bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Morphological developments affecting syntactic change
Authors: Goldbach Maria
Published: March 2014

This article is concerned with the role of the morphological paradigm in syntactic change. The discussion focuses on syntactic change in infinitival complements and the distribution of these complements in the context of infinitive embedding verb phrases. I argue that the syntactic structure of the infinitival complements is closely related to the co-occurrence of inflectional exponents on the infinite verb forms. The presence of inflectional exponents on infinitive verb forms determines the quality of the functional syntactic category Infl in the infinitival complements. Syntactic changes in the structure and/or in the distribution of infinitival complements originate from paradigm alterations concerning the inflectional exponents of the infinite verb forms.
Towards a comprehensive view of language change: Three recent evolutionary approaches
Authors: Winter-Froemel Esme
Published: March 2014

This article investigates whether evolutionary accounts can offer new insights into the paradox of language change. Specifically, I will examine three recent influential accounts (Haspelmath 1999, Keller 1994, and Croft 2000). As they contain a broad spectrum of positions on the relations between language and biology, they can be divided into metaphorical, biologistic and generalized views. Cross-cutting these, two types of evolutionary accounts are distinguished, which I call adaptive and two-level views, respectively. I critically evaluate their potential to provide satisfactory explanations for various types of change, drawing on examples from Romance and Germanic. Finally, I propose a revised explanation scheme which brings together the two-level approaches with theoretical distinctions and explanatory factors that have been suggested in earlier non-evolutionary frameworks, so that a more comprehensive view of language change can be obtained.
The Old English copula weorðan and its replacement in Middle English
Authors: Petré Peter , Cuyckens Hubert
Published: March 2014

With the aid of a specially compiled corpus, this paper accounts for the replacement – mainly by become – of weorðan ‘become’, whose use rapidly decreased in Middle English. Drawing on Goldbergian construction grammar, the paper posits the existence of a lexeme-independent network of copular constructions [Copula + np/ap/…]. Copular uses of weorðan are associated with this network, but also form part of a second network exclusive to weorðan, which, already in Old English, served as a model for the extension of becuman to copular uses. In early Middle English, weorðan reacted to changes in the lexeme-independent copular network. Weorðan was no longer used with adjectival participles when these were constructionally separated from its most frequent collocates, namely human propensity adjectives. Furthermore, reacting to an influx of various adjectives in predicate position, becuman, which had no collocational preferences, extended its use to these adjectives and eventually took over from weorðan completely.
Subjective progressives in seventeenth and eighteenth century English
Authors: Kranich Svenja
Published: March 2014

The aim of the study is to analyse the subjective uses of the progressive in 17th and 18th century English, i.e., uses of the progressives as expressions of speaker attitude. After an overview of the Old and Middle English meanings of the progressive, I discuss the three different types of subjective progressives found in the 17th and 18th century data from ARCHER-2 (A Representative Corpus of Historical English Registers 2). In this context, I discuss some methodological issues, as formal criteria have proved insufficiently reliable for the distinction of subjective uses (cf. Killie 2004). I then look at the relation between subjective and other meanings of the progressive. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the aspectual function of the progressive grammaticalizes, which leads to changing relative frequencies between subjective and objective uses. The paper ends with some suggestions about general tendencies in the relation between grammaticalization and subjectification and objectification.
The which is most and right harde to answere: Intensifying right and most in earlier English
Authors: Méndez-Naya Belén
Published: March 2014

This paper studies the intensifying use of most, comparing it to the behaviour ofright, one of the most common Middle English intensifiers. Using evidence from the Helsinki Corpus, this investigation shows that both items modify the same type of adjectival heads, namely bounded subjective positive adjectives, which suggests that they are not prototypical boosters, but come close to maximisers. While most is first found in typically comparative structures, later extending to intensifying contexts, right first occurs in intensifying environments, but can spread to superlative structures due to its original bounded nature. Most succeeds right on the temporal axis, and while it is equivalent to right in some environments, evidence from honorifics suggests that it usually indicates an even higher degree of intensification.
Rivalry among the verbs of wanting
Authors: Akimoto Minoji
Published: March 2014

This paper discusses rivalry amongst the verbs of wanting, e.g., desire, hope, want and wish. Investigation of these verbs from Middle English to present-day English based on various corpora shows that the functional and semantic expansion and reduction of these verbs during these periods have caused reshuffling among these verbs leading to the establishment of a new system of the verbs of wanting. The verb desire has reduced its function over time, while want has expanded its function since around 1800. Hope and wish have retained their functions in their respective habitat of indicative and subjunctive mood.
Germanic vs French fixed expressions in Middle English prose: Towards a corpus-based historical English phraseology
Authors: Markus Manfred
Published: March 2014

