"Language ideologies are never about language alone"
Autor: Marita Abbud | Publicado: 2011-10-26T05:26:00-07:00

This is a quote from Susanne Stadlbauer's article on the "Arabic diglossic environment", which discusses the power relations within the languages spoken in Egypt. Here only two parts of the text are posted. To see the full text, access the link of the bottom of the post.Language Ideologies in the Arabic Diglossia of EgyptSusanne StadlbauerUniversity of Colorado at BoulderThis paper surveys studies on language ideologies in the Arabic diglossic environment of present-day Egypt. Specifically, it discusses linguistic and cultural implications of language ideologies associated with Classical Arabic (CA), Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), Egyptian Arabic (EA), and English in the Cairo area. The language ideologies of these varieties are a product of both the past and the present: they emerged during British colonialism in the late nineteenth century and are maintained in the postcolonial climate through discourses on the purity of Classical Arabic, on the linguistic corruption of the dialects, and on the increasing use of English as a symbol of Western capitalism and modernity. Aligning with Woolard’s (1998) definition of language ideology as a mediating link between linguistic features and social processes, this study demonstrates how language ideologies are communicated in structural aspects of the language varieties in the Arabic diglossia and how Egyptians use language varieties strategically to access the symbolic power of these ideologies. It argues that studies of language ideologies, language features, and discursive interaction are inseparable in uncovering how language is used in the Arabic diglossia in Egypt.1. IntroductionStudies on language ideologies and language-related historical studies on nationalism in Egypt demonstrate that “the equation of language and nation is not a natural fact but rather a historical, ideological construct” (Woolard 1998:16).Language ideologies are social constructs that are illuminated through a microanalysis of linguistic structures in discourse and a macro-analysis of the factorsthat lead to asymmetries in how languages are perceived. In line with Woolard, I emphasize the analysis of language ideologies within the linguistic practices of specific cultural settings, which means that language ideologies cannot have a single interpretation. They are in dialectical relation with social, discursive, and linguistic practices and often determine “which linguistic features get selected for cultural attention and for social marking, that is, which ones are important and which ones are not” (Schieffelin &amp; Doucet 1998:285).  In short, language ideologies are never about language alone, but rather, envision and enact ties of language to identity, to aesthetics, to morality, and to epistemology. Through such linkages, they underpin not only linguistic form and use but also the very notion of the person and the social group, as well as such Colorado Research in Linguistics, Volume 22 (2010)2fundamental social institutions as religious ritual, child socialization, gender relations, the nation-state, schooling, and law (Woolard 1998:3). Taking these definitions as a conceptual blueprint, this study shows how these linkages play out in a specific linguistic and cultural setting: Arabic diglossia in Egypt. Present-day language ideologies in Egypt find their beginnings in British colonization from 1882 to 1922 (Mitchell 1988, Suleiman 2003, amongst many). In this period, the colonizers restructured Egyptian society according to Western ideals of modernity and economic progress. Among other projects, they initiated anti-Arabic, pro-English language policies that assigned symbolic value to these languages:  Arabic was depreciated because it was perceived as chaotic and random, while English was projected as being modern, prestigious, and desirable. According to Mitchell (1988),  language was one of the most far-reaching strategies of the colonizers to change Egyptian culture.  He cites  al-Marsafi’s (1881)  Eight Words, a book concerning the controversy of  eight particularly powerful words that penetrated Egyptian social and political life during Britishoccupation: “nation”, “homeland”, “government”, “justice”, “oppression”, “politics”, “liberty”, and “education” (Mitchell 1988:131). These terms were the new vocabulary of modern nationalism, and their perceived misunderstanding and misuse created a national crisis: the Western values inherent in these eight words clashed with the cultural background of the Egyptians. The impact of the colonizers on language and social identity  was a breakdown of local culture (Said 1975, 1979; Abuhamida 1988; Mitchell 1988). Said’s  (1975, 1979) controversial research on  Orientalism sharply criticizes Western Orientalists for perpetrating this linguistic imperialism and rendering the Arabic language chaotic and random.  