The Permutative of Self-Correction in Arabic: Terminological Evolution and Typological Reorganisation

Abstract

This article examines the last class of Arabic permutatives (badal), which is often set apart by the grammarians themselves, since it usually involves the speaker correcting himself after having made an unintended mistake, in short, a slip of the tongue. As most Arabic grammars written by Western scholars are almost entirely silent on this topic, it is necessary to turn to the medieval Arabic grammarians. There, however, the data vary considerably from one author to another, which made it essential to consult as many sources as possible in order to grasp the question comprehensively. This reveals that the limitation of the number of subtypes of this permutative to three appears to mark a confinement of the Arabic grammatical tradition within the framework of Sībawayhi’s text (d. 180/796?). One then realises that the taxonomy adopted for the hyperonym most often passes over in silence the essential feature of this type of permutative—namely, retraction—on the grounds that it has usually been understood merely as a hyponym within the category. Finally, although in certain cases, but only in some, it is possible to relate this type of permutative to the notion of abrogation (here, of the permuted term, mubdal min-hu), such abrogation is by no means necessary, since some grammarians emphasise the continued presence of both the permuted term and the permutative. The phenomenon, in fact, rests upon a continuum of intentionality, which may apply to the permutative alone, or jointly to the permutative and the permuted term, or even to both together and to the relation that unites them. All this, while once again showing to what extent at least some medieval grammarians were far from tone-deaf, and how central pragmatic awareness was to their approach, thus calls for a revision of how we envisage this category. It reminds us of the existence of a double retraction, depending on whether or not it is abrogative, which in turn makes it possible to propose a new presentation of this category, too easily and too hastily labelled badal al-ġalaṭ.