1. Introduction

This article is concerned with investigating the relationship between gender and the use of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic (henceforth, SCA) in relation to the frequency of English loanwords, the topics where English loanwords are used by males and females, and the morphological adaptation processes that are carried out by both male and female speakers when these loanwords are incorporated into SCA. The aim is to describe the process of English loanword integration in SCA, identify the dominant fields and topics where English loanwords are most widely used, and explore whether there is any linkage between gender and the use of English loanwords in SCA. The proposition developed in this qualitative study is   that gender is one of the main social variables that plays an important role in linguistic diversity and the adoption of loanwords (Meyerhoff, 2015; Philips et al., 1987, Talbot, 2010, Trudgill, 2000) which usually leads to language changes (vowel/consonant change, grammatical gender, number, pluralization, etc.) within the linguistic system by speakers of the recipient language (Philips et al., 1987, Irwin, 2011). This study investigates a corpus of SCA in order to explore how English loanwords are used by Saudi speakers and to see whether gender has any role in linguistic variation and use of English loanwords in SCA.

It has been observed that the volume of English loanwords in Arabic has recently increased in an unprecedented manner due to the dominance of English as a global language which has resulted in what can be called linguistic expansion of the Arabic vocabulary (Al-Sameray, 2011, Ibrahim, 2006, Ismaeel, 2005, Hashim, 2011). The contact between English and Arabic and how the two languages have been influenced by each other drew the attention of many researchers over the years. In spite of the prolific literature concerning the contact between English and Arabic and more specifically in relation to the issue of English as a global language and its influence on Arabic, however, very little has been done on linguistic diversity in relation to the use of English loanwords in SCA. To put it into effect, many studies have been concerned with what they call risks of the dominance of English as a global language and the increasing use of English as a lingua franca on the Arabic linguistic system and cultural identity. On the other hand, very little has been done in relation to the description, investigation, and exploration of the sociolinguistic aspects and use of English loanwords in SCA. The present study is concerned with addressing this gap in literature by investigating the role of gender in linguistic diversity in relation to the use of English loanwords in SCA.

2. Statement of the problem

In his book English as a Global Language, David Crystal (2003) argues that cultural globalization has significant influences on world languages leading to language changes within these languages. This is due to the idea that there is a correlation between language and culture. According to Labov (2011), changes in cultural patterns then lead to linguistic changes. In this way, Hashim  (2011) argues that cultural globalization has led to drastic and unprecedented changes within Arabic over the last years and that the main bulk of these changes can be clearly observed within Arabic vocabulary . Al-Sameray (2011) attributes the introduction of many loanwords into Arabic to what he refers to as biculturalism. He explains that with the emergence of globalization, many Arab citizens have been influenced by the Western and English culture and adopted different English loanwords which have equivalents in Arabic. Likewise, Ismaeel (2005) argues that the dominance of the American culture due to globalization has resulted in the adoption of numerous American words and expressions by speakers of Arabic. The author adds that the adoption of English loanwords has led to linguistic changes within the patterns and structures of Arabic. The author thus relates language changes within Arabic over the recent years to cultural factors and particularly to cultural globalization.

Although there has always been resistance from many Arab scholars and linguists to the adoption of foreign and English loanwords in Arabic arguing that it has negative implications on the Arab linguistic and cultural identity, linguistic changes within Arabic as a result of the adoption of English loanwords are inevitable. This resistance may explain the reason that very few studies have been done on exploring the linguistic aspects of the adoption of loanwords in Arabic. The majority of studies focus mainly on the reasons behind the adoption of loanwords and its effect on the identity of native speakers of Arabic. Arabic is highly celebrated in the Arab world and Saudi Arabia, as it is the language of the Holy Quran and Saudi Arabia itself is the location of the Holy Mosque and the motherland of Islam and the Quran. In this way, the majority of these studies link the adoption of English loanwords to what they call corruption of Arabic and the loss of the Arab and Muslim identity. Other studies have been concerned with addressing the problems related to loanwords in translation studies (Baker, 1987, Qinai, 2000). This resulted in the idea that different linguistic aspects of the adoption of loanwords in Arabic have been ignored. Furthermore, there are no adequate studies that have tended to explore the relationship between gender, education, and/or social class from one side and the adoption of loanwords in Arabic in general and SCA in particular. The majority of studies addressed either Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Egyptian Arabic, one of the major and most widespread dialects of Arabic(Ibrahim, 2006, Hafez, 1996, Moshref, 2009, Khalil, 1984, Hassan, 2015). The issue of the adoption of loanwords in Arabic is still one of the most controversial ones in the Saudi academic and religious circles(Al-Sameray, 2011, Hashim, 2011, Ismaeel, 2005).

