Breakdown of Me emme siivoa keittiötä tänään.
me
we
ei
no / not (negative verb)
tänään
today
siivota
to clean
Questions & Answers about Me emme siivoa keittiötä tänään.
Why is the word for kitchen keittiötä instead of the basic form keittiö?
Because this is a negative sentence. In Finnish, if you do not do an action to an object, that object must always be in the partitive case. Therefore, keittiö takes the partitive ending to become keittiötä.
Why does keittiötä end in -tä rather than the usual partitive endings -ta or -a?
This is due to vowel harmony. The word keittiö contains the front vowels e, i, and ö. Because it has front vowels, the ending must also use the front vowel ä, making the ending -tä.
Why does the verb siivoa not have the -mme ending for "we"?
In Finnish negative sentences, the negative word itself gets conjugated. Here, it becomes emme to match Me (we). The main verb siivoa stays in its basic negative form and does not take a personal ending.
The dictionary form for "to clean" is siivota. How do we get the form siivoa?
siivota is a Type 4 verb (verbs ending in -ta or -tä). To find the form used in negative sentences, you simply drop the -ta ending from the dictionary form. This leaves the stem siivoa.