The Finnish prefix epä- expresses negation (e.g. kohtelias “polite”, epäkohtelias “impolite”), much like the prefixes non-, im- and un- in English.

This article also deals with other Finnish prefixes that exploaress negation. While epä- is by far the most common, it’s not the only one. We can, for example, also sometimes use ei- as a prefix (katolinen “Catholic”, ei-katolinen “non-Catholic”), and loanwords can have the English negation prefixes (e.g. antisankari “anti-hero”).

In English, there is much more variation with prefixes that express negation: unethical (epäeettinen), inhumane (epäinhimillinen), impolite (epäkohtelias), illogical (epälooginen), irrelevant (epäolennainen) abnormal (epänormaali), apolitical (epäpoliittinen), disloyalty (epälojaalisuus), nonmetal (epämetalli).

1. Finnish Prefix Epä-

Most often, epä- is added to the beginning of adjectives. When added to an existing adjective, epä- expresses the opposite of said adjective. For example, someone can be friendly (ystävällinen) or unfriendly (epäystävällinen).

1.1. Adjectives that start with epä-

1.2. Nouns starting with epä-

There are also nouns that start with epä-.

1.3. Adverbs that start with epä-

I’m giving example sentences for adverbs starting with epä- because they’re probably easier to understand that way.

1.4. Verbs that start with epä-

These verbs starting with epä- are also interesting!

2. Finnish Prefix Ei-

The prefix ei- is also often added to the beginning of adjectives (e.g. ei-automaattinen “non-automatic, hand-operated”), but you will find it as a prefix for nouns pretty regularly as well (e.g. ei-jäsen “non-member”).

2.1. Ei- used for temporary, unestablished words

Ei- is often added to words as a more temporary means of expressing negation. While words with the epä- prefix are generally well-established, the ei- prefix generally creates temporary, unestablished words. That’s why you won’t find many words in a dictionary that start with ei-. In fact, Kielitoimiston sanakirja only includes one such word: ei-kenenkään-maa “no man’s land”.

The prefix ei- is commonly used to express that something remains outside of the main group we’re considering. We have, for example

• “members” jäsenet vs. “non-members” ei-jäsenet → The non-members remain outside of the group.
• “Christians” kristityt vs. “non-Christians” ei-kristityt → Non-Christians are atheists, Buddhists, Muslims, etc.
• “the experts” asiantuntijat vs. “non-specialists” ei-asiantuntijat → When comparing the opinions of both experts and regular people.
  

2.2. Ei- used to be more neutral and objective

In some cases, one could use the prefix epä-, but ei- is be used instead. This is the case when the word created with epä- sounds impolite or discriminatory. In these cases ei- is a more neutral, objective way to express negation.

Take, for example, the words epäammatillinen “unprofessional” and ei-ammatillinen “non-professional”. When we use epä-, this words can be considered resentful or angry: someone is an unprofessional doctor, who e.g. doesn’t take their profession seriously, who is a disgrace to the profession. In contrast ei-ammatillinen is a neutral term for someone who isn’t a professional; an amateur. Another such pair would be epämoraalinen “anti-moral, immoral, evil” and ei-moraalinen “non-moral”.

2.3. Adjectives that start with ei-

The largest group of words starting in ei- are adjectives.

3. Loaned Prefixes: Af-, Anti-, Dys-, Ir-, Non-

English has a lot of prefixes that express negation. New words that get loaned to Finnish often retain whatever prefix is used in the English word. That’s how we get Finnish words that start with an English prefix:

• ANTI-: antibioottinen “antibiotic”, antihistamiini “antihistamine“, antisankari “anti-hero”
• DIS-: diskvalifioida “to disqualify”, dispositio “disposition”, disinformaatio “disinformation”
• IN-: infertiili “infertile”, infiniittinen “infinite”, inkontinenssi “incontinence”
• IR-: irrationaalinen “irrational”, irrelevantti “irrelevant”
• NON-: nonkonformimsi “nonconformity”, nonverbaalinen “non-verbal”
• A-: ateismi “atheism”, asosiaalinen “asocial”, afaattinen “aphasic”
• DE-: deflaatio “deflation”, dekoodaus “decoding”, demobilisaatio “demobilization”

4. Relation between epä- and –ton

If you’ve made it this far, you might have wondered about the suffix –ton, which expresses a lack of something. You can read more about words ending in –ton here.

Sometimes, you can have epä- and –ton words that are synonyms or have a very close meaning. In other cases, however, both words have a very distinct meaning of their own.

I’m pairing up similar words with epä- and with -ton in the table below for you to compare. Words that have multiple meaning or uses are mentioned multiple times.

5. Other overlapping Ways to Express Negation

In some cases, we have several overlapping prefixes that all carry – more or less – the same meaning. This is rare, but happens with some loanwords. For example, the opposite of sosiaalinen “social”, could be:

• asosiaalinen or epäsosiaalinen “asocial”
• ei-sosiaalinen “non-social”
• antisosiaalinen “anti-social”

Just like in English, there is a slight difference between these three, but they do match up fairly closely.

Read more elsewhere

• Kielikello: Ei- vai epätoivottu tapaus?
• VISK: Epävarma, epäluuloinen, epäonni
• VISK: Ei-toivottu, ei-suomalainen, ei-kukaan
• VISK: Epäpoliittinen, irrationaalinen, antiteesi

Related posts:

The Negative Imperfect – Negatiivinen Imperfekti Us-Ukse- versus Us-Ude- Word Comparison Words ending in -tar – Kuningatar, Jumalatar Words Ending in -Sto/-Stö