In the light of the above mentioned problems, this article attempts to describe the use of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic. The study intends to explore whether Saudi speakers prefer to use English loanwords instead of the Arabic equivalents and whether gender is a significant variable in relation to the use and linguistic adaptation of English loanwords in SCA. The main research question of this study is as follows:

What is the relationship between gender and the use of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic? This question leads to a few secondary questions. These include

• What is the ratio of English loanwords to their Arabic equivalents?
• What are the reasons behind the use of English loanwords? Is it prestige, for example? And is it related to gender issues?
• What are the morphological adaptations of English loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic and whether gender has a role in these processes? In other words, do male and female speakers use English loanwords in a different morphological manner?

This study has attempted to answer these questions by carrying out this field study on loan words in Saudi Arabia

3. Literature Review

The issue of loanwords has always been a controversial one in language studies since it is always associated with issues of linguistic awareness and national identity. With the linguistic expansion of English in the 18^th century, for instance, Dr. Samuel Johnson set the first English dictionary to preserve English from the dominance of lexical borrowing. With the development of descriptive linguistics, however, the phenomenon of lexical borrowing, including the adoption of loanwords, has been generally considered one of the inevitable characteristics of human language. Haugen (1950) argued that loanwords are accepted and regularly used in almost all languages. Romaine (1989) agrees that loanwords are used by almost all speakers even if they do not know a foreign language. He argues that bilingualism or the knowledge of a foreign language is not a requirement for the use of loanwords. It is a matter of language contact after all. Millar (2012) puts it clearly that it is highly unlikely that a language finds itself in complete isolation from other languages.

The implication is that contact between cultures and languages leads definitely to borrowing between languages. This is the case with all human languages and the idea is as old as language itself. In this context, Arabic is no exception to the process of linguistic borrowing. English itself is a result of language contact between the people (mainly the Angles, Saxons, and the Jutes) who came from Northern Europe in fifth century and the Britons who were the indigenous inhabitants of the British Isles (Baugh and Cable, 1989). There was nothing to be called English before the conquest of Britain by the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes (Campbell, 2013). In their book Loanwords in the World's Languages, Haspelmath and Tadmor (2009) stress the role of language contact and globalization in the adoption of loanwords in different languages.

Crystal (2003) argues that globalization has led to the arrival of unprecedented numbers of English loanwords into other languages. He asserts that the emergence of English as a global language can influence the structure of other languages especially by providing a fresh source of loanwords for use by these other languages. Crystal also points out how languages like Arabic and Chinese were once used as global languages and had tremendous influence on other languages. The implication here is that the adoption of loanwords is closely related to language contact and globalization is playing a vital role today in the introduction of many English loanwords to almost all world languages including Arabic. In this, different studies have been concerned with addressing the issue of English loanwords in Arabic and the role of globalization in the increasing use of English loanwords in Arabic. This study is not, however, concerned with the reasons of the adoption of English loanwords in Arabic. It is limited to the study of some linguistic diversity in relation to the use of English loanwords in SCA.

