Learn the basic rules of Finnish sentence structure
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| Michael: How are sentences structured in Finnish? |
| Anni: And are the rules rigid? |
| Michael: At FinnishPod101.com, we hear these questions often. In the following situation, Ben Lee, a foreign-exchange student, thinks he sees a famous Finnish singer as he's walking with a friend in central Helsinki. He gestures to his friend, Miia Maeki, and says |
| "I know him, he's Danny." |
| Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Dialogue |
| Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Miia Mäki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| Michael: Once more with the English translation. |
| Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Michael: "I know him, he's Danny." |
| Miia Mäki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| Michael: "Yes, I know him too." |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Michael: In the dialogue, both Ben and Miia say different versions of the phrase, "I know him." The only difference is that Miia adds the word "too" at the end, which in this case is represented by |
| Anni: minäkin |
| Michael: Did you also notice how the words were in a different order? Whereas Ben says, "I know him," or |
| Anni: Tunnen hänet |
| Michael: Miia says, "Yes, I know him too." |
| Anni: kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen |
| Michael: which literally is "yes I too him I know." How did this happen? Like English, Finnish is an S-V-O language, which means it tends to follow the subject-verb-object word order. However, Finnish is significantly more flexible than English when it comes to word order. This is because Finnish has case forms and English doesn't. Moreover, in Finnish, it is not always necessary to change the entire structure of the sentence. Most of the time, changing the meaning of a word simply means adding a certain prefix or suffix to that word. |
| [Recall 1] |
| Michael: Let's take a closer look at the dialogue. |
| Do you remember how Ben Lee says "I know him, he's Danny?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Päivi as Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Michael: Ben follows the usual S-V-O word order by placing |
| Anni: Tunnen |
| Michael: or "I know" before the object, which in this case is |
| Anni: hänet |
| Michael: or "him," referring to the singer Danny. |
| [Recall 2] |
| Michael: Now, let's take a look at our second sentence. |
| Do you remember how Miia Maeki says "Yes, I know him too?" |
| (pause 4 seconds) |
| Päivi as Miia Mäki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| Michael: This literally means "Yes, I too, him, I know." Miia's sentence differs slightly from that of Ben's with the addition of "too," as expressed by the suffix |
| Anni: -kin |
| Michael: attached to the word |
| Anni: minä |
| Michael: forming |
| Anni: minäkin |
| Michael: or "I too," or "me too." |
| Michael: Not only that, but she also chose to express the same thought using a different sentence structure. You would expect her to start her sentence with, |
| Anni: tunnen |
| Michael: or "I know." Instead, she starts with "I too," followed by the object, and then the subject and verb. In this case, Miia follows the object-subject-verb pattern. Let's compare the two sentences once again. Let's try another example to clarify this even further. Let's use |
| Anni: Edvin rakastaa Hannua |
| Michael: "Edvin loves Hannu." Now, consider this next sentence. |
| Anni: Hannua rakastaa Edvin. |
| Michael: The two words exchanging places doesn't necessarily mean that Hannu loves Edvin. |
| Anni: Hannua |
| Michael: is the partitive case of Hannu, which means this sentence literally means "Hannu is loved by Edvin." Changing the order of the words did modify the meaning of the sentence, but not in a way that it changed the main idea of Hannu being the object. If we want to say "Hannu loves Edvin," we have to mark Edvin with the object form and say, |
| Anni: Hannu rakastaa Edviniä. |
| [Summary] |
| Michael: So far, we have learned that Finnish word order is flexible. This means that, while it often follows the subject-verb-object structure, there are many ways one can change the structure of a sentence and still be able to convey the same idea. |
| Expansion/Contrast |
| Michael: Since Finnish is relatively "free" in terms of its word order, does this mean you can always understand what a sentence means regardless of the position of each element? Not necessarily. This is especially true for complex sentences, or sentences that contain multiple verbs |
| Anni: verbejä |
| Michael: or adjectives |
| Anni: adjektiiveja. |
| Michael: Let's take this sentence, for example: |
| Anni: Yrsa näki Merjan lähtevän pois. |
| Michael: "Yrsa saw Merja leave." Here, we have two verbs, "saw," |
| Anni: näki |
| Michael: and "leave." |
| Anni: lähtevän |
| Michael: The flexibility of Finnish word order might tell you that placing the object "Merja'' at the end of the sentence would keep the meaning of the sentence. In reality, it wouldn't. For instance, the sentence |
| Anni: Yrsa näki lähtevän pois Merjan. |
| Michael: would come out as "Yrsa saw leave away Merja," which makes no sense at all. However, you could say |
| Anni: Yrsa näki poislähtevän Merjan. |
| Michael: which means "Yrsa saw Merja, who was leaving." Here, the words |
| Anni: pois |
| Michael: or "away," and |
| Anni: lähtevän |
| Michael: or "leaving" are combined to form the compound word |
| Anni: poislähtevä |
| Michael: "outgoing," meaning something that is leaving or going away. |
| Practice Section |
| Michael: Let's review. Respond to the prompts by speaking aloud. Then, repeat after the native speaker focusing on pronunciation. |
| Do you remember how Ben Lee says "I know him, he's Danny?" |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Päivi as Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Michael: Listen again and repeat. |
| Päivi as Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Päivi as Ben Lee: Tunnen hänet, hän on Danny. |
| Michael: And do you remember how Miia Maeki says, "Yes, I know him too." |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Päivi as Miia Maeki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| Michael: Listen again and repeat. |
| Päivi as Miia Maeki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| [Beep. Pause 5 seconds.] |
| Päivi as Miia Maeki: Kyllä minäkin hänet tunnen. |
| Cultural Insight/Expansion |
| Michael: How a sentence is structured in Finnish also has something to do with emphasis. This means that, even though Finnish word order is flexible, it's still important to get a feel of how sentences are constructed to understand what they convey, especially when they are in written form. For example, we have the sentence |
| Anni: Minä syön omenan. |
| Michael: which means, "I eat an apple." Now, let's change the positions of the subject and the object: |
| Anni: Omenan minä syön. |
| Michael: This still means "I eat an apple," but the emphasis is more on the apple that is being eaten and not on the fact that I am eating it. |
Outro |
| Michael: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them! |
| Anni: Hei hei! |
| Michael: See you soon! |
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