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Published in Encyclopedia of Language and Lingusitics. Second Edition. 2006.

The Language Situation in Morocco Fatima Sadiqi Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University, Fes

Four major languages are used in Morocco: Berber, Standard Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, and French; and two minor ones: Spanish and English. Each one of these languages has a special status in the overall Moroccan ‘linguistic market’. Berber is the oldest language in Morocco1 and indeed North Africa (cf. Ayache 1964, Laroui 1977, Chafik 1982). It is a Hamito-Semitic language (cf. Cohen 1947, Basset 1952, Galand 1960,)2 Three major varieties of Berber are found in Morocco: Tashelhit in the south, Tamazight in the center, and Tarifit in the north. According to the 1994 official statistics, Morocco has 28 million inhabitants, of which 30% speak one of the Berber varieties. However, some linguists state that almost half of the Moroccan population speaks Berber (Boukous 1995, Ennaji 1997, Sadiqi 1997). In September 2004, Berber started to taught in 300 Moroccan primary schools after its codification through its original alphabet: Tifinagh. This initiative was preceded by the creation of the Royal Institute of the Amazigh Culture in October 2001. As for Standard Arabic, it is a ‘modern’ version of Classical Arabic, the language of 1 2

Berber is the oldest language in North Africa. Berber is genetically related to Old Egyptian (Coptic), Kushistic, Chadic, and Semitic.

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the Qur’an and pre-Islamic poetry. Standard Arabic was introduced in Morocco at the end of the seventh and the beginning of the eighth centuries from the East and Islamic Iberia. At the present time, Standard Arabic is the official language of Morocco. It is used in the key formal and powerful domains, namely religion, government, education, and the media. It has great prestige as the ‘language of God’ and as the unifying language at the levels of the Arab world (al-umma al-ςarabiyyah) and the Muslim world (al-umma al-islaamiyyah). It is also a symbol of identity, especially outside Morocco and the Arab world. After Independence, and especially since the 1960s, the policy of language planning in Morocco was characterized by the Arabization of the different socio-cultural sectors, especially the mass media, education and governmental administrations. This Arabization proceeded with varying and debatable success (cf. Grandguillaume 1983). Although Moroccan Arabic (or darija3) shares many linguistic aspects with Standard Arabic, it is structurally different from it as it has simpler morpho-syntax, lexicon, and phonologiy (cf. Ennaji and Sadiqi, forthcoming). Like Berber, Moroccan Arabic is not a homogeneous language in form, as various Moroccan Arabic dialects are spoken in various geographical areas of Morocco. However, unlike Berber, Moroccan Arabic is the lingua franca in Morocco, its wider use reduced the inter-dialect differences and allowed intercomprehensibility between the Moroccan Arabic dialects. Moroccan Arabic is used in family circles, among friends, in commerce, on television, in the theatre, and in the cinema. 3

darija is derived from the Standard Arabic verb daraja which means ‘spread among’ or ‘proceed gradually’.

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French is a second language in Morocco; it is also the country’s window on the West. Five factors contributed to the maintenance of French: (i) Morocco’s economic dependence on France, (ii) social factors (the requirement of French in the job market, especially in the private sector), (iii) historical factors, (iv) immigration, and (v) tourism. It is in the domain of education that French has the most prestige in Morocco. This strong position of French in Morocco has given rise to bilingualism (Arabic/Berber and French) and to code-switching (see Sadiqi 2003). Spanish was introduced in Morocco in the seventeenth century. In spite of 300 years of presence in the country, this language has had much less impact on Moroccan culture than French because has not been used as a means of communication, except in the North by Rifian Berbers and in the Rio de Oro region where it has had some effect (the Spanish did not formally withdraw from the latter region until 1975). Nowadays, the younger generations in the north of Morocco use Spanish less and less. Further, unlike French, Spanish has never been used in the Moroccan administration and its use in the educational system has remained limited. As for English, it was introduced in Morocco during World War II when Americans established military bases on the Moroccan land to link them to battlegrounds in Europe. The presence of English has been greatly enhanced by tourism, the movies, music, and now globalization. The international status of English as the language of science and technology, business, cyberspace, and research even by French educated Moroccans, has also contributed to the spread of English (cf. Sadiqi 1991). Nowadays, English has supplanted Spanish in

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economy and education, and is competing with French in education. It is the fastest growing language in Morocco. The new American style University of Al-Akhawayne has greatly boosted the status of English in Morocco.

References

Ayache, A. 1964. Histoire Ancienne de l'Afrique du Nord. Paris: Editions Sociales Basset, A. 1952. La langue berbère. London: International African Institute. Boukous, A. 1995. Société, langues et cultures au Maroc. Enjeux symboliques. Rabat: Faculté des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines. Chafik, M. 1982. Pour l'élaboration du berbère "classique" à partir du berbère courant. In Actes de la 1ère Rencontre de l'Université d'Eté d'Agadir, pp. 191-197. Cohen, D. 1947. Essai comparatif sur le vocabulaire et la phonétique du chamito-sémitique. Paris: Honoré Champion. Ennajii, M. 2002. “The Major Syntactic Differences Between Standard Arabic and Moroccan Arabic Complex Sentences”, in Aspects of the Dialects of Arabic Today. Rabat: AMAPATRIL Ennaji, M. 1991. Aspects of multilingualism in the Maghreb. In International Journal of the Sociology of Language 87, pp. 7-25. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Ennaji, M. (Ed.) 1997. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 123. New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Galand, L. 1960. Berbère. langue. In Encyclopédie de l'Islam, pp. 1215-1220. Grandguillaume, G. 1983. Arabisation et politique linguistique au Maghreb. Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose. Laroui, A. 1977. Les origines culturelles du nationalisme marocain. Paris: F. Maspero.

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Sadiqi, F. 2002. “The Major Syntactic Differences Between Standard Arabic and Moroccan Arabic Simple Sentences”, in Aspects of the Dialects of Arabic Today. Rabat: AMAPATRIL. Sadiqi, F. 1997a. Grammaire du Berbère. Paris: L'Harmattan. Sadiqi, F. 1997b. The place of Berber in Morocco. In International Journal of the Sociology of Language 123, pp. 7-21. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.