Circles, Voices, Foods, and Faces: Rhetorics of Belonging as a Tool for Achieving Visibility and Negotiating a Hybrid Identity

Nye’s 19 Varieties of Gazelle (2002) is a collection of poems that deals with various aspects of in the Middle East, particularly Palestine. The poems touch on locals’ everyday life, food, family relations, connection with land, peace negotiation with the colonizer, and issues of Arab Americans who emigrated from Palestine after the Israeli colonization. Her more recent poem “Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal”  (2013) is similarly lavish with complex manifestations of identity.

In this post, I seek to explore the complex identity that Nye projects, considering her unique linguistic and ethic experience. Unlike the Arab American women studied by Witteborn (2004), Nye is a second-generation immigrant; she seems more fully absorbed in the American side of her dual identity since her mother is American, which is reflected in her linguistic repertoire as she admits that she lives "on the brinks of Arabic / tugging its rich treads without understanding / how to weave the rug / [she has] no gift. / The sound, but not the sense." (Nye, 2002, p. 91). However, as Sallabank contends, the signs of language loss doesn't have to eat at the heart of ethnic belonging (Omoniyi & White, 2006, p. 6)—at least in Nye's case. Despite linguistic limitations, her ethnic, national, and a particularly accentuated human senses of belonging are actually reflected in the themes of language and circles (both of which I will give snippets of here), as well as foods and community members (which I will further expand on).

My analysis here draws on the Hatcht et al.'s Communication Theory of Identity, which is based on that ‘‘identities have semantic properties that are expressed in core symbols, meanings, and labels’’ (Hecht et al., 2003, p.235). Thereby, I will be looking at the identity-related associations that themes of language, circles, foods, and community members allude to and give off to the readers in Nye's poetry.

Language

As evident in her poem, “Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal,” Naome acknowledges her linguistic identity: rapports of belonging with a stranger, an old monolingual Palestinian lady at Albuquerque's airport, are cemented over the use of a common code—Arabic. A family value appears as a consequence of the joyous chance of sharing Arabic as a language: they start calling people who share the same code—as casually and randomly as one would feel comfortable to do with a family member.

 The association of comfort also plays in: the fears of old lady—who was frantic standing amidst foreigners who didn't speak her tongue in a case of emergency airplane delay was abated by the arrival of someone who carried in their tone the mercy and solace of a mother tongue!

Circles

I think that the circles that Nye so flexibly moves between exhibit interesting identity-related associations. She sometimes seems to find a vent in letting go of a dual ascription of identity (either American or Arab) by swinging to a larger circle by re-proclaiming the human identity above all including all of its associations.

This identity and its associations are unfurled in several loci and dimensions of her poetry: she celebrates the common human identity that she witness in the airport incident, with its associations with empathy, compassion, and kindness, which are illuminated by the people's concern about the troubled old lady—despite their inability to help—, her ma'mul gifts powdered with her simplicity and friendliness, and their grateful acceptance of it.

Several poem in 19 Varieties of Gazelle echo the same jump in circles—moving from local foods and faces (explored below) to universal commonalities, thus drawing her Western readers in. A good illustration of that is the poem "Arabic." An Arab man associates the Arabic linguistic identity exclusively with the effect of pain, yet at the end of the poem Nye reclaims the affect of pain with the human identity regardless of tongue: she calls "pain!" and the taxi answers in all tongues (p. 91). It's also almost as if she saying to that man: why equate Arabic with pain? According to Burbano-Elizondo's second-level indexicalities—i.e. they ways in which people can rationalize their associations with language are so wide and diverse to limited to a negative translation of emotions (Omoniyli & White, 2006, p. 3).

The main poem in the book, "19 Varieties of Gazelle," re-emphasizes the liberation from dual identity restrictions: in a gazelle reservation, a sign reads "KEEP TO THE PATH." She wonders how one would expect a gazelle to stick to simplistic, defined path; "humans have voices / what have they done to us?" (p. 73).

These poems illustrate not only Nye's pursuit of deconstructing the limitations of the emphasis of national and ethnic identities that society imposes but also her pursuit to move in circles in the associations that many Arabs insist to attribute to their linguistic/ethnic identities.

Foods and Faces

Addressing a Western audience in an age that is rife with Orient-Occident conflicts, Nye--with a keen eye for particular details of the Eastern rhetorics of belonging (as exemplified in food and community members)--challenges some widely accepted stereotypes and help Western readers see the humanity of the vague Middle-Eastern nations, which are typically seen as the abstract other filtered through media.  Much like Norman Rockwell who supported the civil rights of African Americans by simply painting the simple details of their everyday lives (Gallagher & Zagacki, 2013, p. 175), Nye achieves “energia”: she uses particularity with details about food and people to achieve a visibility of the humanity of the East, which is a rhetorical technique that defies the Western colonial gaze and the sweeping stereotypes of the “terrorist other.” Indeed, this rhetorical technique subtly draws attention to the humanity both nations of the East and West share. It also somehow represents Nye’s attempt to sort out the two seemingly contrasted sides of her Arab American identity.

