Levantine Arabic Commands: How to Give Instructions

Three forms: a man, a woman, a group

English has one command form. You say "sit down" to anyone. Levantine Arabic has three, depending on who you are talking to: one man, one woman, or more than one person. The good news is that the pattern is very predictable. The masculine form is the bare command, the feminine adds ـي (-i) and the plural adds ـوا (-u).

Take the verb راح (to go). To a man you say روح, to a woman روحي, and to a group روحوا. That is the whole system for most verbs, and you will hear it dozens of times a day in Amman or Ramallah, from parents calling children in for dinner to taxi drivers giving directions.

How to build a command from the present tense

The easiest way to find a command is to start from the "you" form of the present tense. Take بِتدرُس (you study). Remove the بـ and the تـ at the front and you are left with درُس. Arabic does not like starting a word with two consonants, so a short helping vowel is added at the start: اُدرُس (udrus), study!

The helping vowel usually echoes the vowel inside the verb. If the stem has an u sound, as in اُكتُب (uktub) and اُدرُس, the command starts with اُ. Otherwise it starts with اِ, as in اِشرَب (ishrab), اِعمَل (i3mal) and اِشتغِل (ishtghil). For the feminine and plural forms you simply add the endings: اُكتبي, اُكتبوا.

Verbs with a long vowel in the middle, such as روح, زور and نام, already start with a consonant followed by a vowel, so they need no helping vowel at all. That makes them some of the easiest commands to learn.

In everyday speech the helping vowel is often very light, and some speakers barely pronounce it. Do not worry if you hear something closer to "ktub" than "uktub"; both are understood.

• اُدرُس منيح يا علي!udrus mnee7 ya 3ali!Study hard, Ali!
• اِشربي الدوا يا حبيبتي.ishrabi id-dawa ya 7abeebti.Take your medicine, sweetie.
• اُكتُب اسمك هون لو سمحت.uktub ismak hoon law sama7t.Write your name here, please.
• اِصحوا يا ولاد، يلا عالمدرسة!is7u ya wlaad, yalla 3al-madrase!Wake up, kids, off to school!
• كُلوا قبل ما يبرد الأكل.kulu 2abl ma yibrad il-akil.Eat before the food gets cold.

Verbs that end in a vowel

Some verbs end in a vowel sound, such as حَكى (to speak) and مشى (to walk). Their masculine command already ends in ـي, so the masculine and feminine forms look and sound the same: اِحكي (i7ki) and اِمشي (imshi) work for a man or a woman. Only the plural is different: اِحكوا, اِمشوا. Context, or the name you add after the command, tells people who you mean.

صِحي (to wake up) behaves a little differently. To a man you say اِصحى (is7a), to a woman اِصحي (is7i) and to a group اِصحوا (is7u).

A few irregular commands

A handful of very common verbs have short, irregular commands that you simply need to memorise. أكَل (eat) becomes كُل, كُلي, كُلوا. The verb for "take" gives خُد (5ud), and "come" is تعال (ta3aal), with تعالي and تعالوا for a woman and a group. Doubled verbs such as لَفّ (turn) and حَبّ (love) keep their double letter: لِفّ, لِفّي, لِفّوا.

Tip: تعال means "come here" and is used constantly. If you only learn one irregular command this week, make it this one, along with its feminine form تعالي.

Giving directions

Unit 6 of the workbook uses commands to give directions around town. Three verbs do most of the work: روح (go), اِمشي (walk) and لِفّ (turn). Combine them with يمين (right), شمال (left), دُغري (straight on) and بعدين (then) and you can guide someone almost anywhere. Note that in Jordan and Palestine, شمال is the everyday word for "left" as well as "north"; يسار is also understood.

• اِمشي دُغريimshi dughriwalk straight ahead
• لِفّ يمين بعدين دُغريliff yameen ba3deen dughriturn right, then straight on
• روحي يمين بعدين شمالroo7i yameen ba3deen shmaalgo right, then left (to a woman)
• تعالوا هونta3aalu hooncome here (to a group)

Saying "don't"

To tell someone not to do something, you do not use the command form. Instead you put ما (or لا) in front of the present tense without بـ. So "you go" تروح becomes ما تروح, "don't go". The endings follow the same logic: ما تروحي to a woman and ما تروحوا to a group. Both ما and لا are heard in Jordan and Palestine, and بلاش ("no need for") is a softer, very common alternative.

Tip: A bare command can sound abrupt. Add لو سمحت (to a man), لو سمحتي (to a woman) or لو سمحتوا (to a group) for "please", or soften it with يلا (come on) among friends.

Practise

Try saying each command aloud three times: once to a man, once to a woman and once to a group. Then check yourself below.