Next, I will look at how this dual attitude is reflected in the way the guides treat two language phenomena: direct and inverted word order and the use of the possessive suffix. These are both phenomena for which instructions are given in all the guides I have studied and which occur in both written and spoken language (cf. e.g. sentence contrasts, which have been considered to be primarily a feature of written language). "Word order according to the authentic Finnish language" There was a discussion about direct and indirect word order among the developers of the literary language as early as the 19th century.
Over the decades, the subject of special attention has been whether, for example, in the main clause following a subordinate clause or quotation, the subject (direct word order) or predicate verb (inverted word order) comes first. For example: The party was loud, the Australian B2C Email List stated ~ the minister stated (example from Kielitoimisto's grammar guide). The fact that the reversed word order has been considered to be the effect of a foreign language has caused concern. For a long time, there was a misconception among language users that only direct word order is part of the Finnish language.
This, in turn, sometimes led to a seemingly mechanical avoidance of reversed word order. In the word order instructions of language guides, the influence of a foreign language is viewed both openly negatively and neutrally affirmatively. The instructions systematically mention the Swedish language, which has traditionally been a source of dreaded influences and the target of purist actions in the control of the Finnish language. Here are examples from the Kielenoppa, the Finnish language handbook and the Kielitoimisto's grammar guide: We are so used to non-Finnish word order in the literary language that the following word order, which occurs everywhere in the vernacular , seems quite strange to many.