# Madrasa



## Necsus

Good morning!
I'd need to know where the tonic accent is in the word 'madrasa'? Is it on the first 'A' (m*à*drasa) or on the second one (madr*à*sa)? Could you help me?
Thanks!


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## ayed

Necsus said:


> Good morning!
> I'd need to know where the tonic accent is in the word 'madrasa'? Is it on the first 'A' (m*à*drasa) or on the second one (madr*à*sa)? Could you help me?
> Thanks!


M*A*drasa in my dialect.Other dialects "may" differ


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## Necsus

Thank you, ayed! The movie is set in Pakistan...


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## WadiH

In Arabic, the stress in "Madrasa" is on the first vowel.


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## Necsus

Thank you, Wadi. Two votes for 'm*à*drasa'..!


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## Haroon

I think if it is a ( school ) there is no stress on either !!Mdrasa


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## elroy

In standard Arabic, the stress is on the first syllable.

In some dialects (Egyptian, for example), the stress is on the second syllable.

If you are interested in knowing where the stress falls in Urdu, which I believe borrowed this word from Arabic, you'll have to ask in the Other Languages forum.


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## linguist786

I'm not trying to contradict native Arabs (as obviously they know much more than I do about Arabic!) but doesn't it depend? For example, if we were to say "al-madrasa" as a word on its own, then the stress would go on "al-madrasa", I agree. However, if we were to say (for example) "fil-madrasati" (in the school) then I would personally change the stress to "fil-madrasati".

Tell me if I'm wrong!


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## elroy

You are not wrong, Linguist, and what you say does not contradict what anyone said.

Usually, when asked where the stress lies in a single noun, we do not consider any possible changes in stress due to inflection.  We consider the base form of the word.


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## boubata

No .Personally I think there is no stress at all we don't have to pronounce it as Americans do they usually put a stress on d


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## elroy

boubata said:


> No .Personally I think there is no stress at all we don't have to pronounce it as Americans do they usually put a stress on d


 There is definitely stress.  What's meant by "stress" here is the extra emphasis that a certain syllable gets in a multi-syllable word.  It has nothing to do with how individual sounds in the word are articulated.


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## boubata

Dear friends I think stress in arabic means الشدة
can any one find it in المدرسة


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## clevermizo

boubata said:


> Dear friends I think stress in arabic means الشدة
> can any one find it in المدرسة



No - the term "stress" the way we are using it in this thread is نبرة:
"نَبْرَةُ الْكَلِمَةِ" : رَفْعُ الصَّوْتِ عِنْدَ النُّطْقِ بِهَا

I think this is the correct term for the phenomenon we are after. شدة is used for consonant doubling. There is no mushaddad consonant in madrasa, but there is a stress on the first syllable : mád.ra.sa (unless we add suffixes or inflection as noted above).

This phenomenon of stressed syllable is sometimes called "accent" in English. Using this English word for Arabic I find misleading because many people use "accent" to refer to different regional accents/dialects.


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## boubata

So I think you mean the intonation


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## elroy

boubata said:


> So I think you mean the intonation


 "Stress" is the term commonly used with this meaning.  "Intonation" is usually used in reference to a longer utterance, not just a single word.


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## clevermizo

elroy said:


> "Stress" is the term commonly used with this meaning.  "Intonation" is usually used in reference to a longer utterance, not just a single word.



So is نبرة the right word for this situation then?


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## cherine

To my knowledge it's an-nabr (masculine) النبر . I read it in an Arabic book about linguistics (not my usual reading  ) but this is the word I found used. 
Nabra نبرة is the tone of the voice.


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## Necsus

Thank you all!
However, in languages like Italian, stress/accent is the emphasis that may be given to a syllable in a word, and it lies on a vowel.


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## elroy

Necsus said:


> However, in languages like Italian, stress/accent is the emphasis that may be given to a syllable in a word, and it lies on a vowel.


 It's the same in Arabic.


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## Necsus

Thank you, elroy.


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