Friday, January 19, 2007
2al w Golna
Another unfamiliar thing I noticed during my visits to Jordan was that in some families the members of the same family speak two different accents. The males speak in "gal w golna" while the females speak the "2al w 2olna" accent. And when I asked about the reason the answer was that the "2al w 2olna" is more like a feminine or nawa3em accent that doesn't suit men, while the "gal w golna" is too masculine for a female to speak!
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19 comments:
The gal,2al,is not females and males it is what part of the country you come from,or the family,for me it is gal,my wife and kids 2al.
yes, 2al is for girls..
i, my sisters and my brothers use 2al w a5awatoha.. the other day i discovered that my brother uses gal w e5wanoho when speaking with his friends :s.. i couldnt help but afda7oh lol.. he feels shy or embarrassed using 2al 2al sho! ma a7lani w ana ga3ed atdalla3 :D
monafeq :D
I agree with Loza. it is more of the degree of toughness you want to be known for.
I've always noticed that..I myself use the G..although my father's side of the family doesn't..my mother's side does.
Its probably some kind of identity crisis..and still it's an evolution of identity..an understanding that since it's not manly enough for men to use 2al..and not feminine enough for women to use Gal..we collectively agreed in our social psyche to have gendered accents.
As long and complicated as it looks and sounds..it's actually simple, since Jordan is a melting pot of sorts..and by the way..the occasional use of Gal by females is quite cool..gives a weird sign of confidence..!
Diana..so you ended up not kissing the dude's hand, hmmm...I can almost hear the "Godfather" theme play in the background!
I use "2al", we all use 2al in our family (and in our village)
7asab elman6eqa ele jay mnha, ma b3rf kef 3ndko :shy:
All of you don't already know that "2al" is for people living the cities while everything else is for the farmers, Bedouins ...etc
(Gal, Kal, Chal Qal)
I for one, use 2al, and proud of it any my hiritage. Males who vibrate between the two really have some things to sort out with themselves.
For a long time this was a way to distinguish Jordanian from Palestinian. But I doubt it's the case anymore
2al: Originally by (cities dwellers)of palestine.
Kal:Originally by (village dwellers)of Palestine.
Gal: All Jordanians, Palestinians from Ghaza And Haifa.
I talk to my mother with Kal, my male friends with gal. My girl friends with 2al. You know what i see this as a cultural uncertainty. Or maybe it's a part of a natural evolution of a language.
he el sha3'leh y3ni bel 3a2el! fe shabab lahjet el 2a 3ndhom mai3a! y3ni msh 2a 3adeyyeh! hon betseer el ossa osset toughness I guess :P
bs ho kol wa7ad 7or b taree2et 7akyo o ma betdel wala 3ala eshe eza kanat 6abe3eyyeh (Q K G normal "2a")
el mohem tosal el fekra ma e7na aslan kolna 3'alat .. msh fos7a I mean lol
my mom speaks with 2al, and my dad with Qal. When i was a kid i used to tell my mom: mama yalla 2OOMI 3al '3ada, and tell my dad: baba yalla QOOM 3al '3ada.
as for me i use 2a but there are words you should use ga, l2ano bta36e ma3na aGwa :p
yet we don't feel there are a big difference between us in Jordan but try to think of this
Couple of days ago I had discussion with a friend of mine who's 46+ years old and who was born and lived for a while in Palestinian, I was asking him
"Palestine is just a small country with relatively small populations but every and each village even within the same city has its own accent, Khalil, Kada khalil, Nablus, Kada nablus and list goes on, Why did this happen in Palestine but not in any other country ?
In Jordan (While we are close to Palestine even in some families roots) it is very easy to tell who's from South , north or Ammanies and you cannot smell the difference in accent between people within geographical area, maybe Amman is the only exception here just because it has many accents and people from everywhere but in other cities this isn't the case."
weeee5!!
thats a problem, 5sosan awal marra a36e worshop be gaza, and iam an " 2al we 2olna " guy...so it was a strange experience..bas 3ala meen iam too old to change we eishi tani malha el 2al :P
Noooooooooooo
msh haik el gossa !!
el mawdoo3 kan zaman befre2 iza el wa7ad jai mn madeene aw qaryeh!! halla2 kolshi e5talaf!!
el wa7ad be7ki 7asab ma howwe met3awwed ye7ki fl bait!!
I speak "2al w 2olna" because I used to speak this way at home, and I can't change it!! iza ba7ki gal w golna bebayyen ma5wate o betla3 mostana3 :S
ma3 ennu im from ya3bad, a village that speaks "Qal o Qolna" like the rest of jenin's villages ! bas I can't change my accent now!! betla3 fee eshi '3alat
lool
well, did u hear
w2e3 al Galm
or weGe3 al 2earsh
i use it 7asab who next to me ..
even most of Time its ( G ) even am Shami(Syrian) but some times it's better in talk and understand in Jordan ...
bs in general i talk like the other part talked to me
I love the original Palestinian accent of the villagers and try to imitate it.. I hear it from my friends specially those from the west bank (Kalkeelya,Jenin,..) or 1948 occupied lands (Tayba, Jaleel,..) it's like a mix between kal and gal...), my grandpa would say :"Agk3od" :),.. very nice dialect... 2al wa 2olna is for families from cities like Yafa, Jerusalem,...this is for Palestine. But for the Lebanese, I love their accent (females only), but for males I feel the Lebanese dialect is too feminine (anyone agrees?).. but among all, nothing compared to the sweetness and "khefet dam" al Egyptians and their dialects.
Yeah! just like everyone is saying, except that the female-male stuff is a big mistake, the story has nothing to do with masculinity and toughness, the idea of the 2al being a softer accent is simply a reaction from rural Palestinians to the way urban inhabitants of the Palestinian cities used to look down at them. Until this very day, like every other part in the universe, urban Palestinian consider themselves better than the rural people and had often undermined them in every possible way, the only thing that the villagers saw was that their lives were much tougher (painful) than those in the city, and started to concentrate on this idea. The same thing happened in Amman when it was inhabited by urban merchants coming majorly from Khalil, Nablus, Jerusalem, and Yafa who interacted with a majority of Bedouins and Bedouin-like Jordanians and repeated the same story, hence Jordanians also created the same reaction and the toughness-softness idea started to become more famous.
The new generations today in Amman has nothing to do with this, they repeat what they hear from their parents, who are either influenced by their fathers or by the environment they grow up within, an originally urban kid might create a Bedouin accent depending on his school and the neighborhood kids.
Now, obviously, rural Palestinians were much modernized and open-minded than non-urban Palestinians and Jordanians in Amman, these stuff attracts females more than males of course, therefore, the majority of females of non-urban origins tried to adopt this new accent as a sign of being "modernized" more than males did, therefore, amongst non-urban families inside Amman, it has become the norm that females use 2al, and males use Gal.
That is true. I think men are better off using Gal and Golna, and women are better off using 2al and 2olna :D
I love your new look ;)
Interesting!
thank you all for your inputs.
I agree that the accent has nothing to do with toughness and masculinity. and i find it odd for a man who speaks the 2al accent to feel ashamed of it and speak in gal so that people don't make fun of him!
I also know girls who speak the "gal" accent and this doesn't affect their femininity.
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