Learn how to explain the meaning of a word using relative pronouns
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Hi everyone, and welcome back to FinnishPod101.com. This is Intermediate Season 1 Lesson 24 - What Does this Finnish Word Mean? Eric here. |
| Päivi: Hei! I'm Päivi. |
| Eric: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to explain the meaning of a word by using the relative pronouns and about using the passive in the past tense. The conversation takes place at home. |
| Päivi: It's between Linnea and Markku. |
| Eric: The speakers are family members, so they’ll use informal Finnish. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Markku: Hei kulta. Mitä teitte Ainon kanssa? |
| Linnea: Hei! Käytiin kahvilla ja juteltiin Ainon ja Heikin remontista. |
| Markku: Aivan, aivan, heillä on tosiaan remontti käynnissä. |
| Linnea: Lupasin kysyä, jos voisit auttaa Heikkiä tapetoinnissa? |
| Markku: Toki, eiköhän se onnistu. Pitää vain hankkia joitakin tarvikkeita. |
| Linnea: Aivan, puhuttiinkin siitä Ainon kanssa. Heikillä saattaa olla jo jotakin. Mitä tarvikkeita tarvitset? |
| Markku: Ainakin tapetoimispöydän, liisteriharjan, tapettiharjan ja luotilangan. |
| Linnea: Mikä on luotilanka? |
| Markku: Periaatteessa se on lanka, jonka varassa roikkuu punnus. Punnus on painava, minkä ansiosta lanka muodostaa pystysuoran linjan. |
| Linnea: Ahaa. Voit siis sen avulla katsoa, että tapetti tulee suoraan. |
| Markku: Kyllä. Ennen vanhaan niitä käytettiin enemmänkin, nykyään on myös paljon elektronisia mittalaitteita. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation with the English translation. |
| Markku: Hi honey. What did you do with Aino? |
| Linnea: Hi! We went for coffee and talked about Aino and Heikki's remodeling. |
| Markku: Right, right, they do indeed have a renovation in progress. |
| Linnea: I promised to ask if you could help Heikki with wallpapering. |
| Markku: Sure, I suppose it will be fine. Some supplies just have to be bought. |
| Linnea: Right, we were talking about it with Aino. Heikki might already have something. Which supplies do you need? |
| Markku: At least a wallpapering table, adhesive brush, wallpaper brush and a plumb line. |
| Linnea: What’s a plumb line? |
| Markku: In principle it’s a thread from which a weight is hanging. The weight is heavy, which is why the thread makes a perpendicular line. |
| Linnea: Oh, I see. So with that you can see that the wallpaper hangs straight. |
| Markku: Yes. In the olden days they were used even more, and nowadays there are a lot of electronic measuring devices. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eric: Päivi, is it common among Finnish friends to meet for a coffee? |
| Päivi: Yes, and you should know that surprisingly, the Finns drink the most coffee in the world. |
| Eric: Really? Is there any reason for that? |
| Päivi: The reason may lie in the dark autumns and winters, as coffee is drunk as a pick-me-up throughout the day. Finns drink an average of 12 kilograms of coffee per person per year. |
| Eric: That’s a lot! Coffee has been introduced relatively recently, right? |
| Päivi: Right, at the end of the seventeenth century. At first it was only for the upper classes, but it slowly spread as a stimulant for the whole nation. |
| Eric: What’s the most common kind of coffee? |
| Päivi: Finns prefer a lighter roast coffee, and simple filter coffee is still the most popular form of coffee in Finland, with possibly some sugar, milk, or cream added. |
| Eric: Please teach us some Finnish words related to coffee. |
| Päivi: suodatinkahvi means “filter coffee,” pannukahvi means “pot roasted coffee” and erikoiskahvi means “specialty coffee." |
| Eric: Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Päivi: käynnissä [natural native speed] |
| Eric: in progress |
| Päivi: käynnissä[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: käynnissä [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: luvata [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to promise |
| Päivi: luvata[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: luvata [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: eiköhän [natural native speed] |
| Eric: I suppose |
| Päivi: eiköhän[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: eiköhän [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: tarvikkeet [natural native speed] |
| Eric: supplies |
| Päivi: tarvikkeet[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: tarvikkeet [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: saattaa olla [natural native speed] |
| Eric: may have |
| Päivi: saattaa olla[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: saattaa olla [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: luotilanka [natural native speed] |
| Eric: plumb line |
| Päivi: luotilanka[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: luotilanka [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: periaate [natural native speed] |
| Eric: principle |
| Päivi: periaate[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: periaate [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: punnus [natural native speed] |
| Eric: weight |
| Päivi: punnus[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: punnus [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Päivi: muodostaa [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to form |
| Päivi: muodostaa[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: muodostaa [natural native speed] |
| Eric: And last.. |
| Päivi: ennen vanhaan [natural native speed] |
| Eric: in the olden days |
| Päivi: ennen vanhaan[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Päivi: ennen vanhaan [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Eric: Let's have a closer look at some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first phrase is.. |
| Päivi: ennen vanhaan |
| Eric: meaning "in the olden days." |
