EXPRESSING POSSESSIONS IN FINNISH
Possession is expressed in Finnish by the genitive form of the possessor and the possessum. The word order is
possessor (G) + possessum (N), and we can see that Finnish employs the GN word order for possession (Croft 37).
auli - n auto on keltainen.
Auli-gen. Car.nom.sg. be.3s.pres. yellow.nom. ëAuliís car is yellow (Karlsson 89).í
Genitive is also used in some cases, where, in English, juxtaposition or prepositional phrases led by the preposition other than ëof.í
helsingi ñ n yliopisto
Helsinki-gen. university.nom. ëHelsinki University (Karlsson 89).í
englanni ñ n kieli
English-gen. language ëthe English language (Karlsson 89).í
lapi ñ n mies
Lapland-gen. man.nom. ëa man from Lapland (Karlsson 89).í
There are also genitive forms of personal pronouns in Finnish. When genitive forms of the personal pronouns are used, the possessive suffixes are required on the possessum. The genitive forms and their possessive suffixes are as below.
Genitive Suffix
first singular minu ñ n -ni
second singular sinu ñ n -si
third singular hAne ñ n -nsa or -nsA
first plural mei ñ dAn -mme
second plural tei ñ dAn -nne
third plural nei ñ dAn -nsa or ñnsA
The third person, both singular and plural, suffix, ë-nsaí or ë-nsA,í is determined according to the vowel harmony. These example below shows how genitive type possession works.
ota ñ n kirja ñ ni.
take-1s.pres. book-1s.poss.-acc.0 ëI (will) take my book (Karlsson 91).í
myy ñ tte ñ kO auto ñ nne.
Sell-2pl.pres.-question car-2pl.poss.-acc.0 ëDo you (will you) sell your car (Karlsson 91)?í
hAn aja ñ a auto - nsa kotiin.
3s.nom. drive-3s.pres. car-3s.poss.-acc.0 to home(adv) ëHe (She) drives his / her (own) car home (Karlsson 91).í
As these examples above show, if the possessive suffix is used, its genitive form is usually omitted. If, however, the genitive form of the third person is placed before the possessum, the possessor is different from the subject of the sentence.
kelle aja ñ a hAne ñ n auto ñ nsa kotiin.
Kelle.nom. drive-3s.pres. 3s.-gen. car-3s.poss. to home(adv)
ëKelle drives his (=someone elseís) car home (Karlsson 92).í
amerikkalaise ñ t tapaa ñ vat nei ñ dAn edusta ñ ja ñnsa .
American-pl. meet-3pl.pres. 3pl.-gen. representative-pl.-3pl.gen.-acc.0
ëAmericans meet their (=the other sideís) representatives (Karlsson 92).í
These example above show the use of nominative and accusative, which has occasionally no ending, of the possessum. If the information of other cases needs to be encoded, the word structure is as follows. The table below shows the formation of ëessive,í which usually expresses a temporal state, and whose ending is ë-naí or ë-nAí depending on the vowel harmony (Karlsson 111).
word stem plural essive marker possessive suffix translation
talo =a /the house
talo t =(the) houses
talo t na =as houses
talo t na ni =as my houses (Holmberg 2)
Some Finnish linguists, such as Karlsson, consider the use of personal pronoun genitive forms to be concord (Karlsson 91). As we have seen, however, the genitive pronouns are usually omitted is most cases, and in those cases, the possessive suffixes only tell the possessor. Then, the better analysis of the possessive pronouns in Finnish will be that affixation (Croft 29), rather than concord or agreement (Croft 30) is employed to express possessors when the possessor is personal pronouns in Finnish.
Although case and affixation are both commonly used in Finnish, case seems to be the primary strategy for possession in Finnish. If we examine the semantics, as Croft suggests (Croft 35), affixation is more closely related to the notion of ownership that case is. As seen before, case does not necessarily express the ownership, ëHelsinki Universityí or ëa man from Laplandí are the examples. We have also noted, however, affixation is more restricted in its use than case, for affixation can only be employed only when the possessor is personal pronouns, and then, we can say that case is more frequently used than affixation. Although, according to Croft, frequency is one of the least reliable factors, he also states that basicness can be sometimes measured through it (Croft 35). Furthermore, personal pronouns behave, and are treated differently in many languages, as in English, for example, and usually they are given the special and distinguishable status compared with other nominals. Considering these facts, the basic strategy for possession in Finnish is case (genitive) rather than affixation although affixation is also commonly used in Finnish.
CONJUNCTIONS
Conjunctions in Finnish are very similar to those in English, and one explanation for this will be that both English and Finnish employ the SVO, in other words, they are both non-verb-final languages.
