Verbal Play in Egyptian Political Jokes
VERBAL PLAY IN EGYPTIAN POLITICAL JOKES:
PRAGMALINGUISTIC AND SOCIOPRAGMATIC PERSPECTIVES
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Importance
The issue of political jokes in Egypt enjoys a degree of importance which prompted two Egyptian presidents to comment on the matter. In his first public speech in the National Assembly (Now the People’s Assembly) after the 1967 war, the late President Gamal Abdul-Nasser called upon the people to stop joking about the Setback or the consequences of the war.
Without knowing it, we listen to [foreign] broadcasts
and we repeat what they’re saying and say there is
no use. The Egyptian people listen to anything and
make jokes about it. You know of the joke wave which
has spread of late . I know our people . This is the nature
of our people . I didn’t take the matter seriously , and
know the Egyptian people well . I’m one of them and
was brought up among them. Every person whenever
he meets another one , says , “Have you heard the latest
joke ?” and then tells it . They [i.e. foreigners/
our enemies ] can make advantage of us by making
some jokes which affect our dignity -- our dignity
as a people who has vanguards who fought and died .
( Mansour 1988: 173; quoted in Hammouda 1992: 30 ; . translation mine)
President Hosni Mubarak , following the assassination of the late President Anwar El-Sadat said ,
Jokes have never stopped. They only appear then
disappear. But they’re always there.
We are Egyptians and know the Egyptian
temperament which faces difficult situations or
severe crises by mocking them and mocking
themselves too. (...) Jokes [after the 1967 war]
were severe and painful as if the people were
mocking the armed forces, i.e. mocking their
sons and fathers , or themselves . They were
weeping with one eye, and laughing with the
other-- weeping and laughing at themselves at
the same time (...) (Hammouda 1992: 31-32;
translation mine).
More recently , in his answer to a question about the strangest rumor he heard in 1996, President Mubarak stated that there were no many rumors , but he heard so many jokes which made him laugh heartily.
( Al-Ahram , Jan. 1, 1997 :8)
1.2 Definition of Terms
1.2.1 Verbal Play
According to Chiaro (1992 : 5) verbal play, or rather “word play” is “the use of language with intent to amuse”. To her, word play is only one of numerous ways of provoking laughter. The term includes an array of witty expressions ranging from puns and spoonerisms to wisecracks and funny stories. It is inseparably linked to humor which in turn is linked to laughter. (p.4)
Humor itself can be defined as “a type of stimulation that tends to elicit the laughter reflex” (Koestler, 1974; quoted in Chiaro 1992:4). Cicero (1965 : 377) distinguishes two types of humor or wit: “one employed upon facts, the other upon words”. In this paper, however, we adopt Chiaro’s viewpoint (1992 : 14) that
a witty saying has its point sometimes in facts, sometimes in words, though people are most particularly amused whenever laughter is excited by the union of the two.
1.2.2 Egyptian
By “Egyptian” is meant a wider range than merely pertaining to Egypt or its people. Hence, the inclusion of some jokes which deal with non-Egyptian figures (e.g. the Yemeni ex-President El-Sallal) simply because the incident the joke revolves around is reported to have taken place in Egypt (joke no. 4 below), and also joke 17 about the Yemeni Cabinet, and joke 23, which involves a non-Egyptian leader).
1.2.3 Political
In this paper the word “political” is, as in the case of “Egyptian”, used in a wider sense than simply related to politics in its narrow sense. Some of the jokes included in this study may not be strictly political, but are actually more “social“ or ”economic” in nature. This explains why some jokes like 9, 12 and 15 in section 3 below are included.
1.2.4 Jokes
Hockett (1977 :258-259) holds that “jokes are an art form; specifically (...) a genre of literature”. To him, they are discourses that are laughed at, and (...) are repeated from time to time in essentially unchanged form”. Hockett holds that the claim that jokes are a genre of literature is supported when we compare the joke with the practice of participants in what Joos ( 1967 ) calls consultative-style speech. Consultation exchanges information and seeks a collective decision . It is the manifestation in language, of community homeostatis ( on internal stability ). Chiaro ( 1992; 34 ) tells us that Hockett defines Jokes as ‘layman’s poetry , and adds that to Hockett , pun equals poetry.
1.2.5 Pragmalinguistics and Sociopragmatics
Several derivative terms have been proposed to classify the wide range of the subject-matter of Pragmatics. Among these relatively recent terms are Pragmalinguistics and Sociopragmatics . According to Crystal (1985 : 240 ) the former term has been used by some linguists to refer to the more linguistic ‘end’ of Pragmatics. In Pragmalinguistics, the linguist studies matters from the viewpoint of the structural resources available in a language. But in Sociopragmatics, by contrast, a linguist studies “the way conditions on language use derive from the social situation”. It is with both perspectives on Pragmatics , viz. Pragmalinguistics and Sociopragmatics, that the present study is concerned.
1.3 The Difficulty of Translating Jokes
Trying to translate an Egyptian joke into English or any other language is no easy task. There are several reasons for this difficulty, which may be summed up as follows:
3.1 Lack of shared Sociocultural Knowledge
For a translation to be successful, the translator has to convey, in addition to the lexical and syntactic rendition, a whole array of meaning belonging to the culture of the original (or source) language. Since language and culture are actually indivisible, without shared cultural , or rather sociocultural knowledge between the sender and the recipient of the message (in this case the joke ) even a common linguistic code (e.g. American and British English ) will be of little help .
Chiaro (1992 : 80-81) sums up the situation in the following lines:
(…) when the two languages involved in the
translation of a joke possess even a little
shared cultural ground with each other,
although the target version will not always be
perfectly clear to the recipient, it will at least
bear some resemblance, content-wise , to the
message in the original text. (…) Many
[jokes ] play on events, states and situations
which are peculiar to their culture of origin .
1.3.2 Linguistic Restraints
Like jokes which are too culture-specific, jokes which are too language-specific are not easily translated . When sociocultural restraints are combined with linguistic restraints, translation can be an arduous task. Verbal play in jokes presents some extra difficulties not encountered in translating referential prose , which are similar to the difficulties faced in the translation of literary texts especially poetry. According to Chiaro (1992:87) “jokes in which sociocultural references cross-cut play on language are the most difficult of all to render in another language.“
1.3.3 Resorting to Joke-spoiling Explanations
Especially when sociocultural restraints and linguistic restraints combine together in a joke, such a joke creates a serious problem, not only as far as the technicalities of translation are concerned, but for the recipient’s understanding as well. Anticipating this problem, a translator would resort to a rather complex explanation of the joke after which the text would cease to function as a joke. A quote from Chiaro (1992: 77 ) seems in order :
No matter how well the translator
knows the target language, cultural references
and polysemous items may well involve
them in longwinded explanations , after which
the recipient rarely reacts with a laugh.
