| Maghrebi Arabic (Arabic: الْلهجَة الْمَغاربِيَة, Western Arabic; as opposed to Eastern or Mashriqi Arabic) is a vernacular Arabic dialect continuum spoken in the Maghreb—western Islamic Africa and, in the past, Islamic Iberia and Sicily. It includes Moroccan, Algerian, Tunisian, Libyan, Hassaniya, Maltese, and, previously, Andalusi and Siculo-Arabic. It is known locally as ad-Dārija (Arabic: الدارجة; meaning "common or everyday dialect"). This serves to differentiate the spoken vernacular from Standard Arabic. Maghrebi Arabic has a predominantly Semitic and Arabic vocabulary, although it contains a few Berber loanwords which represent 2–3% of the vocabulary of Libyan Arabic, 8–9% of Algerian and Tunisian Arabic, and 10–15% of Moroccan Arabic. The Maltese language is believed to have its source in a language spoken in Muslim Sicily that ultimately originates from Tunisia, as it contains some typical Maghrebi Arabic areal characteristics. |
