Sinhala language

Alternative names (including historical names and autoglottonyms): Sinhalese

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Volume 17. New Indo-Aryan languages
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Genealogy

Indo-European → Indo-Iranian → Indo-Aryan → Insular Indo-Aryan

Geography

Main country: Sri Lanka (show on the map)

Area maps from the encyclopedia (in Russian)

New Indo-Aryan languages in South Asia

Map designer: Yuri Koryakov

Identifiers

Glottolog: sinh1246
ISO-639-3: sin

Features

Phonemic structure

[A‑1]	Number of degrees of vowel height	Four [A‑1‑3]
[A‑2]	Vowel height degrees	Close, mid-close, mid-open, and open [A‑2‑6]
[A‑210]	Opposition in openness/closedness for vowel height degrees	Mid [A‑210‑2]
[A‑3]	Degrees of vowel backness	Front, central and back [A‑3‑4]
[A‑4]	Number of length degrees	Two [A‑4‑2]
[A‑5]	Vowel opposition in labialization	No vowel opposition in labialization [A‑5‑1]
[A‑6]	Vowel opposition in nasalization	No vowel opposition in nasalization [A‑6‑1]
[A‑7]	Vowel opposition in pharyngealization	No vowel opposition in pharyngealization [A‑7‑1]
[A‑8]	Vowel opposition in ATR	No vowel opposition in ATR [A‑8‑1]
[A‑9]	Diphthongs and triphthongs	Only diphthongs present [A‑9‑2]
[A‑11]	Inventory of obstruents by laryngeal features	Opposition by presence and absence of voice [A‑11‑1]
[A‑12]	Inventory of obstruents by manner of articulation	Plosives, fricatives and affricates [A‑12‑3]
[A‑13]	Inventory of obstruents by place of articulation	Labial, coronal, dorsal, guttural and postuvular [A‑13‑2]
[A‑14]	Inventory of labial obstruents by place of articulation	Only bilabial [A‑14‑1]
[A‑16]	Inventory of guttural obstruents by place of articulation	Velar [A‑16‑1]
[A‑17]	Inventory of postuvular obstruents by place of articulation	Only glottal [A‑17‑2]
[A‑18]	Additional articulatory oppositions of obstruents	By palatalization [A‑18‑4]
[A‑19]	Inventory of sonorants by manner of articulation	Nasal, liquid, vibrant and glide [A‑19‑6]
[A‑20]	Inventory of sonorants by place of articulation	Labial, coronal and dorsal [A‑20‑14]

Prosodic phenomena

[B‑1]	Stress character	Non-phonological [B‑1‑3]
[B‑3]	Stress carrier	Syllable [B‑3‑1]
[B‑4]	Stress fixedness	Movable fixed [B‑4‑3]
[B‑5]	Fixed stress carrier	Any syllable of the word [B‑5‑19]
[B‑6]	Number of tone levels	No tones [B‑6‑4]
[B‑10]	Target of vowel harmony	All vowels [B‑10‑6]
[B‑11]	Feature of vowel harmony	Height [B‑11‑3]

Syllable

[C‑1]	Syllable onset	Both null and non-null onset possible [C‑1‑5]
[C‑2]	Syllable coda	Both null and non-null ocoda possible [C‑2‑5]

Phonologic structure and phenomena

[D‑1]	Restrictions on the phonemic structure of segment morphemes in the initial position	No consonant clusters [D‑1‑6]
[D‑2]	Restrictions on the phonemic structure of segment morphemes in the final position	No restrictions [D‑2‑1]
[D‑3]	Characteristics of the syllabic structure of words	Mostly bisyllabic words [D‑3‑6]
[D‑7]	Functional type of alternations	Accompanying and distinctive [D‑7‑4]
[D‑8]	Type of altenations	Vowel and consonant alternations [D‑8‑6]

Morphological type of language

[E‑1]	Type of language by type of morpheme combination in a word	Fusional with some agglutinative features [E‑1‑4]
[E‑2]	Fusional type features	Cumulative affixes [E‑2‑2]

