The Morphological Imperative
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence · one world map for each value
WALS codes 548 languages for this feature. The most frequent value, “Second singular and second plural”, covers 292 of them (53%); the least frequent, “Second plural”, covers 2.
That value is most frequent in North America (72% of the 74 languages coded there) and least frequent in Papunesia (33% of 81).
All 9 Mayan languages coded have “Second singular and second plural”.
Central Sudanic is the most divided, its largest group reaching only 3 of 8.
Second singular and second plural292 languages · 53%
Second singular43 languages · 8%
Second plural2 languages · under 1%
Second person number-neutral89 languages · 16%
No second-person imperatives122 languages · 22%
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Second singular and second plural | 76 | 93 | 27 | 13 | 53 | 30 |
| Second singular | 15 | 17 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| Second plural | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Second person number-neutral | 15 | 32 | 13 | 12 | 9 | 8 |
| No second-person imperatives | 26 | 30 | 38 | 6 | 11 | 11 |
| All values | 132 | 173 | 81 | 32 | 74 | 56 |
Inside the largest families
| Family | Coded | Most frequent value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Niger-Congo | 58 | Second singular and second plural | 43% |
| Indo-European | 53 | Second singular and second plural | 53% |
| Austronesian | 52 | No second-person imperatives | 60% |
| Afro-Asiatic | 36 | Second singular and second plural | 83% |
| Sino-Tibetan | 27 | Second person number-neutral | 44% |
| Pama-Nyungan | 19 | Second person number-neutral | 58% |
| Trans-New Guinea | 16 | Second singular and second plural | 81% |
| Altaic | 15 | Second singular and second plural | 93% |
| Uto-Aztecan | 14 | Second singular and second plural | 86% |
| Uralic | 13 | Second singular and second plural | 77% |
| Nakh-Daghestanian | 12 | Second singular and second plural | 50% |
| Eastern Sudanic | 11 | Second singular and second plural | 91% |
| Austro-Asiatic | 10 | No second-person imperatives | 90% |
| Mayan | 9 | Second singular and second plural | 100% |
Languages to explore
The most fully coded languages with each value.
- Second singular and second plural: Russian, Finnish, Spanish, Turkish, Basque, Greek (Modern)
- Second singular: French, German, Persian, Hausa, Supyire, Tukang Besi
- Second plural: Apurinã, Latvian
- Second person number-neutral: Japanese, Lezgian, Korean, Khalkha, Malagasy, Kayardild
- No second-person imperatives: English, Indonesian, Mandarin, Hungarian, Georgian, Amele