Interrogatives as a linguistic feature of satire in Arabic and English media

Abstract EN

This paper aims to offer a contrastive analysis between Arabic and English languages with special reference to the role of interrogatives in satiric television programmes in Egypt and the United States of America.

Samples from Bassem Youssef's "Al-Bernameg", Ahmed Adam's "Bani Adam Show", Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" and Jay Leno's "The Tonight Show" are particularly selected for being amongst the most widely-seen, and hence, the most influential satiric entertainment talk shows roaming the globe.

The ultimate goal is to monitor the effect of interrogatives as a salient linguistic feature in Arabic and English employed to offer humorous social "satire" in different cultural contexts such as the Egyptian and the American ones in the contemporary age .