Talk:ج

It's asserted in the article that you can pronounciate "ج" as "ʒ" when you recite the quran. it's pronunciated only as "dʒ" as you recite quran, as i know.

Pronunciation in Quran recitation

It is not "dʒ" as far as I know: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGnlk9jLsrc

"Most" standard pronunciation

@Benwing2, Wikitiki89, Stephen G. Brown Is there "the most" standard modern pronunciation of the letter (in most cases, not when it's irregular), if it's appropriate. Al-Jazeera mostly uses [dʒ] and other TV and radio channels, as far as I can tell but I know that in Israel and Palestine, in official recordings [ʒ] is used. (I heard it from a Palestinian moderator on an Arabic discussion forum). Does it merit a note? Will it be discriminating against other varieties (if they are considered standard)? --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:11, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri Please comment as well, if you wish. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:12, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

As it stands now, the article implies that any pronunciation is OK, just pick a region. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:14, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

In most of Algeria, Iraq, and most of the Arabian Peninsula, it is [dʒ]. (I consider the Iraqi pronunciation to be the best for MSA.)

In Gulf Arabic, it is [dʒ], sometimes reduced to [ʒ].

In most of the Levant and northwest Africa, it is [ʒ].

In some parts of Sudan and Yemen, it is [ɟ].

In Egypt and most of Yemen, it is [ɡ].

The Bedouins pronounce a palatalized [ɡʲ]. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:05, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

@Atitarev, Wikitiki89, Stephen G. Brown I think it's reasonable to mention what you noted above about Al-Jazeera and other TV and radio stations using [dʒ]; AFAIK this is considered the most standard for MSA, to the extent there is a standard. Benwing2 (talk) 12:06, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Correct and there are no implications. Any pronunciation is correct. In Egypt as an example, [ɡ] is the standard that even southerners try to follow, pronouncing Literary Arabic. But, who added the [j] pronunciation? This pronunciation isn't spelled with ج for those who pronounce the cognates as such. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 08:07, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

Benwing2, when the pronunciation diverges significantly from what is used by Arabic letters and when there are other Arabic letters that express that pronunciation, the other letter is used to spell the word in dialects. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 08:12, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri: You added that all speakers who pronounce it [d͡ʒ] geminate it as [ʒʒ]. This seems very doubtful to me. I have certainly heard [dd͡ʒ] and have always thought it was the norm. Perhaps there are speakers to geminate [d͡ʒ] as [ʒʒ], but it can't be all of them. --WikiTiki89 22:35, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I've certainly heard حَجّ (ḥajj) mostly with [dd͡ʒ]. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 22:45, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Doesn't [ɡ] also apply to Sudan as well? --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 22:48, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Wikitiki89, the [ʒʒ] pronunciation seems quite doubtful to me as well. Benwing2 (talk) 23:30, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri: BTW for some reason I didn't get your ping. Benwing2 (talk) 23:32, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

• Geminated to [ddʒ] by whom? Certainly non-Arabic speakers. I've never in my life heard of a non-foreigner who pronounced it the Italian way for formaggio. You also have to understand that to the Arabic speaking ear, [ddʒ] sounds like دج.
• The Sudanese pronunciation is very complicated. It has many allophones and [ɡ] is one of them. Others are [ɟ~ɟ͡ʝ].

--Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:00, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri Are you sure you're not thinking of speakers whose normal pronunciation of ج is [ʒ]? I have a hard time believing that it's possible to make generalizations like to the Arabic speaking ear, [ddʒ] sounds like دج because there are so many different Arabic varieties. This sounds like an observation you are making based on personal experience. I imagine a Saudi whose native pronunciation of ج is [dʒ] might feel differently. Benwing2 (talk) 06:10, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Maybe it's weird to you, but not weird to the many local peoples who speak Arabic. We all have no citation to this, but I'm sure you won't find any reference disproving this fact. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:21, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri In the first seconds of this video I hear two occurrences of a geminated ج. I can hear [d͡ʒː]. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 07:14, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

@Mahmudmasri, Benwing2, Wikitiki89 Further, regarding my message about Qur'an recitations:

Please listen to [1], open "22) Al-Ĥaj", locate the line:

