Intra-speaker variation and identity performance through stylistic bricolage: Two texts in the Arabic of Arab Khalde (Lebanon)

This study documents intra-speaker variation through the transcription,
translation, and analysis of two narrative texts produced by a 61-year-old male speaker
from Arab Khalde, Lebanon. Serving as a complementary study to the inter-speaker
variation examined in Iriarte Díez (2025, this volume), it provides a detailed account of
how individual speakers deploy sociolinguistic variables to perform their identities across
different contexts. Other than contributing to documenting a minority dialect in Lebanon,
my analysis demonstrates how linguistic variables function as indexical resources that the
speaker manipulates through stylistic bricolage to: (1) mark in-group/out-group
boundaries, (2) create realistic character identities in reported speech, and (3) position
himself within Lebanon’s sociolinguistic landscape.