Kuulijat

Kuulijat is a Finnish noun meaning listeners or audience members. It is the plural form of kuulija, a person who hears or listens. In everyday Finnish, kuulijat can refer to people listening to a broadcast, a speech, a lecture, or a performance. It is commonly used to denote the audience in media, education, or cultural contexts, and it is often contrasted with those who perform or speak, such as tekijät (producers or creators) or esiintyjät (performers).

Etymology and form: kuulija derives from the verb kuulla, meaning “to hear,” with the agentive suffix -ja, creating a word for a person who listens. The singular is kuulija and the plural is kuulijat. Like other Finnish nouns, kuulija and kuulijat decline for cases (nominative, genitive, partitive, etc.).

Usage notes: In addition to referring to listeners in a program or event, the term can describe a demographic or audience segment in communication studies and journalism. Related terms include kuulijakunta (the listening public or audience as a group) and kuulijoille (to the listeners), used to indicate who is addressed or affected.

As a proper noun: Kuulijat can sometimes appear as a title or name for a publication, project, or organization, but there is no widely known entity by that name. In such cases, capitalization signals its status as a name rather than a common noun.

See also: kuulija, kuulijakunta.