A loanword is simply a word in one language that has been borrowed from one language and incorporated into another language (Durkin, 2015). In the same way, Hafez (1996) suggested that the term has always been associated with the concept of lexical borrowing. The author argues that while some studies use the two terms interchangeably, lexical borrowing is broader. The author further explains that lexical borrowing is an umbrella term that compromises different types including loanwords, loan forms, loan shifts, and loan blends” (1996, P. 383). According to Kemmer (2004), loanwords can be defined as words adopted by the speakers of one language (the recipient/target language) from a different language (the source language) without being translated in that recipient or target language.  In other words, loanwords or lexical borrowing are taken from a foreign language into another by its native speakers. In this way, loanwords have a significant influence on the development and change of languages. The idea is simply that all languages borrow words from other languages. At the beginning, recipient languages generally consider as loanwords and finally they treat them as if they were their own. 

According to Thomason (2001), there is a close relationship between linguistic borrowing and language change. The author argues that borrowing of words, which are referred to as loanwords, from other languages that is the most common type of change that is taking place. That is why; lexical borrowing has always been a controversial issue in almost all languages for its consequences. In almost all languages, there are always many critics, scholars, and policy makers who stand against lexical borrowing. In the Netherlands today, for instance, there is a public unrest that the dominance of linguistic borrowing of English loanwords will ultimately result in the disappearance of Dutch (Booji, 2001; Zenner, 2015). Similarly, there is always strong resistance to lexical borrowing in Arabic. Arabic is the language of the Holy Quran which is one of the main components of Islam. Also, it is the language of the Prophet Muhammad's sayings (Hadith) peace and blessings of Allah be upon him. Quran and Hadith represent a great importance to Muslims since they are the main sources of regulations in Islam. Accordingly, many religious leaders and scholars resist any change within Arabic. In this way, the issue of linguistic borrowing has always been a controversial one in the Arabic linguistic circles.

3.1. Loanwords vs. borrowing

Hoffer (2002, P. 1) defines borrowing as “the process of importing linguistic items from one linguistic system into another, a process that occurs any time two cultures are in contact over a period of time”. According to Yule (2006), linguistic borrowing is one of the most important and widely used processes for creating new words in all languages. It is, Armstrong (2005) argues, a way that a language renews its lexicon. Throughout its long history, Arabic, just like all other languages, has tended to borrow from other languages (Gu, 2013; Versteegh, 2014). Qasim (2009) argues that in Classic Arabic (which was spoken in the Arab Peninsula, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia now), so many Persian and Hindi words were borrowed into English and came to be used as Arabic words. As the history of Arabic shows, these words underwent a process that is described as Arabicizing (borrowed words) or Arabicization. It is even argued that the Quran itself, which is the holy book of Islam and which is highly appreciated by all Muslims all over the world, used different borrowed words which are not pure Arabic words. Yarshater (1998) argues that so many Persian words came into Arabic prior to Islam and with the revelation of the Quran, many of these Persian words were used in the Quran itself. Similarly, Versteegh (2014) argues that the Quran contains a number of foreign loanwords that came into use in the Arab Peninsula during the period of the development of Classical Arabic that preceded the appearance of Islam. In this way, these borrowed words, referred to as Arabized wordsالمعرب , became words within the Arabic lexicon. There is no controversy concerning the use of these words.

It is known that the majority of people living in the Arab Peninsula were converted to Islam and these Arabs conquered many countries either in the East or the West. As a result, Arabic was used as the official language in many of these countries. This however led to the emergence of many dialects of Arabic and many foreign words found their way into the Arab peninsula itself. In the face of this, many Arab scholars called for the preservation of Arabic from corruption. They asked Arab speakers to use Perfect Arabic which is the language of the Holy Quran and not to use foreign words which are referred to as Dakhil meaning strange and outsider. The indication is that these words are extrinsic and not welcome.

In spite of all the social, economic, cultural, and political changes that have influenced Arabic, many Arab scholars still use the term Dakhil to refer to any borrowed word from any other language into Arabic. For these scholars, dakhil words should not be used since they are not Arabic words. Arab speakers should use the Arabic equivalents of such words. For words that have no Arabic equivalents, they suggest muwallad المولد . That is, they suggest that some Classic Arabic words can be used to convey these new meanings.  

