Spoiler Alert: Turkish (Karavinka)
Posted: 2017-10-26, 9:55
This is a log of my feeble attempt at Turkish.
#1: 1,000 Cards Reached (2017/12/21)
#2: 3 Months (2018/01/30)
#3: 4,000 Cards Reached/Phase 3 (2018/03/31)
#4: Change of pace, Phase 3.5
A little disclaimer here. An interest in Turkey and the Turkish culture is something I need to develop from now on. I chose Turkish purely under these criteria:
- The language must have a sizable media production, and the media is accessible to me over the Internet.
- The language should be alien enough to me; I haven't learned it, and I haven't learned a related language
This is a little experiment. Can I learn the language from scratch, with no explicit instruction? The choice narrowed down to Turkish, Tamil and Vietnamese; I chose Turkish. I probably know about 20 words in the language, and all that I know is that it's an agglutinating language superficially similar to Korean or Japanese, structure-wise.
The only materials I allow myself will be:
- Online dictionaries
- Google Translate
- Bilingual texts whenever available (i.e. the Turkish is a translation of something)
The primary tool will be Anki. Today marks the Day 2, and I have 22 cards. The goal that I have set up is currently 1000, and I want to see where I will be at that point. The cards look like this:
----------
Dışarıda çok güzel bir gün
Kuşlar şarkı söylüyor, çiçekler açıyor
Böyle günlerde senin gibi çocuklar...
Chennem'de yanmalı
Ben dünyanın bir numaralı prensesiyim
Beni memnun etmek için ne yapman gerektiğini bilmelisin
İçten bir aşk, bu bir günah!
Göstereceğim sana, neler hissettiğimi!
etc. Random samples taken here and there on the front, and the back lists the vocabulary. That is, almost all the words for now. Currently, the sentences are deliberately mined from the sources that I can quote the original from memory, because I need to peg the Turkish words to familiar contexts not to get completely lost. If I remember 30% of the vocabulary, I can recall what it should say and make sense of Turkish again.
The following are the notes I have made over the language. Please do understand that this is more of an experiment log. I may make mistake. I may completely fail to understand a concept. Please do NOT provide corrections unless I explicitly ask. I want to see if I make sense out of what I failed to understand before; if I wanted an answer right now, I could just grab a book and look it up.
And just because I'm using Turkish as an "experiment" object, please don't think of it as a disrespect. If you are a native or advanced speaker of the language, sit back and laugh at me.
--------
Commonly seen verb elements. The verbs begin with a stem and get affixed a la Japanese. The last element seems to be pronominal, -m/-n/-nil for sg. I haven't come across much plural to determine.
-yor: present ADDRESSED
1sg. bencilce davranmıyorum I'm not acting selfishly
2sg. Sen benim kim olduğumu zannediyorsun? Who do you think I am?
3sg. Günışığı gösteriyor gölgeleri Daylight shows shadows
3pl. Kuşlar şarkı söylüyor, çiçekler açıyor Birds are singing songs, flowers are blooming
-mi-: negative ADDRESSED
2sg: Cidden hiç anlamıyorsun, hem de hiç! : You don't understand, not at all!
Already a major departure: the affix order is different from KO/JP. Good news, it's not going to be boring. Bad news, it's going to be a bit of headache when I try to form sentences.
-ce-: future, intent? ADDRESSED
1sg. Sana karalılığımın ne olduğunu gösterıcem I'll show you what my darkness? is made of
1sg. Artık gidebileceğim bir yer yok Now there's nowhere I can go
1sg. öyle bile olsa seni hala sevecek miyim? Even then, will I still love you?
-bil-: potential ADDRESSED
1sg. Başarabilirim! I can do it!
1sg. Artık gidebileceğim bir yer yok Now there's nowhere I can go
1sg. 1sg. Biliyorum, ama ne yapmalıyım? Ne yapabilirim? I understand, but what should I do? What can I do?
-li: should ADDRESSED
1sg. Benim hatam mı? Sevimli bir hata diyelim. Is it my fault? I should say it's a cute fault.
1sg. Biliyorum, ama ne yapmalıyım? Ne yapabilirim? I understand, but what should I do? What can I do?
