Sibawayhi’s Principles

Arabic Grammar and Law in Early Islamic Thought

By (author) Michael G. Carter

Book cover: Sibawayhi’s Principles

Extent: 296 pages

Publisher: Lockwood Press

Subjects: Islamic & Middle Eastern Studies, Language & Linguistics

Series: Resources in Arabic and Islamic Studies

Series volume number: 5

Language: English

Paperback (Published)

(November 2016)

ISBN: 9781937040581

7.01 x 10 inches

Price: $49.95

In stock

PDF (Published)

(November 2016)

ISBN: 9781937040598

7.01 x 10 inches

Price: $25.00

Michael G. Carter’s Sibawyhi’s Principles: Arabic Grammar and Law in Early Islamic Thought is a corrected version, with considerable Addenda, of his 1968 Oxford doctoral thesis, “Sibawayhi’s Principles of Grammatical Analysis.” It systematically argues that the science of Arabic grammar owes its origins to a special application of a set of methods and criteria developed independently to form the Islamic legal system, not to Greek or other foreign influence. These methods and criteria were then adapted to create a grammatical system brought to perfection by Sibawayhi in the late second/eighth century. It describes the intimate contacts between early jurists and scholars of language out of which the new science of grammar evolved, and makes detailed comparisons between the technical terms of law and grammar to show how the vocabulary of the law was applied to the speech of the Arabs. It also sheds light on Sibawayhi’s method in producing his magisterial Kitab.

Michael G. Carter, BA, MA, DPhil (Oxford), PhD honoris (Lund), currently Honorary Professor at the Center for Medieval Studies at University of Sydney, has taught at Duke University, New York University and at the University of Oslo. His books include Arab Linguistics: An Introductory Classical Text with Translation and Notes (1981), Sibawyhi (2004), and (co-authored with E. Badawi and A. Gully, revised by Maher Awad) Modern Written Arabic: A Comprehensive Grammar (2016).

  • By (author) Michael G. Carter