hän

From Proto-Finnic *hän, from Proto-Finno-Ugric *sän.[1] Cognates include Erzya сон (son).

In practically all dialects (except potentially Ingrian Finnish), se is the most common third-person pronoun for people, and this is also reflected in colloquial Finnish. hän was most often used in indirect speech (as a logophoric pronoun), potentially with a nuance of doubt or disbelief, although in southwestern, southeastern and far northern eastern dialects it was used more widely in subordinate clauses.[1] The use of hän as a general third-person pronoun may thus be a literary feature.

• IPA^(key): /ˈhæn/, [ˈhæn]

• Audio:

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• Audio:

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• Rhymes: -æn
• Syllabification^(key): hän

hän

1. (personal) he, she, one, (singular) they (only of a human being; the pronoun does not determine the sex/gender of the person)
2. he, she, one, they, it (in indirect speech: referring to the subject of the main clause, regardless of whether they are a human being or not, i.e. logophoric pronoun)

• In standard Finnish, hän is generally not omitted, despite the verb showing both the person and the number (compare the usage of he (“they pl”)). This is in contrast to the first and second person pronouns which may freely be omitted, with the person being implied by the verb form.
• In colloquial and dialectal Finnish, the inanimate (demonstrative) pronoun se is mostly used instead of hän, the latter being reserved for certain particular uses such as to indicate that another speaker is being paraphrased. Yet in some others (such as Kven), both pronouns are used in the same role.

• Irregular. The comitative and instructive forms don't exist; the abessive is hardly used. To be more precise: the singular stem is declined like type 32 (sisar) in the singular cases, except for the accusative singular form hänet (see following note).
• In addition to the standard set of cases, hän and the other personal pronouns have a specific accusative form, hänet. This form would have been the nominative plural form of the first stem, if the word were not a personal pronoun.
• The shorter forms hällä, hältä and hälle exist for the adessive, ablative and allative respectively, but these are dated or jocular except in poetic use and some set phrases.

• se (colloquial)

• Kven: hän

• “hän”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-02

• (Ala-Laukaa) IPA^(key): /ˈhæn/, [ˈhæn]
• (Soikkola) IPA^(key): /ˈhæn/, [ˈhæn]
• Rhymes: -æn
• Hyphenation: hän

hän

1. (dialectal) Alternative form of hää
   • 1936, N. A. Iljin and V. I. Junus, Bukvari iƶoroin șkouluja vart, Leningrad: Riikin Ucebno-pedagogiceskoi Izdateljstva, page 46:

     Toisille hän lapsille esimerkin näyttää.

     He sets an example for the other children.

• Ruben E. Nirvi (1971) Inkeroismurteiden Sanakirja, Helsinki: Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura, page 84

From Finnish hän, from Proto-Finnic *hän.

• IPA^(key): /ˈhæn/

hän

1. he, she (animate)

• se

• Eira Söderholm (2017) Kvensk grammatikk, Tromsø: Cappelen Damm Akademisk, →ISBN, page 276

From Old Norse héðan, with influence from Middle Low German hen (“away”), both ultimately related to Proto-Germanic *hiz (“this”).

hän

1. (often somewhat solemn) away, hence (and often by implication to somewhere else)

   Han gick hän

   He walked away/hence (also a euphemism for died)

   Vi åkte hän till Säffle

   We went away/hence to Säffle (redundant, somewhat poetic or jocular)

   Hän mot nya mål!

   Away towards new goals!

• hädan

• hänföra
• hänseende
• hänskjuta
• hänsyn

• bära hän

• hän in Svensk ordbok.

From Proto-Finnic *hän, from Proto-Finno-Ugric *sän. Cognate to Hungarian ő. False cognate with Swedish han.

hän (genitive hänen, partitive händast)

1. he, she

• Zajceva, N. G., Mullonen, M. I. (2007) “он”, in Uz’ venä-vepsläine vajehnik / Novyj russko-vepsskij slovarʹ [New Russian–Veps Dictionary]‎, Petrozavodsk: Periodika