A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English

42/167 åQÒzåTdTÐÓmådcbTЋåKogK°\™åGÐoåGÐÚØ og™wbTÐow}gc›hüÐ *ï}e^TÐ}w}^TÐz—KzdœX **KmeaTÐØíÐØë°dH €cBÐ ‹KˆTÙíÅmf=mg›feXíow_cTÐÓmhízdTЊcKngTmGÌêÐz™GÐé°A‹XÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐqœ—TÐÐ{véíme™w ÜmgaTˆTÙíº‹gg™wSÑmö™S‰—R‹Xow}gc›hüÐo_cTm<o<™bXލZh‹XoZc™–XodcS337102‹Xo`TjXohízX‡w|I og™wbTÐow}gc›hüЏQÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐêÐz™GÐÓøz^Xëmg—=ßÐ|PúmfXÐz™GÐzeKލZeTЈc=‰šXîíz?îzX „Xo_cTÐì{v‰Xm^=ogTËŽcKnšS‹Kæ|^™TÐíºo_cTÐڍ\=o^g—IŠfQŽTÎÒ{QmhÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐoGÐÚØz^= mvÚÐ|b=í }SÚ Anesamf<‹g>zœ™dTЉ—R‹XêÐz™G°Tmf™XÊ°Xímvڍ\=íÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐÚmb™<ЇýÐ|IíocgAzTÐÓmdcbTÐ ÓÐíØÌ êÐz™Gm< ‰gcœ™TÐ é°A ‹Xí  ÓÐÚm^™GøÐí ngSÐ|™TÐí ‡@ЍcTÐ ‰bH {Ai= ™TÐ ÒzTdTÐ ÓmdcbTÐ ŽcK q@m—TÐ Q m^ð ýmH ~gT ÒzTdTÐ ÓmdcbTÐ êÐz™GÐ ëi< meT ‹g—= ogXmf`™GøÐ |XÐíúÐí ‚gde™TÐí ºma𠗖X Òz^dTÐ ŠýЍaTÐ ‰šX ogcgcœ= Þ°™GøÒÐØ̉[Q̏vowÚÐ|b™TЉgcœ™TÐÒÐØÌêÐz™GÐëi<ˆT{S‹g—=íº‹gg™wbTЉ—R‹Xo`TjdTÐow}gc›hüÐލZeTÐ ð oQmašTm<‡c^™=og™wbTÐow}gc›hüЏQÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐ|šSÌëi<rým™eTЋg—=ºˆTÙ‹K°[Q ÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTÐé@rým™eTÐ ogɍ™<qœ—TЊ™wí àmdhúÐì{v‰šX†Yb™–=ëÌpKm\™GÐogcgcœ=ÒÐØ̉[QÌowÚÐ|b™TЉgcœ™TÐÒÐØÌphmSíº‹wzTÐí ogcgcœ=ÓÐíØÌêÐz™GÐíºpœeTmSÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTЋX|šSÌâЍhÌé@dwØmSúÐídc^TÐqœ—TÐÒØmwÛÒÚí|“é@ ŠTm^TÐé@ow}gc›hüÐâЍhÌ‹g<‹Xmf^“Xpg—š=íºpwbTЏQow}gc›hüÐo_cTЄ“íŠf`Tmfcgcœ™Tî|AÌ og™wbTÐow}gc›hüкÒzTdTÐÓmdcbTкŠTm^TÐé@ow}gc›hüкpwbTкow_cTÐÓmhízdTÐogö @m™`dTÐÓmdcbTÐ [email protected] qxŽcUÐp_Yn@ºÑÐØùÐphdTºng=ÐØËípx~hdœiüÐp`dUЋ—Sº{Ln—YÙnšHÌ [email protected] qxŽcUÐp_Yn@ºÑÐØùÐphdTºng=ÐØËípx~hdœiüÐp`dUЋ—SºèÚnZYÙnšHÌ .2023/11/14|YeTÐÒÛm?κ2023/11/6ýmfeTЉwz^™Tк2023/4/30같GøÐ https://doi.org/10.34120/ajh.v42i167.345 To cite this article: Alenezi, Mohammad and Al-Qenaie, Shamlan: A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English , Arab Journal for the Humanities: 167, 2024, 225-255. 225 42/167 Published by the Academic Publication Council of Kuwait University. All rights reserved. A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English Mohammad Abdulaziz Alenezi* Shamlan Dawood Al-Qenaie** Abstract The present work offers insights into lexical aspects of this emerging variety to systematically look into neologisms in Kuwaiti English (KE) using corpus linguistics methods and techniques. Such research results in a deeper understanding of lexical development, productivity, and creativity in the variety under scrutiny, as well as how reciprocal lexical influences develop within a variety (Anesa 3). The study focuses on a written corpus of 337,102 words to see whether or not written English-language texts in Kuwait can provide sufficient data worthy of further exploration. The current project in broad strokes focuses on (i) local neologisms and (ii) L2 neologisms. To flesh out the latter, namely suffixation, compounding, and borrowing, a predetermined list, wildcards, and corpus query language (CQL) were used. For the former, keyness analysis was used, and it was found that this technique provided more insight into indigenous words than suffixation, compounding, predetermined lists, wildcards, and CQL, all of which did not reveal sufficient evidence of neologisms in KE. Overall, keyness analysis was the most successful method in uncovering neologisms in the corpus. As the data indicate, the most productive features of KE seem to be those that are related to culture or religion. It could identify words that were not detected by the other methods. Moreover, more research should be done on more types of neologisms, such as blends, in order to obtain a better understanding of the use of English in Kuwait. According to the study, neologisms are used because they are practical, culturally influenced, and socially acceptable. Additionally, KE neologisms are mainly the result of semantic change, such as semantic restriction. Research on neologisms, especially geared towards understanding cultural or religious concepts incorporated within a variety, seems to be best examined using keyness analysis as it highlights such terms and concepts effectively. Keywords: corpus, Kuwait, Kuwaiti English, neologisms, World Englishes.  Assistant Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, College of Arts, Kuwait University. [email protected] Associate Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, College of Arts, Kuwait University. [email protected] Submitted: 30/4/2023, Revised: 6/11/2023, Accepted: 14/11/2023. 226 https://doi.org/10.34120/ajh.v42i167.345 To cite this article: Alenezi, Mohammad and Al-Qenaie, Shamlan: A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English , Arab Journal for the Humanities: 167, 2024, 225-255. 42/167 Mohammad Alenezi, Shamlan Al-Qenaie 1.0 Introduction The present work offers insights into lexical aspects of an emergent English variety, namely Kuwaiti English (KE) (Alenezi; for more information on KE, see for example Alenezi; Al-Qenaie and Bin Naser; Al-Ajlan and Al-Qenaie), and thus the study is situated within World Englishes (WE) research. Anesa indicates that neologisms in the examined varieties of English (VsoE) are revealing in that they depict the dynamic nature of a language and represent social changes in society. The purpose of the study is to systematically unearth neologisms in KE using Biermeier’s method, described in his “Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes” and “Word-formation in New Englishes”, which relies on a predetermined list of lexical elements. There is already a body of research on word formation, such as those of Platt et al., Görlach, and Biermeier’s “Word-formation in New Englishes”, suggesting that contact between languages and people affects how English is used in different regions. In order to further understand the dynamism and usage of English in Kuwait, the following factors drive the research. It has been shown that English-speaking users in regions where English serves as a second language use it in innovative and creative ways: Word formation is a promising area for exploring this creative use of English. Moreover, investigating and understanding neologisms adds to the knowledge production of the different varieties of English. In light of these points, the purpose of this study is to follow Biermeier’s systematic approach and add an additional technique for excavating neologisms, namely keyness analysis (discussed below). Second, we aim to document distinctive lexical features used by English users in Kuwait. By drawing on empirical data, it is hoped that we help make a more complete picture of Kuwaiti English in light of its recent identification as a legitimate variety of English (Alenezi). Neologisms have been a thriving area of research investigation in international literature, as in Gläser’s study, but they have only recently gained currency in Arabic literature; one example is Awadelkarim’s article, but its focus is primarily on the written genre. The present study continues this focus but on a new VsoE, namely KE. Ahmad examines a limited number of texts produced by Saudis in academia to see the extent of Saudi flavour in the English they have produced. Al-Salman and Haidar investigated 208 COVID-19-related innovative terms collected by interviewing 93 people in tertiary-level positions, like faculty members. Other studies like Hamdan and Al-Salman and Al-Dala’ien et al. examine Arabic neologisms on social media platforms such as Facebook. Their data come from social media, like Instagram, and respondents who provided a list of known neologisms. Still, to the best of our knowledge, the only study that focuses on neologisms in the spoken genre is that of Alenezi. Research on the nature, status, role, and development of English in Kuwait has attracted little attention despite its rise as the working language in the area (Alenezi). 