Now we're going to talk about the present progressive tense in Turkish
The present progressive tense is the tense we're going to use to describe actions that are currently ongoing
that are just about to take place or which occur regularly or habitually
Let's look at how we form the present progressive tense
For our example we're going to use the verb "yazmak"
to write
To form the present progressive tense you take the verb stem
"yaz-
and
add to it the present progressive tense suffix "-yor"
Because Turkish does not
like to see two consonants next to each other we're going to need to use one of these for
buffer
vowels according to the
Turkish rules of four-way vowel harmony, so we're going to choose "-iyor, -ıyor, -uyor, or -üyor"
"yazmak" because of this "a" we're going to choose"-ıyor" so
we have verb stem,
buffer vowel,
present progressive tense suffix
To this we're going to add one of our personal suffixes
so let's start with
the first person singular so "ben": I
"yaz-" verb stem
"ı"
buffer vowel "-yor" present progressive tense suffix
"-um"
"Yazıyorum": I am writing or I habitually write
This is in parentheses this personal pronoun
"ben" because in fact all the information you need to understand this word is already in this suffix
So if you simply say "yazıyorum" that already means
I write or I am writing. If you want to emphasize *I* am writing or clarify then you can use the pronoun then
Let's continue with the second person singular
Sen
yaz-
ıyor
sun
Notice these are the same personal suffixes you've seen elsewhere
But because they will, in the present progressive tense, they will be attaching directly
To the present progressive tense suffix your they'll only appear with the vowel, "u"
so they don't have their usual four different options according to vowel harmony because they'll always harmonize with "yor"
so "sen yazıyorsun"
He or she or it is writing
"o": He she it or you can use a name like Mehmet, Ahmet
"yazıyor-"
And we don't have a third-person singular
personal suffix that we're going to use here. So you stop there. For "he or she is writing" we simply say
"yazıyor" or "o yazıyor"
Let's move on to the plural
"Biz": we
"yaz-"
"ı" buffer vowel, "yor" present progressive tense suffix
"-uz"
"Yazıyoruz": we are writing, we habitually write
"Siz": you plural, you formal
"Yazıyorsunuz"
Remember that I
am using "ı" here as our buffer vowel
but the this buffer vowel will change depending on the vowel in the verb stem
Finally for they
Onlar
And again, I'm using the pronoun here, the personal pronoun, but you're free to use
nouns or proper nouns
"yazıyor"
That's fine that can mean they
are
writing or they habitually write
If the subject, if the person doing the writing and
in this case it must be, is an animate person a human being, you may also want to add the
plural ending to the verb "yazıyorlar":
they are writing, but you don't have to, it's not obligatory
And you're not going to do it if the subject of the verb is an inanimate object
Snowflakes falling for example would not use "-lar"
Okay, so that's "yazmak" in the present progressive tense
Now I want to talk about what happens
if you put
the verbs
"gitmek" to go or "etmek" to do in the present progressive tense
"gitmek" to go or "etmek" to do
"gitmek" and "etmek" when you put them into the present progressive tense are these
you'll notice that these two verbs stems both end in "t"
That "t" is going to undergo consonant alternation with "d"
so
For "girmek" if you want to say I am going or I habitually go I'm going to say
Not "git-" but "gidiyorum"
"gidiyorum": I am going or I have actually go
Same story with "etmek" so this "et-" is going to become "ed-"
"Ediyorum": I am doing
Now let's talk about how you put into the present progressive tense a
verb stem that ends in a vowel
Let's consider the verb "okumak": to read
Take the verb stem, "oku-"
Notice that this verb stem ends, not just in a vowel, but in one of our four four-way vowel harmony valves "i, ı, u, or ü"
If your verb stem ends in one of those four vowels you can just leave it there you're not going to add an additional
buffer value don't need one, so you're simply going to add the present progressive tense suffix "yor"
Let's say I want to say "I am reading or I habitually read." I'm gonna say
"okuyorum" or if it's second person singular "you read or you are reading"
"okuyorsun"
It's pretty simple, but
what if
you're
stem ends in a vowel other than one of these four so for example the Turkish verb "başlamak": to begin
This is the verb stem "başla" "a" it's not one of our four
vowel harmony vowels, so what are we going to do when we want to form the present progressive tense? We're going to take "başla-"
And we're simply going to add
the buffer vowel which harmonizes best with the
preceding vowel in the verb stem. So in this case our preceding vowel is our
According to the rules of four-way vowel harmony we're going to choose "ı" as our buffer vowel so "başlıyor"
And then "başlıyorum" and "başlıyorsun" and so on...