turkish phonology and morphology (türkçe ses ve b‹ç‹mb‹lg‹s‹)

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Turkish Phonology and Morphology (Türkçe Ses ve Biçim Bilgisi)
similar? The evidence suggesting that the Turkish word does not contain a
diphthong comes from the syllable structure. The word ‘ay’ when added the suffix
–› becomes ‘a-y›’, the sound ‘y’ goes to the next syllable. If it were a diphthong, it
would have stayed in the same syllable since a diphthong is considered to be a
single vowel.
ALLOPHONES OF TURKISH VOWELS
Turkish vowels presented above are the phonemic representations. In the actual
realization of speech, variations of these vowels are used. Compare the way you
say the initial vowel of the following words, ‘i¤ne’, ‘inek’. The /i/ in ‘i¤ne’ is more
similar to the tense high front vowel of English produced with more spread lips,
and more extreme tongue position as opposed to the /i/ in ‘inek’. The /i/ in ‘inek’
is realized as [I], similar to lax high front vowel of English. In Turkish, [i] and [I]
are allophones, or variations of the same phoneme /i/. The use of [i] for [I], or the
use of [I] for [i] would not change the meaning of words. Thus, the high front
unrounded vowel /i/ has two allophones in Turkish as represented below.
/i/
This suggests that the occurrence of [i] is restricted to the environment of ‘¤’. [I]
occurs in all other environments.
Similarly, high back vowel /u/ has two allophones, [u] and [U]. Compare the
words ‘tu¤ra’ and ‘tura’. /u/ in ‘tu¤ra’ is longer, more rounded, and produced
with a more extreme tongue position than that of ‘tura’. As with the high front
vowel, [u] occurs before ‘¤’ and [U] in other environments. The allophones of /u/
is schematized below.
/u/
[i] before ‘¤’ (e.g., i¤de, i¤ne)
[I] elsewhere (e.g., isim, inmek)
[u] before ‘¤’ (e.g., tu¤la, bu¤u)
[U] elsewhere (e.g., turne, buhar)
Mid front vowel /E/ has three allophones. The more commonly used allophone
is [E] as in the words ‘eser’, ‘elma’, ‘eksi’. In words such as ‘e¤er’, ‘e¤lence’, ‘de¤il’
/E/ is realized with a ‘j’ glide, thus sounding more like the English [e]. In some
dialects, or idiolects, /E/ is realized as [æ] in certain environments as in words such
as ‘genç’, ‘Mehmet’ (first ‘e’), ‘mendil’. Consequently, the phoneme /E/ has three
allophones as shown below.
[e] before ‘¤’ (e.g., e¤er, e¤lence, de¤il)
/E/ [Q] speaker-dependent (e.g.,genç, Mehmet)
[E] elsewhere (e.g.,genç, Mehmet)
One other phoneme that has three allophones is /a/. The allophones of /a/ are
[a], [√], [´]. Compare the pronunciation of the two /a/’s in the word ‘masa’. Do
you notice the difference in the qualities of the first and the second /a/’s? The first
/a/ is a schwa, a very short and almost nondistinctive vowel (Kopkall›-Yavuz,