Abstract Word formation in Arabic has traditionally been assumed to involveinterdigitation of a consonantal root with a vocalic pattern. This view is adopted bya large number of modern generative morphologists. More recently, however, sev-eral morphologists have argued that words in Semitic are formed from fully voca-lised stems. In this paper, I argue that in San’ani (the dialect of San’a), and in someother Arabic dialects, there is a class of verbs that have as part of either theirdenotations or connotations a diminutive sense. I then consider diminutive nouns inthe dialect. On the basis of semantic and phonological relationships betweendiminutive verbs and their non-diminutive counterparts, as well as native speakers’explanations of certain diminutive verbs, and the relationship between diminutivenouns and their non-diminutive counterparts, I argue that while some derivationalprocesses take the root as the basic morphological unit, phonological and semanticsimilarities between certain stems can only be accounted for by derivation from afully vocalised stem. I therefore conclude that both root-based and stem-based typesof word formation occur.

Keywords Arabic . Stem . Root . Diminutive . Prosodic morphology . Prosodicfaithfulness constraints

1 Introduction

The morphological structure of Arabic stems has traditionally been analysed in termsof consonantal roots and vocalic patterns, with the consonantal root considered anindependent morphological unit. This is reflected in the organisation of traditionalmonolingual and bilingual Arabic dictionaries, which present lexical entries in terms

J. C. E. Watson (&)School of Languages, University of Salford,Maxwell Building, Salford, Greater Manchester, M5 4WT, UKe-mail: j.c.e.watson@salford.ac.uk

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Morphology (2006) 16:189–204DOI 10.1007/s11525-006-9103-5

ORI GI N A L R ES EA R CH

Arabic morphology: diminutive verbs and diminutivenouns in San’ani Arabic

Janet C. E. Watson

Received: 1 March 2006 / Accepted: 14 July 2006 / Published online: 16 November 2006� Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2006

of roots, generally giving under each entry the most basic form of the vocalised rootfirst—the third masculine singular perfect verb—followed by (increasingly) less basicforms (for Classical Arabic, Hava, 1915; Ibn Manzur, 1955–1956; for Modern Stan-dard Arabic, Wehr, 1961; for Arabic dialects, Hinds & Badawi, 1986; Piamenta,1990–1991; Behnstedt, 1992; Al-Iryani, 1996; Holes, 2001; Dickins, 2006; etc.). Thus,for the root /k-t-b/ Wehr (1961) gives the third masculine singular perfect kataba,then the verbal nouns katb, kitba, kitaaba, the gloss ‘to write’, derived forms of theverb with their glosses, non-suffixed stems (kitaab ‘piece of writing; message; book’),followed by suffixed and prefixed stems (maktab ‘office’, maktaba ‘library’). Thesetraditional insights were formalised by McCarthy in a non-concatenative morphologymodel as the interdigitation of a consonantal melody (the consonantal root), asyllabic template and a vocalic melody (McCarthy, 1981, 1982, etc.): thus, kitaab‘piece of writing; message; book’ is analysed as the interdigitation of the consonantalroot /k-t-b/, the syllabic template CvCvvC and the vocalic melody /i-a/.

In recent years, the extent to which morphological processes in Semitic languagesinvolve derivation from the root as opposed to the stem/word has been questioned,with stem theorists claiming that processes operate directly on a vocalised stem,itself a derived or output form (Heath, 1987; Bat-El, 1994; Ratcliffe, 1997, 1998;Ussishkin, 1999, 2005; Gafos, 2002),1 while root theorists bring facts from languagegames and hypocoristics (Davis & Zawaydeh, 1999), metathesis and aphasia (Prunet,Beland, & Idrissi, 2000) in support of the root as an independent morphological unit.

I argue here for neither an entirely root-based nor an entirely stem-based ap-proach, rather claiming, on the basis of data from a modern dialect, that both typesof word formation occur in Arabic. An examination of diminutive verbs anddiminutive nouns in San’ani Arabic, the dialect of the old city of the Yemeni capital,San’a, indicates that while some derivational processes do indeed appear to take theroot as the basic morphological unit, phonological and semantic similarities betweencertain stems can only be accounted for by derivation from a fully vocalised stem.Within a constraint-based model such correspondence relationship between voca-lised stems is formalised in terms of Output-to-Output prosodic faithfulnessconstraints (Burzio, 1999; Ussishkin, 1999; McCarthy, 2000).

2 Diminutives

Cross-linguistically, diminutives are characterised by the basic denotative meaning ofdimensional smallness, and potentially by a large number of connotative meanings,such as endearment, as in English bunny, puppy, sweetie, depreciation or contempt,as in Italian attric-etta ‘starlet’, Russian donn-etta ‘woman of mean spirit’ (Jurafsky,1996; Barbaresi, 2003, pp. 438–439) and English darkie and roughie (Dressler &Merlini Barbaresi, 2001, pp. 46–47), and ‘non-seriousness’ (Dressler & MerliniBarbaresi, 1994, 2001). Diminutives tend to be used mostly by women in addressingand in reference to children, and in reference to women (Jurafsky, 1996; Dressler &Merlini Barbaresi, 2001). Most languages form diminutives by suffixation, with aniconic tendency towards palatal phonemes and/or high tonality, as in English -ie, -y,-let, -ette, German -chen, -lein, Spanish -ito, -ico, -illo and Czech -ink- (Jurafsky, 1996;Barbaresi, 2003). In some cases, diminutives are formed by reduplication (Jurafsky,

1Also in computational morphology (cf. Soudi, Cavalli-Sforza, & Jamari, n.d.).

