Monday, May 7, 2018

Finnish Negative Verb

Finnish is not a member of the Indo-European language family. It has a number of features which are not found in Indo-European languages. One of them is the negative verb.

The negative verb is conjugated in all persons. In English the be-verb is conjugated in phrases such as I am not, you are not and he/she is not. In Finnish, however, the negative verb is conjugated while the be-verb remains the same. Here are examples:

Minä en ole varma (I am not sure)
Sinä et ole varma (You are not sure)
Hän ei ole varma (He/She is not sure)
Me emme ole varma (We are not sure)
Te ette ole varma (You are not sure)
He eivät ole varma (They are not sure)

A special feature of Finnish is the negative verb. This is conjugated just like a regular verb. Unlike in English, the negative verb of Finnish precedes the main verb.

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