Sarkotraficante

Le blog du Chì, one year ago, on TF1’s enthusiasm for the apoplectic dwarf who substituted him as opium of the peephole. Another favourite mystification, from El Ciruco:

Online Moroccan Arabic-Spanish dictionary

I’ve been out and about rather a lot recently, so warm thanks to MM for pointing out a post by Carlos Ferrero at Las palabras son pistolas cargadas on new(-ish) translation blogs. The most interesting one from my perspective is the Arab-Spanish Turjuman árabe, whose contents include a link by Khaled Musa to the online…

Berbers: Parsley Island/Perejil not Moroccan at all

On this Amazigh Dutch site, it’s argued that the Moroccan government made a crucial error in the dispute with Spain by using a spurious Arabic name, Laila, instead of the older Berber word, Tura, being prepared to weaken their claim rather than acknowledge Berber language rights. However, there are further views to be considered.

Decline in Arabic

Funny from a piece by Lamya Tawfik illustrating Egyptian anti-Western paranoia: “Responding to claims that the language used by the youth plays a role in the distortion and erosion of the Arabic language, Nabeel Farouq, a famous Egyptian author of adventure stories for youth, said that this fear is baseless because, to begin with, Arabic…

Etymology of assassin, up in smoke

The hash-crazed killer etymology we all know and love is, according to Nouvelle Langue Française (via Langue sauce piquante), a nonsense, invented in 1809 by a dilettante orientalist, Silvestre de Sacy. We should, instead, be looking to the Arabic, assas, guard.

Oiquipedià

There’s still no article on Chistabín in the Oiquipedià, the Occitan version of Wikipedia, believed to have around 1,832 legitimate pages (Arabic = 11,824).

The Arab street is stopping speaking Arabic

OK, Jordanian Starbucks customers (via Taccuino di Traduzione). More on Arabizi and language death from Jordanian blogger Lina. I know an Itsi-Bitsi-Teeny-Weeny-Honolulu-Strandbikini bit about East African Arabic creoles, but this is new to me. I guess that there must have also existed Romance-Arabic creoles at some stage (Mozarabic was, of course, not one), but I’m…

So why shouldn’t I wet my appetite?

I know it’s banned in English, but it seems perfectly natural to me, just as natural as wetting one’s whistle: if it don’t rain it won’t grow, and the road to the kebab shop is awash with Blairite pub extensions. Gordonio, a medical treatise published in 1495, is against drinking between meals but recommends they…

The Queen of Iznatoraf

A little more reading (Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature, Hispano-Arabic Literature and the Early Provençal Lyrics) suggests (possibly unjustly) that Wallada was famous not so much for her poetry as for being the caliph’s daughter and having poetry written about her by Ibn Zaydun. It’s a shame that in our enthusiasm to find ancient heroines inoffensive…