Dialect Convergence in Egypt: The Impact of Cairo Arabic on Minya Arabic

Abstract This is a sociolinguistic study of the diffusion of Cairo Arabic (CA) in Egypt as exemplified by its spread in Minya Governorate. Focus has been placed on how and why Minya Arabic (MA) speakers converge on CA as regards five linguistic variables: (q), (KaLLiM), (XaLLiF), (WaSSaL) and (stress). The respective CA and MA variants are exemplified as follows: [ʔaːl] and [ɡaːl] ‘he said’; [kallɪm] and [kɪllɪm]/[kallam] ‘he spoke to’; [xallɪf] and [xallaf] ‘he begot’; [jɪ-wɑsˤsˤɑl] and [jɪ-wɑsˤsˤɪl] ‘he gives a lift to someone’; and [madˈɾasa] and [ˈmadɾasa] ‘school’. The data on which the study is based is quantitative (recorded sociolinguistic interviews with 62 MA participants sampled according to age, gender, education and place of residence) and qualitative (an online perception questionnaire answered by 61 participants and detailing why MA speakers converge on CA along with the associations with both CA and MA in Minya). The quantitative data was statistically analysed via mixed-effects logistic regression in R. Results show that age and gender are hardly significant or altogether non-significant, while education and place of residence are almost always significant. This refers to two positive correlations: the higher the educational level of speakers and the more time they have spent living in town, the higher the convergence on CA. Results of the perception questionnaire are in harmony with those statistically-obtained. They confirm the significance of education and place of residence in inducing convergence on CA in Minya and associate CA with education and urbaneness. They also suggest that MA speakers converge on CA not only because of the dialect prestige but also for economic reasons and that their linguistic behaviour is affected by their marital status and exposure to CA on TV.