Based on an analysis of the Innsbruck Prose Corpus, this paper gives evidence of the West Germanic heritage in Middle English fixed expressions. The samples include the non-French and non-modern use of prepositions and of the zeroarticle in prepositional phrases with adjectives (with loud word), moreover some seemingly German but in fact West Germanic idioms in Middle English, twin formulas with and marked by concatenating formal features, such as rhyme, alliteration and repetition, and the special syntagms Adj + N, N + N and a few comparisons with as. A final chapter deals with complex predicates headed byto do, to get, to work and to make. To make + N, as the youngest of the patterns investigated, shows that predicates with the same head may have different ages:to make haste is a relative oldtimer, to make war is an evergreen, and to make love a fairly recent coining.
Disseisin: The lexeme and the legal fact in Early Middle English
Authors: McConchie R.W.
Published: March 2014

Revealing the processes of vernacularising the prefix dis- in English requires attention to each lexeme which uses it. This article explores the term disseisin and its associated lexemes from its earliest uses to about 1200 AD. The historical dictionaries suggest that disseisin is the earliest discompound in English. Elucidating its history requires more however than consulting a historical dictionary or amassing corpus data. I show that the differences between lexemes casts doubt on the standard accounts.

The present data suggests that the seiz- disseis- lexemes may predate the dictionary evidence. Other sources reveal a rich legal background and enough tokens to suggest patterns of usage. It seems that, since seisin/disseisin is an antonymic pair only in legal fact, not in connotation, disseisin is privative but not necessarily pejorative. Since the language boundaries in England between French, Latin, and English were not simple, we should consider individual situations, writers, and individual lexemes wherever possible.
The early Middle English scribe: Sprach er wie er schrieb?
Authors: Laing Margaret
Published: March 2014

Written Middle English is not phonetic transcript. The sound-pattern is not directly known, but has to be reconstructed – from, among other things, written forms interpreted in the light of the particular spelling systems to which they belong. Pronunciation is an object of discovery, not a premiss: assumptions about the way (or ways) in which a written form was pronounced, ought not to be built in to the collection of the primary evidence. It does not follow that phonetic considerations are ruled out for subsequent interpretation. (Benskin 1991: 226)
Essex/Suffolk scribes and their language in fifteenth-century London
Authors: Matheson Lister M.
Published: March 2014

The goal of this essay is to emphasise the prominence within the writing communities of late fifteenth-century London of certain highly productive, professional users of language who were immigrants from East Anglia, particularly Essex and south Suffolk. The forms used by six scribes from this area will be studied. Their spelling systems were clearly current and acceptable types of written language within the metropolis, and an analysis of them provides further useful evidence for the study of the genesis, development, adoption, and dissemination of standard written English.
Northern Middle English: Towards telling the full story
Authors: Fernández Cuesta Julia , Ledesma Nieves Rodríguez
Published: March 2014

The purpose of this article, which is part of an ongoing research project on the history of Northern English, is to give more detailed information about these varieties in the Middle English period, which may serve to modify the somewhat simplistic and general views found in most histories of the language. Traditional accounts of the Northern dialects usually consist of a list of features, such as thir and tha(s) as the plural of the demonstratives, -s as the inflexion for 3sg. present indicative and present indicative plural, ar, er as the forms for the present indicative plural of be, etc. However, the analysis of early and late Middle English texts and the linguistic profiles in LALME reveals a much more complex picture: more variants have been found than those which have been regarded as typically Northern, and in some cases their distribution seems to depend on the geographical area and the type of text.
The Celtic hypothesis hasn't gone away: New perspectives on old debates
Authors: Filppula Markku
Published: March 2014

The majority of scholarly opinion has long held that Celtic influence on English has been minimal on all levels of language. This is usually put down to the socially and politically inferior status of the Celts vis-à-vis their Anglo-Saxon conquerors, which then explains the small number of Celtic loanwords in English. In this article, I join the voice of those scholars who have challenged the prevailing view and called for a fresh examination of the ‘Celtic Hypothesis’. I argue, first, that the nature of the contact situation was such that linguistic influences from Celtic on English were inevitable. Secondly, the paucity of Celtic loanwords in English does not constitute evidence against contact effects at other levels of language but is the expected development. Thirdly, many features of English grammar have characteristics that cannot be satisfactorily explained as independent developments. Fourthly, the modern-era ‘Celtic Englishes’ provide yet another source of indirect evidence supporting the Celtic Hypothesis.
On the trail of "intolerable Scoto-Hibernic jargon": Ulster English, Irish English and dialect hygiene in William Carleton's Traits and stories of the Irish peasantry (First Series, 1830)
Authors: McCafferty Kevin
Published: March 2014