For one thing, Nye’s details about local food show the common human connection with land, which is the natural source of food. Moreover, food imagery is particularly significant since food is one of the most remarkable forms of the gift that is passed down to generations forming a bond of communal identity. In my personal travels around the West, I found a lot of people who are familiar with Middle-Eastern food, such as the long-loved tabbouleh, hummus, or falafel, yet this knowledge was typically only acquired through a capitalist, consumerist institution that commercializes that food and sells it to the public. Middle-Eastern food, much like food from any other culture, can unfortunately often be thought of without due reverence; it can take a capitalist, culture-appropriative turn and become deformed in the minds as a mere “commodity,” which is clearly distinguished from an identity-reverencing gift: “The consumer of commodities is invited to a meal without passion … without the benefit of inner nourishment” (Hyde, 2007, p. 12). Nye, however, reclaims some examples of the ingredients of food in the Middle-East (e.g. locals’ tomatoes, olives, and figs-- restoring them to their reverent meanings that the minds of “otherers” tend to strip them out of.

             Abu Mahmoud and his relationship to his tomatoes both represent identity in locals’ relationship with land. It is a relationship that is based on reverence and awe. Nature, especially land in this case, can easily strike us as humans with awe since we do not have clear ideas about what it is: Is there a soul to it? How does it respond to us? Can it really feel our bond of love and belonging and love us back? Therefore, locals like Abu Mahmoud express their awe and try to sort out this sense of the land’s vague, sublime transcendence through personification. Trying to put the reverence he feels for land and its gifts in simpler terms as a human-to-human relationship is how Abu Mahmoud try to make sense of his identity in relationship to land. For instance, he addresses land saying, “I know you,” and he speaks passionately about his “darling tomato.”

            Examining Abu Mahmoud’s relationship to land helped me recognize an interesting gift system that feeds the circle of local communal identity: Abu Mahmoud, much like the rest of locals, gives a special type of gift to land: he knows how to preserve it and take care of it and as “a result of this knowing,” “earth crumbles rich layer” (p. 21), which is the land’s gift to the table of the family—to the young and hungry in the community. 

As for olives, imagery based on them recurs wildly throughout Nye’s poems. Olives are a famous Mediterranean produce that helps Palestinians survive. It is also more than that; it is a symbol for identity—for a safe place of belonging that locals identify themselves with: for instance, Nye identifies locals as “olive gatherers” (81). The following lines felt to me as a beautiful description of how olives, as a part of the physical nature, can enter the psychological realm that sustains locals’ identity: "The olive’s dusky gray-green shadow / won’t leave a single one of its people alone / It follows them inside their own shadows / It loves them when they think there is no more loving" (33).

Having olives as a part of their identity, locals reaffirm their human affinity with their land as they are facing the Israeli threat of colonization: of seeing their land, which provides them with such a dear sense of belonging, lost to colonial urbanization. In my mind, olives evoke the myth of Noah: after the flood, the sign of finding land, a safe place to belong to and thus a sense of settlement and psychological peace, was an olive branch carried by a dove. Therefore, I think that Nye uses the symbolism of olives artistically with witty consciousness of its connotations to locals and to many of her readers.

Thinking of olives as a metaphor for locals’ identity in relationship to their land hails my mind with other examples of how land and nature structure our understanding of belonging. For instance, when we finally identify with someone as similar to us in their attitudes towards some concepts, we say that we found a common “ground” with that person. We think of our extended web of genetic belonging as a “family tree.” And when we feel like we belong somewhere, we “put down roots.”

Similarly, fig trees can be considered as Nye’s metaphor for a hybrid identity. First, we see the Middle-Eastern fig tree, the one that generates folktales as a generation-to-generation gift that maintains identity: The writer mentions the tradition that, in the evenings, the father “sat by our beds/ weaving folktales like vivid little scarves/ they always involved a fig tree/ once Joha was walking down the road and saw a fig tree/ Or, he tied his camel to a fig tree and went to sleep/ Or, later when they caught and arrested him, his pockets were full of figs” (p. 6). Once children grow up, they “gift” the same stories to other children in the community—which I have personally experienced as folktales inspired by nature are passed down from my grandfather, to my father, to me, and then to my nieces and nephews! The Middle-Eastern fig tree in this case inspires the oral tradition that ties the Middle-Eastern, Palestinian community in its different generations together.

        One the other hand, I was amused to see the fig tree appear again in Nye’s poems as representative of the American side of her identity. We see Nye’s father later lovingly take care of a fig tree in Dallas, Texas, while humming a song—which is another form of folklore and thus another form of gift that this American fig tree has inspired him with (p. 6-7).

