Pian and Kohta

[Fasianos]

Is there a difference between these Kohta and Pian? My dictionary says "Soon", but as always with Finnish, I sense there might be a nuance between the two?

[Jukka Aho]

Is there a difference between these Kohta and Pian? My dictionary says "Soon", but as always with Finnish, I sense there might be a nuance between the two? :?

They are often interchangeable. But maybe the actual difference between them could be described as follows:

kohta = “in a (brief) moment”
pian = “soon”

So pian would be more open-ended... and more “relative”, so to speak. (I also have a hunch that kohta is not used in past-tense sentences all that much as it tends to be somehow... more forward-looking?)

[Satish]

Hmm… Fasianos' and Jukka’s comments gave me an interesting opportunity to learn about the word pian.

To understand pian, Wiktionary led me to the noun prefix pika- signifying quick or fast. (pikajuna = express train, pikanäppäin = keyboard short). The cases of pika- turned out to be adverbs, with Pian belonging to a small family:

Pian (instructive case: expresses the means or the instrument used to perform an action) 2 520 000 hits on google
Its meanings fell into two main categories:
1. a short time later = kohta
2. quickly, urgently = nopeasti, kiirresti

The first explained the overlap with kohta - Lähden pian vs Lähden kohta. The second meaning was very interesting since it conformed to the true use of the instructive case. Maybe kohta could also have overlaps here - Hän tulee kohta takaisin, but with a sense of shortly rather than quickly.

Pikaa (partitive case: indicating a part rather than the whole of something; e.g. some) 33 800 hits
Appeared mainly in a set phrase Tuota pikaa = tuossa tuokiossa = in a jiffy, in next to no time

Tuota pikaa tullaan itse Torreviejaan, jonka ensimmäinen kaupunginosa on La Mata ("Pensaikko"). 
Olen vakuuttunut, että orastavaakin rasismia arvioidaan niin monella silmä- ja korvaparilla, että ne tuota pikaa päätyvät viralliseen tutkintaan.
Kyllä se vanhenee, mutta ei sentään ihan tuossa tuokiossa.

Piakkoin (temporal case: indicates a time) 155 000 hits
Piakkoin = in the near future, soon, shortly
Seen in the titles of articles and emails mainly

Clintonin Suomen vierailun ajankohta varmistunee piakkoin.
Dollari romahtaa piakkoin?

As always, there was no clear answer to the original question about difference, but the thinking around how adverbs are formed from original case forms really helped me..

Sources:
[1] Wiktionary.
[2] Uusi SuomiEnglanti SuurSanakirja, Raija Hurme, WSOY, 1984.
[3] CD-Perussanakirja Oy Edita, 1997.

Edits
1) Cleaned up irritating changes in tense and repetitions
2) Corrected spelling of kiirresti. Thanks Rob A.!

[Rob A.]

Hmm… Fasianos' and Jukka’s comments gave me an interesting opportunity to learn about the word pian.

To understand pian, Wiktionary led me to the noun prefix pika- signifying quick or fast. (pikajuna = express train, pikanäppäin = keyboard short). The cases of pika- turned out to be adverbs, with Pian belonging to a small family:

Pian (instructive case: expresses the means or the instrument used to perform an action) 2 520 000 hits on google
Its meanings fell into two main categories:
1. a short time later = kohta
2. quickly, urgently = nopeasti, kirresti

The first explained the overlap with kohta - Lähden pian vs Lähden kohta. The second meaning was very interesting since it conformed to the true use of the instructive case. Maybe kohta could also have overlaps here - Hän tulee kohta takaisin, but with a sense of shortly rather than quickly.

Pikaa (partitive case: indicating a part rather than the whole of something; e.g. some) 33 800 hits
Appeared mainly in a set phrase Tuota pikaa = tuossa tuokiossa = in a jiffy, in next to no time

Tuota pikaa tullaan itse Torreviejaan, jonka ensimmäinen kaupunginosa on La Mata ("Pensaikko"). 
Olen vakuuttunut, että orastavaakin rasismia arvioidaan niin monella silmä- ja korvaparilla, että ne tuota pikaa päätyvät viralliseen tutkintaan.
Kyllä se vanhenee, mutta ei sentään ihan tuossa tuokiossa.

