Jordanian Arabic Phrasebook – Travel Guide At Wikivoyage

Regional Jordanian Arabic varieties

Although there is a common Jordanian dialect mutually understood by most Jordanians, the daily language spoken throughout the country varies significantly through regions. These variants impact altogether pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary.

The Jordanian Arabic falls into five varieties:

• Hybrid variety (Modern Jordanian): It is almost the current spoken language among all Jordanians. This variety was born after the designation of Amman as capital of the Jordanian kingdom early in the 20th century. It is the result of the merger of the language of populations who moved from northern Jordan, southern Jordan and later from Palestine. For this reason, it mixes features of the Arabic varieties spoken by these populations. The emergence of the language occurred under the strong influence of the Jordanian north dialect. As in many countries English is being used to substitute many technical words, even though these words have Arabic counterparts in modern standard Arabic.
• Northern varieties: It is spoken in the area from Amman to Irbid in the far north. As in all sedentary areas, local variations are many. The pronunciation, exemplified by the audio file has /q/ pronounced [g] and /k/ mostly ([tʃ]). This dialect is part of the southern dialect of the Levantine Arabic language.
• Southern/Moab: Spoken in the area south of Amman, in cities such as Al Karak, Tafilah, Ma'an, Shoubak and their countrysides, replete with city-to-city and village-to-village differences. In this dialect, the pronunciation of the final vowel (æ~a~ɐ) commonly written with tāʾ marbūtah (ة) is raised to [e]. For example, Maktaba (Fuṣḥa) becomes Maktabe (Moab), Maktabeh (North) and Mektaba (Bedawi). Named so after the antique Moab kingdom southern Jordan, this dialect belongs to the outer southern dialect of the Levantine Arabic language.
• Bedouin: Is spoken by Bedouins mostly in the desert east of the Jordanian mountains and high plateau, and belongs to the Bedawi Arabic. This dialect is not widely used in other regions. It is often considered as truer to the Arabic language, but this is a subjective view that shows no linguistic evidence. Note that non-Bedouin is also spoken in some of the towns and villages in the Badia region east of Jordan's mountain heights plateau, such as Al-Azraq oasis.
• Aqaba variety