Although William Carleton’s literary dialect is regarded as reliably accurate, early in his career, Carleton practiced ‘dialect hygiene’. Carleton began this practice between the first two stories of Traits and stories of the Irish peasantry (1830). Scots-derived features of Ulster English and speech forms widespread in (non)standard varieties beyond Ireland were excised; forms shared by Ulster English and Southern Irish English were retained, and forms restricted geographically to Southern Irish English were retained or added. The result is a levelled peasant dialect that is intended to better reflect the speech of the majority of Irish people, which is arguably part of a strategy to make the language more national. Carleton’s practice reflects contemporary native-speaker attitudes to varieties of Irish English, which stigmatised Scottishness in speech. But dialect hygiene also served the political purposes of Carleton’s writing, for his primary objectives included the creation of an Irish national literature in English.
Reconstructing complex structures: A typological perspective
Authors: von Mengden Ferdinand
Published: March 2014

Depending of the type of results we wish to achieve, different methods need to be employed in reconstructing proto-languages. In the first part of this paper I shall discuss the Comparative Method and elaborate why, I believe, this method is in principle not suitable for syntactic reconstruction. In the second part of the paper, I shall discuss alternative methods, which, although not unproblematic either, are, in my view, more promising for this purpose from a typological perspective. One is the use of implicational universals and the inferences on diachronic processes that can be drawn from them. In the second approach, cross-linguistic regularities of grammaticalization processes are used to reconstruct complex structures in proto-languages. Both these approaches have in common that they draw on crosslinguistic data, but both also display considerable differences.
Syntactic change and syntactic borrowing in generative grammar
Authors: Bowern Claire
Published: March 2014

This paper explores three issues in the reconstruction of syntactic borrowing. First, I discuss the scholarly traditions which have shaped historical phonology and historical syntax. I point out some of the incompatible assumptions which the two fields make, and examine the role of speakers’ individual grammars in language change, along with the effects that traditions within generative syntax have had on framing historical syntactic questions. I then move to an investigation of calquing and the reconstruction of syntactic borrowing, and a discussion of the work of Minimalism in historical syntactic research (in particular, Longobardi (2003)). I argue that any detailed account of language change (no matter what the framework) must address the role of language contact. I argue that real progress in syntactic reconstruction requires a theory of borrowing that does not treat loan constructions as simply ‘noise’ in the data.
On the linearization of adjectives in Romanian
Authors: Cornilescu Alexandra
Published: March 2014

The paper discusses the linearization of DP-internal Romanian adjectives, along
the lines of Stavrou (2001), against the background of phase theory (Chomsky
2005). A system of adjective classification is proposed, taking into account
whether they combine with NPs or DPs, whether they are kind- or object-level and
whether they combine with nominals by functional application or by th-
identification. On this basis, it is shown that adjectives, like nouns, may have a
family of related denotations and that the syntax of an adjective, including its
position with respect to the head completely follow from the adjective’s
denotation. It is claimed that the ordering of adjectives is cyclic, and there are two
phasal domains of linearization, the n* domain and the d* domain. The final
sections detail the syntactic, interpretative and linearization properties of
adjectives in the n*/d* domains.
Vowel elision in spoken Italian
Authors: Garrapa Luigia
Published: March 2014

Italian vowel elision across word boundaries has been considered obligatory with
the masculine singular determiners uno ‘a/an’, lo ‘the’ and quello ‘that’ in prevocalic
context, but as unpredictable and subject to variation with the other function
words. I will show that, in Florentine Italian, vowel elision is a morphologically
driven phonological process which crucially depends on two factors: the
morphological features realised by the word-final vowels together with the
possibility of recovering them from the context after the application of vowel
elision, as well as the function word type and its frequency of occurrence.
On the Existence of Null Complementizers in Old French
Authors: Arteaga Deborah
Published: March 2014

This paper considers apparent null complementizers in Old French, a phenomenon typically considered by philologists to be parataxis, or a juxtaposition of two main clauses (cf. Foulet 1982, Jensen 1990, Moignet 1988); recent studies within the Minimalist framework (e.g., Bošković & Lasnik 2003, Epstein et al. 2005 and Kishimoto 2006) argue for the existence of null complementizers. This paper proposes that subordinate phrases apparently headed by a null complementizer in Old French are in fact lexically selected CPs with an EPP feature in C. We argue that subordinate clauses in the subjunctive provide evidence against the traditional parataxis analysis, as the mood is clearly lexically selected for by the main verb. Our analysis accounts not only for the distribution of complementizer phrases not headed by a complementizer in OF, but also for their loss diachronically, as the EPP feature of subordinate C was lost in the evolution from OF to MF.
On the Syllabification of Prevocalic /w/ in Judeo-Spanish
Authors: Bradley Travis G.
Published: March 2014

