1

Estonian, Finnish, and other European languages

Helle MetslangEstonian: typology and databases

Szeged, 27–30 April 2009

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SAE (Standard Average European) 1 B.L. Whorf 1939 (the concept of SAE developed by

comparing Native American languages with the well-known European languages)

M. Haspelmath 1998, 2001: 12 typical structural features were singled out (they occur in most European languages but are usually missing elsewhere)

SAE includes Romance, Germanic, Baltic, and Slavic languages, Albanian, Greek, Hungarian (2001)

3

SAE (Standard Average European) 2 Background to the shared features: great

migrations during the transition period from antiquity to the Middle Ages, at the beginning of the formation of European common cultural space. The SAE linguistic area is also known as the Charlemagne-Sprachbund.

Estonian and Finnish – SAE periphery (1998) / outside SAE, only two shared features (2001).

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Nucleus. core and periphery of SAE (Haspelmath 1998)

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SAE features 1

Haspelmath 2001:

1) Definite and indefinite article (-),

cf. article-like use of E see ‘this’, üks ‘one’; in Finnish, too, se functions as an article

Ma ei jaksa täna seda ajalugu őppida

‘Today I have no energy to study the history’

Üks tüdruk tői sulle ühe raamatu‘A girl brought you a book’

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SAE features 2

2) Relative clauses come after the noun; the clause opens with a declinable relative pronoun (e.g. (der/die/das/welcher/welche/welches; who, whose, whom) (+)

E raamat, mida (P) ma lugesin

F kirja, jota (P) luin

‘the book that I read’

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WALS map 123: relativization of obliques

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SAE features 3

3) have-perfect (-)Estonian and Finnish have the olema-perfect

(‘be-perfect’). Nevertheless, possessive syntactic structures with the impersonal / passive perfect are spreading in Estonian E Mul on õpitud

I-AD learn:IMPS:PFCT

F Olen lukenut läksyniread:PFCT:1SG homework

‘I’m done with my homework’

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SAE features 4

4) Nominative experiencer prevails (-).

Use of syntactic patterns with the nominative experiencer is becoming more frequent in Estonian

Peeter (NOM) armastab teatrit

Peetrile (ALLAT) meeldib teater

‘Peeter loves the theatre’

Peeter (NOM) vajab puhkust

Peetril (ADESS) on vaja puhkust

‘Peeter needs some rest’

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SAE features 5

5) Participial passive (-)is spreading in Estonian.

E Te olete külla kutsutud‘You have been invited to visit us’

F puukirkoista,jotka ovat sisältä leikkauksin koristellut (ISK)'from wooden churches that are decorated inside with woodcuts'

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SAE features 6

6) Prevalence of anti-causative (intransitive) verb derivation over causative derivation (-) It’s true that causative derivation is more common in Estonian and also in Finnish

E loobuma ‘to give up’ > loovutama ‘to surrender sth’sööma ‘to eat’ > söötma ‘to feed’jätkama ‘to continue sth’ > jätkuma ‘to continue’

F luopua > luovuttaapestä ‘to wash’ > peseytyä ‘to wash oneself’

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SAE features 7

7) Dative external possessors (Die Mutter wäscht dem Kind die Haare ‘Mother is washing the hair of her child’) (-)

Three ways to express the possessor: 1) dative (Die Mutter wäscht dem Kind die Haare), 2) locative, 3) NP-internal (English).

Estonian: locative, NPEma peseb lapsel (AD) juukseid / lapse (G) juukseid‘Mother is washing the hair of her child’)Tüdrukul (AD) suri vanaisa‘The girl’s grandpa died’

Finnish: NP, ablativeÄiti pesee lapsen (G) hiuksiaTytöltä (ABL) kuoli isoäiti

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SAE features 8

8) Negative indefinitepronouns and lack of verbal negation (Niemand kommt, nobody comes)

(-)Two form types: 1) V + NI (Niemand kommt), 2)

NV + NI

Estonian, Finnish NV + NIE (Mitte) keegi ei tule F Kukaan ei tule

nobody NEG come

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SAE features 9

9) Comparative constructions with a particle (+)Types of the comparative construction: 1) locative (‘bigger from / to /

at X‘), 2) the exceed comparative (‘Y is bigger exceeding X‘), 3) the conjoining comparative (‘Y is big, Y is little‘), 4) the particle comparative (bigger than X).

