"Kadınlar ve erkekler"

Translation: Women and men

[GordonRobb]

Is there a rule for when Adam and Erkek are used to mean man?

[orde90]

Erkek is more like a gender. It is a gender identity. Its exact meaning is "male". We usually use it in contrast to girls and women. On the other hand "adam" is any man around as a person. You cannot refer to all men as "adamlar" because by saying all men you emphasize the gender. So when you want to exclude or differentiate from females use erkek. When talking about any man as a regular person use adam. Hope it's clear

[GordonRobb]

Thanks, its clear. But confusing as hell :) Why did I decide to try to learn Turkish? :)

[ataltane]

Thanks for the explanation. However, in modern English, "man" more or less means only "male person". Am I right in thinking that you mean "person" everywhere you write "man"?

So "adam" means "person, human" and "erkek" means "male person, man"?

[ex_contributor]

no, adam is also a male person. Think of them like this, wherever you can say "male" instead of "man" you can use erkek. Wherever you can say "guy", typically you cannot say "erkek".

• Odada 3 adam/erkek var (there are 3 men in the room, both OK)
• Bir adam seni bekliyor (a man is waiting for you, erkek is awkward here)
• Bir erkek öğrenci seni bekliyor (a male student is waiting for you - adam is wrong here)
• 10 kız, 10 erkek öğrencim var (I have 10 female, 10 male students- adam is wrong here)

[ataltane]

Ah, ok, thanks!

I see that it's fairly commonly used preceding (modifying) another noun. That makes sense to me. I still don't really see why the first example with 'erkek' is OK, while the second is awkward, though. I probably need to be exposed to more Turkish to see what's going on. Thanks!

[MuhammadNagi]

But, when I was in Istanbul, the shops used to use the words "Bay" and "Bayan" to refer to men and women?

[osma0098]

"Bay" and "Bayan" are just a finer way to say woman and man. Like when you hear the phrase "Ladies and gentlemen" - "Bayanlar ve baylar".

[Ahbar9]

Bay = sir

[Saul_Shitman]

And is it the same with Bayan and Kadın?

[rayasaryan]

Yes

[king360_lolman]

Guys when we use the suffix 'ler' or 'lar'

[callmeyass]

it s all about the vowel harmony rule see there s 2 kind of vowels hard vowel : a/ı/o/u soft vowel : e/i /ü / ö so when the last vowel in a word is a hard vowel u need to use -lar if it was soft vowel then you use -ler

[ToBePolyglott]

Erkek-ler

There's a page somewhere on here to go in-depth, but basically turkish is all about vowel agreement.

[IndiraHeng]

Why is girls and boys a wrong answer to this?

[ToBePolyglott]

Because girls and boys are not adults.

Women and Men

[callmeyass]

kadınlar= women , kızlar = girls

[Ahbar9]

Boy and girl is not edult

[EsmaeilRah]

Woman and men is wrong why? Even ladies is wrong

[Howard]

"Kadınlar" is plural.

[ToBePolyglott]

Women and Men.

[Katia21013]

How I may know when to use -lar or -ler?

[callmeyass]

it s the vowel harmony rule
see there s 2 kind of vowels
hard vowel : a/ı/o/u
soft vowel : e/i /ü / ö
so when the last vowel in a word is a hard vowel u need to use -lar
if it was soft vowel then you use -ler

[deactivated user]

When do we use "ler" and "lar"?

[behnam263]

-ler is used if the last vowel of the word is: e, i, ö, ü

-lar is used if the last vowel of the word is: a, ı, o, u

ev-evler ; dil-diller ; göl-göller ; kül-küller

at-atlar ; yıl-yıllar ; yol-yollar ; ruh-ruhlar

[deactivated user]

Thanks for your explanation:)