            After going over the locals' identity as interwoven with land and its food gifts and the similar fig tree metaphor that Nye uses for the hybrid Arab American identity, we can take a look at the character of the grandmothers to understand the relationship between certain local characters and hybrid identity. I have long seen grandmothers deemed as the heart of the local. Their depiction in Nye’s poems makes them akin to the archetypical Mother Figure, which is characterized by both affectionate caring despite pain, so they end up having to allow the child to go through change no matter how hard it is for them. Similarly, in Nye’s poems, grandmothers—representing the traditional and the local—feel pain to see the hybrid identity of their Arab American grandchildren—the fact that they for example “don’t pray.” Yet, they end up having to let them be shaped by their unique cultural experience as all they can do as elders is just pray for them (p, 5).

            Drawing on the rhetorics of place and belonging through language, circles, and symbols of food and community members, Nye accentuates the humanity that the reader share with Eastern nations.  With a beautifully flowing language that my heart dances to, Nye elucidates the Eastern rhetorics of belonging: this complex net of Middle-Eastern identity—whether local (Palestinian), hybrid (Arab American), or universal (human)— reflected in people like Abu Mahmoud, the elders of the local community, the airport lady; and the gift systems within this community (such as folktales and food).

Indeed, the first few pages of 19 Varieties of Gazelle, by Naomi Shihab, welcomingly received a few warm tears that welled up in my eyes while quizzing their lyrical beauty: rarely have I read anything like these poems--these poems are “me” on paper, and my “Where I am From” poem could possibly fit seamlessly if tucked into the pages of this book:

I'm from Aladdin's magical lamp.

I'm from the golden sand,

The courageous veins,

Spreading in the dunes of land.

But I'm also from the loud fears,

The wars and tears,

The crumbles of bread,

The rubble you tread,

And every lost shred,

Of a child's dream.

But I'm also from the euphony,

The fusion, the harmony,

The chant of a mosque marrying

The bells of a church.

I'm from the threads of my scarves,

Or maybe,

the assumptions one blindly carves?

But I'm also the smoldering allure of Arabian incense,

The welcoming aroma of Arabian coffee,

And the fluttering mane of a free-souled Arabian horse. 

References

Gallagher, Victoria, and  Zagacki, Kenneth. "Visibility and Rhetoric: The Power of Visual Images in Norman Rockwell's Depictions of Civil Rights." Quarterly Journal of Speech: 175. Web. 1 Dec. 2015.

 Hyde, Lewis. The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World. 25th Anniversary Ed. 2nd Vintage Books ed. New York: Vintage, 2007. 10-12. Print.

Hecht,M.L., Jackson,R.L.,II, &Ribeau, S.A.(2003).African American communication(2nded.).Mahwah,NJ: Erlbaum.

 Nye, Naomi Shihab. 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East. New York: Greenwillow, 2002. Print.

Witteborn, Saskia (2004) Of Being an Arab Woman Before and After September 11: The Enactment of Communal Identities in Talk, Howard Journal of Communications, 15:2, 83-98, DOI: 10.1080/10646170490448312

A Preview of Omoniyi and White's Sociolinguistics of Identity

Prefacing the book Sociolinguistics of identity, the editors, Omoniyi and White (2006) take readers on brief tour—covering milestones in the evolution of identity as a sociolinguistic concept.

The genesis story starts with variationinst sociolinguistics and, in tandem, thvariationistconceptualization of identity merely as the stable distribution of social and linguistic values among a certain population. Later, the prosperity of sociolinguistics as a scholarly discipline in late modernity brought about a more panoramic view of identity: one that encompasses a range of social theories. Then, six main identity-related principles gained prevalence: that identity is fluid and ever-changing; that it varies and is constructed within established contexts; that those contexts are filtered with social variables and expressed through language(s); that, whether we place importance on it not, identity plays a significant role in all communicative acts since it shapes these acts and the relevant social relationships; and that—in a given context—several identities can be established and negotiated through a dynamic of identity management.

Although—compared to previous perceptions of identity—these poststructuralist ideas seemed to account more for the complexity of identity, several scholars still contested them in favor of a more dialectical position. For instance, according to Block, socially-established identities, such as gender and ethnicity, are not the only means for defining the identities speakers assume: speakers participate in different communities of practice, such as school, family and work, and thus create some identities in relationship to these communities.

Moreover, while Block concurs that some side of identity can change and be constructed in the shadow of social constructs, he goes beyond that; he sheds lights on the speaker not only as a social being coloring according to contexts and milieus but also as a wholly-existing being with an anchored core of "the psychological self" that shines through in moments of introspection. I actually appreciate this insight since it attributes more value to the human by looking beyond the rhetorical and strategical act of changing of hats. Block's approach, in my opinion, reverences the uniqueness of the individual.

