One significant difference between Turkish and English is sentence structure, or syntax. In English, we structure sentences in a pretty strict Subject-Verb-Object order, whereas the Turkish structure is Subject-Object-Verb. Another interesting difference I’ve already picked up on is the vowel harmony in Turkish. There are two basic types of vowels in Turkish (ones made in the back of your mouth, like ı a and o; and the ones made in the front, like i e ö and ü), and the Turkish language prefers words to keep the same types together. English vowels certainly don’t function the same way. Lastly, as the very first video I watched for Turkish said, the language is, for the most part, phonetic, meaning words are spelled the way they sound. Obviously, this is not the same in English because different vowels can have different sounds depending on their placement and can sometimes sound the same.
Because I’m learning Arabic which has a similar sentence structure, I think it will help me figure out the ordering of Turkish sentences better than I would be able to if I didn’t have this background. Linguistic studies covers a range of topics, but for my studies, I think applied linguistics and sociolinguistics are the most pertinent outer layers after the core elements because part of my learning plan is to get connected/understand the culture and society. I think the other categories, especially the literature/stylistics, are a little too complex for my level, so I will not pursue those. First I need to master the inner pieces, like phonology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.
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