وَأَذِّنْ فِي ٱلنَّاسِ بِٱلْحَجِّ يَأْتُوكَ رِجَالًا وَعَلَى كُلِّ ضَامِر ٍ يَأْتِينَ مِنْ كُلِّ فَجٍّ عَمِيق (waʔaḏḏin fī n-nāsi bi-l-ḥajji yaʔtūka rijālan waʕalā kulli ḍāmir in yaʔtīna min kulli fajjin ʕamīq). There's an audio recording next to it. The occurrences of jīm with šadda - "بِالْحَجِّ" and "فَجٍّ" are both pronounced with a clear [d͡ʒː], IMO. (I've added some extra diacritics to fully automate the transliteration).--Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 11:25, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Let's not use the [ː] symbol as it is very unspecific. Do you mean you hear [ddʒ] or [dʒʒ]? --WikiTiki89 15:30, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

My point was, it's a geminated [d͡ʒ], not [ʒʒ] as claimed by Mahmud. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 20:22, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

That's exactly my point. You are being very unspecific. The whole debate here is "What is a geminated [d͡ʒ]?" And you are basically saying "A geminated [d͡ʒ] is a geminated [d͡ʒ]." Gemination has a different meaning for fricatives and for stops. For fricatives, the duration of the fricative is simply longer (and it is possibly more forceful). For stops, the pressure is built up for a longer duration before the release (and thus the release is also more forceful). Thus, affricates, which are just the combination of a plosive and a fricative, don't have a well-defined meaning for gemination, because either the pressure is built up longer before the release of the plosive part ([ddʒ]), or the duration of the fricative part is longer ([dʒʒ]), or perhaps both ([ddʒʒ]). It is also possible that for some speakers the plosive part disappears, while the fricative part has a longer duration ([ʒʒ]). So just saying "geminated [d͡ʒ]" is rather meaningless if it is not already known which of these it would be referring to. --WikiTiki89 20:56, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Is it really the whole point of this debate? I was referring to Mahmud's comment about [ʒʒ], the exact representation of the sound is a lesser concern for me. If it is for you, have a listen and make your judgement. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 21:23, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Ok, I will take your comment as simply saying that it is not [ʒʒ]. I didn't mean to be argumentative or anything, I just wanted to know which one of them you hear and also to point out that technically [d͡ʒː] refers to [d͡ʒʒ] (or I think so, at least). I certainly hear [dd͡ʒ]. --WikiTiki89 21:43, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

I can't listen again in a while, so I'll leave it up to you to decide on how to represent the geminate "ج" as the most common (?) or preferred (?) pronunciation in MSA. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 21:48, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

• Anatoli T., thanks for the video. I clearly heard it as [d.d͡ʒ] in الحجة in the video and the other link in الحج.
• Commenting on how to transcribe it in IPA for this pronunciation, it should be [dd͡ʒ, d.d͡ʒ, ddʒ, d.dʒ] without using the length mark, since there are two syllables. The same applies to other pronunciations [ɡɡ, ɡ.ɡ, ʒʒ, ʒ.ʒ]... --Mahmudmasri (talk) 23:27, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Use in media (news)

Benwing2's revert claiming that Egypt is just a case. I can't write a lengthy description in the summary! Well, every region follows its tradition. A Lebanese news channel would follow the [ʒ] pronunciation, a Qatari channel as Aljazeera would follow the [dʒ~ʒ] pronunciation, an Egyptian news channel would follow the [ɡ] pronunciation. It's never different from the national tradition.

The majority of Arabic speakers don't normally consider [dʒ] to be different from [ʒ]. These two pronunciations are called تعطيش /taʕˈtˤiːʃ/ (in at least Egypt). --Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:16, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

I can believe that radio and TV stations follow national usage. But what do you mean when you say that most Arabic speakers don't distinguish [dʒ] from [ʒ]? Benwing2 (talk) 06:20, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

Because the affricate is sometimes softened to [ʒ] and always geminated as [ʒʒ] (Update: see above), the affricate can't be felt as more than a stronger pronunciation. When Aljazeera and other foreign Arabic speaking news channels choose the /taʕˈtˤiːʃ/, they wouldn't mind you pronouncing either [dʒ] or [ʒ]. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:27, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

I see no reason for your sentence be left. It's normal that you hear English news channels follow a General American accent, if they are American. Not all follow the British accent. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:33, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

If you want to make a note about the choice of the affricate pronunciation, you may note that many western institutions prefer or choose it over other pronunciations. In the Middle East, the choice for the /taʕˈtˤiːʃ/ in Koran was made by Middle Eastern religious institutions as the correct pronunciation because it was the pronunciation of Hejaz region at the time, which was thought to be the closest to the original Arabic pronunciation at the times of the prophet, because it was where he lived, and to not recite the Koran differently regionally. --Mahmudmasri (talk) 06:50, 15 December 2015 (UTC)