Creolization and Linguistic Change (review)

The work contains the proceedings of a workshop held in Jena (Germany) in 1993. Apart from the introduction by the editors, the work contains eight articles. One of these (by Gilette Staudacher-Valliamée) is in German and deals with the phonology of Reunion Creole. The rest of the articles focus, to varying degrees, on the themes of creolization and language change.

Most of the articles focus on a given language. For example, ‘Creativity in Creole genesis’ by Philip Baker (85–97) is a case study of Mauritian Creole. Likewise, ‘The acquisition of functional categories: The creole way’ by Tonjes VeenstrA (99–115) presents data mainly from Saramaccan.

Some articles are more general in scope. The most prominent of these is ‘Creolization and language change: A comparison’ by Ingo Plag (3–21). The paper examines diverse issues, including differences between pidgins and creoles as well as between creole and noncreole languages. Plag’s position is that the ‘only point on which all researchers agree is that drastic changes occur when pidgins become creoles’ (3). He then expands this idea. However, he is wrong to claim that all researchers agree that pidgins and creoles are different types of languages. Several creolists (most notably Mervyn Alleyne) have argued that there is no linguistic difference between pidgins and creoles. Evidence for this position comes from a number of places, including West Africa, where the differences between pidginized and creolized varieties are almost insignificant.

In an effort to establish the differences between creole and noncreole languages, Plag discusses three features, namely, the tense-mood-aspect system, complementizers, and articles. The general conclusion is that both creole and noncreole languages use similar strategies in grammaticalization, but the processes take place within a shorter period in creole languages. Plag notes that his findings go against Derek Bickerton’s uniqueness hypothesis (which sees creolization as a special type of language change).

Two minor problems with the article are that the work noted as Givón 1981 on page 18 is not in the list of references (19–21). In the same list, ‘Meillet, André’ (20) should read ‘Meillet, Antoine’.

‘Reflexives in the creole languages: An interim report’ by Pieter Muysken and Norval Smith (45–64) is an attempt to decipher the nature of reflexive forms in creole languages. The authors list (46) seven types of reflexive forms attested in the world’s languages before showing (47) the distribution of the different types of reflexives in eight creole languages. Among the reflexive forms listed are first or second person pronouns (e.g. French me and te), self-type forms (e.g. myself), null forms (e.g. with the English verb bathe), and the use of a word meaning body. Among the creole languages referred to are Haitian Creole, Mauritian Creole, Annobonese (West Africa), and Sranan.

Muysken and Smith note that there is an overlap in the use of reflexives in some creole languages. For example, they note that in Papiamentu (a ‘Spanish’ creole spoken in the Dutch West Indies), no fewer than seven forms have replaced the Ibero-Romance clitics. It is unclear, however, whether the authors’ claim that the Ibero-Romance clitics have been replaced is correct since no evidence is given to show that the clitics were ever present in Papiamentu.

Also discussed is the role of the various lexifier languages (English, French, Spanish, . . .) in the formation of creole reflexives. The authors conclude that the role of the lexifier languages is negligible since creole languages are closer to one another than any of them is to the corresponding lexifier language.

The rest of the article deals with several issues, including the grammaticalization of reflexive forms (starting with examples from Quechua). Substrate influence on creole languages is also studied. Several patterns are identified, but only in Annobonese (a ‘Portuguese’ creole of the Gulf of Guinea) and Bini (Nigeria) are there any systematic...