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Article published In:
Pragmatics and Society
Vol. 12:3 (2021) ► pp.349–372

Disagreement realizations in Arabic

Evidence from the University of Jordan

| University of Jordan
| University of Jordan

This paper examines disagreement strategies employed by speakers of Jordanian Spoken Arabic (JSA) with a view to finding out whether variables like gender and social status affect the linguistic choices and disagreement strategies they employ. The subjects are 28 Jordanian Arabic-speaking students at the University of Jordan. The researchers analyze the students’ interactional recorded responses to a set of stimuli included in an oral (recorded) discourse completion task (ODCT) prepared for this purpose. The ODCT comprises six scenarios in which the respondent is requested to disagree with two peers, two higher-status interlocutors and two lower-status interlocutors. The findings show that male and female subjects’ disagreement strategies tend to be influenced by the topic under discussion rather than by the gender and status of their interlocutor. However, some topics are found to be more provocative to females than to males.

Keywords: Arabic, disagreement strategies, Jordan, ODCT, pragmatics
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Methodology
  • 3.Results and discussion
    • 3.1Disagreement strategies
      • 3.1.1Non-confrontational disagreement strategies
      • 3.1.2Confrontational disagreement strategies
    • 3.2Status and the choice of disagreement strategy
      • 3.2.1Disagreement with equals
      • 3.2.2Disagreement with higher-status interlocutors
      • 3.2.3Disagreement with lower-status interlocutors
    • 3.3Gender and the choice of disagreement strategy
      • 3.3.1Gender and disagreement strategies in terms of word count
      • 3.3.2The role of gender in determining the preferred disagreement strategy
        • 3.3.2.1Disagreement with an equal status interlocutor
        • 3.3.2.2Disagreement with a higher status interlocutor
        • 3.3.2.3Disagreement with a lower status interlocutor
  • 4.Conclusions
  • References
Published online: 5 July 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ps.18006.ham
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