Arabic and Society in the Modern Levant

Undergraduate / Graduate

This course is an introduction to the study of spoken Arabic varieties in their social context in the Levant (Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria). Through case studies,we will learn about the relationship between Arabic and social identities, such as age,gender, education, and religion, and how language constructs and is constructed by these identities. Special attention will be paid to variation, both within communities of language practice and across time and space. We will also investigate attitudes of Arabic speakers towards their dialects, situating the discussion within a framework that emphasizes the interplay between codeswitching, bilingualism, and variation.