There is a huge gap between Arabic and western culture. "Sociocultural influences on swearing vary from culture to culture and take some time and experience within a culture to be fully appreciated"
( Jay and Janschewitz 2008: 272). In addition, the sensitivity of this topic
prompts the researcher to avoid inappropriate and cussing words in swearing and choose what is appropriate for Jordanian culture. The difference between the two cultures explains why we can't get full benefit of foreign resources. Furthermore, the interest of Arab linguists in this topic is very little and the studies have a limited concern.
2.2. Arabic Studies
Swearing is widely used in Arabic culture whether intentionally or unintentionally. People swear by everything, for anything and on any occasion. In the pre-Islamic period, people used to swear by their fathers, tribes, worldly objects, swords, idols and everything except Allah. After the advent of Islam and revelation of Glorious Qur'an, swearing by such things became prohibited acts and type of profanity.
Therefore, the Glorious Qur'an and Al-Hadeeth warn people not to swear by anything except by Allah. On the one hand, God says (فلا تجعلوا لله اندادا وأنتم تعلمون) (البقرة:22) then set not up rivals unto Allah when ye know (the truth)(Al-Baqarah: 22). On the other hand, God uses swear words many times in the Glorious Qur'an. He swears by Himself, the Sun, the Moon, Heavens (e.g. warrabbu issamawat wal? rdh, by the God of heavens and Earth), Earth, the holy city of Mecca.
Moreover, our prophet Mohammad (peace and praise be upon him) urges us to avoid swearing by anything except the name of Allah. The prophet also adds (لا تحلفوا بآبائكم ولا بأمهاتكم ولا بالأنداد، ولا تحلفوا بالله إلا وأنتم صادقون) (سنن ابي داوود, كتاب الايمان والنذور: باب في كراهية الحلف بالآباء).
Don't swear by your fathers and your mothers then swear not the rivals, and don't swear by Allah except when you are sincere. (Sunan Al-Termi'thi).
Abedel-Jawad (2000) has carried out a linguistic, sociopragmatic and cultural study on swearing in Arabic, especially Jordanian Arabic.
In his study, he divides swearing into three main types: judiciary oaths which are formally practiced at courts, constitutional or office oaths which are taken by senior officials and conversational oaths (CS). This is the type of swearing uttered by people in everyday life and in routine
interactions between interlocutors. The first two types have fixed patterns and occur in particular situations, they are legally connected.
Abedel-Jawad (2000) focuses on the third type namely; conversational swearing (CS). He analyzes the structure of (CS), the (CS) referents e.g. what is sworn by, and their sociocultural and ideological significance, discourse distribution of (CS) showing speech acts that (CS) performs and the communicative function of (CS) serves in each situation. Furthermore, he characterizes conversational swearing as follows:
1. CS is not legally binding when a swearer breaks his oath.
2. It is linguistically varied and occurs in a wide variety not only on divine deity but also on multiplicity of swearing objects and different entities.
3. CS is not limited to particular domains, context or events. Moreover, it's used by most people to perform many types of
speech acts.
Abdedel-Jawad (2000:238) emphasizes that "swearing is done basically to confirm a proposition, of whatever type, then we can assume that there is a presupposed doubt or suspicion or fear in the mind of the speaker that his interlocutors may not believe him or take what he is saying seriously". For instance, someone asked his friend (ween roħet imabareħ) where did you go yesterday? He replied (wallahi imbarħ roħet ؟ajjam؟ah, by Allah, I went to the university). The use of the swear word (wallhi, by Allah) confirms the proposition, and saves the speaker's face.
Abedel-Jawad, (2000:238) emphasizes that intonation of swearing is very expressive. The interlocutors try to raise their own voices to achieve different functions such as threatening and persuading something. For example, friends in a restaurant may exchange swear words or oaths and raise their voices to be more persuasive and get the honor of paying for the food.
The finding of his study exhibits different degrees of variation in form, usage and function of the swearing. Moreover, it serves different linguistic functions depending upon the context and the culture within the same community.
Almutlaq (2013) presents two factors that mostly affect using swear words in colloquial Jordanian Arabic.
1. Religious commitment. People who follow the instructions of Allah try to avoid swering by anything except Allah.
2. Education. Well-educated people avoid using inappropriate terms such as (wiʃaraf ummi, by the honor of my mother).
Almutlaq (2013) proposes that some swearwords are connected with social values. For example, if one swears by his mustache and doesn't accomplish what he swears for, he will shave it. This considers a taboo since mustache represents a high social value of manhood. Another term which can cause a social problem is swearing by divorce. If the swearer does not do what he swears for, he may divorce his wife, causing a social problem.
