Central Atlas Tamazight

Central Atlas Tamazight is one of the four most-spoken Berber languages, together with Kabyle, Tachelhit, and Riffian, Central Atlas Tamazight speakers refer to themselves as Amazigh (pl. Imazighen), an endonymic ethnonym whose etymology is uncertain, but may translate as "free people". The term Tamazight, the feminine form of Amazigh, refers to the language. Both words are also used self-referentially by other Berber groups, although Central Atlas Tamazight speakers use them regularly and exclusively. In older studies, Central Atlas Tamazight is sometimes referred to as "Braber" / "Beraber", a dialectical Arabic term, or its Tamazight equivalent "Taberbrit". This is related to the Standard Arabic and English term "Berber", used to refer to all Berber dialects/languages, though eschewed by many Berbers because its etymology is pejorative. as in many Middle Atlas dialects, it is more rare in High Atlas Tamazight speakers, and is absent in Tamazight speakers from the foothills of Jbel Saghro. Southern dialects (e.g. Ayt Atta) may also be differentiated syntactically: while other dialects predicate with the auxiliary /d/ (e.g. /d argaz/ "it's a man"), Southern dialects use the typically (High Atlas, Souss-Basin rural country, Jbel Atlas Saghro) auxiliary verb /g/ (e.g. /iga argaz/ "it's a man"). There is some ambiguity as to the eastern boundary of Central Atlas Tamazight. The dialect of the Ait Seghrouchen and Ait Ouarain tribes are commonly classed as Central Atlas Tamazight, and Ait Seghrouchen is reported to be mutually intelligible with the neighbouring Tamazight dialect of Ait Ayache. Genetically, however, they belong to the Zenati subgroup of Northern Berber, rather than to the Atlas subgroup to which the rest of Central Atlas Tamazight belongs, and are therefore excluded by some sources from Central Atlas Tamazight. The Ethnologue lists another group of Zenati dialects, South Oran Berber (ksours sud-oranais), as a dialect of Central Atlas Tamazight, but these are even less similar, and are treated by Berber specialists as a separate dialect group. == History ==

The Berbers have lived in North Africa between western Egypt and the Atlantic Ocean since before recorded history began in the region about 33 centuries ago. By the 5th century BC, the city of Carthage, founded by Phoenicians, had extended its hegemony across much of North Africa; in the wake of the Punic Wars, Rome replaced it as regional hegemon. The Central Atlas region itself remained independent throughout the classical period, but occasional loanwords into Central Atlas Tamazight, such as , "plough ox", from Latin , "team of oxen" and aẓalim "onion" < Punic bṣal-im, bear witness to their ancestors' contact with these conquerors. Arabs conquered the area of modern-day Morocco and Algeria around the 7th century, prompting waves of Arab migration and Berber adoption of Islam. Particularly following the arrival of the Banu Hilal in modern-day Tunisia in the 11th century, more and more of North Africa became Arabic-speaking over the centuries. However, along with other high mountainous regions of North Africa, the Middle Atlas continued to speak Berber. Between the 12th and 15th centuries, the Central Atlas, along with the rest of Morocco, successively fell within the domain of the Moorish Almoravid, Almohad, and Marinid dynasties. Since the 17th century the region has acknowledged the rule of the Alaouite Dynasty, the current Moroccan royal family. However, effective control of the region was limited; until the 20th century much of the Central Atlas was in a condition of siba, recognising the spiritual legitimacy of royal authority but rejecting its political claims. The expansion of the Ait Atta starting from the 16th century brought Tamazight back into the already Arabised Tafilalt region and put other regional tribes on the defensive, leading to the formation of the Ait Yafelman alliance. The 1912 Treaty of Fez made most of Morocco a French-Spanish protectorate (under French and Spanish military occupation), leaving the Alaouite monarchy but establishing a French military presence in the Atlas region and installing a French commissioner-general. However, the Berber tribes of the Middle Atlas, as in other areas, put up stiff military resistance to French rule, lasting until 1933 in the case of the Ait Atta. After Morocco's independence in 1956, a strong emphasis was laid on the country's Arab identity, and a national Arabic language educational system was instituted, in which Berber languages, including Middle Atlas Tamazight, had no place. However, in 1994 the government responded to Berber demands for recognition by decreeing that Berber should be taught and establishing television broadcasts in three Berber languages, including Central Atlas Tamazight. For the promotion of Tamazight and other Berber languages and cultures, the government created the Royal Institute of Amazigh Culture (IRCAM) in 2001. == Geographic distribution ==

