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How
to Learn Arabic

A
Bit of History

Reading & Writing

Alphabet for
Beginners

Arabic
Alphabet

Writing
Hamza

Cluster
Reduction

Verbs

Intro
to Arabic Morphology

Verb
Conjugation

Derived
Nouns

Verb
Paradigms

Hamza
Verbs

Assimilated
Verbs

Hollow
Verbs

Deficient
Verbs

Duplicated
Verbs

Highly
Deficient Verbs

Paradigm
Meanings

Summary

Greater
Etymology

Grammar

Intro
to Arabic Grammar

Arabic
Words

Arabic
Phrases

Arabic
Sentences

The Heart
of Arabic Grammar

Arabic
Inflection

Arabic
Reflection

Diptotes

Nominal
Sentences

Verbal
Sentences

Arabic
Adverbs

Circumstantial
Adverb

Exclusion

Disambiguation

Genitival
States

Summary

Sentence
Parsing

Grammar Subtopics

Definiteness

Gender

Plurality

Broken
Plurals

Arabic
Numbers

Patterns
Reference

Types of
Maa

Vocabulary

Translator

Numbers

Time

Directions

Fruits

Body
Parts

Structures

Travel
Vocabulary

Common
Verbs

Practice
Verbs

Classical Logic

Introduction
to Classical Logic

Indication

Simple
Indication

Indicated
Concept

Definitions

Compound
Indication

Modern
Logic

Indicated
Assent

Proofs

Logic
Reference

Proof
by Contradiction

Mathematical
Induction

Rhetoric

Inspiring
Videos

Eloquence

Predication

Classical
Poetry

Arabic Words

Overview of Words

As
mentioned in the introduction to the
grammar section, words in Arabic are divided into three categories. The
following is a more detailed treatment of this.

·
اسم pl.
أسماء
(noun): This category is defined as those words that impart a single meaning on
their own  and do not afford a
tense. Roughly speaking, this is equivalent to what we know in English as nouns,
pronouns, adjectives, and adverbs.

·
فعل pl.
أفعال
(verb): This category is defined as those words that impart a single meaning on
their own  and afford a tense. This
is exactly what we in English know as verbs.

·
حرف pl.
حروف
(particle): This category is defined as those words that do not impart a meaning
on their own . Roughly speaking, this is equivalent to what we know in English
as prepositions, conjunctions, articles, and other particles.

Particles don’t impart a meaning on their own. This means
that they are only understood when other words are mentioned along with them. In
fact, their very purpose is to expose certain attributes in the words around
them. For example, the word “and” cannot be understood fully unless it has
something to its right and left, as in “you and I”. The purpose of “and” in this
example is to expose the attribute of conjunction in the words “you” and “I”.
Another example is the word “from”. On its own, it doesn’t give a clear meaning
and it needs to have something after it, as in “from Basra”. In the example, the
word “from” exposes the attribute within Basra of being an origin. Without
“from”, this attribute would not have otherwise been apparent.

Hence any word that does not impart a meaning of its own
accord, rather it helps expose attributes of other words, is a particle. If this
is not the case, then the word is either a noun or a verb.

Now, nouns do not afford a tense whereas verbs do. Consider
the word “yesterday”. This is either a noun or a verb since it imparts a single
meaning on its own. But which of the two is it? The word “yesterday”, although
its meaning has something to do with time, does not afford a tense. Hence it is
a noun. On the other hand, a word such as “go” does afford a tense (the future
in this case). Hence it is a verb.

These three categories cover all of the words in the Arabic
language and they are mutually exclusive. That is to say, any given word must
fit into one, and only one, of the above.

Nouns

Nouns are categorized in many ways. The following is a list
of all the useful ways in which a noun can be classified. Each one has its own
place in grammar and this tutorial will give only a brief introduction to each
plus a link to more dedicated tutorials as they are made available.

·
gender: all nouns are
either

o
masculine or

o
feminine

·
plurality: all nouns are
either

o
singular,

o
dual, or

o
plural

·
derivation: all nouns are
either

o
not derived and nothing is
derived from them,

o
a source of derivation (also
known as a gerund), or

o
derived from a gerund

·
definiteness: all nouns are
either

o
indefinite or

o
definite

·
grammatical reflection

o
many
sub-categories

Gender

Nouns in Arabic are either masculine or feminine; there is no
neutral gender. By default, a noun is masculine unless it has one of the four
signs of femininity on it. The signs of femininity are as follows.

1.
the explicit round Taa,
called تاء مربوطة
if it is attached to the letter before it (ـة) or تاء مُدَوَّنة if it is detached (ة)

2.
the assumed round Taa

3.
the الف مقصورة
(ى) that
comes at the end of nouns and is beyond the base letters

4.
the الف ممدودة
(ـاء) that
comes at the end of nouns and is beyond the base letters

Method of
Feminization

Example

Round
Taa

مسلمة (female
Muslim)

Assumed round
Taa

عين
(eye)

الف مقصورة

عُلْيى (most
high)

الف ممدودة

أَذْكِياء (erudite
people)

There is quite a bit more to be said about gender, but that
will be discussed in a dedicated tutorial.

Plurality

In Arabic, nouns are either singular (there’s one of them),
dual (there are two of them), or plural (there are three or more of them). A
singular noun is typically made dual by adding either the suffix ـانِ or the
suffix ـينِ,
depending on the grammatical case of the noun.

