German
WALS coordinates: 52° N, 10° E
spoken in Austria, Germany, Switzerland
Find examples here.
Alternative Names
| Ethnologue: | |
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| Ruhlen: |
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| Routledge: |
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| Other: |
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| ISO 639-3: |
Features
| ID | Feature | Value | Area | References | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1A | Consonant Inventories | Average | Phonology | comment | |
| 2A | Vowel Quality Inventories | Large (7-14) | Phonology | comment | |
| 3A | Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Low | Phonology | comment | |
| 4A | Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | In both plosives and fricatives | Phonology | comment | |
| 5A | Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | None missing in /p t k b d g/ | Phonology | comment | |
| 6A | Uvular Consonants | Uvular continuants only | Phonology | comment | |
| 7A | Glottalized Consonants | No glottalized consonants | Phonology | comment | |
| 8A | Lateral Consonants | /l/, no obstruent laterals | Phonology | comment | |
| 9A | The Velar Nasal | No initial velar nasal | Phonology | comment | |
| 10A | Vowel Nasalization | Contrast absent | Phonology | comment | |
| 11A | Front Rounded Vowels | High and mid | Phonology | comment | |
| 12A | Syllable Structure | Complex | Phonology | comment | |
| 13A | Tone | No tones | Phonology | comment | |
| 14A | Fixed Stress Locations | No fixed stress | Phonology | comment | |
| 15A | Weight-Sensitive Stress | Right-oriented: One of the last three | Phonology | comment | |
| 16A | Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress Systems | Coda consonant | Phonology | comment | |
| 17A | Rhythm Types | Trochaic | Phonology | comment | |
| 18A | Absence of Common Consonants | All present | Phonology | comment | |
| 19A | Presence of Uncommon Consonants | None | Phonology | comment | |
| 20A | Fusion of Selected Inflectional Formatives | Exclusively concatenative | Morphology | comment | |
| 21A | Exponence of Selected Inflectional Formatives | Case + number | Morphology | comment | |
| 21B | Exponence of Tense-Aspect-Mood Inflection | monoexponential TAM | Morphology | comment | |
| 22A | Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb | 2-3 categories per word | Morphology | comment | |
| 23A | Locus of Marking in the Clause | Dependent marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 24A | Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases | Dependent marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 25A | Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology | Dependent-marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 25B | Zero Marking of A and P Arguments | Non-zero marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 26A | Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology | Strongly suffixing | Morphology | comment | |
| 27A | Reduplication | No productive reduplication | Morphology | comment | |
| 28A | Case Syncretism | Core and non-core | Morphology | comment | |
| 29A | Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking | Syncretic | Morphology | comment | |
| 30A | Number of Genders | Three | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 31A | Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems | Sex-based | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 32A | Systems of Gender Assignment | Semantic and formal | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 33A | Coding of Nominal Plurality | Plural suffix | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 34A | Occurrence of Nominal Plurality | All nouns, always obligatory | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 35A | Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns | Person-number stem | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 36A | The Associative Plural | Unique periphrastic associative plural | Nominal Categories |
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| 37A | Definite Articles | Definite word distinct from demonstrative | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 38A | Indefinite Articles | Indefinite word same as 'one' | Nominal Categories |
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| 39A | Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns | No inclusive/exclusive | Nominal Categories |
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| 40A | Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection | No inclusive/exclusive | Nominal Categories |
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| 41A | Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives | No distance contrast | Nominal Categories |
comment
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| 42A | Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives | Identical | Nominal Categories |
comment
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| 43A | Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Related by gender markers | Nominal Categories |
comment
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| 44A | Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | 3rd person singular only | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 45A | Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns | Binary politeness distinction | Nominal Categories |
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| 46A | Indefinite Pronouns | Mixed | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 47A | Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns | Differentiated | Nominal Categories |
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| 48A | Person Marking on Adpositions | No person marking | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 49A | Number of Cases | 4 cases | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 50A | Asymmetrical Case-Marking | Syncretism in relevant NP-types | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 51A | Position of Case Affixes | Case suffixes | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 52A | Comitatives and Instrumentals | Identity | Nominal Categories |
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| 53A | Ordinal Numerals | First, two-th, three-th | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 54A | Distributive Numerals | Marked by preceding word | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 55A | Numeral Classifiers | Absent | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 57A | Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes | No possessive affixes | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 58A | Obligatory Possessive Inflection | Absent | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 58B | Number of Possessive Nouns | None reported | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 59A | Possessive Classification | No possessive classification | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 62A | Action Nominal Constructions | Ergative-Possessive | Nominal Syntax |
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| 64A | Nominal and Verbal Conjunction | Identity | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 65A | Perfective/Imperfective Aspect | No grammatical marking | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 66A | The Past Tense | Present, no remoteness distinctions | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 67A | The Future Tense | No inflectional future | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 68A | The Perfect | From possessive | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 69A | Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | Tense-aspect suffixes | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 70A | The Morphological Imperative | Second singular | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 71A | The Prohibitive | Normal imperative + normal negative | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 72A | Imperative-Hortative Systems | Neither type of system | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 73A | The Optative | Inflectional optative absent | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 74A | Situational Possibility | Verbal constructions | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 75A | Epistemic Possibility | Verbal constructions | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 76A | Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking | Overlap for both possibility and necessity | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 77A | Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | Indirect only | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 78A | Coding of Evidentiality | Modal morpheme | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 79A | Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect | Tense | Verbal Categories |
