Archive for 'Grammar'
Arabic Parsing vs. Diacritics Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Nov 16, 2017
In acquiring Arabic, it is exceedingly essential that articulation rules, namely diacritics الحَرَكَات, be known from the outset. Knowing how to pronounce sounds and words intelligibly leads to better learning and communication. The ability to pronounce words effortlessly speeds up vocabulary acquisition and retention. Likewise, proper pronunciation leads to more comprehensible speech. This post is…
Basic Sentence Structure in Arabic (II) Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Nov 9, 2017
In an earlier post, I focused on one type of Arabic sentences, the verbal sentence الجُمْلَة الفِعْلِيَّة. As its name suggests, it is the sentence that starts with a verb فِعْل. In like manner, the nominal sentence الجُمْلَة الإِسْمِيَّة, our focus in this post, is the sentence that starts with a noun اِسْم. This type…
5 Common Prepositions in Arabic Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Nov 3, 2017
In learning another language, one good thing about prepositions is that they are limited, i.e. belong to a closed class of words, just like pronouns. Besides, in the case of Arabic, they are simple when conjugating them with pronouns (i.e. appending pronouns to them). There are seventeen prepositions in Arabic. Here, we look at the…
Genitive Construction in Arabic Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Oct 30, 2017
Genitive Construction (GC), known as iDHaafah إِضَافَة, is usually encountered at the early stages of learning Arabic. The main reason for this is that a genitive construction, which is a phrasal (i.e. more than one word) structure can be used as a faa‘il فَاعِل ‘subject’ or a maf‘uul مَفْعُول ‘object’ of the sentence in lieu…
Indefinite Nouns and Definite Nouns in Arabic Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Oct 12, 2017
The Noun الاسم alism in Arabic, any noun that is derived from the verb, can be either Indefinite نَكِرَة nakirah or Definite مَعْرِفَة ma‘rifah. The Indefinite النَّكِرَة an-nakirah is almost always changeable to Definite following to two morphological rules. Not every Definite, however, is changeable to Indefinite. That is, there are certain nouns that exist…
Arabic Numbers 1—10: MSA vs. Dialects Posted by Ibnulyemen اِبْنُ اليَمَن on Oct 5, 2017
Deemed as one of the most difficult languages to learn, some may wonder what makes Arabic so. Well, one aspect of difficulty is the variation between the standard formالفُصْحَى (formal, educational form) and the dialectal, colloquial, conversational form العَامِّيَّة. As to numbers, as is the case with most variations, the difference is morpho-phonological. That is…
Run with Saudi Women in the Open Air! (2) Posted by jesa on Sep 30, 2017
Marhaba! Last time I share with you a clip about a group of female runners in Saudi Arabia that have found benefits in running in open air in the streets of the cities. I hope you enjoy the post and learned new things about Saudi Arabia, Arab women, and the Arabic language. Today I provide…