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“To Be or Not to Be:” the Arabic ‘to be’ Verb in Equational Sentences

“To Be or Not to Be:” the Arabic ‘to be’ Verb in Equational Sentences. By Josh Fowler. Introduction Semantically Empty Zero Copula Methodology (Preliminary) Analysis Conclusion Future Work. The book is big. The book big. http://www.wisopinion.com/blogs/whatsleft/2006_04_01_archive.html.

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“To Be or Not to Be:” the Arabic ‘to be’ Verb in Equational Sentences

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  1. “To Be or Not to Be:”the Arabic ‘to be’ Verb in Equational Sentences By Josh Fowler

  2. Introduction • Semantically Empty • Zero Copula • Methodology • (Preliminary) Analysis • Conclusion • Future Work

  3. The book is big. The book big. http://www.wisopinion.com/blogs/whatsleft/2006_04_01_archive.html

  4. Semantically Empty • Development of Algebra • Rhetorical algebra • Elegant Arabic • Other Languages • Chinese • False ‘to be’ • Past and future tense • Subjunctive phrases

  5. Past and Future Tense هو كان دكتورا Huwa kaana duktuuran He was a doctor هو سيكون دكتورا Huwa sayakuunu duktuuran He will be a doctor

  6. Subjunctive phrases يمكنه ان يكون ذكيا Yumkinuhu an yakuuna ðakiyan It is possible for him to be smart.

  7. Zero Copula “The verb be is available in the deep structure of the Arabic nominal sentences … but not in the surface structure” -Hashim H. Noor (7)

  8. Methodology • Search Arabicorpus.byu Newspaper Arabic for kaan/yakuun • Separate examples in previously mentioned environments • If 2/3rds of hits or more are in conditioned environments, than Verb is semantically empty

  9. (Preliminary) Analysis • 75,952 occurrences of yakuun (search string ‘ykwn’) • ≈ 45,000 in conditioned enviroments • (≈ 2/3)

  10. Conclusion • Borderline victory for “Semantically Empty” but… • Still need to do full search of all forms of verb • Still need to do a closer analysis of environments in which verb is found

  11. Future Work • Corpuses in Other registers • Speech Corpus • Survey of Native and non-Native Arabic speakers • Implications for Syntax?

  12. REFERENCES Bashmakova, I. G. The Beginnings and Evolution of Algebra. Washington D.C.: Mathematical Association of America, 2000. Becker, Alton L. Beyond Translation Essays Towards a Modern Philology. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995. Brustad, Kirsten, Abbas Al-Tonsi, and Mahmoud Al-Batal. Al-Kitaab a Textbook for Arabic Part Two. Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2006. Derbyshire, John. The Unknown Quantity a Real and Imaginary History of Algebra. Washington DC: Joseph Henry Press, 2006. Noor, Hashim H. English Syntactic Errors by Arabic Speaking Learners: Reviewed., 1996. Saeed, Aziz Thabit, and Shehdeh Fareh. "Difficulties Encountered by Bilingual Arab Learners in Translating Arabic "Fa" into English." International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 9 (2006): 19. Weiss, Bernard. "Subject and Predicate in the Thinking of the Arabic Philologists." Journal of the American Oriental Society 105.4 (1985): 605-22.

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