( ... ) Jokes, it would seem, travel badly.
However, we should accept the fact that any translation (especially that of a joke) is by its nature an interpretation of the source text rather than its perfect reflection.
1.3.4 Resultant “Translationese”
In addition to cultural barriers and linguistic stumbling blocks, a translated joke will tend to be in a variety of language which is ‘translationese’ rather than English, or for that matter, whatever target language is required. A characteristic of this variety is the rendition of the words involving verbal play in the form of transliteration or transcription. The phonemic symbols used in transcribing Arabic words are included in the APPENDIX at the end of the paper
.
2. FORMS AND CONSTITUENTS OF JOKES
2.1 Forms
Jokes take various forms , or in Chiaro’s words ( 1992 :48 ) “come in numerous shapes and sizes ranging from very long and highly structured ‘shaggy dog stories’ to short, almost spineless one- liners”. Following is a brief account of some of the more common forms of jokes . We should bear in mind, however, that combinations of two or more forms are also possible.
2.1.1 The Monologue
Gabr ( 1986 : 26 ) tells us that “a joke can take the form of a monologue in which what goes on inside the main, and only character (or the protagonist) of the joke is the main purpose.” I found that this form occurred rarely in the corpus of jokes collected for this study. An example is joke 20 in Section 3 below.
2.1.2 The Dialogue
A joke may also assume the form of a dialogue ( i.e. between two participants) or the form of a conversation (i.e. between three or more interlocutors). One cannot help noticing that the dialogue form is more frequent than the conversation form. However, this is only an impression that has to be verified. This situation has to be compared with other cultural settings to determine whether it is culture-specific.
2.1.3 The Narrative Form
In a narrative joke the teller ( or jokester ) “assumes the role of the narrator in a story-like or novel-like manner, commenting on the events or characters” (Gabr 1986 : 26 ). Chiaro ( 1992 : 53 ) differentiates the joke as a narrative form “more ‘serious’ forms of narrative”. To her, joke narratives differ because of what is implicit within the punch (or the second constituent of the joke). In other words, it is this implication or this “cryptic element” which makes the difference.
2.1.4 The Verse Form
A story-style joke can also occur in verse form. Instead of prose, rhyme and rhythm are exploited to humorous ends when used as joke frames. One typical verse frame is the limerick which is exemplified by Chiaro (1992: 59) as follows:
There was a young lady of Ryde,
Who ate some green apples and died:
The apples fermented
Inside the lamented,
And made cider inside her inside.
It is unfortunate that the present study does not include any verse jokes. It remains to be seen whether there are any such jokes in Egypt.
We should bear in mind, however, that a joke in a verse form is not the same thing as a poetic joke. Hockett (1977: 262 ) divides all instances of word play into two categories using literary terminology: prosaic and poetic. While prosaic jokes play on some aspect or other of world knowledge, poetic jokes simply play with the language itself. To him, jokes that turn on accidental resemblance between words in sound and in meaning are poetic, while translatable jokes are prosaic.
2.1.5 The Joke as Formula
In a joke-as-formula, the jokester acts out a dialogue that is not within the frame of a longer narrative structure. In other words, he does not contextualize it in any way. The dialogue or exchange is simply recited point-blank or out of the blue with the assumption that the recipient will recognize the opening as being joke signals. Examples of this type of joke are provided by Chiaro (1992 : 61):
‘ Mummy, Mummy, can I play with Grandma?“
‘ No dear, you’ve dug her up twice this week already!“
‘ Waiter, waiter, there’s a fly in my soup!“
‘ Don’t worry sir, there ‘ll be no extra charge!“
Once again, I did not come across any occurrences of this type of joke in the corpus used for the present study, with the possible exception of joke 2 below. However, this does not necessarily mean that this type does not exist since further investigation may prove otherwise .
2.2 The Constituents of a Joke
A simple joke consists of two constituents, the build-up and the punch. Sometimes the learned coinages epithesis and paiesis ( or paesis) are used for these terms, respectively (Hockett 1977 : 259). The punchline was also called locus by Nash (1985). In this paper the more traditional terms build-up and punch will be adopted .
Here is an example from Hockett (1977 : 259):
An irate man came into a drugstore.
“Yesterday I came in here for hair tonic,“
he complained, “but what you sold me
was glue. This morning I tried to tip
my hat, and lifted myself two inches
off the sidewalk.
In this joke the boundary between the build-up and the punch falls just before the word “lifted“. Hockett ( ibid. ) offers an easy procedure for locating the boundary. Starting at the end of the wording of a joke, one finds the shortest terminal sequence, the replacement of which by suitably chosen words will transform the joke into a non-joke. Thus, in the joke cited above, all we need to ruin the joke is to replace everything after the last “and“ by, say, “almost tore off the brim”.
In addition to the build-up and the punch, the commonest variety of a simple poetic joke revolves around a pun or word/verbal play. A pun, according to Hockett ( 1977 :262 ) “may be perfect or may show any degree of imperfection“. To him, the joke is not a joke at all unless the build-up includes a pun. This pun may be called the pivot of the build-up. (p. 267) However, Hockett points out ( p . 268) that “not all poetic jokes involve puns, overt or implied“. Here is an example from Hockett ( p . 263 ) in the form of a children’s riddle:
Q . Why should one go on tiptoe past the medicine cabinet ?
A . So as not to wake up the sleeping pills .
3. THE TECHNIQUES OF VERBAL PLAY
IN THE CORPUS JOKES
All the jokes in this study are included in Hammouda (1992 ; in Arabic). However, the linguistic analysis presented in this paper is totally mine. Although jokes may be classified on the basis of form ( i.e. monologue, dialogue, narrative, etc. in line with the discussion in Section 2 above ), they are here presented according to the technique of verbal play employed in them. In some cases it was felt that the joke in question could be dealt with under more than one technique, but care was taken to avoid such unnecessary duality , and the joke was determined to exemplify one and only one of the techniques. However, in such cases there will be reference to the other possible classifications and, more importantly, a brief discussion of the other technique(s) of word play involved. Following is a discussion of each of these techniques side by side with all the jokes representing each technique.
