Japanese
WALS coordinates: 37° N, 140° E
spoken in Japan
Find examples here.
Alternative Names
| Ethnologue: | |
|---|---|
| Ruhlen: |
|
| Routledge: |
|
| Other: |
|
| ISO 639-3: |
Features
| ID | Feature | Value | Area | References | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1A | Consonant Inventories | Moderately small | Phonology | comment | |
| 2A | Vowel Quality Inventories | Average (5-6) | Phonology | comment | |
| 3A | Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Average | 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 | No laterals | Phonology | comment | |
| 9A | The Velar Nasal | No velar nasal | Phonology | comment | |
| 10A | Vowel Nasalization | Contrast absent | Phonology | comment | |
| 11A | Front Rounded Vowels | None | Phonology | comment | |
| 12A | Syllable Structure | Moderately complex | Phonology | comment | |
| 13A | Tone | Simple tone system | 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 | Monoexponential case | Morphology | comment | |
| 21B | Exponence of Tense-Aspect-Mood Inflection | monoexponential TAM | Morphology | comment | |
| 22A | Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb | 4-5 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 | Full reduplication only | Morphology | comment | |
| 28A | Case Syncretism | No case marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 29A | Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking | No subject person/number marking | Morphology | comment | |
| 33A | Coding of Nominal Plurality | Plural suffix | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 34A | Occurrence of Nominal Plurality | Only human nouns, optional | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 35A | Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns | Person stem + nominal plural affix | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 36A | The Associative Plural | Associative same as additive plural | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 37A | Definite Articles | No definite, but indefinite article | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 38A | Indefinite Articles | Indefinite word distinct from 'one' | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 39A | Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns | No inclusive/exclusive | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 40A | Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection | No person marking | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 41A | Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives | Three-way contrast | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 42A | Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives | Different inflection | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 43A | Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Unrelated | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 44A | Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | 3rd person only, but also non-singular | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 45A | Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns | Pronouns avoided for politeness | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 46A | Indefinite Pronouns | Interrogative-based | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 47A | Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns | Identical | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 48A | Person Marking on Adpositions | No person marking | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 49A | Number of Cases | 8-9 cases | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 50A | Asymmetrical Case-Marking | Symmetrical | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 51A | Position of Case Affixes | Postpositional clitics | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 52A | Comitatives and Instrumentals | Differentiation | Nominal Categories |
comment
examples |
|
| 53A | Ordinal Numerals | One-th, two-th, three-th | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 54A | Distributive Numerals | Marked by suffix | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 55A | Numeral Classifiers | Obligatory | Nominal Categories | comment | |
| 56A | Conjunctions and Universal Quantifiers | Formally similar, with interrogative | 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 | |
| 60A | Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses | Genitives and adjectives collapsed | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 61A | Adjectives without Nouns | Marked by mixed or other strategies | Nominal Syntax | comment | |
| 62A | Action Nominal Constructions | Double-Possessive | Nominal Syntax |
comment
examples |
|
| 63A | Noun Phrase Conjunction | 'And' identical to 'with' | Nominal Syntax |
comment
examples |
|
| 64A | Nominal and Verbal Conjunction | Differentiation | Nominal Syntax |
comment
examples |
|
| 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 | No perfect | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 69A | Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | Tense-aspect suffixes | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 70A | The Morphological Imperative | Second person number-neutral | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 71A | The Prohibitive | Normal imperative + special 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 | Affixes on verbs | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 75A | Epistemic Possibility | Other | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 76A | Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking | Overlap for either possibility or necessity | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 77A | Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | Indirect only | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 78A | Coding of Evidentiality | Verbal affix or clitic | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 79A | Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect | None | Verbal Categories | comment | |
| 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 | SOV | Word Order |
comment
examples |
|
| 82A | Order of Subject and Verb | SV | Word Order | comment | |
| 83A | Order of Object and Verb | OV | Word Order | comment | |
| 84A | Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb | XOV | Word Order | comment | |
| 85A | Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Postpositions | Word Order | comment | |
| 86A | Order of Genitive and Noun | Genitive-Noun | 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 | Relative clause-Noun | Word Order | comment | |
| 90B | Prenominal relative clauses | Relative clause-Noun (RelN) dominant | Word Order | comment | |
| 90D | Internally-headed relative clauses | Internally-headed occurs as nondominant type | Word Order | comment | |
| 91A | Order of Degree Word and Adjective | Degree word-Adjective | Word Order | comment | |
| 92A | Position of Polar Question Particles | Final | Word Order | comment | |
| 93A | Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions | Not initial interrogative phrase | Word Order | comment | |
| 94A | Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause | Final subordinator word | Word Order | comment | |
| 95A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | OV and Postpositions | Word Order | comment | |
| 96A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Relative Clause and Noun | OV and RelN | Word Order | comment | |
| 97A | Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun | OV and AdjN | Word Order | comment | |
| 98A | Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases | Nominative - accusative (standard) | Simple Clauses |
comment
examples |
|
| 99A | Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns | Nominative - accusative (standard) | Simple Clauses |
comment
examples |
|
| 100A | Alignment of Verbal Person Marking | Neutral | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 101A | Expression of Pronominal Subjects | Optional pronouns in subject position | Simple Clauses |
comment
examples |
|
| 102A | Verbal Person Marking | No person marking | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 103A | Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No person marking | 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 | Distinct from reflexive | 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 | |
| 111A | Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions | Morphological but no compound | Simple Clauses |
comment
examples |
|
| 112A | Negative Morphemes | Negative affix | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 113A | Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Asymmetric | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 114A | Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation | A/Fin and A/Cat | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 115A | Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation | Predicate negation also present | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 116A | Polar Questions | Question particle | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 117A | Predicative Possession | Locational | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 118A | Predicative Adjectives | Mixed | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 119A | Nominal and Locational Predication | Different | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 120A | Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals | Impossible | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 121A | Comparative Constructions | Locational | Simple Clauses | comment | |
| 122A | Relativization on Subjects | Gap | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 123A | Relativization on Obliques | Gap | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 124A | 'Want' Complement Subjects | Desiderative verbal affix | 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 | |
| 128A | Utterance Complement Clauses | Balanced | Complex Sentences | comment | |
| 129A | Hand and Arm | Identical | Lexicon |
comment
examples |
|
| 130A | Finger and Hand | Different | Lexicon |
comment
examples |
|
| 131A | Numeral Bases | Decimal | Lexicon |
comment
examples |
|
| 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 | No M-T pronouns | Lexicon | comment | |
| 136B | M in First Person Singular | No m in first person singular | Lexicon | comment | |
| 137A | N-M Pronouns | No N-M pronouns | Lexicon | comment | |
| 137B | M in Second Person Singular | m in second person singular | Lexicon | comment | |
| 138A | Tea | Words derived from Sinitic cha | Lexicon |
comment
examples |
|
| 142A | Para-Linguistic Usages of Clicks | Affective meanings | Other | comment | |
| 143A | Order of Negative Morpheme and Verb | [V-Neg] | Word Order | comment | |
| 143E | Preverbal Negative Morphemes | None | Word Order | comment | |
| 143F | Postverbal Negative Morphemes | [V-Neg] | 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 | MorphNeg | Word Order | comment | |
| 144L | The Position of Negative Morphemes in SOV Languages | SO[V-Neg] | Word Order | comment | |
| 144P | NegSOV Order | No NegSOV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144Q | SNegOV Order | No SNegOV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144R | SONegV Order | No SONegV | Word Order | comment | |
| 144S | SOVNeg Order | Suffix&NoDoubleNeg | Word Order | comment |
