Kalim and kalam (word classes and utterance)

Sibawayh opens his book with a chapter that limits "kalim" (words, as individual units) to three kinds: noun, verb and particle, illustrating each with Arabic examples. The chapters that follow on "kalam" (speech) deal with predication between the predicate and the subject ^{1 2}.

The chapter divides words into noun and verb, and into particle, which "came to express a meaning that is neither a noun nor a verb." Examples of nouns are man, horse and wall. Examples of verbs include forms built for the past, such as "he went" and "he heard"; forms built for what has not yet happened, such as "strike!", "do!" and "he strikes"; and forms built for what is present and has not ended. Particles include "then," "will" and the oath particle and the particle of annexation ¹.

The editor notes that Sibawayh said "kalim" and not "kalimat" (the plural form). Al-Sirafi explains this by saying that "kalim" is lighter in pronunciation, and that neither term has an advantage over the other ³.

The first chapter is followed by a chapter on "the courses of the endings of words," that is, the changes that happen to the end of a word depending on its position in the sentence ⁴.