Language & Design

Hello again! Sorry it’s been 2 weeks but I am *almost* done with my summer school woo!

ANYWAYS today’s topic was requested by somebody, but I can’t find who, so if you’re reading this, this is for YOU. 

Today we are looking at - 

Inna (إن) and Kaana (كان) and their sisters!

Sisters? in Grammar? WHAT DOES THIS MEAN??

Don’t worry! I will do my best to explain. To understand this, you’ll need to know how cases work in Arabic, so go check out my post on this to get a basic understanding on the function of each case  and how it is represented. 

Okay, so what are Inna (إن) and Kaana (كان)?

They represent categories of words which affect the case of what follows them.  Yes, these are their “sisters”. So Inna and her sisters all follow one rule, and Kaana and her sisters follow another. Think of it as two different households, each having their own way of life  and their schedule. 

In grammatical terms, this “way of life” and “daily schedule” refers to the word order and the case of the different components of the sentence they’re in. 

These two households are important, since the words that fall into the categories are very common and necessary to have a nice written command of Arabic. 

Now before we get into the nitty gritty, make sure you have a good idea of what the subject ( المبتدا) and the predicate (الخبر) is in an Arabic nominal sentence. ( my post here introduces the concept quite succinctly!) . These are the two components whose cases are affected by Inna and Kaana!

Okay let’s go!

إن و أخواتها  - Inna and her sisters

Here are Inna and her sisters + their meanings - (note the shadda ّ  for some of them) 

 - إنّ - indeed ( inna)

- أنّ - that ( e.g. I heard that) (anna)

- كأنّ - as if, (ka’anna) 

- لكنّ - but (lakinna)

- ليت - i wish (layt)

- ّلعل - perhaps / i hope (la3alla) ( in comparison to “layt” which is wishful, “la3alla” implies something is more likely to occur)

- لأنّ - because (li’anna) 

now these are all used at the beginning of a sentence to have the desired meaning. However these have a catch  - whenever you use these, the subject of the sentence becomes mansuub (accusative) and the predicate becomes marfu’3 ( nominative). 

example sentence :المطرُ غزيرٌ - the rain is heavy - (al maṭaru ġazīrun) - both are in the nominative. 

- with Inna and akhwaatu-ha, this changes to - 

ليت المطرَ غزيرٌ - (layt al maṭara ġazīrun) I wish the rain was heavy - Here , the subject ( al maṭara)  is in the accusative as opposed to the nominative and the predicate remains in the nominative. 

This is the case, regardless if you wanted to say “ indeed the rain is heavy” or “as if the rain was heavy” or “ I heard that it was going to rain”. 

Why not give those sentences a try!! 

Okay now

كان و أخواتها - Kaana and her sisters

Kaana has a much bigger household lol - i have only included the most commonly used of her siblings. 

- كان - (past tense indicatior e.g. عندي = “i have” but كان عندي = “i had” ) (kaana)

- أصبح = to become (asbaḥa) 

- ظلّ - to stay, to remain (ẓalla)

- ليس - (negation indicator  - ليس عندي = “i don’t have”) (laysa)

- ما برح - ( indication of continuity) (maa bariḥa)

- مازال - to stay, remain ( sth that is continous to the present e.g. “has remained”) ( maa zaala) 

note - kaana and her sisters CONJUGATE to match their subject e.g. if you use ليس in the past tense first person singular, it will become لستُ ( i’m thinking of covering past tense conjugations next week! it’s a big one!) 

The catch when using these is the opposite to inna wa akhwaatu-ha - the subject of the sentence becomes marfu’3 ( nominative)  and the predicate becomes mansuub (accusative).

 so using the same example sentence , let’s use kaana wa akhwaatu-ha!

كان المطرُ غزيرً - (kaana maṭaru ġazīran) - the rain was heavy. 

Again, the same goes for everything else in kaana’s family. 

the end?? 

Okay, that about explains inna and kaana! It’s easier once you get your head around it. no I don’t know why it exists either. 

I know that some bits I have left quite vague ( like what the heck is an indication of continuity and how does negation work) but I’ve done that on purpose, because honestly those all belong their own posts and I want to focus on one topic at a time, to avoid getting you ( and myself!) all muddled~ 

Of course, you can explore any of the topics you want online - don’t feel like you have to wait for me! 

For books, I recommend the Routledge Arabic Grammar and the Modern Literary Arabic  by David Cowan ( old but gold!) - please try to buy them secondhand from somewhere other than amazon! let’s not support terrible working conditions! Even better - buy it local - support a charity! or your local bookshop, they definitely need it right now! 

also recommend Arabic.desert-sky.com for fantastic blog posts that are much more to the point than mine!

Thank you for reading! Please let me know of any glaring mistakes , suggestions and requests! I will do them allllll

@mrchicsaraleo @britomartis @el-shab-hussein @paintedwiththecolorsofthewind @stephanemiroux

this is vile

STANDING ROCK INDIAN RESERVATION, S.D. — Ray Taken Alive had been fighting for this moment for two years: At his urging, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Council was about to take the rare and severe step of banishing a nonprofit organization from the tribe’s land.

