Pidgins and creoles

Popular terms:

Pidgin

Creole

Patois [patwa]

Uneducated English

Native dialect, etc.

http://www.etymonline.com

http://www.etymonline.com

Pidgins and creoles

Linguistic usage:

• Pidgin: a contact language between adults with different first languages

• Creole: a second-generation language spoken by children who grow up in a pidgin community.

Pidgins and creoles

Pidgin: contact language between adults with different first languages

Audio clip from Margaret Johnson, BA thesis on Kárahnjúkar

(see next slide for text)

A: We no talk speak Mario drill outside.B: Marius tried to call you in the phone. No connection.

Zero.A: Aha. Two zero yes.B: Yes. Marius needs to speak to you.A: Aha. No you speak (oh) zero..B. So that Marius asked you to please go outsideA: AhaB: becauseA: Aha yes ah, Marius ask me, OK. Marius kom.B: Yes. Call - phone.A: Mhm. De Marius, de Marius kom.B: No, no kom.A: No?B: Speak in phone.A: Aha.

Margaret Jónsson, 2007. Contact Languages: Kárahnjúkar. BA essay

Pidgins and creoles

• Grammatical and syntactical similarity of creoles.

Theories of origin:• ‘Foreigner-talk’ theory• Monogenetic theory• Polygenetic theory

Pidgins and creoles• ‘Foreigner-talk’ theory

Masta

Pidgins and creoles

• Monogenetic theory:

(this is the theory mentioned by Wells 7.1.2.,

p. 562. See also Todd.)

The original Mediterranean creole Sabir, i.e. proto-Creole, was relexified by Portuguese, later by French, English, Dutch etc.

Sabir

Portuguese pidgin

English pidgin

French pidgin

Dutch pidgin

means "relexified to"

Pidgins and creoles

First language acquisition:• Where there is a fully developed

language available to children, they will acquire it.

• First languages are not aquired by copying, but by re-creation from key features

Pidgins and creoles

• Where there is not a fully developed language available for children, they create their own

Pidgins and creoles

• pidgin• small vocabulary• lack of stable grammar

• creole• grammar and vocabulary become

elaborated• grammar develops ‘rules’ – native

speakers

Pidgins and creoles

Thus we assume that unorganized vocabulary will organise (creolize) itself into language with generation renewal. Call this the polygenetic theory of pidgin/creole origin

Pidgins and creoles• Polygenetic theory

Masta

Pidgins and creoles

• Why is the vocabulary taken from the Masta language rather than one of the vernaculars?

1. Prestige - the masta's language has power, centrality.

2. The masta's language is always present3. The masta's language is equally alien to

all vernaculars; it is the only language that none of the slaves speaks.

• Creolization:

Pidgins and creoles

Children of Turkish immigrants in Hamborg in the 60s-70s did not create a creole out of their parent's immigrant-pidgin. Why not?

But children of the slaves who worked on cotton planatations in the southern States had no access to standard English and so developed ('creolized') their own language using their parents' pidgin.

Post-creolecontinuum(Jamaica)

Acrolect

Mesolect

Basilect

Decreolization(Jamaica)

Acrolect

Mesolect

Basilect

Nocontinuum:diglossic(Surinam)

AcrolectDutch

Basilect:Sranan Tongo

(one of many languages)

Nocontinuum:diglossic(Haiti)

AcrolectFrench

Basilect:Haitian Creole:Kreyòl ayisyen

• Alsop 1958, see Bickerton Dymanics (9)• Guyanan Creole:

• Surinam:• Fred ben de a tweede boi fu en mama. A

ben tapu siksi yari kba. En bigi brada ben nem Emil. Wan dei di a ben waka na strati, a ben si wan swarfudosu. A skopu en wantu meter moro fara. A waka moro fara èn a skopu a dosu baka. Dan a yere wan sten taki: "Teki a dosu." A teki a dosu èn a luku na ini. Dri dala ben de na ini. Fred no ben sabi omeni moni ben de ini a dosu. So a waka langalanga go na oso.

• http://www.sil.org/americas/suriname/sranan/English/SrananEngLLIndex.html

http://courses.essex.ac.uk/lg/lg449/12feature.html

http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp/Shots.html

http://www.wazobiafm.com

http://www.wazobiafm.com/stream.html

stream:

http://radiotime.com/WebTuner.aspx?StationId=109503&

http://www.wazobiafm.com

http://www.wazobiafm.com

http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/tokpisin/

http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/flash/listen/otherLanguages_Tok.htm

decreolisation / relixification and phrases from English:http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/flash/listen/podcasts_Tok.htmYut forum – first programme

http://www.wazobiafm.com/lagos951/# from 7:00

http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/tokpisin/news/stories/201101/s3121740.htm

Wikipedia:Nicaraguan Sign Language

video at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/07/2/l_072_04.html

nativism vs. cultural learning

Google Michael Tomasello