Congruence in Contact-Induced Language Change: Language Families, Typological Resemblance, and Perceived Similarity 9783110338454, 9783110338348

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Congruence in Contact-Induced Language Change linguae & litterae

27

linguae & litterae Publications of the School of Language & Literature Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies

Edited by

Peter Auer · Gesa von Essen · Werner Frick Editorial Board Michel Espagne (Paris) · Marino Freschi (Rom) Ekkehard König (Berlin) Michael Lackner (Erlangen-Nürnberg) Per Linell (Linköping) · Angelika Linke (Zürich) Christine Maillard (Strasbourg) · Lorenza Mondada (Basel) Pieter Muysken (Nijmegen) · Wolfgang Raible (Freiburg) Monika Schmitz-Emans (Bochum)

27

De Gruyter

Congruence in Contact-induced Language Change Language Families, Typological Resemblance, and Perceived Similarity

Edited by Juliane Besters-Dilger, Cynthia Dermarkar, Stefan Pfänder and Achim Rabus

De Gruyter

ISBN 978-3-11-033834-8 e-ISBN 978-3-11-033845-4 ISSN 1869-7054 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. 쑔 2014 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Printing: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen ⬁ Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

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Contents

Juliane Besters-Dilger, Cynthia Dermarkar, Stefan Pfänder and Achim Rabus Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Part 1: Contact-induced change between closely related languages Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone: Triangulation approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Olga Misˇeska Tomic´ Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Mira Nábeˇlková The case of Czech-Slovak language contact and contact-induced phenomena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Gerd Hentschel Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus . . . . . . . .

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Cyril Aslanov Lingua Franca in the Western Mediterranean: between myth and reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 Lars Johanson Intimate family reunions: code-copying between Turkic relatives . . . 137

Part 2: Contact-induced changes in scenarios with looser family ties Kristin Reinke Language contact in a multilingual setting: The attractive force of Italo-romance dialects on Italian in Montreal . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

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Jouko Lindstedt Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance: from congruence to convergence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168 Tilman Berger The convergence of Czech and German between the years 900 and 1500 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

Part 3: Typological congruence and perceived similarity Sarah G. Thomason Contact-induced language change and typological congruence . . . . 201 Azucena Palacios and Stefan Pfänder Similarity effects in language contact: Taking the speakers’ perceptions of congruence seriously . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219 Anna Babel and Stefan Pfänder Doing copying: Why typology doesn’t matter to language speakers . . 239 Elena Skribnik South Siberian Turkic languages in linguistic contact: Altay-kiˇzi nominalizer constructions as a test case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258 Cynthia Dermarkar French meets Arabic in Cairo: discourse markers as gestures . . . . . 275 Peter Auer Language mixing and language fusion: when bilingual talk becomes monolingual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294

Part 4: “Doing being family”: language families and language ideologies Achim Rabus Siblings in contact: the interaction of Church Slavonic and Russian . 337

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Markus Giger and Kalina Sutter-Voutova Transparency of morphological structures as a feature of language contact among closely related languages: Examples from Bulgarian and Czech contact with Russian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352 Rolf Kailuweit Avoiding typological affinity: “negative borrowing” as a strategy of Corsican norm finding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 368 Juliane Besters-Dilger and Kurt Braunmüller Sociolinguistic and areal factors promoting or inhibiting convergence within language families . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 390

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Introduction

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Juliane Besters-Dilger, Cynthia Dermarkar, Stefan Pfänder and Achim Rabus (Freiburg)

Introduction

Numerous studies on language contact have investigated the question of how languages converge, i.e. how they become more congruent (cf., among others, Bollée 1982; Auer and Hinskens 2005; Berruto 2005; Bossong 2009; Braunmüller and House 2009). But what if the languages display congruent structures from the very start? These effects of congruence on contact-induced change have received relatively little attention so far. Existing research has been conducted from two different angles. The first angle examines contact between genetically related languages. From a diachronic perspective, a language family consists of several languages that can be traced back to a common ancestor. In some cases, e.g. in the case of the Romance language family, the common ancestral language (Latin) is known via written documents; in other cases, e.g. in the case of the Slavic language family, the common ancestral language (Common Slavic, sometimes called Proto-Slavonic) must be reconstructed by comparing the individual “daughter languages” and reversing the regular sound shifts and developments in morphosyntax that have shaped these daughter languages (Schenker 1993). Reconstruction does not necessarily stop with the “mother languages”, as is the case with both Latin and Common Slavic, which can be traced back to a common “grandmother”, namely Indo-European (MeierBrügger 2010). Other non-Indo-European proto-languages have been reconstructed accordingly (cf. Róna-Tas 1998). From a synchronic perspective, congruent structures are found within language families, to the degree that languages in these families not only have a common ancestor, but also share structural features and display similar system-related dynamics (cf. for the Romance language family Berruto 2005; Palacios 2005, and for the Slavic language family Besters-Dilger 2005; Rabus 2010). In this case, inherited congruence facilitates contact-induced change, so that, e.g., even bound morphemes may be borrowed. An example is the Czech derivational suffix -tel for nomina agentis that appears in Polish in a couple of instances instead of the Polish suffix -ciel (e.g. Rabus 2010). Both suffixes go back to the same Common Slavic suffix; the copied suffix is materially, functionally, and structurally transparent. The same holds for the converb suffixes -k´ i, -ki, and the participle formants -st-, -s‰-, which are etymologically related and can easily

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replace one another (Giger and Sutter-Voutova, this volume). These effects of inherited congruence are called family effects in this volume. The second approach holds that typological congruence is necessary for a structural feature to be adopted by a contact language (cf. Silva-Corvalán 1994), or, at least, that it facilitates contact-induced grammatical change (Weinreich 1963; Thomason 2001a, 2001b; Martínez 2010). An example of typological congruence is plural marking by suffix such as Spanish casa-s (‘houses’) and Quechua wasi-kuna which facilitates borrowing from Spanish into Quechua. Typological congruence can also hold on the level of syntax, for instance between languages that have prepositions instead of postpositions, such as French, Wolof, Arabic, or Russian. Congruence may also concern word formation. For instance, because both Arabic and Spanish have wordformation suffixes that convert nouns into adjectives, this typological congruence facilitated the borrowing of the morpheme -í, as in Spanish alfons-í (‘in times of King Alfonso’). As different as the two approaches may seem at first glance, the mechanisms are comparable, as Johanson (1992: 209–210) aptly points out: Contact between genetically related and between nonrelated but typologically similar languages are both facilitated by the existence and/or perception of congruent structural elements in the other language. In this volume, it is argued that (perceived) structural resemblance favors contact-induced grammatical change irrespective of the genetic affiliation of the languages (cf. Jarvis and Pavlenko 2008; Pfänder et al. 2009; Palacios and Pfänder, this volume). The central claim of this volume is that these issues should be treated under the same heading of “congruence”. Our main aim is to investigate the effects of congruent structural elements on contact-induced language change. We open the discussion by focusing on some questions designed to take us beyond the rather general statement “the more congruent the languages, the more likely the contact-induced change”. The volume is divided into four sections, each of which addressing a specific question: Part 1: Contact-induced change between closely related languages: What are the effects of structural congruence on contact between genetically close languages? The vast majority of the authors in this section propose that contact-induced language change is indeed facilitated by similar tendencies or drifts. The methodological challenge is that if the languages are very similar from the beginning, how can we be sure that a particular structural element was not already present in the receiving language? Part 2: Contact-induced changes in scenarios with looser family ties: What happens if the genetic ties are looser, as between distantly related

Introduction

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languages within the Indo-European language family? Taken together, the results of the case studies in this section again suggest that familiar structures make contact-induced change more likely. This argument is further strengthened by the examination of contact scenarios involving more than two languages, as the speakers look for what is familiar to them in various languages. Part 3: Typological congruence and perceived similarity: Contact-induced change is widely reported from very distantly related or unrelated languages, with some of the especially well-known examples coming from languages as typologically diverse as Spanish and Quechua in Latin America. Does this mean that pre-contact structural similarity does not play a role here? In this section, the answers are more heterogeneous than in the prior sections. They support the argument that if congruence effects occur, they rely on systemic potential (Matras 2010) more than on a specific typological congruence. For instance, there is no infix in Spanish, but the Quechua infix -ri- is borrowed anyway. A potentially perceived similar structure in Spanish are clitics as in dámelo ‘give it to me’, which can become darilo or darime in Andean Spanish. Part 4: “Doing being family”: language families and language ideologies. The concept of a language family comes from historical linguistics, and was (at least at the beginning) linked to genealogical lineages. However, the idea of a language family can also be exploited from an ideological and/or sociolinguistic perspective. In the last section of our volume, we ask whether and how, in situations of language planning in contact settings, genealogical closeness is used as an argument in order to propagate or preclude change. For instance, in contact between Corsican and French, the adjective-building morphemes -abile (French -able) and -evule (Italian -evole) correspond to French and Italian equivalent morphemes, respectively, and thus can both be found in the pool of variants. One or the other has been favored by authors who did not want Corsican to be similar to French or Italian, as the case may be. The (ideological) claim of belonging to one language family may also play a role for mutual understanding (Besters-Dilger and Braunmüller, this volume) or on long-term contact-induced change (Rabus, this volume). In what follows, we will present the contributions in each of the four sections in more detail.

Part 1: Contact-induced change between closely related languages The papers in section 1 demonstrate the difficulty of obtaining data on intrafamily contacts, since these often produce subtle, rather indistinct results. In the words of Johanson (this volume) “we need, as it were, magnifying glasses

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to detect and examine the small, finely detailed steps of convergence. It is often impossible to pinpoint the exact course and results of the processes”. Wiemer, Serzˇant, and Erker, as well as Misˇeska Tomic´, Nábeˇlková, Hentschel, Aslanov, and Johanson make use of such magnifying glasses in order to argue for convergence within the (Balto-)Slavic, Romance, and Turkic language families, and they show that close family bonds make convergence easier. Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant, and Aksana Erker analyze convergence in the so-called Baltic-Slavic Contact Zone and use triangulation, a method well established in natural sciences and in empirical social research, for linguistic purposes. They address the problem of how to disentangle genetic closeness, areal proximity, and typological affinity. However, they also stress that internal factors play a role: Convergence alone cannot capture the ongoing changes. “Triangulation” is meant as a cover term for methods aiming at an equilibration of three factors potentially responsible for the emergence of convergent features, namely: (i) typologically frequently attested patterns of change, (ii) contact, and (iii) properties inherited from the common ancestor. The contact phenomena investigated include the resultative perfect with a non-canonically encoded subject. Olga Misˇeska Tomic´ analyzes South Slavic varieties in contact. She provides numerous examples of contact-induced “copies” in Macedonian from Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian and Bulgarian as source languages. One of her key points is that one must distinguish between three types of contact: contact between standard languages (where convergence processes depend on social dominance), contact between dialects (which does not depend on dominance and therefore results in a different amount and a different quality of “copies”) and standard-dialect contact. She gives examples of contact-induced changes between a South Slavic dialect and its respective roofing standard language and vice versa. The author also gives examples of contact between neighboring dialects. Mira Nábeˇlková investigates the intense and long-term contact between Czech and Slovak, two closely related West Slavic languages, throughout several historical periods. The close genetic relatedness of Czech and Slovak allows for mutual intelligibility and brings about receptive bilingualism. Nábeˇlková distinguishes between several historical periods to show that e.g. during the existence of the common Czechoslovak state (1918–1939, 1945–1993) intentional processes of convergence were predominant, especially on the lexical level, accompanied by unintentional contact effects on other system levels. Despite these mutual influences, the Czech-Slovak situation turns out to be asymmetrical due to various sociolinguistic and language-ecological factors, with Slovak being influenced by Czech more than

Introduction

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vice versa. The paper shows that the inherited congruence of Czech and Slovak is the source of many unintentional contact-induced language changes in both languages. Gerd Hentschel focuses on Russian-Belarusian mixed speech which has not received much attention in the literature up to now. The two languages in contact here, Russian and Belarusian, are structurally very close and mutually intelligible, allowing for semi-communication. Russian-Belarusian mixed speech can be characterized as a fused lect in statu nascendi, for which areal heterogeneity is a factor. There is no sharp lexicon–grammar split. Hentschel proposes a hierarchy of the strength of Russian’s impact on Belarusian, with Belarusian sound structure being the least and discourse markers the most influenced by Russian. It is not yet clear whether this mixing will lead to a stable fused lect in the long run. Cyril Aslanov takes a look at the “Western Mediterranean Lingua Franca”, a variety that was used in the area throughout the Middle Ages until the early modern period. Arguing from a language-internal point of view, he shows that this Lingua Franca is not merely a simplified Romance grammar in contact with Arabic, but rather the result of an effort to obtain a lowest common denominator between Italo-Romance and Ibero-Romance languages. Aslanov assumes an initial setting with a Portuguese-Arabic contact vernacular rooted in the linguistic situation of Southern Portugal (Algarve) before the Reconquista. Due to the remarkably limited proportion of Arabic elements, it can be ruled out that Arabic acted as a substrate to the Lingua Franca (as African languages did in creolization processes). Linguistically, the Western Mediterranean scenario must have been that of a coexistence of Arabic dialects and Romance varieties. Aslanov suggests a fourfold model to classify the uses of Romance and Arabic dialects according to the speakers’ provenance. In the context of this volume, it is relevant that a number of closely related Romance languages were in contact. It is the family match between the Romance languages that allowed the speakers to reinterpret their respective Linguae Francae depending on the situations, places, and speakers involved. Lars Johanson claims that family bonds are crucial for an understanding of contact-induced language change in at least two ways: First of all, languages may take over many structures and/or elements from other languages. However, in all likelihood they will not lose their affiliation with a given language family, even in cases of heavy structural copying. Secondly, the relatively recent contacts within the Turkic family show that permanent contact between related languages can produce strong leveling effects. It appears that similarities within a family give rise to the same types of “copying techniques” (cf. also Johanson 2002, 2008).

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Part 2: Contact-induced changes in scenarios with looser family ties This section moves beyond the narrow confines of a language family. In this area it seems easier to obtain observable data, since similarity is restricted to common Indo-European features. Reinke, Lindstedt, and Berger demonstrate that even between more distantly related languages such as English/ Italian, Balkan Slavic/Balkan Romance, and German/Czech, convergence based on similarity is possible, especially when the sociolinguistic conditions are favorable. Using the example of Montreal, Kristin Reinke compares the effect of congruence between standard Italian and Italo-Romance dialects, between French and Italian (all belonging to the Romance language family), and between Italian and English (belonging to the larger Indo-European family). Her detailed corpus analysis shows that contact-induced change is best explained by multiple factors. In most cases, it would be a simplification to assume that only French triggered changes. It seems that both English and Italo-Romance dialects are at work in shaping the Italian variety spoken in Montreal. The author convincingly shows that in multilingual situations, languages (or varieties) of the same family may converge and strengthen each other, thereby favoring contact-induced change. Jouko Lindstedt investigates intense contact between several Balkan languages (especially Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance). He focuses on the postposed article in particular, one of the most important Balkanisms, and shows that different languages have contributed to its emergence by adding either structural elements or grammatical concepts to the “common feature pool” (Mufwene 2001: 4–6). Lindstedt states that an initially existing relative congruence between these Indo-European languages seems to have been a precondition for further convergence. This made copying from Turkish more difficult. But although the grammatical innovations of the Balkan linguistic area were extensive, no material copying took place. This suggests that material copying of grammatical morphemes (as it takes place in Belarusian-Russian Mixed Speech, see Hentschel’s contribution) occurs mainly when the copying process is facilitated by close relatedness and transparency (but see the counterexamples in Auer’s contribution). One of Lindstedt’s key points is that since in the Balkan languages neither the model nor the target of copying are clearly defined, contact-induced change by mutual reinforcement must have taken place. Tilman Berger investigates the convergence of Czech and German, two distantly related languages, up to the year 1500. He identifies two different types of contact: long periods of intense borrowing from German by the

Introduction

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Czechs, and a short period of language shift during which Germans shifted to Czech. A partial convergence of the phonological systems occurred at an early stage, affecting vowel quantity and stress position. In his contribution, Berger also gives examples of borrowed periphrastic constructions and modal auxiliaries.

Part 3: Typological congruence and perceived similarity The two main questions of this section are: To what extent is contact-induced change favored by typological congruence? And do speakers perceive congruence where linguists would not? Sarah Thomason discusses instances of contact-induced change that involve both typologically similar and dissimilar languages. Her analysis suggests that typological congruence facilitates linguistic transfer. Most cases of contact-induced transfer involve congruent structures, which is why copies of inflectional morphemes are “easiest to find in languages that are closely related”. Still, typological dissimilarity does not prevent contact-induced change from happening. More often than not, change resulting from contact between typologically dissimilar languages presupposes language shift of a group of speakers. Notwithstanding the fact that typological (dis-)similarity seems to play a role in the amount and/or quality of linguistic transfer, sociolinguistic factors such as deliberate language change may override the factor of structural (in-)congruence. Azucena Palacios and Stefan Pfänder deal with contact between extremely unrelated languages (Guaraní, Quechua, and Spanish). What linguistic problems do speakers face when they use two fundamentally different contact languages? There are two major difficulties: a combinatorial and a conceptual one. The authors give one example of each difficulty. (1) If speakers of Guaraní have a grammaticalized concept of “hearsay” in their language, it is very unlikely that they will find an equivalent in Spanish. (2) If speakers of Quechua express clausal connection via nominalization techniques instead of the Spanish subordinating conjunctions, they must cope with a combinatorial difficulty. The authors show that speakers overcome these two difficulties by perceiving constructions in the other language as similar. Anna Babel and Stefan Pfänder test the consequences of typological distance on contact between Spanish and Quechua. Their approach focuses on interaction, drawing on Besters-Dilger and Braunmüller’s (this volume) claim that speakers accommodate to each other. When doing so, they discover “bridges” between languages that go beyond those known to gram-

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Juliane Besters-Dilger, Cynthia Dermarkar, Stefan Pfänder and Achim Rabus

marians, and even beyond those that are conventionally acknowledged within the speech community. Typological dissimilarity therefore does not limit the effect of language contact. Grammar is created through interaction and the manifold resources available to the speakers in interaction. Therefore, language contact is as much a matter of situated cognitive processes as it is of language systems. Neither language family nor typology plays a role in this perspective. Elena Skribnik presents a corpus study of nominalizer constructions in the South Siberian Turkic language Altay-kizˇi. Russian, one of its contact languages, is neither genetically related nor typologically close, while other contact languages are related to a certain degree. Skribnik argues that since shared grammaticalization paths can be observed in all languages, this kind of similarity facilitates transfer. She demonstrates that the Russian pattern, which is relatively new and typologically very different, has not (yet) been transferred into the syntactic system of Altay-kizˇi. She emphasizes the crucial importance of social factors, which are more important than family effects. Cynthia Dermarkar’s contribution takes a micro-ecological view on similarities arising from contact between French and Arabic in Egypt. Based on a recent corpus (Dermarkar and Pfänder 2010), the use of the Arabic discourse marker ya3ni in bilingual communication is explored. The paper discusses the specificities of discourse markers in light of Matras’ theory of discourse markers as a kind of “verbal gesture” (Matras 2000: 506). As verbal gestures are bound to activity types, but not (necessarily) to linguistic systems, system congruence does not seem to play a major role here. Peter Auer’s paper deals with extreme cases of contact varieties, i.e. fused lects, which, he argues, emerge from conventionalized code mixing. Providing examples from numerous languages, Auer investigates the crucial question of which structures of bilingual speech become conventionalized. He claims that two types of bilingual talk (code mixing) – minimal and maximal insertion – correspond to the two types of conventionalized fused lects: fused lects with a clear-cut lexicon–grammar split and fused lects with a merger of two grammatical systems, respectively. Furthermore, Auer discusses the question of whether the concept of fusion can be applied to related varieties at all or whether fusion occurs between structurally distant languages only. He argues that genetic affiliation does not exclude fusion. However, in contact between closely related languages, other types of mixing may play an important role than those conventionalized in fused lects which consist of structurally very distant languages.

Introduction

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Part 4: “Doing being family”: language families and language ideologies The authors of this section examine cases of language ideology. These always involve a small group of speakers with a high level of education and high competence in both languages who copy elements from the contact language more or less on purpose in order to foster the ausbau of a language and to thereby “improve” it. In these cases of top-down language change the similarity factor becomes ambiguous: On the one hand structural similarity (congruence) facilitates copying into the recipient language. On the other hand, the aim of the transfer can consist in making the languages more similar (e.g. Giger and Sutter-Voutova) or less similar (e.g. Kailuweit), at will. In processes of language planning it seems that the closer languages are, the easier it is to insert elements of one language into another. Achim Rabus investigates the interaction of Church Slavonic and Russian, an atypical contact constellation in the sense that Church Slavonic was no one’s mother tongue. The author distinguishes two phases: In phase 1 (11th–17th century), predominantly speakers of vernacular Russian shaped Church Slavonic. In phase 2 (18th century and beyond), on the other hand, Russian was shaped by conscious copies from Church Slavonic. Rabus makes a strong argument that pre-existing congruence leads to convergence (and finally to a higher degree of congruence) in processes of conscious copying; he points out that widespread bilingualism is not an indispensable prerequisite for a high amount of copying and convergence. Markus Giger and Kalina Sutter-Voutova analyze the emergence of two participle forms in Modern Standard Bulgarian and Modern Standard Czech, i.e. the Bulgarian present converb in -ki and the Czech active past participle in -(v)sí. Both developed under the influence of Russian in the first half of the 19th century. In both cases the transparency of morphological structures due to their close genetic relationship played a crucial role: Speakers and, in particular, philologically trained supporters of the recodification of both Bulgarian and Czech were able to recognize the particular morphological elements which facilitated the integration of the new forms. In addition, the emergence of new participle forms in modern Slavic standard languages during the 19th century is a typical example of how intentional borrowing is able to reverse broadly accepted language hierarchies: The transfer of participle forms in spontaneous language contact requires a relatively high level of bilingualism. However, the knowledge of Russian in the Bulgarian and Czech territories was not particularly widespread in the early 19th century. Still, the forms emerged as a result of intentional ausbau,

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Juliane Besters-Dilger, Cynthia Dermarkar, Stefan Pfänder and Achim Rabus

and also due to the fact that the variety into which the new forms were borrowed was not a vernacular, but an emerging modern standard language. Rolf Kailuweit discusses how the French linguistic policy of assimilation led to a significant spread of the French language in the domains of everyday speech in Corsica. A common solution to save a local dialect from disappearing is to codify it in a writing system. By analyzing popular linguistic discourse, Kailuweit investigates the way in which the written varieties of Corsican serve the intention to avoid similarities with both French and Italian. Hence, Corsican corpus planning seems to be driven by a kind of intentional “negative borrowing” (i.e. the creation of divergence by way of conscious dissimilation) to ensure the status of Corsican as an independent language. Juliane Besters-Dilger and Kurt Braunmüller discuss factors influencing convergence within the Scandinavian languages and the Slavic language family from a comparative perspective. In the cases under investigation, the process of mutual borrowing is not symmetrical. Rather, there is a target language which incorporates more new features from the other(s) than vice versa. Nevertheless, not all target languages develop new convergent features, even when the conditions seem favorable. The authors show that convergence is the result of an array of factors. This explains why in the Scandinavian languages, convergence is favored by a strong feeling of belonging to the same “family”, whereas in the Slavic area such a feeling does not exist and convergence depends on societal factors: It has been promoted by power relations and hindered or reversed by nation-building processes in the 20th century, whereas similar processes in the 19th century led to opposite results (see also Giger and Sutter-Voutova, this volume). This also explains why there is more evidence for convergence (in the sense of accommodation) in oral communication than in normative written texts and why there is a hierarchy of linguistic features which are subject to convergence within language families. This contribution clearly shows that genetic affiliation can, but does not have to have an effect on the outcomes of language contact.

References Auer, Peter and Frans Hinskens 2005 The study of dialect convergence and divergence: conceptual and methodological considerations. In: Peter Auer, Frans Hinskens and Paul Kerswill (eds.), Dialect Change. Convergence and Divergence in European Languages, 1–48. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Berruto, Gaetano 2005 Dialect/standard convergence, mixing, and models of language contact: the case of Italy. In: Peter Auer, Frans Hinskens and Paul Kerswill (eds.), Dialect Change. Convergence and Divergence in European Languages, 81–95. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Introduction

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Besters-Dilger, Juliane 2005 Modalität im Sprachkontakt: Die ukrainische “Prosta mova” (2. Hälfte 16. Jh). In: Björn Hansen and Petr Karlík (eds.), Modality in Slavonic Languages. New Perspectives, 239–258. München: Sagner. Bollée, Annegret 1982 Die Rolle der Konvergenz bei der Kreolisierung. In: P.S. Ureland (ed.), Die Leistung der Strataforschung und der Kreolistik. Typologische Aspekte der Sprachkontaktforschung, 391–405. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Bossong, Georg 2009 Divergence, convergence, contact. Challenges for the genealogical classification of languages. In: Kurt Braunmüller and Juliane House (eds.), Convergence and Divergence in Language Contact Situations, 13–40. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Braunmüller, Kurt and Juliane House (eds.) 2009 Convergence and Divergence in Language Contact Situations. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Dermarkar, Cynthia and Stefan Pfänder 2010, 22011 Le français cosmopolite. Témoignages de la dynamique langagière dans l’espace urbain du Caire. Berlin: Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag. Jarvis, Scott and Aneta Pavlenko 2008 Crosslinguistic Influence in Language and Cognition. New York: Routledge. Johanson, Lars 1992 Strukturelle Faktoren in türkischen Sprachkontakten. Stuttgart: Steiner. Johanson, Lars 2002 Structural Factors in Turkic Language Contacts. Richmond: Curzon. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar. Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language Contact and Contact Languages, 61–80. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Martínez, Angelita 2010 Lenguas y variedades en contacto. Problemas teóricos y metodológicos. Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana (RILI) 15, 9–31. Madrid: Iberoamericana, Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert. Matras, Yaron 2000 Fusion and the cognitive basis for bilingual discourse markers. International Journal of Bilingualism 4: 505–528. Matras, Yaron 2010 Contact, convergence and typology. In: Raymond Hickey (ed.), The Handbook of Language Contact, 66–86. Oxford etc.: Wiley-Blackwell. Meier-Brügger, Michael 2010 Indogermanische Sprachwissenschaft. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Mufwene, Salikoko S. 2001 The Ecology of Language Evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Palacios Alcaine, Azucena 2005 Aspectos teóricos y metodológicos del contacto de lenguas: el sistema pronominal del español en áreas de contacto con lenguas amerindias. In: Volker Noll, Klaus Zimmermann and Ingrid Neumann-Holzschuh (eds.), El español en América. Aspectos teóricos, particularidades, contactos, 63–94. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert, Madrid: Iberoamericana. Pfänder, Stefan, in collaboration with Juan Ennis, Mario Soto and España Villegas 2009, 22010 Gramática mestiza: Presencia del quechua en el castellano. La Paz: Academia Boliviana de la Lengua, Editorial Signo. Rabus, Achim 2010 Das Polnische im innerslavischen Sprachkontakt. Eine exemplarische Untersuchung anhand des cˇechisch-polnischen und russisch-polnischen Kontakts. In: Katrin Bente Fischer, Gertje Krumbholz, Marija Lazar and Joanna Rabiega-Wis´niewska (eds.), Beiträge der Europäischen Slavistischen Linguistik (POLYSLAV) 13, 206–213. München: Sagner.

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Róna-Tas, András 1998 The reconstruction of Proto-Turkic and the genetic question. In: Lars Johanson and Éva Ágnes Csato (eds.), The Turkic Languages, 67–80. London, New York: Routledge. Schenker, Alexander M. 1993 Proto-Slavonic. In: Bernhard Comrie and Greville C. Corbett (eds.), The Slavonic Languages, 60–121. London, New York: Routledge. Silva-Corvalán, Carmen 1994 Language Contact and Change: Spanish in Los Angeles. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001a Language Contact: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001b Contact-induced typological change. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Language Typology and Language Universals, Sprachtypologie und sprachliche Universalien: An International Handbook, 1640–1648. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Weinreich, Uriel 1963 Languages in Contact. Findings and Problems. The Hague: Mouton.

Part 1: Contact-induced change between closely related languages

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

15

Björn Wiemer (Mainz), Ilja Serzˇant (Vilnius) and Aksana Erker (Mainz)

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone Triangulation approach

1.

Introduction

Our contribution is devoted to the Baltic-Slavic contact zone (BSCZ) and its immediate surroundings, first of all to the North(East), where Finnic languages have played a prominent role. As has been argued for in Wiemer and Erker (2011), Belarusian rural mixed varieties on both sides of the contemporary Belarusian-Lithuanian and Belarusian-Latvian border yield an ideal object for studying what happens in inner-Slavic and Slavic-Baltic language dialect contact if no codifying and “purifying” factors hamper variation on diverse structural levels. These dialects reflect most of the convergent features that are typical for the BSCZ proper. However, many (if not most) of such features have to be judged on a broader areal basis, since they fit both into inner-Slavic dialect continua and into areal clines that cross family boundaries. These boundaries may be “smooth” (as with closely related Baltic) or quite “sharp” (as with genealogically unrelated Finnic). Below we want to examine hotbeds of structural convergence (a) of the BSCZ proper and (b) the Eastern part of the Circum-Baltic Area (CBA), of which the BSCZ forms part. Among the questions highlighted in the present volume we will concentrate on the following one: Can we really disentangle the “genetic factor” from areal proximity and typological affinity? Apart from this, we will give a rough account of the types of code-copying (according to Johanson’s framework; cf. Johanson 2008) found in our data and the literature on the subject. We are eager to add the proviso that the preliminary conclusions based on this account are restricted to the language groups of the chosen area. The article is structured as follows. In section 2 we give an overview of features of structural convergence in the BSCZ and how they “intersect” with known features of the Eastern part of the CBA. We further select about a dozen features which we consider being especially profitable as topics of investigation in the context of the present volume. To a large extent the information given there refers to previous work carried out by ourselves and

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

will be rather sketchy. Section 3 relates these features to Johanson’s typology of code-copying phenomena. In section 4 we explain the notion of ‘triangulation’ and discuss in more detail two features from among those mentioned in section 2. These sort of abridged case studies are meant to show intricacies we have to cope with if we want to disentangle genetic closeness, areal proximity and typological affinity as (often alleged) independent factors influencing the rise and maintenance of convergence. Section 5 summarizes with conclusions and gives a prospect for further research.

2.

Areal convergence in the BSCZ (as part of the CBA)

The notion of ‘linguistic area’ has only recently been given a more concise shape, among others by Haspelmath (2001: 1492): “A linguistic area can be recognized when a number of geographically contiguous languages share structural features which cannot be due to retention from a common protolanguage and which give these languages a profile that makes them stand out among the surrounding languages.” Implicit to such definitions is the assumption that the coherence of features typical, to some degree or other, for a given area can be judged upon only on the background of broader areas into which the area under question is, as it were, inserted (cf. Wiemer 2004). Thus, the BSCZ can be captured as a subregion of the Eastern part of the CBA, the latter as part of the CBA as a whole, which, in turn, can be seen on the background of entire Europe or northern Eurasia, and so on. We thus get a matrëshka-like or concentric arrangement of areas being included into each other. In addition, we have to look at the BSCZ as the intersection of dialectal continua of both main language groups, namely (East) Slavic (plus Polish, belonging to the Western subbranch of Slavic) and Baltic, and of areal clines that protract into diverse directions (most prominently in NE–SW direction, see below). In any case, in order to call the BSCZ a linguistic area in the sense defined above it is required that the features we find within it are in some respect or other outstanding or even exclusive compared to the more immediate surroundings. The BSCZ can be delimited quite sharply on the basis of the geographical overlap of Slavic and Baltic dialects; it practically does not show any “fuzzy edges” (beside, e.g., some moribund Lithuanian insular dialects in Belarus). For this reason and for its small size it has grown rather compact. In comparison to the Balkan, phenomena of language convergence in the CBA, in general, and in the BSCZ, in particular, seem to have been attracting the attention of researchers for a much shorter period of time. However, a sort of digest of features demonstrating convergence in the CBA was published by Koptjevskaja-Tamm and Wälchli (2001). The authors gave a list of

17

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

23 features representing areal properties of the CBA, ranging from the lexicon (pluralia tantum) and phonology (initial word stress, polytonicity) up to syntax. Their list may be not exhaustive. Nonetheless it is noteworthy that from these 23 features the following 17 features can also be found in the BSCZ: 12 Table 1: CBA-features (according to Koptjevskaja-Tamm and Wälchli 2001) encountered in the BSCZ

1

2

Domain

Correlating Feature

Geographical distribution

Lexicon

(i)

Large amount of pluralia tantum

Baltic, East Slavic

Phonology

(ii)

Tones on long syllables

Baltic

Morphology

(iii)

Evidential based on perfect participles with no person agreement

Baltic

Morphosyntax

(iv)

Case alternation for marking total vs. partial objects

Baltic, East Slavic, polszczyzna kresowa1 (+ standard Polish)

(v)

Nominative object

Baltic

(vi)

Case alternation in non-verbal predication (nom-ins etc.)

Lithuanian, East Slavic, Polish

(vii)

Predicative possession not based on have-verbs

Latvian, Latgalian, East Slavic

(viii)

Syncretism of instrumental and comitative

Latvian, Latgalian, (Lithuanian)

(ix)

‘Goal’ (more properly ‘replacement’) comparatives2

all Slavic and Baltic varieties of the BSCZ (except Latgalian)

Here and further we have in mind the northern variety of Polish spoken beyond ethnical Poland on the territory of southern and eastern Lithuania and northern Belarus. Usually, the ‘behind’-type is named as the CBA-representative of this type (e.g., Lith. uzˇ). However, contrary to what is written in the literature (KoptjevskajaTamm/Wälchli 2001: 684, with further references; Wiemer 2004: 505–506), the original meaning of this type of preposition was probably ‘for, instead of ’, not ‘behind’. In Lithuanian we can see this from the required case: uzˇ ‘behind’ governs the genitive, whereas in the meaning ‘for, instead’ it governs the accusative; it is the latter government we find with uzˇ as a comparison particle.

18 Domain

Syntax

Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker Correlating Feature

Geographical distribution

(x)

Comparatives involving particles

East Slavic, Polish (standard and kresowa), Lithuanian, Latgalian

(xi)

Reflexive markers as means of valency recession

all varieties of the BSCZ

(xii)

Adjective agreement

all varieties

(xiii)

Alternation between casegovernment and agreement within numeral constructions:

East Slavic, Polish (standard and kresowa), Baltic

(xiv)

Non-referential indefinite zero subjects

all varieties

(xv)

Flexible SVO

all varieties

(xvi)

SVO / GN

all varieties (though to different extent)

(xvii)

Particle-initial yes/no-questions

Baltic, Polish (standard and kresowa), Belarusian

Admittedly, these features show an uneven distribution over Slavic and Baltic and the dialects of both language groups. For instance, the nominative object (= v) is relatively infrequent in the dialects of the Lithuanian-Belarusian borderlands. Other features are “unspectacular” in that they are ubiquitous all over Slavic (and probably beyond), like feature (xiv), or they can be considered as Europeanisms (or SAE-features, according to Haspelmath 2001), as, e.g., feature (xi), or they are commonplace especially in Eurasia, as, e.g., feature (vii). Other problems in assessing such feature lists are conditioned by the fact that not all features are of the same kind. Thus, many of the properties adduced above are gradable in the sense that either they have spread to different degrees across particular syntactic classes in the lexicon (e.g., features i, iii, iv, xi) or have become more or less mandatory in certain construction types (e.g., features iii, v, vi, xi, xvii). A smaller amount of properties, to the contrary, can be expressed in categorial oppositions and, to this extent, are not gradable; compare, for instance, features (ii, xii, xiii). At the moment, it seems unclear how these inherent properties of structural features correlate with areal clines and convergence. It may occur that categorial oppositions form just an extreme pole in the development of gradable features (oppositions). We will not tackle this question here any further.

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

19

Given the large amount of co-occurrences of features between the CBA as a whole and of the Eastern CBA we might conclude that the languages (dialects) of the Eastern CBA do not show any structural peculiarities that would converge only for them and stand out against the immediate geographical background. However, a closer look at distributional facts reveals that Slavic, Baltic and Finnic varieties of the Eastern CBA share features not encountered in the broader CBA. A very prominent case to demonstrate this is the clear-cut morphological marking of the voice-orientation of participles used predicatively in resultative constructions and/or the perfect. Thus, Baltic and Finnic languages consistently keep apart subject- and objectoriented3 participles used in the perfect (see 4.2). The same obtains for resultatives in East Slavic vernaculars (and the polszczyzna kresowa) encountered in the BSCZ and for some NW-Russian dialects of the Pskov region neighboring with the BSCZ, while East Slavic varieties such as Standard Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian and NE-Russian dialects4, as well as the remaining CBA languages (such as German, Polish, the Scandinavian languages), lack a clear-cut morphological distinction between predicatively used subject- and object-oriented participles in the perfect/resultative domain. Even more, in the East Slavic standard languages there is generally no way to encode agent-/subject-oriented resultativity in a distinct manner. As for Slavic, only dialects of the BSCZ show a productive use of participles (marked with -vsi) that at once are restricted to active voice (i.e. subject-oriented). Their distribution is identical to the voice-orientation of Baltic past active participles, which are their cognates (the common morphological form was *-wo¯s/-us). In Old Russian, predicative participles deriving from this source were used exclusively in different kinds of subordination contexts (e.g., to encode anteriority) and afterwards became sort of anteriority converb in the standard language; cf. Wiemer (forthc. b: 2.2.1). Contrary to that, in East Slavic dialects belonging to the BSCZ and the region immediately bordering to it in the Northwest (i.e. around Pskov, Novgorod), these participles, although losing their inflection as elsewhere in East Slavic, have developed into main predicates to mark anterior or resultative (extended to perfect) meanings (Trubinskij 1988; Wiemer and Giger 2005: 40–41 with further references). In addition, one should notice that indeclinable participles marked with -vsi get increasingly rarer to the NE of the BSCZ and are 3

4

We use these terms in accordance with Nedjalkov and Jaxontov (1988), A- and P-oriented, respectively, in Nedjalkov (2001). For a comprehensive overview and analysis cf. the relevant chapters in Wiemer/ Giger (2005).

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

virtually inexistent in other Slavic-speaking regions (except for standard languages); in turn, several Russian varieties to the Northeast of the BSCZ use participles suffixed -n/t- that increasingly encroach upon the domain of subject-oriented resultatives, first of all of resultatives from one-place verbs (e.g., Ona.nom.f ujde-n-a ‘She’s left’). A clear-cut “share” between two morphological types of participles used in resultatives (suffixed -vsi vs. -n/t) is encountered only in the BSCZ and in a small region near Pskov and Novgorod (Wiemer and Giger 2005: 33 as well as ch. 4–5, following Kuz’mina 1971 and Trubinskij 1984). It is attested nowhere else in Slavic. This geographical distribution can be explained most straightforwardly by Baltic influence5. Notably, a Finnic influence cannot be excluded either in view of the fact that Finnic varieties, as a rule, also distinguish the voice orientation of resultative/perfect constructions by a clear-cut distribution over suffixes.6 Given this, it has to be asked why in the area where Finnic contact must have been most influential – i.e. NE to the BSCZ – such a distribution is reflected only in a small area of East Slavic dialects (see above). In any case, if both Finnic and Baltic have had an impact on the complementary diathetical distribution of anteriority participles in Slavic vernaculars, their influence must have been mostly independent from one another, both in terms of geography and chronology. Similar remarks concerning a more fine-grained level of analysis can be made for East Slavic (let alone Polish) dialects of the BSCZ: they do not show certain properties typically ascribed to the other East Slavic dialects continuing to the NE of the BSCZ. Such features are: (i) case homonymy (“syncretism”) of dat.pl and ins.pl with a unified ending {im}, {am}; (ii) there are hardly any examples of the nominatival object (e.g. nado trav-a.nom kosit’.inf ‘(It’s) necessary to mow the grass’); cf. Wiemer and Erker (2011: section 2.4) for a discussion, also of further features.

5

6

The voice-orientation of the resultative participles of Old Russian (subjectoriented l-resultatives vs. object-oriented n/t-resultatives) has been lost in all modern East Slavic varieties to the extent that l-participles have turned into past forms thereby losing their original resultative meaning. vsi-participles took over their role: before they had been used with resultative meaning, but had not been used as main predicates (with copula). This renewal of a morphologically-driven voice orientation with the resultative/perfect participles in the BSCZ is extremely likely to be due to Baltic impact – even though, by now, it could not be decided whether Baltic has really changed or stabilized voice-orientation of Slavic participles, or whether it rather has played the role of a conserving factor. E.g., Finnish -(n)ut/-(n)yt encodes subject-oriented participle, whereas the perfect with a non-referential agent is expressed by the participle based on suffix -ttu.

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

21

Now, we suggest to roughly profile the BSCZ on the basis of 12 selected features which increase the density of convergence towards the centre of the BSCZ: Table 2: Features profiling the BSCZ Domain

Correlating Feature

Phonology

F1

range of akan’e and jakan’e

Morphonology

F2

consonant alternations

F3

vowel alternations

F4

gender: different stages in the loss of the neuter

F5

derivational affixes: heavy global and selective copying interfering with large amount of cognate affixes (see section 3)

F6

verbs marked with a reflexive marker used for changes in argument structure

F7

animacy distinctions in morphology and syntax

F8

spread of verb particles (vs. verb prefixes)

F9

constructions containing non-canonical realizations of the highest-ranking argument

F10

resultatives, perfects, evidentials based on participles

F11

genitive of indefinite quantity and genitive of negation

F12

loss of the nominative object

Morphology

Morphosyntax

Syntax

These features have been chosen on the basis of a complex of five criteria that seem viable to get a profitable and workable amount of properties. Some of these criteria are designed to equilibrate one another, since they are actually based on conflicting grounds: (i) Lack of typological and/or areal triviality. The features have to show non-trivial manifestations, i.e. be typologically rare and/or deviate from manifestations known from a broad Eurasian background. This requirement is met by certain predicate types (F 9–12) that deviate from the prototypical accusative alignment; they show a semantically based case-assignment, which is typically subject to cross-linguistic variation. (ii) Consistency within a broader area. The features have to be included in a larger areal continuum of which the BSCZ forms a (more or less) central part, i.e. features either have to be found in non-Slavic and/or non-Baltic varieties of contiguous areas, or they should be representative of inner-Slavic and/or inner-Baltic

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

dialectal continua (F 1–12). Facts known from dialect geography should thereby counterbalance an assessment of convergent phenomena from a typological and/or broader areal perspective (compare first requirement). (iii) Structural heterogeneity. The features must be distributed over different structural domains. This requirement is motivated by the fact that contactinduced changes (or maintenance) very often encompass processes in different structural domains. The chance that heterogeneous processes (and their results) converge is much smaller than the occurrence of implicationally connected features. This seems to especially hold true for low-scale areas: if features from different structural domains co-occur in varieties of a small region, we may even assume more firmly that this co-occurrence has not arisen by accident. (iv) Varying degree of transparency. The features have to represent different degrees of accessibility for language contact. Thus, a combination of heterogeneous features includes, on the one hand, such features for which copying (or borrowing) into other varieties, except very closely related ones, seems to be highly impeded for structural reasons (see, e.g., F 2–3). On the other hand, we take account of features for which copying can be assumed to happen more easily across boundaries of even not closely related varieties (e.g., word prosody, gender distinctions, verb particles; see F 1, F 4, F 8). We will thus be able to check some more specific assumptions concerning the mutual “(im)permeability” of structural domains where lasting interference is usually assumed to occur only in cases of most intensive contact (see, e.g., the last stage of the ‘Borrowing Scale’ in Thomason and Kaufman 1988: 74–109, Thomason 22007: 70–71 as well as Matras 2007, 2009: ch. 6 and 8). Baltic and Slavic are particularly well suited to this kind of empirical investigation because, despite their structural similarity, their varieties in the BSCZ still show structural differences that have remained untouched by contact with varieties of the respective other group (compare, e.g., F 7 or F 9). Since structural similarity of Baltic and Slavic is, to a large part, due to their intimate common Indo-European (pre)history, their varieties offer an excellent playground for trying to counterbalance contactconditioned factors against typologically expectable development based on commonly inherited patterns and shared etymological fabric. (v) Complex correlations over structural domains. The features should have their bearings in different structural (sub)domains. E.g., akan’e (F 1) is relevant on the level of phonetics, phonology, morphonology and even the lexicon (cf. lexical exclusions to the rule, e.g. the middle vowel in the unstressed Russian particle no is not reduced to [a]). The importance of such features lies in the fact that if they occur in contacting varieties together with all their structural intricacy, this considerably enhances the probability (or plausibility) of contact as the

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

23

decisive factor for areal convergence (cf. the ‘Principle of Complex Correlation’ in Serzˇant 2010).

3.

Classification in Johanson’s framework

If we now assess features F 1–12 in the framework of Johanson’s Code Copying model (Johanson 2002, 2008), we first have to be aware that for some of these features contact – and thus copying – does not seem to be the major factor leading to areal convergence. This holds in particular for the features discussed in section 4 (F 1, F 9–10). But if we abstract away from such cases we notice that for practically all morphosyntactic features (F 4–12) the crucial process to be observed is the expansion (or its reversion, i.e. shrinkage, see, e.g., F 4, F 12) of the combinability of grammatical morphemes (affixes), members of paradigmatic oppositions or constructions (including alignment types) with lexical stems of a relevant syntactic class.7 It therefore does not astonish that most of these features can be related to selective copying of combinational properties; the increase (or decrease) of frequency is but a natural consequence. Insofar as the extension of combinational properties of a morphosyntactic marker or construction almost inevitably has bearance on its functional range, we furthermore must reckon with a change of its semantic properties. In this sense, all four partial aspects of structure inherent to linguistic units (material, semantic, combinational, frequential properties) are rather tightly interrelated, provided they involve items (a) situated “above” the merely phonic (phonetic, phonological) level and (b) with not too abstract functions. Thus, for instance, very abstract case functions, like those featured under F 11, cannot easily be grasped as an increase (or decrease) of semantic properties (all the more as the function of denoting indefinite quantity was inherent to the genitive already for a long time before the combinational potential and frequency began to increase). Therefore, as concerns the 12 features presented in Table 2, a change of the semantic properties can be asserted for features F 5–10, but not for F 11 (cf., inter alia, Bauer 2007; Dahl 2009; Napoli 2010; Schwyzer and Debrunner 1950; Serzˇant 2012b). Finally, to assert a change in semantic properties would be senseless for F 4 and F 12, too, since here we are dealing with the retreat or even loss of categorial distinctions (in addition, very abstract ones). 7

As for animacy distinctions (F 7) cf. Wiemer (2004: 507–511), Wiemer/Erker (2011: 20–22); as for the genitive in quantificational contexts (F 11) and the nominatival object (F 12) cf. Koptjevskaja-Tamm/Wälchli (2001: 649–663), with further references therein.

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

Global copies, which by necessity include material copying, have been attested only with some derivational affixes (F 5) in Lithuanian insular and borderland dialects and with a couple of verb particles (F 8), for the latter, though, only in inner-Baltic and Baltic-Finnic contact settings (cf. Wiemer 2013: 234–239: Wälchli 2001, respectively), i.e. not in the BSCZ proper. As concerns F 5, i.e. derivational affixes (but not the reflexive marker, F 6), in some Lithuanian dialects that have been under heavy Slavic influence we observe an apparently free combinability of Baltic root morphemes with Slavic derivational affixes, and vice versa. A big problem is however caused by the fact that many such affixes are cognates, so that often it is hard, if not impossible, to state whether the copy is material or just based on an adaptation of combinational and, thus, frequential properties (for details cf. Wiemer 2009: 358–367). Similar observations can be made with respect to verb particles (F 8), which are however more an inner-Baltic issue with a clear decrease of both type and token frequency from north (Latvian) to south (SELithuanian dialects). All in all, with both derivational affixes and verb particles selective copying predominates; beside combinational and frequential properties, an adaptation of semantic properties occurs as well (for details cf. Wiemer 2009: 363–385). As concerns the (mor)phonological system (F 1–3), vowel alternations depending on stress (F 1) do not seem to have been copied at all (see 4.1); other vowel alternations (F 3) do not show resemblances to each other which would justify the assumption of calquing; consonant alternations (F 2) happen to be copied “materially” between Slavic varieties, e.g. Belarusian dialects demonstrate a change {d’} → {d} in the present tense stem (1sg) of the i-conjugation, whereas Russian shows {d’} → {} and Polish {d’} → {dz´}. In rural mixed Belarusian the Russian-like alternation seems to have become predominant. However this case also involves an increase in frequency of an alternation that already existed in Belarusian; in this sense, copying of frequential properties appears to have occurred as well (for another similar case cf. Wiemer and Erker 2011: 18). To establish whether the rules of palatalization have been copied to some extent between (East) Slavic and Lithuanian, and in which direction, turns out as a task hardly to be solved: on the one hand, both East Slavic and East Baltic (and, thus, Lithuanian and Latgalian) are situated in the center of an area for which a ±palatalized opposition of consonants can be spotted as a remote common innovation (cf., e.g., Holzer 2001: 35, 43, 47). On the other hand, what has differed in 20th century Lithuanian and East Slavic varieties of the region are the phonotactic conditions under which (de)palatalization occurs, and it is these rules which sometimes seem to be copied in the sense of combi-

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

25

national and, as a consequence, frequential properties. A good case in point would be the pronunciation of consonant clusters in the Polish speech of Turska’s (1995 [1982]: 63–68) pre-war multilingual informants: in accordance with Lithuanian (and contrary to Polish, or Russian) phonotactic rules, consonant clusters were often unified as ±palatalized groups depending solely on the ±front character of the vowel following the final consonant (e.g., zvrut [pren’t’k’i] zrobiłam lit. ‘I made a quick turn’; cp. standard Polish pr¬dki [prentk’i] ‘quick’); for more cases cf. Wiemer (2006).

4.

Triangulation: case studies

Since areal linguistics has been developing as a natural response to the observation that typological features are unevenly distributed over continents and smaller regions of the world, attempts have been made to establish typological and areal profiles of particular areas for which in some respect or other salient features have been considered to be outstanding (cf. Sandfeld 1926; Masica 1976; Stolz 1989/90; Haspelmath 2001; Thomason 22007: ch. 5; Heine and Kuteva 2005: ch. 5, 2006, among many others). As for more geographically restricted areas, in order to explain how bundles of convergent structural features in neighboring languages, irrespective of their genealogical relatedness, might have come about, contact-linguistics and, much later, dialectology, more particularly, dialect geography have become involved, too. However, only quite recently have all three research domains begun to really profit from one another. They complement each other since our understanding of structural convergence in different kinds of linguistic areas has to systematically reckon with at least three kinds of factors, namely: whether the features encountered are (a) inherited from common ancestors (“genealogical”), (b) typologically frequent, (c) contact-induced. These three possible factors need not counteract; instead, they can work in conspiracy (cf. Thomason 22007; Kuteva and Heine 2012). Attempts at integrating two or all three of these factors have been made, inter alia, by KoptjevskajaTamm and Wälchli (2001), Kortmann (ed., 2004), Matras et al. (eds., 2006), Ramat and Roma (eds., 2007). In the following we will use the term ‘triangulation’ as a cover term for procedures by which phenomena of structural convergence in a dedicated area are systematically equilibrated against the aforementioned three kinds of factors (a–c). Weaknesses of one approach are to be counterbalanced by the strengths of complementary ones. We “borrow” the term ‘triangulation’ from empirical social sciences, where analogical procedures have been experiencing wide application already for some decades (cf., for instance, Olson 2004).

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

In linguistics, less systematic attempts at triangulation have been undertaken implicitly, for instance, in Balkan linguistics. And, without doubt, “[g]ood language contact researchers have long taken into account all of the information available, and considered genealogy, typology and contact in concert” – as an anonymous reviewer rightly pointed out to us. However, a systematic account of factors (a–c) was, until recently, outside the focus of interdisciplinary cross-fertilization. We do not claim being original with respect to the term ‘triangulation’ itself or the factual joint application of methods from the mentioned disciplines in particular cases. We only want to make the concept of triangulation explicit in linguistics, too, and to propagate the systematic equilibration of methods of, and insights from, typology, dialect geography, historical-comparative linguistics, contact and areal linguistics. Thus, multi-factorial approaches toward modeling linguistic areas have begun to be exploited only recently and only concerning very large areas (cf. Koptjevskaja-Tamm and Wälchli 2001; Wälchli 2012; Cysouw, forthc. as well as Wiemer and Wälchli 2012: 5–9 for an overview). Following Wälchli (2012: 233–234), an areal pattern should be understood as “a spatial constellation of linguistic features across languages which is significantly different from a random distribution and which cannot fully be explained by other factors than areality such as genealogic relatedness or universal principles. Areal patterns are cumulative or, put differently, epiphenomena for which it is extremely unlikely that they could have developed without any contact.” The BSCZ seems to be particularly well suited for triangulation, because (a) it represents a paradigm case of small areas whose convergent properties belong to clusters within larger clines and dialect continua, and, (b) the area itself consists predominantly of varieties of two language groups, namely Slavic and Baltic. In this section we will apply triangulation to two case studies representing the levels of phonology (4.1) and syntax (4.2). 4.1. Restrictions on occurrence of mid vowels in non-stressed syllables in West Russian, Belarusian, Latvian Latgalian and North East Lithuanian vernaculars 4.1.1. Introduction Akan’e and Jakan’e are notions from East Slavic dialectology and denote that the occurrence of the middle vowels o (akan’e) and e (jakan’e) has been restricted to stressed syllables only because the former o and e of the nonstressed syllables have turned to another vowel, typically a (but also a˘, and

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

27

after palatalized consonants i; cf. Blinava and Mjacel’skaja 1980: 47; Careva 1962: 70). This change is typical for the whole Middle Russian dialect group and for the southwestern parts of the North Russian dialect group (cf. the so-called Pskov Group, e.g., the variety of Pusˇkinskie Gory, Careva 1962: 58) as well as the Belarusian varieties to the northwest of Polock (cf. the map N2 in Blinava and Mjacel’skaja 1980: 40): cf. dóm ‘house’ (nom.sg) vs. damá ‘house’ (nom.pl), stóranu ‘side’ (acc.sg) vs. staraná (nom.sg). As can be observed from the examples adduced, structurally, the alternation between a and o is emic, not etic. In Serzˇant (2010: 197–201) it has been shown that Eastern Latvian and some Eastern Lithuanian varieties realize these phonotactic rules of akan’e and jakan’e to a high extent (though not exceptionless). Thus, while Standard Latvian (also Proto-Latvian) does not attest short o in genuine Latvian words and in most loanwords at all, the High Latvian dialect does have a genuine o. The latter may occur in its Northeastern and Southwestern Latgalian varieties exclusively, and elsewhere mostly, in stressed syllables, cf. oíz-gald-a ‘a part of a wooden shed’ and góld-s ‘table’, pó-vad-a ‘rein’ and vód-uot ‘lead’ (from Alu¯ksne (NE), adopted from Brencis 1914: 111), whereby the underlined strings encode the same morpheme, etymologically the same root. Hence, at the contemporary stage the alternation between a and o in this High Latvian variety structurally very much resembles akan’e in East Slavic, as in both cases the alternation is phonologically relevant. Analogically, though phonetically somewhat differently, instances of a short o/å can be found in the Northeast Lithuanian varieties also in stressed syllables only; cf. rotai/råtai ‘vehicle (moved by horses)’ in Anyksˇcˇiai or Kupisˇkis (Zinkevicˇius 1966: 50; V. Kardelis, p.c.). However, it seems that this alternation is only of a phonetic type. Additionally, in Latgalian, there is also a strong preference for e to occur mainly in stressed syllables approaching, thereby, to a structural parallelism with jakan’e in East Slavic. 4.1.2. Triangulation-account 4.1.2.1. Typological background The World Atlas of Language Structures (see http://wals.info/) does not register features similar to akan’e/jakan’e, and we do not know of any other comparative work from which it would be possible to judge whether such kinds of phonological alternations are more wide-spread among the languages of the world or, rather, belong to typological rarities. In the CBA no other

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

akan’e- and jakan’e-like phenomena are attested. In a broader perspective, the next comparable phenomenon is akan’e in Mordvinian (Veenker 1967; Stipa 1973). 4.1.2.2. Contact While not going into further detail here, we state that in this area there is a common tendency to restrict the occurrence of the middle vowels to stressed syllables only. Now, since these restrictions are not trivial phonetic correspondences that may have developed independently in each language, but rather structural correlations that affect such domains as segmental phonology and phonotactics, hence the phonological organization of the languages of concern, it is extremely likely that such correlations are not accidental (cf. Serzˇant 2010). Furthermore, there is an obvious areal cline stretching from those Northwest and Middle Russian and North Belarusian rural vernaculars that do not allow o and e in unstressed syllables, to the west into High Latvian and Eastern Lithuanian. Among them we find dialects that allow for o and e in unstressed syllables, although the phonotactic conditions are more specific and may differ.8 4.1.2.3. Properties inherited from common ancestors Interestingly, the historical conditions that have led to these structural correlations were very different in Russian and Belarusian, on the one hand, and Latvian and Lithuanian, on the other. In Russian and Belarusian, the former middle vowels o and e in unstressed syllables became targets of a number of phonetic changes (without an account of their chronology): (i) e became a after a palatalized consonant (spelled henceforth ’a), (ii) o turned into a and then became subject to further reductions. Thus, only stressed syllables have retained the original vowel diversity. The story of Latgalian and (partly) East Lithuanian is completely different. Neither Latvian nor Lithuanian did ever have a short o in their vowel system (only a short a). Very early, short a had acquired a labialized allophone, assumedly something like *å, in a non-palatal context, while a was retained in palatal context (the so-called ‘2nd Latgalian Umlaut’, cf. Serzˇant 2005). The allophone *å became later a short o which was a new sound in the 8

For instance, -o- in unstressed syllables may occur in some (not all!) Latgalian vernaculars if there is another -o- in the stressed syllable, too, cf. vokors (Standard Latvian vakars ‘evening’), vosora (Standard Latvian vasara ‘summer’).

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

29

vowel system of Proto-Latgalian. The allophonic status of both a and the new o has been changed into a phonemic one due to two subsequent processes: (i) former e has turned into a in non-palatal contexts, thus filling the gap and destroying the complementary distribution (a in the palatal contexts and o in non-palatal contexts); (ii) as a later process and, probably, since the rules of the complementary distribution of o have been bleached by (i), paradigmatic leveling (cf. 1 > 2 below) took place and o has been lexicalized: 1. Originally: mozs ‘small’ (nom.sg., non-palatal context) ~ mazi (nom.pl., palatal context) 2. Leveling: mozs ~ mozi Paradigmatic leveling has been considerably expanding in the modern Latgalian rural vernaculars; the old alternations known from the descriptions from the 19th century vanish, thus giving rise to an emic status of o in Latgalian. 4.1.2.4. Conclusions Serzˇant (2010) argues that akan’e and jakan’e in East Slavic varieties and a number of combinatorial sound changes in Latgalian, partly NE Lithuanian as well, lead, as a result, from no correlations at the proto-stage to an increasing degree of coherence, or unification, of the phonological systems of these languages in their later stages. The rise of akan’e and jakan’e in East Slavic, on the one hand, and Latgalian and Northeast Lithuanian, on the other, went through completely different paths with different internal motivations. Thus, in Latgalian, the rise of o (< a) in stressed syllables was motivated by a combination of umlaut processes and other sound changes (Serzˇant 2005: 51–55), while the vowel reduction in the unstressed syllables was the main stimulus in East Slavic. The internal motivations prevail to such an extent that it is in fact difficult to pinpoint a particular step in the development that is arguably triggered by language-contact. We assume, however, that an independent and internal process of rounding in Latgalian and NE Lithuanian must have been facilitated and constrained by the neighboring East Slavic idioms to the extent that the rounding has consistently been preferred only in the stressed syllables. This phonological distribution has been copied from East Slavic as an emerging short o to Latgalian and (partly) East Lithuanian.

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

4.2. Perfect (resultative) with non-canonically encoded subject in North Russian and neighboring languages 4.2.1. Introduction The North Russian perfect consists of a copular verb (with zero realization in the present tense form) and a passive perfect participle formed with an allomorphic n/t-suffix. With a transitive verb both arguments are coded non-canonically: the highest-ranking argument (Actor) is case-marked with an adessive PP consisting of the preposition u ‘at’ governing the genitive, while the lower-ranking argument (Undergoer) is case-marked with the nominative which however does not trigger agreement on the verb: (1) North Russian U menja ruka porane-n-o at me hand:nom.sg.f injure-ppp-nom.neutr.sg=invar ‘I have injured my hand.’ In some NW Russian rural vernaculars the Undergoer can be marked with the accusative. The PP coding the Actor patterns syntactically like a subject (Timberlake 1975). Holvoet (2001) was probably the first to argue that there are striking similarities across the (“possessive”9) perfect constructions in Latvian, Estonian and Votic. He thus correctly interpreted this pattern as areally induced: (2) Latvian Vin¸am viss jau bija izteik-t-s him:dat.sg all:nom.sg already be:past.3 say-PPP-nom.sg.masc ‘He had already said everything (he had to say).’ (3) Estonian (cited from Pihlak 1993: 81) Tal oli kõik juba öel-tud him:adess.sg be:past.3.sg all already say:PPP ‘He had already said everything (he had to say).’

9

As has been shown in Serzˇant (2012a), the historical development of this perfect was not related to the respective possessive construction.

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

31

As has been shown in Serzˇant (2012a), these perfect constructions parallel the North Russian perfect (see ex. 1) both formally and functionally. Standard Russian and Karelian attest this construction, too. In all constructions mentioned so far the first, subject-like argument is encoded in a way that shares functions typical for the dative domain (as, e.g., Experiencer, External and Predicative Possessor or Beneficiary) in the given language. While the languages just mentioned follow coherently this pattern, Lithuanian deviates in two respects: first, the meaning of the Lithuanian construction has developed further: it has a clearly predominant evidential meaning; second, the Actor patterns with the internal possessor and is casemarked with the genitive instead of the otherwise expectable dative, cf. (4): (4) Lithuanian (cited from Jablonskis 1922: 141) Senƒ miskai myle˙-t-a elders:gen.pl forrest:nom.pl love-ppp-sg.neutr ‘The elders [apparently] loved the forests.’ The Undergoer is case-marked with nominative in Standard Lithuanian and accusative in some eastern varieties (cf., inter alia, Danylenko 2005). Although this construction occurs only rarely with transitive verbs, it must be considered as belonging to a more general areal pattern based on a copular construction with a predicative patient-oriented resultative participle, the subject being realized non-canonically (like a possessor) and having ‘perfect’ meaning or an extension of it (Jung 2007: 154; Serzˇant 2012a). This is suggested by the fact that there is, first, structural and etymological correspondence to the Latvian and Russian construction and structural correspondence to the Estonian, Votic and Karelian perfect (in both cases except for the genitive case-marking of the Actor). Second, given that the evidential function evolved out of a perfect (Holvoet 2007: 92–96), we observe tight functional correspondences across the languages of concern.10 In addition, Polish and Finnish – i.e. languages that are on opposite margins of the BSCZ and its immediate surroundings – attest structurally similar patterns except for the “slot” of the highest-ranking argument, which cannot be expressed overtly:

10

In general, close diachronic relationships between perfects and evidentials are well-attested cross-linguistically (cf. Litwinow 1989; Bybee and Dahl 1989: 73–4; Bybee et al. 1994).

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(5) Polish Zawiezio-n-o go do szpitala carry-PPP-neutr.invar he:acc to hospital ‘[They] brought him to hospital.’ (6) Finnish (cited from Karlsson 1987: 151) On ol-tu myös sitä mieltä, että … be:aux.3.sg be-PPP.invar also this:part.sg opinion:part.sg that ‘[People] have also been of the opinion, that …’ Even though the Polish construction matches etymologically the North Russian perfect construction, there are synchronically considerable differences between them: (i) the Polish construction is used in the functions of a generalized past and (ii) there are almost no restrictions on the lexical input if only the highest-ranking (or sole) argument represents a human being, (iii) the higher-ranking argument (= human) can never be expressed, although it remains implicit semantically, (iv) object-NPs are always clearly marked as such (with the case marking corresponding to active voice); cf. Wiemer (forthc. a, forthc. b). These differences allow us to assume that, despite a high degree of (superficial) structural identity, these cognate participial constructions in Slavic varieties of the CBA are based on (at least) two different hotbeds of spread: NW-Russian dialects and Polish (for a more elaborate argumentation cf. Serzˇant 2012a; Wiemer and Hansen 2012: 2.4; Wiemer forthc. a). Areally related Ukrainian shows the same construction type even though, in comparison to its Polish cognate, this construction shows more passivelike syntax except for the accusative marking on the object (Lavine 2005, forthc.); in addition, its restriction to the perfect-resultative domain is arguable (cf. Wiemer and Giger 2005: 63–64). Serzˇant (2012a) suggests that the passive properties of the Ukrainian construction have to be explained internally, namely, due to strong influence by the corresponding passive construction. For the Soviet period, however, one cannot exclude Russian influence (i.e. contact), either. In the following table we summarize the main characteristics of those constructions discussed in this subsection which unanimously represent a perfect (thus, excluded are Finnish, Polish and Ukrainian):

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Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

Table 3: Perfect construction with highest-ranked argument realized non-canonically Language

Actor

Undergoer

Morphosyntactic organization

Function

Morphology

Syntax

North Russian

adessive PP

subject

nom./ acc.

active

perfect

Estonian, Karelian, Votic

adessive

subjectlike

nom./ acc.

active-like

perfect

Latvian

dative

subjectlike

nom.

active-like

perfect

Standard Russian

adessive PP

subjectlike

nom.

active-like

perfect

Lithuanian

genitive

subjectlike

nom./ acc.

active-like

evidential perfect

+nom – nominative and agreement; -nom – nominative with no agreement

At a first glance, the constructions of concern differ from each other not only as to their morphosyntax but also, partly, as to their function. Nevertheless, a closer examination of the developmental paths of the constructions in every particular language reveals striking correspondences among them that are highly unlikely to be accidental. The common developmental path of all constructions can be subsumed as in the following table (Serzˇant 2012a): Table 4: From resultative to agented perfect in the Eastern CBA Stage of development

Reconstructed meaning

Stage A

P-oriented resultative construction

the work is done

Stage B

impersonal perfect construction

(it) has been done the work [in order not to mistake it with a passive proper]

Stage C

split into active and passive perfect constructions/readings

there has been done the work

the work has been done (by someone)

Stage D

subject becomes object

there has been done the work

evolution of passive

Stage E

agented perfect

at me, there has been done the work

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

Thus, all the languages mentioned start with a P(atient)-oriented resultative construction at their proto-level. Baltic and Slavic languages employ etymologically exactly the same source construction, as do the Finnic languages; in all languages the relevant construction acquires (to a different extent) active morphosyntax; in a later process, they acquire a syntactic slot for the highestranking argument that gradually overtakes behavioural properties of a subject. 4.2.2. Triangulation 4.2.2.1. Typologically frequent patterns of diachronic change The construction of concern undergoes developments from A at its protostage to E (see Table 4) along two major recurrent clines. The first cline (i) is well-attested cross-linguistically (Litwinow 1989; Bybee and Dahl 1989: 73–4; Bybee et al. 1994): Cline (i)

resultative >> perfect >> aorist >> simple past

The second cline (ii) consists in the activization of an originally middle-like predicate as regards both its morphosyntax and semantics: the Undergoer argument ceases to promote into subject and another, Actor, argument intrudes into the event structure of the predicate: Cline (ii)

middle >> active

Notably, both clines are implicationally interrelated, since the resultative is a middle-like category (typically one-place even with transitive verbs, low on transitivity scale, etc.) whereas perfect or past is rather active by default (nominative-accusative alignment with transitive verbs, no restrictions on transitivity, etc.). Additionally, cline (ii) implies yet another cline (iii), recently formulated as ‘Behaviour-before-Coding-Principle’ (Haspelmath 2010). This cline can be restated for our purposes as follows: Cline (iii) loss of syntactic subjecthood (control, equi-pro deletion etc.) >> loss of morphosyntactic subjecthood (e.g. verbal agreement) >> loss of morphological subjecthood (nominative case) >> acquisition of accusative case-marking

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

35

4.2.2.2. Properties inherited from common ancestors As has been argued for in Serzˇant (2012a), all languages of concern start at their proto-level with a P(atient)-oriented resultative copular construction (see Table 4). The external evidence for this is comparative data from ancient Indo-European languages (such as, e.g., Early Vedic Sanskrit), but also from earlier stages of, e.g., Old Russian. This evidence witnesses the P-oriented resultative as the earliest function of this construction. Thanks to this comparative evidence we are eligible to claim that the activization11 process found (at least to some extent) in all the languages of concern is not a feature that was somehow anchored in the construction of the ancestor languages. From this it follows that the activization must be a common (though partially independent, see below) innovation in the languages of concern. Mutatis mutandis, the morphology of the construction remains stable throughout the discussed developmental stages, while its morphosyntactic and syntactic organization changes dramatically. Now, what is the reason then for the striking correlations in these later changes? 4.2.2.3. Contact After the etymology and recurrent clines of the construction have been established, we can proceed by trying to isolate the impact of language contact. We shall thus exclude correlations that can sufficiently be explained by independent processes as a drift along the same cline(s) only or as shared inheritances. Given the contiguity of the varieties at stake that show the process of activization as well as the lack of active properties in the respective proto-languages, it is convenient to assume that the trigger instigating the simultaneous drift along the clines (i) and (ii) in these languages must have been due to language contact. There is also some evidence that the languages have stepwisely selectively copied or, rather, adjusted their new morphosyntactic properties of this construction to the respective counterparts (Serzˇant 2012a). For instance, the rise of an invariant form of the participle in Slavic and Baltic varieties, which was instigated by the failure of the nominative argument to control verbal agreement, exhibits striking correlations that are unlikely to be accidental (on non-agreeing patterns cf. also Wiemer 2012). 11

The term activization was first used in Goła˛b (1975: 29) for the Polish no/to-construction to refer to the change from the nominative toward accusative marking of the Undergoer. This change constitutes yet another step toward a full-fledged active construction.

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

Thus, these languages first lose agreement on the participle and retain it on the copular verb; only at a second stage the copular verb also fails to agree with the nominative argument (Matveenko 1961: 111; Serzˇant 2012a). Furthermore, the invariant form of the participle is the neuter singular (except Finnic where there is no gender distinction at all), while some southern varieties of NW-Russian (around Velikie Luki, Pskov), at the borderline with Latvia, employ the form of the masculine nominative in -n/-t as the default form (cf. Kuz’mina 1993: 136), exactly as does Latvian, thus yielding a micro-subarea. At the same time, the result of language contact and drift along the clines was also disturbed by stronger simultaneous processes such as language internal developments partly distorting the homogeneity of areal diffusion. For example, the total abandonment of (non-agreeing) nominative objects in the history of Standard Russian interfered with the cline in (iii): frequently attested lack of agreement between the nominative argument and the participle as well as the subsequent replacement of the nominative case with accusative attested in Late Moscow Russian of the 17th c. (Nikiforov 1952: 319, 320, 322) was replaced by obligatory agreement with the participle in the modern language. This thereby ran counter to the cline in (iii), since it removed the achieved changes along it. Other local disturbances are due to the influence of parallel, near-homonymous passive constructions that employ the same auxiliary and participle. Thus, the use of the instrumental case in Ukrainian and the genitive case in Lithuanian are assumedly due to the influence of the case-marking of the respective Actor arguments in the passive. Another point of language contact has been the activation of the developmental chain leading towards the formation of a subject slot in the construction of concern (see stage E in Table 4). The highest-ranking argument is realized non-canonically, in identical fashion across the languages of concern. And, generally, the very fact that exactly the same clines in the same order were instigated by a number of geographically neighboring languages suggests that language contact must have been an important factor here.

5.

Conclusions and prospect

In section 4, we examined two features in two closely related family branches, Baltic and (East) Slavic. One of these features, akan’e/jakan’e, does not show congruence at the proto-stage, whereas the other one, perfect/resultative, does. Already this difference suggests that convergent features in a dedicated area, like the BSCZ and its immediate surroundings, cannot have emerged in an identical way, in particular that internally motivated changes

Convergence in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone

37

and contact influence must have played a role to different extents and, probably, at different periods. More particularly, we argue that the rounding of [a] in Latgalian and Northeast Lithuanian represents an internal development which was overridden by phonotactic restrictions induced by, or copied from, West Russian and/or Belarusian vernaculars. An account in terms of convergence alone cannot sufficiently capture the processes that took place in Latgalian, Russian and Eastern Lithuanian altogether (see 4.1), since these languages started with quite different, incongruent proto-stages and attest different diachronic processes that were not systematically related to each other at their start; and yet in their contemporary stage we observe a certain degree of unification of the respective phonological systems. Likewise, the rise of perfect constructions with non-canonically marked arguments in the Eastern CBA and of etymologically and functionally related constructions in Polish and Ukrainian which show similar behavior at the syntax-semantics interface, but differ in their aspectual characteristics and the admissible lexical input (see 4.2), demonstrates that there must have been at least two separate hotbeds from which this construction has dispersed across the Eastern (and Southern) part of the CBA. The development of perfect constructions as a whole must be accounted for by assuming a long lasting parallel development consisting of a chain of bi- or multilateral adjustments of a common pattern. This pattern was consistently innovated due to internal motivations independently in all subareas of the eastern CBA. We conceive of the triangulation method as an approach that integrates different types of explanatory keys for any kind of non-random distribution of particular features across languages in a dedicated area. We have tried to demonstrate that the application of triangulation allows for a near-to exhaustive and coherent analysis of non-random correlations across languages belonging to a given area, even if their varieties are very closely related genetically. Notably, it has repeatedly been claimed that language contact is even more likely to occur between genetically related languages and with features that are typologically frequent (cf. Dahl 2001; Wälchli 2012). Triangulation is thus our answer on how language contact between closely related languages (even on a dialectal level) should be approached. Our point of departure was the assumption that once the original constellation of the respective category in some proto-stage is established, any other non-trivial correlations must be analyzed as subject to convergence effects. We tried thus to shed light on how internally motivated changes can be influenced by language contact and how, thus, areal proximity may be disentangled from the “genetic factor” and typological affinity, provided there is sufficient empirical

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Björn Wiemer, Ilja Serzˇant and Aksana Erker

data. To which extent convergence has resulted from typologically expectable clines or rather from adjustments caused by contact cannot be decided upon in a wholesale manner, and it happens that the available data does not allow for an unanimous decision on this issue. Finally, while, in general, studies in language contact are unavoidably biased toward spectacular cases or “quirks” that are highly unlikely to be accidental thanks to their idiosyncratic nature (Wälchli 2012), the high zoom-in level of the triangulation analysis allows seeing the individual properties also of typologically more trivial features. A particular constellation of individual properties – if complex correlations in their properties are found in several neighboring languages – creates uniqueness or idiosyncracy, which thereby creates the necessary evidence for its areal diffusion (cf. the ‘Principle of Complex Correlations’ in Serzˇant 2010)

References Bauer, Brigitte 2007. ‘The definite article in Indo-European: emergence of a new grammatical category?’ In: Elisabeth Stark, Elisabeth Leiss, and Werner Abraham (eds.), Nominal Determination: Typology, Context, Constraints, and Historical Emergence. 103–139 Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Blinava, Evelina D. and Eudakija S. M’acel’skaja 1980 Belaruskaja dyjalektalohija [Belarusian Dialectology]. Vyd. 2. Minsk: Vydav. Vysˇe˙jsˇaja Sˇkola. Brencis, Eduards 1914 Nuove¯ruojumi nuo alu¯ksniesˇu izluoksnes [Observations about the Aluksne dialects]. Rakstu Kra¯jums, Rı¯gas Latviesˇu Biedrı¯bas Zinı¯bu Komisijas izduots, 17: 103–145. kra¯jums, Rı¯ga. Bybee, Joan and Östen Dahl 1989 The creation of tense and aspect systems in the languages of the world. Studies in Language 13 (1): 51–103. Bybee, Joan, Revere Perkins and William Pagliuca 1994 The evolution of grammar: tense, aspect, and modality in the languages of the world. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Careva, L. I. 1962 Akan’e i jakan’e v govorax jugo-zapadnoj cˇasti Pskovskoj oblasti [Akan’e and jakan’e in the dialects of the southwestern part of the Pskov region]. Pskovskie govory I, Trudy pervoj Pskovskoj dialektologi‰eskoj konferencii 1960 goda [Pskov dialects I. Studies of the first Pskov Dialectological Conference in 1960], 58–77. Pskov. Cysouw, Michael forthcoming Disentangling geography from genealogy. To appear in: Benedikt Szmrecsanyi (ed.), Space in language and linguistics: geographical, interactional, and cognitive perspectives. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Dahl, Eystein 2009: Some semantic and pragmatic aspects of object alternation in Early Vedic. In: Jóhanna Bar‡al and Shobhana L. Chelliah (eds.), The Rise of Semantic, Pragmatic, and Discourse Factors in the Development of Case, 23-38. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Dahl, Östen 2001 Principles of areal typology. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Language Typology and Language Universals. An International Handbook. Vol. 2, 1456–1470. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter.

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Danylenko, Andrii 2005 Impersonal constructions with the accusative case in Lithuanian and Slavic (A reply to Axel Holvoet). Zeitschrift für Slawistik 50 (2): 147–160. Goła˛b, Zbigniew 1975 Endocentricity and endocentrization of verbal predicates: illustrated with Latin and Slavic material. General Linguistics 15 (1): 1–35. Haspelmath, Martin 2001 The European linguistic area: Standard Average European. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Language Typology and Language Universals. An International Handbook. Vol. 2, 1492–1510. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter Haspelmath, Martin 2010 The Behaviour-before-Coding Principle in syntactic change. In: Franck Floricic (eds.), Mélanges Denis Creissels, 493–506. Paris: Presses de L’École Normale Supérieure. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva 2005 Language Contact and Grammatical Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva 2006 The Changing Languages of Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Holvoet, Axel 2007 Mood and Modality in Baltic (Baltica Varsoviensia VI). Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellon´skiego. Holzer, Georg 2001 Zur Lautgeschichte des baltisch-slavischen Areals. Wiener Slavistisches Jahrbuch 47: 33–50. Jablonskis, Jonas 1922 Lietuviƒ kalbos gramatika. Etimologija [Lithuanian grammar. Etymology]. Kaunas, Vilnius: Sˇvyturio. Johanson, Lars 2002 Contact-induced linguistic change in a code-copying framework. In: M.C. Jones and E. Esch (eds.), Language Change (The Interplay of Internal, External and Extra-Linguistic Factors). Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johanson, Lars 2008 Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language contact and contact languages, 61–79. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Jung, Hakyung 2007 Internally conditioned language change: the development of the North Russian -no/-to perfect. Russian Linguistics 31: 137–156. Karlsson, Fred 1987 Finnish Grammar. Porvoo: Söderström Osakeyhtiö. Koptjevskaja-Tamm, Maria and Bernard Wälchli 2001 The Circum-Baltic languages: An areal-typological approach. In: Östen Dahl and Maria KoptjevskajaTamm (eds.), Circum-Baltic Languages. Vol. 2, 615–750. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Kortmann, Bernd (ed.) 2004 Dialectology Meets Typology (Dialect Grammar from a CrossLinguistic Perspective). Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Kuteva, Tania and Bernd Heine 2012 An integrative model of grammaticalization. In: Björn Wiemer, Bernard Wälchli and Björn Hansen (eds.), Grammatical replication and borrowability in language contact, 159–190. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Kuz’mina, Irina B. 1971 Predikativnoe upotreblenie pricˇastnyx form. [Predicative use of participles] In: Irina B. Kuz’mina, E.V. Nemcˇenko, Sintaksis pri‰astnyx form v russkix govorax [Syntax of participles in Russian dialects], 16–223. Moskva: Nauka. Kuz’mina, Irina B. 1993 Sintaksis russkix govorov v lingvogeografi‰eskom aspekte [Syntax of Russian dialects from the viewpoint of linguogeography]. Moskva: Nauka. Lavine, James E. 2005 The morphosyntax of Polish and Ukrainian -no/-to. Journal of Slavic Linguistics 13 (1): 75–117.

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Lavine, James E. forthcoming Syntactic Change and the Rise of Transitive Passives in Slavic. In: Leonid Kulikov, and Ilya A. Serzˇant (eds.), Transitivity and voice in IndoEuropean and beyond. A diachronic typological perspective. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins, TSL series. Litwinow, W. P. 1989 Der Modus relativus baltischer Sprachen aus typologischer Sicht. Baltistica 25(2): 146–155. Matras, Yaron 2007 The borrowability of structural categories. In: Yaron Matras and Janette Sakel (eds.), Grammatical Borrowing in Cross-Linguistic Perspective, 31–73. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Matras, Yaron, April McMahon and Nigel Vincent (eds.) 2006 Linguistic Areas. Convergence in Historical and Typological Perspective. Houndsmill, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Matveenko, Vera A. 1961 Osobennosti struktury stradatel’no-bezlicˇnogo oborota [Peculiarities of the structure of impersonal passives]. Materialy i issledovanija po russkoj dialektologii II [Materials and investigations on Russian dialectology II], 103–139. Moscow: Izdatel’stvo ANSSR. Napoli, Maria 2010. The case for the partitive case: the contribution of Ancient Greek. Transactions of the Philological Society 108(1), 15–40. Nedjalkov, Vladimir P. and Sergej J. Jaxontov 1988 The Typology of Resultative Constructions. In: Vladimir P. Nedjalkov (eds.), Typology of Resultative Constructions, 562. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Nedjalkov, Vladimir P. 2001 Resultative constructions. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang. Raible (eds.), Language Typology and Language Universals. An International Handbook, Volume 2, 928–940. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Nikiforov, Stephan D. 1952 Glagol i ego kategorii i formy v russkoj pis’mennosti vtoroj poloviny XVI veka. [The verb, its categories and forms in literary Russian of the 2nd half of the 16th century] Moskva: Izdatel’stvo AN SSR. Olson, Wendy K. 2004 Triangulation in social research: Qualitative and quantitative methods can really be mixed. Developments in Sociology 20: 103–121. Pihlak, Ants 1993 A Comparative Study of Voice in Estonian. Acta Commentationes, Academia Securitatis Publicae Estoniae. Tallinn. Ramat, Paolo and Elisa Roma (eds.) 2007 Europe and the Mediterranean as Linguistic Areas (Convergencies from a historical and typological perspective). Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Sandfeld, Kristian 1926 Balkanfilologien. En oversigt over dens resultater og problemer [Balkan philology. A survey of its findings and problems]. København: Bianco Lunos. Schwyzer, Eduard and Albert Debrunner 1950: Griechische Grammatik. Auf der Grundlage von Karl Brugmanns Griechischer Grammatik. Zweiter Band. Syntax und syntaktische Stilistik. Vervollständigt und herausgegeben von A. Debrunner. München: C. H. Beck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung. Serzˇant, Ilja A. 2005 Otnositel’naja xronologija osnovnyx foneticˇeskix izmenenij v istorii verxnelatysˇskogo dialekta [The relative chronology of the main phonetic changes in the history of the High Latvian dialect]. Acta Linguistica Lithuanica 53: 39–90. Serzˇant, Ilja A. 2010 Phonologische Isoglossen des Hochlettischen, Nord-Ost-Litauischen, Nord-West-Russischen und Weißrussischen. Baltic Linguistics 1: 193–214.

