Dani (Lower Grand Valley)

WALS coordinates: 4° 20′ S, 138° 50′ E

spoken in Indonesia

Alternative Names

Ethnologue:
Ruhlen:
  • Dani (Grand Valley)
Routledge:
  • Dani (Grand Valley)
Other:
  • Lower Grand Valley Dani,
  • Dani,
  • Grand Valley Dani
ISO 639-3:

Features

Feature Value References
Phonology
Consonant Inventories Small
Vowel Quality Inventories Large (7-14)
Consonant-Vowel Ratio Low
Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives No voicing constrast
Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems Other
Uvular Consonants None
Glottalized Consonants No glottalized consonants
Lateral Consonants /l/, no obstruent laterals
The Velar Nasal No initial velar nasal
Front Rounded Vowels None
Syllable Structure Moderately complex
Tone No tones
Fixed Stress Locations Ultimate
Weight-Sensitive Stress Fixed stress (no weight-sensitivity)
Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress Systems No weight
Rhythm Types Trochaic
Absence of Common Consonants All present
Presence of Uncommon Consonants None
Morphology
Fusion of Selected Inflectional Formatives Exclusively concatenative
Exponence of Selected Inflectional Formatives No case
Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb 6-7 categories per word
Locus of Marking in the Clause Head marking
Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases Double marking
Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology Inconsistent or other
Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology Strongly suffixing
Case Syncretism No case marking
Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking Syncretic
Nominal Categories
Number of Genders None
Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems No gender
Systems of Gender Assignment No gender
Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns Person-number stem + pronominal plural affix
The Associative Plural Associative same as additive plural
Definite Articles No definite or indefinite article
Indefinite Articles No definite or indefinite article
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns No inclusive/exclusive
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection No inclusive/exclusive
Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives Related to remote demonstratives
Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns No gender distinctions
Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns No politeness distinction
Person Marking on Adpositions Pronouns only
Number of Cases 6-7 cases
Asymmetrical Case-Marking Symmetrical
Position of Case Affixes Case suffixes
Comitatives and Instrumentals Differentiation
Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes Possessive prefixes
Nominal Syntax
Obligatory Possessive Inflection Exists
Possessive Classification Two classes
Verbal Categories
Perfective/Imperfective Aspect Grammatical marking
The Past Tense Present, 2-3 remoteness distinctions
The Future Tense Inflectional future exists
The Perfect No perfect
Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes Tense-aspect suffixes
The Morphological Imperative Second singular and second plural
The Prohibitive Special imperative + special negative
Imperative-Hortative Systems Maximal system
The Optative Inflectional optative absent
Situational Possibility Affixes on verbs
Epistemic Possibility Affixes on verbs
Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking Overlap for either possibility or necessity
Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality Indirect only
Coding of Evidentiality Separate particle
Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect None
Verbal Number and Suppletion None
Word Order
Order of Subject, Object and Verb SOV
Order of Subject and Verb SV
Order of Object and Verb OV
Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase Postpositions
Order of Genitive and Noun Genitive-Noun
Order of Demonstrative and Noun Noun-Demonstrative
Order of Relative Clause and Noun Noun-Relative clause
Position of Polar Question Particles No question particle
Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause Mixed
Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase OV and Postpositions
Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Relative Clause and Noun OV and NRel
Simple Clauses
Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases Ergative - absolutive
Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns Ergative - absolutive
Alignment of Verbal Person Marking Accusative
Expression of Pronominal Subjects Subject affixes on verb
Verbal Person Marking Both the A and P arguments
Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking No zero realization
Order of Person Markers on the Verb P precedes A
Reciprocal Constructions No reciprocals
Passive Constructions Absent
Antipassive Constructions No antipassive
Applicative Constructions Benefactive and other; both bases
Negative Morphemes Negative particle
Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation Both
Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation A/Fin
Polar Questions Interrogative verb morphology
Complex Sentences
Relativization on Subjects Gap
Purpose Clauses Deranked
'When' Clauses Deranked
Reason Clauses Balanced/deranked
Lexicon
M-T Pronouns No M-T pronouns
N-M Pronouns No N-M pronouns