Liesbeth Zack

Liesbeth Zack is Assistant Professor in Arabic language and linguistics. Her research interests include historical sources of the Egyptian Arabic dialects, Middle Arabic, modern Egyptian Arabic, and Egyptian dialect literature.    
 
She is currently working as a Postdoc at the ACLC on a research project entitled "The making of a capital dialect: Language change in 19th century Cairo", with a Veni grant from NWO (The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research). Read a description of the project here: 

English description of Veni-project

Nederlandse samenvatting Veni-project

Curriculum Vitae

1998, MA (cum laude) from the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The subject of my thesis was an analysis of the Egyptian dialect used by the Egyptian novelist Yusuf al-Qa`id in his novel Laban il`asfur ("The milk of the bird").

1997-2006, Egypt, Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo, Assistant Arabic Studies.

2006-2009, Lecturer of Arabic at the University of Amsterdam.

2009, PhD thesis: Egyptian Arabic in the seventeenth century: a study and edition of Yūsuf al-Maġribī’s "Daf` al-iṣr `an kalām ahl Miṣr.

2009-ongoing, Assistant Professor in Arabic at the University of Amsterdam.

PhD thesis

Dafʿ al-iṣr ʿan kalām ahl Miṣr, “Removing the burden from the speech of the Egyptians”, was written in 1606 by Yūsuf al-Maġribī (d. 1611), and provides its readers with valuable information about the Egyptian dialect used in the 17 th century. The work is unique because it was one of the earliest attempts to study colloquial Arabic. It is a list of Egyptian Arabic words, which al-Maġribī checked for consistency with Classical Arabic. His aim was to prove that many Egyptian dialect terms, which were considered to be “incorrect” Arabic, in fact had their roots in the Classical Arabic language. Al-Maġribī focused on the words used in daily Egyptian life, such as the names of tools and utensils and food and drink, as well as the speech of traders and artisans. These entries are often adorned by anecdotes and lines of colloquial poetry and therefore, provide the reader with insight into the culture and daily life of Egypt in this period. This volume consists of two parts: the first is a study of aspects of daily life, the colloquial poetry, the linguistic characteristics of the dialect of this period, and a glossary of the words which are mentioned byal-Maġribī and the second includes an edition of the Arabic text, based on the autograph.

Lees de Nederlandse samenvatting van het proefschrift.

Publications

Zack, Liesbeth. 2012. “Quenching the thirst for knowledge: An analysis of the colloquial material in al-Xafāğī’s šifā’ al-ġalīl fīmā fī kalām al-‘arab min al-daxīl”. In: P. Sánchez, Á. Vicente and M. Meouak (eds.), De los manuscritos medievales a internet: la presencia del árabe vernáculo en las fuentes escritas. Zaragoza: Universidad de Zaragoza. 193-220.

Zack, Liesbeth and Schippers, Arie (eds.) (forthcoming). Middle Arabic and Mixed Arabic: Diachrony and Synchrony. Leiden: Brill.

Zack, Liesbeth, (2012, forthcoming). “Li‘b al-manār, an Egyptian shadow play. Some comments on orthography, morphology and syntax”. In: Den Heijer, Johannes, La Spisa, Paolo and Tuerlinckx, Laurence (eds.), Autour dela langue arabe. Louvain-la-Neuve: Institut Orientaliste de Louvain.

Woidich, Manfred and Zack, Liesbeth. 2009. "The g/ǧ -question inEgyptian Arabic revisited". In: E. Al-Wer, R.E. de Jong (eds.), Arabic Dialectology: In Honour of Clive Holes on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday. Leiden: Brill. 41-62.

Zack, Liesbeth. 2009. Egyptian Arabic in the seventeenth century:a study and edition of Yūsuf al-Maġribī’s "Daf` al-iṣr `an kalām ahl Miṣr" . Utrecht : LOT. (LOT Dissertation Series; 199)

Zack, Liesbeth. 2008. “Dialect in zeventiende-eeuws Cairo”. In: Zemzem 3/2008. 122-128.

Zack, Liesbeth. 2008. “Vernacular Versus Classical Arabic: A 17th Century Scholar’s View on the Egyptian Arabic Dialect”. In: Grand’Henry and Jerôme Lentin (eds.), Moyen arabe et variétés mixtes de l'arabe à travers l'histoire. Actes duPremier Colloque International (Louvain-la-Neuve, 10-14 mai 2004). Leuven: Uitgeverij Peeters. 489-504.

Zack, Liesbeth. 2004. “Colloquial Arabicin the 17th Century:Yūsuf al-Maġribī’s Egyptian-Arabic Word List”. In: Haak, De Jong en Versteegh (eds.), Approaches to Arabic Dialects: Collection of Articles Presented to Manfred Woidich on the Occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday . Leiden: E.J. Brill. 373-389. (Studies in Semitic Languages and Linguistics; 38)

Zack, Liesbeth. 2001. “The Use of Colloquial Arabic in Prose Literature: Laban ilʿaṣ fūr by Yūsuf al-Qaʿīd”. In: Quaderni di Studi Arabi 19. 193-219.

Zack, Liesbeth. 2001. “Yūsuf al-Maġribī’s Egyptian-Arabic Word List. A Unique Manuscript in the St. Petersburg State University Library”. In: Manuscripta Orientalia 7,3. 46-49.

 

Links

LOT (Landelijke Onderzoekschool Taalwetenschap)

Amsterdam Center for Language and Communication

Nederlands-Vlaams Instituut in Cairo / Netherlands Flemish Institute in Cairo

Leerstoelgroep Arabisch UvA / Department of Arabic Studies

Ondernemingsraad Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen

Nieuws van de Ondernemingsraad

Nederlands Instituut voor Academische Studies Damascus

NWO (The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research)