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Serzˇant, Ilja A. 2012a The so-called possessive perfect in North Russian and the Circum-Baltic area. A diachronic and areal approach. Lingua 122 (4): 356–385. Serzˇant, Ilja A., 2012b: Pragmatics and Semantics of the bare Partitive Genitive in Ancient Greek. Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung 65(2), 113–136. Stipa, Günter J. 1973 Mordwinisch als Forschungsobjekt. Napoli: Istituto Universitario Orientale Euroasiatica. (Folia Philologica AION, SL suppleta; 2,3.) Stolz, Thomas 1989/90 Aspekte der “arealen Natürlichkeit”. Klagenfurter Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft 15/16: 343–359. Thomason, Sarah G. and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language Contact, Creolization, and Genetic Linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 22007 Language contact (An introduction). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Trubinskij, Valentin I. 1984 O‰erki russkogo dialektnogo sintaksisa. [Studies in Russian dialectal syntax] Leningrad: Izd-vo LGU. Trubinskij, Valentin I. 1988 Resultative, Passive, and Perfect in Russian Dialects. In: V. P. Nedjalkov (ed.), Typology of Resultative Constructions, 389–410. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Turska, Halina 1995 [1982/1939] O powstaniu polskich obszarów j¬zykowych na Wilen´szczyz´nie [On the rise of Polish territories in the Vilnius region]. Vilnius. [Photomechanic reprint of: Studia nad polszczyzna˛ kresowa˛ I. Ed. by Janusz Rieger and Wiaczeslaw Werenicz. Wrocław etc., 1982, 19–122. Originally printed in 1939, Wilno.]. Veenker, Wolfgang 1967 Die Frage des finnougrischen Substrats in der russischen Sprache. Bloomington: Indiana University Publications. Wälchli, Bernhard 2001 Lexical evidence for the parallel development of the Latvian and Livonian verb particles. In: Östen Dahl and Maria Koptjevskaja-Tamm (eds.), Circum-Baltic Languages. Vol. 2, 413–441. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Wälchli, Bernhard 2012 Grammaticalization clines in space: zooming in on synchronic traces of diffusion processes. In: Björn Wiemer, Bernhard Wälchli and Björn Hansen (eds.), Grammatical replication and borrowability in language contact, 233–272. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Wiemer, Björn 2004 Population linguistics on a micro-scale. Lessons to be learnt from Baltic and Slavic dialects in contact. In: Bernd Kortmann (eds.), Dialectology Meets Typology (Dialect Grammar from a Cross-Linguistic Perspective), 497–526. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Wiemer, Björn 2006 Osusˇcˇestvlenie soglasnyx v “move prostoj” kak pokazatel’ izmenenij v uslovijax kontaktov [The realization of consonants in the “Mowa prosta” as an indicator of change under conditions of contact]. Acta Baltico-Slavica 30: 439–452. Wiemer, Björn 2009 Zu entlehnten Präfixen und anderen morphosyntaktischen Slavismen in litauischen Insel- und Grenzmundarten. In: Lenka Scholze and Björn Wiemer (eds.), Von Zuständen, Dynamik und Veränderung bei Pygmäen und Giganten (Festschrift für Walter Breu zu seinem 60. Geburtstag), 347–390. Bochum: Brockmeyer. Wiemer, Björn 2012 Zum wechselnden Status nicht-kongruierender Prädikationstypen im nördlichen Slavischen und Litauischen. In: Andrii Danylenko and Serhii Vakulenko (eds.), Studien zur Sprache, Literatur und Kultur bei den Slaven (Gedenkschrift

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für George Y. Shevelov aus Anlass seines 100. Geburtstages und 10. Todestages), 31–57. München, Berlin: Sagner. Wiemer, Björn 2013 Znacˇimost’ sposobov modifikacii glagol’nyx osnov dlja ocenki areal’noj differenciacii baltijskix jazykov (po sravneniju s rjadom slavjanskix mikrojazykov) [The significance of modifications of verb stems for an assessment of the areal differentiation in Baltic (as compared to several Slavic micro-languages)]. In: Vjacˇeslav Vs. Ivanov and Petr M. Arkad’ev (eds.): Tipologija slavjanskix, baltijskix i balkanskix jazykov (v svete jazykovyx kontaktov). Sankt-Peterburg: Aleteija, 220–246. Wiemer, Björn forthcoming a On the rise, establishment and continued development of subject impersonals in Polish, East Slavic and Baltic. In: Seppo Kittilä and Leonid Kulikov (eds.), Diachronic typology of voice and valency-changing categories. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Wiemer, Björn forthcoming b Umbau des Partizipialsystems. In: Tilman Berger, Karl Gutschmidt, Sebastian Kempgen and Peter Kosta (eds.), Slavische Sprachen (Ein internationales Handbuch zu ihrer Struktur, ihrer Geschichte und ihrer Erforschung). Volume 2. Berlin, New York: Mouton, de Gruyter. Wiemer, Björn and Aksana Erker 2011 Manifestations of areal convergence in rural Belarusian spoken in the Baltic-Slavic contact zone. Journal of Language Contact 4: 184–216. Wiemer, Björn and Markus Giger 2005 Resultativa in den nordslavischen und baltischen Sprachen (Bestandsaufnahme unter arealen und grammatikalisierungstheoretischen Gesichtspunkten). München, Newcastle: LINCOM Europa. Wiemer, Björn and Björn Hansen 2012 Assessing the range of contact-induced grammaticalization in Slavonic. In: Björn Wiemer, Bernhard Wälchli and Björn Hansen (eds.), Grammatical replication and borrowability in language contact, 67–155. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Wiemer, Björn and Bernhard Wälchli 2012 Contact-induced grammatical change: the diversity of grammatical transfer phenomena and the diversity of different perspectives on areas. In: Björn Wiemer, Bernhard Wälchli and Björn Hansen (eds.), Grammatical replication and borrowability in language contact, 3–64. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Zinkevicˇius, Zigmas 1966 Lietuviƒ kalbos dialektologija. [Lithuanian dialectology] Vilnius: Mintis.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages

Olga Miseska Tomic´ (Skopje, Novi Sad)

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages

1.

Introduction

The South Slavic languages are present and spoken as primary languages in the greatest portion of the Balkans. They are actually varieties of a language brought to the peninsula between the end of the fifth and the beginning of the seventh centuries. Judging by the similarities between the ecclesiastical texts written in the ninth century A.D., for some time after their settling in the Balkans, the South Slavs used a language close to Common Slavic (cf. Koneski 2001). Byzantine sources report that in the fifth and sixth centuries, the area north of the Danube was populated by many disunited tribes who spoke the same language and in looks did not differ from one another, but were divided in two groups – Slaveni and Antes. The presence of a large number of early Iranian loanwords in the language of the South Slavs, who are actually the descendants of those tribes, indicates that, in their “original” homeland, the Slaveni and the Antes had contact with Iranian tribes. The Antes might have actually originally been a conquering Iranian tribe, which had asserted authority over various Slavic tribes and had thereby donated their name, but had in time become linguistically and culturally assimilated by the larger number of Slavs (cf. Fine 1991: 25–26). The existence of a large number of early Germanic loanwords in South Slavic testifies that, along their rout to the Danube, the Slaveni and the Antes would have run into many Germanic tribes (cf. Tomic´ 2006: 42). The settling of South Slavs on the Balkan Peninsula was uneven. Whereas the Eastern Balkans were easily overrun by Slavic tribes, in the Western Balkans the Slavs seem to have suffered Avar raids throughout the sixth century. There is a popular belief that the Avar raids were eliminated by Slavic tribes named Serbs and Croats, who invaded the Balkans later than the other Slavs and split the earlier settlers. Some phonological similarities between Slovenian and the Cˇakavian Croatian dialect, on the one hand, and Macedonian, on the other, in contrast with standard Serbian and standard Croatian, actually speak in favor of such a belief. For example, the standard Serbian and standard Croatian alveo-palatal voiced stops d¯ and ´c correspond to the

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respective sequences jd and jt in Macedonian, Slovenian and Cˇakavian Croatian. This correspondence can be observed if we compare the Macedonian and Cˇakavian Croatian third person perfective present form of the verb meaning ‘find’, najde, to its standard Serbian and standard Croatian counterpart nad¯e and the Slovenian infinitive with the meaning ‘find’, najti, to its standard Serbian and standard Croatian counterpart nac´i. In some cases, the alveo-palatal glide appearing in Serbian and Croatian is actually absent from Slovenian and/or Macedonian. Thus, the Serbian and Croatian verb form prid¯e ‘approach.3sg.perf.pres’ contrasts with the Slovenian verb form prijde ‘come.3sg.perf.pres’. Throughout history, the language or languages spoken by the South Slavs have undergone phonological and grammatical changes. Up to the tenth century A.D. the phonology and grammar of the South Slavic varieties spoken in the Eastern Balkans and those spoken in Western Balkans were more or less uniform. Between the 10th and 12th centuries, the pronunciation of the jers in the area where Macedonian is nowadays spoken was, however, lowered toward /e/ and /o/, so that the strong jers fell together with these vowels entirely. By the 12th century, changes affecting the nasals /¬/ and /˛o/ had already taken place. The vocalic features of these nasals were gradually lowered towards the pronunciation of /eˇ/ and /ə/, respectively, thus marking the beginning of the differentiation between the groups of dialects that are nowadays referred to as the Macedonian and Bulgarian languages (cf. Koneski 2001: 196–199). The convergence and congruence between the South-Slavic standard languages are, by and large, dependent on social dominance. When Bulgarian or Serbian rulers governed the Balkans, Macedonian converged to Bulgarian or Serbian due to contact with Bulgarian or Serbian. In former Yugoslavia, Serbo-Croatian1 – a language which at the end of the twentieth century was officially dissolved and replaced by Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin, became “lingua communis” – a language with wide communication, but without the implication that it would eventually become the dominant language of the country by supplanting the other languages (cf. Naylor 1978). The minor South Slavic languages, Macedonian and Slovenian, converged to this language. The “lingua communis” actually came to function as a donor of convergence and congruence due to language contact, while the minor South Slavic languages were the recipients. 1

I am using the term “Serbo-Croatian” for reference to formal aspects of these languages, which are basically the same for Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 45

Convergence and congruence resulting from contacts between the dialects of different South Slavic languages do not, however, depend on social dominance. The area where the South Slavic languages are spoken as native actually represents a dialectal continuum with a chain of micro-variations. If you travel by train from Slovenia eastwards towards the capital of Serbia, Belgrade, and then southwards towards the Aegean Sea, south-eastwards towards the Black Sea or south-westwards towards the Adriatic Sea, you would not notice any language barrier; the differences between the South Slavic dialects of any two towns on different sides of the borders between individual countries are comparable to the differences between any two neighboring towns within each of these countries. In this chapter, I will discuss convergence and congruence resulting from contacts between the South Slavic standard languages, as well as convergence and congruence resulting from contacts between adjoining dialects, some of which belong to the same standard language, while others do not. I argue that the two types of convergence and congruence are paired; they are parallel and neither of them overrides the other. Due to the fact that the South Slavic languages are genetically and geographically very close, contacts between the dialects of different languages are not weaker than contacts between the dialects of the same language. Differences in social status influence convergence and divergence between the standards of different languages and convergence and divergence between a standard language and its dialects, but not convergence and divergence between different dialects, whether belonging to the same or to different languages. In section 2, I will discuss contact-conditioned convergence of Macedonian to Bulgarian and Serbian. In section 3, I will concentrate on convergence due to contacts between the variants of Serbo-Croatian and the recent changes in Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin. In section 4, I will deal with convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic standard languages and their respective dialects. In Section 5, I will consider contact conditioned congruence between the South Slavic dialects, within and between individual languages. In section 6 I will sum up the discussion.

2.

Convergence of Macedonian to Bulgarian or Serbian

Standard Macedonian was codified in the course of ten years after the end of the Second World War, following the principles outlined in Misirkov’s (1903) manifesto of Macedonian language policy. In accordance with the tradition of standardization prevalent throughout the Slavic world to base their stan-

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dard languages on dialects that are maximally different from other Slavic languages, the Macedonian standard was based on the West-Central Macedonian dialects, whose phonology differs substantially from those of the neighboring standard Slavic languages. Thus, in the West-Central Macedonian dialects, the main stress falls on the antepenultimate syllable and distinctively contrasts with the stress in both standard Serbian and standard Bulgarian, which is not predicted by any general rule. Also, in the dialects chosen as the core of standard Macedonian, the Old Church Slavonic front and back jers are realized as o and e, respectively, while in standard Serbian they are realized as a and in standard Bulgarian as a˘. Compare the spelling of the words meaning ‘dark’ and ‘dream’ in (1): (1) Standard Macedonian temno son Standard Serbian tamno san Standard Bulgarian ta˘mno sa˘n ‘dark’ ‘dream’ Moreover, the grammatical features that have developed through contact with non-Slavic languages, and as such are distinctive, are unavoidable in the West-Central dialects. In particular, in these dialects, (a) pronominal reduplication is obligatory with definite direct and indirect objects, (b) there is a triple spatial distinction in all determiners, articles included, (c) reporting modality and the new perfect with the equivalents of the “have” auxiliary plus uninflected past participles are used systematically. Due to social dominance, contacts of Macedonian with Serbian and Bulgarian have often led to changes in which Serbian or Bulgarian were the donors and Macedonian the recipient. Koneski (2001: 178) conjectures that in the First Bulgarian Empire (9th–10th centuries), which governed the territory of present Macedonia, Bulgarian influenced the spread of phonological changes, such as those listed in (2a), while in the 13th and 14th centuries, the penetration of mediaeval Serbia into Macedonian regions contributed to the spread of changes such as those listed in (2b) and (2c): (2) a. *tj > st and dj > zˇd b. *tj > ѓ, *dj > g‘ c. ‰r > cr 2

2

Serbian influence is also responsible for the changes ‰r-, ‰re- > cr-, cre- (as in crn ‘black’, creva ‘guts’).

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 47

The fact that in the area where Macedonian is nowadays spoken, each of the Common Slavic sequences *tj and *dj has undergone two different changes, indicates that the spread of these changes did not precede the division of the South Slavic linguistic territory into dialect groups that were the predecessors of distinct languages. Moreover, as noted by Koneski (2001: 178), a number of phonological processes had been common to many languages in the area and the contact of Macedonian with Serbian might have originally taken place on a larger geographical territory, which included contemporary Albania. When in the second half of the 19th century, Bulgarian schools were opened in Macedonia, Bulgarian lexis and word-formation began to spread within the area. A substantial portion of the elements that spread from Bulgarian are nowadays used in standard Macedonian, though many of them were eliminated. Thus, on the basis of analogies with suffixes in existing dialectal lexis, the nominal suffix -nie, introduced in Macedonian under the influence of Bulgarian word-formation, has since in many Macedonian words been replaced by the suffixes -nje, -va, -ok, -ba, -stvo, or else by a zero suffix (cf. Koneski 1967: 26–32). Examples: (3) a. b. c. d. e. f.

kolebanie upravlenie zaklu‰enie raspredelenie deanie te‰enie

⇒ ⇒ ⇒ ⇒ ⇒ ⇒

kolebanje uprava zaklu‰ok raspredelba dejstvo tek

‘uncertainty’ ‘management’ ‘conclusion’ ‘distribution’ ‘action’ ‘course’

However, with nouns derived from perfective verb bases, or else with nominal suffixations that cannot be directly related to cognate verbs, the suffix -nie was kept. Thus, in standard Macedonian we have: (4) a. resenie ‘solution’

as well as resavanje ‘solving’

b. vnimanie but not ‘attention’

*vnimanje or *vnimavanje

c. vlijanie but not ‘influence’

*vlijanje

or *vlijavanje

When, after the Second World War, Macedonia became part of the Yugoslav federation, Serbo-Croatian began to exercise enormous influence on Mace-

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donian. Since the radio and television programs in Serbo-Croatian were often heard throughout Yugoslavia, many Serbo-Croatian words came to be used in Macedonia. Even the usage of elements of Macedonian syntax which relate the language to the syntaxes of non-Slavic Balkan languages was disrupted. Thus, the Macedonian subjunctive marker da is a clitic which procliticizes to the verb, while the Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian/Montenegrin subjunctive marker da can be separated from the verb by any element. However, under the influence of Serbo-Croatian, along with sentences such as (5a), in which da behaves like the corresponding subjunctive markers in non-Slavic Balkan languages, sentences such as (5b), where da behaves as it does in Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian/Montenegrin, came to be (and still can be) heard on the radio/TV and read in the newspapers: (5) a. Saka ti utre sam da dojdes. want.3sg you tomorrow alone subj.mark come.2sg b. Saka da ti utre sam dojdes. want.3sg subj.mark you tomorrow alone come.2sg ‘He wants that you come alone tomorrow.’ The facts that Macedonian journalists based their comments on news coming from a Yugoslav agency that wrote in Serbo-Croatian, and that many foreign books were translated into Macedonian via translations into the Eastern variant of Serbo-Croatian, i.e. via Serbian, contributed to the introduction of new Macedonian lexical items. Looking for a word corresponding to the English word (freeway/highway) interchange, Macedonian linguists examined the Macedonian equivalents of the Serbian word petlja, which originally meant ‘stitch’, but came to be used with the meaning ‘interchange’. Of the two Macedonian words with the meaning ‘stitch’ – klu‰ka and kotelec, for the meaning ‘interchange’, klu‰ka was chosen, because it had the same gender as the Serbian word petlja and this choice simplified the translation of texts mentioning interchanges. When, in the early nineties of the past century, Macedonia withdrew from the Yugoslav federation, there was an outburst of criticism at the congruence of Macedonian with Serbian. Interestingly enough, the strongest criticism was not aimed at the lexicon. The untarnished survival of the lexeme dopag‘a3 ‘like’ is illustrative. The existence of this lexeme has not been questioned, 3

The citation form of Macedonian verbs is the third person singular form. There are no infinitive forms in the language.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 49

although it is not only phonologically but also syntactically very similar to its source – the Serbian lexeme dopadati, itself a calque from the German lexeme gefallen. Unlike most Macedonian verbs, the Macedonian lexeme dopag‘a does not have variable valence and is always accompanied by the reflexive clitic se. Thus, we have (6a) but not (6b): (6) a. Na Petka mu se dopag‘a Jana. to Petko.acc 3sg.m.dat.cl refl.cl like.3sg Jana b. *Petko ja dopag‘a Jana. Petko 3sg.f.acc.cl like.3sg Jana ‘Petko likes Jana.’ Incidentally, dopag‘a has a synonym of Turkish origin, bendisuva, a relative of the Bosnian lexeme begenisati, which does have variable valence: (7) a. Petko ja bendisuva Jana. Petko 3sg.f.acc.cl like.3sg Jana b. Na Petka mu se bendisuva Jana. to Petko.acc 3sg.m.dat.cl refl.cl like.3sg Jana ‘Petko likes Jana.’ Yet, this lexeme has not gained prominence in standard Macedonian, though it is increasingly present in the colloquial dialect of the capital, as are Turkish words, such as epten ‘extremely’, demek ‘so’ and dzgan ‘medley’, the use of which is illustrated in (8): (8) a. Predstavata bese epten dobra. performance+the.F.sg be.3sg.imperf extremely good.f.sg ‘The performance was extremely good.’ dojdes. b. Demek, ѓe So will.mod.cl come.2sg ‘So, you are coming.’ c. Bese dzˇgan polno so lug‘e. be.3sg.imperf medley full.adv with people ‘There were too many people.’

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In the texts written in (dialectal) Macedonian prior to standardization, the Serbian or Bulgarian Cyrillic alphabets were used. The post World War 2 codifiers – members of the Commission for Language and Orthography – had both of these alphabets at their disposal. In many cases, the Macedonian phonemes had equivalents in Serbian and Bulgarian, for which the same symbols were used. Choices had to be made for the representation of the palatalized voiced and unvoiced velars and the palatalized liquid and the voiced palatal plosive, which did not exist in either Serbian or Bulgarian, as well as for the semi-vowel, the palatal nasal, and the voiced affricate, which were represented in the neighboring Slavic languages by different symbols. A decision was made to represent the palatalized velars by adding a diacritic to their non-palatalized counterparts; the voiced palatal plosive came to be represented by the symbol for that phoneme used in Old Church Slavonic; the palatalized liquid, by a symbol which in Serbian represents the liquid palatal, while the semi-vowel, the nasal palatal and the voiced affricate came to be featured by symbols used in Serbian for corresponding phonemes: (9) voiced palatilized velar unvoiced palatilized velar palatilized liquid palatal nasal voiced palatal plosive voiced africate semi-vowel

– rй –ѓ –q –w –y – ¸u –j

The selection of the monograph ¸u, used in the Serbian Cyrillic alphabet, rather than the digraph dх, with which the voiced affricate is represented in Bulgarian, the selection of the “Serbian” symbol j, rather than the “Bulgarian” symbol “ for the representation of the semi-vowel, as well as the use of the symbols q and w, neither of which exists in Bulgarian, and the absence of the symbols ї and ѕ, which in the Bulgarian and Russian alphabets represent the phonemic sequences /ju/ and /ja/, respectively, triggered accusations in the 1990s that the Macedonian writing system had been Serbianized. In particular, there were proposals for the replacement of q and w by l’ and n’, respectively, and the replacement of the apostrophe representing schwa before vocalic r, /r, /, by ч (cf. Velkovska 1988, Ristovski 1994). Indeed, under the influence of Serbian as well as of the dialect of the capital of Macedonia, Skopje, there has been a tendency to pronounce the symbol q and the sequence of symbols lj as palatal liquids, rather than as a palatalized liquid and a sequence of liquid plus semivowel, respectively.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 51

The discussion about schwa became a politicized issue: the decision not to include schwa in the alphabet of standard Macedonian was portrayed by Macedonian nationalists as an example of Serbianization, while their opponents viewed the attempt to introduce the symbol ч as an example of Bulgarophilia. Related to the use of schwa was the question of phonemic versus historical orthography. While professing phonological orthography, the codifiers of the Macedonian standard allowed “deviations” from phonological principles: (a) in final position; (b) before articles; (c) at a morpheme boundary (applying only to the phonemes /g/, /d/ and /t/); and (d) in the case of the final sequence –st, st, zˇd, zd (cf. Vidoeski 1998: 17). Thus, we have: (10) a. b. c. d.

zab zobta gradski list

/zap/ /zopta/ /gracki/ /lis/

‘tooth’ ‘barley.acc’ ‘urban’ ‘leaf ’

During the 1990s there were repeated requests for strictly historical spelling, the phonological spelling being related to Vuk Karadzˇic´’s principle of one letter per phoneme and, accordingly, regarded as Serbianization. As Friedman (1998: 47) points out, the critics were forgetting or did not know that Vuk’s innovations “were actually quite in the spirit of Cyril and Methodius’s original alphabet – Glagolitic, which was phonemic.” In spite of the influence of the neighboring standard language and the most frequently used local dialect of Skopje, there have been no changes in the spelling of Macedonian. At present, more than twenty years after the establishment of the independent republic of Macedonia, the criticism about the congruence of Macedonian with Serbian or Bulgarian is no longer in the focus of attention.

3.

Convergence due to contacts between the variants of Serbo-Croatian

Serbo-Croatian was standardized as a common language for the Serbs and Croats in the 1850s, following the Vienna Literary Agreement between Serbian and Croatian men of letters (cf. Herrity 1992). The Serbs, who were freed from the Ottoman Empire, looked upon this standard as a replacement for the “Slavenoserbski” literary dialect, which had many Old Church Slavonic and Russian features, making it usable only to the literary elite. The Croats saw in it a powerful tool in their striving for independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

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Standardized Serbo-Croatian was based on southern (Hercegovian) dialects, which were used by both Croats and Serbs. The prescribed morphology and syntax gained prominence,4 but the phonological and orthographic differences between the usage of Serbo-Croatian in Croatia and Serbia, along with differences in the lexicon, led to the establishment of the Western and Eastern variants of Serbo-Croatian. There was no social dominance between the two variants. The Western variant was used in Croatia, the Eastern variant in Serbia, while Bosnia and Hercegovina and Montenegro adopted both variants. Lexical items common in each variant often entered the lexicon of the other variant, enhancing, as pointed out by Ivic´ (1992: 105), the communication potential of the language. Thus, the usage of both the Eastern and the Western equivalents of the English word factory – fabrika and tvornica – in Bosnia led to the existence of distinct lexemes for the meanings ‘factory’ and ‘workshop’. The “Western” word spoznaja ‘cognition’, entering the “Eastern” lexicon came to refer to ‘cognition achieved by one’s own thinking’, the word saznanje being restricted to the meaning ‘result of learning from the outside’. The “Western” word zarez ‘comma’ replaced the “Eastern” word zapeta, since it more adequately represented the usage, and the “Western” word sazˇetak ‘summary’ came to be used more frequently than the “Eastern” word rezime, because the latter word does not conform well to the general rules of Serbo-Croatian morphology. Political developments during the last decade of the 20th century led to the replacement of Serbo-Croatian by Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin. Note, however, that there are no significant structural differences between the Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards; while socio-linguistically we have four distinct languages, from the point of view of structural linguistics we are dealing with one language system. The politicians and (some) linguists of the new countries insist on differences. Thus, in Croatia, many older Slavonic words which were introduced by the Croatian elite before the establishment of Serbo-Croatian are being resurrected; in Bosnia and Hercegovina, the use of Turkish words introduced during the rule of the Ottoman Empire is being intensified, while in Montenegro new phonemes are being introduced. But the fact that all the new languages have a common dialectal basis makes it very hard to pinpoint distinctions between the morphology and the syntax of each of the four languages. As pointed out 4

There are minor differences in the syntax. Thus, while in Serbia the subjunctive constructions are used irrespective of whether the main verb and the verb in its complement have joint or disjoint reference, in Croatia they are used only when the two verbs have disjoint reference.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 53

by Brozovic´ (2005), the dialectal differences from the western border of Macedonia to the Black Sea are smaller than the dialectal differences from the border of Croatia with Slovenia to the border of Serbia with Macedonia and Bulgaria, but the different dialectal basis for the standardization of Bulgarian and Macedonian makes Macedonian linguistically distinct from Bulgarian. The unique dialectal basis for Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin is an obstacle to the distinct descriptions of these languages, but the insistence on differences persists and hinders convergence and congruence.

4.

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the standard languages and their dialects

Contacts between the South Slavic standard languages and their dialects have led to convergence and congruence both in the standards and in the dialects. Especially prominent have been contacts in urban centres. Dunja Jutronic´-Tihomirovic´ (1992) examined three syntactic variables in the Split dialect suspected to be undergoing different rates of convergence and divergence under the influence of the Western standard Serbo-Croatian or standard Croatian, namely: 1. The construction od + genitive in the function of possessive adjective. 2. The replacement of the locative by the accusative. 3. The use of the interrogative and relative pronoun ‰a instead of sta ‘what’. Examples of usage of these variables in the Split dialect and standard Croatian are given in (11): (11)

The Split dialect a1 prsten o(d) zlata ring of gold.gen ‘golden ring’

Standard Croatian zlatan prsten golden.m.sg ring.m.sg

a2 pismo o(d) sestre letter of sister.gen ‘my sister’s letter

sestrino pismo sister’s.n.sg letter.n.sg

´cu Potrazˇit b1 Potrazˇit look-for.1sg.pr will.1sg.mod.cl look-for.1sg ga u kavanu. ga 3sg.m.acc.cl in coffe-shop.acc 3sg.m.acc.cl ‘I’ll look for him in the coffee shop.’

´cu will.1sg.mod.cl u kavani. in coffe-shop.loc

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u postelju Lezˇi u postelji. b2 Lezˇi lie.3sg.pr in bed.acc lie.3sg.pr in bed.loc ‘He is in bed.’ zatvoreno? Sˇta ako je zatvoreno? c1 ™a ako je what if be.3sg closed.n.sg what if be.3sg closed.n.sg ‘What if it is closed? Dunja Jutronic´-Tihomirovic´ based her analysis on the speech of three age groups of native speakers of the dialect of Split, with ten speakers in each group, divided equally into males and females. Every dialectal form was noted for every speaker, together with every occurrence of standard forms and then the occurrence of the non-standard form was expressed as a frequency index. The analysis showed the following percentages of frequency of occurrence of the dialectal syntactic features od + genitive, accusative rather than the standard locative, and ‰a instead of the standard sto in the three age groups examined: Table 1: Percentages of frequency of occurrence of dialectal syntactic features Age Group

od + Gen

Acc

‰a

50–70 years old 30–50 years old 18–30 years old

98.32 88.45 75.34

90.50 79.15 38.24

75.34 25.34 5.23

Looking at the statistics in Table (1) we see that the younger generation uses fewer dialectal forms than the older generation. The convergence and congruence are not of the same degree, however. The construction od + genitive is most resistant to the influence of the standard, the replacement of the locative by the accusative is less resistant, but still frequent, while the interrogative-relative pronoun ‰a has been almost completely lost with the youngest generation. Since the pronoun ‰a is a symbol of the Cˇakavian group of dialects to which the dialect of Split belongs, Jutronic´-Tihomirovic´ (1992: 207) concluded that the most salient dialectal features are stronger candidates for convergence to standard features. Examining the maintenance of dialectal phonology, morphology, syntax and lexis in the dialect of Ohrid, I noticed that it depends on the speaker variables of age, neighborhood and roots (cf. Tomic´ 1998). Due to the high prestige of the city and its dialect, convergence in the urban dialect of Ohrid with standard Macedonian is strong only in the speech of those younger

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 55

Ohridians whose parents were not born in Ohrid and do not live in the inner city. The dialects also influence the standard languages spoken in the urban centers. As pointed out by Weinreich (1953: 99), “… a non-standardized vernacular is sometimes more apt to be adopted than a standardized language whose functions do not include everyday speech.” Indeed, in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, where Kajkavian – a dialect whose phonology and grammar significantly differ from the phonology and grammar of standard Croatian – is vernacular, standard Croatian, when used unofficially, is enriched with prosodic and grammatical features of Kajkavian. This Kajkavianized Croatian, which is actually the colloquial register of the city of Zagreb, is used not only by speakers to whom the Kajkavian dialect is vernacular, but also by Croatian speakers who have moved to Zagreb from areas where standard Croatian is spoken as a native language. The vernacular of Skopje, the capital of Macedonia, also exhibits strong influence on standard Macedonian. While in Zagreb the Kajkavianized standard Croatian has turned into an urban colloquial dialect, in Skopje the local Macedonian dialect has not only led to the creation of an urban colloquial dialect, but also to the establishment of diglossal elements in standard Macedonian. Thus, the negative particle ne is in standard Macedonian alternatively treated (a) as a clitic that procliticizes to the verb, as it does in the West-Central Macedonian dialects on which standard Macedonian is based, and (b) as a clitic that, together with other clitics, forms a single prosodically restructured phonological word, as it does in the dialect of the capital of Macedonia, which, as pointed out by Friedman (2003: 177), is located at the intersection of the boundary between the north-west – south-east Macedonian dialects and the boundary that separates the western dialect complexes of Macedonian from the south-eastern ones. The two different prosodies are given in (13):5 (13) a. PETko ne f mi f ja f DAde Petko not.cl 3sg.dat.cl 3sg.f.acc.cl give.3sg.aor KNIgata. book+the.f.sg

5

While capitalized letters mark stressed syllables, f marks directionality of cliticization and – links items pronounced as a single phonological word.

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b. PETko NE –mi – Petko not.cl 3sg.dat.cl

ja DAde 3sg.f.acc.cl give.3sg.aor

KNIgata. book+the.f.sg ‘Petko didn’t give me the book.’ Accordingly, in language contacts between the standard and its dialects, the standard language is most often, but not always, the donor of convergence and congruence.

5.

Contact-conditioned convergence and congruence between the South Slavic dialects

The lack of clearly noticeable differences between the dialects of individual languages and even between neighboring dialects of different languages is a characteristic trait of South Slavic, particularly visible in the area where Serbian, Macedonian and Bulgarian intersect. As one moves from the north to the south of this area, case inflections diminish, while conditions for cliticdoubling increase. In the Northern Serbian dialects, as in standard Serbian/ Croatian/Bosnian/Montenegrin, there are paradigms with distinct genitive, dative, accusative, vocative, instrumental and locative case forms for all nominal and pronominal types and only the non-inflecting direct objects of the deictics with the meaning ‘here’ or ‘there’ are clitic-doubled. In the South-Eastern Serbian dialects, to the north of the Macedonian dialects and to the east of the Bulgarian ones, only accusative and partly dative nominal cases occur, and clitic-doubling is more frequent, though it is always optional and there is a limit to the types of NPs with which clitics can occur. In Macedonian and Bulgarian, nominal cases are practically non-existent, while clitic-doubling occurs with all types of NPs. As one moves from the southeast to the north-west in the area, the use of the aorist and the imperfect diminishes. In Bulgarian, the Proto-Indo-European distinction between the aorist and the imperfect has been preserved, and the forms of these tenses are used along the forms of the “be” perfect, which has retained its original Common Slavic function of referring to events that have occurred in the past, but are relevant at the moment of speaking. This perfect can be witnessed already in Old Church Slavonic, though its use has subsequently increased. In Middle Bulgarian it was used for the expression of resultativeness, and in emotionally colored expressions (cf. Dejanova 1966: 148–149).

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 57

As one moves westwards within Macedonian-speaking territory, the use of the aorist is diminished; the imperfect becomes the past tense par excellence, the exponents of the Common Slavic “be” perfect being increasingly restricted to marking the modal category of evidentiality while a new “have” perfect takes over the function of referring to events that have occurred in the past, but are relevant at the moment of speaking. In the South-Western Macedonian dialects of Bitola and Resen and in the Macedonian dialects in Kostur (Kastoria) in Northern Greece and Korcˇa (Korçë) in Southern Albania, the “have” perfect is the only perfect used. In Northern Macedonian, SouthEastern Serbian and some dialects in Eastern Bulgarian, the “be” perfect prevails, though the aorist and the imperfect are still in use, while in northern Serbia, the “be” perfect has almost ousted the use of other past tenses. The contact-conditioned convergence and congruence between the neighboring dialects of the South Slavic languages are most common in the so-called ‘transitional zones’ between the Serbian, Macedonian and Bulgarian dialectal complexes. Vidoeski (1998) differentiates three groups of common elements in the transitional zone between Serbian and Macedonian: (a) elements of Serbian provenance (e.g. those cited in (14a); (b) elements that connect the transitional zone to Macedonian (e.g. those cited in (14b); and (c) innovations that unite the transitional zone, setting it apart from all neighboring dialects, irrespective of their provenance (e.g. those cited in (14c): (14) a1 The third person personal pronouns on ‘he’, ona ‘she’, oni ‘they’; a2 The third person masculine singular pronouns of the type njega ‘him.acc’ and svakoga ‘everyone.acc’, along with the modifiers relating to them; a3 The prepositions iz ‘from’ and uz ‘along’; a4 The verbal suffixes -mo and -se, as in vikamo ‘call.1sg.pres’ and rekose ‘say.3pl.imperf ’; a5 The nominal suffixes -iѓ (as in petliѓ ‘cock.dimin’), -oѓa (as in ‰istoѓa ‘cleanliness’), -lja’ (as in tkalja ‘weaver.f ’); b1 The third person plural “be” forms sa and se; b2 The personal pronouns mie ‘we’ and vie ‘you.pl’; b3 The adjectival plural form -ne (as in sitne dukati ‘little ducats’);

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b4 The occurrence of the pronominal clitic between the negation particle and the verb, as in: NE – me DIra. not 1sg.acc.cl disturb.3sg.pres; ‘(S)he doesn’t disturb me.’ b5 Clitic doubling of pronouns, as in: Me PRIma mene. 1sg.acc.cl accept.3sg.pres me.pron ‘(S)he accepts me.’ c1 The sequence -lu to the right of dental alveolar consonants (as in slunce ‘sun’, dlugo ‘long.neut’) c2 First person singular present tense forms ending on the vowel u (as in idu ‘go.1sg.pres’, pe‰u ‘bake.1sg.pres’); c3 Third person plural present tense forms ending on the labio-dental consonant v (as in vikav ‘call.3sg.pres’, idev ‘go.3sg.pres’); c4 Nominal neuter plural forms with the suffix -ki (as in piliki ‘chickens’); c5 The adjectival plural form -ne (as in sitne dukati ‘little ducats’); c6 The feminine singular forms njuma ‘her.acc’ and njojze ‘her.dat’; c7 The clitics vu ‘3sg.m.dat.cl’ and gu ‘3sg.m.acc.cl’. It is not clear which of the dialects in contact acted as the donor. Most probably the influences between them have been reciprocal.

6.

Summing up

I have shown that there is an abundance of contact-conditioned convergence and congruence in South Slavic. Convergence and congruence due to contact between different standard languages always depend on social dominance. Differences in social status also influence convergence and congruence between the standard language and its dialects, though a prominent dialect can sometimes exercise an influence on the standard. Differences in social status do not, however, influence convergence and congruence between different dialects, whether belonging to the same or to different languages. Due to the fact that the South Slavic languages are genetically and geographically very close, the contact-conditioned congruence between neighboring

Convergence and congruence due to contact between the South Slavic languages 59

dialects of different languages is actually barely distinguishable from the contact-conditioned congruence between neighboring dialects of the same language. Particularly vibrant is the contact-conditioned congruence between the dialects in the so-called transitional zones between the Serbian, Macedonian and Bulgarian dialectal complexes, where the donor and the recipients of convergence and congruence cannot be discerned.

References Brozovic´, Dalibor 2005 Sociolingvisticˇki i genetskolingvisticˇki status makedonskoga jezika u Slaviji i Evropi [The status of the Macedonian language with regard to sociolinguistics and genetic linguistics in Slavia and Europe]. In: Arealna lingvistika, 15–21. Skopje: Makedonska akademija na naukite i umetnostite. Dejanova, Marija 1966 Imperfect i aorist v slavjanskite ezici [The Imperfect and the Aorist in the Slavic Languages]. Sofija. Fine, John 1991 [1983] The Early Medieval Balkans. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. Friedman, Victor A. 1998 The implementation of Standard Macedonian: Problems and results. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 131: 13–29. Friedman, Victor 1992/2003 An Outline of Macedonian Grammar. In: Bernard Comrie and Grenville Corbett (eds.), Handbook of the Slavonic Languages. London: Routledge, 245–305. [Reprinted in Ljudmil Spasov, Dve amerikanski gramatiki na sovremeniot makedonski standarden jazik. Skopje: MANU, 167–262.] Herrity, Peter 1992 Aspect of Change and Variation. In: Ranko Bugarski and Celia Hawkesworth (eds.), Language Planning in Yugoslavia, 163–175. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica. Ivic´, Pavle 1992 Language planning in Serbia today. In: Ranko Bugarski and Celia Hawkesworth (eds.), Language Planning in Yugoslavia, 101–110. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica. Jutronic´-Tihomirovic´, Dunja 1992 Standard language and dialects in contact. In: Ranko Bugarski and Celia Hawkesworth (eds.), Language Planning in Yugoslavia, 200–209. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica. Koneski, Blazˇe 1967 Gramatika na makedonskiot literaturen jazik [Grammar of the Macedonian Literary Language]. Skopje: Kultura. Koneski, Blazˇe 2001 A Historical Phonology of the Macedonian Language. Translated by Victor Friedman. Skopje: Makedonska akademija na naukite i umetnostite. Misirkov, Krste Petkov 1903 Za makedonckite raboti [On Macedonian Matters]. Sofia: Liberalni klub (Facsimile edition, Skopje: Institut za makedonski jazik 1974). Naylor, Kenneth 1978 The Eastern variant of Serbo-Croatian as the lingua communis of Yugoslavia. In: W. R. Schmalstieg and Thomas Magner (eds.), Sociolinguistic Problems in Czecholslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Yugoslavia, 456–468. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Ristovski, Blazˇe 1994 Remarks at the Second Macedonian-American Conference on Macedonian studies. Ohrid, August 16–19. [Unpublished] Toporisˇicˇ, Jozˇe 1992 The status of Slovene in Yugoslavia. In: Ranko Bugarski and

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Selia Hawkesworth (eds.), Language Planning in Yugoslavia, 111–116. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Tomic´, Olga Misˇeska 1998 Language maintenance and adaptation in the Ohrid dialect of Macedonian. International Journal of Sociology of Language 131: 73–104. Tomic´, Olga Misˇeska 2006 Balkan Sprachbund Morpho-syntactic Features. Dordrecht: Springer. Velkovska, Snezˇana 1989 Kon jazikot – mnogu poodgovorno na site nivoa [For a greater responsibility towards language at all levels]. Lik 3 [52]: 9. Vidoeski, Bozˇidar 1998 Dijalektite na makedonskiot jazik [The Dialects of Macedonian]. Tom I. Skopje: Makedonska akademija na naukite i umetnostite. Vidoeski, Bozˇidar 1998 Five decades since the codification of the Macedonian language. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 131: 13–29. Weinreich, Uriel 1953 Language Contact. The Hague: Mouton.

The case of Czech-Slovak language contact and contact-induced phenomena

61

Mira Nábeˇlková (Bratislava)

The case of Czech-Slovak language contact and contact-induced phenomena Within the broad spectrum of language contact situations with contactinduced phenomena, Czech-Slovak language relations represent a specific case. The ongoing story of Czech and Slovak consists of a series of everchanging contact situations conditioning contact-induced changes in both of these closely related West Slavic languages. The present-day situation, historically marked off by the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1993, represents a fundamentally changed framework of language contact when compared to the previous coexistence of the languages in one state. However, in this period with its new developmental dynamism the high degree of congruence between Czech and Slovak continues to be widely utilized by language users in various spheres of communication. In the relationship between Czech and Slovak we may postulate an interdependence of language contact, mutual intelligibility of the languages based on their genetic relatedness and long-term coexistence (leading to a communicative strategy of receptive bilingualism), along with contact impact on both language systems. Although mutual contact effects may be observed, due to various factors the Czech-Slovak situation has been asymmetrical, Slovak being influenced by Czech far more than the other way round in all periods of coexistence. In regard to convergent, divergent, and parallel tendencies in the development of the languages it is important to distinguish between the processes of development in nonstandard or non-standardized language varieties and the deliberate regulation of congruence between standard languages. This article presents a view of the oscillation of Czech-Slovak language contact forms in relation to historical, social and political changes as well as the changing conceptualizations of mutual Czech-Slovak language relationships and language ideology affecting the position of contact phenomena in the standard languages. While contact-induced phenomena are more distinct on the lexical level (often opposed by delimitative institutional language management), on the morphosyntactic level language contact leads to less apparent processes, sometimes merely supporting the internal processes of a particular language. In accordance with the asymmetrical Czech-Slovak situation primary attention is given to contact phenomena in Slovak and their explanation based on the genetic closeness,

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high degree of the historically formed congruence between the languages and broad communicative contact with Czech.

1.

Czech-Slovak language contact in a series of different language situations

1.1. A general view Czech and Slovak are closely related West Slavic languages with a long history of coexistence affecting the degree of their congruence. Concerning the term “closely related languages”, Viera Budovicˇová, who devoted her attention to studying the mutual relationship between Slovak and Czech in the latter half of the 20th century1, points out that the relationship is not simply that of a genetic relatedness of a higher degree. While “relatedness” refers to a common genetic source, “closeness” is a result of long-term language contacts and mutual interlingual influences. Genetic relatedness is a diachronic phenomenon, whereas in the case of mutual closeness of the languages, we speak of a synchronic aspect reflected in the mutual intelligibility of the languages (Budovicˇová 1973: 271). Martin Olosˇtiak sees Slovak and Czech as two proxemically related national languages, distinguished by “affinity” in all proxemically relevant parameters (Olosˇtiak 2004). The degree of the language closeness, in other words the congruence between Czech and Slovak in the course of their various developmental periods, has been increased by the existence of contact-induced phenomena as well as parallel processes arising from internal developmental impulses. The term “contact phenomena”, or in the narrow sense “contact variants” and “contact synonyms”, has been in use in Slovak and Czech linguistics primarily since the 1970s (cf. Jedlicˇka 1968, 1978, 1985; Buzássyová 1993, 1995; Sokolová 1991, 1995; and others). When differentiating interlingual from intralingual contact phenomena (as a result of contact between language varieties within a national language, speaking mainly of contact between the standard language and dialects), in the Czech-Slovak context it is important to note that the categories of inter- and intralingual contact phenomena often overlap. Czech and Slovak may be viewed as languages emerging from a dialect continuum, which according to Heinz Kloss’ conception fall under the group of Ausbau languages (Kloss 1967). Thus, in his newer study Peter Trudgill 1

The studies of Viera Budovicˇová from the time before the dissolution of the common state (e.g., Budovicˇová 1973, 1978, 1986a, 1986b, 1988) represent the main referential base for current ongoing research.

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63

(2004) mentions Czech and Slovak along with Polish as examples of Ausbau languages (defined as “linguistic varieties which are regarded as distinct languages for political, cultural, social and historical as well as linguistic reasons”): “Polish, Slovak and Czech are Ausbau languages which together form the West Slavic dialect continuum. They are mutually intelligible, especially Polish and Slovak, and Slovak and Czech, but they form three separate languages” (Trudgill 2004: 36).2 The question of “political, cultural, social and historical reasons” alongside the linguistic ones is of great importance when considering the relationship between Czech and Slovak in the various periods.3 These particular reasons also played an important role in the different conceptualizations of mutual Czech-Slovak relationships. The codification of Standard Slovak (1780s – Bernolák’s codification, 1840s – Sˇtúr’s codification as the basis of present-day Standard Slovak) took place in a specific language situation. In addition to the genetic relatedness reflected in the high degree of Czech-Slovak congruence, it was the functioning of Czech as a cultural code on the Slovak territory that played an important role in the perception of the Czech-Slovak relationship both in the Czech and in the Slovak language environments. Czech functioned in this role in various forms from 14th century until 19th century (and in residues as a sacral code of the Slovak Protestants even longer, up until the end of 20th century, cf. Nábeˇlková 2008: 269–290). This cultural functioning of Czech was among the reasons that the concept of the “Czech-Slovak language” appeared as one way of perceiving the relationship between Czech and Slovak. In different periods of mutual relations the conceptions of separate languages and of one Czech-Slovak language coexisted and competed. In relation to contact-induced phenomena it is therefore desirable to bear in mind that with regard to the conception of the Czech-Slovak language, the phenomena which seem interlingual from the viewpoint of separate languages, were actually assessed as intralingual. Although the understanding of Slovak as a separate language formed gradually along with the constitution of the modern Slovak nation during the period of the National Revival in the 19th century, it was not fully accepted in the Czech environment even during 2

3

The term Ausbau languages is not in use in thinking about Czech-Slovak language relations in Czech and Slovak linguistics; however, Frantisˇek Danesˇ points out its usefulness in his study dedicated to the development of Slavic languages (Danesˇ 1968). It were precisely these reasons that influenced the relationship of Slovak and Czech to Polish, resulting in a different (lower) degree of congruence and mutual intelligibility.

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the interwar period.4 In the Ausbau-Einbau frame it could be said that in the general Ausbau situation strong “Einbau tendencies” were present. The official ideology of the interwar Czechoslovak Republic envisaged the Czech-Slovak nation and the Czech-Slovak language, though in two standard versions (on the constitutional and legal level, but also in the linguistic perception of the Czech-Slovak language as a complex of Czech, Moravian and Slovak dialects). In this period deliberately convergent tendencies were accompanied and counterbalanced by deliberately delimitative ones. The Czech-Slovak language contact situations that created various conditions for contact phenomena, can be divided schematically (and mainly from the Slovak point of view) into the following main stages with a changing ratio between Czech and Slovak: 1. the pre-codification period, 2. the period after the codification of Standard Slovak, 3. the first period of coexistence in one common Czech-Slovak state beginning 1918, 4. the WW2 period with the temporary dissolution of Czechoslovakia, 5. the second period of coexistence in a Czech-Slovak state after 1945, 6. the period after the 1993 dissolution of Czechoslovakia, which gave rise to the formation of the independent Czech Republic and Slovak Republic. Each of these periods may be further divided into substages with respect to cultural, social, and political processes that influenced the development of the language situation and language relationships.5

4

5

The contemporary “linguistic question” with all its threats in relation to the further coexistence of Czechs and Slovaks has been described by L’udovít Novák (1935; see also Budovicˇová 1978; Lipowski 2005). In the course of time the problem of periodization of language situations was seldom an object of special interest. With regard to the existence of the modern standard languages, Viera Budovicˇová singles out three main stages of relationships between standard Czech and standard Slovak: 1. the period of Czech-Slovak mutuality – from the appearance of the L’. Sˇtúr generation up until the turnover in 1918; 2. the period of Czech-Slovak state unity (with the emergence and resolution of the so-called Czech-Slovak problem); 3. the period of Czech-Slovak equality – promoting and establishing equal relationships between Slovak and Czech in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (Budovicˇová 1978). In view of the date of creation of this categorization, the period after 1993 is obviously not covered. Intensive language contact, however, did not cease. Jaroslav Lipowski touches slightly upon the periods after 1993 in a monograph primarily aimed at the convergence and divergence of Slovak and Czech in the Czechoslovak state (Lipowski 2005). Special attention to the period after 1993 is paid in the monograph Sloven‰ina a ‰estina v kontakte. Pokra‰ovanie príbehu (Nábeˇlková 2008) and in numerous studies (cf. Hoffmannová and Müllerová 1993; Zeman 1997; Berger 2003; Musilová 2003; Sloboda 2004; Nábeˇlková 2007; Dickins 2009 and others).

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1.2. Czech-Slovak language relationships in respect to contact phenomena from the viewpoint of Slovak From the viewpoint of Standard Slovak, the presence of Czech in the Slovak language situation throughout the centuries is of great importance – in the pre-codification period Czech served as a model for the developing forms of Cultural Slovak and, simultaneously, it opened a wide space for integration of Czech forms of expression (cf. Pauliny 1956, 1983; Budovicˇová 1978). Assuming that “contact is a source of linguistic change if it is less likely that a given change would have occurred outside a specific contact situation” (Thomason, 2008: 47), it is quite right to expect the existence of contact-induced phenomena on the Slovak side in the pre-codification period as well as in other developmental stages of the Slovak language. What is particularly important is the fact that, although a declared delimitation attitude towards Czech is naturally characteristic for the codifications of Standard Slovak carried out by A. Bernolák and L’. Sˇtúr, neither of them represented a radical departure of Slovak in relation to Czech or influenced language development on all levels towards divergent tendencies. On the contrary, in the course of elaborating and establishing Sˇtúr’s norm particularly on the lexical level, Slovak was, apart from relying on the native lexicon, intentionally and continually enriched from Czech. In 1852 Martin Hattala’s reform of Sˇtúr’s codification intentionally introduced several features congruent with Standard Czech. From the viewpoint of contemporary Slovak there were some archaic, obsolete morphological forms that have not been accepted by further communicative practice, but other changes survived (e.g., forms of the adjectival type pekn¤ ‘nice’ pekné, pekného, peknému differing from peknuo, peknjeho, peknjemu in Sˇtúr’s norm). The historically conditioned openness of Slovaks towards Czech (based on the wide-spread reception of Czech culture and Czech texts of various kinds) may be viewed as a stable component in the model of Slovak-Czech language coexistence. Over time contact-induced phenomena conditioned by contact with Czech were coming into Slovak continuously through communicative practice based on receptive bilingualism in various communication spheres and through deliberate and planned steps in various periods of elaborating the standard language. In the opposite direction, delimitation attitudes may be observed in Slovak linguistics in several waves. Many contact phenomena have been rejected as nonfunctional by the official codification, often in spite of their frequency (as can be seen in countless recommendations with respect to language culture). In the present they are part of a wider theoretical-methodological discussion about the issues of a standard language (cf. Dolník 2010). On the

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other hand, the recommendations and warnings of unsuitability and inadequacy of concrete contact phenomena in Standard Slovak serve as clear evidence of their utilization in Slovak communicative practice.6 The wide range of contact with Czech (watching TV and movies, reading books and magazines) still remains in the Slovak environment after 1993. It should also be mentioned that the internet opens an additional space for new contact phenomena these days (cf. Nábeˇlková 2008). Similar to other cases of language contact, a code-switching – borrowing continuum (Matras 2009: 110–114) with the general opposition of situational transfers and more or less integrated borrowings can be seen. 1.3. Czech-Slovak language relationships in respect to contact phenomena from the viewpoint of Czech Bearing in mind that in the overall long-term asymmetrical Czech-Slovak language relations Czech has always been the stronger partner (in certain periods also politically supported), it is only natural that there are fewer contact-induced phenomena in Czech. Nevertheless, the existence of mutual language relations has been reflected in Czech too, although less evidently and in a slightly different way. The functioning of Czech in the Slovak environment in the pre-codification period had its importance in the development of Czech too. An additional considerable impact on the language situation and conceptualization of the mutual language relations can be seen during the Counter-Reformation (a period characterized by different degrees of repression in the two states – Hungary and Austria), especially after 1620 when the Slovak territory represented a safe haven for persecuted Czech Protestant exiles (cf. Horálek 1968; ˇ urovicˇ 1998; Marvan 2003). The Slovak environment as a specific funcD tional territory of Czech may be considered one of the factors that exerted influence on the codification of Standard Czech by Josef Dobrovsky´ (accepted in the 19th century by the emerging Jungmann generation of Czech scholars).7 6

7

Much information about lexical contact phenomena and their status as non-standard words is included in Slovak explanatory dictionaries and serves as an additional form of such evidence. The choice of humanistic Czech as a source language for the codification of modern Standard Czech was influenced by the prestigious language of the Kralice Bible (1579–1593); also influential was its description in one of the most historically important grammar books of Czech – Grammatica Slavico-Bohemica (1746) edited in the Slovak environment by Pavel Dolezˇal (Dobrovsky´ directly referred to Dolezˇal, ˇ urovicˇ 2000). cf. D

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Of special importance was also the participation of a number of Slovaks (the most prominent being Pavol Jozef Sˇafárik and Ján Kollár) in the Czech National Revival as well as the contacts between the cultural elites that introduced numerous Slovak linguistic features, mainly lexical items, into Czech (cf. Josef Jungmann’s dictionary [1835–1839]; Polák [1942]; Blanár [2000]; and others). At this point it should be emphasized, that in the pre-codification period as well as in following periods both types of contact-induced phenomena (in the sense of the code-copying conception of Lars Johanson, 2008) can be observed: take-over insertion (code users take copies from a secondary code over to their primary code) and carry-over insertions (code users carry copies of their primary code over into a variety of a secondary code), having multiple manifestations in language practice. On the one hand, in the Slovak environment Czech elements penetrated into Slovak on various communication levels, but on the other hand Slovak elements penetrated to a large extent into the Czech that was used by Slovaks. The Slovakization of Czech, which was a long-term common practice, both spontaneous and deliberate, gradually received a programmatic character. Among Slovak Protestants in the first half of 19th century the Slovakization of Czech on the Slovak side along with Bohemization of Slovak was perceived as a way of further developing the common language – Czechoslovak.8 These convergent tendencies were most clearly represented by Ján Kollár, who expressed his hopes that “Czechs would Slovakize and Slovaks would Bohemize reasonably …” (Hlasové o potrˇebeˇ jednoty spisovného jazyka pro ™echy, Moravany a Slováky [Voices on the need for a common literary language for Czechs, Moravians and Slovaks] [Kollár 1846]).9 Though Kollár’s Slovakized Czech was not accepted by the broader Czech national elites, in the Jungmann generation we may observe a certain openness towards lexical Slovakisms, some of which are part of Standard Czech even today. The pathways of their penetration may be seen in the more or less Slovakized Czech used by prominent Slovaks with works both published and read in the Czech environment (e.g., in Czech explanatory dictionaries we may find loans from Slovak or traces of non-integrated Slovakisms with examples from Kollár’s works) and in the linguistic practice of those Czechs who exploited Slovakisms with the goal of enriching Standard 8 9

For some time this idea also appealed to L’udovít Sˇtúr, but it was later rejected. Ján Kollár and Andrej Radlinsky´ attempted to codify Czechoslovak in accordance with the ideas described above, namely Czech with a number of Slovak elements on various levels (in fact a mixed language). They did so in their “Old Slovak” described in Radlinsky´’s grammar (1850).

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Czech (cf. Polák 1942). Nevertheless, when compared to the extent of contact phenomena of Czech origin in Slovak, the number of Slovak borrowings in Czech from that time and the following periods is incomparably smaller. From historical as well as current points of view, in respect to mutual language relations and the degree of congruence it is necessary to take into account the coexistence of Standard Czech and Common Czech wide-spread in every-day communication. While Standard Czech has been codified on the bases of archaic humanistic Czech and differs in many respects (partially due to a certain non-synchronicity of language development) from Standard Slovak codified on contemporary language usage, Common Czech has (besides additional differences) many morphophonemic and morphosyntactic features comparable with Slovak. Among characteristics of Common Czech similar to Slovak in morphophonology and morphology there is the wide sphere of the weakening of consonant alternations in many morphological forms, the extinction of short forms of adjectives and participles, or some cases of grammatical unification in conjugation and declension (cf. Nábeˇlková 2008: 103–112). A single plural form for verbs in the past tense, for example: CCZ m. muzˇi, f. zˇeny, n. meˇsta byly10 ‘men, women, towns were’ – SL m. muzˇi, f. zˇeny, n. mestá boli (while in SCZ there are different grammemes m. muzˇi byli, f. zˇeny byly, n. meˇsta byla). Another example is the similar unification of nouns in plural instrumental -ma/-ama/-ema – CCZ s kamarádama, zˇenama, meˇstama ‘with friends, women, towns’ – SL s kamarátmi, zˇenami, mestami (while in SCZ m. kamarády, f. zˇenami, n. meˇsty), which in Standard Slovak and Common Czech represents the result of an analogical developmental process with the exploitation of grammatical morphemes of different origin (dual in Common Czech, feminine in Slovak). In some cases the congruence between Standard Slovak and Common Czech (in comparison with Standard Czech) is thus higher. Some elements of Common Czech gradually penetrate into Standard Czech. For example: until the 1960s in Standard Czech the accusative singular form ho of the pronouns on/ono ‘he/it’ was accepted only with an animate masculine (vidím ho – otce ‘I see him – father’). With inanimate masculines and neuters the bookish form jej was required (vidím jej – dom/okno ‘I see it – house/window’) – while in common communication in such cases vidím ho was widely used. Vidím ho, identical with Slovak, is considered a standard expression in these cases now. In Czech linguistics the strengthening interlingual influence of Slovak is not taken into account in this case, but in other 10

In writings of Common Czech texts with no “orthographic norm” variant forms muzˇi byli/byly can be seen.

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cases of the expansion of typical Common Czech phenomena the parallel intralingual and interlingual effect is considered – e.g., the spread of long adjective forms in preference to short forms in predicative position in Standard Czech under the supporting influence of Slovak is mentioned in Jedlicˇka 1974, 1978; Budovicˇová 1979.11 In Czech there is another area of interplay of intralingual and interlingual factors. Within the dialectal continuum many Moravian and Slovak correspondences exist and Slovak strengthening influence is sometimes taken into account in the explanation of the penetration of Moravianisms into Standard Czech or their reflection in dictionaries (many of them marked as Slovak and/or dialectal). Although traces of language contact can also be seen in Czech, the asymmetry in the results of the language contact corresponds with the asymmetry in the amount of attention paid to them by the language users as well as in linguistic reflection. It can be found in the words of Jan Korˇensky´: “One of the unfulfilled tasks of communication-oriented Czech studies was to determine the extent to which the relationship between the two languages in one state was mutual, i.e., whether the idea of a greater Czech expansiveness was really adequate and whether the considerable amount of lexical and phraseological Slovakisms in Czech texts from given time periods was really merely a quotation text actualization. There is no doubt that in day-to-day Czech communication there were, and continue to be, many such elements even after the dissolution of the common state” (Korˇensky´ 1998: 28). In the present-day language situation in the Czech environment Slovak has not lost its communicative potential. In contrast to the former periods of prevailing indirect contact, direct contact with Slovak in various communicative situations as a potential source of contact-induced phenomena has been strengthened due to the presence of thousands of Slovaks coming to the Czech Republic to study or work (cf. Nábeˇlková 2008).

11

Evidence can be found that the occurrence of long adjective forms in predicative position in Standard Czech (a situation where we need to consider intralingual contact with Common Czech) is perceived by the users of Czech as interlingual strengthening. The following statement may serve as an illustrating example: “It is a certain kind of Slovakism and apparently a case of Slovak influence. The correct Czech form is: ‘Je prˇítomen (not prˇítomn¤) pan X’” .

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Contact phenomena in Slovak and Czech

2.1. Absolute and relative contact phenomena The degree of Czech-Slovak congruence is influenced by both absolute and relative contact phenomena.12 Absolute contact phenomena on various language levels, i.e., copies of language means (lexical items most often) that did not originally exist in the receiving language, increase the degree of congruence of both languages, irrespective of the direction of the copying (either from Czech to Slovak or from Slovak to Czech).13 Less apparent relative contact phenomena also participate to a certain degree in the congruence of the languages, weakening or strengthening one of the competing linguistic expressions under the influence of the contact situation. Language contact is thus one of the factors affecting synchronic language dynamism, which lies in the rearranging and crystallization of the relationships between the competing language elements (cf. Budovicˇová 1988; Dolník 1992). It is naturally easier to identify absolute contact phenomena, although it might not be so easy with closely-related languages, especially in the case of integrated borrowings without phonotactic or other apparent features that would distinguish their structure from that of the receiving language and whose interlingual/acceptance motivation is not clear (anymore).14 The 12

13

14

The distinction between absolute and relative contact phenomena is exploited by István Lanstyák among his central terms of “contactology” (2002). Relative contact phenomena in this dichotomy correspond to the results of frequential copying in L. Johanson’s conception of Code Copying (Johanson 2009). In relation to contact phenomena and the (increase in) congruence between Czech and Slovak, we cannot bypass the question of the enrichment of the lexicon with parallel expressions on the basis of corresponding intralingual processes that can be seen as “non-contact” parallel neologisms. References on the subject may be found in the relevant literature, however, the subject needs to be studied in more detail. Klára Buzássyová explicitly states that phenomena that arose as a result of a parallel development in Czech and Slovak should not be considered either contact variants or synonyms (Buzássyová 1995: 168). The concept of acceptance motivation (as one of the various types of lexical motivation reflecting the origin of lexical units) was introduced into Slovak linguistics by Juraj Furdík (2008: 88), Martin Olosˇtiak, however, prefers the term interlingual motivation in the same sense (Olosˇtiak 2007). He works also with the term interlingual demotivation, reflecting the fact that the awareness of the word origin gets lost during its integration into the lexicon of the receiving language. Vincent Blanár stresses the need to combine several criteria when defining a language unit as a borrowing within a Czech-Slovak contact situation (Blanár 2000). Naturally, the experts’ evaluation of a word origin may, but need not, correspond with the perception of language users.

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postulation of concrete relative interlingual contact phenomena is sometimes “relative” – in a case where the functional load of one of the variant elements is strengthened, the given strengthening may be primarily or concurrently stimulated by internal, intralingual processes (cf. some morphosyntactic tendencies in Czech already mentioned above). In Slovak we may hypothetically speak of a strengthening relative contact effect (in combination with other factors) in the case of the lexeme okno ‘window’ in the lexical pair okno – oblok based on dialectal heteronymy (Czech knowing okno, but not oblok). Other examples might be the conjunction/particle len ‘only’ in the synonymic pair len – iba (CZ jen), the indefinite pronoun niekto ‘somebody’ in the synonymic group niekto – dakto – voafikto (CZ neˇkdo) etc. The strengthening relative contact effect can often be present in the crystallization of a relationship in concrete pairs or groups of lexical synonyms or competing derivational forms of words as well as in developmental processes on other language levels. With regard to morphosyntactic contact-induced phenomena, they are (similar to the lexical ones) more frequent in Slovak. It may involve some grammatical characteristics of isolated lexemes and their declension, verbal phrases and functioning of prepositions, hypothetically the weakening/ strengthening of some clausal structures. Some contact variants in Slovak rejected from the point of view of language culture are based on differences in gender in Czech and Slovak – e.g., contact-induced feminines závefl, závrafl, rada, varianta, Parízˇ ‘testament, dizziness, row, variant, Paris’ instead of masculines závet, závrat, rad, variant, Parízˇ or masculines sál, salám, snímok ‘hall, salami, slide/film’ instead of feminines sála, saláma, snímka. In other cases, interlingual analogy affects only some forms, e.g., genitive singular, nominative plural of the noun medaila ‘medal’: tesifl sa z mediale ‘to be happy with the medal’, tri mediale ‘three medals’ instead of medaily. A specific case of mutual morphosyntactic contact effect can be seen in the relation between genitive and accusative verbal rection. In Czech, besides the internal (wider Slavic) developmental process, Slovak influence is considered in the case of the weakening of genitive rection and the strengthening of accusative rection, e.g., in the variant expressions: vyuzˇíváme teˇchto informací : tyto informace ‘we use this information’, dosáhnout lepsích v¤sledku˚ : lepsí v¤sledky ‘to achieve better results’ (Musilová, in press; Slovak influence is mentioned also in Jedlicˇka 1968, 1974; Budovicˇová 1979)15. On the other hand, in Slovak occasional revitalization of genitive rection (in cases that do not fit the 15

In this case, one of the non-synchronicities of developmental processes in Slovak and Czech can be seen – in Slovak the changes took place earlier.

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valid codification) is reflected as contact-induced: potrebujeme vä‰sej podpory (instead of vä‰siu podporu) ‘we need more support’, nemáme ni‰ nového (instead of ni‰ nové) ‘we have nothing new’, stalo sa nie‰o strasného (instead of nie‰o strasné) ‘something terrible happened’ (cf. Sokolová 1995). Contact variants can be seen among prepositional phrases with prepositions belonging to both languages but in some cases functioning in a different way. In common communication, Slovak language users sometimes alternatively apply the usage typical for Czech. For example, the usage of the prepositions k, u, o, v, pre differs with the valid codification in contact prepositional phrases: spolupráca bola vsetk¤m k úzˇitku (instead of na úzˇitok) ‘cooperation was for the benefit of all’, zmenifl sa k nepoznaniu (na nepoznanie) ‘change to the unknown’, podobn¤ stav je u bytov (pri bytoch) ‘the condition is similar with apartments’, motor o objeme 1,6 l (s objemom) ‘an engine with a capacity of 1,6 l’, vstúpifl v platnosfl (do platnosti) ‘come into force’, uviesfl pre porovnanie (na porovnanie) ‘to state for comparison’. Among syntactic characteristics that differ between Slovak and Czech, in Slovak there is a greater share of noun constructions with prepositions than without. Among contact-induced variants without prepositions there are, for example, constructions like umierafl zˇiafiom ‘to die from grief ’, zˇiarifl sflastím ‘to beam with happiness’ besides umierafl od zˇiafiu, zˇiarifl od sflastia; zvolifl predsedom ‘to elect president’ besides zvolifl za predsedu; zú‰astnifl sa podujatia ‘to participate in an event’ besides zú‰astnifl sa na podujatí. Also, in Czech some prepositional phrases appear as contact variants: probudil se nad ránem (k ránu, z rána) ‘he awoke early in the morning’; na úvod projevu (v úvodu) ‘in the introduction of the speech’; jít na ‰ele pru˚vodu (v ‰ele) ‘to walk at the head of the procession’; vzhledem na ‰tenárˇe (k ‰tenárˇu˚m) ‘in respect to the readers’; vzít do úvahy (v úvahu) ‘to take into account’; b¤t na vineˇ (mít/nést vinu, b¤t vinen) ‘to be to blame’.16 On the other hand, as a manifestation of mutual language interaction, some of these prepositional phrases like v úvode prejavu, v ‰ele sprievodu, vzhfiadom k ‰itatefiom also function in Slovak. There is a specific question of the potential contact influence of Czech in the weakening of some clausal types that represent the specificity of Slovak vis-à-vis Czech and that in some cases show links with South-Slavic and East-Slavic languages (confirming in this respect the central position of Slo16

It is clear that in such cases relative frequencies and spheres of occurrence of the variants are of great importance. For example, in the comparison of the prepositional phrases k ránu – nad ránem the current frequency data from Czech National Corpus show a surprising quantitative superiority of the contact variant nad ránem (Musilová in press).

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vak among Slavic languages – syntactic differences described in Mrázek 1979; Darovec 1988; Giger 1999). Thus, as relative contact phenomena on the syntactic level we could consider for example certain weakening of the Slovak possessive construction with dative pronouns or with the verb habere such as (1a) Brat mi Brother I.dat Brat-a brother-m.acc.sg ‘My brother is ill.’

je be-3sg.prs má-m have-1sg.prs

chor-¤. ill-m.nom.sg chor-ého. ill-m.acc.sg

(1b) Kabát ti je na vesiak-u. Coat you-dat is on peg-m.loc.sg ‘Your coat is on a peg.’ and the strengthening of the clausal types with the verb esse identical with 17 Czech (2a) Môj brat je chor-¤. CZ Mu˚j bratr je nemocn-¤. My brother is ill-m.nom.sg ‘My brother is ill.’ (2b) Tvoj kabát je na vesiak-u. CZ Tvu˚j kabat je na veˇsák-u. Your coat is on peg-m.loc.sg ‘Your coat is on a peg.’17 Nevertheless, in postulating an interlingual relative contact effect in such cases we have to be careful because of the (not reliably described) rather marginal “starting position” of the “weakened” constructions in Standard Slovak. Similarly, a relative interlingual contact effect could be seen in the weakening of clausal types with phasal and modal modification of the process expressed by infinitive of the main verb. For example, Slovak clauses with the phasal auxiliary pustifl sa (synonymous with the verb za‰afl ‘start’) and the 17

Czech does not have the type of Slovak constructions with dative pronoun like Kabát ti je na vesiaku but in this case the construction with the verb habere (identical with Slovak) Kabát más na veˇsáku besides Tvu˚j kabát je na veˇsáku is possible.

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infinitive of the main verb: Pustila sa ‰ítafl ‘She started to read’, Pustili sme sa hfiadafl lepsie riesenie ‘We started to look for a better solution’ (3a) Pusti-l-a sa ‰íta-fl. start-pst-fem.3sg refl read-inf ‘She started to read.’ (3b) Pusti-l-i sme sa hfiada-fl lepsie riesen-ie. start-pst-pl 1pl refl look-inf better solution-acc.sg ‘We started to look for a better solution.’ are in strong competition with clauses with the prepositional genitive of the verbal noun, identical with Czech: (4a) Pusti-l-a sa do ‰ítan-ia. CZ Pusti-l-a se do ‰ten-í. start-pst-fem.3sg refl to reading-gen.sg ‘She started to read.’ (4b) Pusti-l-i sme sa do hfiadan-ia leps-ieho CZ Pusti-l-i jsme se do hledán-í leps-ího start-pst-pl aux.1pl refl. to looking-gen.sg better-gen.sg riesen-ia. ˇresen-í. solution-gen.sg ‘We started to look for a better solution.’ We could think about the weakening of constructions with an infinitive in favor of constructions with an l-participle in a similar way: (5a) Rád by som to vedie-fl. glad cond aux.1sg it know-inf (5b) Rád by som to vede-l. CZ Rád bych to veˇdeˇ-l. glad cond aux.1sg it know-sg.m.l-ptcp ‘I would be glad to know it.’ In this case there is another alternative expression by the clause with modal auxiliary chciefl ‘want’ and the infinitive in both languages:

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(6) Chce-l by som to vedie-fl. CZ Chteˇ-l bych to veˇdeˇ-t. want-sg.m.l-ptcp cond aux.1sg it know-inf ‘I would like to know it.’ Another example can be seen in specific modal constructions like (7a) Bo-l-o by sa nám vráti-fl. be-l-ptcp-n cond refl we-dat return-inf ‘We should return.’ (7b) Prichodí mi uzˇ ísfl. should I-dat already go-inf ‘I should go. that compete with constructions with the modal auxiliaries mafl, musiefl: (8a) Ma-l-i by sme sa vráti-fl. vráti-t. CZ Meˇ-l-i bych-om se have-l-ptcp-pl cond aux.1pl refl return-inf ‘We should return.’ (8b) Musí-m uzˇ ísfl. CZ Musí-m uzˇ jít. must-1sg.prs already go-inf ‘I have to go.’ (8c) Ma-l-a by som uzˇ ísfl. bych uzˇ jít. CZ Meˇ-l-a have-l-ptcp-sg.f cond aux.1sg already go-inf ‘I should go.’ Among syntactic differences in Czech-Slovak comparison there are infinitive clauses with the meaning of possibility and clauses with modal auxiliaries that in the present tense in Slovak, unlike Czech, do not have an auxiliary je ‘is’: po‰u-fl. ™asto hear-inf often CZ Je ‰asto slyse-t. aux.3sg often hear-inf ‘It often can be heard’

(9a)

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(9b) Na l’ud’-och vidie-fl On people-loc.pl see-inf CZ Na lid-ech je videˇ-t On people-loc.pl aux-3Sg.Prs see-inf ‘It can be seen that people are dissatisfied.’

nespokojnosfl. dissatisfaction nespokojenost. dissatisfaction

(9c) V tejto vec-i bada-fl In this matter-f.loc.sg see-inf CZ V této veˇc-i je videˇ-t In this matter-f.loc.sg aux-3sg.prs see-inf ‘In this matter, certain progress can be seen.’ (9d) Dnes Now CZ Dnes Now

uzˇ already uzˇ already

ur‰it¤ certain ur‰it¤ certain

posun. progress posun. progress

v obchod-och dosta-fl vsetko. in store-m.loc.pl get-inf everything je mozˇné v obchod-ech koupi-t aux-3sg.prs possible in store-m.loc.pl buy-inf

vsechno. everything ‘Now it is possible to buy everything in the stores.’ The cases in Slovak communication when the auxiliary je ‘is’ is present (je po‰ufl, je vidiefl, je dostafl, in negative expressions nie je po‰ufl, nie je vidiefl, nie je dostafl instead of nepo‰ufl, nevidiefl, nedostafl ) can be explained by both contact influence and intralingual analogy with the forms of the past and future tenses with the presence of the auxiliary ‘be’ – bolo vidiefl, bude vidiefl. An example of contact-induced syntactic variants can be seen in the construction mám hlad (CZ mám hlad) literally ‘I have hunger’ alongside the basic Slovak expression som hladn¤ ‘I am hungry’. Similarly mám smäd (CZ mám zˇízenˇ) literally ‘I have thirst’ alongside som smädn¤ ‘I am thirsty’ and the less frequent non-personal construction smädí ma (in Czech there is no non-personal verb in this case18). We could deal with more Czech-Slovak morphosyntactic contact phenomena on both sides, but it is important to say that the question has not been paid much attention to yet and it requires more research also from the viewpoint of the mutual ratio between intralingual and interlingual processes. 18

Overall, there is wider spectrum of non-personal constructions based on non-personal verbs in Slovak.

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Contact effects on the morphosyntactic level can be seen as linked with the degree of congruence and contact-induced phenomena on the lexical level. It is noteworthy that the “weakened” constructions in Slovak are sometimes based on lexemes that have no counterparts in Czech while contact-induced copying of syntactic constructions may be based on lexemes belonging to both languages (e.g., hlad in Mám hlad). However, the existence of Czech-Slovak contact-induced phenomena deserves more attention in the comparative description of both languages as a whole – no systematic monograph has been written either in the Slovak or Czech linguistic environment.19 Books dealing with the development of Cultural Slovak in contact with Czech in the pre-codification period (Lauersdorf 1996, 2010), with wider lexical confrontation (Tugusˇeva 2003), treating convergent and divergent tendencies in Slovak and Czech in relation to ideology and political development (Lipowski 2005)20, and also one paying special attention to manifestations of language contact in Slovak on the lexical level (Gazdíková 2005) were all published abroad. In both Slovak and Czech linguistics, partial analyses of the subject matter are dispersed mainly in various studies published in linguistic journals, miscellanies, and conference proceedings (for more literature cf. Nábeˇlková 2008). 2.2. Presence and treatment of lexical contact phenomena in Slovak As already mentioned, on the lexical level, due to a variety of reasons, Slovak has always been the more frequent receiving language, and much more attention has been paid to contact phenomena in Slovak in all periods of development of Standard Slovak as well. The same remains true even today. Considering the different attitudes and distinct linguistic reflections from various methodological positions, it can be postulated that, in Slovak, words of Czech origin and other contact phenomena represent grounds for potential and real conflict of values (Nábeˇlková 1999). Ample language-critical notes from various periods showing negative attitudes towards individual contact phenomena and various language advisory sections in linguistic journals and mass media render (at the same time) an illustrative image of the scope and 19

20

A comparative description of the languages can be found in several textbooks, the newest one being Sloven‰ina a ‰estina. Synchrónne porovnanie s cvi‰eniami [Slovak and Czech. A synchronic comparison with excercises] (Sokolová, Musilová and Slancˇová 2005). Convergent and divergent tendencies in Czech-Slovak language relations (considered from various viewpoints) have appeared as an explicit topic of some arˇ igo 2002). ticles too (Horálek 1985; Z

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an assessment of concrete lexical and grammatical (morphological and syntactic) contact phenomena. Of course, not all contact-induced phenomena and contact-induced variants become the subject matter of present-day linguistic discourse. A large number of borrowings from different periods with more or less rich nests of derivatives form an undisputed part of the contemporary Slovak lexicon (e.g., predstava, veda, zámer, úvaha, názor, rozbor, kyselina, ‰asopis, cestopis, verejn¤, prospech, pohfiad, fiutovafl, vfiúdnosfl, poznatok, sústava, dôkaz, dôvod, zˇiarovka, rôzny, nerast, otázka, dotazník, prvok, zlú‰enina, ústava, zretefin¤, prázdniny ‘idea, science, intention, reflection, opinion, analysis, acid, magazine, travelogue, public, benefit, perspective, to regret, charity, knowledge, system, proof, reason, light-bulb, various, mineral, question, questionnaire, element, compound, constitution, obvious, holiday’ and hundreds more, cf. Pauliny 1956, 1983; Habovsˇtiaková 1973, 1987; Dolník 2010). Even in their original form many of them are fully consistent with the structural properties of Slovak (úvaha, ‰asopis, ústava); others have been adapted (CZ prˇedstava, zámeˇr, pohled, soustava, du˚vod, zˇárovka – SK predstava, zámer, pohfiad, sústava, dôvod, zˇiarovka). Native Slovak speakers are usually not aware of the Czech origin, even in cases when it can be seen in the word’s phonemic or morphemic makeup (verejn¤, prospech, pojem, otázka). There are lexemes among them that have become the basic naming unit after a transitional competitive period along with other domestic or borrowed words (Blanár 1963): pochop – pojem ‘idea’, vakácie – prázdniny ‘holiday’ (the words pochop, vakácie have become obsolete). In discussing contact-induced phenomena of Czech origin in present-day Slovak, for the sake of a more complex picture it would be helpful to offer the percentage of lexical borrowings in the Standard Slovak word-stock. This figure is, however, not available, partly due to the difficulties related to achieving reliable findings – it can be said that we know much more about those lexical items that have not been accepted into Standard Slovak but are in use than about the lexemes that are a part of the basic or larger standard Slovak lexicon.21

21

For instance the new multivolume explanatory Slovník sú‰asného slovenského jazyka ([Dictionary of Contemporary Slovak] two volumes have been published so far 2006, 2011), which systematically describes the origin of borrowed lexemes, approaches Czech borrowings differently. With most of the words that have been integrated into Slovak, their origin is not stated. Mostly the lexemes that are not considered a part of the standard norm (classified as such from the viewpoint of the official codification) are accompanied by labels of origin or other notes referring to vari-

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Generally, contact-induced phenomena often enter specific paradigmatic relations in the receiving language. It can be noted that some of the lexemes with interlingual motivation are marked by the fact that unlike in Czech, in which the individual naming units represent a part of broader derivational nests with regular relations, in Standard Slovak they lack the inherited source base form (e.g., nemocnica ‘hospital’, umenie ‘art’, potrubie ‘pipe’, dotazník ‘questionnaire’, zmluva ‘contract’, vzdelanie ‘education’ and so on). In this sense, in respect to borrowed lexical units from Czech, we need to consider the fact that every borrowing has its own individual history and place in the specific interlingual, intralingual as well as extra-lingual relations. The peculiarities of mutual language relationships may be illustrated with the word zmluva ‘contract’, which is the only basic naming unit in the present-day Slovak lexicon with the root -mluv- (perhaps along with the much more marginal nemluvnˇa, listed in Krátky slovník slovenského jazyka ([Concise dictionary of Slovak] 2003), which is synonymous with the naming units bábätko, bábo ‘baby’, doj‰a ‘suckling’). Present-day Standard Slovak does not know the verb mluvifl ‘to speak’ (which according to Vincent Blanár formed a solid part of the nationwide lexicon in 19th century, but later receded from the standard language and dialects, Blanár 1963, 1969). In Czech it is one of the dominant lexemes within verba dicendi, being also the source of a large derivational nest. In the previous periods of Slovak language development there were considerably more lexemes with this root, for example mluva, mluvnica, mluvidlá, omluva, omluvenka, predmluva, v¤mluva ‘talk (n), grammar, articulation organs, apology, certificate of excuse, preface, excuse’. All were replaced with lexemes with other roots such as hovor, gramatika, hovoridlá, ospravedlnenie, ospravedlnenka, predhovor, v¤hovorka and others. Developmental processes have weakened the level of previous congruence in this particular lexical field. Despite its Slovak history the root -mluv- is largely perceived as Czech and the derivatives (not unreasonably) considered Bohemisms. There is one even more specific lexeme among them – the noun mluv‰í. Apart from the root, we may draw attention to its suffix -‰í, which is not a part of the derivational system of present-day Slovak, although in the past the derivational model with this suffix used to be an active one but it ceased to exist in the pre-Bernolák period (cf. Dorfiua 1977: 39). The existence and the position of the lexeme mluv‰í in Slovak communicative practice is demonstrated by its listing in Slovník slovenského jazyka ([Dictionary of the Slovak language] ous parameters of the lexemes, but the label of origin ‰es. (‘Czech’) is used only rarely. Therefore, even after the dictionary is completed, it will not serve as an easily exploitable supportive source for this purpose.

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1960; SSJ), which describes it as incorrect, points out its Czech origin, and suggests correct equivalents. In the 1980s, beside the equivalents used differently in various contexts, one new one emerged – the word hovorca ‘spokesman’ (regular agent noun derived from the verb hovorifl ‘speaker – speak’). There are comments of language users showing how the new word was perceived.22 In the case of the word mluv‰í, which has disappeared from communication altogether (just like others of the nest members), it is interesting to note that the historical and regional-dialectal linguistic analysis of the derivational base mluv- and the suffix -‰í reveal their domestic Slovak roots even despite the present-day awareness of their “non-Slovak” origin. However, this does not mean that any concrete lexemes with these derivational elements could not have been copies from Czech. Well, the lexeme zmluva (along with its derivatives such as zmluvn¤, zazmluvnifl, zmluvno-právny) stands in the present Standard Slovak lexicon in quite a lonesome position, unlike the Czech lexeme smlouva with incomparably richer paradigmatic relationships. Aside from lexemes without active source motivation, we may mention some other words that belong to more or less complete derivational types on the basis of distinct derivational structure in Czech, but which in Standard Slovak function in different relations. The derivational structure can be seen on the basis of suffixation, but the employed suffixes do not belong in the Slovak derivational system. Examples belonging to the standard Slovak norm could be hádzaná with the suffix -ná ‘handball’, pravítko with the suffix -tko ‘ruler’. Although Standard Slovak does not accept the suffix -tko in the derivation of the names of objects and devices, there are many derivatives of this type in use with a high frequency and different relations to derivatives with the corresponding equivalent suffix -dlo: spáratko – spáradlo CZ párátko ‘toothpick’, lehátko – lezˇadlo CZ lehátko ‘sunbed, simple bed’, sluchátko – slúchadlo CZ sluchátko ‘headphone, (telephone) receiver’ etc. In mutual comparison the suffix -l¤ (as in ospal¤ ‘sleepy’, padl¤ ‘fallen’) is another interesting example – it is not a productive derivational unit in present-day Standard Slovak (Horecky´ 1995b) and some lexemes of this form are interpreted as contact phenomena

22

“The word ‘hovorca’ on its own sounded very strange. People from federal television were used to the word ‘mluvcˇí’, but nobody understood the Slovak equivalent.” . There is one more interesting additional feature – exile Slovak journalists started to use the word hovorca at the time, when it was still unknown in the Slovak environment (Pisárcˇiková 1900).

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having other recommended equivalents (vlekl¤ – vle‰úci sa, dlhotrvajúci ‘protracted’, dosl¤ – doru‰en¤ ‘delivered’). The examples show that not only single words, but also derivational patterns were copied, albeit some of them in their own specific “noncomplex” and irregular way. As an example of contact-induced derivational phenomena firmly incorporated into the Slovak derivational system, the regularly and widely exploited adjectival suffix of Czech origin -tefin¤ ‘-able’ (CZ -teln¤) can be mentioned (akceptovatefin¤ ‘acceptable’, porovnatefin¤ ‘comparable’, pochopitefin¤ ‘understandable’ and so on). 2.3. Czech-Slovak lexical contact phenomena – explanation In considering language contact and the question of the constraints of Czech-Slovak contact-induced phenomena, it is natural that we have to distinguish the situation in the standard language and its codification from the situation in every-day communication. Ján Horecky´ in his earlier study (1967) talked about a filter of language structure that seems to be more effective in the case of Czech and Slovak as closely-related languages than it is in the contact of less related languages. Despite intensive language contact, words beginning with ji- (jícen, jitro), derivatives with suffixes -tko or -‰í, or lexemes where the notion is already expressed by a different form will not get through the filter of lexical and lexical-semantic structure into Standard Slovak (CZ válka – SL vojna ‘war’, CZ stejn¤ – SL rovnak¤ ‘the same’ etc.). The derivational and lexical-semantic filter is more effective if the language users have knowledge of the structure of the donor language (Horecky´ 1967: 44). Nevertheless, as can be seen in the communicative practice of Slovak users in the non-standard sphere, such filters are often not fully applied. In such a situation it is necessary to focus attention on pragmatic and psycho-social aspects of communication in the Czech-Slovak contact situation and to look for more complex and appropriate explanations. In later works of Ján Horecky´, Viera Budovicˇová, Miloslava Sokolová, Klára Buzássyová, and Juraj Dolník a deeper insight into the contact situation with an account of these factors can be found. Juraj Dolník has been dealing with Czech-Slovak language contact and contact-induced phenomena in Slovak for a long time, studying them from various points of view (cf. Dolník 1992, 1998a, 1998b, 1999, 2000, 2010). He takes into account intralingual, interlingual and extralingual factors affecting the linguistic consciousness of Slovak language users. In his explanations he applies the concept of analogical thinking (with formal, formal-semantic and semantic-formal analogy), based on a high degree of congruence between Slovak and Czech.

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Formal analogy is based on phonologically corresponding words and regular interlingual phonological correspondences (in other words on the bivalent and parallel lexemes where the phonological correspondences represent the results of divergent processes in the structure of cognates). Seeing as there are thousands of the same (bivalent) words such as CZ + SL ruka ‘hand’, strom ‘tree’, vysok¤ ‘tall’, mal¤ ‘small’, nahlas ‘aloud’, sto ‘hundred’, ty ‘you’ etc., on the basis of formal analogy the linguistic consciousness of Slovak language users (one of its characteristic features being a certain vagueness of interlingual delimitation) does not refuse contact variants such as závody ‘race’, prepázˇka ‘counter’, závada ‘defect’ etc. which comply with the phonotactic rules of Slovak (despite the fact that there are non-contact variants preteky, priehradka, chyba in Slovak). In word pairs CZ louka : SL lúka ‘meadow’, CZ klika : SL kfiuka ‘(door)handle’ there are regular phonological correspondences ou/ú, li/fiu, therefore analogically word pairs such as CZ sousto : SL sústo ‘bite’, CZ spousta : SL spústa ‘plenty’, CZ klid : SL kfiud ‘peace’ etc. are accepted. Sústo, spústa, kfiud (as transphonemized contact variants of Slovak hlt, kúsok (jedla); hr´ba, hromada; pokoj) have been adapted on the phonic level, but have not been accepted by the explicit Slovak norm and are marked as substandard (sústo, spústa) or incorrect (kfiud correctly pokoj) in the normative Krátky slovník slovenského jazyka ([Concise dictionary of Slovak] 2003). Formal-semantic analogy is based on the correlation of lexemes with different semantic structure (Dolník’s formal-semantic analogy corresponds with what Viera Budovicˇová describes as Czech-Slovak interlingual “tendency towards symmetric parallelism of form and meaning”, 1973). Based on the analogy with the polysemic Czech verb podtrhnout, the corresponding Slovak lexeme podtrhnúfl ‘trip sb. up’ acquired another sense “podcˇiarknufl” ‘underline’, which it originally did not have and according to the valid codification of Standard Slovak does not have (the verb is widely used in this sense though and is also listed with this sense in Slovak explanatory dictionaries23). Semantic-formal analogy is based on interlingual derivational analogy; we may also speak of balancing the derivative asymmetries (if CZ drzˇet ‘hold’ f obdrzˇet, then SL drzˇafl f obdrzˇafl; the Slovak verb obdrzˇafl is considered a contact variant and according to the valid codification the given sense should be expressed by the verb dostafl). Other cases of this type, in which the deri23

In this case the strengthening position of the delimitation approach can be seen in the succession of lexicographical descriptions. While the Slovník slovenského jazyka [Dictionary of the Slovak Language, 1960] listed this sense without a specifying qualifier, the Krátky slovník slovenského jazyka [Concise Dictionary of the Slovak Language, 2003] adds the label subst. (‘substandard usage’) indicating that it does not belong to the standard lexicon.

