Asking questions

12.1 mI after a verb: Geliyor musun?

A question answered yes or no takes mI, as it does after a noun: Öğretmen misin?, "Are you a teacher?". After a verb in -(I)yor it is always mu, since the last vowel before it is the o of yor. And the personal ending leaves the verb and goes onto mu: geliyorsun, "you're coming", becomes geliyor musun?, "are you coming?".

The y in muyum and muyuz keeps two vowels apart, as it does in hasta mıyım?, "am I ill?". "They" is the exception: -lAr stays on the verb, and mI comes after it, taking its vowel from lar: geliyorlar mı?.

mI is written apart from the verb, and whatever comes after it is written joined to mI: geliyor musun, two words. Geliyormusun, run together, is often seen in messages, but it is a misspelling.

With "not", -mA stays in the verb where it was, and mI follows as before:

The answer is evet or hayır, and often the verb as well, said again with its ending. Turkish has no short "I am" or "I'm not" to answer with; the verb itself is the short answer.

12.2 Asking about one word

mI can stand after any word in the sentence, and then it asks about that word alone. The verb keeps its personal ending, since mI is no longer next to it.

English does this with the voice, stressing "Ali" or "Ankara". Turkish stresses the word before mI too, but the mI is what shows it in writing. In Bugün mü geliyorlar? the doubt is about the day, not about whether they come at all.

Two of them, one after the other, ask which of two:

değil mi? at the end of a statement asks for agreement, as English adds "isn't it?" or "don't you?". It is the same two words whatever the sentence before it.

12.3 The question words

A sentence with a question word takes no mI: the question word already makes it a question.

Several are built from smaller words. ne zaman is "what time"; ne kadar, "what amount"; neden is ne with -DAn, "from what". nere-, "what place", is never seen without an ending, and takes the three endings for places: nerede, nereye, nereden. niye means the same as neden, and is more casual.

ne kadar asks about any amount, of money or of time, so it is also "how long":

nasıl before bir and a noun asks "what kind of":

kaç asks for a number, and the noun after it stays singular, as after any number. With yaşında it asks how old someone is. yaşında is yaş, "age", with -(s)I and -DA, "at its age", and it stays the same whoever's age it is; the personal ending goes after it:

hangi, "which", stands before a noun. As an object that noun takes -(y)I, since "which one" always asks for a particular one:

Standing alone, "which one" is hangisi, hangi with -(s)I. As an object it takes -nI, with the n that follows -(s)I:

12.4 Question words with endings

kim and ne take endings as nouns do, for every place a noun can stand in a sentence.

English often makes do with "who" where Turkish needs the ending. The ending is the one the verb wants: aramak takes -(y)I, so "who are you looking for?" is kimi; bakmak takes -(y)A, so "who are you looking at?" is kime.

kimin, "whose", is a genitive, and the noun after it takes -(s)I, as after any genitive. kimde is -DA on a person, which says who has a thing on them:

ne as an object is usually bare, as an indefinite object is, since the asker doesn't know what it is. neyi asks about one of some things already in view.

12.5 Where a question word goes

English moves its question word to the front: "Where is Ali going?". Turkish leaves it where the answer will stand, and that is usually just before the verb, the place for the point of a sentence. What a question asks for is the point of its answer.

So to ask, put the question word in the place of the answer you want, and leave the rest of the sentence as it is:

When the question is about the subject, the subject goes just before the verb, and so does its answer. A definite object moves ahead of it, as it did for emphasis:

Sentences without a verb work the same way. The question word takes the place of the answer, at the end: Bu ne?, "What's this?", and Bu bir kitap, "It's a book"; Ali nerede?, "Where's Ali?", and Ali evde, "Ali's at home".

To ask a stranger, begin with affedersiniz, "excuse me", and keep to siz:

12.6 Questions in a conversation

Two friends, Ali and Ayşe, meet in the street:

The pronouns are there only where they are stressed. In sen nasılsın? the stress is on the turn to the other person, "and how are you?"; in ben de and sen de, de is the small word "too", and the pronoun carries it.