The Curious Case of يدغدغ

يدغدغ

ydaghdagh

As I was discussing Arabic grammar over some Stellas with friends the other day (before you think to yourself ‘wow this girl is a total nerd’: 99% of you have done this before. do not lie.), I said that during my year with CASA I discovered a love for words with 4 letter roots in Arabic, like يهمهم and يوشوش (both onomatopoeias for whispering) as well as يدغدغ (MSA for ‘to tickle.’ not entirely sure how this came up in a graduate level Arabic class, but. you know.). Then my friends informed me that in Egyptian, يدغدغ means ‘to smash’ as in ‘I’m going to smash your head in.’ Probably something you wouldn’t say in an actual fight, but definitely lies within the realm of siblings threatening to beat each other up.

Via arabicproblems.tumblr.com

    Via arabicproblems.tumblr.com

So what is the takeaway here? LEARN. DIALECT. Imagine yourself telling a small child that you’re going to tickle them and watching them burst into tears BECAUSE THEY THINK YOU’RE GOING TO SMASH THEM. Obviously you won’t get it right all the time, and learning a dialect is process, but don’t be the guy that says ‘I’m only interested in learning MSA because I just don’t have the time to learn amiyya.’ Because what you’re really saying is: ‘I can’t be bothered to learn how to interact with actual human beings. I would rather bury my head in books and listen to speeches and watch the news. Oh, and I also suck.’

If you’re interested in learning the basics of any dialect of Arabic, you’d be wise to start here or here.