Breakdown of Kuka on maailman toiseksi paras kokki?
olla
to be
hyvä
good
kuka
who
toinen
other, another; second
Questions & Answers about Kuka on maailman toiseksi paras kokki?
Why is toiseksi in the translative case here?
This is the standard Finnish structure for ranking items. To say "second best", "third largest", and so on, you put the ordinal number in the translative case (ending in -ksi) and follow it with a superlative adjective. Here, toinen (second) becomes toiseksi to modify paras (best).
If we were asking about plural chefs, would toiseksi change to match the plural?
No, toiseksi stays exactly the same. In this structure, the translative ordinal acts like an adverb modifying the adjective, so it does not agree with the noun. However, the adjective and the noun would change to plural: toiseksi parhaat kokit (the second best chefs).
Why do we use the genitive maailman instead of saying "in the world" (maailmassa)?
When expressing the scope of a superlative, Finnish strongly prefers the genitive case to say "the world's best" (maailman paras) rather than using a location case like the inessive (maailmassa). You will see this genitive structure almost every time a superlative is anchored to a place or group.
As a quick refresher, what is the base adjective for the superlative paras?
The base adjective is hyvä (good). It is highly irregular: the comparative is parempi (better) and the superlative is paras (best).