 The editors, after that, survey a number of case studies that build on or challenge the aforementioned theorizations on identity. For example, they preview Suleiman and his detailing of the interrelationship between language and national identity; Jenkins and L2 English speakers' attempts to claim an identity in the hegemonic discourse through the uncomfortable assumption of a native accent; Llamas and the relationship between language, age, and the sense of local membership; Burbano-Elizondo and the two levels of language indexicality (one as the links established between form and social meaning and the other as the ways speakers rationalize these links); Sallabank and the disconnection between language loss and ethnic identity; Mullany and the clash between professional and gender identities; Preece and nonnative undergraduates' attempts to compensate for a presumably inadequate membership in the academic community; Spotti and the school's role in identity construction; and White and the rapport between language, national identity, and post-colonialism.

I think this book would be recommendable for those interested in learning the ABC of sociolinguistic theories of identity. It would also be recommendable to researchers who seek to configure the methodologies and approaches through which studies of practical manifestations of identity in different communities can be conducted. Noteworthy, however, is that—despite their abundance—the studies included here are by no means applicable throughout all contexts, for each situation is  the product of its own cultural, social, historical, linguistic, political, religious and socio-economic intricacies that grant it almost irreplaceable subtleties. I take this into consideration in my upcoming analysis of identity in Naomi Shihab Nye's poetry by avoiding generalizations and acknowledging the influence of her own life experience on the formation of her Arab American identity. 

A Response to "Of Being an Arab Woman Before and After September 11"

          In " Of Being an Arab Woman Before and After September 11: The Enactment of Communal Identities in Talk," Witteborn (2004) contrasts interviews of Arab women before and after September 11, asking them about their use of identity labels and then investigating the associtions relevant to these labels. She finds that Arab woman, before September 11, used to identify themselves as Arabs, tie that to family values and respect, and label themselves as Arab Americans only in the public sphere. However, after the tragic event, they tended to use national labels to associate their respective identities with their national histories and cultural richness.

           In the analysis of these data, the writer draws in her analysis on the Communication Theory of Identity of Hecht et al., namely two assumptions of it: that identities have individual, social, and communal properties and that they are codes that are expressed in conversations and define membership in communities (85-86). She also makes use of the enactment frame," which ‘‘focuses on the messages that express identity [as] identity is enacted in social behaviors, social roles, and symbols’’ (Hecht et al., 2003, p. 236). The analysis of the interviews yields results that reinforce some of these theories and challenge others. The most prominent suggestion that adds to the enactment frame is that speakers do not only express identities but also enlivened and performed, through reported speech, examples, and verbs of emotions, which her participants used. Nonethless, I see that the term given to the theory already entails performance as a way of expression as the word "enactment" denotes: " An instance of acting something out" (Oxford Dictionary).

         In my perspective, I think that it generally does not contribute much to my curiosity as a reader, yet I appreciated some parts of it,. For one thing, I was intrigued to learn about the shift to specific national labels after September, 11. I think that such a discursive act is not only meant to inform the interlocutor that Arabs are not all the same (i.e., they are not all Saudis like those involved in the tragic event). It somehow deploys a specificity that naturally evokes visibility of the humanity of stereotyped communities—Arabs in this case. One of the participants actually mentions the word "visible" in her justification of the use of national labels, which evoked in my mind visibility as a fascinating rhetorical technique that is employed even in visual art. For instance, Norman Rockwell's depicted specific details of everyday life of African Americans during the Civil Rights Movement to help viewers attain a visibility of the humanity of a marginalized community.

         Although I found that aspect of the quoted interviews interesting, I still found that the writer could have utilized the data better by trying to pose questions like: why did the participants use the label "Arab American" only as a part of their public persona before September, 11? Does that indicate a sense of disconnection that was perpetuated even before the attack? After the attack, why didn't they try to emphasize the American aspect of their "Arab American" identity to counteract the resulted "othering"? Could this sense of disconnection be linked to their being "first-generation" immigrants? How does sociolinguistics of gender and the gender-related preconceptions about Arab women play in these identity enactments? All in all, I think that this article provides a initial look at the representation and performance identity of Arab American women in speech, and provokes many more questions for further research and investigation.

Linguistic Crusades: A Horror Story

In his article, "Petro-Linguistics: The Emerging Nexus Between Oil, English, and Islam," Karmani (2015) deems oil wealth in the region of the Arabian Gulf a magnet for further Western linguistic, religious, and economic imperialism. He draws parallels between the capital-intensive approach on which oil-rich rentier systems are based and the preference in the area to export native English language instructors rather than invest in local language experts. While this prejudice in the job market is a Western economic win, the West—according to Karmani—harvests further advantages from the seemingly epidemic spread of English in the Arab Gulf States; most prominent of which is the dissipation of the Arabic language and—thus—of Islam. Therefore, with the blessings of Western powers, more secular schools, universities, and colleges that intensively incorporate English are mushrooming in the area.

