What is "imala"

Imāla (also transliterated ; , literally "slanting") is a vowel shift exhibited in many dialects of Arabic where the open vowel, whether long or short, is raised to or even in certain morphological or phonological contexts. Imāla occurs in modern colloquial as well as classical variants of Arabic, including several ("styles of recitation") of the Quran. As a very noticeable phenomenon, is often one of the most distinguishing features in the dialects that have it, such as Lebanese Arabic.