227 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English Most research on English in Kuwait focuses on ESL/EFL issues (Alenezi), which may hinder our understanding of English in Kuwait. Alenezi’s research shows English is classified as a second language and is spoken by users, not learners; English in Kuwait is no longer restricted to international communication but to intranational as well. In other words, Kuwaiti English (KE) is considered as an emergent English variety. As a result of such inherent issues in the exploration of English in Kuwait, this study explores another area, namely neologisms, as a means of gaining a deeper understanding of the nature of KE. Researching neologisms is beneficial (Anesa) in that it enables us to understand the evolving nature of KE. A language spreads from its origin with all of its cultural and idiomatic flavour in tow. For instance, English reached Kuwait from Britain and America, as Alenezi points out. In British English (BrE) and American English (AmE), some expressions and lexical items that once served their cultures perfectly have since been deemed unsuited to serve Kuwaiti culture, mainly for religious and societal reasons; for example, terms that have not been in use in KE include brothel, pint, and duchess. This is due to the appropriation of the new language in use. By appropriation, we mean that the newly used language (which cannot account for some aspects of the new culture) begins by adopting, absorbing, and finally adapting to the flavour of the culture so that it can fully serve the needs of the people. For instance, in KE, and in spontaneous speech between two near-native speakers of English in Kuwait, one might often hear words such as inshallah (God willing/hopefully), khalas (enough/that is it/stop it), “May God bless your money/descendants”, and so on. In a nutshell, new places and new varieties render new words or different usages and possible new senses of existing words, i.e., neologisms. Neologisms (e.g., using compounds, suffixation, hybridisation, and indigenous vocabulary) hold interesting insights into any variety of English, as suggested by many, such as Biermeier’s “Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”, Fischer, and Walter, to name a few. 2.0 Literature Review Before delving into neologisms, we must lay out a definition to help set constraints for this study. Fischer defines a neologism as “a word which has lost its status of a nonce-formation but is still one which is considered new by the majority of the members of a speech community” (3). However, this definition is not fully useful for this study since it includes nonce-formations, which are beyond the scope of this study. Accepting nonce-formations as neologisms requires a diachronic corpus that allows monitoring of those new words and their frequency of use over a period of time (Biermeier “Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”, Word-formation in New-Englishes). Similar to Biermeier’s monograph Word-formation in New-Englishes, 228 this study lacks this type of corpus; thus, there will be no attempt to distinguish between nonce-formations and neologisms. A more practical definition is that of Anesa, who defines neologisms as “new words or expressions, which may be monolexical and polylexical units. They generally express the need to identify a new concept or idea and may be related to scientific and technological inventions or discoveries, or be a way of labelling specific social and cultural situations” (40). O’Dell argues that neologisms are inevitable; in essence, they add to the variety because they fulfil “the needs of changing times” (94). Equally, according to Biermeier (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”) and Fischer, the concept of neologisms is an axiom. Anesa adds that neologisms are manifested or projected by the linguistic exigencies of a given community. Thus, neologisms are bound to arise, and it is important to put them under scrutiny. With regard to the importance of investigating neologisms, they have gained currency in WEs research and have played significant roles in many frameworks, such as the Dynamic Model set out in Schneider’s “The Dynamics of New Englishes” and Postcolonial English, that account for the developments of VsoE. Biermeier (Word-formation in New-Englishes) rightly considers the frequency of neologisms to be key to determining the status of a VoE. If a community starts to have new words in their variety, it means that their variety has become somewhat independent, or perhaps in Schneider’s term, “nativized”. In addition, neologisms can reveal the dynamics of a variety in a community. To measure how far a variety has evolved from a socio-cultural perspective, studying its neologisms is fundamental (Anesa). Neologisms do not emerge haphazardly. As argued earlier, they emerge due to the needs of a group of people speaking a variety, and many researchers have theorised about this emergence. Fischer stipulates two concepts that help conduce neologisms: productivity and creativity (453). The distinction between the two is that productivity is rule-governed with coinages being predictable, whereas creativity is not rule-governed, so the word formation is not predictable and depends on the linguistic power of the individual. The life cycle of a neologism is determined by the sheer number of times it is used (its frequency) across the community. According to Fischer, the stages of the life cycle are a) birth, b) growth, c) settling down, and possibly d) death, and e) revival (453). However, Anesa questions these two concepts since productivity is linked with nativeness, whereas creativity is considered a perversion of the socalled native speaker’s norms. With the plethora of different VsoE being transplanted in almost every country, she states that “different individuals and communities have different acceptability standards and consider a term more or less useful and attractive depending on their mental schemata,” and new lexemes surface due to exigencies, to serve the need of communities (48). 