Miya
Afro-Asiatic family · West Chadic branch · Africa
WALS records no dominant basic order of subject, object and verb for Miya, a group that holds 189 of the 1,376 languages it codes for this feature.
Within the West Chadic branch, all 10 other languages coded for Order of Subject and Verb have the value “Subject precedes verb (SV)”; Miya has “Both orders with neither order dominant”.
On 'Want' Complement Subjects, WALS codes Miya as “Both construction types exist”, a value held by 14 of the 283 languages coded, Oromo (Harar) and Georgian among them.
On Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions, WALS codes Miya as “Mixed, some interrogative phrases obligatorily initial, some not”, a value held by 23 of the 902 languages coded, Hausa and Indonesian among them.
Contrast Miya with Hausa or with any other language
Uncommon values
Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Miya, rarest first.
- Expression of Pronominal SubjectsSubject pronouns in different position67 of 711
Inside the Afro-Asiatic family
Miya matches the most frequent Afro-Asiatic value on 36 of the 49 features where at least three other members of the family are coded (73%). Among the 24 Afro-Asiatic languages profiled here, that rate ranks second from the top.
| Feature | Miya | Most relatives |
|---|---|---|
| Order of Demonstrative and Noun | Demonstrative word precedes noun (DemN) | Demonstrative word follows noun (NDem) (6 of 7, West Chadic branch) |
Closest profiles
Languages that share the most coded values with Miya; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.
The rest of the profile
WALS codes Miya for 49 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 43 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Miya shares with the fewest languages comes first.
Word structure 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology | Predominantly suffixing | 406 of 969 |
| Reduplication | Productive full and partial reduplication | 278 of 368 |
Nouns and pronouns 14
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Indefinite Articles | Indefinite word distinct from numeral for 'one' | 102 of 534 |
| Number of Genders | Two | 50 of 257 |
| Systems of Gender Assignment | Semantic and formal assignment | 59 of 257 |
| Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems | Sex-based gender system | 84 of 257 |
| Definite Articles | Definite word distinct from demonstrative | 216 of 620 |
| Position of Case Affixes | Neither case affixes nor adpositional clitics | 379 of 1,031 |
| Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes | Possessive suffixes | 355 of 902 |
| Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Unrelated | 100 of 225 |
| Occurrence of Nominal Plurality | Plural in all nouns, always obligatory | 133 of 291 |
| Coding of Nominal Plurality | Plural suffix | 513 of 1,066 |
| Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives | Two-way contrast | 126 of 234 |
| Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns | Intensifiers and reflexive pronouns are formally identical | 94 of 168 |
| Numeral Classifiers | Numeral classifiers are absent | 260 of 400 |
| Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives | Same forms | 143 of 201 |
Noun phrases 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Nominal and Verbal Conjunction | Nominal and verbal conjunction are different | 125 of 301 |
| Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses | Highly differentiated | 77 of 138 |
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 4
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | No tense-aspect inflection | 152 of 1,131 |
| The Prohibitive | Special imperative + special negative | 146 of 496 |
| The Morphological Imperative | Second singular and second plural | 292 of 548 |
| Imperative-Hortative Systems | The language has neither a maximal nor a minimal system | 201 of 375 |
Word order 9
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Polar Question Particles | Question particle at end of sentence | 314 of 884 |
| Order of Genitive and Noun | Noun-genitive (NGen) | 468 of 1,249 |
| Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb | Verb-object-oblique (VOX) | 210 of 500 |
| Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Prepositions | 511 of 1,184 |
| Order of Object and Verb | Object follows verb (VO) | 705 of 1,518 |
| Order of Numeral and Noun | Numeral follows noun (NNum) | 608 of 1,154 |
| Order of Adverbial Subordinator and Clause | Initial subordinator word | 398 of 659 |
| 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 |
Simple clauses 6
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Negative Morphemes | Double negation | 119 of 1,157 |
| Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' | Double-object construction | 84 of 378 |
| Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation | In other grammatical categories: Subtype A/Cat | 82 of 297 |
| Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Symmetric and asymmetric standard negation: Type SymAsy | 130 of 297 |
| Polar Questions | Question particle | 585 of 955 |
| Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation | Negative indefinites co-occur with predicate negation | 170 of 206 |
Complex sentences 6
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Relativization on Obliques | Pronoun-Retention Strategy | 20 of 112 |
| 'When' Clauses | Balanced | 84 of 174 |
| Reason Clauses | Balanced | 90 of 169 |
| Purpose Clauses | Deranked | 102 of 170 |
| Relativization on Subjects | Gap | 125 of 166 |
| Utterance Complement Clauses | Balanced | 114 of 143 |