Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that can help answer the question.
Query: What Arabic dialects are spoken in Saudi Arabia?
Peninsular Arabic, or Southern Arabic, are the varieties of Arabic spoken throughout the Arabian Peninsula. This includes the countries of Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Southern Iraq and the tribal people of Jordan (the native Jordanians).
In light of the deterioration of Iran–Saudi Arabia relations since 2016, which caused matches between teams from Iran and Saudi Arabia to be played on neutral venues in 2016 and 2017, and the Qatar diplomatic crisis since 2017, which led to travel bans imposed by Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates to Qatar, the AFC reiterated that matches should be played on a home-and-away basis as normal instead of on neutral venues, and would try to mediate the situation with the concerned associations (Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates), such that a solution could be found regarding matches between teams from Iran/Qatar and Saudi Arabia/United Arab Emirates. In the end, the same arrangements were made as of the previous season, where matches between Iran and Saudi Arabia were played on neutral venues, while teams from Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates must travel to Qatar to play away matches.
Yemeni Arabic is a cluster of varieties of Arabic spoken in Yemen, southwestern Saudi Arabia, Somalia, and Djibouti. It is generally considered a very conservative dialect cluster, having many classical features not found across most of the Arabic-speaking world.
It is claimed by some Arab authors that the dialect of Belad Ghamid and Zahran (Now known as Al Baha province in Saudi Arabia) is nearest to classical Arabic. Ahmed Abdul Ghafur Attar (Arabic : احمد عبدالغفور عطار ) has said in an article* that the language of the Hejaz (Arabic لهجات الحجاز), especially that which is spoken in Belad Ghamdi and Zahran is close to the Classical Language.
Gulf varieties' closest related relatives are other dialects native to the Arabian Peninsula, i.e. Najdi Arabic and Bahrani Arabic. Although spoken over much of Saudi Arabia's area, Gulf Arabic is not the native tongue of most Saudis, as the majority of them do not live in Eastern Arabia. There are some 200,000 Gulf Arabic speakers in the country, out of a population of over 30 million, mostly in the aforementioned Eastern Province.
The Arab states of the Persian Gulf are solely Eastern Arabia, the borders of the Arabic-speaking Gulf do not extend beyond Eastern Arabia. The modern-day states of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and UAE are the archetypal Gulf Arab states. Saudi Arabia is often considered a Gulf Arab state although most Saudis do not live in Eastern Arabia.
Sudanese Arabic is the most widely spoken language in the country. It is the variety of Arabic, an Afroasiatic language of the Semitic branch spoken throughout Sudan. The dialect has borrowed much vocabulary from local Nilo-Saharan languages (Nobiin, Fur, Zaghawa, Mabang). This has resulted in a variety of Arabic that is unique to Sudan, reflecting the way in which the country has been influenced by Nilotic, Arab, and western cultures. Few nomads in Sudan still have similar accents to the ones in Saudi Arabia. Other important languages include Beja (Bedawi) along the Red Sea, with perhaps 2 million speakers. It is the only language from the Afroasiatic family's Cushitic branch that is today spoken in the territory.
Northwest Arabian Arabic is a variety of Arabic spoken by Bedouins of the Sinai Peninsula, the Negev, southern Jordan, and the northwestern corner of Saudi Arabia. In the eastern desert of Egypt, the dialect of the Maʿāzah borders the dialect of the ʿAbābdah, who speak a dialect more closely related to Sudanese Arabic.
Bareqi Arabic () is the variety of Arabic spoken in Bareq, Saudi Arabia. It is spoken in many towns and villages in that wadi.
