Wannan roba ce.

to be

Breakdown of Wannan roba ce.

• wannan: this
• roba: the rubber

Questions & Answers about Wannan roba ce.

What does ce do at the end of the sentence?

Ce is the marker Hausa uses in this kind of present-tense identification sentence.

So in Wannan roba ce, Hausa is saying something like:

• Wannan = this / this one
• roba = the thing being identified
• ce = the identificational is marker here

English uses is in the middle, but Hausa often uses ne/ce at the end in sentences like X is Y.

Why is it ce and not ne?

Because roba is treated as a feminine noun in Hausa.

In these identification sentences:

• ne is commonly used with masculine nouns
• ce is commonly used with feminine nouns

So:

• Wannan littafi ne. = This is a book.
• Wannan roba ce. = This is a rubber / eraser / plastic item, depending on context

This is grammatical gender, not biological sex. An object can be grammatically feminine.

Does Hausa have a verb to be like English is here?

Not in the same way English does.

In a sentence like this, Hausa does not normally insert a separate word in the middle equivalent to English . Instead, it uses a structure with or at the end.