Spanish prevocalic glides belong to the syllable nucleus except when no less sonorous segment is available to serve as onset (Harris 1983, Harris & Kaisse 1999, Hualde 1989, 1991). Phonological innovations in a particular group of Judeo-Spanish dialects point to a novel generalization regarding the labiovelar glide, namely that /w/ is realized as secondary labialization on a preceding consonant. Evidence supporting this structural innovation comes from an asymmetry in the distribution of labialization. In these dialects, prevocalic /w/ strengthens to a labialized dorsal obstruent in syllable-initial position (ɡʷéso ‘bone’) but is realized as a secondary articulation on a preceding labial (pʷéðe ‘can’) or dorsal (kʷé.ðɾa ‘rope’). Labialized coronals are disallowed and show several historical reflexes depending on the coronal’s manner of articulation: nasal place assimilation (nwe>mʷe), medial vowel epenthesis (twe>tuɣʷe), and prothesis (swe>esʍʷe). These innovations are analyzed in Optimality Theory in terms of interacting markedness and faithfulness constraints. The proposed account has implications for the issue of possible repair strategies, a.k.a. the “too-many-solutions” problem.
Word Order and Minimalism
Authors: Contreras Heles
Published: March 2014

The minimalist program, with its clear separation between constituency, relevant to LF, and linear order, relevant to PF, makes it possible and, I would claim, natural to pursue an approach to ‘free’ word order as the result of underspecification.

In contrast with the prevailing tradition that identifies one basic order and derives the rest by different ‘movement’ operations, I will suggest that it is the lack of ordering stipulations that allows the free permutations of major sentence constituents in languages like Warlpiri (Hale 1983) and the different subject positions in languages like Spanish.

This proposal is not equivalent to the postulation of ‘flat’ structures for certain languages. The structures delivered to LF are necessarily hierarchical, given the properties of Merge, which combines two elements at a time. In this respect, Warlpiri and English are alike. It is only the PF structures that can differ with respect to how much stipulation is needed.
Crypto-Variation in Italian Velar Palatalisation
Authors: Krämer Martin
Published: March 2014

In this paper, I present new data from a nonce-word test that give us further insight into the synchronic status of the phonological process of velar palatalisation in Standard Italian. Velar palatalisation applies in the plural forms of some nouns and in some it does not. When confronted with novel words and the task to produce plural forms speakers split into two groups, those that apply palatalisation to all new forms and those that do not apply the process. The conclusion drawn from these results is that a uniform but ambiguous surface pattern is analysed in different ways by individual speakers, hence, showing crypto-variation. The results give evidence supporting Pater’s (2006) proposal that exceptional application of a process is due to lexical indexation of markedness constraints and exceptional underapplication is due to lexical indexation of faithfulness constraints in Optimality Theory.
Rhythmic and prosodic contrast in Venetan and Sicilian Italian
Authors: White Laurence , Payne Elinor , Mattys Sven L.
Published: March 2014

We compared the Italian of speakers from the Veneto, in the north of Italy, and from Sicily, in the far south, looking for evidence of rhythmic and prosodic differences. We found no reliable differences in scores for rhythm metrics (VarcoV, %V, VarcoC) for Venetan and Sicilian, with both varieties having scores similar to French and indicative of a greater durational marking of stress than Spanish. However, we found much stronger prosodic timing effects in Sicilian Italian, with stressed vowels in nuclear utterance-final position twice as long as in prenuclear utterance-medial position. We also found evidence of differential patterns of vowel reduction: Sicilian showed greater modulation of F1 and F2 values according to stress and prosodic position, indicating greater vowel centralisation in prosodically-weak contexts than in Venetan Italian. Overall, the results indicated greater prosodic contrast in southern Italian, and suggest that multiple factors contribute to the perception of rhythmic differences.
Fixed and variable properties of the palatalization of dental stops in Brazilian Portuguese
Authors: Battisti Elisa , Hermans Ben
Published: March 2014

Assuming that unranked constraints generate variation and that features can reoccur at various levels in the segmental tree, the variable palatalization of dental stops in a speech variety of Brazilian Portuguese is analyzed as a process which is applied in order to link C(Aperture) of high vowels to a higher consonantal position, explaining the cross-linguistic tendency of high vowels to spread to preceding segments. A mixed approach which includes the representation of segments and the set of constraints referring to vowels and the metrical grid is adopted to explain the different rates of palatalization by underlying high vowels and raised vowels.
Post-tonic vowel harmony in some dialects of Central Italy
Authors: Canalis Stefano
Published: March 2014

In Central Italy several dialects display post-tonic regressive vowel harmony, by which post-tonic vowels copy all the features of the word-final vowel. On the basis of phonetic and phonological arguments I argue that the penultimate vowel of proparoxytones, the typical target of this process, is a prosodically weak position, which makes it a good target for assimilation. In some dialects harmony is active only if a liquid consonant intervenes between the trigger and target vowels; since in these dialects liquids do not contrast for place, underspecification can explain this asymmetry. Since place specification of non-liquid consonants is required in other varieties, which nevertheless display harmony across any intervening consonant, following Clements (2001) I argue that in this case some nodes of feature geometry are not active.
Early bilingualism as a source of morphonological rules for the adaptation of loanwords
Authors: Oñederra Miren Lourdes
Published: March 2014