Nominal classifications

[F‑1]	Number of agreement classes	Two [F‑1‑2]
[F‑7]	Nouns classifying categories	Person/non-person and animacy/inanimacy [F‑7‑4]
[F‑9]	Expression of animacy/inanimacy	Morphological [F‑9‑2]

Number

[G‑1]	Number in nouns	Singular and plural [G‑1‑1]
[G‑2]	Single number marking	Marked and unmarked [G‑2‑3]
[G‑3]	Honorific forms in pronouns and verbs	Neutral, polite, and impolite [G‑3‑3]
[G‑4]	Agreement in number	Predicative [G‑4‑2]

Case meanings

[H‑1]	Number of noun cases	Three-seven [H‑1‑2]
[H‑2]	Subject and object marking	Verbal agreement and case affixes [H‑2‑5]
[H‑8]	Case marking of animate and inanimate nouns	Different [H‑8‑2]

Verbal categories

[I‑1]	Voice forms expression	Auxiliary verb and affixes [I‑1‑6]
[I‑5]	Tense forms	Past [I‑5‑1]
[I‑5]	Tense forms	Non-past [I‑5‑5]
[I‑6]	Aspect and tense expression	Separate [I‑6‑1]
[I‑7]	Expression of tense categories	Affixes [I‑7‑1]
[I‑8]	Syncretic expression of several verb meanings	Tense, person and number [I‑8‑8]
[I‑9]	Marking of person in present tense verbs	In singular and plural [I‑9‑3]
[I‑10]	Transitivity marker	Absent [I‑10‑1]

Deictic categories

[J‑1]	Pronominal words	Pronouns-adjectives [J‑1‑12]
[J‑5]	Morphological expression of (in)definiteness	Noun affixes [J‑5‑2]
[J‑6]	Words expressing (in)definiteness	Pronouns [J‑6‑2]
[J‑7]	Expression of politeness	In pronouns [J‑7‑3]
[J‑8]	Expression of negation	Negative particles [J‑8‑3]
[J‑9]	Negation marker position	Preposition and postposition [J‑9‑9]

Parts of speech and inflection

[K‑1]	Personal pronouns inflection	Pronominal inflection type [K‑1‑3]
[K‑2]	Article types	Only definite [K‑2‑3]
[K‑4]	Article place	Postposition [K‑4‑2]
[K‑5]	Position of article in noun phrase	Single article preceding the phrase [K‑5‑1]
[K‑6]	Grammar categories of article	Definiteness [K‑6‑2]
[K‑7]	Number of conjugation types	Single type of conjugation [K‑7‑1]
[K‑8]	Verb agreement types	Subject [K‑8‑2]
[K‑9]	Agreement categories expressed in participle	Number [K‑9‑5]
[K‑12]	Agreement categories expressed in adjective	Absent [K‑12‑1]
[K‑16]	Inflectional categories of noun	Number and case [K‑16‑7]
[K‑17]	Cumulative expression of several categories in noun	Gender / agreement class, number and case [K‑17‑11]
[K‑18]	Inflection means	Affixes [K‑18‑2]
[K‑19]	Word form model	Mainly or only suffixal [K‑19‑4]

Word formation

[L‑1]	Word formation means	Derivation and compounding [L‑1‑12]
[L‑2]	Derivation affixes	Suffixes [L‑2‑2]

Simple sentence

[M‑1]	Morphosyntactic alignment	Accusative with elements of ergativity [M‑1‑7]
[M‑3]	Dominant word order	SOV [M‑3‑2]
[M‑4]	Order of nouns and its modifier	Modifier precedes noun [M‑4‑1]

Complex sentence

[N‑3]	Dependent clause predicate	Both finite and non-finite forms possible [N‑3‑3]
[N‑5]	Compound sentence syndesis and asyndeton	Asyndeton dominant [N‑5‑2]

Unfilled features