229 42/167 Mohammad Alenezi, Shamlan Al-Qenaie 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English Anesa also argues that newly-formed words are generated and driven by the people’s needs in any given situation. These coinages develop and become prevalent in a community after having undergone a process called the “neological continuum”, which is similar to Fischer’s life cycle of neologisms. This continuum depicts the different stages of a neologism from the time it appears as a need in a given communicative situation, until it becomes a neologism and ends possibly in its demise. These stages are: a) protologism, b) prelogism, c) neologism, d) stable word, e) archaism, f) necrologism and g) postlogism. Necrologism and postlogism are similar to Fischer’s death and revival stages, respectively. Anesa does not explain this continuum thoroughly and sets it as a proposal worth investigating in future research. Fischer’s life cycle and Anesa’s continuum cannot be considered for the current study because their studies lack a diachronic corpus. Another view that is simplistic yet influential is that of Humbley, who proposes two parameters to function as a barometer of neologism: distance and proximity. These two parameters are arguably highly influential in explaining the emergence of a word in a variety such as KE. Distance is exemplified by different communities who come together to practise a shared activity, resulting in a proximity that enables the flow of ideas and, most importantly, shared words between these in-groups. These in-groups distance themselves from the original groups, who are native speakers of English. As far as this study is concerned, the distance parameter is exemplified by the native speakers of normed Englishes such as BrE, i.e., the original group, whereas the proximity is best exemplified by the people in Kuwait, the in-group. The in-group tend to creatively use words in rather new senses, possibly coining new words, or even borrowing words from their original language, relying on what Humbley calls the solution of proximity (2). The in-group do this because of their linguistic proximity, which makes it easier for them to “effectively incorporate new terms in their active vocabulary” (2). Thus, the parameters of distance and proximity provide insights into the formation of new words and the circulation of those words in a community (9). O’Dell corroborates Humbley’s argument. She indicates that neologisms emerge in a certain context and in a specific location; thus, her space and time taxonomy is congruent with Humbley’s parameters. We have already discussed how new words emerge in a variety; therefore, we will proceed by analysing the types of neologisms and narrowing the focus, reaching the primary elements that are of interest to this study. There are many types of neologisms discussed in the literature, and Anesa has created a comprehensive list of neologisms made up of the following seven major categories: 1) Composites, which are further divided into: a) affixation (adding a suffix to a root) and b) compounding (merging two or more words to create a new word) 230 2) 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al enaie Abbreviations, which are divided into: a) acronyms and initialisms (e.g., XML) and b) clipping (word shortening, so “influenza” becomes “flu”) 3) Blends (merging, for example, two or more words into one, as when “Coronavirus Disease 2019” becomes “COVID-19”) 4) Borrowings (loanwords) 5) Conversion (changing the class of words, say, from a noun to a verb, as in “to google”) 6) Semantic drift (best exemplified when an existing word is used in a new sense, as when “mouse” is used to describe an input device as opposed to an animal) 7) Eponyms (generifying words, such as “Kleenex” or “Xerox”) The categories discussed above are the overarching ones into which a neologism falls. As they range in categories, they also range in terms of frequency and productivity. To limit the word count of this study, a closer look was needed to help decide which types are the most productive and frequent pertaining to any given variety. In “Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”, Biermeier claims that composites, i.e., suffixation and compounding, are the most productive, and his argument is supported by his seminal work Word-formation in New-Englishes. However, to Iakovleva, these two come after the borrowings category, which was the largest group in her study. She investigated newspapers in Russia between 2016 and 2017, and half of the neologisms in her results were loanwords. Thus, based on our review of the literature on neologisms in general and the studies of Anesa and Biermeier in particular, we chose the categories of suffixation, compounding, and borrowings as the focus of our investigation and analysis. According to Biermeier, the most practical way of pinning down neologisms is through the use of corpora (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”, Word-formation in New-Englishes). Corpora provide us with the frequency of words and different usages that will, in turn, help us to determine the status of the word of interest (Biermeier, Word-formation in New-Englishes; Fischer; Schneider, Postcolonial English; Iakovleva), as well as where it lies within Anesa’s continuum. Most importantly, “they can offer insightful data into word-formation processes, even (or especially) for words which are not lexicographically recognised yet” (Anesa 48). In this study, we use corpus linguistics to inspect neologisms, as delineated in (3.0). The study of word formation and neologisms has figured and been prominent since the 1960s, especially those of Marchand “On content as a criterion of derivational relationship with back-derived words” and “The Categories and Types of Present-day En- 231 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English glish Word formation”, and has continued in many forms over the years, including Bauer and Biermeier “Word-formation in New-Englishes”. Such studies take understanding Englishes around the world centre stage; some, such as Biermeier’s “Word-formation in New-Englishes” approach to neologism from a synchronic perspective, and others, like Marchand “On content as a criterion of derivational relationship with back-derived words”, examine English varieties from diachronic and synchronic perspectives. In the Arab World, research on neologisms has predominantly examined the subject matter from a translation perspective. Examples of such studies include Cannon, Abdalla, Younis, Alqinai, Haddad and Montero-Martínez, and Alduhaim and Alkhaldy. A newer trend of studies, such as those of Alrahaili et al. and Al-Ahdal and Algouzi, examine the learnability of neologisms in educational settings, but since COVID-19, we have seen an increase in studies like Hamdan and Al-Salman on word formation and neologisms in social media. In spite of the growing interest in this phenomenon, no research has examined it from a sociolinguistic perspective to date; thus, this is a gap that needs bridging. Hence, the present study purports to contribute to