Translation of an Arabic Wikipedia Article: Omani Arabic

Well Wikipedia may not always be the best source of info but I always find it a good source of new vocabulary (since you can just go onto any given article which has an Arabic double to find out what the words mean. Occasionally I find my vocabulary, etc. up to scratch to read the entire thing. This recently happened in an article of some interest to me, the Arabic article on the Omani dialect of Arabic. Since learning as much about Omani Arabic as possible is a big priority for me, I was very excited to see that the article seemed to have a good deal of material, not found at all in the two-line English article.

After actually translating the article, I was somewhat disappointed with the amount of actual information to be gained from it. Never the less, it proved a good exercise in my Arabic reading ability and I did learn a bit about the geographical distribution of the dialects in Oman.

So without further ado, here is the article in Arabic and my rather literal translation.

اللهجة العمانية

خارجة عن اللهجة الخليجية واللهجات العربية الأخرى وكلماتها متغيرة كليا ومعانيها مختلفة وهي لهجة عريقة توارثها الاجيال حتى وقتنا الحاضر، كما أن اللهجة العمانية تختلف من منطقة إلى أخرى وأحيانا من ولاية إلى أخرى.. فاللهجة بالمنطقة الشرقية تختلف عن الباطنة
وتختلف عن مسندم ووتختلف عن الداخلية وتختلف عن لهجة اهل ظفار.

تعتبر لهجة اهل مسقط - المسقطية - هي اللهجة المفهومة عند الكل ،لأن أغلب البرامج
والمسلاسلات التلفزيونية تعرض بهذه اللهجة...كما أنه اهل مسندم لكونهم بقرب من الفرس فإنهم قد تأثروا بهم فهناك بعض الكلمات الفارسية يستخدمونها في حديثهم باللغه العربية لذلك تكون غير مفهومة لمن لا يفهم الفارسية..ولهجة أهل ظفار قريبة من لهجات اليمن.. كما أن لهجة الشرقية ومحافظة البريمي تكون مفهومة عند اهل الإمارات...
واللهجات العمانية، غنية بكثير من التنوع في الظواهر الصوتية، ولكون اللهجات العامية بشكل عام، ما هي إلا تطور عن اللغة العربية الفصيحة، فكثيرا ما نجد للظواهر الصوتية في اللهجات العامية أصولا عربية فصيحة، مثال ذلك، قلب ضمير المخاطبة إلى شين، مثال:قلت لش، أي قلت لك، حيث تذكر المصادر أن هذه الظاهرة كانت موجودة عند بعض القبائل العربية.
ومن الظواهر الصوتية الشائعة أيضا تسهيل الهمزة، والتسهيل قد يكون بحذف الهمزة أو بقلبها إلى صوت آخر، مثلا كلمة :رأيت، تنطق في اللهجة العمانية، ريت، حيث تقلب الهمزة
إلى صوت ممال بين الألف والياء.

من الظواهر الصوتية أيضا، ما يسمى بالجيم القاهرية، وتشيع هذه الظاهر في ولايات المنطقة الداخلية من عمان، كولاية نزوى وبهلا وإزكي وغيرها.
وهناك أيضا قلب الجيم ياء، وهذه الظاهرة تشيع عادة في كلام البدو، وتوجد أحيانا هذه الظاهرة عند غير البدو، وقد لاحظت هذه الصفة عند بعض أهالي ولاية إبرا.
ومن الظواهر الصوتية أيضا قلب القاف إلى الجيم القاهرية، وهذه الظاهرة أيضا تشيع في كلام البدو عادة.

ومن الظواهر الصوتية قلب القاف إلى كاف، وتوجد هذه الظاهر في ولاية بهلا.
هذا وتوجد بعض الدراسات التي تناولت مجال اللهجات العمانية، على سبيل المثال، رسالة ماجستير في لهجة ولاية الحمراء، كما توجد دراسة حول لهجة ولاية صحار، وتوجد دراسة حول لهجة قريات، وتحتلف الدراسات المذكورة من حيث الجوانب التي تناولتها بالتحديد من اللهجة.وهذه الدراسات يمكن التوصل إليها من خلال مكتبة جامعة السلطان قابوس.

وتحت هناك فقرة صغيرة مبينة ان ليس عندها اي علاقة مع بقية المقالة فوقها

لاتختلف اللهجة العمانية عن أخواتها لهجات شبه الجزيرة العربية..فكل تركيبة أو أسلوب فيها له نظير في اللهجات الأخرى العربية.... وهناك مجموعة من اللهجات ربما تكون المجموعةالعمانية إذ يفهم العمانيو بعضهم البعض رغم اختلاف لهجاتهم.
وتقترب بعضها إلى الفصحى وهي لهجات غنية بالقاموس اللغوي. وهناك من ألف فيها أمثال الشيخ سعيد الحارثي ومحمود بن حميد
الجامعي....

