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Active Participles in اللغة العربية | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| strikingstar Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5174 days ago 292 posts - 444 votes  Speaks: English*, Mandarin*, Cantonese, Swahili Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 1 of 10 09 December 2010 at 8:44pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Are there any differences between these two sentences?
ندرس في المكتبة . (nadrusu fil maktaba) vs. نحن دارسون في المكتبة (nahnu daarisuuna fil maktaba) Don't they both mean "We're studying in the library." Is there any reason to use the 2nd sentence over the 1st. Also, wouldn't a sentence like أنا كاتب في المدرسة have 2 interpretations, i.e. "I am a writer in the school" and "I'm writing in the school". How would we know which interpretation is being referred to without the benefit of context? Also, could someone explain how, when and where to use Active Participles in Arabic. It's still a little fuzzy to me. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Emiliana Diglot Groupie Germany Joined 5115 days ago 81 posts - 98 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Arabic (classical) | Message 2 of 10 09 December 2010 at 9:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Your second example
أنا كاتب في المدرسة can't mean "I am writing in the library" because كاتب is not a verb (I guess it means "writer"). "I write" means أَكْتَبَ. Regarding your first example: I don't know exactly what دارسون means but obviously it is again not a verb because it ends with ون which indicates that it is a noun masculine plural. So my guess is that it means "students", then the first sentence is: Wir are studying in the library" while the second one is "we are students in the library". Notice that there is no word for "to be" in arabic. I hope someone corrects me if neccessary! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Emiliana Diglot Groupie Germany Joined 5115 days ago 81 posts - 98 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Arabic (classical) | Message 3 of 10 09 December 2010 at 9:44pm | IP Logged | |||||
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sorry, I made a typing error:
"I write" is: أَكْتُبُ 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| strikingstar Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5174 days ago 292 posts - 444 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin*, Cantonese, Swahili Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written) | Message 4 of 10 09 December 2010 at 10:20pm | IP Logged | |||||
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مرحبا, Emiliana.
daarisunna and kaatib are Active Participles. They come from verbs. (Well lots of words come from verbs.) The derivation/conjugation is easy enough. For a Form I sound verb, e.g. darasa, just add an alif behind the first letter and change the fatha on the second letter to a kasra. darasa --> daaris (s,m). For Form II and higher verbs, you add a mu in front of the verb. أنا كاتب في المدرسة can indeed mean "I'm writing in the library", insofar as I trust my textbook. Here are a few examples from the textbook. نحن ذاهبون إلى المكتبة . (Nahnu dhaahibunna 'ilal maktaba/We're going to the library.) أنا كاتب مقالة عن مستقبل الشرق الأوسط. This translates to "I am writing an article about the future of the Middle East." Anaa kaatibun maqaalatan 3n .... From the case endings, it is clear the sentence does not mean "I am an author of an article about the future of the Middle East". There is no idaafa relationship. Otherwise, there'll be no nunation on kaatib and maqalla will be in the genitive, not accusative. My question is therefore, why not simply write أكتب مقالة عن مستقبل الشرق الأوسط. Is there no difference between this and the previous form at all?? Part of another sentence goes: بنتي حصلت على شهادة. It means "My daughter has obtained a degree." Notice this is in the past tense. It's not even in the present tense anymore and I don't understand why. If it had been up to me, I would have translated it as كانت بنتي حصلت شهادة. Notice also that there's no kaanat in the sentence. So the question is: how the heck do I use/interpret Active Participles. شكرا Edited by strikingstar on 09 December 2010 at 10:25pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5321 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 5 of 10 10 December 2010 at 9:36pm | IP Logged | |||||
The both mean exactly the same. Generally speaking, verbs who describe an action can be replaced with participles for stylistic reasons without any change in meaning. Since conjugated present (imperfect) verbs are more common in written MSA, you should use them when translating English present tense verbs into Arabic. (Note that in many Arabic dialects present participles are more common than conjugated verb forms.) However, with verbs describing an action or a state there is a difference whether you use the active participle or the finite verb. The active participle usually describes a state while the verb usually describes an action. For example: (هو قائم) huwa qā'imun = he's standing (هو يقوم من كرسيه) huwa yaqūmu min kursiyhi = he gets up from his chair
In Arabic, you'll often need to depend on the context to figure out the exact meaning of a sentence. And this sentence is one of the easier cases, because both interpretations mean more or less the same. Edited by Doitsujin on 10 December 2010 at 9:45pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| translator2 Senior Member United States Joined 6920 days ago 848 posts - 1862 votes Speaks: English* | Message 6 of 10 10 December 2010 at 10:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Edited by translator2 on 12 December 2010 at 9:13pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Mikael84 Bilingual Pentaglot Groupie Peru Joined 5301 days ago 76 posts - 116 votes Speaks: French*, Finnish*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Arabic (classical), German, Russian | Message 7 of 10 11 December 2010 at 5:07am | IP Logged | |||||
Doitsujin's answer regarding the use of active participles is spot on, in MSA it is quite uncommon to see a continuous action described with an active participle. You would have to just use the imperfect tense. So I will just answer your second question. You are puzzled as to why "My daughter has obtained a degree." (or "my daughter obtained a degree") is translated as: بنتي حصلت على شهادة The past tense is used because it is a finished action in the past, she has already obtained her degree, she is not obtaining it anymore. Your suggested translation in Arabic, كانت بنتي حصلت شهادة reads "my daughter had obtained a degree" (although to be perfectly correct grammatically I believe you'd have to insert a "qad" before "hasalat"). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cetacea Bilingual Tetraglot Groupie United States booh.com Joined 5325 days ago 80 posts - 163 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin*, Arabic (Yemeni), Arabic (Written) Studies: French | Message 8 of 10 11 December 2010 at 9:49am | IP Logged | |||||
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Active participle and present tense verb convey different meanings.
أنا جالسة على هذا الكرسي means I'm sitting on this chair (right at this moment). VS أجلس على هذا الكرسي means I always sit on this chair ( as in " This is my seat. I sit here every time I come here." ) In the above example active participle was used to convey the current state of the doer while present tense meant a habitual action. أدرس اللغة العربية means I study Arabic, not necessarily I'm studying Arabic now. Another use of active participle is profession: هو متحدث can mean he is a spokesperson or he is talking depending on context. كانت بنتي حصلت شهادة doesn't sound right. كان when used with a PRESENT tense verb means past continuous action, i.e. used to. But you can't use it with a one-time action like حصل على unless you want to say "my daughter used to obtain degrees all the time." which doesn't sound logical. The alternatives are: حصلت بنتي على الشهادة قبل سنتين My daughter obtained the degree two years ago. كانت بنتي تدرس للحصول على شهادة. My daughter used to study in order to obtain a degree. بنتي لديها شهادة My daughter has a degree. More examples: سقطت من الدرج I fell from the stairs ( can't use كنت because fell is a one-time action.) كنت أسقط هنا دائما ( I was so clumsy that )I used to fall here all the time. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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