هم
“هم” (хум) — they in Arabic. Pronoun, level A0, topic — pronouns. For a group of women — hunna, for any pair — humaa. Three forms of "they", and all of them are alive. In a live sentence: “هم من مصر” — They are from Egypt. Written with the characters ه, م. One of 27 words in the set “pronouns” in the Arabic course.
In short
| Written in Arabic | هم |
| Read in Latin letters | хум |
| Translation | they |
| Part of speech | pronoun |
| Level | A0 |
Why it looks that way
For a group of women — hunna, for any pair — humaa. Three forms of "they", and all of them are alive
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- هم من مصرхум мин мисрThey are from Egypt
Nearby words: pronouns
I, you, we, they. There is a handful of them, they turn up in every sentence, and politeness rides on them: most of these languages keep a formal “you” apart from a familiar one, and choosing the wrong one is noticed faster than a mispronounced word.
- أناанаIDropped all the time in speech: the verb or the setting has already said who is talking. Kept for emphasis — "it was me"
- أنتантаyouTo a woman — anti with an i on the end: أنتِ. In writing the vowel mark keeps the difference, in speech the sound does
- أنتمантумyou (plural)To a group; to a group of women — antunna. There is no separate polite you: respect is carried by the plural alone
- هوхуваheAbout two men the word is humaa: Arabic has a dual number even for "they two"
- هيхияsheAbout two women — also humaa: the dual does not care about gender
- نحنнахнуweOne "we" for every case: Arabic does not split "we including you" from "we without you"
- نحن الاثنانнахну аль-иснаанthe two of usThere is no separate pronoun for two people: they say "we, the two". The verb, though, has its own form for two, with -aani on the end
- ليлиmineA cast of li — to me — and the word means "mine": al-kitaab lii is the book is mine. You have seen the suffix -ii (kitaabii); this is possession named on its own
- لكлякаyoursThe partner of lii: to you, hence yours. The same recipe builds lanaa and lakum — ours and yours (plural)
- لناлянаoursLiterally "to us": ours. Arabic does not keep a separate possessive word — possession lives in the preposition
Test yourself
Five questions from the same set — “pronouns”. Recalling a spelling from meaning is harder than knowing a familiar word on sight, and therefore more useful.
- How do you say “they” in Arabic?
For a group of women — hunna, for any pair — humaa. Three forms of "they", and all of them are alive
- How do you say “the two of us” in Arabic?
There is no separate pronoun for two people: they say "we, the two". The verb, though, has its own form for two, with -aani on the end
- How do you say “you (plural)” in Arabic?
To a group; to a group of women — antunna. There is no separate polite you: respect is carried by the plural alone
- How do you say “ours” in Arabic?
Literally "to us": ours. Arabic does not keep a separate possessive word — possession lives in the preposition
- How do you say “we” in Arabic?
One "we" for every case: Arabic does not split "we including you" from "we without you"
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “they” in Arabic?
«هم», read “хум”. In a live sentence: “هم من مصر” — They are from Egypt. Pronoun, level A0, from the set “pronouns”; written with the characters ه, م.
How is “هم” written in Latin letters?
хум. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
For a group of women — hunna, for any pair — humaa. Three forms of "they", and all of them are alive. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.