Negation in Finnish

[Satish]

Stumbling around the rules on verb negation, negative pronouns etc, it seemed that they were smaller, more random insights into a more general topic of negation. With this idea, I started to think about how do you really negate a sentence? Surprisingly, I managed to do it many ways, to various parts of a sentence:

– Lenka is playing a violin in the room - Indicative sentence
– Not Lenka (but Wang) is playing a violin in the room – negating subject
– Lenka is not playing (but is tuning) a violin in the room – negating verb
– Lenka is playing not a violin (but a cello) in the room – negating object
– Lenka is playing a violin not in the room (but in the garden) – negating adverb

So, with this in mind, I started collecting forms and usage of various Finnish negations. Here goes:

Verb
Pure verb negation forms are discussed at length in grammar books, so I rested easy on this one

Noun
I guess noun negation is achieved with using “ei” in the place of “not”. I think!!

Indefinite Pronoun
They are mikään, kukaan = marked by interrogative pronouns (mi-, ku-) with enclitic –kaan The negative verb must always occur in Finnish with these pronouns
e[] kukaan – Nobody, no one (I use the [] brackets to indicate that the personal endings must be inserted - en, et, emme)
e[] mikään – Nothing, no
Mikään koira ei ole noin viisas. - No dog is that smart
mikään, kukaan = anything, anybody, can occur on their own only in question clauses:
Tietääkö kukaan, missä se on? - Does anybody know where it is?

Indefinite Adverb
e[] koskaan, e[] ikinä , e[] milloinkaan – Never, not anytime
En ole ikinä nähnyt mitään noin suurta. - I have never seen anything that big.
e[] mihinkään, e[] minnekään, ei missään, ei mistään - nowhere , not anywhere
Et saa lähteä minnekään - You are not allowed to go anywhere.
Koskaan, ikinä, milloinkaan, mihinkään etc = anytime, anywhere, can occur on their own in question clauses only

Adjective
Prefix (epä-) Used to invert the meaning of a word. English counterparts include in-, non-, un- (in some cases mis-, mal-)
selvä (clear) – epäselvä (unclear)
I am sure there are others..'

Adverb
They seem to be mainly prefixes and suffixes. Can't think of a clear structure for examples

Negative particle (–kAAn)
Used only in negative clauses
a) Appended to any word except a verb in a negative clause indicates neither, not…either
Kaverinikaan ei juo huomenna kahvia. = Neither will my friend eat ice-cream tomorrow. (My friend won't be the only one who won't eat...)
Kaverini ei juo huomennakaan kahvia. = My friend won't drink coffee tomorrow either. (Tomorrow isn't the only day my friend won't eat...)
Kaverini ei juo huomenna kahviakaan. = My friend won't drink coffee either tomorrow. (Coffee is one of the things my friend won't drink...)

b) Appended to verb in a negative clause Indicates confirmation of not doing something
Kaverini ei juokaan huomenna kahvia. = But my friend won't drink coffee tomorrow.
(Minä) en syönytkään eilen jäätelöä = But I didn't eat ice-cream yesterday.

Conjunction
Typically, the negative verb fuses with the preceding conjunction
Ja + e[] -> jae[] -> e[]kä =… and… No
Että + e[] ->ette[] = …that… no
Jos + e[] -> jose[] = …if …no
Joss + e[] = josse[] + …. Iff… no

Am I thinking about this the right way? Any suggestions would be great!

Sources:
1) Wiktionary (both English and Finnish)
2) Leila White “A Grammar Book of Finnish
3) Merlijn de Smit: Negation in old finnish legal texts [Edit - I dont know the exact reference, but if you google this phrase, you will get the pdf]

[Jukka Aho]

Stumbling around the rules on verb negation, negative pronouns etc, it seemed that they were smaller, more random insights into a more general topic of negation. With this idea, I started to think about how do you really negate a sentence? Surprisingly, I managed to do it many ways, to various parts of a sentence [...] So, with this in mind, I started collecting forms and usage of various Finnish negations. Here goes:

Hey, that’s really quite a comprehensive study into the subject. Well done. I’m impressed. :)

Noun
I guess noun negation is achieved with using “ei” in the place of “not”. I think!!

