In Arabic a meaningful word is divided into three categories namely Noun (الاسم), Verb (فعل) and Particle (الْحرف). In this lesson we will Insha Allah learn the noun and its types i.e., الاسِمْ وَأَنْوَاعُهُ but first of all let us define a noun:

"A word that names a person, place, or thing, as in "Khalid", "museum" or "book".

Definiteness and Indefiniteness ("The" and "a"):
 

In this lesson we will Insha Allah learn the definite and indefinite nouns and their types. A noun is either definite i.e. (الْمَعْرِفَةُ) or its is indefinite i.e., (النَكِرَةُ).   An indefinite noun can be defined as "Name of an unspecific person, place or thing" e.g., man (رجلٌ), book (كِتَابٌ), city (مَدِيْنَةٌ), and cow (بَقَرَةٌ).   A definite noun can be defined as "Name of a specific person, place or thing" e.g., Muhammad (مُحَمَّدٌ), Makkah (الْمَكَّةُ), or Black-Stone (الْحَجَرُ الأسْودُ).

Gender and Number:

A noun can be categorized into two categories with respect to its gender i.e., Masculine (الْمُذَكَرُ) and feminine (الْمُؤَنَثُ).   Unlike English noun Arabic noun can be categorized into three categories with respect to number i.e., Singular (الْمُفْرَدْ), Dual (الْمُثَنى) and Plural (الْجَمْعُ). In the previous lessons we have studied these categories but in the next lessons we will learn about them in more detail, Insha Allah (God Willing).
 

There are very specific rules for definite and indefinite nouns in the Arabic language - we will learn these later Insha'Allah (God Willing)

A definite Arabic noun has six types namely:

• Proper Noun (الْعَلَمْ),

• Pronouns (الْضَمَائِرُ), already partially covered in (Lesson_004 & Lesson_010, Lesson_013B, Lesson_014, Lesson_015, Lesson_017)

• Demonstrative Pronouns (الاَسْمَاءُ الإِشَارَة), already learnt in (Lesson_001, Lesson_002, Lesson_006, Lesson_007, Lesson_013A, & Lesson_017)

• Relative Pronouns (الاَسْمَاءُ الْمَوْصُوْلَةُ), (Lesson_009, Lesson_012)

• Definite due to the definite article (مُعَرَفٌ بِـأل), already discussed in detail in (Lesson_003 & Lesson_007) and

• Definite with Annexation (مُعَرَفٌ بِالإِضَافَةِ) already learnt in detail in (Lesson_005)