Turkish Grammar › Derivational Suffixes
İsimden İsim Yapma Eki (-CA)
Noun-Deriving Suffix -CA
Level A1Derivational Suffixes
The ending -ca/-ce attaches to nouns and creates the meaning of a language, a manner, or «like…».
In Turkish the ending -ca / -ce attaches to certain nouns and makes new words. It is very common in everyday speech, and at A1 level it is enough to learn its most frequent uses.
Its most common job is to name a language. Türkçe, İngilizce, Japonca, Çince, Almanca and Fransızca are all made with this ending and refer to a language. For example: Türkçe öğreniyorum. İngilizce biliyor musun?
Another job of -ca / -ce is to state an opinion. Added to personal pronouns it expresses a thought or a judgement. The most common forms are bence, sence, bizce and sizce. For example: Bence bu film çok güzel. Sence doğru mu? Bizce bu fikir iyi. These words mean «in my opinion», «in your opinion».
This ending can also give a sense of plurality or approximate number. Added to numbers it means «about». Words like onlarca, yüzlerce, binlerce do not give an exact number but say that there are many. This meaning appears in sentences like: Toplantıya yüzlerce kişi katıldı. Kütüphanede binlerce kitap var. Parkta onlarca çocuk oynuyor.
Which form is used is decided by vowel harmony. Words with back vowels usually take -ca, words with front vowels take -ce. For example Türkçe, Çince, Almanca, Japonca.
This ending cannot be added to every noun. Which words it goes with has to be learned over time through examples. At A1 level the main aim is to use the everyday words Türkçe, İngilizce, Çince, Japonca, bence and sence correctly.
Examples
- Türkçe öğreniyorum.I am learning Turkish.
- O Çince konuşabiliyor.He/she can speak Chinese.
- Sence bu doğru mu?Do you think this is right?
- Bizce bu iyi fikir.We think this is a good idea.
- Orada onlarca arkadaşım var.I have dozens of friends there.