3.1 Phonological Play
Phonological play may take the form of assuming a foreign accent, assonance or consonance , or near rhymes. Here are some examples. The block letter “J” will stand for “Joke“, and will be followed by a serial number just for ease of reference. The number is followed, between parentheses, by the page number(s) on which the joke occurs in Hammouda. The meanings of Arabic words which are phonologically transcribed, as well as the meaning of some other words that need to be explained are given in square brackets.
3.1.1 Disguised Pronunciation
J1 (124 ) (1) In Al-Tankit Waltabkit, a magazine by Abdullah Al-Nadim, he tells us this joke:
A foreigner stood in front of a judge in a law court. The judge started,
- did you kill that man, Khawaga ? [an address form for foreigners , especially non-Muslims].
- No , / xabiibi / [ my dear ]. He / katal ruuxuh /. [killed himself ]
The judge yelled in relief,
- Innocent .
It was then the turn of a native countryman.
The judge asked him,
- Did you knife that man?
- No, I swear by the Prophet, your honor.
- Then, was it he who knifed himself?
- Yes, sir.
- Strange. Is there anyone who can knife himself? What’s your name, man?
- My name is / mixammid xisein /! (2)
In J1 the Egyptian countryman disguises the pronunciation of his name to sound foreign by means of replacing the phoneme /h/ ( voiceless pharyngeal fricative) in both names by the phoneme / x / ( voiceless back- velar fricative). In addition, he uses the vowel / i / ( the high front vowel ) in the first name instead of the typical Egyptian pronunciation of the name using an /a/ or a /¶/. The consonant replacement echoes that used in / xabiibi/ instead of /habiibi / and /ruuxuh/ instead of /ruuhuh/ in the (British) foreigner’s speech. Incidentally, the foreigner also replaces the phoneme /q/ in /qatal/ ( voiceless uvular stop) by the phoneme /k/ ( voiceless velar stop). Using /x/ for /h/ and /q/ for /k/ are instances of typical foreign accents of pronouncing Arabic words since the phoneme /x/ does not occur in the phoneme inventory of English and many other languages, and the Arabic phoneme /q/ occurs only as an allophone of the English phoneme / k / in some phonetic environments.
It is worth mentioning that the joke took place at a time when Egypt was under British control, during which foreigners in general, and the British in particular, enjoyed certain privileges which the Egyptians did not
enjoy.
3.1.2 Assonance and Rhyme
Hockett (1977: 269) states that one type of poetic jokes “has only some verbal play, along the line of rhyme or assonance, in the punch.”
J2 (32) The joke went that someone said,
- “Three people will never go to Paradise”.
- “Who are they ?”, people asked.
-”Shams Badran, Abdul-Hakim Amer, and Gamal Abdul-Nasser,“ the man replied.
-”Why ?”, people asked.
-The man said , “The first left the army without / idda/ [ (military) equipment; weapons ]; the second died as the result of falling in love with /warda / [a famous Algerian singer living in Egypt ] ; and the third abdicated at the time of /sidda / [hardship ; crises] .
In J 2 there is assonance between the words / idda / and / sidda / . Harmsworth (n.d.:12 ) defines assonance as
a species of imperfect rhyme , or a substitute for
rhyme , consisting in using the same vowel sound
with different consonants , and requiring the use
of the same vowels in the assonant words from
the last accented vowel to the end of the word .
Examples are “man“ and “hat “ , “penitent “ and “ reticence “ .
As for the word / warda /, it rhymes with the two other words / idda / and / sidda / sharing with them the consonant-vowel combination /-da / even though there is no gemination as in the cases of the two latter words .
J 2 circulated after the 1967 war at a time referred to as the “Setback “ . Abdul-Nasser was then the President ; Badran was the Minister of War ;
and Amer was the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces . In addition to widespread rumors about a “ relationship “ between Amer and the Algerian singer , there were also some rumors as to his being a drug addict, hence the following joke which circulated following his death :
3.1.3. Rhyme and Consonant Clusters
J3 ( 40 ) He lived / mastuul / [ high ] , died / mastuul /, and was buried in /?astaal / [ his native hometown ] .
In addition to the identity of the first two words , which are actually used in the same meaning , and hence are mere repetitions intended for emphasizing the fact -- or rather the claim -- that Field Marshal Amer was “high“ throughout his life , the three words -- or rather the two -- rhyme together since they all end in the consonant phoneme /-l / . The identity of the first vowel in each of the two words , as well as the medial consonant cluster /-st- / in both helps bring about the overall phonetic similarity .
3.2 Semantic/Lexical Play
In the domain of lexical items we have three closely related options of word play : polysemes which are single words with different meanings ; homonyms which are words with the same form but with different meanings ; and homophones which are words that sound the same but have different meanings . Although these three options are distinct , they are similar in the duplicity characterizing each of them and which is inherent in the language itself .
Discussing puns , Chiaro (1992 : 39 ) states that they
(…) (whether phonetic or semantic ) are two-faced .
Their hidden meaning is brought out by the
environment in which they occur , where a
more ‘obvious‘ meaning is usually expected .
Here Chiaro deals with puns in their two different manifestations -- the phonetic and the semantic , which are the homonymous (or the homophonous) and the polysemous , respectively .
Although I quite agree with Leech (1969 ) that the distinction between homonymy and polysemy is extremely subtle , an effort is here exerted in order to distinguish one from the other using some criteria of my own , however tentative these may be . However , the demarcation line seems so elusive in some cases that the decision seems to be more arbitrary than otherwise . It is also worth noting that the great majority of the corpus jokes falls into the homonym category . Interestingly enough , there is one instance in which there is one example of each homonymy and polysemy in one and the same joke (J 5 below) .
3.2.1 Polysemy
J 4 (141) Field Marshal Abdullah El-Sallah , the then Leader of the Revolution in Yemen went for medical examination in the Armed Forces Hospital in Maadi , Cairo . After the doctors examined the man , they told him,
-” Your excellency , you need treatment with electricity .“
-”It seems that electricity will enter my body before it enters Yemen !” , was his reply .
The polysemy in this joke lies in the assumption that the same word ( i.e. electricity ) has two different meanings , the one used by the doctor (i.e. electric treatment / shock ) and the other used by the patient (i.e. electric light).
Now we turn to the following joke which exemplifies homonymy in its first pun , and polysemy in its second pun .
J5 (10 ) Field Marshal Abdul-Hakim Amer once suffered from a prick in his chest . When Shams Badran , the then Minister of War , asked him ,
- “What’s wrong with you ? “
n “Nothing . It was only a / azza / [ Gazza ; a prick ] but it / raahit / [ came to an end ; was lost ] , replied Amer .
