Structural classification of words

Words in Finnish can be classified by their internal structure as follows:

• root words, which are “atomic” in Finnish, though if they are loanwords, they may have some decomposition in the original language; examples: talo (house), injektio (injection)
• derived words, formed (in Finnish) almost exclusively using suffixes; examples: talous (economy), derived from talo, and taloudellinen (economic), derived from talous
• compound words, formed from two or more words; examples: puutalo (wooden house), from puu (wood; tree) and talo (house), and kansantalous (national economy).

In this “Vocabulary” part, we discuss root words and some general issues with the vocabulary. It is followed by parts about derived words and compounds.