Sociostylistic Stratification of Arabic in Makkah (Sociolinguistics, Variation; Saudi Arabia).

A socially realistic linguistic description of any speech community should account for variation in the speech of members of this community and for the linguistic and extra-linguistic factors which influence it. This is the assumption underlying this descriptive correlative sociolinguistic study of phonological variation in the Arabic-speaking community of Makkah, Saudi Arabia. Linguists who previously described the speech of this community followed the traditional linguistic approach of maintaining that some variation is "free" and excluded such variation from their analysis. This study shows that by accounting for the linguistic and extra-linguistic factors which influence it, the systematic nature of the majority of this variation will be revealed. Three linguistic and four extra-linguistic variables are examined in this study. The linguistic variables are the interdental fricatives (th), (dh), and (Dh); the extra-linguistic variables are style, ethnicity, education, and age. The study explores linguistic constraints on variation and correlation of variation with the extra-linguistic variables. The findings show that variation in the realization of the three linguistic variables in speech of Makkans is both linguistically and socially determined. It is structured and functional, and , therefore, an integral part of Makkan Arabic. Such integral part, the study concludes, must not be disposed of but, rather, accounted for along with the linguistic and extra-linguistic factors which influence it in a socially realistic linguistic description of the speech system of the Makkan community. Through examining variation patterns in the speech of different age groups, this study also speculates on the issue of linguistic change. The findings show that there is a linguistic change in progress in the speech of Makkans. Patterns of variation are expected to be different in the future from what they are today.PhDLinguisticsUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/160469/1/8512350.pd