Arabic-L:LING:needs feedback on Moroccan Arabic sentences

[Dilworth Parkinson]

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Arabic-L: Mon 25 April 2011
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1) Subject: needs feedback on Moroccan Arabic sentences

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1)
Date: 25 April 2011
From: Sara Phillips <saracphillips at gmail.com>
Subject: needs feedback on Moroccan Arabic sentences

Hello all,
   I'm preparing a study on focus marking in Moroccan Arabic (Darija), and I need some help from native speakers to check my stimuli.  I've composed some sentences, written in Moroccan with Latin orthography, and want to see if they are grammatical.  Many of them are strange because I am trying to use mostly words with voiced consonants that will make it easy to see the pitch movements in my recordings.  I'm aware that they are strange, but that really doesn't matter to me as long as they are something you could say in the context of a linguistic experiment.  I'd really appreciate any feedback on:

1. the grammaticality of the sentences
2. the accuracy of the translations
3. if anything is so strange that you wouldn't be able to produce the sentence fluently
4. the spellings that I'm using - I want them to be easily understandable and not reflect any marked regionalisms

  Just for context, I will be eliciting these sentences using pictures.  Participants will be trained on the names of pictures ahead of time, and then they will see a sequence of pictures with the appropriate verb and be asked a question such as "Chkon jab l3oud?" ("Who brought the lute?").  They will then answer the question based on the pictures in the display.  I'll be doing the experiment primarily in Fez, and maybe with some speakers from Casablanca, so I want to avoid any regionalisms that would be unfamiliar to those speakers. 

Here they are:

1. lweld jab l3oud
    'the boy brought the lute'
2. rrajl lkbir jab lmous jjdid f lbazar
    'the old man brought the new knife in the bazaar'
3. rrajl ssghir jab l3oud
    'the young man brought the lute'
4. lweld jab lmous lqdim
    'the boy brought the old knife'
5. lgzzar drab zzarbiya
    'the butcher hit the rug'
6. nnjjar lmaghrebi drab rrwida lkbira f zzenqa
    'the Moroccan carpenter hit the big wheel in the street'
7. nnjjar lmasri drab zzarbiya
    'the Egyptian carpenter hit the rug'
8. lgzzar drab rrwida ssghira
    'the butcher hit the little wheel'
9. lmohendis wzen lbaliza
    'the engineer weighed the suitcase'
10. lmotarjim lghlid wzen lmakina lghalia f lmatar
    'the fat translator weighed the expensive machine in the airport'
11. lmotarjim rrqiq wzen lbaliza
    'the thin translator weighed the suitcase'
12. lmohendis wzen lmakina rrkhisa
    'the engineer weighed the cheap machine'
13. jjmel 3awn ddib
    'the camel helped the wolf'
14. lbghel ddaki 3awn lfil rrmadi f jjerda
     'the smart mule helped the gray elephant in the garden'
15. lbghel lmkllkh 3awn ddib
     'the stupid mule helped the wolf'
16. jjmel 3awn lfil zreq
     'the camel helped the blue elephant'
17. l3awd jber ddrraja
     'the horse found the bicycle'
18. lkelb lbyad jber jjarida lfaziga f lwad
     'the white dog found the wet newspaper in the river bed'
19. lkelb lqehwi jber ddrraja
     'the brown dog found the bicycle'
20. l3awd jber jjarida nnachifa
     'the horses found the dry newspaper'
21. l2amir 3rd lmo3llem
     'the prince invited the teacher'
22. l3amid lmqllaq 3rd lmoghnni zz3er f l mihrajan
     'the worried dean invited the blond singer at the festival'
23. l3amid lfr7an 3rd lmo3llem
      'the happy dean invited the teacher'
24. l2amir 3rd lmoghnni ssmer
      'the prince invited the dark-skinned singer' (not sure how to translate smer appropriately in English - swarthy??)
25. ttbiba wjjedat lloz
      'the doctor prepared the almonds'
26. ttaliba lghaniya wjjedat rroz lldid f l2ardiya
      'the rich student prepared the delicious rice in the first floor'
27. ttaliba lmskina wjjedat lloz
      'the poor student prepared the almonds'
28. ttbiba wjjedat rroz lmsous
      'the doctor prepared the bland rice'
29. jjaara ba3t lbanan
      'the neighbor sold the bananas'
30. jjedda ttwila ba3t ddnjan ttayib f lmat3am
      'the tall grandmother sold the cooked aubergine in the restaurant'
31. jjedda lqsira ba3t lbanan
     'the short grandmother sold the bananas'
32. jjaara ba3t ddnjan lkhder
     'the neighbor sold the raw aubergine'
33. sserbay hezz lmagana
     'the server lifted the clock'
34. lbombi jjamil hezz lmraya ttqila f l3imara
     'the handsome fireman lifted the heavy mirror in the building'
35. lbombi lkhayb hezz lmagana
     'the ugly firefighter lifted the clock'
36. sserbay hezz lmraya lkhfifa
     'the server lifted the light mirror'
37. nnemla 3ammarat lmqraj
     'the ant filled the kettle'
38. ddjaja lbeldiya 3ammarat lbrrad lkhawi f ddar
     'the country chicken filled the empty teapot in the house'
39. ddjaja rrumiya 3ammarat lmqraj
     'the european chicken filled the kettle'  (not sure how to translate rumi versus beldi - beldi ones are brown and from the countryside, and rumi ones are white and more like the kind you'd get from industrial farms, is that right?)
40. nnemla 3ammarat lbrrad l3amr
     'the ant filled the full teapot'  (I know it doesn't make sense to fill a teapot that's already full, but that's ok as long as the grammar is correct)


Thank you very much for your help!!  Chokran bzzaf,
   Sara

Sara Phillips
saracphillips at gmail.com
Graduate Student
Department of Linguistics
The Ohio State University

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