Estonian: particle, locativeEma on noorem kui isaEma on isast (EL) noorem‘Mother is younger than father‘

Finnish: particle, partitive (<locative)Äiti on nuorempi kuin isä.Äiti on isää (P) nuorempi

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SAE features 10

10) relative-based equative constructions (-): so groβ wie ein Elefant

nii suur kui elevant

‘as big as an elephant’

niin iso kuin norsu

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SAE features 11

11) Subject person affixes as strict agreement markers (-). The verb has personal forms and the subject is obligatory: du kommst, wir kommen

It does not occur in Estonian and Finnish:E tuled, ei tule F tulet, et tule

‘you come, you don’t come’

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SAE features 12

12) Intensifier-reflexive differentiation (-): different pronouns used as intensifiers (G selbst, R sam) and reflexives (G sich, R sebja)

E intensifier ise, endaMinister ise (N) tuleb‘The minister himself will come’Oodatakse ministrit ennast (P)‘The minister himself is expected to come’

reflexive enda, iseendaMinister kiitis ennast / iseennast (P) ‘The minister praised himself’

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SAE features 13

F intensifier itse, itse+PSx

Ministeri itse tulee

Odotetaan ministeria itseään

reflexive itse+PSx

Ministeri kehui itseään

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SAE features, Estonian and Finnish Both Estonian and Finnish have the following

features: 2 (relative pronoun), 9 (comparative with a particle), and 10 (equative with a relative construction)

Both languages lack the following features: 6 (anti-causative), 7 (dative possessor), 8 (negation with a pronoun), 11 (obligatory predicate agreement with the pronoun); Finnish has no 3 (have-perfect)

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SAE features, Estonian and Finnish Developments in the direction of SAE-like

features in Estonian: features 1 (article), 3 (possessive perfect), 4 (nominative experiencer), 5 (passive), 12 (reflexive pronouns); in Finnish 1, 4, 5, 12?

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Some further likely SAE features 1Because of insufficient data Haspelmath did not

include on his list, for example,

AND-coordination (vs WITH-coordination) E isa ja ema, F isä ja äiti‘father and mother’

also WITH-coordination: isa emaga, isä äidin kanssa ‘father with mother’

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Some further likely SAE features 2 Verb fronting in polar interrogatives

(inversion)E Tuled sa koju? ‘Will you come home?’

interrogative particle: Kas sa tuled koju?

F particle: Tuletko kotiin?

Spoken language reveals also inversion: Tulet sä kotiin?

Comparative marking of adjectives

(E suure-m, F suure-mpi ‘bigger’)

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Some further likely SAE features 3 Comitative-instrumental syncretism Comitative: jalutab lapsega (COM)’is walking

with the child’, kirjutab pliiatsiga (COM) ‘writes in pencil’ Syncretism is absent in Finnish: kävelee lapsen kanssa (POSTP), kirjoittaa kynällä (AD)

Suppletive second ordinal numeral: E kaks – teine, F kaksi – toinen‚ zwei – zweite‘ (vgl. two – second)

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Some comparisons between Estonian, Finnish, German, and Russian Opposition of totality-partiality 1 The application of the opposition of totality –

partiality is more restricted in Estonian than in Finnish

E Pahempoolsed on saamas võitu (P) Poola valimistel

F Vasemmisto on saamassa voiton (G) Puolan vaaleissa

‘The lefties are gaining a victory at the Polish elections’

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Totality-partiality opposition 2

The opposition of totality–partiality occurs in several Circum-Baltic-languages (Finnic, Baltic, Russian). In the case of negation Estonian and Finnish always have the partial object and the partial subject in existential sentences; in similar cases Russian tends to have the genitive (not the nominative or the accusative).

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Totality-partiality opposition 3

Partial objectE Ma ei saanud seda raamatut (P)F En saanut sitä kirjaa (P)R Ja ne polučila ètoj knigi (G) / ètu knigu (ACC)‘I did not receive this book’

Partial subject:E Mul ei ole raamatut (P)F Minulla ei ole kirjaa (P)R U menja net knigi (G)‘I don’t have the book’

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Expression of aspectual meaning by means of verb particles

ära jooma – aus/trinken – vy/pit‘ ‘drink up’, ära viima – abf/ühren – u/nesti ‘take away’, läbi lugema – durch/lesen – pro/čitat ‘read through‘.

