Ainu

a family of its own in WALS · Eurasia

Ainu is an SOV language, like 564 of the 1,376 languages WALS codes for basic word order.

On Distributive Numerals, WALS codes Ainu as “Marked by following word”, a value held by 5 of the 251 languages coded, Malagasy and Selkup among them.

WALS lists no other language in the family it assigns to Ainu.

The closest grammar profile to Ainu in the atlas belongs to Tauya, a Trans-New Guinea language: the two agree on 36 of the 55 features both have coded.

The order Ainu uses in 8 pairings of a head word and its dependent. Bars: how all languages coded for each pairing split, before or after.

Contrast Ainu with Tauya or with any other language

Uncommon values

Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Ainu, rarest first.

Other Roles of Applied ObjectsInstrument and locative12 of 183
Alignment of Verbal Person MarkingSplit alignment28 of 380
Verbal Number and SuppletionSingular-plural pairs, suppletion15 of 193
Number of CasesExclusively borderline morphological case-marking24 of 261
Third Person Zero of Verbal Person MarkingZero in all 3rd person forms36 of 380
ReduplicationFull reduplication only35 of 368
Plurality in Independent Personal PronounsPerson-number affixes25 of 261

Closest profiles

Languages that share the most coded values with Ainu; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.

Nara (in Ethiopia) Eastern Sudanic28 of 43
Khanty Uralic34 of 55
Apurinã Arawakan60 of 103
Urubú-Kaapor Tupian49 of 83

The rest of the profile

WALS codes Ainu for 119 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 110 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Ainu shares with the fewest languages comes first.

Sounds 15

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Consonant Inventories	Small	89 of 563
Lateral Consonants	No laterals	95 of 567
Consonant-Vowel Ratio	Moderately low	101 of 564
Tone	Simple tone system	132 of 527
Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives	No voicing contrast	182 of 567
Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems	Other	242 of 567
The Velar Nasal	No velar nasal	235 of 469
Vowel Quality Inventories	Average vowel inventory (5-6)	287 of 564
Syllable Structure	Moderately complex syllable structure	274 of 486
Glottalized Consonants	No glottalized consonants	409 of 567
Vowel Nasalization	Contrastive nasal vowels absent	180 of 244
Presence of Uncommon Consonants	None	449 of 567
Uvular Consonants	No uvulars	470 of 567
Absence of Common Consonants	All present	503 of 567
Front Rounded Vowels	None	525 of 562

Word structure 8

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology	Approximately equal amounts of suffixing and prefixing	147 of 969
Locus of Marking in the Clause	P has no marking	42 of 236
Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases	Possessor is head-marked	78 of 236
Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb	4-5 categories per word	52 of 145
Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking	Subject person/number marking is never syncretic	81 of 198
Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology	Inconsistent marking or other type	121 of 236
Case Syncretism	Inflectional case marking is absent or minimal	123 of 198
Zero Marking of A and P Arguments	Non-zero marking	219 of 235

Nouns and pronouns 22

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Ordinal Numerals	Zero: Ordinal numerals do not exist	33 of 321
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection	Inclusive and exclusive differentiated	30 of 200
Numeral Classifiers	Numeral classifiers are optional	62 of 400
Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives	Different stems	37 of 201
Occurrence of Nominal Plurality	Plural in all nouns, always optional	55 of 291
Person Marking on Adpositions	Person marking for pronouns only	83 of 378
Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns	Second person pronouns encode a binary politeness distinction	49 of 207
Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes	Possessive prefixes	255 of 902
Asymmetrical Case-Marking	Symmetrical case-marking	79 of 261
Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns	Inclusive and exclusive differentiated	63 of 200
Position of Case Affixes	Neither case affixes nor adpositional clitics	379 of 1,031
Conjunctions and Universal Quantifiers	Formally similar, involving interrogative expression	43 of 116
The Associative Plural	Associative plural marker also used for additive plurals	104 of 236
Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives	Unrelated	100 of 225
Coding of Nominal Plurality	Plural suffix	513 of 1,066
Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives	Two-way contrast	126 of 234
Number of Genders	None	145 of 257
Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems	No gender system	145 of 257
Systems of Gender Assignment	No gender system	145 of 257
Indefinite Pronouns	Interrogative-based indefinites	194 of 326
Comitatives and Instrumentals	Differentiation	213 of 322
Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns	No gender distinctions	254 of 378

