selän

Selän is the genitive form of the Finnish noun selkä, meaning the back of a person or the rear part of something. It functions to indicate possession or association, and appears in phrases such as selän kipu (back pain) or selän alue (the back area). In everyday speech, selkä is often used for the back itself, while selän is used when describing something related to the back.

In anatomical and medical contexts, selkä refers to the back of the body, with more specific terms used for parts of the back: selkäydin denotes the spinal cord, and selkäranka the vertebral column. The back includes the muscles, bones, nerves, and connective tissues that support posture and movement, and discussions of back health often involve expressions containing selän.

Etymology and language notes: selkä is a native Finnish word with cognates in other Finnic languages, such as Estonian selg. The form selän follows standard Finnish inflection for the genitive singular. Finnish also provides many other inflected forms of selkä to express different cases and numbers.

Related terms and concepts: selkä, selkäydin, selkäranka, back health and injury in medical contexts, posture and mobility discussions that commonly reference the back region.