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1996, p. 570), particularly, but not exclusively, in children’s language, as in Englishpuspus, weewee, German Wehweh-chen and Wehweh-tscherl (< es tut weh ‘it hurts’)(Dressler & Merlini Barbaresi, 1994, p. 121), Tagalog bahay ‘house’ > bahay-baha-yan ‘doll-house/game of house’ (Jurafsky, 1996, p. 570), and the San’ani Arabic verbsdagdag ‘to knock several times lightly’, laflaf ‘to go round in small circles’.

Universally, diminutive formation applies most commonly to noun bases(Barbaresi, 2003; Dahl, 2006), followed by adjectives, adverbs and verbs. Diminutiveverbs, whose denotative meaning often indicates the lightness/unimportance of theaction of the verb and, sometimes, its fragmentation into smaller repeated actions(Dressler and Merlini Barbaresi, 1994, p. 127), are attested in several languages,including Russian (Stawnicka, 2001), Czech, Oceanic and Salish. In Czech, dimin-utive verbs often refer to children’s activity. Thus, spat ‘to sleep’ has the diminutivespinkat ‘to sleep [child]’, and blıt ‘to puke’ has the diminutive blinkat ‘to bring up[child, milk/food]’. Czech verbs which relate to children’s activities in the base formhave an affectionate diminutive form, as in: hajat ‘to sleep [child]’ versus hajinkat[affectionate form], papat ‘to eat [child]’ versus papinkat [affectionate form](T. Dickins, personal communication). Diminutive verbs may, indeed, be morecommon than is generally believed: Italian, English and German have a (in the caseof the latter two, relatively small) number of diminutive-type verbs, e.g. Germanhusteln ‘to cough lightly and repeatedly’ versus husten ‘to cough’, Italian dormic-chiare ‘to sleep lightly and intermittently’ versus dormire ‘to sleep’ and English toquibble (a little quip), to piddle (to do a little piss) and even to fiddle and to wobble,though these latter may have no non-diminutive counterparts today.

In San’ani Arabic, diminutive forms are derived in one of three ways: by suffix-ation of -ii, exemplified in hypocoristics, shahaabii < shahaab [personal name],muHammadii < muHammad [personal name], nouns indicating physical smallness,Su9bii ‘young donkey’ < Sa9b ‘donkey’, zugzugii ‘small alley’, and individuatives,mawzii ‘a banana’ < mawz ‘bananas [coll]’, zurgayfii ‘a marble’ < zurgayf ‘marbles[coll]’ (Watson, 2002, pp. 192–193); by reduplication, as in kuskusii ‘puppy’, dagdag‘to knock lightly several times’ (cp. dagg ‘to knock’), wa9wa9 ‘to whimper’, 9as9as‘to touch several times’ (cp. 9ass ‘to touch’), hazhaz ‘to wobble s.th.’ (cp. hazz ‘toshake s.th.’); and by infixation of -y-, as in: tjayhal ‘to act like a child’ (cp. jaahil‘child’), trayjal ‘to act like a man’ (cp. rajjaal ‘man’). The denotative meaning ofnominal diminutives is essentially physical smallness, with connotations of affectionand, less frequently, contempt. The denotative meaning of verbal diminutives withinfix -y- is lightness/unimportance of the action of the verb, including diminution ofharm, with connotations of contempt, pejorativeness, pretence, playfulness andjocularity. In this paper, I will not deal with diminutive verbs derived by redupli-cation, which, by contrast, generally have the denotative meaning of segmentationinto a number of smaller actions, nor will I deal with the nominal diminutive suffix-ii, which has denotations of smallness and individuation and connotations ofendearment.

3 Diminutive verbs in San’ani

In common with several other Arabic dialects (cf. Holes, 2004), San’ani has a richinventory of quadriliteral verbs on the template CaCCaC. One of the most

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productive of these in San’ani is (t)CayCaC,2 also attested in the Saudi dialect ofAbha (Y. Asiri, personal communication), and, apparently to a lesser extent, inEastern Arabian (Holes, 2004) and Central Sudanese dialects (J. Dickins, personalcommunication.).3 (t)CayCaC verbs mostly describe mental and physical states withpejorative overtones of pretence, viz: ‘to act as if/pretend to be X’,4 and they areoften used in jocular or otherwise non-serious situations. Forms without initial /t/(i.e. CayCaC) are considerably less common than forms with initial t-.5 The formeroccur either as synonyms of an otherwise identical tCayCaC verb, as in Hayraf andtHayraf ‘to be poor/destitute’, or as a transitive counterpart to intransitive tCayCaC,as in jaymal ‘to make s.o. appear beautiful’ versus tjaymal ‘to make oneself (o.s.)appear beautiful’, or have the intransitive sense of pretence and do not have at-initial counterpart, as in: daywal ‘to act like a ruler’.