E Ema lõhku-s tassi ära

F Äiti rikko-i muki-n

D Die Mutter zerbrach die Tasse

R Mama raz-bi-la čašku

‘Mother broke a cup’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: saama 1Quasi-auxiliaries saama ‘get, become’, tohtima ‘may, be

allowed’, laskma ‘let’, ähvardama ‘threaten’, tõotama ‘promise’

SAAMA: future

E Elu saa-b ole-ma raskeF Elämä tulee ole-maan vaikeaD Das Leben wird schwer sein R Žizn‘ bude-t nelegka

‘Life will be hard’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: saama 2 SAAMA: impersonal construction

E Sa-i palju tantsi-tud

become-PST a lot dance-PASS:PART

F Tul-i tanssi-ttu-a paljon

come-PST dance-PASS:PART-PRTV a lot

D Es wurde viel getanzt

‘We used to dance a lot’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: saama 3 SAAMA: passive construction’

E Töö sa-i teh-tud

work become-PST make-PASS:PART

F Työ tul-i teh-dy-ksi

work come-PST make-PASS:PART-TRN

D Die Arbeit wurde gemacht

‘The work was done’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: tohtima TOHTIMA ‘may, be allowed’ – a special deontic

modal verb (similar to the German dürfen; in Finnish the common modal verbs as saada ‘can’, pitää ‘must’, tarvita ‘need’, etc.; it’s the same in Russian)

E Lapsed tohivad meres ujuda

F Lapset saavat uida meressä

D Die Kinder dürfen im See baden

‘The children are allowed to swim in the sea’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: laskma 1 LASKMA ‘to let’ (Finnish reveals derivation, e.g. rakentaa

> rakennuttaa or antaa ‘to give‘; Russian uses dat‘/davat‘ ‘to give‘).

E Lapsed lasid isal segamatult töötada

F Lapset antoivat isän työskennellä rauhassa

G Die Kinder lieβen den Vater ungestört arbeiten

R Deti dali otcu spokojno rabotat’

‘The children let the father work undisturbed’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: laskma 2

Particle las:

E las olla!

G laß sein!

‘let (it) be’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: ähvardama, tõotama 1 ÄHVARDAMA ‘to threaten’, TÕOTAMA ‘to promise’ in the

function of modal verbs

G Das Hochwasser droht die Altstadt zu überschwemmenE Suurvesi ähvardab vanalinna üle ujutada

‘The flood threatens to flood the old city’

F USA:n ja E-Korean vapaakauppasopimus uhkaa kariutua (HS)‘The treaty of free commerce between the USA and South-Korea threatens to fall through’

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Verb constructions with quasi-auxiliaries: ähvardama, tõotama 2GMein Mann droht krank zu werden

E Mu mees ähvardab haigeks jääda

‘My husband is likely to fall ill’

G Die Aktienkurse verspechen zu steigen

E Aktsiakursid tõotavad tõusta

‘Share prices promise to rise’

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Evidentiality

Expression of the opposition of direct and indirect information in verb morphology (Circum-Baltic: Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian)

E Maril olevat (QUOT) palju aega

G Mari habe (CONJ:PRES) viel Zeit

F Marilla on (IND) kuulemma (PARTICLE) paljon aikaa

R U Mari, govorjat (PARTICLE), mnogo vremeni (IND)

‘Mari is reported to have a lot of time’

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Infinitive as the predicate: command

E Mitte (NEG) akna peal seista (dINF)!

F Ei saa seistä ikkunalla!

G Nicht am Fenster stehen!

R Na okne ne (NEG) stojat’ (INF)!

‘No standing in the window’

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Infinitive as the predicate: final clauseE Pylkkänen peitis suu käega, et (CONJ) mitte

(NEG) muiata (smile:dINF) F Pylkkänen peitti suunsa kädellään, ettei

(CONJ.NEG) hymyilisi (COND)G Konsta hielt sich die Hand vor dem Mund, um

sein Grinsen zu verbergenR Pjulkkjanen prikryl rot rukoi, čtoby (CONJ) ne

(NEG) ulybnutsja (INF)‘Pylkkänen covered his mouth with his hand in

order not to smile’

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Subordinating conjunctives: person agreement of the relative pronounE Sina, kes sa kõik oled teinud, pole ära teeninud

etteheiteid.G Du, der du alles getan hast, verdienst keinen Vorwurf‘You who have done everything have not deserved any

criticisms’

No agreement:F Sinä, joka olet tehnyt kaiken,…R Ty, kto vsë sdelal, …

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Subordinating conjunctives: kusjuures etc.

Subordinating adverbs that join a subordinate clause with the entire main clause (and not some part of the sentence): kusjuures (G wobei, indem, R pričëm) ’whereas’, mispeale (G worauf) ‘whereupon’, misüle (G worüber) ‘over what’.

E Ta läks läbi metsa, kusjuures ta aeg-ajalt peatus ja kuulatas.

