My Favourite Arabic Podcast is Back!

عَودة

root: ع-و-د / verbal noun of form I / definition: return

Over a year ago, I shared with you the best Arabic podcast I’d found—recordings from The Arabic Circle, by the University of Chicago. The only issue was that new uploads stopped years ago and I was desperate for some new listening material.

(The episodes are somewhat reminiscent of my Arabic lectures at university, and have such a brilliant variety of topics.)

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Arabic Verb Forms XI-XV

أَكْثَر

root: ك-ث-ر / comparative, superlative / definition: more, most

As you can see, I couldn’t wait too long for another post about Arabic roots following our look at quadriliteral (four-letter-root) verb forms.

But this time, we’re going back to triliteral (three-letter) verb forms and exploring the ones above X—i.e. forms XI-XV (yes, they exist!).

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Step-by-Step Arabic Literature Translation #6

شاعِر

root: ش-ع-ر / noun / plural: شُعَراء / definition: poet

For today’s addition to the literature translation series, I’ve chosen some lines from a poem that really had an impact on me the first time I read it.

And that’s because the poet’s words are not confined to a poem. Instead, they unsettlingly foreshadow his own unfortunate death.

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Six Ways to Say “Can” or “to be Able to” in Arabic

قُدْرَة

root: ق-د-ر / noun / plural: قُدُرات / definition: ability, capability

For the vast majority of us, this past year has swirled into a nebulous stretch of time—a calendar that’s run away with itself and plunged into senselessness.

One of the only things punctuating my weeks has been writing these posts (the Wehr Wednesdays posts, in particular, prevent the days of the week from slipping towards the arbitrary).

That being said, in the midst of uncontrollable events, there are still things within our power. And speaking of what we can do, here’s six different ways to say “to be able to” or “can” in Arabic!

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Quadriliteral Arabic Verb Forms

وَزْن

root: و-ز-ن / noun / plural: أَوْزان / definition: form, pattern

We’ve come across some Arabic words from quadriliteral roots before on this blog—that is, roots comprising four letters. And I even went into a little depth about a quadriliteral verb form in Wehr Wednesdays #23.

But “a little depth” doesn’t really do it for me when it comes to Arabic grammar.

So, in this post, we’re going to explore the various forms in which verbs with four-letter roots occur.

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Root Exploration: م-و-ه

بَسيط

root: ب-س-ط / adjective / definition: simple

What can we get from the root of a word as simple as “water”? In Arabic, quite a lot!

Here we are, with the second post in the Root Exploration series, and this time we’re taking a look at the root م-و-ه.

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How to Say “Such” in Arabic

كَيْف

root: ك-ي-ف / interrogative / definition: how

One thing I’ve noticed about myself since starting this blog is that I can never definitively plan out the order of my posts—I post what I feel like writing that day (well, night, usually), whether I noted down the topic months ago or just thought of the idea.

This post’s topic happens to be one I wrote down many months ago, when I came across a construction that I don’t remember seeing before.

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Four Particles That Mean “So That”

حَرْف

root: ح-ر-ف / noun / plural: حُروف / definition: letter, (grammatical) particle

It’s never too soon for another synonyms post, so this week we’re taking a look at four different particles we can use to express purpose—they can all be translated as “so that” or “in order to“.

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Arabic Observations: the Abstract Noun of a Question?

تَأنيث

root: ء-ن-ث / verbal noun of form II / definition: feminisation

You might know that, in order to create an abstract noun in Arabic, you can simply feminise a regular noun with the typical ـِيّة ending.

Examples include:

  • إنسانِيّة – humanity (derived from إنسان, human)
  • اِشتِراكِيّة – socialism (derived from اِشتِراك, participation)
  • لاشَيئِيّة – nothingness (derived from لاشَيء, nothing)
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Arabic Headline Analysis #5

نِقابة

root: ن-ق-ل / noun / plural: نِقابات / definition: syndicate, union

It’s been a while since the last instalment in the Arabic Headline Analysis series, so we’re back today with another headline from the Project Syndicate website to analyse. (Take a look at this post to find out why this news website is great for language learners!)

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