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vational regularities of Slovak are violated, have already been mentioned: in Czech there are motivation pairs like lízat ‘lick’ f lízátko ‘lollipop’, díl ‘part’ f díl‰í ‘partial’, and it is on the basis of interlingual analogy that, even despite the existence of domestic expressions in Slovak, pairs with the same derivational relations are in use: lízafl f lízatko (lízanka), diel f diel‰í (‰iastkov¤) (for more examples see Dolník 1992, 2010). In connection with semantic-formal analogy and its effect, it is worth mentioning some concrete cases when the different distribution of the same or parallel derivational suffixes in Slovak and Czech becomes relative in communicative practice. The Slovak feminine suffix in the derivational pair predseda : predsední‰ka ‘chairman : chairwoman’ has received a contact variant from Czech predsedkynˇa (with intralingual analogy to Slovak words as letkynˇa, plavkynˇa). In the opposite Slovak-Czech direction the codified Czech feminine lexeme psychiatryneˇ ‘psychiatrist’ from the pair psychiatr : psychiatryneˇ has received the contact variant psychiatri‰ka (with intralingual analogy to Czech words as lékarˇka, u‰itelka). Another interesting example of mutual interlingual influence is the word pair CZ zpravodaj : SL spravodajca ‘correspondent or informative bulletin’, where in Slovak and Czech communication we come across several contact variants: CZ zpravodaj/zpravodajce (also zpravodajec) – SL spravodajca/spravodaj. Though spravodaj is not considered a standard expression, in Slovak communicative practice a certain stabilization of both forms on the basis of semantic and derivational dissimilation can be seen. While spravodajca serves the purpose of referring to a person ‘correspondent’, spravodaj is frequently used in the sense ‘informative bulletin’ (Nábeˇlková 2008: 186–187). Existing pairs or groups of contact variants and synonyms and their domestic counterparts have to be looked at from various perspectives. We need to take into account the historical intralinguistic and extralinguistic circumstances of their formation, the internal linguistic conditions that enable and support the existence of the contact phenomena, the transformations of their status in terms of the codification of the standard language, which reflects the official attitude towards the contact phenomena in general as well as the attitude towards the concrete contact variants and synonyms. Of great importance is also knowledge of the communicative effectiveness that is ascribed to contact variants by language users contrary to the official codification. The research work of Miloslava Sokolová (1991, 1995) and Martina Gazdíková (2005) has contributed to our knowledge of the functional load and assessment of the communicative effectiveness of contact-induced phenomena. Miloslava Sokolová examined the mutual relationships in 330 pairs of (lexical, including derivational and phraseological, phonological, morpho-

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logical and syntactic) contact and non-contact language units in a socio-linguistic survey with 360 respondents. The results of the survey show that many contact variants used by the examined language users are considered communicatively more effective than the recommended non-contact expressions due to various pragmatic reasons. Based on the results of the survey the pairs of contact and non-contact variants may be divided into several groups. There are pairs with a clearly higher degree of communicative effectiveness either of the non-contact variant or of the contact variant, and other pairs with relatively equal communicative effectiveness between both variants (Sokolová 1991). Apart from the results of the sociolinguistic survey, the 1995 study also offers a large list of hundreds of contact-induced phenomena that have been rejected over the years from the viewpoint of language cultivation as well as a comparison of changes that have been made in the codification description. As already mentioned, a specific interplay of inter- and intralingual factors can be seen also on the lexical level as one among the forces contributing to the usage of contact variants in everyday communication. As an illustrative example consider the word botník, which functions as a frequent variant of the standard multiword expression skrinka na topánky ‘shoe cabinet’. Botník is not listed in any Slovak dictionary, and linguistic journals attest to its continuous explicit rejection by Slovak linguists who refer to the non-existence of the word bota ‘shoe’ (in Standard Slovak topánka) as the base form of the derivative botník in the explicit Slovak norm. But the word botník has, aside from the interlingual, also an intralingual dialect base form – the non-standard lexeme bota exists in some Slovak dialects (Czech-Slovak congruence resulting from the dialect continuum) and it appears in informal communication either under this influence or under Czech influence. An interesting manifestation of the lexeme botník may be seen in communicative practice. In commercial offers on webpages of sellers of furniture we may often find both variants standing next to each other. The sellers probably assume that the potential buyers of their product may search for it not only under the “official” expression but also under the frequent botník (c.f. Botníky, skrinky na topánky , Botníky – skrinky na topánky ).24 24

A similar strategy exploited in internet sales is also found with other word pairs, e.g., in the coexistence of the term kozub and its interlingual contact variant krb ‘fireplace’, which belongs to those contact variants whose present-day communicative position is much stronger in comparison to the domestic word (cf. ; Krby, kozuby, krbové vlozˇky, komíny – servis, predaj krbov ; Krby, krbové vlozˇky, kozuby, predaj krbov ).

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As can be seen, Czech-Slovak contact-induced phenomena on various language levels represent a large, multifarious, dynamic and dynamizing, traditionally sensitively perceived sphere in the Slovak language. In the presentday situation of continuing intense language contact with Czech, the question of the functioning and the treatment of existing contact-induced phenomena and the appearance of new contact-induced phenomena remains open.

3.

Conclusion

The aim of this text was to introduce the types of contact-induced phenomena in Slovak embedded in the wider frame of Czech-Slovak interlingual processes. In the family of Slavic languages Czech and Slovak represent a pair of closely-related languages belonging to the West Slavic branch with a specific history of mutual relationships. During its successive stages the high degree of congruence on phonological, morphosyntactic and lexical levels resulting from genetic relatedness has been enriched through the deliberate and planned steps in several periods of elaborating the standard languages (especially on the lexical level) as well as through the Czech-Slovak communicative practice based on receptive bilingualism. According to a complex of socio-political, cultural and demographic factors the language contact situation has been asymmetrical, Slovak being influenced by Czech far more than the other way round in all periods of coexistence. An historically conditioned openness of Slovaks towards Czech resulting in the presence of contact-induced phenomena has been accompanied by delimitative tendencies reflecting the fact that contact phenomena of Czech origin traditionally represent a sensitive topic and grounds for potential and real conflict of values. In the Czech-Slovak contact situation absolute contact phenomena as well as relative contact phenomena can be tracked, though sometimes the postulating of relative contact influence, consisting in supporting the intralingual processes of rearranging between concrete competing language elements, may be only hypothetical. In addition, concrete language processes in Standard Slovak that might be interpreted as interlingual are often the results of the interplay of interlingual and intralingual contact situations due to specific relationships between standard language and dialects. The categories of inter- and intralingual contact phenomena may overlap. In Slovak on the morphosyntactic level the impact of language contact can be seen in the competition of some noun variants based on CzechSlovak differences in gender, declension forms, verbal and prepositional

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phrases as well as in the competition of specific sentence constructions. The contact influence here is often linked with congruence on the lexical level affecting the lexical units identical (or similar) in both languages. With respect to lexical contact-induced phenomena (lexical units, contact-induced meanings, word-formation strategies) a specific congruence-difference interplay can be seen. Penetration of contact phenomena should be explained as based on interlingual analogy. While on the morphosyntactic level mostly intuitive and unconscious copying can be expected, on the lexical level there is also wider space for deliberative choice based on intended communicative effectiveness of some contact variants representing (more or less) semantically or pragmatically differentiated means of expression. Although most of the attention in this article has been devoted to contactinduced phenomena in Slovak because of their incomparably larger abundance, functional load, and social and linguistic resonance, it does not mean that the contact phenomena in Czech induced by Slovak are of no greater interest (cf. Nábeˇlková 2008: 177–188). It was mentioned that contact-induced phenomena have been appearing in Czech since the National Revival and still appear even today. Slovakisms in Czech have never received as much attention and they have never been as sensitive an issue as Bohemisms in Slovak. This may be due to the fact that, in the case of Slovak contact-induced phenomena in Czech, we are often dealing with transfers, i.e., code-switching phenomena mainly in informal communication, while the number of integrated borrowings does not exceed the degree that would activate certain defense delimitative mechanisms in the language community. The types and communicative effectiveness of lexical contact phenomena in Czech are currently studied mainly by Kveˇtoslava Musilová (2005, in press; together with Miloslava Sokolová 2003). Regarding the significant functional load of some of these Slovak lexical items, in the future it will be interesting to observe their treatment in Czech lexicography. At present, both in the Czech and Slovak environments, it is necessary to remember that a new contact situation is bringing and will bring new contact opportunities and new contact phenomena. The bilateral significance of cyberspace multiplying the opportunities for language contact is enormous; bilingual Czech-Slovak communication on the basis of receptive bilingualism is very frequent here (Nábeˇlková 2008). In addition to communication based on receptive bilingualism representing the space for potential emergence of contact-induced phenomena, another increasing phenomenon should be mentioned. Not only on the internet, but also in situations of direct language contact (in schools, institutions, businesses of various types) many Slovaks living in the Czech environment are actively using Czech and, as a result,

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various kinds of Czech texts written by Slovaks appear. In this regard, besides take-over insertions, contact-induced phenomena of Slovak origin in “Czech of Czechs”, we should consider the presence of carry-over insertions: Slovaks carrying over copies from Slovak into their Czech. In a certain sense it could be seen as a distant analogy to the situation in the inter-war period, when thousands of Czechs lived in Slovakia and their communicative practice therefore influenced the contemporary shape of Slovak (cf. Blanár 2003). However, there is no mirror image of that language situation at all; in regard to the socio-political and cultural circumstances as well as to the status of languages the present-day contact situation in the Czech environment is different in many respects. We may simply rightfully assume that due to continuing interlingual communication today there are conditions for the appearance of new Czech-Slovak contact phenomena on various language levels not only in the Slovak language situation but in the Czech environment as well.

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Budovicˇová, Viera 1986b Literary languages in contact (A sociolinguistic approach to the relation between Slovak and Czech today). In: Jan Chloupek and Jirˇí Nekvapil (eds.), Reader in Czech Sociolinguistics, 156–175. Praha: Academia. Budovicˇová, Viera 1988 Semikomunikácia ako faktor medzijazykovej dynamiky [Semi-communication as a factor of interlingual dynamics]. In: Radoslava Brabcová and Frantisˇek Sˇtícha (eds.), Dynamika sou‰asné ‰estiny z hlediska lingvistické teorie a skolské praxe, 45–54. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Buzássyová, Klára 1993 Kontaktové varianty a synonymá v slovencˇine a cˇesˇtine [Contact variants and synonyms in Slovak and Czech]. Jazykovedn¤ ‰asopis 44: 92–107. Buzássyová, Klára 1995 Aspekty kontaktov slovencˇiny a cˇesˇtiny [Aspects of the contact of Slovak and Czech]. In: Slavo Ondrejovicˇ and Mária Sˇimková (eds.), Sociolingvistické aspekty v¤skumu sú‰asnej sloven‰iny, 163–182. Bratislava: Veda. Danesˇ, Frantisˇek 1968 Dialektické tendence ve v¤voji spisovn¤ch jazyku˚ (Prˇíspeˇvek sociolingvistick¤) [Dialectic tendencies in the development of standard languages (A sociolinguistic contribution)]. In: ™eskoslovenské prˇednásky pro VI. mezinárodní sjezd slavistu˚ v Praze, 119–128. Praha: Nakladatelství Cˇeskoslovenské akademie veˇd. Darovec, Miloslav 1988 Z konfronta‰nej syntaxe slovensko-‰eskej [On Slovak-Czech comparative syntax]. In: Jozef Mistrík (ed.), Studia Academica Slovaca 17, 83–103. Bratislava: Alfa. Dickins, Thomas 2009 Cˇesˇi a slovensˇtina [Czechs and the Slovak language]. Nase spole‰nost 7: 12–26. Dolník, Juraj 1992 Cˇeské slová v slovencˇine [Czech words in Slovak]. In: Jozef Mlacek (ed.), Studia Academica Slovaca 21, 1–10. Bratislava: Stimul. Dolník, Juraj 1998a Metajazyková axiologická kompetencia Slovákov (vo vzflahu k cˇesˇtine) [Metalinguistic axiological competence of Slovaks (in relation to Czech)]. In: Ján Bosák (ed.), Slovensk¤ jazyk. Najnowsze dzieje j¬zyków słowian´skich, 26–32. Opole: Uniwersytet Opolski – Instytut Filologii Polskiej. Dolník, Juraj 1998b Postoje k bohemizmom v súcˇasnej slovencˇine (ako signály vyrovnávania sa so slovensko-cˇesky´mi vzflahmi) [Attitudes towards Bohemisms in contemporary Slovak (as signals of the leveling of Slovak-Czech relations]. In: Ivo Pospísˇil (ed.), Brneˇnská slovakistika a ‰esko-slovenské vztahy, 41–44. Brno: Masarykova univerzita. Dolník, Juraj 1999 Spisovná slovencˇina a cˇesˇtina [Standard Slovak and Czech]. In: Jozef Mlacek (ed.), Studia Academica Slovaca 28, 39–52. Bratislava: Stimul. Dolník, Juraj 2000 Tradícia cˇesˇtiny na Slovensku a jej následky [The tradition of Czech in Slovakia and its consequences]. In: Jozef Hvisˇcˇ (ed.), Slovensko-‰eské vzflahy a súvislosti, 196–202. Bratislava: T.R.I. MÉDIUM. Dolník, Juraj 2010 Teória spisovného jazyka – so zretefiom na spisovnú sloven‰inu [A theory of standard language – with regard to Standard Slovak]. Bratislava: Veda. Dorufia, Ján 1977 Slováci v dejinách jazykov¤ch vzflahov [Slovaks in the history of language relations]. Bratislava: Veda. ˇ urovicˇ, L’ubomír 1998 Slovenská vy´vinová línia spisovnej cˇesˇtiny [The Slovak D developmental line of literary Czech]. In: Alexandr Stich (ed.), Pocta 650. v¤ro‰í zalozˇení Univerzity Karlovy v Praze, 42–52. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. ˇ urovicˇ, L’ubomír 2000 Pavel Dolezˇal a jeho Grammatica Slavico-Bohemica (Pri D trojstom vy´rocˇí narodenia: 1700–2000) [Pavel Dolezˇal and his Grammatica Slavico-Bohemica (On the 300th anniversary of his birth 1700–2000)]. Slovenská re‰ 65: 22–32.

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Furdík, Juraj 2008 Teória motivácie v lexikálnej zásobe [A theory of motivation in the lexicon]. Martin Olosˇtiak (ed.). Kosˇice: Vydavatefistvo LG. Gazdíková, Martina 2005 Die tschechischen Kontaktwörter in der slovakischen Sprachpraxis und in der Rezeption der zeitgenössischen Slovakistik. (Slavistische Beiträge 440.) München: Otto Sagner. Giger, Markus 1999 Prechodné miesto slovencˇiny medzi západoslovansky´mi jazykmi z typologického hfiadiska: syntax [The transitional position of Slovak among the West-Slavic languages from a typological point of view: syntax]. In: Mira Nábeˇlková and L’ubor Králik (eds.), Varia VIII, 203–215. Bratislava: SJS pri SAV. Giger, Markus 2006 Otázka aplikace termínu ‘diglosie’ na prˇedmoderní jazykové situace (na prˇíkladeˇ situace ve starém Rusku a na Slovensku 17.–18. stol.) [The question of the application of the term ‘diglossia’ to pre-modern linguistic situation (on the example of the situation in Old Russia and in Slovakia in 17th–18th century]. In: Hana Gladkova and Václav Cvrcˇek (eds.), Sociální aspekty spisovn¤ch jazyku˚ slovansk¤ch, 73–86. (Acta Slavica et Baltica VI.) Praha: Euroslavica. Habovsˇtiaková, Katarína 1973 O lexikálnych bohemizmoch v slovencˇine predspisovného obdobia [On lexical Bohemisms in Slovak in the pre-literary period]. In: Sˇtefan Krisˇtof (ed.), Sˇtúdie pedagogickej fakulty v Nitre. Zborník jazykovedn¤ch stúdií na po‰esfl VII. slavistického kongresu vo Varsave, 121–130. Bratislava: SPN. Habovsˇtiaková, Katarína 1987 Slovná zásoba spisovnej sloven‰iny z v¤vinového hfiadiska [The lexicon of Standard Slovak from a developmental point of view]. Nitra: Pedagogická fakulta v Nitre. Hoffmannová, Jana and Olga Müllerová 1993 Interference cˇesˇtiny a slovensˇtiny v mluvené komunikaci [The interference of Czech and Slovak in oral communication]. Slavia 62: 311–316. Horálek, Karel 1985 Konvergence a divergence ve vy´voji cˇesˇtiny a slovensˇtiny [Convergence and divergence in the development of Czech and Slovak]. In: Viera Budovicˇová (ed.), Slavica Pragensia. 25. Acta Universitatis Carolinae. Philologica. 1982, 169–173. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Horecky´, Ján 1967 Sloveso jazdifl a jeho odvodeniny [Verb jazdifl and its derivatives]. Kultúra slova 2: 333–338. Horecky´, Ján 1989 Vzflahy medzi slovencˇinou a cˇesˇtinou [Relations between Slovak and Czech]. In: Viera Budovicˇová (ed.), Slavica Pragensia. 30. Acta Universitatis Carolinae. Philologica. 1987, 49–53. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Horecky´, Ján 1995a Slovensko-cˇeská diglosná komunikácia [Slovak-Czech diglossic communication]. In: Slavomír Ondrejovicˇ and Mária Sˇimková (eds.), Sociolingvistické aspekty v¤skumu sú‰asnej sloven‰iny, 183–187. Bratislava: Veda. Horecky´, Ján 1995b Prídavné mená na -ly´ [Adjectives with the suffix -ly´]. Kultúra slova 29: 338–342. Horecky´, Ján 1999 Odraz kultúrnych prvkov v slovnej zásobe slovencˇiny, cˇesˇtiny a mad’arcˇiny [The reflection of cultural elements in the lexicon of Slovak, Czech and Hungarian]. In: Slavomír Ondrejovicˇ (ed.), Sloven‰ina v kontaktoch a konfliktoch s in¤mi jazykmi, 94–97. (Sociolinguistica Slovaca 4.) Bratislava: Veda. Jedlicˇka, Alois 1968 Studium soucˇasny´ch jazyku˚ slovansky´ch a problematika variantnosti normy [The study of contemporary Slavic languages and the question of variability of norm]. Slovo a slovesnost 29: 113–124.

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Jedlicˇka, Alois 1974 Poznámky ke konfrontacˇnímu studiu cˇesˇtiny a slovensˇtiny [Notes on the comparative study of Czech and Slovak]. Jazykovedné stúdie XII: 20–29. Jedlicˇka, Alois 1978 Spisovná ‰estina v sou‰asné komunikaci [Standard Czech in presentday communication]. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Jedlicˇka, Alois 1985 Korˇeny a rozvoj konfrontacˇního studia cˇesˇtiny a slovensˇtiny [Roots and the development of the comparative study of Czech and Slovak]. In: Viera Budovicˇová (ed.), Slavica Pragensia. 25. Acta Universitatis Carolinae. Philologica. 1982, 11–24. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Jungmann, Josef 1835–1839 Slovník ‰esko-neˇmeck¤. I–V [Czech-German dictionary]. Praha: Knízˇecí arcibiskupská tiskárna. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar. Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language contact and Contact Languages, 62–79. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Kloss, Heinz 1967 Abstand languages and Ausbau languages. Anthropological Linguistics 9: 29–41. Korˇensky´, Jan (ed.) 1998 ™esk¤ jazyk [The Czech language]. Opole: Uniwersytet. Lanstyák, István 2002 K niektory´m pojmom a disˇtinkciám z oblasti kontaktológie [On some concepts and distinctions from the field of contact linguistics]. In: Jozef Sˇtefánik (ed.), Bilingvizmus. Minulosfl, prítomnosfl a budúcnosfl, 77–89. Bratislava: Academic Electronic Press. Lauersdorf, Mark Richard 1996 The question of “cultural language” and interdialectal norm in 16th century Slovakia: A phonological analysis of 16th century Slovak administrative-legal texts. (Slavistische Beiträge 335.) München: Verlag Otto Sagner. Lauersdorf, Mark Richard 2010 The Morphology of 16th-Century Slovak AdministrativeLegal Texts and the Question of Diglossia in Pre-Codification Slovakia. (Slavistische Beiträge 473.) München, Berlin: Verlag Otto Sagner. Lipowski, Jaroslav 2005 Konvergence a divergence ‰estiny a slovenstiny v ‰eskoslovenském státeˇ [Convergence and divergence of Czech and Slovak in the Czechoslovak state]. (Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis No 2727. Slavica Wratislaviensia CXXXII.) Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego. Marvan, Jirˇí 2003 Cesty ke spisovné ‰estineˇ – prvních tisíc let (800–1800). Mal¤ pru˚vodce deˇjinami ‰eské jazykové mysli [Paths to Standard Czech – the first thousand years (800–1900). A small guide to the history of Czech linguistic thought]. Ústí nad Labem: UJEP. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mrázek, Roman 1979 Kontrastivní charakteristika syntaktického systému soucˇasné spisovné slovensˇtiny a cˇesˇtiny [Contrastive characteristics of the syntactic system of present-day standard Slovak and Czech]. Slavica Slovaca 14: 3–22. Musilová, Kveˇtoslava 2005 Slovakismy v soucˇasné cˇesˇtineˇ [Slovakisms in contemporary Czech]. In: Oldrˇich Ulicˇny´ (ed.), Eurolitteraria & Eurolingua 2005, 261–266. Liberec: Technická univerzita. Musilová, Kveˇtoslava in press Vliv slovensˇtiny na dynamiku vy´voje cˇesˇtiny (sociolingvisticky´ pru˚zkum) [The influence of Slovak on the developmental dynamics of Czech (sociolinguistic survey)]. In: Dynamika spolo‰ensk¤ch zmien a stratifikácia národného jazyka. Banská Bystrica: UMB. Musilová, Kveˇtoslava and Miloslava Sokolová 2003 Funkcˇnost cˇesko-slovensky´ch kontaktovy´ch jevu˚ v soucˇasnosti [The functionality of Czech-Slovak contact phe-

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nomena today]. In: ™eské, polské a slovenské jazykové a literární souvislosti, 223–229. Olomouc: AUPO. Nábeˇlková, Mira 1999 Slovencˇina a cˇesˇtina dnes. Kontakt cˇi konflikt [Slovak and Czech today. Contact or conflict]. In: Slavomír Ondrejovicˇ (ed.), Sloven‰ina v kontaktoch a konfliktoch s in¤mi jazykmi, 75–93. Bratislava: Veda. Nábeˇlková, Mira 2007 Closely Related Languages in Contact: Czech, Slovak, “Czechoslovak”. In: Roland Marti and Jirˇí Nekvapil (eds.), Small and Large Slavic Languages in Contact, 53–73. (International Journal of the Sociology of Language 183.) Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Nábeˇlková, Mira 2008 Sloven‰ina a ‰estina v kontakte. Pokra‰ovanie príbehu [Slovak and Czech in contact. Continuation of the story]. Bratislava, Praha: Veda. Newerkla, Stefan Michael 2000 Language Affinity in Central Europe – Some Thoughts on the Interrelations of German, Czech, Slovak and Magyar. Opera slavica – Slavistické rozhledy X: 1–16. Novák, L’udovít 1935 Jazykovedné glosy k ‰eskoslovenskej otázke [Linguistic comments on the Czechoslovak question]. Turcˇiansky Sväty´ Martin: Matica slovenská. Olosˇtiak, Martin 2004 O interlingválnej proxemike (Príspevok k poznaniu medzijazykovy´ch súvislostí) [On interlingual proxemics (a contribution to the study of interlingual connections)]. In: Vladimír Patrásˇ (ed.), Sú‰asná jazyková komunikácia v interdisciplinárnych súvislostiach, 131–142. Banská Bystrica: Univerzita Mateja Bela, Fakulta humanitny´ch vied. Olosˇtiak, Martin 2007 Interlingválna a slovotvorná motivácia [Interlingual and derivational motivation]. Jazykovedn¤ ‰asopis 58: 103–112. Pauliny, Eugen 1956 Cˇesˇtina a jej vy´znam pri rozvoji slovenského spisovného jazyka a nasˇej národnej kultúry [Czech and its importance in the development of the Slovak standard language and our national culture]. In: L’udovít Holotík (ed.), O vzájomn¤ch vzflahoch ™echov a Slovákov, 99–124. Bratislava: Slovenská akadémia vied. Pauliny, Eugen 1983 Dejiny spisovnej sloven‰iny od za‰iatkov po sú‰asnosfl [History of standard Slovak from its beginnings to the present]. Bratislava: SPN. Peciar, Sˇtefan 1968 Slovenské ekvivalenty cˇesky´ch vy´razov na -tko [Slovak equivalents of Czech expressions with -tko]. Kultúra slova 2: 329–335. Pisárcˇiková, Mária 1990 Hovorca [Spokesman]. Kultúra slova 24: 223–224. Polák, Václav 1942–1943 K problému vplyvu slovencˇiny na cˇesˇtinu [On the problem of the impact of Slovak on Czech]. Slovenská re‰ 10: 6–12, 97–104, 150–156, 218–222, 285–289, 323–327. Sloboda, Marián 2004 Slovensko-cˇeská (semi)komunikace a vzájemná (ne)srozumitelnost [Slovak-Czech (semi)communication and mutual (in)comprehensibility]. ™estina doma a ve sveˇteˇ 12: 208–220. Sokolová, Miloslava 1991 Komunikatívna efektívnosfl cˇesky´ch kontaktovy´ch javov v slovencˇine [The communicative effectiveness of Czech contact phenomena in Slovak]. In: Pavol Odalosˇ and Vladimír Patrásˇ (eds.), Vseobecné a specifické otázky jazykovej komunikácie, 232–242. Banská Bystrica: PF. Sokolová, Miloslava 1995 Cˇeské kontaktové javy v slovencˇine [Czech contact phenomena in Slovak]. In: Slavomír Ondrejovicˇ and Mária Sˇimková (eds.), Sociolingvistické aspekty v¤skumu sú‰asnej sloven‰iny, 183–206. Bratislava: Veda. Sokolová, Miloslava, Kveˇtoslava Musilová and Daniela Slancˇová 2005 Sloven‰ina a ‰estina. Synchrónne porovnanie s cvi‰eniami [Slovak and Czech. A synchronic comparison with exercises]. Bratislava: Univerzita Komenského.

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Thomason, Sarah G. 2008 Social and linguistic factors as predictors of contactinduced change. Journal of Language Contact. Thema II: 42–56. Trudgill, Peter 2004 Glocalisation and the Ausbau sociolinguistics of modern Europe. In: Anna Duszak and Urszula Okulska (eds.), Speaking from the margin: global English from a European perspective, 35–49. Frankfurt: Lang. Tugusˇeva, Roza Chasanovna 2003 O‰erki po sopostavitefinoj leksikologii ‰esskogo i slovackogo jazykov [Essays on the comparative lexikology of Czech and Slovak]. S. Peterburg: Izdatefistvo Peterburgskogo universiteta. Zeman, Jirˇí 1997 Czech – Slovak. In: Hans Goebl, Peter Nelde, Zdeneˇk Stary´ and Wolfgang Wölck (eds.), Kontaktlinguistik: ein internationales Handbuch zeitgenössischer Forschung. Volume II, 1650–1655. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. ˇ igo, Pavol 2002 Konvergentné a divergentné tendencie vo vy´vine slovencˇiny Z a cˇesˇtiny [Convergent and divergent tendencies in the development of Slovak and Czech]. Slovenská re‰ 67: 5–18. This publication was made possible by Charles University Research Development Program no. 10 – Linguistics, sub-program Language Management in Language Situations. I’m grateful to Zuzana Starovecká for the English translation of this text and to Mark Richard Lauersdorf for the language correction of its final version.

Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus

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Gerd Hentschel (Oldenburg)

Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus1

1.

Introduction

The territory of modern Belarus has been an area of extensive language contact for centuries. Only towards the end of the 19th century did Russian overtake the role of the so-called H-variety from Polish. It was only at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century that Belarusian developed to a modern standard language reaching the heyday of its status in the 1920s due to liberal and pluralistic language policies under early Soviet rule. After World War I and before World War II, Polish was again the dominant language in the western part of the country. In the east and after 1945 in the whole country, Belarusian underwent a severe decline in importance as a standard language following Stalin’s consolidation of his power in the 1930s that resulted in several periods of more or less restrictive language policies. In recent decades, Russian has gained enormous ground, not only in Belarusian public life, but in informal areas and family life as well. In a survey in seven Belarusian towns (including Minsk and six minor ones) Hentschel and Kittel (2011)2 found that only 18 % of the respondents claimed to use Belarusian always (2 %) or often (16 %), whereas 73 % claimed to use Russian always (45 %) or often (28 %). 1

2

The study presented here forms part of the work of the research project Trasjanka in Belarusian – a “mixed variety” as a product of the Belarusian-Russian linguistic contact. Language-based structure, sociological mechanisms of identification and language economics. The project is being conducted by the author and Bernhard Kittel from the Faculty of Business, Economics and Statistics, University of Vienna (formerly: Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Oldenburg) in cooperation with the Belarusian State University Minsk (Sjarhej Zaprudski, Belarusian Philology, and David Rotman, Social Sciences) and is funded by the Volkswagen Foundation. I am grateful to Sjarhej Zaprudski, Thomas Menzel and Sviatlana Tesch for comments on an earlier version of this paper. Remaining errors are mine. This survey is based on data from 1,400 respondents: 200 each from the capital of Minsk and the smaller towns of Akcjabrski and Slonim in the south west, Sˇarkou˘sˇcˇyna and Xocimsk in the north east, and Smarhon’ and Rahacˇou˘ in intermediate regions. All the smaller towns have between roughly 10,000 and 50,000 inhabitants.

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Belarusian and Russian are genetically very close and structurally very similar languages. There is a certain degree of mutual intelligibility, which is not total as claimed by some, but the closeness is strong enough to allow for semi-communication and gradual conversational approximation between the codes, usually in the direction of Russian. Without any doubt, there have always been forms of mixing Belarusian and Russian in Belarus since the 19th century, e.g. in the speech of Belarusians conversing with Russian speaking superiors or authorities approximating the language of the latter. After World War II, socio-demographic conditions in Soviet Belorussia changed dramatically. The country underwent a massive industrialization, which caused massive village-town migration and consequently an equally massive urbanization. Today, almost 75 % of the Belarusian population lives in towns or cities. The new urban environment required from the new town dwellers a shift from (often rural, dialectal3) Belarusian to Russian, as far as their competence in Russian reached (see Zaprudski 2007 for a detailed discussion). Moreover, they raised their children in this “language” (cf. Hentschel and Kittel 2011), which they took for Russian, understanding Russian as a tool for social advancement, but which was in fact nothing other than Belarusian-Russian Mixed Speech in the sense of an approximation to Russian, an interlanguage (see part 2.3). This was the background for the spread of Belarusian-Russian Mixed Speech, which will be referred to in the abbreviation BRMS for reasons of convenience. Hentschel and Kittel (2011) report that 41 % of their respondents name BRMS as the main means of communication (Russian 55 %, Belarusian 4 %). Asked for the languages used in their families, 73 % of the respondents stated that BRMS was one of these (Russian 54 %, Belarusian 48 % – more than one answer possible).4 BRMS has become a topic of scientific discussion only in the last two decades (for an overview cf. Bieder in press). Regarding its status, some (usually scholars from Belarus like Cyxun in press or Mecˇkovskaja in press) claim that the mixing of the languages in speech is purely spontaneous, without conventionalization in the direction of a fused lect, underlining the enormous degree of variation (between Belarusian and Russian). Others, like Liskovets (2009), take the conventionalization for granted, pointing at notori3

4

Little is known about the influence that Russian has had on the rural varieties before and even after World War II. Dialectologists have never been interested in this question and usually ignored any linguistic elements or traits they considered to be of (rather recent) Russian origin. So it cannot be ruled out that, to a certain degree, people used to speak a Belarusian-Russian mixture before their migration to towns and cities. Regarding the social background cf. Kittel, Lindner, Tesch and Hentschel (2010).

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ous hybrid phenomena on different layers of linguistic structures. Little attention has been paid to Trudgill’s (1986) findings that in the establishment of new mixed dialects (and the structural distance between Belarusian and Russian is of the kind prototypically acknowledged for different dialects of one language), a stabilization in the sense of considerable reduction of variation occurs only in the fourth generation of speakers usually using mixed speech. And little attention is paid to the fact that the speech that is based partially on a fused or mixed lect tends to remain strongly variative as long as the two (or more) original lects keep being used in the given social context. This is clearly the case in Belarus, though Belarusian (at least in its standard variety) is much less present than Russian and is clearly in danger of being given up in the long run. Against such a background, the only way to discover a tendency towards the development of a new fused lect, C, is the analysis of quantitative preferences for elements of A and B (Belarusian and Russian) in a variety of structural positions of paradigmatic or syntagmatic nature, following the tenets of the variationist approach to socio(contact)linguistics (cf. Dubois and Sankoff 2001). This approach provides for Auer’s (1999) insight that different forms of intertwining two languages in discourse and speech, i.e. in his terms code switching, code mixing and fused lect, can be superimposed on each other: spontaneous and conventionalized mixing (in a broad sense) can co-occur in speech. The objective of this investigation is to examine whether, in spite of a high degree of variation in BRMS, a trend toward stabilization of preferences for one of the co-competing variants (a Belarusian variant, a Russian one or, under certain conditions, a hybrid variant) can be verified. Such a trend would indicate the beginnings of a fusion. Mixing Belarusian and Russian spoken elements could then only be partially described as spontaneous; the other part would, to a certain extent, be conventionalized. Selectively at least, it should be discussed whether regional differences can be identified that are brought about by the partially dialectal character of the Belarusian part of the mixed speech. Furthermore, it should be questioned whether the effectivity of a hierarchy of borrowability presents itself in the BRMS. In such a hierarchy, imported Russian would more strongly shape the BRMS in the structural areas at its lexical end and autochthon Belarusian would more strongly shape the structural areas at the grammatical end. An extreme version of such a process would be a lexicon-grammar split in the distribution of autochthon Belarusian and “imported” Russian elements and structures which Matras and Bakker (2003) consider characteristic for mixed (fused) languages, at least for those arising out of two structurally distant languages.

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In pursuing this objective the following chapter outlines the principle problem of mixed speech arising from two closely related and structurally very similar languages or varieties, namely being able to distinguish between the two or being able to allocate elements and structures to one of the two. In particular, the weak symptomatic role of phonetics and phonology in such a differentiation will be emphasized. In the analytical section, a series of different competitions in morphology, morphosyntax and lexis between Belarusian, Russian and, if present, hybrid variants from the corpus will be quantitatively analyzed and the observed preferences presented. The final chapter interprets the findings. Until recently, no such analysis was possible due to the lack of corpora of Mixed Belarusian Russian speech. Previous studies, such as those of Cyxun (2000), Mecˇkovskaja (1994) and Mjacˇkou˘skaja (2007) or – relating only to the capital, Minsk, – Liskovec (2005) and Liskovets (2009), base their empirical investigations either on informal observation or on only a very small corpus. During the research project named above, a much larger corpus has been compiled (cf. Hentschel 2008a), which allows for quantitative analysis. The data were collected in the same cities and towns where the sociolinguistic interviews were conducted.5 The central part of the corpus consists of transcribed conversations within families (including relatives, friends, neighbors), which all scholars see as the most important domain of mixed speech in Belarus. The analyses below are based on this material if not stated otherwise. It contains roughly 212,000 word forms in about 38,000 utterances, mostly simple or complex sentences.

2.

Belarusian-Russian Mixed Speech (BRMS)

2.1. On how to determine what is Belarusian and what is Russian in BRMS Suprun (1987) stated that about 80 % of the “words” in Belarusian and Russian are identical. The general message in his statement is that, firstly, there are very many linguistic elements and traits that are common and that, secondly, in many cases it is not easy to decide whether a certain element or trait should be described as Belarusian, Russian or common. There are several dimensions to this classification, the most important of which will be shortly outlined (cf. Hentschel 2008a for details).

5

There is one exception: instead of Slonim, the west of the southwest region is represented by Baranavicˇy in this corpus.

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(i) In Belarusian and Russian we find, for example, the preposition za with the meaning ‘behind, at’ in the prototypical local or directional usage, where it governs instrumental case. In such contexts (cf. Blr. za stalom, Rus. za stolom ‘at the table’) za is of course described as common, whereas in many other usages it is described as language specific, where one language would use za and the other language another preposition or a different morphosyntactic construction in the comparable context: Blr. bol’s za sorak, Rus. bol’se soroka/bol’se ‰em sorok ‘more than forty’. After comparative forms of adjectives and adverbs, only Belarusian shows the preposition za plus accusative case whereas Russian has either genitive government or takes advantage of the element ‰em traditionally described as a conjunction. The same context sensitive principle of qualification holds for morphological elements like prefixes. Both languages have for example za- in Blr./Rus. zakuska ‘appetizer, snack’, where it is described as common, but in the following pair of equivalents only Belarusian has za-, which consequently is qualified as Belarusian here: Blr. za-bic’ vs. Rus. u-bit’ ‘to kill’. It should be noted that in the corpus every morph (token) is indexed as being Belarusian, Russian, common or hybrid.6 More complex linguistic signs are calculated on the basis of this morphological indexation.7 (ii) A rather complex problem is connected with the fact that in several cases linguistic elements or traits in Belarusian dialects do not converge with the corresponding ones in Standard Belarusian but with those in Standard Russian (cf. Ramza 2008). In the analysis of the corpus, the procedure of classification is the following: A linguistic element resembling Standard Russian more than Standard Belarusian is qualified as Russian, unless there is evidence that this element is given in the dialects in the region where the respondent comes from.8 6

7

8

Intramorphic hybridity, hybridity in the narrowest scope of linguistic signs, is rare. A case of hybridity in the phonological representation of some morphs will be discussed below. On the other hand, this means that the greater the scope of the linguistic sign (morphs, word forms, phrases, clauses, complex sentences …), the higher the probability of hybridity. A holistic view is only taken in some cases: when the morphs of the word form are common to both languages but the meaning of the whole is specific to one of the given languages. For example, zˇonka in Belarusian is the neutral expression for ‘wife’, whereas in Russian it can be the diminutive of zˇena ‘wife’ or a rather stylistically low equivalent for zˇena. Since there is no comprehensive description of Belarusian dialects for all morphs, word forms, words etc. that had to be qualified in the corpus there is, without any doubt, a certain but minor rate of error in this procedure that cannot be eliminated. Most likely there will never be such a comprehensive description: Belarusian dialects are also being more and more influenced by Russian.

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It should be noted that according to (i) and (ii) the ascription of the label “Belarusian” or “Russian” in this analysis does not mean that the corresponding element or construction is “taken” from one or the other language by bilingual speakers with a roughly similar command of both languages (see below). It is a descriptive statement of resemblance with elements and traits in (mainly) the standard varieties of Belarusian and Russian. (iii) Another question is to what extent sound patterns recorded in the corpus can be taken advantage of for qualifying morphs, word forms and so on as Belarusian or Russian in our endeavors to look for a fused lect. It is a wellknown fact that there are many Belarusians with a good or even very good command of Russian who in their Russian speech still show more or less severe phonic interference from Belarusian. This Belarusian type pronunciation of Russian is one of the main characteristics9 of a variety of Russian that has been called the Belarusian Natiolect of Russian and may be compared, for example, with the Swiss variant of Standard German. It would, of course, not make sense to consider such a variety of Russian with rather strong and regular phonic interference from Belarusian as an instantiation of a fused lect. The important methodological consequence is the following: If Belarusian sound patterns regularly occur in the Russian speech of Belarusians, then phonic characteristics of Belarusian cannot automatically be interpreted as indicative for a word form to be Belarusian if the speech is mixed beyond sound patterns. Therefore, sound patterns have to be divided into two classes: phonic ones, comprising phonetic and phonological traits, and morphonemic representations (the representation of a morph by phonemes). The following sound differences (Blr. vs. Rus.) are examples for the phonic type: budzes vs. budes’ ‘to be, 2nd pers. sg. future’, where [dz ’] contrasts with [d’] ˘ [r’], ‰uma vs. ‰uma in intervocalic position10, bura vs. burja ‘storm’ – [r] vs. ‘plague’ – initial [ ] vs. [ ’/t ]. Both forms of the corresponding pairs are ˘ in the ˘ corpus. ˘ classified as common The following differences belong to morphonemic contrasts: budze vs. budet ‘to be, 3rd pers. sg. future’ – _Ø vs. [_t], ën [jɔn], jana vs. on, ona [na] ‘he, she’ – [j_] vs. Ø_, ruc-e˙ vs. ruk-e ‘loc. sg. fem.’ of Blr./Rus. ruka ‘hand’ – [ts ] vs. [k’/c] in stem final position. The absence of [t] in final position of the ˘Belarusian form in the first example is a contrast between two inflectional endings: Blr. -e vs. Rus. -et. A final [t] in Belarusian is not ruled out on the phonic level. The initial [j] in the two Belarusian an9

10

There may also be other linguistic phenomena: sporadic occurrences of Belarusian words, especially for Belarusian realia, terms for near relatives etc. Note that there is no sound difference behind the orthographic contrast between Blr. -s and Rus. -s’ in final position.

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aphoric pronouns is not based on some phonological process of consonant prothesis (though these were common in Belarusian in specific phonic contexts other than those in these forms). And the post alveolar affricate in the Belarusian locative singular of ruka is the well-known morphonemic reflection of the second Slavic palatalization some 1,200 years ago, a reflection that in Russian nominal inflection has been replaced during later centuries by analogical change. Thus, for the basic qualification of morphs and word forms in BRMS as Belarusian, Russian, hybrid or common, only expression plane contrasts between the two languages of the latter type, based on morphonemic representation, are decisive. But of course the correlation with the corresponding phonic Belarusian or Russian traits will be controlled.11 2.2. Pronunciation in BRMS: on some phonetic and phonological patterns The phonic characteristics of BRMS are predominantly Belarusian, irrespective of the Belarusian or Russian status of morphs and word forms from the point of view of deeper structural layers. (This is a view generally shared by all scholars doing research on this topic.) But there are some specific phenomena in the Belarusian-Russian constellation where this must be differentiated, because this differentiation sheds some light on how one language in a pair of genetically close ones can influence the other in sound patterns. (a) Belarusian (Standard and dialects as well as Ukrainian and South Russian dialects) has a fricative /γ/ where Russian (standard language, northern and central dialects) shows plosive /g/. Both languages use the same grapheme, Cyrillic G, for the different phonemes. A plosive [g] is acknowledged for some loans in Standard Belarusian (written then with Cyrillic G, too), which in speech is nevertheless often replaced by [γ]. (b) Both Belarusian and Russian show strong reductive processes for vowels in unstressed syllables. One of them is of interest here because it has clearly different phonetic results in Belarusian and Russian: the directly pretonic syllable when there is a palatal consonant before the unstressed vowel in this syllable. Roughly speaking, in Belarusian the phonetic realization of /e, a, o/ here is [a], whereas in Russian we find [ι], which would be the same as for unstressed /i/. The Belarusian phenomenon is called Jakanne (Rus. “Jakan’e”), the Russian one Ikanne (Rus. “Ikan’e”). Ikanne is not reflected in Russian orthography, but most instances of Jakanne are mirrored in Belaru11

The description of the interrelation between phonic and more abstract layers, for example in code switching and mixing phenomena (cf. Bullock 2009), is one of the future aims of the project.

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sian orthography: cf. Blr. jamu vs. Rus. emu [jιmu]. There are hints by some Belarusian scholars (e.g. Tatsjana Ramza, personal communication) that even convinced speakers of Belarusian Standard often enough do not pronounce a clearly open [a] as would be required by the standard. For the time being, this has not been investigated, but the corresponding compromise sound would go into the direction of [e]. Furthermore, there are some rather word specific instances of Ikanne in Belarusian, as in nima vs. njama ‘there is no’. (c) In Belarusian there are many instances of prothetic consonants even in the codification of the standard: cf. Blr. he˙tamu vs. Rus. ˙etomu ‘this; dat. sg.’, Blr. ën, [jɔn] vs. Rus. on ‘he’. One instance is (rather) unexceptional and therefore traditionally considered as still process based, whereas other scholars already note that this is developing into a morphonemic trait, specific to certain morphemes or words (cf. Lukasˇanec 2007, 17–18). This phenomenon is a Blr. /v/ before stressed /u, o/ and its absence in Standard Russian12 as in Blr. vulica vs. Rus. ulica, both ‘street’. All three phenomena thus provide at least some evidence for a development from phonic to morphonemic status. In each case the differences can easily be perceived and reproduced by Belarusians, in contrast to many other merely phonic differences. In this respect, they are salient and thus ideal candidates for conscious imitation in the sense of Trudgill (1986: 12–16), which would foster the process of unconscious accommodation. In the corpus analyzed, the frequencies for the Belarusian and Russian variants in the three phenomena are different: (a) In roughly 94 % of some 11,000 instances the Belarusian variant [γ] has been recorded. As to (b), in almost 18,000 instances the transcribers noted [i] or [a] to roughly 40 % each. In 20 % of the instances they noted an intermediate [e].13 (This pronunciation, called Ekanne, is common for many Russian dialects and used to be the norm in Russian some 100 years ago.) For (c) in 88 % of the instances the Russian variant, i.e. forms without the prothetic [v] are attested. How can these differences, especially the extremely divergent differences for (a) and (c), be explained? Trudgill (1986: 16) states “Salient features will be accommodated to unless other factors intervene to delay, inhibit or even prevent accommodation”. This obviously is the case here. Accommodation to the Russian trait does not occur to a significant extent with (a). Inhibiting factors here are: First, though the normative pronunciation in Russian is [g], many people 12

13

There are some instances of word-specific fossilized prothetic [v] in Russian: cf. not only Blr. vosem, but also Rus. vosem’ with Pol. osiem, all ‘eight’. The transcription was a rather broad one comprising three transcriptional options . Hentschel and Zeller (2011) offer an experimental study of this phenomenon in BRMS.

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with a South Russian background pronounce [γ] (or [x] instead of [k] in positions of devoicing). Second, the fricative variant is at least in that respect connoted with religion since even in Standard Russian the name of God, Bog, even today is a fricative (an old trace of the influence of Kievan Church Slavonic), although elsewhere in Russian and even broadly in Russian Church Slavonic (cf. Plähn 1978: 82) the pronunciation is [g]. But at least there is no negative connotation in pronouncing [γ]. No such inhibiting factor for accommodation to Russian exists in (c). On the contrary, the connotation of prothetic consonants in Russian, apart from the very few cases accepted in the standard variety, is negatively rural. In (b), where we find an intermediate degree of accommodation to Russian, factors delaying accommodation to the pronunciation of [ι] are the following: First, the degree of saliency in unstressed syllables is definitely less, although in directly pretonic position it is higher than in other unstressed positions: in the latter, reductive processes especially in Russian are much stronger. Second, there are Russian speakers who articulate [e] instead of [ι] in this position. Third, the articulation of the latter is (apart from some exceptions) not supported by orthography, neither in Belarusian (where it should not happen), nor in Russian. These regularities may not only have an impact on BRMS, but even on practiced Belarusian Standard: The pronunciation of [a] in positions of the type discussed in (b) and the pronunciation of [v] before stressed /u, o/ as discussed in (c) are no longer process governed but develop into instances of morphonemic representation (cf. Hentschel & Zeller (in press) for a more detailed study on phonic phenomena in BRMS). 2.3. Intermezzo: How many codes are there? In the same way as word forms and morphs, the utterances in the corpus under analysis (mostly sentences, sometimes elliptic constructions) can also be classified as either hybrid (containing Belarusian and Russian elements apart from unspecific, common ones), Belarusian (containing Belarusian and common elements), Russian (containing Russian and common ones), and common ones (containing only common elements and being structurally possible in both “donor” languages, Belarusian and Russian). The first relevant observation is that hybrid utterances comprise 53 % of the material (of all word forms) in the corpus, Russian ones nearly 30 %, Belarusian ones 12 %, and common ones 5 %. The latter are firstly infrequent and secondly very short. This classification and quantification ignores mere phonic traits, because the pronunciation is – as has been already stated – mostly Belarusian, even the pronunciation of Russian utterances.

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Second, some speaker-specific tendencies in choosing code in mixed discourse must be considered (cf. Hentschel & Zeller 2013): (i) The majority of respondents proved only to be capable of producing larger blocks of discourse either in Russian (apart from Belarusian phonic interferences) or in hybrid utterances. (ii) There are only a small number of respondents who produced some larger blocks of pure Belarusian utterances. As a rule, in addition to pure Belarusian speech these respondents showed largely mixed speech. Only two of them produced larger blocks of Belarusian, mixed speech and Russian. (iii) There are also only a few people who use rather exclusively mixed speech without any larger block of pure Belarusian or Russian speech. Most respondents thus have the choice to produce either mixed speech or Russian speech and sometimes even Belarusian speech in larger blocks of discourse.14 This allows for the following interpretation: Whereas for (the majority of) village-town-migrants of the 1970s and 1980s BRMS can be understood as an interlanguage, as an approximation to Russian, as has been suggested by Liskovec (2005), this would be ungrounded for the generation of their children. This generation practices BRMS in some informal, e.g. family contexts, mainly but not only communicating with the older generation, but on the other hand these people show a good or even very good command of Russian. (Of course, their spoken Russian shows some specific Belarusian characteristics, mostly phonic ones. But this is no different to the slight differences in spoken Standard German in North or South Germany, in Austria or Switzerland.) At least in this sense mixed speech can be considered a code of its own. This choice, be it conscious or unconscious, depends on the usual factors named for functional code switching: interlocutor, topic of the discourse, conversational strategy (we-code, they-code) and others. 14

In many places of discourse, of course, for example one Russian, one Belarusian and one hybrid utterance are produced in direct adjacency, without any obvious discourse-functional motivation for the putative switches. It must be taken into account that, first, most word forms have to be considered non-specific, common, due to the high degree of structural congruence between Belarusian and Russian (see below). So the Belarusianness or Russianness of single utterances (especially short ones, which prevail in informal conversations) in some cases can depend on just one specific Belarusian or Russian word form in the context of several common ones in the corresponding utterance and thus may be a matter of chance. Only for larger blocks of only Russian or Belarusian or hybrid utterances with one speaker can we be relatively sure that he or she had consciously or at least functionally chosen the given code (cf. Hentschel forthcoming). With single utterances or even phrases or word forms, Russian pronunciation would be indicative of a functional switch to Russian (which is very rarely the case), whereas Belarusian is almost never indicative.

103

Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus

When we try to find out whether mixed speech is developing toward a new, fused lect only the data from hybrid utterances, from instances of intrasentential intertwining of Belarusian, and Russian can be taken into account as the empirical basis. This is BRMS in the narrow sense which we will apply in the following, contrasting it with mixed Belarusian-Russian-BRMS discourse (BRMS in a broad sense). 2.4. Morphology 2.4.1. Some general quantitative observations There are approximately 42,000 word forms of nouns, verbs and adjectives and 20,000 of pronouns (tokens) in the corpus. If we qualify each morph for being common, Belarusian, Russian or hybrid we get the following relative (token) frequencies:15 Table 1: Share of common, Belarusian, Russian or hybrid morphs (in percent) Type of morph

word class

common

Belarusian

Russian

hybrid

stem

N/V/Adj Pro

69 % 59 %

6% 19 %

24 % 18 %

0% 1%

ending

N/V/Adj Pro

82 % 70 %

10 % 19 %

6% 10 %

0% 0%

If we ignore phonic surface facts due to the reasons outlined above, we find first of all that most morphs are common. Secondly, we can state that Russian does have a stronger impact in lexicon than in grammar. There are four times as many specific Russian stem morphs in the prototypical lexical word classes of nouns, verbs and adjectives than Belarusian ones. In stems of pronouns, i.e. more grammatical items, Belarusian and Russian show an equal share. But there are twice as many Belarusian endings than Russian ones in pronouns and lexical word classes. Nevertheless, these figures already indicate that there is no clear lexicon grammar cut. Instead, these figures hint at the phenomenon of dialect leveling. What must be underlined is the fact that there is almost no hybridity in the minimal linguistic signs of morphs. The instances that can be found are all 15

The value “0 %” in italics indicates that there is an n > 0, but that the relative frequency is below 0.5 %.

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hybrid in their morphonemic representation. The most regular and frequent phenomenon is the stem morpheme of the demonstrative pronoun of the proximal deixis. As described by Hentschel (2008b), there is a strong tendency to use a form with the Russian vocalic anlaut (e˙- instead of Blr. he˙-) but to avoid Russian-type stem allomorphy with a palatal [t’] in the whole plural paradigm and in instrumental case of masculine and neuter gender, and a non-palatal [t] in other cases: cf. widespread mixed speech ˙et-ym vs. Blr. he˙t-ym and Rus. ˙et-im. Turning now to word forms, tokens and types16 will be differentiated:17 Table 2: Share of common, Belarusian, Russian or hybrid word forms (tokens) Word class

common

Belarusian

Russian

hybrid

n

N/V/Adj

38 %

22 %

33 %

7%

39,105

Pro

41 %

33 %

22 %

%

19,788

Table 3: Share of common, Belarusian, Russian or hybrid word forms (types) Word class

common

Belarusian

Russian

N/V/Adj

36 %

20 %

36 %

8%

Pro

20 %

36 %

32 %

12 %

16

17

hybrid

n 15,216 928

Note that it is not lemmata that are meant by “types of word forms”, but unique forms with a certain lexical meaning and/or certain grammatical “meanings”. Differences on the expression plane of the forms are only taken into consideration if they are indicative for belonging to Belarusian or Russian on the level of morphonemic representation. For example, the nominative singular form of the feminine noun ruk-a ‘hand’ is interpreted as one type of word form, here a common one, occurring in Belarusian and Russian. The form ruk-e is the expression of two other types, here of Russian word forms, firstly the dative singular, secondly the locative (in the Russian tradition usually called prepositive) singular of the same noun denoting ‘hand’. Consequently, a third form ruc-e˙ stands for two still further types of word forms, in these cases Belarusian word forms, again for the dative and for the locative singular of ‘hand’. This simple example for the noun ‘hand’ illustrates that there are instances where it is simply impossible to differentiate between Belarusian and Russian in mixed speech on the level of abstract lemmata. Some inflectional forms with a given lexical meaning and common etymological background can be differentiated, others cannot. And in genetically closely related and structurally very similar languages like Belarusian and Russian there are tens of thousands of such instances, that may be called “interlemmata”. Names, mainly personal names and place names, and abbreviations, inflected and uninflected ones, have been excluded from the analysis.

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With respect to tokens, even at the level of word forms the common elements are the most frequent ones, but of course their share (compared with the share of common morphs) decreases. In word forms of inflected word classes, i.e. in linguistic units that consist of at least a stem and an ending (and maybe some affixes) this is a normal statistical effect, because of the probability of a common stem or ending being combined with a specific (Belarusian or Russian) ending (or affix), that makes the whole word form specific. With respect to types, a differentiation between inflected lexical items (nouns, verbs, adjectives) on the one hand and pronouns on the other is necessary: For the former, the relative shares of common, Belarusian, Russian and hybrid types by and large resemble the corresponding shares in tokens. This results from the fact that in corpora of the size of the one analyzed here, the vast majority of types of lexical word forms (as a matter of fact, even of lemmata) is represented by just one or two word forms. (Some instances, where this is clearly not the case, will be discussed in section 2.6.) Note that the absolute frequency of types of lexical word forms (15,216) makes up 39 % of the absolute frequency of the tokens of lexical word forms (39,105). Things are different for types of word forms of pronouns. Here the absolute number of types of word forms (928) equals roughly 5 % of the absolute number of tokens of pronominal forms. This reflects the universally much higher token frequency of pro-forms compared with lexical items. In detail, two phenomena deserve attention. (a) The type frequency of common proforms is much lower than their token frequency. It is clearly lower than the type frequency of Belarusian and Russian. (b) The type frequency of Russian pro-forms almost reaches that of Belarusian pro-forms, whereas in tokens of pro-forms the Belarusian share is much higher than the Russian one. These two phenomena can to a large extent be explained by very simple facts of universal regularities of token frequency and/or phenomena of systematic differences or coincidences between Belarusian and Russian pronouns. For (a), one of the main reasons is connected with personal pronouns: First, in oral conversation (in many cases of dialogic character) deictic personal pronouns (‘I, you, we’) show a very high token frequency. Of course, this holds only for languages that (rather) systemically realize pronominal subjects in speech (non-pro-drop languages). This is the case in Belarusian and Russian (contrary to Polish). Second, in inflected (Indo-European) languages the nominative case of these pronouns is the most frequent one. Third, the four corresponding pro-forms relevant here are common in both donor languages; ja ‘I’, ty ‘you, sg.’, my ‘we’, vy ‘you, pl.’. These four common pronominal forms (types) in nominative case make up 5 percent of the types, but 18 % (n=3,617) of the tokens. A high token frequency can also be found

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for anaphoric pronouns, again especially of those in nominative. This holds for the corpus analyzed too, but the absolute number is firstly lower than those of deictic personal pronouns (n=2,662), which is 13 % of all types, and secondly each of the two languages has specific forms for ‘he, she, it, they’: Blr. ‘n, jana, jano, jany vs. Rus. on, ona, ono, oni. So the overall number of tokens must be divided into two specific shares. Here the Belarusian one is larger (10 %), the Russian one smaller (4 %). The general point to be made here is that there are many cases of pro-forms with certain structural values that cross-linguistically (not only in Russian or Belarusian) show a high token frequency, but for which Belarusian and Russian do not show formal differences. Another instance is the nominative and accusative for the pronoun ‘what’, which is only spelled differently in the two languages (Blr. sto and Rus. ‰to), but pronounced in the same way. For (b) the reason is much simpler: Due to the generally high token frequency of pronouns, almost every Belarusian pro-form with certain systematic values (type of pronoun, case, gender, number) finds its Russian equivalent in the corpus, and vice versa. On the level of tokens, the Belarusian ones are on average more frequent, but things may differ drastically for single items: For example, the interrogative pronoun ‘who’ is only realized in 7 % of the instances for nominative case (n=269) by the Russian variant kto, in 93 % by the Belarusian one xto. Things are completely different for the determinative pronoun ‘every, each’: all 88 occurrences show the Russian stem kazˇd-, none the corresponding Belarusian stem kozˇn-. All this requires further detailed investigation. All in all, at first glance there is a rather low share of hybrid word forms, both in tokens and types.18 But as Tesch (in press) has argued, the following must be taken into account: hybrid forms consist of minimally two specific morphs, at least one Belarusian and one Russian, apart from possible common ones. Belarusian and Russian word forms minimally contain only one specific morph, either from one or the other language. This means that in order to estimate the impact of hybridization in morphology one must compare the frequency of hybrid word forms with language specific Belarusian and Russian word forms with at least two morphs from the respective language. We restrict our quantitative analysis here to tokens of stems and endings: 18

As a matter of fact, within types of pronouns the share of hybrids (table 3) is three times higher than that found in tokens (table 2). This is mainly due to the fact that although hybridity of word forms is (as will be immediately shown) on the token level higher with lexical items than with pro-forms, it is higher with pro-forms on the type level, because there are far fewer types of pro-forms than lexical forms.

107

Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus Table 4: Morphologically hybrid vs. non-hybrid word forms (tokens) stem

ending

N/V/Adj (n=2,730)

Pro (n=3,200)

Blr.

Blr.

19 %

30 %

Rus.

Rus.

49 %

56 %

Rus.

Blr.

31 %

12 %

Blr.

Rus.

0%

0%

These figures tell us that morphological hybridization is widespread among lexical word classes but much less so for pro-forms. The latter fact is due to their high token frequency: at least in certain grammatical values they are acquired and produced holistically. With respect to lexical stems, it must be underlined that hybridity is common only for Russian stems combining with Belarusian endings, e.g. mixed vtar-y vs. Blr. druh-i and Rus. vtor-oj ‘the second’, zerkal-y vs. ljustr-y and zerkal-a, palu‰aj-e vs. atrymlivaj-e and polu‰a[j]-et. These forms are even more frequent than fully Belarusian inflectional forms, i.e. forms with Belarusian stem and ending. There are only very few instances of combinations of Belarusian stems with Russian endings, e.g. mixed nijakava vs. Blr. nijak-aha and Rus. nikak-ogo [-ovə], pryjdz-ët [-ot] vs. pryjdz-e and prid-ët. This simply reflects the well-known, probably universal fact that speakers from a given language or variety acquire lexical items from other languages more easily than grammatical ones. 2.4.2. Endings As has been stated above, it is generally claimed that in inflectional morphology in BRMS Belarusian traits dominate. And of course there are instances supporting this position. One of them is the ending of adjectives, adjectival participles and pronouns with adjectival inflection in genitive case in singular number of masculine and neutral gender and, when in congruence with personal nouns, accusative case of masculine gender. Belarusian has an ending of the structure /-VγV/ and is thus in line with all other Slavic languages showing in a regular way either a dorsal fricative /γ/ (//) or plosive /g/ except for Russian, which here exhibits a labiodental fricative, i.e. /-VvV/. Furthermore, in Russian it is only in this ending where /v/ is graphemically not represented by the usual Cyrillic character /v but by /g, the usual letter for /g/, indicating thus the historical quality of the consonant. Within almost 800 instances analyzed, there is an average preponderance of 70 % of the Belaru-

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sian variant. This quantitative relation is very stable in all seven locations where data has been gathered. We find another example for the preference of a Belarusian ending with verb forms in present tense 3rd person singular. In Belarusian the ending is either /-V/ or /Vts’/, but in Russian always /-Vt/ (apart from some irregular forms, which have not been taken into consideration). There are about 2,900 instances of such forms, in about 2,200 of them Belarusian and Russian clearly contrast.19 In the latter, we find a clear preponderance of Belarusian endings. Russian-type endings make up only about 21 %. The Belarusian ones can be divided into the group with endings in concord with the standard language (62 %) and with endings from dialectal inflection (17 %). This tendency is again very stable in all seven locations. Whereas these inflectional phenomena seemingly indicate that Belarusian dominates in this area, there are other phenomena that clearly contradict it. The first contradictory phenomenon can be found with genitive case of masculine nouns in the singular. Both languages have the two endings /-a/ and /-u/, but with partially different regularities of their distribution. Both languages share, for example, the trait that personal nouns allow only for /-a/. With inanimate nouns, both endings are used in both languages, but in Russian the occurrence of /-u/ is rather restricted. Apart from some idiomatic sequences like iz domu, /-u/ occurs only when one of certain mass nouns (not mass nouns in general) in the utterance or sentence refers to some rather indeterminate amount of that mass (e.g. nemnozˇko ‰aju ‘some tea’). Some call this a partitive usage. All these nouns take the ending /-a/ in other genitive contexts and beyond.20 In Belarusian /-u/ is much more widespread. Nouns that take /-u/ in Belarusian may be grouped by some semantic features. But often there are exceptions, for example, with mass nouns (njamnoha rys-u/xleb-a ‘some rice/bread’). There are 420 instances of masculine nouns in the genitive singular in the corpus where the two languages would contrast. And we find a clear preponderance of the Russian variant /-a/ of 84 %. Again this preferential tendency is very stable in all seven locations. 19

20

There are about 700 instances where, due to assimilation processes, it is hard to tell whether there is the Belarusian ending /-t s ’/ or the Russian one /-t/ before the reflexive postfix -sja. Note that here the standard inventory of six morphological cases in Russian is taken as the background for the description. The phenomenon just described is one of the instances where if a rather rigorous approach to modeling morphological case is taken, a further case should be acknowledged (cf. Zaliznjak 1967: 36–55). Some call these instances of /-u/ with Russian mass nouns “second genitive” or “partitive”.

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A second instance of preferring Russian inflectional variants can be found with adjective forms (see above) of masculine and neuter gender in locative case of the singular number. Whereas Russian in this position has an ending that differentiates locative from instrumental case, both forms coincide in Belarusian (e.g. Rus. velik-om vs. velik-im, Blr. vjalikim in both cases). Apart from instances where due to the above cited reductive processes with unstressed vowels it cannot be stated whether the ending resembles Belarusian or Russian patterns, almost 90 % of the endings (with n=100) are of the Russian type, contrasting them formally with instrumental forms. And this is so in all seven locations. The third example is the nominative and accusative plural of neuter nouns. Gender differences are formally much less reflected in plural paradigms than in singular ones. There is a rather general historical tendency of leveling such contrasts. Belarusian shows no reflection of gender differences in the endings of nouns in the nominative plural, with /-i/, -i/-y as the standard ending. In Russian, the ending /-i/ dominates in the nominative plural of nouns of masculine21 and feminine gender, but with most neuter nouns it is /-a/. Although the Belarusian trait of leveling gender differences is the simpler variant, it is the Russian ending /-a/ that dominates quantitatively in the corpus: roughly 80 % (n=108). Again, this quantitative relation holds for all seven locations with only insignificant differences. 2.5. Morphosyntax As in many other comparable cases, German-Polish language contact in Silesia – a contact between structurally different languages – suggests that in morphosyntax one language can easily interfere with the other and thus change it permanently (cf. Tambor 2008: 172–172). Tesch (forthcoming) tackles this question for several phenomena where Belarusian and Russian show differences. (In many other contexts, morphosyntactic structures in both languages are congruent.) The first phenomenon to be discussed is case assignment to nouns in the scope of numerals ‘two’, ‘three’, ‘four’ (even as final parts of complex numbers) and ‘both’ in noun phrases that without quantification would receive nominative or accusative case. (In structural contexts where other cases would be assigned, no differences between the two languages arise.) In 21

Of course, there are some masculine nouns taking /-a/ (exclusive stressed) in nominative plural (cf. Hentschel 1991). But this is of no importance in this discussion.

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Standard Belarusian we find an agreement pattern (as with other case contexts). Noun and numeral take the same case and – with ‘two’ – gender, and the noun is in plural number. The noun can be considered the controller of agreement. In Standard Russian we find a construction with a rather complicated mixture of agreement and government, the latter being dominant. Here only the numeral takes nominative or accusative case, but the nouns occur in the genitive form22 although from the singular sub-paradigm.23 Obviously the numeral governs case and number of the noun. With ‘two’, the noun functions as the controller of agreement in gender: masculine dva stola ‘two tables’, but feminine dve zmei ‘two snakes’. Another complication lies in the fact that in both languages for nouns of feminine or neutral gender the forms of genitive singular on the one hand and nominative and accusative plural on the other coincide. The noun Rus. dve komnaty can be interpreted as both genitive singular and nominative (accusative) plural case. A final complication is of a different nature: both morphosyntactic patterns can be found in Belarusian dialects with a concentration of the congruent pattern in the Northwest and of the government pattern in the Southeast. When we (following Tesch forthcoming) concentrate our analysis on the occurrences of phrases with paucal numerals where we can undoubtedly differentiate between the competing patterns in Belarusian and Russian, the result is that the more complicated, Russian-like pattern dominates clearly: of the 172 patterns found in the corpus, 72 % are of this type. The government pattern dominates in all seven locations of data collection more or less clearly. Only in one place, where the agreement pattern is dominant in the surrounding dialects, is the quantitative relation between the two variants roughly balanced. (This hints at the possibility that there may be different developments of tendencies for preferences in different areas of the country.) However, the government pattern clearly remains the more attractive one. The next phenomenon is the question of the case governed by the prepositions Blr. pa and Rus. po: dative or locative.24 In Russian, po almost always 22

23

24

In these contexts with paucal numerals, some Russian nouns have forms differentiated by stress from usual genitive forms: zna‰enie saga vs. dva saga ‘the importance of the step’ vs. ‘two steps’. For this reason, Zaliznjak (1967: 46–48) postulates the additional case “counting form”. When there is an adjective in such a phrase it would take the genitive, too, but occur in the corresponding plural form: dva bol’ˇsix stola ‘two large tables’. We ignore phrases of this shape in our discussion because they are extremely rare in the corpus, so that no conclusions can be drawn from them. Furthermore, both languages have constructions with pa/po plus accusative, which are irrelevant here.

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governs dative case (with the exception of some very view-specific contexts with po where both cases are possible). In Belarusian, some structural contexts demand dative case as in Russian, others locative case. The rather complicated distributional regularities cannot be described here. Tesch’s (forthcoming) analysis concentrates on the contrasting structural contexts and states an overall preponderance of dative case (88 % of 159 instances) – to put it clearly, where Belarusian actually demands locative case. The Russianlike trait is again on the winning side in all locations investigated. The final morphosyntactic phenomenon to be mentioned is the competition between the prepositions of Russian iz (a preposition not attested in Belarusian) and Belarusian z with the noun phrase denoting the source of an action and similar participants: e.g. Blr. pryvezci z vëski, Rus. privezti iz derevni ‘to take from the village’, Blr. adno z dvux, Rus. odno iz dvux ‘one of two’. In many other structural contexts, the noun denoting the source in Russian would be marked by the preposition s: Rus. snjat’ s polki, Blr. znjac’ z palicy. Due to regularities of voice assimilation, Blr. z and Rus. s can often not be differentiated in speech. In the latter example, the pronunciation would be [s] for both. Tesch (forthcoming) analyzed contexts in the corpus of Mixed Speech where Russian would demand iz: again we get a very clear result, but this time with the Russian trait on the losing side. In 89 % of 267 relevant instances a non-syllabic preposition [z/s] ist attested, which before sonorants, where there is no voice assimilation, in the clear majority of cases turns out to be s rather than z. 2.6. The lexicon The corpus with its roughly 212,000 running words that can be analyzed for this study does, of course, not allow for a comprehensive study of the lexicon. But it is possible to analyze lexical variables where the equivalent variables from Belarusian and Russian exhibit a high token frequency. 2.6.1. Non-inflected functional words Non-inflected functional words are heterogeneous in their functions. We find polarity particles ‘yes, no’, deictic pronominal adverbs ‘now, then …’, conjunctions ‘or, but …’, modal operators ‘it is necessary that’, particles ‘only, even …’ and many others.25 Here we also find that in cases of pairs 25

The classification patterns of such elements vary strongly in the literature. We accept the approach of Grochowski (1997). But we do not take into account prepositions in this part of analysis because they can be analyzed more precisely in

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(triples …) with at least one Belarusian and one Russian equivalent, sometimes the former, sometimes (but generally more often) the latter dominates clearly, and sometimes the quantitative relation is rather balanced (see Hentschel in press for details26). Very clear instances of the preponderance of the Russian variant over the Belarusian equivalent are to be observed in the following cases (the Belarusian variant27 will always be given first): taksama < tozˇe ‘also’ (99 %, n=332), potym < potom ‘also’ (97 %, n=347), tak < da ‘yes’ (99 %, n=472), tre˙ba < nado ‘it is necessary’ (92 %, n=641) and many others with lower percentage values but still clear quantitative dominance. Instances of preferences for the Belarusian variant are: tady > togda ‘then’ (77 %, n=54), ne > net ‘no’ (92 %, n=704), dze > gde ‘where’ (87 %, n=345), jas‰e˙ [_ε] > es‰ë [_ɔ] ‘still’ (67 %, n=691). Among the 25 most frequent equivalent pairs (triples …) analyzed by Hentschel (in press) there are clearly fewer with Belarusian quantitative dominance, and where this is the case the highest Belarusian percentage values are lower than for the highest Russian ones. For pairs that on a country-wide scale show a balanced quantitative relation between equivalent elements from Belarusian and Russian, there are often (not always) opposite tendencies in different part of the country. For the last pair named (jas‰e˙ – es‰ë), in one of the seven towns and cities Russian es‰ë is clearly preferred. Nevertheless, there are obviously different distribution patterns of the correlating elements in the pairs in BRMS on the one hand and Standard Belarusian or Russian on the other. Compare in this light the patterns of the polarity expressions ‘yes – no’: Blr. tak – ne, Rus. da – net, BRMS da – ne. The reason for a Belarusian or Russian variant being preferred (given the background of a rather general orientation towards Russian) may vary highly, for socio- or structural linguistic reasons, which cannot be discussed here in detail (but cf. Hentschel in press). Only two points shall be indicated here with corresponding examples. In another pair of equivalences cited by Hentschel (in press), tut – zdes’, the latter, a Russian variant, is extremely rare (4 %,

26

27

morphosyntax, i.e. in connection with the element or syntactical value they are connected with on the one hand and, on the other hand, together with the nominal elements they govern formally. Note that in the paper cited I concentrate on hybrid utterances of the Trasyanka corpus, as I do in the whole of the present paper. Other papers cited in this part mostly take all the material into consideration. In many cases both Belarusian and Russian elements show a considerable amount of variation on the expression plane (in phonetics of the phonological representation of the etymologically stable element). We do not make this variation explicit but rather name the variants from the standard languages.

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n=466). But its dominating counterpart tut cannot be classified as specific for Belarusian. It is common to both languages and functions in Russian as a partial synonym for zdes’. But tut cannot be used everywhere in Russian where zdes’ is possible. And where this is possible, the latter is stylistically higher. Be that as it may, there is a clear regularity in the distribution of such ßßßcompetes with a functionally roughly equivalent variant that is common to both languages, then the latter will win. Another interesting case has been outlined by U. Ljankevicˇ (2011). Blr. dyk28 is extremely frequent in the corpus, in all seven locations. It is a highly polyfunctional element. Depending on these different functions it must be translated by several different expressions into Russian. For example, as a conjunction it has the equivalent Rus. to in the sense of ‘then’ in if … then …. It correlates with Russian tak in the sense of ‘so’ in we have done our work, so we can go. As a particle it can be either Rus. ved’ corresponding to German doch in er ist doch krank ‘he is ill, you know/don’t you remember’. Some more Russian equivalents could be named for other contexts. It is obviously the fragmentation of the “landscape of Russian equivalents” that makes dyk resistant to being replaced by one or the other Russian equivalent. 2.6.2. Discourse markers and lexical words In a bilingual constellation, discourse markers are known to be easily taken from the language that individuals or groups are eager to adapt to. Katsiura (2011) analyzed several competing discourse markers in BRMS. Most of them derive from verb forms in the second person singular (less frequently plural) or with the imperative forms of the verbs. In some cases, the preponderance of the corresponding Russian elements is indeed extremely strong. All instances (n=115) for the pair Blr. razumees – Rus. ponimaes’ ‘you understand’ are realized by the latter. Somewhat less drastic but still clear is the quantitative dominance of the Russian element in the pairs Blr. ba‰ys < Rus. vidis’ (85 %, n=157) ‘you see’ and ‰ues < Rus. slysis’ (74 %, n=31) ‘you hear’ (rather used as an imperative ‘you should listen’). Again we find contrasting pairs with one common and one specific element, common znaes > Blr. vedaes ‘you know’ (n=271) and common hljadzi/gljadi29 > Rus. smotri ‘look’ (n=139). 28

29

Note that the classification of dyk as Belarusian, in spite of its presence in Russian sub-varieties, results from the methodological criteria outlined in 2.1. Dyk is broadly used in both, in the Belarusian Standard language and in Belarusian subvarieties, but not in Contemporary Standard Russian. The first form represents the Belarusian, the latter the Russian pronunciation (see above).

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In Katsiura’s analysis it is the common variant that dominates clearly (99 % or 73 % respectively), irrespective which language the specific form belongs to. We can thus state a clear tendency for discourse markers that are derived from verbs to be either Russian or common. Incidentally, Katsiura points out that very similar preferences hold for the elements of pairs mentioned when the forms are not used as discourse markers but as normal verb forms of corresponding sentences. Zaprudski and Janenka (2011) offer the first analyses of competing lexical items. In a couple of lexical pairs their findings support the communis opinio about the Russian character of the lexicon in BRMS (Belarusian variant always named first): hadzina < ‰as ‘hour’ (98 %, n=197), ‰as < vremja ‘time’ (98 %, n=188), pytanne < vopros ‘question’ (93 %, n=108), vëska < derevnja ‘village’ (75 %, n=145). But there are instances where we find a rather balanced quantitative relation: sukac’ – iskat’ ‘to look for’ (54 % vs. 46 %, n=58), hrosy – den’gi ‘money’ (45 % vs. 55 %, n=225) and mova – jazyk ‘language’ (38 % vs. 62 %, n=84). And last but not least there are instances, though rare, where the Belarusian variant is clearly preferred: bac’ka > otec ‘father’ (91 %, n=145). The latter is an instance of the stability of autochthonous (substrata) words with high frequency when they denote objects in the private sphere. Lexical variables with variants from both languages in general and specifically pairs with a balanced quantitative relation between the variants must still be analyzed more thoroughly, not only for dialectal constellations supporting the usage of one or the other variant but also for their specific synonymic relation, i.e. for differences in metaphorical usage or in respect to patterns of polysemy and collocation. For example, it is often the case that mova is used when referring to Belarusian (Blr. belaruskaja mova) and jazyk with reference to Russian (Rus. russkij jazyk). By and large, most of the lexical items apart from common ones are much more frequently Russian-like elements (see above). But there remain instances where Belarusian-like elements are preserved and may even dominate.

3.

Conclusion

The above description of distributional regularities of Belarusian, Russian (and common) equivalents on different structural levels in BRMS indicates clearly that there is no relatively homogeneous mixed Belarusian-Russian sub-variety in the sense of a relatively stabilized fused lect all over Belarus. But nevertheless there are several stable country-wide patterns of a redistribution of functionally equivalent Belarusian and Russian elements or traits

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on all structural levels, which make BRMS differ from both Belarusian and Russian in the corresponding structural contexts. Additionally, in some instances there are different preferential tendencies for a Belarusian or Russian variant in different parts of the country. The schematic areal distribution patterns for competing elements or traits b and r from Belarusian or Russian are the following: Table 5: Schematic areal distribution patterns for competing elements or traits Area:

A

B

C

D

…

Variable 1

b

b

b

b

b

Variable 2

r

r

r

r

r

Variable 3

b

r

r

b

b or r

Variable 4

b≈r

b≈r

b≈r

b≈r

b≈r

This means that for some instances of competition, the Belarusian variant b is clearly preferred all over the country (as in variable 1), in others it is the Russian one (as in variable 2). For still others, the preferences of b and r vary in different areas (as in variable 3) and for some there are no clear preferences to be found (variable 4). Of course, other combinations of these four principal schemes are possible and do exist. The observation that apart from traits and patterns common in and specific to BRMS in all places there is some areal heterogeneity (cf. Hentschel 2013 on further aspects of stability in BRMS) is itself not astonishing. This can be compared with mixed varieties between rural dialects and standard language for example in Germany (especially Southern Germany). The social, political and psychological difference is that in Germany there is only one standard, which is perceived as an “autochthonous” standard, whereas in Belarus there are two competing standards, Belarusian and Russian, and it is the latter that dominates and shapes mixed speech decisively. But it is perceived as non-autochthonous, foreign. This mixture of “the own and the foreign” is stirring up some parts of Belarusian elites. The mere fact of many rather stabilized preferences for a Belarusian or Russian variant (be they characteristic for the whole Belarusian territory or for sub-areas) of a considerable number of variables suggests the existence of a fused lect at least in statu nascendi (or a couple of areal fused lects with a considerable structural overlap). The overall tendency is that Russian elements and traits dominate. And this is not astonishing. BRMS arose in a social situation where Belarusians had to accommodate to Soviet-Russian social

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patterns, including linguistic ones. BRMS was thus triggered by the endeavor to speak Russian, i.e. initially it was a reflection of imperfect learning of Russian. But since today there is a generation of speakers with good and fluent competence in Russian, who in certain contexts nevertheless often switch to BRMS, this of course means that for many speakers BRMS does not correlate with imperfect learning of Russian. Furthermore, the widespread “parallel” usage of BRMS and Russian by many respondents for family communication and the rather weak quantitative role of Belarusian in this area indicate that it is Russian that has a stronger impact on BRMS today (and probably in the future) than Belarusian. But on the other hand there are (although fewer) Belarusian elements and traits that are preferred in BRMS and some (although rare) instances of hybrid formations with a considerable frequency, such as the very widespread fused paradigm of the demonstrative pronoun of the proximal deixis with a Russian-like initial vowel and a Belarusian-like stable non-palatal stem final consonant. The latter is fostered by the close structural resemblance of the two “donor” paradigms. Then there is the question of which role structural and social factors play for the decisions made in competitions between functionally equivalent elements and traits from Belarusian and Russian. Unfortunately, there is no space here to discuss this at length. But it can definitely be stated that the more simple structural solution is by far not always preferred in such competitions. There are certainly such instances, for example, when in BRMS following Russian the simpler pattern with the preposition po plus only dative is preferred whereas Belarusian has po with either dative or locative in complementary distribution. The same holds when the ending /-a/ with the genitive singular of masculine nouns dominates in BRMS following Russian to the disadvantage of the rather complicated complementary distribution of /-a/ and /-u/ in Belarusian. But simplicity alone, at least on the Belarusian side, is obviously not decisive: the rather complicated morphosyntactic pattern in the context of paucal numerals of Russian is clearly preferred over the simple agreement pattern of Belarusian. Nor is the generalization of /-i/ as the ending of all nouns in the nominative plural preferred in BRMS, but rather the more complex Russian pattern with the special ending /-a/ for neuter nouns. On the other hand, a “functional all-rounder” like Belarusian dyk with its high frequency in BRMS seems to hold its own in competition with its various Russian (and there equally frequent) counterparts. On the whole, the social dominance of Russian in Belarusian society is obviously the strongest general factor. But there are selective factors, social and structural ones specific to the corresponding variable, that motivate the resistance of Belarusian variants to being replaced by Russian ones.

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Of course there are differences in the degree of dominance of Russian traits and elements on different structural layers. But there is clearly no sharp lexicon-grammar split, although this differentiation, which is taken to be the decisive criterion for assuming a mixed language, does play a role (Matras and Bakker 2003). But this role is rather one of gradation. The data from BRMS suggest a hierarchy of strength of Russian impact as follows: phonic elements < inflectional endings (with pronouns < with lexical words) < pronominal stems / functional words30 < lexical stems < discourse markers The higher the structural sub-area on the right of this hierarchy, the stronger the influence of Russian and the weaker that of Belarusian. But there are, without any doubt, elements of both in all of these areas. And this is different from the instances of a rather clear-cut distribution of elements from one or the other language in similar (generic) hierarchies cited by Matras and Bakker (2003: 1–8). But all their examples refer to couples of typologically and structurally different languages. Belarusian and Russian on the dialect (sub-variety) level and standard level are extremely congruent languages and this is most obviously the reason for the gradational distribution pattern of competing Belarusian and Russian elements and traits across structural subareas. In other words, the example of BRMS indicates that a sharp lexicongrammar split, which is reportedly typical for mixed languages from structurally and genetically clearly differing donor languages should not be expected for the fusion of two structurally very similar and genetically closely related languages or varieties. The previously mentioned, empirically proved hierarchy in BRMS most obviously resembles well-known hierarchies of “borrowability” (cf. Field 2002: 34–40). But one is reluctant to speak of borrowing in the traditional sense. Against the background of the phenomena described, it would be misleading to describe BRMS as the result of massive borrowing from Russian into Belarusian, although BRMS is a phenomenon of Belarusian society. It would also be misleading to speak of borrowing from Belarusian into Russian, although Russian characteristics dominate not only in the lexicon but even in some parts of grammar. The concept of copying, proposed by Johanson (2008) or the one of replication, proposed by Matras (2009: 146–165) 30

These two areas have not been compared directly. But functional (uninflected) words show less impact from Russian than lexical stems and pronominal stems more than pronominal endings.

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can solve this problem, last but not least in terminology. Elements, traits and constructions from both languages are steadily copied into or replicated in mixed speech, here BRMS. Some are preferably shaped on samples from one language, some on ones from the other language, others, like the hybrids, on samples from both languages und finally some can be innovations based on the creative linguistic capacities of all human beings. Last but not least, preferences that evolve can get stabilized in the mixed varieties when they are used to such an extent and over such a long time as is the case in Belarus, but mixed varieties, especially mixed sub-varieties, will of course always remain highly variative (due to an overlap of conventionalized and spontaneous mixing), as long as one or two or even more donor varieties remain in usage in the corresponding society.