The first occurrence of pun / azza / is presumably a homonym since it is used in two senses one of which is a proper noun ( i.e. the name of a city ) and the other a common noun (a prick / an acute pain in the chest ) , and hence cannot be one and the same word . As for the second occurrence of pun , the verb form ( or probably the one-word sentence ) / raahit / , it can be taken to mean “ended“ ( or “is over” ) on the one hand , and “ was lost ( in battle )” on the other . The reference here is to the seizure of the Palestinian city , which was under Egyptian administration , in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war .
3.2.2 Homonymy
J6 ( 29 ) After a meal to which someone was invited , the guest said to the host, “ May Allah make it ( i.e. your house / household ) / aamir / [Amer; prosperous ] . Hereupon , the host immediately said , “ No ! For the Prophet’s sake , do me a favor . We cannot afford another Setback.”
The homonymy lies in the word / aamir / which means either Field Marshal Amer , or thriving / prosperous . The former meaning refers to a proper noun , while the latter is an adjective , and hence the homonymy . The reference in the joke is to the consequences of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war , which were toned down by the political leadership at that time as “the Setback“. The joke also hints at the responsibility of Amer for the consequences of the war .
J 7 ( 41 ) The joke went that after Amer died , his close friends asked that a hole be made in his grave so that / sams / [ Shams ( Badran ) ; ( the ) sun / sunrays ] would enter through it . It was also said that they put (a ) / warda / [Warda ; a rose ] on his tomb .
There is a couple of homonymous items in this joke. The first one involves / sams / which plays on the two possible meanings of the word , i.e. Shams Badran , the then Minister of War , or the sunrays . We should note , however , that the homonymy in this case exhibits some imperfection since the reference to “ sunrays “ in Arabic is usually accompanied by the definite article / al- / to render the assimilated form / assams / . As for the homonymy involved in / warda / , it was explained in J 2 above . The hint here is to the common responsibility of both Amer and Shams for the Setback , as well as to the alleged relationship which was claimed to have contributed to the loss of the battle as a result of Amer's inattention to his responsibilities , which was brought about by this relationship .
J8 ( 59 ) Because of the complications of diabetes from which Abdul-Nasser suffered acute pain in his right leg , he went for treatment in the (then ) Soviet Union . He could hardly walk . After he came back he was asked ,
-”Can you / timsi / [ walk ; leave ] now ?
-” Yes,“ was his reply .
-”Then why don’t you /timsi /?” [leave = abdicate ]
The verbal play here is in the word / timsi / which means either “you walk” (as a slight distortion of the classical pronunciation / tamsi / ) , or the colloquial interpretation of the word as “abdicate“ or “resign“ . The hint here is to the dissatisfaction of some people with the late President and their wish that he abdicated .(3)
J 9 ( 197-8 ) After the July 1952 Revolution , army officers were far-reaching in government offices and organizations and were reported to have abused the people there . They were referred to as “ the leadership delegates“ and assumed a power above all powers . This aroused the grudge of people and made them joke about army officers .
A junior officer who became a “leadership delegate“ went to get his salary . The teller handed him 100 Egyptian pounds . The officer was surprised and said to the teller ,
-”But my salary is 30 pounds only .“
-The rest is /badalaat / [ reimbursement ]
-” Seventy pounds reimbursement ?“ asked the officer .
-”Yes , replied the teller.
-”How come ?“
-”Twenty pounds reimbursement for the battlefield , 20 for clothing , and 10 for ‘representation‘ .
-”How about the remaining 20 ?“ asked the officer .
-”These are /badal / [instead of ] someone else takes it ! “ answered the teller .
The decision as to /badal / being a homonym is based on the fact that it is used in two meanings , one of which is a noun (in the sense of per diem / reimbursement ) and the other is an expression meaning “instead of “/ “lest” ) It is also noteworthy to mention that the use of / badal / in the second case is followed by a complement , viz. / ma hadd taani yaxudhum / i.e. “ lest someone else should take it ( them )“. However, the homonymy is still there regardless of the complement . The essential difference lies in the fact that in the first three cases (i.e. battlefield; clothing; representation) , the Arabic words form a construct , while in the fourth case the homonym is followed by a clause / sentence .
J10 ( 204 ) While discussing the draft Constitution of 1956, there was a heated discussion between the late President Abdul-Nasser and one of the cabinet ministers , namely Fathy Radwan . To tone down the discussion , Radwan finally remarked in a joking spirit,
- “If Members of the parliament do not / yisawwatu / [ vote; wail ] in case of the death of the President of the Republic , then when will they / yisawwatu / ?
The late President was reported to have protruded his lips in disgust , saying ,
- “ Well-said , Mr. Fathi ! “
The one-word sentence / yisawwatu / is a homonym since the two meanings are quite distinct: “vote“ on the one hand, and “wail“ on the other .
J 11 (204 ) On another occasion Abdul-Nasser brought with him a copy of the Chinese Constitution which be highly praised. Mr. Radwan remarked jokingly,
- “But it’s fragile !“
- “ Why fragile “ , asked the President . “Because it’s / siini /! [ Chinese ; china ]
Here , Abdul-Nasser frowned , thought for a minute , and when he eventually got the joke , looked away , and was reluctant to laugh .(4)
The homonym / siini/ is once used as an adjective ( i.e. that of China ) and once as a noun ( i.e. china , which is indeed fragile ) .
J 12 (245-6 ) During the visit of the late Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to Egypt , he and the late President Sadat saw a great crowd in front of a co-op for food stuffs . Begin asked Sadat ,
-” What are those people crowded for , Mr. President?”
Sadat , who was embarrassed , finally said ,
-”Nothing , it’s only a funeral ; and this crowd is here to give condolences . “
Begin approached the crowd and asked a man standing in the queue,
-”/ azzeit /?” [ Did you give condolences? / for food oil ?]
-”No . For sugar !” said the man .
The homonymy stems from the use of / azzeit / once as a one-word question meaning “Did you give condolences ?” and another time as a prepositional phrase meaning “for oil?“. In other words the homonymy comes about as a result of syntactic play . It is also worthy of mention that the pronunciation of the homonym as a prepositional phrase is an elided form of / ala-zzeit /.
J 13 (253-4) The late President Sadat wanted to change the name of the “People’s Assembly“. He asked the members to discuss the matter . A member of Al-Wafd Party suggested going back to the old name “Parliament“. Another of the National Democratic Party suggested calling it Al-mastaba [the village outdoor meeting place ] . Sadat asked the Interior Minister ,
- “ You, Nabawy , what do you think ? “ - “ Mr. President , I suggest calling it Bata ,“ answered the cabinet minister .
