Learn the basic facts concerning grammatical cases in Turkish
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Intro |
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| Michael: How many grammatical cases are there in Turkish? |
| Dilek: And how do they work? |
| Michael: At TurkishClass101.com, we hear these questions often. Imagine the following situation: Ben and Nilgun are meeting at Nilgun's to work on a college project. Ben calls Nilgun and says: |
| "I'm leaving home right now." |
| Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Dialogue |
| Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Nilgün Nevşehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| Michael: Once more with the English translation. |
| Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Michael: "I'm leaving home right now." |
| Nilgün Nevşehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| Michael: "I'll wait at home, then. " |
Lesson focus |
| Michael: One of the most important characteristics of the Turkish language is that it's an agglutinative language. Simple sentences are built in subject-object-verb order; however, the order is not fixed. Words can be put anywhere in the sentence as their functions and relations between each of them are highly obvious thanks to suffixes. In this lesson, you'll learn how this characteristic applies to nouns or |
| Dilek: isimler |
| Michael: Let's start by considering an example: the phrase "in the car." Unlike English, where there are prepositions such as "in," "at," and "on," to identify the location of something, Turkish uses special suffixes attached to the words to express the same meaning. The result is that the English phrase "in the car" in Turkish corresponds to one word: |
| Dilek: arabada |
| Michael: which is made by the noun meaning "car" |
| Dilek: araba |
| Michael: and the suffix indicating location |
| Dilek: da |
| Michael: In other words, when constructing a sentence in Turkish, you need to decline the nouns to express concepts that in English are indicated by different words. There are five different noun cases in Turkish. The "nominative" or |
| Dilek: İsmin yalın hali, |
| Michael: The "accusative" or |
| Dilek: İsmin -i hali, |
| Michael: the "dative" or |
| Dilek: İsmin -e hali, |
| Michael: the "locative" or |
| Dilek: İsmin -de hali, |
| Michael: and finally the "ablative" or |
| Dilek: İsmin -den hali, |
| Michael: Now, let's see now how each of these cases work. |
| The nominative case, which is the basic form of the noun without any suffixes and indicates the subject or an indefinite object in the sentence. Here is an example: |
| Dilek: Kolye çok güzel. |
| Michael: "The necklace is beautiful." Here, the word meaning "necklace" is in the nominative case, |
| Dilek: kolye. |
| Michael: Next up is the accusative case which indicates a direct and definite object and usually ends in |
| Dilek: -i |
| Michael: Let's consider the word |
| Dilek: sepet, |
| Michael: which means "basket." In the accusative case, it becomes |
| Dilek: sepeti, |
| Michael: literally meaning "the basket." Let's compare two sentences with both forms. First, we have the nominative |
| Dilek: Bana sepet ver, |
| Michael: meaning "Give me a basket." Next is the same sentence with the accusative case. |
| Dilek: Bana sepeti ver, |
| Michael: which means "Give me the basket." Notice how here the word declined in the accusative case refers to a definite object. |
| Now, let's see the dative case. The dative case is something equivalent to the English words "to" or "towards." It suggests a direction in the sentence. It usually ends in |
| Dilek: -e |
| Michael: Let's consider the word |
| Dilek: ev, |
| Michael: which means "house." In the dative case, it becomes |
| Dilek: eve. |
| Michael: Let's hear a sample sentence: |
| Dilek: Eve giderim, |
| Michael: which means "I go to the house" or "I go to a house." |
| Next is the locative case which is similar to the English prepositions "on," in" or "at," and suggests the idea of being in a position. It usually ends in |
| Dilek: -de |
| Michael: Let's consider the word |
| Dilek: i̇ş, |
| Michael: which means "work." In the locative case, it becomes |
| Dilek: işte. |
| Michael: Notice how the ending changes due to the vowel harmony rules. |
| Dilek: işte. |
| Michael: Now, let's hear a sample sentence: |
| Dilek: Telefonumu işte unuttum, |
| Michael: which means "I forgot my phone at work." |
| Now onto the ablative case which corresponds to the English words "from," "than," or "out of." It suggests moving away from something or somewhere. It's also used when doing comparison. It usually ends in |
| Dilek: -den |
| Michael: Let's consider the word |
| Dilek: araba |
| Michael: which means "car." In the ablative case, it becomes |
| Dilek: arabadan. |
| Michael: Notice how the ending changes due to the vowel harmony rules: |
| Dilek: arabadan. |
| Michael: Now, let's hear a sample sentence: |
| Dilek: Arabadan çıktım, |
| Michael: which means "I got out of the car." Now, let's hear a comparative sentence with the ablative. |
| Dilek: Senden daha uzunum. |
| Michael: "I am taller than you." Here, the ablative is |
| Dilek: senden |
| Michael: and translates to "than you." |
| [Recall 1] |
| Michael: Now, let's take a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Ben says "I'm leaving home right now?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Dilek as Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Michael: Here, you should already be able to recognize the ablative case in the word |
| Dilek: evden |
| Michael: which means something like "from home." It's made of the word "home" |
| Dilek: ev, |
| Michael: and the ablative suffix |
| Dilek: den. |
| [Recall 2] |
| Michael: Now, let's take a look at our second sentence. |
| Do you remember how Nilgun says "I'll wait at home, then?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Dilek as Nilgun Nevsehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| Michael: In this case, the word meaning "home" is in the locative case |
| Dilek: evde |
| Michael: This means something like "at home." It's made of the word |
| Dilek: ev, |
| Michael: followed by the locative suffix |
| Dilek: de. |
| [Summary] |
| Michael: In this lesson, you learned that, in Turkish, certain meanings, usually conveyed by prepositions or articles in English, are obtained by declining nouns into five different cases. |
| Review |
| Michael: Let's review. Respond to the prompts by speaking aloud. Then, repeat after the native speaker focusing on pronunciation. |
| Do you remember how to say "I'm leaving home right now?" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dilek as Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Michael: Listen again and repeat. |
| Dilek as Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dilek as Ben Lee: Şimdi evden ayrılıyorum. |
| Michael: And do you remember how to say "I'll wait at home, then?" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dilek as Nilgun Nevsehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| Michael: Listen again and repeat. |
| Dilek as Nilgun Nevsehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Dilek as Nilgun Nevsehirli: O zaman evde bekliyorum. |
| Expansion |
| Michael: When you create the plural form of a noun using the suffix |
| Dilek: -ler, |
| Michael: remember to place it between the stem and the case ending, for example |
| Dilek: ellerde |
| Michael: which means "in the hands." Here, the stem is |
| Dilek: el. |
| Michael: Then, we have the plural suffix |
| Dilek: -ler |
| Michael: and last is the locative case ending in |
| Dilek: -de |
Outro |
| Michael: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Dilek: Hoşçakalın! |
| Michael: See you soon! |
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