الولاية كبيرة.

A common pause pronunciation is:

al-wilāya kabīra

If you read it with full case endings in careful MSA, it is:

al-wilāyatu kabīratun

A rough stress pattern is:

al-wi-LAA-ya ka-BEE-ra

Also, the ال in الولاية is pronounced al- here, because و is a moon letter, not a sun letter.

Because Arabic usually leaves out the present-tense verb to be in sentences like this.

So:

الولاية كبيرة
literally looks like the-state big

but it means:

The state/province is big.

This is a very normal Arabic pattern. In grammar terms, it is a nominal sentence: a subject plus a predicate.

If you wanted a past tense, you would usually add a verb such as كان:

الولاية كانت كبيرة = The state/province was big.

Because ولاية is a feminine noun, and the adjective has to agree with it.

• ولاية is feminine
• so the adjective must also be feminine
• كبير is the masculine form
• كبيرة is the feminine form

So Arabic uses:

• بيت كبير = a big house / the house is big if the structure fits
• ولاية كبيرة = a big state/province or the state/province is big, depending on the structure

In your sentence, كبيرة matches the feminine noun الولاية.

That letter is called tāʾ marbūṭa.

It often marks a word as feminine. That is why you see it in many feminine nouns and adjectives.

A few useful things to know about it:

• In normal pause pronunciation, it usually sounds like -a
  • ولاية → wilāya
  • كبيرة → kabīra
• When grammatical endings are fully pronounced, it behaves like a t
  • wilāyatu
  • kabīratun

So it is important both for gender and for pronunciation.

Because here كبيرة is not being used as a normal adjective directly attached to the noun. It is the predicate of the sentence.

So:

• الولاية كبيرة = The state/province is big
• كبيرة is the part telling you something about الولاية

In this kind of sentence, the predicate is commonly indefinite, so it does not take ال.

If you put ال on the adjective, you change the structure and the meaning.

You would say:

الولاية الكبيرة

That is a noun plus an attributive adjective, both definite.

Compare:

• الولاية كبيرة = The state/province is big
• الولاية الكبيرة = the big state/province

This is a very important difference in Arabic:

• noun + indefinite adjective/predicate can form a full sentence
• noun + definite adjective gives a noun phrase

With full vowel endings, it is:

الولايةُ كبيرةٌ

Both words are in the nominative:

• الولايةُ is the subject
• كبيرةٌ is the predicate

In ordinary Arabic writing, these short vowels are usually not written, so you normally just see:

الولاية كبيرة

Also, when stopping at the end of the sentence, speakers usually do not pronounce the final case endings.

No. In الولاية, the ل of ال is pronounced normally.

That is because و is a moon letter.

So you say:

al-wilāya

not something like aw-wilāya.

This is different from words that begin with a sun letter, where the ل sound is absorbed, such as:

• الشمس → ash-shams

But here:

• الولاية → al-wilāya

Yes. Even if the meaning is already given in your lesson, it is useful to know that ولاية can have several related meanings depending on context, such as:

• state
• province
• governorate
• sometimes authority, jurisdiction, or guardianship

In a sentence like الولاية كبيرة, the intended meaning is usually an administrative region such as state or province, depending on the country and context.