Tribal Variation of the Pronominal System in Ha'ili Arabic

Abstract

This study examines tribal variation in the pronominal system of Haʾili Arabic (HA), a Northern Najdi variety spoken in the Ha'il region of Saudi Arabia. Although HA is often classified as part of a broader "Northern Najdi" dialect, the region's speech community is shaped by the coexistence of multiple tribal groups alongside sedentary populations. Based on naturalistic speech, sociolinguistic interviews, and elicitation data from 32 speakers representing the Shammar, Sedentary, ʿAnizah and Rashāydah tribes, the study analyzes variation in independent pronouns and bound possessive and object suffixes. The findings show that HA preserves the core morphosyntactic structure of Najdi Arabic while exhibiting systematic variation in the phonological realization of pronominal forms, including vowel quality, affrication, epenthesis, and syllable structure. Shammar and Sedentary varieties display strong structural convergence and retain several conservative features, whereas ʿAnizah and Rashāydah varieties show greater phonological divergence and partial leveling. This study contributes to Arabic dialectology by demonstrating the importance of incorporating socially grounded categories—particularly tribal affiliation—into the analysis of morphosyntactic variation in the Najdi dialect continuum.