Questions
In everyday speech, the -ko/kö suffix has the -s clitic added, becoming -kos/kös, which in turn reduces to -ks:
- olenko minä hengissä? → oo(n)ks mä hengis? "am I alive?"
- puhutko sinä englantia? → puhut sä enkkuu? or puhuks(ä) enkkuu? "do you (sg.) speak English?"
- tuliko hän jo? → tulikse jo? (via tuliko se jo?) "did he/she come yet?"
The choice of morphemes -kos/kös or -ks is not always purely dialectal or accidental. Many Finns regularly use more than one variation in their speech. The choice might depend among others on the rhythm of the sentence or the (wished) tempo of the discussion. Sometimes it has other clearly communicational purposes e.g. the longer variation might be used to soften an intruding question.
The clitic -s is also found in imperatives, e.g. me(n)es "(I expect you to) go!" It can also be, that the -tkö elides not to -ks, but -t before a 's', e.g. menetkö sä ? me(n)et sä. Because this is identical to sä menet except for the word order, questions are indicated by word order.
Read more about this topic: Colloquial Finnish
Famous quotes containing the word questions:
“In fact, now I come to think of it, do we decide questions, at all? We decide answers, no doubt: but surely the questions decide us? It is the dog, you know, that wags the tail—not the tail that wags the dog.”
—Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)
“The real grounds of difference upon important political questions no longer correspond with party lines.... Politics is no longer the topic of this country. Its important questions are settled... Great minds hereafter are to be employed on other matters.... Government no longer has its ancient importance.... The people’s progress, progress of every sort, no longer depends on government. But enough of politics. Henceforth I am out more than ever.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“Certainly the philosopher of ‘possible worlds’ must take care that his technical apparatus not push him to ask questions whose meaningfulness is not supported by our original intuitions of possibility that gave the apparatus its point.”
—Saul Kripke (b. 1940)