I see the writer's point about the skewed hierarchy between native speakers and local language experts in the job market, yet such a prejudice is equally evident in many other second language teaching settings—no matter the language that is being taught. I also see why some researchers would raise a red flag when a pedagogical institution inadequately teaches Arabic or Islam, but so is the case if English is not taught well enough to help students survive a globalized world. Most importantly, the genesis of the problem in this article is the underlying assumption of predation—the obsessive illusion of a lingo/religio-conspiracy that similarly permeates many Muslim Arab communities as well. Indeed, to test the validity of this assumption of predation, questions like the following can be helpful: Is English exclusively Western anymore? Is Islam inherently Arabic? Are we talking Islam or Islamic extremism and can English curb the latter? Can't English and Arabic co-exist?

Is English Exclusively Western Anymore?

         Throughout history, people in the periphery tended to converge linguistically to those in the center. However I think that English—in particular—is starting to increasingly lose such a centric connotation. Indonesians, Indians, Arabs, Israelis, and other nonnative English speakers (whose number exceeds that of native speakers according to ethnologue.com) speak this global language with their respective voices and accents and even enrich it with their linguistic innovations: they are being their own centers. Canagarajah's world Englishes and other terms describing this gradual, yet steady decentralization that is stripping English  from its Western exclusivity and, thus, of the suggested imperialistic connotations are gaining wide precedence in the literature of linguistics and applied linguistics. Therefore, when children are taught a lot of English in school, we could deconstruct the assumption of predation and rather think of English as a neutral international code of communication that will help those children go on with their professional life later on.

         Is Islam Inherently Arabic?

The ghost of English prowling around the fortress of the Arabic language has been haunting speakers of Arabic for quite a long time, especially due to the ideological weight that is typically given to the latter as the language of Islam. Karmen's argument builds on this ideological association: more English means less Arabic and, eventually, less Islam. However, the presumption of an inherent relationship between Arabic and the Islam, in my opinion, is another deconstruction-worthy point. Most of Muslims are not Arabs: according to Pew Research Center, two thirds of Muslims are from the Asia-Pacific Region, where languages other than Arabic are dominant.

Indeed, not only do the prolific translations of Islamic literature dissolve the claimed the exclusive bond between Islam and Arabic, but so do the hereditary nature of the religion: more of non-Arabic speaking Muslim parents pass the spirits of the texts to their children in everyday interactions without necessarily delving into the archaic Arabic texts or the Arabic language itself. Furthermore, after the advent of modernity, the intellectual growth in the Islamic world calls for a hermeneutic approach that takes a step-back from the specificities of linguistic literalism when dealing with Islamic religious texts—and rather moves towards considering the Islamic literature as a whole and preserving its general language-less moral spirit.

More significantly, forging an exclusive connection between the Arabic language and Islam is in itself of an imperialistic nature: it is an act of disowning Coptic, Christian, Jewish, Atheist, and Agnostic native Arab communities who have the right to the language as much as any Muslim Arab does.

         Are We Talking Islam or Extremism? And Can English Curb Islamic Extremism?

Interestingly, except for four mentions of the "War on Terror" (p. 87,99 , 100), Karmani throughout his article keeps referring to the ultimate enemy that English is to defeat as Islam, rather than Islamic extremism: "opting for 'more English and less Islam.'" These loose references pose the question of whether the writer is confusing or equating Islam with Islamic extremism.

However, if Karmani actually intends to point out English as a means of fighting Islamic extremism (rather than Islam as a whole), this is still a straw man argument. For one thing, one might contend that English can be an eye-opener that helps people connect with other cultures, and thus develop tolerance. Nonetheless, this result is not always guaranteed. In fact, many terrorists, whether Muslims or not, spoke fluent English (e.g., Adam Yahiye).

Actually, the spread of English in areas where Arabic used to be the only language might very well amplify the sense of the "other," of the myth of an "invader" to stand up against, and thus aggravate tendencies towards terrorism. Besides, studies show that structural factors in a society, including the chance to receive secular education (which would typically entail extensive English training), is never a sure predictor of whether someone will or won't fall for extremism (Banihashimi, 2016, p. 3).

Can't English and Arabic Co-exist?

After the deconstructing the relationship between English and imperialism, between Arabic and Islam, and between secular education and the prevention of Islamic extremism, I think that it would be more appropriate to adopt a translanguagage attitude towards the spread of English in the Arabian Gulf Region and in among Arabs in general: one socially named language does not naturally push away another—they are all equal communication devices.

