Lesson 41 – الدَّرْس الحادي والأرْبَعُونَ
Interrogative (questioning) Articles (1 of 3) – أدَوَات الاسْتِفْهام (١ من ٣)
The Interrogative (questioning) noun ما /mā/
- Let's Continue to learn Arabic through our free Arabic language course. This Arabic course contains Arabic grammar, Arabic syntax, Arabic morphology and more.
- Mā (مَا) is an Arabic Interrogative (questioning) noun with a sukūn case-ending.
- The usage of /mā/ (مَا) is similar to /man/ مَنْ, but the only difference is that it is used to ask about inanimate, singular, dual or plural (masculine and feminine). Study the following examples:
Translation | Answer | Translation | Question | Number/gender |
This is an elephant. | /Hādhā fīlun./ | What is this? | /Mā hādhā?/ | Singular masculine |
Its price is one thousand dollars. | /thamanuhā alf-u dulārin/ | What is the price of the car? | /Mā thaman-u as-sayyāra-ti?/ | |
This is a plane. | /Hādhihī ŧā’iratun./ | What is this? | /Mā hādhihī?/ | Singular, feminine |
These are the two science books. | /hādhān-i kitābān-i al-ulūm-i/ | What are these two books? | /Mā hādhān-i al-kitābān-i?/ | Dual, masculine |
These are the two Kuwaiti planes. | هَاتَانِ طَائِرَتا الكُوَيْتِ. /hātān-i ŧâ’iratā al-kuwayt-i./ | What are these two planes? | /Mā hātāni aŧ-ŧâ’iratān-i?/ | Dual feminine |
These are the doors of my new flat. | هَذَهِ أَبْوَابُ شَقَّتِي الجَدِيدَة. /hādhihi abwābu shaqqati-ya al-ĵadīda./ | What are these doors? | Mā hādhihi al-abwāb-u?/ | Plural masculine |
These are the drawing tools. | /hādhihi adawātu ar-rasm-i/ | What are these things? | /Mā hādhihi al-ashyā-‘u?/ | Plural feminine |
- In the last example, we used the demonstrative noun hādhihi before the inanimate plural as any inanimate plural is handled like a feminine singular, as in the following examples:
Translation | Transliteration | Example |
These are pens. | Hādhihi aqlām-un | |
These are doors. | Hādhihi abwāb-un
| |
These are watches. | Hādhihi sāξāt-un |