مجلة المواقف
Volume 4, Numéro 1, Pages 387-395

A Historical Background Of The Linguistic Situation In Algeria

Authors : Abdelkarim Chami .


As far as the study of language change compels our curiosity to think about the historical mutation beyond the multiple linguistic changes in our speech. How could we refer to the aspects of meaning that are expressed in a language, code, or other form of representation? Logically when we examine such a phenomenon there are two basic ways of looking at it: as it exists at some particular moment ‘synchronic study’ or as it develops and changes across time ‘diachronic study’. We will deal with the diachronic study of the linguistic situation in Algeria; from the Antiquity to the modern French colonization. Diachronic linguistics views the historical development of a language. Thus, on the diachronic axis we can go back and forth in time, watching the language with all its features change, as stated by John Lyons:“Diachronic (or historical) linguistics studies the development of language through time: For example, the way in which French and Italian have ’evolved’ from Latin.” (Lyons, 1983:14)


Linguistic; Algeria; Situation; language; Latin; French; Italian; Arabic