The people of Najd have spoken Arabic, in one form or another, for practically all of recorded history. As in other regions of the Peninsula, there is a divergence between the dialect of the nomadic Bedouins and the dialect of the sedentary townspeople. The variation, however, is far less pronounced in Najd than it is elsewhere in the country, and the Najdi sedentary dialect seems to be descended from the Bedouin dialect, just as most sedentary Najdis are descendants of nomadic Bedouins themselves. The Najdi dialect is seen by some to be the least foreign-influenced of all modern Arabic dialects, due to the isolated location and harsh climate of the Najdi plateau, as well as the apparent absence of any substratum from a previous language. Indeed, not even the ancient South Arabian language appears to have been widely spoken in Najd in ancient times, unlike southern Saudi Arabia, for example. Within Najd itself, the different regions and towns have their own distinctive accents and sub-dialects. However, these have largely merged in recent times and have become heavily influenced by Arabic dialects from other regions and countries. This is particularly the case in Riyadh.
Sudanese Arabic is the variety of Arabic spoken throughout Sudan and in parts of Eritrea. Some of the tribes in Sudan still have similar accents to the ones in Saudi Arabia.
Some modern Arabic varieties developed palatalization of ك (turning into , , , or ) and ق (turning into or ), usually when adjacent to front vowel, though these palatalizations also occurred in other environments as well. These two palatalizations occur in a variety of dialects, including Iraqi, rural Palestinian varieties, a number of Gulf Arabic dialects, such as Kuwaiti, Qatari, Bahraini, and Emarati, as well as others in the Arab peninsula like Najdi, the southern dialects of Saudi Arabia, and various Bedouin dialects. Examples:Palatalization occurs in the pronunciation of the second person feminine singular pronoun in those dialects. For instance :
The Saudi–Yemen barrier was constructed by Saudi Arabia against an influx of illegal immigrants and against the smuggling of drugs and weapons.
A 2004 law passed by Saudi Arabia's Council of Ministers, entitles Muslim expatriates of all nationalities (except Palestinian) who have resided in the kingdom for ten years to apply for citizenship with priority being given to holders of degrees in various scientific fields. (The estimated 240,000 Palestinians living in Saudi Arabia are excluded, because of Arab League agreement instructions barring the Arab states from granting them citizenship of another Arab state.)
Najdi Arabic () is a variety of Arabic spoken in the Najd region of Saudi Arabia.
Pre-Islamic Arabic can be considered a polycentric language. In Arabic-speaking countries different levels of polycentricity can be detected.
Modern Arabic is a pluricentric language with varying branches correlating with different regions where Arabic is spoken and the type of communities speaking it. The vernacular varieties of Arabic include Gulf Arabic (spoken in the Persian Gulf kingdoms of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait), Iraqi Arabic, Levantine Arabic (spoken in Levantine countries of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Palestine), Egyptian Arabic, Sudanese Arabic, and Maghrebi Arabic (spoken in Northwestern Africa), among many others. In addition, many speakers use Modern Standard Arabic in education and formal settings. Therefore, in Arabic-speaking communities, diglossia is frequent.
The peninsula's constituent countries are (clockwise north to south) Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates on the east, Oman on the southeast, Yemen on the south and Saudi Arabia at the center. The island nation of Bahrain lies off the east coast of the peninsula. Six countries, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and Oman form the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), also known as the Arab states of the Persian Gulf. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia covers the greater part of the peninsula. The majority of the population of the peninsula live in Saudi Arabia and in Yemen.
The Rashaida, Rashaayda or "Bani Rashid" () is a tribe of ethnic Bedouin Arabs descending from Banu Abs native to the Hejaz region of Saudi Arabia. They currently inhabit Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Oman, Yemen, Palestine, Jordan, Eritrea, Sudan, Libya and Tunisia. In 1846, many Rashaida migrated from the Hejaz region in present-day Saudi Arabia into what is now Sudan, Kuwait, Ras Al Khaimah, Umm Al-Quwain, United Arab Emirates and Western Malaysia after tribal warfare had broken out in their homeland. They are present in other Arab countries too, such as Egypt, Libya, Palestine. Large numbers of Bani Rasheed are also found on the Arabian Peninsula.
