US influence on Iraqi Lexicon
Schott’s Vocab is an interesting, somewhat lighthearted linguistics blog on the New York Times website. There’s an interesting post on American-influenced words that Iraqis use as a part of their everyday vocabulary. The most notable would be “Am-raqi,” or an Americanized Iraqi who has incorporated various American cultural objects and ideas as a part of their own life. American rap and country music, an unlikely pairing of genres, are favored by young Iraqis, according to an article in the Washington Post. Even tattoo artists have been able to make a living in the country, despite Islam’s strict rules against tattoos. In markets, cowboy and motorcycle boots are sold alongside an assortment of inevitably falsified American movies on DVD.
Culture changes, albeit slowly, so it is important to know how this happens. The mainstream adoption of material culture (culture one can see and feel) is usually a sign that the invisible aspects of culture are also changing. The influence can come from both directions, material influencing invisible and vice versa. For Iraq, foreign agents of change are not new, as history shows us, but in order to understand how to most effectively establish relationships with people from other cultures, knowing its evolution, and even its historical trajectory, is an invaluable competency.
