Nominal class

Nominal classes are divisions of all their nouns into a finite number of groups, which are predetermined by the grammar of a language and which often - but by no means always - include words of the same meaning. Languages that are based on a nominal class system are called class languages . The (maximum three) genera in the Indo-European and the Semitic languages can be regarded as a special case of nominal classes .

The group membership of a noun must be indicated by an affix that identifies the class , the nominal classifier. If the noun is connected to an adjective or is the subject of a sentence, the same classifier can be found in many languages with noun classes on the dependent adjective or main verb. This type of congruence , or more precisely: concordance , strengthens the cohesion within a sentence. Often, classifiers can also be used to refer to a word from the previous sentence. In this case, instead of the whole word, it is sufficient to just repeat the classifier.

Nominal classes are particularly characteristic of the Bantu languages and some other branches of the Niger-Kordofan languages in Africa , for example Fulfulde . But they also exist in completely different language families , such as in the Pama-Nyunga language Dyirbal in Australia and in Sino-Tibetan languages - they cannot always be traced back to a common root in the sense of genetic language relationship.

Wilhelm Heinrich Immanuel Bleek examined the nominal classes of the Bantu languages in his doctoral thesis in 1851 . He introduced a numbering system for the nominal classes of the Bantu languages, which is still used today. In some Bantu languages there are over 20 nominal classes. In the Bantu languages, the nominal classifiers always come before the actual word stem. In the Bantu languages, pronouns, adjectives and verbs adapt to the nominal class of the noun to which they belong.

Here are two examples from Swahili . As in the second example, about half of the classes have two class prefixes, one for nouns, adjectives and numerals and another with a more pronounced pronominal character. The class numbers - here class 2: plural of class 1 (mainly people); Class 6: Class 5 plural (many different things, including containers) - correspond to those in the Class and Meaning section in the Bantu languages article .

Watu warefu wawili wanaingia nyumbani. "Two tall people go into the house."
Swahili:	wa -tu	wa -refu	wa -vili	wa -na-ingia	nyumba-ni
Literally:	2nd class plural - human	2nd class place - large	2nd class place - two	2. Kl.Pl. – present– go in	House-in

Mayai yale makubwa mawili yanatosha. "Those two large eggs are enough."
Swahili:	ma -yai	ya -le	ma -kubwa	ma -vili	ya -na-tosha
Literally:	6th grade plural - egg	6th class pl.– those	6th class place - large	6th class place - two	6. Kl.Pl. – present– suffice

Numerical classifiers

In a number of languages, for example Chinese , numerical classifiers (also: counting words, counting unit words) are used for counting . It is not possible in these languages to use a numerals, e.g. B. "three", to be connected directly with a noun. Instead, a classifier must be inserted between the numeral and noun to make the noun countable :

sān zhāng zhǐ means three “sheets” of paper .
sān wèi rén means three “person” man .

Here the classifier zhāng is used for flat objects and the polite classifier wèi for people.

Often in modern colloquial language the unit word ge ("piece") is generally used, but this can lead to confusion:

yí kuài dàngāo means a "piece" of cake .
yí ge dàngāo actually means a "whole" cake .

In addition, the different counting unit words can make listening easier. In the following two sentences, the actual words for "fish" and "jade" differ only in their accentuation ( yú vs. yù ), but the numerical classifiers are completely different:

yì tiáo yú means a fish .
yí kuài yù means a piece of jade .

Nominal class

Numerical classifiers

See also