Interesting Pausal Forms in the Speech of Muslims and Christians in Kufᵘr-Kanna

The aim of this paper is to describe the system of vocalic variants in pause pertaining to speakers of Arabic in Kufᵘr-Kanna (AKK) and in this regard to determine the features that characterize the AKK. As in Nazareth, the incidence of pauses in AKK varies and depends on the content, the listener and the speaker’s intentions. In AKK I detected pausal forms in the speech of middle-aged and elderly Muslims and elderly Christians. In addition to changes in consonants and vowel quality in their speech, in pausal position final syllables also undergo other modifications as compared to the contextual forms. Unlike in Nazareth, four further types were identified in AKK: (1) lengthening of short vowels in final position: ‑Cv > ‑Cv̄#, -CvC > -Cv̄C#; lengthening of normal and anaptyctic short vowels in final closed syllables: -CvC#; (2) devoicing of voiced consonants in word-final position; (3) glottalization after con­sonants and vowels in word-final position; and (4) aspiration: addition of (h) in pausal position where the word ends in long vowels. Key words: Arabic dialects – Pausal forms – Syllables – Long vowels – Short vowels – Christians and Muslims.