A Pragmatic Study of Connectives in Mosuli Dialect with Reference to English

Abstract

Connectives are used as discourse markers by speakers of Mosuli Iraqi Arabic so that listeners will pay more attention during their utterances. The current study investigates the pragmatic functions of connectives in Mosuli Iraqi Arabic, selected from seven comedy series presented by Hassan Fashel. These comedy series contain the commonly used connectives that were investigated in the current research. These connectives are zee, kawee, dahiq, hasatta, and they are assumed to have different functions in different contexts. The study aimed to prove that connectives in Mosuli are multifunctional and intended to guide the listener to interpret the speaker’s utterance. The data selected from the series were analyzed according to Brinton’s model (1996). It is concluded that these connectives are multifunctional in different contexts and that the connective kawee was the most common in Mosuli dialect. The study also concludes with some remarkable suggestions that will be valuable for further research.