During field-work conducted in San’a between 2000 and 2002, and in 2006, themajority of (t)CayCaC examples I collected from women and children and from aYemeni comedy radio series (Mutahhar & Watson, 2002) could be classified in thesemantic field of harmless childish naughtiness: e.g. ‘being naughty/silly/cheeky/inattentive/ignorant/neglectful’. Here we have the sense of lightness/unimportanceof the action coupled with pejorative overtones. As for diminutives in other lan-guages (Jurafsky, 1996; Dressler & Merlini Barbaresi, 2001), tCayCaC verbs are usedconsiderably more by women than by men—both in addressing and referring tochildren, and in addressing women. Between women, the tCayCaC verb often hasplayful, jocular connotations. When used between men, pejorative or contemptuousconnotations are paramount. Thus, the verb tlay9an amongst women in addressingwomen has the sense of ‘to be cunning; to be sharp in a devilish way’, while amongstmen it has the more directly negative sense of ‘to behave badly; to misbehave’.

San’ani has a very few instances of tCayCaC with positive or neutral connota-tions. These include: tHaylaa ‘to think the world of; to act sweet towards’, tHaymash‘to act efficient [woman]’ and, arguably, t9ayzab ‘to be/act as if unmarried’. For a fewverbs, a triliteral tCaCiCiaC6 counterpart exists with positive connotations, as in:tgaHHam ‘to be bold’ versus tgayHam ‘to be rash’. For a few other verbs, thetCayCaC verb has a form V synonym, as in: tkabbar/tkaybar ‘to be proud/boastful’.And for others, alongside the tCayCaC verb is a triliteral form III (CaaCaC) withslightly different connotations, as in: tSaynaj ‘to pretend not to hear’ versus Saanaj‘to not hear’. All these verb forms (tCayCaC, tCaCCaC, CaaCaC) have in common astem-initial heavy syllable (Cay, CaC, Caa).

For Eastern Arabian dialects, Holes (2004) claims the (t)CeeCaC verb type to bederived denominally from adjectives: however, while tmayraDh ‘to malinger/feignillness/pretend to be ill’ (Eastern Arabian tmeeraDh) is semantically related to, andcould be argued to be derived from, the adjective mariiDh ‘sick’, there is no reasonin this case to rule out derivation from the bare root /m-r-Dh/ ‘ill’. A rather clearer

2In San’ani, 89 examples of (t)CayCaC in a dictionary data base of 7,000 words.3In Central Sudanese, three examples in a dictionary data base of c. 26,000 entries.4Form VI (taCaaCaC) in San’ani, in common with many other dialects of the Peninsula, has apredominantly reciprocal sense, and does not have the alternative sense of pretence attested inStandard Arabic (cf. Wright, 1975) or dialects of Cairo (Hinds & Badawi, 1986) and Central Sudan(J. Dickins, personal communication).57 Of 89, i.e. under 8% of (t)CayCaC verbs in the database occur without initial t-.6In traditional Arabist nomenclature form V.

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case is the verb tmaywat ‘to pretend to be dead’, which can certainly not be derivedfrom the adjective stem mayyit ‘dead’ due to the presence in the tCayCaC verb ofthe medial root consonant /w/, lacking in the adjective. The derivation of ‘to pretendto be dead’ from mayyit ‘dead’ would yield the unattested form *tmayyat.

The intuition of speakers is, of course, crucial: the fact that a theorist is able toconstruct a theory whereby stems are derivable from roots is not sufficient to indi-cate that the consonantal root is an independently accessible part of the nativespeaker’s mental lexicon. When I elicited the meaning of tCayCaC verbs, informantsmost commonly provided a partial explanation, not through a triliteral adjectivefrom the same consonantal root or through a phrase or a synonym from a differentroot, but through one or more basic triliteral verbal noun/s or other singular noun/sof the same root. Thus, txaybal ‘to act as if stupid’ was explained as xabal ‘stupidity’,axbal ‘stupid’, xabaalih or mixbaalih ‘acting stupidly’ (root /x-b-l/); tlaygan ‘to bicker’as lagaanih and layganih ‘bickering’ (root /l-g-n/); tbaylah ‘to act stupid’ as balah‘stupidity’ (root /b-l-h/); and txayda9 ‘to act to deceive’ as xada9 and xadaa9ah‘deceit; deception’ (root /x-d-9/). The explanatory use of a large number of differentbase forms, which share with the diminutive verb only the consonantal root, suggestsboth that the basic consonants are extractable from the tCayCaC form and that thetriliteral consonantal root is recognised by speakers as an independent morpholog-ical unit. Further evidence for the morphological independence of the consonantalroot in these verbs is the fact that synonyms and near-synonyms in certain abstractsemantic fields often share two or three consonants or that the root consonants ofsynonyms and near-synonyms share place of articulation features: for example, mostverbs describing ‘to be stupid/daft/naive’ have root consonants with the features[guttural]/[labial]/([lateral]) in various orders, as in: /h-b-l/, /b-l-h/, /x-b-l/, /x-w-sh/,7

/x-j-f/, /x-b-S/. Verbs describing ‘to cling/stick’ have the initial root consonants /l-[sibilant]/, as in: /l-z-g/, /l-z-T/, /l-z-m/, /l-s-y/.

