Summary of Arabic Morphology

Introduction

The Arabic language sub-science known as صرف – referring roughly to what we know as Morphology as well as Etymology – is a subject through which one learns the internal assembly of a word by way of patterns of vowelization and introduction of extra letters—or what we call a template. Morphology differs from Lexicology in the sense that the latter gives the root meaning associated to a set of base letters, whereas the former gives all other meanings and connotations achieved by the template.

In practice, the following topics are discussed in this science. Their purpose is to aid students of the language, with the help of Lexicology, in forming and correctly vowelling words.

1.      conjugating basic conjugable words

2.      conjugating enhanced conjugable words

3.      conjugating irregular conjugable words

4.      understanding the added meanings achieved by enhancing basic conjugable words

Simple Conjugation

Below are conjugation tables for a particular verb in the perfect and imperfect tenses. Alongside the tables are methods of varying the meaning of a verb in each of the two tenses. Notice that the tables also note the idiosyncrasies of certain conjugations.

Perfect Tense

Voice (rendering an active verb passive) 1.      starting with the first conjugation, the second-last letter is given a كسرة 2.      all preceding letters which are vowelled are given a ضمة 3.      conjugation then proceeds normally Negation (negating an affirmative verb) 1.      the particle ما precedes the verb as a separate word ·        this applies to both active and passive Distance (changing the meaning of “opened” to “has opened” or “had opened”) ·         present perfect (“has”) is achieved by the particle قد preceding the verb as a separate word ·        قد applies to affirmative active and affirmative passive only ·        past perfect (“had”) is achieved by conjugating the verb كان in tandem with the main verb (somewhere before it) ·        كان applies to both voices and both affirmative and negative ·        كان will be conjugated in the active despite the voice of the main verb	Perfect Tense
	فَتَحَ
	فَتَحَا
	فَتَحُوْا
	فَتَحَتْ
	فَتَحَتا
	فَتَحْنَ
	فَتَحْتَ
	فَتَحْتُما
	فَتَحْتُمْ / فَتَحْتُمُوْنِيْ
	فَتَحْتِ
	فَتَحْتُما
	فَتَحْتُنَّ
	فَتَحْتُ
	فَتَحْنا

Imperfect Tense

Voice (rendering an active verb passive) 1.      starting with the first conjugation, the second-last letter is given a فتحة 2.      the imperfect prefix is given a ضمة 3.      conjugation then proceeds normally Negation (negating an affirmative verb) 1.      the particle لا precedes the verb as a separate word ·        this applies to both active and passive Limiting the Tense ·         the particle سـ is prefixed to the verb to limit it to the near future ·        the particle سوف precedes the verb as a separate word to limit it to the somewhat distant future ·        both particles apply to affirmative active and affirmative passive only Building the Subjunctive 1.      the 5 conjugations without a نون suffix will have their ضمة change to a فتحة 2.      the rest of the conjugations will lose their نون 3.      but conjugations 6 and 12 will retain their نون (they do not change at all)	Imperfect Tense
	يَفْتَحُ
	يَفْتَحانِ
	يَفْتَحُوْنَ
	تَفْتَحُ
	تَفْتَحانِ
	يَفْتَحْنَ
	تَفْتَحُ
	تَفْتَحانِ
	تَفْتَحُوْنَ
	تَفْتَحِيْنَ
	تَفْتَحانِ
	تَفْتَحْنَ
	أَفْتَحُ
	نَفْتَحُ

·         the particle لن is one of 4 reasons an imperfect verb is rendered subjunctive; لن emphatically negates the verb in the future (“will never”)

Building the Jussive

1.      the 5 conjugations without a نون suffix will have their ضمة change to a سكون

2.      the rest of the conjugations will lose their نون

3.      but conjugations 6 and 12 will retain their نون (they do not change at all)

·        the particle لم is one of 5 reasons an imperfect verb is rendered jussive; لم emphatically negates the verb in the past (“has never”)

Distance (forming the past continuous “used to” or “would”)

·         conjugate the verb كان in tandem with the main verb (somewhere before it)

·        this applies to both active and passive and can be negated using the particle ما

·        the verb كان will be conjugated in the active despite the voice of the main verb

Emphasizing the Verb

1.      render the imperfect verb subjunctive (this is just a shortcut and, grammatically speaking, the verb will not actually be in the subjunctive case); if the verb now ends in واو or ياء, drop that letter

2.      prefix every conjugation with the particle لَـ

3.      for every conjugation that ends in an Aleph, add the suffix ـنِّ

4.      for conjugations 6 and 12, add the suffix ـانِّ

5.      for all other conjugations, add the suffix ـنَّ

·        the emphasized verb has its tense limited to the future (“will certainly”)

·        this applies to affirmative active and affirmative passive only

·        note that in every conjugation with an Aleph before the particle of emphasis (the نون), the نون is مكسور, and that it is مفتوح in all other conjugations

·        it is possible, for prosodic reasons, to use a lighter particle of emphasis – the particle ـنْ with a سكون – but this can only be done with those conjugations where the other نون is مفتوح

Command and Prohibition

Forming the Imperative

·         for the second-person active conjugations

o       start with the imperfect and remove the prefix

o       Add an eliding Hamza if necessary. The vowel on this Hamza will be determined as follows

1.      if the second base letter has a ضمة, the Hamza will be given a ضمة

2.      if the second base letter has either of the other two vowels, the Hamza will be given a كسرة

