at the Beverly Hills Lingual Institute
Did you know?
Istanbul is Europe's largest city, with a population of more than 15 million.
Merhaba! Turkish has approximately 90 million speakers worldwide, 90 percent of which are in Turkey, and the rest spread over some 35 countries including Bulgaria, Greece, Cyprus, North Macedonia, Romania and Uzbekistan. Although distantly related to Finnish and Hungarian, Turkish bears no relation to the other major languages of Europe or the Middle East.
The words divan, kayak, kebab, kiosk, pilaf, and yogurt are of Turkish origin.
Common
Yes.
No.
Please.
Okay
Thank you.
Thanks.
Do you speak English?
Excuse me.
I'm sorry.
I want…
Where?
Which?
How much does it cost?
Are there any?
How many are there?
Hello.
Good morning.
Good evening.
Goodnight.
How are you?
Goodbye.
Evet.
Hayir.
Lutfen.
Taman.
Teskkur ederim.
Tesekkuler
Ingilizce biliyor musunuz?
Affedersiniz.
Ozur dilerim.
Istiyorum…
Nerede?
Hangi?
Kac para?
Varmi?
Kac tane?
Merhaba.
Gunaydin.
Iyi akşamlar.
Iyi geceler.
Nasil-siniz?
Hosca kalin.
![Learn [LANGUAGE] in Los Angeles](images/640x360/languages/turkish/bazaar.jpg "Learn Turkish in Los Angeles")
Turkey has geographical strategic importance, and is often referred to as a bridge between the East and West. The great variety in dress on the streets of Istanbul illustrates this point: men may be in traditional garb or in T-shirts and jeans; women, in headscarves or in miniskirts and high-heeled shoes.
The basic word order of Turkish is subject-object-verb, which may appear odd to English speakers. For instance, Kadın kitabı okudu literally means, 'The woman the book read.' However, Turkish also has no noun classes or grammatical gender. You do not need to remember whether a thing is masculine or feminine as you do in French or German. Turkish grammar is also very regular: learn a rule and there are usually no exceptions.
Turkish has used a version of the Latin alphabet since 1928. It has eight vowels and 21 consonants. Each letter only makes one sound. The Turkish Latin script features dotted and undotted i's, o's, and u's, but in most cases beginners can pronounce them as usual. The extra letters are ş ('sh'), ç ('ch') and ğ. The last of these, known as 'yumuşak (soft) g,' is a placeholder letter which makes no sound; it merely elongates the letters around it. Relaxing your throat and vocal cords will help you make that subtle connection between the surrounding vowels.
Where English uses a number of words, Turkish often uses only one. For example, the phrase 'you will be able to come,' is the single word gelebileceksin. Where English adds meaning to the verb 'come' by placing other words in front of it, Turkish adds meaning to the verb gel by tagging endings onto it: gel ('come'), -ebil ('be able to'), -ecek ('will'), and -sin ('you'). The technical term for this way of doing things is agglutination, which means 'sticking bits together.'
Vowel harmony is a fundamental aspect of the Turkish language. When you agglutinate in Turkish, most of the endings usually have to rhyme, or harmonize, with the word you're adding them to. The ğ letter plays a significant role in preserving harmony within words. The vowels of suffixes must harmonize with the vowels of noun and verb stems: if the stem has a round vowel, for example, then the vowel of the suffix must be round, and so on.