Small attached words
Which small words lean on a neighboring word?
المعنى
Some short grammar words lean on a neighboring word instead of standing on their own. They can express meanings such as possession or questions while depending on another word for their sound or position. Languages differ in which words behave this way, and some use full words or endings instead. Unlike Endings, these elements can attach to a whole phrase rather than to one word's stem.
طريقة التعرّف عليه
Look for a short grammar element that has no stress of its own or must sit beside another word, even when it belongs in meaning to a larger phrase.
في اللغة الأم
Arabic has clitics, short grammar words pronounced with a neighboring word and usually joined to it in writing. Attached pronouns express an object, an owner, or the person after a preposition; short forms such as wa-, meaning and, also join the following word. An attached pronoun can change its vowel with its host, as in -hu and -hi.
هَذَا كِتَابُهُ. (hādhā kitābuhu.)
The attached -hu identifies the male owner.
رَأَيْتُهُ فِي بَيْتِهِ. (raʾaytuhu fī baytihi.)
The same male reference appears as object -hu and owner -hi; the preceding vowel affects the suffix.
اشْتَرَيْتُ خُبْزًا وَحَلِيبًا. (ishtaraytu khubzan wa-ḥalīban.)
Wa- is written together with the following word.
في اللغة قيد التعلم
English uses short attached forms of auxiliary verbs, the verbs that help build a sentence: 'll for will and 's for is or has. The possessive 's also attaches at the end of the phrase naming the owner, not necessarily to its main noun. These small forms depend on a neighboring word and are called clitics.
I'll call you after lunch.
'll is the attached short form of will.
She's waiting outside.
Here 's stands for is.
The man next door's dog is friendly.
's attaches to the end of the whole phrase the man next door.
Learners whose language keeps auxiliary verbs as full words may avoid these forms in everyday speech. Short affirmative forms such as 'm cannot normally stand alone in a stressed reply: say Yes, I am, not *Yes, I'm.