Speaker
Professor Ohad Cohen / University of Haifa
This lecture explores the role of the desert line—defined as the demarcation between areas receiving more or less than 200 mm of annual rainfall—in shaping the linguistic milieu of the surrounding region. The analysis begins with an examination of the contemporary Arabic dialects spoken in this area, focusing on how the desert line influences their distribution and interrelations. The discussion then transitions to a comparative investigation of linguistic evidence derived from the Persian period’s Aramaic ostraca unearthed in southern Israel (Idumea). Employing a historical linguistic methodology, this study integrates ancient data with insights from modern linguistic research. The lecture concludes by considering the implications of these findings for our understanding of Biblical Hebrew.
Dr. Ohad Cohen is the Head of the Hebrew Language Department at the University of Haifa. His scholarly interests span several interrelated fields: Biblical Hebrew, syntax and verbal tense systems, Arabic dialectology, Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) Hebrew, Biblical and Targumic Aramaic, and comparative Semitic linguistics. In recent years, his research has focused on two main areas: developing a theoretical model for the study of Late Biblical Hebrew through comparison with the linguistic profile of contemporary Palestinian Arabic dialects and the study of Early Modern Hebrew.