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:
“I loved reading, and had a great desire of attaining knowledge; but whenever I asked questions of any kind whatsoever, I was always told, “such things were not proper for girls of my age to know.”... For “Miss must not enquire too far into things, it would turn her brain; she had better mind her needlework, and such things as were useful for women; reading and poring on books would never get me a husband.””
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)
“I put forward formless and unresolved notions, as do those who publish doubtful questions to debate in the schools, not to establish the truth but to seek it.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
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—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)