Breakdown of Hänen ruokavalionsa on lihaton, koska hän on kasvissyöjä.
olla
to be
hän
he / she
koska
because
ruokavalio
diet
lihaton
meatless
kasvissyöjä
vegetarian
Questions & Answers about Hänen ruokavalionsa on lihaton, koska hän on kasvissyöjä.
How is the word lihaton formed?
It is made by taking the noun liha (meat) and adding the suffix -ton, which means "without" or "-less". This turns the noun into the adjective lihaton (meatless).
Why use -ton here, but sometimes -tön on other words?
It depends on vowel harmony! Words with back vowels (a, o, u) like liha take -ton. If the base word has front vowels (y, ä, ö), like työ (work), you must use -tön instead, making työtön (unemployed).
Why does ruokavalio (diet) have the ending -nsa?
In standard Finnish, when you say "his" or "her", you use the genitive pronoun hänen AND add the third-person possessive suffix -nsa (or -nsä) to the noun. So hänen ruokavalionsa is a mandatory double-marking that essentially means "his diet-his".
kasvissyöjä (vegetarian) looks like a very long word. What are its parts?
It is a compound of two words: kasvis (vegetable) and syöjä (eater). The word syöjä comes from the verb syödä (to eat). So a vegetarian in Finnish is literally a "vegetable-eater".
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