There is a new trend in Saudi online communities in which the use of Franco-Arabic, or Arabish is heavily visible. The trend started in the mid 1990s when cellphones were not equipped with Arabic characters and people had to send text messages to each other using only Latin characters. Below are some examples of how the Latin characters are used to accommodate the Arabic sounds. You will see the Arabic character, the Latin character used in chat, IPA transcription, and the formal transcription respectively.
| ع | 3 | /ʕ/ | ‘ |
| غ | gh , 3' , 8 | /ɣ ~ ʁ/ | gh |
| ح | 7 | /ħ/ | h , H |
| خ | kh , 5 , 7' | /x ~ χ/ | kh |
| ص | s , 9 | /sˁ ~ s/ | s , S |
One example where code meshing is used is this short passage of a college student describing a the first day in college.
"So today kan awal youm adawem feh aljma3a ok .. New term, new classes new teachers and new 8a3at, o ana 6ab3an i don't know fen 8a3aty, so i go to the secritary and ask her where to go or 3ala al-a8l to give me the paper that have the names and stuff.. i knock the door and what do i find inside, 4 women sitting laughing and having coffee ya3ny jalsa 7elwa ketha, i'm at the door leya sa3a o m7d ye3brny, so then i say be kol bara2ah " lao sm7ty " .... " lao sam7ty " .. after 10 mins sob7aaan allah she saw me o radet"".
The problem is with such model is that only "online-savvy" people could understand it. Plus this type of communication is not recognized by official and is often seen as "polluting" the Arabic language. In a Saudi context this kind of language will not be endorsed by the policy makers of the Saudi Ministry of Education.
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