Elon.io is an online learning platform
We have an entire course teaching Turkish grammar and vocabulary.
Questions & Answers about Asansör çalışmıyor.
What does Asansör mean?
Asansör means “elevator” or “lift” in Turkish. It’s borrowed from French ascenseur and pronounced approximately ah-sahn-SOOR.
What does çalışmıyor mean?
çalışmıyor is the negative present-continuous form of çalışmak (“to work” or “to function”), so çalışmıyor = is not working.
How is çalışmıyor formed grammatically?
You build it in three steps:
- çalış- = verb stem “work/function”
- -ma/-me (negative suffix) → çalış-m-
- -yor (present-continuous suffix) + zero ending for 3rd person → çalışmıyor
Vowel harmony turns m + yor into mıyor here.
Why isn’t there a subject pronoun like o (“he/it”) in the sentence?
Turkish drops personal pronouns when they’re clear from the verb ending. The zero ending in çalışmıyor already tells you it’s 3rd person singular (“it isn’t working”).
How would I turn this into a question (“Is the elevator not working?”)?