Gender loss in accusative clitics in Basque Spanish
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Bruno Camus Bergareche
Abstract
This paper describes the use of feminine leísmo for the variety of Spanish spoken in the Basque Country, i.e., the use of the unstressed dative pronoun le to refer to feminine direct objects. After reviewing its presence in historical texts, as well as its synchronic geographical and social distribution, we link leísmo in Basque Spanish with some grammatical characteristics of the other language spoken in this area, namely Basque. Taking this contact situation as our starting point, we put forward different arguments to corroborate our theory, including the existence of similar phenomena in other Spanish varieties in contact with languages whose pronominal systems are partly akin to those of the Basque language. Lastly, we will explain the phenomenon of feminine leísmo in Basque Spanish by assuming the models of contact-induced change and convergence developed by Palacios (2005) for cases in which gender has been eliminated in clitics in Latin American Spanish. In this way, we hope to contribute to a better understanding of littleknown processes of grammatical convergence in Spanish in situations of contact with other languages.
Abstract
This paper describes the use of feminine leísmo for the variety of Spanish spoken in the Basque Country, i.e., the use of the unstressed dative pronoun le to refer to feminine direct objects. After reviewing its presence in historical texts, as well as its synchronic geographical and social distribution, we link leísmo in Basque Spanish with some grammatical characteristics of the other language spoken in this area, namely Basque. Taking this contact situation as our starting point, we put forward different arguments to corroborate our theory, including the existence of similar phenomena in other Spanish varieties in contact with languages whose pronominal systems are partly akin to those of the Basque language. Lastly, we will explain the phenomenon of feminine leísmo in Basque Spanish by assuming the models of contact-induced change and convergence developed by Palacios (2005) for cases in which gender has been eliminated in clitics in Latin American Spanish. In this way, we hope to contribute to a better understanding of littleknown processes of grammatical convergence in Spanish in situations of contact with other languages.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Convergence and divergence in Ibero-Romance across contact situations and beyond 1
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Part 1: Convergence and divergence in contact situations in the Iberian Peninsula
- Gender loss in accusative clitics in Basque Spanish 25
- Exploring historical linguistic convergence between Basque and Spanish 55
- Structural convergence of two Ibero-Romance varieties 87
- Language contact on the Spanish- Portuguese border 115
- Portuguese as a contact language in Galicia 147
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Part 2: Convergence and divergence across Ibero-Romance varieties outside Europe
- Linguistic perceptions on Spanglish discourse settings 179
- Building locations from directional prepositions 209
- Discourse structure, constructions and regional variation 245
- Impersonal se constructions in the Portuguese of East Timor 281
- Index 307
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Convergence and divergence in Ibero-Romance across contact situations and beyond 1
-
Part 1: Convergence and divergence in contact situations in the Iberian Peninsula
- Gender loss in accusative clitics in Basque Spanish 25
- Exploring historical linguistic convergence between Basque and Spanish 55
- Structural convergence of two Ibero-Romance varieties 87
- Language contact on the Spanish- Portuguese border 115
- Portuguese as a contact language in Galicia 147
-
Part 2: Convergence and divergence across Ibero-Romance varieties outside Europe
- Linguistic perceptions on Spanglish discourse settings 179
- Building locations from directional prepositions 209
- Discourse structure, constructions and regional variation 245
- Impersonal se constructions in the Portuguese of East Timor 281
- Index 307
