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Questions & Answers about ندرس مساء.
Why is there no Arabic word for "in" or "the" before مساء?
In Arabic, words for times of day like مساء (evening) or صباح (morning) can act directly as adverbs of time. You do not need to use the preposition في (in) to say "in the evening". The word مساء by itself in this context carries the full meaning of "in the evening".
If مساء is acting as an adverb of time, does its pronunciation change?
Yes! Adverbs of time take an "-an" sound at the end, known as tanween fatha, so it is pronounced "masaa'an". You will often see this written with two little diagonal dashes over the last letter, though they are frequently left out in everyday standard text.
Why doesn't مساء get an extra alif at the end to show that "-an" sound?
Usually, words that take the "-an" adverb ending add an extra alif letter at the end. However, there is a spelling rule in Arabic: if a word ends in a hamza that comes right after an alif (like in مساء), you do not add another alif. The "-an" sound just sits directly on the hamza.
How do we know the sentence means "we study" if there is no separate word for "we"?
The verb ندرس starts with the letter ن (noon), which is the standard prefix for "we" in the present tense. Because this prefix already tells us who is doing the action, the standalone pronoun نحن (we) is usually dropped unless you want to add special emphasis.