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Pronunciation • Roots • Root Extraction • Nouns • Plural Nouns EDITED • Masculine Plural Nouns EDITED • Feminine Plural Nouns
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Irregular Plural
Nouns • Irregular Perfective Conjugation • Irregular Imperfective Conjugation • Prepositions • Conjunctions • Adverbs • Inactive Particles • Ablative Particles • Vocative Particles • Exclamatory Style • Praise & Disparagement • Passive Participles • Participle-like Adjectives • Comparatives • Place-nouns • Time-nouns • Tool-nouns • Attributives • Diminutives
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Demonstratives
Demonstratives in English are "this," "that," "these," and "those." In Arabic, demonstratives are nouns, thus they have the characteristics of gender, number, and case. There are so many demonstratives in classical Arabic; I am going to try to put them all, but I will indicate which ones are the ones used usually in modern life. Demonstratives are called in Arabic the "nouns of pointing" أَسْماءُ الإِشارَةِ.
1. Near Demonstratives The basic forms of demonstratives are the near demonstratives. All demonstratives are "built" words (do not change form with changing in grammatical case) except for the dual demonstratives, which are case inflected.
*The و is silent. The feminine singular demonstrative had so many variants in the classical language of which none is used in the modern language. However, some of them may be heard in some spoken dialects today.
All of those feminine singular demonstratives are also "built" words; except for ذِاْتُ which is a really obsolete demonstrative anyway.
It is common to add a haa- هَـ prefix to demonstratives. This prefix will change nothing in the meaning. Note that the haa- lacks an extended 'alif in writing هَـ when attached to most demonstratives. This haa'< is called the " haa'< of attention " هَاْءُ التَّنْبِيْهِ.
أُولَىْ cannot take haa- prefix, and this prefix takes a different figure هَا when attached to the feminine dual demonstratives. Four of the feminine singular demonstratives can be prefixed with attention haa'< :
Now to the bottom line, the near demonstratives that are really used in modern standard Arabic are the following:
Examples: هَذَاْ يَوْمٌ جَمِيْلٌ haathaa yawm(un) jameel(un)
= this (is) a day a beautiful Translation: this is a nice day
هَذِهِ نَصِيْحَةٌ جَيِّدَةٌ haathih(i) naseeha(tun) jayyida(tun)
= this (is) an advice a good
Translation: this is a good advice
هَؤُلاءِ قَوْمٌ صَادِقُوْنَ haa'ullaa'(i) qawm(un) saadiqoon(a)
= these (are) people honest
Translation: these are honest people
Since that demonstratives are definite nouns, when the predicate is also definite there can be a problem of ambiguity. This problem is similar to what has been described already in the section on separation pronouns. هَذَاْ الْمُعَلِّمُ haathaa ('a)l-mu"allim(u)
This phrase can mean either one of two things:
this teacher this (is) the teacher
So to make a distinction, a separation pronoun is used:
هَذَاْ هُوَ الْمُعَلِّمُ haathaa huw(a) ('a)l-mu"allim(u)
= this he (is) the teacher
Translation: this is the teacher
So, basically, according to the noun after the demonstrative we have the following three situations:
هَاْتَاْنِ هُمَاْ التِّلْمِيْذَتَاْنِ haataan(i) humaa ('a)t-tilmeethataan(i)
= these they (are) the two students (fem.)
Translation: these are the two students humaa was necessary here to distinguish the sentence "these are the two students" from "these two students." هَذَاْ هُوَ صَدِيْقِيْ haathaa huw(a) sadeeq-ee
= this he (is) (the) friend (of) me
Translation: this is my friend huw(a) here was not necessary like in the previous examples. The phrase without the pronoun could not mean anything other than "this is my friend." هَذَاْ صَدِيْقِيْ haathaa sadeeq-ee
= this (is) (the) friend (of) me
Translation: this is my friend So because there was no ambiguity here, the usage of a separation pronoun was optional. هَذِهِ مَكَّةُ haathih(i) makka(tu)
= this (is) Mecca
Translation: this is Mecca
هَذِهِ هِيَ مَكَّةُ haathih(i) hiy(a) makka(tu)
= this she (is) Mecca
Translation: this is Mecca hiy(a) here was optional (emphatic).
هَذِهِ هِيَ haathih(i) hiy(a)
= this (is) she
Translation: this is her / here she is hiy(a) here was a predicate but not a separation pronoun.
Thus, a rule can be stated: A separation pronoun must be used after demonstratives only if the predicate is a noun attached to the definite article 'al- ال . Otherwise it is optional (emphatic).
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