# Levantine Arabic: بـ verbal prefix + عم / رح



## Drink

Which of these is correct in Levantine Arabic? Do they have different meanings? Does it vary by region?

Present:
أنا عم أشرب قهوة or أنا عم بشرب قهوة

Future:
أنا رح أشرب قهوة or أنا رح بشرب قهوة


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## Izumrud

Speaking for Jordan, it is always

3am with b-
أنا عم بشرب قهوة

but

raH without b-
أنا رح أشرب قهوة

The other options do not exist and would sound incorrect; it's not a matter of different meaning.


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## Jack.D

In the present both sentences can be used and there are totally OK for me, but I think the more common is to say:
أنا عم بشرب قهوة

In the future you can only say:
أنا رح أشرب قهوة

the addition of "ب" to the verb is to indicate that this verb is in the present form


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## Hemza

You can say it without "أنا", it's useless . It's like if you say in English: "me, I'm drinking a coffee". No need to ad "me" before "I" .


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## elroy

In Palestinian, both are used with عم.  With رح, only the form without ب is used.  

However, رح بشرب is used in Lebanese.


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## raful

Are there occasions in which you wouldn't use رح although you are talking about an action taking place in the future?


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## elroy

Yes.  Do you have a specific example you'd like to discuss?


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## wriight

Can رح be used with بـ in metro Lebanese? It sounds pretty old-timey/"homely" to me. (My dad uses it sometimes when he's in full day3awe mode, lol)

As for "Is there a رح-less way of expressing future actions?", and assuming you're not just thinking of the synonymous حـ, there is in fact a بـ verb prefix (separate from the present-indicative one and whatever other uses it has) that serves this exact purpose. Here are some Lebanese examples:

بيدوبوا بعد شوي
_They'll melt in a bit._
عبكرة بطل عليهن
_I'll check in on them tomorrow._
عم يقللي بيخبّرك
_He's telling me he'll let you know._
منبلش؟
_Should we start?_ (b- before /n/ changes to m-)
Oddly, this can be translated even-more-directly into English as "do we start?", where it still refers to the future
I guess if I had to codify the difference between بـ and حـ/رح here, I'd liken it to the difference between "will" and "is gonna/is going to". (This is a satisfying parallel in more ways than one, considering the origin of and relationship between حـ/رح.) In contrast with the first list item, حيدوبوا بعد شوي feels more like "they're gonna melt in a bit" -- this applies to all list items except the last one, which (unlike the others) is a modal future, so while حنبلش؟ does express "are we gonna start?", it's not related to منبلش؟ in quite the same way.

The book _The Syntax of Spoken Arabic_, which I had laying around as a PDF, has a chapter dedicated to "The Multiple Meanings of Syrian /b-/". It lists a few examples along the lines of the above in addition to the following two, which, interestingly, aren't really grammatical to me in Lebanese:

انشالله ما بنسى
_Hopefully I won't forget._
نفرض انه ما بيجي
_Let's suppose he won't come._
Translations copied from the book. For the first, the b- just doesn't hold any future meaning for me -- I'm parsing it as present indicative, which is wrong and thus makes me want to fall back on انشالله ما انسى. The second is just strange, and the closest I can get to the intended meaning is with رح but I'm still not positive.

Regardless, the "future-tense–marking بـ" should be present in a general sense across the Levant, and I guess it's the best answer to the question "[a]re there occasions in which you wouldn't use رح although you are talking about an action taking place in the future?".


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## Drink

wriight said:


> there is in fact a بـ verb prefix (separate from the present-indicative one and whatever other uses it has) that serves this exact purpose.



Just curious, what makes you say they are separate prefixes rather than different uses of the same prefix? Or am I misunderstanding you?


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## wriight

Hm, I don't think there's too big a difference between "a different بـ prefix" and between "a different usage of the بـ prefix" -- no matter what you call it, it _is_ different.
I do think I prefer the first phrasing, though, because it seems to afford less room for confusion: the second might imply that the بـ's present-indicative meaning has some overlap, in usage or semantics, with its future-tense meaning, and that's evidently not the case. Referring to them outright as different prefixes could help solidify the distinction between them.

Etymologically, btw, it's totally likely that the present-indicative بـ and the future بـ come from different sources and just happen to have converged. This paper I read a bit ago takes it as a given (as noted in the small-font abstract at the very beginning), for instance, and there are others out there that propose/defend the idea reasonably enough. I wish the prefix's origin(s) were known for sure, though!


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## Drink

wriight said:


> Etymologically, btw, it's totally likely that the present-indicative بـ and the future بـ come from different sources and just happen to have converged. This paper I read a bit ago takes it as a given (as noted in the small-font abstract at the very beginning), for instance, and there are others out there that propose/defend the idea reasonably enough. I wish the prefix's origin(s) were known for sure, though!