- “ Why , Nabawy ? “
- “ Because , your excellency , we elect /gozein/ [two Pairs ] from each constituency” , was the answer .
The joke would be meaningless to someone who is not familiar with the fact that Bata is the name of a famous chain-store for shoes , and that the homonym / gozein / means either “four“ on the one hand or “two pairs (of shoes )” on the other. The hint here is to the claim that those “elected “ MP’s did not actually come to the Parliament as the result of free elections , but rather through forfeited ones , and hence were considered by the government to be as “low “ as shoes are.
A quote from Chiaro (1992: 11-12) about shared knowledge is
in order:
If a joke is to be successful, it has to play on knowledge
which is shared between sender and recipient. That
is why foreign or translated jokes remain restricted to
those who are au fait with the underlying implications.
One of the reasons for the lack of appreciation of ‘foreign‘
jokes to the full is due to a mismatch not only in
language but also in shared sociocultural knowledge .
Such knowledge is varied and ranges from everyday
experiences to what may be termed encyclopaedic or
“world” knowledge .
3.3 Sociopragmatic Play
In addition to phonological play (3.1 ) and lexical / semantic play (3.2 ) there can also be syntactic play , or as Chiaro puts it “playing with syntax , which she defines as “play on an ambiguity which can easily occur (…) when sentences contain rank-shifted prepositional groups“ (1992 : 41) . One example quoted from Chiaro would suffice to illustrate this type of play :
child : Mummy , can I go out to play ?
Mother : With those holes in your trousers ?
Child : No , with the girl next door .
In this exchange the child misinterprets the prepositional phrase “with those holes in your trousers“ to be a complement to the transitive verb “play“ rather than “ trousers with holes (in them )” .
It is unfortunate that the corpus of jokes for the present study does not include any such examples of rank-shifted prepositional groups . However , moving to a level higher than the syntactic we find examples of a pragmatic or rather sociopragmatic nature . These examples will now be discussed in terms of two categories , playing with implication and playing with the rules of conversation .
3.3.1 Playing with Implication / Implicature
Gabr (1986: 30 ) discusses explicit vs. implicit meaning of a joke , or meaning by implication . He states that
it is not only what a joke says , but equally important
is what it implies (...) [A joke ] leaves quite a good
room for the imagination of the recipient (...) One
may venture to coin a term that is in line with
transformational tradition viz. deep and surface
meaning whereby the deep meaning is what
matters. (...) The contradiction between implied
and explicit meaning is one of the major semantic
devices of a joke .
Gabr ( p. 31 ) goes on to discuss “allusion“ which , to him , goes a step further than implied meaning in that reference is actually to what the joke teller purports to hint at rather than to what he explicitly / implicitly says . Chen (1992 ) discusses some strategies which creative writers and joke tellers or humorists employ in order to form word play . These include using words or phrases with both a literal meaning and an idiomatic meaning(5) , as well as openly meaning one thing in the hope of communicating another , more hidden meaning. Chiaro (1992: 5 ) also points out the importance in word play of what she calls “non-verbal stimuli“. To her , “word play is inextricably linked to circumstances which belong to the world which exists beyond words.“
Defining implicature , Leech (1983 : 30 ) tells us that
semantics and pragmatics describe the meaning
of an utterance in different ways . The task of
pragmatics is to explain the relation between
these two types of meaning : the sense (which has
often been described as the “literal“ or face-value
meaning ) and the (illocutionary ) force . I assume
(... ) that the sense can be described by means of
a semantic representation in some formal
language or notation . The force will be
representas a set of implicatures .
It is in this sense of implicature that the present study employs the term , i.e. the set of factors which determine the illocutionary force of the utterance , in this case the joke , or rather the punch .
J14 ( 54 ) In the 1960’s , two friends met . One said to the other ,
-” Did you know that Mr. so and so got his tooth pulled through his nose ?”
-”Why didn’t he get it pulled through his mouth ?” , the second person asked .
-”Is there anyone who can open his mouth these days ?” , was the reply .
Bearing in mind that the joke took place in the 1960’s at a time when the freedom of speech was severely suppressed , the meaning of the clause “open his mouth“ in the punch is definitely not the ‘literal’ or ‘face-value’ meaning (using Leech’s term ) , but rather the non-literal or the implied meaning of ‘speak one's mind‘ or ‘voice one’s opinion‘ .
J15 (114) A Turkish pasha who used to collect tax money from Egyptians using his whip met a group of Egyptians . One of them noticed that although it was a cold night , the pasha was not wearing gloves . The Egyptian remarked ,
-”It’s strange, pasha , that you are not wearing gloves in this very cold weather.“
Another Egyptian immediately remarked ,
-”Why does he need gloves when his hands are in our pockets ?!”
First of all we should bear in mind that the scene of the joke is Egypt under Ottoman control , at a time when taxes were levied using force or rather brutal force -- with the whip . Therefore it is not the literal meaning of ‘has his hands in our pockets’ that is intended , but rather the implication that the Turkish rulers were behaving in a pick-pocket manner . Worthy of mention also is the fact that one normally may put his hands in his own pocket , not in someone else’s , unless he is a thief .
J16 (219) Abdul-Nasser used to hasten to support any Revolution that took place in any country in the world . He always said in the Statement of Support that any aggregation against that Revolution would be considered an aggression against the then United Arab Republic . The joke goes that when the film “Revolt on the Ship Bounty“ was shown in Egypt , Abdul-Nasser was quoted to have said:
-”We support the Revolution on the Ship Bounty , and we consider any aggression against it an aggression against the UAR . “
The implication here is two-fold : first , that the political leadership at the time could not differentiate between a “revolt“ on a ship and a “revolution“ in a country or state . (Incidentally the Arabic word / qawra / can stand for both , although other words can, and usually are , used in the case of rebellions on ships . e.g. / tamarrud / or / isyaan / . In other words we are facing a polysemous situation where one and the same word stands for two words in English . Second , the implication is also that the Egyptian people were not really against giving support to worthy national revolutions, but were rather against giving it to worthless civilian rebellions. In other words, there was no objection to the support itself but rather to hastening to give or express it before there was a clear vision as to what is taking place .
J17 (220) The joke went in Egypt that the Yemeni cabinet ministers were discussing the terrible economic problems facing their country when someone of them said ,
-”I have a stunning solution .”
-”Quick , out with it ,“ said the ministers .
-”We have to declare war against the United States . After we lose the battle , the Americans will spend thousands of millions of dollars to reconstruct our country , exactly as they previously did with Germany and Japan .”