·        for all other conjugations

o       Prefix the imperfect conjugations with لِـ. This لام will have a سكون when preceded by a conjunction

·        all imperative conjugations will receive the same ending as the imperfect jussives

·        all imperative conjugations can be emphasized using either of the two methods of emphasis mentioned above

Forming the Prohibitive

1.      using the imperfect conjugations, the particle لا will precede the verb as a separate word

2.      the conjugations will receive the same ending as the imperfect jussives

·        all prohibitive conjugations can be emphasized using either of the two methods of emphasis mentioned above

Derived Nouns

Fem.  Broken Plurals	Masc. Broken Plurals	Fem. Sound Plural Used	Masc. Sound Plural Used	Feminine	Masculine	Group
فواعل	فُعّال، فعَلة	Y	Y	فاعلة	فاعل	Active Participle
مفاعل، مفاعيل		Y	Y	مفعولة	مفعول	Passive Participle
various		often		فَعِل، فَعُوْل، فَعِيْل، فَعَّال، فُعَّال، فُعُّوْل، فِعِّيْل، فَيْعُول، مِفْعَال، مِفْعِيْل، فَعَّالَة		Hyperbolic Participle
various		very rarely		various		Resembling Participle
مَفَاعِل		N			مِفْعَل	Utilitarian Noun
				مِفْعَلَة
	مَفَاعِيْل				مِفْعَال
	فَوَاعِل				فَاعَل
	مَفَاعِل	N			مَفْعَل	Locative/Temporal Noun
					مَفْعِل
فُعَل	أَفَاعِل	Y	Y	فُعْلى	أَفْعَل	Comparative / Superlative

 

Verb Paradigms and Paradigm Connotations

Verbal paradigms are variations that come about in the stem of basic verbs, and they result from one of two things. The first is a result of the combination of middle letter vowel in the perfect conjugations and the middle letter vowel in the imperfect conjugations. For a given verb, the middle letter vowel for both tenses is basically random and is determined by looking in a dictionary. There is basically no meaning significance to these vowels and this is just a phenomenon of the language. The combination of what vowel a verb’s middle radical is given in the two tenses gives the following paradigms.

Cmd.	Passive Part.	Active Part. or Common Substitutes		Common Gerunds		Imperfect	Perfect
		Intransitive	Transitive	Intransitive	Transitive
اُفْعُلْ	مَفْعُوْل	فَاعِل	فَاعِل	فِعَال، فَعَلاَن، فُعَال، فُعُوْل، فَعِيْل	فَعْل	يَفْعُل	فَعَلَ
اِفْعِلْ						يَفْعِل	فَعَلَ
اِفْعَلْ						يَفْعَل	فَعَلَ
اِفْعَلْ		فَعِل، فَعْلاَن، أَفْعَل		فَعَل		يَفْعَل	فَعِلَ
اِفْعِلْ						يَفْعِل	فَعِلَ
اُفْعُلْ		فَعِيْل، فَعْل، فَعَل، أَفْعَل		فُعُوْلَة، فَعَالَة		يَفْعُل	فَعُلَ
فَعْلِل	مُفَعْلَل	مُفَعْلِل		فَعْلَلة		يُفَعْلِل	فَعْلَلَ

The other reason why verbal paradigms exist is because of extra letters that are added to the stem in order to enhance the meaning of the verb. The following are by far the most popular methods of enhancement.

Popular Connotations Achieved by the Enhancement	Gerunds	Perfect
transitivity	إِفْعَال	أََفْعَلَ (يُفْعِل)
transitivity, intensity	تَفْعِيْل، فِعَّال، فِعَال، تَفْعِلَة	فََعَّلَ
mutuality	مُفَاعَلَة، فِعَال	فَاعَلَ
reflexive of تفعيل, consequence to تفعيل, pretending to do the verb	تَفَعُّل، تِفِعَّال	تَفَعَّلَ
reflexive of مفاعلة, consequence to مفاعلة, pretending to do the verb	تَفَاعُل	تَفَاعَلَ
reflexivity, consequence of an action, etc	اِفْتِعَال	اِفْتَعَلَ
seeking the verb, to deem/consider something X	اِسْتِفْعَال	اِسْتَفْعَلَ
passivity	اِنْفِعَال	اِنْفَعَلَ

Forming the imperfect conjugations

1.      append the imperfect prefix

2.      if the first conjugation of the perfect tense has exactly 4 letters (including eliding Hamzas), the prefix will be مضموم, and it will be مفتوح otherwise

3.      if the perfect conjugations have an extra تاء prefixed to them, the second last letter will be مفتوح, otherwise it will be مكسور

·        all variations of the perfect verb, all variations of the imperfect verb, and forming the imperative and prohibitive all use the same formulas as the simple verb

·        derived nouns, however, are treated differently

Forming the active and passive participles

1.      starting with the first conjugation from the imperfect table, replace the imperfect prefix with a ميم مضمومة

2.      for the active participle, ensure the second last letter is مكسور, and for the passive, ensure it is مفتوح

·        enhanced paradigms do not have other derived nouns; although they may use the two participles as a substitute if necessary

 

Irregularity Rules

Hamza Verbs

Rule 1
	if two Hamza occur side-by-side in the same lexical word and the first has a vowel while the second does not, the second Hamza must change to the long vowel appropriate to the short vowel on the first