Diacritical Marks (Pronunciation Guide) Flashcards
How is the Arabic script a modified Abjad?
The Arabic script is a modified abjad, where short consonants and long vowels are represented by letters but short vowels and consonant length are not generally indicated in writing.
Tashkīl is optional to represent missing vowels and consonant length (usually only present in religious texts, children’s book, or education materials)
What are ḥarakāt حَرَكَات?
The ḥarakāt حَرَكَات , which literally means ‘motions’, are the short vowel marks. There is some ambiguity as to which tashkīl are also ḥarakāt; the tanwīn, for example, are markers for both vowels and consonants.
ـَ
The fatḥah 〈فَتْحَة〉 is a small diagonal line placed above a letter, and represents a short /a/ (like the /a/ sound in English word “cat”). The word fatḥah itself (فَتْحَة) means opening and refers to the opening of the mouth when producing an /a/.
When a fatḥah is placed before a plain letter 〈ا〉 (alif) (i.e. one having no hamza or vowel of its own), it represents a long /aː/ (close to the English word “dad”, with an open front vowel /æː/, not back /ɑː/ as in “father”). For example: 〈دَا〉 /daː/. The fatḥah is not usually written in such cases. When a fathah placed before the letter 〈ﻱ〉 (yā’), it creates an /aj/ (as in “lie”); and when placed before the letter 〈و〉 (wāw), it creates an /aw/ (as in “cow”).
ـِ
A similar diagonal line below a letter is called a kasrah 〈كَسْرَة〉 and designates a short /i/ (as in “me”, “be”) and its allophones [i, ɪ, e, e̞, ɛ] (as in “Tim”, “sit”). For example: 〈دِ〉 /di/.
When a kasrah is placed before a plain letter 〈ﻱ〉 (yā’), it represents a long /iː/ (as in the English word “steed”). For example: 〈دِي〉 /diː/. The kasrah is usually not written in such cases, but if yā’ is pronounced as a diphthong /aj/, fatḥah should be written on the preceding consonant to avoid mispronunciation. The word kasrah means ‘breaking’.
ـُ
The ḍammah 〈ضَمَّة〉 is a small curl-like diacritic placed above a letter to represent a short /u/ (as in “duke”, shorter “you”) and its allophones [u, ʊ, o, o̞, ɔ] (as in “put”, or “bull”). For example: 〈دُ〉 /du/.
When a ḍammah is placed before a plain letter 〈و〉 (wāw), it represents a long /uː/ (like the ‘oo’ sound in the English word “swoop”). For example: 〈دُو〉 /duː/.
The word ḍammah (ضَمَّة) in this context means rounding, since it is the only rounded vowel in the vowel inventory of Arabic.
ــٰ
The superscript (or dagger) alif 〈أَلِف خَنْجَرِيَّة〉 (alif khanjarīyah), is written as short vertical stroke on top of a consonant. It indicates a long /aː/ sound for which alif is normally not written. For example: 〈هَٰذَا〉 (hādhā) or 〈رَحْمَٰن〉 (raḥmān).
The dagger alif occurs in only a few words, but they include some common ones; it is seldom written, however, even in fully vocalised texts. Most keyboards do not have dagger alif. The word Allah 〈الله〉 (Allāh) is usually produced automatically by entering alif lām lām hāʾ.
ـٓ آ
The maddah 〈مَدَّة〉 is a tilde-shaped diacritic, which can only appear on top of an alif (آ) and indicates a glottal stop /ʔ/ followed by a long /aː/.
In theory, the same sequence /ʔaː/ could also be represented by two alifs, as in *〈أَا〉, where a hamza above the first alif represents the /ʔ/ while the second alif represents the /aː/. However, consecutive alifs are never used in the Arabic orthography. Instead, this sequence must always be written as a single alif with a maddah above it, the combination known as an alif maddah. For example: 〈قُرْآن〉 /qurˈʔaːn/.
