Grebo
Niger-Congo family · Kru branch · Africa
Grebo is an SVO language, like 488 of the 1,376 languages WALS codes for basic word order.
On Weight-Sensitive Stress, all 8 other Niger-Congo languages coded have the value “Fixed stress (no weight-sensitivity)”; Grebo has “Not predictable”.
On Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation, WALS codes Grebo as “A/NonReal and A/Cat”, a value held by 11 of the 297 languages coded, Mangarrayi and Nunggubuyu among them.
On Negative Morphemes, WALS codes Grebo as “Negative auxiliary verb”, a value held by 47 of the 1,157 languages coded, Finnish and Thai among them.
Contrast Grebo with Igbo or with any other language
Uncommon values
Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Grebo, rarest first.
- N-M PronounsN-M pronouns, non-paradigmatic11 of 230
- Imperative-Hortative SystemsThe language has a minimal system, but not a maximal one20 of 375
- Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress SystemsLexical: lexical stress, diacritic weight38 of 500
- The Morphological ImperativeSecond singular43 of 548
- Presence of Uncommon ConsonantsLabial-velars45 of 567
- Other Roles of Applied ObjectsInstrument17 of 183
- Expression of Pronominal SubjectsSubject pronouns in different position67 of 711
Inside the Niger-Congo family
Grebo matches the most frequent Niger-Congo value on 68 of the 107 features where at least three other members of the family are coded (64%). Among the 27 Niger-Congo languages profiled here, that rate ranks 19th from the top.
| Feature | Grebo | Most relatives |
|---|---|---|
| Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology | Consistently dependent-marking | Inconsistent marking or other type (8 of 8) |
Closest profiles
Languages that share the most coded values with Grebo; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.
The rest of the profile
WALS codes Grebo for 107 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 95 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Grebo shares with the fewest languages comes first.
Sounds 16
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Syllable Structure | Simple syllable structure | 61 of 486 |
| Tone | Complex tone system | 88 of 527 |
| Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Moderately low | 101 of 564 |
| Vowel Nasalization | Contrastive nasal vowels present | 64 of 244 |
| Rhythm Types | Absent: no rhythmic stress | 98 of 323 |
| The Velar Nasal | Velar nasal, also initially | 147 of 469 |
| Vowel Quality Inventories | Large vowel inventory (7-14) | 184 of 564 |
| Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | Voicing contrast in plosives alone | 189 of 567 |
| Consonant Inventories | Average | 201 of 563 |
| Fixed Stress Locations | No fixed stress (mostly weight-sensitive stress) | 220 of 502 |
| Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | /p t k b d g/ | 255 of 567 |
| Lateral Consonants | /l/, no obstruent laterals | 388 of 567 |
| Glottalized Consonants | No glottalized consonants | 409 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 10
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb | 6-7 categories per word | 31 of 145 |
| Locus of Marking in the Clause | P is dependent-marked | 63 of 236 |
| Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking | Subject person/number marking is never syncretic | 81 of 198 |
| Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases | Possessor is dependent-marked | 98 of 236 |
| Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology | Predominantly suffixing | 406 of 969 |
| Exponence of Selected Inflectional Formatives | No case | 75 of 162 |
| Case Syncretism | Inflectional case marking is absent or minimal | 123 of 198 |
| Fusion of Selected Inflectional Formatives | Exclusively concatenative | 125 of 165 |
| Exponence of Tense-Aspect-Mood Inflection | monoexponential TAM | 127 of 160 |
| Zero Marking of A and P Arguments | Non-zero marking | 219 of 235 |
Nouns and pronouns 19
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Number of Genders | Three | 26 of 257 |
| Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Related by gender markers | 24 of 225 |
| Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems | Non-sex-based gender system | 28 of 257 |
| Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | 3rd person only, but also non-singular | 42 of 378 |
| Systems of Gender Assignment | Semantic assignment | 53 of 257 |
| Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes | No possessive affixes | 260 of 902 |
| Asymmetrical Case-Marking | No morphological case-marking | 81 of 261 |
| Definite Articles | Neither definite nor indefinite article | 198 of 620 |
