Usan
Trans-New Guinea family · North Adelbert branch · Papunesia
Usan is an SOV language, like 564 of the 1,376 languages WALS codes for basic word order.
On Ordinal Numerals, WALS codes Usan as “Variou-th: Other solutions”, a value held by 7 of the 321 languages coded, Kewa and Vietnamese among them.
On Subtypes of Asymmetric Standard Negation, WALS codes Usan as “In finiteness and reality status: Subtypes A/Fin and A/NonReal”, a value held by 9 of the 297 languages coded, Korean and Chukchi among them.
On Verbal Number and Suppletion, 4 of 5 other Trans-New Guinea languages coded have the value “No singular-(dual)-plural pairs/triples”; Usan has “Singular-plural pairs, suppletion”.
Contrast Usan with Daga or with any other language
Uncommon values
Values that fewer than one in ten of the coded languages share with Usan, rarest first.
- Weight-Sensitive StressNot predictable26 of 500
- Weight Factors in Weight-Sensitive Stress SystemsLexical: lexical stress, diacritic weight38 of 500
- Applicative ConstructionsBenefactive object only; both bases16 of 183
- Number of CasesExclusively borderline morphological case-marking24 of 261
- Occurrence of Nominal PluralityNo nominal plural28 of 291
Inside the Trans-New Guinea family
Usan matches the most frequent Trans-New Guinea value on 63 of the 90 features where at least three other members of the family are coded (70%). Among the 16 Trans-New Guinea languages profiled here, that rate ranks third from the top.
Closest profiles
Languages that share the most coded values with Usan; the count is out of the features both languages are coded for.
The rest of the profile
WALS codes Usan for 91 of the 144 profile features used on this site. The remaining 82 are listed here, grouped by topic; within each group the value Usan shares with the fewest languages comes first.
Sounds 16
| 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 |
| Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | Voicing contrast in plosives alone | 189 of 567 |
| Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | Other | 242 of 567 |
| Fixed Stress Locations | No fixed stress (mostly weight-sensitive stress) | 220 of 502 |
| 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 |
| Tone | No tones | 307 of 527 |
| 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 6
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology | Consistently head-marking | 47 of 236 |
| Locus of Marking in the Clause | P is head-marked | 71 of 236 |
| Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking | Subject person/number marking is syncretic | 60 of 198 |
| Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases | Possessor is head-marked | 78 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 13
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Definite Articles | Demonstrative word used as marker of definiteness | 69 of 620 |
| Asymmetrical Case-Marking | Additive-quantitatively asymmetrical case-marking | 53 of 261 |
| Person Marking on Adpositions | Person marking for pronouns only | 83 of 378 |
| Indefinite Pronouns | Generic-noun-based indefinites | 85 of 326 |
| Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Verbal Inflection | No inclusive/exclusive opposition | 79 of 200 |
| Plurality in Independent Personal Pronouns | Person-number stem | 114 of 261 |
| Intensifiers and Reflexive Pronouns | Intensifiers and reflexive pronouns are formally differentiated | 74 of 168 |
| Third Person Pronouns and Demonstratives | Unrelated | 100 of 225 |
| 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 |
| Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns | No inclusive/exclusive opposition | 120 of 200 |
| Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | No gender distinctions | 254 of 378 |
Noun phrases 2
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Nominal and Verbal Conjunction | Nominal and verbal conjunction are largely identical | 161 of 301 |
| Noun Phrase Conjunction | AND-languages: 'and' and 'with' are not identical | 131 of 234 |
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence 9
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect | Suppletion according to tense | 36 of 193 |
| Situational Possibility | Affixes on verbs | 63 of 234 |
| Epistemic Possibility | Affixes on verbs | 84 of 240 |
| Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
| Coding of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 181 of 418 |
| Overlap between Situational and Epistemic Modal Marking | No overlap | 105 of 207 |
| Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | Tense-aspect suffixes | 667 of 1,131 |
| 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 10
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Position of Polar Question Particles | No question particle | 355 of 884 |
| Order of Demonstrative and Noun | Demonstrative word follows noun (NDem) | 562 of 1,225 |
| Order of Object and Verb | Object precedes verb (OV) | 712 of 1,518 |
| Order of Degree Word and Adjective | Degree word precedes adjective (DegAdj) | 227 of 481 |
| 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 |
| 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 20
| Feature | Value | Languages sharing it |
|---|---|---|
| Order of Person Markers on the Verb | P precedes A | 57 of 379 |
| Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' | Secondary-object construction | 65 of 378 |
| Polar Questions | Interrogative intonation only | 173 of 955 |
| Other Roles of Applied Objects | No other roles (= Only benefactive) | 36 of 183 |
| Predicative Possession | Topic Possessive | 48 of 240 |
| Nominal and Locational Predication | Identical | 117 of 386 |
| Predicative Adjectives | Predicative adjectives have nonverbal encoding | 132 of 386 |
| Negative Morphemes | Negative particle | 502 of 1,157 |
| Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Symmetric and asymmetric standard negation: Type SymAsy | 130 of 297 |
| Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals | Zero copula is possible | 175 of 386 |
| Alignment of Case Marking of Pronouns | Neutral | 79 of 172 |
| Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No zero realization of third person S forms | 181 of 380 |
| 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 |
| Alignment of Verbal Person Marking | Accusative alignment | 212 of 380 |
| Passive Constructions | There is no passive construction | 211 of 373 |
| Expression of Pronominal Subjects | Pronominal subjects are expressed by affixes on verbs | 437 of 711 |
| 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Relativization on Obliques | Non-Reduction Strategy | 14 of 112 |
| Relativization on Subjects | Non-reduction | 24 of 166 |
Vocabulary 4
| 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 | No m in second person singular | 152 of 230 |
| N-M Pronouns | No N-M pronouns | 194 of 230 |