Their resistance to lexical borrowing is based on the argument that the lexical expansion of Arabic and the adoption of borrowed words will lead to the death of Classic and Standard Arabic words and the language of the Quran will not be understood by future generations. They argue that the new versions of Arabic will be completely different from the language of the Quran. The history of English is always given as an example. They argue that Old English is now a dead language and the majority of native speakers of English cannot understand a text written in Old English. In this sense, English and other loanwords are described as dakhil since they are not included in the Arabic lexicon.  

3.2. Loanwords and code-switching

In sociolinguistics, the concept of loanwords has always been associated with code-switching.  This is simply a process whereby speakers switch back and forth between two or more languages. Just like loanwords, code-switching, Myers-Scotton (2006) argues, is also a language contact phenomenon. However, it is related to particular types of bilingual speech communities.  Wardhaugh and Fuller (2015) explain that code-switching takes place when the languages used change according to the situations where the speakers find themselves. In given situations, speakers alternate between two or more varieties. According to Auer (2003), code-switching has social, cultural and communicative functions. The main difference between code-switching and the adoption of loanwords, Sachdev and Giles (2004) argue, is that the adoption of loanwords is not limited to bilingual communities. It is not a requirement that a speaker must be a bilingual to use loanwords. In order to illustrate the point, let’s take this example. The use of both French and Arabic in Morocco is described as code-switching since it is a bilingual community where both French and Arabic are spoken. For social reasons, speakers alternate between French and Arabic. However, the use of English words within Arabic or French is described as a process of adopting English loanwords.    

3.3. Lexical borrowing and loanwords in Saudi Colloquial Arabic

The unprecedented spread of global communication channels and social media has dramatically fostered linguistic borrowing across the world. Commenting on this linguistic reality, Graddol (2004) asserts that languages undergo rapid changes due to demographic trends, new technology, and international communication. Unavoidably, globalization has dramatically increased intercultural encounters; which in turn, has fostered word-loaning across the languages.Numerous English loanwords have spread in many languages including Arabic. Through its long history, Arabic has influenced and been influenced by many other languages including Spanish and English. Hofer (2002) asserts that Arabic is one of the languages that have had an overwhelming significance as carriers of languages. He illustrates that so many Arabic words came into Spanish over centuries of Arabic occupation. The implication here is that there is always a close relationship between political and cultural power of language and lexical borrowing. During the period of Arab Renaissance, Arabic was a powerful language that influenced other languages. In this context, Cannon (1994) traced the influence of the lexical borrowing of Arabic on English. He asserts that by means of lexical borrowing, so many Arabic words are still widely used in English. During this period, Crystal (2003) argues, Arabic was a global language. Similarly, Taylor (1933), in his book Arabic Words in English, noted that English Language borrowed about a thousand words from Arabic and there are thousands of derivatives from these words. Today, Arabic is greatly influenced by English since the latter is now the global language. This explains the relationship between economic and political power on the one side and the dominance of a language on the other hand (Darwish, 2015).     

In spite of the prolific literature in the influence of English loanwords on MSA and other Arabic dialects including Egyptian Arabic and Jordanian Arabic (Abushabib, 2016; Hafez, 1996; Suleiman, 1985), very little has been done on Saudi Arabic. Different studies assert that English loanwords are now widely used in colloquial Arabic in different regional dialects of Arabic which are not classified as MSA which are usually described as colloquial Arabic (Rosenhouse and Kowner, 2013). It should be noted that in Arabic, there is a big difference between and colloquial dialects of Arabic and MSA. MSA is a highly formal version of Arabic. It is used almost in the same way by all Arab speakers. It is the sort of language used in the press, news bulletins, education, and academia (Holes, 2004; Ibrahim, 2009).    