G Er ging durch den Wald, wobei/indem er ab und zu stehen blieb und horchte.‘He walked through the forest and stopped from time to time and listened awhile’

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Subordinating conjunctives: kusjuures etc.

R v pohode byli tri dnja, pričëm nočevali v palatkah

‘they undertook a three-day hike whereas they camped in tents’

E alused põrkasid kokku, kusjuures teine uppus F alukset törmäsivät yhteen, jolloin toinen niistä

upposi (usual relative time adverb)‘the vessels clashed whereas the other one sank’

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Multifunctionality of quantifiers: väga väga ‘very’

E väga ilus, väga kiiresti, väga palju, ma armastan sind väga

F hyvin / erittäin kaunis / nopeasti / paljon; rakastan sinua paljon

G sehr schön, sehr schnell, sehr viel: ich liebe dich sehrR očen‘ krasivyj / bystro / mnogo, ja tebja očen‘ ljublju‘very beautiful, very fast, very much, I love you very much’

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Multifunctionality of quantifiers: palju palju : paljud ‘much; many’

E palju vett, palju sõpru, paljud sõbrad

F paljon vettä, paljon ystäviä, useat / monet ystävät

G viel Wasser, viele Freunde

R mnogo vody, mnogo druzej, mnogie druz’ja

‘much water, many friends, many of the friends’

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Word order (V2, frame construction) E Anna on oma raamatud ümber tõstnudF Anna on siirtänyt kirjansa toiseen paikkaanG Anna hat ihre Bücher umgestellt‘Anna has rearranged her books’

E Täna tuleb Anna kojuF Tänään Anna tulee kotiinG Heute kommt Anna nach HauseR Segodnja Anna pridët domoj‘Anna will come home today’

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Syncretism of comitative and instructiveMetaphor INSTRUMENT IS A COMPANION

Anne kirjutab pliiatsiga

Anne kirjoittaa kynällä

Anne schreibt mit dem Bleistift

Anne pišet karandašom

‘Anne writes in pencil’

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Summary of comparisons (use the symbol + or -)

Feature Finnish Estonian German Russian

Totality-partiality

Aspect with verb particles

saama, laskma, tohtima as auxiliaries

Evidential verb form

Infinitive as the predicate

Conjunctive kes sa, kusjuures

INSTRUMENT IS A COMPANION

väga, paljud

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Summary of comparisonsFeature Finnish Estonian German Russian

Totality-partiality ++ + - ±

Aspect with verb particles ± + + +

saama, laskma, tohtima as auxiliaries

- + + -

Evidential verb form - + + -

Infinitive as the predicate - + + +

Conjunctive kes sa, kusjuures - + + +

INSTRUMENT IS A COMPANION

- + + ±

väga, paljud - + + +

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Concerning Finnish against the background of the languages of Europe and the world Dahl 2005: how exotic is Finnish?

(the conclusions are probably valid for Estonian, too)

Euro-centrism in linguistics; the Uralic languages are regarded as exotic, e.g. typical agglutinating languages, such as Finnish and Turkish.

The position of Finnish in typology according to WALS.

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Languages that are typologically close to Finnish 1Typological distance between two languages:

how many of the 142 WALS features are represented in these languages?

Close languages include: Slavic and Baltic languages spoken in the

Circum-Baltic area Genetically related languages Probably some accidentally close languages

(e.g. Armenian)

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Languages that are typologically close to Finnish 2Languages that are typologically closest to Finnish (according to

WALS; the figure showing typological distance)(East-)Armenia (Indo-European) 22Polish (Indo-European) 25Latvian (Indo-European) 25Nenets (Uralic) 25Bulgarian (Indo-European) 26Latvian (Indo-European) 26Russian (Indo-European) 27Kashmir (Indo-European) 27Evenki (Altaic) 28Brahui (Dravidian) 28Turkish (Altaic) 29Hungarian (Uralic) 29

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Concerning agglutination in FinnishAccording to classical morphological typology,

languages are divided into isolating, agglutinating, inflecting (fusional languages) and polysynthetic languages.

In the case of Finnish one can ask – is Finnish an agglutinating or inflecting language?

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Agglutination in Finnish: a quantitative comparison Haspelmath (2009) compared 30 languages, incl.

