Epena Pedee

WALS coordinates: 3° N, 77° W

spoken in Colombia

Alternative Names

Ethnologue:
Ruhlen:
  • Saija
Routledge:
  • Emberá (South)
Other:
  • Embera-Saija,
  • Saija
ISO 639-3:

Features

Feature Value References
Phonology
Consonant Inventories Moderately small
Vowel Quality Inventories Large (7-14)
Consonant-Vowel Ratio Moderately low
Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives In plosives alone
Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems None missing in /p t k b d g/
Uvular Consonants None
Glottalized Consonants No glottalized consonants
Lateral Consonants No laterals
The Velar Nasal No velar nasal
Vowel Nasalization Contrast present
Front Rounded Vowels None
Syllable Structure Moderately complex
Tone No tones
Fixed Stress Locations No fixed stress
Weight-Sensitive Stress Right-edge: Ultimate or penultimate
Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress Systems Long vowel
Absence of Common Consonants No nasals
Presence of Uncommon Consonants None
Morphology
Fusion of Selected Inflectional Formatives Exclusively concatenative
Exponence of Selected Inflectional Formatives Monoexponential case
Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb 4-5 categories per word
Locus of Marking in the Clause Dependent marking
Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases No marking
Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology Inconsistent or other
Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology Strongly suffixing
Reduplication Productive full and partial reduplication
Case Syncretism No syncretism
Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking No subject person/number marking
Nominal Categories
Number of Genders None
Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems No gender
Systems of Gender Assignment No gender
Coding of Nominal Plurality Plural clitic
Occurrence of Nominal Plurality Only human nouns, obligatory
Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns Person-number stem
Definite Articles Definite word distinct from demonstrative
Indefinite Articles No indefinite, but definite article
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns No inclusive/exclusive
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection No person marking
Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives Two-way contrast
Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives Different inflection
Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives Unrelated
Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns No gender distinctions
Person Marking on Adpositions No person marking
Number of Cases 10 or more cases
Asymmetrical Case-Marking Symmetrical
Position of Case Affixes Postpositional clitics
Numeral Classifiers Absent
Conjunctions and Universal Quantifiers Formally different
Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes No possessive affixes
Nominal Syntax
Obligatory Possessive Inflection Exists
Possessive Classification No possessive classification
Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses Highly differentiated
Adjectives without Nouns Marked by mixed or other strategies
Verbal Categories
Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes Tense-aspect suffixes
The Morphological Imperative Second singular and second plural
The Prohibitive Normal imperative + special negative
Imperative-Hortative Systems Neither type of system
The Optative Inflectional optative absent
Epistemic Possibility Affixes on verbs
Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality Indirect only
Coding of Evidentiality Separate particle
Word Order
Order of Subject, Object and Verb SOV
Order of Subject and Verb SV
Order of Object and Verb OV
Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb OVX
Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase Postpositions
Order of Genitive and Noun Genitive-Noun
Order of Adjective and Noun Noun-Adjective
Order of Demonstrative and Noun Demonstrative-Noun
Order of Numeral and Noun Noun-Numeral
Order of Relative Clause and Noun Internally headed
Position of Polar Question Particles No question particle
Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions Initial interrogative phrase
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 Other
Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun OV and NAdj
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 Neutral
Expression of Pronominal Subjects Optional pronouns in subject position
Verbal Person Marking No person marking
Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking No person marking
Order of Person Markers on the Verb A and P do not or do not both occur on the verb
Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' Indirect-object construction
Passive Constructions Absent
Antipassive Constructions No antipassive
Applicative Constructions Non-benefactive object; both bases
Periphrastic Causative Constructions Sequential but no purposive
Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions Morphological but no compound
Negative Morphemes Negative affix
Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation Asymmetric
Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation A/Fin and A/Cat
Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation Predicate negation also present
Polar Questions Interrogative verb morphology
Predicative Adjectives Verbal encoding
Nominal and Locational Predication Different
Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals Possible
Complex Sentences
Relativization on Subjects Non-reduction
Relativization on Obliques Non-reduction
'Want' Complement Subjects Subject is left implicit
Purpose Clauses Deranked
'When' Clauses Balanced
Reason Clauses Balanced
Utterance Complement Clauses Balanced