Now we're going to talk a little bit about vowel harmony
Vowel harmony is the process in Turkish by which the vowel and an ending or suffix
changes to become more like the vowel, the last vowel in the word
it's attaching to. This sounds a little complicated, it isn't and
it will be really important to making your Turkish sound right to Turkish ears
Today, we're going to start with the more simple form of vowel harmony
two-way vowel harmony
two-way vowel harmony shows up in a number of Turkish suffixes
including the plural and that's what we're going to use as an example today.
The plural in Turkish
depending on vowel harmony takes one of two forms, either -ler or -lar attached to the end of a word
Let's start with an example.
The Turkish word for house is "ev"
If we want to make that plural, if we want to say "houses," we're going to choose one of these two plural forms
-ler or -lar
How are we going to know which one to choose? We're going to use the rules of two-way vowel harmony
It's called two-way because it can appear in one of two ways either as -ler or -lar
For "ev"
remembering that we want to be sure that according to the rules of vowel harmony
the suffix
we choose a suffix that harmonizes best with the final vowel in the word we're attaching it to.
Now which by harmonizes, I essentially mean, is most similar to
which of these is most similar to "e"
-ler
so
we're going to
change "ev" make it plural
"evler": houses
That's pretty easy. Let's look at another example
the Turkish word for horse, "at"
now if we want to make "at" plural, if we want to say horses
we're again going to have to make this choice between our two possible ways or forms of our plural suffix
-ler or -lar
Remember because were're doing vowel harmony we're going to want to choose the suffix, the form of the plural suffix, which
harmonizes best with the final vowel in the word we're attaching it to, in this case "at"
the only vowel in "at" is "a"
"a" is most similar/harmonizes is best with
"-lar" this "a" in "-lar" and so to form the plural of "at" we're going to say "atlar"
horses
Just to repeat so it's completely clear in your mind for "ev"
becomes "evler": houses, but "at" becomes "atlar": horses
But of course not every word in Turkish contains an "e" or an "a" in its final syllable
So, how are you going to know
how
to choose the correct form of the suffix?
There are rules to govern vowel harmony even for those words that don't contain an "e" or an "a". Let's take a look.
I should emphasize that these
relationships I'm about to explain are
true for any suffix that uses two-way vowel harmony
Not just for the plural but we're going to stick to the plural suffix -ler/-lar for our examples right now
We can divide the four..excuse me! We can divide the eight vowels in Turkish into two categories
The first category, we're going to call "back" or "a" vowels
These vowels are called back vowels because they're articulated in the back of your mouth
And we can also call them "a" vowels because in
two-way vowel harmony, they're going to harmonize best/be considered most similar to "a"
In the case of a plural this is going to mean any word containing a
back or "a" vowel in its final syllable is going to take the plural, -lar
Let's look at a concrete example
Let's say you want to make the plural of the Turkish word for fish, "balık"
the final syllable of "balık" contains the vowel "ı"
"ı" is one of our four
back or "a" vowels
a, ı, o, and ü
Because "ı" is a back or "a" vowel we're going to choose naturally the form of the plural suffix which
harmonizes best
for "ı"
Find it on our chart "ı" a back vowel our
suffix vowel is "a" so the plural of "balık": fish is going to be "balıklar": fishes
Let's look at another example "palto" which means overcoat
the vowel and final syllable of "palto" is "o" which is another one of our back vowels
which means, of course, think back to our two-way vowel harmony
we're going to choose the form of the plural suffix which harmonizes best with "o"
as a back or "a" vowel, "o" is going to harmonize best with
-lar
"paltolar": overcoats
Another example. What if you want to make the plural of the word for "child": çocuk ?
Now the vowel and the final syllable of "çocuk" is "u". Let's look at our chart..."u"
It's one of our back or "a" vowels
What does that mean for us is we form the plural?
Well of course it means we're going to choose the form of the plural that
harmonizes best with "u"
"u" is a back, "a" vowel and it will harmonize best with
-lar
"çocuklar": children
Of course as we saw earlier if you're lucky enough to have a word that actually contains an "a" in
its final syllable, and you want to add a plural suffix, your life is very easy
What does "a" harmonize best with?
"a"
Which would give us, for example, in the case of "masa" the word for table
Masa Lar
So those are the back or "a" vowels. Let's take a look at the second category
The second category are called front or "e" vowels
They're called this because they're articulated at the front of your mouth
these vowels include "e, i, ö, and ü"
Every one of these four in
two-way vowel harmony is going to harmonize
best with "e"
For performing the plural this means that when we go to choose one of our two forms -ler or -lar
If we see any of these vowels "e, i, ö, or ü"
in the final syllable of the word we want to make plural we'll know that when we choose our
plural suffix we'll choose the one that harmonizes best: -ler, because these are the front "e" vowels
Let's take a look at a concrete example or two
"Kedi" is the turkish word for cat. If we want to say
cats
we need to look at the vowel in the final syllable of "kedi": "i"
Find it on our chart...it's a front "e" vowel. That means that its suffix vowel is going to be an "e"
So when we go to form the plural of "kedi": cat, we're going to say it's "kediler"
That "e" corresponding to the "i" in the final syllable
Let's look at another example, "profesör" which means professor
If you want to refer to more than one professor you want to make that plural
We're going to look what's the vowel in the final syllable "-sör" that "ö" is one of our front "e" vowels
So when we choose our plural suffix we're going to choose
-ler
profesörler: "professors"
because this "e"
harmonizes best with the "ö" as a front "e" vowel
Another example
"gün": day
If we want to make the plural of day: days
We're again going to look at the vowel in our final syllable in this case our only syllable
"ü"
"ü" is one of our front "e" vowels
Its suffix vowel should be an "e" so of course when we go to make it plural we're going to choose the form of the plural
containing this suffix vowel -ler
"Günler": days
Of course as we saw earlier if the final syllable of the word you want to make plural
actually contains an "e" then of course "e" will harmonize best with itself, so
your suffix vowel will also be "e"
An example, "köpek" the word for dog
"köpek" becomes "köpekler": dogs