Breakdown of Teen tämän työvuoron sairaan kollegan sijasta.
tämä
this
sairas
sick
tehdä
to do
kollega
the colleague
työvuoro
work shift
sijasta
instead of (+ noun)
Questions & Answers about Teen tämän työvuoron sairaan kollegan sijasta.
Why are the words sairaan kollegan in the genitive case here?
They are governed by the postposition sijasta (instead of). In Finnish, most postpositions require the main noun and any attached adjectives coming immediately before them to be in the genitive case, ending in -n.
Could I use the postposition puolesta in this sentence instead?
Yes, but the nuance shifts slightly. sijasta means you are physically taking their place (instead of them), which makes perfect sense for covering a work schedule. If you used puolesta (on behalf of), it would sound more like you are doing it specifically as a favor for their benefit, rather than just swapping places.
Why is the object tämän työvuoron not in the partitive case?
Because the action is complete and bounded. You are intending to do the entire work shift, so the object takes the accusative case (which looks like the genitive with the -n ending here). If you were only doing a portion of the shift, you would use the partitive tätä työvuoroa.
Where does the postposition sijasta actually come from?
It is the elative case form (ending in -sta, meaning 'out of' or 'from') of the noun sija, which means a place, position, or spot. So kollegan sijasta literally translates to 'out of the colleague's place'. Understanding this makes it much easier to remember why it acts as a postposition of substitution!
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