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Authors: Rahima Akbar, Hanan Taqi, Taiba Sadeq
Keywords: Arabizi, Kuwait, non-standard variety, social media, status/solidarity, English schools, public schools
Abstract: In an era, where social media has globally invaded every household, a group of young Kuwaitis has almost replaced traditional communicative styles with an overwhelmingly fast pace innovative writing style called Arabizi, a process of using non-standard roman letters to write Arabic scripts. This study investigates the prevalence of Arabizi amongst young Kuwaitis who are the product of two different educational and linguistic settings, public schools and English-private schools. It also sheds light on the views associated with the practice along with the two sociolinguistic facets of status/solidarity. The study employs a mixed-method design that combines two data collection tools; a digital questionnaire followed by WhatsApp group discussions to resolve ambiguities revealed through the quantitative data. Our findings suggest the existence of two nonstandard language varieties that work side by side with standard Arabic: Kuwaiti dialect and Arabizi, both being transliterated on social media platforms. Despite Arabizi’s extreme non-standardness, its high vitality amongst its users reflects ‘covert prestige’. Along the solidarity line, young Kuwaitis who have studied in public schools find Arabizi users as losing their national identity, less fun to be around and most importantly, losing their gender identity. The study concludes that attitudes around Arabizi script shift drastically according to schooling and social settings. The findings also imply that Kuwait is developing a new social structure whereby Arabizi would be more integrated into the nation’s profile, with a likelihood of the community undergoing a future linguistic shift.