Breakdown of Çalışkanız.
çalışkan
hardworking
Questions & Answers about Çalışkanız.
Where is the word for 'we' in this sentence?
In Turkish, 'to be' is attached directly to the end of the word as a suffix. The suffix -ız means 'we are'. You can say Biz çalışkanız, but the pronoun Biz (we) is usually dropped because the suffix already makes it clear who you are talking about.
Why is the suffix -ız and not -iz?
This is because of 4-way vowel harmony. You look at the last vowel in the base word çalışkan, which is a. When the last vowel is a or ı, the suffix must use the vowel ı. Therefore, we use -ız.
The lesson says the suffix for 'we are' is -(y)Iz. Why is there no y in this word?
The buffer letter y is only used when the root word ends in a vowel. This stops two vowels from bumping into each other (like in iyiyiz - we are good). Because çalışkan ends in a consonant (n), we don't need a buffer, so we just add -ız directly.
Is çalışkan related to the verb çalışmak (to work)?
Yes, it is! The verb root is çalış- (work/study). The ending -kan is a suffix that turns a verb into an adjective for someone who does that action a lot. So, a çalışkan person is a 'hardworking' person.
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