[Foundation-l] On Arabic and sub-language proposals.

[Delirium]

Mark Williamson wrote:
> A good, comprehensive study is needed (and probably already exists) to
> better classify the varieties of Arabic, because SIL has done a
> piss-poor job. It's shameful, considering just how many people speak
> one or another variety of Arabic.
>   
It does exist, but the problem is that dozens of such studies exist, 
arriving at different results. =] There is also disagreement over the 
extent to which it even makes sense to classify Arabic into distinct 
varieties, given the complex varieties of diglossia (to the point of 
"multiglossia"), continuums along multiple axes of variation, and 
discrepancies between speakers' reported dialect/language and actual 
grammatical features.

A decent survey can be found in the editor's introduction to the 
collection _Understanding Arabic_ (1996, ed. A. Elgibali, ISBN 
9774243722), and in more details in some of the papers therein.

Of course, I'm no expert in the field; have just read a small amount of 
what's written by people who are. It's a complex enough area that it's 
basically an entire field of research.

-Mark