Hamza - from the perspective of a student One thing that I have noticed is that in casual writing, hamza seems to be ignored the most. When I say "casual writing", I don't mean dialect that has been written down, but Modern Standard Arabic (الفصحى) written in an informal context. As a beginner, you read texts that have every letter and tashkeel checked for accuracy. Every hamza is present, and you develop this secondary sense of how to rapidly decipher a word that you've never seen (e.g. is it a verb, noun, plural, singular?). For example: اشرب - I see no hamza. It is likely a command أشرب - I see hamza. The most likely choices are a verb inflected for أنا or some other أفْعَلَ verb form. اعتبر - I see no hamza, but the word is long -- too long to beفعل الأمر for a verb of type فَعَلَ. The infixed ت tells me that this is some kind of افتعل verb form. It could be the command form or it could be هو. أعتبر - I see hamza, but the word is long. Again, I see ت so I conclude this is inflected for أنا للأطفال -- begins with للأ, so it must be لـ + ال + أ . The أ means it is likely a plural (أفعال) للاعتبار -- here, I see للا. It could be li-laa or lil-i. The length of the word means it is likely hamzatu-l-waSl. Things start to break down when hamza isn't present. اريد ان اتكلم للافال اريد - I stop at this. What could be i-reed? However, I've seen أريد so many times and the ان that follows -- surely the word must be أريد. After this point, I can guess that اتكلم is أتكلم and so on. Most of the time, hamza seems to be missing when الف is at the beginning of the word. However, not always... سالني ما المشكلة؟ Word-internal hamza. If this is not, I have a much more difficult time understanding the word. سالني - What on earth is this? I see the ني , so I assume it must be a verb. OK, no problem. Let's pull out the dictionary... سال - to drain, stream, flow (liquid). "He drained me"? Of course, the word is actually سأل - to ask. The only hint is the next few words. ما المشكلة؟ - what is the problem. The word ما is an interrogative, and the phrase is something spoken rather than pure prose. In this case, I can usually figure it out. If you are a learner, I hope this helped. If you write Arabic, please use hamzaat! It helps us to understand. Next time: Why دجاجه and دجاجة are two totally different things.