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Questions & Answers about Yara suna gida yanzu.
What does Yara mean?
Yara is the plural of yaro (“child”), so it means children.
What is suna? Is it a verb?
Suna isn’t a main verb. It’s the third‑person plural present‑progressive construction: su (“they”) + na (progressive aspect). It functions like “are (doing)…” in English. Here, with no lexical verb, suna simply “links” the subject to its location.
Why isn’t there a separate verb for “to be” in Hausa?
Hausa doesn’t use a dedicated present‑tense copula. Instead it relies on pronoun + aspect markers (like na for present/progressive). For equational sentences with nouns or adjectives you sometimes see ne/ce, but that’s not needed in basic location statements.
What role does gida play here?
Gida means home or house. In this sentence it’s a locative complement meaning “at home.” Hausa often omits a preposition when a location is clear from context.
What about yanzu—where does it go?
Yanzu means now. It’s a temporal adverb and can appear at the end (as here) or at the beginning:
Yanzu yara suna gida.
How would you ask “Are the children at home now?”
Use rising intonation on the same sentence:
Yara suna gida yanzu?
Or add shin at the start for a clear yes/no question:
Shin yara suna gida yanzu?
How do you negate “Yara suna gida yanzu”?
Wrap the predicate in ba … ba:
Yara ba suna a gida yanzu ba.
(Some speakers also say Yara ba suna gida yanzu ba, omitting the a.)
How would you say “The child is at home now” (singular)?
Change the noun and agreement marker to singular:
Yaro (child) + yana (he/it + na) + gida + yanzu →
Yaro yana gida yanzu.
What’s the difference between gida, a gida and cikin gida?
- gida or a gida = “home” / “at home”
- cikin gida = “inside the house” (emphasizing being within)
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