Indeclinable Nouns – Personal Pronouns

السَّلام عليكم

This post explains one of the مَبْنِيْ nouns: pronouns- known as الضَّائِر. Pronouns in Arabic are extremely versatile and can be used in various structures. They can be used in the place of a subject, object and more in different cases. The following chart is a breakdown of this (I would suggest clicking on the picture to enlarge it):

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As pronouns are مَبْنِيْ they have no case endings and therefore we cannot identify it’s state – is it مرفوع؟ منصوب؟ مجرور؟. The pronouns are in the place of a certain case depending on governing elements around them. This chart helps us to understand in what situations a pronoun is one of those cases

Starting from the beginning of the chart:

  • Pronouns – الضَّمائر are of two types hidden المُسْتَتِر and apparent البارِز
  • الضَّمِيْر المُسْتَتِر can only be in the case of رفع in the position of a فاعِلٌ – subject. There are only two instances when a pronoun would be hidden in a ماضي inflection; five for مضارع and one for أَمر (as listed above).
  • The apparent pronoun الضَّمِيْر البارِز is of two types: attached pronouns الضَّمِيْر المُتَّصِل and detached pronouns الضَّمِيْر المُنْفَصِل
  • The attached pronoun الضَّمِيْر المُتَّصِل can be in the case of رفع, نصب and جر. When it is رفع it is the فاعل and is identified as all the other non-hidden inflections of the ماضي , مضارع and أَمر. When it is نصب it is the مفعول به (object). Anytime you see an ضمير متصل i.e هُ، هُما، هُم after a verb then you can immediately assume its the مفعول به. Finally, it can be جر in one of two ways: as the مضاف إليه after a noun or as an إسم مجرور after a حرف جر.
  • The detached pronoun الضَّمِيْر المُنْفَصِل can be in the case of رفع and نصب. It is in the case of رفع when functioning as a مَبْتَدَأ in a nominal sentence. It is in the case of نصب when functioning as an مفعول به which has been detached from a verb and upgraded to the beginning of sentence to denote exclusivity – as it cannot stand on it’s own, an إيَّا is attached to it.

As always, feel free to comment.

Ma’salaam 🙂

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