The present socio-cultural situation in the Basque speaking area of Spain offers a privileged field for the study of Spanish loanwords in Basque, due to the more expanded use of Basque, together with a better knowledge of Spanish among Basque speakers. Within the theoretical framework of Natural Phonology, this paper explores some phonological and lato sensu morphological mechanisms that take part in the integration of Spanish loanwords into Basque. First it deals with the mutual influence between Spanish and Basque when both are first languages for the speaker. Early bilingualism only causes the loss of Basque processes that are suppressed in Spanish, but those processes need not be completely lost. There is clear evidence that continued collective bilingualism and need of translation motivate the transformation of denaturalised phonological substitutions into morphological devices for the adaptation of loanwords.
Dental fricatives and stops in Germanic
Authors: Smith Bridget
Published: March 2014

This paper presents evidence for four important arguments: (1) Particular conditions in the development of the English language have allowed phonetic variation in the dental fricative to persist with few phonemic developments over the course of time. (2) The range of variation in production of the modern American English dental fricative reflects the range of actual outcomes in the other Germanic languages developing out of Proto-Germanic. (3) Relying on the uniformitarian principle, that the kinds of processes we can observe in the present are the same as processes that shaped languages in the past, this paper illustrates that the kinds of variation that are present in the Modern American English dental fricative are the same kinds of variation that can be posited to have existed in the dental fricative in Proto-Germanic. (4) These three points support, and are supported by, the theory, derived from multiple branches of linguistics, that sound change is the result of different phonemic interpretations and generalizations derived from ongoing variation. The spread of these generalizations is what gives us measurable and widespread sound changes such as those that have produced the various modern instantiations of the dental fricative.
On the loss of the masculine genitive plural in Cypriot Greek
Authors: Sitaridou Ioanna , Terkourafi Marina
Published: March 2014

The case system of Greek has undergone extensive changes, most notably loss of the dative and reorganisation of the genitive. The clear winner of this situation is the accusative. In this paper we investigate one more instance whereby the accusative wins out over the genitive: the loss of the genitive plural from the masculine nominal paradigm of Cypriot Greek. Noted in descriptions of the dialect since the 19th century —and persisting, albeit somewhat attenuated, to this day— this phenomenon has been attributed both to internal evolution (analogy) and to external factors (contact with French). We assess these two explanations from a structural and from a sociolinguistic perspective, and highlight some problematic areas that ought to be investigated before we can arrive at a more comprehensive view of how this change came about.
Wild variation, random patterns, and uncertain data*
Authors: Wanner Dieter
Published: March 2014

The sequencing between an infinitive and clitics in pre-modern Spanish changed from the absence of any principle in Latin to variable proclisis (13th century), prevalent proclisis (15th century), and finally categorical enclisis as a complete trend reversal (17th century). The strong increase in proclisis up to the 15th century is driven by dominant models in the language (with preceding negation, preposition, etc., following the sequencing with finite verb forms). Since standard analyses are not adequate here, an analysis relying on analogy will be compared with an interpretation based on the unreliability of documentation. This second approach leads to an explanatory impasse. While analogical modeling of unruly data implies a diminished role for strict regularity, it provides a much better fit with the data than standard rules, or a blunt challenge to the data, making it the preferred solution by far.
Vinderup in real time
Authors: Schøning Signe Wedel , Pedersen Inge Lise
Published: March 2014

This article is based on a panel and a trend study showing the real-time language changes in spoken Danish over 28 years. The local dialect rapidly loses ground to regional standard Danish, but with large differences between the intra- and the intergenerational changes and with increasing gender differences. Our findings point to women being in the lead of these language changes. To obtain a deeper insight into the linguistic changes we provide a qualitative family study of three generations which relates the use of dialect to the issues of gender, lifestyle and life history. In generation 1 and 2 gender has less bearing on linguistic usage than lifestyle and life history in signalling local affi liation, whereas dialect in generation 3 functions as a masculine subcultural identity marker. Dialect therefore no longer indicates local orientation or a locally bound lifestyle.
The restructuring of tense/aspect systems in creole formation
Authors: Winford Donald
Published: March 2014

This paper attempts to reconcile the so-called ‘superstratist’ and ‘substratist’ views on creole formation, with special attention to the emergence of tense/aspect systems in Haitian French Creole and Sranan Tongo. Creole formation involves a process of restructuring by which interlanguage grammars are created and elaborated in the course of second language acquisition. This process involves three major components: input (intake) from the TL, L1 influence, and internal developments. Differences in the degree of TL and L1 influence result in differences between Haitian Creole and Sranan Tongo in their inventory of tense/aspect categories, and the forms that express them. At the same time, both creoles display similarities due to shared substrate input as well as similar processes by which superstrate lexical forms are reanalyzed as tense/aspect markers.
A fresh look at habitual be in AAVE
Authors: Collins Chris
Published: March 2014

