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Kalkmıştım?
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| 1. |
20 Dec 2006 Wed 02:55 pm |
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Earlier I read the following as a reply to someone asking "are you still asleep?":
"Hayır, bu sabah erken kalkmıştım"
Why would someone use the inferential tense in that situation? It's not like he was "thinking that he woke up early". Nor was he telling a story, just answering a question. Wouldn't "Erken kalktım" be better? 
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| 2. |
20 Dec 2006 Wed 03:10 pm |
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Quoting Elisa: Earlier I read the following as a reply to someone asking "are you still asleep?":
"Hayir, bu sabah erken kalkmıştım"
Why would someone use the inferential tense in that situation? It's not like he was "thinking that he woke up early". Nor was he telling a story, just answering a question. Wouldn't "Erken kalktım" be better?
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V+mişti+Personal_ending is perfectly equivalent to Past Perfect in English.
But in your example, it's a preference to say it instead of "erken kalktım". Sometimes it can be said that way. They have the same meaning. They should all be clear in a proper context.
Kimi aramıştınız?
Who are you looking for?
Elif'i aramıştım
I am looking for Elif
Ne demiştiniz?
What did you say (a moment ago)?
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| 3. |
20 Dec 2006 Wed 03:23 pm |
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Quoting aslan2: Quoting Elisa: Earlier I read the following as a reply to someone asking 'are you still asleep?':
'Hayir, bu sabah erken kalkmıştım'
Why would someone use the inferential tense in that situation? It's not like he was 'thinking that he woke up early'. Nor was he telling a story, just answering a question. Wouldn't 'Erken kalktım' be better?
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V+mişti+Personal_ending is perfectly equivalent to Past Perfect in English.
They should all be clear in a proper context.
Kimi aramıştınız?
Who are you looking for?
Elif'i aramıştım
I am looking for Elif
Ne demiştiniz?
What did you say (a moment ago)? |
There you said the magical word: 'context'... I don't always see it. This tense seems to have its way of confusing be 
I don't understand at all why it should be used here instead of the geçmiş zaman 
Btw, the examples you gave in english have the 'present continuous tense' (I hope I remember that corrctly..) So do you mean that the -miş tense can be used as an equivalent?
But then still, 'I woke up early' is not a continuous action is it? Or am I taking it way to far?
Kafam karıştı 
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| 4. |
20 Dec 2006 Wed 03:44 pm |
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Quoting Elisa: Quoting aslan2: Quoting Elisa: Earlier I read the following as a reply to someone asking 'are you still asleep?':
'Hayir, bu sabah erken kalkmıştım'
Why would someone use the inferential tense in that situation? It's not like he was 'thinking that he woke up early'. Nor was he telling a story, just answering a question. Wouldn't 'Erken kalktım' be better?
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V+mişti+Personal_ending is perfectly equivalent to Past Perfect in English.
They should all be clear in a proper context.
Kimi aramıştınız?
Who are you looking for?
Elif'i aramıştım
I am looking for Elif
Ne demiştiniz?
What did you say (a moment ago)? |
There you said the magical word: 'context'... I don't always see it. This tense seems to have its way of confusing be
I don't understand at all why it should be used here instead of the geçmiş zaman
Btw, the examples you gave in english have the 'present continuous tense' (I hope I remember that corrctly..) So do you mean that the -miş tense can be used as an equivalent?
But then still, 'I woke up early' is not a continuous action is it? Or am I taking it way to far?
Kafam karıştı |
Yes. Context. What's said before or what you know beforehand. Then they make some sense.
The examples I gave sounds better when they are translated using the present continuous tense. There may be others without using it.
niçin gelmiştin (=niçin geldin)?
Why have you come here?
(when paying for what you have drunk, you may hear the following question)
ne içmiştiniz (=ne içtiniz)?
what have you drunk?
ne istemiştiniz (=ne istediniz/istersiniz)?
what do you want? or what would you like?
etc.
I should say they sound a bit more kinder. They can be preferred more in more official context (among people who don't know each other very well)
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| 5. |
20 Dec 2006 Wed 08:43 pm |
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Thank you aslan2 
I get the point, but I'll only fully get it through reading and practising I think..
Anyway, you did make it clearer now! 
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| 6. |
31 Jan 2007 Wed 07:43 pm |
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A bit of linguistic banter about -miş
The inferential sense of the -miş ending is often stressed so heavily that its other meanings tend to get ignored sometimes. I see it also as a perfective ending. Often Turkish -miş constructs overlap in function with English present perfect. I remember one day walking with our Turkish teacher by a fountain on the campus. It was not working. I said "Söndürdüler." My teacher corrected me: "söndürmüşler." The reason being of course that I didn't see it happen - I only saw that the fountain was off. I was describing its present state.
In English if I'd said "They turned off the fountain," a logical question might have been, "who? when?" There's an implication that I saw someone do it. Not having seen that, I couldn't answer those questions. By saying "They've turned off the fountain," I'm describing the present state. (That's why "when have they turned off the fountain" is incorrect English.)
Whether the inferential sense or the perfective sense evolved first in Turkic languages would be an interesting linguistic question. In Bulgarian, almost certainly because of Turkich influence, the present perfect has a very strong "miş" sense. (The original Bulgars were Turkic; though other Slavs in the area lived under heavy Turkish influence they don't have this "inferential" sense in their present perfect tenses.)
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| 7. |
01 Feb 2007 Thu 12:55 am |
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Thanks for the very informative post, sazji.
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