Abstract Three templates in Hebrew exhibit a non-radical “intruder” [t] in their final C-position, which is otherwise reserved for radical segments. The appearance of this [t] correlates with feminine grammatical gender, whereas any other consonant in that position implies masculine gender. I therefore propose that this segment is no other than the feminine suffixal morpheme /-t/ which comes to occupy the template-final position. The intrusion is made possible because of the identity of the lexical roots of the relevant items. In some cases, that lexical root involves a glide as a third consonant; in others, the root is biradical or reinterpreted as biradical. This distinction between weak-final and biradical roots correlates with different behaviors of the intruder in inflected forms.

Abstract Hijazi Arabic has been described as relying solely on intonation to mark polar questions (Aljarf, 2023). In this paper, I revisit this claim and demonstrate that Hijazi Arabic employs the particle muu at the beginning or end of a sentence as an alternative strategy for forming polar questions. Following well-established grammaticalisation paths (Heine & Kuteva, 2002), I assume that the polar question particle muu is historically derived from the negative marker muu. However, I present novel empirical evidence to argue that, in the synchronic grammar of Hijazi Arabic, interrogative muu is not syntactically derived from negative muu. I propose that muu is an overt spell-out of the polarity head [±Pol], which is merged at a position higher than Focus in the C-domain.

Abstract In this paper, we study the interaction of universal principles and language-specific properties in light of the prosodic development of Arabic and Hebrew—two languages that differ in terms of stress pattern and syllable structure. We show that despite the differences between Arabic and Hebrew, the developmental paths of children acquiring these languages are similar, in particular during the very early stages of speech. We propose three guidelines that navigate the interaction of universal principles with language-specific properties: (a) the emergence of unmarked structure, (b) the avoidance of marked structure, and (c) the contribution of frequency. We argue that universal principles prevail in early speech, while the effect of frequency and other language-specific properties becomes apparent in later stages of speech.

Abstract This text is a review of Ancient Egyptian and Afroasiatic: Rethinking the Origins (2023). The book includes thirteen chapters all written by different scholars and addressing the relationship between Ancient Egyptian and other Afroasiatic, especially Semitic, languages. Most chapters conclude that Ancient Egyptian is indeed an Afroasiatic language but that the specificity and the degree of its affinities with other Afroasiatic languages, including Semitic, is obscured by the old age of the phylum and by methodological and theoretical issues. One chapter by Aren Wilson-Wright, however, strongly disputes the genetic relatedness of Ancient Egyptian and Semitic and thus the very existence of Afroasiatic. Most of the present review critically deals with several issues in Wilson-Wright’s argumentation.

Abstract The study examines the criteria that are responsible for competition in noun and adjective formation in Hebrew. I compare two cases where words receive an additional form with no change in meaning. I account for such changes, arguing that they target morphological and semantic transparency between related words and a morphological distinction between lexical categories. Adjectives ending with -an exhibit variation through -i suffixation (daykan~daykani ‘punctual’). This results in two competing forms that can be used interchangeably in the same semantic and syntactic contexts. I argue that such variation occurs mainly in order to avoid polycategoriality. The CaCCan pattern and the -an suffix are typical of agent nouns (saxyan ‘swimmer’) that do not undergo a change (*saxyani (as a noun)). -an ending adjectives receive additional adjectival marking in order to create a morphological distinction between the two lexical categories. This case study is compared to another case, where agent nouns and instrument nouns take an additional form, resulting in polycategoriality, as well as ambiguity. Though there seems to be a contradiction between the two criteria that trigger variation and change, I argue that the conflict can be resolved assuming a distinction between words that are derived and stored in the lexicon and words that are derived in the syntax, and that morphological processes apply in both components. The results of this study suggest that the grammar tends to tolerate polycategoriality and ambiguity when at least one of the ambiguous forms is not stored in the lexicon. In case both categories are stored in the lexicon, morphological mechanisms tend to avoid polycategoriality, and as a result, morphological change takes place. The analysis sheds light on the status of morphology in the grammar and its interaction with the lexicon and the syntax, where each interaction has its own characteristics.

Abstract The process of building a linguistic corpus involves a variety of problems when it comes to annotation. One of the notoriously difficult issues concerns the classification and annotation of clitics. The proposed solutions range from a general doubt about the need for a separate class of clitics to innovative categorizations, specifically when dealing with the affix-versus-clitic challenge. The present contribution aims at highlighting the problems that arise in this context by providing an insight into the creation of a linguistic corpus for a hitherto undescribed variety of Arabic within the documentation project The Language of the Arab Minority in Southern Iran (AiS) and discussing concrete strategies for solving them. In doing so, it adds to the literature on Arabic linguistics and to the general discussion about clitics by addressing a linguistic problem that has not been systematically investigated for Arabic.

Abstract This study offers a synchronic analysis of Kuwaiti surnames and shows that their morphology and their phonology abide by the grammar of Kuwaiti Arabic. Surnames can be deconstructed into prefixes, suffixes, and stems combining consonantal roots and syllabic patterns. The two most prominent prefixes are definite l- and derivational m-. Definite l- presents three set of allomorphs and connotes social prestige. Derivational m- forms active/passive participles and nouns of instrument/place. Surnames also include consonantal roots, sometimes shared by a derivational family of surnames. The diminutive pattern (such as calb ‘dog’ > cleeb ‘puppy’) and hypocoristic pattern (such as female given name xadiij-a > xadduuj(-a)) are the most frequent ones in surnames. Some facts suggest that word-to-word formation is at work in the diminutive of both surnames and words. The two most frequent suffixal strings, -a and -aan, can be traced back to several Kuwaiti and/or Modern Standard Arabic homophonous suffixes.