Omani Arabic: Historical and Linguistic Description

Abstract

The article consistently examines the phonetic, grammatical and lexical features of Omani Arabic as a dialect strongly contrasting the literary variant ( al-fuṣḥā ) compared to other dialects of the Arabian Peninsula. For the first time the authors propose a thesis that the basic factors of Omani Arabic formation were associated with the key historical events that occurred in this part of the Arabic world in the last centuries - from the settlement of the genuine Arabic tribes in the Arabian Peninsula to migration waves to Oman from the Asian region. The authors show the uniqueness of Omani Arabic, which easily assimilates lexical units borrowed from the non-European languages and emphasize the relevance and incompleteness of this process.