Tigak
Austronesian family · Oceanic branch · Papunesia
Tigak is an SVO language, like 488 of the 1,376 languages WALS codes for basic word order.
On Lateral Consonants, WALS codes Tigak as “No /l/, but lateral obstruents”, a value held by 8 of the 567 languages coded, Chukchi and Kutenai among them.
The closest grammar profile to Tigak in the atlas belongs to Sedang, an Austro-Asiatic language: the two agree on 31 of the 41 features both have coded.
On Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions, 50 of 53 other Austronesian languages coded have the value “Morphological type but no compound type”; Tigak has “Both morphological type and compound type”.
Contrast Tigak with Sedang or with any other language
Uncommon values
Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Tigak, rarest first.
- Negative MorphemesNegative word, unclear if verb or particle73 of 1,157
- Verbal Person MarkingPerson marking of only the P argument24 of 378
- Expression of Pronominal SubjectsSubject pronouns in different position67 of 711
Inside the Austronesian family
Tigak matches the most frequent Austronesian value on 39 of the 56 features where at least three other members of the family are coded (70%). Among the 38 Austronesian languages profiled here, that rate ranks ninth from the top.
Closest profiles
Languages that share the most coded values with Tigak; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.
The rest of the profile
WALS codes Tigak for 56 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 50 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Tigak shares with the fewest languages comes first.
Sounds 16
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Consonant Inventories | Small | 89 of 563 |
| Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Moderately low | 101 of 564 |
| Fixed Stress Locations | Initial: stress is on the first syllable | 92 of 502 |
| Rhythm Types | Absent: no rhythmic stress | 98 of 323 |
| Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | Voicing contrast in plosives alone | 189 of 567 |
| Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | Other | 242 of 567 |
| Vowel Quality Inventories | Average vowel inventory (5-6) | 287 of 564 |
| Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress Systems | No weight, or weight factor unknown | 261 of 500 |
| Weight-Sensitive Stress | Fixed stress (no weight-sensitivity) | 281 of 500 |
| Syllable Structure | Moderately complex syllable structure | 274 of 486 |
| Tone | No tones | 307 of 527 |
| 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 | Little or no inflectional morphology | 141 of 969 |
| Reduplication | Productive full and partial reduplication | 278 of 368 |
Nouns and pronouns 8
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Coding of Nominal Plurality | Plural word | 170 of 1,066 |
| Indefinite Articles | Indefinite word distinct from numeral for 'one' | 102 of 534 |
| Person Marking on Adpositions | Person marking for pronouns only | 83 of 378 |
| Comitatives and Instrumentals | Identity | 76 of 322 |
| 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 |
| Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | No gender distinctions | 254 of 378 |
Noun phrases 1
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Noun Phrase Conjunction | AND-languages: 'and' and 'with' are not identical | 131 of 234 |
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 1
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | No tense-aspect inflection | 152 of 1,131 |
Word order 13
| 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 Degree Word and Adjective | Degree word follows adjective (AdjDeg) | 192 of 481 |
| Order of Numeral and Noun | Numeral precedes noun (NumN) | 479 of 1,154 |
| 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 Adverbial Subordinator and Clause | Initial subordinator word | 398 of 659 |
| Order of Adjective and Noun | Modifying adjective follows noun (NAdj) | 879 of 1,367 |
| Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions | Interrogative phrases not obligatorily initial | 615 of 902 |
| 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 9
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No person marking of the S | 96 of 380 |
| Predicative Possession | Have-Possessive | 63 of 240 |
| Predicative Adjectives | Predicative adjectives have verbal encoding | 151 of 386 |
| Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals | Zero copula is possible | 175 of 386 |
| 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 Verbal Person Marking | Accusative alignment | 212 of 380 |
| Passive Constructions | There is no passive construction | 211 of 373 |
| Polar Questions | Question particle | 585 of 955 |
| Nominal and Locational Predication | Different | 269 of 386 |