, Shilha, and Riff), and rivals Shilha as the most-spoken Berber language in Morocco. Central Atlas Tamazight is mostly spoken in the entire Middle Atlas and its outcroppings, reaching east to Taza and west to the region near Rabat. It is also spoken in the central and eastern High Atlas mountains in Morocco. Central Atlas is mutually intelligible with the dialects Riff and Shilha; but Shilha- and Riff-speakers cannot understand each other, although transitional varieties exist between these dialects, creating a smooth transition. At least a third of Moroccans seem to speak Berber languages,. Tamazight is estimated to be spoken by about 40~49% of Morocco's Berber-speakers, while Shilha commands 32~40% and Riff 20~25%. == Status ==

Tamazight, along with other Berber languages of Morocco, has a low sociolinguistic status, used mainly in the home, and rarely in official or formal contexts. Media broadcasts and music are available in it, and there is a policy of teaching it in schools, although it is not always applied. Of the Central Atlas Tamazight speakers, 40–45% are monolingual, while the others use Arabic as a second language. Women are more likely to be monolingual than men, since they typically stay in the village while the men go to work in the cities. Bilingual Berber speakers have learned Moroccan Arabic via schooling, migration, media, or through the government. However, Tamazight speakers are reported to immigrate less than many other Berber groups. Moreover, Tamazight has a large enough body of native speakers not to be considered under risk of endangerment, although Tamazight speakers reportedly have a lower birth rate than the country of Morocco as a whole. On October 17, 2001 King Mohammed VI sealed the decree (Dahir 1–01–299) creating and organizing the Royal Institute of Amazigh Culture (IRCAM). The institute, located in Rabat, has played an important role in the establishment of the Tifinagh script in Morocco. A legal issue affecting Tamazight speakers is restrictions on naming - Moroccan law stipulates that first names must have a "Moroccan character", and uncommon names, including some Berber ones used in the Central Atlas, are often rejected by the civil registry. == Orthography ==

Until the 20th century Tamazight, like many other Berber languages but in contrast with neighbouring Tashelhiyt, was basically unwritten (although sporadic cases, using Arabic script, are attested.) It was preserved through oral use in rural areas, isolated from urban hubs. == Phonology ==

Consonants Central Atlas Tamazight has a contrastive set of "flat" consonants, manifested in two ways: • For front segments, pharyngealization: ) • For back segments, labialization: ) Note that pharyngealization may spread to a syllable or even a whole word. Historically Proto-Berber only had two pharyngealized phonemes (), but modern Berber languages have borrowed others from Arabic and developed new ones through sound shifts. In addition, Tamazight has uvular and pharyngeal consonants, as well as a lack of in its plosive inventory, unusual globally but characteristic of the region. All segments may be geminated except for the pharyngeals . In Ayt Ndhir, which is a dialect of Tamazight with spirantization, the consonants that can be spirantized appear in their stop forms when geminated, and additionally the geminate correspondents of are usually respectively. However some native Berber words have (not ) where other dialects have singleton , and similarly for . In addition, in Arabic loans singleton non-spirantized occur (though and to an extent often alternate with their spirantized versions in loans), giving this alternation marginal phonemic status. : is aspirated. It is voiced before voiced consonants and voiceless before voiceless consonants, or alternatively it can be realized as a voiced or unvoiced consonant release. It also may be realized as the syllabicity of a nasal, lateral, or /r/. These are some of the rules governing the occurrence of : (# denotes word boundary, R denotes , H denotes , denotes R or H, and B denotes not R or H.) Examples: • > ('you (fp) turned') • > ('she is present') • > ('to meet') However note that word-initial initial are realized as before consonants. In word-medial or -final position , , and are realized as , , and respectively, and may become and in rapid speech. is written as in neo-Tifinagh and as in the Berber Latin alphabet. French publications tended to include in their transcriptions of Berber forms despite their predictability, perhaps due to the French vowel system. This can cause problems because alternations such as 'he slaughtered' – 'he did not slaughter' would then have to be morphologically conditioned. Stress Word stress is non-contrastive and predictable, and falls on the last vowel in a word (including schwa). Examples: • > ('to ask') • > ('he is present') • > ('to explain') • > ('you (fp) explained') == Grammar ==