| Ordinal Numerals | First, two-th, three-th | 110 of 321 |
| Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection | No person marking at all | 70 of 200 |
| Position of Case Affixes | Neither case affixes nor adpositional clitics | 379 of 1,031 |
| Indefinite Articles | Neither indefinite nor definite | 198 of 534 |
| Number of Cases | No morphological case-marking | 100 of 261 |
| Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns | Person-number stem | 114 of 261 |
| Occurrence of Nominal Plurality | Plural in all nouns, always obligatory | 133 of 291 |
| Coding of Nominal Plurality | Plural suffix | 513 of 1,066 |
| Person Marking on Adpositions | Adpositions without person marking | 209 of 378 |
| Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns | No inclusive/exclusive opposition | 120 of 200 |
| Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns | Second person pronouns encode no politeness distinction | 136 of 207 |
Noun phrases 3
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Possessive Classification | No possessive classification | 125 of 243 |
| Obligatory Possessive Inflection | No obligatorily possessed nouns | 201 of 244 |
| Number of Possessive Nouns | None reported | 233 of 243 |
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 13
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| The Past Tense | Present, 2-3 remoteness distinctions | 38 of 222 |
| Epistemic Possibility | Verbal constructions | 65 of 240 |
| The Prohibitive | Special imperative + special negative | 146 of 496 |
| The Perfect | Other perfect | 80 of 222 |
| Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
| Coding of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
| Perfective/Imperfective Aspect | Grammatical marking of perfective/imperfective distinction | 101 of 222 |
| The Future Tense | Inflectional marking of future/non-future distinction | 110 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 |
| Suppletion in Imperatives and Hortatives | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 153 of 193 |
| Verbal Number and Suppletion | No singular-(dual)-plural pairs/triples | 159 of 193 |
| The Optative | Inflectional optative absent | 271 of 319 |
Word order 11
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Polar Question Particles | Question particle at beginning of sentence | 129 of 884 |
| Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions | Interrogative phrases obligatorily initial | 264 of 902 |
| Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb | Verb-object-oblique (VOX) | 210 of 500 |
| Order of Demonstrative and Noun | Demonstrative word follows noun (NDem) | 562 of 1,225 |
| Order of Object and Verb | Object follows verb (VO) | 705 of 1,518 |
| Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Postpositions | 577 of 1,184 |
| Order of Numeral and Noun | Numeral follows noun (NNum) | 608 of 1,154 |
| Order of Genitive and Noun | Genitive-noun (GenN) | 685 of 1,249 |
| Order of Adjective and Noun | Modifying adjective follows noun (NAdj) | 879 of 1,367 |
| Order of Relative Clause and Noun | Relative clause follows noun (NRel) | 579 of 824 |
| Order of Subject and Verb | Subject precedes verb (SV) | 1,192 of 1,496 |
Simple clauses 18
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Asymmetric standard negation only: Type Asy | 53 of 297 |
| Verbal Person Marking | No person marking of any argument | 82 of 378 |
| Alignment of Verbal Person Marking | Neutral alignment (no verbal person marking) | 84 of 380 |
| Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' | Double-object construction | 84 of 378 |
| Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No person marking of the S | 96 of 380 |
| Applicative Constructions | Benefactive and other; both bases | 49 of 183 |
| Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns | Nominative - accusative (standard) | 61 of 172 |
| Predicative Adjectives | Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 151 of 386 |
| Passive Constructions | There is a passive construction | 162 of 373 |
| Order of Person Markers on the Verb | A and P do not or do not both occur on the verb | 187 of 379 |
| 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 |
| 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 |
Complex sentences 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| 'When' Clauses | Balanced | 84 of 174 |
| Purpose Clauses | Deranked | 102 of 170 |
Vocabulary 3
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| M-T Pronouns | M-T pronouns, paradigmatic | 27 of 230 |
| M in First Person Singular | m in first person singular | 53 of 230 |
| M in Second Person Singular | m in second person singular | 78 of 230 |