Here one of the ministers shook his hand disapprovingly , and said,
-”But --- what if we won the war ?!”
If we take it that the cabinet minister , in uttering the punch , was not being deliberately sarcastic , then the implication is one of sheer self-deception or grave miscalculation .
J18 (232) In an attempt to be nice to the political detainees whom Sadat had just ordered to be set free in the 1970’s after spending some time in Abu- Za’bal concentration camp , the Sheriff of the prison said ,
-”I don’t want to see you here again .“
-”Why ? Do you plan to quit working with the Prison Administration ?”, retorted a detainee .
The detainee’s question is far from being a literal question . He only implies that it is impossible for the Sheriff not to see them in prison again unless he leaves the Prison Administration altogether. In other words , the detainees feel that their return to the prison sooner or later is inevitable and only a mater of time .
J19 (235) Following Abdul-Nasser’s death , Sadat got on his chair . At a crossword the driver asked ,
-”Should we go right or left ?”
Sadat was puzzled for a while and finally said ,
-”Where did Abdul-Nasser use to go ?”
-”To the left , Mr. President ,“ said the driver .
Here Sadat sighed and said ,
-”Well , give a signal to the left , but turn right !” (6)
This joke has a double implication . The first is that Sadat actually assumed a policy contradictory to that of Abdul-Nasser . However , he did not wish to openly make this known , but rather to give the impression that he was following Abdul-Nasser’s policy , while in fact he was doing quite the reverse, and hence giving a signal to the left but going to the right . The second implication is that one really wonders if the ‘right‘ and ‘left‘ would in fact hint at the United States and the defunct Soviet Union , or rather to capitalism and communism , respectively .
J20 (240) Sadat was reported to have said , “One day Gamal came to me . I said to him , “What’s the matter , Gamal ?” Remember that we were friends . He , may Allaaah bless his soul , said to me , “Lend me one [Egyptian ] pound. “ Gamal Abdul-Nasser is borrowing one pound . And from whom ? From me who cannot find enough money to buy cigarettes . The important thing is that I gave him the pound . Abdul-Hakim Amer , may Allaaah bless his soul , bore witness to this . But I said one witness was not enough . There must be two witnesses according to Islamic law . I said there was no one to bear witness but Salah Salem , may Allaaah bless his soul . By chance , he had with him his brother Gamal Salem , may Allaaah bless his soul . They bore witness that I lent Gamal a pound . That was exactly what made me during the Rectification Movement get rid of the Power Centers because they didn’t pay back the pound Gamal borrowed , and I felt I must get it back .
In this joke which takes the monologue form , we find an example of what Sadat was famous , or rather notorious , for . He used to cite dead people as bearing witness to what he was saying , i.e. People whom no one could go to for verification . That was how he retold the July 23 Revolution as he willed , especially to the T.V host Hemmat Mostafa who used to interview him during his celebration of his birthday in his native village Meat Aboul-Koam . He used to call her , “my daughter Hammat“ -- a phrase which some Egyptians mimicked . People also mimicked his way of speaking , an example of which is the way he pronounced the word / ?allah / “Allah / God” with a remarkably prolonged last vowel , hence the way it was spelled in the body of the joke .
However , the gist of the joke or its implication is that the late Sadat used to do massive deeds with the least significant justification , hence his Rectification Movement in which he took into custody many of his opponents -- the justification being the alleged one Egyptian pound which Abdul-Nasser owed him . It is also significant to note that there was no relation whatsoever between the “victims” and the alleged loan , with the probable exception that some of them probably held pro-Nasser attitudes .
J 21 ( 41 ) Following the 1967 Arab-Israeli war , Cairo was left dark , gloomy , unattractive , overcrowded , and lacking in services . It was said that a tourist magazine held a competition among its readers . The prizes were as follows :
First Prize : A one- week stay in Cairo .
Second Prize : A fifteen-day stay in Cairo .
Third Prize :A one-month stay in Cairo .
The implication of the joke stems from the fact that the lower the prize , the longer the stay or the duration of the “reward“ or rather the punishment .
J 22 (232) Similar to joke 21 above , the joke went that a Mafia clan kidnapped ex-President Sadat then phoned and threatened the then Minister of the Interior Mamdouh Salem saying ,
-”If you don’t pay a 100-million dollar ransom , we’ll immediately return him to you !”
The implicature stems from the paradoxical situation where the ransom is paid not for the return of the abductee , but rather for his detention .
3.3.2 Playing with Rules of Conversation
In addition to the traditional hierarchy of the language system in terms of phonology , morphology , lexis , and syntax , there is pragmatics which forms a supra-structure. Pragmatics can be as ambiguous as any item belonging to any of the levels of linguistic analysis just cited . As Chiaro (1992: 43) puts it : “Choices and restrictions which a language user encounters in conversation can become two-faced when seen in relation to form.” More specifically , it is not only that certain discourse markers or functions are simply multifarious , but one or more of Grice’s cooperative principles are not being totally observed . For example , among Grice’s maxims we find “Avoid ambiguity“ . However , as Chiaro (p.75 ) puts it
All jokes are ambiguous per se, so , in a certain sense ,
every time we tell a joke we are being uncooperative
with our interlocutor . If then we joke within the convention
of the joke we are surely being doubly ambiguous .
Though they are ambiguous by nature , most jokes are predictable , not in the sense that the recipients already know or can easily predict the punch , but in the sense that they already realize that they are about to hear a joke . In other words , apart from the punch itself , the recipient knows exactly what to expect. These expectations , however , can be sometimes foiled if the joke teller decides to play with the convention itself .When the recipient’s expectations are defeated in this way, he / she falls into what Chiaro (p.74 ) labels “a pragmatic trap“. And when we play with or twist the pragmatic or sociolinguistic rules of language so as to confuse our interlocutors into not knowing whether we are serious or joking , this situation could well be called , “verbal ‘guile’” , if we borrow Chiaro’s label (p.75 ) .
J23 (28) During the graduation ceremony of a batch of army officers , Field Marshal Amer asked one of the graduates ,
-”Where would you like to serve ?”
- “In your office , sir ,“ replied the officer .
-”Are you crazy ?” said Amer .
-”Is it a must ?” asked the officer .
In this joke , the officer’s exclamatory question twists the rules of conversation in the sense that Amer’s second ( again exclamatory / rhetorical ) question was to be interpreted on the part of the officer as an expression of disbelief and indirect rejection of the officer’s request . However , the officer (deliberately?) took the question at its face-value , and thus inquired about the necessity of being crazy in order to serve at the Field Marshal’s office .
