Chara language

[p] and [f] are in free variation.[7] /ɗ/ only occurs in the word /jalɗa~jaltʼa/ 'crooked'.[6] Yilma (2002) found /ɓ/ to occur five times in around 550 lexical items.[7] He also found /ʑ/ occurring in two, both in the sequence /iʑa/.[7] Occurrence of /ɗ/ and /pʼ/ may be governed by dialectal variation.[7]

/a/ is realized as [ə] in unstressed word-medial syllables.[8]

Length is minimally contrastive.[7] Minimal pairs include /mola/ 'fish', /moːla/ 'egg'; /masa/ 'to wash', /maːsa/ 'leopard'; /buna/ 'flower', /buːna/ 'coffee'.[7]

Chara has phonemic stress.[8] Examples: /ˈbakʼa/ 'to slap', /baˈkʼa/ 'empty'; /ˈwoja/ 'to come', /woˈja/ 'wolf'.[8]

Morpheme-initial nasals assimilate point of articulation to that of the preceding consonant, usually found when verbs are suffixed with the singular imperative morpheme /-na/, e.g. /dub-na/ 'to hit.imp' → [dubma] 'hit!'.[9]

Chara generally uses noun case suffixes and postpositions.[5]

Nouns are inflected for gender, number, definiteness, case, and possession.[10] These are all suffixes, except for the possessive.[10]

Gender pairs are usually lexical, except for a few with /-i/ in the masculine and /-a/ in the feminine.[10] Examples:[10]

/mansa/ 'ox', /mija/ 'cow'

/izi/ 'he', /iza/ 'she'

Nouns and adjectives inflect for plural with the suffix /-eːndi/.[10] Examples:[11]

/ina/ 'mother', /ineːndi/ 'mothers'

/dala/ 'while (sg.)', /daleːndi/ 'white (pl.)'

Definiteness in nouns is marked with the suffix /-naːzi/ (as an independent word meaning 'the male/man') for masculines and /-ena/ for feminines.[12] Adjectives take /-bi/ in the masculine and /-ena/ in the feminine.[12] Examples:[12]

/mansa/ 'ox', /mansanaːzi/ 'the ox'

/mija/ 'cow', /mijena/ 'the cow/

/karta/ 'black', /kartabi/ 'the black (m.)', /kartena/ 'the black (f.)'

Nouns and adjectives may be marked for nominative, accusative, dative, genitive, ablative, instrumental, or vocative case.[13] The nominative suffix is /-i/, accusative /-(i)s/, dative /-(i)ri/, genitive /-e/, ablative /-kaj/, instrumental /-ne/, and vocative /-o/.[13]

Bound possessive pronouns: /ta-mija/ 'my cow', /ne-mija/ 'your cow', /iza-mija/ 'his cow'.[15]

Chara is a subject–object–verb language.[5]

Adjectives end in /-a/ like nouns, and inflect for number, definiteness, plurality, and case.[16] In noun phrases adjectives precede their nouns, and are not inflected.[16]