the body of research by bridging this gap through examining neologisms from a sociolinguistic perspective. Here, we examine indicative studies that examined neologisms in different varieties of English. In his investigation of neologisms and Cameroonisms in Cameroon English and Cameroon Francophone English, Safotso shows that speakers tend to code switch while using English, thus their many English neologisms coming from their local languages, such as words like “mbete” and “ngolong”, which all signify types of trees in the said local languages. Thus, their reliance on their local languages stems from practicality. Ahmad examines the use of neologisms, namely the use of Arabic loan words in Saudi English, and concludes that cultural influences and norms play major roles in incorporating local words into English within a confined geographical area. From their side, Hamdan and Al-Salman investigate the impact of social media on Arabic in a number of social networking applications like X platform (Previously Twitter). Such impact causes a number of words to propagate in the Arabic language, such as “save” and “password”. The use of different loan words is ascribed to many reasons: “practicality and convenience, accuracy and relevance, trendiness and internationalization, in addition to lack of equivalence in the Arabic language system” (Hamdan and Al-Salman 45). Al-Athwary took another perspective by investigating the semantic shift of English borrowings in the Arabic language. Her data come from different Arab Gulf States’ newspapers. She argues that the semantic shift of English words is common when used in the Arab region but that most mechanisms of semantic change are due to semantic restriction; at the same time, they are scarce in the written genre. 3.0 The methodology Although neologisms thrive in spoken corpora (Biermeier, Word-formation in New-Englishes), Alenezi’s first compiled spoken corpus in Kuwait (the Kuwaiti English 232 enaie National Corpus 2021) did not reveal many insights into neologisms. The present pilot study focuses on a written corpus to see whether or not written English-language texts in Kuwait can provide us with sufficient data that is worthy of further exploration. In fact, this focus is motivated by Al-Surmi’s investigation of lexical innovations in written corpora compiled from Bahraini newspapers. The design of this very corpus has been informed by Biermeier (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”) and Fischer. Fischer discusses neologisms, relying on newspaper articles (e.g., opinion pieces) compiled over a five-year period from 1991 to 1996. Biermeier (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”) studied the same concepts; however, he depended on a pre-existing corpus, namely the spoken component of the International Corpus of English (ICE). Similar to Fischer, we decided to build a corpus consisting of newspaper opinion articles as well as novels, all written by Kuwaitis. All the opinion pieces were written between 2016 and 2020, so given that a diachronic analysis needs more than five years’ worth of data, and we had less than that, a synchronic analysis was required (McEnery et al.). As there is no consensus in the literature in relation to corpus size, there is something to be gained by praxis (i.e., consulting previous research to see what corpus size is conducive to an effective analysis). A 600,000-word corpus seems to be deemed sufficient for the study of neologisms (Biermeier, “Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”; Anesa; Lange and Leuckert); Biermeier took a 600,000-word corpus (of spoken discourse) from each of several varieties. Our corpus stands at 337,102 words, with 20,000 types, so the Type/Token Ratio (TTR) came to only 5.9%. The corpus is divided into three main genres: a) newspapers at 222,821 words; b) literature at 65,326 words; and c) blogs at 48,955 words. With that being said, if traces are found on neologisms in this study, then the topic itself might yield very interesting and fruitful results with a much bigger corpus, making it worthwhile to investigate in future research. The corpus tool that houses our corpus is SketchEngine, through which you can intuitively explore the workings of language. The tool offers a range of applications, including text mining and analysis. It is a well-known paid tool used by specialists such as linguists, lexicographers, translators, terminologists, text analysts, teachers, and historians for many purposes, including product naming and sentiment analysis. The sophisticated tool offers a wide range of corpus techniques such as wordlist and word sketches – that enable researchers to flesh out phraseological units – web crawling, term extraction, and a trends feature that allows the automatic identification of neologisms, which is especially well-suited for diachronic corpora and analyses. Besides these features, SketchEngine was chosen to include many English-based reference corpora such as the British National Corpus and the Open American National Corpus; this made it easier for us to compare and contrast three different forms of English in one place (i.e. chosen for practicality). The corpus at hand could be considered representative to a great extent; how- 233 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English ever, as argued in the literature, representativeness is relative in nature (Lindquist and Levin 34). We adopted Stefanowitsch’s definition of representativeness because it largely aligns with the purpose of this study: “[A] representative sample is a subset of a population that is identical to the population as a whole with respect to the distribution of the phenomenon under investigation” (28). As for opinion articles in Kuwait, we have two English-language newspapers: the Kuwait Times, established in 1961, and the Arab Times, inaugurated in 1977. Neither of them is a typical broadsheet or tabloid as known in the West; instead, Kuwaiti newspapers could be classified as formal newspapers. In Kuwait, English has no official status and is relatively new, which is why we have few Kuwaiti journalists and writers who use the English language. From the Kuwait Times, we collected all opinion pieces written by Kuwaitis during the years chosen; thus, these articles were representative. Since they are publicly available, there was no ethical problem. It took a lot of time and effort to copy and paste all the documents to the computer. It was a daunting task; after saving them in a Word format, we manually erased all page breaks and carriage returns because they prevented the plain text and corpus tools from processing data efficiently and reliably. We used the Find and Replace (Ctrl+H) function to delete carriage returns as well as to replace ^p’s with spaces. Afterwards, we saved all files as plain text files. However, dealing with the Arab Times brought us to an impasse. Because we had access issues, our attempts to crawl the web with Sketch Engine and to use the Copy-Paste strategy failed as the newspaper