Subordinate conjunctions, for example, according to Schachter, are prepositional in non-verb-final languages, (Schachter 49), and in Finnish, the conjunction ëettAí leads the ëthatí clause of English.
tiedA ñ n ettA pirkko on tAAllA.
know-1s.pres. that Pirkko be.3s.pres. here(adv) ëI know that Pirkko is here (Karlsson 191).í
ol -i mukava ettA tul ñ i ñ t.
be-3s.imp. nice.nom. that come-imp.-2s. ëIt was nice that you came (Sulkala 29).í
The same is true with other subordinate conjunctions.
matti katsel ñ i kun irmeli kirjoitt ñ i.
Matti.nom. watch.3s.imp. when Irmeli write-3s.imp. ëMatti watched while Irmeli wrote (Sullkala 31).í
ajattel ñ i ñ n jos sinA halua ñisi ñ t lAhteA.
think-imp.-1s. if 2s.nom. want-cond-2s. leave.inf. ëI wondered if you would like to come (Sulkala 31).í
According to Schachter, coordination is allowed only for nouns and noun phrases in many languages (Schachter 48). In Finnish, as in English, there is no restriction about the conjuncts connected by the coordinate conjunctions.
These are the examples of the coordination of two nouns, which many languages allow.
tiedote ja ilmoitukse ñt ol ñi ñvat pien ñi -A.
announcement and notice-pl. be-imp.-3pl. small-pl.-par. ëThe announcement and notices were small (Sulkala 107).í
julkais ñ i ñ n use ñi ñta tiedotte ñi ñta ja ilmoituks ñi -a.
publish-imp.-1s. many-pl.-par. announcement-pl.-par.-acc.0 and notice-pl.-par-acc.0
ëI published many announcements and notices (Sulkala 107).í
As in English, the conjunction ëjaí can coordinate verbs in Finnish.
tule ñn ja mene ñn.
come.-1s.pres. and go-1s.pres. ëI come and go (Sulkala 106).í
Also as in English, Finnish coordination is prepositional, in which the conjunctions "form structure units with the conjuncts that precede (Schachter 47)."
em-me voi ñnee ñt syOdA emme juoda emme ñkA nukkua
(ja emme )
neg.1pl. can-2ptc.-pl. eat.inf. neg. drink.inf. neg.1pl.-cl. sleep.inf.
ëWe could not eat, drink, and sleep (Sulkala 107).í
In negation sentences, the conjunction ëjaí turns into the clitic ëkA,í and the attachment of ëkAí shows that the conjunction unites with the conjunct that it precedes (unites with ëemme nukkaí rather than ëemme juoda,).
One interesting thing about conjunctions in Finnish is correlative conjunction. Schachter gives the examples of Japanese and Hausa, and says one characteristic of correlative conjunction is the repetition of the same conjunction (Schachter 47). As Finnish is a non-verb-final language, the correlative conjunctions are placed before the conjuncts, however, the correlative conjunctions are not the repetition of the same conjunctions.
joko matti tul ñee tai maija tul ñee.
either Matti come-3s.pres. or Maija come-3s.pres. ëEither Matti comes or Maija will come (Sulkala 105).í
yhtiO sekA makso ñi vela ñt ettA lisAs ñi voitto ña- an.
company both pay-3s.imp. debt-pl.-acc.0 that increase-3s.imp. profit-par-3s.poss.-acc.0
ëThe company both paid off its debts and increased its profits (Sulkala 105).í
Possessive suffix for third person is sometimes ë-aní depending on the vowel quality preceding it (Karlsson 93). As we have seen above, two verbs can be coordinated in Finnish.
Looking at the examples above, English ëeither orí is ëjoko taií and ëboth andí is ësekA ettAí in Finnish. Because of the lack of repetition, Schachter concludes that English correlative conjunctions are somewhat atypical (Schachter 48). As we have seen, however, Finnish and English conjunctions share many properties in common, and, then, it seems more plausible to classify English and Finnish conjunctions as one type or category of conjunction, rather than to consider them to be atypical or exceptions.
Keys
A: low, front, lax, vowel
O: mid, front, rounded, vowel
pres.: present tense
imp: imperfect tense
inf: infinitive
cl: clitic
cond: conditional (one of the moods)
2ptc: second participle (past participle)
nom: nominative
acc.: accusative, acc.0: accusative with no ending
gen: genitive
par: partitive
poss; possessive suffix
Works Cited
Croft, William. Typology and universals. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, New York, Port Chester, Melbourne, Sydney, 1990.
Holmberg, Anders. "On the Morphological structure of Finnish." Case and Other Functional Categories in Finnish(2). Mouton de Gruyter. Berlin, New York, 1993.
Karlsson, Fred. Finnish Grammar. Werner Soderstorm Osakeyhtio. Helsinki, 1982.
Schachter, Paul. "Parts of Speech System." Language Typology and Syntactic Description. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, New York, Port Chester, Melbourne, Sydney, 1990.
Sulkala, Helena. Finnish, Descriptive Grammars. Routledge. London, New York, 1992.
Back to languages table of contents
Back to topics
Revised February 26, 1999