Many assume that the spread of one language naturally leads to the incapacity to keep another, a fear that is fed by clips like this) at 4:09-5:41). In this video, children who are seemingly educated in international schools are unable to complete the simple task of identifying animals in Arabic. However, in this other clip, an Arab child growing in the US shows off his Arabic;   his full acquisition has not overtook the capacity to learn Arabic (or practice a religious recitation of Quran—to tie it with Karmani's article). That's because—at the end of the day—if parents care enough to educate their child in both languages, no Western conspiracy can stop that. Both languages end up as parts of the child's skill repertoire, of his/her idiom, and his/her acquisition of a certain named language does not push away another: it's all one toolbox of communication tools

         In fact, preserving our individual identities—our ideolects that reflect our experiences—is no less significant that preserving named languages. It is indeed the essential concern and the real way to show reverence to each member of the community—and thus the community as a whole.

Conclusion

         Illusionary monsters can seem as real to societies as they would to children—only on a larger scale. As for the illusionary monster of English pushing away Arabic and—thus—Islam in area of the Arabian Gulf. This monster will definitely vanish if we turn on the lights in our heads and question the presumed exclusive relationships between English and the West, Arabic and Islam, English and extremism, and the emphasis of named languages over idiolects. 

Two Tongues in One Toolbox: Bilingualism in the Case of Arab Speakers

In a globalized age, the influence of other languages and cultures can sometimes be inescapable in Arab societies, especially to the youth who are being heavily exposed to intercultural/interlinguistic popular culture and educational settings. The ensuing kaleidoscope of linguistic creativity, as exemplified in the use of so-called code switching, is a definitely thought-provoking topic that arouses my curious instinct. As a sample of such a phenomenon, a conversation on race that takes place between two bilingual Arab students studying in the U.S. will be examined in this post, which would hopefully help in understanding the implications of both the internal and external perspectives on code-switching, terms for which are inspired from García et al.’s “Clarifying Translanguaging and Deconstructing Named Languages” (p. 289, 2015),  with the context of bilingual speakers of Arabic as an example.

Transcription

1.  متى أول مرة  شعرت إنك بلاك؟

في  أولى ابتدائي الأستاذ الفلسطيني الله يسامحه بس كان يضربني يضربني عشان أتكلم عربي لأني كنت أتكلم صومالي  بس ما حسيت مرة إني مختلف لأنو كنا عايشين وإحنا صغار في حي كله من نفس الطبقة الاجتماعية يمنيين وصوماليين وبخاريين وسعوديين مخلطين ما حسينا بفرق عن بعض حتى المدرسة في نفس الحي مفصولين عن الباقين فما حسيت إلا في الجامعة بديت اسمع كلمات

2.  مين كان يقلك كلمات ؟

في الجامعة القبليين بدؤوا يقولوا هادا حضري هادا بدوي هادا ايش يرجع

3. في الكلاس في لغة مارجناليازيشن؟

دايما كنت اسمع كلمة يا خال في الجامعة يا خال ياخال ياخال مرة ماااااأانسى موقف صار لي مع مدرس الله يرحمه كنا نوضي بعض صب عليا الموية عشان أتوضا قام قال: "الله يرحم فيصل" يحسبني ما اعرف بعدين قال امزح امزح انتي عارفة فيصل اللي حرر العبيد كمان الطلاب كانو يقولو عبد

4. هاو دو يو فيل من الكلمات هاذي؟

اتوجع زي يمدحو ابوباما بس يقولو الخال أوباما اقوللهم لوسمحت لااااااا تستعمل الكلمة هاد يتذكرني بأشياء مو حلوة زي صح قلتلك السيكيوريتي اللي يسألني في المطار يحسبني مو درجة اولى لأني عنده خاااال

5.   هل تشعر اللي يقولك هذي الكلمات متعلم؟

في مو متعلمين بس كتير متعلمين اللي يقولها اكثر شي احسه اللي يقولها بيكون شي كدا  قبلي

6.  طيب تستعمل هاذي الكلمت بينك وبين اللي مثلك؟

ايوا عادي اشوف واحد خال أقله هادي الكلمات ويقولي لأنه مافي بيننا باور من أول

7.  طيب والمزحات بهذي الكلمات من اللي الكلتشراللي وايت؟

شوفي هي حسب الكونتكس بس ستيل مو مفضلة عندي

8.  طيب ممكن احنا لو كلتشراللي وايت نغير معناها ونهدم المعنى السلبي باستعمالها ككلمات عادية وصفية أو مزحات؟

ممكن لكن بس اذا كانت العلاقة مرة مرة قوية واقدر امزح معاه نفس الشي  لكن مو أي احد صعب

The External Perspective

The more external approach to “code switching” in this conversation can be based off  Bot et al.’s “Sources of Triggering in Code Switching.” The externality of the viewpoint adopted in this approach is not attributed to its lack of explicating the mental/cognitive process that is possibly involved in triggering code switching (actually the authors provide a thorough breakdown of that). It is rather attributed to the fact that it draws on an external view of language throughout these analyses. That is, it treats language--not as the individual’s unique repertoire or as their own independent psychological and mental construct--but rather as a social construct of two different named languages (in this case, Arabic and English). This external view that draws on socially constructed perceptions of language is, thus, where the term code switching comes from.

