Peripheral Arabic dialects

The topic of this chapter is the so-called peripheral Arabic dialects, i.e. dialects of Arabic spoken in non-Arab countries, with a focus on Anatolian Arabic and Central Asian Arabic dialects, as well as brief discussions of Cypriot Maronite Arabic and Khorasan Arabic. ¹ For the study of the history of the Arabic dialects, peripheral Arabic dialects, which lost contact many centuries ago with the mainstream Arabic-speaking world, are crucial. These dialects are different from Arabic-based pidgins and creoles (cf. Tosco and Manfredi 2013 for an overview), and Arabic spoken as a medium for interethnic communication. Owens (2001) takes Central Asian Arabic dialects as representative of peripheral Arabic dialects, calling peripheral Arabic ‘Araboid language’ which can no longer be regarded as Arabic due to the extensive structural changes it has undergone. ² A review of other dialects, however, reveals that not all peripheral Arabic dialects have undergone such extensive structural changes, and so it is plausible to speak of a continuum spanning a large area from Anatolia to Central Asia.