Arabic in all registers exploits full pattern repetition for rhetorical effect (cf.Johnstone, 1991; Dickins & Watson, 1999, pp. 518–520, 546–547), and this we find inSan’ani with both diminutive verbs and diminutive verbal nouns, as in: ma nguul laaHaggak as-sayhalih wa-d-daywa9ah8 ‘what can we say about your lack of concern?!’(Mutahhar & Watson, 2002, p. 48) and tijaymiliihaa wa-ti9aynigiiha ‘you f.s. make herappear beautiful and elegant’, tijaymiliihaa and ti9aynigiiha are partial synonyms,while sayhalih and daywa9ah are synonymous. The only morphological distinctionbetween the two words in each pair is the triliteral consonantal root, providing furthersupport for the view that speakers manipulate roots, not just rhyming patterns.

The following analysis of diminutive verbs relies on recognition of a default verbstem in Arabic with an initial bimoraic syllable. This is evidenced by the fact that:(a) cross-dialectically verbs of the template CaCCaC, as in rassal ‘to send’, zawwaT‘to hurry’, are by far the most common in modern Arabic. Historically verbs with amedial geminate (CaCiCiaC)9 have replaced verbs with an initial ’a- (’aCCaC)10 in

7There is evidence that the phoneme represented here as /sh/ was at one stage a voiceless lateralfricative in Arabic (Watson, 2002, p. 2).8Verbal nouns of diminutive verbs most commonly have a non-t-initial stem + -ih suffix, as inshaylatih ‘being silly’, faylatih ‘acting as if physically weak’, layganih ‘bickering’.9In traditional Arabist nomenclature form II.10In traditional Arabist nomenclature form IV.

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most dialects, and the mainly colour/defect specific final geminate verb (iCCaCiCi)11

in many dialects.(b) In the derivation of the vast majority of verbs from loan words, onamatopaeicwords, and phrases, three or four consonants are extracted from the base andassociated with the template CaCCaC.12 Examples from San’ani include: Sabban ‘towash’ (< Saabuun ‘soap’), mazzag or mayzag ‘to make music’, kansal ‘to cancel’,sayyaf ‘to save [on a computer]’, zaflat ‘to lay asphalt, pave’, kawfar ‘to dress hair’(< coiffure) washwash ‘to display interference [television]’. Verbs formed fromwords with derivational suffixes or from prepositional phrases include: baxxar ‘tocure’ (< bi-xayr ‘well’ lit: ‘of-goodness’), and suffixes, as in: (t)San9an ‘to becomeSan’ani’ (< San9aanii < San9aa [proper noun] + nii [adjectival suffix]).(c) Intensive counterparts of the basic verb (CvCvC)13 are derived through affixationof a mora in the initial syllable. This results in medial C gemination or, in a number ofdialects including some Syrian dialects and San’ani, association of /l/ with the affixedmora. San’ani examples include: Hamash ‘hitch up’ and Hammash ‘hitch right up’,dama9 ‘to make tears [eye]’ and damma9 ‘to tear a lot [eye]’, katab ‘write’ and kattab/kaltab ‘write continuously’, dahaf ‘push’ and dalhaf ‘push hard’, Saffag ‘clap’ andSalfag ‘keep clapping’, DhaHak ‘laugh’ and DhalHak ‘laugh hard/continuously’.

In deriving a diminutive verb from the consonantal root, root consonantsassociate with the consonant slots of the default verb stem (here linked to nuclearmora to form CV moraic sequences); the right-most C is placed in angled bracketsto denote its extrametical status; the diminutive morpheme /y/ associates withthe right-most mora of the initial bimoraic syllable; the detransitivising morpheme,/t/ (McCarthy & Prince, 1990a), is prefixed; the default vocalic melody is /a/:

ð1Þ (σ)

µ µ µ {perfect verb}

<l>t {detransitiviser}

y {diminutive}

a {default vocalic melody}

Output: txaybal

X b

σ σ

11In traditional Arabist nomenclature form IX.12In Modern Hebrew, most denominative verbs are formed on the typically transitive patternpi’el—the intensified form of the basic pa’al and the MH equivalent to the Arabic form II template.The verb form with most prosodic flexibility, pi’el is able to deal with the derivation of verbs fromloan words with more than the three consonants typically contained in a Semitic verb. Examplesinclude: telegraf ‘telegraph’ > tilgref ‘to telegraph’, citata ‘quotation’ > citet ‘to quote’ and torpedo‘torpedo’ > tirped ‘to damage’ (Bat-El, 1994).13In traditional Arabist nomenclature form I.

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There are other cases, however, in which the semantics of the verb indicate deri-vation from some morphological unit higher than the root. This is again supportedby the semantics of the verb and the manner in which informants explain terms.Terms such as twayzar ‘to pretend to be a minister’ and tmaydar ‘to pretend to be amanager/to lord it over s.o.’, for example, were paraphrased respectively as uuga9waziir/mudiir ‘he became a minister/manager’ with additional suggestions of pre-tence and disapproval. In the sense of ‘manager’, mudiir is a relatively recent term inArabic. An active participle of form IV from the root /d-w-r/ (’adaar), it is the onlyword with the consonants /m-d-r/ which entails the sense of ‘manage’: the term for‘management’ is ’idaarih. The verb tmaydar is listed in neither Piamenta’s dictionary(1990–1991) nor in Rossi’s glossary (1939), and is most probably an innovationdating back to the 1980s, when administration began to become a fact of urban life inYemen. In San’ani, the sense of ‘minister’ is only entailed in the noun waziir, itsplural wuzaraa’, and the verb twayzar ‘to pretend to be a minister’; the root /w-z-r/,etymologically derived from /’-z-r/, now refers to a men’s waist-wrapper (Piamenta,1990–1991). Similarly, the verb tHaymash ‘to act efficient [woman]’ shares thespecific connotations of efficiency [of a woman] with only one other vocalised stemwith the consonants /H-m-sh/, namely Humaysh ‘efficient [woman]’. It has none ofthe connotations of the verbs Hamash ‘to hitch up’ and Hammash ‘to hitch right up’.In Abha, the verb taHaymar ‘to act like a donkey’, also attested in San’ani, wasdescribed to me by Yahya Asiri as ‘more polite than yaa Himaar ‘‘you donkey!’’’taHaymar has none of the redness connotations of the basic root /H-m-r/, from whichthe noun Himaar ‘donkey’ is ultimately derived.

