This study examines the morpho-syntax of labile anticausative structures in Jordanian Arabic (JA). Although the transitive counterpart of anticausatives is marked via morphological affixes that reflect structural and lexical components in Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic, a number of verbs involving causative alternation exhibit identical forms in JA (e.g., ġala [+T] ‘to CAUSE boil something’ vs ġala [–T] ‘to BECOME boil’). Such variation poses challenges for mapping between verb morphology and its lexical semantics. To handle such variation, which is also observed cross-linguistically, we argue in favour of Schäfer (2008; 2012), Schäfer & Vivanco (2015), and Ramchand’s (2008) “causer-less” analysis over Koontz-Garboden’s (2009) “reflexive” analysis. This work further assumes the existence of a Voice phrase lacking a specifier (external argument) and assumes that Voice projection is headed by an implied Voice head ( ^v causer) that syntactically assigns the accusative case to its new subject and semantically encodes the internal argument and describes the resultant subevent of the verb. The work also provides an alternative solution for voice projection that lacks an explicit specifier bearing [+agent] or [+causer] feature specification. The work assumes the presence of an inchoative Voice head [ ^v inch] introducing the Spec Voice Phrase, which encodes an inchoative resultant state of an event achieved over its theme. Contrary to Al-Qadi (2015), the present model assumes that such verbs constitute a middle position between transitive and intransitive verbs in JA but do not constitute a separate class of their own. Evidently, the correct characterization of the anticausative subclass distribution is that it surfaces wherever v is transitive as well as in intransitive volitional contexts (a non-natural class). More intriguingly, the presented material suggests that there is an ongoing process of diachronic change in spoken Arabic varieties (including JA) that amounts to the development and expansion of an inchoative class where no external or internal inchoative detransitivizing morphemes are involved. This topic, which incorporates an intriguing diachronic dimension in addition to the syntactic details, is missing from the generative literature on Arabic morpho-syntax and is potentially of sufficient interest to merit investigation.

This study investigates the key forms of address used amongst Jordanian university students, the impact of gender on using these forms and what accounts for the variation in their address system. By addressing the issue of normativity and heterogeneity in the use of address terms, in different social settings, the study enriches the understanding of the internal variation of the address term system. Data collected through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were analysed, based on Watts’ discursive approach to politeness and Agha’s approach of indexicality. The results revealed that the identified normative patterns represent Jordanian university politic behaviours, which index different social meanings and relations among the youth community, in relation to specific social contexts. The most frequent strategies university students use for addressing others are personal names, innovative terms, descriptive phrases, pronouns, titles, teknonyms, and religious, military, attention attractors, as well as a combination of these terms. It also seems that there are no absolute stable patterns of address term usage among the youth community, speaking Jordanian Arabic. Rather, there is an infinite society-internal heterogeneity in the address terms usage. The results also revealed that an intra-group variation signifies social struggles over the norms of address term usage and potentially normative incertitude.

Purpose of Study: This paper evaluated the validity of self-categorization theory (Turner, 1987; Turner & Reynolds, 2011) in predicting the relationship between tentative language use and the prominent power of the speaker’s gender and social status in Jordanian society. Methodology: Eighteen adult Jordanian dyads participated in dyadic conversations. Each dyad consisted of high-status females and low-status males. Before recording their mixed-gender conversations, dyad’s gender; status and national identity were primed one at a time using Palomares’ manipulation method (2004, 2008). One group of dyads read a passage about the patriarchal nature of Arab society, another dyadic group read a passage about the importance of education in obtaining high-level jobs, and a third group read a passage about Jordanians’ patriotism. Results: Results showed that Jordanian high-status women tend to use more tentative language than Jordanian low-status men within and across the three primed contexts: gender-salient, status-salient and national- identity-salient contexts. Findings are inconsistent with the prediction of the self-categorization theory. The discrepancies between these findings and the outcomes of the Western research were ascribed to the patriarchic and gender-segregated nature of Jordanian society. Implications: This paper concluded that sociolinguistic practices are not universal. Research on language and gender should take socio-cultural peculiarities into account to reach a comprehensive view of how social power is communicated through language. Novelty/Originality of this study: This study emphasizes the role of socio-cultural practices in determining the relationship between speech style and the prominent power of the speaker's gender and social status. In Arab Jordanian society, tentative language is mainly gender-based language; less influenced by social identities other than gender.