Piakkoin (temporal case: indicates a time) 155 000 hits
Piakkoin = in the near future, soon, shortly
Seen in the titles of articles and emails mainly

Clintonin Suomen vierailun ajankohta varmistunee piakkoin.
Dollari romahtaa piakkoin?

As always, there was no clear answer to the original question about difference, but the thinking around how adverbs are formed from original case forms really helped me..

Sources:
[1] Wiktionary.
[2] Uusi SuomiEnglanti SuurSanakirja, Raija Hurme, WSOY, 1984.
[3] CD-Perussanakirja Oy Edita, 1997.

Edits
1) Cleaned up irritating changes in tense and repetitions

Good analysis....and an interesting thread....I, too, started looking a little more closely at the word, pian... and could quickly see that it led to the prefix pika-....

Based on Jukka's explanation, I was wondering if pian might have retained a bit of the sense of urgency implied by pika-....that you might use pian....say, with an expression such a:

Nähdään pian... to imply a bit more urgency than if you were to say: Nähdään kohta........Or maybe Nähdään kohta... would have a slight note of tentativeness about it...??...

Also I noticed your word *kirresti...which should be kiireesti...

[Aside: A good time to discuss again the Finnish "ghost" consonant (pdf page 12 in here)....Kiire is one of those Finnish nouns ending in "e"....implying that there was once a consonant there.... The effect tends to be that the "e" is double and the invisible "presence" of the this consonant affects the various declensions of kiire...presumably...??...even now-fixed adverbial forms... ]

[And the closest word I could find to *kirresti is kirrestä...the elative form of kirsi...now why the "s" changes to an "r" is another "mystery"...I thought "s" was a strong letter in Finnish...???...Oh well something for some future investigation...]

[Jukka Aho]

Based on Jukka's explanation, I was wondering if pian might have retained a bit of the sense of urgency implied by pika-....that you might use pian....say, with an expression such a:

Nähdään pian... to imply a bit more urgency than if you were to say: Nähdään kohta.....

Well, what I tried to say above was that pian is more “open-ended” and more “relative” in its time-scale than kohta. So it’s almost the opposite of what you suggest.

“Nähdään kohta” would suggest, to me, that we’ll be seeing again after a brief moment. How brief? Maybe in one-and-a-half minutes; maybe it’ll take 15. An hour would already be stretching it. “Kohta” is almost like a promise: the expectation is that we will be seeing very soon – there’s no doubt about it – and the “soon” is usually measured in minutes or seconds rather than hours.

When they exclaim “See you on the other side!” in movies – before dashing head-first in a garbage chute while swerving bullets, or whatever – “Nähdään kohta!” could be a workable translation in the Finnish subtitles if there’s no space left for a longer text.

“Nähdään pian”, on the other hand, could refer just to a general wish about “seeing you soon” at some point in the future, within some reasonable timeframe. Maybe six months is “soon” in some context, maybe it is a couple of hours in the other.

“Nähdään pian” could also be used similarly as “Nähdään kohta” – for referring to very brief moments of time; in the scale of seconds and minutes – but the opposite does not appear to be true: “Nähdään kohta” cannot refer to weeks or months, unless used in an ironic or belittling sense.

kirrestä...the elative form of kirsi...now why the "s" changes to an "r" is another "mystery"...I thought "s" was a strong letter in Finnish...???...Oh well something for some future investigation...:D]

Here’s Mrs. Mäkäräinen’s take on the matter.

[Rob A.]

Based on Jukka's explanation, I was wondering if pian might have retained a bit of the sense of urgency implied by pika-....that you might use pian....say, with an expression such a:

Nähdään pian... to imply a bit more urgency than if you were to say: Nähdään kohta.....

Well, what I tried to say above was that pian is more “open-ended” and more “relative” in its time-scale than kohta. So it’s almost the opposite of what you suggest.

“Nähdään kohta” would suggest, to me, that we’ll be seeing again after a brief moment. How brief? Maybe in one-and-a-half minutes; maybe it’ll take 15. An hour would already be stretching it. “Kohta” is almost like a promise: the expectation is that we will be seeing very soon – there’s no doubt about it – and the “soon” is usually measured in minutes or seconds rather than hours.