Noun phrases 6

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses	Adjectives and relative clauses collapsed	33 of 138
Nominal and Verbal Conjunction	Nominal and verbal conjunction are different	125 of 301
Possessive Classification	No possessive classification	125 of 243
Noun Phrase Conjunction	AND-languages: 'and' and 'with' are not identical	131 of 234
Obligatory Possessive Inflection	No obligatorily possessed nouns	201 of 244
Number of Possessive Nouns	None reported	233 of 243

Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 16

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
The Morphological Imperative	Second person number-neutral	89 of 548
Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality	Both direct and indirect evidentials	71 of 418
Coding of Evidentiality	Verbal affix or clitic	131 of 418
Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking	Overlap for either possibility or necessity	66 of 207
The Prohibitive	Normal imperative + special negative	182 of 496
Epistemic Possibility	Other	91 of 240
The Past Tense	No grammatical marking of past/non-past distinction	88 of 222
The Future Tense	No inflectional marking of future/non-future distinction	112 of 222
The Perfect	No perfect	114 of 222
Imperative-Hortative Systems	The language has neither a maximal nor a minimal system	201 of 375
Perfective/Imperfective Aspect	No grammatical marking of perfective/imperfective distinction	121 of 222
Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes	Tense-aspect suffixes	667 of 1,131
Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect	No suppletion in tense or aspect	123 of 193
Situational Possibility	Verbal constructions	158 of 234
Suppletion in Imperatives and Hortatives	None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material)	153 of 193
The Optative	Inflectional optative absent	271 of 319

Word order 11

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause	Final subordinator word	96 of 659
Order of Relative Clause and Noun	Relative clause precedes noun (RelN)	141 of 824
Order of Adjective and Noun	Modifying adjective precedes noun (AdjN)	373 of 1,367
Position of Polar Question Particles	Question particle at end of sentence	314 of 884
Order of Numeral and Noun	Numeral precedes noun (NumN)	479 of 1,154
Order of Demonstrative and Noun	Demonstrative word precedes noun (DemN)	542 of 1,225
Order of Object and Verb	Object precedes verb (OV)	712 of 1,518
Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase	Postpositions	577 of 1,184
Order of Genitive and Noun	Genitive-noun (GenN)	685 of 1,249
Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions	Interrogative phrases not obligatorily initial	615 of 902
Order of Subject and Verb	Subject precedes verb (SV)	1,192 of 1,496

Simple clauses 21

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give'	Secondary-object construction	65 of 378
Order of Person Markers on the Verb	A precedes P	96 of 379
Predicative Possession	Have-Possessive	63 of 240
Applicative Constructions	Benefactive and other; both bases	49 of 183
Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation	Symmetric standard negation only: Type Sym	114 of 297
Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation	Non-assignable (no asymmetry found)	114 of 297
Predicative Adjectives	Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding	151 of 386
Negative Morphemes	Negative particle	502 of 1,157
Passive Constructions	There is a passive construction	162 of 373
Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns	Neutral	79 of 172
Verbal Person Marking	Person marking of both the A and P arguments	193 of 378
Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases	Neutral	98 of 190
Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals	Zero copula is impossible	211 of 386
Reciprocal Constructions	Distinct from reflexive	99 of 175
Polar Questions	Question particle	585 of 955
Expression of Pronominal Subjects	Pronominal subjects are expressed by affixes on verbs	437 of 711
Nominal and Locational Predication	Different	269 of 386
Antipassive Constructions	No antipassive	146 of 194
Productivity of the Antipassive Construction	no antipassive	146 of 186
Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions	Morphological type but no compound type	254 of 310
Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation	Negative indefinites co-occur with predicate negation	170 of 206

Complex sentences 5

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Purpose Clauses	Balanced	38 of 170
'When' Clauses	Balanced	84 of 174
'Want' Complement Subjects	The complement subject is left implicit	144 of 283
Reason Clauses	Balanced	90 of 169
Utterance Complement Clauses	Balanced	114 of 143

Vocabulary 6

Feature	Value	Languages sharing it
Numeral Bases	Pure vigesimal	20 of 196
Hand and Arm	Identity: a single word denotes both 'hand' and 'arm'	228 of 617
M in Second Person Singular	No m in second person singular	152 of 230
M in First Person Singular	No m in first person singular	177 of 230
N-M Pronouns	No N-M pronouns	194 of 230
M-T Pronouns	No M-T pronouns	200 of 230