The Concept of Word Economy between Classic Arab Rhetors and Modern Scholars: A Comparative Study
Rima Mahmoud Al-Essa,The Language Center, Al-Albayt University, Mafraq, Jordan.
Abstract
The aim of this paper is to conduct a comparative study regarding word economy between Arab rhetors and modern scholars. A number of opinions have been provided to explore how Arab rhetors deal with this issue-word economy- as a part of eloquence. They have encouraged being economic, especially to what is attached to literature. Despite the fact that Arab rhetors presented the idea, they do not have a clear vision to what is considered as economic. Besides, modern scholars have studied the issue in details; they have differentiated between non-functional repetition in literature on the one hand, and wordiness as well as redundancy in practical writing on the other hand. The concept agreed upon by the two parties is that word economy is about reducing the space whereas ideas should be perfectly expressed using the minimum number of words.
It is widely believed among rhetors that it is the meaning beyond the words is the aim, so it is better to use as less words as one could in order to achieve a functional piece of writing. However, Arab rhetors disagree on what is more important: the words used or the meaning intended; consequently, the term “word economy”, especially regarding literature, arose to describe the quality of a written work. Two parties processing the debate in the matter of word vs. meaning can be noticed: the first one consists of rhetors who adopted the priority of selecting words over meaning, such as al Jāḥiẓ, Ibn al Athῑr and Ibn Qudāma whereas the second party is mainly presented by al Qāḍῑ al Jurjānῑ with his preference of meaning to selected words and his theory of the naẓm. The current paper tries not only to investigate what is said about word economy among Arab rhetors but also to conduct a comparative study on how modern studies deal with the matter.