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Questions & Answers about Kirja on lyhyt.
What are the grammatical roles of each word in Kirja on lyhyt?
Kirja is the subject (a noun in the nominative singular). On is the verb “to be” in the 3rd person singular present tense. Lyhyt is an adjective functioning as a predicate adjective, also in the nominative singular to agree with kirja.
Why is there no equivalent of “the” or “a/an” in Kirja on lyhyt?
Finnish does not have articles. Definiteness or indefiniteness (whether you mean “the book” or “a book”) is inferred from context rather than from separate words like the or a/an.
How do adjectives agree with nouns in Finnish?
Adjectives in Finnish agree with the noun they modify in case and number, but not in gender (Finnish has no grammatical gender). Here both kirja and lyhyt are in the nominative singular, so neither carries an extra ending.
What case are kirja and lyhyt in this sentence?
They are both in the nominative singular. The nominative is used for the subject of a clause and for predicate nouns/adjectives after olla (“to be”).
How do you make this sentence negative?