Segmental Phonemes of Kubeisa Iraqi Arabic with Reference to Standard English

Abstract

This study examines one of the Iraqi dialects “spoken in the town of Kubeisa in the west of Iraq. It conducts a phonological analysis for phonemes in isolation with reference to Standard English (SE). This study examines one of the Iraqi dialects” spoken in the town of Kubeisa in the west of Iraq. It conducts a phonological analysis for phonemes in isolation. In the present study, a phonological analysis of the segmental phonemes of KIA with reference to SE was conducted using an explanatory qualitative approach, and qualitative data were collected and analyzed in this context. The basic picture needs to be clarified, expanded upon, or explained through qualitative data collection. An explanatory study aims to provide an explanation and rationale for the descriptive data. In the present study, the researcher uses judgment sampling to select the informants from the Kubiesa community. The participants who are involved have different educational backgrounds, namely, naive speakers, half- educated speakers, and educated speakers. The present study involves several procedures for data analysis. First, descriptive analysis will be used to present the results of qualitative data obtained from instruments which are mentioned before. Second, thematic analysis will be used to present qualitative data obtained from a semi structure and follow up interviews. In analysis of data, the model adopted is Roach (2009). This model is the forerunner in establishing the classification and description of Segmental Phonemes which are adopted in this study. Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) is also referred to when required to help in the analysis of the utterances chosen to be analyzed from KIA data depending on the data collected from native speakers of KIA.