Arabic-L:LING:A female vice president would be a catastrophe

[Dilworth Parkinson]

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Arabic-L: Thu 21 Jun 2007
Moderator: Dilworth Parkinson <dilworth_parkinson at byu.edu>
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1) Subject:A female vice president would be a catastrophe

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1)
Date: 21 Jun 2007
From:Michael.Schub at trincoll.edu
Subject:A female vice president would be a catastrophe

Hi Dil and Friends,
       Hypothetically, if a woman were  elected vice President in  
2008, will she be called  /naa'ibu  r-ra'iis[at]i/  or

/naa'batu  r-ra'iis[at]i/ ??  The crux here is that the second  
expression may be interpreted to mean 'the

President's calamity/disaster/catastrophe.'  Thus, explains George  
Jirdaq (Al-Majalla #1390, Oct., 2006.

p. 15 mid), that female Lebanese legislators are called  /an-naa'ibu   
fulaana/  [using the masculine form].

      There are literally hundreds of synonyms for 'calamity/ 
catastrophe,' etc. in Arabic, and some 138 of them

[including  /naa'ibatun/] are listed by Rafael Nakhla, S.J. in his   
*Gharaa'ibu  l-Lughati  l-`Arabiyyati,*

Beirut, no date.

       Best wishes from an undisclosed location, welding polysemy  
onto politics,

                                                                         
                                    Mike Schub

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End of Arabic-L:  21 Jun 2007