A thank-you note

What your class asks

This lesson asks you to write a note in Arabic that uses conventions of courtesy, among them expressions of gratitude and appreciation. The museum offers only what the record on shukr says about its meaning. The Arabic expressions of thanks themselves, the salutations and closings of letters, and date and currency formats, your class brings. ¹

Curriculum expectations, with their official codes

D3.2 identify sociolinguistic conventions associated with a variety of social situations in diverse communities where the target language is spoken, and use them appropriately in their written work in the target language […]

The lesson

To whom will you write, and what will you say?

Decide whom you thank and for which kindness, then choose from the expressions you have learned those that suit the formality between you and the reader.

Go deeper

The record on shukr has a section on thanking people for a kindness, taken from the Kuwaiti encyclopaedia of jurisprudence. It says that thanking a benefactor is approved by all sensible people, even for a small favour, since, as it puts it, whoever does not thank the little does not thank the much ² ³ ⁴. Thanks in deed is the root, paying a kindness with a kindness; if that is not possible, a good word is enough ² ³ ⁴. It says that asking the beneficiary for thanks is disliked ² ³ ⁴.

How do we know?

These are rulings reported by a jurists' encyclopaedia, not letters or notes that people wrote ² ³ ⁴. How a note of thanks is worded in your language you learn from the texts your class reads.

Think about it

The encyclopaedia says thanking a benefactor is approved even for a small favour ² ³ ⁴. Give a reason from your own experience: why might a small kindness deserve thanks as much as a large one?

Into the museum

Shukr: its definition, how it differs from praise and commendation, and the section on thanking people.
Greeting with peace: the meaning of taslim in the language and in the jurists' usage.

Try this

Read the record on shukr. Write a short thank-you note in Arabic using expressions you learned in class, and tell a classmate which kindness you acknowledged in it.

Check yourself

Nothing here is marked or sent anywhere. It is for you.

Which of these did you meet in this lesson?

Shukr (gratitude to God and to people: its meaning, its rulings, its virtue and its opposite)

Yes. That is the one from this lesson.

Tasmiya (naming: giving a name to a child, and the rules on names)

Not in this lesson. Look again at the cards above.

Islamic calligraphy

Not in this lesson. Look again at the cards above.

In your own words: what does Shukr (gratitude to God and to people: its meaning, its rulings, its virtue and its opposite) have to do with this lesson?

Compare with the card

A good word. The Kuwaiti Encyclopaedia of Fiqh describes shukr as the acknowledgement of a kindness, its spreading and praise of its doer, made by the tongue, the heart and the limbs. It adds that to repay a kindness in deed is the root of thanks, and that if one cannot, a good word is enough. To whom will you write your thank-you note, and which kindness will you acknowledge in it?

I can now

D3.2identify sociolinguistic conventions associated with a variety of social situations in diverse communities where the target language is spoken, and use them appropriately in their written work in the target language […]

1 What your class asks

2 The lesson