And the translation (again, very literal):

The Omani Dialect

The Omani dialect differs from the (Arabian) Gulf dialect (of Arabic) and the other Arabic dialects and its words change entirely and their meanings differ. (And) It is a dialect, deep-rooted of heritage for generations until our present time. Just as the Omani dialect differs from one region to another and sometimes from one province to another…the dialect in the eastern region (name of a province in Oman) differs from the interior, and the dialect of Masandam differs from the Dakhalyi (dialect), which differs from the dialect of the people of Dofar.

The dialect of the people of Muscat—Muscati—is the understood dialect to all, because the most predominate of TV serial programs are presented in the dialect….for the people of Musandam, due to their geographical proximity to Persia, may be influenced (by Persia), for there are Persian words which they use in their speech in the Arabic language. Thus (their Arabic) is not understandable to someone who does not understand Persian. And the dialect of the people of Dofar is close to the dialect of Yemen, just as the dialect of the East (a province) and the province of Barimy is understood by the people of the (United Arab) Emirates.

The Omani dialects are very rich in the diversity of their phonological phenomena, and in general, the Omani dialects are nothing except an evolution of the eloquent Arabic language (id est al fuS7a—High Arabic). Frequently what we find in the Omani dialects for phonological phenomena are rooted in High Arabic, for example, the transformation of the attached pronoun to “shin”, for example “qult lish” i.e. “qultu laki” (I said to you(feminine), where it is remembered that the source (sources) (of this change) are that this phenomenon was found amongst some of the Arabic (Bedouin) tribes.

And also from among the common phonological phenomena are the easing (lightening?) of the “hamza” (the letter representing the glottal stop in Arabic, as the dash in the English “uh-oh”, which may be found in any and all positions in Classical Arabic words) and this easing may exist in the elision of the Hamza or its change to another sound, for example a word: “ra2aytu” (“I saw”, the 2=hamza), which is said in the Omani dialect (and one should add, almost all Arabic dialects—CJ) “rayt”, where the Hamza changes to a middling sound between the Alif (long “a” sound) and the “Yaa2” (long “I” sound, as in Spanish).

And from the phonological phenomena also, is what is called the “Cairene ‘Jiim’” (the letter “Jiim” is usually pronounced as a sound somewhat similar to the English “j” in most Arabic dialects, but in the dialect of Cairo this is famously pronounced as the letter “g” in the word “graft”--CJ), and this phenomenon often occurs in the provinces of the area of the Daachliy in Oman, such as the state of Nizwa, and Bahala, and Izki, and others besides these. And there is also the change of the “Jeem” (to) “Yaa2”, and this phenomenon usually appears in the speech of the Bedouin, and this phenomenon is sometimes found amongst non-Bedouin people, and sometimes this characteristic is observed of some of the peoples of the state of Ibra.

And also from among the phonological phenomena is the change of the “Qaaf” (a letter representing a deep, uvular plosive “k” not found in any Western languages--CJ) to the “Cairene Jiim”, and this phenomenon also often appears in the speech of the Bedouin. And (also) from among the phonological phenomena is the change of the “Qaaf” to the “Kaaf” (=K), and this phenomenon is found in the state of Bahala.
(“This”—I just cannot figure out what the purpose of this word is) And there are some studies which have been presented (in) the domain of the Omani dialects, for instance, a masters thesis on the dialect of the province of Hamra, just as there is a study about the dialect of the state of Sahar, and there is also to be found a study on the dialect of Kireat, and the before mentioned studies differ (I believe there is a typo in this word—should read “ta5tallif” not “ta7tallif”--CJ) in regards to the sides (views) which they present about the demarcation of the dialect. And these studies may be obtained through the office of Sultan Qaboos University.

And underneath is this little paragraph which appears to have a nebulous relation, at best, to the rest of the article………

The Omani dialect does not differ from her sisters the (other) dialects of the Arabian Peninsula, for every expression or phrase in it is observed in the other (Arabic) dialects. And there is a group of dialects which may be the Omani group since the Omanis understand one another despite the differences of their dialects. And they are (all) close to High Arabic and they are dialects rich in the linguistic dictionary. And there are thousands of examples of it of the Shaykh Sa’iid Al-Harathi and Mahmoud bin Hamiid Al Jama’i.

Comments:

This article frustrated me at several points. The usage of "fa" to connect seemingly unrelated ideas seemed to defy translation to some extent, and my awkward usage of "for" (perhaps because of the alliteration with "fa"? I honestly don't know....) is evidence of this. Also the I found the information presented to be somewhat frustrating. It offered some general comments on the phonology of Omani Arabic, but absolutely nothing I hadn't heard before, except for the interesting bits about the geographical distribution of the different pronunciations. All in all not what I was expecting but I am glad that I did it. Also getting those studies from the Sultan Qaboos uni is now officially on my to do list.....