A study: “At” in Tunisian Arabic

In this article we will examine how the English preposition “At” is translated and treated in Tunisian Arabic. And if you’re looking for a catalogue on English to Tunisian Arabic translations, Ithaca Bound Languages is documenting Tunisian Arabic. Here is our catalogue with over 4,500 pages of Tounsi content with recordings — IBL: Tunisian Arabic.

In English, “At”, the preposition, is used in three contexts:

• Physical context
• Context of time
• A subject moving towards an object

Physical context

In a physical context, “At” is translated as fi / في. (Alternative, reasonably common spellings of this same word include: F, Fy, f-) (Same Arabic script spelling of في)

IBL contributor, Aroua F. pronounces Fi:

Here are three “At” statements that use Fi in their translations:

“We’re at the store.”

Na7na fel 7anout.

.نحنا في الحانوت

“I’m at my parents’ house.”

Ena f darna.

.أنا في دارنا

“They are at work right now.”

Houma fel khedma tawa.

.هوما في الخدمة توّا

In the above translation, the word fel is used. In Tunisian Arabic, when El / ال (“the”) precedes Fi (so, “at the”) the two words are often combined as Fel / فال. (A short compound word)

Fi can also mean “About”, as a preposition, but not in every case.

For instance, “I’m thinking about you.” is translated as:

Nkhamem fik.

.نخمم فيك

Fi / في is used in the word fik / فيك. (The -k / ك- puts the word in the “You” form)

Whereas, the translation for “I dreamt about you.” doesn’t use Fi:

7lemt bik.

.حلمت بيك

(Are you enjoying this article? We have a similarly written IBL article called: A study: “Of” in Tunisian Arabic that you may find interesting and helpful in your process of learning Tunisian Arabic.)

Time

Another context where “At” is popular in English is in the context of time. In Tunisian Arabic, “At” in the context of time is M3a / مع.

Aroua pronounces M3a:

Like in English, M3a immediately precedes the time in a statement. For instance: “I’m off work at 4:30pm.” is Nokhrej mel khedma m3a 4:30 mta3 la3cheya. / نخرج من الخدمة مع 4:30 متاع العشية.

In Tunisian Arabic, M3a also means “With” when speaking about living beings (As an aside, “With” when speaking about objects is a different word)

A note that some Tunisian Arabic speakers omit M3a entirely (hence, omitting a preposition) when writing the time in a statement. The work statement above in this section without m3a would be: Nokhrej mel khedma 4:30 mta3 la3cheya. / نخرج من الخدمة 4:30 متاع العشية., and would be perfectly fine to speak or write as well. So including M3a or not is optional, but it’s perfectly correct and conventional to do so.

Here are three statements of M3a in use:

“Do you want to meet at 3pm?”

T7eb net9ablou m3a el 3 (mta3 l9ayla)?

تحب نتقابلو مع ال3 (متاع القايلة)؟

(Including mta3 l9ayla (“in the afternoon”) in the statement above is usually optional as the interlocutor would normally know speaker is referring to the afternoon.)

“He works at 8am every morning.”

Yekhdem m3a el 8 kol sbe7.

.يخدم مع ال8 كل صباح

“Our flight is at 1:30pm tomorrow.”

El vol mte3na m3a el 1:30 mta3 l9ayla ghodwa.

الفول متاعنا مع ال1:30 متاع القايلة غدوة.

In the above translation, for 1:30, Madhi se3a w nos mta3 l9ayla is spoken. To understand this phrase more read the IBL article  Time in Tunisian Arabic.

Going towards something

The third context in which “At” is used is when a subject is going towards an object. This context is less common in both English and Arabic and is usually expressed in English when there is some form of expected confrontation or contact that will occur. (E.g., In sport, someone could say “He’s running at the other player!”) Contexts that usually don’t have the expected contact element, so to speak, often use the preposition “towards”. (E.g., “They are walking towards the beach.”)

In Tunisian Arabic, “At” isn’t translated as a single word in this context (a subject going towards an object). The best way to express the statement depends on its parts.

Let’s examine this more closely:

Statement #1

In the following statement (sports context) “He’s running at the other player.” there are two conventional ways that this can be translated in Tunisian Arabic:

Option 1: 9a3ed yejri fel direction mta3 el joueur lekher. / .قاعد يجري في الديريكسيون متاع الجوور الاخر

In the above statement fel direction mta3 means “in the direction of”, and therefore, fulfills on communicating that the subject (“He”) is running towards an object (“the other player”).

Option 2: Mechi yejri lel joueur lekher. / ماشي يجري للجوور الاخر

Alternatively, the above statement could have been used. In Lel / لل, conventionally, L / ل means “For“. But in this case, it maintains its prepositional form and would translate as “to” or “towards”.

Statement #2

In the statement “She’s running at the ball.”, it too can be translated in two conventional ways:

Option #1: 9a3da tejri fel direction mta3 el koura. / .قاعدة تجري في الديريكسون متاع الكورة

Here, again, fel direction mta3 is used, giving the effect of “in the direction of”.

Option #2: Mechya tejri lel koura. / .ماشية تجري للكورة

And just like in Statement #1 (above in this section) Lel / لل is used which gives the effect of “to the” or “towards the”.

In closing

By studying the contents of this article you will understand how to use the important and common preposition “At” in Tunisian Arabic. If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to the IBL platform and continue to access Tunisian Arabic learning content everyday, including over 4,500 pages of Tounsi translation content with recordings. And here are some additional articles you may find use: The letter “A” in Tunisian Arabic and 100 two- and three- word statements in Tunisian Arabic.

We trust you’re enjoying learning Tunisian Arabic.

And as always, we wish you a marvellous journey!