Morocco, Darija, and Tifinagh

الدّارِجة

root: د-ر-ج / noun / definition: colloquial language spoken in North Africa

I’ve just returned from my one-week holiday in Agadir, and I’m slowly and reluctantly adjusting to the notable lack of heat and sunshine in London, with my already-fading tan and henna sweet reminders of my Moroccan stay.

While I managed to tick off at least one touristy bucket list item (thanks to a sunset camel ride), I also felt strangely like a linguist on a research trip with all of the language-related elements I observed and couldn’t help but mull over and make notes on.

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Case Endings of the Sound Feminine Plural

مُؤَنَّث

root: ء-ن-ث / passive participle of form II / definition: feminine

Most of us will have learnt that sound masculine plurals in Arabic have one of two endings: ـونَ when مرفوع, and ـينَ when منصوب or مجرور.

But the sound feminine plural ending (ـات) doesn’t change in spelling. Instead, we use either damma/dammatayn (ـاتُ/ـاتٌ) or kasra/kasratayn (ـاتِ/ـاتٍ) to indicate case.

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The مَـ of Place and Time

مَكان

root: ك-و-ن / noun / plural: أَماكِن / definition: place

After 11 weeks, my first semester of teaching is officially over. And I’m reflecting on these past three months as I pack for my upcoming trip, having already tucked James Scanlan’s A Moroccan Journey into my backpack—a pertinent read considering my destination.

One thing that I’ve found myself mentioning to Arabic students across various classes, and something that seemed to spark some aha! moments, is the مَـ of place and time.

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Arabic Synonyms Meaning “Resistance”

ثَلْج

root: ث-ل-ج / noun / plural: ثُلوج / definition: snow, ice

I couldn’t resist wrapping up in all my layers this morning around sunrise to venture out into the garden and ramble through the thick snow blanketing the decking.

My mum handed me some dried remnants of the floral arrangements we’ve had displayed around the house since last month to stick into the somewhat-vase-shaped snowball I had made on the garden table, with some desiccated red rose petals falling picturesquely onto the surrounding white snow.

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Reading Arabic Literature: An Interesting (?) Structure

تَرْكيب

root: ر-ك-ب / verbal noun of form II / plural: تَراكيب / definition: (grammatical) construction

If it seems like the last post in the Reading Arabic Literature series was almost a year ago… that’s because it was, unfortunately. (January, apparently?!)

And this doesn’t mean I haven’t been reading any Arabic literature—because as you might have read in my step-by-step literature translations, like this one—I’ve actually got more than one Arabic novel on the go, thanks to my as-of-yet-not-started and just-applied-for-as-of-Friday PhD. That makes for a mouthful.

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Resource: Arabic Literature Podcast

حَلْقة

root: ح-ل-ق / noun / plural: حَلَقات / definition: episode

I’m rushed off my feet this week and to top it off, I have an important deadline lying menacingly in wait on the footstep of Friday evening when it will, assuredly, catch me off-guard and drag me into the lair of panic that I’ve frequented so often, it has several caffeinated drinks waiting for me.

Still, it’s never too busy for a (short) blog post.

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Verbal Nouns of Hollow Roots

مَصْدَر

root: ص-د-ر / noun / plural: مَصادِر / definition: verbal noun, source

Back in June, when we looked at the different types of Arabic roots, we mentioned that hollow roots are those with either و or ي as the middle letter. Like ق-و-ل and غ-ي-ر.

Verbal nouns (مصادر) derived from hollow roots sometimes follow a different pattern to those derived from sound (regular) roots.

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The Verb يتسبّب and its Prepositions

مُتَنَوِّع

root: ن-و-ع / active participle of form V / definition: various

In one of the examples in Arabic Observations: Words with Antonymic Meanings, we saw how changing the preposition following a verb could produce two completely opposite meanings.

While the meaning of the form V verb تَسَبَّبَ / يَتَسَبَّبُ doesn’t change that drastically, it still shifts depending on the accompanying preposition/s.

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Distance and Perspective

بُعْد

root: ب-ع-د / noun / plural: أَبْعاد / definition: distance, dimension

So I’m back from my one-week solo trip to Istanbul which was perfect on all fronts. To feel so immersed in history, culture, spirituality… and to be there with my thoughts alone… was simply unbeatable.

With every step I took through the palaces, museums, and mosques, and across the bridges over the Golden Horn, and with every breathtaking sweeping view from the city’s rooftops, I felt as though I was stepping back to look at my own life.

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Arabic Observations: The Eye and Other Water Sources

عَيْن

root: ع-ي-ن / noun / plural: عُيون أو أَعْيُن / definition: eye, spring

Here we are with another post in the Arabic Observations series, and this one starts with the word عَين (“eye”).

When you look up عَين in the dictionary and scoot your finger across a little from its first definition, you’ll land on another meaning: “spring (of water)”.

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