Always the Villain: The Wife in Emirati Folktales - A Socio-cultural and Linguistic Reading

Aug 26, 2026

Uploaded by Xiajie

Folklore preserves local heritage and offers insight into cultural and religious norms, language, and environment. Emirati folktales form part of the United Arab Emirates’ intangible cultural heritage, rooted in Bedouin tribal lineages and desertic and maritime settings. Based on three Al-Ain stories in Emirati Arabic, the study delivers a socio-cultural and linguistic analysis centered on a shared motif: the wickedness of wives.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages19

Reading Time48 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Introduction

Folktale definition and scholarly framing

R O C Z N I K O R I E N T A L I S T Y C Z N Y, T. LXXV, Z. 2, 2022, (s . 103–121) DOI 10.24425/ro.2022.143575 NAJLA KALACH (University of International Studies of Rome, Italy) ORCID: 0000-0003-0807-5544 Always the Villain: The Wife in Emirati Folktales. A Socio-cultural and Linguistic Reading Abstract Folklore plays a crucial role in the preservation of the local heritage, and it can provide valuable information regarding cultural and religious norms, language, and environment of that people. The folktale is one of the many forms of folklore and it represents the product of the individual traditional heritage that originates from a population’s collective cultural imagination and background. In the Arabian Gulf societies, the oral tradition of storytelling has been prominent for a very long time and it has somehow been preserved until fairly recent times. The folktale belongs to the Emirati intangible cultural heritage, and it constitutes a deeply rooted element related to Bedouin tribal clans and to the desertic and maritime environments which characterised the territory. The United Arab Emirates is very attentive to the conservation of their heritage, both at national and international levels. This study provides a socio-cultural and linguistic analysis of the Emirati folktale, based on a sample of three stories from Al-Ain, written in Emirati Arabic, which share a common feature: the wickedness of wives. Keywords: Emirati Folklore, Folktales, United Arab Emirates, Oral Literature, Emirati Intangible Cultural Heritage, Arabic Dialectology, Emirati Arabic, Al-Ain Copyright © 2022. Najla Kalach. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0, [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. 104 NAJLA KALACH Introduction The study of a country’s folklore can give us an idea of the lifestyle and traditions inherited from the past generations, and how they have helped convey cultural values that are, even today, socially accepted. Moreover, folklore is the solid foothold which enables individuals to cling to the society, by constructing their social identity, and the sense of belonging of a group of people to a peculiar milieu. However, as stated by the Russian scholar Vladimir Jakovlevič Propp, it would be fairly misleading to assume that folklore would directly reflects social relationships. In fact: Folklore, especially in its early stages, is not a description of life. Reality is not reflected directly but through the prism of thought, and this thought is so unlike ours that it can be difficult to compare a folklore phenomenon with anything at all. (…) Space and time are perceived differently from the way we perceive them. (…) What we never consider real is considered real and vice versa.1 So, how can the word folklore be defined? Propp identifies folklore as ‘the product of a special form of verbal art’2 and he specifies that ‘not only there is a close tie between folklore and literature, but folklore is a literary phenomenon.’3 However, folklore and literature do have some differences: for example, literary work is unchangeable and it is represented by one or more authors, whereas folklore never has a specific author. In other words, it can be stated that the folktale is a product of folklore: it originates from a collective cultural background which promotes social, ethical, and moral values. Furthermore, it sets an example of how social norms should regulate the local community. Propp adds that ‘the folktale is an ideological phenomenon, a reflection of the world in men’s minds. It is not a reflection of itself.’4 Before getting into the core of the article, it is necessary to explain the concept of folktale as it is tackled in this study. According to Thomps

FAQs

What role does folklore play in preserving cultural heritage in Emirati society?

Folklore preserves local heritage and conveys cultural and religious norms, language patterns, and environmental context through oral storytelling traditions.

How does the study define the folktale for its analysis?

It treats the folktale as a traditional, usually anonymous story transmitted orally across generations, noting its narrative structure, third-person narration, and moral themes.

What corpus does the study use to analyze Emirati folktales?

The analysis is based on three Al-Ain folktales written in Emirati Arabic that share a common motif: the wickedness of wives.

Aug 26, 2026

Uploaded by Xiajie