That's exactly the sort of answer I was looking for, thanks for the paper link!


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## raful

elroy said:


> Yes.  Do you have a specific example you'd like to discuss?


One of my colleagues, who teaches colloquial PA, claims that you shouldn't use رح if a proper time is given.
For example: بشوفه بكرا and not رح اشوفه بكرا
If it matters he is from East Jerusalem.


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## elroy

بشوفه بكرة works if the decision is made on the spot.

For example:

Customer: شفتلّي الكومبيوتر اللي جبتلّك اياه الأسبوع الماضي؟
Repairman: صدّق انشغلت كتير ومقدرتش. خلص، بشوفه بكرة

Did you look at the computer I brought in last week?
I'm sorry, I was really busy and I couldn't.  I'll look at it tomorrow, I promise.
In fact, راح أشوفه wouldn't work in that context, because that would mean that he had already planned to look at it tomorrow.

This definitely applies to East Jerusalem usage.  Please show the dialogue to your colleague.  I'd be very surprised if he didn't agree with me!


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## raful

Your example doesn't contradict his approach - the time is given.
Let's say the repairman already decided to look at it tomorrow:  قلتلك لمّا جيبتلّي اياه - بشوفه بكرا or here it would be رح اشوفه بكرا ?


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## elroy

Oops, I misread your last post -- sorry!

He's still wrong  because as I said راح أشوفه can mean "I'm going to look at it tomorrow" in the sense of "My plan is to look at it tomorrow."

I _suspect_ your colleague must have been thinking of a specific case in which the present tense is used in reference to the future with a time reference -- and that's when you're referring to when something is *scheduled *for.  For example:

الطيارة بتوصل بكرة ع الساعة تلاتة.
الأسبوع الجاي ببدا العيد. ("scheduled" in a metaphorical sense, if you will)

But this is a very specific case that he seems to have overgeneralized.  When you talk about things you've already planned to do but that you're not referring to when they're _scheduled _for, راح, and not the present-tense, is used.

يوم الأربعا راح أقدّم إمتحان
Compare this to:
الامتحان ببدا ع الساعة تسعة

The actual start time of the exam is scheduled, whereas the event of taking the exam is planned more generally.

Also, while the present-tense isn't used in the "planned" case, I would hesitate to say that راح would be _wrong_ in the "scheduled" case.  In other words, the following sentences don't sound wrong to me:

الطيارة راح توصل بكرة ع الساعة تلاتة
الأسبوع الجاي راح يبدا العيد
الامتحان راح يبدا ع الساعة تسعة

At most, it's a difference in nuance.

Compare this to the use of the present-tense in the "planned" case:

يوم الأربعا بقدّم إمتحان

This doesn't work if the intention is to express that this has already been planned.  It would mean that you just decided to take an exam on Wednesday -- an unlikely scenario, obviously!  However, it's conceivable if, say, a testing center offers various exams that you can take on any day you wish, and they take walk-ins (no scheduling necessary).  In that case, you could spontaneously decide to "take an exam on Wednesday." 


raful said:


> Let's say the repairman already decided to look at it tomorrow: قلتلك لمّا جيبتلّي اياه - بشوفه بكرا or here it would be رح اشوفه بكرا ?


 راح would just be a general "I told you I would look at it tomorrow."  بشوفه implies that the decision was made on the spot.

For example:

A.) Customer brings in computer and says it needs repair.  Repairman asks customer to wait for a bit while he goes and checks the schedule to see when the computer can be looked at.  A few minutes later, repairman tells customer that they will look at it on such-and-such-a-day. >>> راح

B.) Customer: "This is urgent.  I really need this computer for a presentation in ten days.  Can you please take a look at it before then?"  Repairman:  "That's gonna be hard, we're really backed up.  But it sounds like this is emergency, so... [quickly looks at schedule] I'll move some things around and look at it on such-and-such-a-day." (decision made on the spot) >>> present-tense 

Again, I would be surprised if your colleague rejected any of these judgments!!


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## dakaplo

Another thing that's worth mentioning regarding the use of عم and بـ is that in Lebanese Arabic sometimes the بـ disappears for phonological reasons. As previous posters have said, you have to say عم بَشرب and would never say *عم أشرب.

However, if you wanted to say "he is drinking," in a Lebanese accent you'd say عم يِشرَب , which is underlyingly عمْ بْيِشرب , but the three-consonant sequence  /mby/ isn't allowed, so the بـ has to go.

This is different from a Palestinian/Jordanian accent, where you'd say عم بِشرب, since the third-person prefix is reduced to just a kasra. In other words, the three-consonant sequence is avoided by deleting the ي instead.

