1. Family: Niger-Congo
  2. Subfamily: Adamawa-Ubangi
  3. Genus: Ubangi

Zande

WALS coordinates: 4° N, 26° E

spoken in Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan

Alternative Names

Ethnologue:
Ruhlen:
  • Zande
Routledge:
    Other:
    • Azande
    ISO 639-3:

    Features

    Feature Value References
    Phonology
    Consonant Inventories Average
    Vowel Quality Inventories Large (7-14)
    Consonant-Vowel Ratio Moderately low
    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 Laterals, but no /l/, no obstruent laterals
    Front Rounded Vowels None
    Tone Simple tone system
    Absence of Common Consonants All present
    Presence of Uncommon Consonants Labial-velars
    Morphology
    Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology Equal prefixing and suffixing
    Nominal Categories
    Number of Genders Four
    Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems Sex-based
    Systems of Gender Assignment Semantic
    Coding of Nominal Plurality Plural prefix
    Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns 3rd person singular only
    Person Marking on Adpositions No person marking
    Position of Case Affixes Case suffixes
    Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes Possessive suffixes
    Verbal Categories
    Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes Tense-aspect prefixes
    Word Order
    Order of Subject, Object and Verb SVO
    Order of Subject and Verb SV
    Order of Object and Verb VO
    Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase Prepositions
    Order of Genitive and Noun No dominant order
    Order of Adjective and Noun Adjective-Noun
    Order of Demonstrative and Noun Demonstrative before and after Noun
    Order of Numeral and Noun Noun-Numeral
    Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions Not initial interrogative phrase
    Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase VO and Prepositions
    Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun VO and AdjN
    Simple Clauses
    Alignment of Verbal Person Marking Accusative
    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 A precedes P
    Passive Constructions Present
    Negative Morphemes Negative particle
    Predicative Possession Conjunctional
    Predicative Adjectives Mixed
    Nominal and Locational Predication Different
    Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals Impossible