Breakdown of Kedi bu mamayı yemeyecek, onu sen besler misin?
bu
this
o
that / he / she / it
kedi
cat
sen
you
yemek
to eat
mi
question particle (mı/mi/mu/mü)
mama
pet food
beslemek
to feed
Questions & Answers about Kedi bu mamayı yemeyecek, onu sen besler misin?
Why use the aorist tense in besler misin instead of the future tense like the first half of the sentence?
In Turkish, polite requests are usually made using the aorist (simple present) tense in question form. While the first part is a literal prediction about the future (yemeyecek - won't eat), the second part is a polite request asking "would you feed?" or "will you please feed?"
How is the polite request besler misin built?
It comes from the verb beslemek (to feed). We drop the -mek and add the aorist tense suffix -r (because the verb root ends in a vowel) to get besler. Then we add the question particle mi followed by the "you" personal ending -sin, making besler misin?
If misin already means "you", why is the word sen in the sentence?
Turkish often drops subject pronouns because the verb ending already tells us who is acting, but here sen is added for emphasis. Because the cat won't eat on its own, the speaker is contrasting the situation and asking, "will you feed it (instead)?"
What does the word onu refer to in this sentence, the cat or the food?
Onu means "it" in the accusative (specific direct object) case. In English, you might say "feed the food to the cat," but in Turkish, the direct object of "to feed" (beslemek) is the creature receiving the food. Therefore, onu refers to the cat (kedi).
Why does mama have a -yı ending here?
Mama means pet food (or baby food). Because the speaker is talking about this specific food (bu mama), it must be treated as a specific direct object. We add the accusative case ending -ı, using the buffer letter -y- to separate the two vowels, which gives us mamayı.
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