In a number of cases, that the basic morphological unit is the basic singular noun oradjective is suggested both by the semantics of the verb and by the uniqueness of thebase word: i.e. the base noun is otherwise the only form in the language with this root:this is the case with t’aysad ‘to act like a lion’, uniquely linked to the noun ’asad ‘lion’;twayghad ‘to act the scoundrel’, uniquely linked to waghd ‘scoundrel’ (cf. Piamenta,1990–1991); and tkay9ad ‘to be mean’, uniquely linked to ku9dih ‘mean’, ametaphorical extension of the concrete term ku9dih ‘clay jug with narrow spout’.14

4 Diminutive nominals

In Standard Arabic, diminutive nouns, adjectives and adverbs are derived at leastsemi-productively from singular nouns, adjectives and adverbs on the pattern Cu-CayC < CvCC/CvCvC, CuwayC(iC) < CvvC(vC) and CuCayyiC < CvCvvC (cf.McCarthy & Prince, 1990b; McCarthy, 2000, etc.). Examples from Standard Arabic(list adapted from McCarthy 2000) are given in (2) below:

(2)Template base diminutive gloss(a) CvCC nafs nufays-ah soul

Hukm Hukaym judgement(b) CvCvC ’asad ’usayd lion

rajul rujayl manmalik mulayk king

(c) CvCvvC+ah saHaab+ah suHayyib cloudjaziir+ah juzayyir island

14According to Tim Mackintosh-Smith (personal communication), the sense of meanness stemsmetaphorically from the narrowness of the spout of the ku9dih.

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Haluub+ah Hulayyib milch camel(d) CvvCvC(+ah) faakih+ah fuwaykih fruit

’aanis ’uwaynis cheerful(e) CvvCv(v)C xaatam xuwaytim signet ring

qaamuus quwaymiis dictionary(f) CvCCv(v)C jundub junaydib locust

sulTaan sulayTiin sultan

4.1 Nominal diminutives in the dialects

There is evidence that at one stage in the development of the language, Cairenederived nominal diminutives in this way: thus ’uTeeT-a15 ‘kitten’ is related to ’iTT-a‘cat’ (CvCC base), rufayya9 ‘thin’ is etymologically related to rafii9 ‘thin’ (CvCvvCbase), ’urayyib ‘near’ to ’ariib ‘near’, Sughayyar ‘small’ to Saghiir ‘small’, and shu-wayy-a ‘a little’ to shee’ ‘thing’ (CvvC base). Today, diminutives are most commonlyformed in Cairene by suffixation to the base, usually of -aaya (cf. Woidich, 2006). InNorth African dialects, in which long vowels have merged historically with shortvowels, productive diminutive formation is based on a single pattern (depending onthe dialect, CCeyyeC, CCiw/yeC, CCiwiwieC, CCiyiyieC) irrespective of the patternof the non-diminutive form: for Jewish Libyan Tripoli, Yoda (2005, p. 244) givesHneyyesh ‘snake’ (< Hnesh), kleyyeb ‘dog’ (< kelb) and zgheyyer ‘child’ (< zghir);for some Moroccan dialects, Heath (2002, p. 324) gives Sghiwwer < Sghir ‘small’ andqwliyyel < qlil ‘few’.

In San’ani, we have an interesting situation shared with a number of other moderndialects (e.g. Abha, Central Sudanese): while diminutives are not derived from basenouns, adjectives or adverbs on the pattern CuCayC, the CuCayC pattern is richlyattested in proper nouns (e.g. al-Hudaydah, al-Hubaysh, al-Junayd, al-9udayn, BaniHushaysh, Zubayri, BuHayr, Musayk, cf. Al-Maqhafi 1985), and present in a fewfixed expressions in children’s games (e.g. udhaynii ‘ear’, Sudayri ‘chest’, jubayhii‘forehead’, rujaylii ‘leg’, nuxayrii ‘nose’, luTaymii ‘slapping cheek’, sulayxaan‘thighs’) and in a few isolated lexemes (e.g. Humaysh ‘efficient [said of a woman]’,zughayr / zughayrii / zughayyir ‘small’ and kuwayyis ‘good’16), some of which arerelated semantically to a tCayCaC verb (e.g. xubaySii ‘clever talking’).17 With theexception of expressions used in children’s games,18 any diminutive sense theCuCayC pattern may once have had is no longer present in these lexemes. CuCayCpattern lexemes of the root /z-gh-r/ have no non-diminutive counterpart.