In surveying the literature concerning the use of English loanwords in the Saudi dialect or what is referred to as Saudi Arabic, it has been found out that the majority of studies are concerned with MSA in terms of the mutual contact between Arabic on the one hand and other languages such as English, French, Hindu, and Persian. The implication is linguistic and religious circles still insist that only standard Arabic should be studied. Many linguists believe that colloquial dialects are not in a position to be linguistically studied. Nevertheless, the recent years have witnessed the birth of new attempts to study the sociolinguistic aspects of the Saudi version or dialect of Arabic and the emphasis of the descriptive nature of language. For hundreds of years, the study of Arabic was confined to prescriptive rules.

In an investigation of the main sources of foreign loanwords in SA today, Kashgary (2014), argues that there are three main sources of foreign loanwords in SCA. These are English, French and Italian in order. He explains that the majority of foreign loanwords in SCA are borrowed from English. These are words that are science and technology. He adds that French comes second where Saudi speakers tend to use French loanwords in talking about fashion, etiquette and arts. Italian comes third with loanwords that refer to opera and Christianity.  In a more  recent study,  Alahmadi (2015) investigated the relationship between social factors including gender, age, and education on one side and the adoption of loanwords in Arabic. The study is limited to Meccan Hijazi Dialect and there is no explanation of the linguistic changes within English loanwords when incorporated into Saudi Arabic. This suggests that there is a close relationship between lexical borrowing and the adoption of loanwords on the one side and the political and cultural power of languages. Recipient languages usually borrow from powerful languages. Today, the use of English as a global language has significant influence on almost all world languages including Arabic. Discussions also indicated that in Saudi Arabia, there have been different forms of rejection to foreign loanwords in Arabic for linguistic and cultural identity reasons. Many linguists and religious leaders urge people to keep Arabic pure from any dakhil words دخیل (foreign loanwords). According to them, Arab speakers have to speak perfect Arabic, the language of Quran so that they can understand its meanings. In the recent years, however, there is a tendency of linguists and scholars to address the descriptive properties of Arabic language. They have come to reject the long established tradition of the prescriptive study of Arabic.

4. Methodology

Procedures

In order to answer the research questions, this study is based on a corpus of English loanwords in SCA and their Arabic equivalents. Only spoken data is used for the purpose of the study. The rationale is that spoken data is more likely to be spontaneous. Furthermore, in Arabic, there is a great difference between spoken dialects of Arabic and written Arabic. Arab speakers tend to use more casual kind of language in their everyday communication while they tend to use more formal language in writing. Many English and foreign loanwords do not even appear in writing.

The corpus included only the English loanwords that have Arabic equivalents that participants used. For this purpose, a stop-word list was developed. It excluded all Arabicized words such as democracy, liberal, liberalism, academy, microwave, film, video, cinema, shampoo, cream, fax, battery, and microphone. The clean list also included the website names of Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Although the last two names are sometimes given Arabic names, they are not used in a common way or the manner  which is not known in SCA. After executing the clean list, the final corpus was created. English loanwords were classified based on the topic/theme. These include social media, education, household items, colors, fashion and clothes, and electronic devices.

The frequency of loanwords and ratios of their use by male and female speakers were graphically represented in tables and diagrams. This is consistent with the content analysis method of representing the data qualitatively. Analytical coding was done to identify the frequency and the repetition of loan words in both types of groups. This method helped to understand the linguistic adaptation processes (consonant/vowel change, grammatical gender assignment, number, pluralization, etc.) of the English loanwords.  It also allowed the researcher to investigate whether there exists any relationship between gender and the linguistic adaptation processes or whether there was any linguistic diversity in relation to the English loanwords used in SCA.

Sampling and Population

Participants of this study are only Saudi males and females whose first language is Arabic. There is no selectivity in data collection. That is, the study will include all the English loanwords (and their Arabic equivalents where available) used by Saudi speakers during the given period so that there is no bias. Ethical issues are also considered. The evening TV show Audience Contest on the Saudi official TV (Channel 1) is used for the purpose of the study. The program is based on audience participation and calls for answering the anchor’s questions. These are a variety of questions in different areas including history, sports, politics, geography, arts, and cinema. Winners receive cash awards and sometimes cars. The program is broadcast during the holy month of Ramadan, which is usually topped as the most watched time in Saudi Arabia.