Arabic-L:LING:standalone wa- speculations

[Dilworth Parkinson]

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Arabic-L: Wed 13 Mar 2013
Moderator: Dilworth Parkinson <dilworth_parkinson at byu.edu>
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1) Subject:standalone wa- speculations

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1)
Date: 13 Mar 2013
From:Afra Al-Mussawir <afraalmussawir at yahoo.com>
Subject:standalone wa- speculations

I wonder (and I don't know enough history here, so I really am wondering
and following the discussion on this list with interest) if this possible
explanation proposed by Dr. Abbassi depends on the assumption that the
Umayyad dynasty was heavily centralized. Surely expansion of empire does
not occur from the center directly to the margins, though the (heavily
centralized) Ottoman empire's relationship with Iraq (and the 'wild
frontier lands') shows how empire can 'pull the margins inward' so to
speak. Hence we see the strong influence of Turkish in modern-day Iraqi
colloquial Arabic.

I have been thinking that we could learn much about the orthographic
conventions by observing spoken conventions, specifically from the point of
view of speech act theory. Is it at all significant that 'wa' is a particle
easily and readily picked up by non-native learners of Arabic? Does it mean
anything that (in my experience) a native Arabic speaker might attenuate
the 'wa' particle in speaking (i.e. 'waaaaaaaa...'), as they speak?
Sometimes it is clear that the speaker is attenuating the 'wa' particle as
a way to hold the (speaking) floor, while at other times it seems that the
interlocutor takes an attenuated 'wa' as an opportunity to interject.

I cannot recall ever hearing someone do the same with other particles (as
in 'liiiiiiiii...' or 'biiiiiii...'), but that may be the fault of
selective memory. If there is indeed a difference, then what are the many
linguistic functions of 'wa'? It is clearly not just to mean 'and' --
though the difference may relate, in the end, more to the phonetic
qualities of the sounds involved ('w,' 'a,' 'l,'i,'  & 'b') than to the
linguistic functions of the whole particle. It may also be that the
phonology influences the morphology and other linguistic characteristics of
the particle.

Likewise, the functions of 'wa' in speech may influence whether people
write it as attached or as stand-alone. An example of the margins
influencing the center or of the center directly affecting the margins?

Afra Al-Mussawir

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