Central Atlas Tamazight grammar has many features typical of Afro-Asiatic languages, including extensive apophony in both the derivational and inflectional morphology, gender, possessive suffixes, VSO typology, the causative morpheme /s/, and the use of the status constructus. Morphology Tamazight nouns are inflected for gender, number, and state. Singular masculine nouns usually have the prefix /a-/, and singular feminines the circumfix . Plurals may either involve a regular change ("sound plurals"), internal vowel change ("broken plurals"), or a combination of the two. Masculine plurals usually take the prefix , feminines , and sound plurals also take the suffix in the masculine and } in the feminine, but many other plural patterns are found. Examples: : 'big tent(s)' (m) : 'Berber(s)' (m) : 'sandal(s)' (m) : 'mule(s)' (m) : 'tent(s)' (f) : 'cow(s)' (f) : 'mat(s)' (f) : 'property(ies)' (f) Nouns may be put into the construct state (contrasting with free state) to indicate possession or when the subject of a verb follows the verb. This is also used for nouns after numerals and some prepositions, as well as the conjunction ('and'). The construct state is formed as follows: in masculines, initial becomes , initial becomes , and initial becomes . In feminines, initial usually becomes , initial usually becomes , and initial remains unchanged. Examples (in Ayt Ayache): to the controlling verb. Demonstrative pronouns distinguish between proximate and remote. When they occur independently, they inflect for number. They may also be suffixed to nouns: /tabardaja/ 'this pack-saddle'. Central Atlas Tamazight verbs are heavily inflected and are marked for tense, aspect, mode, voice, person, and polarity. Tamazight verbs have at their core a stem, modified by prefixes, suffixes, moveable affixes, circumfixes, and ablaut. The prefixes indicate voice, tense, aspect, and polarity, while the suffixes indicate mood (normal, horatory, or imperative). Subject markers are circumfixed to the verb, and object marking and satellite framing are accomplished via either prefixing or suffixing depending on environment Some verb forms are accompanied by ablaut, and sometimes metathesis. Pronominal complement markers cliticize to the verb, with the indirect object preceding the direct object:/iznz-as-t/ "he sold it to him". Attributive adjectives occur after the noun they modify and are inflected for number and gender. Adjectives may also occur alone in which case they become an NP. They may take pronominal suffixes. Some prepositions require the following noun to be in the construct state, but others do not. Syntax Word order is usually VSO (with the subject in construct state) but is sometimes SVO (with the subject in free state), e.g. ( vs. 'the Berber went out'). Tamazight also exhibits pro-drop behavior. Tamazight may use a null copula, but the word 'to be, to do' may function as a copula in Ayt Ayache, especially in structures preceded by /aj/ 'who, which, what'. wh- questions are always clefts, and multiple wh-questions do not occur. Consequently, Tamazight's clefting, relativisation, and wh-interrogation contribute to anti-agreement effects, similar to Shilha, == Vocabulary ==

As a result of relatively intense language contact, Central Atlas Tamazight has a large stratum of Arabic loans. Many borrowed words in Berber also have native synonyms (// or /tiflut/ 'door'), with the latter being used more in rural areas. The contact was unequal, as Moroccan Arabic has not borrowed as much from Berber languages, but Berber has contributed to the very reduced vowel systems of Moroccan and Algerian Arabic. Arabic loans span a wide range of lexical clasees. Many nouns begin with /l-/, from the Arabic definite prefix, and some Arabic feminines may acquire the native Berber feminine ending /-t/, e.g. /lʕafit/ for /lʕafia/ 'fire'. Many Arabic loans have been integrated into the Tamazight verb lexicon. They adhere fully to inflectional patterns of native stems, and may even undergo ablaut. Even function words are borrowed: // or // 'that', // 'although', // 'just', etc. All higher cardinals are borrowed from Arabic, consistent with the linguistic universals that the numbers 1–3 are much more likely to be retained, and that a borrowed number generally implies that numbers greater than it are also borrowed. The retention of one is also motivated by the fact that Berber languages nearly universally use unity as a determiner. Central Atlas Tamazight uses a bipartite negative construction (e.g. /uriffiɣ ʃa/ 'he did not go out'), which was apparently modelled after proximate |Arabic varieties, in a common development known as Jespersen's Cycle. It is present in multiple Berber varieties and is argued to have originated in neighbouring Arabic varieties and to have been adopted by contact. == Examples ==