Finnish, Hungarian, and Turkish, on the basis of three parameters that characterize fusional languages

1. Cumulation: how many morphological categories can be found in a single morpheme

2. Alternation: abundance of allomorphs in stems and affixes

3. Suppletion: variation of forms cannot be explained by phonology or morphology (e.g. go : went)

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Agglutination in Finnish: a quantitative comparisonAccording to these parameters

More agglutinative e.g. Turkic, Swahili

More fusional e.g. German, Latin, Arabic

Finnish, Hungarian: close to the fusional end

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Agglutination in Finnish: inflectional synthesis of the verb 1 Inflectional synthesis of the verb: number of

categories in a verb form (WALS, 145 languages). Finnish has 2–3.

For example, Romance languages reveal a richer verb morphology (tense, aspect, and mood are combined in verb forms)

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Agglutination in Finnish: inflectional synthesis of the verb 2Number of categories per word form

Number of languages

0–1 5

2–3 24 (incl. Finnish)

4–5 52

6–7 31

8–9 24

10-11 7

12-13 2

Total 147

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Agglutination in Finnish: number of cases WALS: among 261 languages there are only 24 that

have over 10 cases. Uralic languages, with the largest number in Hungarian; also Finnish.

Also infinitives are declinable Dahl: it is the case system that makes the Uralic

languages, so to say, typologically special and make an impression of agglutination

Also, the possessive suffix adds to agglutination; however, possessive suffixes can be found in three-fourthd of the languages covered by WALS.

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WALS map 49: number of cases

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Summary of Finnish and other Finnic languages by comparison with the languages of Europe and the worldDahl: Finnish cannot be regarded as an SAE

language, but it is rather close to this status. During the co-existence that spans over several millennia the Uralic and Indo-European languages around the Baltic Sea have converged while there has been divergence from their genetically related eastern languages.

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References 1

Dahl, Östen 2008, Kuinka eksoottinen suomen kieli on? - Virittäjä 4: 545–559.

Erelt, Mati 1996, Relative words in Estonian relative clauses - Erelt, Mati (ed.), Estonian: Typological Studies I. (Publications of the Department of Estonian of the University of Tartu 4.) Tartu: Tartu University Press, 9–23.

Erelt, Mati & Helle Metslang 2006, Estonian clause patterns — from Finno-Ugric to SAE. – Linguistica Uralica 2006, nr. 4, 254–266

Goddard, Cliff 2001, Lexico-semantic universals: A critical overview, - Linguistic Typology 5.1, 1–65.

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References 2

Haspelmath, Martin 1998, How young is standard average European? - Linguistic Sciences, 20.3: 272287.

Haspelmath, Martin 2001, The European linguistic area: Standard Average European. - Haspelmath, M. et al. (eds.), Language typology and language universals: An international handbook. Vol. 2. (Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft, 20.2.) New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1492–1510.

Haspelmath, Martin 2009, An empirical test of the Agglutination Hypothesis. – Magni, Elisabett; Scalise, Sergio; Bisetto, Antonietta (eds.), Universals of Language Today. (Sudies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 76.) Springer, 13-29.

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References 3

Heine, Bernd & Kuteva, Tania 2006, The changing languages of Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Lindström, Liina & Tragel, Ilona 2007, Eesti keele impersonaali ja seisundipassiivi vahekorrast adessiivargumendi kasutuse põhjal. – Keel ja Kirjandus 7.

Metslang, Helle (forthcoming), Estonian grammar between Finnic and SAE: some comparisons. – Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung 1-2, 2009

Nichols, Johanna; Peterson, David E. & Barnes, Jonathan 2004, Transitivizing and detransitivizing languages, in: Linguistic Typology 8.2, 149–212.

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References 4

Pajusalu, Renate 1997, Is there an article in (spoken) Estonian? – Estonian: typological studies II. Ed. by Mati Erelt. (Tartu Ülikooli eesti keele õppetooli toimetised 8.) Tartu: 146-177.

Vliegen, Maurice 2007, The relation between lexical and epistemic readings: The equivalents of promise and threaten in Dutch and German - Bert Cornillie & Nicole Delbecque (eds.), Topics in Subjectification and Modalization, Belgian Journal of Linguistics 20 (2006). Benjamins, 73–96.

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References 5

Ziegelmann, Katja & Winkler, Eberhard 2006, Zum Einfluβ des Deutschen auf das Estnische. - Arold, Anne; Cherubim, Dieter; Neuendorff, Dagmar & Nikula, Henrik (Hrsg.), Deutsch am Rande Europas. (Humaniora: Germanistica 1.) Tartu: Tartu University Press, 43–70.

WALS = Haspelmath, Martin; Dryer, Matthew, Gil, David; Comrie, Bernhard (eds.) 2005, The World atlas of language structures. Oxford: Oxford University press. [http//www.wals.info]