- Sa'idi Arabic
Infobox Language
name=Sa`idi Arabic
familycolor=Afro-Asiatic
states=Egypt
speakers=18,900,000
fam2=Semitic
fam3=West Semitic
fam4=Central Semitic
fam5=South Central Semitic
fam6=Arabic
script=Arabic alphabet
iso3=aecSa`idi Arabic (also known as Saidi Arabic [ [http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=aec ISO 639-3 spelling] ] ) is the variety of
Egyptian Arabic spoken by Sa'idis south of Cairo to the border ofSudan . [Versteegh, p. 163] It shares linguistic features both with northern Egyptian Arabic, as well asSudanese Arabic . Dialects include Middle andUpper Egypt ian Arabic. Speakers of Lower Egyptian Arabic do not always understand more conservative varieties of Sa`idi Arabic. [Raymond G. Gordon, Jr, ed. 2005. "Ethnologue: Languages of the World". 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.]Sa'idi Arabic carries little prestige nationally though it continues to be widely spoken, including in the north by rural migrants who have partially adapted to
Egyptian Arabic . For example, the Sa'idi genitive exponent is usually replaced with Egyptian "bitāIPA|ʕ", but the realization of /q/ as /g/ is retained. Second and third-generation Sa'idi migrants aremonolingual in Egyptian Arabic, but maintain cultural and familial ties to the south.Sa'idi Consonants [Khalafallah 1969]
Notes
References
* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=aec Ethnologue entry for Sa`idi Arabic]
* Khalafallah, Abdelghany A. 1969. "A Descriptive Grammar of Sa'i:di Egyptian Colloquial Arabic". Janua Linguarum, Series Practica 32. The Hague: Mouton.
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