Tamil

WALS coordinates: 11° N, 78° 30′ E

spoken in India, Sri Lanka

Alternative Names

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

      Features

      Feature Value References
      Morphology
      Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology Strongly suffixing
      Reduplication Productive full and partial reduplication
      Nominal Categories
      Number of Genders Three
      Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems Sex-based
      Systems of Gender Assignment Semantic
      Coding of Nominal Plurality Plural suffix
      Occurrence of Nominal Plurality All nouns, optional in inanimates
      Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns Person-number stem + nominal plural affix
      Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives Two-way contrast
      Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives Different inflection
      Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns Multiple politeness distinctions
      Indefinite Pronouns Interrogative-based
      Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns Identical
      Position of Case Affixes Case suffixes
      Comitatives and Instrumentals Differentiation
      Ordinal Numerals First, two-th, three-th
      Distributive Numerals Marked by reduplication
      Conjunctions and Universal Quantifiers Formally similar, with interrogative
      Nominal Syntax
      Action Nominal Constructions Sentential
      Noun Phrase Conjunction 'And' different from 'with'
      Nominal and Verbal Conjunction Differentiation
      Verbal Categories
      Perfective/Imperfective Aspect No 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
      Situational Possibility Affixes on verbs
      Epistemic Possibility Affixes on verbs
      Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking Overlap for either possibility or necessity
      Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality Indirect only
      Coding of Evidentiality Verbal affix or clitic
      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 XOV
      Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase Postpositions
      Order of Genitive and Noun Genitive-Noun
      Order of Adjective and Noun Adjective-Noun
      Order of Demonstrative and Noun Demonstrative-Noun
      Order of Numeral and Noun Numeral-Noun
      Order of Relative Clause and Noun Relative clause-Noun
      Order of Degree Word and Adjective Degree word-Adjective
      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 Subordinating suffix
      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 RelN
      Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun OV and AdjN
      Simple Clauses
      Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' Indirect-object construction
      Reciprocal Constructions Distinct from reflexive
      Antipassive Constructions No antipassive
      Applicative Constructions No applicative construction
      Periphrastic Causative Constructions Purposive but no sequential
      Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions Morphological but no compound
      Negative Morphemes Negative affix
      Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation Predicate negation also present
      Polar Questions Interrogative verb morphology
      Predicative Possession Locational
      Predicative Adjectives Nonverbal encoding
      Nominal and Locational Predication Identical
      Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals Possible
      Comparative Constructions Locational
      Complex Sentences
      Purpose Clauses Deranked
      'When' Clauses Deranked
      Reason Clauses Deranked
      Utterance Complement Clauses Deranked
      Lexicon
      Hand and Arm Identical
      Finger and Hand Different