In this paper, I describe the use of agentive be (‘If you don’t be careful, you will be caught’) in informal American English. I will show that agentive be has largely the same syntactic behavior as habitual be in AAVE (African American Vernacular English). Based on these similarities, I will conclude the paper by raising a number of questions about the origin of habitual be in AAVE.
Oral narrative and tense in urban Bahamian Creole English
Authors: Hackert Stephanie
Published: March 2014

This paper presents a quantitative analysis of past inflection in urban Bahamian Creole English. The variable has held a prominent position in the study of African American Vernacular English and Caribbean creoles, but whereas phonological, grammatical, and social factors have received much attention in this context, the influence of style or discourse type has rarely been noted. I analyze the formal and functional properties of three types of oral narrative obtained in sociolinguistic interviews. All of them, personal narrative as well as folktale and ‘generic’ narrative, show considerably lower inflection rates compared to the ‘chat’ mode but do so for different reasons; this, in turn, has repercussions for cross-variety comparisons, as samples usually differ in terms of their composition with regard to discourse type.
3. On the syntax and semantics of DP in Cape Verdean Creole
Authors: Baptista Marlyse
Published: March 2014

In this chapter, I provide an in-depth description of the semantics and structure of the Cape Verdean noun phrase involving both determined and determinerless nouns. It shows how overt determiners and their null counterparts interact and overlap in covering the same range of meanings.

Bare nouns are interpretable as generic, definite, indefinite, singular, plural or mass. However, singular bare nouns display a subject/object asymmetry when it comes to their (in)definiteness status.

Besides determined and determinerless nouns and pluralization strategies, this study of the Cape Verdean DP examines adjective placement in an attempt to identify the nature and number of structural layers reflecting the various types of nouns. In addition, I assume that an indexing relation between D, T and C takes place in order to derive the correct interpretation of bare nouns.

Finally, I examine in what respects the determiner system of Cape Verdean Creole (CVC) differ from both European Portuguese (EP) and the Brazilian Portuguese (BP). This comparative study will reveal that the use of bare nouns in CVC is much more widespread than in both EP and BP but that CVC and BP determiner systems also share a number of common points.
7. Bare nouns in Palenquero
Authors: Schwegler Armin
Published: March 2014

The present article argues that the traditional accounts of Palenquero's article system are fundamentally flawed. Schwegler's revisionist analysis is largely based on data he had collected in situ, but also relies on Moñino (in press), who similarly questions the traditional accounts of the Palenquero article system. Mo ñ ino and Schwegler have reached a consensus as regards two key points: in their view, (1) Palenquero has noun phrases consisting of just a bare noun; and (2) a striking property of these bare nouns is their non-specification for number (they are neither singular nor plural). One of the objectives of this study is to offer a comparison between Schwegler and Mo ñ ino's analysis of Palenquero ma, and to outline why they – independently so – reject the traditional views on the matter. In so doing, Schwegler shows that the Palenquero lexicon emphasizes the role of context rather than overt morphology or lexical structure. This new approach represents a radical departure from earlier analyses, as it renders all Palenquero nouns “transnumeral.” As will become apparent, Mo ñ ino's and Schwegler's findings coincide on several major points of grammar, but differ on the more theoretical issue concerning the genesis of ma.
8. Bare nouns in Réunionnais Creole
Authors: Chaudenson Robert
Published: March 2014

This paper examines the determiner system of Réunionnais Creole (RC) with a special focus on the use, interpretation and distribution of its bare nouns. The synchronic part of the study involves a comparison of bare nouns between RC and Modern French whereas the diachronic section considers RC and Middle French in an attempt to determine the origins of RC bare nouns and whether there are uses proper to RC.

On the one hand, this paper uncovers convincing evidence tracing the use and distribution of bare nouns in RC to Middle French. On the other, it highlights the full complexity of the situation by taking into account the many variants spoken at the time when RC emerged, as well as the current situation of diglossia with French.1
12. Bare nouns and articles in Sranan
Authors: Bruyn Adrienne
Published: March 2014

The paper investigates the distribution of determiners in Sranan, which differs both from that in the lexifier, English, and the Gbe substrate. From an early stage onwards, the article wan functions as a marker of indefinite singularity with nonspecific as well as specific indefinites; it may, however, also be absent. Similarly, the definite articles (n)a (SG) and den (PL), while exhibiting further grammaticalization over time, do not obligatorily appear with all definite nominals even in the modern language, and definite, pragmatically important arguments can appear as bare nouns. On the whole, bare nouns are open to several interpretations with respect to definiteness, specificity or referentiality, and number delimitation, precluding a zero article to assume a unique value. Even though specificity, or pragmatic referentiality, plays a role in the distribution of the articles, number and definiteness are the primary distinctions. The distribution of articles in Sranan does not conform to the proposal by Bickerton (e.g. 1981) and Givón (e.g. 1984b), nor can it be fully accounted for by assuming that articles express individuation while bare nouns typically refer to mass-like collectives, as suggested by Mufwene (e.g. 1986).
13. Aspects of the syntax and semantics of bare nouns in Jamaican Creole
Authors: Stewart Michele M.
Published: March 2014

