Culturally Speaking

[jmfargo]

According to what we have learned in Arabic 105, meeting somebody for the first time requires a lot of what I would almost consider "filler" speech. I know we do this in America as well, but usually the filler is quick and simple, "That's nice," or "Oh, yeah!"

In Arabic countries, a typical introductory greeting between two people could go like this:

John: Good morning to you!
Mike: And good morning to you, as well!
John: My name is John.
Mike: My name is Mike.
John: Nice to meet you!
Mike: Good morning to you!
John: Good morning to you too!
Mike: How are you?
John: Good, thank you, praise God. And you?
Mike: A little tired, praise God. Thank you.
John: I work at the university.
Mike: I'm a librarian.
John: Good morning to you!
Mike: Good morning to you too!
John: It was nice to meet you. I have a meeting, may I go?
Mike: Of course, go. Nice to meet you.
John: Goodbye.
Mike: Goodbye.

The literal translation would be different, but you're saying the exact same thing after every bit of introductory information. The "Good morning to you" translates roughly to a general statement of pleasure at learning something new. It's strange to me.

And there's a LOT of praising God built into the language. For example, if you say you're doing well, but don't say "Al-hum dul-allah" ("praise God"), it is considered strange and possibly rude.

Just thought I'd share.

Comments

[argonel.livejournal.com]

As much as you can separate language and culture is the praising of god part of the language or is it "just" a cultural issue. I.E. is it required to be grammitically correct or is on so ingrained in the culture that it sounds unnatural to leave it out.
Considering that languages don't exist in a vacuum it can be interesting to see what cultural baggage comes along for the ride.

[jfargo.livejournal.com]

In this case, you can leave it out and it would just be rude, not incorrect. In some other cases it's built in. For example: "in sha-allah" Roughly translated it means "If God wills it," but it means sort of "With any luck" or "I hope."