Baghdadi Judeo-Arabic

Baghdadi Judeo-Arabic (Arabic: عربية يهودية بغدادية, עַרָבִיָּה יְהוּדִיַּה בַּגדָאדִיַּה) or autonym haki mal yihud (Jewish Speech) or el-haki malna (our speech) is the variety of Arabic spoken by the Jews of Baghdad and other towns of Lower Mesopotamia in Iraq. This dialect differs from the North Mesopotamian Arabic spoken by Jews in Upper Mesopotamian cities such as Mosul and Anah. Baghdadi and Northern Mesopotamian are subvarieties of Judeo-Iraqi Arabic.

As with most Judeo-Arabic communities, there are likely to be few, if any, speakers of the Judeo-Iraqi Arabic dialects who still reside within Iraq. Rather these dialects have been maintained or are facing critical endangerment within respective Judeo-Iraqi diasporas, namely those of Israel and the United States. In 2014, the film Farewell Baghdad (Arabic: مطير الحمام; Hebrew: מפריח היונים, lit. 'The Dove Flyer'), which is performed mostly in Jewish Baghdadi Arabic dialect, became the first film to be almost completely performed in Judeo-Iraqi Arabic.

The language is being taught at the Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages by Dr Assaf Bar Moshe whose family emigrated to Israel from Iraq and who speaks it as his mother tongue . His textbook Baghdadi Judeo-Arabic, an introductory text is available as an open-source textbook .

Iraqi Jewish author Samantha Ellis wrote a book about the language, which is also her mother tongue, called Chopping Onions on my Heart in the UK and Always Carry Salt in the US, which was shortlisted for the Wingate Prize

Classification

Baghdad Jewish Arabic (and Baghdadi Christian Arabic) resemble North Mesopotamian Arabic, and more distantly Syrian Arabic, rather than the Baghdadi Arabic spoken by Baghdadi Muslims. Muslims speak a gilit dialect (from their pronunciation of the Arabic word for "I said") while the others are qeltu dialects.