Pashto for dummies

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With verbs that express wishes, possibilities, necessity, doubts, emotions etc. the subjunctive sense has to be used.. just like in French or Spanish.. maybe in Arabic as well? I'm not sure, I don't speak Arabic lol

in Proper Arabic it would be "madaa tareed 3an ta3amoul?"

in lebanese or palestinian Arabic they would say "sho bithel bidek/bidak?

in Yemeni from the area of 7adramout they would say "ash tifeddel tif3al? "

the 3 (ayn) and 7 (ha) represent Arabic letters.

They expressing wishes doesn't have a special tense like for example if you say "May Allah guard you" you simply say "Allah yi7afethak/yi7afethik"

[Mayana]

Yeah, some languages use subjunctive tense, some don't. English and German for instance don't have a distinct tense for it anymore, they just use the conjunctive tense. Other languages, like French and Spanish have a distinct tense for it.

[ScimitarXEdge]

do you study linguistics?

[Mayana]

No, I don't. Just a nerd for languages

[ScimitarXEdge]

LOL; but your nerdery has keen usage of academic terminology.

[Mayana]

I just had excellent language arts teachers in school.

[ScimitarXEdge]

BTW in your dialect of Pakhto do they shorten words in the subjunctive tense

for example saying "wakey" instead of "wakawey"?

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I just had excellent language arts teachers in school.

[Mayana]

We do say "wakai" and I've never heard of "wakawai" and it'd sound wrong to me as kawal is conjugated irregularly.

[ScimitarXEdge]

We do say "wakai" and I've never heard of "wakawai" and it'd sound wrong to me as kawal is conjugated irregularly.

in many Mashreqi dialects it's conjugated as "kawey" and "kawum" and "kawi"

we say Kawum/Kawi/Kawey, why does the Qandahari dialect abandon the "w"?

Perhaps this will give me certain insights as to why certain phrasings differ between regions.

My clan is of Qandahari origins but migrated Eastward after we lost Qandahar to the Abdali 300 years ago.

[Mayana]

in many Mashreqi dialects it's conjugated as "kawey" and "kawum" and "kawi"

we say Kawum/Kawi/Kawey, why does the Qandahari dialect abandon the "w"?

Perhaps this will give me certain insights as to why certain phrasings differ between regions.

Hmm
For the present tense, we do say Kawam, Kaweh, Kawi. A colloquial variation of this is Kawam Kayeh Kayi. It's just easier to form a y-sound than it is to form a w-sound in this case because 'K' is formed in the back and so is the y-sound.. as opposed to w which is formed in the front of your mouth by moving your lips. I assume that's how this variation formed. But like I said, it's just colloquial; formally it still is kawam, kaweh, kawi.

For the subjunctive sense we say Wakam, Wakeh, Waki.

[ScimitarXEdge]

Hmm
For the present tense, we do say Kawam, Kaweh, Kawi. A colloquial variation of this is Kawam Kayeh Kayi. It's just easier to form a y-sound than it is to form a w-sound in this case because 'K' is formed in the back and so is the y-sound.. as opposed to w which is formed in the front of your mouth by moving your lips. I assume that's how this variation formed. But like I said, it's just colloquial; formally it still is kawam, kaweh, kawi.

For the subjunctive sense we say Wakam, Wakeh, Waki.

My Pakhto knowledge is not nearly as detailed as yours; I can speak it but like I said I have gaps, most people don't seem to notice too much difference when I speak to them in Pakhto, except that I have a thick American accent.

Getting back to our examples

I hear "Khudai di wadan waki" and "wakawi".....do you speak Pakhto mainly with Qandahari/Helmand/Zabul people?

[Mayana]

I speak Pashto mainly with people from the South although I hear a lot of the Eastern dialect as well on TV and such.
We usually say "Khodai di waki chi...." as in "May God.. " but I've never heard wakawi =/

[ScimitarXEdge]

I speak Pashto mainly with people from the South although I hear a lot of the Eastern dialect as well on TV and such.
We usually say "Khodai di waki chi...." as in "May God.. " but I've never heard wakawi =/

Cool; well I want to understand why some people say it the way I do, is it just ignorance or slang or just corruption due to straying from the original dialect, or just me not understanding things in their proper context.

I read Qandahari is the proper Pakhto.

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Pohand Abdul Hai Habibi disagrees.