In this chapter, the writers explain the possible cognitive triggers of so-called code switching, considering the socially constructed named languages as well-defined systems that a code switcher alternates between. They enumerate the different levels at which code switching might be triggered (e.g., the lexical level, the conceptual level, etc.). Moreover, they implement the theory of Self-organization Criticality to illustrate that the languages one speaks can be easily triggered in situations of code switching, yet predicting what the trigger--or the “switch”--is and the level(s) or way(s) in which the following code switching will take place is not quite predictable. Furthermore, they highlight aspects that might play a role in in the process, such as the co-activation between production and perception, and how languages with shared elements can raise the odds of code switching (p. 85-100, 2009).

In this conversation, code switching appears in lexical choices such as مارجناليازيشن , بلاك, and  اللي الكلتشراللي وايت. When attempting to speculate what triggered it, it does not seem as if these English words were preceded or triggered by some other Arabic words that semantically or phonetically overlap with them. Therefore, it would be palpable in this case to refer to Bot et al.’s statement that while conceptual, lexical, or structural triggers “play a role” in inciting code switching, other factors contribute more directly to this phenomena. For instance, “there maybe code switching due to the recollection of an event that was encoded in a specific language.” For these students, perceptions of racism, its complexities, and its implications were fundamentally encoded during their study in the U.S. That, indeed, might have been a great trigger for switching to English to express concepts like مارجناليازيشن and social categories like للي الكلتشراللي وايت, which can be essential to the discussion of race. This shift to another language system might not be only a result of the  fact that their consciousness of these concepts matured mostly in English; it might also be because English in general--throughout their academic experience in the U.S--has been grounded in their memories as the language of challenging pre-imposed intellectual structures, which is not as encouraged in Arab-speaking countries and educational systems.

If they were not to discuss the topic by means of such English terms, the speakers might very well have veered into a discussion that bears bits and pieces of the tone of religious discourse, which is  a very common way to discuss race for speakers of Arabic, as evident in the reflections on racism by Arab users of Twitter in the survey included in my previous blog post. However, the speakers in this conversation still chose to stick with the perspective afforded by English, which--with its evocation of the power to challenge--might have helped them in a sense to move forward beyond the well-beaten track of religious discourse, which is another social construct whose challenge or dismissal is typically forbidden in the everyday talk of Arabic speakers.

A closer look at the conversation also calls for another possible analysis of the trigger of code switching involved. The code switching in this conversation is mostly initiated by the interviewer, a culturally-white speaker of Arabic, as evident in questions 1, 3, and 4, rather than by the interviewee, a black speaker of Arabic. Considering the positionality of the two speakers and the rhetorical situation that entails a sensitive exposure of the interviewee’s intimate experiences with racism, one can contend that the interviewee shift to a system other than their mother tongue is a face-saving strategy that tones down the power and the offensive connotations of race-based labels, such as  بلاك and اللي الكلتشراللي وايت. We acquire our mother tongues as children and we learn at an early stage to describe our feelings in that language, which can in turn tie that language more closely to our emotions. The interviewer’s code switching to a second language, English, is potentially a fascinatingly natural way of indirectness and of tactfully handling the interviewee's feelings:  هاو دو يو فيل من الكلمات هاذي؟

ِِِAn Internal Perspective

The more internal perspective stems from García et al.’s “Clarifying Translanguaging and Deconstructing Named Languages.” The writers in this article prefer the term “translanguaging,” which they define as “deploying all of the speaker’s lexical and structural resources freely. To repeat, translanguaging refers to using one’s idiolect, that is, one’s linguistic repertoire, without regard for socially and politically defined language labels or boundaries.” In other words, the writers would refrain from analyzing a conversation like the one above in terms of the socially constructed demarcations of named languages (i.e., Arabic vs. English). Rather, they think of it only in terms of idiolects, the individual linguistic repertoires of  the interviewee and the interviewers, considering that those speakers make choices from these repertoires to accommodate each other and adapt to the demands of the social situation (279, 2015).

I think that this perspective focuses more on the concept of freedom. It weaves different conceptual arguments to call for linguistic equality and a speaker’s right to be unrestricted in utilizing their linguistic repertoire--regardless of whether their speech strictly follows a named language or not. Therefore, such a perspective would lead us to consider the interviewee and the interviewer’s right to mix Arabic and English in this conversation since--at the end of the day--these categories are socially constructed and lexical items from either named language are an equally acknowledgeable aspects of the participants' individual linguistic repertoires as bilingual speakers of Arabic and English. Their speech, thus, is not shameful “broken Arabic” but a respect-worthy form of communication.

