In Arabic it’s known as /ضَمِيْر مُتَّصِل / dhameer muttaSil, and it is used to show who owns what. Of course, we’re talking about possessive pronouns as suffixes and in Arabic, they are /ee/, /ka/, /ki/, /hu/, /haa/, /kumaa/, /humaa/, /kum/, /kunna/, /hum/, /hunna/, /naa/. Possessive pronouns also happen to be the subject of today’s blog. So, without further ado, let’s look into this very key part of the Arabic language.

Possessive Pronouns in Arabic  

As you might expect, possessive pronouns are a little bit different than they are in your native tongue. To start with, in Arabic, possessive pronouns must agree with the possessed noun and not the one who possesses.
What’s more, possessive pronouns in Arabic do not stand alone as they do in the English language, for instance. Rather, they are what we call “attached pronouns”, which appear as suffixes attached to a noun, verb, or particle. Today we will focus on the possessive pronoun attached to the noun.
The table below shows a complete list of possessive pronoun suffixes in Arabic, their transliterations and their meanings in English.


Arabic

Transliteration

English

Singular

ـي

-ee

me

ـكَ

-ka

you (masc.)

ـكِ

-ki

you (fem.)

ـهُ

-hu

him

ـها

-haa

her

Dual

ـنا

-naa

us (two people)

ـكُما

-kumaa

you (two people)

ـهُما

-humaa

them (two people)

Plural

ـنا

-naa

us

ـكُم

-kum

you (masc.)

ـكُنَّ

-kunna

you (fem.)

ـهُم

-hum

them (masc.)

ـهُنَّ

-hunna

them (fem.)


Let’s Get Together



Below are some examples of Arabic possessive pronouns attached to nouns:


English

Transliteration

Arabic

Singular

My pen

qalamee

قَلَمِيْ

His pen

qalamuhu

قَلَمُهُ

Her pen

qalamuhaa

قَلَمُها

Your pen (m.)

qalamuka

قَلَمُكَ

Your pen (f.)

qalamuki

قَلَمُكِ

Dual

Their pen (2 people)

qalamuhumaa

قَلَمُهُما

Your pen (2 people)

qalamukumaa

قَلَمُكُما

Plural

our pen

qalamunaa

قَلَمُنا

Your pen (m.)

qalamukum

قَلَمُكُم

Your pen (f.)

qalamukunna

قَلَمُكنَّ

Their pen (m.)

qalamuhum

قَلَمُهُم

Their pen (f.)

qalamuhunna

قَلَمُهُنَّ


A Few Things to Know

If the preceding letter has a kasrah, then the pronoun has a kasrah. (Kasrah is a diagonal stroke written below the consonant which comes before it when you pronounce it. It stands for a short vowel “i” like the "i" in English "pit"). 

When you attach possessive pronoun suffixes to nouns, it indicates who owns the nouns. Likewise, it also makes the nouns definite. For instance, “his pen” in Arabic is a grouping of قَلَم and the suffix هُ. When we join them together them we get قَلَمُهُ / qalamuhu (his pen).
As we mentioned before, nouns with possessive suffixes are considered definite. As a result, adjectives that describe those nouns take the definite article ال because of adjective agreement. Take a look at the phrase قِطَتُنا الجَّميلَة / qiTatunaa iljjameelah (“our beautiful cat”) for example.

These are just a few things you should know about possessive pronouns in Arabic. In the end, however, possessive pronouns in Arabic are pretty easy to learn. Moreover, once you learn these rules, you will be able to use them with little worry.

Of course, there’s more to Arabic grammar than pronouns, and if you’d like to learn more, visit our website today. After all, learning Arabic has never been easier than it is today with the Kaleela Arabic learning app. Get yours today – only from kaleela.com
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Watch the full video about Possessive Pronouns here