In this paper I argue that there is no plural marking in Jamaican Creole (JC), since post-nominal dem, traditionally analyzed as a marker of plurality, is instead best considered to be what I call an Inclusiveness marker. As a consequence of the lack of plural marking, all the interpretations of both singular and plural noun phrases in a number-marking language such as English, may be assigned to the JC noun phrase. I argue that this availability of multiple sense possibilities points to the need for functional structure above the NP, which projects in a plural interpretation, when there is a need to individuate.

I extend the analysis to definiteness and indefiniteness, which the data show may exist even when they are not phonetically realized. Thus, there is also functional structure above the JC noun phrase which regulates the expression of definiteness even where there is no overt manifestation of this phenomenon. Noun phrases lacking overt functional modifiers, traditionally “bare” noun phrases, then, are not considered to be structurally bare if they express definiteness or indefiniteness.
14. NPs in aspectual Be constructions in African American English
Authors: Green Lisa
Published: March 2014

This paper examines indefinite and bare plural NPs in aspectual be constructions in African American English (AAE). Aspectual be constructions are like simple tense generics in that they receive a habitual interpretation. The interpretation of singular indefinite subject NPs in aspectual be constructions depends on the type of predicate that occurs with the subject. On the other hand, bare plural subjects in aspectual be constructions exhibit a similar type of ambiguity associated with bare plurals in generics in English. Bare plurals with individual-level predicates in aspectual be constructions are unambiguous, but bare plurals with stage-level predicates are ambiguous between a habitual and existential habitual reading. It has been noted that NPs in AAE share some patterns with NPs in Creoles, but bare NPs in the two languages are interpreted differently. Analyzing NPs in aspectual be constructions provides an opportunity to learn more about the differences and similarities between the interpretation of NPs in AAE and Creoles.
6. The origin of the Portuguese words in Saramaccan: Implications for sociohistory
Authors: Smith Norval
Published: March 2014

The aim of this article is to try and trace the source of a phonological change that applies only in the Portuguese-derived lexicon in Saramaccan. Saramaccan is a mainly English-lexifier maroon creole language with a very substantial Portuguese element in its vocabulary.

This phonological change, from /g/ to /k/, cannot have taken place in Surinam, as none of the other contributory languages to Saramaccan shows any sign of it. I identify the change as one that occurs in Kikongo-dominated or Kimbundu-dominated contexts. I then try to identify the particular geographical and historical context of this change.

I work back along a number of possible transfer paths: (1) Cayenne–Surinam; (2) Dutch Pernambuco–Cayenne; (3) Pre-Dutch Pernambuco–Dutch Pernambuco, and conclude that all three paths are involved in the transference of the phonological change. I try, finally, to identify Jewish individuals and families who could have been involved in both Pre-Dutch Paramaribo and Surinam, i.e., both ends of the path.
10. A first step towards the analysis of tone in Santomense
Authors: Maurer Philippe
Published: March 2014

Santomense originated on the island of São Tomé (Gulf of Guinea) at the beginning of the 16th century out of the contact between Portuguese and West African languages, especially from Nigeria and Angola. Contrarily to what has been claimed until now, I believe that Santomense is a tonal language with two tones, H and L, whereby some low tones might be better defined as neutral. In Santomense, tone is used for lexical distinctions, but also for grammatical purposes, especially for the distinction between nouns and verbs. As all of the known substrate languages of Santomense are tonal, there is no doubt that the origin of the tonal system of Santomense lies in the substrate languages. However, more research is needed in order to find out how Santomense’s tonal system functions and how this system is related to the system of one or more of its substrate languages.
11. Balanta, Guiné-Bissau Creole Portuguese and Portuguese: A comparison of the noun phrase
Authors: Intumbo Incanha
Published: March 2014

This paper describes aspects of noun phrase structure in Portuguese, Guiné-Bissau Creole Portuguese and Balanta, an Atlantic language of Guiné-Bissau that is an important substrate and current adstrate for the Creole. I examine definite and indefinite determiners, gender and number in nouns and adjectives, and the forms and syntactic properties of personal pronouns. I identify seven different ways in which Guiné-Bissau Creole Portuguese patterns like Balanta, and thus appears to show influence from this substrate (or adstrate) language.
15. A la recherche du "superstrat": What North American French can and cannot tell us about the input to creolization
Authors: Neumann-Holzschuh Ingrid
Published: March 2014

Within the field of French creolistics it is above all Robert Chaudenson who, in various publications, has emphasized that a better knowledge of the “marginal Frenches” in North America may help to answer certain questions concerning the European input into creolization. On the basis of data collected for a research project on the varieties of Acadian French I will try to show that a closer investigation of Acadian French does indeed shed light on the language spoken by the settlers, one major component of the “feature pool” (Mufwene) accessible to the slaves, and thus provides the source of numerous specific creole forms and structures.

