Archive for 'Arabic Language'
Everyday (cultural) phrases in colloquial Egyptian Arabic: ‘Hope for the best’ (3) Posted by Hanan Ben Nafa on Sep 26, 2018
Welcome to the third and the last part of this blog post where we’re looking at a song called تفائلوا بالخير ‘wish for the best’ by the Egyptian singer Yasmin Ali. As mentioned in the first and second part of the blog, the song is interesting in terms of the several cultural phrases included in…
Basic Arabic: Diacritical Marks Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Sep 25, 2018
In an earlier post, you learned that short vowels الحَرَكَات القَصِيْرَة in Arabic are not represented by letters; rather, they are diacritical marks that are placed over or below regular consonant letters. These short vowels are the fatHah الفَتْحَة, the kasrah الكَسْرَة, and the DHammah الضَّمَّة. In addition, there are two other essential marks: the…
Tricky Prepositions Posted by aziza on Sep 24, 2018
Prepositions can be a very tricky aspect of learning a foreign language. Often, we find correspondence between languages in the basic meaning and usage of certain prepositions, e.g. in Arabic (في) usually translates into (in) in English and (على) usually translates into (on) in English. However, this is not always the case, as there are…
Basic Arabic: The Alphabet Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Sep 20, 2018
الأَبْجَدِيَّة العَرَبِيَّة al-abjadiiyah al-‘arabiiyah, i.e. the Arabic Alphabetical System, includes twenty-eight letters. In addition to the alif ا and the alif al-madd آ, they are thirty. Nearly all these letters are consonants. Vowels are two types: long and short. Long vowels are represented by letters, while the short ones are represented by diacritical marks. Each…
Everyday (cultural) phrases in colloquial Egyptian Arabic: ‘Hope for the best’ (2) Posted by Hanan Ben Nafa on Sep 19, 2018
Welcome to the second part of this blog post where we’re looking at a song called تفائلوا بالخير ‘wish for the best’ by the Egyptian singer Yasmin Ali. s mentioned in the first part of the blog, these phrases are culturally interesting and thus can sound somewhat funny if were translated literally. It’s for this…
Everyday (cultural) phrases in colloquial Egyptian Arabic: ‘Hope for the best’ (1) Posted by Hanan Ben Nafa on Sep 12, 2018
In this post, we’re going to look at a nice song that was quite famous during the previous Ramadan season. The song titled اتْفَائْلُوا بِالْخِيرْ ‘hope for good’, which is produced in Egyptian Arabic, by the talented singer Yasmin Ali. أَمْرْ وَاقَعْ From a linguistic point of view, the song is very interesting as it’s…
Some Insights into Arabic Verb Usage (1) Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Sep 11, 2018
Certain rules of Arabic verb conjunction, formation, meaning, and pronunciation are oftentimes overlooked because they are minute and needs a meticulous learner or instructor to discover and/or pay attention to. Knowing these niceties lead to more accurate language use and speedier language learning overall. This post gives a list of rules and illustrations that concern…