References Auer, Peter 1999 From code-switching via language mixing to fused lects: Toward a dynamic typology of bilingual speech. The International Journal of Bilingualism 3: 309–332. Bieder, Hermann in press Die weißrussisch-russische Mischsprache (Trasjanka) als Forschungsproblem. In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Bullock, Barbara E. 2009 Phonetic reflexes of code-switching. In: Barbara E. Bullock and Almeida J. Toribio (eds.), The Cambridge handbook of linguistic code-switching, 163–181. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cyxun, Henadz’ 2000 Kre˙alizavany pradukt. Trasjanka jak ab’ekt linhvistycˇnaha dasledavannja [A creolized product. Trasyanka as an object of linguistic inquiry]. In: http://arche.home.by (No. 6). Cyxun, Henadz’ in press Soziolinguistische, soziokulturelle und psychologische Grundlagen gemischten Sprechens. In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Dubois, Sylvie and David Sankoff 2001 The Variationist Approach toward Discourse Structural Effects and Socio-interactional Dynamics. In: Deborah Schiffrin, Deborah Tannen and Heidi E. Hamilton (eds.), The handbook of discourse analysis, 282–303. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell. Field, Frederic W. 2002 Linguistic borrowing in bilingual contexts. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Grochowski, Maciej 1997 Wyraz˙enia funkcyjne. Studium leksykograficzne [Function expressions. A lexicographic study]. Kraków: Wydawnictwo IJP PAN. Hentschel, Gerd 1991 Rol’ sxem formal’noj differenciacii v razvitii flektivnoj sistemy russkogo jazyka [The role of schemes of formal differentiation in the development of the Russian inflectional system]. Russian Linguistics 15: 31–51. Hentschel, Gerd 2008a Zur weißrussisch-russischen Hybridität in der weißrussischen “Trasjanka”. In: Peter Kosta and Daniel Weiss (eds.), Slavistische Linguistik 2006/2007, 169–219. (Slavistische Beiträge 464.) München: Otto Sagner.

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Hentschel, Gerd 2008b On the development of inflectional paradigms in Belarusian Trasjanka: The case of demonstrative pronouns. In: Gerd Hentschel and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), Belarusian Trasjanka and Ukrainian Surzˇyk: Structural and social aspects of their description and categorization, 99–133. (Studia Slavica Oldenburgensia 17.) Oldenburg: BIS Verlag. Hentschel, Gerd and Bernhard Kittel 2011 Weißrussische Dreisprachigkeit? Zur sprachlichen Situation in Weißrussland auf der Basis von Urteilen von Weißrussen über die Verbreitung “ihrer Sprachen” im Lande. Wiener Slawistischer Almanach 67: 107–135. Hentschel, Gerd 2013 Zwischen Variabilität und Regularität, „Chaos“ und Usus: Zu Lautung und Lexik der weißrussisch-russischen gemischten Rede. In: G. Hentschel (Hrsg.): Variation und Stabilität in Kontaktvarietäten: Beobachtungen zu gemischten Formen der Rede in Weißrussland, der Ukraine und Schlesien. (= Studia Slavica Oldenburgensia 21), Oldenburg, 63–99 Hentschel, Gerd in press Zur Systemhaftigkeit der weißrussisch-russischen gemischten Rede: Phänomene der Redistribution von weißrussischen und russischen Varianten von Funktionswörtern. In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Hentschel, Gerd forthcoming Mixed Belarusian-Russian speech and mixed BelarusianRussian discourse. Hentschel, Gerd and Jan Patrick Zeller [Xensˇel’, G. and J. P. Celler] 2011 Jakan’e, ekan’e, ikan’e v belorussko-russkoj smesˇannoj recˇi: nabljudenija na osnove e˙ksperimental’no-akusticˇeskogo analiza [Yakanie, ekanie, ikanie in the BelarusianRussian mixed speech: observations based on experimental-acoustic analysis]. In: Galina Ivanovna Sˇevcˇenko (red.), Aktual’nye problemy filologii: anti‰naja kul’tura i slavjanskij mir, 228–234. Minsk: RIVSˇ. Hentschel, Gerd and Jan Patrick Zeller 2013 Gemischte Rede, gemischter Diskurs, Sprechertypen: Weißrussisch, Russisch und gemischte Rede in der Kommunikation weißrussischer Familien. In: Wiener Slawistischer Almanach 70 (2012): 127–155. Hentschel, Gerd and Jan Patrick Zeller in press Belarusians’ pronunciation: Belarusian or Russian? Evidence from Belarusian-Russian mixed speech. In: Russian Linguistics 38 (2). Hentschel, Gerd, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.) in press Studies on Belarusian Trasjanka and Ukrainian Surzˇyk as results of Belarusian- and Ukrainian-Russian language contact. (Papers from a conference, Oldenburg, June 15th–18th 2007.) Frankfurt/M.: Lang. Kittel, Bernhard, Diana Lindner, Sviatlana Tesch and Gerd Hentschel 2010 Mixed language usage in Belarus. The sociostructural background of language choice. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 206: 47–71. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar: copying, conventionalization, grammticalisation. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language contact and contact languages, 61–79. (Hamburg Studies on Multilingualism 7.) Amsterdam: Benjamins. Liskovec, Irina 2005 Russkij i belorusskij jazyki v Minske: problemy bilingvizma i otnosenija k jazyku [The Russian and the Belarusian language in Minsk: problems of bilingualism and language attitudes]. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation European University St. Petersburg. Liskovets, Irina 2009 Trasjanka: A code of rural migrants in Minsk. International Journal of Bilingualism 13: 396–412.

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Ljankevicˇ, Alena in press Die Einstellung zu den gemischten sprachlichen Codes in Weißrussland (an Material eines Matched Guise Tests). In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Ljankevicˇ, Uladzimir 2011 Zna‰enija i funkcii ˙elementa “dyk” v belorussko-russkoj smesannoj re‰i [Meaning and functions of the element “dyk” in the Belarusian-Russian mixed speech]. Paper read on the conference Belarusian Trasjanka – a “mixed variety” as a product of Belarusian-Russian language contact, Oldenburg, Germany, March 29th–31st. Lukasˇanec, Aljaksandr A. 2007 Karotkaja hramatyka belaruskaj movy: Fanalohija, marfanalohija, marfalohija [Short grammar of the Belarusian language: phonology, morphonology, morphology]. 1. Minsk: Belaruskaja navuka. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Matras, Yaron and Peter Bakker (eds.) 2003 The study of mixed languages. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The mixed language debate. Theoretical and empirical advances, 1–19. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Mecˇkovskaja, Nina B. 1994 Jazykovaja situacija v Belarusi: e˙ticˇeskie kollizii dvujazycˇija [The language situation in Belarus: ethical collisions of bilingualism]. In: Russian Linguistics 18: 299–332 Mecˇkovskaja, Nina B. in press Weißrussische Trasjanka und ukrainischer Surzˇyk: quasi-ethnische Substandards mit russischen Merkmalen in der Geschichte sprachlicher Konstellationen. In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Mjacˇkou˘skaja, Nina B. 2007 Trasjanka u˘ kantynuume belaruska-ruskix idyjalektau˘: xto i kali razmau˘ljae na trasjancy [Trasyanka in the continuum of Belarusian-Russian idiolects: who speaks Trasyanka and when]. Vesnik BDU. Seryja IV. Filalohija. Zˇurnalistyka. Pedahohika 1: 91–97. Muysken, Peter 2000 Bilingual speech. A typology of code-mixing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Plähn, Jürgen 1978 Der Gebrauch des modernen russischen Kirchenslavisch in der Russischen Kirche. Hamburg: Buske. Ramza, Taccjana 2008 Die Evolution der Trasjanka in literarischen Texten. Zeitschrift für Slawistik 53 (3): 305–325. Suprun, Adam E. 1987 Soderzˇanie obu‰enija russkomu jazyku v belorusskoj skole [Issues of Teaching Russian in the Belarusian school]. Minsk: Vysˇe˙jsˇaja Sˇkola. Tambor, Jolanta 2008 Mowa górnos´la˛zaków oraz ich ´swiadomos´´c j¬zykowa i etniczna [The speech of Upper Silesians and their linguistic and ethnic awareness]. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu S´la˛skiego. Tesch, Sviatlana in press On morphological hybrids: Byelorussian-Russian word forms in Trasyanka. In: Gerd Hentschel, Oleksandr Taranenko, Curt Woolhiser and Sjarhej Zaprudski (eds.), in press. Tesch, Sviatlana forthcoming Syntagmatische Aspekte der gemischten weißrussisch-russischen Rede: Kodewechsel und Kodemischung. (Ph.D. dissertation University of Oldenburg, Germany). Thomason, Sarah G. 2008 Social and linguistic factors as predictors of contactinduced change. Journal of language contact – THEMA 2. www.jlc-journal.org. Trudgill, Peter 1986 Dialects in contact. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Zaliznjak, Andrej A. 1967 Russkoe imennoe slovoizmenenie [Russian nominal inflection]. Moskva: Nauka.

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Zaprudski, Sjarhej 2007 In the grip of replacive bilingualism: the Belarusian language in contact with Russian. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 183: 97–118. Zaprudski, Sjarhej and Natallja Janenka 2010 On the possibilities and limitations of lexical variants processing and some first findings based on individual variants. Paper read on the conference Belarusian Trasjanka – a “mixed variety” as a product of BelarusianRussian language contact, Oldenburg, Germany, March 29th–31st.

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Cyril Aslanov (Jerusalem)

Lingua Franca in the Western Mediterranean: between myth and reality

1.

Introduction

In this paper I would like to reassess the concept of Lingua Franca from a language-internal perspective. I will try to make the point that Lingua Franca was probably more adapted to the communication between people speaking various Romance languages than to the linguistic intercourse between Arabicspeakers and people without any knowledge of Arabic. Beyond the mixed nature of that changing language I will identify some structural features that may hint at two important processes: 1) the renunciation of the morphological marks that could not serve as a common platform between Ibero-Romance and Italo-Romance, the two main components of Lingua Franca; 2) the possible Portuguese nucleus of Lingua Franca, the origin of which could go back to the linguistic situation of Southern Portugal (Algarve) before the Reconquista of that area. Some years ago I made a distinction between the languages of the Franks in the Latin East at the time of the Crusades and the Lingua Franca in the narrow sense. In my opinion, the latter is connected with the Western Mediterranean in early modern to modern times. Some of those ideas were expressed in the introduction to my book on the French in Levant (Aslanov 2006: 16–26), as well in the long review I wrote (Aslanov 2010: 103–113) on Jocelyne Dakhlia’s book (Dakhlia 2008). Judging from current research, it appears that even in the Western Mediterranean, where Lingua Franca was in use throughout the modern era (at least until the conquest of Algeria), this lowest common denominator between the Romance languages spoken at the time was redundant in communication between Christians and Muslims. The latter often had a command of at least one Romance language – Italian in Tunisia and Tripolitania; Spanish in the Regency of Algiers; Spanish and Portuguese in Morocco. As for the Christians who had been brought into contact with Muslims as a result of trade, war or captivity, they had some grasp of Arabic. Between Arabic and Romance languages there was a sociolinguistic continuum since the gap between the two languages was partly bridged by a bumper consisting of the approximative knowledge of some rudiments of

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Arabic by Christians in contact with Arabic-speaking people on the one hand, and the Muslims’ ability to communicate in a broken variety of Italian and Spanish on the other. Moreover, in the cosmopolitan context of Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli, Arabic was only a second language for many people, not necessarily just Christians: the renegades from Corsica or Calabria, some of the Sephardic Jews and the Spanish-speaking Moriscos. As shown by Jocelyne Dakhlia (2008), Lingua Franca was often superfluous in the sociolinguistic ecosystem of early modern North Africa, where some Romance languages were in circulation on both sides of the quite relative demarcation line between Christendom and Islam. In order to solve this paradox, I would like to suggest the hypothesis that Lingua Franca was, first and foremost, intended to aid communication between speakers of different Romance languages who had been brought into contact as a result of trade, war or captivity. Evidence in favor of such an assumption is the extreme scarcity of Arabic, Turkish or Berber elements in the extant remnants of Lingua Franca. Should we ascribe this striking under-representation of Arabic, and other languages spoken on the Muslim shore of the Western Mediterranean, to the fact that the texts to whom we owe the written record of Lingua Franca were written by Europeans unable to perceive the specificity of the non-Romance components of that contact vernacular? However, the absence of Arabic is not only a lexical matter. It also affects the dimension of the language system, which is far more important from a linguistic point of view. The genesis of Lingua Franca in the Western Mediterranean probably goes back to the end of the Middle Ages, as shown by the existence of a parodic text known as Contrasto della Zerbitana ‘Dialogue of the Djerbian woman’ (Southern Italy, fourteenth century). If we may postulate a continuity between the first echo of Lingua Franca extant to us and later reverberations from the early modern period, it would be interesting to consider the remnants of the language as an attempt to reduce the gap between the various Romance languages brought into contact in the context of the bellicose or pacific intercourse between Muslims and Christians in the Western Mediterranean. Considered from this perspective, the question of Lingua Franca pertains to the issue of the contact within the same language family rather than to that of the fusion of two allogeneous languages. The community of origin between the Romance languages spoken in the Western Mediterranean greatly helped the process of convergence between them and the reactivation of the same pan-Romance legacy. Now it remains to explain why the remnants of Lingua Franca that are extant to us display so many striking isoglosses with Portuguese, a language that only partially applied to the Mediterranean hor-

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izons (through the Portuguese possessions on the Moroccan shore which also included the Mediterranean harbor of Ceuta) (see paragraph 3).

2.

Turkish and Arabic, negligible components of Lingua Franca

To begin with, Turkish was even less important than Arabic in the linguistic cocktail of Lingua Franca. Indeed, this language was only superficially rooted in the Barbary States and it left only a few lexical items, which were mostly integrated through the mediation of the North African Arabic dialects. Tamazight, an ethnic language mostly spoken in the inland (and in the Kabyle quarter of Algiers) seems to have been blatantly absent from Lingua Franca. As for the genuinely Arabic words that occasionally appear in Lingua Franca, they are hardly more abundant than the Arabic component in Sicilian, Castilian and Portuguese. In any case, the divergences between Arabic and Lingua Franca are mostly perceptible on a structural level. Indeed, the phrase-book contained in Dictionnaire de la langue franque ou petit-mauresque (Marseille 1830: 93–98) which is one of the most complete and most reliable sources for information about Lingua Franca, as well as the stereotypical representations of Lingua Franca in literature (Minervini 1996; Aslanov 2006: 21–24) reveal that the only verbal forms in use in that language are the nominal forms of the verb: infinitive and past passive participle. To be sure, Arabic does possess a passive participle. However, in this language there are no fully-fledged infinitives in the syntactic meaning of the word. The mas· dar is no more than a nomen actionis expressing the general concept of the corresponding verb. Now, Lingua Franca makes great use of the infinitive, conferring to it the status of a universal substitute of almost any possible conjugate verb. In this sense, Lingua Franca is the exact opposite of Arabic. Another notable divergence between the structures of Arabic and those of Lingua Franca is the complete insensibility of the substantive to the category of number in Lingua Franca. Interestingly, Arabic uses the singular instead of the plural in order to refer to more than ten items. However, when the number is not specified, the plural is used as a default choice category. Moreover, Arabic has preserved the category of dual. With such a rich nominal and verbal morphology, Arabic can by no means be considered the source of the structure of Lingua Franca, a language with almost no flexional morphology. For Lingua Franca, Arabic did not play the role of a substrate as, for instance, African languages did during the emergence of Creoles (see for example Lefebvre 1999). From a typological point of view, the strong and complex Arabic morphology could not influence the

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processes of morphological simplification that led to the emergence of Lingua Franca, a contact vernacular resulting from a thorough simplification of the Romance languages. Incidentally, it should be noted that the indifference to number that characterizes the substantives and adjectives of the Lingua Franca is quite reminiscent of the French plurals. However, unlike French, Lingua Franca did not compensate for the lack of a plural marker at the end of a word through the use of the proclitic article as a quasi-morpheme. Such a compensating marker only appears in deictics. One of the few structural features of Lingua Franca that could be ascribed to the latent influence of Maghrebi Arabic is the expression of possession through a suffixed preposition postponed to the noun: di mi ‘my’; di ti ‘your’; di ello ‘his’; di ella ‘her’; di noi ‘our’; di voi ‘your’; di loro ‘their’. Although this syntactical feature is attested in several Romance languages (Portuguese; Italian), its appearance in Lingua Franca could be interpreted as a calque of or at least as a convergence with the Maghrebi Arabic possessive diali, dialek, dialu, dialha, dialna, dialkum, dialhum or nta‘i, nta‘ek, nta‘u, nta‘ha, nta‘na, nta‘kum, nta‘hum. This assumption is all the more tempting in that in the 3rd person singular masculine and feminine of the first range of possessives (dial- +), there is a quasi-perfect homonymy between the Lingua Franca and Maghrebi Arabic: di ello ‘his’ like dialu, same meaning; di ella ‘her’ like dialha, same meaning. From a sociolinguistic perspective, the almost complete absence of Arabic in the overt or latent layers of Lingua Franca could be due to the fact that the speakers of this contact vernacular knew at least a little of Maghrebi Arabic. In communication between Christians and Muslims in the Western Mediterranean, the Romance languages used by Muslims were probably counterbalanced by the simplified kind of Arabic known to the Christians. A reverberation of this symmetry is found in the aforementioned Dictionnaire de la langue franque. Seven pages (100–107) of this little lexicon French-Lingua Franca that was written to facilitate the communication between the soldiers of the French expeditionary forces and the local populations, contain a French-Maghrebi Arabic phrase-book. This semilect possibly reflected the partial knowledge that the Europeans had of this language in the situations where Arabic was preferred to Lingua Franca. Pragmatically speaking, the oscillation between Lingua Franca and the basic notions of dialectal Arabic may be explained by the courtesy that coincides with addressing someone in his own language. However, this mark of goodwill towards the Other may also be interpreted as an act of condescendence that probably had a counterpart among the Arabic-speaking popu-

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lation who had no real difficulty speaking in Lingua Franca or even in a fullyfledged Romance language with the Europeans with whom they happened to be in contact. This mix of condescendence and courtesy is part and parcel of a strategy of complicity that consisted of suggesting to the Other that his language, his codes and his customs were not unknown to the speaker. If we apply Uriel Weinreich’s methodology, the coexistence of Lingua Franca and the Arabic semilect in the ecolinguistic system of the Western Mediterranean may be analyzed as a four-fold model where the Arabic dialect and the Romance languages are separated by intermediate instances: the Romance languages fragmentarily known by Arabic-speaking people and the rudimentary Arabic of people speaking Romance languages. In Uriel Weinreich’s terms, one could say that the Romance languages spoken by Arabic native speakers are a secondary system with respect to the primary system represented by the Romance languages in their original setting. Likewise, when spoken by Romance-speaking people, the Arabic dialects are a secondary system with respect to the Arabic dialects spoken as a primary system (Weinreich 1966: 14–20). As for the strictly lexical dimension of Lingua Franca, it does not seem to have been enriched by a rich contingent of Arabic words. This relative obliteration of Arabic may be due to the fact that in the ecolinguistic system of Maghreb and Tripolitania, the Lingua Franca and the broken Arabic spoken by Christians were used alternatively. The two languages that coexisted in the frame of the same code-switching communication process might have been artificially isolated from each other by the author(s) of the Dictionnaire de la langue franque. In any case, the few Arabic words that are mentioned in the part of the Dictionnaire de la langue franque that specifically deals with Lingua Franca are not necessarily Arabic. We find there the Turkish word pas¸a ‘Pasha’ Arabized as bacha (p. 27, s. v. dey). Conversely, the Arabic word tarjuma¯n ‘translator’ appears in the Westernized form drogman, as well as in the Gallicized avatar trucheman (< truchement ‘intermediary’). The latter can also be interpreted as the Spanish word truchimán which is itself an adaptation of French truchement (p. 43, s. v. interprète). The incertitude as to the channel through which those Arabic or Arabized terms entered the lexicon of Lingua Franca is quite characteristic of the inextricable nature of the relations between Arabic and the Romance language since the Middle Ages (on the most ancient phrases of this contact, see Ineichen 1997). The same Arabic word could have entered the same Romance language several times through different connections. This is the case of miskı¯n ‘poor’ that became meschine ‘girl’ in Old French and mesquin ‘miser’ in

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Modern French and in most other Romance languages. However, in Lingua Franca, the avatar of the Arabic etymon miskı¯n preserves its primary meaning of ‘unfortunate’ that is also attested in the Arabic loanword mischinu in Sicilian. Thanks to the direct contact between Arabic and Romance, the etymological meaning of meskin was reactivated, as shown by the equivalence that the Dictionnaire de la langue franque set between the French lemma pauvre and the word meskin in Lingua Franca (p. 57). The dictionary contains other Romanized avatars of Arabic etyma or conversely, Arabized forms of Romance borrowings. This convergence process between the two languages in contact reveals that in Lingua Franca the process of hybridization can be at work within the lexeme itself, and not only through the coexistence of heterogeneous words in the lexicon. Thus, the Arabic etymon haza¯nah ‘wardrobe’ appears in a Romanized form casana as a ˘ French lemma armoire (p. 14). Sometimes, the Romanized translation of the form of the Arabic word is already well rooted in one of the languages that enters in the composition of Lingua Franca. This is the case with Italian catrame ‘tar’ (written the French way catramé). This word translates the French lemma goudron (p. 39). Now both catrame and goudron are reflections of the Arabic term qatra¯n. ˙ above, some Arabic words go back to Romance etyma. As mentioned Such is the case of flinta that translates platine ‘platinum’ (p. 59). The shift [p] > [f] reveals that this word, the ultimate origin of which is Romance, has passed through the filter of Arabic. The same applies with regard to the form osbidal used to translate hôpital (p. 41). This is obviously the Italian word ospedale adapted to the phonemic system of Arabic which lacks the phoneme [p]. Lastly, the name of the chestnut and the date appear in a hybridized form where it is possible to recognize Arabized or even Turkified Romance words (if the element -li is to be identified with the Turkish suffix li/ lı). Thus, datoli might go back to the Sicilian etymon dàttula rather than to the Spanish word dátil (p. 25) with an interesting resuffixation by means of the Turkish suffix -li; castali could also be considered a resuffixed avatar of Italian castagna or Spanish castaña (p. 21). Moreover, the specimen of Lingua Franca preserved in the dictionary also has some Kulturwörter directly borrowed from Maghrebi Arabic. Some food items are called by their Arabic names. Thus, the French lemma jujube is translated by aneb, which is the Romanization of ‘anna¯b (Maghrebi Arabic ‘annäb). This transliteration takes note of the non-conditioned ima¯lah (apophony) that characterized Maghrebi dialects (p. 44). Let us also mention limoun as a translation of the lemma limon, the name of a kind of citrus fruit (p. 46), festouk for pistache (p. 59) with a typically Maghrebi reduction of the

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unaccented vowel to [ə], which is noted by means of the grapheme , and rouss for riz (p. 70). This form rouss corresponds to the Maghrebi form ru¯z with a Spanish devoicing of the final [z]. Among the realia characteristic of the Maghrebi civilization, let us mention Cadi (< qa¯d· ¯ı) for juge (p. 44), foundouk (< funduq) for marché (p. 47) and bernus for manteau (ibid.). Curiously enough, some terms that are not connected at all with the specificity of Maghrebi life appear in Arabic, which could suggest that they were used as such in Lingua Franca. Therefore, the lemma miroir is rendered by maréïa, a transcription of Maghrebi Arabic mareyah (< Classical Arabic mar’ah) (p. 50). Likewise, the lemma berger is translated by raï (< Classical Arabic ra¯’ı¯) (p. 17). At this stage of the demonstration, we can deduce from the extremely scarce presence of Arabic in the remnants of Lingua Franca that this language developed on the margins of Arabic rather than within it. Far from being a mix of Arabic and Romance, Lingua Franca is in fact the result of a synthesis between some Romance languages.

3.

Hispanized Italian or italianized Spanish?

Judging from the data gathered in the Dictionnaire de la langue franque, the base of the contact vernacular known as Lingua Franca is strikingly reminiscent of the broken Italian that used to be spoken in the Eastern Mediterranean. However, unlike that Levantine broken Italian, the “petit-mauresque”, as it was sometimes called, was strongly Hispanized, especially as far as the lexicon is concerned. As a matter of fact, this perception could be due to a problem of perspective connected with the conditions in which the dictionary was written. Eager as they were to give an account of the contact vernacular used in the Regency of Algiers, the author or the authors of the Dictionnaire probably condensed into one book two varieties of the Lingua Franca: the Hispanized one that was spoken in the Regency of Algiers and its Tunisian counterpart, the Italianized character of which is explicitly acknowledged in the short introduction to the dictionary (Dictionnaire de la langue franque 1830: 6). The result of this consideration of two varieties of Lingua Franca is a hybrid linguistic object. It is rather the lexicographic constraints which reflect this hybrid character than the inherent character of the language itself. This is clearly shown by the fact that sometimes one French lemma is translated by two terms, one Italian and the other Spanish, as if the lexicographer wanted to give two options, each corresponding to a different part of the

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Maghrebi space. Thus, the lemma plus is doubly translated by piou ou mas, that is, Italian più and Spanish más (p. 60). Besides the Italian or Spanish nature of the linguistic material gathered in the dictionary, there are also some Provençalisms like the word gorba ‘basket’, a Hispanized or Italianized form of Occitan gòrba [górbɔ] (p. 56). Another obvious Provençalism is the use of the form crompar instead of comprar ‘to buy’ (p. 11) with the metathesis that distinguished Occitan crompar/croumpa from Italian comprare and Ibero-Romance comprar. Beyond the aforementioned vacillation between an Italian and a Spanish blend of Lingua Franca, a discreet but persistent manifestation of a latent Portuguese influence left its mark on this vernacular. One of the most striking Portuguese interferences is the extension of star, an Italianized counterpart for Ibero-Romance estar, at the expense of ser. The use of estar where Spanish would have resorted to ser is by itself a characteristic feature of Portuguese where the opposition between the ontological essence and the situational condition has been blurred by the existence of a third verb, ficar ‘to remain’, that is also able to function as a copula in order to express a particular situation. Very often Portuguese ficar is the most exact rendering of Spanish estar: e.g. ficar bravo ‘to be angry’ as an equivalent of estar enfadado, same meaning. The specialization of ficar in the meaning of a copula expressing the situation allowed estar to partially overlap with ser, as shown by the phrase está certo ‘it is true’, the Spanish equivalent of which es cierto contains the essential copula ser (Aslanov 2010: 109). The generalization of star at the expenses of ser (Italian essere) is a way to systematize to the extreme a structural drift that appears only occasionally in Portuguese. The aforementioned postposition of the possessive that we ascribed to a possible Arabic influence also constitutes a remarkable isogloss with Portuguese, at least as far as the 3rd person singular and plural is concerned. Indeed, di ello in Lingua Franca looks very much like Portuguese dele ‘his’; di ella like dela ‘her’; di loro like deles/delas ‘their’. As a matter of fact, it is possible that in Portuguese itself this construction is also the result of an Arabic influence. Therefore, the question is whether the possessives di ello, di ella, di loro of Lingua Franca are a direct Arabism or an Arabism introduced into Lingua Franca through the intermediary of Portuguese. It is worth noting that neither ello nor ella can go back to the neutral Spanish demonstrative ello or to its feminine counterpart ella. Had those words been Spanish, the Dictionnaire, which usually resorts to a very phonetic notation of the items, would have expressed the yeismo so characteristic of Spanish outside the Peninsula (in Morisco and Sephardic context particularly). Thus, ello and ella

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would have been written eyo and eya. Their spellings ello and ella could be interpreted as a superficial Italianization of Portuguese ele and ela. Those few yet obvious Lusisms camouflaged by a superficial Italianiazation – the use of star where ser was expected and the postposition of the possessive di ello, di ella, di loro; – are even more troubling in that they pertain to the very core of the grammatical structure of the language. This speaks for the antiquity of this Portuguese component of Lingua Franca. Let us try to give a tentative historical explanation for this state of things.

4.

Historical interpretation

How could the history of languages explain the discreet but persistent presence of Portuguese structural features in the Italian-Spanish Interlingua that is usually known as Lingua Franca? As a matter of fact, Portugal does not belong to the Mediterranean space, even though some bridgeheads along the Mediterranean coast of Morocco had been conquered during the fifteenth century by the House of Aviz. Those bellicose contacts between the Europeans and the Maghrebis occurred before the beginning of Barbary piracy and could have generated a contact vernacular between the Portuguese and the Moroccans. Later on, this minimalist nucleus was probably engulfed by Spanish and Italian, from which two linguistic varieties emerged: a Spanishbased one used in Algiers and an Italianized-based one, more connected with Tunis and Tripoli. The occasional Lusisms that are perceptible in the deep layers of the Lingua Franca could be the last echoes of the Portuguese-based prototype of Lingua Franca. The impact of Lusisms in the genesis or prehistory of Lingua Franca could be connected with a notorious fact of the history of Portuguese. Indeed, the Arabisms of this Ibero-Romance language do not necessarily correspond with those found in Spanish. In many instances, Castilian uses a lexeme of Latin origin where the Portuguese equivalent is an Arabic loanword. Thus, the Castilian words granada ‘pomegranate’, lechuga ‘lettuce’ or the aforementioned dátil ‘date’ have Arabic-borrowed counterparts in Portuguese: romã (< Arabic rumma¯n), alface (< Arabic al-has) and tâmara (< Arabic tamr), respectively. Moreover, the designation of ˘the weekdays with cardinal numerals (Segunda-feira; Terça-feira; Quarta-feira; Quinta-feira; Sexta-feira) is by itself a blatant Arabism that distinguishes Portuguese from the other Romance languages. The strong Arabization that characterizes the southern dialects of Portuguese, the role of which was so crucial in the affirmation of a linguistic variety distinct from Galician-Portuguese, reveals that in Portugal, the Christians were more fluent in Arabic than their Spanish neighbors. Or at least,

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their relationship to Arabic was different. Moreover, the Arabic to which the Portuguese were exposed may have been different from the mainstream Andalusi Arabic. It was probably the specific dialect of Algarve, that is, al-Gharb or Gharb al-Andalus, the westernmost part of Al-Andalus. As in the Dictionnaire de la langue franque where the Romance languages represented by the Lingua Franca coexist with the fragmentary knowledge of Maghrebi Arabic that was available to the Christians, the sociolinguistic horizon of Southern Portugal before 1249 – the date that marked the end of the Reconquista on Portuguese soil – was probably a place where four varieties of language came together: the Portuguese spoken as a native language by the Christians; the Portuguese spoken by Moors; the Arabic spoken as a primary and native language by the same Moors; the Arabic spoken by Christians, of which the numerous Arabisms present in Portuguese constitute the last echo (Machado 1958). As in the Barbary States of the early modern period, the counterpart of the Romance-based Lingua Franca was a minimalist use of vernacular Arabic that was the mirror image of the Lingua Franca on the Christian side. This embryo of Portuguese-based Lingua Franca’s contact with other Romance languages (mainly Spanish and Italo-Romance) could have attenuated the Lusitanity of that language since it served not only for the communication between Christians and Muslims, but also for the language intercourse between Christians that came from various places of Romania. The spreading of a Portuguese-based Lingua Franca, originally used in Algarve or on the Portuguese-conquered Moroccan shores, to the whole Maghreb and especially to the Christians present therein can be viewed as the promotion of a Luso-Arabic pidgin to the dignity of a Western Mediterranean contact vernacular based on either Italian or Spanish, depending on the place. This contact vernacular was far more than just an expedient meant to enable the communication between Arabs and Christians in the Western Mediterranean. Like the Caribbean and Indian Ocean Creoles that were the media of communication between the slaves themselves as well as between the slaves and their masters, this Western Mediterranean Lingua Franca could function as a meeting point between captives or renegades who did not originally share the same Romance language. Whatever the importance of the Portuguese-based nucleus of Lingua Franca may be, it is obvious that the main bulk of the linguistic material represented by this contact vernacular has to do with the two major Romance languages of Western Mediterranean: Spanish on the one hand and Italian on the other.

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Family effect on the language contact

The Portuguese nucleus of the incipient Lingua Franca survives only as a substrate of the Italian-Spanish Interlingua that served for the Christians’ communication in the Barbary States more than for the intercourse between Christians and Muslims. In fact, the main bulk of the lexemes contained in the Dictionnaire are either Italian or Spanish. However, this situation is probably due to the circumstances of the composition of this little book. Moreover, the lexicon cannot by itself constitute a base of reflection on the mechanisms of convergence between two languages within the same language family. Lastly, it would not be a unique case in the history of Spanish and Italian that an interlingua appeared between both languages. The Bagitto once spoken by Leghorn Jews is a variety of Tuscan colored by the presence of a Spanish-Portuguese substrate (Campagnano 2007: 161–190). Conversely, the Cocoliche that was spoken in the Italian neighborhoods of Buenos Aires was a colonial Spanish deeply affected by the interference of Italo-Romance dialects (mainly from Southern Italy). All these examples seem to confirm that the congruence between languages belonging to the same language family leads to interlingual convergence. The peculiarity of Lingua Franca is not necessarily due to a simplification of the Romance grammatical structure in contact with Arabic, but rather to the attempt to find a lowest common denominator for Italo-Romance and Ibero-Romance languages. In this way, we could explain the dropping of the plural marks in the nominal declension on the one hand and the renunciation of personal endings in conjugation on the other hand. Since the Italo-Romance dialects and the Ibero-Romance languages form their plural in a radically different way (vocalic alternation in the former case, use of the -s ending in the latter), the simplest way to conciliate both systems was to use a zero-ending for the plural of the nouns like in the sentence questi signor star amigo di mi ‘these men are my friends’ (p. 7). This simplification process that is due to the contact between two cognate languages is reminiscent of the dynamic of morphological erosion described in Frans Van Coetsem’s book on the contact-induced diachronic changes (Van Coetsem 2000). Likewise, the Romance languages brought into contact in the context of the Barbary States have thoroughly different nominal systems to the extent that the contrast between the vocalic alternation and the use of the ending -s was retained as a criterion of demarcation between the Western and the Eastern branches of the Romance language family. The impossibility of a real hybridization between the Italo-Romance -i ending and the Ibero-Romance -s ending probably motivated a reshuffling of the morphological system in such a way that

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both endings were dropped and replaced by invariable nouns. This drastic solution reflects the principle that in the creation of an interlinguage, it was precisely the presence of some structural incompatibilities that led to an extreme simplification. The same argument can be applied to the verbal system. The contrast between the Italo-Romance 2nd person singular ending -i and the IberoRomance -s ending could have triggered the use of infinitives instead of the conjugated forms of the verb. To be sure, the use of invariable forms in the nominal system has some parallels in Provençal. The aforementioned microsyntagma questi signor ‘these men’ is reminiscent of the compensatory mechanisms of Provençal stricto sensu. In order to react to the loss of the plural endings, this dialect of Occitan uses the plural forms li (lei) of the article and aquesti (aquestei)/aqueli (aquelei) of the demonstrative. Moreover, it recycles the ending -i (-ei) as a plural marker in adjectives when they precede the noun. However, this punctual isogloss between Lingua Franca and Provençal (at least as far as the use of the demonstrative is concerned) is probably too general to be ascribed to a direct contact (although some Provençalisms are attested in Lingua Franca, as mentioned above). The use of the ending -i at the end of the determinative (mostly demonstrative) is more likely to be a parallel convergence of both Provençal stricto sensu and Lingua Franca toward Italo-Romance. Another remarkable isogloss that connects Lingua Franca with some Italo-Romance dialects is the use of the accusative forms mi, ti of the pronoun where the nominative would have been expected: ti crédir per mi, mi poudir assicourar per ti ‘you believe me; I can assure you’ (p. 93). There are at least three differences between this use of the pronoun accusative in Lingua Franca and its Italo-Romance counterpart (Rizzi 1986). In Italo-Romance, te is not an accusative per se, but rather the form used after a preposition (however, the difference between the accusative form ti and the prepositional form te is neutralized in Sicilian where ti is used in both cases). Moreover, the overlapping of the accusative with the nominative occurs only in the 2nd person singular: mi credi, te? ‘you believe me, don’t you?’. Lastly, the internal economy of the verbal syntagma differs from one language to the other. In Lingua Franca, the pronoun is the only marker of person due to the use of the infinitive instead of the conjugated forms of the verb whereas in ItaloRomance, the pronoun te is a redundant mark that expresses the person in addition to the ending of the verbal form. This partial isogloss between Lingua Franca and Italo-Romance is one more confirmation of the importance of the Italian component in the Italian-Spanish Interlingua of which Lingua Franca consists (in spite of its dee-

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pest layers or initial nucleus that we tried to ascribe to a Portuguese origin). In any case, the use of the pronoun accusative as a nominative in Lingua Franca confirms that, structurally speaking, this language was not influenced by Arabic where the nominative of the pronoun strongly differs from the pronominal suffixes attached to the verb or the preposition. On the other hand, the identity of the nominative and the accusative of the pronouns could be once again ascribed to the influence of Portuguese, where almost all the forms of the pronominal paradigm may be used as nominative, accusative or prepositional as a result of the replacement of the clitic accusatives -o ‘him’ and -a ‘her’ by the nominative ele ‘he’ and ela ‘she’ respectively. Once again, it appears that Lingua Franca inherited a latent structure from Portuguese. Later on, this feature was reinterpreted and relexified through the mediation of an Italo-Romance linguistic material. Once transferred to the Western Mediterranean, the Portuguese-based pidgin that would serve the purpose of communication between Christians and Muslims in Algarve before 1249 or in Portuguese-conquered Moroccan harbors at the end of the fifteenth century was considerably buffered by the Italianization/Hispanization of the Portuguese core. During this process of Italianization/Hispanization, the isoglosses between the two languages have been retained.

6.

Conclusion

Lingua Franca crystallized as a result of the convergence between two or three Romance languages on the basis of a primordial nucleus that may have been a real contact vernacular (pidgin) between Lusophones and Arabicspeaking people. Later on, this contact vernacular became a medium of communication between speakers of various Romance languages. This can explain why this language could not find a place on the Eastern Mediterranean ecolinguistic horizon where the Romance languages (French and Italo-Romance mainly) were transplantations from the West. In the Western Mediterranean, however, Italo-Romance, Spanish and Provençal were epichoric languages, truly rooted in the hinterland. Thus, the contact between them on the southern shore of the Western Mediterranean should be considered a prolongation of their primeval existence on the northern shore of the same geographical area. The intrusion of French into the Maghrebi ecolinguistic system put an end to the existence of Lingua Franca, a contact vernacular where Italo-Romance and Ibero-Romance used to converge in a subtle and variegated way. After it was recorded by the lemmata of the Dictionnaire that stood at the

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center of the present study, French superseded Lingua Franca to the extent that the very meaning of sabir, a synonym for Lingua Franca, or petit-mauresque was thoroughly modified. In pied-noir milieus, Sabir used to refer irreverently to the variety of French spoken by Arabs, that is, to a secondary system with respect to the primary system constituted by the French that was used by the colonists. This variety of French was the object of a caustic parody by the humorists, Edmond Martin (alias Kaddour Ben Nitram) in Tunisia or Roland Bacri in Algeria and France. However, this alleged Sabir did not owe anything to the authentic Lingua Franca of which the Dictionnaire gives a consistent though not comprehensive image. Curiously enough, today’s Maghreb, where knowledge of French sometimes waned, has opened itself up again to Italian and Spanish, the two pillars of the former Lingua Franca. The impact of Italian was reactivated in Eastern Maghreb (Constantinois; Tunisia; Tripolitania), where the traditional Lingua Franca tended to be Italianized, while Spanish is very strongly implanted in Western Algeria and throughout Morocco. Moreover, the migration waves that brought about a large amount of Moroccan people to Italy exposed to Italian a population that was traditionally connected with Spanish. This recent reactivation of the ties that used to connect Maghreb with Italian and Spanish sometimes creates a zone of overlapping between the two languages. There they happen to interfere with each other again. This is the case when a Moroccan or an Algerian who is used to speaking Spanish tries to communicate in Italian or conversely, when a Tunisian or a Libyan more familiar with Italian is compelled to speak Spanish. Thus, the convergence process that occurred on the southern shore of the Western Mediterranean in the early modern period was reactivated and continued on the northern shore as a result of the immigration process that brought Maghrebi people to the southern edge of the Schengen area. The same dynamics of language mixing are taking place right before our eyes. This convergence between related languages is efficient not only because of the primeval kinship that unites them, but also because the existence of Lingua Franca (until 1830, at least) constitutes a precedent that probably hastens the process of language mixing between Spanish and Italian on both shores of the Western Mediterranean.

References Author Unknown 1830 Dictionnaire de la langue franque ou petit-mauresque. Marseille. Aslanov, Cyril 2006 Le français au Levant, jadis et naguère: à la recherche d’une langue perdue. Paris: Honoré Champion.

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Aslanov, Cyril 2010 Débat sur l’ouvrage de Jocelyne Dakhlia, Lingua franca: histoire d’une langue métisse en Méditerranée. Langage et société 134 (December): 103–113. Campagnano, Anna Rosa 2007 Judeus de Livorno: Sua língua, memória e história [Leghorn Jews: Their language, their memory and their history]. São Paulo: Humanitas. Dakhlia, Jocelyne 2008 Lingua franca: histoire d’une langue métisse en Méditerranée. Arles: Actes Sud. Ineichen, Gustav 1997 Arabisch-orientalische Sprachkontakte in der Romania. Ein Beitrag zur Kulturgeschichte des Mittelalters. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Lefebvre, Claire 1999 Creole Genesis and the Acquisition of Grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Machado, José Pedro 1958 Influência arábica no vocabulário português [Arabic Influence in Portuguese Lexicon]. Lisbon: Álvaro Pinto. Minervini, Laura 1996 La lingua franca mediterranea. Plurilinguismo, mistilinguismo, pidginizzazione sulle coste del Mediterraneo tra tardo medioevo e prima età moderna. Medioevo Romanzo 20 (2): 231–301. Rizzi, Luigi 1986 On the Status of Subject Clitics in Romance. In: Osvaldo Jaeggli and Carmen Silva-Corvalán (eds.), Studies in Romance Linguistics, 391–419. Dordrecht: Foris. Van Coetsem, Frans 2000 A General and Unified Theory of the Transmission Process in Language Contact. Heidelberg: C. Winter. Weinreich, Uriel 1966 Languages in Contact: Findings and Problems. London, The Hague, Paris: Mouton.

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Intimate family reunions: code-copying between Turkic relatives

1.

Two types of linguistic encounters

The following brief notes concern two types of contact between languages or language varieties. To begin with, an anthropomorphic metaphor may be permitted to illustrate analogous situations in the life of human beings. In the life of humans, individuals may become closer to each other and, a result, come to resemble each other. We may think of two different kinds of social gatherings: on the one hand, a party where you mingle with persons previously unknown to you, and on the other hand, an intimate family reunion with parents, children, grandchildren, and relatives by marriage (i.e. genealogically unrelated persons). In the first case, we expect heterogeneity, dividing lines, contrasts. In the case of family bonds and kinship, we expect more homogeneity. The members bear some likeness to one another, some affinity in terms of appearance and personality. If somebody exerts influence on others, it is likely to be more clearly detectable in the first case. Within an intimate family circle, the influence may be less obvious owing to preexisting similiarities. The members are, as a rule, already relatively close to each other. It is often impossible to pinpoint the exact nature of instances of assimilation or convergence. The two types of gatherings differ with respect to the steps taken to come closer to each other: large steps, small steps, longer distances, shorter distances. This is of course a very rough and imprecise sketch. Nevertheless, it may help us to see analogous differences in the encounters of languages. Here, too, we may distinguish foreigners and relatives.

2.

Families and protolanguages

Turkic will serve to illustrate the differences to be dealt with here. It is common in genealogical linguistics to use biological metaphors and thus to speak of “language families”. Turkic is, in terms of its territorial extension, one of the largest language families in the world. According to the criteria provided by traditional com-

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parative linguistics, it forms a group of related languages descended from one single ancestral language, Proto-Turkic. The members represent divergent branches and subbranches of this protolanguage. It can be shown that Turkish, Uzbek, Yakut, Chuvash, and others are interrelated, i.e. “of Turkic stock”, just as Swedish, Lithuanian, Greek, and Armenian can be proven to be relatives within the Indo-European family. We thus assume a Turkic protolanguage and its subsequent differentiation. The results may be represented in the form of a taxonomic scheme of classification, in common metaphorical parlance: a genealogical tree, a family tree, a pedigree, a kind of bloodline. But a language family is somewhat different from a group of human beings of common ancestry. A language family is a single-parent family. In the normal course of linguistic evolution, each language has a single parent in the genealogical sense. Furthermore, the metaphorics of genealogical relatedness only includes mothers, daughters, and sisters. It is, as it were, a purely “feminine world” with single mothers, without any fathers involved. Nonetheless, it is common to speak of so-called “mixed languages”, which are claimed to have two parents belonging to different language families. As I have repeatedly pointed out in previous writing, there are reasons to be skeptical about this concept of mixed breed. If mixed languages actually exist in this sense, they seem to be marginal phenomena occurring in exceptional cases. Dixon remarks that “… when two groups of people – each speaking a distinct language – merge to form one community, with a single language, this will be a genetic descendant of just one of the original languages, not of both of them equally (it is, however, likely to have a sizeable substratum or superstratum from the second language” (1997: 11). If family metaphors are needed, it would be preferable to speak of relatives by marriage, i.e. step-parents. As we will see, however, the situation within groups of closely interrelated varieties may raise special issues. On intertwining of written languages see Johanson (2013). Proto-Turkic cannot have been strictly uniform, but must have been dialectally diversified, like any natural language. Though the prehistorical linguistic map is per definition unknown, Proto-Turkic itself may have been a member of a family of a higher order. It may well have had sisters representing collaterally related branches of an earlier protolanguage.

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Expansion and diversification

In any case, the Turkic family became a highly expansive family. As it expanded, it underwent differentiation into branches and subbranches. There were recurrent movements from east to west, as it seems, originally from the territory of today’s Manchuria. Until the latter half of the first millennium CE, Turkic was spoken by a population inhabiting today’s Mongolia. It then spread across Central Eurasia as far as the Balkans and Turkey. These are old processes. It is a popular misunderstanding that there existed a uniform Turkic that was destroyed in modern times, that is, that the differences in the family arose as a result of modern language policy. Turkic became more varied through diversification into dialects, processes of decreasing comprehensibility. Language split would typically start with a group of speakers dissociating themselves from the main body. Their variety split off, broke away, and left the area it had so far shared with other varieties of the protolanguage. Though this area partly disintegrated, the protolanguage could remain relatively intact for some time. The withdrawing variety did not take part in the further development of the varieties left behind, but developed own innovative features. The development of innovations had partly internal reasons, but there were also external factors. The differentiation was often caused by complicated contact-induced processes, influences from foreign contact languages, which can be said to be “in-laws”, relatives by marriage.

4.

Code-copying

What happened? The Code-copying Model will be used here to account for the possible options. Its principles are valid for both inter- and intrafamily contacts. The model cannot be explained here in detail (see Johanson 1993, 1999a, 1999b, 2002a, 2002b, 2008), but some important points will be mentioned. Turkic varieties were influenced by non-Turkic contact varieties. “Takeover” copying took place, which means that Turkic-speakers took over copies from a secondary code into their primary code, which was thus the basic (recipient) code. Furthermore, Turkic varieties used by non-Turkic speakers were influenced by substrate phenomena. In this case, “carry-over” copying took place, which means that originally non-Turkic speakers carried over copies from their primary code into their own variety of a secondary Turkic code, which was thus the basic code. Some speaker groups would shift to dominant foreign codes, abandoning their old codes, but retaining

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carried-over copies as substrate effects. Complex situations including takeover copying, carry-over copying and shift are often observed in intensive Turkic language contacts. For example, Turkic varieties were introduced into the Finno-Ugricspeaking Volga region. The ancestors of the modern languages Chuvash and Mari were distinct languages, members of different families, Turkic and Finno-Ugric. Turkic varieties were introduced into Iranian-speaking Central Asian regions. The ancestors of the modern languages Uzbek and Tajik were distinct languages, members of different families, Turkic and Iranian. Contact-induced influence made these genealogically unrelated varieties more similar to each other. In both cases, the languages in question were involved in processes of copying and – at least in certain segments of the speaker groups – also code shift.

5.

No shift of family

Not even heavy copying, however, has led any of these languages to leave their families. Northern Tajik has not become a Turkic language as a result of the overwhelming Turkic influence (cf. Doerfer 1967), and no Uzbek dialect has developed into an Iranian language in spite of very strong influences on phonology, syntax etc. Languages do not die of “structuritis” (Johanson 2002c): Even strong structural copying has not eliminated the languages in question or led to fusion. Mari is Finno-Ugric, Tajik is Iranian, and Chuvash and Uzbek are Turkic. It is always possible to determine which code is the basic code, and which code is the model code. Note that fusion should not be confused with code shift – shift to a dominant model code –, a very common social phenomenon. These are the normal scenarios: split through internally conditioned drift and externally conditioned contact influence. We assume protolanguages and their successive, often binary, branching. There is first a split into a few main dialects, primary branches. Through further differentiation, more specialized kinds emerge: secondary or tertiary branches. In all cases, there may of course also be isoglosses that cross the branch boundaries.

6.

Intra-family contacts

This is, however, probably not the whole story. It is necessary to look at cases of contact-induced influence within the families. What happened, for example, when Turkic varieties met each other after they had been disconnected, i.e. after the split of the protolanguage? They met each other in dif-

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ferent heterogenous confederations, consisting of various nomadic groups. It is important to pay attention to the historical situation, which is strongly characterized by migrations: We are not dealing with settled populations with fixed geographical borderlines, as often observed in the linguistic history of Europe. The fronts changed continuously, though at irregular intervals. Related varieties did not occur in clear-cut geographic clusters. Owing to demographic and political circumstances, floating nomadic unions of clans, tribes, and subtribes moved ceaselessly over huge distances, basically in search of pasture for their livestock. The numerous, sometimes huge Turkic political realms were mostly short-lived or even ephemeral. In certain parts of the Turkic-speaking world, nomadism or semi-nomadism has continued until quite recently. There were always tensions between nomads and settled. But the nomad populations settled by and by, even in urban areas. Most Uzbek speaker groups emerged this way, whereas, for instance, Kirghiz speaker groups remained nomadic much longer. The results of this are seen in the Ferghana valley, in the interaction between sedentary Uzbek communities and formerly nomadic Kirghiz groups.

7.

Mixed speech communities

In the development of Turkic we thus always have to reckon with contact situations in which mutually intelligible varieties met and influenced each other. This was the normal situation in the old tribal confederations with their mobile heterogeneous groups. Groups speaking varieties of the same language family came together in attractive areas that were suitable for a nomadic lifestyle. The Mongol invasions that started in the 13th century led to a redistribution of Turkic varieties and to their dominance over a huge territory. The intra-family contacts meant that groups using different codes were brought together to coexist in tribal confederations, in mixed speech communities based on new social networks. Abrupt reorganization processes led to the emergence of modified varieties. The varieties were sufficiently close to adapt to each other, that is, to undergo a certain leveling. This could lead to amalgamation, the opposite of diversification. Disparate varieties were knit together, came to resemble each other more closely, developed common features, and assimilated. The Turkic languages have historically diverged from each other, but many have also, as family members, come to converge with each other through areal interaction. The dual forces of divergence and convergence have formed new clusters. The interaction in a number of contact areas led to new constellations involving convergence and leveling.

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Today’s Turkic languages may normally have emerged this way. Some served as koinés, regional or transregional linguae francae for intergroup communication, leveled varieties that also influenced other varieties within their respective areas of validity. Even the earliest kind of Turkic known to us might, in view of its transparent, regular structure, have been a koiné, a leveled language of this kind (Johanson 2002a: 149). The interesting question here is whether genealogically and typologically close varieties could coalesce into new varieties. Can contacts between coexisting, mutually intelligible varieties lead to glottogenesis, the birth of new languages?

8.

The case of Kashkay

The results of such convergent developments are hard to analyze if the contributing varieties are very similar. As in human families, it may be impossible to tell which participants have exerted a given influence that leads to convergence. To prove scenarios like this, we may look at recent developments, for example in Iran, where the intricate history of Turkic tribes has led to mutual linguistic influences. We may look at a region in Southern Iran, one of the last areas of nomadism in the Turkic world. The area is highly suitable for nomadic life, and it has attracted many different incoming groups from various directions. Modern Kashkay, which is spoken here, may serve as a model case for possible similar situations in the older history of Turkic. Kashkay is the language of a heterogenous tribal union. Its territory has always been well-suited for pastoral nomadic life and has thus attracted many different elements (Dolatkhah 2007, 2010). Though the origins of all components of the Kashkay community are not quite clear, the ancestors must have been predominantly speakers of southwestern Turkic, so-called Oghuz Turkic, to which also Turkish and Azeri belong. Some may have immigrated in the pre-Seljuk and Seljuks periods, others in later periods. The linguistic differences mirror the various backgrounds of the tribes. The Abiverdi tribe, originating in Khorasan, is a relatively recent member. The Eymur tribe seems to have immigrated very late, since its members are claimed to lack knowledge of Persian. Also groups of non-Turkic speakers, e.g. speakers of the Iranian languages Kurdish, Lori, Lak, and Balochi have joined the confederation. All of them now speak Kashkay varieties as a result of code shift. The Turkic varieties of the individual nomadic tribes manifest differences at all levels of the grammar and lexicon. As a rule, it is possible to determine,

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on the basis of linguistic features, which tribe a speaker belongs to (Csató 2005: 7). Nevertheless, a leveled Kashkay variety for intergroup communication has, interestingly enough, developed. Part of its characteristics are contactinduced. Iranian languages have to some degree influenced all varieties. The leveling processes can still be studied in the present-day Kashkay area. It is possible to compare texts written down by Gunnar Jarring in the 1940’s with today’s language, studied by Éva Á. Csató (2006). A good deal of development has taken place since Jarring’s texts were taken down: A much more homogenous linguistic landscape has emerged.

9.

An example

One example of variation and unification in this South Oghuz variety will be given here on the basis of Csató (2001, 2005). Turkic languages display an old present aspect-tense form which can be called Present 1. Most of the languages also have a second present aspect-tense form, which can be called Present 2. It represents a more focal view on events and is similar to the English progressive, whereas Present 1 is used as a general present or modal item. There are four options in Kashkay: One of the varieties of Kashkay, the Abiverdi variety, whose speakers once came from Khorasan in the east, only displays Present 1 forms. The Shishbeyli variety exhibits the old Present 1 plus a Present 2, which is similar to the Turkish Present 2. Other varieties display the old Present 1 plus a Present 2, which is similar to the Azeri Present 2. Certain Abiverdi speakers in the district of Shiraz lack a Present 1, but use an Azeri-like Present 2 as their only present form. Table 1: Present tense in Kashkay varieties Abiverdi

Shishbeyli

Other Kashkay varieties

Present 1

Present 1

Present 1

Present 2 of the Turkish type

Present 2 of the Azeri type

Abiverdi speakers in Shiraz Present 2 of the Azeri type

The competing present paradigms present an interesting situation. It is obvious that the Azeri-like pattern is the most successful one, owing to the dominant position of Azeri in Iran. Older speakers mostly seem to know two

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variants, of which they prefer the more conservative one. Younger peoplemay also have two variants at their disposal, but they seem to prefer the more progressive Azeri-like patterns. Certain Abiverdi speakers in Shiraz use the Azeri-like Present 2 as their only present form, but they have also copied the semantics of the old Present 1 onto it.

10. Conclusions What does this mean? There seems to be a difference between contact within language families and contact between unrelated languages, owing to the genealogical and often typological proximity of the varieties involved. To judge from the relatively recent situation described here, several related tribal varieties in constant contact may produce strongly levelled varieties. The similarities within the families seem to favor copying of various kinds. Effects of take-over, carry-over, and shift are observed. Sociolinguistic factors may (co-)determine the quantity and quality of the copying. A limiting factor is probably the will to keep a certain distance between the varieties, to maintain certain differences for the purpose of tribal selfidentification (Csató 2001: 117–118). Tendencies of this kind may, however, vanish increasingly from generation to generation. The same methods can certainly be used for analyses of intra- and extrafamily copying. It is also certain that degrees of typological similarity are important in contacts between non-related languages as well. There is one major difference, however, namely the difficulty of getting reliable observable data concerning intra-family contacts, which often produce rather subtle results. We would need, as it were, magnifying glasses to detect and examine the small, finely detailed steps of convergence. It is often impossible to pinpoint the exact course and results of the processes. Nevertheless, their study may allow us to discover connections to areas to which the varieties belonged in earlier periods, and perhaps even to reconstruct movements of the speaker groups. What does this mean for a protolanguage or the earliest known language of a family? If code-copying between relatives can really lead to the birth of new languages through leveling, Proto-Turkic may also have been the result of areal convergence processes in which the contributing related codes became more similar to each other, fusing into a more homogeneous language. If a daughter were born this way, we might be entitled to talk of her “multiple parents”. However, this would not threaten her membership in the family. She would be born within her family and remain in it.

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References Csató, Éva Á. 2001 Present in Kashkay. Turkic Languages 5: 104–119. Csató, Éva Á. 2005 On copying in Kashkay. In: Éva Á. Csató, Bo Isaksson and Carina Jahani (eds.), Linguistic convergence and areal diffusion: Case studies from Iranian, Semitic and Turkic, 271–283. London: Routledge-Curzon. Csató, Éva Á. 2006 Gunnar Jarring’s Kashkay materials. In: Lars Johanson and Christiane Bulut (eds.), Turkic-Iranian contact areas. Historical and linguistic aspects, 209–223. (Turcologica 62.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Dixon, Robert M.W. 1997 The rise and fall of languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Doerfer, Gerhard 1967 Türkische Lehnwörter im Tadschikischen. (Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 37, 3.) Wiesbaden: Steiner. Dolatkhah, Sohrab 2007 Présentation et documentation du folklore Kashkay (language turcique du sud de l’Iran). Master thesis. Paris: École Pratique des Hautes Études. Dolatkhah, Sohrab 2010 The Kashkay people, past and present. Bilig 53: 103–114. Johanson, Lars 1993 Code-copying in immigrant Turkish. In: Guus Extra and Ludo Verhoeven (eds.), Immigrant languages in Europe, 197–221. Clevedon, Philadelphia, Adelaide: Multilingual Matters. Johanson, Lars 1999a Frame-changing code-copying in immigrant varieties. In: Guus Extra and Ludo Verhoeven (eds.), Bilingualism and migration, 247–260. (Studies on Language Acquisition 14.) Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johanson, Lars 1999b The dynamics of code-copying in language encounters. In: Bernt Brendemoen, Elizabeth Lanza and Else Ryen (eds.), Language encounters across time and space, 37–62. Oslo: Novus Press. Johanson, Lars 2002a Structural factors in Turkic language contacts. [With an introduction by Bernard Comrie.] London: Curzon. Johanson, Lars 2002b Contact-induced linguistic change in a code-copying framework. In: Mari Jones and Edith Esch (eds.), Language change: The interplay of internal, external and extra-linguistic factors, 285–313. (Contributions to the Sociology of Language 86.) Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johanson, Lars 2002c Do languages die of ‘structuritis’? The role of code-copying in language endangerment. Italian Journal of Linguistics 14: 249–270. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar: Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language contact and contact languages, 61–79. (Hamburg Studies on Multilingualism 7.) Amsterdam: Benjamins. Johanson, Lars 2013 Written language intertwining. In: Peter Bakker and Yaron Matras (eds.), Contact languages. A comprehensive guide, 273–331. Boston, Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

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Part 2: Contact-induced changes in scenarios with looser family ties

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Kristin Reinke (Mainz-Germersheim)

Language contact in a multilingual setting The attractive force of Italo-romance dialects on Italian in Montreal

Introduction The Italian language spoken in Montreal is of particular interest because of its contact with several languages and dialects creating an extremely complex language situation among this immigrant community. On the one hand, there is language contact with two dominant languages, French and English, on the other hand, we also have to consider the contact between Standard Italian and the Italo-romance dialects. Studies have so far dealt mainly with the English and French influence on Italian and investigated phenomena of borrowing (insertional code copying) at the lexical level. In the present article, I shall focus on the morphological level with regard to nouns (gender), verbs (regression of the subjunctive present tense), personal pronouns (replacement of lei by voi) and determinatives (omission of the determined article before a possessive). Generally, inflectional morphology is believed to be relatively resistant to code copying. If this is true for English and French as contact languages, it does not seem to be the case for the Italo-romance dialects. By analyzing some examples of a broader oral corpus, I shall discuss the effect of the congruence between Standard Italian and Italo-romance dialects as well as the interaction between language contact and language attrition.

1.

The Italian community of Montreal

Italian immigration to Canada began around 1880 and continued in several waves until 1970 with a considerable increase after World War II. Italians are considered one of the most important immigrant groups, and Montreal was the site of the first established Italian community in Canada. The city still has the second largest Italian community, following Toronto, and Italians make up the third largest ethnic group in Montreal (Statistics Canada, 2006 Census of Population). As the present community is two-thirds derived from post war immigration (Villata 1990a: 80), it will be the focus of my study. The majority of this group came to Canada in the context of the post war immi-

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gration policy encouraging the recruitment of European immigrants and allowing for the so-called chain immigration. Consequently, Italians settled down with their families to become permanent residents. In Little Italy they lived near to each other for mutual support and, even nowadays, it is a centre of Italian culture in Montreal, to some extent reproducing the traditions of the home country. There, one can find the Italian church Madonna della Difesa, Italian associations, shops and official institutions, although at present, the authentic life of the Italian community has since moved to northeastern parts of the city, transforming Little Italy into more of a tourist attraction. The community created several institutions to maintain Italian culture, among which the Patronato Italo-Canadese di Assistenza agli Immigranti (PICAI) offers Italian language courses for immigrants. Most Montreal Italians emigrated from the poor southern regions of Italy and belonged to the lower socio-economic class (blue collar workers). At the time of immigration they spoke neither French nor English and, for the first generation, this has hardly changed, so that the Italian language or an Italoromance dialect continues to be the family language. Even in the work environment, they were able to continue communicating in their language of origin because of the high concentration of Italian immigrants working together in the same domains. The present language situation of the Italian community has, to a large extent, been influenced by its relationship to the two dominant population groups, the French and the English. The first Italians settled in the cheaper French districts, belonged to the same socio-economic class as the French and were more attracted by the French language because of the same romance origin and a certain cultural affinity. As a result, contacts with the French population were more extensive and the French language initially became their second language. However, in the hope of improving their social and economic status, the majority of the post war immigrants sent their children to English schools: We have left our friends and family and our country behind. We have come all the way to Canada in order to better ourselves and provide for the future of our children. It just simply wouldn’t make sense for us to limit the range of jobs open to our children by educating them in French, for French is only spoken in the province of Quebec. English is the language of North America. (subject’s statement in Boissevain 1970: 38)

The contact with two dominant languages and the choice of English as the language of education had as an effect that the Italian language1 in Montreal 1

The reader should keep in mind that what is popularly refered to as “Italian”is in fact a continuum of very distinctive language varieties.

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today is better preserved than in other Italian communities surrounded by only one contact language. Since parents and children were unable to communicate in the same second language they therefore had to use their language of origin. The Italian community of Montreal is not as homogenous as it would appear at first glance. The extremely high number of associations, for example, indicates a certain fragmentation of the community. Most of them have no cultural-political ambitions but mainly organize leisure activities which primarily attract the first generation immigrants while the younger generation becomes ever more distant to the community. For the latter, the Italian language is restricted to communicating with the older generation whereas English (or French) is their dominant language to be employed in all other situations: Insomma per voi giovani adulti del 2000, che cosa vuol dire parlare italiano in un paese che ha tante altre lingue da proporre? Diciamolo chiaramente: pur essendo figli nostri, siete tanto lontani da noi. Avete cultura, identità ed esigenze nordamericane. […] Quando i giovani s’incontrano, quando lavorano insieme, quando giocano insieme, lo fanno in inglese o in francese. L’italiano, lo tiran fuori ogni tanto, solo per il gusto di sfoggiare qualche termine scurrile che non ha equivalente in inglese o francese. (Bombardieri 1999:12) [Finally for you young adults of the year 2000, what does it mean to speak Italian in a country that has many other languages to offer? Let us state it clearly, even as our sons, you are very distant from us. You have culture, identity and North American expectations. […] When young people meet, when working together, when playing together, they do so in English or French. Italian is pulled out once in a while, only for wishing to show off some strange term that has no equivalent in English or French. (Bombardieri 1999: 12; my translation of the above citation)]

Ultimately, the Italian community is changing. The younger generation is speaking less and less Italian and this cannot be without consequences for the Italian language in Montreal.

2.

The Italian language of Montreal: Italianese/Montreal Italian

Studies have so far investigated the contact between Italian and the two competing contact languages, as well as the primary phenomenon of borrowing on the lexical level (Villata 1990a/b; Bagola 2000a/b/c, 2002), which I will refer to as “insertional code copying” using Johanson’s (2009) terminology.2 2

“The term code refers to languages and language varieties (dialects, sociolects, ideolects, registers). […] Contact induced copying means that users of a Basic Code copy elements of a Model Code. The Model Code is the ‘source’, ‘donor’ or ‘diffusing’ code, while the Basis Code is the ‘recipient’ or ‘replica’ code. The term

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According to Villata (1990a: 4), Montreal Italian is a continuum consisting of three varieties. At one end, one can observe the Italian dialects spoken among speakers of the same region of origin. At the other end, these dialects are opposed to Standard Italian, as used by the Catholic Church, Italian media, social elites, in language courses for immigrants and in different forms of contact with Italy (Bagola 2000c). A particular characteristic of the Italian spoken in Montreal is the third variety, the so-called Italianese which, according to Villata (1990a), is a koiné between the dialect and standard spoken by the majority of Montreal Italians when it is impossible for them to communicate in their dialect. Villata attributes its emergence to the necessity of communication between speakers of different dialects. The distance between Italianese and Standard Italian is not as great as that between the latter and the Italo-romance dialects, mainly because of different copying processes from English and French. Some of the examples for such copying are: • from English: begga < eng. bag (ital. busta), scioppa < eng. shop (ital. negozio), germanese < eng. german (ital. tedesco), stoppare < eng. to stop (fermare), • from French: asciuranza < fr. assurance (ital. assicurazione), cava > fr. cave (ital. cantina), majorità > fr. majorité (ital. maggioranza), fermare < fr. fermer (ital. chiudere) In many cases, this copying from two contact languages results in the creation of doublets such as: permesso < fr. permis de conduire competing with licenza < eng. driving licence (ital. patente), magazine < fr. magasin competing with storo < eng. store (ital. negozio). According to Villata (1990a: 117), French functions more often as the Model Code (source language) among the first generation and English among the second. However, Bagola (2002: 64) believes that Montreal Italian (from now on referred to as MI)3 has incorporated more copies from English as Model Code, but does not provide any statistical data to confirm this. Villata further discusses different adaptation strategies of these copies to the phonological, lexical semantic and morphosyntactic system of the Basis Code (receiving language). He demonstrates that, by using Italian final mor-

3

copying which covers what is otherwise called ‘borrowing’, ‘diffusion’, ‘transfer’, ‘interference’, ‘replication’, etc., is chosen to stress that copies are per definition not identical to their models.” (Johanson 2009: 62) In this article, I shall avoid Villata’s term italianese because it evokes, to a large degree, the language contact with English which is not the primary concern of my study. Instead, I shall simply use more neutral terms such as “Italian spoken in Montreal” or “Montreal Italian” and represented by the abbreviation MI.

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phemes, particularly -a, -o and -e (for example eng. market > marchetta, frz. garage > garagio), these adaptations conform perfectly to the Italian language system and its diachronic evolution (Villata 1990a: 49). Studying language contact in immigrant situations normally means focussing on contact between the language of origin and the dominant language(s) in the new environment, as is the case in the studies of Villata and Bagola for Italian spoken in Montreal. However, the original language repertoire of an immigrant group is never homogenous. It might also involve a language contact that has its origin in the home country, but that evolves in its specific way under the conditions of the new environment. This has even been suggested by Villata and Bagola by referring to MI as a koiné. Even if there are different definitions of the term, koiné generally refers to a language form emerging from contact between different dialects, which many authors consider to be a mixture or compromise between several dialects.4 It seems therefore necessary, for a better understanding of MI, to take into account not only the contact between Italian and French or English but also the contact with Italo-romance dialects. On one hand, the linguistic distance between Standard Italian and Italo-romance dialects is indeed large enough (see Bochmann 1989: 23) to justify including this form of contact in any discussion of language contact.5 On the other hand, their typological proximity due to their Latin roots and a shared recent history on a politically unified territory makes their study interesting in order to provide some insights to the central question of this volume: Does congruence between contact languages have an effect on contact outcomes? For our corpus, we shall therefore analyze what role the Italo-romance dialects play in the outcome of this particular contact situation.

3.

Corpus and methodology

The results presented in this article are based on the analysis of 30 in-depth interviews varying between 30 and 90 minutes each. The corpus was compiled in the summer of 2006 after years of intensive participant observation (1999–2004) and previous preliminary studies (2004–2006). The subjects were chosen starting with my Italian-Canadian acquaintances and passers-by in the centers of the Italian community and subsequently recruited via a snowball effect. I limited the study to post-war immigrants and their descendants because they constitute the majority of the Italian community in Mon4 5

See Siegel (1985: 362) for a discussion of different definitions of the term. This is the reason why I use the term “Italo-romance” instead of “Italian” dialects.

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treal. Also, since the first immigrants are mostly still living, this sampling made a comparison between first and second generation possible. The immigrant subjects mostly came from the poorer southern regions of Italy (Sicily, Calabria, Lazio, Campania, Molise) and were originally dialect speakers with some knowledge of a diastratic (socially) marked Italian. The fact that I was not part of the community and spoke Standard Italian as a foreign language, forced the subjects to, as much as possible, suppress their dialect and try to express themselves in Standard Italian, i.e. the socalled Montreal koiné, which I consider for the purpose of my study the Basis Code (receiving language). Since this was the object of my research, I could conduct the interviews myself. The data presented in this article stem from a research project which focussed on language change in MI and did not aim explicitly at analysis of language contact phenomena. The interviews were conducted in Italian and the speakers were not aware of my knowledge of the other languages involved. The conversations could be characterized as taking place more in a monolingual mode and phenomena such as code-switching were therefore rarely observed. The analysis was based on morpho-syntax (nouns, verbs, personal pronouns and determinatives) since this linguistic aspect has so far only been partly described for MI. Firstly, for each subject, all forms “deviating”6 from Standard Italian were counted for each linguistic feature (e.g. “deviating” gender marking as in artrose instead of artrosi, sporto instead of sport). Then, the percentages of the latter were calculated over the total of each of the features recorded, representing tokens rather than types. The data were correlated with the generational affiliation of our subjects and, in order to verifiy the statistical significance of the observed differences in the percentages of “deviation” from standard (continuous from 0 % to 100 %), an analysis of variance (ANOVA) was carried out using the Statview statistical software (SAS). In order to take into consideration the characteristics related to the migration context, the data were also compared qualitatively with data provided 6

I use the more neutral terms “deviation” and “specificity” instead of “error” in order to avoid the negative connotation that the latter still has for some people. Although this is obsolete, since Henri Frei (Grammaire des fautes, 1929) has shown that errors are an important factor of linguistic change, this perception continues to dominate purist views. I am aware that the terms “deviation” and “specificity” are also not entirely free of negative connotations and this is why I use quotation marks in the text which indicate that I should like them to be understood as neutral.

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by studies of the Italian varieties in the home country and with those from studies on both language attrition and second language acquisition. The reason of this methodological approach is the declining use of Italian in Montreal, especially among the younger generation (Villata 1999: 54–55). This reduced usage might affect the language competence of the speakers as well as the language structure, manifesting itself as language attrition. Within the framework of the so-called regression hypothesis, the latter can be considered as a mirror of language acquisition (Jakobson 1969), i.e. the first acquired language elements are best and longest maintained whereas the most recently learned are most rapidly lost. An important concept for our analysis is also the markedness of a linguistic element which constitutes a bridge between language attrition and L2-acquisition, since a child’s language, L2 interlanguages and languages in the process of attrition all follow the same universal principles (Giacalone Ramat 1994a: 28). For the purpose of simplifying, markedness divides linguistic oppositions into marked and unmarked items and predicts that an unmarked element is with a high probablility acquired before and lost after a marked one because it is more typical, more frequent, easier to perceive etc. (see Greenberg 1966: 33; Dressler et al. 1987: 13–14; Chini 1995: 111; Ludwig 2001: 408; Giacalone Ramat 2003: 25). In order to answer our research question, i.e. whether congruence between contact languages has an effect on contact outcomes, we shall consider the five conditions mentioned by Thomason (2001: 93) necessary for demonstrating “structural interference in a (proposed) receiving language”. The first condition is, that we have to avoid focussing on a single grammatical feature, but should support our observations by also looking at others: “[…] an argument for a contact origin will only be convincing if it is supported by evidence of interference elsewhere in the language’s structure as well” (Thomason 2001: 93). Second, a source language needs to be identified. Third, there must be shared structural features in the source and the receiving language. Fourth, it has to be proven that the shared features were not present in the receiving language before it came into contact with the source language. Fifth, it has to be proven that the shared features were present in the proposed source language before it came into contact with the receiving language. In the present article, I have chosen one example of each of the abovementioned morpho-syntactic groups (gender marking in nouns, regression of the subjunctive present tense, replacement of lei by voi and omission of the determined article before a possessive) which can often be explained by language contact with French or English, and I shall discuss the possibile in-

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fluence of both dialect contact and mechanisms related to language attrition and L2-acquisition.

4.

Results

With regard to the investigated morpho-syntactic categories, the nucleus of MI corresponds to a large extent to Standard Italian. For all analyzed features, the average “deviation” from standard does not exceed 17 %. In the following sections, I shall present examples of such “deviations” (or rather specificities), and discuss what might have caused them. 4.1. Nouns: gender It is important to underline that 97.0 % of all nouns (N = 9 057) correspond in terms of inflectional morphology to the norm of Standard Italian as described by traditional grammar. In this respect, there is a statistical significant difference (p < 0.05) between the first and second generation which use 2.8 % and 5.0 % “deviated” forms respectively. Whereas 64.5 % of all “deviations” relate to gender, 35.5 % relate to number. The observation that gender is more unstable than number has also been demonstrated in studies on Italian as L2, where gender is acquired later than number because it is less functional (Chini 1995: 286). It is also considered to be the marked form (Giacalone Ramat 1994b: 28; Chini 1995: 61, 163). A ranking of the “deviated” gender forms clearly shows that they are more often found among plural rather than among singular nouns (85.1 % vs. 14.8 %) and more often among feminine rather than among masculine forms, i. e. this particularly concerns nouns of the inflectional class II (e. g. casa/case) and IIIf (e. g. estate/estati) which together comprise 58 % of all “deviated” forms. Of course, some “deviations” can directly be related to language contact with one of the dominant languages. Contact with French might explain forms such as l’artrose (instead of artrosi) < fr. arthrose (I43), un libre (instead of un libro) < fr. livre (I54), le tax (instead of le tasse) < fr. les taxes (I55), le programme televisive (instead of i programmi televisivi) < fr. les programmes (I11).7 In all of these cases, the formal resemblance between the Italian and the French forms might lead us to assume that French interference is at the origin of these “deviated” forms. For example, in the syntagma le programme televisive, the speaker might first copy the French article le and then adjust the 7

I + number refer to the subject who produced the cited form.

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inflection accordingly. As forms in -e / -es are very frequent in French, one could say that this language contact might inhibit forms in -i, but as we shall see later this would not appear to be the case. With regard to English, the “deviant” gender endings could not be attributed to language contact which is hardly surprising since English has no productive gender markers and its gender system is based primarily on natural gender (with some exceptions). Contact with English would probably give rise to forms that end in consonants as reported by Chini (1995: 199), e.g. problem, offis, television, animal. On the contrary, our subjects even go so far as to adapt copies which are in fact already part of Standard Italian to the Italian morphology by overgeneralising the inflectional class I, e. g. bar > barro (I20), sport > sporto (I26), nord > nordo (I05), sud > sudo (I05), club > clubi (I55). By giving priority to this very frequent inflectional class and by exclusively using vocalic endings, speakers demonstrate that they have a clear idea of how a typical Italian noun sounds. As the data quantity only allows important observations for the inflectional classes I, II and III, we shall now take a closer look at the “deviated” forms of these three groups which may best be described as a confusion of inflectional classes. The most common case in our corpus is the choice of a plural morpheme of another inflectional class. 26.3 % of all “deviations” are due to the usage of the final plural -i, normally characterising the inflectional classes I (e. g. vento/venti) and III-masculin (e. g. cortile/cortili), in nouns that belong to the inflectional class II, e. g. personi (instead of persone) (I02). This weakens the above-mentioned hypothesis of a strong French influence as there is no reason to attribute these forms to French. On the contrary, one explanation for this overgeneralization might be dialect contact as some Italo-romance dialects such as Sicilian actually only possess this one plural gender marker (Rohlfs 1968: § 362 and § 365; Varvaro 1988: 722). But overgeneralizations of nominal endings are also considered to be a feature of popular Italian (italiano popolare) (Berruto 1987: 119). Furthermore, overgeneralizations of forms in -i, which are regarded as “unmarked” because they are the masculine form of the inflectional class with the highest frequency, have also been observed in L2-acquisition (Valentini 1990: 344; Chini 1995: 218; Chini and Ferarris 2003: 44). This rather transparent ending is actually the first to be acquired among all plural markers in L2-acquisition (Chini and Ferarris 2003: 48; Brincat 1979: 50). Not only are nouns of the inflectional class II used in analogy to class I (or IIIm), the inverse is also true: 14.4 % of all “deviated” nouns of class I are used in analogy to class II, ending in -e instead of -i, e. g. gruppe (instead of gruppi) (I62). Here the high frequency of -e in French might play a certain role, however this kind of overgeneralization could also be attributed to a

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dialect contact because, according to Rohlfs (1968: § 366), even in modern dialects -e is much more common than we would so far have expected. The fluctuation between -e and -i in different dialects and the divergence between dialect and standard endings might create a degree of insecurity regarding the correct endings. However, the overgeneralization of the plural -e concerns rather the inflectional class III and more often feminine (25.1 %) than masculine (18.6 %) nouns of this class. Nouns such as associazione, generazione, informazione etc. become frequently invariable and are used according to the singular form, most likely in analogy to the inflectional class II (f. pl.) that also ends in -e. It is therefore possible that the speakers already perceive the ending -e as a plural marker. This same overgeneralization has been reported by Chini (1995: 218) in her study on L2-acquisition. In general, the preference for endings of the inflectional classes I and II has also been observed for the Italian spoken in Australia – often cited as an example of language attrition – where nouns in -e are, as well, most unstable (Bettoni 1991b: 376). 4.2. Verbs: regression of the subjunctive (present tense) Altogether 89.8 % of all verbs (N = 11 407) correspond to the norm of Standard Italian in line with traditional grammar.8 First generation speakers use 4.3 % “deviated” forms, second generation speakers 16.9 %: a difference which is statistically significant (p < 0.0001). Calculated within all possible contexts where a subjunctive would be expected, the latter is not employed in 98.4 % of cases; it is mostly replaced by the indicative mode and this independent of the generation. It is important to underline that the regression of the subjunctive has also been observed in Italy where it is considered to be a feature of the so-called neo-standard – the new, more dynamic standard which, as a result of the trend towards destandardization, takes into account the way in which people actually speak (Berruto 1987: 71). According to Berruto, the regression of the subjunctive in Italy is attributable to three factors: its difficulty and limited functionality, the influence of Italo-romance dialects and the contact with 8

It should be noted that the analysis is complicated by the fact that the use of verbs is rather unstable even in Italy where it characterizes particularly the neo-standard or italiano d’uso medio. For this reason, these percentages refer only to the morphology in its strictest sense, i. e. to grammatical morphemes and paradigms (see Berretta 1990: 181).

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English. The latter is also suggested by Picone and Valdman (2005: 153) to explain the strong decline of the French subjunctive in contact situations where French is a minority language (e. g. New Brunswick, Ontario, Louisiana); they interpret this as a sign of language attrition. Certainly, all these factors contribute to the weakening of the subjunctive which is observed more so in Montreal than in Italy where the phenomenon is again more evident in the south than in the north. However in Italy, the limited use of the subjunctive concerns only certain contexts (e. g. after the negative use of verbs expressing an opinion or knowledge), while it remains stable in others (Cortelazzo 2002: 98). The highest rate of regression is reported by Cortelazzo with 23.66 % after epistemic adjectives. Contrastly, in Montreal one can observe the indicative mode in all possible contexts, e. g. malgrado che / ne ho avuti / dei “dit spaghetti” (instead of abbia) (I02), credo che / che la CIBA è più / un’associazione per i / giovani professionali italiani (instead of sia) (I10), il modo più corretto / è quello senza accento ma / non penso che esiste (instead of esista) (I07). It is actually the use of the subjunctive mode that represents the exception since within 30 analyzed interviews, only 2 “correct” subjunctive forms were detected – sembra che sia una cosa buone (I11), a meno che non piova (I13) – as well as 2 cases of hypercorrection, i. e. use of a subjunctive where it is not required – noi siamo rimasti con la vecchia grammatica / là hanno quella nuova / e allora ecco perché ci sia la differenza (I21), io non penso ch’è vero / so(no) veramente / come si dice / non mi vengano / non mi viene (I42). However, the subjunctive mode is not always simply lost, but in some cases expressed lexically by using forse, può darsi, probabilmente (credo che forse ha raggione, I08) or by using the future (le lingue per loro / boh / no_non credo che sarà molto importante per loro, I11), a tendancy which has also been observed for Italy (Berretta 1993a: 217; Banfi and Bernini 2003: 77, 82 and 87). The extreme low vitality of the subjunctive in Montreal might be due to the interplay of all the above-mentioned factors (its difficulty and limited functionality, the influence of Italo-romance dialects and the contact with English) which are particularly strong in Montreal and thus would accelerate this process. The idea of language contact with English as a causal factor seems supported by the observation that, sometimes, the conjunction che after verbs of opinion is missing, e. g. non penso [che] sarà come adesso / penso piuttosto / sarà come a New York (I20), mi sembra [che] sarà un po’ difficile you know (I29), just as in English where that can, under certain conditions, be deleted in relative clauses. At the same time, the Italo-romance dialects are much more present in Montreal than in Italy and do probably reinforce the regression of the subjunctive because southern dialects – our subjects mostly originate from southern Italy – do not at all have the subjunctive present

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tense (as is the case for Campania and Calabria; see Rohlfs 1968: § 559 and 681; Radtke 1988: 657 and 664) or it is rarely used (as is the case for Sicily; see Varvaro 1988: 722). This would also explain why it is better maintained in northern compared to southern Italy as mentioned by Cortelazzo (2002: 98). In fact, its replacement by the indicative mode is also reported by Telmon (1993: 122) and Coveri, Benucci and Diadori (1999: 50) as being typical for certain italiani regionali. Finally, the idea regarding its difficulty and low functionality is further supported by the fact that it is also rarely used by L2-learners who first aquire the unmarked and prototypical indicative and only later all other modes (Bernini 1994, Banfi and Bernini 2003). 4.3. Personal pronouns: replacement of lei by voi Altogether 95.9 % of all personal pronouns (N = 14 388) correspond to the norm of Standard Italian. First generation speakers use 1.1 % “deviated” forms, second generation speakers 3.0 % and this small difference is again statistically significant (p < 0.05).9 Formally, the personal pronouns in our corpus correspond, with only one exception, to Standard Italian: on only one occasion did a single speaker use the Sicilian form idu instead of lui (Mais se quello la parla il siciliano / io parlo siciliano con idu non c’ho problema, I04). Elsewhere, calculated across all possible contexts of a given form, it is the use of the second person plural (voi) instead of the third person singular (lei) (with or without the personal pronoun) which constitutes the feature exhibiting the highest frequency of “deviations” within personal pronouns. In 66.6 % of cases, our subjects used voi instead of lei (N = 21), e. g. pensono voi siete turista (instead of lei è) (I24), voi scrivete (instead of lei scrive) (I29). As the total occurrence of the polite form of address is only 21 and the 66.6 % thus only represents 14 cases, this result should be interpreted with care. Therefore, it is not surprising that the comparison between first and second generation is not statistically significant, even if the difference between both groups reveals that this tendency was, with 11 cases more common among the second generation than among the first where only 3 cases were observed for one single speaker. A first explanation that comes to mind is language contact with French where the polite form is, in fact, the second person plural vous. It seems logical that the phonetical similarity between both forms could lead to the use of 9

The high total occurrence of personal pronouns in our corpus is due to the fact that the zero pronouns have also been counted, i. e. use vs. non-utilization of subject pronouns.

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voi. But voi as a polite form of address also has its roots in Italian where, according to Rohlfs (1969: § 477), it was even the form used in texts written by Dante and Pertrarca, while the use of lei spread only as of the 15th century. Voi is, in fact, presently considered to be the polite form of address in several Italian regions, e. g. Southern Calabria, Naples, Northern Apulia, Rome, Ticino, and Corsica (Rohlfs 1969: § 477), Campania (Radtke 1988: 657) and Sicily (Varvaro 1988: 723). Coveri, Benucci and Diadori (1999: 50) mention this form as typical for the italiani regionali centro meridionali where, according to them, it is not diastratically (socially) marked. In contrast, Berretta (1995: 343) who observed this form in L2-acquisition states that it is present in native Italian, but rare, very marked, archaic, popular and expressing extreme respect. On the other hand, it is also seen as “a common feature of most immigrant languages” where “the marked formal pronoun is not learned by many members of the second generation as the language is restricted to the home and friendship domains” (Clyne 1992: 26). The use of the polite address form can be considered as another example where probably different factors acting in unison would underlie the trend towards the more frequent use of voi. 4.4. Determinatives: omission of the determined article before a possessive “Deviations” concerning the possessives are at 17.0 % rather frequent, probably because, in addition to inflectional morphology and the choice of a certain form instead of another, various syntactic combinations are also involved, e. g. its position before or after the noun and its variation concerning the co-ocurrence with an article. First generation speakers use 8.0 % “deviated” forms and second generation speakers 18.9 % (N = 636). It is actually the omission of the determined article in front of a possessive, e. g. mio paese (instead of il mio paese) (I1), mio libro (instead of il mio libro) (04) that is the most common “deviation” in this context. When analyzing this category, 18.4 % of all required articles before a possessive (N = 412) were found to be missing, with a proportion of 11.7 % for the first and 39.7 % for the second generation; the difference being statistically significant (p < 0.05). One explanation for the omission of the determined article in front of a possessive might be language contact with French and/or English since both these languages do not possess such a combination of article + possessive. On the other hand, the insecurity with regard to the use of the article probably also stems from the variation of its use in Italian and from contact with Italo-romance dialects.

