Breakdown of Ne oppii sanaston ulkoa toistamalla sanoja.
ne
they / those (non-human) / they (of people)
sana
word
oppia
to learn
sanasto
the vocabulary
toistaa
to repeat
ulkoa
by heart
Questions & Answers about Ne oppii sanaston ulkoa toistamalla sanoja.
How does toistamalla translate to "by repeating"?
This is the third infinitive adessive form, which you use to say "by doing" something. You take the third infinitive stem of toistaa (to repeat), which is toistama-, and add the adessive ending -lla. Here, it tells us exactly how the vocabulary is learned: by repeating.
Why is the verb oppii in the singular form when the subject Ne (they) is plural?
In spoken Finnish, it's very common to use the pronoun ne (literally "those") for "they" instead of the formal written pronoun he. A major rule of spoken Finnish is that when you use ne, the verb takes the 3rd-person singular form (oppii) rather than the plural form (oppivat).
Why is the word ulkoa used here for "by heart"? Doesn't it mean "from outside"?
Yes, literally ulkoa means "from outside" (it's the elative form of the root for "outside"). However, oppia ulkoa is a fixed idiom in Finnish that means "to learn by heart" or "to memorize". You can think of it as bringing information from the outside world into your brain!
Why is sanaston in the genitive/accusative form, but sanoja is in the partitive?
Sanaston (the vocabulary) is a total object: it implies they learn the entire vocabulary set completely. Sanoja (words), on the other hand, is the object of the action "repeating" (toistamalla). Repeating words is an ongoing, continuous process without a set endpoint, so it requires the partitive case.
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