Najdi Arabic

Najdi Arabic
Spoken in	Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, Syria
Native speakers	9,863,520  (date missing)
Language family	Afro-Asiatic Semitic Central Semitic Arabic Southern Najdi Arabic
Writing system	Arabic alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-3	ars

Najdi Arabic (Arabic: اللهجة النجدية‎) is a variety of the Arabic language spoken in the desert and oases of central Saudi Arabia.

There are four major groups of Najdi Arabic.

1. Northern Najdi, spoken in Zulfi, Qaseem and Jabal Shammar regions of Najd.

2. Central Najdi (Urban Najdi), spoken in the city of Riyadh and surrounding towns and farming communities.

3. Southern Najdi, spoken in the city of Kharj and surrounding towns.

4. Badawi Najdi, spoken by the nomadic tribes of Najd. Some tribes have their own distinct accents. Badawi Najdi is also spoken in neighboring Jordan, Syria, and Iraq.^[1]

Notes

1. ^ Raymond G. Gordon, Jr, ed. 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.

References

• Ethnologue entry for Najdi Arabic
• P.F. Abboud. 1964. "The Syntax of Najdi Arabic," University of Texas PhD dissertation.

External links

• Najdi Arabic at Ethnologue
• Entry for Najdi Arabic at Rosetta Project