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In Standard Italian, the article is indeed not employed in certain contexts. It is particularly variable before kinship terms, where it is normally absent, e. g. mio padre, mia madre, mio figlio, mia figlia, mio marito, mia moglie, but sometimes it is nevertheless used. This is the case with plural kinship terms (i miei figli), together with an adjective (il mio caro nonno), with derivatives of kinship terms (la tua sorellina) or with the affectionate forms babbo, papà, mamma, figliolo, figliola, with loro (il loro padre), when the pronoun comes after the noun (la madre mia) as well as when some further explanation or detail follows (il mio nonno di Roma). Looking up this grammatical category in grammer books, one finds that there is no consensus concerning the co-occurrence of article, possessive and kinship terms, and this is likely because of regional and dialectal differences in this respect (Hölker 1996: 1). Thus, in Tuscany, the article is used with kinship terms other than madre, padre, figlio and figlia, while it is omitted in other parts of Italy (Serianni 2006: 178). Also, forms such as mia mamma and mio papà are very much in use in informal Italian outside of Tuscany. Berruto (1993b: 64) considers the omission of the article in front of a possessive as a feature of popular Italian. It might also be considered an archaic attribute of Italian, since its introduction was only identified relatively late in Italian language history and it still varies markedly from dialect to dialect. Even Dante usually employed possessives without the article (Rohlfs 1969: § 432) and this was also still common in the literary language of the 19th century (Serianni 2006: 178). Uncertainties in the use of the article before possessives have furthermore also been found in L2-acquisition (Chini and Ferraris 2003: 56). Moreover, the general omission of the article also characterizes several “unstable” situations of language use: Pidgins, L2-acquisition, the Italian of foreign workers in Switzerland (Berruto 1990a: 213; Berretta 1990: 186; Valentini 1990: 345; Berruto 1991: 346; Banfi 1993: 53 and 1994: 107; Chini 1995: 225; Chini and Ferraris 2003: 54) and the Italian in other immigration contexts (Bettoni 1990b: 377, Gobbi 1994: 115). Consequently, the example of the possessive again clearly demonstrates that, to better understand languages in a migration context, one has to consider more than solely the language contact with the dominant languages. 4.5. Our data with respect to Thomason’s five conditions for structural interference Contrasting our results with Thomason’s five conditions for structural interference (Thomason 2001: 93) allows us to elucidate the following points: With respect to the first condition, our analysis considers multiple features of MI. For each feature, the analysis substantiates the difficulty in es-

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tablishing a single source of language change. The characteristic features are reasonably explained by contact between the Italo-romance dialects, or contact with (one of) the two dominant languages, or as changes which characterize language attrition and L2-acquisition. As for Thomason’s second condition, determining a source language (or Model Code), English, French and the Italo-romance dialects are identified, and as per Thomason’s fifth condition, the features of MI attributed to contact with them were indeed present in these languages prior to contact. The third condition – shared features in the source and in the receiving language (or in the Model and Basis Code) – is ambiguous and points slightly more in the direction of dialect contact since for some features the source language is most likely a dialect rather than English or French, e. g. the overgeneralizations of the final -i in nouns cannot be attributed to English or French. Among the various contacts, dialect is the more constant explanation, while in some cases it is occasionally either French or English that underlies particular features, e. g. French for some “deviations” of the noun markers and the replacement of lei by voi; English, both for the loss of the subjunctive and for the omission of the article before the possessive. The fourth condition is more problematic since the shared features investigated in our study were in actual fact present in the receiving language before it came into contact with the other languages and these can be described in terms of overgeneralizations or extention across other linguistic contexts. Does this mean that language contact has to be excluded? Certainly not. Even Thomason (2001: 94) claims that, in many contact situations, one cannot satisfy the fourth and fifth conditions. Moreover, as we have seen, all of the presented features can be explained by several causal factors, each reinforcing one another. Most of our observations are perfect examples of what Johanson (2009: 74) refers to as “frequential copying”, i. e. the increase of an existing pattern under the influence of the contact language(s) whereby in our study dialect contact seems to provide a convincing explanation for many features of MI. Nevertheless, we must not forget that we have also observed a clear tendency for a preference towards unmarked features which appears to be more apparent among speakers of the second generation and which confirms that the unstable situation of MI manifests itself in language attrition. Even if this might not be an influence of the contact languages, this kind and quantity of changes would have been less likely without the given sociolinguistic situation where speakers shift away from their origin language in favour of the dominant languages and where the acquisition of the L1 has been incomplete (see Thomason 2001: 62).

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Conclusion

The aim of the present article was to provide elements in reply to the central question of this volume: Does congruence between languages in contact have an effect on contact outcomes? For this purpose, we investigated what role the Italo-romance dialects play in the Italian language spoken in Montreal. Explanations regarding changes that occur in the original language within migration contexts have normally dealt mainly with language contact with the new dominant language(s). However, we have seen in the previous sections that in the case of the Italian language spoken in Montreal, dialect contact must also be taken into account. Our results confirm Thomason’s (2001: 91) statement that it is difficult to establish the fact of contact-induced change with structural interference and that multiple causation has to be considered. Due to several possible explanations for every “deviation” from Standard Italian observed in our corpus, we are unable to clearly determine a single specific source underlying the linguistic outcome. However, the overall data support the hypothesis that the Italo-romance dialects play an important role in shaping the Italian language spoken in Montreal. For the particular language features analyzed we have seen that they fit rather well typologically with the structure of Standard Italian and, even if it is not the only likely explanation, congruence between Standard Italian and Italoromance dialects is a very plausible one for the specific outcome, though in interaction with other mechanismes of language change converging in the same direction. It becomes clear that it is not only the direct influence from dominant languages that has to be taken into consideration when attempting to explain specific outcomes in particular contact situations.

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Rohlfs, Gerhard 1968 Grammatica Storica della Lingua Italiana e dei suoi Dialetti. Morfologia. Torino: Giulio Einaudi editore. Rohlfs, Gerhard 1969 Grammatica Storica della Lingua Italiana e dei suoi Dialetti. Sintassi e Formazione delle Parole. Torino: Giulio Einaudi editore. Serianni, Luca 2006 Grammatica Italiana: Italiano Comune e Lingua Letteraria. Torino: UTET. Telmon, Tullio 1993 Varietà regionali. In: Alberto A. Sobrero (ed.), Introduzione all’Italiano Contemporaneo. La Variazione e gli Usi, 93–149. Bari: Editori Laterza. Thomason, Sarah 2001 Language Contact: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Valentini, Ada 1990 Genere e numero in italiano L2. In: Monica Berretta, Piera Molinelli and Ada Valentini (eds.), Parallela 4. Morfologia / Morphologie, 335–345. Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag. Varvaro, Alberto 1988 Italienisch: Areallinguistik XII. Sizilien. In: Günter Holtus, Michael Metzeltin and Christian Schmitt (eds.), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, Bd. IV, 716–731. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag. Villata, Bruno 1990a L’italiano a Contatto con il Francese e con l’Inglese. Montréal: Montfort & Villeroy Éditeurs. Villata, Bruno 1990b Bilinguisme et Problématique des Langues Ethniques. Enquête sur le Comportement Linguistique des Jeunes Montréalais d’Origine Italienne. Québec: Centre international de recherche sur le bilinguisme. Villata, Bruno 1999 Il destino delle lingue minoritarie. In: Bruno Villata (ed.), L’Italiano a Montréal nel Duemila. Atti del Colloquio Montréal 19 Marzo 1999, 51–58. Montréal: Lòsna & Tron.

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Jouko Lindstedt (Helsinki)

Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance: from congruence to convergence

Proto-Slavic and Balkan Latin/Romance came into intense contact in the Balkans after the Slavs spread to the peninsula from the 6th century CE onwards. Originally, Proto-Slavic and Latin possessed fairly similar grammatical structures of the Indo-European synthetic type, but instead of simply reinforcing this similarity, both languages became subject to changes that made them members of the developing Balkan Sprachbund, or the Balkan linguistic area. In this paper I shall compare their roles in the formation of this area and discuss their possible mutual structural interference. The Balkan system of definite articles will be used as the main illustrative material. The Balkan Sprachbund did not come into being by borrowing from a single source language: different languages contributed variously to the system of Balkan enclitic articles, and the roles of Albanian and Balkan Romance were greater than that of Balkan Slavic. Explanations for the different roles of the Balkan languages in the Sprachbund formation should be sought in social history rather than in structural factors.

1.

Balkan convergence as mutual reinforcement of change

Ever since Kopitar’s (1829) pioneering article, structural similarities among Balkan Slavic, Balkan Romance, and Albanian have attracted the attention of linguists. In modern terms, Balkan Slavic comprises Bulgarian, Macedonian, and the Prizren-Timok (or Torlak) dialects of Serbian, and Balkan Romance means Daco-Romanian (i.e., Romanian proper) as well as the much smaller Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian, and Istro-Romanian. Judezmo (JudaeoSpanish, Ladino), although a Romance language spoken in the Balkans, is usually not included in Balkan Romance, owing to its different history and structure. Albanian is usually treated as a single language, although the difference between the Gheg and Tosk dialects is notable. By the appearance of Sandfeld’s (1930) Linguistique balkanique, Greek had already been accepted as one more member of what is called the Balkan Sprachbund, or the Balkan linguistic area. Romani, though still ignored in Asenova’s (2002) solid description of the Sprachbund, for instance, is now more and more often

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explored in its Balkan context – at least those of its dialects whose speakers have remained in South-Eastern Europe (Friedman 2000a: 3–4, 2000b; cf. Boretzky and Igla 1999). The Balkan linguistic area is thus defined by structural convergences among Balkan Slavic, Balkan Romance, Albanian, Greek, and, for some researchers at least, the South-East European Romani dialects. Those of their convergent features that are not simply part of their common Indo-European inheritance but rather due to their prolonged contacts in the Balkans are known as Balkanisms. There are lexical, phraseological, phonological, grammatical, and pragmatic Balkanisms, but grammatical ones have received most attention as they testify to a long, intense contact among the languages affected. Not all Balkanisms are manifested equally by all the languages of the area, and languages can consequently be divided into “more Balkanized” and “less Balkanized”. No definitive and commonly accepted set of grammatical Balkanisms exists, but the grammatical innovations included in the following list more or less coincide with those proposed in other contemporary studies (Lindstedt 2000: 232–234, with some modifications): Argument marking 1. Enclitic articles (postpositive and linking articles). 2. Object reduplication (clitic doubling). 3. Prepositions instead of cases: a tendency away from inflectional case marking. 4. Recipient/possessor merger. 5. Goal/location merger. 6. Relativum generale: relative clauses introduced by an uninflected marker. Verb system 7. Finite complementation (lack of an infinitive). 8. Volo future: the verb ‘to want’ grammaticalized as the marker of the future tense. 9. The past future tense used as an irrealis conditional mood. 10. Habeo perfect: a perfect (anterior) tense formed with the auxiliary ‘to have’. 11. Grammaticalized evidentials. Other 12. Analytic comparison of adjectives.

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The common typological characteristic of these grammatical Balkanisms is explicit analytism, by which I mean the overt marking of grammatical relations with free morphemes – prepositions, (p)articles, and auxiliaries. Explicit analytism can be opposed both to synthetism, i.e., grammatical marking with bound morphemes, and to isolating analytism where word order is the sole marker of grammatical relations. In terms of the above list of features, Balkan Slavic (especially Macedonian) forms the most “Balkanized” core of the area, followed by Albanian, Balkan Romance, Greek, and Romani (Lindstedt 2000: 234). The main problem with this approach is that when whole languages, or genetic subgroups of languages, are compared, it is difficult to account for the varying distribution of Balkanisms in their dialects. It can roughly be said that the most Balkanized dialects of the five language groups are to be found in Central Balkans, around the lakes Ohrid and Prespa. The high “Balkanization score” of Macedonian is mainly due to the fact that its standard language was based upon dialects that were closer to this epicentre of the linguistic area than those dialects the other standard languages of the Balkans have drawn on. As rightly pointed out by Aronson (2007), among others, most Balkanisms are features that are easy to find in European languages outside the Balkans, and they are not typological rarities worldwide, either. The infinitive-less complementation of the Balkan languages is perhaps their most exotic structural feature from a European point of view, but among the languages of the world, this type is quite common (Haspelmath 2011). What makes the Balkan area special is thus not the uniqueness of its defining features, but rather their sheer number and their central position in the grammars of the participating languages. The grammatical Balkanisms are found, as dominant features or at least as strong dialect tendencies, in all five (sometimes four) of the main Balkan language groups, which represent different branches of Indo-European, and this shows the strength of the areal diffusion effect. The first scholars discussing structural similarities among the Balkan languages, Kopitar (1829) and Miklosˇicˇ (1861), did not need a special concept for this kind of multilateral contact influence because they saw the source of the Balkanisms essentially in one direction: in the substratum influence of the so-called Palaeo-Balkan languages, spoken in the Balkans before the arrival of the Latin speakers and the Slavs. Miklosˇicˇ (1861: 6) called this “das alteinheimische Element”: Modern Albanian is the continuation of one of the Palaeo-Balkan languages – perhaps Illyrian, as first suggested by the Swede Johann Thunmann (1774: 240–282) – whereas Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance adopted Balkan features, similar to those of Albanian, by a substra-

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tum effect. The question of Balkanisms in Greek, which certainly never had a similar Indo-European substratum, was not posed. But the substratum explanation does not really work for Balkan Slavic either: in Old Church Slavonic, as attested from the 10th century onwards, there were practically no Balkanisms, though the Slavs had already been living in the Balkans for four centuries and the language shift must have been well underway by then. And of course the hypothesis was also more or less circular: we do not really know anything about the grammars of Illyrian, Thracian, or other PalaeoBalkan languages (Solta 1980: 11–39), so the explanation that, say, the postpositive definite article of Bulgarian is due to the Thracian substratum cannot be verified. Thus, grammatical Balkanisms cannot be traced back to a single (and unknown) substratum, but most of them are not borrowings from a single dominant language either. Turkish, the state language of the Ottoman era, was obviously too different typologically to exert significant influence on the Indo-European languages of the Balkans – congruence seems to have been a precondition for convergence. Turkish is, however, the most obvious source of the grammaticalized evidential distinctions (Friedman 1978, 1999: 521). Greek, the dominant language of the Byzantine era, and later the prestige language among the Christian population of the Ottoman Empire, would be a better candidate, and Sandfeld (1930: 213) did indeed seek the source of most Balkanisms in Greek (“dans la grande majorité des cas”) though he admitted that the postpositive article, at least, must have had a different source. However, regarding most lists of Balkanisms, Greek turns out to be less Balkanized a language than Balkan Slavic, Balkan Romance, and Albanian. There is also a strong logical argument against the primacy of Greek: all Balkanisms whose source has been sought in Greek are post-classical innovations in this language, too; as a prestige language of the Balkans, we would expect it to have contributed old and new features alike to the Sprachbund, but this is not the case. Thus, even in Greek, Balkanisms were innovations that it shared with other languages of the area to begin with (Lindstedt 2000: 237). The history of most Balkanisms is vague as regards the source of the innovations in a particular Balkan language, but it seems clear that after this unknown initiation, each change spread in several languages more or less simultaneously. It is difficult to call Balkanisms structural loans, as neither the source nor the target of the borrowing – or, in Johanson’s (2008) terminology, neither the model nor the target of grammatical copying – are clearly defined (Asenova 2002: 291). Friedman (2000b: 95) has called this “interactive interference”, and I have written about “contact-induced change by mu-

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tual reinforcement” (Lindstedt 2000). Horrocks describes the contacts between Romance and Greek with such terms as “mutual consolidation of changes already under way” and “mutual reinforcement of trends” (2010: 346, 348), and Thomason (2008: 45) writes about “negotiation” between language systems resulting in “partial transfer”. It is beyond the scope of this article to assess how unique the Balkan linguistic area is and what general properties it possibly shares with other areas or Sprachbünde around the globe (for a recent critical survey, see Tosco 2008). Trubetzkoy (1928), the father of the Sprachbund concept, seems to have aimed at a concept complementary to, and equally well-defined as, genetic families, but in actual practice there are rather few good examples of such uncontroversial Sprachbünde. Even the usefulness of the Balkan Sprachbund itself as a concept has been questioned (Aronson 2007; Spasov 2010), but no one has denied the existence of interesting contact-induced grammatical changes in the Balkans. I prefer Sinnemäki’s (2010: 895) approach: “the concept of linguistic area is not used here for an ontologically well-delimited entity but as a way to operationalize the more general phenomenon of areal diffusion”.

2.

Balkanized Romance or Romanized Slavic?

Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance have served as heuristic keys for understanding the Balkan linguistic area, because contrary to Greek and Albanian, both possess close relatives outside the Balkan area with which they can be compared so as to determine the specifically Balkan innovations. As for Romani, the dialects spoken outside the Balkans have been secondarily de-Balkanized (Finnish Romani, for instance, has developed a new infinitive), but there are no Romani dialects that have never passed through the Balkans. The status of Balkanisms in Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance, as compared to their closest relatives, is not the same (cf. Topolin´ska 2010: 33–34). Balkan Slavic is typologically different from the rest of Slavic languages, and this difference is mainly explained as a result of the influence of other Balkan languages. Balkan Romance does not differ from other Romance languages so radically. Object reduplication, recipient/possessor merger, goal/location merger, the use of the past future tense as an irrealis mood, the habeo perfect, and the analytic comparison of adjectives – indeed, half of the grammatical Balkanisms are to a significant extent attested also in Romance languages outside the Balkans. No Slavic languages outside the Balkan area have grammaticalized definite articles, but all Romance languages have done so – it is only the position of the article after the head noun that is peculiar to Balkan

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Romance. As for nominal declension, the Balkan environment seems to have influenced the two language groups quite oppositely: only Balkan Slavic among all Slavic languages has lost case inflection (except for some pronouns), whereas only Balkan Romance among all Romance languages has preserved it, though with fewer distinctions than in Latin. The roles of Slavic and Romance in the formation of the Balkan linguistic area seem to have been different, in that Slavic mainly adopted Balkan innovations, whereas Romance had a more active role in initiating and forming those innovations. As explained in section 1 above, the simple distinction between source and target languages does not do justice to the patterns of areal diffusion in the Balkans, to be sure, but it is nevertheless significant that no major Balkanism has had its origin attributed to Slavic. The biggest structural contribution of Slavic to the Sprachbund seems to be the pattern of forming the numerals 11 to 19 as “one upon ten”, “two upon ten” etc.: cf. Old Church Slavonic du˘va na des¬te ‘twelve’ (and similarly in all Slavic languages, e.g. Russian dvenadcat’), Romanian doi-spre-zece ‘id.’, Albanian dy-mbëdhjetë ‘id.’ – but Modern Greek ó eka, and Romani uses the model “ten and two” (Matras 2002: 28), e.g. Finnish Romani dehˇ-o-dui. The Proto-Slavic language spread to the Balkans from the middle of the sixth century CE onwards. The main component of the Slavic invasion was the mainly agricultural population that settled all over the Balkans with the weakening of Byzantine imperial control. The Slavs became the dominant population not only in Illyria and Thrace, but also in much of the Greek countryside, including Macedonia, Thessaly, and even all of Peloponnesus. This is attested to not only by historical sources (Vasmer 1941: 11–19; Weithmann 1994), but also by the numerous Slavic place-names found all over Greece, even in such southern regions as Laconia and the island of Crete (Vasmer 1941). The mediaeval Slavic states of Bulgaria and Serbia had a well-developed written language based upon Old Church Slavonic, which was created by Cyril and Methodius in the 9th century, but the prestige of Slavic as a language of a higher culture never rivalled that of Greek. Slavic loans can be shown in all Balkan languages (Hinrichs 1999), but their Slavic influence is mainly of the adstratal type, though north of the Danube, Slavic may also have had the role of a substratum. The role of Romance, and its predecessor Latin, was more manifold. First, Latin was the dominant language in the Roman Empire. Its influence on Greek can be detected from late Antiquity, long before the Slavs’ arrival in the Balkans (Haarmann 1999: 565–568; Horrocks 2010: 126–132). In the mediaeval Byzantine Empire the influence of Latin and Romance was much weaker, but it again increased after the “Latin” conquest of Constantinople

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by the Crusaders in 1204; this influence mainly came from Italian and French (Horrocks 2010: 345–349). Second, the language of the native speakers of Balkan Romance (often known as Wallachians or Vlachs), was an adstratum of other Balkan languages, and it also became a substratum when part of the Vlachs living south of the Danube shifted to Slavic and Greek. Goła˛b (1997) has argued that the Aromanian adstratum and substratum had a “decisive role” in the Balkanization of Macedonian, and that several Balkanisms developed in Balkan Romance before Balkan Slavic. Markovi´k (2007) has analyzed the contact of Macedonian and Aromanian at the dialect level in and around the city of Ohrid, in the very centre of the Sprachbund. Other studies on AromanianSlavic contacts include Ylli (2008), Schaller (2008), and Sobolev (2008). Third, Romance languages also functioned as a channel for European linguistic features to enter the Balkans. The Balkans are not an exotic linguistic area outside Europe proper but rather part of the core of “Standard Average European” (Haspelmath 1998: 273; Aronson 2007: 7–12). Haspelmath (1998: 285) tentatively places the beginning of SAE in “the time of the great migrations at the transition between antiquity and the Middle Ages”, though he admits that different features of this European linguistic area may have largely different ages. According to him, “most SAE features were absent in Latin and developed only in the Romance languages” (Haspelmath 1998: 285). As argued by Mufwene (2008: 45–49, 218–220), the birth of Romance languages out of Latin meant restructuring as radical as is usually associated with creoles. Yet another difference between Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance is that Balkan Romance shows a much greater number of words that are only known in the Balkans and must come from the Palaeo-Balkan substratum languages. They are mostly words attested only in Balkan Romance and Albanian, and associated with transhumance and livestock breeding (Solta 1980: 39–58). Insofar as Albanian, whose earlier history we do not know, is a descendant of one of the Palaeo-Balkan languages (such as Illyrian), it is of course incorrect to speak about “substratum words” in it. Part of these lexical Balkanisms in Balkan Romance may be borrowings from Albanian or its ancestor; others may come from a substratum language that has completely disappeared (see Solta 1980: 58–63 for discussion). At any rate it seems that the earlier arrival of Romance, in comparison with Slavic, meant also stronger influence from the older languages of the peninsula. Romance (as Latin) and Slavic arrived in the Balkans with fairly congruent grammatical systems – with case inflection and no articles, with several past tenses opposed aspectually, and infinitive complementation. In the Balkans

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they adopted much the same grammatical innovations, but as explained above, their role in the formation of the linguistic area was not the same. I shall now exemplify this with one of the major Balkanisms, the enclitic article.

3.

The enclitic article

The Balkan enclitic article (mostly a definite article, but cf. the Albanian adjective below) comes in two varieties. The better-known type is the postpositive definite article, which is a second-position clitic inside the NP, as in Bulgarian ‰ovek ‘man, human being’, ‰ovek-a˘t ‘the man’, dobrij-at ‰ovek ‘the good man’. In addition to Balkan Slavic, it can be found in Balkan Romance, as in Romanian om ‘man, human being’, om-ul ‘the man’, and Albanian: njeri ‘man, human being’, njeri-u ‘the man’. Contrary to Balkan Slavic, in Balkan Romance and Albanian the adjective usually follows the head noun, so the enclitic definite article does not move when an adjective specifier is added. However, when the Romanian or Albanian adjective is in the marked position before the noun, it takes the postpositive article as in Balkan Slavic, cf. Romanian om-ul bun ‘the good man’, but also bun-ul om ‘id.’ (Solta 1980: 186). Greek and Romani do not possess a similar postpositive definite article; their definite article is normally at the beginning of the NP and the unmarked word order is Adjective + Noun, as in Greek o kalós ándras ‘the good man’, Romani o baro raklo ‘the big boy’. However, when the adjective is in the marked position after the head noun, the definite article must be repeated: Greek o ándras o kalós, Romani o raklo o baro. This linking article between the head noun and the following specifier (adjective or possessive) is the other variety of the Balkan enclitic article. It is also found in Romanian in addition to the postpositive article: om-ul cel bun ‘the good man’; in this example it is optional, but it is obligatory when the adjective does not come immediately after the head noun, as in duh-ul Domnului cel sfânt ‘the Lord’s holy spirit’ (Solta 1980: 188). In Albanian, the linking article is obligatory for a great number of adjectives, even when the nominal reference is indefinite: it is used not only in njeri-u i mirë ‘the good man’ (where -u is the postpositive definite article and i the linking article) but also in një njeri i mirë ‘a good man’ (with the prepositive indefinite article një). It precedes the adjective even in the marked pre-nominal position, cf. vajz-a e mirë ‘the good girl’ (-a is a postpositive article, e is a linking article), but e mir-a vajzë ‘id.’ (Agalliu et al. 2002: 170; Solta 1980: 193). Notice that the Albanian adjective mir- here takes two articles – though it is of course possible to analyze the Albanian linking article as a structural marker different from what is usually understood by an article.

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We thus have two varieties of the enclitic article, the postpositive article and the linking article, which appear in the Balkan languages in various combinations and with different rules governing their use. The systems are different, but the common features are also easy to see. The languages have drawn on a common feature pool – to use Mufwene’s (2001: 4–6) concept – to which they have all contributed (perhaps with the exception of Romani) and from which they have selected different combinations of features. The contribution of Slavic to the feature pool was the optionally enclitic demonstrative pronoun. Bulgarian kniga-ta ‘the book’ is clearly the same construction as Polish ksia˛z˙ka ta ‘this book’. In Old Church Slavonic texts, the demonstrative tu˘ ‘this, that; it’, which became the source of the definite article in Balkan Slavic, is often enclitic (meˇsto to ‘this place’), and it can also appear between an adjective and the head noun, e.g. bogo‰ı˘stivy tu˘ m˛ozˇu˘ ‘this pious man’ (Supr. 564.13–14). It is difficult to judge in the texts when tu˘ was grammaticalized as a real definite article, but it is interesting to note that in the 11th-century Codex Suprasliensis, which is a translation from Greek, it sometimes corresponds to the Greek definite article in the original (Solta 1980: 195; but cf. Kurz 1937–1938 and 1939–1946 for a critical review of all the relevant examples). In the 12th century, the Balkan Slavic definite article must have already been established (Mircˇev 1978: 196–205). Slavic may also have been one of the languages that contributed the idea of grammaticalized definiteness, because Proto-Slavic (just as Baltic) had earlier developed a category of definite adjectives adding the demonstrative *jı˘ after the adjective. Thus, Old Church Slavonic opposes novo meˇsto ‘a new place’ and novo-je meˇsto ‘the new place’, with a so-called long or definite adjective (Leskien 1969: 102–109). In Modern Bulgarian and Macedonian this distinction has disappeared, the long adjective as such being only used as part of some masculine toponyms such as Bulgarian Gorni Da˘bnik ‘Upper D.’, Dolni Da˘bnik ‘Lower D.’; cf. the normal masculine singulars goren ‘upper’ and dolen ‘lower’. However, the masculine definite article in Balkan Slavic does not attach to this normal masculine form but to the old long form, as in Bulgarian gornij-at etazˇ, Macedonian gorni-ot kat ‘the upper floor’. This shows that the new system of definite t articles came into being before the old system of definite j articles had completely disappeared. While most of Slavic lost the old distinction between definite and indefinite adjectives (at least in the definiteness function), all of Romance developed definite articles (Posner 1996: 126–131), and the contribution of Balkan Romance to the grammaticalization of definiteness must therefore have been significant. And although most of Romance has a prepositive definite article, the position after the head noun was possible for the Latin demon-

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strative ille, from which most of Romance (with the exception of Sard and some varieties of Catalan, Posner [1996: 128–129]) developed its definite article: Vae autem homini illi […] Bonum est ei, si non esset natus homo ille ‘Woe to that man (…) good were it for that man if he had never been born’ (Vulgata, Mark 14:21). Greek cannot have contributed a postpositive article to the Balkan feature pool, but certainly the idea of definiteness itself. Moreover, the linking article in Greek is an ancient phenomenon and as pointed out by Solta (1980: 193–194), the Greek system is not as irrelevant to the Balkan system of articles as is often suggested. As for Romani, it seems to have copied the Greek system without essential changes (Matras 2002: 96). The history of Albanian is poorly known, because the oldest texts are from the 16th century (Fiedler 2006: 48), but the postpositive article seems to have been an ancient phenomenon in it. Internal reconstruction shows that it antedated Latin loan words in the language. The linking article is of later date, being less grammaticalized in several respects (Voronina 1976: 154–155, based on Çabej’s studies; cf. also Fiedler 2006: 36–37). Hamp (1982) has also presented possible toponymic evidence, from the Roman period, for the postpositive article in the ancestor language of modern Albanian. Thus, although a simple substratum explanation does not account for all of the Balkan article systems, the ancestor language of Albanian, which perhaps had close relatives in the Balkans, was the first to contribute a postpositive article to the Balkan feature pool. Greek contributed the grammaticalization of definiteness, though it had a different kind of marker for it. Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance both contributed the optionally enclitic demonstrative that could be used as material for a postpositive definite article; it seems that the enclitic tendency of the Proto-Slavic tu˘ was even stronger than that of the Latin ille. As for expressing definiteness grammatically, this seems to have been a stronger tendency in Romance – as it eventually affected all of Romance – than in Slavic, which only had the old and weakening system of long (definite) adjectives for this purpose. The linking article is younger in Albanian than the postpositive article, but it is common to different types of specifiers (adjectives and possessives). Balkan Romance uses different linking articles for adjectives (cel) and possessives (al, also used with ordinal numbers). Standard Romanian is different from Albanian in that the possessive linking article is not used if the possessor (in the dative case) follows immediately after the postpositive article, as in limb-a animalelor s¸i a paserilor ‘the language of the animals and the birds’, where the first -a is a postpositive article and the second a is a linking pos-

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sessive article before the possessor paserilor ‘the birds’ (in the plural dative). In Aromanian (as in older Daco-Romanian) the article is used even immediately after the postpositive article (Solta 1980: 187). Notice that the linking a is really an article, not a preposition, as it agrees with the feminine genre and singular number of limb- ‘language’; the masculine singular form would be al, the feminine plural ale and so on. The linking article thus agrees with the possessed noun on its left, not with the possessor noun on its right. The Greek linking article could have been the oldest model for the linking articles in Balkan Romance and Albanian, though there certainly was also interactive interference between these two. The Romance copy differs from the model in that there are two different linking articles according to the function; the Albanian copy differs in that the linking article is also used in indefinite noun phrases. In all, the Albanian and Balkan Romance are nearer to each other than either of these to Greek. Balkan Slavic did not develop a linking article because its unmarked word order is Adjective + Noun. In the southernmost Slavic dialects, the Greek Noun + Adjective constructions with a linking article are copied by means of doubling the postpositive article: the Greek i jortés i meáles “the-holidays-the-big” = ‘the great festivals’ may be rendered as praznici-te golemi-te “festivals-the-big-the” (e.g. on the title page of the Kulakia Gospel, written in Macedonian near Thessaloniki in 1863, see Mazon and Vaillant 1938: 3–4).

4.

Discussion

In terms of Johanson’s (2008: 64–65) typology of grammatical copying, the grammatical innovations of the Balkan linguistic area exclude material copying. The borrowing of grammatical morphemes is not common in the Balkans, and neighbouring languages easily tolerate direct cross-language clash between their phonological forms in the same semantic fields: compare ‘yes’ : ‘no’ = Bulgarian /da/ : /ne/ = Greek /ne/ : /óχi/; ‘and’ : ‘or’ = Bulgarian /i/ : /íli/ = Greek /ke/ : /i/; ‘my’ : ‘his’ = Bulgarian /mi/ : /mu/ = Greek /mu/ : /tu/. Semantic, pragmatic, syntactic, and frequential convergence is common. Asenova (2002: 97–104) has pointed out the very similar uses of the main prepositions, for instance, in the Balkan languages, though the phonological forms of the prepositions are different in each case. The main question is, though, whether such terminology as “copying”, “borrowing”, or “transfer” is justified in the Balkans at all, given the fact that mutual reinforcement of change seems to have been the way the most Balkanisms have originated. In a way, the Balkans and similar areas are a linguistic analogue of the three-body problem in physics: the methods we have are best suited to de-

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scribing the interference between pairs of languages, not among three or more languages simultaneously. Comparing Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance, as a pair of languages, can be useful as one approximation to the general problem, especially since both possess an external “control group”, namely, closely related languages in other parts of Europe. As argued by Joseph (2010: 628–629), the Balkan Sprachbund is best understood as the common result of several smaller convergence areas. The interactive inference between Balkan Slavic and Balkan Romance took place in what are today Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, and northern Greece. Slavic and Romance, as two branches of the Indo-European family, shared several inherited structural features when they first came into contact in South-Eastern Europe. As the end result of convergence processes, Balkan Slavic now has more structural features in common with all Romance languages (not only with those spoken in the Balkans), but Balkan Romance has clearly been affected by its Balkan environment, too. The influence of Greek and Albanian (and the ancestral language of the latter) is strong in both. In particular, I tried to show that the contribution of both Slavic and Romance to the Balkan feature pool of articles was stronger than is assumed in some substratum theories, but the influence of the postpositive article of Albanian and the linking article of Greek also has to be taken into account in the same pool. (For the concept of feature pool, see Mufwene [2001: 4–6, 2008: 117–132] and his short illustrative presentation of the idea in Mufwene s. a.) From the point of view of Balkan Slavic, the grammars of Bulgarian and Macedonian look like hybrids of “Slavic” and “Romance” grammars with some Albanian additions. Spasov (2010) compares the structure of Macedonian with that of Molise Croatian spoken in Italy and argues that what is (in his view mistakenly) called the “Balkanization” of Macedonian is to a large extent Romance influence. The Romance (Aromanian) component in the “so-called Balkanization of Macedonian” is also emphasized by Goła˛b (1997); but notice that in Molise, Italian acts as the dominant language, whereas in Macedonia Aromanian is and was an adstratum and, as emphasized by Goła˛b (1997: 15), also the substratum language in a Romance-Slavic language shift. As I tried to show in my overview of the Balkan article systems, any reduction of the Balkan linguistic area to a unidirectional influence from a single source, such as Balkan Romance, does not do justice to the complex constellation of linguistic facts. It is, however, possible to say that the significance of Balkan Romance as the initiator of some changes, such as the grammaticalization of definiteness, may have been greater than that of Balkan Slavic,

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whereas Balkan Slavic “accelerated the expansion of the contact-induced changes and strengthened typological links between particular Balkan languages” (Topolin´ska 2010: 56). The different patterns of spread and settlement and the different social histories of the Balkan languages gave them different roles in the formation of the linguistic area. As their initial structures were typologically rather similar, the different roles they assumed corroborate Thomason’s (2008 and earlier) arguments for the primacy of social factors over structural factors as determinants of contact-induced change.

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Mufwene, Salikoko S. 2008 Language Evolution: Contact, Competition and Change. London, New York: Continuum. Mufwene, Salikoko S. s. a. The “feature pool” idea. Available online at. http:// humanities.uchicago.edu/faculty/mufwene/feature_pool.html, accessed on 2 November 2012. Posner, Rebecca 1996 The Romance Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sandfeld, Kristian 1930 Linguistique balkanique: problèmes et résultats. Paris: C. Klincksieck. Schaller, Helmut 2008 Balkanromanischer Einfluss auf das Bulgarische. In: Biljana Sikimic´ and Tijana Asˇic´ (eds.), The Romance Balkans, 27–36. (Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Institute for Balkan Studies, Special Editions 103.) Belgrade: Institut des Études balkaniques. Sinnemäki, Kaius 2010 Word order in zero-marking languages. Studies in Language 34(4): 869–912. Sobolev, Andrej N. 2008 On some Aromanian grammatical patterns in the Balkan Slavonic dialects. In: Biljana Sikimic´ and Tijana Asˇic´ (eds.), The Romance Balkans, 113–121. (Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Institute for Balkan Studies, Special Editions 103.) Belgrade: Institut des Études balkaniques. Solta, Georg Renatus 1980 Einführung in die Balkanlinguistik mit besonderer Berücksichtigung des Substrats und des Balkanlateinischen. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Spasov, Ljudmil 2010 Pomazˇe li nam molisˇkohrvatski jezik da podrobno razmotrimo pojam “balkanistike” u znanosti? [Does the Molisian Croatian language help us better discuss the concept of “Balkan studies” in scholarship?] Paper read at the Peti hrvatski slavisticˇki kongres [the 5th Croatian Congress of Slavic Studies], Rijeka 2010. Supr. = Codex Suprasliensis. Edition: Jordan Zaimov and Mario Kapaldo [Capaldo] (eds.), Suprasa˘lski ili Retkov sbornik, I–II. Sofija: Ba˘lgarska Akademija na Naukite 1982–1983. Thomason, Sarah. G. 2008 Social and linguistic factors as predictors of contactinduced change. Journal of Language Contact – THEMA 2: 42–56. Thunmann, Johann 1774 Untersuchungen über die Geschichte der östlichen europäischen Völker. Erster Theil. Leipzig: Siegfried Lebrecht Crusius. Topolin´ska, Zuzanna 2010 The Balkan Sprachbund from a Slavic perspective. Zbornik Matice srpske za filologiju i lingvistiku 53 (1): 33–60. Tosco, Mauro 2008 What to do when you are unhappy with language areas but you do not want to quit. Journal of Language Contact – THEMA 2: 112–123. Trubetzkoy, N. S. 1928 [Proposition 16.] In: Actes du Premier Congrès International des Linguistes à La Haye, du 10–15 avril 1928, 17–18. Leiden: A. W. Sijthoffs Uitgeversmaatschappij. Vasmer, Max 1941 Die Slaven in Griechenland. (Abhandlungen der Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Jahrgang 1941, Philosophisch-historische Klasse 12.) Berlin: Verlag der Akademie der Wissenschaften. Voronina, I. I. 1976. K voprosu o sisteme artiklej v albanskom jazyke [On the system of articles in Albanian]. In: A. V. Desnickaja (ed.), Grammati‰eskij stroj balkanskix jazykov. Issledovanija po semantike grammati‰eskix form [The grammatical structure of Balkan languages: Studies on the semantics of grammatical forms], 126–161. Leningrad: Nauka.

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Vulgata = Nova Vulgata Bibliorum Sacrorum Editio. Edition: Eberhard Nestle, Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland (eds.), Novum Testamentum Latine. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft 1985. Weithmann, Michael W. 1994 Interdisziplinäre Diskrepanzen in der “Slavenfrage” Griechenlands. Zeitschrift für Balkanologie 30 (1): 85–111. Ylli, Xhelal 2008 Aromunische Interferenzen in den slavischen Minderheiten Albaniens. In: Biljana Sikimic´ and Tijana Asˇic´ (eds.), The Romance Balkans, 107–112. (Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Institute for Balkan Studies, Special Editions 103.) Belgrade: Institut des Études balkaniques.

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Tilman Berger (Tübingen)

The convergence of Czech and German between the years 900 and 1500

1.

Introduction

Czech, a member of the Slavic subfamily of Proto-Indo-European, and German, a member of the neighboring Germanic subfamily have been in close contact for more than 1200 years. Several developments in Czech which did not occur in other Slavic languages (or occurred in them to a much lesser extent) have been explained by German influence since the late 19th century; other scholars have contested such influence. The paper gives an overview of the sociolinguistic factors influencing language change and then describes three periods of contact between Czech and German in more detail. I will refer to previous scholarship as well as to my own research. First contacts between both languages can be dated to the beginning of historical tradition in the 9th century A.D. In that century small principalities on the territory of Bohemia merged to form a larger state to become the Duchy of Bohemia under Prˇemyslid rule during the 10th century. The ruler of this state was a vassal to the East Frankish king and thus from the beginning the Duchy was part of the Holy Roman Empire. It controlled some minor states which are known as the Lands of the Bohemian Crown (Moravia, Lusatia, Silesia). In 1198 the Duchy turned into a kingdom, which continued to be part of the Holy Roman Empire. The Czech tribes had apparently already been Christianized by German missionaries before 900 A.D. (we know rather little about this process) and the higher clergy tended to be German for quite a long time. German monastic orders played an important role in the cultivation of Southern and Western Bohemia during the 10th and 11th centuries. Later the Bohemian rulers invited “founders” into their country who should found new towns. From about 1250 German settlers cultivated the regions on the periphery, also with the support of the Czech rulers. Czech names are known from the 9th century; the first words and short fragments of texts go back to the 11th century. The written language at that time was Latin, but we can assume that Czech and German dialects were spoken in the major cities, whereas the villages tended to be monolingually Czech. This situation began to change during the second half of the 13th cen-

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tury when written Czech began to gain ground, at first mostly in religious texts, but soon also in a chronicle known as the “Chronicle of Dalimil”, which was written around 1314. Czech literature enjoyed a first flourishing period during the reign of Charles IV, King of Bohemia and Roman Emperor, who used Czech himself (besides Latin, French and German), but the literary language was still limited to religious texts and fiction. In the years after 1360 the whole Bible was translated, Czech thus being the first modern European language with the complete Bible in the vernacular. The first tendencies of using the vernacular for administrative purposes can be observed in the second half of the 14th century. They can be seen in the context of the vernacular gaining ground all over Western Europe, but there were specific factors as well: Many towns which used to have a German majority became Czech, partly by assimilation of the German population, partly by migration from the surrounding villages. These tendencies became much stronger in connection with the Hussite revolution, which began after the execution of the Czech reformer Jan Hus in Constance in 1415. Czech became the language of the Hussite movement (though there were small groups of German Hussites as well) and was soon used in all spheres of public life. Printing in Czech began around the year 1470 (with the so-called “Kronika trojánská”) and a large number of books were printed before 1500. If we try to describe the different phases of contact between Czech and German on the basis of Thomason and Kaufman’s model we can characterize them as follows (cf. Berger 2009a: 137–138): The first phase is the period before the year 1200, where we do not have any Czech texts or exact knowledge about the sociolinguistic relation between both languages. Nevertheless, we can observe a convergence of the phonological systems of both languages, which can be explained only by close contact. The following phase, from about the year 1200, was characterized by heavy borrowing from German to Czech. This was a period during which literary varieties of German exerted influence on the beginnings of literary Czech. The third phase is characterized by a temporary change of the language situation in the second half of the 14th century. At this time we can observe a language shift of German-speaking town population to Czech. During this period, which lasts till about the year 1450, the processes of language contact include phenomena different from the period before, especially in the field of phonology. At the same time other borrowing processes continue, but on a lesser scale. By the end of the 15th century literary Czech became so stabilized that the contact situation should be characterized as moderate borrowing.

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As I mentioned before, Czech and German belong to neighboring branches of the same language family, Proto-Indo-European. Therefore they exhibited some similarities inherited from their common ancestor at the beginning of their contact. Their phonological systems were rather different, but both languages shared the opposition of short and long vowels. In morphology the core systems of nominal and verbal inflection in both languages were rather similar, if not to say congruent, at that time. Both languages had systems of fusional inflection by means of endings and phonological alternations (quantity alternations, umlaut-like alternations, apophony). Last but not least, the grammatical categories were rather similar, although in most cases the inventory of Czech categories was richer (seven cases instead of four cases in German, one additional number, the dual, until the end of the 15th century, more tenses).

2.

Convergence of phonological systems from 900 to 1200

The phonological system of Czech attested in the oldest texts exhibits quite a few features which distinguish it from the (reconstructed) system of Common Slavic. The vowel system especially had undergone several changes, e.g. the loss of the reduced vowels ц and ч (which caused the emergence of the phonological opposition of palatalization), the change of the nasal vowels ¬ and o˛ to ä and u, a contraction of vowel groups divided only by the semivowel j and a restructuring of the subsystem of mid and open vowels. The original vowel a had fused with the new vowel ä after palatalized consonants, and the reduced vowel ч had resulted in a new vowel ə in the so-called “strong” positions (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 50–52). Scholars differ in their view on ə: Most of them interpret it as an allophone of e; only Jakobson (1929) interpreted it as a phoneme (and I followed him in my studies). While the first of these changes occurred in all Slavic languages and the second in most of them, the third change is typical of the “central” Slavic languages (cf. Marvan 2000) and the fourth only of Czech (and partly Slovak). Through these changes the Czech vowel system acquired a shape characterized by an opposition of front and back vowel phonemes like a/ä, ə/e and u/ü (the elements of the latter pair are traditionally interpreted as allophones as well). A further important feature of the Czech vowel system is the opposition of short and long vowels. Czech inherited this opposition from Common Slavic, but the importance of the quantity opposition increased through a series of innovations, which also brought about quantity alternations in the inflectional system (cf. mráz ‘freeze’, genitive singular mrazu, or kráva ‘cow’,

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genitive plural krav). Conversely, the intonation system with rising and falling accents, which had been characteristic of Common Slavic, was lost in Czech. This vowel system was affected by two further changes which occurred later, presumably between the 11th and 13th centuries. In connection with a process which is labeled as “depalatalization” in Czech tradition, fronted ä changed to a before non-palatalized consonants. In other positions ä (often, but not exclusively resulting from older a after palatalized consonants) fused with the central vowel eˇ, and the phoneme ü (or the allophone ü after palatalized consonants) changed to i. The last two changes are called “prˇehláska” in Czech, which means exactly the same as German Umlaut – this led to some confusion in older literature, although Czech “prˇehláska” was caused by a preceding palatalized consonant, whereas Germanic umlaut was caused by i or j in the following syllable. Nevertheless, the effects of the changes were similar to some extent, since the “prˇehláska” caused alternations in the morphology, e.g. Old Czech prˇietelé ‘friends’ (nominative plural) vs. prˇátel (genitive plural), or Jene, the vocative of the name Jan. These phonological changes caused a lot of homonymies in inflectional morphology and thus increased the difference between Czech and other Slavic languages (cf. Skalicˇka 1941, 1951). Another important change of the Czech phonological system concerns stress. Czech lost the free stress which was characteristic of the Slavic languages and replaced it with a fixed stress on the first syllable. This stress system resembles the root stress of German though it is not identical, and the situation is further complicated by the fact that neighboring Polish has fixed stress as well, but on the penult. In Berger (1995) I tried to explain the West Slavic fixed accent as a compromise between free stress in Slavic and fixed stress in Germanic, with the result that the stress is not mobile and is never placed on the last syllable of the word. The Czech and the Polish systems can then be explained as two different types of generalization. The consonant system of Old Czech was much more stable than the vowel system. According to most scholars it was characterized by the important role of the palatalization opposition, which was allegedly preserved until the beginning of the 15th century. The main changes which should be mentioned here are the change of g > h, which is also characteristic of some other Slavic languages, and the assibilation of palatalized r’, which developed into the consonant ˇr, which is characteristic of Czech (and Old Polish), but not of Slovak. If we try to characterize the development of the Czech phonological system in broad terms, we can say that consonantal distinctions had an impact on vowel distinctions with the effect that Old Czech had a rather complex

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vowel system, resembling neighboring German. This observation goes back to the 19th century. Even Gebauer, the founder of Czech historical grammar, already compared some of the processes to similar Germanic developments. An overview of these older opinions can be found in Beer (1905). Jakobson formulated the thesis that all those correlations that did not occur in German were eliminated from Czech, whereas those correlations that Czech and German had in common were preserved: Il est caractéristique de voir les corrélations qui, en tchèque, en fin de compte, ont été liquidées, et celles qui ont été conservées. Ont été éliminées les suivantes: “accent musical ~ atonie” (absente de l’allemand), “accent d’intensité ~ atonie” […]. A survécu la corrélation: “longueur ~ brièveté de voyelles” (de même qu’en allemand). En d’autres termes, dans la sélection des corrélations, le tchèque a suivi le modèle allemand. Dans les cas de “carrefours” phonologiques, le tchèque a choisi dans l’alternative celle des deux voies qui avait son parallèle en allemand […]. (Jakobson 1929: 55)

The Czech historical grammars of the 20th century refuted this thesis and tried to explain all changes of the vowel system by internal factors. In my study from 2003 I tried to give a new account which resumes some of Jakobson’s ideas and interprets the pairs a/ä, ə/e and u/ü as different phonemes. This way the opposition of palatalized and not-palatalized consonants must be assumed only for dental consonants (where it is preserved until today), and this means that the phonological system resembles the German system even more. Of course, the systems of both languages were not completely identical at the end of the 12th century (cf. Berger 2003: 23). German had more vowel phonemes and especially diphthongs (Czech had only one of them at that time, namely ie); Czech had more consonants, especially sibilants. Nevertheless, the systems were very similar and to some extent congruent, i.e. parts of them were organized according to the same principles. It would be tempting to explain this state by a Germanic substrate of Old Czech, but unfortunately we know too little about the sociolinguistic situation in Bohemia at the time of Christianization. Language shift from Germanic to Slavic seems rather improbable, at least on a large scale. However, we can assume that the partial congruence of both systems might be the result of bilingualism occurring in regions where Germans and Czechs lived together closely for a relatively long period. Sˇlosar (2006) criticizes my proposal with reference to Newerkla’s study about German loanwords in Czech. He claims that the number of German loanwords before 1100 was rather small and that the assumption of intensive language contact in this period is not justified. I am not completely sure how to assess the percentage of loanwords before the beginning of written texts,

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so I do not know how to measure the intensity of contact. Nevertheless, the phonological processes which I assume should rather be explained by some kind of bilingualism, which is not necessarily linked to borrowing.

3.

Heavy borrowing from German to Czech after 1200

The close contact of Czech and German also brought about the borrowing of lexical elements. These borrowing processes had begun long before the Christianization of Bohemia and Moravia. Newerkla (22011: 101–107) enumerates 17 clear cases of loanwords from Germanic and West Germanic before 600 A.D. (as well as 10 unclear cases) and more than 70 loanwords from Old High German (cf. Newerkla 22011: 120–140). After the year 1150 the number of loanwords increases further: Newerkla enumerates more than 400 loanwords from Middle High German (cf. Newerkla 22011: 150–240). The high number of loanwords lets us expect structural borrowing as well. In the following text I will concentrate on this issue, since several cases of structural borrowing have been discussed intensively since the 19th century. In contrast, the presence of a high percentage of German loanwords in Old Czech has not been disputed at all. Although classical Czech lexicography tended to ignore them (e.g. they were not included into the huge dictionary of Old Czech which Gebauer started to edit in 1902), they were studied by many scholars. Newerkla’s comprehensive description of all aspects of the problem has been available since 2004. From the start I would like to stress that there are no examples of material borrowing of inflectional morphemes from German to Czech. The examples of structural borrowing which have been discussed so far concern periphrastic constructions – in the first place the periphrastic future tense and periphrastic past tenses – and modal auxiliaries. In the case of periphrastic constructions we can observe copying of structural models; the same is true of modal auxiliaries, although there has been some material borrowing of lexical items here. The complete absence of material borrowing of inflectional morphemes may be surprising, but in my opinion it can be explained rather easily by the similarities of the core systems of nominal and verbal inflection in both languages which were mentioned above. The situation was quite different with periphrastic constructions. At that time German possessed two periphrastic past tenses, perfect and pluperfect, which were opposed to the simple past tense and were both formed with the auxiliaries haben and sîn and the past passive participle (cf. Paul 252007: 292–293). Further, there was an emerging periphrastic future tense formed

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with the auxiliary werden and the present participle and the infinitive (cf. Paul 252007: 294–296) and a periphrastic passive voice formed with the auxiliaries werden and sîn and the past passive (cf. Paul 252007: 301–304). Czech had two simple past tenses (aorist and imperfect) and two periphrastic past tenses, which are called perfect and pluperfect as well, but which were formed with the auxiliary b¤ti ‘to be’ and a past active participle (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 244–245). Apart from that, it had an emerging periphrastic future tense formed with several auxiliaries (budu ‘I will be’, chcu ‘I will’, jmám ‘I have’) and the infinitive of imperfective verbs (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 245) and a periphrastic passive construction formed with the auxiliaries b¤ti ‘to be’ and b¤vati ‘to be usually’ and the past participle (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 245–246). I will not discuss the periphrastic passive here. In the Old Czech period it was used only in the past tense, following the model which is to be found in all Slavic languages, e.g. sentences like je psáno, literarily ‘it is written’, but used with the meaning ‘it has been written’. From the 17th century this construction has acquired a present-tense meaning, and new forms are being used for the past, like bylo (na)psáno with the past copula bylo (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 198–199). This development is usually attributed to Latin influence, but I personally would not exclude copying from German as well. However, this issue has to be discussed against a completely different sociolinguistic background, taking into account the situation of Czech in the 17th century. In the following I will take a closer look at the periphrastic future and the coexistence of several past tenses in Old Czech. The future tense formed with budu is a Czech innovation, in the sense that it is not attested in Old Church Slavonic, nor in other ancient Slavic languages like Old East Slavic. It can be found in Czech texts from the very beginning (cf. Rösler 1952: 121–124), and it seems to have been exported to other Slavic languages like Polish, Ukrainian and Russian (cf. Moser 1998: 303–330). Since the combination of the future tense of the verb ‘to be’ with the infinitive is not very plausible in Czech, whereas the German construction can be explained by the older form of werden and the present participle, Rösler (1952: 142–143) formulated the hypothesis that the Czech construction came into being through German influence. This hypothesis was challenged by Krˇízˇková (1960), who showed that the combination with the infinitive was predominant in Czech from the beginning, whereas in German it was established later (towards the end of the 14th century). The same opinion is to be found in historical grammars of Czech like Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer (1986: 196). Leiss (1985) proposed another hypothesis, which took into account

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Krˇízˇková’s criticism of Rösler: According to Leiss the German werden future may have been grammaticalized under the influence of the Czech construction. Krämer (2005: 75–81)1 refutes this hypothesis with several arguments: She doubts that the Old Czech construction was really the predominant way of expressing future tense and thinks that it may have been only one of several ways for quite a long time. She argues with the character of the language contact situation, in which Czech was the weaker partner and where we should not expect a loan construction from Czech in German. Furthermore she does not agree with Leiss’ idea that the werden construction spread from East Central German (which was spoken in Bohemia and the neighboring regions) to other dialects of German. Last but not least, she stresses the semantic differences between Czech budu and German werden. In my opinion, we must acknowledge the fact that both languages used a number of alternative means to express the future tense for rather a long period, maybe until the end of the 14th century. If Czech speakers were confronted with the German construction of werden + infinitive, they may have copied it to their own language, using budu (which was used to express the future tense of ‘to be’) together with the Czech infinitive. One can even imagine that they misunderstood werden + a participle ending in -end as an infinitive, a form which was much more familiar to them than the participle. In any case the Czech construction may have come into being as an example of replica copying, and it may then have prevailed over other constructions which were more complicated or polysemic (like other future periphrases with modal verbs like chtieti ‘to want’ or mieti ‘to have’). In any case it seems plausible that the emergence of those two constructions which existed only in these two languages (before the budu future spread to other Slavic languages) is connected. The coexistence of four past tenses in Old Czech (aorist, imperfect, perfect and pluperfect), which ended with the disappearance of the two synthetic tenses aorist and imperfect around the year 1400 (though conservative authors continued to use them nearly up to 1500), has always been interpreted as an internal development of Czech (and most other Slavic languages). The common opinion, which can be found e.g. in Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer (1986: 194–195), is that the periphrastic perfect, formed with the present tense of the copula and the past active participle with the suffix -l-, coexisted with the synthetic tenses for quite a long time but prevailed in the end because it was much more regular and “convenient” than the aorist and imperfect forms, which were characterized by a lot of homonymy (e.g. the 1

I thank Björn Wiemer for drawing my attention to this book.

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2nd and 3rd person singular were always identical) and irregularity. For a long time nobody saw any parallels to the German tense system, which consisted of a synthetic past, a periphrastic perfect and a periphrastic pluperfect. Nevertheless, one could try to draw parallels with the loss of simple past forms in High German Dialects, which occurred between the years 1450 and 1550 and is known by the term “Präteritumschwund” (cf. Lindgren 1957). Typological accounts like Thieroff (2000) treat the Czech tense system as being in a different category from the German one. While German is characterized by the opposition of ANT:PRET (cf. Thieroff 2000: 281), Czech is an example of PFV:IMPV (cf. Thieroff 2000: 297). However, this description is valid only for the contemporary system. Old Czech possessed a regular pluperfect, which was formed with a combination of the aorist or the perfect of b¤ti ‘to be’ and a past participle (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 245). Moreover, the aspect system was not yet the same as today. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer (1986: 199–201) assume that the opposition of perfective and imperfective verbs was already grammaticalized in the 14th–15th centuries, but there are good reasons to be skeptical about this, at least if one bears in mind the description of the evolution of Russian aspect given by Bermel (1997). Abraham and Conradie (2001: 12–16) make a similar point, although they argue more superficially, without mentioning the aspect opposition. Instead of this they see different degrees of analyticity in a scale which begins with South Slavic and ends with Russian, Czech and Polish standing in the middle. I am not sure if this is completely adequate, but I agree with the point that the North Slavic languages (with the exception of Sorbian) were affected by the “Präteritumschwund” in a similar way to the High German dialects (and some other Germanic languages). The “Präteritumschwund” has been explained in several ways. Abraham and Conradie (2001) assume that discourse factors were crucial here and operated in different languages in the same way. Drinka (2003)2 advocates a monocausal explanation, in which the Latin ‘have’ perfect is explained by Greek influence and the shift of perfects from anterior or resultative to preterital meaning is assumed to have originated in Parisian French. I am inclined to prefer the first explanation, but I do not think that this is important for a judgment about the relation between the development of Czech and German. We know too little about the loss of simple past forms in both languages and especially in the German dialects of the Bohemian Lands. Therefore we can only state that the “Präteritumschwund” occurred in both lan2

I thank Johannes Reinhart for drawing my attention to this article.

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guages and was probably caused by the same factors. So we have here another case of convergence of Czech and German, which – to some extent – can be compared to the convergence of the phonological systems. Let us now turn to the modal auxiliaries, a further area where language contact with German has played an important role in Old Czech. In this case the direction of influence is clear. In Common Slavic, modality was expressed by impersonal predicates or special constructions (e.g. the pure infinitive), and there was only one verb with a modal meaning, i.e. mogti ‘to be able’3. Old Czech, on the contrary, has three more modal auxiliaries, drbiti and musiti/ museˇti ‘must’, jmieti ‘ought’. The first two of them are material copies from Middle High German durfen and müezen, the third is the equivalent of German soln. Porák (1967: 31–35) has showed that infinitival modal constructions continued to exist in Old Czech along with the “new” modal auxiliaries, but eventually lost ground. In Modern Czech these constructions sound archaic and are used rarely. The two loanwords drbiti and musiti/museˇti are attested from the oldest written texts. Drbiti is rather archaic and disappears quickly; musiti/museˇti has been preserved up to the present. It also acquired epistemic usage later, e.g. Modern Czech musí b¤t nemocn¤ ‘he must be ill’. The modal auxiliary jmieti is not a calque from German (German haben can be used as a modal auxiliary, but with a different meaning) and Porák (1968: 99) explains it as a generalization starting from cases like nejmás dáti ‘you do not have what to give’ to ‘you shall not give’. I personally prefer the explanation of Neˇmec (1979: 15) and Vykypeˇl (2010: 132) who explain the emergence of the modal auxiliary as the result of a syntactic transformation, which is typical of the pair ‘to be’ and ‘to have’: The infinitival construction jest mi jíti, literally ‘it is to go for me’, was transformed to jmám jíti, literally ‘I have to go’, in the meaning ‘I should go’, in an analogous way as jest mi duom ‘it is a house for me’ and its transformed version jmám duom ‘I have a house’. By this process jmieti becomes the equivalent of German sollen and Czech acquires a further modal auxiliary. Other West Slavic languages show a similar development. Slovak and Polish use the loanword musiefl/musiec´ and the auxiliary ‘to have’ in a similar way (cf. Weiss 1987; Hansen 2001). Upper Sorbian preserved the older loan dyrbjec´ in the meaning ‘must’. There are several further periphrastic constructions in Modern Czech, e.g. the resultative construction with the auxiliary mít ‘to have’ and the past passive participle (cf. Giger 2003a), the so-called “absentive” construction 3

If one is inclined to acknowledge a voluntative modality as well, another modal verb would be xчteˇti ‘to want’.

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with the auxiliary b¤t ‘to be’ and the infinitive (cf. Berger 2009b) or the recipient passive formed with the auxiliary dostat ‘to get’ (cf. Giger 2003b). All of them resemble German constructions: the first looks rather similar to German periphrastic perfect tense with haben, the second is reminiscent of modern German constructions like er ist essen ‘he is (away) to eat’, and the third resembles the German recipient passive like er bekommt die Haare geschnitten ‘he gets his hair cut’. Though there are good reasons to discuss the impact of Czech-German language contact on these constructions, they will not be discussed here since they are first attested much later than the other periphrastic constructions mentioned before.

4.

Language shift from German to Czech after 1350 and its consequences

The changes to the Czech phonological system described above occurred in the period immediately before the first longer texts were written. After these changes the phonological system was rather stable for quite a long time. The only major development after 1300 was the change of ó > uo, which most authors date to the first half of the 13th century (cf. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 105). New developments began at the end of the 14th century, and they changed the shape of the vowel system once more. These changes consisted of two subsequent processes, the diphthongization of ú > ou and ¤ > ej and the monophthongization of ie > í and uo > u˚ 4. Cf. the following examples súd ‘court of law’ > soud; b¤k ‘ox’ > bejk; biel¤ ‘white’ > bíl¤; duom ‘house’ > d˚um. The changes did not affect the whole territory of Czech dialects (and did not advance to the Slovak dialects at all) and they were still going on during the period of the first printed books. For this reason the graphic realization of these changes is rather complicated. The grapheme ¤ continued to be used to render the diphthong /ej/ until the 17th century. From that time on scribes began to write ej in roots, but continued to write ¤ in endings. During the “revival” of Czech at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century the codification returned to ¤, with the effect that the literary spelling and pronunciation ( ! ) today is b¤k and not bejk. The digraphs ie and uo were used until the end of the 16th century and came out of use then. The striking similarity of these processes to the diphthongization and monophthongization in Middle High German was observed very early. Gebauer (1894) mentioned it and Beer included these processes into his list of 4

This is a purely historical convention to write the long vowel /u¯/.

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German influences. Nevertheless, the Czech historical grammars of the 20th century are very skeptical and try to give internal reasons for these developments. They argue that similar processes can be seen in other Slavic languages or dialects and they try to associate it with the loss of palatalization. For example, the first part of the diphthong ej is explained as a means to differentiate between ¤ and í after the palatal consonant before i was depalatalized. This explanation presupposes the presence of palatal consonants in that period and is in contrast to my assumption that the palatalization correlation was lost much earlier. Havránek (1966) was the first to explain this development as a consequence of “language mixing”, e.g. the language shift from German to Czech, which the urban population underwent in the second half of the 14th century. His article was cited in historical grammars (e.g. Lamprecht, Sˇlosar and Bauer 1986: 108), but only in the sense that German influence was possible but could not be proven. In a 1998 study I re-opened the issue and argued in much more detail and with explicit reference to Thomason and Kaufman’s typology of language contact. I noted with interest that two other non-Czech scholars have given a similar interpretation of these changes, the American Slavicist Pontius (1997) and the Polish Slavicist Bednarczuk (2000), neither of whom cited Havránek or me. Sˇlosar (2006: 652) considers German influence as a possible reason for the diphthongization of ú > ou and ¤ > ej, but maintains that the monophthongization ie > í and uo > u˚ should rather be explained by internal factors.

5.

Conclusion

I hope to have shown that Old Czech underwent a number of changes which can be explained by language contact with German. These changes are not uniform but were caused by heterogeneous processes. A rather long period of time was characterized by intensive borrowing, not only of lexical items but also of grammatical structures, and there were short periods of language shift, presumably around the time of Christianization and, definitely in the second half of the 14th century. In the case of the changes dating before 1200, I argue against the traditional view that explains them by referring to internal language processes: I take the view that we should speak of a convergence of phonological systems. Heavy borrowing from German to Czech in the lexicon after 1200 is not controversial, but I argue that several periphrastic constructions can be explained in a similar way. With regard to diphthongization and monophthongization I repeat my view expressed in earlier articles that these phe-

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nomena are due to language shift. This view has been taken by several scholars in the past, often independently of each other, but it is not yet reflected in the historical grammars of Czech. It is difficult to decide if family effects played a role in the first period of language shift around Christianization, since this period was characterized by a convergence of the phonological systems of both languages which had been rather different before (with the exception of the quantity opposition). On the other hand, family effects were very important during the period of intensive borrowing. The borrowing of grammatical structures in particular can be understood only against the background of an overall similarity of the core systems of nominal and verbal inflection, a similarity which was inherited from a common ancestor. During the second period of language shift in the second half of the 14th century, family effects were not relevant any more, since the phonological changes of this period resulted from the previous convergence of phoneme systems and not from inherited similarities.

References Abraham, Werner and C. Jac Conradie 2001 Präteritumschwund und Diskursgrammatik. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Bednarczuk, Leszek 2000 Czy istnieja˛ wpływy niemieckie w fonetyce czeskiej? [Do German influences on Czech phonetics exist?] In: Henryk Wróbel (ed.), Studia z filologii słowian´skiej ofiarowane profesor Teresie Zofii Orlos´, 47–56. Kraków: Wydawn. Uniwersitetu Jagiellon´skiego. Beer, Antonín 1905 O stopách vlivu neˇmeckého v cˇesˇtineˇ staré [On the traces of German influence on Old Czech]. In: Veˇstník Královské ‰eské spole‰nosti nauk, Trˇída filosoficko-historicko-jazykozpytná, No 7. Berger, Tilman 1995 Überlegungen zur Geschichte des festen Akzents im Westslavischen. In: Uwe Junghanns (ed.), Linguistische Beiträge zur Slawistik aus Deutschland und Österreich II, 29–49. Wien: Gesellschaft zur Förderung slawistischer Studien. (reprinted 2008 in: Tilman Berger, Studien zur historischen Grammatik des Tschechischen. Bohemistische Beiträge zur Kontaktlinguistik. München: Lincom, 7–19). Berger, Tilman 1998 Nové cesty k bádání cˇesko-neˇmecky´ch jazykovy´ch vztahu˚ (na prˇíkladu hláskosloví) [New ways of investigating Czech-German linguistic relations (illustrated by the example of phonetics)]. In: Alexandr Stich (ed.), Pocta 650. v¤ro‰í zalozˇení Univerzity Karlovy v Praze. Sborník prˇízpeˇvku˚ prˇednesen¤ch zahrani‰ními bohemisty na mezinárodním sympoziu v Praze 20.–26. srpna 1998, 21–35. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. (reprinted 2008 in: Tilman Berger, Studien zur historischen Grammatik des Tschechischen. Bohemistische Beiträge zur Kontaktlinguistik. München: Lincom, 21–28). Berger, Tilman 1999 Der alttschechische “Umlaut” – ein slavisch-deutsches Kontaktphänomen? In: Ernst Hansack, Walter Koschmal, Norbert Nübler and Radoslav Vecˇerka (eds.), Festschrift für Klaus Trost zum 65. Geburtstag, 19–27. München: Sagner. (reprinted 2008 in: Tilman Berger, Studien zur historischen Grammatik des Tschechischen. Bohemistische Beiträge zur Kontaktlinguistik. München: Lincom, 29–35).

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Berger, Tilman 2003 Gibt es Alternativen zur traditionellen Beschreibung der tschechischen Lautgeschichte? In: Ernst Eichler (ed.), Selecta Bohemico-Germanica. Tschechisch-deutsche Beziehungen im Bereich der Sprache und Kultur, 9–37. Münster: LITVerlag. (reprinted 2008 in: Tilman Berger, Studien zur historischen Grammatik des Tschechischen. Bohemistische Beiträge zur Kontaktlinguistik. München: Lincom, 37–55). Berger, Tilman 2008 Deutsche Einflüsse auf das grammatische System des Tschechischen. In: Tilman Berger (ed.), Studien zur historischen Grammatik des Tschechischen. Bohemistische Beiträge zur Kontaktlinguistik, 57–69. München: Lincom. Berger, Tilman 2009a Tschechisch-deutsche Sprachbeziehungen zwischen intensivem Kontakt und puristischer Gegenwehr. In: Christel Stolz (ed.), Unsere sprachlichen Nachbarn in Europa. Die Kontaktbeziehungen zwischen Deutsch und seinen Grenznachbarn, 133–156. Bochum: Brockmeyer. Berger, Tilman 2009b Einige Bemerkungen zum tschechischen Absentiv. In: Tilman Berger, Markus Giger, Sibylle Kurt and Imke Mendoza (eds.), Von grammatischen Kategorien und sprachlichen Weltbildern – Die Slavia von der Sprachgeschichte bis zur Politsprache. Festschrift für Daniel Weiss zum 60. Geburtstag, 9–28. München, Wien. Bermel, Neill 1997 Context and the Lexicon in the Development of Russian Aspect. Berkeley: University of California Press. Drinka, Bridget 2003 Areal factors in the development of the European periphrastic perfect. Word 54: 1–38. Gebauer, Jan 11894, 21963 Historická mluvnice jazyka ‰eského. I. Hláskosloví [Historical Grammar of the Czech Language. I. Phonetics]. Praha. Giger, Markus 2003a Resultativa im modernen Tschechischen: unter Berücksichtigung der Sprachgeschichte und der übrigen slavischen Sprachen. Berlin: Lang. Giger, Markus 2003b Die Grammatikalisierung des Rezipientenpassivs im Tschechischen, Slovakischen und Sorbischen. In: Patrick Sériot (ed.), Contributions suisses au XIIIe congrès mondial des slavistes à Ljubljana, 79–102. Bern. Hansen, Björn 2001 Das slavische Modalauxiliar. Semantik und Grammatikalisierung im Russischen, Polnischen, Serbischen/Kroatischen und Altkirchenslavischen. München: Sagner. Havránek, Bohuslav 1966 Zur Problematik der Sprachmischung. Travaux linguistiques de Prague 2: 81–95. Jakobson, Roman 1929 Remarques sur l’évolution phonologique du russe comparée à celle des autres langues slaves. (Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de Prague 2.) Prague: Jednota Cˇeskoslovensky´ch Matematiku˚ a Fysiku˚. Krämer, Sabine 2005 Synchrone Analyse als Fenster zur Diachronie: Die Grammatikalisierung von werden + Infinitiv. München: Lincom. Krˇízˇková, Helena 1960 V¤voj opisného futura v jazycích slovansk¤ch, zvl. v rustineˇ [The Development of Periphrastic Future Tense in Slavic Languages with a Focus on Russian]. Praha. Leiss, Elisabeth 1985 Zur Entstehung des neuhochdeutschen analytischen Futurs. Sprachwissenschaft 10: 250–273. Lindgren, Kaj B. 1957 Über den oberdeutschen Präteritumschwund. Helsinki: Suomalainen tiedeakatemia. Marvan, Jirˇí 2000 Jazykové milénium: Slovanská kontrakce a její ‰esk¤ zdroj [Linguistic Millennium: Slovak Contraction and its Czech source]. Praha: Academia. Moser, Michael 1998 Die polnische, ukrainische und weißrussische Interferenzschicht im russischen Satzbau des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts. Frankfurt am Main: Lang.

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Neˇmec, Igor 1979 Starocˇeské jmieti a novocˇeské míti [Old Czech jmieti and New Czech míti]. Listy filologické 101: 12–17. Newerkla, Stefan Michael 12004, 22011 Sprachkontakte Deutsch – Tschechisch – Slowakisch. Wörterbuch der deutschen Lehnwörter im Tschechischen und Slowakischen: historische Entwicklung, Beleglage, bisherige und neue Deutungen. Frankfurt am Main: Lang. Paul, Hermann 252007 Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik. Neu bearbeitet von Thomas Klein, Hans-Joachim Solms und Klaus-Peter Wegera. Mit einer Syntax von Ingeborg Schöbler, neubearbeitet und erweitert von Hein-Peter Prell. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag. Pontius, Jason 1997 Language codification and the perception of otherness: The case of Czech and German. Chicago Linguistic Society 33. The Panels: 101–108. Porák, Jaroslav 1967 V¤voj infinitivních veˇt v ‰estineˇ [The Development of Infinitive Clauses in Czech]. Praha: Univerzita Karlova. Porák, Jaroslav 1968 Modalverben im Tschechischen und Deutschen. In: Bohuslav Havránek and Rudolf Fischer (eds.), Deutsch-tschechische Beziehungen im Bereich der Sprache und Kultur II, 97–101. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag. Povejsˇil, Jaromír 1996 Tschechisch – Deutsch. In: Hans Goebl et al. (eds.), Kontaktlinguistik. Ein internationales Handbuch zeitgenössischer Forschung. Volume II, 709–714. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Rösler, Karl 1952 Beobachtungen und Gedanken über das analytische Futurum im Slavischen. Wiener Slavistisches Jahrbuch 2: 103–149. Skalicˇka, Vladimír 1941 V¤voj ‰eské deklinace [The Development of Czech Declination]. Praha: Jednota cˇesky´ch matematiku˚ a fysiku˚. Skalicˇka, Vladimír 1951 Typ ‰estiny [The Type of the Czech Language]. Praha: Slovanské nakladatelství. Sˇlosar, Dusˇan 2006 Hláskosloví staré cˇesˇtiny alternativneˇ [An alternative view on Old Czech phonetics]. In: Bernhard Symanzik (ed.), Festschrift für Gerhard Birkfellner zum 65. Geburtstag, 649–653. Volume II. LIT-Verlag: Münster. Thieroff, Rolf 2000 On the areal distribution of tense-aspect categories in Europe. In: Östen Dahl (ed.), Tense and Aspect in the Languages of Europe, 265–305. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Thomason, Sarah G. and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language contact, creolization, and genetic linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001 Language Contact: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburg University Press. Vykypeˇl, Bohumil 2010 Slavonic-Baltic Addenda to the World Lexicon of Grammaticalization. Jazykovedn¤ ‰asopis 61: 131–144. Weiss, Daniel 1987 Polsko-niemieckie paralele w zakresie czasowników modalnych (na tle innych j¬zyków zachodniosłowian´skich) [Polish-German modal verb parallels (against the background of other West Slavic languages)]. In: Gerd Hentschel, Gustav Ineichen and Alek Pohl (eds.), Sprach- und Kulturkontakte im Polnischen, 131–156. München: Sagner.

Part 3: Typological congruence and perceived similarity

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Contact-induced language change and typological congruence

1.

Introduction

Questions are frequently raised about whether typological congruence facilitates contact-induced language change and, conversely, about whether certain kinds of contact phenomena are rare or even nonexistent in situations where the languages in contact are very dissimilar typologically. This paper provides tentative answers to these questions. I argue that although there is no simple correlation like “more congruent languages = more feature transfer”, it is true that some features – perhaps most notably in the inflectional morphology – are more easily transferred between typologically congruent languages. However, attitudinal factors can counteract any tendency toward increased homogeneity in the structures of (for instance) closelyrelated languages in contact, so that one cannot predict with any confidence that more similar languages in contact will become even more similar over time. Moreover, profound contact-induced changes often affect typologically dissimilar languages, especially when the agents of change are fluent in both the source language and the receiving language. In particular, when speakers in a contact situation deliberately change their language(s), there seems to be no obvious effect of typological congruence on the process of change. The structure of this paper is as follows. Section 2 sets the stage for the general topic by discussing briefly the nature of typological congruence and the kinds of predictions about structural interference that have been based on the concept. Section 3 provides argumentation and examples to support the conclusion that typological congruence does facilitate contact-induced change. In § 4 I show that typological dissimilarity does not prevent feature transfer, and in § 5 I suggest that typological congruence plays no discernible role in cases of deliberate change. The paper ends with a brief summing-up conclusion (§ 6). Before beginning a systematic discussion of the main issues, I will give my definition of contact-induced change. It is not completely idiosyncratic, but it does include other linguistic changes besides the transfer of features from one language to another, especially the kinds of distancing changes through

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which a speech (often a dialect) community differentiates its speech more sharply from that of neighboring communities. Here is the definition: “any linguistic change that would have been less likely to occur outside a particular contact situation is due at least in part to language contact” (see Thomason 2001a: 62–63 for discussion of the theoretical implications of this definition). One other preliminary comment is necessary: in my opinion, any innovation – even a one-time speech error or a joking coinage – is a potential language change. The fate of every innovation is determined by a combination of linguistic and (especially) social factors. Some of the examples in this paper are potential changes rather than actual ongoing or completed changes, a fact that does not, to my mind, reduce their relevance to the issue of typological congruence and contact-induced change.

2.

What is typological congruence, and what does it have to do with contact-induced change?

Two general points need to be made before we examine evidence for the influence of typological congruence on contact-induced change. First, many scholars have espoused a very strong constraint on typological matching and structural interference – namely, that typological congruence is a requisite for contact-induced structural change. Here are a few examples. The great Indo-Europeanist Antoine Meillet, in an essay entitled Le problème de la parenté des langues [‘The problem of language relationship’], predicted that grammatical borrowing would only be possible between typologically similar languages (1921: 84). Related claims were made by Roman Jakobson “A language accepts foreign structural elements only when they correspond to its own tendencies of development” (Jakobson 1962 [1938]: 241) and Edward Sapir: “[Foreign sounds can enter a language] provided always that these new variations … are in the direction of the native drift” (Sapir 1921: 200). Both Jakobson and Sapir refer to processes of change rather than static typological congruence, but the connection between the two is clear. An example of a more recent proposal, one that does refer explicitly to typological congruence, is Carmen Silva-Corvalán’s (1994: 134): “… only those [linguistic features] that are compatible … with the structure of the borrowing language … will be adopted, disseminated, and passed on to new generations”. As we will see in § 4 below (and see also, e.g., Thomason and Kaufman 1988: 14–20; Thomason 2001a: 63–64), it is not especially difficult to find counterexamples to these claims.

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My second preliminary point about typological congruence is that it is gradient and structure-specific, not a categorical or overall characteristic of any pair (or larger group) of languages. No language has a single unified typological profile; there is no reason to expect that (for instance) a language with basic SOV sentential word order will have ejective stops or a category of inclusive vs. exclusive ‘we’. This does not of course mean that all typological features are mutually independent; to take the most famous example, certain morpheme-ordering features have been known to cluster together since the 1960s (Greenberg 1963). But comparing two languages typologically requires systematic feature-by-feature comparison, not a determination of one overarching typological profile. Moreover, determining typological congruence is often not an either/or decision. Sometimes features can indeed be characterized as simply present or absent; examples might be a voiced/voiceless distinction in stops, an inclusive vs. exclusive ‘we’ distinction, exclusively suffixing vs. exclusively prefixing inflectional morphology, or the presence or absence of finite subordinate clauses. But gradience is evident in a great many cases, and it causes problems in attempts to compare specific language structures typologically. For instance, the Mayan language K’iche’ has just one voiced obstruent, /b’/, in addition to a rather elaborate set of voiceless obstruents. It is therefore true that the language has a voiced/voiceless opposition in obstruents; but comparing this opposition in K’iche’ to the obstruent system in a language like English, where every voiceless obstruent phoneme is matched by a corresponding voiced obstruent phoneme, would be misleading. It would be similarly misleading (though somewhat less so) to compare the English voiced/voiceless opposition, which is confined to obstruents, to the partially corresponding distinction in Burmese, which has voiced/voiceless phoneme pairs not only in oral stops and affricates but also in nasals and laterals. A language might have an inclusive/exclusive ‘we’ distinction only in certain morphosyntactic contexts, and it might have a very few finite subordinate clauses but an otherwise uniform pattern of non-finite subordinate constructions. In other words, typological comparisons must be carried out with caution, and the wise scholar will not use a method confined to checking yes/no boxes in a list of features. The implications of gradience – and more generally of typological indeterminacy – for an investigation of typological influence on contact-induced change are obvious. Here’s a fairly simple illustration. Indo-European languages inherited a rich case system, with eight separate cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, instrumental, ablative, locative, and vocative. The inherited case system is best preserved in Baltic and most Slavic languages.

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Finnic languages that have long been in contact with at least Baltic and northern Slavic languages have even richer case systems, fifteen or more, with the greatest proliferation in the locative category – in Finnish, inessive, adessive, elative, ablative, illative, and allative. The two types of system are clearly similar in many typological respects, but equally clearly they differ in other respects. When, as a result of Finnic speakers’ shift to (pre-)Lithuanian, three new locative cases – illative, allative, and adessive – were added to the Lithuanian system (Senn 1966: 92), the much larger Finnic case system might or might not be considered typologically congruent with the inherited Baltic system. Concluding that the new cases would have fit easily into a case system that already included one locative category, and that this constitutes evidence for pre-existing typological congruence, risks circularity in attempts to define “typological congruence”. On the other hand, the converse situation – loss of a structural feature that is absent from the receiving language in a contact situation – may often be explained as the result of a typological mismatch between the source language and the receiving language at a particular structure point. Another example from Finnic/Baltic contacts provides an illustration. One dialect of the Baltic language Latvian has lost grammatical gender entirely under the influence of shifting speakers of the Finnic language Livonian, which, like other Finnic languages, has no gender distinctions (Comrie 1981: 147). Other dialects of Latvian preserve the inherited masculine and feminine genders. The lesson to be drawn from this discussion is not that typological comparisons should be abandoned in investigations of contact-induced language change. On the contrary, they can be extremely useful. The lesson, instead, is that we must often deal with partial congruence and partial mismatches in our efforts to use typological congruence as a (partial) predictor of the linguistic results of contact.

3.

Typological congruence facilitates contact-induced change

It is no accident that so many linguists, including some of the very best (such as Meillet, Sapir, and Jakobson), have based predictions of contact-induced change on typological congruence. Almost certainly, most instances of feature transfer do target structures in which the receiving and source languages are not too disparate typologically. The most obvious examples involve language pairs that are closely related. So, for instance, certain K’ichean languages have borrowed from neighboring Mamean languages a phonological rule that palatalizes a velar stop before a vowel followed by a uvular stop (Campbell 1998: 74). K’ichean and Mamean are two different branches of

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the Mayan language family; no morpheme transfer accompanies the borrowed rule, and there is no typological distance between source and receiving languages at this structure point. A similar phonological example, also a case of rule borrowing without morpheme transfer and with typological congruence, comes from the Bantu subbranch of Niger-Congo: KiShambaaa and KiPare share an innovative tone-spreading rule (David Odden, p.c. 1993). Contact-induced inflectional change is easiest to find in language pairs that are closely related. One striking (but probably fairly typical) example comes from dialects of the language formerly known as Serbo-Croatian. The Croatian dialect of Serbo-Croatian spoken on the Adriatic island Hvar, for instance, originally had syncretism in oblique plural noun cases such that the genitive and locative plural shared one case suffix (-i:h) and the dative and instrumental plural shared another. This system contrasted with the pattern of oblique plural syncretism in Standard Serbo-Croatian nouns, which had one suffix for the genitive (-a:) and another suffix (-ima) shared by the dative, instrumental and locative plural. In 1935, older speakers of the Hvar dialect in some villages still had the original pattern; but younger speakers had replaced it with the Standard Serbo-Croatian pattern, using their inherited genitivelocative plural suffix -i:h only for the genitive and the suffix -ima, borrowed from Standard Serbo-Croatian, for the dative-instrumental-locative plural (Hraste 1935: 17–25). This inflectional change came about as a result of standard-dialect pressure via the school system, which had considerably increased the influence of Standard Serbo-Croatian in the two or three decades before 1935. The overall typological distance between Standard Serbo-Croatian and Hvar Croatian was minimal; in this case one morpheme was transferred. Many structural changes due to language contact happen in contact situations that don’t involve closely-related languages or dialects, however, and in many or most of these one can also argue that there is no major typological mismatch. One example mentioned in § 2, the addition of three new cases in Lithuanian noun declension under Finnic influence, falls into this category: the matching between a typical Finnic case system and the (pre-contact) Lithuanian case system was far from exact, but the type of change – proliferation of locative cases – did not disrupt the Lithuanian case system, especially as the language already had prepositions that expressed the relevant spatial categories. A partly parallel example can be seen in the so-called “second genitive” of Russian. This is a partitive construction, a new category in Russian that occurs in just one of the language’s several noun declensions, historically the o-stem declension. It contrasts a partitive in -u (e.g. ‰aska ‰aj-u ‘cup of tea’)

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with the general genitive in -a (e.g. cena ‰aj-a ‘price of tea’). This category (which is said to be disappearing from modern Russian) probably arose when speakers of Finnic languages shifted to Russian and mapped their native partitive vs. genitive case distinction onto an older Russian distinction between two noun declensions, the u-stems and the o-stems. As mentioned above, Finnic languages have no gender (or other noun-class) distinctions, and in any case Russian never had a semantic differentiation between the u-stems and the o-stems; these two declensions lacked a semantic basis even as far back as Proto-Indo-European. Finnic speakers would have heard both the u-stem genitive singular in -u and the o-stem genitive singular in -a; and, by hypothesis, they made sense of the two endings by assigning them to two different categories familiar from their heritage Finnic language(s). This case of contact-induced inflectional change involves no morpheme transfer and arguably no great amount of typological distance, in spite of the fact that it introduced a new inflectional category, the partitive, into Russian. Russian already had a rich case system; as with the new Lithuanian cases, adding a new case was not typologically disruptive. The example thus seems to belong with other cases in which contact-induced changes are facilitated by (partial) typological congruence. A different type of example that also belongs in this section is change in sentential word order. This is one of the most easily transferred syntactic features, although it comes with the caveat that superficially identical sentential word order patterns may be produced by very different underlying syntactic structures. In a sense, all basic word order patterns – SOV, SVO, VSO, etc. – are typologically congruent with each other, since all of them fulfill the same basic function, primarily to distinguish the verb’s subject (or agent) from its object (or patient). The frequency of this kind of change in cases of moderate to heavy structural interference is therefore unsurprising. A few examples are the changes from Proto-Finnic SOV word order to SVO in Finnish (under Indo-European influence), from VSO to SOV in Akkadian (under Sumerian influence; Kaufman 1974: 132), from SVO to SOV in Munda (the AustroAsiatic relatives of Munda have SVO word order, but other language families in India have SOV), from SVO to SOV in Austronesian languages of New Guinea (under the influence of non-Austronesian New Guinea languages; Bradshaw 1979, cited in Bickerton 1981: 292), and the frequent occurrence of SOV word order in Asia Minor Greek (under Turkish influence). Potential changes in word order often occur in fieldwork situations. The Waikurúan language Kadiwéu of Brazil, for instance, displays multiple word-order patterns in spontaneous discourse – SOV, VSO, OVS, SVO, VOS, and OSV; but in sentence-elicitation tasks, during fieldwork conducted with the SVO

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language Portuguese as the medium of elicitation, Kadiwéu speakers overwhelmingly produce SVO sentences (Sandalo 1995). In this case – and doubtless in most others as well – the contact influence is a change in frequency, not the innovation of a word order pattern previously unknown in the receiving language. But it is a contact-induced syntactic change nevertheless. It involves no morpheme transfer and little or no typological distance. A final point should be made in this section. Although it would be difficult or impossible to prove, it looks very much as if typological congruence can inhibit change as well as facilitating it in contact situations. Balto-Slavic languages, with up to seven nominal cases inherited from Proto-Indo-European (PIE), are unique among modern Indo-European languages in their preservation of the rich PIE case system. This retention goes against the powerful drift seen elsewhere in IE; it seems unlikely to be purely accidental that the languages in closest contact with Baltic and Slavic are Uralic (mostly but not entirely Finnic) languages with elaborate case systems. Similarly, most languages of the Atlantic branch of Niger-Congo have lost lexical tones, but Kisi and some other southern Atlantic languages have tonal systems that resemble those of surrounding languages of the Mande branch of Niger-Congo (Childs 1995). Examples of contact-induced changes that target typologically similar structures in the source and receiving languages can be multiplied endlessly. As noted above, changes in this general category are almost certainly much more common than contact-induced changes involving non-congruent structures. Still, it is so easy to find examples of the latter type that proposing even a weak typology-based constraint on contact effects seems unjustified. The next section provides examples to support this statement.

