Työtään

Työtään is a Finnish noun phrase that roughly corresponds to “one’s work” or “the work (someone) does.” It is formed from the noun työ, meaning work, and a third-person possessive element that marks the relation of the work to the subject. The result is a functionally possessive object used in clauses about someone’s duties or tasks. The form is especially common when referring to the work a person is actively doing or responsible for.

Morphology and usage

Työtään combines a plural or generalized stem related to works or tasks (työt) with a possessive ending that points to the subject. In sentences, työtään behaves as a direct object or as part of a predicate that describes what the subject is doing or how they handle their responsibilities. It is related to and often contrasted with työnsä, the more straightforward singular possessive “their/his/her work,” which can emphasize ownership or completed work rather than ongoing activity.

Typical contexts

- Hän teki työtään koko päivän. (He did his work all day.)

- Hän hoitaa työtään huolellisesti. (He takes care of his/her work diligently.)

- Hän muita auttoi vain silloin, kun hänellä oli aikaa työtään varten. (He helped others only when he had time for his work.)

Variants and nuance

Työnsä is the common form for “his/her/its work” in a generic sense, often signaling ownership or responsibility. Työtään, by contrast, tends to foreground the act of doing the work or the tasks themselves, and may be more frequent in written language or formal contexts.

See also

Finnish grammar, possessive suffixes, genitive constructions in Finnish.