Breakdown of Hän on sähkömies, jonka ruuvimeisselin lainasin.
olla
to be
hän
he / she
lainata
to borrow
joka
who / which (relative pronoun)
ruuvimeisseli
the screwdriver
sähkömies
the electrician
Questions & Answers about Hän on sähkömies, jonka ruuvimeisselin lainasin.
Why do we use jonka instead of joka in this sentence?
Jonka is the genitive form of the relative pronoun joka. Here it translates directly to "whose", showing that the screwdriver belongs to the electrician. Just like in English, it sits immediately before the noun it possesses.
Why does ruuvimeisselin end in -n rather than being in the partitive case?
You borrowed the entire screwdriver, so it acts as a total object. Because it is a singular noun and the verb lainasin is a standard active verb, the complete object takes the -n ending, which is often called the genitive-accusative case.
Could I change the word order in the relative clause to say jonka lainasin ruuvimeisselin?
No, because jonka acts as a possessive determiner for ruuvimeisselin here. Just like you wouldn't say "whose I borrowed screwdriver" in English, you must keep jonka ruuvimeisselin together as a single block at the start of the relative clause.
Sähkömies literally means "electricity man". Is this the official word for an electrician?
While sähkömies is the most common term used in everyday spoken Finnish, the official, gender-neutral job title you will see on formal documents and contracts is sähköasentaja.
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