4.

Typological dissimilarity does not prevent contact-induced change

Contact-induced changes that target typologically disparate structure points in the source and receiving languages necessarily result in some degree of typological change. In considering examples of this type of change, we should keep in mind the important distinction between delayed typological change and immediate typological change under contact conditions (see Thomason 2001b for detailed discussion). As we will see below, the immediate changes are the ones most relevant to the topic of this paper. But I’ll start by describing the delayed type briefly. Contact-induced typological change may be delayed in a temporal (and thus trivial) sense if there is long-term contact but no typologically signifi-

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cant change until recently, for instance because of a recent intensification of the contact. An example might be Spanish influence on Basque: recent events, such as increased second-language learning of Basque by Spanish speakers, have led to both borrowing and shift-induced interference from Spanish in Basque. More relevantly in the present context, contact-induced typological change is also sometimes delayed structurally when a typologically trivial borrowing leads to a snowball effect that ends up changing the receiving language’s structure significantly. That is, the initial change is typologically inert or very minor; but subsequent changes triggered by that initial change eventually lead to significant typological restructuring in the receiving language. An example is the standard account (Matisoff 1973, and see also Haudricourt 1954) of tonogenesis in Vietnamese, a member of the otherwise nontonal language family Austro-Asiatic. Vietnamese has a long history of intense contact with Chinese, and as a result a very large number of Chinese loanwords have entered Vietnamese. Presumably the earliest Chinese loanwords came into Vietnamese without their tones, just as loanwords from tonal languages like Chinese have entered English and other non-tonal languages without tones. But at some point in history, Chinese words retained their tones when they were borrowed into Vietnamese, creating a situation in which the language’s vocabulary roughly split into native words without tones and borrowed Chinese words with tones. Still later, consonant changes within Vietnamese eliminated contrasts in certain positions – contrasts that, in some cases, had determined pitch distinctions in neighboring vowels. Among these changes were mergers of syllable-initial voiced stops (low pitch on a following vowel) and voiceless stops (high pitch on a following vowel), and deletion of the syllable-final laryngeal consonants /h/ (low pitch on a preceding vowel) and /ʔ/ (high pitch on a preceding vowel). Thanks no doubt to the existence of a great many tones in Chinese loanwords, Vietnamese speakers retained the pitch differences in the vowels even after the consonant distinctions that had conditioned those different pitches were eliminated. Thus previously allophonic pitch differences in vowels became phonemic pitch distinctions, and Vietnamese became a full-fledged tone language, with distinctive tones in native as well as borrowed words. Another example, this one from the syntax, is found in Siberian Yupik, an Eskimoan language. Intense contact with Chukchi, a member of the Chukotko-Kamchatkan family, has led to a great deal of borrowing from Chukchi in Yupik (Menovsˇcˇikov 1969: 124–130; de Reuse 1994). The many Chukchi loanwords included function words, among them conjunctions. These borrowings would have been typologically trivial when they entered the lan-

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guage, but they led eventually to the replacement of some of the native Yupik means of expressing coordination and subordination by different constructions, through a series of changes triggered by the borrowing of the conjunctions. An example is the apparent two-stage replacement of a native NP coordination construction (Menovsˇcˇikov 1969: 128). The starting point was coordination by means of a comitative suffix -l˜ ju, which was added to both nouns in a construction N-l˜ ju N-l˜ ju. To this construction was added the borrowed Chukchi conjunction inkam ‘and’, placed between the two nouns, each of which retained the comitative suffix: N-l˜ ju inkam N-l˜ ju. The final stage was deletion of the comitative suffix from both nouns, leaving a construction N inkam N. The initial borrowing of the ‘and’ conjunction was a very minor change from a typological perspective, but replacement of the native comitative suffixes in this construction was a significant alteration in the Yupik coordination system. Because delayed typological changes of this type begin with the transfer of low-impact features, immediate contact-induced typological changes are much more relevant to issues concerning the effects of typological congruence in contact situations. The rest of this section will therefore be devoted to these. “Immediate” change is of course not literally immediate, because even in the smallest speech community some time is required for an innovation to become fixed in the entire community. But it seems reasonable to call a contact-induced change typologically immediate if the innovation alters the typology of the receiving language as soon as it appears – in contrast to delayed typological changes. Many examples of immediate typological change, in this sense, are found in language shift contexts, for instance in Ethiopic Semitic languages, which were influenced by shifting speakers of Cushitic languages (see e.g. Leslau 1945, 1952; Moreno 1948; Hetzron 1975). (Both Semitic and Cushitic are branches of the Afro-Asiatic language family, but they are not closely related, and they are typologically quite different.) Some of the most striking changes in Ethiopic Semitic are in the morphology and syntax, among them the near-total loss of the dual number (Cushitic has no dual) and the replacement of Semitic VSO (or SVO) basic sentential word order and related syntactic orderings by Cushitic SOV and related ordering patterns. Another set of immediately significant typological changes is seen in the Indic (or Dardic) language Shina of northeastern Pakistan, which was influenced by shifting speakers of Burushaski, an isolate (Lorimer 1937). Among the features transferred from Burushaski to Shina are a singulative construction formed with a suffix derived from the native Shina word for

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‘one’, the use of a plural verb with an indefinite/interrogative pronoun, and an unusual discourse marker – the use of an infinitive with a case marker to begin a sentence, where the infinitive is that of the main verb of the preceding sentence. As with the Ethiopic Semitic examples, no morphemes have been transferred in these Shina examples, but significant typological change at the particular structure points has occurred. Intense borrowing situations (in my narrow sense of the term ‘borrowing’) also provide examples of significant typological change. Several examples are found in the most-turkicized dialects of Asia Minor Greek, for instance; among them is the loss of the definite article except in the accusative case. Turkish has no definite article, but it does distinguish a suffixed definite accusative object from an unmarked indefinite accusative object (Dawkins 1916: 46, 87). A few other examples are the loss of interdental fricatives (ibid., 44, 76, 77), the loss of most agreement inflection in attributive adjectives (ibid., 115), the near-total loss of grammatical gender (ibid., 87, 115, 119, 125; Turkish has no grammatical gender), and the emergence of partly agglutinative nominal and verbal inflection in some villages (ibid., 114). Further examples are easy to find. Some dialects of the Turkic language Uzbek, for instance, have lost vowel harmony under the influence of the Iranian language Tadzhik (Menges 1945; Comrie 1981: 65–66); some Indic languages, e.g. Bengali and Marathi, have acquired negative verbs under Dravidian influence (Klaiman 1977: 311; Southworth 1971: 264); other modern Indic languages, e.g. Sindhi, Gujarati, and the Kupwar dialect of Urdu, have acquired an inclusive/exclusive ‘we’ distinction under Dravidian influence (Emeneau 1980 [1962]: 59; Southworth 2005; Gumperz and Wilson 1971); the Dravidian language Kannad· a, under Indic influence, has developed subordinate clauses with finite verbs beside typical Dravidian participial constructions (Sridhar 1978: 205, citing Nadkarni 1970). Few of the changes cited in this section involved the transfer of morphemes; in most cases, the contact-induced innovations in phonological, morphological, and syntactic categories are expressed by native morphemes. None of these changes caused major typological restructuring of an entire language, but all of them brought about typologically significant change at particular structure points. In the more extreme cases, such as Asia Minor Greek and certain Indic/Dravidian contact situations, the number of such changes is large enough to make the receiving language look structurally quite unusual by comparison to other languages in the same family.

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Deliberate contact-induced change and typological congruence

So far none of the contact-induced changes cited in this paper, as far as one can tell, were deliberate. Typologically significant contact-induced changes are common in intense contact situations, but the greater frequency of changes in typologically congruent structures strongly indicates that typology plays a facilitating role in structural interference. But when we turn to examples of deliberate change, it turns out to be as easy to find examples that target typologically disparate structures as it is to find examples that target typologically congruent structures – with one major type of exception, which I will discuss at the end of this section. Before we look at some examples, I should emphasize that it is usually impossible to prove that a given linguistic change was brought about by deliberate speaker agency. The argument for conscious, deliberate innovation and spread of a linguistic change must therefore rest on such evidence as a clear social motivation and/or a change too rapid to have come about by ordinary change processes. First, let’s compare two fairly minor phonological changes – or rather potential changes, because quite possibly neither of them is thoroughly fixed (yet). In what Peter Trudgill has called hyperdialectism in England, speakers on the r-ful side of the r-ful/r-less border insert postvocalic r’s where they don’t belong etymologically, e.g. in walk, calf, and straw (Trudgill 1986). Trudgill interprets this as a distancing change, a way of (over)emphasizing the difference between the r-ful speakers’ speech and that of the neighboring r-less region. The structures in this case are typologically congruent, in that the r-ful dialect already had a phoneme /r/ that occurred in both prevocalic and postvocalic positions within a syllable, so that a few more postvocalic r’s fit perfectly well into the dialect’s pre-existing structure. What makes this a contactinduced change, in spite of the fact that no features are transferred from either dialect to the other, is that the change would have been less likely to occur outside of the particular dialect context (see § 1 for my definition of contact-induced change). The same is true of several of the following examples. Next, consider a change that is taking place in Ma’a (northeastern Tanzania), a mixed language of apparently Cushitic origin that has been almost totally Bantuized except for part of its lexicon. Ma’a speakers, apparently to emphasize the exoticness of their “secret language” (i.e. Ma’a) by comparison to the Bantu language spoken most often by them as well as by the majority non-Ma’a speakers in their community, insert one of their few remaining Cushitic features, a voiceless lateral fricative / /, into Bantu words (Mous 1994: 199). Like Trudgill’s example of hyperdialectism, Ma’a speakers’ insertion of the lateral fricative into words that did not have it originally has a

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clear social motivation – essentially a distancing motivation in both cases, although the specifics differ. But the two examples contrast sharply in their typological implications. Unlike the postvocalic r in r-ful English dialects, the lateral fricative is foreign to the Bantu language of the community in which the Ma’a people live: it is not typologically congruent with the local Bantu phonology. In other words, while both of these (potential) phonological changes involve similar processes and partly similar social motives, they differ in the congruence vs. non-congruence of the structures of the receiving and source dialects/languages. Comparable examples of deliberate distancing changes seem to be rather common in the world’s languages. Papua New Guinea, with ca. 700 languages, is a country in which this type of change is so common as to constitute a regional characteristic: “New Guinean communities have purposely fostered linguistic diversity because they have seen language as a highly salient marker of group identity … [they] have traditionally seized upon the boundary marking dimension of language, and … have cultivated linguistic differences as a way of ‘exaggerating’ themselves in relation to their neighbors …” (Kulick 1992: 1–3; see also Foley 1986: 9, 27). Not all such changes are as minor as the English and Ma’a examples. One especially dramatic example, from Bougainville Island in Papua New Guinea, concerns morphosyntactic gender agreement. One language on Bougainville, Buin, has about 17,000 speakers in all, including 1500 speakers of the Uisai dialect. The language has masculine and feminine gender and elaborate gender-agreement patterns, with agreement markers on pronouns, verbs, numerals, and deictics. At some point, Uisai speakers switched all their masculine and feminine agreement markers, so that masculine nouns in Uisai correspond systematically to feminine nouns in other Buin dialects and vice versa (Laycock 1982: 36). In this instance, there is no typological distance at all – all dialects of Buin, Uisai included, have masculine and feminine nouns and elaborate gender agreement. It is possible to find deliberate changes that bring the source and receiving languages closer together, with (of course) different social motivations. Here is an example of a potential change, not an actual one, from Salish-Pend d’Oreille, a gravely endangered Native American language spoken in northwestern Montana. All of the few remaining native speakers of this language are elderly, and all of them also have native fluency in English; in fact, nowadays English is their dominant language. Some years ago I was trying to elicit ditransitive sentences from an elderly Salish speaker, and he kept giving me the following kind of translation for sentences like ‘Johnny stole huckleberries from Mary’:

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st’sa tl’ Malí (1) ™oní naqw’ t Johnny steal obl huckleberry from Mary This sentence is completely grammatical in Salish-Pend d’Oreille; it is also very close to a word-for-word translation from English. But it is very far from what I expected, which was something like this: (2) Naqw’-m-l˜ -t-s Malí t ™oní t steal-derived.trans-2ndobj-trans-3.agent Mary obl Johnny obl st’sa huckleberry The first version, though grammatical, is very highly marked stylistically, for several reasons. In particular, the agent would normally appear first in a sentence only if it were strongly emphasized; and the bare verb would normally be used only in a narrow range of discourse contexts, for instance when there is a change of agent in a story, so that the agent is emphasized. As an isolated sentence, therefore, that version is rather bizarre. When I finally asked the elder if these sentences were perhaps a bit Englishy, he was surprised: yes, he said, I thought that’s what you wanted, since you were asking in English. I then asked how he would say ‘Johnny stole huckleberries from Mary’ normally, and he gave me the second version, with a very complex transitive verb form in sentence-initial position (the sentential syntax in Salish-Pend d’Oreille is basically VOS). As noted above, sentences like the first version do not represent actual changes in the language. They are certainly possible changes; but even if the language were to begin changing in that direction, there is too little time left for it to proceed very far, given the ages of the last few fluent speakers. But the fact that speakers can and do produce sentences like that first version shows that it is possible to exploit surface similarities to make changes that, if carried through to completion, will alter the language’s typology drastically. In this instance, aside from a major word order change, the result would be loss of the morphologically intricate transitive system and, ultimately, a change from a polysynthetic to an analytic morphological type. Admittedly, most deliberate changes are not as drastic, from a typological perspective, as this one would be. Most instances, like the examples in § 4, target specific structures and have relatively little overall typological impact. An example that belongs in the same general category as the Salish-Pend d’Oreille example, though with much less extreme results, is the synthetic superlative invented by the Estonian language reformer Johannes Aavik

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early in the 20th century (Saagpakk 1982); like some of Aavik’s other proposed changes, this one was based on a German model. The typological distance between the original Estonian analytic superlative and the innovative German-style synthetic superlative is not enormous – they are functionally congruent – but the means of expression differ typologically. The cases that rival or surpass the potential Salish-Pend d’Oreille example in typological impact are bilingual mixed languages, at least some of which must have arisen abruptly and deliberately. These are in-group languages; neither component of the structure is distorted, which means that the creators must have been fluent in both languages, so that they had no need for a new language to serve as a contact language. The best-known examples are Michif (Manitoba, North Dakota), which consists essentially of French noun phrases and Cree (Algonquian) verbs and sentential syntax; Mednyj Aleut (Mednyj [Copper] Island, Russia), which is primarily Aleut but with entirely Russian finite verb inflection; and Media Lengua (Ecuador), a mixture of Spanish lexicon and Quechua grammar. Each of these abrupt bilingual mixtures pairs two languages that are extremely dissimilar from a typological viewpoint, and in each – especially Michif and Mednyj Aleut – structures from the two component languages are combined in an integrated grammar that is, or was, learned as a first language by children. It is debatable whether it makes sense to talk about language change in discussing bilingual mixed languages; the processes through which they emerge should probably be characterized instead as language creation. Nevertheless, they show that bilingual speakers can create combinations that are typologically disruptive when seen from the perspective of either component language. To take just one example, consider gender. In Michif, every noun must be lexically marked both for animate or inanimate gender, in order to ensure the correct agreement pattern in the Algonquian verb, and for masculine or feminine gender, to ensure the correct agreement pattern in the French noun phrase. In Mednyj Aleut, Russian pronouns are used in finite past tense verb forms (since the Russian past tense does not indicate person distinctions), and those pronouns have gender distinctions, a category that is otherwise alien to Aleut. With deliberate change, then, typology does not seem to constitute a barrier of any kind to contact-induced linguistic innovations. Given appropriate social motivations – such as the creation of a new ethnic (sub-)group, as was the case with Michif, Mednyj Aleut, and Media Lengua, or a desire to use linguistic means to distance one’s own group from neighboring groups – speakers can and sometimes do make typologically disruptive changes.

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There is, however, one type of bilingual (or bidialectal) deliberate change in which typological congruence is a prerequisite. This is the application of correspondence rules (or borrowing routines, in the terminology of Heath 1989) – namely, systematic replacement of a source-language phonological feature by a receiving-language phonological feature. Typically, the two features are etymologically related. Correspondence rules can be used only with languages that are genetically and typologically close – that is, languages that share most of their lexicon as well as most of their structure. One example, from Rudolf de Jong (p.c. 1995), is found in Fayyoum Oasis Arabic, a dialect of Egyptian Arabic that is spoken about 100 km from Cairo. Speakers of this dialect travel to Cairo markets regularly, so they have a great deal of contact with the Cairene dialect. The Fayyoum Oasis diphthongs aw, ay correspond to Cairene Arabic long vowels o:, e:, as in FO bayt ‘house’ vs. Cairene be:t; FO represents the original vocalic situation, while Cairene has undergone a monophthongization. Evidence for the existence of correspondence rules, and for their application by FO speakers, comes from words (such as European loanwords) that never had diphthongs: so, for instance, the Cairene word tilifo:n ‘telephone’ is borrowed into Fayyoum Oasis as talafawn. Another example is the application of a correspondence rule in borrowings from nasalless Salishan languages of the Pacific Northwest (Washington, Oregon, British Columbia) – languages that have undergone a sound change from m, n to b, d and that therefore lack nasal phonemes. As with the Arabic example, “mistaken” applications of correspondence rules provide evidence for their existence. One widespread cultural loanword in the region is the word for ‘table’, ultimately from French la table and probably disseminated through the area via the pidgin Chinook Jargon, where the word is latab (or, in some Chinook Jargon dialects, latap). The Salishan language Upper Chehalis, which does have /m, n/ phonemes, has latam for ‘table’ instead of the expected latap; Upper Chehalis has no voiced oral stops, and /p/ is the expected replacement for a foreign /b/. This replacement of an oral stop with the corresponding nasal stop can only have happened if Upper Chehalis speakers applied a correspondence rule in borrowing the word from a nasalless Salishan language, where it would have been pronounced latab; speakers of Upper Chehalis must have had a correspondence rule something like “their [b] corresponds to our [m]”. It is obvious that correspondence rules can only exist where there is close matching in most respects between the source language and the receiving language. It is less obvious that all applications of correspondence rules are deliberate, but at least some of them are, as shown by speakers’ occasional metacomments. They constitute the only exception I know of to my claim

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that typological congruence is insignificant as a factor in deliberate contactinduced changes.

6.

Conclusion

As we have seen, typological congruence does play an important role in facilitating contact-induced changes: it is easy to find typologically significant contact-induced changes, but it is even easier to find changes in which the relevant structures in the source and receiving languages are typologically congruent. Thus it is almost certainly true that most structural interference occurs between typologically congruent languages, or rather structures, in ordinary contact situations. It is of course also true that in many (not all!) cases the primary source of typological congruence between two languages is genetic affiliation – that is, that the two languages are related, so that the typologically congruent structures are descended from the same ancestral structure. This is not to say that all demonstrably related languages are typologically similar; but the vast majority of closely-related languages do indeed share many similar structures. Most, though by no means all, of my examples of ordinary structural interference between typologically dissimilar languages are instances of shift-induced interference. But the most dramatic examples of typologically disruptive contact-induced changes are abruptlycreated bilingual mixed languages, followed fairly closely by “ordinary” contact phenomena and by less drastic instances of non-distancing deliberate changes. Typological congruence, then, is just one of many factors that help us move toward weak predictions of the linguistic results of language contact. Together with most other historical linguists, I do not believe in the possibility of making strong predictions about linguistic change, including contactinduced change, primarily because of the impossibility of discovering and weighing all the social factors that affect the outcome of a change process. Like other predictions about contact-induced change, the linguistic factor of typological congruence can be, and often is, trumped by social factors like deliberate language mixing by fluent bilinguals.

References Bickerton, Derek 1981 Roots of language. Ann Arbor, MI: Karoma. Bradshaw, J. 1979 Causative serial constructions and word order change in Papua New Guinea. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, Los Angeles.

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Campbell, Lyle 1998 Historical linguistics: an introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Childs, George T. 1995 Tone and accent in the Atlantic languages: an evolutionary perspective. In: Anthony Traill, Rainer Vossen and Megan Biesele (eds.), The complete linguist: papers in memory of Patrick J. Dickens, 195–215. Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag. Comrie, Bernard 1981 The Languages of the Soviet Union. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Dawkins, Richard M. 1916 Modern Greek in Asia Minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. de Reuse, Willem Joseph 1994 Siberian Yupik Eskimo: the language and its contacts with Chuckchi. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Foley, William A. 1986 The Papuan languages of New Guinea. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Greenberg, Joseph H. 1963 Some universals of grammar with particular reference to the order of meaningful elements. In: Joseph H. Greenberg (ed.), Universals of Grammar, 58–90. Cambridge, Mass.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press. Gumperz, John J. and Robert Wilson 1971 Convergence and creolization: a case from the Indo-Aryan/Dravidian border. In: Dell Hymes (ed.), Pidginization and creolization of languages, 151–167. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Haudricourt, André Georges 1954 De l’origine des tones en vietnamien. Journal Asiatique 242: 69–82. Heath, Jeffrey 1989 From code-switching to borrowing: a case study of Moroccan Arabic. London: Kegan Paul International. Hetzron, Robert 1975 Genetic classification and Ethiopic Semitic. In: James Bynon and Theodora Bynon (eds.), Hamito-Semitica, 103–127. The Hague: Mouton. Hraste, Mate 1935 Cˇakavski dijalekat ostrva Hvara [The cˇakavian dialect of the island Hvar]. Juzˇnoslovenski Filolog 14: 1–59. Jakobson, Roman 1962 [1938] Sur la théorie des affinités phonologiques entre des langues (in his Selected writings, vol. 1: 234–246, The Hague: Mouton, 1962; reprinted from Actes du Quatrième Congrès International de Linguistes, Copenhagen: Munksgaard 1938, 48–59). Kaufman, Stephen A. 1974 The Akkadian influences on Aramaic. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Klaiman, Miriam H. 1977 Bengali syntax: possible Dravidian influences. International Journal of Dravidian Linguistics 6: 303–317. Kulick, Don 1992 Language shift and cultural reproduction: socialization, self, and syncretism in a Papua New Guinean village. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Laycock, Donald C. 1982 Melanesian linguistic diversity: a Melanesian choice? In: R.J. May and Hank Nelson (eds.), Melanesia: beyond diversity, 33–38. Canberra: Australian National University Press. Leslau, Wolf 1945 The influence of Cushitic on the Semitic languages of Ethiopia: a problem of substratum. Word 1: 59–82. Leslau, Wolf 1952 The influence of Sidamo on the Ethiopic languages of the Gurage. Language 28: 63–81. Lorimer, David L. R. 1937 Burushaski and its alien neighbors: problems in linguistic contagion. Transactions of the Philological Society: 63–98.

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Matisoff, James A. 1973 Tonogenesis in Southeast Asia. In: Larry M. Hyman (ed.), Consonant types and tone, 71–95. (Southern California Occasional Papers in Linguistics 1.) Los Angeles: University of California at Los Angeles. Meillet, Antoine 1921 Linguistique historique et linguistique générale. Paris. Menges, Karl H. 1945 Indo-European influences on Ural-Altaic languages. Word 1: 188–193. Menovsˇcˇikov, G.A. 1969 O nekotoryx social’nyx aspektax èvoljucii jazyka [On some social aspects of the evolution of language]. Voprosy social’noj lingvistiki, 110–134. Leningrad: Nauka. Moreno, Martino Mario 1948 L’azione del cuscito sul sistema morfologico delle lingue semitiche dell’ Ethiopia. Rassegna di Studi Etiopici 7: 121–130. Mous, Maarten 1994 Ma’a or Mbugu. In: Peter Bakker and Maarten Mous (eds.), Mixed languages: 15 case studies in language intertwining, 175–200. Amsterdam: Institute for Functional Research into Language and Language Use (IFOTT). Nadkarni, Mangesh V. 1970 NP-embedded structures in Kannada and Konkani. Los Angeles: UCLA dissertation. Saagpakk, Paul F. 1982 Estonian-English dictionary. New Haven: Yale University Press. Sandalo, Filomena 1995 A grammar of Kadiwéu. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh dissertation. Sapir, Edward 1921 Language: an introduction to the study of speech. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World. Senn, Alfred 1966 Handbuch der litauischen Sprache. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitätsverlag. Silva-Corvalán, Carmen 1994 Language contact and change: Spanish in Los Angeles. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Southworth, Franklin C. 1971 Detecting prior creolization: an analysis of the historical origians of Marathi. In: Dell Hymes (ed.), Pidginization and creolization of languages, 255–273. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Southworth, Franklin C. 2005 Linguistic archaeology of South Asia. London: Routledge-Curzon. Sridhar, Shikaripur N. 1978 Linguistic convergence: Indo-Aryanization of Dravidian languages. Studies in the Linguistic Sciences 8 (1): 197–215. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001a Language contact: an introduction. Edinburgh, Washington, DC: Edinburgh University Press, Georgetown University Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001b Contact-induced typological change. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Language typology and language universals, Sprachtypologie und sprachliche Universalien: An international handbook, 1640–1648. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Thomason, Sarah Grey and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language Contact, Creolization, and Genetic Linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Trudgill, Peter 1986 Dialects in Contact. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

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Similarity effects in language contact Taking the speakers’ perceptions of congruence seriously

1.

Introduction

One of the assumptions in contact linguistics is that typological congruence should be taken seriously when it comes to model borrowing, transfer or copying processes (Weinreich 1953; Johanson 2002; Siegel 2008; Matras 2009). We approach this issue through case studies involving contact-induced grammatical change between American Spanish and various Amerindian languages (cf. Palacios 2010, 2012; Pfänder et al. 2012). In the following we will present data from two intense contact scenarios; Spanish-Quechua in Ecuador and Spanish-Guaraní in Paraguay. By intense, we refer to the fact that everyday life is constantly marked by the presence of two languages for the speakers in our sample. The three-fold aim of our contribution can be summarized as follows: Firstly, we will replicate the study by Babel and Pfänder (this volume), both for new grammatical subsystems and new contact situations (Spanish/ Guarani). Secondly, we will show that the similarity principle not only holds for cases of pattern replication, i.e. selective copies, but also for matter replication, i.e. global copies. Finally, we aim to contribute to the growing body of knowledge concerning the effects of similarity in contact-induced change; that is, how speakers match a new pattern to available constructions. As Matras (2009) aptly highlights, speakers need to develop strategies to effectively achieve their communicative goals. The speaker aims at pursuing a particular communicative goal, embedded into a particular communicative context. This is transposed into a concrete linguistic task for which an appropriate task-schema (…) needs to be assembled from within the linguistic repertoire. Scanning through the entire repertoire, the speaker identifies a construction that would serve this particular task most effectively (Matras 2009: 241).

In order to fulfill the linguistic task at hand, the speaker aims at identifying a construction that could best serve their communicative need. The choice of a grammatical construction to a communicative goal is determined accord-

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ing to a multitude of factors (cf. Díaz et al. 2002). Most crucially, speakers draw on linguistic structures from the whole range of their (multilingual) linguistic repertoire. Their choice of linguistic structure may thus reflect the recency of its acquisition and hence prominence and ease of retrieval, or its suitability in terms of capturing inter-personal aspects of communication (Godenzzi et al. 2003). Inter-personal aspects of communication are crucial in the sense that speakers need to constantly monitor their (multilingual) interlucotors’ expectations and reactions, and adjust their communicative goal and means of achieving it accordingly. It is essential that the choice of linguistic items is contextually appropriate, stylistically unmarked and, above all, intelligible to the interlocutor. One interactional requirement is the perception of this congruence by a speaker in the contact situation. We could not agree more with de Smet when he writes that grammatical representations are interconnected in multiple ways, including via superficial formal resemblances (Smet 2012). The analysis of a feature congruence thus acquires a “participant” component: going beyond structural congruence as described by linguists, we shall focus on cases of congruence between certain elements of language A and language B as perceived by participants of the respective bilingual communities. As such, we draw L2 acquisition literature, in particular Jarvis and Pavlenko’s concept of “perceived similarity” (2008).1 In doing so, we ascribe a prominent role to grammar as an open system (Hartmann 1959; Auer and Günthner 2003; Jacob 2003; Steels 2009; Ehmer and Pfänder 2009; Breyer, Ehmer and Pfänder 2011); an emergent and emerging (Auer and Pfänder 2011), online and locally managed complex system of potentialities with which to improvise (Ehmer and Pfänder 2009; Franceschini 2011; Martínez in print). In other words, we propose that spoken grammar in language contact situations can be modeled as a set of highly adaptive resources for interaction. In this contribution, we will provide two sets of empirical data to support our thesis and find answers to the then crucial question of how speakers perceive structural and/or functional equivalence. After explaining in greater detail what “perceived similarity” is (§ 2), we shall analyze two phenomena in sections 3 and 4. In § 3, we will demonstrate how speakers adopt and identify “gerund constructions” as linguistic equivalents to converbs, then in § 4, we will discuss particular concepts speakers of Guaraní assume exists in Spanish, 1

Cf. Andersen as early as in 1983 for a similar concept, and the application of his approach in the domain of contact in Siegel 2008; in cross-linguistic research cf. Cuttler et al. 2003 on prosody.

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namely the concept of attributed quote and the concept of non-attributed hearsay. Finally, and in the light of these empirical findings, we will discuss the place that a theory of language contact should attribute to similarity and its effects on contact induced language change.

2.

Assumed and perceived similarities as driving forces

Jarvis and Pavlenko (2008: 179) differentiate between two strategies: Firstly, a speaker assumes that the language with which he is in contact (let’s say for convenience the L2), has categories and/or patterns which are similar to the resources of his L1: An assumed similarity […] is a conscious or unconscious hypothesis that a form, structure, meaning, function, or pattern that exists in a source language has a counterpart in the recipient language, regardless of whether the L2 user has yet encountered anything like it in the input of the recipient language, and regardless of whether it actually does exist in the recipient language. (Jarvis and Pavlenko 2008: 179)

A good example of the first principle (assumed similarity) is the well-known tendency to massively develop aspect marking in Creole languages. This is due to the greater importance of the category aspect in the substrate languages, whereas the European superstrates expresses aspect only marginally. Speakers of (African) substrate languages assume that aspect is to be marked in language anyway, so they will refunctionalize and later grammaticalize lexical items like be at/finish etc. into aspect markers. Secondly, a speaker perceives categories and/or patterns in the L2 in a different way than a L1 speaker of that language, or a linguist: A perceived similarity is a conscious or unconscious judgment that a form, structure, meaning, function, or pattern that an L2 user has encountered in the input of the recipient language is similar to a corresponding feature of the source language. (Jarvis and Pavlenko 2008: 179)

A well-known example of the second principle (perceived similarity) is L2-German learners’ tendency to express the fact that one shivers because of low temperatures by saying “er ist kalt” instead of “ihm ist kalt”, thus putting the suffering person in the subject position instead of the regular German dative object construction. This is found in those speakers whose L1 has a similar structure (as for example in English: he is cold). The crucial point here is that speakers not only assume that a congruent construction should be possible in German too, but that they perceive evidence for this assumption in similar

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constructions such as he is old (in German: er ist alt) or the white wine is cold (in German: der Weißwein ist kalt). We can apply this concept to research on language contact in general and use it to model “convergence” in the following way: Jarvis and Pavlenko’s definition is in line with the assumption concerning monolingual language change – common in the recent cognitive literature – that speakers must be considered pattern seekers (cf. Rens Bod 2006). When applying the notion of perceived similarity to early, distant stages of language contact (the first phases of creolisation, for instance), the following problem arises: unlike in L2 research, the prototypical speaker in language contact can at the most be reconstructed for the early years of the genesis of contact languages (if he ever existed, that is). However, with the help of demographic studies and sociohistorical interpretations of the demographic data, one can at least come close to what language competence and everyday language use must have been like in these early scenarios. The concept of “perceived similarity” consequently implies that we play increased attention to the speaker’s cognition when shaping convergence and thus to a subjective factor which may perhaps be a universally cognitive one. For this reason, we can introduce two observations which indicate varying behaviour of different linguistic levels and different system areas. We might view the copy or replication of patterns as a kind of compromise strategy that allows speakers to continue and flag language loyalty through a more or less rigid choice of word-forms and at the same time to reduce the load on the selection and inhibition mechanism by allowing patterns to converge, thus maximising the efficiency of speech production in a bilingual situation “constraints on the distribution of matter and pattern replication are not just social; structural factors may play a role too. As we shall see, the replication of patterns depends on the ability to match a new pattern to available word-forms” (Matras 2009: 235). If we include the concept of perceived similarity in the definition of convergence, this reinforces the idea that the speaker plays a key role in interaction (cf. Díaz et al. 2002). However, this brings us back to the question regarding the relationship between copy, convergence and contact-induced change. According to our concept, a convergence process based on perceived similarity can be compatible with copying from A to B and thus does not coincide with other definitions of contact-induced change. The research group led by Shana Poplack (cf. Poplack et al. 2011), for instance, would only regard phenomena as contact-induced that did not exist in language B prior to language contact.

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Converbs in contact: gerund constructions from Quechua to Spanish

The non-periphrastic gerund constructions in Spanish show great typological variability. Presently, however, we will limit our discussion to the temporal gerund constructions that constitute clauses. The simple gerund is, in terms of aspect, generally considered an imperfective or progressive form that expresses a developing or rather, incomplete action or process denoted by the verb, in contrast to the perfect gerund that indicates a completed action or verbal process (Fernández Lagunilla 1999: 3457). Consider the following examples: (1) a. Me dio la noticia saliendo de la universidad. ‘He gave me the news leaving the university.’ b. Me dio la noticia habiendo salido de la universidad. ‘He gave me the news having left the university.’ In (1a), the simple gerund conveys simultaneity and coexistence, whilst the perfect gerund in (1b) indicates anteriority. This is further proven by the construction of the following two sentences: (2) a. Me dio la noticia mientras salía de la universidad. ‘He gave me the news whilst he left the university.’ b. Me dio la noticia después de que saliéramos de la universidad. ‘He gave me the news after we had left the university.’ Since the gerund does not have specific flexive morphology, the concepts of time and aspect are slightly ambiguous. Thus, we may confirm that, as a general rule, the simple gerund expresses simultaneity and the perfect gerund anteriority. Consider the following examples with respect to the simple gerund: (3) a. *Recogiendo los platos, se sentaron a tomar café. ‘Collecting the plates, they sat down to have coffee.’ b. Habiendo recogido los platos, se sentaron a tomar café. ‘Having collected the plates, they sat down to have coffee.’ In (3a), the temporal meaning of the simple gerund requires simultaneity with the main clause, which results in ungrammaticality, since in this context it would be impossible to sit down and have coffee without already having

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collected the plates. In (3b), the perfect gerund allows for a temporal reading of anteriority with regard to the event denoted by the main clause sentarse a tomar café, which makes the sentence perfectly grammatical. Nevertheless, in certain, exceptional contexts, the simple gerund can express anteriority, as shown in the grammaticality of (4a), in which one expects the two actions denoted by the verbs to immediately succeed one other. However, the presence of a perfect gerund in (4b) allows for what we will call a “mediated” anteriority reading: (4) a. El profesor salió llevándose los exámenes. ‘The professor left, taking the exams with him.’ b. El profesor salió habiendo recogido los exámenes. ‘The professor left, having collected the exams.’ In varieties of Mexican Spanish, one can observe uses of the simple gerund with a mediated anteriority reading, such as in sentence (5). However, these are ungrammatical in Peninsular Spanish and generally infrequent: (5) a. El profesor salió recogiendo los exámenes. The professor left collecting the exams. b. Y argumentar a ustedes, recogiendo del diario de los debates lo que ustedes mismos argumentaron …2. [And to argue against you, collecting what you yourself argued from the diary of the debates …] The gerund construction in Spanish can also express posteriority with regard to the action or process denoted by the main verb, as (6) demonstrates: (6) a. La policía llegó al lugar de los hechos deteniendo a los ladrones que habían asaltado el banco. [*The police arrived at the scene of the crime, arresting the thieves that had held up the bank.] ‘The police arrived at the scene of the crime and (then) arrested the thieves that had held up the bank.’ b. El autobús se estrelló muriendo dos pasajeros. [* The bus crashed, dying two passengers.]‘The bus crashed and (then) two passengers died.’ 2

Real Academia Española: Database (CREA) [online]. Corpus de referencia del español actual. [12/12/2011].

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It must be said that the gerund of posteriority is generally not prestigious and normativist grammarians advise against its use, labeling it vulgar, erroneous and of low prestige. Nevertheless, it appears fairly frequently, especially in journalistic and juridical-administrative written language, which proves its vitality. The most important aspect of the temporal simple gerund constructions is undoubtedly the fact that in Spanish, they express simultaneity, posteriority and immediate anteriority (with many restrictions, given that the perfect gerund expresses this value in a prototypical manner, as has been shown). In Andean Spanish, the temporal gerund constructions can express immediate anteriority, simultaneity or posteriority to an equal extent. Such variety enables the expression of mediated temporality with the help of simple rather than perfect gerunds. This is demonstrated in the following examples of Ecuadorian Andean Spanish, taken from Haboud (1998: 204): (7) a. Siempre regresa comiendo, por eso no quiere nada. [*He/She always returns eating, that is why he/she does not want anything.]‘He/She always eats on her way back, that is why he/she does not want anything.’ b. Viene durmiendo, por eso está tranquilo. [*He comes sleeping, that is why he is relaxed.]‘He sleeps on his way here, that is why he is relaxed.’ Examples (7a) and (7b) are perfectly acceptable in non-Andean Spanish and express simultaneous temporality. This may be clarified in by a simplified restatement of these phrases: “while he returns, he eats” and “while he comes, he sleeps” (during a train journey, for example). In these cases, the gerund has an imperfective aspect that shows simultaneity regarding the action expressed by the main verb. Due to the gerund’s perfective aspect, this reading coexists with one of mediated anterior temporality in Ecuadorian Andean Spanish. A grammatical presentation of these examples in English would be: “he/she always returns after having eaten” or “he comes after having slept”. Interestingly enough, this perfective reading is absolutely ungrammatical in non-Andean varieties of Spanish.One may observe how the following sentences (also taken from Haboud 1998: 204–205) can only have a temporal anteriority reading: (8) a. Arreglando todos los problemas, vuelves. [*Sorting out all of the problems, you return.] ‘When you have sorted out all the problems, you return.’

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b. Solo durmiendo trabaja. [*Only sleeping does he/she work.] ‘Only after sleeping/having slept does he/she work.’ In both sentences in (8), the only possible interpretation of the gerund is a perfective one, which results in an inevitable temporal anteriority reading of the following type: (9)

a. Después de arreglar todos los problemas, vuelves/*vuelves mientras arreglas todos los problemas. ‘After sorting out all of the problems, you return/*you return whilst you sort out all the problems.’ b. Solo después de dormir, trabaja/* solo mientras duerme trabaja. [*Only after sleeping, he/she works] ‘Only after sleeping does he/ she work.’/ [*Only while he/she sleeps he/she works.] *‘Only while he/she sleeps does he/she work.’

These same constructions with the same temporal mediated anteriority reading are documented in the speech of Andean Ecuadorian migrants who have been living in Spain for over ten years: (10) a. No hay problema, regresando me pagan los zapatos. [*There is no problem, returning they pay the shoes for me.] ‘It’s no problem, when they return they will pay for my shoes.’ [*After returning, they will pay for my shoes.] When I return, they will pay for my shoes /* Whilst they return, they will pay for my shoes. b. De Quito vine haciendo la primera comunión, pero no vine haciendo la confirmación; por eso mi madrina es española. [*From Quito I came doing the first communion, but I didn’t come doing the confirmation; that is why my godmother is Spanish.] ‘I came from Quito when I had made my first communion, but I didn’t come having made my confirmation/ *I came from Quito whilst I was making my first communion, but I didn’t come whilst I was making my confirmation.’ In Andean Bolivian Spanish, Pfänder et al. (2010: 142) also document this same construction with a temporal mediated anteriority reading:

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(11) a. Comiendo viene. [* Eating, he comes] ‘He comes after eating / He eats on his way.’ b. Lavando el recipiente, colocas la carne que compré. [*Washing the pot, you put in the meat I bought] ‘After washing the pot, you put in the meat I bought.’ / *You put in the meat I bought whilst you wash the pot. Note that the construction in (11a) can also have a temporal simultaneity reading, which is verified by the meaning of the verbs ‘to eat’ and ‘to come’ (one can complete the action of eating while already going from one place to another), unlike (11b), which only expresses mediated anterior temporality. In these constructions, the temporal expression of anteriority is attributed to the gerund that we interpret as perfective. Yet, in non-Andean Spanish it is the composed gerund that is perfective; the simple gerund is mostly imperfective and very rarely results in a perfective reading, as was proven at the beginning of this chapter. Further proof is in the fact that in non-Andean Spanish, all of these constructions would be perfectly grammatical by replacing the simple gerund with a perfect gerund, as we will do in (12): (12) a. Siempre regresa habiendo comido, por eso no quiere nada. [*He/she always returns having eaten, that is why he/she doesn’t want anything] ‘He/she always returns after having eaten, that is why he/she doesn’t want anything.’ b. Viene habiendo dormido, por eso está tranquilo. [*He comes having slept, therefore he is relaxed] ‘He comes after having slept, therefore he is relaxed.’ c. Habiendo arreglado todos los problemas, vuelves. [*Having sorted out all the problems, you return] ‘After having sorted out all the problems, you return.’ d. Solo habiendo dormido trabaja. [*Only having slept he/she works] ‘Only after having slept does he/she work.’ e. No hay problema, habiendo regresado me pagan los zapatos. [*There is no problem, having returned they pay the shoes for me] ‘It’s no problem, when they have returned they will pay for my shoes.’ f. De Quito vine habiendo hecho la primera comunión, pero no vine habiendo hecho la confirmación; por eso mi madrina es española.

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[*From Quito I came having done my first communion, but I didn’t come having done my confirmation; that is why my Godmother is Spanish] ‘When I came from Quito I had done my first communion, but when I came I hadn’t done my confirmation; that is why my Godmother is Spanish.’ g. Habiendo comido, viene. [*Having eaten, he/she comes] ‘He/She comes after eating.’ h. Habiendo lavado el recipiente, colocas la carne que compré. [*Having washed the pot, you put the meat in that I bought] ‘After you have washed the pot, you put the meat in that I bought.’ In short, a linguistic change seems to have occurred in Andean Spanish: the normally imperfective simple gerund has adopted values of perfectivity which assign temporal readings of mediated anteriority to the construction. In other words, the simple gerund has implemented uses and values that are usually ascribed almost exclusively to the perfect gerund. The question that arises at this point is: Why has this change happened only in Andean Spanish and not in other Spanish varieties? And, more importantly: How did the change occur? With regard to the first question, Toscano Mateus (1953), Grimm (1986), Haboud (1998), Lee (1997) and Pfänder et al. (2010) demonstrate that the perfective gerund reading is a result of the direct influence of the Quechuan suffix shpa/spa on the Andean Spanish language. This Quechuan suffix is an adverbial subjunction used to indicate the perfective aspect of the subordinate clause in constructions that express the temporal continuity of two closely linked events, as demonstrated in (13), taken from Pfänder et al. (2010: 140): (13) Mikhu-spajamu-sa-n. To eat-SADVto come-progressive-3sg.not fut. Viene después de haber comido/ Habiendo comido, viene (non-Andean Spanish). He/she comes after having eaten/ *Having eaten, he/she comes. Literally: Comiendo viene / Castellano andino: comiendo viene. = [*Eating, he/she comes.] He/she eats on the way. Andean Spanish: [*Eating, he/she comes.] He/she eats on the way. Indeed, it seems that the suffix shpa/spa transmits the idea of aspectual perfectivity to the gerund simple, as occurs in Quechua in the temporal succes-

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sion of two consecutive events that can only take place due to the fact that one of them has a perfective aspect (the one expressed by means of the gerund in Spanish and the suffix shpa/spa in Quechua). The explanation for this construction given by a speaker of Ecuadorian Andean Spanish, documented in Haboud (1998: 209), is highly revealing in this respect, as it coincides with the values and meanings expressed by shpa/spa in Quechua. There is a definite difference between the phrases “limpio la casa antes de venir” and “limpiando vengo.” The first phrase implies two separate, independent actions. However, in the second sentence, the two actions are combined, as if they were continuously enacted within a “circular” time period, rather than situated on a linear continuum. There is no break between one action and the other. Are we dealing with a semantic copy from Quechua to Spanish or a contact-induced change in which, thanks to Quechuan influence, the simple gerund adopts the composed gerund’s perfective values? In order to resolve this question, one must remember that the Spanish simple gerund was able to express temporality of immediate anteriority, as shown in (4), and even mediated anteriority, as shown in (5), albeit with many restrictions. If this is true, we cannot claim to be dealing with a semantic copy, since the simple gerund in Spanish can express perfectivity in certain contexts. It could instead be a selective copy (or a contact-induced, indirect copy), a process of approximation from Spanish to Quechuan structures. We may also define it as an individualized process of adjustment and readjustment that allows the bilingual speaker to more effectively express the temporal and aspectual aspects of a construction that points to some of these possibilities (simultaneity and posteriority), but does not fully develop. As we have seen, the bilingual speaker disposes of different means in both languages to exploit the relations of temporality and aspectuality, our object of study. The temporal simple gerund constructions enable the speaker to express actions that occur at the same time as or after the action expressed by the main verb. This implies that there are certain similarities in both languages that the speaker in some way assumes and/or perceives, between -ndin Spanish and shpa/spa in Quechua. The speaker assumes that both languages have routines that allow the expression of the temporal and aspectual relationships connecting two events, even though the mechanisms that develop between the two are not exactly similar. He also perceives a certain similarity in the materialization of these assumed similarities, between the gerund and the morpheme shpa/spa – the temporal relationship between the two events and the perfectivity of the event that denotes the adverbial subordinate clause, either by means of shpa/spa, or by means of the gerund.

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The similarities perceived by the speaker are real, however, the resemblance between the Quechuan morpheme and the perfect gerund is stronger than between the morpheme and the simple gerund. Why then does the speaker not use this category in the first place, seeing as it already exists in the language with a similar meaning? Why does he produce a construction with new values instead? In our view, there are various reasons why this does not happen: a) because the perfect gerund is assigned to a formal context and to a written register, which distances it from everyday linguistic practise, and b) because the copies are not automatic but manual, i.e. the speaker copies whilst adapting, reorganizing, bringing the structures of one language closer to those of the other language according to the possibilities offered by both, i.e. they do not “copy” from one language to the other, just for the sake of copying, if they do not find where to copy something to. Therefore, we believe that the bilingual speaker causes the simple gerund construction (which is the one he uses) to converge with the Quechuan construction, thereby eliminating the restrictions that the first uses to express temporality of anteriority. It exploits the possibilities that Spanish has to offer and orients them towards Quechuan strategies, which enables the exploitation of routines that until now have been restricted in Spanish. In this way, the simple gerund invades the uses of the perfect gerund in a process of indirect change, induced by contact with Quechua, precisely because the speaker translates the characteristics of the Quechuan morpheme (i.e. the perfectivity) to the Spanish gerund construction because the he perceives these same characteristics in his own Spanish construction (or at least their possible realization). In other words, he causes a new Spanish construction to emerge on the basis of both the Quechuan characteristics and the Spanish characteristics themselves. We have attempted to explain how the emergence of the perfective gerund construction or that of the gerund of anteriority has occurred in Andean Spanish. We think that this contact-induced change originally took place between bilingual Quechuan and Spanish speakers. At present, it has been documented as a highly productive construction that prevails in the speech of both bilingual and Spanish monolingual speakers.

4.

Hearsay – an obligatory concept in Guaraní, but (no) concept in Spanish?

When looking at a Paraguayan daily journal written in Spanish, the Diario Popular published online (www.popular.com), one comes across a certain number of global, i.e. direct copies from Guaraní (Palacios 2008). The two by

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far most frequent global copies are the quotative marker he’i (‘s/he says’) and the hearsay marker ndaje (‘it has been said that, people say that’) – both with past and present reference, depending on the context. Let us first discuss the attributed quotes with he’i (ex. 14–19), then the non-attributed quotes ndaje, ex. 20–27, before comparing these internet findings with spoken data (ex. 14 ss.). The quotative marker he’i can introduce direct and indirect speech. In indirect speech, he’i is often postponed (ex. 14): (14) Estaba drogado he’i ‘He was drugged she said’ The postposition is one of the options in direct speech as well (as in ex. 15 and 16): (15) “Las palabras de mi hija me pesan”, he’i. “The words of my daughter are hard for me to hear”, he said.’ (16) “… soy inocente de todo lo que se me acusa”, he’i el detenido. “… I am innocent of everything I am being accused of ”, said the arrested.’ If the marker precedes the indirect speech, it merges with the Spanish complementizer que as he’i que as in ex. (17), (18) and (19): (17) Raúl … he’i que estaba sentado en su sillón. ‘Raúl … said that he was sitting in his armchair.’ (18) El acusado, tras llegar al país he’i que no tenía nada que ver con la muerte del artista. ‘The accused, after arriving in the country, said that he had nothing to do with thedeath of the artist.’ He’i can also be separated from que (ex. 19): (19) Un testigo he’i a los investigadores que R. habría mandado matar a R.V. ‘A witness said to the investigators that R. had had R.V. killed’ The hearsay marker ndaje could be translated into European Spanish as se dice que or dicen que (3rd person plural; as Spanish is a prodrop language, the pronoun ellos/ellas is not overtly expressed). Sometimes, when ndaje has a more evidential meaning, it can be translated as parece que ‘it seems that’ or al parecer ‘seemingly’. In some cases, both Guaraní ndaje and Spanish al parecer are combined, as in ex. (20):

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(20) Al parecer se puso celosa ndaje ‘It seems she was jealous’ As a phrasal adverb, ndaje is mostly postponed, as in ex. (21): (21) a. Llevó libros ndaje ‘They allegedly took books’ b. Querían robar ndaje ‘They allegedly planned to steal’ c. Médico violó a yiyi ndaje ‘Doctor allegedly raped girl’ However, we also find instances of ndaje introducing the hearsay content as in ex. (22): (22) Ndaje … inventó historia ‘He is said to have invented the story’ The examples in (23) show that ndaje is quite flexible with regard to its syntactic position: (23) a. Estaba ndaje mirando, cuando … ‘He is said to have been watching, when …’ b. Le “sedó” ndaje a su hijastro ‘She allegedly “sedated” her stepson’ c. Denunció a su concu … por haber intoxicado ndaje a su hijo ‘She reported her concu … for having allegedly poisoned her son’ Ndaje can be combined with Spanish verbs of saying as in (24) and with the Guaraní quotative marker he’i, as in (25): (24) Denuncia por chat ndaje ‘He is said to report via chat’. (25) Upéi he’i ndaje chupe que no cuente a nadie lo ocurrido ‘Then it is said that they told her not to tell anybody what happened’. Ndaje is not combined with the Spanish complementizer que (as is he’i, see above, ex. 17), but can function as a matrix clause as in ex. (26):

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(26) Ndaje una denuncia por supuesto acoso sexual fue presentada contra el pelotero Marco Lazaga, quien chuta en el club Everton de Chile. ‘An accusation of alleged sexual harassment was presented against the player Marco Lazaga, who plays football in the Chilean club Everton.’ Whereas – as we have just seen – in our written internet press corpus, the global copies he’i and ndaje replace Spanish expressions most of the time, this is not true for our corpus of oral narrations. The following examples were taken from María Isabel Guillán’s doctoral thesis Procesos de cambio lingüístico inducidos por contacto en el español del nordeste argentino: el sistema pronominal átono, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, which was supervised by Azucena Palacios and defended on the 20th February 2012. In spoken language, the solutions speakers find are mostly in Spanish. What is striking, however, is the high frequency of quotative marking (ex. 27), which has also been documented for other indigenized varieties of Spanish (cf. Pfänder et al. 2010): Salía, supongo que esa planta y de ahí salía una luz redonda así, poquito, se cruzaba y se caía una así y otra allá, me dice, … nos decía, estábamos en una casa ajena y me dice “vamo ahí a ve” me dijo un señor. Y vamo le digo, y esa luz cuando vo te va al lado de él, se apaga. Si vo ve bien de donde sale esa luz, vo tené marca y tené que pone una cruz, una cruz dice, para que no se pierda. (H, 11: 293–304) ‘I suppose it was this plant that shot up and a light came out of it that was this round, small, they crossed each other and one fell like this and the other over there, one tells me … one tells us, we were in a house far away and apparently a man said to me “let’s go and see”. Let’s go I tell him, and this light when you go to his side it goes off. If you look where this light comes from exactly, you mark it and draw a cross, a cross apparently, so as not to lose it.’ (H, 11: 293–304)

As for the quotation, one constantly comes across dice or dice que. However, language contact effects appear in the category of hearsay/evidentiality. There are two types of solutions speakers choose to express these concepts in Spanish that are not grammaticalized. Seemingly, the choice between the two possible solutions does not depend on the speakers’ linguistic competence in one or two languages, but rather on the communicative genre. In more formal, interview-like data, the speakers opt for codified normative Spanish form se dice que (ex. 28) and dicen que (ex. 29). (28) P: Si uno ve el fuego o la luz ¿puede ir y sacar el entierro o no? R: Se dice que depende de la persona; si e para vo, se te va a da o si no, no. (…). (H, 10: 242–245) P: ‘If one sees fire or light, can one go and dig up the valuable objects buried in the ground or not?’

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R: ‘One says that it depends on the person; if it’s for you, if he will give it to you or not, right?’ (29) Dicen que a los perros negros no le (sic!) quiere el espiritú ‘One says that the spirit does not like black dogs’ In less formal parts of the interview, and especially in ongoing narratives, speakers tend to choose indirect, i.e. selective copies from Guaraní, for example the third singular form dice (que), used here in the impersonal sense of ‘one says’ (see ex. 30 with dice and 31 with dice que): (30) Él le pega, dice ‘One says that he hits him/her’ (31) Como curaba, dice que hacía payé ‘Since he/she heals, one says that he/she did magic’ Seeing as these forms could be misinterpreted by the interviewer from Spain, the interviewees tend to rephrase the items, producing a normative, almost completely Spanish construction like in ex. (32): (32) Y dice … suele contar que … cuando hay mal tiempo … ‘And one says … one generally says that … when the weather is bad …’ If we take a closer look at the hearsay marking in oral narrative, we are again struck by the enormous frequency of marking, just as we were in the quotative (see above ex. 27). In example (33), dice que occurs as an introduction of the subordinate clauses: Y ese dice que era así también escarbaban y alcanzó [el entierro], alcanzó dice que así un … dice y era pesado; entonce ello largaron una soga, hizo así un agujero y le ataron ahí y cuando le etaban por levanta dice que le vió a … su papá (…) (H, 10: 252–254). ‘And he apparently was like that and they looked around and he reached [the buried valuables], he apparently reached a … apparently and it was heavy; so they got a rope and this way he made a hole and they tied him to it and when they were just about to pull him up apparently he saw his … his Dad (…)’ (H, 10: 252–254).

However, we also find occurrences of dice que that are inserted in the ongoing syntactic project (ex. 34): [Al Pombero] No, el trapo está por la frente nomá, por dentro de la pierna del perro, del perro negro, y dice que el perro negro también le ve, otro perro no le ve, pero el perro negro dice que le ve. Nosotro dice que … nosotro que nos bautizamo, dice que tenemo una estrella que brilla para el Pombero acá nosotro … Nosotro tenemo una luz dice que … por eso dice que no le podemo ver. (H, 11: 176–180).

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‘[To the Pombero] No, the cloth is just in front, between the dog’s legs, the black dog’s, and apparently the black dog sees him/her too, another dog doesn’t see him/her, but the black dog, he apparently saw him/her. We are said to … we who are christened, we are said to have a star that shines for the Pombero here … we are said to have a light … that is why one says that we can’t see him/her’ (H, 10: 252–254).

The concept of quote and hearsay is grammaticalized to different extents in different languages. In Spanish, it is expressed by means of impersonal expressions such as dicen que or se dice que. What is important about this category is that something was said without the speaker specifying who it was that said it. In other words: it’s not the personalized voice that counts, but the speech act itself. In Spanish, hearsay is a category that is not used as rarely as, for instance, the category of tense. In the pre-Columbian languages however, tense is employed far less commonly than hearsay. Hearsay belongs to a family of categories, one of which is evidentiality. The speaker uses this category to demonstrate that there are indications which prove the correctness of the proposition. However, he only takes limited responsibility for what has been said because he has no more than indications. From a grammatical point of view, the same goes for this neighboring category in Spanish as it does for hearsay: the option is partly grammaticalized (parece que and habrá + PARTICIPLE) but does not belong to the most common options offered by the Spanish grammar system. Spanish in America that is in intensive contact with the pre-Columbian languages has turned the rather infrequently used option of expressing hearsay into a highly frequent one. If the speaker knows something because someone else has said it, this will be expressed much more often than in European Spanish. Very clear distinctions can be drawn between at least two subcategories: – The first option corresponds formally and functionally to the supranational norm. In Paraguay, a global copy from Guaraní has been integrated as a further marker (additionally, i.e. as a doublet): he’i (‘he/she says/said’). – A second marker has been reported that functions as a global copy in Paraguay: ndaje (‘it has been said, people seem to say’). The speaker is not identified, either because he can’t be identified or because this is not intended. This subcategory could be expressed with dicen or se dice in supranational Spanish but is generally expressed as an impersonally used dice or dice que in Paraguay and some other Latin American countries (cf. Babel 2009; Pfänder et al. 2010).

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Conclusions

This contribution’s central claim is that what “counts” in contact-related language variation and change is not typological convergence or congruence between languages, it is rather perceived similarity. In language contact, it is the bilingual speakers’ perception of similarities in form, function, or relating to the categorical status of a form-function unit, which leads to language change. One of the main assumptions in contact linguistics is that typological congruence facilitates borrowing, transfer or copying processes (Weinreich 1976; Siegel 2008; Matras 2009; Johanson 2002, 2011). There are many different terms for this assumed constraint: congruence constraint, congruent lexicalization, interlanguage similarity, structural convergence, typological parallels or source and target language equivalence. Although contact linguistics is a rather heterogeneous discipline that brings together scholars of quite different backgrounds such as anthropology, historical linguistics or discourse analysis, there is general support the aforementioned constraint. The current contribution challenges this view. Instead, we propose a different motivation for replication or copying, namely perceived similarity. Most authors admit that sometimes speakers perceive similarities between languages where typologists would not see any parallels at all. Nevertheless, these cases are usually treated as exceptions that only confirm the rule of typological congruence, rather than as an important principle in its own right. An in-depth analysis of different Romance contact settings has led us to the innovative hypothesis that speakers systematically draw on their perception of similarity (and not only from time to time, as suggested by other theorists). Thus, we are the first to claim that one of the main forces motivating contact-induced language change can best be described in terms of similarity effects (Cutler et al. 2003). Finally, the overall importance of similarity effects in the emergence of new linguistic constructions leads us to reconceptualize grammar as an open, fluid system (Steels 2009), which holds for both bilingual and monolingual speakers. Consequently, we would subscribe to a model of grammar as an open system consisting of subsystems as well as of macro- and microconstructional schemes and patterns that are highly adaptive resources for ongoing interaction.

Acknowledgements Portions of this research were supported by the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies and the German Science Foundation (DFG), Pf699/4-1, RomWeb.

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References Andersen Roger W. 1983 Transfer to somewhere. In: Susan Gass and Larry Selinker (eds.), Language transfer in language learning, 177–201. Rowley, MA: Newbury. Auer, Peter and Susanne Günthner 2003 Die Entstehung von Diskursmarkern im Deutschen – ein Fall von Grammatikalisierung? LiSt 38. Auer, Peter and Stefan Pfänder 2011 Constructions: Emergent or emerging? In: Peter Auer and Stefan Pfänder (eds.), Constructions: Emerging and Emergent, 1–21. (Linguae & Litterae 6.) Berlin: De Gruyter. Babel, Anna 2009 Dizque, evidentiality, and stance in Valley Spanish. Language in Society 38: 487–511. Bod, Rens 2006 Exemplar-Based Syntax: How to Get Productivity from Examples. The Linguistic Review 23, Special Issue on Exemplar-Based Models in Linguistics: 291–320. Breyer, Thiemo, Oliver Ehmer and Stefan Pfänder 2011 Improvisation, temporality and emergent constructions. In: Peter Auer and Stefan Pfänder (eds.), Constructions: Emerging and emergent, 186–216. (Linguae & Litterae 6.) Berlin: De Gruyter. Cerrón-Palomino, Rodolfo 1987 Lingüística quechua. Cuzco: Centro de Estudios Rurales Andinos Bartolomé de las Casas. Cutler, Anne, Lalita Murty and Takashi Otake 2003 Rhythmic similarity effect in non-native listening? In: Proceedings of the Fifteenth International Congress of Phonetic Sciences. Barcelona, Spain. Volume 1, 329–332. Adelaide: Causal Productions. Díaz, Norma, Ralph Ludwig and Stefan Pfänder 2002 Procesos lingüísticos en situaciones de contacto: parámetros y perspectivas. In: Norma Díaz, Ralph Ludwig and Stefan Pfänder (eds.), La Romania americana: procesos lingüísticos en situaciones de contacto, 389–441. Madrid, Frankfurt: Iberoamericana, Vervuert. Ehmer, Oliver and Stefan Pfänder 2009 Sprache kann in jedem Moment ganz anders sein. Improvisationstechniken im Gespräch. In: Maximilian Gröne, HansJochen Gehrke, Frank-Rutger Hausmann, Stefan Pfänder and Bernhard Zimmermann (eds.), Improvisation. Kultur- und lebenswissenschaftliche Perspektiven, 175–194. Freiburg: Rombach. Epps, Patience, John Huehnergard and Na’ama Pat-El 2013 Contact Among Genetically Related Languages. In: Journal of Language Contact, Vol. 6, Issue 2, 209–219. Fernández Lagunilla, Marina 1999 Las construcciones de gerundio. In: Ignacio Bosque and Violeta Demonte (eds.), Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española. Volume 2, 3343–3503. Madrid: Espasa. Franceschini, Rita 2011 What unfocussed acquisition can say about relative openness of systems in contact. In: Emmanuele Miola and Paolo Ramat (eds.), Language Contact and Language Decay – Socio-political and linguistic perspectives, 109–135. Pavia. Godenzzi, Juan C., Stefan Pfänder, Victor Fernandez and Philipp Dankel (eds.) 2013 El español andino. Espacios comunicativos y cambios gramaticales. Guillán, María Isabel 2012 Procesos de cambio lingüístico inducidos por contacto en el español del NEA: el sistema pronominal átono. Madrid: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. Doctoral Thesis. Haboud, Marleen 1998 Quichua y castellano en los Andes ecuatorianos. Los efectos de un contacto prolongado. Quito: Abya-Yala.

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Hartmann, Peter 1959 Offene Form, leere Form und Struktur. In: Sprache – Schlüssel zur Welt (FS LeoWeisgerber), 146–157, Düsseldorf: Pädagogischer Verlag. Jacob, Daniel 2003 De la función primaria a la autonomía de la sintaxis: hacia un enfoque sociológico del cambio gramatical. Lexis (Lima/Perú) 27: 359–399. Jarvis, Scott and Aneta Pavlenko 2008 Crosslinguistic Influence in Language and Cognition. New York, London: Routledge. Johanson, Lars 2002 Contact-induced change in a code-copying framework. In: Mari C. Jones and Edith Esch (eds.), Language Change. The Interplay of Internal, External and Extra-Linguistic Factors, 285–313. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Lee, TaeYoon 1997 Morfosintaxis amerindias en el español americano. Desde la perspectiva del quichua. Madrid: Universidad Complutense. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Martínez, Angelita in print Las escuelas del MERCOSUR: la trama de las gramáticas y el concepto de identidades dinámicas. In: Elvira Arnoux (ed.), Planeamiento del lenguaje en el MERCOSUR. Bueno Aires: Editorial Biblos. Palacios, Azucena 2008 Paraguay. In: Azucena Palacios (ed.), El español en América. Contactos lingüísticos en Hispanoamérica, 279–300. Barcelona: Ariel. Palacios, Azucena 2010 Algunas reflexiones en torno a la Lingüística del Contacto. ¿Existe el préstamo estructural? Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana VIII.2 (15): 33–36. Palacios, Azucena 2012 Contact-induced change and internal evolution: Spanish in contact with Amerindian languages. In: Isabelle Léglise and Claudine Chamoreau (eds.), The Interplay of Variation and Change in Contact Settings, 165–198. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Palacios, Azucena in print Variación y cambio lingüístico en situaciones de contacto: algunas precisiones teóricas. In: Argumentos cuantitativos y argumentos cualitativos en sociolingüística (Segundo coloquio de cambio y variación lingüística). México: El Colegio de México. Pfänder, Stefan; Juan Ennis; Mario Soto and España Villegas 22010 (first edition 2009) Gramática mestiza. Con referencia al castellano de Cochabamba. La Paz: IBLEL. De Smet, Hendrik 2012 The course of actualization. Language 88 (3): 601–633. Poplack, Shana, Lauren Zentz and Nathalie Dion 2011 Phrase-final prepositions in Quebec French: An empirical study of contact, code-switching and resistance to convergence. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 15 (2): 203–225 Real Academia Española: Database (CREA) [online]. Corpus de referencia del español actual. http://www.rae.es Siegel, Jeff 2008 The emergence of pidgin and creole languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Steels, Luc 2009 Is sociality a crucial prerequisite for the emergence of language? In: Rudolf Botha and Chris Knight (eds.), The Prehistory of Language, 36–57. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. Weinreich, Uriel 1953 Languages in Contact. Findings and Problems. New York: Linguistic Circle.

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Anna Babel (Columbus, OH) and Stefan Pfänder (Freiburg)

Doing copying: Why typology doesn’t matter to language speakers

1.

Introduction

This book addresses the hypothesis that typological similarity – in particular, common genetic inheritance – influences the outcome of language contact. In this chapter, we challenge the assumption that similarity should be measured according to purely linguistic criteria by testing the way that congruence is perceived by speakers. We argue that beyond common historical influences and developments, congruence is built through the production of similarity by speakers. Every utterance is embedded in a particular social and cultural interpretive framework that can influence the way that grammatical categories are understood and produced. We know that the familiar grammatical pigeonholes that emerged from the classical study of languages can mask complex, flexible, multivalent, and sometimes contradictory usages; how, then, do language users take advantage of this potential to produce and interpret utterances? This question leads us to some of the deepest questions of our field: What, ultimately, are grammatical categories? How does language function as a cognitive process in the minds of speakers? In this article, we introduce an example of how congruence can emerge between two typologically dissimilar languages, Spanish and Quechua. However, we also discuss the resonance between two varieties of Spanish: Standard Spanish (an idealized, standard variety that is presented as a target or goal by institutions of higher education) and Andean Spanish (in this case, the local, non-standard variety spoken in Central Bolivia, where this research was conducted). Thus, the situation that we discuss represents the confluence of at least three varieties – and includes the flexible space among them and their respective sub-varieties, in which language is available for practices such as code-switching and language blending. We argue that speakers take advantage of opportunities to “build bridges” across typologically different languages. These bridges are based on similarities that speakers perceive, rather than pre-determined grammatical categories. While grammarians might see language as an array of constructions that can be arranged in different configurations, we hold that speakers understand language as a set of possibilities, probabilities, and opportunities. To explain

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this suggestion, we turn to the metaphor of a bridge. If many travelers are faced with the challenge of getting from one side of a river to another, they will take many different routes. Over time, some of these routes will become well-traveled while others fall into disuse; speakers will find some to be convenient for some purposes and others to be more convenient for different ends. At the heart of this metaphor is the claim that similarity, far from being a pre-existing, easily definable characteristic, is constructed through practice and in communicative situations. Furthermore, we must remember that grammar is not limited to production; the perception of grammatical forms is produced through the interplay of speaker, audience, and context, among other factors, and is conditioned by speakers’ particular backgrounds and routines. A native Spanish speaker may have little conception of how her speech is understood by Quechua-dominant bilinguals, and even speakers of the “same” variety may find themselves speaking to different purposes. Indeed, what does it mean to speak “the same” or “similar” languages? As linguists have often noted (cf. Einar 1966), felt similarities tend to run along political and social lines rather than grammatical ones. To make matters even more complicated, the extent to which language is shared among individuals is an open question. We use this chapter as an opportunity to explore the production of congruence beyond typological similarity or common genetic inheritance, demonstrating that congruence is not limited to closely-related languages, and pursuing a line of investigation that probes the concept of congruence as it is produced by two kinds of experts – in the academic field, linguists; and beyond the academy, hands-on practitioners, the speakers of the languages we study.

2.

Theoretical framework

The question of the relative power of social and grammatical factors in language contact and change has long been debated in contact linguistics (Thomason 2001; Thomason and Kaufman 1988). In this chapter, we suggest that the question is not a distinction between “grammar” or “social” factors so much as it is the way that social factors comprise part of the cognitive processes whose end product we understand as grammar(s). If, as many recent lines of investigation suggest (e.g. “The Five Graces” 2009; Bybee 2010; Croft 2009; Pierrehumbert 2001), language is a complex adaptive system, it seems reasonable to assume that social cognition is an important component of the way that we process language. In this contribution, we suggest that speakers not only perceive but also produce similarities between language systems, even those that linguists consider

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to be dissimilar. Our approach draws from two existing sources: Jarvis and Pavlenko’s distinction between perceived and assumed similarities (2008) and Johanson’s code-copying framework (Johanson 2008). Jarvis and Pavlenko hold that in language contact, it is the “similarities (and differences) that the L2 user believes or perceives to exist between the languages” which count (Jarvis and Pavlenko 2008: 178–179, our emphasis). Perceived similarities are features that a language user has encountered in a second language and believes to be analogous to his/her first language. Assumed similarities, on the other hand, are similarities that a language user, based on his/her first-language experience, assumes must be present in some form or another in the second language. Johanson, on the other hand, provides a detailed framework for the ways in which parts of language can be copied. Pfänder et al. (2010) note that when using the term “copy,” we should keep in mind that copies are not always perfect or identical to the original; they can be mostly similar, partly similar, different through error, wear, or lack of technique, or different by design. Johanson distinguishes between four types of copies: semantic, combinatorial, material, and frequency (Johanson 2002, 2008). Semantic (or functional) copies are copies that overlay the semantic content of one language with the semantics of another language, as when speakers of Guaraní-influenced Spanish use locative preposition in voy en ‘go at’ rather than the normative Spanish dative voy a ‘go to’. Combinatorial copies are those that take structure or patterns from one language and rearrange the other language to fit these schemes, as when speakers of Quechua-influenced Spanish use OV order for emphasis under particular pragmatic conditions, resulting in sentences such as cuatro fumo ‘four I smoke (OV)’ rather than fumo cuatro ‘I smoke four (VO).’ Material copies extract parts of one language that are incorporated into another language, such as the use of English loanwords handy ‘cell phone’ and beamer ‘projector’ in German with only a tangential connection to their original meaning. Finally, frequency copies take the distribution patterns of particular features in one language and superimpose them on the other language, as when English-influenced Spanish speakers in the US use overt pronouns much more frequently than do most other varieties of Spanish. In this article, we focus on semantic (or as it were, functional) copies sensu Johanson. Our approach is also informed by developments in closely-related fields, such as creole studies and second-language acquisition. According to the somewhere-to principle in second-language acquisition (Anderson 1983, 1997) and in Creole linguistics (Siegel 1999, 2008), in order for a feature to transfer from one language to another, it must have a place – a slot, a home – in the

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other language. In this chapter, we further this research by examining the question of how this compatibility is produced and evaluated by speakers. In parallel with this viewpoint, the concept of positive transfer in SLA shifts the focus from the availability of language to the actions of speakers. Speakers use enormous amounts of information taken from their first language in building their understanding of a second or other language (Ortega 2009). Ellis (2006) elaborates a model to describe how a speaker’s native language(s) influence the way that subsequent languages are learned, arguing that a language user’s prior experience biases the way in which they perceive and understand other languages, resulting in selective attention to features of the other language. In Ellis’s words, “the functors have to be perceived as cues before they can partake in acquisition” (2006: 189). This observation also applies to typology; languages must be understood to be similar before material can be transferred. What is at stake in all of these approaches to language contact and congruence is the way in which speakers’ cognitive systems influence the way that we understand and produce language, especially when there are social distinctions between the varieties that are spoken in a particular communicative situation. In this article, we take language and grammatical structures to be rule-governed, but fundamentally flexible and situationally dependent. As Breyer, Ehmer and Pfänder argue, linguistic structure emerges through improvisation on a theme – rules exist, but they are available for reference rather than existing as deterministic objects (Breyer, Ehmer and Pfänder 2010). Therefore, the “slots” that speakers perceive as existing in other languages, or the elements that they consider to be transferable, may vary depending on context and situation. We take these theoretical developments as support for our observation that speakers take advantage of opportunities to “build bridges” across typologically different languages, an agentive process that follows rational but non-deterministic paths across perceived linguistic differences and similarities. Speakers have multiple potential paths to express their pragmatic needs, using linguistic features in complex, multivalent, creative, and context-dependent ways. The choices that they make as language users – and which are ultimately codified in grammar books and style manuals – are tightly intertwined with their social relationships and stances. Because similarity is always perceived, assumed, and/or and constructed – whether by speakers or by scholars – congruence is a sociolinguistic phenomenon.

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Areal background and methodology

Andean Spanish is an umbrella term for the varieties of Spanish spoken in the Andean area, which stretches from southern Colombia to northern Argentina and which are spoken in migrant communities from coastal Chile to Buenos Aires, Argentina, as well as in migrant communities in Europe and North America (see Coronel-Molina and Rodríguez-Mondoñedo 2012 for an overview). This region is generally considered to be centered in the three “Andean” nations of Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, and the greater part of the body of work carried out by Andean scholars has focused on Peru. While there are numerous shared features among the varieties of Spanish spoken in this area, no single variety has all the features that have been discussed in the literature, and all varieties vary by education, language background, and speech context, among other factors (Babel 2010; Escobar 2000; Klee and Caravedo 2006; Pfänder et al. 2010). For this reason, we refer more narrowly to the Central Bolivian variety of Andean Spanish, recognizing that there is regional variation even within this label – Pfänder’s data were collected largely from the urban Cochabamba area, while Babel’s data come from the Spanish-dominant rural valleys, at a distance of less than three hundred kilometers, but in practical terms a day’s travel by land. One key feature that unites different varieties of Andean Spanish is their common influence from Quechua languages. Spanish and Quechua first came into contact in the early 16th century, when Spanish conquistadores and missionaries began to flood into South America. Quechua, the language spoken by the Inca, was used as an administrative language by both the Inca and the Spanish, and spread by Spanish missionaries over much of the Andean region (Durston 2007; Mannheim 1991). While the present-day Quechua language family is spoken by a few million speakers1 over a fairly limited geographical area, the influence of Quechua on local varieties of Spanish is far wider. Quechua-influenced varieties of Spanish are usually oral varieties and are frequently stigmatized. Spanish and Quechua could not be more different typologically or genetically. While the varieties that make up the Quechua language family are linguistic isolates,2 Spanish is part of a robust Romance family, many varieties of which are both standardized and crucial to a national or regional identity. 1

2

Ethnologue estimates there are a total of 10 million speakers of Quechua; other estimates are more conservative. The CIA Factbook estimates that 21.2 % of the population, or just over 2 million people, speak Quechua in Bolivia. Some scholars have claimed that Quechua may be related to Aymara, another Andean language (see W. F. H. Adelaar 2012).

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There has been great deal of historical contact among the different branches of the Romance family, as well as a great deal of scholarly ink spilled over their precise relationship between them. Quechua, on the other hand, has received relatively little scholarly attention, to the point that it is often treated as a single language rather than a group of related varieties. While the different national varieties of Quechua have remained relatively unstandardized (Cerron-Palomino 1993; Godenzzi 1996), Spanish has been aggressively standardized, emerging as a pluricentric language with different standard varieties in Europe and South America. Typologically, Quechua is an agglutinative, left-branching language with SOV structure and variable word order. Spanish is fusional and right-branching, a pro-drop language with SVO structure. Andean Spanish has existed as a spoken variety for centuries although, since it is has always been a predominantly oral language, it is difficult to pinpoint its exact extension and history. Andean Spanish exists in a classic diglossic relationship with Standard Spanish. The former variety is generally assumed to be the result of the combined influence of large numbers of firstlanguage Quechua speakers shifting to Spanish, a process which reinforced tendencies within the system which are now considered “marginal” or “archaic” in other varieties of Spanish (Palacios 2001, 2007).3 Some examples of semantic parallels that have been described between Andean Spanish and Quechua include the transference of evidential features (Babel 2009; Escobar 1994; Feke 2004) and the non-standard use of perfect tenses (W. Adelaar 1997; Klee and Ocampo 1995) and causatives (Pfänder and Soto Rodríguez 2002) among other features (see, for example, Calvo Pérez 2000). While these features are obligatory in Quechua, they appear as lexical markers with varying degrees of grammaticalization in Andean Spanish. The degree to which these markers can be considered to be grammaticalized depends to a large extent on register and speech context – while more standard varieties of Spanish use optional lexical strategies to mark causation and evidentiality, less standard varieties tend to function with much stricter, even obligatory marking of these categories. In this article, we will focus on an emergent use of the había past tense that seems to contain elements of both Standard Spanish and Andean Spanish semantics, as well as other potential interpretations that could be understood 3

It’s important to note that while we have extensive documentation of Spanish in isolation from Quechua influence, we have no way to document Quechua in isolation from Spanish influence, given that our first written evidence of the language comes from colonial sources.

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to align with other features of Quechua grammar. Through this example, we demonstrate how a marker that has been firmly established as a “tense” or “mirative” marker in many existing interpretations of the grammar is nevertheless used flexibly and creatively in real interactions. The data that we present in this chapter were collected from Central Bolivia, from spontaneous spoken and internet corpora (Pfänder) and from ethnographic participant-observer interactions (Babel).

4.

Data

In this article, we focus on a use of the había past tense that seems to incorporate core elements of both standard Spanish and Andean Spanish interpretations, as well as other semantic/pragmatic content that has the potential to align with features of Quechua grammar. Through this example, we demonstrate how a marker that has been firmly established as a “tense/aspect” (in Standard Spanish) or “mirative/deictic” marker (in Andean Spanish) is nevertheless used flexibly and creatively in a real communicative situation. In Standard Spanish, the [había + past participle] marker functions as a past perfect tense, establishing the sequence of two points in the past, as in the following example: Example 1: Standard Spanish (1) Ya había ido al mercado cuando me viste. ‘I had already gone to the market when you saw me.’ In example 1, two events (going to the market and you seeing me) are placed in temporal succession by the use of the past tense había + past participle: Event A, “going to the market,” occurred before event B, “you seeing me.” In Andean Spanish, however, the literature (as well as the authors’ practical experience) suggests that the Spanish perfect tense había functions less as a past perfect marker than as a parallel to the Quechua -sqa, or non-experienced past (Escobar 1997; Klee and Ocampo 1995; Pfänder et al. 2010; Sanchez 2004). Quechua has an opposition between two past tenses, which contrast the experienced past (-rqa or -ra) to the non-experienced past (-sqa). This opposition has been interpreted as a mirative (W. Adelaar 1977), as a deictic marker (Faller 2004), and more generally as part of the epistemic system, working in conjunction with evidential markers -si ‘reported’ and -mi ‘attested’ (Feke 2004). Thus, in Quechua, there is a distinction between the following sentences:

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Example 2: Quechua experienced (a) and non-experienced (b) past (2) a. Khumpa-y hamu- rqa-Ø Friend- my come- experienced past-3rd person ‘My friend came (I vouch for this information).’ b. Khumpa-y hamu- sqa-Ø Friend- my come- nonexperienced past-3rd person ‘Apparently my friend came.’ This grammatical structure has several semantic extensions, such as surprise and non-volitionality – it can be used in the first person for dreams and for actions that one carries out while drunk. In this sense, it aligns closely with mirative constructions in other languages (Curnow 2003; DeLancey 2001). Example 2c: Quechua non-experienced past (2) c. Hamu- sqaykiña! Come- nonexperienced past- 2nd person already ‘You’re here already!’ (surprise) As can been seen in the examples above, the distinction between Quechua past tenses -rqa and -sqa is primarily an epistemic one, related to experience/ non-experience. While there is some debate over the exact semantic content of these past tense forms, they are certainly not identical in linguistic terms to the Standard Spanish past perfect tense described in example 1. However, the historical record corroborates the potential for the development of this tense as a mirative marker in some historical varieties on Spanish. In historiographical texts, past perfect tenses are commonly found after verbs of saying or thinking, as in the following examples (Davies 2002; O’Neill 1999). In these examples, epistemic verbs are underlined and past perfect tenses are in boldface. Example 3: (3) a. dixo que no sabia qién le avia ferido & muriose de aquellas feridas ‘he said he didn’t know who had wounded him & he died of those wounds’ (Alfonso X (1251–1255): Fuero Real)4

4

Later also to be found in the following compilation: Anónimo (1284): Libro de los fueros de Castiella. Edición empleada: Bares, Madison: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, 1993.

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b. Algunos dellos notaron bien lo q avian visto & preguta-les por los vientos sy avia an-dado ‘Some of them noted well what they had seen & ask them by what winds they had come’ (Tratado de la música, Anonymous) c. en aql tpo penso q los sus encatamentos avia pedi-do la fuerça ‘at that time I think that the enchantments had lost their power’ (Sumas de la historia troyana, Leomarte)5 This connection between epistemic verbs (of thinking or knowing) and the past perfect tenses demonstrates that there was a possible “bridge” available to firstlanguage Quechua speakers who may have assumed, in Jarvis and Pavlenko’s sense, that there must be a way to express evidentiality in Spanish. Therefore, the route for a semantic copy was opened. This furnishes a possible explanation for the way the past perfect marker has developed in Andean Spanish. In Andean Spanish, the Quechua semantic content of the experienced/ non-experienced distinction seems to have been laminated onto the Spanish past perfect marker, effectively converting it from a tense marker to an epistemic marker. At this point, we turn to data from our corpora. Example 4: Andean Spanish (from Internet corpus) (4) calma diego […] ‘cool it, diego […]’ tan leeendooo había sido el weeellamss […] ‘he turned out to be so nice, this Williams’ In this example, marked by stylistic variation such as nonstandard orthography, punctuation, and capitalization, a participant in a chat uses the había marker in order to ironically express an unexpected result – that another participant, Williams, had turned out to be tan lindo ‘so nice.’ This usage has no connection to the past perfect tense, but it does align perfectly with the Quechua-influenced Andean Spanish epistemic marker that is our focus in this chapter. We now turn to two longer examples in their ethnographic context. The first, example 5, is a classic use of the había epistemic marker. In the following transcript, Babel, marked in transcript as A, speaks to a friend, marked in 5

Also found cited as Crónica de 1344 I, Pedro Afonso de Barcelos, translated by Anonymous.