disabled it. During the period covered, there were four Kuwaiti writers of opinion articles, one of whom is a colleague at Kuwait University. Thus, we asked him if he would be willing to send us all his articles written from 2016 to 2020. He agreed instantly and sent his articles to the first author of this article. The same processes and strategies with file processing were followed with the Arab Times articles. The limitation is that we were able to obtain only a quarter of the population. The subcorpus of literature consists of novels. We were able to contact seven Kuwaitis who write in English, but only two agreed to participate, as their novels were already posted online and free to download. As for blogs, they are not popular in Kuwait at all. After asking around and posting on social media platforms, we found a Kuwaiti online directory containing blogger names and their websites, and we eventually consulted it to get the data. As anticipated, blogs were not popular; the last active blog dated back to early 2017. We found around ten Kuwaiti bloggers writing in English; half of them had permanently closed their blogs, but the other five blogs, written from 2016 to 2017, were still available, so we obtained their data following the same copy-pasting strategy. This genre is arguably balanced and representative. The total corpus was arguably balanced at this stage, as we had managed to 234 enaie obtain more than 50% of the total population in the corpus. As such, we can state that, in accordance with Sinclair’s seminal study, we relied completely on external factors, as opposed to internal factors, in compiling the corpus. No matter what topic each article or novel discussed, we just fed it into the corpus. The present corpus was deemed representative and allowed us, to a great extent, to draw some conclusions. Since we used Sketch Engine software, the corpus was automatically tagged RQFHLWZDVXSORDGHGWRWKHZHEVLWHࡳDOWKRXJKIRUWKLVVWXG\LWPLJKWEHRIWULYLDOLPSRUtance to have a tagged corpus simply because we depended on pre-existing, defined strategies informed by Biermeier (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”) and Fischer. For example, the method of data retrieval for suffixation was by searching for *ship, *ism, *ish, *ee, and *y, which enabled Biermeier to acquire an insightful list of suffixes across all varieties. For compounding, he created a predetermined sample list of 180 compounds (100 compound nouns [e.g., birdbrain], 40 adjectives [e.g., law-abiding], and 40 verbs [e.g., to broadcast]) because it is impossible to summon all compounds in a systematic way, as is the case with suffixes unless the corpus is manually annotated for such a purpose (Biermeier 313). This predetermined list is included in the appendix. As for the hybridisation/borrowings category discussed in the literature, we used the Keyness formula to enable us to identify unique words within the target corpus when compared with the reference corpus. Keyness analysis is an established approach based on the frequency of items in the target and reference corpora and comes from corpus linguistics and corpus-based discourse analysis (Willaert), as well as terminography (Messina) and terminology (De Schryver). Keyness analysis is well-suited to the purpose of the study as it allows for comprehensive understanding and enables religion- and culture-based concepts to be fleshed out; it is widely used in many studies, such as those of Nolte et al. On keyness and the importance of conducting keyness analysis, Biber et al. indicate that “the keyness of a keyword represents the value of log-likelihood or Chisquare statistics; in other words, it provides an indicator of a keyword’s importance as a content descriptor for the appeal. The significance (p value) represents the probability that this keyness is accidental” (138). Using this analytical method, Gabrielatos (225) argues that we can identify key concepts and terms discussed in the corpus of interest. SketchEngine uses simple maths as the keyness score by which the target and the reference corpora are compared. It allows comparison across corpora but also within the same corpus, namely subcorpora. Following is the formula: 235 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English It can also be formulated as follows: \frac{fpm{rm focus} +N}{fpm{rmref} +N}. The numerator represents the normalised frequency (per million words [pmw]) of the word of interest in the target corpus, while the denominator represents the normalised frequency (pmw) of the word in the reference corpus. Using this method, we can sort items by their frequency differences between the two corpora. Using keyness analysis, we compared our corpus against the British National Corpus (BNC). All the words obtained were then checked against the Oxford English Dictionary, the Cambridge Dictionary, the BNC 2014, and the BNC to enable us to find possible neologisms. We adopted the following criteria for words to qualify as neologisms: Once all results were obtained from SkechEngine, we manually checked the words for their existence in the consulted corpora and the Oxford and Cambridge dictionaries. If they exist in any of the mentioned resources, they would not qualify our criteria stipulated for this study. 4.0 Analysis and Discussion 4.1 Compounding: Nouns, Verbs and Adjectives As discussed in the literature, we used a predefined list of compounds (100 nouns, 40 verbs, and 40 adjectives) taken from Biermeier’s Word-formation in New-Englishes. Out of the 100 nouns—surprisingly, and contradicting Biermeier’s statement that compounding seems to be the most productive aspect through which neologisms arise—the corpus showed great reluctance in using compound nouns, which had an extremely low frequency. For example, bedtime came at 1 (relative frequency: 2.59 per million). The highest compound noun produced was greenhouse at 19. After consulting the standard references and the BNC, we found that KE followed the same trajectory as the Tanzanian English (TanE) and Kenyan English (KenE) examined by Biermeier, which showed no sign of neologisms. All were used as indicated by these references. As for verbs, this category was extremely surprising as the corpus showed evidence of only four types of verbs: brainwash at 1, broadcast at 1, handcuff at 1, and outgrow at 2. KE showed no sign of any creative usage of compound verbs. In comparison with all the results from Biermeier’s study, KE achieved the lowest, after TanE at nine types. This category showed poor production of this type. It was more interesting to investigate adjectives, as we were able to find potential evidence of neologism. We obtained 15 compound adjectives out of the 40 listed by Biermeier, e.g., breath-taking at 7, and clean-shaven at 2. Yet again, KE followed the same trajectory as TanE (with 11 types) and KenE (with 19 types), with all of them showing extreme hesitance in using compounds. A potential neologism is evidenced in law-abiding, which came at 19 (49.27 per million). When we consulted the above-men- 236 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al enaie tioned references, all three showed that this word can describe any individual; plus, in the BNC, it highly collocated with citizen(s). However, in KE, its usage was restricted to describing expatriates. Interestingly, even in Kuwaiti Arabic, when the exact word was used, the context was usually about discussing the situation of expatriates, who constitute almost 70% of the total population of Kuwait according to the Kuwait Public Authority for Civil Information. Thus, the word might undergo a semantic shift in KE, to describe non-Kuwaitis (i.e., non-citizens) only. While the literature puts forward many mechanisms for semantic change, such as extension, in Kuwaiti English, there seem to be two major observations: (i) semantic change is scarce, and (ii) the main process of semantic change this study shows is restriction. These, in turn, substantiate AlAthwary’s claims. 