| Päivi: The expression is made up of two words- the adverb ennen, meaning "before" or "prior to," and the adjective vanha meaning "old." Therefore it literally means “before in the old.” |
| Eric: You can use this expression when you’re referring to events that happened a long time ago in history. |
| Päivi: For example, an elderly may often use this expression when referring to events of his youth. |
| Eric: Can you give us an example using this word? |
| Päivi: Sure. For example, you can say.. Ennen vanhaan ei ollut kännyköitä. |
| Eric: .. which means "There were no mobile phones in the olden days." Okay, what's the next word? |
| Päivi: mittalaite |
| Eric: meaning "measuring device." |
| Päivi: This word is made up of two parts- the noun mitta for "measure" and noun laite for "device." |
| Eric: Let’s have an example. |
| Päivi: You can say.. Laboratoriossa on erilaisia mittalaitteita. |
| Eric: .. which means "There are different kinds of measuring devices in the laboratory." Okay, now onto the lesson focus. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: In this lesson, you'll learn how to explain the meaning of a word by using relative pronouns and the passive in the past tense. Let’s start with the relative pronouns. |
| Päivi: Pronouns are small words used as a substitute for nouns. Relative pronouns start relative clauses and they refer to either a word in the previous sentence, or possibly to the whole previous sentence. |
| Eric: In Finnish, there are two relative pronouns. |
| Päivi: They are joka and mikä. Joka in its different forms can be translated as "who," "whom," and "whose," as well as "which" in English, whereas mikä can be translated as “which,” “what,” or “that.” |
| Eric: Relative pronouns are always placed as the first element in the relative clause. The pronouns can be inflected in all cases. Listeners, you will find the complete declensions in the lesson notes. Here we’ll try to use them. |
| Päivi: Let’s see, for example, joka in the inessive case, singular which is jossa. Talo, jossa hän asuu on punainen. |
| Eric: “The house, where he lives, is red.” |
| Päivi: Now the adessive case, plural which is joilla, Täällä käy paljon nuoria, joilla ei ole omaa koiraa. |
| Eric: “A lot of youngsters who don’t have their own dog come here.” |
| Päivi: We saw the pronoun in the dialogue, too. Periaatteessa se on lanka, jonka varassa roikkuu punnus. |
| Eric: “In principle, it is a thread from which a weight is hanging.” |
| Päivi: jonka refers to the noun lanka, meaning “thread.” You can see how the relative clause can be useful when explaining something. |
| Eric: Now let’s see the other pronoun. |
| Päivi:The relative pronoun mikä has a more limited use than joka. Mikä is usually used when referring to the entire previous sentence, or when the noun to which the pronoun is referring to is in the superlative. |
| Eric: Please give us some examples. |
| Päivi: Here is an example with the nominative, Olin kuumeisena töissä, mikä heikensi toimintakykyäni. |
| Eric:“I was working while feverish, which reduced my ability to function.” |
| Päivi: Here is one with the ablative. Nyt tehtävillä päätöksillä on suuri vaikutus siihen, miltä tulevaisuus näyttää. |
| Eric: “Decisions that are made now have a great impact on what the future will look like.” |
| Päivi: Listeners, note that there is only a difference in the singular and plural conjugations in the nominative case. |
| Eric: Ok, now let’s move on the passive past tense. |
| Päivi: The “passive past tense,” or passiivin imperfekti, uses the same basic principle as the passive tense. |
| Eric: The sentences with the passive past tense don’t have or don’t show the subject, but express something that was done in the past. |
| Päivi:In modern spoken language the passive verb form is also often used to replace the plural first case. |
| Eric: Do we have some examples in the dialogue? |
| Päivi: Yes, for example Käytiin kahvilla ja juteltiin Ainon ja Heikin remontista. |
| Eric: Which means “We went for coffee and talked about Aino and Heikki’s remodeling.” How can we form this? |
| Päivi: For verb type 1, find the first singular stem of the verb and add the ending -ttiin. For example sanoa meaning “to say,” changes into sanottiin. Also, if the last vowel of the stem is a or ä, it will change into e before the passive ending. For example, tietää, which means “to know,” becomes tiedettiin |
| Eric: Another simple way is that if you remember the passive tense, you’ll just need to replace the ending. |
| Päivi: Right. You should replace the ending -taan or -tään with the ending -ttiin |
| Eric: What about verb types 2 and 3? |
| Päivi: All you have to do is to add the passive past tense ending -tiin to the infinitive stem. For example juoda, meaning “to drink,” becomes juotiin |
| Eric: The rule is the same for verb types 4&5, but the ending is slightly different. |
| Päivi: Right, they have a double t, -ttiin, so pakata, which means “to pack,” becomes pakattiin. |
| Eric: What about the negative form? |
| Päivi: Basically it’s formed by the negation ei followed by the verb, and the ending will be -ttu or -tty instead of -ttiin |
| Eric: Listeners, you’ll find more details about the formation in the Lesson Notes. Now we’ll see how to use this form. |
| Päivi: As I mentioned before, you can use the passive tense when you don’t know who exactly did or didn’t do something, or when you don’t want to express who the subject was. |
| Eric: Let’s conclude the lesson by giving some examples. |
| Päivi: Hänet valittiin Miss Universumiksi 80-luvulla. |
| Eric: “She was chosen to be Miss Universe in the 80s.” |
| Päivi: Autooni murtauduttiin viime yönä. |
| Eric: “My car was broken into last night.” |
| Päivi: Jauhotkin jauhettiin ennen vanhaan käsin. |
| Eric: “In the olden days even the flour was milled by hand.” |
Outro |
| Eric: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye! |
| Päivi: Hei hei! |
Comments
HideDo you like coffee? Try to explain your favourite drink in Finnish!
