1. Family: Nilo-Saharan
  2. Genus: Eastern Saharan

Kanuri

WALS coordinates: 12° N, 13° E

spoken in Nigeria, Chad, Niger, Sudan

Alternative Names

Ethnologue:
Ruhlen:
  • Kanuri
Routledge:
    Other:
      ISO 639-3:

      Features

      Feature Value References
      Phonology
      Consonant Inventories Moderately large
      Vowel Quality Inventories Large (7-14)
      Consonant-Vowel Ratio Average
      Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives In both plosives and fricatives
      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 /l/, no obstruent laterals
      The Velar Nasal Initial velar nasal
      Vowel Nasalization Contrast absent
      Front Rounded Vowels None
      Syllable Structure Moderately complex
      Tone Simple tone system
      Absence of Common Consonants All present
      Presence of Uncommon Consonants None
      Morphology
      Locus of Marking in the Clause Double marking
      Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases Dependent 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 case marking
      Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking Not syncretic
      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 suffix
      Occurrence of Nominal Plurality All nouns, always obligatory
      Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns Person-number stem + pronominal plural affix
      The Associative Plural Associative same as additive plural
      Definite Articles Definite word distinct from demonstrative
      Indefinite Articles Indefinite word distinct from 'one'
      Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns No inclusive/exclusive
      Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection No inclusive/exclusive
      Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives Two-way contrast
      Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives Unrelated
      Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns No gender distinctions
      Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns No politeness distinction
      Person Marking on Adpositions No person marking
      Number of Cases 6-7 cases
      Asymmetrical Case-Marking Subtractive-quantitatively asymmetrical
      Position of Case Affixes Postpositional clitics
      Comitatives and Instrumentals Differentiation
      Ordinal Numerals First/one-th, two-th, three-th
      Numeral Classifiers Absent
      Conjunctions and Universal Quantifiers Formally similar, with interrogative
      Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes Possessive suffixes
      Nominal Syntax
      Obligatory Possessive Inflection Absent
      Possessive Classification No possessive classification
      Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses Adjectives and relative clauses collapsed
      Adjectives without Nouns Without marking
      Action Nominal Constructions Mixed
      Noun Phrase Conjunction 'And' identical to 'with'
      Nominal and Verbal Conjunction Differentiation
      Verbal Categories
      Perfective/Imperfective Aspect Grammatical marking
      The Past Tense Present, no remoteness distinctions
      The Future Tense Inflectional future exists
      The Perfect Other 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 Neither type of system
      The Optative Inflectional optative absent
      Situational Possibility Verbal constructions
      Epistemic Possibility Other
      Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking No overlap
      Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality No grammatical evidentials
      Coding of Evidentiality No grammatical evidentials
      Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect Tense
      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 Object, Oblique, and Verb OXV
      Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase Postpositions
      Order of Genitive and Noun Noun-Genitive
      Order of Adjective and Noun Noun-Adjective
      Order of Demonstrative and Noun Noun-Demonstrative
      Order of Numeral and Noun Noun-Numeral
      Order of Relative Clause and Noun Noun-Relative clause
      Order of Degree Word and Adjective Adjective-Degree word
      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 OV and NRel
      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 Nominative - accusative (standard)
      Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns Nominative - accusative (standard)
      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 Both orders of A and P occur
      Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' Indirect-object construction
      Passive Constructions Present
      Antipassive Constructions No antipassive
      Applicative Constructions Benefactive and other; 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 Both
      Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation A/Cat
      Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation Predicate negation also present
      Polar Questions Interrogative verb morphology
      Predicative Possession Conjunctional
      Predicative Adjectives Mixed
      Nominal and Locational Predication Different
      Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals Possible
      Comparative Constructions Locational
      Complex Sentences
      Purpose Clauses Deranked
      'When' Clauses Balanced
      Reason Clauses Balanced
      Utterance Complement Clauses Balanced
      Lexicon
      Hand and Arm Identical
      Finger and Hand Different
      Numeral Bases Decimal
      M-T Pronouns No M-T pronouns
      N-M Pronouns N-M pronouns, non-paradigmatic
      Tea Words derived from Min Nan Chinese te