In Finnish, you can turn a verb into a noun describing the person doing the action by adding the suffix -ja or -jä. This is equivalent to the English "-er" or "-or".
Vowel harmony applies: use -ja for words with back vowels (a, o, u), and -jä for words with front vowels (ä, ö, y) or only neutral vowels (e, i).
Forming Actor Nouns
Attach the suffix to the verb's strong stem. If the strong stem ends in -e, it changes to -i before the suffix.
- laulaa (to sing) → stem laula- → laulaja (singer)
- esiintyä (to perform) → stem esiinty- → esiintyjä (performer)
- lukea (to read) → stem luke- → lukija (reader)
- tehdä (to make/do) → stem teke- → tekijä (creator, maker)
| The narrator is also a performer. | Kertoja on myös esiintyjä. |
| Is the reader also a good spectator? | Onko lukija myös hyvä katsoja? |
| The dancer is the creator of this new play. | Tanssija on tämän uuden näytelmän tekijä. |
Actor Nouns in Different Cases
Because these new words are standard nouns, they take all the usual case endings depending on their grammatical role.
When expressing necessity with verbs like pitää (to have to), the actor noun takes the genitive case (-n):
| The dancer has to perform alone on the stage. | Tanssijan pitää esiintyä yksin lavalla. |
When the actor noun is the object of a verb that requires the partitive case, add the partitive ending (-a or -ä):
| Doesn't the spectator understand the performer? | Eikö katsoja ymmärrä esiintyjää? |
You will also frequently use these nouns with the allative case (-lle, meaning "to" or "for") when an action is directed at them:
| I give a flower to the player. | Annan kukan soittajalle. |
| This book is important to the reader and the listener. | Tämä kirja on tärkeä lukijalle ja kuuntelijalle. |