2sg. Ölmeya hazırlanmalısın You should prepare to die
3sg. Chennem'de yanmalı Should be burning in hell
-ğı-: nominalizer? ADDRESSED : The morpheme is probably -ik
Birincisi, saçımı yaptırdığımda bunu farketmelisin First, when I make a hairdo, you should notice it
yaptır-dı-ğım-da in my making
#1: 1,000 Cards Reached (2017/12/21)
#2: 3 Months (2018/01/30)
#3: 4,000 Cards Reached/Phase 3 (2018/03/31)
#4: Change of pace, Phase 3.5
A little disclaimer here. An interest in Turkey and the Turkish culture is something I need to develop from now on. I chose Turkish purely under these criteria:
- The language must have a sizable media production, and the media is accessible to me over the Internet.
- The language should be alien enough to me; I haven't learned it, and I haven't learned a related language
This is a little experiment. Can I learn the language from scratch, with no explicit instruction? The choice narrowed down to Turkish, Tamil and Vietnamese; I chose Turkish. I probably know about 20 words in the language, and all that I know is that it's an agglutinating language superficially similar to Korean or Japanese, structure-wise.
The only materials I allow myself will be:
- Online dictionaries
- Google Translate
- Bilingual texts whenever available (i.e. the Turkish is a translation of something)
The primary tool will be Anki. Today marks the Day 2, and I have 22 cards. The goal that I have set up is currently 1000, and I want to see where I will be at that point. The cards look like this:
----------
Dışarıda çok güzel bir gün
Kuşlar şarkı söylüyor, çiçekler açıyor
Böyle günlerde senin gibi çocuklar...
Chennem'de yanmalı
Ben dünyanın bir numaralı prensesiyim
Beni memnun etmek için ne yapman gerektiğini bilmelisin
İçten bir aşk, bu bir günah!
Göstereceğim sana, neler hissettiğimi!
etc. Random samples taken here and there on the front, and the back lists the vocabulary. That is, almost all the words for now. Currently, the sentences are deliberately mined from the sources that I can quote the original from memory, because I need to peg the Turkish words to familiar contexts not to get completely lost. If I remember 30% of the vocabulary, I can recall what it should say and make sense of Turkish again.
The following are the notes I have made over the language. Please do understand that this is more of an experiment log. I may make mistake. I may completely fail to understand a concept. Please do NOT provide corrections unless I explicitly ask. I want to see if I make sense out of what I failed to understand before; if I wanted an answer right now, I could just grab a book and look it up.
And just because I'm using Turkish as an "experiment" object, please don't think of it as a disrespect. If you are a native or advanced speaker of the language, sit back and laugh at me.
--------
Commonly seen verb elements. The verbs begin with a stem and get affixed a la Japanese. The last element seems to be pronominal, -m/-n/-nil for sg. I haven't come across much plural to determine.
-yor: present ADDRESSED
1sg. bencilce davranmıyorum I'm not acting selfishly
2sg. Sen benim kim olduğumu zannediyorsun? Who do you think I am?
3sg. Günışığı gösteriyor gölgeleri Daylight shows shadows
3pl. Kuşlar şarkı söylüyor, çiçekler açıyor Birds are singing songs, flowers are blooming
-mi-: negative ADDRESSED
2sg: Cidden hiç anlamıyorsun, hem de hiç! : You don't understand, not at all!
Already a major departure: the affix order is different from KO/JP. Good news, it's not going to be boring. Bad news, it's going to be a bit of headache when I try to form sentences.
-ce-: future, intent? ADDRESSED
1sg. Sana karalılığımın ne olduğunu gösterıcem I'll show you what my darkness? is made of
1sg. Artık gidebileceğim bir yer yok Now there's nowhere I can go
1sg. öyle bile olsa seni hala sevecek miyim? Even then, will I still love you?
-bil-: potential ADDRESSED
1sg. Başarabilirim! I can do it!
1sg. Artık gidebileceğim bir yer yok Now there's nowhere I can go
1sg. 1sg. Biliyorum, ama ne yapmalıyım? Ne yapabilirim? I understand, but what should I do? What can I do?
-li: should ADDRESSED
1sg. Benim hatam mı? Sevimli bir hata diyelim. Is it my fault? I should say it's a cute fault.
1sg. Biliyorum, ama ne yapmalıyım? Ne yapabilirim? I understand, but what should I do? What can I do?
2sg. Ölmeya hazırlanmalısın You should prepare to die
3sg. Chennem'de yanmalı Should be burning in hell
-ğı-: nominalizer? ADDRESSED : The morpheme is probably -ik
Birincisi, saçımı yaptırdığımda bunu farketmelisin First, when I make a hairdo, you should notice it
yaptır-dı-ğım-da in my making