Arabic: Adjectives
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Arabic adjectives agree with the noun they go with in gender, number, case AND determination (definite/indefinite), the latter is something which would need some explaining. The adjective appears behind the noun, unlike in English:
- indefinite, nominative, masculine: a big man - (rajulun kabīrun) رجل كبير
- definite, nominative, masculine: The big man - (ar-rajulu l-kabīru) الرجل الكبير
- indefinite, nominative, feminine: a big queen - (malikatun kabīratun) ملكة كبيرة
- definite, nominative, feminine: The big queen - (al-malikatu l-kabīratu) الملكة ٱلكبيرة
You see that the definite article is used with both the noun and adjective, or nunation is used with both.
The feminine singular form of an adjective is usually formed by adding a ta-marbuta (ة) to the masculine form.
Note that there is an ambiguity in the indefinite constructions:
- (rajulun kabīrun) رجل كبير can mean both:
- a big man
- a man is big
Context usually makes clear which is meant, the former is of course the most common usage.
We mentioned that the adjective agrees with the noun in gender, number case and determination. This is however not the case when it comes to plural nouns who refer to non-persons. In this case the adjective is placed in its feminine singular form!
Take a look at the following examples in nominative case, the first two phrases refer to non-persons and use the singular feminine form of the adjective, the second two refer to persons so use the plural form agreeing with the gender of the noun (the masculine plural form of kabīr is kibār, the feminine plural form is kabīrātun, more about forming plural can be found in a later chapter):
- Indefinite, non-person: big books - (kutubun kabīratun) كتب كبيرة
- Definite, non-person: The big books - (al-kutubu l-kabīratu) الكتب الكبيرة
- Indefinite, person, masculine: big men - (rijālun kibārun) رجال كبار
- Definite, person, masculine: The big men - (ar-rijālu l-kibāru) الرجال الكبار
- Indefinite, person, feminine: big girls - (binātun kabīrātun) بنات كبيرات
- Definite, person, feminine: The big girls - (al-binātu l-kabīrātun) البنات الكبيرات