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| 79B | Suppletion in Imperatives and Hortatives | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 80A | Verbal Number and Suppletion | None | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 81A | Order of Subject, Object and Verb | No dominant order | Word Order | comment | |
| 81B | Languages with two Dominant Orders of Subject, Object, and Verb | SOV or SVO | Word Order | comment | |
| 82A | Order of Subject and Verb | SV | Word Order | comment | |
| 83A | Order of Object and Verb | No dominant order | Word Order |
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| 84A | Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb | No dominant order | Word Order | comment | |
| 85A | Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Prepositions | Word Order | comment | |
| 86A | Order of Genitive and Noun | Noun-Genitive | Word Order | comment | |
| 87A | Order of Adjective and Noun | Adjective-Noun | Word Order | comment | |
| 88A | Order of Demonstrative and Noun | Demonstrative-Noun | Word Order | comment | |
| 89A | Order of Numeral and Noun | Numeral-Noun | Word Order | comment | |
| 90A | Order of Relative Clause and Noun | Noun-Relative clause | Word Order | comment | |
| 90C | Postnominal relative clauses | Noun-Relative clause (NRel) dominant | Word Order | comment | |
| 91A | Order of Degree Word and Adjective | Degree word-Adjective | Word Order | comment | |
| 92A | Position of Polar Question Particles | No question particle | Word Order | comment | |
| 93A | Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions | Initial interrogative phrase | Word Order | comment | |
| 94A | Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause | Initial subordinator word | Word Order | comment | |
| 95A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Other | Word Order | comment | |
| 96A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Relative Clause and Noun | Other | Word Order | comment | |
| 97A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun | Other | Word Order | comment | |
| 98A | Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases | Nominative - accusative (standard) | Simple Clauses |
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| 99A | Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns | Nominative - accusative (standard) | Simple Clauses |
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| 100A | Alignment of Verbal Person Marking | Accusative | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 101A | Expression of Pronominal Subjects | Obligatory pronouns in subject position | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 102A | Verbal Person Marking | Only the A argument | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 103A | Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No zero realization | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 104A | Order of Person Markers on the Verb | A and P do not or do not both occur on the verb | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 105A | Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' | Indirect-object construction | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 106A | Reciprocal Constructions | Mixed | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 107A | Passive Constructions | Present | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 108A | Antipassive Constructions | No antipassive | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 108B | Productivity of the Antipassive Construction | no antipassive | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 109A | Applicative Constructions | No applicative construction | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 109B | Other Roles of Applied Objects | No applicative construction | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 110A | Periphrastic Causative Constructions | Sequential but no purposive | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 111A | Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions | Morphological but no compound | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 112A | Negative Morphemes | Negative particle | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 113A | Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Symmetric | Simple Clauses |
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| 114A | Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation | Non-assignable | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 115A | Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation | No predicate negation | Simple Clauses |
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| 116A | Polar Questions | Interrogative word order | Simple Clauses |
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examples |
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| 122A | Relativization on Subjects | Relative pronoun | Complex Sentences |
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examples |
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| 123A | Relativization on Obliques | Relative pronoun | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 124A | 'Want' Complement Subjects | Subject is left implicit | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 125A | Purpose Clauses | Balanced/deranked | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 126A | 'When' Clauses | Balanced/deranked | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 127A | Reason Clauses | Balanced | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 129A | Hand and Arm | Different | Lexicon |
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| 130A | Finger and Hand | Different | Lexicon |
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| 131A | Numeral Bases | Decimal | Lexicon |
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| 132A | Number of Non-Derived Basic Colour Categories | 6 | Lexicon | comment | |
| 133A | Number of Basic Colour Categories | 11 | Lexicon | comment | |
| 134A | Green and Blue | Green vs. blue | Lexicon | comment | |
| 135A | Red and Yellow | Red vs. yellow | Lexicon | comment | |
| 136A | M-T Pronouns | M-T pronouns, paradigmatic | Lexicon |
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| 136B | M in First Person Singular | m in first person singular | Lexicon | comment | |
| 137A | N-M Pronouns | No N-M pronouns | Lexicon |
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| 137B | M in Second Person Singular | No m in second person singular | Lexicon | comment | |
| 138A | Tea | Words derived from Min Nan Chinese te | Lexicon |
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| 142A | Para-Linguistic Usages of Clicks | Affective meanings | Other | comment | |
| 143A | Order of Negative Morpheme and Verb | Type 1 / Type 2 | Word Order | comment | |
| 143E | Preverbal Negative Morphemes | NegV | Word Order | comment | |
| 143F | Postverbal Negative Morphemes | VNeg | Word Order | comment | |
| 143G | Minor morphological means of signaling negation | None | Word Order | comment | |
| 144A | Position of Negative Word With Respect to Subject, Object, and Verb | More than one position | Word Order | comment | |
| 144B | Position of negative words relative to beginning and end of clause and with respect to adjacency to verb | End, not immed postverbal | Word Order | comment | |
| 144D | The Position of Negative Morphemes in SVO Languages | More than one construction | Word Order | comment | |
| 144E | Multiple Negative Constructions in SVO Languages | SVONeg/SONegV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144H | NegSVO Order | No NegSVO | Word Order | comment | |
| 144I | SNegVO Order | No SNegVO | Word Order | comment | |
| 144J | SVNegO Order | No SVNegO | Word Order | comment | |
| 144K | SVONeg Order | NoDoubleNeg | Word Order | comment | |
| 144L | The Position of Negative Morphemes in SOV Languages | More than one construction | Word Order | comment | |
| 144M | Multiple Negative Constructions in SOV Languages | SONegV/SVONeg | Word Order | comment | |
| 144P | NegSOV Order | No NegSOV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144Q | SNegOV Order | No SNegOV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144R | SONegV Order | Word&NoDoubleNeg | Word Order | comment | |
| 144S | SOVNeg Order | NoSOVNeg | Word Order | comment |
