Characterization of flagging resources

Turkish is an agglutinative, morphologically rich language belonging to the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family. Inflectional and derivational suffixes exhibit allomorphy. The choice of the right allomorph is determined by morphophonological constraints, namely intersyllabic front vs back harmony, labial harmony and consonant assimilation (Csató & Johanson 2021: 197-198).

The constituent order of the main clause is a non-rigid SOV, with possible different orders to emphasize constituents for pragmatic reasons (Csató & Johanson 2021: 214, Göksel & Kerslake 2004: 337, 344). Word order variation is subject to definiteness/specificity conditions.

Pronominal arguments in both subject (S/A) and object position (O) can be either omitted or overtly expressed for pragmatic functions (Csató & Johanson 2021: 213). Subject agreement is expressed through a set of personal markers on the verb and, in case of nominal and adjectival predicates, on the nominals or on the forms of the copula.

Turkish is a dependent-marking language, but it shows double marking in possessive constructions.

Valency changing operations (passive, reflexive, causative and reciprocal) are coded on the verb. Apart from the passive alternation, the passive suffix also codes the impersonal passive and the inchoative alternations. Not all suffixes are equally productive: the reflexive and the reciprocal markers only attach to a certain number of stems (Göksel & Kerslake 2004: 72) and the verb thus derived often takes on a lexicalized meaning. In this case an analytical construction is available, where the underived verb and a pronoun convey the transparent reciprocal and reflexive meaning (Csató & Johanson 2021: 204-205). In such constructions, the valency of the verb remains unchanged, and therefore they have not been considered alternations for the purposes of the present project. Suffixes can be combined: apart from markers coding different valency changing operations, such as the productive combination causative + passive, also different allomorphs of the passive (up to two) and causative suffix (up to three) can be attached to a stem.

Regardless of their morphological complexity, verbs can be simple or compound. The latter can be further subdivided in three sub-categories: compound verbs with light verbs, compound verbs with a lexical verb and a cognate object, and compound verbs with a lexical verb and a non-cognate object. A syntactic property shared by the last two categories is the possibility, for the incorporated object, to behave as an argument when it is specific, i.e. when it takes a possessive suffix or a compound marker which triggers the accusative.

Characterization of flagging resources

In Turkish there are 7 cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, ablative, instrumental, comitative. The latter two are not considered core cases. (Göksel & Kerslake 2004: 67, 154).

The object can be unmarked provided that it is in preverbal position and that it is not specific (Csató & Johanson 2021: 215).

Certain arguments might either take the required case suffix or appear in a different case followed by postposition, the choice being motivated either by syntactic or semantic reasons. The first instance could be exemplified by the beneficiary, which might appear in the dative or in the nominative (genitive if it is a pronoun) case followed by the postposition için ‘for’. The latter option is preferred in causative sentences to avoid ambiguity, since the causee obligatorily takes the dative case (Göksel & Kerslake 2004: 67, 132). The second instance is exemplified by the agent of personal passive sentences, which could be in the nominative (genitive if it is a pronoun) case followed by the postposition tarafından ‘by’, or it could take the suffix -CA if it has a collective meaning.

Characterization of indexing resources

Turkish displays a nominative-accusative alignment, where the nominative is unmarked. The object can be unmarked provided that it is in preverbal position and that it is not definite (Csató & Johanson 2021: 215). The personal markers attach to verbs, to nominals or to copula particles and show subject agreement with the first and second persons. The third person singular has no specific marker, whereas the third plural marker is often omitted, coinciding formally with the third person singular form.

In the case of impersonal passive constructions there is no agreement, as the verb is by default in the third personal singular (Zhaksybek 2023: 192).

Characterization of ordering resources

Left-branching language
Unmarked SOV constituent order.
Modifiers precede the modified
Subordinate clauses precede main clauses, the exception being clauses introduced by the subordinator ki, which obligatorily follow the main clause. (Göksel & Kerslake 2004: 355).

Source of the data and generalizations/background of the contributor(s)

Data have been collected from various corpora contained in the [Leipzig Corpora Collection website])https://wortschatz.uni-leipzig.de/en/download/Turkish).

Zeynep Erk Emeksiz is Associate Professor of linguistics in the Department of Turkish Language and Literature at Anadolu University, Eskişehir, Türkiye.

A. Sumru Özsoy is Em. Professor of linguistics in the Department of Linguistics at Boğaziçi University, Türkiye.

Maria Chantal Seghedoni graduated from the Master’s program in ‘Theoretical and Applied Linguistics and Linguistics of Modern Languages’ at the University of Pavia with a thesis titled ‘Valency Patterns in Turkish.’

Language Turkish