Said points to textual biases in literature about the Orient. He claims, for instance, that Arabs are metaphorically associated with hot-blooded sexual prowess (416), while institutionally or culturally “they are nil, or next to nil” (416). The use of sexual metaphor to describe male and female Arabs was the Orientalists’ way of “dealing with the great variety and potency of Arab diversity, whose source is if not intellectual and social then sexual and biological” (416). These ideological forces gave rise to linguistic conflicts in post-colonial Egypt: the desires for historical and linguistic nostalgia on one hand, and for modernization of language and society on the other. Religious conservatives, fueled with anti-Western sentiments and historical nostalgia, argue for a superiority of CA, and its purity is strongly anchored in Muslim Arab history, morality, and nationalism (Suleiman 2003, 2004; Haeri 2003). They relate “authentic” Egyptian identity to Islamic laws and values that are uncorrupted by the West (Suleiman 2003, 2004; Haeri 2003). This causes the religious conservatives to fight to keep CA undiluted with foreign borrowings. Suleiman (2004) points to military warfare metaphors in their Arabic rhetoric, such as “language regiment”, “defense of the national language”, and “enemies of Islam” Language Ideologies in the Arabic Diglossia of Egypt3(50), while they are projected as “holy warriors”, “garrisoned troops”, and “patrons” of Classical Arabic (49). Any modernization of CA is lahn “linguistic corruption”, hadm wa-takhrib “sabotage”, or ghazw “invasion”, aimed at destroying the Qur’an and the hadith “the Prophetic Traditions” (50). In contrast, pan-Arab nationalists propose a united Arabic language – MSA - to be the unifying force of all Arabic-speaking people in the Arab world.(Abuhamida 1988;  Suleiman 2003; Haeri 2003; amongst many). These idealistic nationalists argue for a written language that is mutually comprehensible in all Arab nations and unifies the Arab world.  One proponent of this view is  the Egyptian government, which has been  controlling the modernization of CA  byoverseeing institutions of learning, publishing, and social affairs since the middle of the nineteenth century (Haeri 2003; Van Mol 2003). The government is mainly concerned with “revitalizing” CA as  a means of achieving social, economic, and political progress for Egypt. According to Haeri (2003),  state officials, Egyptian intellectuals, educators, and high bureaucrats regard  CA  as too literary, flowery, and lacking in modern vocabulary needed for science and technology on a global scale. Nevertheless, many voices point to the  predicament that Egyptian Arabic, the vernacular, is ignored in writing and education, even though it is the mother tongue of Egyptians and the lingua franca used in face-to-face interaction. In this view, Egyptian Arabic cannot be divorced from the identity of Egyptian people and their local and national culture. Linguistic regionalists, mainly Arab and non-Arab writers, are calling for the consolidation of spoken varieties at the expense of the standard variety (Abuhamida 1988:42). According to Abuhamida (1988), this call for linguistic regionalism coincides with political regionalism.  Lastly, proponents of a modern cultural and linguistic landscape in Egypt advocate increasing use of English in many social domains in order to connect to the international community. Their argument is that English has always been present in the postcolonial period. Schaub (2000) states that “after a return to Arabic and Egyptian nationalism during the Nasser period in the 1950s and 1960s, the situation again changed towards favoring English after the 1973 October War against Israel” (228). He also explains that during the Sadat years (1970-81), Egyptian university students turned increasingly towards the United States. From 1974 on, “the U.S. Agency for Internal Development has offered assistance to Egypt in the training of public school teachers in English language instruction” (228). English in Egypt is strategically used by the government and the media to achieve economic progress and to strengthen political and economic ties with the West. In sum,  the interference of ‘modern’ Western thought in colonial and postcolonial Egypt acts as a powerful organizing force for present-day language ideologies: the devaluation of the local dialects as a result of both pan-Arab nationalism and religious conservatism; an elevation of CA to a carrier of tradition and religious morals; the authority of MSA as a contemporary standard variety able to reflect scientific and economic progress; and the use of English as Colorado Research in Linguistics, Volume 22 (2010)4symbolic capital linking Egypt to the “prosperity” of the West. Proponents of each position use essentialized cultural differences between the East and the West as their logic and strategy to construct social action, morality, nationalism, and the “right” interpretation of language. In this highly contested, politicized language conflict over the “best” language variety, it is relevant to ask “which linguistic features are seized on, and through what semiotic processes they are interpreted as representing the collectivity” (Woolard 1998:18). These topics are explored in section two, which uses linguistic and sociolinguistic research to provide a description of CA, MSA, and Egyptian Arabic (EA) in the Arabic diglossia in Egypt and to show how language ideologies are linked to the  linguistic structures of these language varieties. Section three demonstrates how language ideologies are ranked, play a structuring role in every-day interaction, and shape a variety of communicative strategies. Speakers use the shared historical, cultural, and linguistic background associated with varieties as an interactional resource in discourse. This dialectic aspect of ideology shows that “simply using language in particular ways is not what forms social groups, identities, or relations…; rather, ideological interpretations of such uses of language always mediate these effects” (Woolard 1998:18). In such interactional uses speakers take advantage of the social, moral, and political attributes of each variety, which  leaves  a picture of dynamic reinterpretation of language use in Egypt. The effects of these communicative strategies range from showing solidarity with the pan-Arab nationalist ideology to transgressing social and geographic boundaries by tapping into Western communicative styles.  