The verb "to be" in Turkish is "olmak".
In English one simple case of using the verb "to be" is to tell one's occupation(s). Similarly,
in Turkish "olmak" is used to tell ocupations as well. Here is an example:
| I am a student | Ben öğrenciyim |
| You are a student | Sen öğrencisin |
| He / She is a student | O öğrenci |
| We are students | Biz öğrenciyiz |
| You are students | Siz öğrencisiniz |
| They are students | Onlar öğrenciler |
Personal suffixes
In the sentence "I am a student" the word "I" is a personal pronoun, the word "student"is a noun and
the word "am" is the 1st person conjugation of the verb to be. In the Turkish counterpart "Ben" is the
personal pronoun, "öğrenci" is the noun, and the "yim" part is called 1st person personal suffix.
Personal suffixes change according to the vowel in the last syllable.
Note: if the noun/adjective ends in a vowel also a "y" is added which is shown in the table below
| Last Vowel | a/ı | e/i | o/u | ö/ü |
|---|
| Ben | -[y]ım | -[y]im | -[y]um | -[y]üm |
| Sen | -sın | -sin | -sun | -sün |
| O | | | | |
| Biz | -[y]ız | [y]iz | -[y]uz | -[y]üz |
| Siz | -sınız | -siniz | -sunuz | -sünüz |
| Onlar | -lar | -ler | -lar | -ler |
Personal suffixes according to last vowel
Here are some examples:
I am a father: (baba) Ben babayım, sen babasın, o baba; biz babayız, siz babasınız, onlar babalar
I am a doctor: (doktor) Ben doktorum, sen doktorsun, o doktor; biz doktoruz, siz doktorsunuz, onlar doktorlar