1. Family: Trans-New Guinea
  2. Genus: Binanderean

Suena

WALS coordinates: 7° 45′ S, 147° 33′ E

spoken in Papua New Guinea

Alternative Names

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

      Features

      Feature Value References
      Phonology
      Consonant Inventories Large
      Vowel Quality Inventories Average (5-6)
      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 absent
      Front Rounded Vowels None
      Syllable Structure Simple
      Tone Simple tone system
      Absence of Common Consonants All present
      Presence of Uncommon Consonants None
      Morphology
      Locus of Marking in the Clause No 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
      Case Syncretism Core cases only
      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
      Occurrence of Nominal Plurality Only human nouns, optional
      Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns Person stem + pronominal plural affix
      Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns Inclusive/exclusive
      Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection Inclusive/exclusive
      Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns No gender distinctions
      Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns Binary politeness distinction
      Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns Identical
      Person Marking on Adpositions No person marking
      Number of Cases 4 cases
      Asymmetrical Case-Marking Additive-quantitatively asymmetrical
      Position of Case Affixes Case suffixes
      Numeral Classifiers Absent
      Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes No possessive affixes
      Nominal Syntax
      Obligatory Possessive Inflection Absent
      Possessive Classification No possessive classification
      Nominal and Verbal Conjunction Identity
      Verbal Categories
      Perfective/Imperfective Aspect No 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
      Imperative-Hortative Systems Neither type of system
      The Optative Inflectional optative absent
      Situational Possibility Verbal constructions
      Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality Indirect only
      Coding of Evidentiality Separate particle
      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 Adposition and Noun Phrase Postpositions
      Order of Genitive and Noun Genitive-Noun
      Order of Adjective and Noun Noun-Adjective
      Order of Demonstrative and Noun Noun-Demonstrative
      Order of Numeral and Noun Noun-Numeral
      Position of Polar Question Particles No question particle
      Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions Not initial interrogative phrase
      Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause Initial subordinator word
      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 Adjective and Noun OV and NAdj
      Simple Clauses
      Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases Ergative - absolutive
      Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns Neutral
      Alignment of Verbal Person Marking Accusative
      Expression of Pronominal Subjects Optional pronouns in subject position
      Verbal Person Marking Only the A argument
      Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking No zero realization
      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 No applicative construction
      Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation Both
      Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation A/Fin
      Polar Questions Interrogative verb morphology
      Complex Sentences
      'Want' Complement Subjects Subject is left implicit