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[edit] Egyptian Arabic versus Sa'idi Arabic
Sa'idi Arabic is clearly distinguished from Egyptian Arabic in ISO 639-3 and Ethnologue as well as in the linguistic literature. Comments that are specific to Sa'idi should be placed on the page for Sa'idi. (Taivo (talk) 21:16, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
- Ethnologue is not the only and ultimate authority on any language, let alone Egyptian Arabic. What other "linguistic literature" are you referring to? — Zerida ☥ 21:18, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- For example:
- This is a source on Sa'idi that does not include Egyptian: Khalaffallah, Abdelghany A. 1969. A Descriptive Grammar of Sa'i:di Egyptian Colloquial Arabic. Janua Linguarum, Series Practica 32. The Hague: Mouton.
- Here is a source on Egyptian that does not include Sa'idi: Harrell, Richard S. 1957. The Phonology of Colloquial Egyptian Arabic. American Council of Learned Societies Program in Oriental Languages Publications Series B, Aids, Number 9. New York: American Council of Learned Societies.
- On this map Egyptian and Sa'idi (Upper Egyptian) are on equal status as separate varieties of Arabic: Kaye, Alan S., & Judith Rosenhouse. 1997. "Arabic Dialects and Maltese," The Semitic Languages. Ed. Robert Hetzron. London: Routledge. Pages 263-311 (map on page 264).
- On the World Atlas of Language Structures, Egyptian Arabic does not include Sa'idi ("Cairo" sources are clearly in abundance and specific Sa'idi sources are missing): World Atlas of Language Structures--Egyptian Arabic entry (Taivo (talk) 21:28, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
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- That doesn't quite answer my question, Taivo. That there are sources on Sa'idi specifically has no bearing on its well-attested relationship with Lower Egyptian (Masri). Kaye for example has written on the Qift dialect. Does this mean it is not Sa'idi? No! But no one is arguing that Lower and Upper Egyptian are not distinct dialects. It's a question of whether the term "Egyptian Arabic" is a catch-all for the dialects of the Egyptian Nile Valley (which only excludes the Bedouin dialects of the deserts and Sinai). It is. — Zerida ☥ 21:41, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- Your question was are there sources that place Egyptian Arabic and Sa'idi Arabic on separate, but equal status as varieties of Arabic. If so, then Sa'idi information needs to be placed on the Sa'idi Arabic page and Egyptian information (of which 99% of this article constitutes) needs to remain here. The Kaye and Rosenhouse map clearly does that and the use of "Egyptian Arabic" without Sa'idi information in WALS does that as well. ISO 639-3 distinguishes the two as separate, but equal. I don't doubt that there is a "cover term", but since this article deals 99% with Egyptian and not with Sa'idi, and the language template does NOT include the ISO 639-3 code for Sa'idi, then this article is, ipso facto, an Egyptian Arabic article and not a "general Egyptian" article. By subsuming "Sa'idi" in this article, Wikipedia is seeming to perpetuate the apparent cultural prejudice that Lower Egyptians feel towards the "country folk". Sa'idi has an independent existence in ISO 639-3 codes, and, therefore, in Wikipedia. (Taivo (talk) 21:52, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
- I also notice the article's point-of-view right from the very beginning--the use of Masri as an alternate name for the "Egyptian Arabic" of this article--Masri only refers to Cairene Arabic, not to Sa'idi. (Taivo (talk) 21:58, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
- Ooh, I would love to see the map from Hetzron. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 22:08, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
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- By subsuming "Sa'idi" in this article, Wikipedia is seeming to perpetuate the apparent cultural prejudice that Lower Egyptians feel towards the "country folk"' No, that's your assumption, and it is not appreciated. Most major language articles incorporate information on the major regional dialects of that language, but is usually more heavily geared toward the standard variety as a matter of convention. Since there is now an article on Sa'idi, it does make more sense to provide more detailed information on it there, but there is no rule that says that we are not allowed to write anything about the major regional variations in the main language article. As regards the name Masri, as the article explains, Masr is the both the name of Egypt and Cairo in Egyptian Arabic; therefore Masri, the nisba adjective, refers specifically to Cairene Arabic as well as to Egyptian Arabic more generally. — Zerida ☥ 22:14, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- So now that there is a separate article on Sa'idi, specific information about Sa'idi should be placed there first since it is not subsumed under the ISO 639-3 code for "Egyptian Arabic". The use of ISO in the template at the top of language pages makes the implicit assumption that information found on that page is related to the language identified by that code. It's not a perfect system, but it's the one there is. This whole discussion is also based on the entire issue of what is and is not a "variety of Arabic" and what is a dialectal variant of one of the varieties (a discussion way outside the bounds of what should be discussed here). As long as Sa'idi is given its just due as a separate and equal variety of Arabic then this issue can rest for now. (Taivo (talk) 22:33, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
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- The truth is that what constitutes a dialect or a variety or a language will always be an issue in Arabic sociolinguistics. It would be nice if we could give straight linguistic information on each variety, but unfortunately when it comes to Arabic, experience has shown that this is just not possible on Wiki without running into issues. And that fact is that your earlier description of Sa'idi as an "Afro-Asiatic language" (should at least be Semitic) did not help. Ironically, I have always been of the linguistically-based opinion that "Arabic" is cover term for a group of mutually unintelligible languages. Unfortunately, treating Arabic that way has always been an invitation for ideological edit warring, so we need to reach a middle ground. Also, readers are more likely to swallow that Egyptian Arabic (Lower and Upper) is a distinct variety or a language or whatever, than Sa'idi. Native speakers of Sa'idi themselves would react quite incredulously to the notion that their dialect is a separate language from Egyptian Arabic. It is difficult enough dealing with the thorny issue of what Egyptian Arabic constitutes, let alone Arabic in general. That said, there are linguistic grounds for treating Sa'idi and Masri (i.e. Egyptian) as representing a dialect continuum, for which I provided a reference. Let's keep things in perspective. — Zerida ☥ 22:56, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- I am rather blunt in my writing and this comes across as abrasiveness. No offense was intended. But in the end both articles got improved. The "Afro-Asiatic" language tag is mainly because I was building a lot of Afro-Asiatic stubs at the time and it's easier to use one basic pattern rather than fidgeting around with each of them. There was no "agenda" related to it--just convenience. (Taivo (talk) 23:26, 22 March 2008 (UTC))
- No offense taken. Communication over the internet can lead to misunderstandings. I am sure in a different context, we would be having more interesting and intellectually-stimulating linguistic conversations. The underlying representation :-) here is that we probably agree more than we disagree on the surface. But I found it interesting that Khalafallah's grammar does describe Sa'idi as "a variety of Egyptian Arabic" [1], so we could use that as a reference as well. I hope to check it out some time, and also to see both of these articles improved to the level of one of the better covered language articles (it's always a WP:LPOV issue with Arabic). By the way, I wasn't referring to the tag, but to the previous lead which referred to Sa'idi as "an Afro-Asiatic language spoken in Egypt" [2]. Setting aside the language question, it should be "an Arabic ____" or at least "a Semitic ____" for classification purposes; i.e. the next upper level subgroup. I don't how many other Arabic stubs have that description in the lead. — Zerida ☥ 00:36, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
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To-do list for Egyptian Arabic:
