Editing Telugu language (section)

=== Morphosyntax ===
Relations between participants in an event are coded in Telugu words through [[suffix]]ation; there are no prefixes or infixes in the language.<ref name=":0" /> There are six word classes in Telugu: nominals (proper nouns, pronouns), verbs (actions or events), modifiers (adjectives, quantifiers, numerals), adverbs (modify the way in which actions or events unfold), and clitics.

Telugu nouns are [[Morpheme|inflected]] for [[Grammatical number|number]] (singular, plural), [[noun class]] (three classes traditionally termed ''masculine, feminine'', and ''neuter'') and [[Grammatical case|case]] ([[Nominative case|nominative]], [[Accusative case|accusative]], [[Genitive case|genitive]], [[Dative case|dative]], [[Vocative case|vocative]], [[Instrumental case|instrumental]], and [[Locative case|locative]]).<ref>{{cite book| year=1857 |title= A grammar of the Telugu language |author1=Charles Philip Brown |edition=2 |publisher=Christian Knowledge Society's Press}}</ref>

==== Word order ====
The [[Word order|basic word order]] in Telugu is subject-object-verb (SOV).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Elçi |first1=Atilla |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YRjBDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA148 |title=Smart Computing Paradigms: New Progresses and Challenges: Proceedings of ICACNI 2018 |volume=1 |last2=Sa |first2=Pankaj Kumar |last3=Modi |first3=Chirag N. |last4=Olague |first4=Gustavo |last5=Sahoo |first5=Manmath N. |last6=Bakshi |first6=Sambit |date=30 November 2019 |publisher=Springer Nature |isbn=978-981-13-9683-0 |page=148 |language=en}}</ref>

==== Noun classes (gender) ====
As with other Dravidian languages, gender in Telugu follows a semantic system,<ref name=":2">{{cite book|title=Gender|last=Corbett, Greville G.|date=1991|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=0-521-32939-6|location=Cambridge [England]|pages=151–154|oclc=21227561}}</ref> in the sense that it is mostly the meaning of the word which defines the noun class to which it belongs. There are three noun classes: masculine (human males, ''he-''gender), feminine (human females, ''she''-gender), and neuter (all non-humans, ''it-gender''). The gender of most nouns is encoded through agreement/indexation in pronominal suffixes rather than overtly on the noun.<ref name=":0" />

{{interlinear
| lang = tel
| indent = 3|anna vaccā'''ḍu'''|older.brother come-past-'''MASC'''|The older brother came
}}

{{interlinear
| lang = tel
| indent = 3|amma vacc-in'''di'''|mother come-past-'''FEM'''|Mother came
}}

In terms of the verbal agreement system, genders in marking on the Telugu verb only occur in the third person.<ref name=":0" />

{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Third person
!Singular
!Plural
|-
!Masculine
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericā-'''ḍu'''|He opened
}}
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericā-'''ru'''|They opened
}}
|-
!Feminine
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericin-'''di'''|She opened
}}
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericā-'''ru'''|They opened
}}
|-
!Neuter
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericin-'''di'''|It opened
}}
|{{interlinear
| lang = tel|tericā-'''yi'''/tericina-'''vi'''|They (non-human) opened
}}
|}

The Telugu gender system differs from other Dravidian languages such as [[Tamil language|Tamil]] in that the Telugu feminine shares indexation morphemes with the masculine plural (''-ru'') and with the neuter singular (''-di''). What characterises the three-gender system is then the individual behaviour of the singular-plural ''pairs'' of suffixes.<ref name=":2" />

{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Gender
|Verbal suffixes<br/>(singular : plural)
|-
!''Masculine''
| -ḍu : -ru
|-
!''Feminine''
| -di : -ru
|-
!''Neuter''
| -di : -yi/-vi
|}