Introducing and talking about yourself and your friends.

Saying who you are

There are two ways to introduce yourself :

أنا محمّد

(ana Mohammed)

I am Mohammed

إسمي محمّد

(ismee Mohammed)

My name is Mohammed

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I am, He is, She is

The first way is similar to how we said "this is" "that is" (see the lesson about it), except we are swapping "this" for "I". Look at the following

أنا محمّد

(ana Mohammed)

I am Mohammed

أنتَ رشيد

(anta Rachid)

you are Rachid (to a boy)

أنتِ سارة

(anti Saara)

you are Saara (to a girl)

هو عليّ

(huwa Ali)

He is Ali

هي نورة

(hiya Noura)

She is Noura

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My name is... (possessive pronouns)

To understand this method, first we need to look at how to say "My", "your", "his" and "her". (These words are referred to grammatically as possessive pronouns.)In Arabic these are expressed by letters joined to the end of the word.

Look at the following examples : (the arabic word for "name" is إسم )

إسمي

(ismee)

my name

إسمكَ

(Ismuka)

your name (to a boy)

إسمكِ

(Ismuki)

your name (to a girl)

إسمه

(Ismuhu)

his name

إسمها

(Ismuhaa)

her name

These can be added to any word to show who it belongs to, eg

كتابي

(kitaabee)

my book

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Asking questions about who people are

We learned before that the word for who is من

من هذا؟

(man haadha?)

who is this? (male)

من هذه؟

(man haadhihi?)

who is this? (female)

من ذلك؟

(man dhaalika?)

who is that? (male)

من تلك؟

(man tilka?)

who is that? (female)

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These questions should be familiar from lesson two.

We could now also ask :

من أنتَ؟

(man anta?)

who are you? (to a boy)

من أنتِ؟

(man anti?)

who are you? (to a girl)

We can also ask questions such as "Is this Ali?" or "Is this Noura?" as we learned in lesson two.

هل هذا عليّ؟

(hal haadhaa Ali?)

Is this Ali?

هل هذه نورة؟

(hal haadhihi Noura?)

Is this Noura?

هل هذه أمّكَ؟

(hal haadhihi Ummuka?)

Is this your mother? (to a boy)

To ask "what is your name" we ask...

ما إسمكَ؟

(maa Ismuka?)

what is your name? (to a boy)

ما إسمكِ؟

(maa ismuki?)

what is your name? (to a girl)

A sample answer would be...

إسمي محمّد

Ismee Mohammed

My name is Mohammed