Predicative Adjectives
Simple clauses · one world map for each value
WALS codes 386 languages for this feature. The most frequent value, “Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding”, covers 151 of them (39%); the least frequent, “Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding”, covers 103.
That value is most frequent in North America (69% of the 67 languages coded there) and absent from the 20 languages coded in Australia.
All 29 Indo-European languages coded have “Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding”.
Afro-Asiatic is the most divided, its largest group reaching only 13 of 25.
Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding151 languages · 39%
Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding132 languages · 34%
Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding103 languages · 27%
One map per value; each dot is a language WALS codes with that value.
By macro-area
| Value | Africa | Eurasia | Papunesia | Australia | North America | South America |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 25 | 30 | 37 | 0 | 46 | 13 |
| Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 8 | 70 | 23 | 14 | 5 | 12 |
| Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding | 54 | 11 | 12 | 6 | 16 | 4 |
| All values | 87 | 111 | 72 | 20 | 67 | 29 |
Inside the largest families
| Family | Coded | Most frequent value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Austronesian | 49 | Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 76% |
| Niger-Congo | 30 | Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding | 77% |
| Indo-European | 29 | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 100% |
| Afro-Asiatic | 25 | Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding | 52% |
| Trans-New Guinea | 15 | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 100% |
| Eastern Sudanic | 13 | Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding | 62% |
| Sino-Tibetan | 13 | Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 77% |
| Austro-Asiatic | 12 | Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 58% |
| Pama-Nyungan | 11 | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 100% |
| Uralic | 11 | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 100% |
| Altaic | 10 | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 100% |
| Uto-Aztecan | 8 | Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding | 62% |
Languages to explore
The most fully coded languages with each value.
- Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding: Indonesian, Mandarin, Abkhaz, Tagalog, Malagasy, Vietnamese
- Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding: English, French, Russian, Finnish, Spanish, Turkish
- Predicative adjectives have mixed encoding: Japanese, Korean, Supyire, Maori, Greenlandic (West), Swahili