Arabic/LearnRW/Alphabet Basics

Arabic Reading and Writing Basics

In addition to the Arabic language, the Arabic writing system is used in the Urdu (mainly Pakistan) and Persian (Iran) languages among others. So once you can read one of these languages learning to read others is easier.

Arabic is written from right to left top-down, like so:

<---------------------------------------- Writing begins here
<---------------------------------------------------------------------
Writing ends here <---------------------------------------------------------------------

The Arabic alphabet has 28 letters. Each letter represents a sound and has a distinct shape. Some letters have dots to distinguish them, but the pattern of dots is never shared for more than one letter.

Arabic writing uses many dots and symbols above and below the main symbols. The Arabic writing system is "cursive", which means that most letters in words are connected to each other. Most Arabic letters have different forms depending on the place they appear in the text: at the beginning of a word, in the middle of a word, at the end of a word, or as an isolated letter. For most shapes the forms resemble each other, so it is easy to recognize them. Because some vowels are optional, Arabic's writing system is classified as an abjad.

Shapes are either connector shapes, or non-connector shapes. Connector shapes connect to shapes after them, but they can never connect words. Non-connector shapes never connect to letters following them. In all Arabic writing (including printing) letters are transformed in order to be connected to each other.

Shapes vs Letters

• Many Arabic shapes end in tails.
• A tail can only be seen in the isolated-form or end-form.
• The most important part of a shape is the shape minus the tail. This part is called the shape-essence.
• A letter is a shape plus a number of dots.
• Dots are either placed above or below the shape.
• The placement of dots is significant (possible placements: above OR under the shape).
• The number of placed dots is significant.

Dotting

• The way the dots are placed is insignificant (e.g., a diagonal line, a vertical line, a triangle). Variations in their placement are used in fancy fonts.

In most printing

• Three dots are grouped into a triangle
• Two dots are written side by side
• Single dots appear as diamond shapes, square shapes, or circles.

In fast writing by hand by experienced Arabs

• Three dots is written in as ^
• Two dots are written as a dash "-" or somewhat like a tilde "~" mirrored horizontally
• Some other shortcuts are used.

• Dots are sometimes written as hollow circles on childish hand-made posters.