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Hassaniya Arabic (; also known as ', ', ', ', and Maure) is a variety of spoken by Arabs, Arabs and the . It was spoken by the Beni Ḥassān Bedouin tribes of origin who extended their authority over most of and between the 15th and 17th centuries. Hassaniya Arabic was the language spoken in the pre-modern region around .

The language has completely replaced the that were originally spoken in this region. Although clearly a western dialect, Hassānīya is relatively distant from other Maghrebi variants of Arabic. Its geographical location exposed it to influence from and . There are several dialects of Hassaniya, which differ primarily phonetically. There are still traces of South Arabian in Hassaniya Arabic spoken between Rio de Oro and , according to G. S. Colin.

Today, Hassaniya Arabic is spoken in , , , , , and the .


Phonology
The phonological system of Hassānīya exhibits both very innovative and very conservative features. All phonemes of are represented in the dialect, but there are also many new phonemes. As in other Bedouin dialects, Classical /q/ corresponds mostly to dialectal ; and have merged into ; and the interdentals and have been preserved. The letter ج is realized as .

However, there is sometimes a double correspondence of a classical sound and its dialectal counterpart. Thus, classical is represented by in 'to take' but by in 'scissors'. Similarly, becomes in 'laugh (noun)', but in 'to be sick'. Some consonant roots even have a double appearance: 'heavy (mentally)' vs. 'heavy (materially)'. Some of the "classicizing" forms are easily explained as recent loans from the literary language (such as 'law') or from sedentary dialects in case of concepts pertaining to the sedentary way of life (such as 'scissors' above). For others, there is no obvious explanation (like 'to be sick'). Etymological appears constantly as , never as .

Nevertheless, the phonemic status of and as well as and appears very stable, unlike in many other Arabic varieties. Somewhat similarly, classical has in most contexts disappeared or turned into or ( 'family' instead of , 'insist' instead of and 'yesterday' instead of ). In some literary terms, however, it is clearly preserved: 'suffering (participle)' (classical ).


Consonants
Hassānīya has innovated many consonants by the spread of the distinction emphatic/non-emphatic. In addition to the above-mentioned, and have a clear phonemic status and more marginally so. One additional emphatic phoneme is acquired from the neighboring along with a whole palatal series from Niger–Congo languages of the south. At least some speakers make the distinction /p/–/b/ through borrowings from (and in Western Sahara). All in all, the number of consonant phonemes in Hassānīya is 31, or 43 counting the marginal cases.

+Consonant phonemes of Hassaniya Arabic ! colspan="2" rowspan="2"! colspan="2" ! colspan="2" ! colspan="2"/Alveolar ! rowspan="2"Palatal ! rowspan="2" ! rowspan="2" ! rowspan="2"Pharyngeal ! rowspan="2"Glottal

On the phonetic level, the classical consonants and are usually realised as voiced (hereafter marked ) and . The latter is still, however, pronounced differently from , the distinction probably being in the amount of air blown out (Cohen 1963: 13–14). In geminated and word-final positions both phonemes are voiceless, for some speakers /θ/ apparently in all positions. The uvular fricative is likewise realised voiceless in a geminated position, although not fricative but plosive: . In other positions, etymological seems to be in free variation with (etymological , however varies only with ).


Vowels
Vowel phonemes come in two series: long and short. The long vowels are the same as in , and the short ones extend this by one: . The classical diphthongs and may be realised in many different ways, the most usual variants being and , respectively. Still, realisations like and as well as and are possible, although less common.

As in most Maghrebi Arabic dialects, etymological short vowels are generally dropped in open syllables (except for the feminine noun ending < ): > 'you (f. sg.) write', > > 'he wrote'. In the remaining closed syllables dialectal /a/ generally corresponds to classical , while classical and have merged into . Remarkably, however, morphological is represented by and by in a word-initial pre-consonantal position: 'I stood up' (root w-g-f; cf. 'I wrote', root k-t-b), 'he descends' (subject prefix i-; cf. 'he writes', subject prefix jə-). In some contexts, this initial vowel even gets lengthened, which clearly demonstrates its phonological status of a vowel: 'they stood up'. In addition, short vowels in open syllables are found in Berber loanwords, such as 'man', 'calves of 1 to 2 years of age', and in passive formation: 'he was met' (cf. 'he met').


Code-switching
Many educated Hassaniya Arabic speakers also practice . In Western Sahara it is common for code-switching to occur between Hassaniya Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic, and , as had ; in the rest of Hassaniya-speaking lands, is the additional language spoken.


Orthography
Hassaniya Arabic is normally written with an . However, in , the government has adopted the use of the to write the language, as established by Decree 2005–980 of October 21, 2005.
EJOTXʔ
ejotxʼ


Speakers distribution
According to , there are approximately three million Hassaniya speakers, distributed as follows:


See also

  • (1963). 225200150X, Librairie C. Klincksieck. 225200150X
  • "Hassaniya, the Arabic of Mauritania", Al-Any, Riyadh S. / In: Linguistics; vol. 52 (1969), pag. 15 / 1969
  • "Hassaniya, the Arabic of Mauritania", Al-Any, Riyadh S. / In: Studies in linguistics; vol. 19 (1968), afl. 1 (mrt), pag. 19 / 1968
  • "Hassaniya Arabic (Mali) : Poetic and Ethnographic Texts", Heath, Jeffrey; Kaye, Alan S. / In: Journal of Near Eastern studies; vol. 65 (2006), afl. 3, pag. 218 (1) / 2006
  • Hassaniya Arabic (Mali) : poetic and ethnographic texts, Heath, Jeffrey / Harrassowitz / 2003
  • Hassaniya Arabic (Mali) – English – French dictionary, Heath, Jeffrey / Harrassowitz / 2004
  • Taine-Cheikh, Catherine. 2006. Ḥassāniya Arabic. In Kees Versteegh (ed.), Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics, 240–250. Leiden: E.~J.~Brill.


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