Aliakbari and et al (2013) have conducted a study to investigate the nature of swearing expressions in Persian. The data were collected from daily conversations and divided into different sub-categories. Most of these data such as swearing by Allah, holly times, parts of body, the prophet and relatives show a great degree of similarities with the taxonomies provided by Abedel-Jawad (2000).
Additionally, they go along with Abedel-Jawad (2000) by saying that the similarities of swearing patterns in both cultures are originally religious in nature. They have added that the expansion and the presence of loan Arabic swearwords among Iranian swear words (بالله, by Allah) and, وغروب الغاربين), by the sunset of those who have been departed from their hometown) show" the footprints of cultural and lingual relations of one or both sides of an interaction" (Aliakbari and et al 2013: 56).
In standard Arabic, the swearing structure is divided into three parts:
First, swearing particles ( waw alqasam, ba'a alqasam and ta'a alqasam) walahi, billahi and tallahi.
Second, the nominal swearing which is a type of structure that begins with a name such as ( ؟amr, yameen and ayman).
Third, verbal swearing. This type of structure begins with a verb such as ( uqsem ,ihlaf, qasama).
2.3 History of Swearing
Swearing has a long history of practice; the word "swear" or "swearing" reveals its Christian origin, with the tradition of oath which dates back to the sixth century (Hughes :1998).
Vicens (2014) examines Muslims oaths that are found in Christian legal texts in the medieval and early modern Iberia. His study explains the development of Arabic formula of swearing from the twelfth to sixteenth century. Both Christian and Islamic texts emphasize that Muslims swear by God at that time. Additionally, the study indicates that Muslims in al-Andalus, who followed Maliki tradition, preferred oath formula" bi-l-Lahi llaði la ilaha illa Huwa". (By God, there is no other god but He) (p: 131).
Harris (1987) warns of the possibility of mixing between the history of swearing and the history of swear words. The history of swearing reveals its origin as Christian oaths and curses, with the traditions of swear words in English which date back to the sixth century (Montagu, 1967).In the middle ages, women were criticized for using swear words while men were banned from using swear words in the presence of women (Hughes, 1992:292).
Montagu (1967: 71) states "Like most other human traits, swearing is a learned form of human behavior in cultures and under conditions in which it is encouraged". So, the surrounding environment, situations and interaction among the interlocutors influence the speakers to learn such patterns of swearing. Anderson and Trudgill (1990: 15) argue that language reflects one's values "the sort of swearing that goes on in a particular language may tell you something about the values and beliefs of the speakers". They indicate that swear words are more frequent in informal circumstances than in formal ones.
2.4. Syntax of Swearing
Many linguists have confirmed that swearing and swear words are compatible with certain syntactic conventions. These conventions are as follows:
1. Swear words have different syntactic roles (Anderson and Trudgill, 1990). They can be nouns (wallah al؟ðˤeem), verbs (uqsimu billah), adjectives or adverbs. Some swear words, such as "qassaman" can be used as two or more parts of speech.
2. McMillan (1980) argues that swear words have productive characteristics. They can obtain new syntactic roles and be used to constitute new words or expressions by the processes of infixing and interposing, for example "billah ؟alik" or "sayik ؟alik allah".
3. Swearing serves as force markers such as imperative or interrogative force. For example, (ihlif billah, swear by God) or "Go to hell!"(Ljung, 1989:185).
2.5. Pragmatics of Swearing
Jay (1992), Jay and Janschewitz (2008) demonstrate that swearing is contingent on some pragmatic variables such as speaker's( position, professions, gender and age), contextual factors (e.g. discourse type and the relationship with the interlocutors) and a type of word that is used in imprecation which carries greater or lesser face threat. Therefore, some swear words within a certain social group appear to be offensive or taboo to a person who does not belong to the same group. For example, swear by honor in collegiate community appears to be impolite to a person from another group.
Harris (1987: 187) claims that "swearwords become unmentionable precisely because institutionalized swearing is the unique and marginal case where locution and illocution are one: the utterance is the indeed and the indeed is utterance."
Smith (1998:168) studies the social meaning of swearing in Russia. He states "much of the meaning of swearing depends upon context, upon the shared values and social intuitions of the speaker and addressee." Swearing is controlled by situation, context and the relationships between people. For example, what is acceptable or appropriate in a particular situation becomes unacceptable or inappropriate in a different one.