Apart from being a linguistic “window to the past”, the varieties of North American French enable us to discern areas within French grammar that are particularly prone to intrasystemic changes. The question, however, remains as to what extent the phenomena observed in Acadian French can be usefully applied in explaining the creolization process, especially since some of the developments that are particularly interesting from a creolist’s point of view are rather recent. On the basis of some examples, I will show that the heuristic value of a close examination of marginal Frenches lies above all in retracing the source of specific formal, functional and semantic peculiarities of creole languages; creolization itself, however, implies restructuring processes that go far beyond those that marginal Frenches have undergone in the course of time.
Gradual restructuring in Ecuadorian Quechua
Authors: Muysken Pieter
Published: March 2014

The notion of gradual restructuring, pioneered by Jacques Arends, offers a way to arrive at a perspective on language genesis responsive to language typology and language history. I would like to contribute to this approach by looking at restructured Ecuadorian varieties of Quechua. The type of gradual restructuring studied here does not involve the gradual expansion of a pidgin into a creole. Rather, we are dealing with the gradual transformation of an expansion language, Incaic imperial Quechua, into a morphologically more simple variety as it spread northward into Ecuador. Documentary evidence is given that there was gradual restructuring of the language as it spread in Ecuador. I conclude by presenting these features in a more general perspective. The main point made is that the relation between syntax and morphology is not the same in all processes of restructuring, as indeed it is not in the languages involved in the contact.
A note on the process of lexical diffusion in the development of creoles: The case of double-object verbs
Authors: Lefebvre Claire
Published: March 2014

In this paper, I explore the role of lexical diffusion in the development of creole languages through the study of lexical items involved in the double-object construction in Haitian Creole and its substrate languages. First, it is shown that, while the double-object construction is available in the substrate languages of Haitian, it is not available in French, the superstrate language of this creole. Second, it is shown that, while the class of verbs participating in the doubleobject construction is quite small in some of the substrate languages, it is quite large in the creole. It is argued that these discrepancies may be accounted for in terms of lexical diffusion. The paper ends with a discussion on the long standing issue of whether creolization is ‘abrupt’ or ‘gradual’.
Development of a creole lexicon
Authors: Huttar George L.
Published: March 2014

This paper explores the contribution of lexical research, with particular regard to Ndyuka of Suriname, to evaluation of Arends’ gradualist hypothesis of creolization. The number and semantic nature of 195 Ndyuka lexical items from different relevant African groups of languages are compared. The results are evaluated in light of our knowledge, thanks largely to Arends’ work, of when speakers of each group were numerically most dominant among slaves in Suriname. The results show continued growth of the African-derived part of the Ndyuka lexicon over several generations. Although this lexical inventory does not comprise a structural phenomenon to the same degree as creole syntactic and phonological systems, this conclusion provides indirect support for the gradualist hypothesis.
In search of a submerged phonology: The case of early Cape Dutch Pidgin
Authors: den Besten Hans
Published: March 2014

Due to the orthography in which the scattered data of early Cape Dutch Pidgin (CDP) until about 1720 have come down to us the phonology of this pidgin seems to be fairly ‘Dutch’ in nature. Yet this conflicts with Baron van Reede’s complaint about the Khoekhoen’s pronunciation of Dutch. Van Reede’s complaint is confirmed by Dutch loanwords as can be found in Khoekhoe word lists of the same period. Furthermore, careful analysis of the pidgin data has brought to light a few additional cases. Finally, there can be shown to be phonological continuity between CDP (as spoken by the Khoekhoen) and present-day Khoekhoe Afrikaans although the evidence is not overwhelming.
Initial vowel agglutination in the Gulf of Guinea creoles
Authors: Hagemeijer Tjerk
Published: March 2014

The Gulf of Guinea creoles (GGCs) exhibit a number of cases of initial vowel agglutination to etymologically consonant-initial words in the lexifier, Portuguese. This property is especially common in Lung’ie (Principense). Comparing agglutinated items in the four GGCs not only sheds light on their diachronic development, it also shows the linguistic compromise made between the different strata that gave rise to this feature. It will be argued that prosthetic vowels are phonetically calqued on the Portuguese definite article system, which bleached and became generalized as something else than a gender/number system, whereas the African contribution consists of creating vowel-initial items that are guided by rules of vowel harmony.