For a limited period, however, CuCayC diminutive formation appeared tobecome semi-productive in San’a. One of the most popular evening television seriesduring Ramadan 2000 screened on a daily basis the inevitable misadventures of awretched hero, Kashkuush. After each misadventure, Kashkuush would hold hishead in his hands and cry yaa muxxii yaa muxayxii ‘my brain, my poor brain!’ Within

15The feminine suffix -a adds a sense of diminution in many Arabic dialects, and is present in Cairenein most, if not all, diminutives on the pattern CuCayC.16This last recently introduced from Cairene (cf. Diem, 1973).17Cf. txaybaS ‘to pretend innocence cunningly’ (Piamenta, 1990–1991).18Where the participant is small (cf. Jurafsky, 1996).

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days, this catch-phrase had become adopted and adapted by children and young menin particular, with phrases such as:

(3)yaa lukfii yaa lukayfii ‘my mouth, my poor mouth!’yaa rijlii yaa rujaylii ‘my leg, my poor leg!’yaa Dhahrii yaa Dhuhayrii ‘my back, my poor back!’yaa bizzii yaa buzayzii ‘my breast, my poor breast!’yaa raasii yaa ruwaysii ‘my head, my poor head!’

This was adopted not only by native speakers, but also by my children aged 7 and 11,who were attending Yemeni school and learning Arabic on the basis of input fromschool and neighbourhood friends. Spotting the sea on the way to al-Mukha inFebruary 2001, they, together with three San’ani children, cried out yaa baHrii yaabuHayrii ‘my sea, my little sea!’

This use of the nominal diminutive CuCayC only occurred in jocular situationsand in conjunction with the base.19 The semantics indicates that the diminutive isderived in these cases from the base noun—a vocalised stem—and not from themore abstract root.

5 An analysis

In a Prosodic Morphology model, McCarthy and Prince (1990b) analyse derivationof the nominal diminutive20 in Standard Arabic as the parsing out of the minimalword (a quantitative trochee, Fqu) from the left-edge of the non-diminutive base, itssubsequent mapping onto a light-heavy iambic foot template, the restoration of theresidue, which is protected from alteration by the template, and overwriting of theoriginal vocalic melody by that of the diminutive (u-ay-(i)). Thus, the diminutive’usayd is derived from ’asad ‘lion’ by the following process:

(4) (a) Extraction of a quantitative trochee (Fqu), ’asa, from the left-edge of the base, ’asad;(b) Mapping of the extracted portion, ’asa, to a light-heavy iambic foot, to give ’asaa;(c) Restoration of the portion, d, that remained after Fqu extraction, to give ’asaad;(d) Overwriting of the original vocalic melody, a, with that of the diminutive, u-ay,

to give ’usayd.

Since many Arabic nominals do not begin with a quantitative trochee, extraction ofthe trochaic foot may be at the expense of any pre-existing prosodic analysis. In thelist of base forms and corresponding diminutives given in (2) above and repeatedbelow with explicit circumscription, this is seen in (c) where the long vowel of thebase is split between the extracted element (for convenience, represented here asEx) and the residue (for convenience, represented here as Res):

19On my return to San’a in April 2006, informants remembered using such forms, but since thedecline in popularity of the Kashkuush series in which the expression originated, have apparentlystopped using them.20And the broken plural. The distinction between the broken plural and the diminutive is marked bythe vocalic melody—/a-i/ in the case of the unmarked broken plural of a non-minimal singular, /u-ay-(i)/ in the case of the diminutive, as in: faakihah ‘fruit’ > fawaakih ‘fruits’ / fuwaykih ‘fruit [dim]’.

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(5) Formal treatment circumscriptionally (adapted from McCarthy, 2000)

Template base Ex Res diminutive gloss(a) CvCC nafs naf s nufays-ah soul

Hukm Huk m Hukaym judgement(b) CvCvC ’asad ’asa d ’usayd lion

rajul raju l rujayl manmalik mali k mulayk king

(c) CvCvvC+ah saHaab+ah saHa ab suHayyib cloudjaziir+ah jazi ir juzayyir islandHaluub+ah Halu ub Hulayyib milch camel

(d) CvvCvC+ah faakih+ah faa kih fuwaykih fruit’aanis ’aa nis ’uwaynis cheerful

(e) CvvCv(v)C xaatam xaa tam xuwaytim signet ringqaamuus qaa muus quwaymiis dictionary

(f) CvCCv(v)C jundub jun dub junaydib locustsulTaan sul Taan sulayTiin sultan

One important insight of Prosodic Morphology is that the residue (Res) remainsprosodically unaltered in the diminutive (as it does in the broken plural). Where theresidue is C, the diminutive ends in C, as in ’asad / ’usayd ‘lion / little lion’; where theresidue is CvC, the diminutive ends in CvC, as in jundub / junaydib ‘locust / littlelocust’; and where the residue is CvvC, the diminutive ends in CvvC, as in qaamuus /quwaymiis ‘dictionary / little dictionary’.

