Ajami in West Africa

Souag, Lameen

Abstract

West Africans throughout the region have creatively adapted the Arabic script to write non-Arabic languages, a form of literacy known as Ajami which remains widespread today despite little or no government support. The variety of methods used to extend the Arabic script to fit other phonological systems are of particular interest: methods that appear unmotivated from a purely linguistic perspective can readily be explained as rational adaptations to the parallel educational system in which Ajami is typically learned, an issue often not taken into account in orthography planning.

Citation

Souag, L. (2010). Ajami in West Africa. Afrikanistik online, 2010,

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2010
• Deposit Date: Mar 19, 2012
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 11, 2025
• Journal: Afrikanistik online
• Electronic ISSN: 1860-7462
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 2010
• Keywords: Arabic, West Africa, Sahel, Ajami, orthography development, literacy, writing systems
• Publisher URL: http://www.afrikanistik-online.de/archiv/2010/2957
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