Learn how to use plural case forms
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Brandon: Hello, and welcome to FinnishPod101.com! This is Lower Beginner Season 1, lesson 13. Take Your Hands Out of Your Pockets in Finland. I’m Brandon. |
| Nico: Hei kaikki, minä olen Nico. Hi everybody, I’m Nico. |
| Brandon: In this lesson, we’re going to talk about plurals. The dialogue takes place at home. Petri’s daughter is just about to leave for school in the morning. |
| Nico: The conversation is between Petri, Satu, and Viivi. They're members of the same family, and they'll be speaking standard Finnish in the casual register. |
| Brandon: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Petri: Viivi, älä sitten juokse noilla kengillä lätäköissä. Ne eivät pidä vettä. |
| Satu: Ja laita paita housuihin. |
| Petri: Äläkä unohda käsineitä kouluun. |
| Satu: Hyvää koulupäivää! |
| Viivi: Hyvää työpäivää! Heippa! |
| Brandon: Let’s hear the conversation one time slowly. |
| Petri: Viivi, älä sitten juokse noilla kengillä lätäköissä. Ne eivät pidä vettä. |
| Satu: Ja laita paita housuihin. |
| Petri: Äläkä unohda käsineitä kouluun. |
| Satu: Hyvää koulupäivää! |
| Viivi: Hyvää työpäivää! Heippa! |
| Brandon: Now let’s hear it with the English translation. |
| Petri: Viivi, älä sitten juokse noilla kengillä lätäköissä. Ne eivät pidä vettä. |
| Viivi, don’t go running in puddles with those shoes, okay. They aren’t watertight. |
| Satu: Ja laita paita housuihin. |
| And tuck your shirt into your trousers. |
| Petri: Äläkä unohda käsineitä kouluun. |
| And don’t forget your gloves at school. |
| Satu: Hyvää koulupäivää! |
| Have a nice day at school! |
| Viivi: Hyvää työpäivää! Heippa! |
| Have a nice day at work! Bye bye! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Brandon: How old do you think Viivi is? |
| Nico: Hmm, I’d guess she’s something like seven or eight, so she’d be in the first or second grade at school. |
| Brandon: She seems to be going to school by herself, though. |
| Nico: Sure. Most kids do in Finland actually. We don’t have a tradition of driving kids to school, though of course, there are some parents who do it. |
| Brandon: What if it’s a long way to school? |
| Nico: Well, if the distance to the nearest school is more than three or five km, the local authorities are required to provide transportation. |
| Brandon: I see, that’s convenient. Okay. now let’s onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Brandon: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| The first word we shall see is: |
| juosta [natural native speed] |
| to run |
| juosta [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| juosta [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| kenkä [natural native speed] |
| shoe |
| kenkä [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| kenkä [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| lätäkkö [natural native speed] |
| puddle |
| lätäkkö [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| lätäkkö [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| pitää [natural native speed] |
| to hold, to hold onto, to like, to have |
| pitää [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| pitää [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| laittaa [natural native speed] |
| to put, to prepare food |
| laittaa [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| laittaa [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| paita [natural native speed] |
| shirt, blouse |
| paita [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| paita [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| housut [natural native speed] |
| trousers, pants, slacks |
| housut [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| housut [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| käsine [natural native speed] |
| glove |
| käsine [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| käsine [natural native speed] |
| Next: |
| koulupäivä [natural native speed] |
| schoolday |
| koulupäivä [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| koulupäivä [natural native speed] |
| And Last |
| työpäivä [natural native speed] |
| workday |
| työpäivä [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| työpäivä [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Brandon: Let’s take a closer look at some of the words and phrases from this lesson.What’s the first word we’ll look at? |
| Nico: It’s pitää. You may already be familiar with it in the sense “to like”, as in Veera pitää jäätelöstä |
