Participle formation

Hi everyone!

Today we’re going to look quickly at one final component of the verbal system: active participles. In this post we’ll look at how to form the participle. In the next post we’ll see how it’s used.

Formation

Active participles are formed similarly to fuS7a. Form I verbs generally use the pattern faa3el. Note that the doubled forms are regular (the fuS7a form here would be داقّ daaqqun):

SOUND	كاتب kaateb has written
HOLLOW	شايف shaayef has seen
DEFECTIVE	حاكي 7aaki has spoken
DOUBLED	داقق daa2e2 has tapped

A handful of Form I verbs use a form on fa3laan or fi3laan, which strictly speaking is a distinct adjective form in fuS7a. Most such verbs are ‘verbs of becoming’ (often corresponding to ‘get’ + adjective), although there are a handful of exceptions, عرف ‘know’, فهم ‘understand’ and قدر ‘be able to’ being common examples:

تعب ti3eb get tired	تعبان ta3baan [has got] tired, ill
جاع jaa3 get hungry	جوعان joo3aan [has got] hungry

Most other forms use the imperfective stem plus the prefix مـ, which is m- before a single consonant and mi- before a consonant cluster:

يعلم y-3allem he teaches	معلم m-3allem has taught
يستغرب yi-staghreb he’s surprised	مستغرب mi-staghreb surprised

The handful of forms that have a as their final vowel in the imperfective stem change this vowel to e or i in the active participle:

يتعلم yi-t3allam he learns	متعلم mi-t3allem has learnt
يتحاكى yi-t7aaka he is spoken to	متحاكي mi-t7aaki has been spoken to

The forms given above, of course, are the masculine. Feminines and plurals are formed with ـة -e/a and ـين -iin, which follow the normal rules:

داقق daa2e2 has tapped (m.)	داقة daa22-a has tapped (f.)	داقين daa22-iin have tapped
متعلم mit3allem has learnt (m.)	متعلمة mit3allm-e has learnt (f.)	متعلمين mit3allm-iin have learnt

Form with pronouns

As with verbs, pronouns can be attached representing the object. The masculine and plural forms are predictable, but note the feminine generally restores its deleted i/e:

كاتبة kaatbe has written (m.)	كاتبتو kaatibt-o has (f.) written it
معلمة m3allme has taught	معلمتهن m3allimt-on has (f.) taught them

Normally, the participle makes no person distinctions (‘I’, ‘you’, ‘she’ etc) explicitly. Where it refers to ‘you (f.)’ and a pronoun is attached, however, an -ii- is inserted. This creates the following distinction:

كاتبتهن kaatibt-on she has (f.) written them

كاتبتيهن kaatibt-ii-on you have (f.) written them