Indeed, Arab students who end up--like these interviewer and interviewee--spending 4 to 10 years getting their degrees abroad sometimes have to cope up with an unforgiving social stigma once they get back home if a foreign word slips out of their mouths in a conversation. They might be very well accused of being boastful and ungrateful for their Arab community.

To test the extent of such monitoring on bilinguals in Arab societies, I conducted the following experiment: I took a look at a Twitter account of a widely acclaimed full-professor of languages and translation at King Saud University. In most of her tweets, she would offer Arabic alternatives to common English words, aiming to preserve Arabic, the holy language. In one tweet, she rhetorically asked--in Arabic--why Arabic speakers would use English words that already have alternatives in their mother tongue, and she encouraged responses that parroted her views on the necessity of shaming those who do that. In the convenience of Twitter's 140-character limit, I tried to respond to that thread--suggesting that a language is nothing but a social construct that we can mold and expand; that bilinguals use words, regardless of their language of origin, as a way to express identity and fulfill rhetorical purposes in a conversation as Peter Auer suggests in his book, Code-switching in Conversation: Language, Interaction and Identity; and that it is thought-provoking to look at such a phenomenon beyond a didactic, prescriptive attitude towards language. She ignored my Arabic comment. I repeated my response in English, and she immediately flooded me with fervent responses in English. That should have helped her see bilingual’s right to strategically utilize their linguistic resources, as she unconsciously did. However, as Eastern societies discourage students from challenging the authorial voice no matter how uninformed it is, it was hard to propose new ideas to a supposedly highly intellectual Arab professor specialized in language (you might want to refer to my “Articles on Arabic Sociolinguistics: Discovering the Unusual in the So Usual” blog post for more details on the obstacles posed by such an issue). Here’s her response:

This indignant response to mere suggestions of deconstructing socially constructed linguistic restrictions was not only elicited by the taboo of challenging the traditional authorial voice of the professor that represents a large academic and governmental institution but also by the collective nature of Arab societies. The internal perspective exudes an individualistic ideology, which might not make it easily applicable in the Arab context. Nevertheless, the relatively long and common individualistic experience in the U.S. (which lasted for 8 years in the case of the interviewer and over 10 in the case of the interviewee) might have helped the two Arab friends feel free and safe to deploy their unique idiolects--without the fear of having the quality of their "Arabic” judged. An individualistic language ideology would, expectedly, be discouraged in a fully Arab, Muslim, and monarchical context--like that of the professor--since it could pose a threat to the collective, just-follow-the-crowd mentality that makes it easier for political and religious hegemonies to lead and prevail.

Conclusion

The internal and external perspectives provide different angles for looking at the situation of bilingualism among speakers of Arabic, as evident in the analysis above. I think that both these perspectives are valuable since they guide us to multi-faceted conclusions that compliment our understanding of the different linguistic moves in a particular conversation and their larger social implications. I would rather make the best of what each perspective can theoretically offer, rather than rely on one of them fully, for each of them is still questionable: for instance, the external approach still needs more experiments using naturally occurring data to answer further questions, such as: how far should shared lexical items, for example, overlap to trigger code switching? Similarly, the internal approach in Gracia’s et al.’s article makes one wonder: where’s the cognitive framework that proves that internally a speaker mentally and psychologically utilizes different languages, learned at different times and bound with different cultures and memories, as one repertoire rather than disparate socially constructed named languages? Does that always happen? Is there enough empirically supported literature shoring that claim up? Also, the writers claim that named languages are social constructs while idiolects are not: they are merely lexical and structural constructs (303, 2015). However, I think this point demands further revision and research since many bilingual speakers, myself included, think that their linguistic repertoires are almost equally a social construct: they went through social experiences at home and school that molded their idiolects by, for instance, adding certain words to them rather than others or by providing their tacit linguistic rules, e.g. when to say something and how, and when not to say it. These points of objection, nonetheless, should not blunt our appreciation for some of the valid concepts that these perspectives shed light on, such as the understanding of how--as far as proved in current literature--different languages can trigger certain discursive practices or the advocacy for bilinguals’ right not to have their benign unconventional linguistic practices demeaned.

References
Bot, Kees, Isurin, Ludmila, Donald, and Winford de, eds. “Sources of triggering in code switching.” Multidisciplinary Approaches to Code Switching. Amsterdam, NLD: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2009. ProQuest ebrary. Web. 30 March 2016.

García, O., Otheguy, R. & Reid, W. (2015). “Clarifying translanguaging and deconstructing named languages: A perspective from linguistics.” Applied Linguistics

Review 6(3): 281-307.