1

3.1 Properties of the IsmGender (Fake Feminine)

In English, we say that something is a he, she, or it. It does not exist in Arabic. In Arabic, everything
has a gender, a masculine or feminine gender. Something we would call an it in English is given a fake
gender in Arabic. How do you know what the gender of a word is? Heres a good rule of thumb:
Pretend that all words are masculine unless you find certain clues to make the word feminine.
By this logic, it would only make sense to study the feminine since everything else will be considered
masculine.
There are two kinds of feminine in Arabic:
1. Real Feminine
2. Fake Feminine
1. Real Feminine is just another word for female. Real feminine words will be considered feminine

whether the word is in Arabic or not. ( mom), ( woman/wife), ( sister), ( maternal

aunt), ( paternal aunt), Husna, Ayesha, etc are examples of real feminine.
2. Fake Feminine: There are 3 kinds of fake feminine. We only covered one of them in class today:
a. If a word ends with , , or , chances are that the word is feminine.

( mercy), ( forgiveness), ( prayer), ( resurrection), ( ('good news),

( greater/greatest), ( white), ( blue), ( green), etc are all considered

fake feminine.

However, , , 4 , and are mens names even though they end with or
.
Since they already have a real gender, theyre not considered fake feminine.

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EXERCISES:
Tell the Status, Number, and Gender:

.1 9

.2

.3?
.4?
.5
.6

.7

.8D

.9
.10

.11
.12

.13
.14K

.15

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ANSWER KEY:
1. N, S, F
2. N/J, PAIR, F
3. R, PL, F
4. R, S, M
5. R, PL, F
6. N, S, F
7. N/J, PL, M
8. R/N/J, S, F
9. R, PL, M
10. R, S, M
11. N/J, PL, F
12. R, S, F
13. N/J, PAIR, F
14. R, PAIR, M
15. R, PL, M