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REVIEWS945 history and a comparative study of its lexicon and syntax. Doctoral dissertation, School of Oriental and African Studies, London. Le Page, Robert. 1977. Processes of pidginization and creolization. Pidgin and creóle linguistics, ed. by Albert Valdman, 222-5. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ------ . 1980. Projection, focussing, diffusion; or, Steps towards a sociolinguistic theory of language. York Papers in Linguistics 9.9-31. Lovejoy, Paul. 1983. Transformations in slavery. Cambridge: University Press. Mathurin-Mair, Lucille. 1978. Erotic expediency: The early growth of the mulatto group in West Africa. Caribbean Journal of African Studies 1.20-26. Maude, H. E. 1964. Beachcombers and castaways. The Journal ofthe Polynesian Society 73.254-93. Mauss, Marcel. 1967. The gift: Forms and functions of exchange in archaic societies. New York: Norton. Niles, Norma. 1980. Provincial English dialects and Barbadian English. Dissertation, University of Michigan. Polomé, Edgar. 1980. Creolization and linguistic change. Theoretical orientations in creóle studies, ed. by Albert Valdman & Arnold Highfield, 185-202. New York: Academic Press. Riesenberg, Saul. 1976. The organization of navigational knowledge on Puluwat. Pacific navigation and voyaging, ed. by Ben Finney, 91-128. Wellington, NZ: The Polynesian Society. Rodney, Walter. 1970. A history of the upper Guinea Coast 1545-1800. Oxford: University Press. Trudgill, Peter. 1983. On dialect: Social and geographical perspectives. New York: New York University. Valkoff, Marius. 1966. Studies in Portuguese and creóle. Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University. Van Name, Addison. 1870. Contributions to creóle grammar. Transactions of the American Philological Association 1.123-67. Williams, Jeffrey. 1983a. Dutch and English créole on the windward Netherlands Antilles: An historical perspective. Amsterdam Creole Studies 5.93-112. ------ . 1983b. A social history of white Saban English. University of Texas, Austin, ms. Wood, P. H. 1974. Black majority: Negros in colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion. New York: Knopf. [Received 10 November 1983.] Isle de France Creole: Affinities and origins. By Philip Baker and Chris Corne. Ann Arbor: Karoma, 1982. Pp. viii, 299. Cloth $23.50, paper $15.50. Reviewed by Roger W. Andersen, UCLA 1. The debate on the origin of creóle languages was once restricted to the choice between monogenesis (one source for all creóles) and polygenesis (independent origins; cf. DeCamp 1971, Bickerton 1976). However, this debate has reached a new level of significance for linguistics with the controversial 'bioprogram' account of Bickerton 1981.' He argues that the 'classical' creóles of different lexical bases (principally English, French, Portuguese, and Span1 Bickerton (1981:4) restricts the use of the word 'creóle' to languages which (a) arose out of a prior pidgin which had not existed for more than a generation; or (b) arose in a population where not more than 20% were native speakers of the dominant language, and where the remaining 80% was composed of diverse language groups. 946LANGUAGE, VOLUME 60, NUMBER 4 (1984) ish—but also Arabic, and once also German and Dutch) share the features they do because the creators ofthese languages, the first-generation creóle speakers, had to create viable languages from the inadequate, non-native input of their surroundings; and they were successful because of their genetically transmitted inherent capacity to do so along specific lines. If Bickerton is right, then creóle languages offer a better laboratory for investigating linguistic universals than non-creoles.2 Baker & Corne's book is important within this debate. Although B&C do not directly address the 'bioprogram' hypothesis, and mention it as only one of several explanations which future research must consider, they do give it a privileged position; and their findings are fully consistent with its general framework , if not its details. B&C's work is especially significant because it provides important new data and interpretations on the Indian Ocean French creóles (whereas Bickerton's work leans heavily on the English creóles), and because it is unique in bringing together precise linguistic analysis (both synchronic and historical) with detailed historical demography. B&C discuss four Indian Ocean French creóles: the native languages of the island group called the Seychelles Islands, and of the islands of Réunion, Mauritius , and Rodrigues, all located close to Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. Their objective is to refute the 'Bourbonnais' theory of Chaudenson 1974, 1979a...

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