The Lakota Language Consortium had promised to preserve the tribe’s native language and had spent years gathering recordings of elders, including Taken Alive’s grandmother, to create a new, standardized Lakota dictionary and textbooks.

But when Taken Alive, 35, asked for copies, he was shocked to learn that the consortium, run by a white man, had copyrighted the language materials, which were based on generations of Lakota tradition. The traditional knowledge gathered from the tribe was now being sold back to it in the form of textbooks. 

This isn’t about books. This is about an organization founded and led by two white men using the work of indigenous peoples to create resources for their endangered languages and then not giving those people access to those resources. It’s about them literally copywriting the words of Elders and other indigenous people and refusing to let their tribes use them.

People are fighting to have access to the recordings that deceased loved ones gave to this organization and being denied because those recordings are copywrited. These men are literally taking aspects of these communities and saying, “these are ours now, no one else can use them, not even the people who shared them with us.”

And it’s not just one or two people who have issues with this. It’s not just one tribe. It’s multiple accounts of this organization and its founders violating the boundaries of both individuals and tribes and taking what wasn’t theirs to take.

compare with the real kanji

First up we have:

Compare with 太

The original kanji means “to gain weight”. But it adds the コ “ko” and ロ  “ro” katakana symbols at the top to represent the weight you gain while staying home due to the corona virus.

Then we have:

Compare with 会 

The original kanjij means “meeting”, but the lower radical is changed to look more like a “Z” to represent Zoom meetings. Thus, the new kanji means “web meetings” or “zoom calls”

And of course another social distancing one:

Compare with 話 

This means “to talk” or “chat”, but it’s changed simply to show the two radicals social distancing from one another as we should also while holding conversations nowadays.

to titter - kichern - glousser

glib - wortgewandt - éloquent

to skedaddle - türmen - filer

to canoodle - schmusen - se faire des mamours

disingenuous - hinterlistig - sournois

thingummy - Dingsda (n.) - bidule (m.)

hoity-toity - etepetete - prétentieux

apoplexy - Schlaganfall (m.) - apoplexie (f.)

to gripe - maulen - se plaindre

insipid - abgestanden/fahl - insipide

incense - Räucherwerk (n.) - encens (m.)

pesky - nervtötend - embêtant

scrooge - Geizhals (m.) - avare (m./f.)

ludicrous - lächerlich - ridicule

hallo und herzlich willkommen! today i will be going over some transitional words and phrases you might find in conversations! all information gathered and examples used are from fluentu; please let me know if anything's incorrect or outdated! <3

weil - because when using "weil" in anyway, you'll have two clauses; your regular and subordinate clause. in subordinate clauses, in this case the sentence using "weil", your conjugated verb should go at the end! ich bin müde, weil ich nicht gut geschlafen habe ( i am tired because i didn't sleep well )

(immer) noch - still "immer noch" stresses time or continuity and has a stronger attitude than "noch", although both still translate as "still". ich habe gewartet und gewartet und der Zug war immer noch nicht da. (I waited and waited, and the train was still not there.)

deshalb - therefore a clause that begins with "deshalb" requires a different construction. in these clauses, the conjugated verbs always appear in the second position, like in the main clause. ich bin müde, deshalb möchte ich schlafen. (I am tired, therefore I would like to sleep.)

vorher - before "vorher" and "vor" both mean “before,” but they are used differently in german. "vorher" is used as an adverb to indicate that something happened before a specific point in time. "vor" is a preposition that triggers dative case. ich habe ein Buch gelesen und vorher habe ich eine Serie geschaut. (I read a book, and before that I watched a TV series.) vor dem Treffen, habe ich Kaffee getrunken. (Before the meeting, I drank coffee.)

danach - after "nachher" and "nach" are similar to "vorher" and "vor". "nach" is used as a presposition that triggers dative, and "danach" is an adverb. ich habe meine Hausaufgaben gemacht und danach habe ich geschlafen. (I did my homework, and after that I slept.) nach dem Unfall ist er nicht mit dem Auto gekommen. (After the accident he didn’t come by car.)

trotzdem - nevertheless this works the same as "deshalb" es ist kalt, trotzdem gehe ich spazieren. (It’s cold, nevertheless I’m going for a walk.)

1) DON’T use your search bar to find and open the Run app

2) DON’T type in services.msc

3) DON’T find Adobe Genuine Software Integrity Services and right-click to get a dropdown menu, and don’t select ‘properties’

4) if you happen to click properties, DON’T use the startup type dropdown to locate the option to disable the program. be sure you DON’T click apply to finalize that change. 

5) DO NOT do the same thing in order to also disable Adobe Genuine Software Monitor 

if you do all of these things, this WILL disable adobe’s ability to monitor the software, and you will be forced to continue using the same older software that you already paid for instead of having to sign up for a newer, shittier version and pay more for it. so if you have lots of cash to spare and are cool with putting it the pockets of racketeering capitalists, definitely don’t do any of these things. 

I’M SORRY MA'AM. I KNOW YOU’RE UPSET.