As we said earlier (Cf. introduction to 3 ) it is sometimes difficult to distinguish one category of joke from another . The present joke is a good example of such difficulty since although it is classified here as a joke playing with the rules of conversation , it can as well be an example of implicature . Implicature here is two-fold : Amer implies that the officer's request is incredible since those serving in his Office were a rather closed group or coterie whom the officer had no chance to join ; and on the other hand, the officer’s question / comment implies that those who worked with Amer must be crazy , bearing in mind the rumors about his being a drug-addict and about his coterie’s willingness to do anything he ordered them to do for his own personal safety .
J 24 (39) Dr. Tharwat Okasha , a former Minister of Culture tells us that Abdul-Nasser said to him in the presence of the then Minister of the Interior Sha’rawy Gom’a , and some other cabinet ministers, “Make them [i.e. people] at ease , Tharwat! Suspend the performance of the play “The Revolt of the Negroes“ reports about which gave me headache . Rest assured that we have put an end to the ‘Negroes‘!
“Upon saying this , Dr. Okasha continues , “there followed loud laughter amongst all present .“ Okasha was surprised at all that he heard , unable to realize the secret behind this feverish laughter until it was night when he knew that Abdul-Nasser gave his only Vice-President at that time , namely Anwar El-Sadat , an open leave of absence to stay confined at home .
In this “joke” we have Abdul-Nasser playing with the rules of conversation in the sense that he used the word ‘Negroes‘ not in the sense it is used in the name of the play , but rather to refer to Sadat who had a dark complexion . More specifically , Abdul-Nasser’s addressee would expect him to use the same word referring to the same people , but this was not the case , since the word was used in its “literal “ sense in the title of the play , but was made to stand for a man who happened to be dark-skinned in the other case .
J25 (149) At five o’clock p.m. on March 8 , 1919 some English soldiers broke into the house of the Egyptian political leader Sa’d Zaghloul . The leader of the soldiers said ,
-”I have an order from the Commander General of the English forces to arrest you . “
Zaghloul smiled and said ,
-”You‘ve come late ! I’ve been waiting long for you !” (7)
The officer , who did not understand the implication of Zaghloul’s words said ,
-”Why ? The order I have is to arrest your excellency at five o’clock p.m. And now it is five p.m. !“
In this exchange we have a good instance of playing with the rules of conversation or with Grice’s cooperative principles on the part of the Egyptian leader . Zaghloul did not mean the verbatim interpretation of his utterance , but rather the ‘far-fetched‘ meaning that the arrest was not really a surprise to him since he had expected it for some time . However , instead of the officer getting the message in its pragmatic sense , he assigned to it a literal interpretation which led to the unintentional joking element that may have resulted from the fact that the officer, being a foreigner , was unable to go beyond the immediate interpretation of the utterance .
J 26 (207) When the price of rice was raised during the premiership of Zakareyya Mohyyildin , directives were issued to the Socialist Union and to the Youth Organization to justify the raise and to promote using alternatives to rice such as macaroni . Residents of coastal cities objected since fish cannot be eaten with macaroni . A senior official in the political organization was reported to have said ,
-There is nothing wrong with eating fish with macaroni .
Fish itself is / makaroona / [ macaroni / the name of a kind of fish ] .
When Abdul-Nasser heard about the incident , he remarked ,
-The problem is that officials in the Socialist Union are “Italians “ .
Then he ordered the price of rice be lowered to what it was before the raise.
Although there is an obvious pun in the use of the word / makaroona / , the joke is here classified as a case of playing with the cooperative principles of conversation presuming that the official’s remark was deliberately intended to distort facts , making use of the accidental identity of the two words ‘macaroni’ and ‘a kind of fish‘ in (Egyptian ) Arabic .
Taking the official’s statement at its face value , rather than as a potential (cunning) joke , the late President Abdul-Nasser himself was probably resorting to playing with the rules of conversation when he described the officials as ‘Italians‘ . The implication of using ‘ Italians ‘ -- apart from its close association with ‘macaroni‘ -- is that the word is sometimes used by some Egyptians in a rather derogatory form / talayna / (actually the form used by the President) to mean “unscrupulous” .
One cannot help supposing that Abdul-Nasser did not ‘get the joke‘ or got it but for some reason or other decided to take it as a serious statement rather than as a joke . (Cf. J 10 , J 11 and Endnote 4 . )
J 27 (215) ex-President Abdul-Nasser once needed the services of a translator. When he asked about the best translator , he was informed that it was Dr. so and so . He ordered the Intelligence Service to fetch him . A week later , the translator did not show up yet . When Abdul-Nasser inquired why they did not bring him , they said ,
-We brought him , Sir. He confused , was tried and was executed .
The lack of observing Grice’s principles stems from the fact that the mere request or order that someone be fetched or summoned entailed the person being suspected , charged , tried , and finally executed . The order to fetch the poor translator meant nothing but an order to arrest him as a start and to put an end to his life in the end .
There is also a hint at the torture the man was exposed to ; otherwise he would not have confessed of ‘a conspiracy‘ he was indeed innocent of participating in or even leading .
J28 (233 ) Sadat used to call the year 1971 ‘the year of decision‘ or ‘the decisive year‘ , concerning the Egyptian-Israeli war . When that year passed without any trace of decisiveness , Sadat said,
-This is because of the fog coming from India [ at the time of the Indian- Pakistani war ] .
The word “fog“ triggered a lot of sarcasm and many jokes . Thus , a student , for example , used to say that he / she failed his / her exams because of “fog“ ; a wife did not prepare a meal for her family because of “fog“ ; and a man found himself in another person’s house because of “fog“ .
The pragmatic play in this joke or rather series of jokes resides in transferring the alleged fog from its initial situation into completely different situations , i.e. from war into exam failure , family relations , and even illicit relations .
The implication of the Sadat pretext is that he often did (or did not do ) things because of very improbable reasons . (Cf. J 20 above ) . However , to do justice to Sadat , some observers claimed that his announcement of 1971 as the decisive year and then not doing anything about it was actually part of his tactics to lure the Israelis into believing that he did not really have anything in store for them . In other words , it was the jokes that he indeed wanted to elicit in order to be able to carry out his plan of waging war two years later .
