Questions & Answers about Unguwar tana da shiru.
Why is it unguwar and not unguwa?
Unguwa is the basic dictionary form, meaning neighborhood or district.
Unguwar is a marked form often used for a definite noun, so here it works like the neighborhood. Hausa does not usually have a separate word for the like English does. Instead, definiteness is often shown by the form of the noun itself.
So:
- unguwa = neighborhood / a neighborhood
- unguwar = the neighborhood
Why is there a tana after unguwar? English would just say The neighborhood is...
In Hausa, it is very normal to have:
- a full noun subject, and
- an agreeing subject marker after it
So Unguwar tana... is literally something like:
- The neighborhood, it...
That is standard Hausa sentence structure. English usually does not repeat the subject this way, but Hausa does.
Why is it tana and not yana?
Because unguwa is a feminine singular noun in Hausa.
Hausa nouns belong to grammatical gender classes, and the agreeing marker has to match the noun:
- yana = he/it (masculine) is...
- tana = she/it (feminine) is...
So since is grammatically feminine, you use .