Hmm, what kind of English sentences do you have in mind here?

Koskaan, ikinä, millionkaan, mihinkään etc = anytime, anywhere, can occur on their own in question clauses only

You’ve got a typo in there. (millionkaan vs milloinkaan)

Adjective
Prefix (epä-) Used to invert the meaning of a word. English counterparts include in-, non-, un- (in some cases mis-, mal-)
selvä (clear) – epaselvä (unclear)
I am sure there are others..'

(Your epä- in the word epäselvä is missing it’s dots.)

You sometimes see adjectives used with the ei- prefix as well, such as in...

    ei-uskonnolliset ihmiset (non-religious people)

...but this might not be a “recommended” way of forming negation. (It could – at least in some cases – imply quick-and-dirty, sloppy, lazy translation from another language. For example, the above could be replaced with the “more Finnish” descriptive phrase “ihmiset, jotka eivät ole uskonnollisia”.)

Conjunction
Typically, the negative verb fuses with the preceding conjunction
Ja + e[] -> jae[] -> e[]kä =… and… No
Että + e[] ->ette[] = …that… no
Jos + e[] -> jose[] = …if …no
Joss + e[] = josse[] + …. Iff… no

“Jos ei” is just “jos ei”, it doesn’t have a combined form, except perhaps in particularly sloppy writing. (There is also no separate double-s form of jos... what’s that all about?) In practice, “jos ei” will get pronounced as “jossei” in speech, though, unless you’re putting some special effort in trying to enunciate the words separately, for emphasis or clarity.

[Satish]

Noun
I guess noun negation is achieved with using “ei” in the place of “not”. I think!!

Hmm, what kind of English sentences do you have in mind here?

This one bend's my mind a bit. I suppose I am trying to make a difference between "No animals can enter here " and "Animals cannot enter here". The first one is negating animals and the second the verb enter.

You’ve got a typo in there...Your epä- in the word epäselvä is missing it’s dots..

Fixed, thanks!

There is also no separate double-s form of jos... what’s that all about?

I found joss in the finnish wikipedia and is defined as jos ja vain jos (if and only if?) If I remember my code cutting days, there is a big logical difference to just "if".

Hey, that’s really quite a comprehensive study into the subject. Well done. I’m impressed.

Thanks! My next attempt will be the Optative mood, but give me a few weeks..

[Jukka Aho]

Noun
I guess noun negation is achieved with using “ei” in the place of “not”. I think!!

Hmm, what kind of English sentences do you have in mind here?

This one bend's my mind a bit. I suppose I am trying to make a difference between "No animals can enter here " and "Animals cannot enter here". The first one is negating animals and the second the verb enter.

In prohibitive signs and warnings, this is solved by phrasing it “Ei eläimiä”, “Ei rullaluistimilla sisään kauppaan”, “Ei palautusoikeutta”, “Ei sateenvarjoja museoon”, etc. but this is not normal, natural language, so you wouldn’t use it in other contexts. Signs and warnings use these kind of forms to remain terse and compact. (Another form of “sign language” is of course “X [on] kielletty”, as in “Tupakointi kielletty”, “Pysäköinti kielletty”, “Nenän kaivaminen kielletty arkipäivisin kello 8—16”)

There is also no separate double-s form of jos... what’s that all about?

I found joss in the finnish wikipedia and is defined as jos ja vain jos (if and only if?) If I remember my code cutting days, there is a big logical difference to just "if".

Oh, that one. But “joss” (iff) is a connective used in formal logic; not really a part of natural language, so it’s probably of little significance or use to most language learners.

[Jukka Aho]

A song which uses several “negative” words to relay a positive message:



(Lyrics)