Çoğu insan kitap okumayı seviyor.

Most people like reading books.

Breakdown of Çoğu insan kitap okumayı seviyor.

• kitap: the book
• okumak: to read
• insan: the person
• çoğu: most
• sevmek: to like

Questions & Answers about Çoğu insan kitap okumayı seviyor.

What does çoğu mean, and how is it different from çok or birçok?

Çoğu means “the majority of” or “most of” and always takes a following noun in singular form (e.g. çoğu insan = most people).

• çok simply means “many” or “a lot” (e.g. çok insan = many people) without implying a majority.
• birçok means “numerous” or “many” in a similar way to çok, but slightly more formal (e.g. birçok insan = numerous people).

Why is insan in singular form after çoğu, instead of insanlar?

When you use çoğu, the noun stays singular. You say çoğu insan (most people), not çoğu insanlar. Grammatically, çoğu already marks plurality, so the noun does not take a plural ending.

Why is the verb seviyor singular when it refers to “most people”? Shouldn’t it be seviyorlar?

In Turkish, the verb agrees with the grammatical subject. Here çoğu insan is treated as a single entity (“the majority of people”), so it takes the third-person singular seviyor. If you explicitly used insanlar (“people”) as the subject, you would say insanlar seviyorlar or more commonly just insanlar seviyor (dropping the plural verb ending is normal with a clearly plural subject).

What is the function of -ı in okumayı? Why not just okuma?

The suffix -ı is the accusative case marker showing that okumayı (“reading”) is the definite object of seviyor (“likes”).

• Okuma (without -yı) would be the nominative noun “reading.”
• Okumayı marks “reading” as what is liked.

Why is okumak changed to okuma plus -yı? How does this nominalization work?

1. -mak/-mek is the infinitive ending: okumak = “to read.”
2. To turn a verb into a noun (“reading”), replace -mak with the gerund suffix -ma/-me: okuma = “reading.”
3. Because okuma is now the object of seviyor, it takes the accusative -ı, with a buffer y after a vowel: okumayı.

Why is kitap without any case ending before okumayı? Shouldn’t it have a suffix too?

Kitap is the direct object of the internal verb okumak, but once you nominalize the whole phrase with -ma, you no longer mark the inner object with a case ending. So kitap stays in its base form inside the noun phrase kitap okumayı (“reading books”).

Why does kitap okumayı come before seviyor? Can I say seviyor kitap okumayı?

Turkish word order is typically Subject-Object-Verb (SOV).

• Subject: Çoğu insan
• Object: kitap okumayı
• Verb: seviyor
  Putting kitap okumayı after the verb (seviyor kitap okumayı) would be ungrammatical or very marked in standard Turkish.

Can I use the simple present sever instead of seviyor here?

Yes.

• Çoğu insan kitap okumayı sever is perfectly correct for “Most people like reading books.”
• Sever (simple present) expresses general truths or habits, while seviyor (present continuous) can add a nuance of immediacy, but both are acceptable.

How do you pronounce çoğu, and what happens with the ğ?

Çoğu is pronounced roughly as [ˈtʃoːu]. The letter ğ (soft g) has no independent sound; it simply lengthens the preceding vowel. So you hear a long o followed by a smooth transition to u.

Where is the stress in the sentence Çoğu insan kitap okumayı seviyor?

In Turkish, each word typically has stress on its last syllable, and the main sentence stress often lands on the final word.

• ço-ĞU, in-SAN, ki-TAP, o-ku-MA-yı, se-vi-YOR (primary stress on YOR of seviyor).