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the transcript as E, about the food that was left over from a party that E had thrown the night before. In this transcript, the past perfect tense is marked in boldface and the present perfect is underlined. Example 5: The gravy filled the big pot right up (5) 1. E: Llenito en su olla grande era el jugo pues. E: ‘The gravy filled the big pot right up.’ 2. A: Mm-hm A:‘Mm-hm’ 3. E: En la otra arroz en la otra papa–Papa había sobrado harto. E: ‘In the other one, rice, in the other, potatoes; there were tons of potatoes left over.’ 4. A: Uh-huh? A: ‘Uh-huh?’ 5. E: Después arroz no ha sobrado casi, ni chuño casi no ha sobrado. E: ‘And then there wasn’t much rice left over, and almost no chuño was left over either.’ 6. (Background: … la puerta pero!) (Background: ‘ … the door then!’) 7. A: Mm A: ‘Mm’ 8. E: Papa nomás había sobrado. E: ‘Just the potatoes were left over.’ 9. (Background: ¡Cerrá la puerta!) (Background: ‘Close the door!’) 10. E: Después así juguito nomás también sin carne ha sobrado también. E: ‘And then just some gravy without meat or anything was left over too.’ In this transcript, E discusses the food that was left over, using Spanish present perfect ha + past participle (underlined in transcript) and past perfect había + past participle (boldface in transcript) to distinguish between two types of information. In Standard Spanish, this would mark a tense distinction between the present perfect, ha + past participle, and the past perfect había + past participle. However, in this case, all the food was consumed at the same time, so there is clearly no temporal distinction; rather, E is indicating surprising, novel, or foregrounded information using the Spanish markers. While not much rice and chuño ‘dehydrated potatoes’ were left over (turn 5), lots of potatoes were left over (turn 3, 8). By the use of the past tense, we are given to understand that this is an unexpected result.

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Table 1: The gravy filled the big pot right up Topic

Verb

Tense

Reading

Gravy

llenito era ‘was completely full’

Simple past

Background information

Potato

había sobrado ‘were left over’

Past perfect

Unexpected, surprise

Rice

no ha sobrado ‘none was left over’

Present perfect

Expected, no surprise

Chuño (dehydrated potato)

no ha sobrado ‘none was left over’

Present perfect

Expected, no surprise

Potato

había sobrado ‘were left over’

Past perfect

Unexpected, surprise

Gravy

ha sobrado ‘was left over’

Present perfect

Expected, no surprise

This is a classic use of the Andean Spanish perfect tenses as described in the literature. In this usage, we can note the parallels that speakers have found between apparently dissimilar elements – tense and aspect in Standard Spanish, and epistemology and mirativity in Quechua. The extension of epistemology to a temporal marker may seem like an unusual process, but in fact it is cross-linguistically attested; the Bulgarian (past) perfect marker becomes an evidential (see Willett as cited in Escobar 2000: 135) and Spanish -ara, the past subjunctive form, comes from Latin -averat, the past perfect indicative. Therefore, in this example we may be seeing a reflection of common tendency in Romance dialects – a similarity that is perceived by speakers in many different cross-linguistic forms. Likewise, in example 6, taken from Pfaender’s Cochabamba corpus, a speaker carefully distinguishes between events she has seen and those she has not seen using the Spanish perfect tenses. In this example, as in the examples above, the past perfect tense is marked with boldface and the present perfect tense is underlined. Example 6: And what is the Calvary like? (6) 1. A: ¿Y cómo es el calvario? A: ‘And what is the Calvary like?’ 2. B: Se sube arriba al cerro, se saca piedra, dice que había unos borrachitos, que habían hecho su virgencita de piedra B: ‘You climb up the hill, you take out stone(s), they say there were some drunks, who made a virgin out of stone.’

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3. A: Ah sí, ¿cómo? A: ‘Oh, really? How?’ 4. B: Dice que una virgencita de piedra habían tallado y allí ovejitas dice habían hecho. B: ‘They say they carved a virgin out of stone, and there, little sheep, they say they did.’ 5. A: Sí, […] pero cómo han pasado todo el día pues, todo el día han estado ¿no vé? A: ‘Yes, […] but what did you do all day, you were there all day, right?’ 6. B: Se han ido ellos, nosotros estábamos jugando, helados nos hemos comprado, refrescos, al baño hemos ido, la Neli se ha trancado en el baño, no podía salir, “ay no se puede”, yo igual al mismo baño he entrado, “ay no se puede”, chistoso hemos salido (CC.1,301) B: ‘The others left, we were playing, we bought ice cream, drinks, we went to the bathroom, and Neli got stuck in the bathroom, she couldn’t leave, “Oh, I can’t!” and I went into the same bathroom too, “Oh, I can’t!” It was hilarious [how] we came out.’ In this excerpt, the speaker clearly distinguishes between events that she has not seen both by the use of dice ‘they say’ and by the use of the past perfect tense in turns 2 and 4, then switches to the present perfect tense for turn 6, in which she narrates the experiences she went through on a particular day with her friend Neli.6 This example, like examples 4 and 5, clearly demonstrates that the past perfect tense functions as an epistemic marker in Andean Spanish. In the final example, we turn to a more complex usage of this construction. In this example, a doctor is speaking to an audience of community members in the town of Iscamayo, in Central Bolivia, trying to convince them to agree to a community-wide fumigation to eradicate the vinchuca beetle. This speaker grew up in the local area, but was educated at medical school in the city. As such, she is familiar with both formal registers of Spanish and with the local dialect. While she identifies herself as a monolingual Spanish speaker, she has certainly grown up speaking a variety of Spanish that has significant Quechua contact. The vinchuca beetle, a vector of a chronic disease known as Chagas, is associated with poor-quality rural homes and with keeping livestock close to the house. This is a sensitive topic because of the connotations of the presence of the beetle; the doctor does not want to appear to be blaming her audience for a lack of hygienic precautions, much less to imply that they are impoverished, dirty, and ignorant. 6

The place name and all personal names are pseudonyms.

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Example 7: That’s what the government wants to do for us (7) 1. Es lo que el gobierno quiere hacer por nosotros. ‘That’s what the government wants to do for us.’ 2. Pero nos ha puesto una condición. ‘But they put a condition on it.’ 3. Si Uds. quieren hacer tratamiento para sus niños que tienen Chagas, ‘If you want to have treatment for your children that have Chagas,’ 4. tienen que erradicar las vinchucas como dice en esa convocatoria. ‘you have to eradicate the vinchuca beetle, as it says in that announcement.’ 5. Y es difícil. ‘And it’s hard.’ 6. Porque hay harto en la casa, ‘Because there are lots of them in the house,’ 7. porque teníamos nuestros gallineros, ‘because we had our henhouses,’ 8. porque antes fumigaban y ahora no fumigan, ‘because they used to fumigate and now they don’t,’ 9. porque en nuestra casa también no nos alcanza el dinero para poder revocar, pon, poner un, unas mallas, ‘because in our house we don’t have enough money to apply cement or stucco, pu-, put up some screens,’ 10. todo eso es dificil. ‘all this is difficult.’ 11. Entonces la única forma que habíamos visto nosotros es fumigar, ‘So the only way that we could think is to fumigate,’ 12. por lo menos en dos semanas, ‘at least in the period of two weeks,’ 13. todas las casas que pertenecen al municipio de Iscamayo. ‘all the houses that belong to the town of Saipina.’ 14. Estamos contando tanto con todas las comunidades, como con las OTBs aquí dentro del municipio. ‘We’re counting on the [rural] communities, as well as the OTBs here in the muni cipality.’ 15. Y, bien, habíamos quedado que podemos hacer. ‘And so, we decided that we can do it.’ 16. Pero necesitamos gente que lo haga. ‘But we need people to help.’

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In this transcript, boldface indicates person markers (see table 2). The speaker, Serena, carefully manages the situation at hand (Serena is the only speaker; line breaks occur at prosodic breaks). She uses pronouns and verb tenses in order to alternate between the roles of doctor, sympathetic community member, and member of a group of public authorities. It is a delicate balance; if she is too authoritative, she comes across as bossy and stuck-up; if she is too familiar, she comes across as inexperienced and unconvincing. In table 2, we summarize Serena’s use of tenses and pronouns through this short section of discourse. After beginning by including herself with the statement “This is what the government wants to do for US,” she continues by addressing her audience in the second person plural: YOU have to eradicate the vinchuca beetle if you want the government to help (lines 3, 4). She then switches back to the first person plural, including herself with her audience in a sophisticated rhetorical strategy that uses parallelism to build a sympathetic, compelling stance: Things are hard. In lines 11–15, however, she uses the [había + past participle] construction to introduce a new “WE”: Serena as part of the scientific community, as part of the group of local authorities. This WE does not include her audience. Finally, she closes with an ambiguous WE: “WE can do it, but WE need help.” This WE may or may not include her audience. The había + past participle construction occurs in lines 11 and 15. This appearance of había does not fall neatly into either Standard Spanish or Andean Spanish – it does not seem to function to establish a relationship between two points in time, nor does it present novel or surprising information. Rather, it serves to mark a shift in persons from the “we” of the community to the “we” of the professional community that is making the recommendation – a shift in Serena’s stance. Serena uses the [había + past perfect] marker as part of a strategy for shifting between different perspectives or roles. Serena, as mentioned above, is a bidialectal speaker of Standard Spanish and Andean Spanish, but not a Quechua speaker. Her audience, on the other hand, is comprised primarily of Quechua-Spanish bilinguals and speakers who are most comfortable in the local, non-prestige variety of Spanish, which has strong influence from Quechua. Serena uses the había construction to invoke a number of possible interpretations. It may constitute a polite suggestion, along the lines of “we had thought.” It may indicate a temporal remove, since the conversation with her colleagues occurred at an earlier point in time. It implies a change in person, from the present audience to the recommendation of her colleagues. However, it is certainly not an epistemic marker of the type discussed in examples 4–6, because this information is not surprising or novel; it is part of a discussion that Serena was present for. Table 2: That’s what the government wants to do for us

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English translation

Person referent

Verb tense

tienen que erradicar

you have to eradicate

2nd person plural: YOU

Present

si Uds. quieren

if you want

2nd person plural: YOU

Present

nuestra casa

our house

1st person plural: WE (inclusive)

(Possessive)

teníamos nuestros gallineros

we had our henhouses

1st person plural: WE (inclusive)

Imperfect

habíamos visto nosotros

we could think [lit. we had seen]

1st person plural: WE (exclusive)

Past perfect

estamos contando

we are counting

1st person plural: WE (exclusive)

Present

habíamos quedado

we decided

1st person plural: WE (exclusive)

Past perfect

podemos hacer

we can do it

1st person plural: WE (ambiguous)

Present

necesitamos gente

we need people

1st person plural: WE (ambiguous)

Present

Based on previous research, we can posit that había is used for concepts relating to some kind of distance or remove, whether temporal or epistemic. This example is especially striking because it suggests another use of the había construction, one which focuses on a shift in person or perspective. This usage echoes another Quechua grammatical feature, the use of separate inclusive and exclusive “we” pronouns – nuqanchis and nuqayku, respectively. This construction, used as a positioning strategy by a speaker who finds herself in a delicate situation, has the potential for interpretation at multiple levels. This usage does not, in itself, constitute a stable or enduring change in the grammar of Andean Spanish. However, it does illustrate the point that grammar is precisely this – neither stable nor enduring, but a series of riffs on the established patterns and tendencies that speakers recognize and interpret, even when scholars are slow to see the parallels between apparently dissimilar grammatical constructions.

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Conclusion

Speakers use linguistic signs to draw on a complex of meanings (Eckert 2008). Particular meanings are picked out by contextual clues and draw on interpretations of these clues that circulate through social pathways. While these interpretations are, in some sense, shared, they are not necessarily identical for all participants in the interaction; Serena may be unaware that inclusiveexclusive is an important category for Quechua speakers, even as she uses a strategy that draws on that exact distinction. However, the way she makes this distinction may be relevant to her audience, and it will be incorporated into the way that they understand and process this construction in the future, even if this association is relatively weak compared to the more canonical interpretations of the form. We hold that speakers take advantage [of perceived and constructed similarities] to “build bridges” across languages, even when those languages are typologically dissimilar or genetically distant. As research from a number of fields (cited in the Theoretical Framework section) demonstrates, speakers use their existing knowledge of language in order to form hypotheses about what their interlocutors will understand. These predictions are based on perceived or assumed similarities (Jarvis and Pavlenko 2008), which in turn emerge from language use in context. The effects of language contact are the accumulation of communicative routines or habits, which speakers play on as they engage in creative language use. Spanish and Quechua have been in contact for more than five hundred years. Even after all this time, speakers use multiple paths to express their pragmatic needs, using features in complex, multivalent ways. In summary, we hold that language doesn’t change; rather, speakers change languages (cf. Milroy 2003: 14). While language can be described as a system, there is room for play within this system; people try out changes before they spread (or fade). As these data indicate, speakers use language in ways that may not align perfectly with existing descriptions of particular grammatical forms in the eyes of linguists. Regardless of whether they lead to long-term change, these processes are interesting because they tell us something about the way that language users find potential for change – and similarity – in existing structures. Language change is not automatic; cognitive universals are conditioned by social interaction. For this reason, we argue that typology is not the defining factor of language convergence or divergence; rather, speakers’ perceptions of differences and similarities between languages are crucial to their development and change.

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Acknowledgements Portions of this research were supported by the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies, the German Science Foundation (DFG), Pf699/4-1, RomWeb, the University of Michigan, and by the United Stated National Science Foundation. The authors gratefully acknowledge the influence of conversations with Lourdes Ortega, Jeff Siegel, and Barbara Johnstone, and also thank Mario Soto, Philipp Dankel, Julie Peuvergne, and Hiltrud JunkerLemm for their contributions to the finished product.

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DeLancey, Scott 2001 The Mirative and Evidentiality. Journal of Pragmatics 33 (3): 369–382. Durston, Alan 2007 Pastoral Quechua: The history of Christian translation in colonial Peru. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press. Eckert, Penelope 2008 Variation and the indexical field. Journal of Sociolinguistics 12 (4): 453–476. Einar, Haugen 1966 Dialect, language, nation. American Anthropologist 68: 922–935. Ellis, Nick C. 2006 Selective Attention and Transfer Phenomena in L2 Acquisition: Contingency, Cue Competition, Salience, Interference, Overshadowing, Blocking, and Perceptual Learning. Applied Linguistics 27 (2): 164–194. doi: 10.1093/applin/ aml015 Escobar, Anna M. 1994 Evidential Uses in the Spanish of Quechua Speakers in Peru. Southwest Journal of Linguistics 13 (1–2): 21–43. Escobar, Anna M. 1997 Contrastive and Innovative Uses of the Present Perfect and the Preterite in Spanish in Contact with Quechua. Hispania 80 (4): 859–870. Escobar, Anna M. 2000 Contacto social y linguístico: El español en contacto con el quechua en el Perú. Lima: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú. Faller, Martina 2004 The Deictic Core of ‘Non-Experienced Past’ in Cuzco Quechua. Journal of Semantics 21 (1): 45–85. Feke, Marilyn S. 2004 Quechua to Spanish cross-linguistic influence among Cuzco Quechua-Spanish bilinguals: The case of epistemology. Doctoral Thesis, University of Pittsburgh. Godenzzi, Juan C. 1996 Educación bilingue intercultural en los Andes y la Amazonia. Revista Andina 28, 14 (2): 559–581. Jarvis, Scott and Anna Pavlenko 2008 Crosslinguistic influence in language and cognition. New York: Routledge. Johanson, Lars 2002 Structural factors in Turkic language contacts. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar: Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language Contact and Contact Languages, 60–80. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Klee, Carol A. and Alicia M. Ocampo 1995 The expression of past reference in Spanish narratives of Spanish-Quechua bilingual speakers. In: Carmen SilvaCorvalán (ed.), Spanish in Four Continents, 52–70. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. Klee, Carol A. and Rocío Caravedo 2006 Andean Spanish and the Spanish of Lima: Linguistic Variation and Change in a Contact Situation. In: Clare Mar-Molinero (ed.), Globalisation and Language in the Spanish-Speaking World, 94–113. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Mannheim, Bruce 1991 The Language of the Inka Since the European Invasion. Austin: University of Texas Press. Milroy, James 2003 On the role of the speaker in language change. In: R. Hickey (ed.), Motives for Language Change, 143–157. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. O’Neill, John 1999 Electronic Texts and Concordances of the Madison Corpus of Early Spanish Manuscripts and Printings. Madison, New York. Ortega, Lourdes 2009 Understanding second language acquisition. London: Hodder Arnold.

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Palacios, Azucena 2001 El español y las lenguas amerindias. Bilinguismo y contacto de lenguas. In: Tedosio Fernández, Azucena Palacios and Enrique Pato (eds.), El indigenismo americano I, 71–98. Madrid: Universidad Autonoma de Madrid. Palacios, Azucena 2007 ¿Son compatibles los cambios inducidos por contacto y las tendencias internas al sistema? In: Martina Schrader-Kniffki and Laura Morgenthaler García (eds.), Lenguas en interacción: Entre historia, contacto y política. Ensayos en homenaje a Klaus Zimmermann, 259–279. Frankfurt: Vervuert. Pfänder, Stefan, in collaboration with Juan Ennis, Mario Soto and España Villegas 2009, ²2010 Gramática mestiza: Presencia del quechua en el castellano. La Paz: Academia Boliviana de la Lengua/Editorial Signo. Pfänder, Stefan and Mario Soto Rodríguez 2002 El verbo ‘hacer’ en el castellano boliviano. Lexilexe – Revista del Instituto Boliviano de Lexicografía III (3): 60–67. Pierrehumbert, Janet B. 2001 Stochastic Phonology. GLOT 5: 157–169. Sanchez, Liliana 2004 Functional Convergence in the Tense, Evidentiality and Aspectual Systems of Quechua Spanish Bilinguals. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 7 (2): 147–162. Thomason, Sarah G. and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language contact, creolization, and genetic linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001 Language Contact: An Introduction. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

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Elena Skribnik (Munich)

South Siberian Turkic languages in linguistic contact Altay-kizˇi nominalizer constructions as a test case

In this paper a syntactic subsystem in the South Siberian Turkic language Altay-kizˇi will be described and analyzed from the point of view of contact influences: supposed Uralic and Yeniseic substrates, earlier Mongolic and recent Russian adstrates. Nominalizer constructions are a good test case here because several strategies of their formation exist that can be associated with language families. The aim is to check whether contact outcomes are affected by genealogical factors or typological congruence between Altay-kizˇi and its contact languages. In the following I will provide some background information about the South Siberian Turkic languages and what is known about their contact history, followed by general characteristics of Altay-kizˇi (section 1); in section 2 I give an overview of strategies for ad-hoc nominalizations in contacting languages. In section 3 the corpus is presented; section 4 illustrates the results of data analysis, in particular the contact-induced development of nominalizer constructions with neme ‘thing’ as well as the recent Russian influence; section 5 sums up the results.1

1.

Background information

1.1. South Siberian Turkic languages and their contacts The Turkic languages of southern Siberia are classified into four large groups, defined geographically (e.g. Schönig 1998, 2001): Altay, Sayan, Yenisey and Chulym. Altay Turks speak Altay (with the six varieties Altay-kizˇi, Teleut, Telengit, Qumandy, Tuba, and Cˇalkandu, also often considered different languages), Yenisey languages are Khakas (with the Qacˇa and Saa varieties) and Shor (Mrass, Kondoma and the intermediary variety defined as the Shor dialect of Khakas). Sayan Turks speak Tuvan (including TodzˇaTuvan and Soyot idioms) and Tofa(lar); other genetically and geographically 1

My warmest thanks go to Ayana Ozonova, Claus Schönig and Rogier Blokland for constructive discussion, valuable comments and suggestions.

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close languages spoken in the steppe and forest steppe to the north of the Altay and Sayan mountains are Chulym Turkic and Siberian Tatar dialects (Western Tatars, Baraba Tatars, Tomsk Tatars). The Turkic languages of the Altay-Sayan upland have a complicated contact history (Schönig 1993, 1997). The Turkicization of this region probably started in the 2nd half of the first millennium AD and somewhat earlier on the southern slopes. The substrate languages are Uralic (Ob-Ugric and Samoyed) and Yeniseic. There are also strong Mongolic influences, especially in Tuvan, and multiple interactions with other Turkic idioms. The most recent intensive contact is with Russian. Of these contact languages, Russian (Indo-European) and Yeniseic are neither genetically related nor typologically close, Uralic demonstrates typological proximity, and Mongolic is not only typologically close, but also considered either a different branch of the same Altaic family, or one of the participants of the Altaic Sprachbund (see the bibliography on the Altaic controversy in Schönig 2004: 403); the latter was recently reinterpreted as “the Eurasian steppe spread zone” (Nichols 2011). 1.2. Altay/Altay-kizˇi Altay is a titular language of the Altay Republic with the capital Gorno-Altaisk. This administrative unit was established in 1922 as the Oyrat Autonomous District of the USSR, renamed the Oyrot Autonomous District in 1932, and the Gorno-Altay Autonomous District in 1948. It was then elevated in 1990 to an Autonomous Socialist Republic and to a Republic of the Russian Federation in 1991, first as the Gorno-Altay Republic; since 1993 it has been known as the Altay Republic. The people and the language were called Oyrat till 1948, also previously known as Altay Tatars. The six Altay varieties mentioned above are classified into two groups: Northern Altay (Qumandy, Tuba, and Cˇalkandu) and Southern Altay (Altaykizˇi, Teleut, Telengit). The Northern group is closer to Khakas and Shor, and the Southern group shows features typical for the Kirghiz-Kipchak branch. There are also cultural and anthropological differences between these two groups: “The Southern Altay Turks are of Central Asian Mongolid type and show cultural relations to Kazakh and Kirghiz Turks and to the Western Mongol Oyrat. […] The Northern Altay Turks exhibit Caucasid admixtures. Their traditional culture shows common traces with the cultures of ObUgric, Samoyedic and Yeniseyic peoples” (Schönig 2001: 64). Writing traditions were external, introduced by politically dominant groups. In the 17–18th centuries the Southern Altay Turks were part of the

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Dzungarian Khanate (the Western Mongolian Oyrats, the name was transferred to the Altay Turks under their rule); Telengits reportedly also used the Oyrat “Clear Script” (Todo Bi‰ig) to write their native language (Istorija Respubliki Altaj 2002). After the Russian colonization of Siberia, linguistic material on Altay was collected in Academic expeditions (e.g. by F.W. Radloff). In 1828 Russian Orthodox missionaries introduced writing based on the Teleut variety, Cyrillic with some additional characters (publications include Bible translations, but also the excellent grammar by Ilminskij et al. 1869 and the dictionary by Verbickij 1884). In 1929 the alphabet was changed to Latin, the next reform in 1937 brought back the Cyrillic alphabet and changed the Teleut base of the written variety: the modern Altay literary language incorporates some features of other varieties, but is basically Altay-kizˇi.2 In this literary language quite an extensive and interesting literature exists, largely written in 1970–80s; a national newspaper Altaidiŋ ‰olmonï [‘The star of Altay’] appears three times a week; there are also district newspapers, a magazine for children, theatre plays and radio programs in Altay. There are primary schools with education in the native tongue, but education is conducted mostly in Russian, with Altay taught as a subject. Communication in the official sphere is conducted only in Russian, but in family communication too Altay is losing its status. The young and middle-aged generations are fully bilingual. There is a strong influence of Russian in the lexical sphere and frequent code-switching; today all Altay idioms are classified as endangered. Table 1: Sociolinguistic data on Altay from the census of 2002 (http://www.perepis2002.ru, vol. 13) Ethnic group

Total population

Native speakers of Altay

Russian also spoken

Altay-kizˇi

67 239

55 473

62 494

Qumandy

2888

931

2880

Telengit

2368

2314

1999

Teleut

2534

1717

2530

Tuba Cˇalkandu

1533

408

1530

830

466

817

2

As all my informants are speakers of Altay-kizˇi, I can say that actually all my data, both textual and experimental, is Altay-kizˇi; in the following I will use “Altay” only referring to all six varieties as a whole.

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Some remarks on typology: like all Turkic languages, Altay is an agglutinative SOV language; the inflection is postfixal on both nouns and verbs, adpositions are postpositions, satellites precede their heads and dependent clauses precede main clauses. Altay and other Turkic as well as Mongolic languages employ the non-finite clause linking (with the exception of constructions based on direct speech). The following features of non-finite constructions are characteristic (cf. Cˇeremisina et al. 1986): • the use of the same non-finite forms, traditionally called participles, in attributive clauses and nominalizations; • the use of possessive affixes as dependent personal markers and the possibility for the dependent clause subject to be in the genitive case (often with pragmatically governed differential subject marking); • in attributive clauses and participant nominalizations gapping of the relativized element is used; • therefore the opposition of “passive” vs. “active” participles is rare; normally the same participles are used with head nouns – relativized subjects and head nouns – relativized objects; • there is no grammatical agreement of attributes.

2.

Ad-hoc nominalizations and nominalization strategies in the languages involved

There is a subsystem in the syntax of these languages that can be regarded as a test case for “family effects” in syntactic transfer: the syntax of ad-hoc participant nominalizations, e.g. an Altay-kizˇi example of such a construction with a non-finite verbal form (past participle): ‰ibi (1) mös dep kör-gön-iŋ cedar quot see-ptcp.pst-poss.2sg fir ‘What you believed to be a cedar (literally yours seen as a cedar) is a fir tree’. Heyvaert (2003: 120–123) discusses the term and the distinctions between lexicalized and ad-hoc nominalizations with the agentive suffix -er in English (as in He is a saver of many lives): the term “captures the fact that these nominals are not sufficiently entrenched to be lexicalized and therefore have to be derived ‘on the spot’, on the basis of the constructional schema of -er derivation” (2003: 120). Ad-hoc participant nominalization can be seen as a universal communicative task of establishing a reference, deictic or anaphoric, syntactically, without using standard lexical or pronominal means; classic extralin-

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guistic motivations for such tasks are e.g. restrictions on the use of a proper term such as taboo/political correctness, lack of a fitting term or simple lapse of memory. For this task many different nominalization strategies can be used. In the contacting languages mentioned above several such strategies are found: a) Constructions with non-finite verbal forms (traditionally called “participles”, but functioning both as adjectivizers and nominalizers), analyzed also as “headless relative clauses”, illustrated above in 1; b) auxiliary nominalizers ‘man/person’, ‘thing’, ‘place’, and ‘event/business’ grammaticalized from abstract nouns in participial relative clauses; compare Altay-kizˇi (2): (2)

Bil-er neme-ni qïsqan-baj ajd-atan-ï d’aqsï know-ptcp nr:thing-acc hide-cvb.neg tell-ptcp-poss.3sg good ‘It is good that he tells what he knows, concealing nothing’.

c) For Old Turkic Erdal describes a strategy he calls “correlative relativization” (2004: 499–504) based on a construction with a conditional converb in -sAr: “Uygur (like many other Turkic languages) has a two-clause sentence pattern in which the subordinate clause contains or consists of an interrogative-indefinite pronoun and a verb form in -sAr, to which there is explicit (demonstrative) or implicit resumptive reference in the main clause”. Here is a Qarakhanid example (2004: 500, glossing is mine): (3)

kärgä-yür tavar kim-nig ükli-sä bäg-lik aŋar wealth who-gen grow-cvb bäg-adj that:dat fit-aor ‘Whoever acquires much wealth, being a bäg befits him’ or ‘If anybody acquires much wealth, it befits him to become a bäg’.

d) Nominalizing suffixes used with both finite and non-finite forms are described for Ket (Yeniseic): -s, “by far the most productive nominalizing suffix” after Vajda (2004: 15), is used after finite verbs and “infinitives” (Nefedov 2006): (4a) d-il-aq-sj 3m-pst-come-nr ‘the one who came’; (4b) isqo-s kill:fish-nr

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‘fisherman (= the one who kills fish)’. e) Different combinations of pronouns, mostly question and demonstrative, with finite verbal forms are commonly used for ad-hoc nominalizations in Russian: (5) Kto is‰-et, tot vsegda najd-ët who search-prs.3sg that always find-fut.3sg ‘The one who searches will always find (what he searches)’. Of these strategies, (a) is described as originally Turkic: “Most Old Turkic clauses serving as nominals in participant tasks are headless relative clauses” (Erdal 2004: 448); it is widely used also in Mongolic languages. (b) is characteristic for both Uralic (Ob-Ugric and Southern Samoyedic) and Mongolic languages; in Altay-Sayan Turkic it is most probably contact-induced (Skribnik 2009). Auxiliary nominalizers are a characteristic feature of this area: Turkic languages spoken elsewhere do not use them. Common South Siberian Turkic participant nominalizers are kizˇi ‘man, person’ (in different phonetic variations), ‰er ‘place’ and ‘things’ of pronominal origin: Altay-kizˇi neme ‘thing’ < neme ‘what/something’, Tuvan ‰üve ‘thing’ < ‰üü ‘what/something’, Khakas nime ‘thing’ < nime ‘what/something’; in this way additional semantic characteristics of the referent are supplied (animate participant – inanimate participant – location). Event nominalizations are predominantly non-finite constructions, but there are cases when the word kerek ‘necessity; thing-to-do, business’ can be used as a reference element to events and as a nominalizer, which is also an areal feature (all Turkic languages, including Siberian, use kerek – in different phonetic variants – as a modal word expressing necessity). Strategies (a), (b) and (c) are typologically compatible, being based on a non-finite principle of clause combining. Strategies (d) and (e) are typologically very different: they both employ finite predication in embedded clauses, though with totally different types of connectors. The nominalization of finite forms by an additional suffix (d), attested for Yeniseic languages, theoretically could be expected as a substratal transfer feature; but it is totally absent in Altay-Sayan Turkic, so it evidently did not manage to reach them. As for the typical Indo-European strategy (e), it has emerged recently in many Siberian languages under Russian influence as a part of the general principle of combining finite clauses with the help of analytic connectors (relative pronouns and conjunctions of different types). My Altay-kizˇi data show predominantly strategies (a) and (b); (c) is un-

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known and is judged by informants as very strange (which probably shows that its Turkic superstrate was not of the Old Uyghur type); (d) is impossible. Examples of (e) are absent in written texts, including newspaper articles, but are used sporadically by young bilingual speakers. I will discuss the data in the next section.

3.

The Altay-kizˇi corpus and its analysis

For this study, a corpus of modern literary texts was compiled; I am extremely grateful to Dr. Ayana Ozonova (Novosibirsk) for her help with it. The corpus includes all issues of the newspaper Altaidiŋ ‰olmonï in May and June 2011 (12 issues, 8 pages per issue, abbreviated as ACˇ) and three novels: 1) Palkin, E. Alan. Gorno-Altaisk, 2006. 384 p. (abbreviated as A); 2) Maskina, J. D’ürümniŋ d’uruktarï. Gorno-Altaisk, 2002. 183 p. (abbreviated as DD); 3) Ukacˇin, B. Tuular tuular la bojï artar. Gorno-Altaisk, 1985. 390 p. (abbreviated as TT). The corpus was analyzed in order to study the usage of these three strategies: one original with non-finite verbal forms (a), one old contact-induced/typologically compatible with auxiliary nominalizers (b), and one new contact-induced/typologically incompatible with pronominal connectors (c). In this paper I will concentrate on the nominalizer neme ‘thing’ as the most functionally differentiated, and accordingly on other types of ad-hoc nominalizations referring to inanimate participants. In the corpus there are ca. 400 participial nominalizations (about 60 participant nominalizations, about 30 referring to inanimate participants) and ca. 40 constructions with neme; there are no examples of pronominal connectors. Additionally a questionnaire was compiled containing 25 different expressions in Russian for translation by bilingual speakers of Altay-kizˇi. The questionnaire was filled out by six native speakers (three persons aged between 34 and 40, three persons between 20 and 22), all fully bilingual from early childhood, educated in Russian, using Russian in their professional life and Altay-kizˇi in their family life. In the following interviews questions were put concerning the possibility of constructions other than those used spontaneously by the informant or found in the corpus, and about the differences between them in the informant’s perception. For inanimate participants the questionnaire data shows a roughly equal number of participial nominalizations and neme-nominalizations; additionally two of the three younger informants used pronominal connectors, too.

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Results

In this section I will first demonstrate participial nominalizations (both event and participant). After that I will concentrate on the auxiliary nominalizer neme ‘thing’ and its functions: the primary (reference to inanimate participants) and the extended one (pejorative about persons/events) in 4.2, also comparing it with participial nominalizations. The secondary function as an assertive element will be discussed from the contact perspective in 4.3. Bi-finite constructions with pronominal connectors (Russian influence) are treated in 4.4. 4.1. Participial nominalizations As already shown, participial nominalizations are dependent clauses with predicates in the form of one of five Altay-kizˇi participles, predominantly the past participle in -GAn for concrete events in the past and the future participle in -(A)r for general, potential and future events. Possessive affixes (used for subject agreement or as subject indicators by themselves) and necessary case affixes are attached after the participle affix (v-ptcp-poss-case). As the corpus data show, the majority of participial nominalizations are event nominalizations (ca. 360 out of 400): ait-qan-ï baza d’oldu (6) Olor-dïŋ köp-köp d’ïlu sös-tör they-gen many warm word-pl say-ptcp-poss.3sg also rightful ‘It’s also rightful that they said many warm words’ (ACˇ 2011-82) (7) Altail-ap bi‰i-ir-in-de ondo kü‰ ne bar? use:Altay-cvb write-ptcp-poss.3sg-loc there difficult ptcl cop ‘What is so difficult in writing in Altay language?’ (ACˇ 2011-78). Participial nominalizations referring to (inanimate) participants differ from event nominalizations in that they have a gap in the structure of the participial clause where the referent’s name should be placed – normally as a subject or a direct object; i.e. the same strategy is employed as in the case of participant relativization, but without a head noun naming the referent (hence “headless relative clauses” interpretation). They are often constructed with verbs of perception and communication (‘what I saw/said’), though actually there are no semantic limitations here (any types of verbs dealing with inanimate objects are possible):

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D’e d’oloi kör-gön-im süün‰-im-di but on.the.way see-ptcp-poss.1sg joy-poss.1sg-acc ö‰ur-ip ij-di extinguish-cvb aux-pst:3sg ‘But what I saw on my way extinguished my joy’ (ACˇ 2011-82);

(9)

kizˇi Ajt-qan-ïm-dï oŋdo-or say-ptcp-poss.1sg-acc understand-ptcp nr:person bol-or oŋdo-or understand-ptcp aux-fut ‘Who is able to understand, will understand what I said’ (ACˇ 2011-91)

In this last example there are two ad-hoc participant nominalizations: a participial one as an object and additionally a construction with a nominalizer kizˇi ‘person’ as a subject. Both participial predicates in (8) and (9) are transitive verbs, but there is no direct object, as in the event nominalization (6), so the whole clause is understood as a reference to this gapped referent. 4.2. Nominalizations with neme ‘thing’ Formally auxiliary nominalizers are generic head nouns with participial attributive clauses, so the nominalizations inherit their structure and morphology. The same gapping strategy is used, but possessive and case affixes land on the nominalizer (v-ptcp nr-poss-case). Ad-hoc nominalizations with neme ‘thing’ and participial nominalizations for inanimate participants have an almost similar frequency, so the question arises as to what the (semantic) differences between them are. All corpus examples were checked with informants, and it turned out that the substitution of a neme-construction by a participial one was possible in the case of straightforward ad-hoc nominalizations, i.e. when such constructions were used as subjects and objects in the matrix clause (10a, b): (10a) Ondo bi‰-ip sal-gan neme-niŋ aajïna kem ‰ïg-ar? there write-cvb aux-ptcp nr-gen postp who go:out-fut ‘Who will understand what he wrote there?’ (ACˇ 2011-91) aajïna kem ‰ïg-ar? (10b) Ondo bi‰-ip sal-gan-nïŋ there write-cvb aux-ptcp-gen postp who go:out-fut ‘Who will understand (lit. follow after) what he wrote there?’

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Neme-constructions cannot be replaced by participial nominalizations when they are used as predicate nominals and acquire additional assertive effects: (11)

™algï da qur‰ïd-ar neme d’ok scythe ptcl sharpen-ptcp nr neg ‘There is nothing (here) even to sharpen the scythe with’ (A: 50)

(12)

Ol onˇco-zï aˇs-qa tolij-tan neme that all-poss.3sg grain-dat exchange-ptcp.mod nr ‘All that is what shall be exchanged for grain’ (A: 159)

Nominalizations with neme ‘thing’ can also refer to persons, but in this case with pejorative connotation: (13)

d’er-ge otur-baj, d’aantajïn teni-gen neme-de D’aŋïs Only:one place-dat sit-cvb.neg always wander-ptcp nr-loc d’aksï la d’ok good ptcl neg ‘There is nothing good in those who are always roaming, never staying in one place’ (A: 20)

Sometimes such pejorative connotation is present also in references to inanimate referents: compare the original example and its variant with a participial nominalization; the informants characterize the first expression as pejorative and the second as neutral: ber-gen neme-zi bu (14a) Me, Tantïbar-dïŋ bi‰-ip take T.-gen write-cvb aux-ptcp nr-poss.3sg this ‘Take it, this is what Tantybar wrote’ (A: 82); ber-gen-i bu (14b) Me, Tantïbar-dïŋ bi‰-ip take T.-gen write-cvb aux-ptcp-poss.3sg this ‘Take it, this is what Tantybar wrote’. The further extension of scope allows nominalizations with neme ‘thing’ to refer to events instead of their participants:

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(15a) Mïnda bol-up tur-gan neme-ni kirlü d’abarlas Here become-cvb aux-ptcp nr-acc dirty lie dep ajd-arga d’ara-ar quot say-inf is:possible-fut ‘What happened here can be called a dirty lie’ (ACˇ 2011-95). In this example the neme-nominalization can be substituted by the participial one: (15b) Mïnda bol-up tur-gan-dï kirlü d’abarlas dep ajd-arga Here become-cvb aux-ptcp-acc dirty lie quot say-inf d’ara-ar is:possible-fut ‘What happened here can be called a dirty lie’. Still, it is not always possible; cf. the following example with the modal participle in -AtAn: (16)

Bol-oton neme bol-bo-gon‰o bol-bos be-ptcp.mod nr be-neg-cvb be-fut.neg ‘What must happen, will happen’ (A: 130).

The other way around, in the examples (6) and (7) with participial event nominalizations the variant with neme was considered ungrammatical. For cases when both types of nominalization were possible, the only thing the informants agreed upon, albeit reluctantly, was the more negative connotation of sentences with neme and the neutrality of participial constructions. At this stage of analysis I cannot yet formulate the differences, just state that they exist and that this is a matter for future research. 4.3. Nominalizer neme ‘thing’ in contact perspective The next question is whether the source of this construction is a Uralic substrate or Mongolic adstrate. In Ob-Ugric and Southern Samoyedic languages nominalizer constructions are used mostly for onomasiological purposes: many ad-hoc “constructional names” become entrenched and lexicalized as nouns, so that nominalizers themselves develop into derivational affixes: Mansi (Ob-Ugric) te¯nut ‘food’ < te¯-ne ut ‘thing to eat’, Selkup (Samoyed) apsodimï ‘food’ < ap-sodi

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mï ‘idem’. Similar tendencies are demonstrated by South Siberian Turkic languages with a Uralic substrate, especially Tofa: tïn-ar ‰üme ‘air’ < ‘thing to breathe’, ojna-ar ‰üme ‘toy’ < ‘thing to play’ (Skribnik 2009: 574–576). Compare also: “The fact that the Siberian Turkic peoples refer to themselves ˇ I (‘people’) may well derive from a Samojed model. In repeatedly as -KIZ Samojed compound tribal names whose second element is an appellative with the meaning ‘man, inhabitant’ are common, viz., ha¯saba, d’e¯r, gum, kuza etc. < …> The Jenisejans also employ this mode of designation … which can in no case be regarded as originally Turkic” (Menges 1956: 171). In Altay-kizˇi such lexicalization also occurs, but is not especially pronounced; there are relatively few examples mostly from the taboo sphere, like neme bil-er kizˇi ‘shaman’ (literally ‘a person who knows things’), kara neme ‘evil spirit; devil’ vs. ak neme ‘benevolent spirit’ (literally ‘black thing’ and ‘white thing’). Mongolic languages show different uses of their nominalizer constructions: as highlighting devices for purposes of information structuring. For that purpose they are used as predicate nominals after the scheme ‘I did it’ > ‘I am the person who did it’, compare “cleft-to-highlighting” (Harris and Campbell 1995: 151–168); nominalizers in such contexts tend to further grammaticalization as predicative (assertive or evidential) particles: Buryat (Mongolic) yüm (assertive particle) < yüüme(n) ‘thing, something’ < yüü(n) ‘what’ (cf. Ramstedt 1952: 80–81). For neme in Altay-kizˇi such usage is also attested, so that here the process of further grammaticalization to an assertive particle under Mongolic influence can be stated: ujuqta-p d’at-qan neme-zi ne (17) Mïnïŋ This:gen sleep-cvb aux-ptcp nr/ptcl-poss.3sg ptcl ‘And this one is still sleeping!’ (A: 117); mïnda otur-gan neme-ŋ ne? (18) Alan, seniŋ A. you:gen here sit-ptcp nr/ptcl-poss.2sg ptcl ‘Alan, why do you sit here?’ (A: 118); (19) Ta qan‰azïn d’öpsin-eten neme? ptcl how much agree-ptcp.mod nr/ptcl ‘How long will (he) concede?’ (A: 197)

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d’aŋïs la d’ïlïytu-lar-daŋ (20) Meniŋ d’ürüm-im I:gen life-poss.1sg only ptcl loss-pl-abl tur-gan neme-dij stand-ptcp nr/ptcl-comp ‘It surely seems that my life consists of nothing but losses’. Similar development is demonstrated for other South Siberian Turkic languages in contact with Mongolic, especially Tuvan (Mongusˇ 1983: 15, glossing mine): (21) ™oq, kizˇi-daa al-baan kizˇi ‰üve no person-ptcl take-neg:ptcp nr:person ptcl ‘No, he did not even marry’. Here ‰üve (< ‘thing’) accompanies the nominalizer kizˇi ‘person’, definitely serving already as an assertive particle. It is plausible to assume that this is a case of areally shared grammaticalization paths (cf. grammaticalization area in Heine and Kuteva 2005: 182ff), with language contact as a relevant factor. 4.4. Russian influence As already mentioned, there are no examples with pronominal connectors between finite clauses in the written corpus, but they can be heard sporadically from younger speakers. In order to find out whether the Russian patterns are transferred into this subsystem, a questionnaire with nominalization expressions was compiled in Russian for translation by bilingual speakers of Altay-kizˇi. It was expected that the pressure of the Russian original would cause the informants to reproduce the patterns, so that the number of such constructions would be relatively high. However, out of six informants only the two youngest bilingual speakers (students, 20 and 22 years old) used the Russian bi-finite pattern with a combination of question and demonstrative pronouns (the stimulus was a line from a well-known Russian song, see 5): (22)

?Kem

bedir-er, ol tab-ar who search-fut that find-fut ‘Who searches, will find (it)’.

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Such sentences were criticized and corrected by the older speakers; their own variants were: (23a) Bedre-gen-i tab-ïp al-ar search-ptcp-poss.3sg find-cvb aux-fut ‘Who searches, will find (it)’. (23b) Bedre-gen kizˇi tab-ïp al-ar search-ptcp nr:person find-cvb aux-fut ‘Who searches, will find (it)’. This leads to the conclusion that the Russian pattern, typologically very different, has not yet been transferred into the syntactic system of Altay; it is still ungrammatical for older speakers, though already partly acceptable for the younger generation.

5.

Summary

In the syntactic subsystem of ad-hoc participant nominalizations, South Siberian Turkic languages and Altay-kizˇi as a member thereof predominantly use two strategies: non-finite, participial constructions and constructions with the auxiliary nominalizers ‘person’, ‘thing’ and ‘place’. The first strategy can be seen as an original Turkic one; the second strategy is areal (absent in Turkic languages elsewhere). Drawing conclusions from the corpus data and consultations with informants, I can state that participial nominalizations dominate as event nominalizations, but are freely used also as ad-hoc participant nominalizations both for animate and inanimate referents. Constructions with neme are employed primarily as ad-hoc nominalizations for inanimate participants, but expand their scope to animate participants and events, though with additional negative connotations. So the difference between them lies in broad neutral vs. more narrow and specific usage, which supports the hypothesis of contact-induced origin of the neme-construction. Moreover, it can be considered doubly contact-induced: initially through substratal Uralic influence and later reinforced by adstratal Mongolic influence (which also gave a new pragmatic turn to their usage). Firstly, similar lexicalization tendencies based on nominalizer constructions are attested in Uralic and South Siberian Turkic languages (Skribnik 2009), and secondly, similar grammaticalization paths are attested in Northern Mongolic and South Siberian Turkic languages:

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pronoun ‘what/something’ > nominalizer ‘thing’ > assertive particle This development is also an areal feature (narrower in comparison with the broader nominalizer area) and can be confidently explained by language contact. Nominalizer constructions are not immediately recognizable as being due to contact transfer, because of the typological proximity of languages in contact (Uralic and Mongolic): their grammatical systems in the sphere of complex constructions are remarkably similar. It can be assumed that this similarity facilitated the contact transfer; but note that the equally typologically compatible strategy (c), employing conditional converbs, is not attested. As for typologically different constructions, the Yeniseic one is definitely absent in South Siberian Turkic languages (if it ever was eligible for transfer), and the Russian pattern is still very peripheral in Altay-kizˇi today, though it is already used by the younger generation, the second fully bilingual one. Is it safe to assume that the “family effects” function(ed) here as negative selection filters? Taking into consideration historical and sociolinguistic factors at work, the length of contacts and the social prestige of the source language, my prognosis is that the next (diminishing) generation of Altay-kizˇi speakers will accept the pronominal nominalizations, too: “… given enough time and intensity of contact, virtually anything can (ultimately) be borrowed” (Harris and Campbell 1995: 149). So I cannot but agree that “the social factors will be the primary determinants of the linguistic outcome” (Thomason 2008: 42).

Abbreviations abl acc aor aux comp cop cvb dat fut gen loc m mod neg nr

ablative accusative aorist auxiliary comparative copula converb dative future genitive locative masculine modal negation nominalizer

South Siberian Turkic languages in linguistic contact pst pl poss postp prs ptcp ptcl quot sg

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past plural possessive postposition present participle particle quotation marker singular

References Cˇeremisina, M. et al. 1986 Strukturnye tipy sinteti‰eskix polipredikativnyx konstrukcij v jazykax raznyx sistem [Structural types of complex constructions with synthetic connectors in different linguistic systems]. Novosibirsk: Nauka. Dyrenkova, Nadezˇda P. 1940 Grammatika ojrotskogo jazyka [A grammar of Oirot (Altay)]. Moscow, Leningrad: Izdatel’stvo Akademii nauk SSSR. Erdal, Marcel 2004 A grammar of Old Turkic. (Handbook of Oriental Studies, 3.) Leiden, Boston: Brill. Golden, Peter B. 1992 An introduction to the history of the Turkic peoples: ethnogenesis and state-formation in medieval and early modern Eurasia and the Middle East. (Turcologica 9.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Harris, Alice C. and Lyle Campbell 1995 Historical Syntax in Cross-Linguistic Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva 2005 Language Contact and Grammatical Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heyvaert, Liesbet 2003 A Cognitive-Functional Approach to Nominalization in English. Berlin: de Gruyter. Ilminskij, N.I. et al. 1869 Grammatika altajskogo jazyka (sostavlena ‰lenami Altajskoj missii) [A grammar of Altay, compiled by members of the Altay mission.] Kazan. Istorija Respubliki Altaj [The history of the Altay Republic]. Volume 1. Gorno-Altaisk. 2002. Menges, Karl H. 1956 The South-Siberian Turkic languages. II. Notes on the Samoyed substratum. Central Asiatic Journal 2: 161–175. Mongusˇ, Dorug-ool A. 1983 O sluzˇebnyx funkcijax slov kizˇi, ulus i ‰üve v tuvinskom jazyke [Grammatical functions of words kizˇi, ulus and ‰üve in Tuvan]. In: Tjurkskie jazyki Sibiri, 12–35. Novosibirsk. Nefedov, Andrej 2006 Relative Clauses in Ket. Paper read at the conference “Syntax of the World’s Languages” (SWL2), Lancaster University, September 14–17, 2006. Nichols, Johanna 2011 Forerunners to globalization: the Eurasian steppe and its periphery. In: Cornelius Hasselblatt, Peter Houtzagers and Remco van Pareren (eds.), Language Contact in Times of Globalization, 177–196. (Studies in Slavic and General Linguistics 38.) Amsterdam, New York: Rodopi. Ramstedt, Gustaf J. 1952 Einführung in die altaische Sprachwissenschaft. II. Formenlehre. (Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne 104.) Helsinki.

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Schönig, Claus 1993 Türkische Sprachkontakte in Ostsibirien. In: Jens-Peter Laut (ed.), Sprach- und Kulturkontakte der türkischen Völker, 155–163. (Veröffentlichungen der Societas Uralo-Altaica 37.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Schönig, Claus 1997 Wie entstand das Südsibirische Türkisch? In: Barbara KellnerHeinkele and Peter Zieme (eds.), Studia Ottomanica. Festgabe für György Hazai, 147–163. (Veröffentlichungen der Societas Uralo-Altaica 47.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Schönig, Claus 1998 South Siberian Turkic. In: Lars Johanson and Éva Ágnes Csató (eds.), The Turkic languages, 403–416. London: Routledge. Schönig, Claus 2001 Some basic remarks on South Siberian Turkic and its position within Northeast Turkic and the Turkic language family. Dilbilim Aras¸tırmaları: 63–95. Schönig, Claus 2003 Turko-Mongolic relations. In: Juha Janhunen (ed.), The Mongolic languages, 403–419. (Routledge language family series). London, New York: Routledge. Skribnik, Elena 2009 Die Nominalisatoren ‘Mensch’ und ‘Ding’ in den uralischen und türkischen Sprachen Südsibiriens: I, Lexikon und Wortbildung. FinnischUgrische Mitteilungen 32/33: 567–586. Thomason, Sarah 2001 Language contact: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Thomason, Sarah 2008 Social and linguistic factors as predictors of contact-induced change. Journal of language contact – THEMA 2. www.jlc-journal.org Vajda, Edward J. 2004 Ket. (Languages of the World/Materials 204.) München: Lincom Europa. Verbickij, Vasilij I. 1884 Slovar’ altajskogo i aladagskogo nare‰ij tjurkskogo jazyka [A dictionary of Altay and Aladag idioms of the Turkic language]. Kazan’.

French meets Arabic in Cairo: discourse markers as gestures

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French meets Arabic in Cairo: discourse markers as gestures

This contribution1 models the perception of similarity on the basis of a recent corpus of French in contact with Arabic in Egypt, (Dermarkar and Pfänder 2010) paying special attention to the discourse marker ya3ni2 from a micro-ecological perspective. This phenomenon is particularly interesting, given that the languages involved are typologically very different; Arabic belonging to the Semitic group, French to the Indo-European (see section 1). We shall test and discuss Yaron Matras’ hypothesis (2000, 2009, 2011) of the gesture-like nature of discourse markers in language contact (section 2), and see in which respect his theory applies for our French-Arabic data. We will show that in the case of the gesture-like discourse marker ya3ni, neither typology nor language family are relevant for this kind of code copying (section 3).

1.

Egypt, a multilingual landscape

The Atlas mondial de la francophonie lists Egypt as a member of the Frenchspeaking world.3 Although it shows Egypt’s entire surface area as Frenchspeaking, it would be entirely misguided to consider Egypt as part of Dominique Wolton’s (2006) “third category” Francosphere (along with countries such as Bulgaria), where identification as a French-speaking country is a desirable political symbol without any real linguistic basis. The tendency to

1

2

3

The research for this paper was made possible through the support from the German Science Foundation (DFG), Pf699/4-1, RomWeb. I would also like to thank Stefan Pfänder for fruitful discussions and valuable comments to the analyses of the corpus material. The transcription used here follows the conventions established in the Arabic SMS and chat alphabet which replaces sounds that are not represented in the Latin character set by numerals bearing a certain formal resemblance to the respective Arabic letters. Thus, the numeral 3 represents the pharyngal fricative sound called 'ayn in Arabic. Poissonnier and Sournia 2006.

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lump Egypt together with these countries, however, may explain the lack of linguistic research in this area.4 A closer look at the linguistic situation in Egypt reveals that the French variety spoken there can be accurately classified as a secondary language (in Wolton’s terminology), as is the case, for example, in Bucharest, where French is held in high esteem due to a historically founded cultural affinity. In accordance with Jean-Jacques Luthi (2005), we can assume that today, French is only spoken in Cairo and Alexandria. In our field work conducted in Cairo in 2007–2008,5 Stefan Pfänder and myself documented a linguistic community in which even children are as proficient in French as they are in Arabic. 1.1. Historical foundations of the French language presence in Egypt Having outlined the historical conditions in previous publications,6 I will confine myself to giving a fast-motion summary of the relevant periods since the 19th century. Though Napoleon Bonaparte’s expedition around the turn of the 18th/19th century ended with a military defeat in 1801, it had a considerable aftermath at the cultural level. The Ottoman viceroys, who reigned from 1805 onwards, maintained intense relationships with France. Wishing to modernize the Egyptian state, they entrusted French specialists with the reform of the educational system. Even after the country’s administration passed to the British in 1882, French remained the preferred language as the language of diplomacy, administration and all cultural domains. It wasn’t until the middle of the 20th century that English began to rival French, even as Arabic took on an ever-more-important role in the context of independence movements. This accounts for the fact that a large part of Cairo’s (literate) population has at least some knowledge of English (with varying degrees of proficiency) in addition to their first language, Arabic. The number of French speakers is 4

5

6

Spoken French constitutes a terra incognita in Egypt’s linguistic landscape, even in the linguistic literature. To date, research on the use of French in the Arab world has focused largely on the Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) and occasionally on Lebanon. Studies on the French of Egypt, such as Marc Kober’s 1999 collection of essays and the work of Zahida Jabbour 2007, focus on literary production. Jean-Jacques Luthi 1981, 2000, 2005 works from a historical point of view, but also takes aspects of French-speaking Egypt into consideration. Dermarkar and Pfänder 2010, the corpus collected is partly accessible in the data base ciel-f.org/vitrine. For discussion of the material see Dermarkar, Gadet, Ludwig and Pfänder to appear 2014. Dermarkar, Gadet, Ludwig and Pfänder 2008; Dermarkar, Pfänder, Pusch and Skrovec 2010.

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decidedly smaller. Members of this group also speak fluent English, so they are at least trilingual. In general, speakers of English as a second language (L2) have no knowledge of any other non-native language. Today, at the beginning of the 21st century, French lives on in the large cities of Egypt as the language of the cultural elite, which is influential even though it comprises a very small minority of the population. Cultivating French today is backed up by a rich educational and media landscape provided by French-supported institutions in Egypt. 1.2. Speaker perceptions: obsolescence vs. renaissance Between the younger and older generations, it seems as though a dramatic change in the distribution of language ability has taken place. The broad spectrum of code alternation techniques that we observed can provide important data in relation to this. It seems that these techniques directly correlate with two self-representational speaker motifs. The French-speaking interlocutors we interviewed about the state of French in Egypt can be divided into two groups. Some state that: (1) “It’s going downhill”, say older speakers from Christian circles, mostly Catholics. They interpret the changes they observe as evidence of the language’s decline, fearing that the Francophone element of their culture will disappear with increasing Egyptian nationalism. In line with previous publications, I refer to this group as the traditionalists. Their language usage has a clear-cut diglossic distribution: French for private and sometimes professional use, Arabic for everyday communication with people outside these networks. Others, who I will call innovators, are optimistic: (2) “French is coming”, said many of the younger speakers we spoke with. They are among the beneficiaries of the Francophone institutions. We can observe the emergence of a new class of cultured bourgeoisie, and of a new type of model: the Arabic-speaking Muslim family that sends its children to French schools as a result of a deliberate decision. In these cases, French is a school language and possibly not even used in the family. It appears that the two groups use varieties that are evolving in opposite directions. Initially, one might think that these varieties correspond to a generational classification. But actually there is a dividing line between cultural/religious backgrounds that runs across the surface distinction. Because of their diverging backgrounds, the linguistic strategies of the two groups are fundamentally different. The French spoken by the traditionalists derives from familial and educational transmission. And this explains why age is not the sole criterion, or put more simply: traditionalists also have children. Their lan-

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guage is characterized by stylistic confidence and, this holds for the elder generation, a tendency towards purism, e.g. self-restrictions as to code-switching. On the other hand, the language spoken by the innovators is striking regarding its lack of linguistic assurance, obviously compensated with various strategies, especially extensive code-switching. These speakers claim that they have “revived” French-speaking Egypt, speaking of their generation’s role in “cultural enrichment”. It is certainly premature to speak of a cultural decline. However, it is predictable that the “younger” perspective on French will become more dominant than the “traditional” one. In any case, the unorthodox manifestations of this linguistic phenomenon exhibit the vitality of this new cosmopolitan French variety in Cairo. 1.3. Arabic-French code copying The colonial prehistory of Arabic-speaking countries gave rise to persisting situations of language contact. This may explain the fact that linguists interested in French spoken in the Arab world tend to focus on the study of situational code-alternation and long term code copying. Only the latter shall be considered as relevant to language change.7 The transcribed recordings from Cairo corroborate this view, as they reveal a broadly variable competence among speakers. From the collected data, it appears that French is never the only language spoken, and that very few older speakers with French as their first language (L1) rated their Arabic competence as L2.8 Most speakers of the traditional group however assessed both their French and Arabic competence as L1. Many of the younger adults (roughly under forty years of age), on the other hand, displayed less experience with French. During conversations, these speakers often introduce linguistic elements in Arabic (or English), which qualifies them for the group referred to as innovators. However, this phenomenon is not limited to the younger speakers; moving from one language to another is clearly a commonplace linguistic practice for speakers of all ages. Code copying can occur blockwise within turns right down to syntagmatic fragments or single words. To sum up, Cairo’s multilingualism provides ample opportunity for the cross-linguistic use of discourse markers. 7 8

Cf. Johanson 2008. These findings reflect the reponses of the participants in a questionnaire that prompted them (among others) to assess their language competence. The (anonymous) results can be consulted in the database on ciel-f.org.

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Discourse markers as verbal gestures

Discourse markers9 are an essential part of conversational turn-taking. In this context they serve as tools in reformulation processes, and more generally, they help structure the discourse. Under conditions of language contact, we have to deal with the difficulties of transference from one language to another. Furthermore, we have to take their polysemous character into account and the fact that, due to high frequency and resulting semantic bleaching, it is difficult to delimit their exact meaning. In the specific situation of language contact, speakers of the Cairo variety of French, especially those we characterized as innovators, draw heavily on Arabic discourse markers. Their usage often coincides with code-alternation to Arabic and vice versa.10 Yaron Matras has shown that discourse markers are particularly favorable to copying, even across typological boundaries. One of the reasons lies in their syntactic autonomy. As he points out, [i]t seems, however, as though the elements on which the speaker relies in order to monitor and direct the hearer through the processing of the discourse are not processed exclusively at the analytical level. Discourse operators and the like are in some ways verbal gestures, the insertion of which carries with it certain aspects of a situational reflex […] (Matras 2009: 21; emphasis mine).

As verbal gestures, discourse markers are not only syntactically, but also pragmatically detachable. As “interaction-level devices”, they act in an automatized way, which makes them less subject to analytical control, and consequently quasi independent from the linguistic system (Matras 2011: 227). This phenomenon is defined “as a nonseparation of the systems of discourse marking in the two languages in contact”, resulting from “the type of switching which is triggered by cognitive factors” (Matras 2000: 506).11 The nonseparation of systems has a cognitive motivation in that fused markers facili9

10

11

I am aware of the terminological diversity in the literature: Particles, markers, discourse markers (Schiffrin 1996; Auer and Günthner 2003), Gliederungssignale (Gülich 1970), discourse particles (Mosegaard Hansen 1998). The terms used by these authors don’t all refer to exactly the same concept, and yet what the approaches have in common is that they deal with oral phenomena serving to structure speech and organise the relations between the participants of a linguistic interaction. Not treated here is the code alternation in the opposite direction, i.e. Arabic to French, which seems to function in a different way: mainly taking place on the lexical level, it serves as a device of peer communication and is used to deploy special vocabulary or to tackle taboo issues (the latter is socially motivated). To be distinguished from the other types of borrowing: integration, differentiation and convergence (Matras 2000: 505).

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tate encoding in bilingual operations. Speakers copy elements in an unconscious effort to reduce the mental processing load otherwise required to manage two linguistic inventories. Applied to the Egyptian situation, we have to assume an A-system (French) into which elements are copied from the B-system (Arabic). According to Matras, the A-system is pragmatically dominant in that it is “the language toward which a speaker directs maximum mental effort at a given instance of (…) interaction” (2000: 521). Using discourse markers from the B-system spares them the mental effort of making selections in two different languages. In the following I will test this hypothesis in terms of a micro-ecological approach, where discourse is framed by the following factors:12 a) The participants: who is talking (age, social background), with whom (degree of acquaintance) and the relationship between them?; b) The type of activity: e.g. table conversation, business meeting; c) The topics themselves can also have an effect on the strategies of discourse. 2.1. Discourse structuring and/or searching for words: the marker ya3ni In his grammar of spoken Arabic in Cairo, Manfred Woidich defines particles as a common denominator for those small functional words, or “markers” in linguistic terminology, that serve to add focus, emphasis and depth to speech (Woidich 2006: 162). These markers, which are often adverbs or conjunctions, exhibit a versatility that manifests itself in highly varied semantics. This is especially true for frequently used markers such as ya3ni (‘that means’, ‘i.e.’), ba2a (‘now’), bass (‘enough’, ‘that’s it’) and lessa (‘still’, ‘(not) yet’). The meaning of these particles varies according to the known communicative parameters, i.e. context, situation, speaker’s intentions, shared knowledge etc. Their pragmatic functions range somewhere between simple fillers, hedges, marking of reported speech and positive exhortation.13 The particle ya3ni is undoubtedly the most pervasive discourse-structuring element in Egyptian Arabic. In its primary form, as a verb, it signifies ‘(that) means, (that) is’, but most often it is used as a modal particle meaning ‘in other words’, or ‘namely’.14 Its meaning is fluid, depending on the context. Examples found on the internet corroborate the observation of semantic 12 13

14

For a detailed account see Dermarkar et al., to appear 2014. An exhaustive analysis of this paradigm is out of the question at this point, though it seems to provide a promising field for future studies. Manfred Woidich (2006: 363) classifies ya3ni as an interrogative and exclamative particle which serves to establish a link between (dialogic) statements.

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bleaching through frequent arbitrary employment. For example, this can be seen on a Facebook site called “ya3ni”, presented self-derisively by its author: “Ya3ni i (sic!) made a page called ya3ni cause ya3ni im bored (…)”.15 The Urban dictionary also features an entry s.v. “yaani”: “‘Like’ in Arabic. So instead of saying ‘like’, people from the Middle east use the word ‘yaani’ instead”.16 The following samples are mostly produced by our so-called innovator speakers. This has to do with the fact that their linguistic behavior is characterized by lively code copying, while the traditionalists tend to avoid copying Arabic elements into their French speech.17 To obtain an idea of the extent of switching, let us look at a lengthy excerpt from a conversation between three ladies in their forties, close friends, who discuss a theater performance they recently attended (recorded in 2008). They mention that the play topicalized political suppression while aptly skirting censorship. The conversation takes place in the host’s (LAY) living room who had invited two friends for tea, thus it corresponds roughly to the activity type “table conversation”. The transcription complies with the conventions of the Gesprächsanalytisches Transkriptionssystem (GAT) (Selting et al. 1998). In the French parts, capitalization stands for loudness and emphasis, as opposed to capitals in the Arabic transcript which stand for certain phonemes that cannot be represented any other way (see below). The numbering within the examples corresponds to turns or, in longer turns, to cohering sequences separated by a noticeable pause or prosodic mark. For the Arabic sounds that do not have a corresponding character in the Latin alphabet, we adopt the notation popular in Arabic SMS and chat communication, i.e. 2 for the glottal stop (hamza), 3 for the pharyngeal fricative ain, and 7 for the glottal fricative hah. To account for the phonematically relevant distinction between palatal and velar (so-called emphatic) realization of a, t, d and s, we transcribe the velar sounds with the capital letters: A, T, D and S respectively. 15

16

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URL: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Ya3ni/255784617773391 (accessed 16 October 2013). URL: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=yaani. It continues saying: “To more accurately write the word in the way it is spoken it is sometimes spelled as ya3ni, because the 3 looks like the letter ayin” (accessed 16 October 2013). The traditionalist usage corresponds to what Yaron Matras designates as “differentiation” in bilingual exchanges (2000: 508–509, 513). These highly polyphonic techniques are discussed in Dermarkar et al. 2009; Dermarkar et al., to appear 2014.

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Excerpt from fra. CD19.lamyamoca: 01 LAY [oui parce que c’était] ancien il a adapté/ [pour ‘yes, because it was old, he has adapted to’ 02 HAD [OUI il a] adapté/ pour le:(.) pour ce::cette représentation/ ‘yes, he has adapted to the, to this performance’ 03 LAY et:::~ (1.0) ya3ni c’était:: (0.3) p- pour dire que les égyptiens: ils sont pas l- LIbres de: de parler:: comme ils veu:lent (0.4) comment la police peut::: .h ‘and i.e. this was to say that the Egyptians, they are not free to say what they want. How can the police …?’ 04 SIL-EVEN ((noise of a signal-horn outside)) 05 LAY euh: ya3ni momken temsek ay 7ad euh: te7oTTou fil sign=euh te3azzebou. ya3ni ‘i.e. you can arrest anybody, put him in jail, torture him, as it were’ 06 LAY ((laughs)) lazem atkallem bel3arabi mich3arfa ezzay [ma3arafch] ‘I have to speak in Arabic, I don’t know how, I don’t know.’ 07 HAD [non non c’est ça tu as dit le bon thème] ‘no no, this is it, you have mentioned the right subject’ 08 LAY ah .h ya3ni:: kan gad=eh ya3ni ‘yes i.e. he was cour(ageous) eh as it were’ 09 LAY c- c- c’était très courageux/ (0.2) qu’il fasse quelque chose comme ça parce tout le monde a peu:r/ de::~ .h (0.5) d’expliquer ce queuh ya3ni politiquement qu- est-ce ce qui se PASSe ‘it was very brave to do something like that, because everybody is afraid of what er i.e. what happens in politics.’ 10 CYN ((low)) hm 11 LAY .h fa ‘so, then’ 12 LAY parce qu’il a utilisé un ((laughing)) tEXTe/ (.) de soixantaine/ (.) personne ne peut lui dire quelque chose tu vois/ ‘Because he used a text of some sixty pages. Nobody can say anything to him. You see.’ 13 LAY ((laughs)) ((laughing)) c’est pas son texte comme ça il s- [il s- il a PU:// .h (0.5) lui/] et les étudiants ont pu (.) ont pu: euh: s’expriMEr:// ‘This is not his text. Thus, he could … And the students could express themselves.’ 14 HAD [pour un texte classique (0.2) par exemple (x)] ‘for a classical text, for example’

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15 LAY d- de ce qui se PAsse euh (.) en Egypte/ euh les jeunes (x) n’ont (.) ne sont pas libres de:: (1.1) .h ya3ni euh:: (0.2) de s’exprimEr ‘of what happens in er Egypt, er young people are not free to i.e. er to express themselves.’ 16 LAY .h euh: tu dis quelque chose tu es=en prison:~ puis euh: ceux qui (es=)en prison ils sont:: euh tellement euh m ‘euh if you say something, you’ll end up in prison, then those who are in prison are so …’ 17 LAY t .h démoralisés:/ et quand ils sortent ils peuvent pas continuer leu- r vie (0.3) comme (.) avant/ (.) ya3ni ‘… demoralized. And when they get out of prison, they are not able to continue their life as before, as it were’ 18 LAY biye7Sal ta3zib gamed awi fil sogoun=ya3ni euh m ya3ni biDAmmarou=lchabab fi mASr. fi=sogoun ‘Horrible tortures happen in the prisons, i.e. they let Egypt’s youth waste away in the prisons.’ 19 CYN hmm 20 LAY ça c’était le thème (.) parce que: (0.4) c’était vraiment très ((laughing)) audac- (0.5) très courageux/ ‘That was the topic, because it was really very brave.’ 21 CYN hmm 22 LAY .h mais: mais c’était un tEXte/ (.) .h (0.5) ya3ni ‘But this was a text, written in the sixties. So, as it were’ 23 CYN ils: ont repris le thème qui était: exprimé aussi dans l’immeuble yacoubian n’est-ce pas? (0.77) ‘They revisited the topic that was also covered in The Yacoubian Building, didn’t they?’ Even at first glance, the frequency of the particle ya3ni is striking: within a time span of less than two minutes, it occurs as often as 11 times. Other discourse structuring particles include the Arabic sequential marker fa (‘so, then’) in line 11 and the hesitation marker euh which is not strictly language specific. French discourse markers are tu vois (line 12), puis (line 15) and alors (line 22). Why is it that ya3ni is used almost excessively, and French markers so scarcely? In general terms, the high frequency of ya3ni can be explained as reflecting the difficulty of broaching a threatening subject, the persecution of dissidents. Yet it stands to reason that ya3ni does not mean the same thing every time it is pronounced. We can tentatively state that its meaning varies depending

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on its position in a turn, or, more precisely, with respect to a sequence within a turn. In fact, we can distinguish three types of occurrences: 1. ya3ni in initial position; 2. ya3ni inside a turn or sequence; 3. ya3ni in final position. In the following, I will show how the position determines the different communicative functions. 2.2.1. Sequence initial position: explanation, reformulation At the beginning of sequences, ya3ni usually introduces an explanatory reformulation in the sense of ‘that is’. Its meaning then corresponds to the French donc (‘so’) or alors (‘thus’, ‘then’). Example 1 03 LAY et:::~ (1.0) ya3ni c’était:: (0.3) p- pour dire que les égyptiens: ils sont pas l- LIbres de: de parler:: comme ils veu:lent (0.4) comment la police peut::: .h ‘and i.e. this was to say that the Egyptians, they are not free to speak as they want to. How can the police …?’ Here ya3ni introduces an explanatory passage. It is followed by the meta-discursive marker c’était pour dire que (‘that was to say that’). This could be interpreted as an exact translation of ya3ni into French, thus a case of self-repair to modify ya3ni. However the fact that c’était pour dire que is in the past tense indicates that it does not refer to the proposition itself (as ya3ni does), but to the narrated event, namely as a comment on the director’s intention in staging the play. If it did not sound awkward here, this occurrence of ya3ni could easily be translated by the French c’est-à-dire. Sometimes ya3ni signals imminent code alternation as in: Example 2 03 LAY (…) comment la police peut::: .h ‘(…) how can the police’ 04 EL-Ev18 ((noise of a signal-horn outside)) 05 LAY euh: ya3ni momken temsek ay 7ad euh: te7oTTou fil sign=euh te3azzebou. ya3ni ‘i.e. you can arrest anybody, put him in jail, torture him, as it were’ 18

EL-ev stands for “extralinguistic event”.

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After a hesitation (euh), ya3ni here announces not only an explanation, but also switching to the other language. The speaker does so apologizingly (line 06). Unlike the example above, the French counterpart of ya3ni is not conceivable in this context. This means that the reverse copying operation does not work. 2.2.2. Within a sequence: hesitation, repair In intermediate positions, ya3ni assumes the functions of “fillers” that are used to structure the speech flow, especially when speakers search for words as they retell or comment on an experience. In example 3, it is difficult to determine whether ya3ni is final to line 08 or initial to line 09. Located between both, it serves as a hinge between an Arabic utterance and reformulation in French. Example 3 08 LAY ah .h ya3ni:: kan gad_eh ya3ni ‘yes i.e. he was cour(ageous) eh as it were’ 09 LAY c- c- c’était très courageux/ (0.2) qu’il fasse quelque chose comme ça parce tout le monde a peu:r/ de::~ .h (0.5) d’expliquer ce qu_ euh ya3ni politiquement qu_ est-ce ce qui se PASSe ‘it was very brave to do something like that, because everybody is afraid of what er i.e. what happens in politics.’ Line 09 features a complex construction: In the course of formulation, information is dealt with retrospectively. The statement ‘it was very courageous’ is complemented by the subordinate clause qu’il fasse, which in turn is modified by the causal subordination parce que, giving the reason why the action was daring: because everybody is scared to say how things really are. To this purpose, the sentence might continue as follows: d’expliquer ce qui se passe. In fact, the speaker inserts the adverb politiquement to specify her statement. In Standard French grammar, this would be expected in final position (ce qui se passe politiquement), but here, the normal word order is shifted about. It is the Arabic particle ya3ni that introduces the insertion of politiquement. The example suggests that an Arabic discourse marker in French does not imply an exact copy of the element in question. Whatever the approximate French translation, ya3ni acts on a different level: it has a signal effect in that it highlights the unexpected and oddly placed adverb. This procedure is perfect evidence for the so-called online syntax, i.e. shaping utterances bit by bit whilst speaking.

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Example 4 In the continuation of the same conversation, the ladies exchange their views regarding the movie The Yacoubian Building.19 24 LAY MOI j’aime pas des f … ya3ni ce genre de films. ‘I do not like f(ilms) (i.e.) this kind of movies.’ This is clearly a case of repair: LAY was about to say *“des films” (which would have required some specification, probably in the form of a longer relative clause). Instead she chose to correct her sentence in the middle of speech to ‘this kind of movies’. Example 5: Excerpt from fra. CD10.progres: Talking about the duties of a newspaper reporter, e.g. preparing a theater write-up, the editor says: 25 WAF elle essaie de nous transmettre son point de vue et aussi en nous racontant le spectacle ou bien, ya3ni, l’évènement qu’elle a pu couvrir. ‘she tries to convey her point of view to us and also, tells us about the performance or ya3ni, the event that she was able to cover.’ Le spectacle is reformulated as ‘the event that she was able to cover’. The reformulation is prepared by the French conjunction ou bien, followed by the Arabic particle ya3ni. Linking these reformulation markers suggests that they are interchangeable, functionally equivalent. The particle ya3ni functions as an equality sign between two attempts to find the appropriate expression (through synonyms: spectacle, replaced by évènement). Interestingly, ou bien alone did not suffice to trigger the reformulation. It is the habitual ya3ni that enables the speaker to continue her sentence. If this analysis holds, then we have evidence for the unconscious, automaticized character of borrowing here. Example 6 26 LOU Je peux par exemple: (--) rentrer dans un magasin pour acheter des habits, (--) et::=et trouver quelqu’un qui me dit ‘blouse’* aou** 'panty' aou ((speaker ponders)) I don’t know ya3ni. plein d’exemples de ce genre. * blouse: English pronunciation; ** aou: Arabic conjunction ‘or’.

19

Screen adaptation (2006) of the eponymous novel by Alaa al-Aswani (al-Aswa¯nı¯ 2004).

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‘I can, for example, go into a shop to buy clothes and I find someone who says to me “blouse, panty”. I don't know, (i.e.) a lot of examples of this kind.’ The speaker, talking about the use of English terms in colloquial Arabic, switches between French, Arabic and English. The connecting conjunction ‘or’ is taken from the Arabic code (aou) although she is perfectly aware of the French equivalent ou. The result is an utterance that jumps from French to English and Arabic back to French, the latter being the main code used to express the statement as such, while Arabic and English provide the structuring particles. The string I don’t know ya3ni marks a hesitation that is followed by a summary of the preceding speech (plein d’exemples). 2.2.3. Sequence final position: attenuation, downgrading, generalization When a speaker is called to make a value judgment but hesitates to express it directly, e.g. in order to avoid offending someone, ya3ni can assume additional hedge-like functions.20 Example 7 28 ESM enfin MOI j’ai=j’ai trouvé le livre bien moi personnellement, ‘Well, I personally thought the book was good.’ 29 LAY morbide morbide ya3ni. [trÈs morbide] ‘morbid, morbid, (i.e.) very morbid’ 30 HAD [trÈs morbide. eh da?] ‘very morbid, what’s that?’ The repeated morbide (line 29) is considered too strong by LAY and therefore mitigated by the postpositioned ya3ni. For these purposes, Metropolitan French offers attenuating phrases like en quelque sorte ‘sort of ’ or pour ainsi dire ‘as it were’. We found no attestation of the French counterparts in our corpus. Hence it seems, on the basis of this data, that the Francophone speakers in Cairo at least disprefer the corresponding French expressions. Example 8 (sequel to the long excerpt) 27 LAY non=non=non=non=non euh they destroy their relationships ya3ni bi2oulou 7agat we7cha bel sitt. 3ala gozha. we heyya lamma yeTlA3 tib2a 3ayza tsi:bou. keda ya3ni it’s horrible 20

Matras calls them “high-risk activities”, where the speaker risks his assertive authority (2011: 219).

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‘No no no no no (er) they destroy their relationships, i.e. they tell the woman bad things about her husband; and when he gets out (of prison), she wants to leave him (so that, when he gets out, …), like that, ya3ni (= as it were) it’s horrible?’ The first occurrence is of the type discussed in 2.2.1. (sequence initial, explanatory type and introducing a code alternation). The second one is accompanied by the Arabic modal adverb keda (‘like that’, ‘so’, ‘thus’), a common combination in colloquial Arabic. Together they introduce the speaker’s switch to English to conclude her report with an evaluation: it’s horrible. At the referential level the twin marker keda ya3ni can be analyzed as sequence initial, in that it follows a pause and introduces a comment in another language. But it can also be seen as in final position arguing that keda ya3ni refers to the preceding proposition, downgrading it to attenuate the effect and to ease the reception with regard to the interlocutor. Difficult to classify: Ellipses and allusions In informal, relaxed settings, interlocutors express themselves through ellipses and allusions. Example 9 Excerpt from fr.CD5.bureau: The situation: the office of the dean of the Faculty of Applied Languages. The interlocutors, the dean’s assistant and a lecturer responsible for organizing a guest professor’s stay discuss his accommodation. In the course of their business meeting-style conversation, they joke about the accommodation in a hotel they consider too basic for Europeans. 31 MOK: Et pour l’hôtel, non, non, j’ai pas réservé pour l’instant, mais … ben, je pense qu’on a … on a réservé l’année dernière à l’hôtel … à un hôtel à Zamalek, l’hôtel ‘A.’, voilà. Voilà, mais je pense que il faut changer parce qu’il était … c’est très archaïque, c’est très ancien, c’est … (rit) ‘And the hotel, no, I have not reserved it yet, but … I think, last year, we reserved the hotel in Zamalek, hotel ‘A’, But I think, we will have to change, because it was very outdated and old.’ 32 DIN: Ben, écoute, tu n’as qu’à voir l’état 7’Ales ba2a, ya3ni. Tu … tu peux voir, ya3ni, juste les tapis, juste les tapis. ‘Listen, you just have to see the state 7’Ales ba2a, ya3ni. you can only see ya3ni the carpets, only the carpets.’ 33 MOK: (laughing) Oui. Oui. ‘Yes yes.’

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DIN’s opening signal in line 32 is a French linearization quite uncommon in the Cairo variety. In her working environment that includes frequent contact with European academics, it is, however, plausible that such elements form part of her competence. But the subsequent dialogue seems to be typical of the usage among bilingual Egyptians. To describe the state of the carpets, DIN begins a sentence in French (tu n’as qu’à voir l’état) and then continues by inserting a series of Arabic discourse markers (7’Ales ba2a ya3ni) before continuing with the sentential complement. 7’Ales is a modal adverb of gradation (Woidich 2006: 236) meaning ‘altogether’, ‘entirely’, ‘totally’. Ordinarily, it is positioned after a noun phrase. In the above example, however, the adverb is isolated in the form of an apposition, adding a value judgment to the statement. However, rather than explicitly judging the state of the carpet, this evaluation is implied (but not positively expressed) through the use of the adverb 7’Ales. The particle ba2a is difficult to translate; it means something like ‘now’, ‘then’, ‘finally’, ‘after all’. As an exclamation it can mean: ‘honestly’, sometimes bearing the connotation ‘that’s the last straw’.21 Without attempting to translate the string 7’Ales ba2a, we can infer that the cluster is meant to emphasize and even exaggerate the description, thus giving a strong evaluation. The appended ya3ni can only be interpreted as a means of conversational politeness, pronounced to downgrade a value judgment which would otherwise be considered too harsh. This process, typical of oral exchanges, depends entirely on the situational context and on shared knowledge. The use of these Arab particles prioritizes affective value over propositional content – they “season” utterances, so to speak, in the context of polite conversation. Obviously, there is no French equivalent to ya3ni in this position. Translating it into the French c’est-à-dire (‘that is’) reveals the grammatical nonsense in this context. It follows that the Arabic particle assumes a function that is not provided for in French. 32 DIN: (…) tu … tu peux voir, ya3ni, juste les tapis, juste les tapis. There is an affective connotation that develops along with the context: The mention of tapis ‘carpet’ is enough to conjure up the situation in its entirety. The fact that MOK laughs while speaking attests the communicative success of the indirect strategy. In an otherwise formal business conversation, mentioning the modest hotel calls up a host of stereotypes about Egypt (typical 21

For the range of grammatical functions in Arabic see Woidich (2006: 245–246, 325).

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poverty, primitive facilities and their effect on Western travellers), that never fail to cause hilarity among natives. This last example shows that an analysis of the discourse marker at face value would fall short of its real semantic and pragmatic scope. ya3ni in our examples goes far beyond the literal meaning of the word. Depending on several factors (e.g. position in a turn or sequence, kind of relationship between interlocutors, shared knowledge, to name but a few), it covers a wide range of pragmatic functions. 2.3. ya3ni, an odd-job discourse marker In light of its frequent and varied usage, it is obvious that ya3ni has lost its verbal character and is used as a polyvalent (modal) particle. In addition to its basic meaning (‘that is’), there is a phatic component comprising a number of denotations and connotations which accompany the message, all of them pragmatically variable. The Arabic particle ya3ni clearly belongs to the interaction-level devices (Matras 2011). Instead of assigning one item to one function, elements of this category are employed in a generalized manner. Furthermore, their use is characterized by the non-separation of systems, i.e. the speakers are not aware of repeated copying. To sum up, we have accounted for the following functions depending on distribution: 1) Sequence-initial: this is nearest to the basic meaning of ya3ni as a verb (‘that is’). It is used to enhance the listener’s understanding by introducing reformulations; 2) Hedges within a sequence: When formulating proves difficult, ya3ni serves as a hesitation marker, as a device to bridge pauses, to play for time while searching for the appropriate expression; 3) Sequence-final hedges: As a mark of politeness and consideration, it can attenuate the bluntness of a statement. There is a further meaning that was neither accounted for nor attested in the corpus: in colloquial Arabic (and conceivably in French-Arabic conversation) ya3ni can occur as a turn in its own right, e.g. in response to a question of the type: ça va? (‘how are you?’). The potential answer ya3ni (with a drawling intonation) corresponds to French pas tellement (‘could be worse’). In other contexts ya3ni appeals to a shared background. In these cases it creates a mood of familiarity that encourages joking and irony, thus adding an affective value.

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Generally speaking, we can say that the marker is semantically bleached and assumes various pragmatic functions depending on its position in turntaking. The strength of the Arabic particle ya3ni lies in the domain of directing the hearer. The wide semantic scope of ya3ni seems to make up for a significant lack of corresponding markers in the Egyptian variety of French. Hence we are faced with a situation of partial congruence: ya3ni assumes disparate discursive functions depending on its position and context. The following table summarizes the uses discussed above and gives tentative translations. Table 1: Discursive functions of the particle ya3ni Discursive function

French (Europe)

English

Definition, explanation

c’est-à-dire

‘that is (i.e.)’

Code switching

donc, euh

‘so’

Turn taking

donc, alors

‘so’

Turn maintenance

donc, alors

‘so’

Hesitation

euh, donc

‘hum’

Downgrading

en quelque sorte, pour ainsi dire

‘or so’, ‘as it were’ ‘like’, ‘sort of ’

Here, we return to our claim that the types of markers analyzed above reflect the communicative activities of the speakers. Together with the particle ya3ni, they are transferred as a whole from the Arabic system into the Cairo French variety. The notion of social prestige often mentioned in the literature does not apply in the case discussed above. Arabic is considered the ‘low’ variety within the diglossic setting, so that a prestige argument for borrowing from Arabic into French does not hold. (It does play a role in the opposite direction, however, when lexical items are copied from French or English into Arabic speech, cf. footnote 10). But as far as the borrowing of Arabic discourse markers into French is concerned, the affective value is probably the appropriate concept.

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Discourse markers as gestures

In French-Arabic language contact in Cairo, the particle ya3ni can only be deployed in communication where the partners can be sure that the other person has a command of the same linguistic codes. Knowledge of Arabic is a necessary prerequisite in this game. Otherwise, the range of meanings would remain concealed. The marker ya3ni overlays the discourse with an affective basic idea, which gives it the character of a verbal gesture. As Matras (2011: 223) points out, “(t)he motivation to borrow discourse operators of these types arises from their gesture-like and automatized use.” Ya3ni is furthermore phatic in the Jakobsonian sense; by virtue of its phonetic shape (Arabic), it appeals to a common cultural background. As it is semantically bleached, ya3ni ceases to be language specific, acting instead within the space of non-verbal communication (“pragmatically detachable”, cf. Matras 2009: 140). As a result, system boundaries disappear with respect to the marker ya3ni, so that we can conclude that the Arabic discourse marker has fused with its French counterpart that ceded its place to the more powerful specimen of the other language. This observation also implies that communicative resources are not necessarily divided up into the individual languages. Thus, as the first results of our case study, I suggest that in this particular situation of language contact, neither typology nor the effects of language family are at work. As a second – and related – result, I claim that Yaron Matras’ notion of verbal gesture as a triggering factor in contact languages applies very well to the frequently used Egyptian-Arabic marker ya3ni.

