Learn the Arabic alphabet - Lesson 01 - Introduction and first 7 letters
Channel: Alex Arrick
Date: 2013-05-23

This is a comprehensive introduction to the Arabic alphabet. After several friends of mine complained about not having a good resource out there for beginners, I decided to make some videos of my own. When I was learning the Arabic alphabet I had to go to several different sources and wasted a lot of time sifting through all the information (which sometimes didn't always agree!).

So my goal with these videos is to provide an easy explanation for how to read the Arabic alphabet with classical pronunciation. It's good for those who are learning Classical Standard or Modern Standard Arabic. And a must-have foundation for those who want to learn to speak colloquial Arabic, which varies by region.

The letters we cover in this video are: alif, ba, ta, tha, jeem, 7a, and kha.

Video notes:

1. There are 28 letters in the Arabic language. It's not as intimidating as you think!

2. Arabic is written from right to left! Don't mess that up.

3. The entire language is written in cursive, so (most of) the letters connect to the other letters in the word. There are some exceptions but there are few. There is ALWAYS a gap between words!

4. See the example in the video: 1:23

5. The first letter! Alif: 3:13

ا   ـا  

Alif usually makes an "A" sound, but can also make an "U" sound and an "I" sound. We'll get to that in a later video.

Note that the Alif either stands by itself or is connected to the letter before it. It's never connected to the letter after it (even if it's part of the same word).

6. Ba: 3:58

ب   ببب

Ba makes a normal "B" sound.

7. Ta: 4:17

ت تتت

Ta makes a normal "T" sound.

8. Tha: 4:33

ث ثثث

Tha makes a light "th" sound like in the word "thing." Note that it is not a hard "th" sound like in the word "that" - there's another letter for that.

9. Jeem: 5:31

ج ججج

Jeem makes a "J" sound like in the words "judge" or "George."

10. 7a: 5:52

ح ححح

7a is written with a "7" when written with English letters. It's not quite an "H" sound, but comes from farther back in the throat. It's similar to the sound that you make when you take off your glasses and blow from the back of your mouth to clean them.

11. Kha: 6:52

خ خخخ

Kha is the sound that you might have heard in the Hebrew word "Hanukkah." It's further up in the throat than the 7a and makes a light scraping sound.

12. Examples of how to write Arabic (it's in cursive!): 7:24

*Note that the Alif does not connect to the letter after it, even if it's part of the same word. You would just start with a new letter and keep going. See 12:18 for an example: باب

See another example of when we combine 7a and Ba: 13:20

حب

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Congrats! You now know the first seven letters of the Arabic alphabet. Learn the next eight letters in the next video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qk7PCSkifyc