Hello Barbara,
Thank you for your good question. In my opinion, one can use both words in this case. So, it is not so strict in Finnish. Mainly "joka" word is used with human-related sentences though. "Hän on mies joka osaa monia asioita" for example. It is not so good idea to replace "mikä" word in these kinds of sentences. Hope this helps.
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hello Aarni,
I do have another question about this lesson.
Instead of "Juna on kulkuväline, mikä kulkee kiskoilla", wouldn't it be better to say "Juna on kulkuväline, joka kulkee kiskoilla", because the relative pronoun refers to "Juna" and not to the whole sentence, and there is no superlative in the sentence?
Thank you for your answers!
Barbara
Hello Shanti,
Thank you for your question! “Joka” is translated as “what”, “who”, “whom” and “whose”, as well as “which” "Mikä" only means “which”. that's the difference.
Let us know if you have any questions.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hi, could you please explain why 'mikä' is used instead of 'joka' in the sample sentence 'Juna on kulkuväline, mikä kulkee kiskoilla.'? It sounds to me more that the subordinate clause here is explaining the a word rather than the whole previous clause.
Hello ELSIE PARKER],
Thank you for your comment.
Yes, We Finnish people really love to drink coffee. ?
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hello ELSIE PARKER,
Thank you for your posting.
"Ennen vanhaan niitä käytettiin enemmänkin."
“In the olden days, they were used even more.”
so the thing that WAS being talked about (luotilanka) is replaced by “käytettiin” ?
Yes, It is in plural form now, as the guy wanted to say it. Plural form for the word "luotilanka" is "luotilangat" The partitive form is then "luotilankoja"
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hi ELSIE PARKER,
Thank you for your question.
Yes, luotilanka is the basic form. The question was: "Mikä on luotilanka?" In English:"What is", so the word "luotilanka" must be in basic form.
If you have any questions, please let us know.
Thank you.
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Hello ELSIE PARKER,
Thank you for your kind feedback.
"In this lesson’s dialoque
“Käytiin kahvilla ja juteltiin Ainon ja Heikin remontista”
juteltiin= talked with, chatted.
This word is used in the dialogue AND is not in the new vocabulary, AND I don’t think it’s been mentioned in a
previous lesson."
This sentence has been translated into dialogue section as:
"Käytiin kahvilla ja juteltiin Ainon ja Heikin remontista."
"(We) went for coffee and talked about Aino and Heikki's remodelling."
I hope it could reach students also this way as an example sentence.
Let us know if you have any question.
Cheers,
Aarni
Team FinnishPod101.com
Finns drink an average of twelve kilograms of coffee per person per year.
That is about 25-26 pounds of coffee. I think that is more than most Americans.
Minä rakastan kahvia. Ja myös suome.
ELSIE PARKER
Ennen vanhaan niitä käytettiin enemmänkin.
"In the olden days they were used even more."
so the thing that WAS being talked about (luotilanka) is replaced by "käytettiin" ?
Kiitos
ELSIE PARKER
Hei-
In this lesson, even if the woman did not know what a " luotilangan" was,
she knew to change the ending to ask the question what is a " luotilanka?"
The word follows a rule of changing the ending?..I guess the langan ending is a direct object ending
and lanka is the singular basic form of the word?
I hope this is somewhere near correct.
Please tell me what I'm missing.
Kiitos loputon-
ELSIE PARKER
Kylä, minä pidan kahvia, mutta juon vain nelja kuppia kahvia joka päivää.
Luulen, etta normali suomalaisia juovat seitsemän kuppia kahvilla joka paivää.
In this lesson's dialouge
"Käytiin kahvilla ja juteltiin Ainon ja Heikin remontista"
juteltiin= talked with, chatted.
This word is used in the diaglogue, AND is not in the new vocabulary, AND I don't think it's been mentioned in a
previous lesson.
This makes things more difficult. Another word I need to know, AND study the new words.
ELSIE PARKER
I love Finnish. I want to learn it!