4.2 Nominal suffixes: , , / The corpus produced a very low number of nouns ending with *ism – only 50 out of the 366 types identified by Biermeier; again, it came last when compared to TanE, which had 106 types. The findings of the present study corroborate those of Biermeier, who argued that this nominal suffix usually generates abstract religious as well as social terms. Topicality played a role in producing such terms, namely jihadism and tribalism, at 8 and 2, respectively. Given the context of Kuwait’s lying at the heart of an unstable region, with major events such as the Arab Spring, the term Arab Spring was produced at the exact rate that Biermeier considered to be the yardstick for a topic to be reliable. Briefly, there was no evidence of neologisms, as well. As for nouns ending with -ment, 70 types were produced in the corpus. Similar to TanE and KenE in Biermeier, there was evident reluctance to use these types of nouns in new and creative ways. In fact, only one type showed a potential neologism, which was embezzlement at 2. In the Cambridge and Oxford dictionaries, supported by empirical evidence obtained from the BNC and BNC2014, the word denotes stealing money belonging to corporations or other organisations but definitely not stealing from an individual. In the present corpus, there seems to be a semantic shift as it was used to describe an ordinary theft of money from an individual. This finding supports mainstream research like Platt et al. and Biermeier “Word-formation in New-Englishes” in that some lexical items are used (slightly) differently due to many reasons, such as language contact. In relation to -er and -or, the corpus, once again, did not show creative ways of coining new words, except for the words harasser and influencer. There is no evidence of the word harasser in the standard references or in the BNC2014, and the BNC produced only four tokens of these words in the written miscellaneous genre. Thus, it might be claimed that there is evidence of a new neologism here worth investigating 237 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English when expanding this corpus. As for influencer (20 tokens), all the references consulted showed that this word refers to any individual, whether famous or not, who has the ability to influence or affect others. In the corpus, they all came to denote any individual who has an account on one or more social media platforms. Thus, it can be argued that this is a sign of an already existing word with a new sense. 4.3 Adjectival suffixes: , , and The most productive way of obtaining these types of adjectives is perhaps by using the corpus query language. For example, by using [word=”.*ish” & tag=”J.*”], we were able to retrieve all adjectives ending with -ish. Adjectives with -ish and -y can be discussed as one, as there was no evidence of neologisms found, following the same pattern as TanE and KenE. The corpus produced only nine types of -ish, e.g., cultish and nightmarish, whereas adjectives ending with -y were more productive at 45 types, e.g., unruly and bloody, as anticipated by Biermeier (“Compounding and Suffixation in World Englishes”, Word-formation in New-Englishes). Again, no neologism was in evidence in our corpus. Interestingly, KE showed a readiness to creatively coin new adjectives given the unique context and/or Humbley’s proximity in Kuwait. Also, this coincides with Görlach’s and Ahmad’s views that contact and people in the same area are likely to have or use words distinctly compared with other speakers of English. As Biermeier argued in Word-formation in New-Englishes, varieties of English show a willingness to produce these types because they are easier to coin. Although there were not many such types (-like at 11), we found three potential neologisms: clique-like, well-like, and Ramadan-like. None were found in any reference consulted. It is worth noting that they all relate to the Islamic culture or the geographical features of Kuwait (e.g., clique and Ramadan denote Islamic concepts, and well-like describes the holes in the streets that look like water wells). These points support Ahmad’s findings, showing how cultural influences impact how English is used, thus having Arabic words coined with other English-based lexical items such as like. 4.4 Indigenous words Our findings regarding indigenous words go hand in hand with Iakovleva’s findings. This type is deemed to be the most productive category, and this is a typical feature of the English varieties. The corpus generated different loanwords from the mother tongue (i.e., Arabic). Table 1 summarises salient loanwords in the corpus. 238 enaie ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 1 ABDULAZIZ - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 2 ABDULREDHA - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 3 AL-ADHA - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 4 AL-AHMAD - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 5 AL-AHMED - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 6 AL-DALLAL - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 7 AL-GHANEM - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME OR THE NAME OF A CAR DEALERSHIP 1 8 AL-JABER - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 9 AL-SABAH - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 10 AL-SALEH - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 11 AL-SALEM - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 12 AMIR - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 13 ANWAR - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 14 ASHOUR - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 15 AWADHI - PERSONAL FAMILY NAME 1 16 EMAN - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 17 FAHD - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 18 FAJER - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 19 FARIS - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 20 HAMZA - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 21 HANAN - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 22 JABER - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 23 JASSEM - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 24 MAHMOOD - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 25 MARZOUK - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 26 MUBARAK - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 27 QABOOS - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 28 REDA - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 239 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al 42/167 240 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 29 REEM - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 30 SABAH - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 31 SALEH - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 32 SALIM - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 33 SAQIR - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 34 SHEIKH - PERSONAL FIRST NAME 1 35 DINAR DINAR CURRENY NOTE OF KUWAIT 2 36 FILS FILS NAME OF COIN IN KUWAIT 2 37 KD KUWAITI DINARS CURRENCY SYMBOL 2 38 ABAYA - LOOSE OVER-GARMENT OR CLOAK COVERING THE WHOLE BODY, USUALLY BLACK 3 39 AL-FATEHA AL-FATIHA 1st CHAPTER OF THE QURAN, THE HOLY BOOK OF ISLAM 3 40 AL-FITR - BREAKING OF THE FAST 3 41 ALLAH - - 3 42 AL-MAEDA AL-MAIDAH 5th CHAPTER OF THE QURAN, THE HOLY BOOK OF ISLAM 3 43 $/0Ɩ('$ AL-MAIDAH 5th CHAPTER OF THE QURAN, THE HOLY BOOK OF ISLAM 3 44 AL-SHAMS ASH-SHAMS 91st CHAPTER OF THE QURAN, THE HOLY BOOK OF ISLAM 3 45 AWQAF - A MORTMAIN 3 46 ETHAN PRAYERS CALL FOR MUSLIM PRAYER 3 47 FEQH FIQH ISLAMIC JURISPRUDENCE 3 48 FTOOR FUTOOR/IFTAR BREAKING-FAST MEAL EATEN AT SUNSET IN RAMADHAN, THE HOLY MONTH OF ISLAM 3 49 HARAM RELIGIOUSLY FORBIDDEN PROSCRIBED BY ISLAMIC TEACHINGS 3 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al enaie ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 50 HIJAB - HEAD-SCARF WORN FOR RELIGIOUS PURPOSES 3 51 IFTAR FUTOOR BREAKING-FAST MEAL EATEN AT SUNSET IN RAMADHAN, THE HOLY MONTH OF ISLAM 3 52 ISRA ISRA’ PART OF THE NIGHT JOURNEY THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD PBUH TOOK DURING A SINGLE NIGHT 3 53 MAKKAH MECCA THE HOLY CITY OF ISLAM IN SAUDI ARABIC 3 54 MATHAHIB MADHHAB A SCHOOL OF THOUGHT OR A WAY OF BEHAVIOUR IN ISLAM 3 55 MERAJ MI’RAJ PART OF THE NIGHT JOURNEY THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD PBUH TOOK DURING A SINGLE NIGHT 3 56 MOATHIN MUEZZIN THE PERSON WHO CALLS FOR PRAYER IN A MOSQUE 3 57 MUSLIMS - - 3 58 NIQAB - BLACK FACE COVER 3 59 PBUH - PEACE BE UPON HIM 3 60 QURAN THE QURAN HOLY BOOK OF ISLAM 3 61 QURANIC - RELATED TO THE QURAN 3 62 RAMADAN - HOLY MONTH OF ISLAM 3 63 TAQWA - PIETY AND FEAR OF ALLAH AND WORKING IN HIS OBEDIENCE 3 64 ARABS - - 4 65 BEDOON STATELESS RESIDENTS IN KUWAIT WHO REFUSE TO DECLARE THEIR ORIGINAL NATIONALITY 4 66 DAESH ISIS THE TERRORIST GROUP 4 67 DEWANIYA DEWANIYA SOCIAL GATHERING AT A RECEPTION HALL IN A PRIVATE HOUSE 4 68 DISHDASHA - A LONG TRADITIONAL DRESS WITH LONG SLEEVES WORN BY MEN IN THE ARABIAN GULF 4 241 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English ITEM 242 DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 4 69 DIWAN DEWANIYA THIS BIENG THE SUPERLATIVE FORM DENOTING A MORE FORMAL SOCIAL GATHERING IN A DESIGNATED RECEPTION HALL 70 DIWANIYA DEWANIYA SOCIAL GATHERING AT A RECEPTION HALL IN A PRIVATE HOUSE 4 4 71 EID - MUSLIM RELIGIOUS HOLIDAY CELEBRATING THE END OF RAMADHAN THE HOLY MONTH OF ISLAM 72 GAHWA COFFEE THE ACTUAL DRINK OR THE COFFEE SHOP ITSELF 4 73 GCC GCC GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL 4 74 GHOTRA GHUTRA TRADITIONAL ARAB HEADDRESS/ HEADCLOTH 4 75 HORMUZ - - 4 76 IRAQI - - 4 4 77 KAFEEL SPONSOR A COMMON PRACTICE IN THE ARAB GULF STATES WHERE GULF NATIONALS SPONSOR FOREIGNERS TO GRANT THEM TEMPORARY RESIDENCY 78 KHADDAMA HOUSE MAID DOMESTIC WORKER 4 79 KUNA - KUWAIT NEWS AGENCY 4 80 NASFA GHUTRA STYLE WEARING THE GHUTRA IN A SPECIFIC WAY ACCORDING TO REGION 4 81 OGAL AGAL/IQAL BLACK DOUBLED-CORD WORN ON THE HEAD 4 4 4 82 SALAMAT (WISH YOU) GOOD HEALTH/SAFETY SAID TO SOMEONE WHO HAS JUST BEEN BACK FROM THEIR TRAVELS OR SOMEONE WHO HAS JUST SUFFERED A HEALTH/ PHYSICAL PROBLEM 83 SHISHA HOOKA/WATERPIPE - enaie ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 84 US-IRANIAN - - 4 85 WASTA NEPOTISM FAVOURITISM IN TREATMENT 4 86 YALLA COME ON/LET’S DO IT/ ALRIGHT/HURRY UP - 4 87 YSALEMKOM (AND MAY THE) GOOD HEALTH/ SAFETY WISHES BE WITH YOU A REPLY TO “SALAMAT’ 4 88 ABDALLY - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 89 AL-RAI - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 90 AL-SHUYOUKH JILEEB ALSHUYOUKH NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 91 AZZOUR AL-ZOUR NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 92 BASRA - NAME OF CITY IN IRAQ 5 93 BAYAN - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 94 BNAIDER - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 95 DASMAN - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 96 FARWANIYA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 97 HAWALLY - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 98 JABRIYA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 99 JAHRA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 100 KABD - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 101 KHARTOUM - A CITY IN SUDAN OR COULD ALSO MEAN A NOZZLE/TRUNK 5 102 MUBARAKIYA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 103 SABAHIYA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 104 SALMIYA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 105 SALMIYAH - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 106 SALWA - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 107 SHUWAIKH - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 243 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al 42/167 244 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 108 AL-ASHBAN - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 5 109 SADEER SUDAIR AREA IN SAUDI ARABIA 5 6 110 ALBOHAYRA (THE) LAKE REFERS TO THE BLUE LAKEA FARM IN NORTH KUWAIT PROVIDING DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES TO VISITORS 111 AL-DIBDIBAH - NAME OF AREA IN KUWAIT 6 6 112 ALZARQA (THE) BLUE REFERS TO THE BLUE LAKEA FARM IN NORTH KUWAIT PROVIDING DIFFERENT ACTIVITIES TO VISITORS 113 AMIRI AMIRI HOSPITAL A MAJOR SECONDARY CARE HOSPITAL 6 114 HAMRA - A SHOPPING MALL IN KUWAIT T CITY 6 115 ISESCO ICESCO, FORMERLY ISESCO THE ISLAMIC WORLD EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANISATION 6 116 JACC - JABER AL-AHMAD CULTURAL CENTRE 6 117 KAC - KUWAIT AIRWAYS CORPORATION 6 118 KISR - KUWAIT INSTITURE FOR SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH 6 119 LOYAC - LOTHAN YOUTH ACHIEVEMENT CENTRE 6 120 LULU LULU HYPERMARKET A GROCERIES STORE 6 121 MOI - MINISTRY OF INTERIOR 6 122 MUROUJ - DIINE-IN, RETAIL, LEISURE, AND ENTERTAINMENT DESTINATION IN KUWAIT 6 123 NABTA NABTA LITERALLY TANSLATES TO ‘PLANT’. A TEA BRAND 6 124 NBK - NATIONAL BANK OF KUWAIT 6 125 PACI - PUBLIC AUTHORITY FOR CIVIL INFORMATION (IN KUWAIT) 6 enaie ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME 126 SHAKAYA SHAGAYA NAME OF AREA IN KUWAITKNOWN FOR ITS SOLAR POWER NATIONAL PROJECT 6 127 SHUOON MINISTRY OF SOCIAL AFFAIRS SHUOON’ IS THE COMMON LOCAL NAME FOR IT WHICH TRANSLATES LITERALLY TO ‘AFFAIRS’ 6 128 SURAT - A LOCAL DIGITAL NEWS REPORTING PLATFORM 6 129 ANDALASIA - - 7 130 ANTI-EXPAT - ANTI-EXPATRIATE RHETORIC 7 131 CHAI TEA - 7 132 FEBRAYER FEBRUARY - 7 133 SPOOLIE - - 7 134 TOURISTIC - - 7 135 AYN EYE - 7 136 HAB SEEDS USUALLY (SUN)FLOWER SEEDS 7 137 HATHI THIS ONE (FEM.) - 7 138 SAJ YOU’RE RIGHT WHAT YOU ARE STATING/ CLAIMING IS TRUTHFUL 7 139 SUMMAT TABLE COVER USUALLY PLASTIC 7 7 140 HALA HELLO IN HERE IT IS PART OF “FEBRAYER” OR ‘FEBRUARY- THE NAME OF THE NATIONAL SHOPPING FESTIVAL IN KUWAIT (HALA FEBRAYER) OR (HELLO FEBRUARY) 141 ENSHALLAH INSHALLAH IF ALLAH WILLS 3,4 142 INSHALLAH INSHALLAH IF ALLAH WILLS 3,4 143 IQAMA RESIDENCY AS IN THE VISA OR YOUR STAY AT A PALCE 3,4 3,4 3,4 144 MAGHRIB EVENING COULD REFER TO THE TIME OF DAY OR THE EVENING (MAGHRIB) PRAYER FOR MUSLIMS AROUND THE WORLD 145 TASAMUH FOREBEARANCE AND TOLERANCE A DELIBERATE OVERSIGHT FOR WRONG-DOINGS 245 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English 146 ITEM DEFINITION GLOSS THEME MABROOK CONGRATULATIONS OR COULD REFER TO A COOKWARE SHOP WITH THE SAME NAME 4,6 CODES: 1 = PERSONAL NAMES 2 = MONETARY 3 = RELIGIOUS 4 = SOCIAL/POLITICAL 5 = NAME OF AREA 6 = NAME OF PLACE 7 = EVERYDAY ROUTINE WORD Table 1 Productive L1-sourced words in KE Keyness analysis fleshed out many L1-sourced words in KE, and they are highly productive in the corpus, as the data suggest. The results were far more than Table 1; however, we only included the L1-sourced ones as the interest in this section is in the indigenous words. Seven different themes emerged from the analysis, with 152 assigned codes. Although codes 3 and 4 are somewhat similar, they are separated because they are separated in the literature. However, in Arab and Muslim cultures, they are usually inseparable, and religion plays a major role in influencing social and political matters. Code 1 was assigned 22%. It is composed of both family/ tribe names, such as Al-Salem, and personal first names, such as Hanan. All incidences in code 1 appeared in contexts relating to code 4 and, to a lesser extent, code 3. Code 2 was only assigned 2%, relating to monetary terms such as dinar. Perhaps the most productive codes pertained to 3 and 4, at 21% and 20%, respectively, especially if we consider that code 1 only emerged due to codes 3 and 4. A clear pattern emerged in the words produced (e.g., wasta – high connections; ghotra – a piece of cloth worn on the head by men; bedoon – stateless; taqwa – piety; ftoor – iftar; moathin – muezzin; and khaddama – female domestic worker), denoting either social or religious concepts; in fact, for every religious term which had a direct English translation, such as taqwa – piety, the Arabic word was used instead. All these words are worth investigating in future research. Another emergent code was 5, at 14%. It revolves around areas in Kuwait, such as Bayan, and outside Kuwait, such as Sadeer. Name of place (code 6) is another 246 42/167 ohammad Alene i Shamlan Al enaie theme that emerged from the analysis, standing at 13%. Code 6 contains acronyms such as Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR), Kuwait News Agency (KUNA), Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and Ministry of the Interior (MOI), which are evident in the corpus, and these acronyms are all government-related bodies, but there is no abbreviation or acronym found that was created by Kuwaiti users of English that relates to everyday conversation/ language, like btw (“by the way”). Finally, code 7 was assigned 8% of the total codes. They refer to mundane aspects (e.g., summat – table cover) and informal spoken discourse, like discourse-pragmatic markers (e.g., saj – you’re right). The results and findings here are in congruence with the research on neologisms, like (Hamdan and Al-Salman) different varieties of English, in that second language English users tend to incorporate local words into their L2 for many reasons like practicality. Cultural influence and norms significantly impact the use of English in Kuwait, consequently having many Arabic-based words (borrowings) in English. 5.0 Conclusion Based on the study, neologisms are used for reasons of practicality, cultural influences, and social norms. Further, semantic change, such as semantic restriction, accounts for the majority of neologisms in Kuwaiti English. Having said that, there is not ample evidence of the occurrence of neologisms in KE based on the data except for the integration of local words into English, i.e., borrowings. A case in point is the lower frequency and avoidance of coining and combining new words in English into Kuwait, e.g., embezzlement at 2 (section 4.2) and clique-like at 11 (section 4.3). Apart from incorporating local words within English (section 4.4), other examined features (sections 4.1-3) like suffixation and compounding do not appear to widely figure in KE. Similar to the results pertaining to TanE and KenE, KE showed evidence of hesitancy in the context of neologism formation. Perhaps the most contributing factor to this hesitancy is the cultural and religious influences. Cultural and religious terms (codes 3 and 4 in Table 1) are used, and this corroborates the findings of Alenezi. While suffixation and compounding did not show signs of neologisms, borrowing appears, such as ghotra, kafeel, and khaddama, to be more productive in KE. Further investigation is needed following Al-Surmi’s study focusing on newspaper articles. In the same way, more research is needed to investigate other types of neologisms, such as blends and eponyms, in detail. 6.0 Suggestions and Recommendations To build on the preliminary results of this pilot study, future studies should think about undertaking a more thorough analysis. Neologisms in KE can be better understood by employing a wider corpus, including more data sources, and modifying the study topics. Future research should look towards adding more sources of written texts 247 42/167 A Pilot Study of Neologisms in Kuwaiti English in KE to the corpus to improve its representativeness. Although the present study only looked at books, newspapers, and blogs, including academic journals, online message boards, social networking sites, and other digital publications may offer a wider variety of linguistic data. It is suggested that future research specifically incorporate a comparison of KE with other English dialects. Comparing KE to other World Englishes, in addition to using reference corpora like the British National Corpus and the Open American National Corpus, may provide important insights into the particular traits and patterns of neologisms in Kuwaiti English. Works Cited Abdalla, Manar Abdelhafeeth. “Translating English euphemisms into Arabic: Challenges and strategies.” PhD dissertation, 2009. 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