In recent work, however, McCarthy (2000) argues that parsing-mode prosodiccircumscription seems to have no applicability beyond a narrow range of cases likeArabic. He demonstrates that circumscription can be eliminated in favour ofOptimality theoretic output–output (O–O) constraints, constraints that capture theinsights of Prosodic Morphology, but express them in terms of universal prosodicfaithfulness constraints. Faithfulness constraints are formulated under Correspon-dence Theory (McCarthy & Prince, 1995; McCarthy, 2000), which posits thefollowing general relation between linguistic forms:

(6) Correspondence

Given two linguistic forms S1 and S2 standing to one another as input andoutput, base and reduplicant, etc., correspondence is a relation R between anysubset of elements of S1 and S2. Any element a of S1 and any element b of S2 arecorrespondents of one another if aRb.

The faithfulness constraints are of two kinds: faithfulness to the elements standing incorrespondence (segments and moras), and faithfulness to the autosegmental asso-ciation relations between these elements. The relevant constraints are:

Element Constraints

MAX-l—every mora in S1 has a correspondent in S2,DEP-l—every mora in S2 has a correspondent in S1,MAX-seg—every segment in S1 has a correspondent in S2,DEP-seg—every segment in S2 has a correspondent in S1.

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Association ConstraintsNO-DELINK(s, V)Let si and Vj stand for elements on distinct autosegmental tiers in two related pho-nological representations S1 and S2, where

s1 and V1 e S1,s2 and V2 e S2,s1Rs2 andV1RV2

if s1 is associated with V1

then s2 is associated with V2.

NO-SPREAD(s, V)Let si and Vj stand for elements on distinct autosegmental tiers in two related pho-nological representations S1 and S2, where

s1 and V1 e S1,s2 and V2 e S2,s1Rs2 andV1RV2

if s2 is associated with V2

then s1 is associated with V1.

NO-DELINK/NO-SPREAD express faithfulness to autosegmental associations, mili-tating against the loss and gain of association lines in corresponding forms. Theautosegmental associations of interest in Arabic are moras and segments, thusNO-SPREAD(s, V)/NO-DELINK(s, V) read NO-SPREAD(l, seg)/NO-DELINK(l, seg), wheremoras and segments stand in correspondence.

Following McCarthy (2000), superscripted indices in the diagram below are usedfor the mora-to-mora correspondence relation and subscripted indices for the seg-ment-to-segment correspondence. Faithfulness to autosegmental associations is ex-pressed in terms of:

If Xa associates to li in S1 (here the base), then Xa associates to li in S2 (here, thediminutive).

The mappings baHr ‘sea’ � buHayr ‘little sea’ and jundub ‘locust’ � junaydib‘little locust’ can be characterised as below:

(7) baHr � buHayr Correspondence Relations

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(8) jundub � junaydib Correspondence Relations

The added mora in the diminutive forms buHayr and junaydib appears at the end of thesecond syllable (after lii). This mora and diminutive y, to which it is linked, are shownwithout superscripts/subscripts, because they both lack correspondents in the singular.The vowels in the diminutive are prescribed, hence the vowels of baHr and buHayr,jundub and junaydib are not in correspondence with each other, and are shown withoutsubscripts. Of the element constraints, MAX-lOO is undominated, while DEP-lOO isviolated by virtue of the added mora in the diminutive; MAX-segOO is undominated,while DEP-segOO is violated by virtue of the added segment, y, in the diminutive.

The position of the affixed mora in the diminutive noun (after lii) is determinedby positional faithfulness (after Beckman, 1997). Positional faithfulness constraintsassert that some prosodic positions are priviliged to receive special faithfulnesstreatment. The positions so priviliged universally are stem-initial and stem-finalsyllables. In Arabic, positional faithfulness to the stem-initial syllable forces moraaffixation in the stem-medial syllable. This is what we see in the mapping of jundub‘locust’ � jundaydib ‘little locust’. In disyllabic stems which lack a stem-medialsyllable, such as baHr ‘sea’ � buHayr ‘little sea’, faithfulness to the stem-initialsyllable takes precedence over faithfulness to the stem-final syllable, with the resultthat mora affixation is forced in the stem-final syllable.

The diminutive of bases in which the initial bimoraic sequence is a long vowel,such as raas ‘head’ � ruways, show an epenthetic consonant, w, after li. The positionof the epenthetic consonant is explained in terms of faithfulness to autosegmentalassociations, the effects of preserving corresponding segment-to-mora linkage of theNO-DELINK/NO-SPREAD type (McCarthy, 2000). The mapping of raas ‘head’ �ruways can be characterised as in (9):

(9) raas � ruways Correspondence Relations

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In the correspondence relations in raas � ruways, s is associated to lii in neitherthe base nor the diminutive, remaining extrametrical in both. The preference ofepenthesis of w over spread of the medial consonant (which would give thedisallowed form*rusays) shows that spreading is dispreferred where no spreadingtakes place in the base, expressed as the constraint ranking NO-SPREADOO(l, seg)>> DEP-segOO.

The mapping of bizzii ‘my breast’ � buzayzii ‘my poor breast’, by contrast, inwhich the second consonant, z, occupies two syllabic positions in both the base andthe diminutive, shows that where spreading occurs in S1, spreading, and not epen-thesis (which would give the disallowed form *buwayzii), is preferred in S2. Just asepenthesis in ruways ‘little head’ follows from the anti-spread constraintNO-SPREADOO(l, seg), so spread in buzayzii ‘my poor breast’ follows from the anti-delink constraint NO-DELINK(l, seg).