(I'm not sure the exact distribution of عم يِشرَب vs. عم بِشرب)

But anyway, if it seems like sometimes you hear عم without a بـ , it is likely that the بـ is there in spirit, if not actually pronounced


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## wriight

I'm not a fan of that analysis lol, specifically that in Lebanon it "sometimes disappears for phonological reasons". Regardless of its origins, the b-prefixed version currently exists as a wholly separate thing from its b-less counterpart IMHO.

That's particularly obvious when the verb starts with /bC/ instead of /bV/, because that causes the 3am to be realized as 3ammə ([ʕamma] ~ [ʕammə]). "3ammə bshouf" and "3ammə byeshrab", for instance. For /bV/, the "3am" remains as is ("3am bishouf" etc.), but I still hold that the b-verb there is a _separate_ rather than an _alternate _realization to the unprefixed version.
It's not like initial /ʕaː/ vs /ʕeː/ (consider عامل) where they're in mostly free variation and are obviously the same thing underlyingly

I also have my doubts about the /mbC/ cluster's infeasibility -- continuants (viz. /m/) tend to blur the consonant-cluster rules, e.g. the realization [yiŋksr̩] for ينكسر, and I'm thinking in particular of a YouTube video ("Lebanese Google Assistant | Wissam Kamal") where I swear you can hear him say /ʕambʔellak/ at the beginning of the video and especially at 2:03. If it's not just me hearing things, that'd also lend weight to that 3am-without-b has other motivations.


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## dakaplo

I'm certainly willing to believe that the analysis you describe is accurate for some speakers. Personally, I've never noticed عم with a shadda on the meem, but I don't have enough familiarity with different varieties to claim it doesn't exist. These things are highly variable.

The analysis that I described matches what I've heard from many speakers, and it is also based on a time when I sat with a native speaker and went carefully through the verbal papradigms. The speaker was a young woman from Saida who had lived a long time in Beirut. I'm positive that she dropped the b when it came between two consonants, so that she said, e.g. "3amtishrab" but "3ambitsakker."


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## analeeh

Yeah, all of these possibilities exist across North Levantine, as well as the (now fairly rare) rural _3an_ instead of _3am_. 

It's definitely true that some speakers have _b-_ and no _b-_ after _3am _in phonologically predictable and complementary positions, just as some speakers have _3am _and _3amma_ in phonologically predictable complementary positions. Some speakers also have _3amma_ everywhere or as a free variant of _3am_. And some speakers just have _3am b-_ everywhere or _3am 0-_ everywhere.


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## raful

Elroy, I'm a bit lost. Can you establish a rule when would you use رح and when you would drop it?


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## dakaplo

analeeh said:


> It's definitely true that some speakers have _b-_ and no _b-_ after _3am _in phonologically predictable and complementary positions, just as some speakers have _3am _and _3amma_ in phonologically predictable complementary positions. Some speakers also have _3amma_ everywhere or as a free variant of _3am_. And some speakers just have _3am b-_ everywhere or _3am 0-_ everywhere.



So many possibilities! I have to say the version with _3am 0- _everywhere surprises me—does this happen even in first person where the prefix is _a_? So "_3amashrab_"?


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## wriight

Ahhhh — see, _3am 0-_ is me except for when I consciously switch to _b-_, and when I made my above post I wasn't even considering the possibility of someone mixing between the two *in a regular, phonologically predictable manner*. I suppose you correctly analyzed the speech of the woman you talked to! As for first-person verbs, the initial hamza pops in to say hi: _3am 2eshrab _(or _2ashrab_, of course).


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## dakaplo

Oh, hi hamza! Glad you could make it 

And that makes it the same pattern of consonants and vowels as _3am teshrab _or _3am yeshrab_.


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## raful

elroy said:


> Yes.  Do you have a specific example you'd like to discuss?


OK, so here's another scene -  someone calls you and you can't to talk right now. How would you say "I'll get back to you later": برجع لك بعدين or رح ارجع لك بعدين?
Based on your examples I'd say رح ارجع لك since it was decided on the spot.


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## apricots

This is pretty unscientific but maybe Elroy can confirm my feeling but it seems to me b is used instead of ra7 where in colloquial American English we'd say I'll (or with any other pronoun).


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## analeeh

raful said:


> OK, so here's another scene -  someone calls you and you can't to talk right now. How would you say "I'll get back to you later": برجع لك بعدين or رح ارجع لك بعدين?
> Based on your examples I'd say رح ارجع لك since it was decided on the spot.



برجعلك بعدين sounds better to me. But I think you've misread elroy here in any case since the decision on the spot he said you use _b-_ for.


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