ٱ
The waṣlah 〈وَصْلَة〉, alif waṣlah 〈أَلِف وَصْلَة〉 or hamzat waṣl 〈هَمْزَة وَصْل〉 looks like a small letter ṣād on top of an alif 〈ٱ〉 (also indicated by an alif 〈ا〉 without a hamzah). It means that the alif is not pronounced when its word does not begin a sentence. For example: 〈بِٱسْمِ〉 (bismi), but 〈ٱمْشُوا۟〉 (imshū not mshū). This is because no Arab word can start with a vowel-less consonant (unlike the English school, or skateboard). But when it happens, an alif is added to obtain a vowel or a vowelled consonant at the beginning of one’s speech. In English that would result in *ischool, or *iskateboard.
It occurs only in the beginning of words, but it can occur after prepositions and the definite article. It is commonly found in imperative verbs, the perfective aspect of verb stems VII to X and their verbal nouns (maṣdar). The alif of the definite article is considered a waṣlah.
ـْـ
The sukūn 〈سُكُونْ〉 is a circle-shaped diacritic placed above a letter ( ْ). It indicates that the consonant to which it is attached is not followed by a vowel, i.e., zero-vowel.
It is a necessary symbol for writing consonant-vowel-consonant syllables, which are very common in Arabic. For example: 〈دَدْ〉 (dad).
The sukūn may also be used to help represent a diphthong. A fatḥah followed by the letter 〈ﻱ〉 (yā’) with a sukūn over it (ـَيْ) indicates the diphthong ay (IPA /aj/). A fatḥah, followed by the letter 〈ﻭ〉 (wāw) with a sukūn, (ـَوْ) indicates /aw/.
ـٌ ـٍ ـً
The three vowel diacritics may be doubled at the end of a word to indicate that the vowel is followed by the consonant n. They may or may not be considered ḥarakāt and are known as tanwīn 〈تَنْوِين〉, or nunation. The signs indicate, from right to left, -un, -in, -an.
Grammatical cases and tanwīn endings in indefinite triptote forms:
- un: nominative case;
- an: accusative case, also serves as an adverbial marker;
- in: genitive case.
ـّـ
The shadda or shaddah 〈شَدَّة〉 (shaddah), or tashdid 〈تَشْدِيد〉 (tashdīd), is a diacritic shaped like a small written Latin “w”.
It is used to indicate gemination (consonant doubling or extra length), which is phonemic in Arabic. It is written above the consonant which is to be doubled. It is the only ḥarakah that is commonly used in ordinary spelling to avoid ambiguity. For example: 〈دّ〉 /dd/; madrasah 〈مَدْرَسَة〉 (‘school’) vs. mudarrisah 〈مُدَرِّسَة〉 (‘teacher’, female).
ئ ؤ إ أ ء
Although often a diacritic is not considered a letter of the alphabet, the hamza هَمْزَة (hamzah, glottal stop), often stands as a separate letter in writing, is written in unpointed texts and is not considered a tashkīl. It may appear as a letter by itself or as a diacritic over or under an alif, wāw, or yā.
Which letter is to be used to support the hamzah depends on the quality of the adjacent vowels;
If the glottal stop occurs at the beginning of the word, it is always indicated by hamza on an alif: above if the following vowel is /a/ or /u/ and below if it is /i/.
If the glottal stop occurs in the middle of the word, hamzah above alif is used only if it is not preceded or followed by /i/ or /u/:
If /i/ is before or after the glottal stop, a yāʼ with a hamzah is used (the two dots which are usually beneath the yāʾ disappear in this case): 〈ئ〉.
Otherwise, if /u/ is before or after the glottal stop, a wāw with a hamzah is used: 〈ؤ〉.
If the glottal stop occurs at the end of the word (ignoring any grammatical suffixes), if it follows a short vowel it is written above alif, wāw, or yā the same as for a medial case; otherwise on the line (i.e. if it follows a long vowel, diphthong or consonant).
Two alifs in succession are never allowed: /ʔaː/ is written with alif maddah 〈آ〉 and /aːʔ/ is written with a free hamzah on the line 〈اء〉.
