Have and Don’t Have in Turkish

Let's talk about expressing possession in Turkish, using the words 'var' and 'yok'. These two crucial words indicate whether you have or don't have something. They typically come at the end of a sentence.

To understand their meanings, 'var' translates to "exists", while 'yok' means "doesn't exist".

So when you say you own something in Turkish, you are literally saying it exists.

For example, if you want to express that you have a car in Turkish, you'd say "benim arabam var."

Let us break down this sentence and understand what it means.

Ben is "I"

Benim is "My"

araba is "car"

arabam is "my car", the suffix "-Im" added shows the possesive relationship between "ben" and "araba"

If the last letter is a vowel, only -m is added (as in the case of araba - arabam)

If the last letter is not a vowel, the table below shows how the suffix "-Im" is added.

Benim arabam var” → literal translation “My car exists”
It means → "I have a car" in English.

My car exists" == "I have a car" in Turkish grammar.

You may say I get benim but why do we have to add suffix to the car and say arabam. Shouldn’t a car be just be a car everywhere regardless of how it is used in a sentence?

Think about it this way, whenever you add a suffix to a Pronoun(Ben, sen, o, siz, biz), you are saying I have initiated(opened) something so the way to end(close) it is with another appropriate closer.

When I say Benim, I initiated a relationship so I will close it with some closer suffix. So Benim arabam, Senin evin, Onun evi

Think of it like opening and closing a parenthesis. ( ).

The aphorism below sums it up.

If you open, you've got to close.

In Turkish language structure matters especially towards the end (as it has suffix based grammar) where key meaning is determined with either “var” denoting existence thus confirming possession or “yok” indicating non-existence hence clarifying lack of possession in our case.

So if you are the type that sometimes hums the end a word or sentence when you are not sure, it may let you down in Turkish.

Thanks for reading!

Written by

Abbas Abdelila

@abbasabdelila