Abstract
This study investigates a special variety of rhetorical questions in colloquial Jordanian Arabic, namely proverbial rhetorical questions: these are rhetorical questions used as proverbs with metaphorical content. Eighty-one instances of PRQs, ethnographically observed in everyday, naturally occurring conversations, were analyzed and their discursive role examined. It was found that PRQs are exploited by the interactants to serve a variety of pragmatic functions, namely invoking common ground in order to convey an opposite point of view, performing ritual impoliteness, performing face-enhancing and face-aggravating acts, evoking humor, and communicating irony. A common thread of these functions is the socioculturally shared presuppositions that underlie these formulaic PRQs and the role that metaphor plays in shaping and communicating messages in social interaction.
Acknowledgements
The author gratefully acknowledges the financial support provided by Jordan University of Science and Technology to conduct this research during the sabbatical year 2012–2013. The author also wishes to thank the Editor, Professor Hubert Cuyckens, and the anonymous reviewers for their most helpful and constructive suggestions and comments on this article.
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Appendix: Proverbial Rhetorical Questions in Colloquial Jordanian Arabic
Yes–no questions
Is the one who crosses the sea unable to cross the lake?
Does the camel look at how long/twisted its neck is?
Did Noah die and entrust you with his posterity?
Have you come to sell water in the neighborhood of water-sellers?
Does the eye become higher than the eyebrow?
Is prayer accepted without the Fātihah?
Does the one who sells his camel regret losing its ears?
Does a dead person come back to life?
Can lies fry eggs?
Does the one who wants to get drunk count the glasses (of wine)?
Does he who sees the moon turn his eyes to stars?
Does a beggar give charity?
Do you want to establish religion in Malta?
Is it a touch of prophet?
(Are you) a beggar and term-setter?
Can a kid goat fool a he-goat?
Do I (look like someone who) wash the dead and guarantee Paradise for them?
Is going into the bathroom like getting out of it?
Is it (like) cucumber and snake cucumber?
Is it (like) selling a bunch of radish?
Can the moon be invisible? (SA)
Can the sun be covered with a sieve?
Does oil mix with water? (SA)
Can the apothecary fix what time has ruined? (SA)
Can a fatwa be issued when (Imam) Malik is in Medina? (SA)
Have you sold us a mule?
Did I give birth to you and forget you?
Does it need a visit to the judge?
Are you comparing shit with the Book of God?
Is there someone following you with a stick?
Is there no one-eyed person but the one-eyed from Dogara?
Is there anyone who reveals his balls among unmarried people?
Is there anyone who exchanges gold with stones?
Is there anyone who buys fish which is still in the sea?
Is there anyone who exchanges his gazelle with a monkey?
Is there anyone who divorces before getting married?
Is there anyone who rolls up his pants before reaching the river?
Have you ever heard / seen that a dog’s tail became straight?
Has blood ever turned into water?
Do you want me to fast and then break my fast on an onion?
Wh-questions
Who vouches for the bride except her mother?
What does a blind person want except two seeing eyes?
If the judge is your adversary, who can you complain to?
What can one choking on water drink?
Whose donkey is dead?
What does farting have to do with a head scarf?
What does Sha’ban have to do with Ramadan?
Who brings a bear to his own orchard?
What is (the value of) a chick and what is (the value of) its soup?
What forced you into what is bitter except what is bitterer?
How can donkeys appreciate the smell of flowers?
How can donkeys appreciate the taste of ginger?
How can horses understand the taste of cardamom?
Why is he setting his monkey on my flour?
What is burning your onion?
Who is pressing hard on your tail?
Who lends his dick on his own wedding night?
Who are you trying to impress, you who is dancing in the dark?
What has she brought from her father’s house?
Who would say that his (olive) oil is not pure?
What can one censer do among one hundred farting people?
You who forgot the fard, how can you perform your prayers?
What relieves you of the (annoying) boy?’ Divorcing his mother!
What has distanced you from me when you are my (paternal) cousin?
Why would I (try to) comb a hairless person?
What does a Shami have to do with a Maghrebi?
What does Zarqa have to do with Balqa?
Why do you/we need the lengthy details?
If my husband is pleased, why should the judge interfere?
The dove cried ‘I am so black!’ the crow said ‘What should I say?
If lunch is (only) olives, where would fullness come from?
If you are a prince and I am a prince, who will ride the donkeys?
If air and water are against us, how can we hoist our sail?
What has God made you love and what God has made you hate?
What relieves you of a bad tooth except extracting it?
Disjunctive questions
Is he a boy or the judge of the town?
Am I his neighbor or one searching for his secrets?
(Should I ask) you or the wolf (for a favor)?
Do you want the truth or its cousin?
Do you want to get the grapes or fight the orchard’s guardian?
Do you want the long version (of the story) or the short one?
[SA] marks PRQs used in its Standard Arabic form without colloquial modification
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