A sociolinguistic typology for languages in contact
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William A. Croft
Abstract
Different types of languages evolve in situations of human social contact, depending on the nature of the contact and the attitudes on the part of the speakers towards the societies in contact. Three socially-defined language types are useful for classifying contact languages. One may distinguish between an esoteric language, used for communication within a speech community, and an exoteric language used for communication between different speech communities. The third language type, a neogenic language, results when speech communities merge (e.g., in colonisation). Each language type involves a continuum depending on the degree and asymmetry of the social contact between speech communities. This chapter describes these continua, the “contact” or “mixed” languages that they account for, and their structural linguistic correlates.
Abstract
Different types of languages evolve in situations of human social contact, depending on the nature of the contact and the attitudes on the part of the speakers towards the societies in contact. Three socially-defined language types are useful for classifying contact languages. One may distinguish between an esoteric language, used for communication within a speech community, and an exoteric language used for communication between different speech communities. The third language type, a neogenic language, results when speech communities merge (e.g., in colonisation). Each language type involves a continuum depending on the degree and asymmetry of the social contact between speech communities. This chapter describes these continua, the “contact” or “mixed” languages that they account for, and their structural linguistic correlates.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements vii
- Acronyms and glosses ix
- Portrait of Salikoko S. Mufwene xiv
- Introduction 1
- A sociolinguistic typology for languages in contact 23
- A local history of Tok Pisin 57
- Conventionalized creativity in the emergence of a mixed language – A case study of Light Warlpiri 81
- Acquisition or shift? 105
- Substrate influence in Northern Quechua languages 133
- Coordination in the Suriname Creoles 161
- Reflections on Darwin’s natural selection 191
- Building grammar in the early stages of development of French Creoles 211
- Foundings and futures 243
- Detecting loan words computationally 269
- Learnability and ecological factors as motivators of language change 289
- The restructuring of Salikoko Mufwene through competition and selection 307
- Language Index 327
- Subject Index 329
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgements vii
- Acronyms and glosses ix
- Portrait of Salikoko S. Mufwene xiv
- Introduction 1
- A sociolinguistic typology for languages in contact 23
- A local history of Tok Pisin 57
- Conventionalized creativity in the emergence of a mixed language – A case study of Light Warlpiri 81
- Acquisition or shift? 105
- Substrate influence in Northern Quechua languages 133
- Coordination in the Suriname Creoles 161
- Reflections on Darwin’s natural selection 191
- Building grammar in the early stages of development of French Creoles 211
- Foundings and futures 243
- Detecting loan words computationally 269
- Learnability and ecological factors as motivators of language change 289
- The restructuring of Salikoko Mufwene through competition and selection 307
- Language Index 327
- Subject Index 329
