Questions & Answers about Parkta köpek uyuyor.
Turkish follows a Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) order. In Parkta köpek uyuyor, you have:
• Parkta (locative phrase “in the park”)
• köpek (subject “dog”)
• uyuyor (verb “is sleeping”)
Putting the verb last is the norm in Turkish, though you can move adverbials (like parkta) to the front for emphasis.
-ta is the locative case suffix meaning “in/at.” Two things decide its form:
- Vowel harmony: since the last vowel in park is a (a back vowel), you use -da rather than -de.
- Consonant assimilation: park ends in the voiceless consonant k, so the d in -da becomes t, giving park + ta → parkta.
Turkish has no separate definite or indefinite articles. A bare noun like köpek can mean “a dog,” “the dog,” or simply “dog” depending on context. If you want to stress “a dog,” you add bir:
• Parkta bir köpek uyuyor. (“There is a dog sleeping in the park.”)
Uyuyor is the present-continuous form of uyumak (“to sleep”). Formation steps:
- Start with the stem uyu- (from uyumak after dropping -mak).
- Add the progressive suffix -yor (vowel‐harmonized but here it remains -yor).
- For the 3rd person singular, there is no additional personal ending.
Result: uyu + yor = uyuyor → “he/she/it is sleeping.”
Attach the question particle mu/mü/mi/mu (with vowel harmony) after the verb, plus a question mark:
• Parkta köpek uyuyor mu?
This literally means “Is the dog sleeping in the park?”
Insert the negative suffix -m before -yor:
- Start with the stem uyu-
- Add -m → uyum-
- Add -yor → uyumuyor
So you get:
• Parkta köpek uyumuyor. (“The dog is not sleeping in the park.”)