Gulf Arabic ( ' or ', ) is a variety of the Arabic language spoken in Eastern Arabia around the coasts of the Persian Gulf in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, as well as parts of eastern Saudi Arabia (Eastern Province), southern Iraq (Basra Governorate and Muthanna Governorate), and south Iran (Bushehr Province and Hormozgan Province) and northern Oman.
A number of different dialects of Arabic are spoken in the region, including Gulf Arabic and Bahrani Arabic. The Lurs language of Kumzari is also spoken by Omani people of Musandam Peninsula. Kumzari is the only Iranian language native to the Arab world.
It is widely spoken in countries west of Iran and east of Saudi Arabia, such as in Iraq and Kuwait. It is somewhat different from Peninsular Arabic or Egyptian Arabic.
The Arabs of Eastern Arabia speak a dialect known as Gulf Arabic. Most Saudis do not speak Gulf Arabic because most Saudis do not live in Eastern Arabia. There are approximately 2 million Gulf Arabic speakers in Saudi Arabia, mostly in the coastal eastern region. Before the GCC was formed in 1981, the term "Khaleeji" was solely used to refer to the inhabitants of Eastern Arabia.
Historically, the Hejaz has always seen itself as separate from the rest of Saudi Arabia. The Hejaz is the most populated region in Saudi Arabia; 35% of all Saudis live there. Hejazi Arabic is the most widely spoken dialect in the region. Saudi Hejazis are of ethnically diverse origins.
Saudi Arabia – United Arab Emirates relations refers to the current and historical relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Saudi Arabia maintains an embassy in Abu Dhabi and a consulate in Dubai while the U.A.E. has an embassy in Riyadh and consulate in Jeddah. Both countries are neighbours and as part of the Middle East and Persian Gulf region, share extensive political and cultural ties.
The official language of Saudi Arabia is Arabic. The three main regional variants spoken by Saudis are Hejazi Arabic, Najdi Arabic, and Gulf Arabic. There are approximately 2 million Gulf Arabic speakers in Saudi Arabia, and the dialect is only spoken in the Eastern Province. The remaining Arabic speakers in the province speak one of the other two dialects, more commonly the Najdi dialect. Saudi Sign Language is the principal language of the deaf community. The large expatriate communities also speak their own languages, the most numerous of which are Indian languages, Filipino/Tagalog, Egyptian Arabic, Indonesian, Rohingya, and Urdu.Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil producing company of Saudi Arabia, is based in Dhahran, which is located in the Eastern Province, and most decisions on oil policy and production that affect the global economy are made there. The kingdom's main oil and gas fields are mostly located in the Eastern Province, onshore and offshore. Notable among these are the Ghawar Field and the largest crude increment in the world. Petroleum from the fields is shipped to dozens of countries from the oil port of Ras Tanura and is also used as feedstock in numerous industrial plants in Jubail.
Yemeni Arabic, displays a past conjugation with the very archaic -k suffix, as in southern Semitic languages. It has to be noted that the dialect of Aden has /ɡʲ/ > [ɡ] as in Cairo. Hejazi Arabic, spoken in Saudi Arabia along the coast of the Red Sea, especially in the cities of Mecca and Jeddah. Strictly speaking, there are two distinct dialects spoken in the Hejaz region, one by the Bedouin rural population and another by the urban population. However, the term most often applies to the urban variety, spoken in cities such as Jeddah, Mecca, and Yanbu. Najdi Arabic, spoken in the center of the peninsula in Saudi Arabia and is characterized by a shift of /q/ to [dz] and /k/ to [ts]. Gulf Arabic (including Omani Arabic, Dhofari Arabic and Shihhi Arabic), spoken in the coast of the Persian Gulf. Bahrani Arabic, spoken in Bahrain and Oman. The dialect of Syrian Desert nomads, with the characteristic feature of /q/ > [dz] and /k/ > [ts].