HARMONY OF VOWELS

In Turkish the consonant sounds are b, c, ç, d, f, g, ğ, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, ş, t, v, y, z and the vowel sounds are a, ı, o, u, e, i, ö, ü.

In fact, there are three main types of harmony: one harmony between vowels, one harmony between vowels and consonants and one harmony between consonants. The schema of the vowel harmony can be seen in the table below:

Some suffixes in Turkish have 2 variants of low vowels (look at the table above), including the vowels “a” and “e” and the other suffixes have 4 variants of high vowels including the vowels “ı”, “i”, “u”, “ü”. For example, if the suffix “-er” (worker, fisher) was a Turkish suffix it would have 2 variants- the low sounds "a" and "e", because it contains the low sound "e" too. In the same way, if “-ing” (going, doing) was Turkish it would have 4 variants: “-ıng”, “-ing”, “-ung”, “-üng”, because the sound "i" is high (look at the table above). Thus, according to the harmony of vowels, for choosing which of these variants of a suffix to fit a verb, we look at the last vowel of the verb. For example, the last vowel of the verb “go” is, as seen in the table above, back vowel. So from the 4 variants of “-ing” (“-ıng”, “-ing”, “-ung”, “-üng”) we chose “-ıng” and “-ung” which also contain back vowels. Then we look again at the table and see that, like “o” in go, “u” in “-ung” is rounded. So the variant “-ung” fits the verb “go” taking the form goung. In a word, for choosing which variant of a suffix will fit certain verb we choose the suffix in accordance with the last vowel of the verb looking firstly if it is back or front and secondly if it is rounded or unrounded.

The Turkish suffix “-a”, “-e” means “to”. For example “okula” means “to school”. You see that “to” is preposition in English, and suffix in Turkish. The words dağ (mountain), dal (branch) will take the variant “a” from the suffix -a/-e and become dağa, dala, because their last vowel is back.

♥ Exercise 1:

Apply the suffix “-ı”, “-i”, “-u”, “-ü” (it means “the” for showing that an object is under the influence of another object) in accordance with the harmony of vowels to the following verbs:

The right answers:

♥ Exercise 2:

Apply the suffix “-a”, “-e” in accordance with the harmony of vowels to the following verbs:

The right answers:

These both suffixes (“-ı”, “-i”, “-u”, “-ü” and “-a”, “-e”) are stressed.

HARMONY BETWEEN VOWELS AND CONSONANTS

If a word ending in “ç”, “p”, “t” or “k” takes a suffix beginning with a vowel, then “ç” becomes “c”, “p” becomes “b”, “t” becomes “d” and “k” becomes “ğ”. For example:

Some words consisting of a syllable don`t meet this rule: at- atı, kut- kutu, tek- teki etc. Besides, in some words ending in a consonant + k the last becomes “g”: renk- rengi (but not in all words: ırk- ırkı, çark- çarkı etc.). Also in some words’ ends voiced consonant + “ç”, “p”, “t” or “k” and taking a vowel may make the last consonant voiced too: rint- rindi.

♥ Exercise:

Apply the suffix “-ı”, “-i”, “-u”, “-ü” to the following verbs:

The rıght answers:

HARMONY OF CONSONANTS

In Turkish there are voiced consonants and their opposed voiceless consonants:

The suffixes beginning with one of these consonants have 2 variants (voiced and voiceless). For example in the use of the suffix -da, -de, -ta, -te (in the meaning of “in, on, at”): if a word ends in a voiceless consonant, this word will take the voiseless variant of the suffix. Examples:

 Note: In Turkish bir (meaning a, an) is not often used like in English.

 Note: After vowels a voiced variant of a suffix comes. Example: kedi→ kedide.

♥ Exercise:

Apply the suffix “-da, -de, -ta, -te” to the following words:

The right answers: