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World Atlas of Language Structures

Dataset of structural properties of languages

Originator: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.)

The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) is a large database of structural (phonological, grammatical, lexical) properties of languages gathered from descriptive materials (such as reference grammars) by a team of 55 authors. A feature is a structural property of language that describes one aspect of cross-linguistic diversity. A WALS feature has between 2 and 28 different values.

(202 columns, 2679 rows)

Examples

Basic Examples

Retrieve the resource:

In[1]:=
ResourceObject["World Atlas of Language Structures"]
Out[1]=

Retrieve the default content:

In[2]:=
ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures"]
Out[2]=

Find properties related to verbs:

In[3]:=
Select[ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures", "ColumnNames"], StringContainsQ["Verb"]]
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Create a function to generate maps of specific property values:

In[4]:=
walsMap[property_, title_] := With[{data = KeySort[KeyDrop[ GroupBy[ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures"], property][[All, All, "GeoPosition"]], Missing["NotAvailable"]]]}, GeoListPlot[Values[data], PlotLegends -> Placed[Normal[Keys[data]], Below], GeoCenter -> {0, 0}, ImageSize -> Full, PlotLabel -> title]]; walsMap["81A", ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures", "ColumnNames"][ "81A"]]
Out[4]=

Find properties related to articles:

In[5]:=
Select[ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures", "ColumnNames"], StringContainsQ["Article"]]
Out[5]=

Compare language families by features related to the use of definite articles:

In[6]:=
Sort[#, Greater] & /@ (Counts /@ KeySort[KeyDrop[ GroupBy[ResourceData["World Atlas of Language Structures"], Key["37A"]], Missing["NotAvailable"]]][All, All, "Family"])
Out[6]=

Wolfram Research, "World Atlas of Language Structures" from the Wolfram Data Repository. (2017) https://doi.org/10.24097/wolfram.27706.data

License Information

CC-BY-4.0

Source Metadata

  • Title: The World Atlas of Language Structures Online
  • Creator: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin
  • Publisher: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
  • Source: http://wals.info/
  • Citation: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.) 2013. The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. (Available online at http://wals.info, Accessed on 2017-08-04.)

Data Downloads

Publisher Information

  • Contributed By: C. Alan Joyce (Wolfram|Alpha)
  • Publisher of Record: Wolfram Research