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Question about partitives (sopuli.xyz)

submitted 4 months ago by nokturne213@sopuli.xyz to c/learn_finnish@sopuli.xyz

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This could be Duolingo, as they have already had partitive mistakes they quietly corrected.

Lesson 1: Vesi on syvää.
Lesson 2: Vesi on syvä ja sininen.

Why is 2 not syvää ja sinistä?

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[–] nokturne213@sopuli.xyz 3 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I was leaning towards Duolingo being incorrect as well. But in the past we had:

Minulla on uusi poikaystävä.
Minulla on poikaystävää.

But silently #2 was changed to:

Minulla on poikaystävä.

However in this case we are talking about a single boyfriend, not the vastness of deep blue water.

[–] markz@suppo.fi 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

"Minulla on poikaystävää" means "I have (some) boyfriend" in the same way as "I have (some) water" or "I have (some) sand".

"Minulla on poikaystävä" is "I have (a/the) boyfriend"

If it's a countable unit, use the basic form. Boyfriends can be counted, but water and sand can not.

[–] Tuuktuuk@sopuli.xyz 2 points 3 months ago

In "minulla on poikaystävää" you are talking about the vastness of boyfriend, though.

It's a very interesting phrase when used alone :D
Either it means that you are pieces of a boyfriend. That is, maybe you cut a third of the right side of his butt? But why? Or maybe it's like "I've got some boyfriend to sell you. Would you like to have three and a quarter? Or about a half?"

I guess this has happened on Duolingo because many conjugations conjugate with the partitive form. "Minulla on ikävä poikaystävää" can also be paraphrased to "Minulla on poikaystävää ikävä" without changing anything but secondary nuances in the meaning. And maybe someone wanted to accept the "Minulla on poikaystävää ikävä" and accidentally added "poikaystävää" as a translation of "boyfriend"?