Pohnpeian
Austronesian family · Oceanic branch · Papunesia
Pohnpeian is an SVO language, like 488 of the 1,376 languages WALS codes for basic word order.
On Number of Possessive Nouns, WALS codes Pohnpeian as “Five or more”, a value held by 3 of the 243 languages coded.
On Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions, WALS codes Pohnpeian as “Mixed, some interrogative phrases obligatorily initial, some not”, a value held by 23 of the 902 languages coded, Indonesian and Tukang Besi among them.
Within the Oceanic branch, 8 of 10 other languages coded for Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns have the value “Second person pronouns encode no politeness distinction”; Pohnpeian has “Second person pronouns encode multiple politeness distinctions”.
Contrast Pohnpeian with Taba or with any other language
Uncommon values
Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Pohnpeian, rarest first.
- Order of Genitive and NounBoth orders occur with neither order dominant96 of 1,249
- Coding of Nominal PluralityNo plural98 of 1,066
Inside the Austronesian family
Pohnpeian matches the most frequent Austronesian value on 32 of the 50 features where at least three other members of the family are coded (64%). Among the 38 Austronesian languages profiled here, that rate ranks 24th from the top.
Closest profiles
Languages that share the most coded values with Pohnpeian; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.
The rest of the profile
WALS codes Pohnpeian for 50 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 44 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Pohnpeian shares with the fewest languages comes first.
Sounds 13
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Low | 58 of 564 |
| Consonant Inventories | Small | 89 of 563 |
| Syllable Structure | Complex syllable structure | 151 of 486 |
| Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | No voicing contrast | 182 of 567 |
| Vowel Quality Inventories | Large vowel inventory (7-14) | 184 of 564 |
| Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | Other | 242 of 567 |
| Tone | No tones | 307 of 527 |
| Lateral Consonants | /l/, no obstruent laterals | 388 of 567 |
| Glottalized Consonants | No glottalized consonants | 409 of 567 |
| 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 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology | Moderate preference for suffixing | 123 of 969 |
| Reduplication | Productive full and partial reduplication | 278 of 368 |
Nouns and pronouns 7
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Pronominal and Adnominal Demonstratives | Different stems | 37 of 201 |
| Indefinite Articles | Indefinite word distinct from numeral for 'one' | 102 of 534 |
| Numeral Classifiers | Numeral classifiers are obligatory | 78 of 400 |
| Position of Case Affixes | Neither case affixes nor adpositional clitics | 379 of 1,031 |
| Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives | Three-way contrast | 88 of 234 |
| Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes | Possessive suffixes | 355 of 902 |
| Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Unrelated | 100 of 225 |
Noun phrases 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Possessive Classification | Two classes | 94 of 243 |
| Obligatory Possessive Inflection | No obligatorily possessed nouns | 201 of 244 |
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 3
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | Combination of tense-aspect strategies with none primary | 146 of 1,131 |
| Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
| Coding of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
Word order 11
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Order of Degree Word and Adjective | Both orders occur with neither order dominant | 62 of 481 |
| Position of Polar Question Particles | No question particle | 355 of 884 |
| 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 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 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 |
| Order of Subject and Verb | Subject precedes verb (SV) | 1,192 of 1,496 |
Simple clauses 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Polar Questions | Interrogative intonation only | 173 of 955 |
| Negative Morphemes | Negative particle | 502 of 1,157 |
Vocabulary 4
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Tea | Words derived from Min Nan Chinese te | 84 of 230 |
| Hand and Arm | Identity: a single word denotes both 'hand' and 'arm' | 228 of 617 |
| Numeral Bases | Decimal | 125 of 196 |
| Finger and Hand | Different | 521 of 593 |