Määräisessä

Määräisessä is a Finnish grammatical form. It is the inessive singular of the adjective määräinen, which means definite or determinate. In linguistic descriptions, määräinen is used to discuss the concept of definiteness, i.e., how a noun may refer to a specific entity rather than a generic one. Because Finnish normally lacks articles, definiteness is often expressed through context, demonstratives, or possessives, but määräinen and its inflected forms appear in grammars and linguistic discussions to describe how adjectives encode a sense of specificity.

Morphology and use: määräinen is an adjective that agrees with the noun it modifies in case and number. The inessive singular form is määräisessä, used before a noun in the inessive case or in phrases where the adjective itself precedes the noun in that case. Other singular forms follow regular Finnish adjective declension: genitive singular määräisen, partitive singular määräistä, allative singular määräämelle, and so on. The forms are constructed by applying standard vowel harmony and case endings to the stem määräis-. In everyday language, speakers rarely rely on määräinen as a standalone marker; its use is more common in descriptive grammar, linguistic analysis, or careful prose discussing definiteness.

Examples:

- Määräisessä kontekstissa sana voi viitata tiettyyn koiraan. (In a definite context, the word may refer to a particular dog.)

- Tekstissä käytetään määräisen muodon sanalle, jotta sen viittaus olisi selkeämpi. (In the text, a definite form is used for the word to make its reference clearer.)

Relation to language concept: Finnish expresses definiteness mainly through demonstratives and possessives rather than articles. Määräinen serves as a technical term in grammar to distinguish a definite reference from an indefinite one, a distinction emphasized in linguistic and philological discussions.

See also: Finnish grammar, definiteness, epämääräinen, demonstratives.