When they exclaim “See you on the other side!” in movies – before dashing head-first in a garbage chute while swerving bullets, or whatever – “Nähdään kohta!” could be a workable translation in the Finnish subtitles if there’s no space left for a longer text.

“Nähdään pian”, on the other hand, could refer just to a general wish about “seeing you soon” at some point in the future, within some reasonable timeframe. Maybe six months is “soon” in some context, maybe it is a couple of hours in the other.

“Nähdään pian” could also be used similarly as “Nähdään kohta” – for referring to very brief moments of time; in the scale of seconds and minutes – but the opposite does not appear to be true: “Nähdään kohta” cannot refer to weeks or months, unless used in an ironic or belittling sense.

Thanks...that's much clearer... So if I wanted to show sincerity in wanting to see someone again very soon, I would say:

Nähdään kohta.......and if it's a more general wish without any strong desire...it would be Nähdään pian..... ??? Kohta would have more emotion attached to it than pian...????...

kirrestä...the elative form of kirsi...now why the "s" changes to an "r" is another "mystery"...I thought "s" was a strong letter in Finnish...???...Oh well something for some future investigation...]

Here’s Mrs. Mäkäräinen’s take on the matter.

Yes...I'm not sure what I was thinking... ..."s" is always changing....uusi...uuden; susi...suden; vuosi...vuoden....ad nauseum... I think my mind was stuck on consonant gradation.... I can't, at the moment, remember what this change is called, but I do recall a discussion during one of my Finnish classes about this...I seem to remember the instructor saying something about this applying only to old Finnish words...something about the "s" having replaced some older letter, but this change not affecting the declined forms.... But I might be wrong about this...???

[silk]

“Nähdään kohta” would suggest, to me, that we’ll be seeing again after a brief moment. How brief? Maybe in one-and-a-half minutes; maybe it’ll take 15. An hour would already be stretching it. “Kohta” is almost like a promise: the expectation is that we will be seeing very soon – there’s no doubt about it – and the “soon” is usually measured in minutes or seconds rather than hours.

I wonder if the word kohtalo, "fate", is related to kohta or if it is just a coincidence.

Nähdään kohta.......and if it's a more general wish without any strong desire...it would be Nähdään pian..... ??? Kohta would have more emotion attached to it than pian...????...

Can't help but play with cultural stereotypes here... The North-American "see you soon", "see you around" doesn't carry as much desire or promise as the Finnish nähdään kohta.

[Rob A.]

“Nähdään kohta” would suggest, to me, that we’ll be seeing again after a brief moment. How brief? Maybe in one-and-a-half minutes; maybe it’ll take 15. An hour would already be stretching it. “Kohta” is almost like a promise: the expectation is that we will be seeing very soon – there’s no doubt about it – and the “soon” is usually measured in minutes or seconds rather than hours.

I wonder if the word kohtalo, "fate", is related to kohta or if it is just a coincidence.

Nähdään kohta.......and if it's a more general wish without any strong desire...it would be Nähdään pian..... ??? Kohta would have more emotion attached to it than pian...????...

Can't help but play with cultural stereotypes here... The North-American "see you soon", "see you around" doesn't carry as much desire or promise as the Finnish nähdään kohta.

So it seems, "nähdään kohta" would be close to the English, "see you shortly", which implies a definite commitment to meet with the person, usually at some specifc time very close at hand, and "nähdään pian", to, "see you in a while" ...which is a more general, but usually...though not always, ....a definite commitment to meet. "See you later"....can sometimes be a commitment, but tends, I think, to be a vague, noncommitted "goodbye". "See you around" is definitely not a commitment to meet again.... I suppose the Finnish equivalents would be "moi"; "moi, moi"; "hei"; "hei, hei".... ...

[Pursuivant]

OK

Jukka is so full of expllanations... for me:

Nähdään kohta = I'll see you in = 10-20 minutes, today
Nähdään pian = I'll see you in = today, tomorrow, in 3 months, next year

just "Nähdään" means... bye... "näkyillään" is "I'll be seeing you around"