Arabic Language Blog

Dual can be very tricky at times. The word (كِلا) in Arabic means ‘both’ in English. It is used mainly as part of an idaafa construction, either with a definite noun (كِلا الطالبان) ‘both students’ or a pronoun, e.g. (كِلاهما) ‘both of them’. Many people erroneously use (كِلا) with both masculine and feminine, without realizing that there is a feminine of the word which is (كِلتا); therefore, many people make mistakes in expressions like (كِلا اللغتين) ‘both languages’ and (كِلا الدولتين) ‘both countries’, when it should be (كِلتا اللغتين) and (كِلتا الدولتين).

In addition, when we mark the cases on these words, the final vowel is changes according to the case. i.e. we use (كِلا) and (كِلتا) in the (مرفوع) nominative case. When they are used in the (منصوب) accusative and (مجرور) genitive cases, the final vowel changes to (ي), e.g.

جاء كِلا الرجلان.

‘Both men came.”

زرت كِلتي الدولتين.

‘I visited both states.’

تكلمنا مع كِليهما.

‘We talked to both of them.’

In Arabic, nominal sentences typically begin with a subject (مبتدأ), which can be a noun or a pronoun, e.g.

الولد طويل.

‘The boy is tall.’

هي طالبة.

‘She is a student.’

A noun that occurs as a subject is often definite, e.g. a proper noun like (محمد) or (نادية), a noun that begins with ال, e.g. (الولد) or (الطالبة), or a noun that has a possessive ending, e.g. (كتابي) or (صديقتي).

In some cases, when the subject is indefinite, it appears after the predicate. The predicate in this case is often made up of a prepositional phrase or the expression (هناك), i.e. ‘there is’. In this case, the predicate occurs at the beginning of the sentence (خبر مقدم) and the subject appears after it (مبتدأ مؤخر), e.g.

هناك أماكن جميلة في العالم العربي.

‘There are beautiful places in the Arab world.’

في الكتاب الجديد قصص جميلة.

‘In the new book, there are lovely stories.’

This is important with regard to the case marking of these sentences, as many students often miss the fact that these sentences are nominal sentences with fronted predicates. The subject that comes at a later position in the sentence must be marked nominative, e.g.

في الكتاب الجديد قصصٌ جميلةٌ.

In this post, I explain the use of the case marking system with sound feminine plurals. Sound feminine plural nouns and adjectives end with (ات). They are marked for their case with vowels like singular nouns. However, they have special markings. In the nominative case, i.e. when the noun is used as the subject of a verbal sentence or as a subject or predicate of a nominal sentence, feminine plural nouns and adjectives are marked with (ـُ) if they are definite and (ـٌ) if they are indefinite, e.g.

تعمل المهندساتُ المصرياتُ في نفس الشركة.

“The Egyptian engineers work at the same company.”

المهندساتُ المصرياتُ مجتهداتٌ.

“The Egyptian engineers are hard-working.”

When the noun is used as an object, the case is accusative. Feminine plural nouns and adjectives are marked with (ـِ) if they are definite and (ـٍ) if they are indefinite, e.g.

قابلنا المهندساتِ المصرياتِ.

“We met the Egyptian engineers.”

كلّمتُ طالباتٍ عربياتٍ.

“I talked to Arab students.”

When the noun is used after a preposition or after the first word of an idafa construction, the case is genitive. Feminine plural nouns and adjectives are marked with (ـِ) if they are definite and (ـٍ) if they are indefinite, e.g.

تكلمت مع المهندساتِ المصرياتِ.

“I spoke with the Egyptian engineers.”

شركة المهندساتِ كبيرة.

“The company of the engineers is big.”

The special thing to be noted about feminine plurals is that they take the same marking for accusative and genitive cases, i.e. whether a feminine plural noun or adjective is accusative or genitive, they are marked with (ـِ) if they are definite and (ـٍ) if they are indefinite.