The Pragmatic Roles of Personification in Iraqi Arabic: A Study of Everyday Digital Discourse on Facebook

This study explores the pragmatic functions of personification in Iraqi Digital Arabic (henceforth IDA), focusing on how human attributes are assigned to non-human entities in everyday speech. While personification has been widely examined in literary contexts, its role in localized Iraqi digital Arabic discourse remains underexplored. Drawing on Searle’s (1969) Speech Act Theory, The study design involves qualitative content analysis of natural Iraqi conversations on Facebook. The analysis reveals that assertive and expressive speech acts each constitute 35% of the data, reflecting how personification is used to describe socio-economic conditions and convey emotions. Directive speech acts account for 20%, functioning as indirect advice or warnings, while commissives, comprising 10%, reinforce cultural identity and social cohesion. The findings demonstrate that personification in Iraqi Digital Arabic serves not merely as a stylistic feature but as a communicative tool for expressing frustration, voicing indirect complaints, and strengthening interpersonal interaction. This study contributes to the field of Arabic pragmatics by highlighting the interplay between figurative language and everyday discourse.