Some grammatical features of Faifi Arabic with a focus on emphatic fricatives

After overviewing some unusual features of Faifi Arabic, the present study investigates the distribution of emphatic fricatives in a subvariety of Faifi Arabic (FA) focusing on their unique realizations. First, we observe that the emphatic /sˤ/, which is cognate with Classical Arabic /sˤ/, is typically realized as [st] in FA. Second, FA emphatic fricative /ðˤ/ is affected by a process of root-initial devoicing, whether it is cognate with Classical Arabic /ðˤ/ or /dˤ/. When root-initial /ðˤ/ is cognate with Classical Arabic /ðˤ/ and low vowels occur in the first two syllables, the emphatic devoices, resulting in the surface allophone [θˤ]; if a high vowel is present, the emphatic also depharyngealizes, resulting in [θ]. When FA root-initial /ðˤ/ is cognate with Classical Arabic /dˤ/, it typically surfaces as labiodental fricative [f]; otherwise, it is realized as [ðˤ].