Chadian Arabic

Spoken in

Afro-Asiatic

• Semitic Central Semitic Südzentralsemitisch Arabic

Shu

The Chadian Arabic or Schuwa - Arabic, also Arabe Choa, Shuwa Arabic, l' arabe du Tchad, Baggara - Arabic, is a variety of Arabic, which is spoken in the region of the Chad Basin. It is written in the Arabic alphabet.

It has become the mother tongue of nearly one million people in Chad, Sudan, South Sudan, Cameroon, Nigeria, Niger and the Central African Republic. It serves as a lingua franca in much of the region and is competing with the French language, which is the official language of Chad in addition to the Standard Arabic.

In Nigeria, it is now spoken by about 10 % of the population Maiduguris. It is characterized by the absence of the pharyngeal [ ħ ] and [ ʕ ], the interdental fricatives [ ð ], [ θ ] and [ ð ˤ ], as well as diphthongs. But it also has / l ˤ ​​/, / r ˤ / and / m ˤ / as special phonetic emphasis. Some examples of minimal pairs of such stresses are / ɡallab / " he galloped ", / l ˤ ˤ ɡal from / " he was angry "; / karra / " he tore " / kar ˤ r ˤ a / " he sugar-coated "; / amm / " uncle " / ˤ at ˤ m / "mother". In addition, the Arabic Nigerian has the advantage that a / a / after gutturals ( ʔ, h, x, q) can be integrated. Another addition is the change of the standard Arabic form V tafaal ( a) to alfaal; For example, the word " taallam ( a) " to alallam. The first person singular of the verb differs in form from other Arabic dialects in that it has no final t. Nevertheless, the first person singular of the verb is Katab the Katab, with emphasis on the second syllable of the word, while the third person singular is the Katab, with emphasis on the first syllable.

The following is part of the basic vocabulary: