Les formations idiomatiques arabes dialectales dans les productions langagières des étudiants de Licence d’Anglais

Abstract

Dialectal Arabic idiomatic formations in the productions of English “Licence” students

This article deals with a practical and experimental question that relates the link between Dialectology and the Teaching of Foreign Languages. This question is none other than the "presence of the Algerian dialect in the English language of the English undergraduate student".
Algerian dialect is a particularly idiomatic and poetic dialect. It is precisely this wealth of expressions and idioms that makes the student of a foreign language (English in our case) recourse to his native dialect when it comes to making an effort and thinking in English. Moreover, he never hesitates to fully translate expressions, idioms, or sentences without wondering if they make sense in English or not.
Rather, it is legitimate for the student to use (generally unconsciously) his dialect, therefore this idiomatic language. However, it is much less legitimate for the teacher to accept an English (half-English, half-Algerian dialect) and which moreover makes no sense. Our interest will focus on this English with an Algerian flavor. We collected a sample of literal translations from the Algerian dialect incorporated into the student's spoken English.
In this article, we confine ourselves to presenting some observations on the use of expressions and idioms of the Algerian dialect literally translated and transferred to English. It is true that one very often finds in the English speaking of the student a flavor of the Algerian dialect. This is mainly due to the fact that the student uses his native dialect to communicate in a language and culture that are totally foreign to him (In our case English). By translating literally as he does, the student transfers expressions and idioms from his own dialect almost mechanically. This mechanical translation seems almost necessary to students of the average level and especially to those of the low level.
We are concerned by a few observations made over ten oral sessions, i.e. during approximately 15 hours of oral language practice (English). We joined Kacem Ben Hamza’s idea stipulating that an appropriate communicative competence for any student requires an understanding followed by an internalization of the linguistic structures, but also of the way in which these are used according to the situations and according to the current norms in the culture of the language. The real and everyday use of language has always depended on extralinguistic considerations.

language has always depended on extralinguistic considerations.