2. Arabic DiglossiaAccording to Eisele (2002), dialect geography represented the most dominant form of linguistic analysis of Arabic until the 1950’s (12). However, Ferguson’s (1959) introduction of  diglossia to the Arabic sociolinguistic landscape “helped to crystallize modernist notions about this phenomenon and set the agenda for subsequent studies” (Eisele 2002:12). Ferguson (1959, 1996) conducted an extensive analysis of Arabic diglossia. Ferguson defines diglossia as a relatively stable language situation in which, in addition to the primary dialects of the language (which may include a standard or regional standards), there is a very divergent, highly codified (often grammatically more complex) superposed variety, the vehicle of a large and respected body of written literature, either of an earlier period or in another speech community, which is learned largely by formal education and is used for most written and formal spoken purposes but is not used by any sector of the community for ordinary conversation (Ferguson 1996:34-35).Ferguson claims that in Arabic diglossia, CA is the divergent, highly codified, and superposed variety. It is seen as superior to vernaculars, such as EA, due to Language Ideologies in the Arabic Diglossia of Egypt5widespread prejudices against vernaculars within  the language community1. In line with Ferguson  (1996), this paper will use “H” for a high prestige language, such as CA or MSA, and “L” for the low prestige dialects, such as EA. 2.1 H and LIn diglossic situations, there is usually a belief that H is more beautiful, more logical, and more sophisticated (Ferguson 1996; Van Mol 2003). This is true for Arabic diglossia.  According to Haeri (2003),  CA is often perceived as a “language whose aesthetic and musical qualities move its listeners, creating feelings of spirituality, nostalgia and community” (43). CA “socializes people into rituals of Islam, affirms their identity as Muslims and connects them to the realm of purity, morality, and God” (Haeri 2003:43) and attributes of the language are often translated to the moral virtues of the user.  CA also attained high prestige due to its  rich literary tradition (Ferguson 1996; Van Moll 2003, amongst many). There is a “sizable body of written literature which is held in high esteem by the speech community” (Ferguson 1996:29-30).  In contrast to EA, the orthography of CA is well established and “has a long tradition of grammatical study and a fixed norm for pronunciation, grammar and lexicon” (Van Mol 2003: 43). The fixed norms of CA were established as early as the ninth century, when  CA was codified and, as the language of the Qur’an, has been one of the major areas of study of Muslims scholars ever since  (Parkinson 1991; Van Mol 2003). Scholars have produced grammars, dictionaries, pronunciation manuals, and stylistic conventions thatrestrict variation and protect  CA from the influence of modernity.  This  recallsWoolard’s (1998:17) observation that “written form, lexical elaboration, rules for word formation, and historical derivation all may be seized on in diagnosing ‘real language’ and ranking the candidates” (17).Somewhat contradictorily, Haeri’s (2003) research also shows that many Egyptians judge the spoken vernacular, EA, as the more beautiful variety, even for writing literature. She claims that “ordinary people describe it [EA] as easy, light, full of humor and more beautiful than other Arabic dialects, as a habit and as the language of Egyptians” (37).  EA, or  al-‘amiyyah “the common”  is the mother tongue used for every-day communication in Egypt and serves as a marker of Egyptian identity and national culture (Haeri 2003:37).  Nevertheless, EA is not generally recognized by religious scholars or pan-Arab nationalists as a language of writing; since  it has layers of lexical borrowings from Coptic, Turkish, Persian, Greek, Italian, French, and English, it is criticized as “permissive”, “promiscuous”, or “weak” (38). Furthermore, it is perceived as the                                                 1  It is important to note, however, that not all Egyptian dialects are valued equally. Urban dialects, such as Cairene Arabic spoken in the city of Cairo, usually have a higher prestige than rural dialects. Colorado Research in Linguistics, Volume 22 (2010)6language of the ordinary Egyptians on the streets, and the image of an EA speakeris that of a common or backward man (Haeri 2003).This argument, however, is not sound since the extent of foreign borrowings into CA and their acceptability or naturalization is obscurred by the large timeframe in which it happened and “by the degree to which foreign elements have extended to be assimilated to the root-pattern system of the morphology and also by the organizing principles of Arabic dictionaries, whereby assimilated borrowings are listed under a theoretical ‘root’” (305). For instance, the medieval borrowing di:ba:j “silk brocade” from the Persian di:ba gave rise to the verb  dabbaja “to embellish” (305). It then was reanalzed in the modern lexicon with the trilateral root d-b-j and took on Arabic productive morphology, which can be seen in the derivation  mudabbaja:t “figures of speech” (305). Furthermore, concurrent with colonial times, “as western political, economic, and scientific ideas proliferated and ramified through the Arab world, transliterated foreign words, especially in the sciences, and uncontrolled and sometimes inaccurate loan translations began to pour into written Arabic” (308). This discrepancy between the ideologies and actual language features complicates the notion of the purity of CA. Ferguson (1996) states that  the communicative tensions between the H and L varieties in diglossia may be resolved by “the use of relatively uncodified, unstable, intermediate forms of the language” (31). MSA is the most common intermediate form and is perceived as a “modern” version of CA. However, there are problems with defining MSA, towhich I turn to next.http://www.colorado.edu/ling/CRIL/Volume22_Issue1/paper_STADLBAUER.pdf