Singular

Dual

تِـنِّـيْـن (dragon)

تِـنِّـيْـنَانِ / تِـنِّـيْـنَـيْنِ

This is seemingly quite simple, and most of the time this is
all there is to it. However, there are some rules to noun duality which will be
discussed in a dedicated tutorial.

A singular noun may be made plural in one of two ways. One
method of pluralisation is to add the suffix ـونَ or
ـينَ
(depending on the grammatical case) for masculine nouns, and the suffix ـات for
feminine nouns. These are called sound plurals. Another method for forming
plurals is to use certain patterns. These are called broken plurals.

Singular

Plural

طالب

طالبُوْنَ / طالبِيْنَ (sound masculine)

طالبة

طالبات (sound feminine)

طالب

طُلاَّب (broken)

There is a lot to be discussed with respect to plurals in
Arabic. The tutorial entitled Pluralisation
gives a detailed account of plurals, and the tutorial entitled Broken Plurals
is an advanced discussion about forming broken plurals.

Derivation

With respect to whether a noun has been derived using
morphology or not, nouns fall into exactly one of three categories. A noun could
be such that it has not been derived and nothing has been derived from it. These
are called frozen nouns and an example of this is the word شجرة (tree).
A noun could be such that other words are derived from it using the rules
of morphology. This type of noun is called a gerund and an example is the
word لعب (to play
/ playing). Finally, a noun could be derived from a gerund. Such nouns are
called derived nouns and examples include the active participle, the passive
participle, the superlative, and others.

There is nothing to be said about frozen nouns; they are
simply looked up in the dictionary. Very deep Arabic etymology does, however,
give some attention to these types of nouns. For a detailed account of this,
refer to the advanced tutorial entitled Greater
Etymology. Gerunds are not thoroughly studied because there is little to be
said about them beyond their patterns. For a brief look at gerunds, refer to the
tutorial entitled Verb
Paradigms, where the most common gerunds are given. And finally, derived
nouns are discussed thoroughly in the Derived Nouns
tutorial.

Definiteness

By default, a noun is indefinite. There is no article, sign,
or any mechanism that indicates this. In order to make a noun definite, one of
seven things must be done. In other words, there are seven ways in which a noun
is made definite; if none of those have been used, the noun is indefinite.

The methods of definiteness are as follow

1.
the noun is a personal
pronoun (“هو”)

2.
the noun is a demonstrative
pronoun (“هذا”)

3.
the noun is a relative
pronoun (“الذي”)

4.
the noun is a proper noun
(“Saudi Arabia”)

5.
it is prefixed with the
definite article الـ

6.
it is a non-final noun in a
possessive
structure and the final noun is definite

7.
the noun comes after a
particle of vocation (“يا رجل”)

Most of the above are topics with their own place in grammar
and it is not appropriate to give their details here. Dedicated tutorials will
be made available for each of them.

Grammatical Reflection

Most nouns in the language experience grammatical
inflection. This results in nouns entering different grammatical cases
depending on how they’re being used in a sentence. But not all nouns reflect
their case in the same manner. So when we divide nouns based on how grammatical
cases are represented on them, we get 16 categories. For a full treatment of
this topic and this list of 16 categories, refer to the Reflection of
Grammatical Case tutorial.

Summary

The above ways of classifying a noun are separate from one
another. Thus a given noun will have a particular gender, a plurality, a
derivation class, a type of definiteness, and a method of grammatical
inflection. All of these methods of classification will apply to a given noun.

For example, the word شجرة (tree)
is

·
in terms of gender:
feminine

·
in terms of plurality:
singular

·
in terms of derivation:
frozen

·
in terms of definiteness:
indefinite

·
in terms of its method of
grammatical inflection: Reflection Type I

Verbs

Arabic
morphology has its own way of classifying and dealing with verbs. The main
topic of grammar, however, is grammatical
inflection. In light of this concept, grammar divides verbs into the
following categories.

·
ماضي
(perfect): the past tense verb

·
مضارع
(imperfect): this includes the present, future, prohibition and all
variations

·
أمر حاضر معروف (imperative): this includes only the active, second-person
conjugations of the command verb

The Grammatical
Inflection tutorial discusses which of the above types of verbs inflect for
grammatical case, and the Grammatical
Reflection tutorial discusses how that inflection is reflected on the
verb.

Particles

There are less than 80 particles in the entire language. Due
to the number being so small, it is possible to categorize them based on their
meanings and their effects, explaining the meaning of each particle one by
one.

Particles are divided into the following 15 categories.

1.
حروف الجر:
genitival particles

2.
الحروف المشبهة بالفعل: the particles that resemble verbs

3.
الحروف العاطفة: conjunctions (e.g. “and”)

4.
حروف التنبيه: particles used for alerting (e.g. “Hey!”)

5.
حروف النداء:
vocative particles (e.g. “O”)

6.
حروف الإيجاب: particles for affirmative answers (e.g. “yes”)

7.
حروف الردع:
particles used for negative answers (e.g. “never”)

8.
الحروف الزائدة: extra

9.
حروف التفسير: particles that introduce an explanatory sentence (e.g.
“i.e.”)

10.
حروف المصدر:
gerundival particles

11.
حروف التحضيض: particles use for prodding

12.
حروف القرب:
particles used to indicate nearness in time or certainty (e.g. “has/had”)

13.
حروف الإستفهام: interrogative particles

14.
حروف الشرط:
conditional particles

15.
Miscellaneous

Since there are so many categories, they will not be
discussed at this point.

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All tutorials on this website are authored by Shariah Program
graduate Mohtanick Jamil
© 2003-2011 Shariah Program All Rights
Reserved.

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