# اسكت Askout!



## mayapan

The word '_Askout!_' is at p198, Chapter 21, of the novel _The Sheltering Sky_ by Paul Bowles.

Port, still sick, is resting in a courtyard while Kit and an Arab guide go searching for a hotel. When they find the entrance, the guide knocked on the door loudly. A long time passed with no answer. Kit told the guide to knock again. And so...

"...he pounded with greater energy than before. This time a dog began to bark somewhere back in the garden, and as the sound gradually came closer it was mingled with cries of reproof. '_Askout_!' cried the woman indignantly, but the animal continued to bark. Then there was a period during which an occasional stone bumped on the ground, and the dog was quiet."

So, what meaning does that word "askout" have? Thanks for the continuing help.


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## elroy

It means “Shhhhh!”, as in, a command to be quiet.


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## Abbe

Isn't صه shh

and اسكت be quiet?


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## Hemza

It means _be quite_ or -probably- more vulgarly,_ shut up_ (and this is one of the words I've heard the most across my quarter century long life from my parents ).


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## mayapan

Many thanks. I thought the word should mean something like you all said.


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## suryoyo

أُسْكُتْ is how you pronounce it, isn't it?
Are أُصْمُتْ and إخْرَسْ synonymous with it?


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## bearded

It should be the imperative from verb يسكت،(to be silent).
Is the correct pronunciation in MSA  uskut?


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## fenakhay

In MSA, it is pronounced (2)uskut.


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## Mahaodeh

suryoyo said:


> Are أُصْمُتْ and إخْرَسْ synonymous with it?



اصمت yes, more or less. But اخرس is equivalent of 'shut up' while the other two are equivalent to 'be quite' or 'be silent'.


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## elroy

I would say that in order of increasing intensity/offensiveness, it goes:

اسكت
اصمت
اخرس


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## suryoyo

Thanks. In these three words isn't it necessary to put the hamza above (or below in the third case)?


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## elroy

No, that would be wrong.


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## suryoyo

But technically, these words begin not with an alif but with a hamzah. More specifically, they begin with a hamzat al-wasl, as opposed to a hamzat al-qat'.


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## fenakhay

Like you said, it is a hamzatu wasl, it shouldn't be written since technically it doesn't exist. It is only there to ease the pronunciation of initial clusters which MSA/CA don't like.


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## elroy

suryoyo said:


> they begin with a hamzat al-wasl


 That’s right.  That’s why no hamza is written.


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## suryoyo

fenakhay said:


> Like you said, it is a hamzatu wasl, it shouldn't be written since technically it doesn't exist. It is only there to ease the pronunciation of initial clusters which MSA/CA don't like.



But it does exist when it's at the beginning of the sentence.


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## elroy

It’s _pronounced_ — but not _written_ — at the beginning of an utterance.


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## wriight

And a hamza symbol is _only_ written when it's to represent a hamzat qat3, i.e. a hamza that's always pronounced. Or, equivalently, when the hamza is morphologically rather than just phonetically part of the word.



suryoyo said:


> these words begin not with an alif but with a hamzah. More specifically, they begin with a hamzat al-wasl, as opposed to a hamzat al-qat'.


This is correct, but as fenakhay indicated, you're deriving the wrong conclusion from it. Regardless of how it's pronounced in a particular place in a sentence, hamzat al-wasl is _always_ underlyingly part of a word, and so it's a distinct thing entirely from hamzat al-qat3 (which is always written).



suryoyo said:


> أُسْكُتْ is how you pronounce it, isn't it?


Regarding this: it's pronounced that way in MSA, yeah, but the language being represented isn't MSA. The book in question is set in North Africa and its characters speak the Arabic vernaculars of the region.
However, considering the author's shaky track record with transcriptions (see other threads), I'm not sure the word's exact pronunciation can be determined from the way it was written. @fenakhay, how would "_askout_" properly be pronounced in Morocco?


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## fenakhay

wriight said:


> how would "_askout_" properly be pronounced in Morocco?



Skut and also Askut in some dialects though not related to the CA askut because it comes from 2a = Particle used for alerting + skut


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## suryoyo

Is this particle used for alerting in CA too? If memory serves, أ is used to call people, just like يا and أي.


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