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Volume 4, Issue 2
  • ISSN 2772-3720
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Abstract

Abstract

While there is a great deal of work analyzing definiteness in Finnish, the literature on the ongoing development of a definite article is either inconclusive or incomplete. Using a battery of tests gauging definiteness and articlehood, this article argues that Finnish has developed a definite article. The core proposal is that the demonstrative elements / ‘that/those’ have developed into definite articles, syntactically D heads, while still also occurring as neutral demonstratives. This paper therefore proposes that, for Finnish and , each one has two lexical entries: one for the definite article, and one for the demonstrative.

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2025-10-24
2025-11-14
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  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): definite article; deixis; demonstrative; determiner; DP; Finnish; noun phrase; uniqueness
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