epäyleisen

Epäyleinen is a Finnish adjective meaning not common or not generally used. In linguistic and descriptive contexts, it is used to refer to forms, expressions, or usages that are not part of standard or widespread language use. The term is primarily encountered in academic writing rather than everyday speech, where more common terms like yleinen or harvinainen might be used.

Etymology and form: epäyleinen is formed from the negating prefix epä- attached to yleinen (common, general), with the standard Finnish adjective ending -inen. As with other adjectives in Finnish, epäyleinen inflects for case and number, and its derived forms follow the noun they modify. The genitive singular form is epäyleisen, which is used to describe a noun in genitive case, e.g., epäyleisen muodon.

Usage and nuance: The concept describes something that deviates from standard language norms rather than simply being rare. It can apply to words with unusual meanings, rare grammatical forms, or stylistic choices that are atypical in general discourse. In practice, epäyleinen often signals scholarly evaluation rather than everyday judgment of language.

Examples: In a linguistic study, one might speak of epäyleisiä sanoja to refer to words that are not part of the common vocabulary, or epäyleisen rekisterin ilmaisuihin to describe expressions typical of a non-mainstream register. An example sentence could be: Tämä muoto on epäyleinen nykykielessä.

See also: yleinen, harvinainen, poikkeuksellinen, rekisteri.