nähtäis ????? what does it mean???

[squirrel58]

Hi,I'm having trouble finding out what this word means "nähtäis" anybody help me??? thanks

[Pete]

Well is someone said 'Koska nähtäis?' it would mean when would we see each other, maybe a film or something else (if there was that word tacked on at the end).
So roughly in whatever context it is used, it would mean 'to see'.

[squirrel58]

thanks ver much pete,much appreciated

[Mangrove]

That is, koska voisimme nähdä or just koska nähtäisiin.

[Pete]

In the real world people just say koska nähtäis...

[Jukka Aho]

Hi,I'm having trouble finding out what this word means "nähtäis" anybody help me??? thanks

1. In colloquial speech, the 1st person plural forms, such as...
   
   Koska näemme? (“When do we see [each other]?” or “When are we going to see [each other]?”)
   
   ...are commonly expressed using the 4th person, or “passive” forms, instead:
   
   Koska nähdään?
   
   Regardless of this change, it still means the exact same thing: “When do we see [each other]?” or “When are we going to see [each other]?” Now it’s just expressed in a more colloquial way.
2. Your example was not only the 1st person plural, but the 1st person plural in the conditional mood (-isi-)...
   
   Koska näkisimme? (“When would we [be able to] see [each other]?”)
   
   ...but as it was spoken language, the 4th person (or “passive”) form was used instead of the “proper” 1st person plural... basically just like in the above point, but with the conditional -isi- marker:
   
   Koska nähtäisiin?
3. To confuse you some more, in colloquial speech, words are often “economized” by shortening them according to certain “standard” patterns. The conditional mood, with its -isi- marker, is one of the entities that usually undergoes such “economization”... getting chopped down to a mere -is-. Additionally, the remaining 4th person (or “passive”) ending, -in, is dropped as well:
   
   Koska nähtäis?

More examples:

Koska juoksisimme?
→ Koska juostaisiin? (1)
→ Koska juostais? (2)

Menisimmekö jo?
→ Mentäisiinkö jo? (1)
→ Mentäiskö jo? (2)

Jos Beckham olisi kunnossa, kesällä tehtäisiin uusi ennätys! (3)
→ Jos Beckham olis kunnossa, kesällä tehtäis uusi ennätys! (2)
→ Jos Beckham olis kunnos, kesällä tehtäis uus ennätys! (4)

Explanations for the above numbers in the parenthesis:

1. Replacing the 1st person plural with the 4th person (or “passive”) verb form.
2. Snipping the conditional marker and removing the passive ending. Makes the utterance appear even more “colloquial” and “spoken”!
3. Here, the latter clause actually contains an actual 4th person (or “passive”) verb form, not just a replacement for the 1st person plural. But as far as these “economizations” go, it will be treated the exact same way.
4. Some possible further shortenings for a couple of other words.

So there. Ain’t Finnish easy? Us native speakers even bend backwards and shorten our words for you!

[Upphew]

Jos Beckham olis kunnos, kesällä tehtäis uus ennätys! (4)

So there. Ain’t Finnish easy? Us native speakers even bend backwards and shorten our words for you!

Oi! Oi! We can shorten that even more: Jos Pekham ois kunnos, kesäl tehtäs uus ennätys!
That is how I would say it...

[Jukka Aho]

Jos Beckham olis kunnos, kesällä tehtäis uus ennätys! (4)

So there. Ain’t Finnish easy? Us native speakers even bend backwards and shorten our words for you!

Oi! Oi! We can shorten that even more: Jos Pekham ois kunnos, kesäl tehtäs uus ennätys!
That is how I would say it...

Quite correct... although I think your example is beyond the line which separates the “standard”, “neutral” colloquial speech – as heard on TV, radio and movies – from regional dialects and speech patterns... each of which may mangle words in their own, special ways. ;)

[garoowood]

I don't belong here.

[finningman]

most of the replies are correct: methinks it is colloquial, means when we're gonna see somebody/thing etc.
it's hard to keep track of recent changes..shortened forms..it's kinda like jive talk

[Bavarian]

So there. Ain’t Finnish easy? Us native speakers even bend backwards and shorten our words for you!

If you really wanted to make the language easier, you'd get rid of the %$@%@#! consonant gradation and vowel harmony. Down with the disappearing K!

At least Finnish doesn't have tone like Chinese.

[MagicJ]

I don't belong here.

Jukka is great, he makes the impossible sound obvious and straightforward without making it less impossible.

[Rob A.]

So there. Ain’t Finnish easy? Us native speakers even bend backwards and shorten our words for you!

If you really wanted to make the language easier, you'd get rid of the %$@%@#! consonant gradation and vowel harmony. Down with the disappearing K!

At least Finnish doesn't have tone like Chinese.

It's not hard at all... ....it just takes some time to "de-program" yourself and then "re-program" à la finnoise ....

I suppose there are two basic approaches to learning a language, first, learn the correct words and how to put them together, relying on your memory to keep it all sorted out.... probably the way...more or less...native speakers learn their languages, though, of course, they have spent their whole lives doing it...

The other way is to try to understand some of the underlying principles, making the language learning process more of a predictive effort.... But, of course, in a fast flowing conversation you won't have time to try to "predict" the right thing to say....

In really, for second language learners, a combination of these two is probably the only realistic way to go....

I think at a very essential level Finnish "wants" to be a harmonic, smooth flowing language.... Stressing and de-stressing in as rhythmic a manner as possible...

[Aside: Other Finnic languages go to even greater lengths to achieve this than does Finnish... ]

Finnish is essentially a bisyllabic language... words tend to be built from two-syllable components ...the first syllable, stressed; the second, unstressed ...and this pattern repeats itself throughout the words.... But various other "linguistic realities" upset this flow and, so, conventions and "rules" have been developed to deal with this... (And this seems to be the reason why some words have optional variants)....

So I would say it is best not to underestimate this two-syllable essential structure with the word intial stress on the first syllable, and the, ideally, repeating first syllable secondary stress regime for each of the following two-syllable units....

But, of course, it's not a "magic bullet".....just another thing to help make the language learning process a bit easier....

[andymcgra]

I get the bisyllabic stress thing but as bavarian said the thing that really puts the brakes on the learning curve is the consonant gradation.
This can be quite unpredictable for an outsider.

[mrjimsfc]

As you can tell, colloquial terms get a little wierd! Everyone who has responded has tried to put the word in a sentence for you. If the person simply waved and said "nähtäis" as they were leaving it would translate into colloquial English (American) as "see ya later".