The use of the indefinite pronoun <i>keegi</i> ‘someone’ in Estonian dialects

Abstract The Estonian indefinite pronouns keegi ‘someone’ and miski ‘something’ are distinguished by being able to refer animate or inanimate entities, respectively. However, in certain dialects, is used entities as well. aim of this paper describe the functions use based on data Corpus Dialects. We statistical analyses determine which dialects typically variables (polarity, function, position clause, case marking) contribute most variation. results show that there significant differences between dialects: mostly northern (most frequently Western, Mid, Eastern dialects), but phenomenon rare non-existent southern dialects. All studied variation: likely an when it partitive case, object, a subject, negative polarity item, positioned at end clause.