3onf عنف
Moroccan Darija · noun
“3onf” (عنف) is a noun in Moroccan Darija meaning violence.
Meanings
- violence
- brutality, excessive force
Usage
3onf means physical or moral violence. The word comes from Standard Arabic and is heard a lot in the media, at school and in discussions about society. It is often used with the article: l3onf. It appears in common phrases such as l3onf dyal drari (youth violence) or l3onf did lmra (violence against women). In everyday speech, to describe a concrete fight, other words are used instead, such as dbez (to fight). So 3onf stays in a fairly neutral, even serious, register.
Example
العنف ماشي حل
l3onf machi 7all
“Violence is not a solution.”
How to write it in Latin letters
In Arabizi, Darija written in Latin letters, you will find “3onf” but also “3ounf” and “3nf”. No spelling is official: people write the sounds as they hear them.
Digits stand in for Arabic letters that have no Latin equivalent: 3 is ayn (ع), a voiced sound from deep in the throat with no English equivalent.