The case of the diminutive verb in San’ani differs somewhat from that of thediminutive noun. Because verbs in Arabic have to accommodate both consonant-initial and vowel-initial inflectional suffixes and because trimoraic syllables aredisallowed, expressed as the constraint *lll]r (McCarthy, 2005), no verb stem endsin -vvC or -vCC.21 Thus, hypothetical forms such as *kataab / kataab-tu and *kanasl /kanasl-tu, in which the verb stem ends in -vvC and –vCC, respectively, are disal-lowed. This means that the diminutive verb cannot be formed by mora affixation inthe stem-final syllable, to give *twazayr or *tmadayr. This is not a case of positionalfaithfulness, however, since positional faithfulness to the stem-final syllable wouldfail to explain the correspondence relations between nouns ending in –vvC anddiminutive verbs, as in: waziir ‘minister’ � twayzar ‘he acted like a minister’ andmudiir ‘manager’ � tmaydar ‘he acted like a manager’. The requirement that allverb stems end in -vC or -vv is better accounted for by McCarthy’s Optimal Para-digms theory, which acknowledges correspondence relations between the stems inevery pair of paradigm members. Verb stems in Arabic end in -vC/-vv beforeC-initial inflectional suffixes in order to not breach the undominated constraint*lll]r. Optimal Paradigm weight faithfulness constraints are breached whenevervowel length alternates within the paradigm (McCarthy, 2005), as in the hypotheticalparadigm members: kataab ROP katabtu. Dominance of the Optimal Paradigmweight constraints forces the verbal stem to end in -vC throughout the paradigm togive katab ROP katabtu. Since the weight of the stem-final syllable is fixed, any moraaffixation within the verb is forced into the stem-initial syllable. Thus, the verbaldiminutive is formed by mora affixation in the stem-initial syllable, to which y islinked, as in the correspondence relations of ’asad ‘lion’ � (t)’aysad ‘to act like alion’ in (10) below:

21Apart from final geminate verbs, such as jarr ‘to pull’. In Standard Arabic, these takethe alternative stem CvC1vC1 before C-initial suffixes, as in jarar-tu ‘I pulled’; in colloquialArabic, -C1C1 final stems take the infix -ay- before C-initial suffixes on analogy with final-weakverbs of the form jaraa > jar-ay-t ‘I ran’, as in San’ani dagg-ay-t ‘I knocked’ (cp. dagg ‘heknocked’).

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(10) ’asad � (t)’aysad Correspondence Relations

6 Conclusion

The principal diminutive morpheme in San’ani Arabic is y linked to an affixed mora.Depending on the semantics of the verb, San’ani diminutive verbs are derived eitherby association of the root consonants to the consonantal slots of the default verbform (with association of the diminutive morpheme y to the post-initial mora), orfrom a fully vocalised nominal stem. Evidence from a short-episode in the history ofSan’ani Arabic, by contrast, indicates that nominal diminutives are derived fromfully vocalised stems.

According to Lass, ‘Languages … innovate preferentially by utilising (includingtransforming) existing material’ (Lass, 1997, p. 305). The existence of CuCayC as anominal pattern in other parts of the San’ani lexicon, such as proper nouns, presentsa pattern to be used for a second purpose—the nominal diminutive.22 Speakers’strong awareness of patterns and their ability to manipulate them enables the ana-logical extension of one pattern to a second (related) purpose. The semantics ofdiminution and its phonological realisation—association of y to an affixed mora—areadopted from the presence of diminutives in other Arabic dialects to which speakershave access directly or through the mass media (e.g. Egyptian, Syrian), and from thediminutive verb, tCayCaC.

Language games, metathesis and aphasic dyslexia in which the consonantal root ismanipulated and reorganised provide some of the clearest evidence in favour ofconsidering the root an independent morphological unit, which is stored in thelexicon on a distinct morphemic tier. My evidence here does not involve reorderingof root consonants, but rather the use of same-root synonyms in informants’explanations of terms, similarities in root consonants in lexemes with the same orsimilar connotations, and frequent rhetorical repetition of patterns which differ onlyin the identity of the root consonants. Recognition of the root as an independentmorphological unit at one level, however, does not exclude the existence of con-straints that transform one stem into another stem without recourse to the root unit,a relationship expressed here in terms of O–O prosodic faithfulness constraints.

22In general historical terms, the diminutive sense, of course, is older—Al-Iryani describes theYemeni place name al-9Udayn as a diminutive of 9Adan, and lists it under the root /9-d-n/(Al-Iryani, 1996). This brief period of nominal diminutive derivation can therefore be seen as a caseof secondary innovation or re-innovation in San’ani.

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Acknowledgements Many thanks to my informants in San’a for cheerfully explainingand re-explaining San’ani diminutive verbs, in particular the women and children ofBayt al-Gini, Bayt al-Sayrafi, Bayt Banga, Bayt Shamiya, Bayt al-Shamahi, Baytal-Haddad and Bayt al-Amri. Thanks are also due to Tim Mackintosh-Smith, for hisundying enthusiasm in San’ani and his willingness to sit for hours discussing theminutiae of the San’ani lexicon and morphology, to Lutz Edzard, Judith Broadbentand my husband, James Dickins, for suggesting many changes, to Tom Dickins forproviding the Czech examples of diminutive verbs, to Geert Booij and to twoanonymous reviewers for their pertinent suggestions. I, of course, am responsible forall remaining errors.

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