| Brandon: It means “Veera likes ice cream”. So you’re saying it has more meanings? |
| Nico: That’s right. The basic meaning is “to hold” as in Pitäisitkö kirjaani hetken? which means “Could you hold my book for a second?” |
| Brandon: But in this lesson it was used for being watertight. |
| Nico: Yes, that’s a special case of holding. If a container is watertight, it holds water inside. If shoes are watertight, they keep water out. |
| Brandon: Ahh, Got it. |
| Nico: It can even be a helping verb meaning “to have to”, as in Minun pitää nyt mennä - “I have to go now”. |
| Brandon: Okay. What’s the next word? |
| Nico: Housut. |
| Brandon: That’s “trousers”, right? |
| Nico: Right. It’s the most generic word for all kinds of trousers, pants, slacks and so on. |
| Brandon: So basically anything you wear from the waist down that isn’t a skirt? |
| Nico: Yes. It’s used for both men’s and women’s garments, and by adding various specifiers you get different kinds of garments. For example, by adding sukka, which means “sock”, you get sukkahousut, or “tights”. |
| Brandon: Housut is a plural form, just like the English “trousers”, right? |
| Nico: That’s a good point, it is. |
| Brandon: Okay. What’s the next word? |
| Nico: Käsine, or “glove”. That’s usually the kind of thing that has all fingers separated. |
| Brandon: Ok if that’s your word for glove, What would you call mittens. |
| Nico: That could be rukkanen, if it’s made of leather or fabric, and lapanen, if it’s made of wool. Hanska is commonly used as well, but it could have fingers either together or separately. |
| Brandon: Those are also words you’re likely to see used in the plural. Okay, now onto the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Brandon: In this lesson, we’re going to learn about plurals in Finnish. |
| Nico: I think our listeners already know that the nominative plural ending is -t or -T . You’re probably also getting the hang of the various case endings used in the singular forms of words. |
| Brandon: let me guess, we have to learn a whole new set of endings for the plural! |
| Nico: No, don’t worry. Most of the endings are the same as in the singular, you just add -i- before them. |
| Brandon: That’s it? That doesn’t sound too bad. |
| Nico: Well… There’s a bit more to it, but let’s start with the basics. Let’s take, say, the word käsine, or “glove”. You just add -i- and then the case ending you need. |
| Brandon: Let’s run through all the forms. I’ll say the name of the case and the rough English equivalent, and you say singular first and then the plural. |
| Nico: Okay. As always, don’t worry if you don’t remember the names of the cases. Most Finns don’t remember them, either. We just use them because we need a way to refer to each case. |
| Brandon: Okay. Nominative. |
| Nico: Käsine, käsineet |
| Brandon: Partitive, “part of glove”. |
| Nico: Käsinettä, käsineitä |
| Brandon: Genitive, “glove’s” |
| Nico: Käsineen, käsineiden |
| Brandon: Inessive, “in glove” |
| Nico: Käsineeseen, käsineisiin |
| Brandon: Elative, “from glove” |
| Nico: Käsineestä, käsineistä |
| Brandon: Illative, “into glove” |
| Nico: Käsineeseen, käsineisiin |
| Brandon: Adessive, “on glove” |
| Nico: Käsineellä, käsineillä |
| Brandon: Ablative, “from glove” |
| Nico: Käsineeltä, käsineiltä |
| Brandon: Allative, “onto glove” |
| Nico: Käsineelle, käsineille |
| Brandon: It sounds to me like there’s more difference than just the additional -i-. |
| Nico: That’s quite true, very good! The long -ee- sound at the end of the stem gets shortened before the -i-. So you don’t add the -i- to käsinee- but to käsine-. |
| Brandon: I see. Does that happen to all long vowels? |
| Nico: Yes. For example, the inessive singular form of the word maa, “country,” is maassa, but the plural is maissa instead of maaissa. |
| Brandon: Okay. Let’s have a look at some other words, for example “school”. |
| Nico: That’s an easy one. The stem koulu doesn’t change at all, it’s the same in all cases both in singular and plural. However, the plural marker -i- changes into a -j- when it’s between two vowels. |
| Brandon: That happens in the partitive and genitive cases, right? |
| Nico: Yes. The partitive singular is koulua, and plural is kouluja instead of kouluia. The genitive singular is koulun, and the plural is koulujen instead of kouluien. |
Outro |
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| Brandon: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. |
| Nico: Thank you for joining us! See you next time! Hei hei! |
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