De la variation au changement phonologique : une étude en synchronie dynamique du système consonantique de l’arabe parlé en Jordanie

Abstract

Varieties of Jordanian spoken Arabic are interesting not only because they violate the standard Arabic phonological system, but also because they exhibit innovative internal mechanisms of articulations, best be described as evolution of languages (or dialects). While research highlights the social aspects of the emergence of varieties of languages in general and Jordanian spoken Arabic in particular, the present study focuses on the internal processes of evolution of those sounds. In this, the study steps from extrinsic to intrinsic factors of language evolution in the given context. For this purpose, the study draws its discussions and arguments from a quantitative and qualitative analyses of data obtained from an audio corpus of spoken Arabic language from 90 speakers in their natural settings. The study thus aims to contribute to the field of varieties of language through surpassing the traditional tendencies (i.e. extrinsic or conscious factors) of this filed into more precise descriptions of the unconscious articulation of language sounds.