Though there are, by far, too many things to explain about Modern Standard Arabic's grammatical rules, I want to discuss what I, personally, have recently learned.
It's called al-i3raab (the three represents a sort of gagging noise) and it's relatively simple, once you've practiced it a few times. To give you some background, pronouncing every sound in a word is only for being extremely formal. These rules are mostly used in the Holy Qu'ran and in poems.
To begin, there are three main cases of al-i3raab. The first, called al-ism al-majroor, is the case where you pronounce the end of words with an "ee" sound. This happens when you have "an object (and its modifiers) of a preposition, or in a possessive relationship of one noun to another in an iDaafa (*something* of *something*) except the first of the two words" (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya).
This case is awesome because it's really easy to identify. When ever you see a preposition, the next word and its modifiers are pronounced with an "ee" sound called kasra. Or, if the word is indefinite, it takes an "een" sound.
The next case is al-ism al-marfoo3. The word/s proceeding either a subject in a sentence that starts with a verb or the subject or predicate in a sentence that starts with a noun (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya). This case is less seeable because you have to look at the sentence structure. The sound that follows is "oo" or, for indefinite "oon" called damma.
The final case is called al-ism al-monsoob. It is either preceded by "a direct object of sentence that starts with a verb or an adverb" which makes it relatively easy to spot. Also, al-ism al-majroor overrides this iDaafa and any prepositional phrase it might contradict (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya). The vowel sound that follows is that of "ah" or, for indefinite, "ah-n" and is called fatHa.
I hope this isn't all too difficult to follow! I love it and it makes Arabic make so much more sense to me!
For example, in class, my classmates and I read out our homework answers to our teacher. As we start in, we awkwardly stumble across words and phrases, not knowing how we're supposed to pronounce the ends of words. It was not until now that we learned the rules. After months of feeling horrible about our pronunciation, wondering if we missed something in the book from before that might have explained these kinds of things, it all became clear.
Class has become such a breeze. In the beginning, we were often frustrated with our oral comprehension. There are lots of examples of times when one word, when correctly pronounced, sounds so similar to another word, which caused us all great confusion. For example, "ibna" means daughter; "ibnatayn" means two daughters. When correctly pronounced, "ibna" becomes "ibnatan" if it's indefinite (like if they're somebody else's two daughters). So, with just a slight pronunciation difference ("tayn" verses "tan"), it sounds like he's saying two daughters instead of one. Naturally, in the beginning, I thought that was what he was saying. It would cause me minor errors in my oral comprehension that were frustrating.
So that's why al-i3rab is so awesome!
Hope you learned something!
It's called al-i3raab (the three represents a sort of gagging noise) and it's relatively simple, once you've practiced it a few times. To give you some background, pronouncing every sound in a word is only for being extremely formal. These rules are mostly used in the Holy Qu'ran and in poems.
To begin, there are three main cases of al-i3raab. The first, called al-ism al-majroor, is the case where you pronounce the end of words with an "ee" sound. This happens when you have "an object (and its modifiers) of a preposition, or in a possessive relationship of one noun to another in an iDaafa (*something* of *something*) except the first of the two words" (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya).
This case is awesome because it's really easy to identify. When ever you see a preposition, the next word and its modifiers are pronounced with an "ee" sound called kasra. Or, if the word is indefinite, it takes an "een" sound.
The next case is al-ism al-marfoo3. The word/s proceeding either a subject in a sentence that starts with a verb or the subject or predicate in a sentence that starts with a noun (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya). This case is less seeable because you have to look at the sentence structure. The sound that follows is "oo" or, for indefinite "oon" called damma.
The final case is called al-ism al-monsoob. It is either preceded by "a direct object of sentence that starts with a verb or an adverb" which makes it relatively easy to spot. Also, al-ism al-majroor overrides this iDaafa and any prepositional phrase it might contradict (Al-Kitaab fii Ta3allum al-3Arabiyya). The vowel sound that follows is that of "ah" or, for indefinite, "ah-n" and is called fatHa.
I hope this isn't all too difficult to follow! I love it and it makes Arabic make so much more sense to me!
For example, in class, my classmates and I read out our homework answers to our teacher. As we start in, we awkwardly stumble across words and phrases, not knowing how we're supposed to pronounce the ends of words. It was not until now that we learned the rules. After months of feeling horrible about our pronunciation, wondering if we missed something in the book from before that might have explained these kinds of things, it all became clear.
Class has become such a breeze. In the beginning, we were often frustrated with our oral comprehension. There are lots of examples of times when one word, when correctly pronounced, sounds so similar to another word, which caused us all great confusion. For example, "ibna" means daughter; "ibnatayn" means two daughters. When correctly pronounced, "ibna" becomes "ibnatan" if it's indefinite (like if they're somebody else's two daughters). So, with just a slight pronunciation difference ("tayn" verses "tan"), it sounds like he's saying two daughters instead of one. Naturally, in the beginning, I thought that was what he was saying. It would cause me minor errors in my oral comprehension that were frustrating.
So that's why al-i3rab is so awesome!
Hope you learned something!
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