4. CONCLUSION
It is hoped that the preceding discussion of Egyptian political jokes from pragmalinguistic as well as sociopragmatic perspectives has shown that jokes in general , and political ones in particular exhibit some interesting linguistic features which are worthy of examination . It is also hoped that the present study has demonstrated that jokes , being “a genre of literature“ , (Cf. 1.2.4) , represent a language function which depends on the context of situation and on cultural setting in order to be understood and appreciated . Although there are some situations which may be considered funny in many parts of the world , it remains true that different people are amused by different things . This means that some situations and jokes are only amusing within their country of origin and that jokes do not generally travel well . What people find funny is determined by linguistic , geographical , diachronic , sociocultural and personal factors . However , it is hoped that the present study has managed , however partially this may be , to give at least a glimpse at what many Egyptians find funny as far as politics are concerned .
We have also seen that jokes fall into several forms , ( Cf. 2.1 ) , e.g. the monologue form , the narrative form , the verse form , the formula form , etc. Although the jokes in the present study have been classified according to the type of verbal play employed in them , there was occasional reference to the type of joke in terms of form . Since the present investigation did not come across any examples of jokes in verse or as formula , it is here suggested for further study to try and find some of these forms , if any , and to subject them to a similar linguistic treatment .
ENDNOTES
(1) Quoted from Mahmoud El-Sa’dani , Al-Zurafaa (The Light-Hearted) ,
In Al-Hilal Book , Feb. 1967 .
(2) In line with this , Hammouda ( pp. 124-125 ) tells us a joke about a nightwatchman who saw a burglar descending from a window and carrying a bundle of clothes . The watchman yelled at the thief , - “Who is there ?” - “I’m a khawaga,“ said the burglar . -”Excuse me ! I thought you were an Egyptian!” However , this joke is not included in the study since it does not exhibit any verbal play .
(3) Similar to this is an Arab joke (Hammouda, p.144 ) . The radio and Television in an Arab country frequently broadcast a song in which the leader of that country was described as “dear” which (in Arabic, as well as in English) mean “expensive“. A simpleton , or a man in the street , commented on this by saying , “As long as he is ‘dear‘ , why don’t we sell him ?”
(4) A probably good comment on the situation is this quote from Shakespeare , and which was used by Gabr even though for a different purpose :
A jest’s prosperity lies in the ear
Of him that hears it , never in the tongue
Of him that makes it (… )
Love’s Labour’s Lost V , ii.
(5) An interesting example of the problem of miscommunication which may result from the discrepancy between a literal and a non-literal (or idiomatic ) meaning is when the translator of the American ex-President Jimmy Carter orally translated the then President’s statement “I’ve come to Poland for good“ into “I’ve come to Poland for ever“. Magallatul-Faisal (Al-Faisal Magazine), September / October 1996 . p. 32 .
(6) Related to this joke are these jokes : (A) Sadat used to say that he was following the “road“ or footsteps of Abdul-Nasser . People used to comment on this saying , “ He’s doing so indeed but with an eraser to remove them . (B) Some Egyptians also said that Sadat could not distinguish between Nasser’s road and the Corniche road . (C) A taxi driver once asked a passenger if he wanted to go to Heliopolis via the Salah Salem Road or the Nasser road, (which does not actually exist in its non-figurative sense) .
(7) Cf. this joke (Hammuda:183): - First drunkard :“They say that war is at the door” (around the corner ). - Second drunkard : “Don’t believe it . I didn’t see anything at / in front of our door” .
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. English Works
Chen , Rong (1992) . “Ambiguity Can Be Pragmatic , and a Good Thing , Too“, ERIC Document ED 351 699 .
Chiaro , Delia (1992). The Language of Jokes : Analyzing Verbal Play, London : Routledge .
Cicero (1965 ). De Oratore , Libri tres , Hidesheim , Olm .
Crystal , David (1987) . A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics , Oxford : Basil Blackwell.
Gabr, Abdel-Rehim ( 1986 ). “A Few Preliminary Brief and Tentative Observations on Egyptian Jokes : A Sociolinguistic Perspective “, Faculty of Languages and Translation Studies , Vol. 13 ,pp. 19-40 .
Harmsworth , J. R . (n.d.) . Dictionary of Literary Terms, London: Coles Publishing Company .
Hockett , Charles F. (1977). “Jokes“ in C. F . Hockett, The View From Language : Selected Essays, Athens : The University of Georgia Press , pp. 257-289 .
Joos , Martin ( 1967; originally 1961 ) . The Five Clocks, New York : Harcourt, Brace and World .
Koestler , A . ( 1974 ) . “Humour and Wit“ , in The Encyclopaedia Britannica , Vol. 9 , Chicago : Penton .
Leech, Geoffrey N. (1969). A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry , London: Longman.
_______ ( 1983 ) . Principles of Pragmatics, London and New York : Longman.
Nash , W. ( 1985 ). The Language of Humour , London : Longman .
B. Arabic Works
أنيس منصور . عبد الناصر ، القاهرة : المكتب العربي الحديث ، 1988 .
الأهرام (جريدة ) . حديث الرئيس محمد حسني مبارك إلى برنامج " صباح الخير يا مصر " ، منشور بجريدة الأهرام يوم
4 / 1 / 1997 ، ص 8 .
عادل حمودة . النكتة السياسية : كيف يسخر المصريون من حكامهم ، القاهرة : دار سفنكس للطباعة والنشر ، الطبعة الرابعة ، 1992 .
APPENDIX
The phonemic symbols used in transcribing Arabic words in this paper are :
A. Consonants
/b / voiced bilabial stop .
/ t / voiceless dental stop .
/d / voiced dental stop .
/ t / voiceless alveolar stop .
/ d / voiced alveolar stop .
/ k / voiceless velar stop .
/ g / voiced velar stop .
/q / voiceless uvular stop .
/? / voiceless glottal stop .
/ f / voiceless bilabial fricative .
/q / voiceless interdental fricative .
/ / voiced interdental fricative .
/s / voiceless dental fricative .
/ z / voiced dental fricative .
/s / voiceless alveolar fricative .
/ z / voiced alveolar fricative .
/ s / voiceless alveo-palatal fricative .
/ x / voiceless back-velar fricative .
/ g/ voiced back-velar fricative .
/ h / voiceless pharyngeal fricative .
/؟/ voiced pharyngeal fricative.
/h/ voiceless glottal fricative.
/m/ voiced bilabial nasal.
/n/ voiced dental nasal.
/l/ voiced dental lateral.
/l/ voiced alveolar lateral.
/r/ ; /r/ voiced alveolar flap.
/w/ voiced bilabial semi-vowel
/y/ voiced palatal semi-vowel.
2nd. Vowels
/i/ high front short vowel.
/e/ mid front short vowel.
/u/ high back short vowel.
/o/ mid back short vowel.
/a/ low central short vowel.
Length is indicated by doubling the symbol.
.
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