Breakdown of Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali su je bene na sama.
Questions & Answers about Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali su je bene na sama.
suna is the 3rd person plural pronoun su (they) plus the aspect marker na, which together mark a continuous / progressive action.
- Yara suna hawa matakala...
= The children are climbing the stairs...
In Hausa, you normally need both:
- a subject pronoun (su, ya, ta, mu, ku, etc.)
- plus an aspect marker (na, ke, ma, etc., depending on dialect/structure)
So suna is not just are, it’s more like they + (progressive).
hawa is a verbal noun (sometimes called a gerund) from the verb hawã (to climb, ride).
In Hausa, the progressive often looks like:
- Subject pronoun + aspect marker + verbal noun
So:
- suna hawa matakala
literally: they are in the act of climbing stairs
You can think of hawa here as climbing (the -ing form) acting like a noun. This pattern is very common in Hausa:
- yana cin abinci – he is eating food (cin from ci, to eat)
- muna shan ruwa – we are drinking water (shan from sha, to drink)
matakala is plural, from mataki (step).
In everyday usage:
- mataki – a (single) step, stage
- matakala – steps / stairs / a staircase
So hawa matakala is best understood as climbing the stairs rather than just climbing a step.
a hankali means slowly or carefully.
- hankali = sense, reason, calmness
- a = a preposition often meaning in / with / at, but here it’s part of a fixed manner expression.
Literally, a hankali is something like in calmness, which naturally extends to:
- slowly, gently, carefully
The a is used in many adverbial/manner phrases:
- a sauri – quickly
- a hankali – slowly
- a tsanake – calmly, quietly
Yes, a hankali is fairly flexible. All of these are possible and natural:
- Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali su je bene na sama.
- Yara suna hawa matakala su je bene na sama a hankali. (less common, can sound like they go upstairs slowly rather than climb slowly)
- Yara suna a hankali suna hawa matakala su je bene na sama. (more marked/emphatic: they are, slowly, climbing the stairs...)
The most neutral and common is the original placement, right after the object (matakala), modifying how they are climbing.
su je starts a second clause with its own subject marking, even though the subject is the same children.
- su – they (subject pronoun, 3rd person plural)
- je – go
In Hausa, when you chain actions (do X and then do Y / do X in order to do Y), you often repeat the pronoun for the next clause:
- Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali su je bene na sama.
= The children are climbing the stairs slowly to go to the upper floor.
So:
- first clause: Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali
- second clause: su je bene na sama
The su in su je marks that this is another action of the same subject.
Yes. In context, su je bene na sama is naturally understood as a purpose/result clause:
- suna hawa matakala... su je bene na sama
≈ they are climbing the stairs… so that they go / in order to go to the upper floor
Hausa often uses this kind of bare subject pronoun + verb structure to show:
- next action in a sequence, or
- intended result/purpose.
You could make the purpose even clearer by adding don or domin:
- Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali don su je bene na sama.
= The children are climbing the stairs slowly so that they may go upstairs.
Literally:
- bene – floor (of a building), storey
- na – of (possessive / genitive linker)
- sama – up, above, top
So bene na sama = the floor of above → the upper floor / the upstairs floor.
Compare:
- sama on its own – up, above, the sky, the top
- na je sama can mean I went up / upstairs (depending on context).
- bene na kasa – the lower floor / ground floor
- bene na biyu – the second floor, literally the floor of two.
In this sentence, bene na sama specifically points to an upper storey of a building, not just “upward” in a general sense.
Yes, to make yara definite (the children), you normally add the -n / -r definite ending:
- Yaran suna hawa matakala a hankali.
= The children are climbing the stairs slowly.
So:
- yara = children (general / indefinite)
- yaran = the children (definite)
In your original sentence, Yara suna... can mean children are... or the children are..., depending on context, but adding -n makes the definiteness explicit.
You change the subject and the agreement:
- Yaro yana hawa matakala a hankali ya je bene na sama.
- Yaro – child / boy (singular)
- yana – he is (ya + na)
- ya je – he goes
So:
- plural: Yara suna hawa matakala a hankali su je bene na sama.
- singular: Yaro yana hawa matakala a hankali ya je bene na sama.
The pattern subject + aspect marker and then same-subject pronoun + verb in the second clause stays the same, only the person/number changes (suna / su → yana / ya).