valintansa

Valintansa is a Finnish noun phrase meaning “one’s own choice” or, more generally, “the choice of someone.” It is formed from valinta, meaning “choice,” plus the third-person possessive suffix -nsa (or -nsä). The resulting form valintansa literally means “his/her/its choice.” The suffix is one of the Finnish possessive endings and marks that the choice belongs to a third person. In practice, valintansa is used when referring to a specific individual’s or entity’s choice, without repeating the possessor.

The phrase typically functions as the subject or the object of a clause. Examples include: Hän teki valintansa. (He/She made his/her/its choice.) Yhtiö teki valintansa siirtää tuotantoa ulkomaille. (The company made its choice to move production abroad.) The construction allows the possessor to be deduced from context; in many cases valintansa alone suffices to indicate “their/its/your/his/her choice,” depending on the surrounding sentence.

Variations and notes: valintansa uses the third-person possessive suffix, and like other Finnish possessive forms it adapts to the phonology of the stem. The form is productive in contemporary Finnish and can be combined with different infinitival or noun phrases following it, such as valintansa tekemiseen or valintansa perusteella, depending on what is being said.

Etymology: valintansa derives from valinta + the possessive suffix -nsa/-nsä, a standard pattern for marking possession by a third person in Finnish. The expression is common in everyday language as well as in written Finnish.