Breakdown of Annem saçımı taradı ama tırnaklarımı kendim kestim.
anne
mother
saç
hair
ama
but
kesmek
to cut
kendi
self
taramak
to comb
tırnak
nail
Questions & Answers about Annem saçımı taradı ama tırnaklarımı kendim kestim.
Why do we use kendim here instead of just ben?
kendim means "myself." In this sentence, you are contrasting who did the action: your mother combed your hair, but you cut your nails yourself. To say "myself," you take the reflexive pronoun kendi and add the first-person possessive suffix -m. Using just ben (I) wouldn't give this strong emphasis that you did it on your own.
Both saçımı and tırnaklarımı end in -ı. What is this suffix doing?
That final -ı is the accusative case suffix, which marks the specific direct object of a verb. Let's break down saçımı: saç (hair) + -ım (my) + -ı (accusative, because it is the specific object being combed). Whenever a direct object has a possessive suffix like "my" or "your", it is always specific, so it requires the accusative case.
Why is hair singular (saçımı) but nails are plural (tırnaklarımı)?
In Turkish, the hair on your head is usually treated as a single collective noun (saç), just like in English. However, nails are treated as individual items, so we add the plural suffix -lar to make tırnaklar (nails) before adding the possessive (-ım) and accusative (-ı) suffixes.
Why does the past tense suffix look different in taradı and kestim?
This is a great refresher for two Turkish harmony rules! tara- ends in a vowel, so it takes the standard past tense suffix -dı. However, kes- ends in a voiceless consonant (s). Following the "Fıstıkçı Şahap" rule, the d in the past tense suffix hardens to a t, and vowel harmony changes the vowel to i, making it -ti (plus -m for "I").
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