SHAWQ
A strong pull toward what one longs for.
SHAWQ · شوق
A feeling that travels with you.
The Feeling
A song that brings back a street you have not walked in years. The smell of a house you grew up in. The name of someone far away appearing on your phone.
Shawq is the pull toward what you miss: a person, a place, a moment. It is tender and it is strong, and it shows how much something still matters.
Listen to the Word
- Say it
- SHAWK
- Syllables
- shawq
One syllable. The final q is a deep sound made further back in the throat than an English k.
The Language
- Arabic
- شَوْق
- Unvowelled
- شوق
“A strong pull toward what one longs for.” is MA’NA’s interpretation of the feeling, not a dictionary translation.
Where It Lives
Spoken Around the World
Arabic is a family of closely related varieties. Modern Standard Arabic is shared in writing, media and formal speech, while everyday conversation happens in regional dialects.
Ethnologue figures as listed by Encyclopaedia Britannica, early 2020s data. Many people use more than one variety, so the figures overlap and should not be added together. They describe speakers of the language, not people who use this particular word.
In Culture
Wear the Word
Know someone who feels like shawq?