Note on Transcription and Glossing

Note on Transcription and GlossingThe present textbook does not quote words and phrases from Classical Arabic or Modern Standard Arabic in Arabic script except for a number of longer text passages, but represents them in transliteration in order to make the book accessible for those who do not read Arabic.In transliterating, the Arabic characters are represented by single Latin characters, often with diacritics (and always written in italics).There is no un iversal standard for transliteration, at least not for academic pu rposes, and the number of current systems of transliteration is regrettably large.The system chosen here is more or less identical with the one used in the Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics (EALL), with two exceptions: ḫ is used instead of x, and ǧ is used instead of j.In Table A the characters used in transliteration are given in the third column; in the fourth column their equivalent in IPA characters has been added.This is the standard adopted by the International Phonetic Association.Whenever a phonetic transcription is needed, IPA signs will be used, always between square brackets [ ].Note that IPA [j] = y, but in some transcriptions (including the one used in the EALL and the second edition of this book) j = [ʤ].Note also that the sound represented by the letter ḏ̣ ̣ āʾ ‫ظ‬ is usually realised in Modern Standard Arabic as ẓ, often used to transliterate the Arabic character.With emphatic consonants there is a discussion about their realisation, which is either velarised (IPA [t ɣ ], [d ɣ ], [s ɣ ], etc.) or pharyngalised (IPA [t ʕ ], [d ʕ ], [s ʕ ], etc.).Rather than choose between velarisation and pharyngalisation, the IPA signs with a mid-tilde [ᵵ], [d̴ ], [ᵴ], etc. have been chosen here; these symbols leave open both options.The vowels of Classical Arabic are represented as a, i, u; long vowels are represented with a makron (ā, ī, ū), diphthongs with ay, aw.In the convention followed here, the feminine ending with tāʾ marbūṭa is transcribed as -a, except in the construct state before a vowel (thus madīnat al-nabiyy, but al-madīna al-kabīra).The assimilation of the article al-before the so-called sun letters (s, š, ṣ, z, n, l, t, ṭ, ṯ, d, ḍ, ḏ̣, ḏ̣ ̣ , r) is not represented (thus, al-šaǧara, al-rābiʿ, not aš-šaǧara, ar-rābiʿ).As a general rule, short vowel verbal endings are represented in transcription, but short vowel