References al-Aswa¯nı¯, ‘Ala¯’ 2004 The Yacoubian Building. American University in Cairo Press. Auer, Peter and Susanne Günthner 2003. Die Entstehung von Diskursmarkern im Deutschen – ein Fall von Grammatikalisierung?, InLiSt – Interaction and Linguistic Structures, No. 38, URL: http://www.uni-potsdam.de/u/inlist/issues/ 38/index.htm (accessed 16 October 2013). Dermarkar, Cynthia, Françoise Gadet, Ralph Ludwig and Stefan Pfänder 2008 Vom Französischen in den Kolonien zum français global? Der Fall Ägypten als Spiegel für linguistische Arealtypologien. Romanistisches Jahrbuch 59: 101–127. Dermarkar, Cynthia, Stefan Pfänder, Claus Pusch and Marie Skrovec 2010 Le français global – émergence, variation, francoversaux: un nouveau corpus de la francophonie actuelle. In: Actes du CILPR (Innsbruck 2007), 81–96. Dermarkar, Cynthia, Françoise Gadet, Ralph Ludwig and Stefan Pfänder to appear 2014 Hybrid speech of francophone groups in Cairo: From macro-level ecology to discourse. In: Ralph Ludwig, Peter Mühlhäusler and Steve Pagel (eds.), Language Ecology and Language Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

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Dermarkar, Cynthia and Stefan Pfänder 2010 Le français cosmopolite. Témoignages de la dynamique langagière dans l’espace urbain du Caire. Berlin: Berliner WissenschaftsVerlag. Gülich, Elisabeth 1970 Makrosyntax der Gliederungssignale im gesprochenen Französisch. München: Fink. Jabbour, Za¯hida D. 2007 Littératures francophones du Moyen-Orient. Aix-en-Provence: Édisud. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar. Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language Contact and Contact Languages, 61–79. (Hamburg Studies on Multilingualism.) Amsterdam: Benjamins. Kober, Marc 1999 Entre Nil et sable. Paris: Centre National de Documentation Pédagogique. Luthi, Jean-Jacques 1981 Le Français en Égypte. Beyrouth: Maison Naaman pour la Culture. Luthi, Jean-Jacques 2000 La littérature d’expression française en Égypte. Nouv. éd. remaniée. Paris: L’ Harmattan. Luthi, Jean-Jacques 2005 En quête du français d’Égypte. Paris: L’Harmattan. Matras, Yaron 2000 Fusion and the Cognitive Basis for Bilingual Discourse Markers. International Journal of Bilingualism (4): 505–528. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Matras, Yaron 2011 Universals of structural borrowing. In: Peter Siemund (ed.), Linguistic universals and language variation, 200–229. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Mosegaard Hansen, Maj-Britt 1998 The function of discourse particles. Kopenhagen: Benjamins. Poissonnier, Ariane and Gérard Sournia 2006 Atlas mondial de la francophonie. Paris: Ed. Autrement. Schiffrin, Deborah 1996 Discourse markers. Cambridge, Philadelphia, Pa.: Cambridge University Press. Selting, Margret, Peter Auer, Birgit Barden and Jörg Bergmann 1998 Gesprächsanalytisches Transkriptionssystem (GAT). Linguistische Berichte 173: 91–122. Woidich, Manfred 2006 Das Kairenisch-Arabische. Eine Grammatik. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Wolton, Dominique 2006 Demain la francophonie. Paris: Flammarion.

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Peter Auer (Freiburg)

Language mixing and language fusion: when bilingual talk becomes monolingual*

1.

Introduction

After a time of intense and partly controversial discussion, the topic of “mixed languages” seems to have settled on a definition of mixed languages as languages with a “split ancestry” (Matras and Bakker 2003: 1; Bakker 1996: 13; Golovko 2003: 191; Thomason 2003: 21). There is no agreement, however, on whether these mixed languages should be seen as strictly delimited from “unmixed” languages (which just show some ‘ordinary’ borrowing) or whether they are merely extreme cases on a continuum whose other extreme is ‘ordinary’ borrowing as it occurs in every language. The first case, advocated most strongly by Bakker (e.g. 2003), stipulates that mixed languages “must have numerically (roughly) equal and identifiable components from two (or more?) other languages” (2003: 108–109); only in this case would the above definition hold true in a strict sense. If the number of components from the two languages are not “(roughly) equal”, a mixed variety may still be said to have language A as its (main) ancestor, even though it contains any number of elements from another language B. The continuum view, on the other hand (propagated by the present author and also by e.g. Thomason 2003: 21; Myers-Scotton 2003: 101), argues that there is no clear boundary between mixed languages and ‘ordinary’ borrowing. Mixed languages simply represent a rare case of massive borrowing from one language to another. This view implies that the split ancestry definition must be gradient: A mixed variety may be related to two ancestor languages, but in most cases, one of these ancestor languages will be the dominant (real?) one. I will follow the gradient view of mixed languages in this paper and argue that there is nothing special or extraordinary about mixed languages from a grammatical point of view. The individual linguistic processes involved are those we know from language contact in general. What is special in the radical cases of mixed languages is their sociolinguistic status and history, i.e. the circumstances which led to such radical borrowing, sometimes within a * I wish to thank Victor Friedman and Carmel O’Shannessy for comments on an earlier version of this paper.

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short time-span. Very often (Matras 2009: 304), this happens in situations of language shift and language obsolescence, in which elements of the former group language are maintained by fusing them with the dominant, out-group language. As a rule (but not always) the sociolinguistically dominant language is also the structurally dominant one, i.e. the new variety is genetically speaking a variant of the shifted-to language, rather than a descendent of the lost or endangered language. Looking at mixed languages as an extreme case of borrowing implies a shift from the result (a mixed language) to the process of their emergence (extensive borrowing). In order to underline this shift of perspective, I suggest the term fusion for the processes of extensive borrowing of elements from another language into the receiving language, and the term fused lect to refer to its outcome. While the usual suspects for radically mixed languages are a few, partly insufficiently documented varieties whose status is often disputed due to a simple lack of data, the focus on fusion as a process opens up the possibility of investigating examples of partial fusion as well. In most of these cases, the ancestor language question will not be central; they can clearly be attributed to one ancestor language much more strongly than another one. What is central is the structural conventionalization and indeed grammaticization of bilingual mixing patterns. The main argument of this paper is that the basis of language fusion is language mixing (often also called code switching), a phenomenon which we need to separate strictly from “mixed languages” (in the above sense of fused lects in their extreme form), and which has been abundantly documented in bilingual studies. Language mixing is a surface phenomenon which consists of the juxtaposition of two languages. It will be argued that most cases of fusion originate from such mixing (even though other routes cannot be excluded in principle). This leads to the most important question: What kind of surface patterns of bilingual talk become part of the language structure of a fused lect? The main argument I will put forward here is that language fusion is the result of the conventionalization of the two basic strategies of insertional mixing. These two basic mixing strategies have been amply documented in studies on bilingual talk, where they may occur in isolation or in combination. The first strategy, called minimal insertion here, consists of inserting stems (or uninflected words) from one language into the grammatical frame (“matrix”) of the other language without any accompanying grammar. In this case the lexical material from the inserted language is accommodated completely to the grammatical structure of the matrix language. (Phonology and phonetics are not necessarily affected.) The second strategy, called maxi-

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mal insertion or “embedded island” insertion here, prefers to bring the other-language item(s) into the matrix frame together with the accompanying grammatical markers (affixes or grammatical words) and often extends to the phrase level. I will argue that these two strategies are the equivalents of the two main patterns of language fusion which can account for the structure of radically fused (“mixed”) languages. Minimal insertion in mixing is the basis of the structure of “symbiotic” fused lects, in which the fusion affects the lexicon of one language and the grammar of another. The grammar is entirely in language B, and lexical items (usually stems) are selectively inserted into this pattern (examples are Media Lengua, or Para-Romani). Maximal insertion, on the other hand, accounts for the second group of fused lects in which two grammars merge. The idea that fusion arises out of mixing is not new (see Myers-Scotton 1998, 2000; Auer 1999; Thomason 2001: 131–133). It has sometimes been criticized on the basis that “no documentation of a transitory phase between the supposed CS behavior preceding the mixed languages” existed, as Bakker (2003: 129), one of its strongest opponents, writes. In the meantime, however, there is historical evidence for such a transition (McConvell and Meakins 2003; McConvell 2008; O’Shannessy 2012; Schaengold 2004). In this paper, additional evidence will be given by approaching the issue in a somewhat indirect way by showing that the structural similarities between language mixing and fused varieties are so substantial that it is highly likely that the former provide the basis of the latter. Intermediate stages of fusion will be presented which provide a better understanding of how fused lects emerge. With regard to the overarching topic of this volume, it should be noted that the notion of split ancestry and hence the concept of language fusion is theoretically speaking orthogonal to that of family resemblance, i.e.: language fusion should occur regardless of whether the two languages in contact are genetically related or come from different language families. However, a look into existing research on “mixed languages” shows that by far the majority of cases discussed so far come from language contact between unrelated or genetically hugely distant languages. This raises the question of whether the same concept of fusion can be applied to closely related varieties as well or whether fusion contradicts family resemblance. I will briefly (and somewhat speculatively) address this question in the last section of this paper.

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297

Fused lects in their extreme form (“mixed languages”)

An overview of the better-known extreme results of fusion – the so-called mixed languages – is given e.g. in Matras (2009: Ch. 10.3.), Thomason (2001: Ch. 8.), Matras and Bakker (2003) and Thomason and Kaufmann (1988). It will therefore suffice here to summarize some of their structural features. The sociolinguistic motivation in all cases can be said to be identity-related. The fused variety arises out of a need to serve as a symbol of ethnic or group identity under circumstances of heavy pressure from majority groups which force the community to shift language. The fused lect usually, but not always, appears to be a variant of this shifted-to language into which elements of the abandoned minority language are borrowed. Deliberate strategies to create such a linguistic identity symbol through language manipulation seem to have played a role in at least some of these cases. This may explain the rapidity under which some mixed languages have emerged. Bakker’s (2003) contention that the prototypical mixed language is one in which a split between vocabulary and lexicon occurs (“language intertwining”)1 has been refuted by Matras already (2009). I suggest distinguishing instead between two basic types of fusion. One of them indeed comes close to Bakker’s “language intertwining”. It consists of the borrowing of lexical material only into the grammatical frames provided by the other language. No grammatical affixes and only some grammatical words are borrowed alongside the lexical items (words or stems). The second type involves the fusion of a part of the grammar of one language with another. As a consequence, a grammatical split may occur, such that, for instance, the verbal system – including stems and morphology – comes from one language, and the nominal system from another, often together with the relevant parts of the vocabulary. Good examples of the first type are the following languages or varieties: – Media Lengua, a variety of Quechua, spoken by ethnic Quechua in Quito, Ecuador, in which Quechua grammar combines with 90 % Spanishbased vocabulary. The Spanish words are fully integrated into Quechua grammar and even phonology (Muysken 1981). Lexical borrowing includes grammatical words such as pronouns and negators. In addition to this “relexification” (Muysken), copying of Spanish discourse markers occurs which have no equivalent in Quechua.

1

Also cf. Winford (2003: 24), who defines mixed languages as languages incorporating “large portions of an external vocabulary into a maintained grammatical frame”.

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– Ma'á (or Outer Mbugu), a register used by a community in Tanzania (Mous 2003). The lect consists of a parallel lexicon of mainly Cushitic words superimposed on the grammar of the Bantu language Mbugu. The difference between Ma'á and Media Lengua is that in addition to grammatical words, Ma'á also has some structural non-Bantu features, such as a voiceless lateral fricative apparently used to overtly distort Bantu words (phonology), and possessive affixes and constructions (morphology), among others. The exact history of Ma'á remains unclear due to a lack of data. – Anglo-Romani (and other Para-Romani varieties), a variety of English into which some hundred Romani words have been borrowed. Anglo-Romani is used as a secret code and as an in-group way of speaking (Boretzky and Igla 1994). Some grammatical words are also borrowed from Romani. Anglo-Romani also shows some deviations from autochthonous English (simplifications due to the omission of grammatical words such as determiners), but these are not due to contact with Romani (cf. Matras 2010). – Jenisch, Lekoudesch and other in-group/secret varieties spoken by cattle dealers and itinerant groups in Germany and Austria (Matras 1988, 1991). Words from Rotwelsch (the German thieves’ cant), from Hebrew and Romani, are inserted into (dialectal) German. Only few grammatical words are affected. – Old Helsinki Slang (Jarva 2008; de Smit 2010), a variety spoken in working-class areas of Helsinki from the end of the nineteenth century until the mid-twentieth century by speakers of Finnish and Swedish as a first language at a time when Helsinki changed from dominantly Swedish-speaking to a dominantly Finnish-speaking city during a process of industrialization and an influx of Finnish speakers from other parts of Finland. Old Helsinki Slang seems to have been used as an expression of the new urban identity at the margins of society, i.e. as an anti-language. The structure of Old Helsinki Slang is clearly Finnish, but up to 75 % of the vocabulary is said to be of Swedish origin. There are some deviations from standard and dialectal Finnish morphology. The phonology may be deliberately distorted by deviations from the patterns of initial consonant clusters from those permissible in Swedish. – Bilingual Navajo (Schaengold 2004), a variety that emerged from language mixing between English and monolingual Navajo through conventionalization. Bilingual Navajo is another example of partial relexification, since in this variety, the grammar is Navajo (with some changes), while the lexicon is increasingly English. English nouns are inserted with nativized Navajo phonology; English verbs are integrated via the use of a light verb (the auxiliary ashI¯ééh ‘to prepare, do’).

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This entire first group of “mixed languages” may be called “symbiotic” (following Matras 2009), as the fused lects heavily rely on the grammar of one of the two contact languages, in this case on Quechua, Mbugu, English, German, Finnish and Navajo, respectively. In the case of Anglo-Romani, Jenisch, Lekoudesch, and perhaps also Old Helsinki Slang, one of the functions of the copied verbal material is to make the majority language incomprehensible to its monolingual speakers (in addition to an identity-related function which is central for all fused lects in this group, as we have seen). In some cases, it can indeed be questioned whether we are dealing with a fused variety (“language”) at all; a better term for Anglo-Romani, Jenisch, Lekoudesch, and Old Helsinki Slang may be register, since the functional range of these ways of speaking is limited. Also, structural conventionalization seems to be only partial, i.e. there is lexical variation (speakers select from a repertoire of languages and varieties: Bakker and Matras [2003: 8] speak of a “style of speech, consisting of occasional lexical insertions”, their number depending on the knowledge of Romani of the speaker). In this sense, Para-Romani, Jenisch, Lekoudesch, and Old Helsinki Slang may not be conventionalized mixed languages at all, but rather examples of how speakers mix languages for secretive and identity-related purposes. Ma'á and Media Lengua, on the other hand, have reached beyond this status of a register for special purposes, since they are used in a variety of situations by their speakers. In all cases, the symbiotically superimposed variety is the weaker one, since it only provides a fraction of varying size of the vocabulary, while the grammar is clearly that of the other, dominant language. This even holds for Media Lengua: Structurally speaking, it is a variety of Quechua, not of Spanish, since the grammatical structure of Quechua is fully intact and only (re-)lexified by Spanish words. Decisive for this first group of radically fused lects is the fact that the borrowed lexical material is fully integrated into the grammatical structure of the receiving language. All grammatical affixes are those of the receiving language, as is their syntactic structure including word order. A typical example from Lekoudesch (from Matras 2009: 293) is the following: (1) Der schäff-t de ganze Jomm im Uschpiss, he sit-3.sg the whole day in-the pub und dua-t immer harme schasskenn-a und melouch-t lou. and do-3.sg always much drinking and work-3.sg not

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cf. Alemannic dialect: Der sitz-t de ganze Daag im Gaschthaus und dua-t immer viel drink-a und schaff-t net. ‘He sits all day in the pub, and drinks a lot, and doesn’t work.’ The Hebrew words (italics) are fully integrated into the Alemannic dialectal frame. Both word order and inflectional affixes are exactly those of the dialect. While the nouns Jomm, Uschpiss (Hebrew yo¯m ‘day’, uspı¯z ‘pub’, from Lat. hospitium ‘hospitality’) and the adverbs harme and lou (Hebrew harbe, lo¯) are not inflected in Lekoudesch, simply because they would not be in German either, the infinitive schasskenn- (Hebrew sa θa ‘drink’) receives the Alemannic -a infinitive suffix, and the inflected verbs melouch- (Hebrew məlaxa ‘work’) and schäff- (Hebrew sev- ‘to sit’) receive the third-person singular suffix -t. (The full integration of the Hebrew words into the Alemannic frame makes some phonological adaptations necessary, such as the deletion of Hebrew final vowels.) In a second group of mixed languages, grammatical subsystems from two different languages are combined to form one grammar. This can happen with or without compartmentalization of the two languages. By compartmentalization I mean that grammatical elements are borrowed together with the corresponding lexical items (following Friedman 2008). What results is often (but not always) a grammatical split along the lines of verbal grammar vs. nominal grammar. Examples are the following: – Michif (Bakker 1997), the language of the Métis, a community which owes its existence to the marriages of Cree women with French fur traders in the nineteenth century. The complete verbal lexicon, the verbal grammatical system, and the word order are Cree, while the NPs – including adjectives and determiners – are almost entirely (Métis) French. We therefore find a clear case of compartmentalization (stems from one language combine with its grammar, stems from the second language combine with the other grammar) which even includes phonology. In addition, a split between the verbal and the nominal part of the language has occurred. Nonetheless, since Cree is an agglutinating language with strong head-marking features, there can be no doubt that French and Cree do not contribute equally to Michif: The verbal system is at the heart of Cree and has not been affected by borrowing from French, while the more peripheral NPs have been replaced to a large degree by French ones. The imbalance between Cree and French also shows in the “leakage” of Cree into French NPs, where a Cree demonstrative and obviative suffix are used. Michif is Cree with extensive borrowing from

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Métis French. Obviously, the borrowing strategy is very different from the one observed in the first group of “mixed languages” discussed above: French words are integrated into Cree together with their grammatical marking, resulting in the insertion of French NPs into Cree matrices. Matras and Bakker (2003) give the following example: (2) La Cendrieuse mâka tout kî-piskeyiht-am tout The Cinderella however all past-clean-it all la maison, le plancher kî-kisîpêkin-am. the house the floor past-wash.by.hand-it ‘Cinderella, however, cleaned everything. She washed the house, the floor.’ On the surface, we find juxtapositions of French NPs (La Cendrieuse, tout, la maison, le plancher) and Cree VPs (kî-piskeyiht-am, kî-kisîpêkin-am). Note the head-marking structure of the Cree VPs which incorporates an anaphoric element referring to the NPs in the periphery: The VPs alone could form a full-fledged sentence. The VPs are therefore structurally quite independent from the NPs. The strategy of fusion underlying Michif is obviously entirely different from the strategy of fusion exemplified in (1) for Lekoudesch. The basis of a compartmentalized language is the borrowing of lexical elements together with their grammatical entourage – certainly their inflectional morphology, but often also grammatical words (such as functional heads) that form the phrase together with them. In Michif, it was the structure of Cree and French that additionally led to a split between a verbal and a nominal domain of the language, respectively. Compartmentalization resulted from the combination of a polysynthetic and an inflectional language. Other contact situations in which extensive borrowing occurred and led to fusion had different results, since the contact languages made different types of grammatical structures fuse. An example is Kormakiti Arabic, a fusion between Arab and Greek, whose status as a full-fledged “mixed language” is somewhat disputed these days (Thomason and Kaufman 1988: 105–106 count it in, following Newton 1964; also cf. Thomason 2003: 24). But even if Kormakiti Arabic (which was the language of a community of Arab-speaking Maronite Christians who migrated to Cyprus in the twelfth century, and is extinct today) was only partially fused and/or still in the mixing stage, its structure is telling. It is similar to that of Michif without being subject to the same structural constraints. There is no nominal/verbal split, but nonetheless a strong compartmentalization: All Arabic words (from whatever

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word class) retain Arabic morphology, while Greek words exhibit Greek morphology (the phonology is Greek throughout).2 This shows that the decisive feature of the second group of fused lects is not compartmentalization as such (since this is a by-product of the languages involved), but the tendency to borrow lexical elements together with their grammar, and not as isolated words or stems. – Mednyi Aleut (Copper Island Aleut), like Michif, came into being through intermarriage, in this case between Russian fur traders and Aleut women on Mednyi Island (Vakhtin 1998; Golovko 1994). As in Michif, there is a grammar split with an Aleut nominal part (including lexical stems, inflection and word order) and a Russian verbal part (including verbal inflection and word order). However, the division is much less clear, since function words pattern less predictably (object personal pronouns, demonstratives, indefinite pronouns and most numerals are Aleut, as might be predicted, but subject personal pronouns and possessives are Russian), and there are numerous Aleut verb stems which take on Russian inflection. Matras and Bakker (2003: 4) give the following example: (3) ya bud ivo ha yaa-t' ukushka-ˆx haksii-t'. I will him ask-inf window-case open-inf ‘I will ask him to open the window’ The pronouns and the future auxiliary bud (from Russian budu) are Russian. The object NP receives Aleut nominal inflection (-ˆx), and the two infinitives Russian verbal inflection (-t'), as predicted by the nominal/verbal grammar split, but the nominal stem is Russian (from okoshko ‘small window’) and the verbal stems are Aleut. Mednyi Aleut thus combines lexical (stem) insertion (the first pattern) – in most of the VP grammar – with compartmentalization and grammar split (the second pattern) in the NPs. I would follow Vakhtin (1998) in arguing that a fusion pattern like this must have emerged from a Russian basis, i.e. from a situation in which Russian speakers (re-)introduced Aleut elements into their monolingual Russian after the Aleut language had already been lost. – Light Warlpiri (O’Shannessy 2007), a new Australian variety fused from Kriol/Aboriginal English and Warlpiri. Again there is compartmentalization and a split between nominal and verbal grammar, since most verbs and ver2

Borg (1984) thinks that Kormakiti Arabic is not a fused lect, but merely a case of language mixing, which supports my view that on the surface, mixing and fusion are highly similarly patterned.

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bal morphology are Kriol, while nouns come from English or Warlpiri, and nominal morphology from Warlpiri. Light Warlpiri has additionally developed some new structural features (the auxiliary system). – Gurindji Kriol (McConvell and Meakins 2005; Meakins 2011, 2012), like Light Warlpiri spoken in the Australian Northern Territory, shows a similar split. As a consequence of the attrition of Gurindji, a fused lect has emerged in which Kriol provides the verbal part of the grammar (particularly the TAM system) and the basic verbs, while Gurindji structures are maintained in the nominal part. Since the nominal part of the lexicon and important sections of the verbal lexicon come from both languages, there is little compartmentalization. (More on Gurindji Kriol below, section 3.) So far, I have argued that there are only two structural types of radically fused lects (“mixed languages”). In the one case, lexical material (words, or more often stems) is inserted into the receiving language without any accompanying grammar; the other-language material is integrated completely into the grammar of the receiving language. In the second case, the grammatical systems merge. I will argue in the next sections of this paper that the basis of such a merger is the insertion of phrasal constituents from another language into the syntactic frame of the dominant language. Arguably, this is the stronger type of fusion. The insertion of phrasal constituents implies at least an initial stage of compartmentalization, i.e. the morphology is copied together with the lexical stems. This compartmentalization is not always complete, as Mednyi Aleut and Gurindji Kriol show. A split between nominal and verbal grammar may or may not occur, depending on the structure of the languages in contact. Since the two Australian cases are sociolinguistically and historically well documented, we know that in their case, fusion (a stage which may not have been reached entirely yet) was preceded by a period of language mixing. In addition, there can be no doubt that in these cases, mixing not only preceded fusion in time, but that fusion is the result of the grammaticization of mixing. It is likely that the same applies to Michif and Mednyi Aleut, although detailed historical evidence is lacking in their case. During the time of mixing in a number of the documented cases (surely Light Warlpiri and Gurindji Kriol, perhaps also Mednyi Aleut), a “matrix language turn-over” (Myers-Scotton 1998) must have occurred. Before that time, the dominant language was the ethnic minority language, and since it was in contact with a sociolinguistically more powerful language such as Kriol or Russian, it is unlikely that it was used in a monolingual way; rather, a mixed way of speaking must have existed in which Kriol or Russian elements were inserted into the minority language. However, at some point in time (the point of the matrix language turn-over),

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the majority language took over in providing the grammatical frame for most sentences into which elements of the old language were then inserted through frequent mixing. The old ethnic language (Aleut, Gurindji, Warlpiri) was factually lost at that time, and language shift occurred, but for the speakers this shift was not dramatic because the extensive admixture of elements of the ethnic minority language into talk in the main language provided the impression that they were still speaking the minority language. The language mixing which emerged after the matrix language turn-over became conventionalized and provided the basis for fusion. Michif differs from this scenario since no matrix language turn-over took place. In sum, we get the following typology of the varieties discussed in the literature as “mixed languages” (fused lects, in the terminology used here):

Figure 1: Typology of the varieties classified as fused lects

Kormakiti Arabic and Ottoman are linked by a dashed line in this figure. Whether a language with strong compartmentalization but no split in the grammar (such as Kormakiti Arabic) should be called a “mixed language” is a matter of definition. Strictly speaking, what we are dealing with here is not so much a fusion of two grammatical systems as a partial duplication of the grammatical system (as also observed in Ottoman Turkish and its Arabic-Persian components; cf. Németh 1953). This grouping is different from the one suggested by Thomason (1995), where the mixed languages resulting from prolonged language contact (“per-

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sistent group”: Kormakiti Arabic, Ma'á, and Caló, a Para-Romani variety with Romani lexicon and Spanish grammar) are opposed to those whose emergence was presumably rather abrupt (Michif, Mednyi Aleut, Media Lengua). Thomason’s sociolinguistically defined groups are also linguistically coherent as she classifies Ma'á as a Cushitic language with extensive Bantu borrowing in lexicon and grammar, and Caló as a Romani variety with Spanish grammatical and lexical borrowing. She argues that in these varieties, the dominant language has affected the lexicon and the grammar in substantial ways, whereas in the second group of newly emerging varieties, the effect of the dominant language is less pervasive and restricted to certain domains of the language/grammar. However, this parallelism between social and linguistic facts cannot be upheld if Ma'á and Caló – which includes only slightly more Romani grammar than Anglo-Romani and can therefore also be classified as a Para-Romani variety – are taken to be varieties of Bantu or Spanish, respectively, into which some Cushitic or Romani words are inserted.

3.

The structure of mixing

In studies of bilingual speech, the term mixing refers to a way of speaking in which the two (or more) languages occur within grammatically independent units (“sentences”) or/and conversational turns.3 For the present discussion, the structure of mixing is important. There is widespread agreement that mixing can be alternational or insertional (cf. Auer 1999, Muysken 2000). Alternational mixing means that a syntactically independent unit such as a sentence begins in one language and ends in another (multiple mixing is also possible); it is therefore often difficult to define the matrix language of the sentence as a whole. Alternational mixing is a surface phenomenon of bilingual talk. The speaker starts out in one language and changes the language on the fly. The point of alternation is constrained to a certain degree by the grammar of the two languages. Often, their syntactic structures converge in 3

Mixing is often conflated with code-switching, but there is an important difference that should be made between discourse functional juxtapositions of the two languages and juxtapositions that are not. I therefore restrict the term mixing to the latter case (Auer 1999). Frequent code-switching can result in mixing, as the discourse meaning of the individual switches diminishes. Even though mixing is not discourse-functional in its single occurrences, it is a form of bilingual talk that carries sociolinguistic meaning, being as an expression of ethnic or social identity. The social function of mixing is therefore similar to that of fused lects which often serve the identity needs of severely pressured minority groups or new social groups (intermarriage type), as shown in section 2.

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this point. In many cases of alternational mixing, the second stretch of talk begins with what looks like an insertion into the matrix of the sentence that has emerged so far. However, the end of the would-be insertion does not coincide with a return to the matrix language. Rather, the language of the would-be insertion is also the language of the remainder of the sentence. Typically, the stretches in language A and B are therefore not coextensive with single constituents. Now, an important generalization is that alternational mixing never grammaticizes into a fused lect (i.e. the structure of fused lects always reflects an insertional mixing structure). Why is this so? Consider some examples of alternational mixing: (4) (Twi [italics]/English [capitals] mixing in Ghana, from Flamenbaum in press): MAINTAIN, IF THE COUNTRY CAN AFFORD IT, be tumi a Y 3.plu fut can cond maintain, if the country can afford it, y

CONVENIENT FOR EVERYBODY.

3sg-be convenient for everybody ‘We will be able to maintain [it], if the country can afford it, it is convenient for everybody.‘ (5) (Russian/German mixing in Germany, data collected by N. Khakimov, ongoing PhD project Freiburg University) tak s devљonkami vsegda b«li vmeste (a) m« kak-to my kak-to tak s dev‰onkami vsegda byli vmeste we somehow so with girls always were-pl.past together

von der hauptschule bis komplettem ende from the secondary school to ((the)) complete end ‘We, the girls, had always kind of stuck together from general education secondary school to the very end.’ kohlensäure schmeckt doch (b) kola bez kola bez cola without gas tastes-3.sg.pres particle ‘Coke without gas does taste good.’

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In (4), the speaker in both lines starts the utterances with a sequence of Twi grammatical elements which are followed by an English predicate (maintain, convenient) in the focus position. This English predicate turns the language of the emerging sentence around (the following conditional clause and prepositional object dependent on the adjectival predicate are also produced in English). Despite the tendency for the alternation point to coincide regularly with the topic/focus boundary in these data (as Flamenbaum shows), the grammatical structure of the stretch of talking up to the point of alternation as well as that following it is highly variable and not predictable. The same applies to the Russian/German data in (5). In (5a), the speaker adds a German prepositional phrase as a kind of afterthought to her sentence which is continued in this language. In (b), the subject NP is a (presumably) Russian head noun modified by a Russian preposition which governs a German noun (Kohlensäure, ‘gas’). The use of this German noun arguably triggers the continuation of the sentence in German, with a German predicate and a final emphasizing particle. Once more, the alternation could have occurred at any point in the emerging sentence, provided that the grammars of the two languages in play converge sufficiently to make the transition possible. Such a highly variable pattern cannot grammaticize. As Backus (2003) aptly puts it: “Alternational CS4 (…) entails unbridled variation”. Grammaticization, like any type of conventionalization, presupposes repetition. If there is no structural similarity between the individual instances of alternational mixing, no conventionalization can take place. Therefore, mixed bilingual talk which is of the insertional and alternational type must eliminate the alternational elements on the way to fusion. In the further discussion of how mixing becomes grammaticized in fused lects, we can therefore disregard the structure of alternational mixing. Let us now look at insertional mixing in more detail. In insertional mixing, there is a matrix language for each syntactically independent unit (“sentence”). Mixing elements of the other language into this matrix language structure follows two basic strategies (combinations occur, of course, but often one of the two strategies is usually dominant): single lexeme insertions and embedded island insertions. “Embedded language island” is the term introduced by Myers-Scotton to refer to “full constituents consisting only of Embedded Language morphemes occurring in a bilingual C[omplementiser]P[hrase] that is otherwise framed by the Matrix Language. An Embedded Language island shows structural dependency relations; minimally it can be two content morphemes 4

CS = code-switching, the term he uses instead of mixing.

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(e.g. noun and modifier), or a content morpheme and a non-derivational system morpheme” (202: 139). Numerous examples have been given in the literature (see Myers-Scotton 1997, among others). Typical are Luther’s bilingual (Latin/Early New High German) dinner conversations (cf. Stolt 1965), particularly the German sentences into which Latin material is inserted. As a rule, the Latin material is structured as islands which consist minimally of a noun with its Latin inflection, but often of a more complex NP.5 (Some other inflected word classes such as adjectives, but rarely verbs, are also involved, as well as non-inflected word classes such as adverbs, conjunctions, and discourse markers.) (6) (Luther’s dinner conversations, from Veit Dietrich’s notes; Latin in italics) (a) (about the devil) (122) Wolan, der gifftig Geist, er thutt uns vil zu leyd. well, the poisonous spirit, he gives us a lot of pain Ich ways, ich will yhn ein mal sehen, in novissimo I know, I want him one time see, on young-sup-abl die, und seine ignita tela. day-abl, and his blistering projectiles. ‘Well, this poisonous spirit gives us a lot of pain. I know that I want to meet him once, on the Last Day, and his blistering bullets.’ (b) (about the devil) (590) Judas ist in vita sua nit angefochten; Judas is in life his not tempted; Ideo da Therefore when

das stundlin the hour-dim

kam, gieng er securus dahin, came, went he assured there,

wuste nit, wo aus. knew not, where out. ‘Judas had never been tempted in his life; so when the hour came, he went there self-assured and did not know what to do.’ 5

See Stolt (1964) for details. Quoted from the Weimarer Edition of Luther’s Complete Works, edited by Ernst Kroker.

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(c) (about professions) (519) Fratris consilio sol man folgen. brother-sg.gen advise-sg.dat shall one follow. ‘You should follow the advice of your brother.’ (d) (about the Holy Spirit) (521) Ideo mus er cum viperis et pharisaeis Therefore must he with snakes-pl.dat and pharisees-pl.dat anderst reden. differently talk ‘Therefore he has to talk differently with snakes and pharisees.’ (e) Sed unse Herr Got will finem machen but our Master God will end-sg.acc make in ultima stultitia. (522) in last stupidity ‘But our Lord will put an end to this last stupidity.’ (f) (about the Turks, he = God) (206) Er mus in die caecos et perversos homines zeichnen. Hemust against the blind-pl.acc and rotten-pl.acc people-pl.acc sign. ‘He must give signs against the blind and rotten people.’ (g) (about the devil) (588) Der kann das verbum nit leyden. He can the word-sg.acc not stand ‘He can’t stand the (holy) word. In all these examples, the matrix language is German. Yet Latin elements are inserted into the grammatical frame of German. In the examples given here,6 the insertions are either single non-inflected elements such as conjunctional adverbials (ideo, sed), or they are phrases (adjectival, prepositional, or NPs), whose internal structure is entirely Latin. These EL islands are either single stems with a Latin inflectional ending (such as the accusative fin+em in [e]), or more complex NPs in which the noun is modified by an adjective (ultima 6

There are also numerous cases of alternational mixing in the data.

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stultitia [e]), or a genitive NP (fratris consilio [c]). If the NP is governed by the German verb it takes on the Latin case ending required by this verb (such as the dative in [c]).7 Prepositional phrases can be inserted as a Latin EL island together with the preposition (as in [e], in ultima stultitia, or in [d], cum viperis et pharisaeis or in [b], in vita sua); alternatively, the preposition can also be German but the dependent NP Latin (f). In a number of cases, the embedded Latin phrase is additionally marked by German grammatical words such as a definite article ([g]; but cf. [e], where the German definite article is lacking before finem). In a few cases, other parts of speech, such as the adjective modifying the subject pronoun securus in (b), are treated as an EL island. There is then a strong tendency in Latin/German code-mixing as practiced by the humanists around Luther to avoid full integration of Latin elements into the grammar of New High German. Instead, in insertional mixing, Latin elements almost always carry along their grammatical marking, and often they even occur in larger EL islands. In other bilingual communities, a different strategy of single lexeme mixing is preferred in which uninflected words or stems of the embedded language are inserted into the matrix of the other language. In this case, all grammatical elements come from the matrix language. As the grammatical integration of the borrowed lexical material is nearly total, some researchers have argued that we are not dealing with mixing here at all, but rather with a completely different type of bilingual talk, i.e. ad hoc (“nonce”) borrowing (see Poplack 2004 for a summary of arguments). This is largely a terminological issue, but it shows that the two strategies are very different. An example of a multilingual community in which minimal lexical insertion and total integration into the matrix language is preferred is the Hungarian-German-Romanian community of Neu-Palota (as described by Szabó 2010), an old German-speaking settlement in the Banat region in presentday Romania.8 Although EL islands are not absent, the dominant pattern is one of complete integration of single stems. Since case marking on the noun is hardly existent in German, this means, for instance, that Hungarian nouns are inserted in their bare (nominative) form in German matrix sentences, even though Hungarian would require a case ending (Hungarian in italics): 7

8

Some exceptions to this rule – i.e. cases in which the Latin ending does not follow the case frame of the German verb, but rather its Latin equivalent – are discussed in Auer and Muhamedova (2005). I’m glossing over some details here, such as simplifications in the structure of Hungarian verbs when inserted into German. Double marking is not unusual, particularly in the plural. The German dialect found in mixing has converged in several aspects towards Hungarian. See Szabó (2010) for a full description.

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(7) (from Szabó 2010) (a) weil et arweit och dort drauß beim olasz (p. 341) because she works also there out with-the Italian ‘because she also works out there at the Italian’s’ (b) hát ich weiß einmal wie of kezelés war, well I know once when on treatment was-1./3.sg demal warscht du och of kezelés mit der (.) mitmama at-that-time were you also on treatment with the with-mother net, (p. 338) right ‘well, I remember, once when I was away for therapy, then you too were away for therapy together with the sister of your brother/sister-in-law’ In (7a), Hungarian would require an adessive case suffix (-nál), in (7b) a superessive suffix (-en). If German requires a suffix, such as in the plural, the Hungarian insertion usually receives the German suffix -e or -er: (8) awer ich brich vielleichter mei schuh net ausziehe, but I need perhaps my shoe not take-off dass ich soll abzähle wie viel fagylalt-e, so-that I should count how often ice cream-pl wie viel (-) eis ich geese han. in zweiunsiebzig jahr. how much ice cream I eaten have. in seventy two years. weil nur ((claps hands)) zammelese die garas-er, because only ((claps hands)) collect the mite-pl da mer kunnen ofbau wat. so-that we can build-up something. ‘But perhaps I don’t have to take off my shoe to be able to count how many ice creams – how much ice cream I have eaten in seventy two years. Because we only had to contribute our mite so that we were able to build up something.’

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There are two Hungarian insertions in this extract (from Szabó 2010: 353) – fagylalt and garas – which are both marked by the German plural suffixes attached to the base form (= nominative singular) of the Hungarian word. The insertion of an EL island is avoided. Even more remarkable are the following examples in which a derivational affix is attached to a Hungarian adjectival stem that is inserted into German. Since German adjectives are not regularly marked morphologically at all, the affixation of the German adjective-forming -ig ending to Hungarian stems is not required by German grammar. Even more so, it is evidence for the speakers’ preference to integrate the Hungarian material explicitly into the German sentence frame: (9)

(a) und de péterke is gyáva-ig. (p. 360) and the Peter-dim is coward-ish ‘and little Peter is a coward’ (b) na waren son (-) solche szivacs-ig-e (.) then were such-a these sponge-ish-pl fressel so mackor welche, und has (p. 376) food-stuff like little-bears some, and rabbit ‘and there were those (-) these spongy food stuff like some little bears and rabbits’

The Hungarian nouns gyáva ‘coward’ and szivacs ‘sponge’ are turned into adjectives by the German derivational suffix -ig; the newly formed adjective szivacsig is additionally pluralized by the German plural suffix -e. (The projected head noun of the utterance is not produced; rather, the speaker breaks off and continues with a German singular noun, i.e. fressel ‘food’.) The mixed style of the Banat Swabian settlers even allows for the German dialectal participle circumfix g-X-t to be attached to Hungarian verbs in their base form (Szabó 2010: 299–317; also cf. Földes 2005: 133): (10) (a) welchen tag hat K. g-vállal-t? (p. 300) which day has K. part-take-part ‘which day did K. choose?’ (b) na han mer uns immer g-vitáz-t (p. 301) then have we us always part-quarrel-part ‘so we always quarreled’

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The basic forms of the Hungarian verbs vállal and vitáz are used here just like German verb stems and receive the German participle-forming circumfix. The result looks like a German verb in all respects. Note in passing that the lexical elements that are inserted into the German sentence frames are not restricted to those referring to ‘new’ cultural spheres added to the traditional German lexicon in order to cope with modern conditions of life. Some of them clearly affect the core area of the vocabulary (as shown particularly well by the examples in [10]). This is important since some researchers have claimed that language mixing only serves to integrate additional vocabulary (“cultural borrowings”) from the majority language (and majority society) into a language, while in “mixed languages” (fusion) it affects the core vocabulary (Backus 2003). The data from Neu Palota demonstrate that this is not the case. In this section, I have shown that the two basic strategies of insertional mixing are minimal lexical insertions (“ad hoc borrowing”) with maximal integration into the matrix language, and maximal insertion in the format of EL island insertions into the matrix language. These strategies correspond with the two basic formats observed in fused lects. Minimal lexical insertions are the equivalent of fused lects with relexification (fusion by lexical (stem) insertion); maximal insertions in the format of EL islands are the equivalent of grammatical fusion in fused lects. These parallels strongly suggest that the two types of fused lects have their basis in corresponding insertional strategies of mixing. In fact, the data from Gurindji/Kriol mixing presented by McConvell (2008: 191–194) prove this point; they show that the mixing patterns are reproduced in the newly emerged Gurindji Kriol: (11) Gurindji/Kriol mixing (McConvell 2008: 191; Gurindji in italics) kaa-rni-mpal said orait yutubala kat-im ngaji-rlang-kulu east-up-across side alright 2du cut-trn father-dyad-erg ‘You two, father and son, cut it across the east (side of the cow)’ (12) Gurindji Kriol (McConvell 2008: 193) an skul-ta-ma jei bin hab-im sport karu-walija-ngku. And school-loc-top 3pl.s pst have-trn sport child-pauc-erg ‘And the kids had sport at school.’ The two insertions from Gurindji into the Kriol matrix sentence in (11) are EL islands with an internal constituent structure conforming to the grammar of Gurindji: an initial directional expression and a transitive subject NP

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in final position. The Gurindji Kriol utterance in (12) is based on the fusion of a Kriol matrix into which the two islands are inserted, a local adverbial phrase, and a final subject NP. But what exactly happens on the way from mixing to fusion? As in all processes of grammaticization, the first change is obviously the conventionalization of certain mixing patterns. In a fused lect, the speakers no longer have a choice; they speak one, new language. In mixing, there is always a choice between juxtaposing elements from the two languages or using material from only one language. But conventionalization is not everything; the emergence of a fused lect out of language mixing also implies a considerable amount of regularization. This means that some mixing patterns are lost while others become more frequent. We already pointed out in the beginning of this section that perhaps the most regular type of regularization is the loss of alternational mixing patterns; in addition, a mixing style which shows minimal and maximal insertions into the matrix language may prioritize one of them in fusion. A further difference between mixing and fusion only applies to EL islands/phrasal insertion. Here, compartmentalization of the language may lead to a split between the nominal and the verbal grammar and lexicon as part of the regularization of the insertional pattern, usually conditioned by the grammatical structure of the language (head marking vs. depending marking, etc.; cf. McConvell 2008). But often, the compartmentalization is not total but allows combinations of nominal lexical material from language B with the nominal grammar of language A, or verbal lexical material from language B with the verbal grammar of language A. An example can be seen in ex. (12), i.e. the locational phrase skul-ta-ma. Gurindji Kriol has a nominal/ verbal split, and the nominal grammar of the language tends to be from Gurindji. But in skul-ta-ma, the nominal stem is Kriol, and only the suffixes are Gurindji, i.e. the nominal/verbal split is maintained in the grammatical suffixes but not the stem (no compartmentalization). Fusions like this cannot be a left-over from mixing according to the minimal insertion strategy (as in ex. [3] from Mednyi Aleut), since the direction of the insertion is reversed: Whereas in Kriol/Gurindji mixing the matrix language was Kriol, the grammatical elements in skul-ta-ma come from Gurindji, the Embedded Language. A solution to this problem will be presented in the next section (4.2.–4.4.).

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Partial fusion

In order to come to a better understanding of the way from mixing to fusion, it is not sufficient to consider the final outcome of this grammaticization, i.e. the “mixed language” in its final state of development. Rather, it is useful to look at incipient and intermediate stages in the conventionalization of mixing formats as well. Their investigation can provide a glimpse into the way fused lects emerge. In this section, I will look at some examples of this partial fusion. Far from providing a full and coherent picture, the following is only intended as a first unsystematic collection of cases, each of which is very different and deserves further extensive treatment. The varieties discussed show some amount of fusion, but they would not be called “mixed languages” since the fusion only affects a section of the language. We will start with minor and unspectacular kinds of fusion and end with some examples in which the classification of the variety in question as a “mixed language” in the sense of extreme fusion is already possible, although not suggested here. 4.1. Fusion of discourse marker and modal particle systems The most frequent case of incipient fusion beyond the mere borrowing of lexical material is certainly the borrowing of another language’s system of discourse markers (including tag questions and hesitation markers) and/or modal particles. Conjunctions (particularly coordinating ones) are often included in this list as well, which is plausible as their discourse meaning in spoken interaction often comes close to that of discourse markers. The phenomenon is widespread and has been documented extensively (cf. Matras 1998, 2000, 2007). In order to speak of fusion, a substantial part of the system of discourse markers/particles has to be borrowed, not just a single marker, either replacing the system of the receiving language or adding to it (particularly if the receiving language has few or no particles). The borrowed markers may change their meaning in order to fit into the new fused system. An example is the Sinti variety spoken in Germany which Holzinger (1993) describes. Here, discourse markers, modal particles, and some conjunctional elements (in addition to separable verb prefixes, which present another case of fusion, see 4.2.) are taken from German and solidly fused with the Romani variety:

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(13) (from Holzinger 1993: 322; German-origin elements in italics) Ach kai denn? oh where part Kon dsˇajas denn koi hin, who wen part there to,

me doch gar! I part not

Naja, dann his noch mire gesvistre ap o vurdi pre. well, then was still my siblings on the wagon up ‘So where? Who went there indeed, certainly not me! Well, then my siblings were still on the wagon.’ This short passage includes two German-origin discourse markers/interjections (ach, naja), three modal particles (denn in the first and second line, which is used for emphatic questions, and doch in the second line, used as an appeal to common knowledge), and one temporal adverbial (dann, used primarily to advance the narrative by introducing a next narrative step). Other examples are the system of French discourse markers borrowed into Shaba Swahili (de Rooij 1996), the system of English discourse markers copied into German varieties spoken in the U.S. (Salmon 1990), or the system of Russian interjections and discourse markers borrowed into Karelian (Sarhimaa 1999: 234–235). The borrowing of discourse markers, particles and conjunctions (which Matras subsumes under the term “utterance modifiers”) also occurs in more heavily fused varieties (such as the ones discussed in section 2), and of course it is also part of language mixing in many bilingual communities. The important step towards fusion is reached when the utterance modifiers can no longer be replaced by the respective elements of the receiving language. Mixing in discourse markers is different from simple lexical borrowing as it clearly affects another layer of meaning. Discourse markers and modal particles operate on a “metapragmatic” level (as Matras rightly argues), i.e. they direct the hearer towards the intended interpretation of the speaker’s utterance. This system of metapragmatics can be said to be part of a discourse grammar of the language. 4.2. Fusion of two systems of derivational morphology English and German both show traces of fusion as a consequence of extensive lexical borrowing from French, even though this language contact was

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too much controlled by norm-setting language authorities to proceed beyond a certain point. (A similar point could be made for Scandinavian languages, particularly Danish, with respect to (Low) German influence.) As is well known, both English and German derivational morphology show a characteristic compartmentalization. The reason is language contact: From the thirteenth/fourteenth century onwards, but particularly between 1500–1700 (and again in the nineteenth century), both languages borrowed a large amount of vocabulary from French (and Latin), above all learned vocabulary. But the French impact went far beyond the borrowing of words; it also brought into the languages a whole system of new derivational means, which were generalized out of the borrowed complex words to become part of the derivational system of the receiving languages. However, the productive domain of these borrowed derivational affixes is up to the present day limited almost entirely to the ‘non-native’ lexicon: For instance, ‘native’ Germanic words only very rarely combine with non-native Germanic derivational affixes. Examples are the German noun-forming derivational suffixes -ität (from French -ité), (at)ion, -ant/-ent, -eur, -ismus, -ist, the adjectiveforming derivational suffixes -abel/-ibel, -esk, -ös (fr. -able/-ible, -esque, -eux), and the verb-forming derivational suffixes -ifizieren, -isieren; they almost exclusively attach to (neo-)Latin, (neo-) Greek or French stems (cf. Dignität, Student, Voyeur, grotesk, melodiös, harmonisieren). A look into the history of this compartmentalization shows that it was not consistently adhered to throughout. For instance, Hilpert (2013) analyses the borrowing of the French derivational suffix -ment into English. New words (types) with -ment entering the language were particularly frequent up to around 1600, after which their number declined (although the total number of nouns ending in -ment continued to increase). Whereas the number of derivations borrowed as such was particularly high until 1500, the number of newly derived forms created in English after the pattern of the French words increased over this time, and, from 1550 onwards, was much higher than that of the direct borrowings. The interesting point for our discussion is that around 1500, there were no restrictions against the use of -ment with a Germanic stem (as shown by words like renewment, embitterment), even though some of these words later disappeared again, cf. desightment (‘the act of making unsightly’), shatterment (‘the act of shattering’) or worsenment (‘the process of getting worse’).9 Since the influence of French (and Latin) was largely restricted to the domain of derivation, we would not want to call English or German a fused

9

All examples from OED, as cited by Hilpert (2013).

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language. However, the way in which derivational grammar was borrowed into these languages is instructive. It demonstrates how grammatical affixes are borrowed from one language into another. They start out as borrowed words, without a productive grammatical structure that can be used in the receiving language. Once a sufficient number of borrowed words of the same type are available, speakers distill a constructional pattern out of them, which can then become productive. This productivity can be unconstrained when all restrictions on stem–affix compatibility are lifted (a tendency which can be observed for -ment in English around 1500), but the more usual way is to limit the productivity of the grammatical affix to stems of a language which is deemed to be compatible with the affix (usually the same language from which the affix was copied). The early phases of in toto borrowing initially require bilingual speakers, who insert the words in question into their speech through intentional code-switching and mixing. Once the derivational pattern is part of the receiving language, no bilingualism is required to introduce new words following this pattern. The fusion of the derivational system of a language with that of another one is a process which is also observed in languages other than English and German, of course. Benítez-Torres (2009) discusses the borrowing of derivational morphology from Berber into Tagdal, a Northern Songhay language of northern and central Niger. Present-day Tagdal has many features of Berber which separate it from the Southern Songhai languages. Among them is phonology, a large part of the lexicon, the lack of tone, as well as many morphological influences. The derivational system has three valencechanging prefixes which are all of Berber origin: the causative, passive, and reciprocal prefix. The important point is that these prefixes only attach to Berber stems, i.e. the fused part of the language is compartmentalized just like in English and German. If, for instance, a Songhay active verb is to be passivized, the Songhay stem has to be replaced by a Berber stem (which in turn would not be used without the derivational affix in Tagdal). (14)(Tagdal, from Benítez-Torres 2009: 77; Berber origin elements in italics) (a) active voice γa-

b- baay- a 1s imp know 3s ‘I know it.’

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(b) passive voice a- b- tuw-asən 3s imp pass.known ‘It is known.’ While the Songhay verb for ‘to know’ is bay, it is replaced in the passive by its Berber equivalent sən, so that the passivizing, originally Berber prefix tuwcan be attached to it. The inflectional system of Tagdal is entirely Songhay. The verbal grammar therefore shows fusion between a Berber derivational and a Songhay inflectional system. Benítez-Torres argues that Tagdal is a Songhay language acquired by Berber-speaking conquerors who learned the language of the people whose lands they had occupied. He also argues that the fusion must have been the result of widespread Berber/Songhay bilingualism and codemixing, in an “abrupt genesis” (80) which did not leave enough time to exchange the derivational system as well. Regardless of whether this reconstruction is correct, Tagdal is a language which clearly shows fusion in its verbal grammar, accompanied by compartmentalization. Just like in English or German, borrowed derivational affixes only combine with borrowed lexical stems. Benítez-Torres states that the basis of this fusion was mixing, presumably after a matrix-language turn-over. In the mixing phase, stems and derivational prefixes were inserted together into frames that included the matrix language’s inflectional morphology. This is what we find in German and English as well. The mixing strategy was somewhere between the minimal and the maximal strategy outlined above. 4.3. Fusion by the borrowing of grammatical words “Utterance modifiers” are not always easy to separate from grammatical words, and as argued above, some grammatical words (conjunctions and adverbials in particular) tend to change their status and become discourse markers (Auer and Günthner 2005). Yet, while discourse markers may be said to be part of the discourse grammar of a language, grammatical words are part of the sentence grammar which is more tightly structured. Borrowing material from another language into this part of the grammar is therefore a more radical step. Nevertheless, this kind of fusion is quite frequently observed. Let us consider two examples. The first example comes from the speech of German settlements in Romania (previously Hungary) which we already discussed as an example of

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language mixing in section 3. In some cases, the communities have gone beyond mixing and proceeded towards grammatical fusion. A case in point is the system of subordinating irrelevance particles which in most varieties of “Danube Swabian” (Donauschwäbisch, including the variety of Neu-Palota) is regularly constructed on the basis of the Hungarian stem akar- and a German dialectal interrogative (cf. Szabó 2010: 381): “Danube Swabian”

std. German

Hungarian gloss

akár-wer akár-was akár-wu akár-wuhin akár-wann akár-wie

wer auch immer was auch immer wo auch immer wohin auch immer wann auch immer wie auch immer

akár-ki akár-mi akár-hol akár-hova akár-mikor akár-hogy

‘whoever’ ‘whatever’ ‘wherever’ (local) ‘wherever’ (directional) ‘whenever’ ‘however’

Since the new system of irrelevance particles is based on the compounding of a Hungarian and a German element, this is also an example of the borrowing of word-formation patterns. An example of the discourse use of akár- is the following: (15) (German dialect of Neu-Palota, Romania, from Szabó 2010: 383; Hungarian-origin elements in italics) weil ákerwann i hnausgon of die gass, because whenever I out-go on the street niemal never

einmal once

grießen greet

se they

net not

ungarisch Hungarian

‘because whenever I go out into the street, they don’t even greet (me) in Hungarian.’ It is obvious that this German dialect has restructured the entire system of German irrelevance particles (which in std. German is only moderately grammaticized, as the lack of phonological univerbation indicates). The language-internal reason is perhaps the simplification resulting from such a fusion and the fact that the standard German irrelevance particles are rather alien to the traditional dialects. The newly created irrelevance particles can also be used as indefinite pronouns (16) and adverbials (17), which is not possible in standard German, where the indefinite pronoun is irgendjemand, and the indefinite adverbial irgendwohin:

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(16) (German dialect of Neu-Palota, Romania, from Szabó 2010: 387; Hungarian-origin elements in italics) 10 hát kannst du net ákerwer in de haus tien 10 but can-2sg you not somebody in the house do ‘but you can’t let anybody into the house’ (17) (German dialect of Neu-Palota, Romania, from Szabó 2010: 387; Hungarian in italics) hiába geiht der P. bácsi áker wohin, dat in-vain goes the P. uncle.sg.nom wherever, that musse auszahle must-he pay.inf ‘wherever uncle P. goes, he has to pay for it’ Áker may have replaced jeder- first and now be generalized to the use of an irrelevance conjunction. One would hypothesize that the first step was the insertion of Hungarian indefinite pronouns and indefinite adverbials into the German matrix as a whole. Indeed, such a process of mixing is documented in my second example, Chiac, the variety of French spoken in Moncton, Canada. In this variety, Perrot (1995, 1998, 2001, 2003, 2005) observes the copying of a number of English grammatical elements (in addition to utterance modifiers) and their fusion with the grammar of monolingual Canadian French among young speakers. The variety described by Perrot has replaced the entire system of French indefinites (determiners, pronouns, adverbials, and irrelevance pronouns) by their English counterparts: (18) (youth variety of Chiac in Moncton, Canada; from Perrot 2003: 273; English-origin items italicized) (a)

Whoever qui travaille à MacDonald’s là, everybody haït ça. ‘Whoever who works at MacDonalds there, everybody hates it.’

(b)

Nobody se moque de moi. ‘Nobody makes fun of me.’

10

“Danube Swabian” has also partly borrowed the Hungarian system of utterance modifiers.

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Fusion in the Chiac variety investigated by Perrot also includes intensifiers (such as right, as in j’aime right ça ‘I like just that’; that as in c’est pas that bon ‘it’s not that good’, Perrot 2003: 274; quite a, as in: c’était quite a différence ‘it was quite a difference’, on a eu quite a batailles ‘we had quite some fights’; cf. Perrot 2003: 275), possessives (ils faisont encore leur own affaire ‘they still do their own thing’, instead of post-positioned French ils faisont encore leur affaire à eux; cf. Young 2002: 119) and prepositions (such as about as to mark prepositional objects, as in parler about ‘think about’ instead of de, and penser about ‘think about’ instead of à; or local prepositions as in i allont over un cliff ‘they go over a cliff ’; Perrot 1998: 221; Young 2002: 129–131). Perrot takes pains to underline that we are not dealing with language mixing here, since the code has stabilized (i.e. it has become conventionalized). This stabilization has led to some adaptations of English to the French matrix, as the example on a eu quite a batailles shows: Here, the singular indefinite article of English does seem to have lost its grammatical meaning, and quite a has become a single word that can modify the noun batailles, which is plural. Intensifiers need a head to be modified, and prepositions govern an argument. In both cases, the borrowed grammatical word cannot form a phrase on its own. Interestingly, there is variation in Chiac between examples in which the grammatical English word combines with a French element to form a phrase, and others in which the whole phrase is in English: cf. for the latter case ça m’excite pas that much ‘that doesn’t excite me that much’, j’aime pretty much tout except la country ‘I like pretty much everything except country (music)’, c’était quite a trip ‘it was quite a trip’, le TV était improv-é quite a bit ‘the TV has improved quite a bit’ (Perrot 2003: 274–275); i aviont fait un movie about it ‘they have made a movie about it’ (Perrot 1995: 84). This suggests that the basis of the fusion of grammatical words from English into French grammar may have been mixing of the maximizing, phrase-related type. The variety of Chiac analysed by Perrot is a youth variety. In it, the widespread format of maximizing, phrase-related mixing, which is likely to occur in other, less stabilized varieties of Chiac as well, has developed into a much more marked kind of fusion according to which single grammatical words are inserted into French. Arguably, this variety has an aspect of playful distortion of French to it, a partly conscious, identity-related effort to create something very specific which only young bilingual speakers can produce. Many researchers have suggested that this may also have been one of the mechanisms by which quicklyevolving “mixed languages” came into being. Moncton Chiac youth language may be an example which is happening before our eyes of how this works. These obviously are only some few examples of a beginning grammatical fusion on the level of grammatical words which is far from complete, and in

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which we surely would not want to speak of a fused lect yet. Many more examples are known, among them famous controversial cases such as Chamoru (Chamorro), the Malayo-Polynesian language of the Mariana Islands which used to be in heavy contact with Spanish, and as a consequence has borrowed grammatical words such as indefinite article (un); the definite article (i < el), the demonstrative (este); prepositions (sin) or the comparative construction (mas … ki < Sp. más … que) (Pagel 2010). These grammatical forms are an obligatory and non-variable part of Modern Chamoru grammar, while other borrowings are variable and alternate with Chamoru equivalents. It seems a futile discussion whether Chamoru is a “mixed language” (fused lect) (cf. Stolz 2003); there is no categorical distinction between mixed and unmixed languages, but there a good reasons to believe in gradience in fusion with Chamoru being a good and uncontroversional case of fusional processes at work. 4.4. Fusion of two systems of inflectional morphology The borrowing of derivational affixes is in the middle range of the borrowability hierarchy; in contrast, the borrowing of inflectional morphology is much rarer. However, there are also cases of partial fusion affecting the inflection of a language. We will look at an example of fusion in the inflectional grammar with a high degree of compartmentalization, and another example in which no such compartmentalization is observed. An example of inflectional fusion with compartmentalization is Komotini Romani, a Romani variety spoken in Greek Thrace today (Adamou 2010). Nowadays, the Komotini Roma are trilingual, speaking Greek, Turkish, and Romani. The speakers distinguish between “pure Romani” and their own Romani variety, called xoraxane romane ‘Turkish-Romani’. Like numerous other Romani dialects of the North and South Balkan as well as of the South Vlax group (cf. Friedman 2008), this variety of Romani borrowed extensively from Turkish due to long-term dialect contact during the Ottoman Empire. Among these borrowings are conjunctions (as expected; cf. 4.1.) such as adversative (j)ama ‘but’, the negative answer particle ayir (turk. hayır), time adverbials and grammatical words such as indefinites (er, from turk. her ‘all’, ‘every’), the focus marker/coordinator -da and the obligation marker lazım, in addition to a large number of lexical borrowings. But most remarkably, Komotini Roma has borrowed the time, aspect, mode, number, and person system of Turkish which is used with all Turkish verbal stems. (Borrowed nouns by and large are integrated into Roma morphology.) The use of these morphological forms is obligatory. The borrowed verbal stems are numer-

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ous and include a large part of the basic vocabulary. Romani stems never take on Turkish endings. Cf. the following examples: (19) (Komotini Romani, from Adamou 2010; Turkish origin parts in italics) leski kor ka tʃindol kon ama alna-ma-dak who.nom but understand-neg-fut.3sg his throat will cut.3sg ‘but the one who will not understand, I will cut his throat’ The Turkish-origin negative suffix -ma and future marker -dak are attached to the Turkish-origin stem alna- ‘to understand’ (from Turkish anla-). The first clause (kon ama alna-ma-dak) could indeed be classified as Turkish if it did not follow the Romani (Indo-European) pattern of relative clause formation unknown in Turkish. Note that the Romani verb in the second clause has no Turkish, but a Romani person suffix. This is also the case in the following example. (It additionally includes a Greek and a Romanian element which, however, must be considered examples of mixing, not fusion.) (20) (Komotini Romani, from Adamou 2010; Turkish origin parts in italics, Greek underlined, Romanian underlined and in italics) jaz-mi-jor tuke ap-ora psixoloγos/psixoloγos psychologist psychologist write-neg-prog.3sg you.dat pills-pl del tut kantʃik in nothing neg gives you.acc konuʃ-ur tusa vo mono beʃel he just sit.prs.3sg speak-prs.3sg you.instr ‘a psychologist, a psychologist, doesn’t prescribe pills to you. He gives you nothing. He just sits, talks to you.’ Here, the Turkish verbs stems jaz- (‘write’) and konuʃ- (‘speak’) are inserted together with their inflectional endings for the present continuous (-jor-), the negation (-mi), and the present tense (-ur) into a Romani sentence. Romani provides the word order, which clearly makes it the matrix language. Romani verbs are inflected in the Romani way (del, beʃel). As mentioned above, the compartmentalized fusion of borrowed (Turkish) and traditional inflectional morphology is typical of many Balkan varieties of Romani. These varieties therefore provide a good picture of the process of fusion. Friedman (2008: 133) suggests the following hierarchy which portrays this process:

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preterite < present (general and/or progressive) < clitic idi (past) < optative < future and negative < infinitive Komotini Romani has borrowed all elements excluding the infinitive. Let us now consider an example of non-compartmentalized fusion. I suggest that non-compartmentalized forms of fusion have gone through a similar phase of compartmentalized fusion, but have lifted the structural co-occurrence constraints typical of compartmentalized grammars. For instance, Pakendorf (2009) describes inflectional borrowing in the Northern Tungusic language E˙ven in Yakutia from Sakha (Yakut), the dominant language in which all speakers are fluent. Despite a long history of bilingualism and contact, the process of fusion seems to be an ongoing one, i.e. the patterns are not yet sedimented entirely. Evidence for this ongoing process from mixing to fusion is that the speakers are still aware of the use of the two languages and can identify its components, and that the patterns are still variably used. E˙ven has borrowed the mood system from Sakha which is not known in the non-fused Tungusic languages but is highly frequent and highly salient as an expressive marker in Sakha. This mood system includes (among other suffixes such as the negative present participle and the necessitative) the suffix -TAχ which Pakendorf (2009) calls “assertive-presumptive” and which is frequently used in Sakha to refer to past events in narratives. I suggest that this copying is a consequence of language mixing in which the whole predicate was inserted from Sakha into E˙ven. Evidence for this interpretation comes from the fact that the assertive-presumptive suffix is always copied together with the person suffix: (21) (Sebjan-Küöl E˙ven, from Pakendorf 2009: 94; Sakha-origin elements in italics) ejm-u koke-ri-ke-n´un-ni tar mother-poss.1sg die-impf.ptc-dim-com-poss.3sg dist other honte ahi·-w ga-j-dag-a=di: woman-acc take-conn-ass-poss.3sg-emph ‘as soon as my mother died he took another wife’ In this example, the assertive-presumptive suffix plus the person suffix attach to an E˙ven stem. But there are also examples in which the entire VP is Sakha. To begin with, there is an analytic form of the assertive-presumptive which is based on the Sakha auxiliary buol and which is inserted together with the suffix -TAχ and the person suffix into an E˙ven sentence:

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(22) (Sebjan-Küöl E˙ven, from Pakendorf 2009: 97; Sakha origin parts in italics) 11 nehi:le i·lan-n´u· n ki·la:h-a-lkan buol-lag-i· m=di: 11 barely, three-com grade -ep-prop aux-ass-poss.1sg=emph ‘I have barely done three grades (at school)’ But even more, whole VPs with a lexical stem from Sakha are also attested: (23) (Sebjan-Küöl E˙ven, from Pakendorf 2009: 101; Sakha in italics)

12

buolla kïajan tik-pet tari·t buolla, u· nta-w-u· 12 fur.boots-acc-poss-1sg dp be.able sew-neg then dp buol-lag-i· m=di: aux-ass-poss.1sg=emph ‘and then, well I can’t sew fur boots, right’ These phrasal constituents are classified as “switches” by Pakendorf, i.e. language mixing, which she believes to have been the origin of present-day E˙ven with its partially fused inflectional system. Mixing following the pattern in (23), then, was the entry point for copying the Sakha inflectional system into E˙ven. A plausible path in the grammaticization of the present-day system is that Sakha verbs were first inserted as a part of VP-islands following the maximal insertion strategy into E˙ven matrix clauses, together with their modal and person affixes. However, E˙ven did not compartmentalize, i.e. Sakha suffixes could not only be used with Sakha verb stems, but also with E˙ven verbs. The fact that only some inflectional endings (those of the modal system) were fused into the monolingual grammar of E˙ven is best explained by the fact that they were highly salient in Sakha to bilingual Sakha/E˙ven speakers, but lacking in their own language. As the process of conventionalization is not finished yet, E˙ven is indeed a real-time example of how such forms can enter a language, starting with initial code-switching by some speakers, developing into established codes in their linguistic repertoire, and over time and with constant repetition by this group of innovators finally entering the language of those speakers of Sebjan-Küöl E˙ven who are not radically opposed to Sakha copies, but who view them as salient features of their dialect (Pakendorf 2009: 106).

11 12

Russian loanword. Discourse markers are also frequently borrowed from Sakha.

Language mixing and language fusion

5.

327

Fusion within a language family?

Due to a curious division of labor, linguists who work on bilingualism are rarely interested in the long-term consequences bilingualism can have on the language systems of the two languages involved. On the opposite side, linguists working on language contact almost exclusively deal with structural outcomes, but show little interest in the question of how these structural changes have originated in bilingual talk. Yet, it is difficult to imagine how structural language contact could take place without prior manifestations in bilingual talk. The aim of this paper was to look into the conventionalization of bilingual speech and into its long-term grammaticization in the structure of a language. The example discussed in some detail here was how language fusion can emerge from language mixing. There seems to be growing agreement today that even extreme results of language fusion – so-called mixed languages – result from discourse-based mixing through regularization and conventionalization. Such a development is also compatible with the sociolinguistic embedding of language mixing at the discourse level and that of radically fused lects: In both cases, matters of group identity seem to be of utmost importance. Both mixing and fused lects are products of identity construction – they do not emerge out of the need to understand each other, as do pidgins, and they are not a mere matter of interference and substrate influence after language acquisition or shift. The main argument I have put forward here is that language fusion is the result of the conventionalization of the two basic strategies of insertional mixing (alternational mixing was shown to be unsuitable for conventionalization). These two basic mixing strategies have been amply documented in studies on bilingual talk, where they may occur in isolation or in combination. The first strategy, called minimal insertion here, consists of inserting stems (or uninflected words) from one language into the grammatical frame (“matrix”) of the other language without any accompanying grammar. In this case the lexical material from the inserted language is accommodated completely to the grammatical structure of the matrix language. (Phonology and phonetics are not necessarily affected.) The second strategy, called maximal insertion or “embedded island” insertion here, prefers to bring the other-language item(s) into the matrix frame together with the accompanying grammatical markers (affixes or grammatical words) and often extends to the phrase level. I have argued that these two strategies are the equivalents of the two main patterns of language fusion which can account for the structure of radically fused (“mixed”) languages. Minimal insertion in mixing is the basis of the

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structure of “symbiotic” fused lects, in which the fusion affects the lexicon of one language and the grammar of another. The grammar is entirely in language B, and lexical items (usually stems) are selectively inserted into this pattern (examples are Media Lengua, or Para-Romani). Maximal insertion, on the other hand, accounts for the second group of fused lects in which two grammars merge. While symbiotic fused lects can occur without any traces of maximal insertion, the group of grammatically fused lects usually also shows minimal insertion as well. This group is therefore more heterogeneous. Fused grammatical systems that most directly reflect the stage of maximal insertional mixing are those in which a strong compartmentalization of grammar and lexicon occurs, which may result in a split between verbal and nominal grammar (as in Michif or Gurindji Kriol). But such a split is not a necessary correlate of compartmentalization; rather, it is dependent on the grammatical structure of the two languages in contact. Non-split compartmentalized fusion occurs as well (e.g. in radically fused languages such as Ottoman Turkish and Kormakiti Arabic). Weak or one-way compartmentalization may be due to various reasons, most obviously (if the non-compartmentalized part allows for combinations of Matrix Language grammar with Embedded Language stems) to the conventionalization of a co-occurrence of minimal and maximal insertion strategies at the mixing stage (Mednyi Aleut). On the contrary, if the non-compartmentalized part allows for the combination of Embedded Language grammar with Matrix Language stems, a generalization of the grammatical structure of the Embedded Language islands to Matrix Language stems is likely to have occurred (E˙ven, Chiac). In section 4 of the paper I have presented varieties that were or are in a process of grammatical fusion but have not reached (and will perhaps never reach) the extreme forms of fusion known from “mixed languages”. The weakest forms are cases in which the system of “utterance modifiers” (Matras), most notably discourse markers and conjunctions, are borrowed and made an obligatory part of the receiving varieties. In this case, the distinction between maximal and minimal insertion plays no role. The next step is the copying of derivational grammar (word formation) as in German, English, or Tagdal (in the latter case already deeply linked to syntax). The underlying mixing strategy is still minimal here, but fusion implies the grammatical analysis and productive use of the borrowed grammatical elements. In the case of fusion of language B derivational grammar into language A grammar, it is possible to distinguish between compartmentalized and non-compartmentalized results (in the latter case, the borrowed derivational elements of grammar freely combine with stems of the receiving language in addition to those of the source language). A next step consists in the integration of grammatical words, which

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may or may not be phrase-building, into the borrowing languages (Chiac). The basis of this kind of fusion is Embedded Language mixing. Patterns corresponding exactly to the maximal insertion strategy in mixing are observed alongside with the generalized use of the borrowed grammatical words with content words of the receiving variety. Finally, fusion in the domain of inflectional affixes was discussed (Balkan Romani, E˙ven). Again, the compartmentalized version (corresponding to maximal insertion of Embedded Language islands) and its generalization to all stems was observed. Considering partial grammatical fusion in addition to radical fusion (“mixed languges”) shows that the latter are less exotic with respect to the patterns of borrowing than one might think. As Thomason (1995) puts it: “It is only the results that are extraordinary. The actual processes that lead to these extreme outcomes are quite ordinary”. Keeping these results in mind, we can now turn again to the question of whether fusion is restricted to unrelated languages, or requires a certain structural distance between the languages involved. It is true that most examples for “mixed languages” (radical fusion) come from situations in which unrelated languages are in contact. (Exceptions are fusions of the “symbiotic” type, such as Anglo-Romani or Lekoudesh.) However, once we include partial fusion in the picture, and look at fusion as a process rather than a state, the number of examples increases in which e.g. two Indo-European languages are involved. This suggests that the scarcity of examples of radical fusion between two languages from the same language family is probably not due to structural factors but rather a result of the social conditions under which such extreme cases arise. Family resemblance therefore does not exclude fusion. Now we can take the argument one step further and ask how closely related two varieties can be in order for grammatical fusion to occur. Can fusion even take place between two varieties of a language (two dialects, or a dialect and the standard variety), or between mutually intelligible languages such as Swedish and Norwegian or Belarusian and Russian (cf. Hentschel 2008 and in this volume)? In the spirit of the hypothesis of this paper (i.e. that fusion is grammaticization of mixing), the question cannot be answered but a more precise prediction can be derived. If it is true that fusion is a sedimentation of patterns of mixing on the discourse level, then the absence of such mixing would make fusion impossible. More precisely, if mixing between two varieties follows neither the “maximal insertion” nor the “minimal insertion” strategy, no fusion will emerge – at least not the kind of fusion known from so-called “mixed languages”. This prediction needs to be tested empirically. There are cases of contact between very closely related languages

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or varieties which show precisely the patterns of mixing that are the basis of fusion, and nothing should prevent such mixing patterns from becoming sedimentated. However, in structurally very close varieties, other forms of mixing are also observed, and the reasons for these types of mixing – untypical for contact between structurally distant languages – must surely be located on the structural level (cf. Muysken’s “congruent lexicalization”, Muysken 2000, as well as Berruto 2005 who discusses many pertinent examples from contact between standard Italian and dialects). In these cases, different mechanisms are at work and mixing need not follow the constraints observed between more distant languages. The resulting structures, if grammaticized, would not fall under the term fusion. In sum: family resemblance is unlikely to be a good predictor for the grammaticization from mixing to fusion; however, extremely close resemblance within a language family (such as that between immediate siblings) may trigger additional processes not known from contact between more distant languages.

References Adamou, Evangelia 2010 Bilingual speech and language ecology in Greek Thrace: Romani and Pomak in contact with Turkish. Language in Society 39 (2): 147–171. Auer, Peter 1999 From code-switching via language mixing to fused lects: toward a dynamic typology of bilingual speech. International Journal of Bilingualism 3 (4): 309–332. Auer, Peter and Susanne Günthner 2005 Die Entstehung von Diskursmarkern im Deutschen – ein Fall von Grammatikalisierung? In: Torsten Leuschner, Tanja Mortelmans and Sarah de Groodt (eds.), Grammatikalisierung im Deutschen, 335–362. (Linguistik – Impulse und Tendenzen 9.) Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Auer, Peter and Raihan Mohamedova 2005 ‘Embedded language’ and ‘matrix language’ in insertional language mixing: some problematic cases. Italian Journal of Linguistics / Rivista di linguistica 17 (1) (special issue “Commutazione di codice e teoria linguistica”, edited by Gaetano Berruto): 35–54. Backus, Ad 2003 Can a mixed language be conventionalized alternation codeswitching? In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 237–270. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Bakker, Peter 1996 Language intertwining and convergence: typological aspects of the genesis of mixed languages. Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung 49 (1): 9–20. Bakker, Peter 2003 Mixed languages as autonomous systems. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 107–150. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Benítez-Torres, Carlos M. 2009 Inflectional vs. derivational morphology in Tagdal: a mixed language. In: Masangu Matondo, Fiona McLaughlin and Eric Potsdam (eds.), Selected Proceedings of the 38th Annual Conference on African Linguistics: Linguistic Theory and African Language Documentation, 69–83. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.

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Berruto, Gaetano 2005 Dialect/standard convergence, mixing, and models of language contact: the case of Italy. In: Peter Auer, Frans Hinskens and Paul Kerswill (eds.), Dialect Contact, 81–95. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Boretzky, Norbert and Birgit Igla 1994 Wörterbuch Romani – Deutsch – Englisch für den südosteuropäischen Raum. Mit einer Grammatik der Dialektvarianten. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Borg, Alexander 1984 Kormakiti Arabic: Phonological notes and texts. Journal of Arabic Linguistics 13, 68–85. de Rooij, Vincent A. 1996 Cohesion through Contrast: Discourse Structure in Shaba Swahili/ French Conversations. Amsterdam: IFOTT. de Smit, Merlijn 2010 Modelling mixed languages: some remarks on the case of Old Helsinki Slang. Journal of Language Contact VARIA 3: 1–19. Flamenbaum, Rachel in press The pragmatics of codeswitching on Ghanaian talkradio. International Journal of Bilingualism. Földes, Csaba 2005 Kontaktdeutsch. Tübingen: Narr. Friedman, Victor A. 2008 Codeswitching and code integration in Romani. In: Max Bane, Juan José Bueno Holle, Thomas Grano, April Lynn Grotberg and Yaron McNabb (eds.), Proceedings from the Annual Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society 44 (2), 123–138. Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society. Golovko, Evgenyi 1994 Mednij Aleut or Copper Island Aleut: an Aleut-Russian mixed language. In: Peter Bakker and Maarten Mous (eds.), Mixed Languages: 15 case studies in languages intertwining, 113–121. Amsterdam: IFOTT. Golovko, Evgenyi 2003 Language contact and group identity: The Role of ‘Folk’ Linguistic Engineering. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 177–209. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Hentschel, Gerd 2008 Zur weißrussisch-russischen Hybridität in der weißrussischen “Trasjanka”. In: Peter Kosta and Daniel Weiss (eds.), Slavistische Linguistik 2006/2007, 169–219. München: Otto Sagner. Hilpert, Martin 2013 Constructional Change in English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Holzinger, Daniel 1993 Das Rómanes: Grammatik und Diskursanalyse der Sprache der Sinte. Innsbruck: Institut für Sprachwissenschaft. Jarva, Vesa 2008 Old Helsinki Slang and language mixing. Journal of Language Contact VARIA 1: 52–80. Matras, Yaron 1998 Utterance modifiers and universals of grammatical borrowing. Linguistics 36: 281–331. Matras, Yaron 2000 Fusion and the cognitive basis for bilingual discourse markers. International Journal of Bilingualism 4: 505–528. Matras, Yaron 2002 Romani: A Linguistic Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Matras, Yaron 2003 Mixed languages: re-examining the structural prototype. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 151–176. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Matras, Yaron 2007 The borrowability of grammatical categories. In: Yaron Matras and Jeanett Sakel (eds.), Grammatical Borrowing in Cross-Linguistic Perspective, 31–74. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Matras, Yaron 2009 Language Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Matras, Yaron and Peter Bakker 2003 The study of mixed languages. In: Yaron Mat-

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ras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 1–20. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Matras, Yaron and Peter Bakker (eds.) 2003 The Mixed Language Debate. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Matras, Yaron and Jeanett Sakel (eds.) 2007 Grammatical Borrowing in Cross-Linguistic Perspective. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. McConvell, Patrick 2008 Mixed languages as outcomes of code-switching: recent examples from Australia and their implications. Journal of Language Contact 2: 186–212. McConvell, Patrick and Felicity Meakins 2005 Gurindji Kriol: A mixed language emerges from codeswitching. Australian Journal of Linguistics 25: 9–30. Meakins, Felicity 2011 Case-Marking in Contact. The Development and Function of Case Morphology in Gurindji Kriol. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Meakins, Felicity 2012 Which mix – code-switching or a mixed language? – Gurindji Kriol. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 27 (1): 105–140. Mous, Maarten 2003 The linguistic properties of lexical manipulation and its relevance for Ma'á. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 209–236. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Muysken, Pieter 1981 Halfway between Spanish and Quechua: The case for relexification. In: Arnold Highfield and Albert Valdman (eds.), Historicity and Variation in Creole Studies, 57–78. Ann Arbor: Karoma Press. Muysken, Pieter 2000 Bilingual Speech: A Typology of Code-mixing, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Myers-Scotton, Carol 1997 Duelling Languages. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Myers-Scotton, Carol 1998 A way to dusty death: the Matrix Language turnover hypothesis. In: Lenore A. Grenoble and Lindsay J. Whaley (eds.), Endangered Languages: Language Loss and Community Response, 289–316. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Myers-Scotton, Carol 2000 What matters: The out of sight in mixed languages. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 3 (2): 119–121. Myers-Scotton, Carol 2003 What lies beneath: Split (mixed) languages as contact phenomena. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 73–106. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Németh, József 1953 Zur Kenntnis der Mischsprachen. (Das doppelte Sprachsystem des Osmanischen.) Acta Linguistica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 3: 159–199. Newton, Brian 1964 An Arabic-Greek dialect. Word 20 (3): 43–52. Nichols, Johanna 1987 Head-marking and dependent-marking grammar. Language 62 (1): 56–119. O’Shannessy, Carmel 2004 Light Warlpiri: a new language. Australian Journal of Linguistics 25 (1): 31–57. O’Shannessy, Carmel 2012 The role of code-switched input to children in the origin of a new mixed language. Linguistics 50 (2): 305–340. Pagel, Steve 2010 Spanisch in Asien und Ozeanien, Frankfurt/M.: Lang. Pakendorf, Brigitte 2009 Intensive contact and the copying of paradigms: An E˙ven dialect in contact with Sakha (Yakut). Journal of Language Contact VARIA 2: 85–110. Perrot, Marie-Ève 1995 “Tu worries about ça, toi?” Métissage et restructurations dans le chiac de Moncton. Situations du français 33 (2): 79–85.

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Perrot, Marie-Ève 1998 Les modalités du contact français/anglais dans un corpus chiac: Métissage et alternance codique. Le français en Afrique: Francophonies, Recueil d’études offert en hommage à Suzanne Lafage 12: 219–336. Perrot, Marie-Ève 2001 Bilinguisme en situation minoritaire et contact de langues: l’exemple du chiac. Faits de Langues 18: 129–137. Perrot, Marie-Ève 2003 Le français acadien en contact avec l’anglais: analyse de situations distinctes. In: André Magord (ed.), L’Acadie plurielle: dynamiques identitaires collectives et développement au sein des réalités acadiennes, 267–279. IEAC (Université de Poitiers) et CEA (Université de Moncton). Perrot, Marie-Ève 2005 Le chiac de Moncton: description synchronique et tendances évolutives. In: Albert Valdman, Julie Auger and Deborah Piston-Hatlen (eds.), Le français en Amérique du Nord, 307–326. Québec: Presses de l’Université Laval. Poplack, Shana 2004 Code-Switching. In: Ulrich Ammon, Norbert Dittmar, Klaus J. Mattheier and Peter Trudgill (eds.), Sociolinguistics. An International Handbook of the Science of Language and Society, 589–596. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. 2nd edition. Salmons, Joe 1990 Bilingual discourse marking: code switching, borrowing, and convergence in some German-American dialects. Linguistics 28: 453–480. Sarhimaa, Anneli 1999 Syntactic Transfer, Contact-Induced Change, and the Evolution of Bilingual Mixed Codes. (Studia Fennica Linguistica 9.) Helsinki: Finnish Literary Society. Schaengold, Charlotte C. 2004 Bilingual Navajo: Mixed codes, bilingualism, and language maintenance. Ph.D. dissertation, Ohio State University. Stolt, Birgit 1965 Die Sprachmischung in Luthers Tischreden. Studien zum Problem der Zweisprachigkeit. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell. Stolz, Thomas 2003 Not quite the right mixture: Chamorro and Malti as candidates for the status of mixed language. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 271–315. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Szabó, Csilla Anna 2010 Language shift und Code-mixing. Deutsch-ungarisch-rumänischer Sprachkontakt in einer dörflichen Gemeinde in Nordwestrumänien. Frankfurt/M: Lang. Thomason, Sarah G. 1995 Language mixture: ordinary processes, extraordinary results. In: Carmen Silva-Corvalán (ed.), Spanish in Four Continents, 15–33. Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001 Language Contact – An Introduction. Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press. Thomason, Sarah G. 2003 Social factors and linguistic processes in the emergence of stable mixed languages. In: Yaron Matras and Peter Bakker (eds.), The Mixed Language Debate, 21–40. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Thomason, Sarah G. and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language Contact, Creolization, and Genetic Linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Vakhtin, Nikolay 1998 Copper Island Aleut: A case of language ‘resurrection’. In: Lenore A. Grenoble and Lindsay J. Whaley (eds.), Endangered Languages: Language Loss and Community Response, 317–327. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Winford, Donald 2003 An Introduction to Contact Linguistics. Oxford: Blackwell. Young, Hilary A. N. 2002 ‘C’est either que tu parles français, c’est either que tu parles anglais’. A cognitive approach to Chiac as a contact language. unpubl. Ph.D., Rice University.

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Part 4: “Doing being family”: language families and language ideologies

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Siblings in contact: the interaction of Church Slavonic and Russian

1.

Introduction

The intra-Slavic contact situation between Church Slavonic and Russian is remarkable due to several factors: The sociolinguistic situation is noteworthy, albeit not unique. Both varieties in question coexisted on one territory for more than 1000 years, from the importation of the Church Slavonic language from Bulgaria in 988, the date of the baptism of Kievean Rus’, until today. However, the character of their coexistence changed considerably in the 18th century. The coexistence of the two varieties was governed by clear functional constraints. On the one hand, Church Slavonic fulfilled all the functions not just of a sacred and religious, but also of a literary language1 and was the natural choice for anyone wishing to produce written texts in most registers well into the late 17th century.2 On the other hand, Old Russian3, the East Slavic vernacular, was used in everyday face-to-face interaction and, besides that, in a restricted number of written registers and genres, such as letters (e.g. the famous birch-bark letters that form a paradigm of the so-called Old Novgorod dialect, cf. Zaliznjak 1995), law documents (cf. e.g. the Russkaja Pravda, Trunte 2001) and, in later times, newspapers (e.g. the Vesti-kuranty, cf. e.g. Maier 1997: 38). Notwithstanding the fact that some linguistically hybrid genres exist, such as e.g. the Chronicles (cf. Hüttl-Folter 1983: 420; Keipert 1999: 743), the Old and Middle Russian linguistic situation can be classified as endoglossic diglossia in the sense of Auer (2005), i.e. as diglossia between

1

2

3

In this respect the role of Church Slavonic in Russia or, better, in the whole realm of orthodox slavdom (Slavia orthodoxa, cf. Pikkio 2003) resembles the role of Latin in Western Europe. For a critical comparison cf. Rabus (2011c). Cf. the famous and often cited statement by Ludolf: “[…] apud illos dicitur, loquendum est Russice et scribendum est Slavonice” [it is said there that one has to talk in Russian and to write in Slavonic], cited from Kiparsky (1975: 71). For terminological discussion of glottonyms and for periodization see Buncˇic´ (2006: 26). In this paper, I shall restrict myself to the discussion of the (Great) Russian language situation proper.

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closely related varieties.4 Although there were significant changes in both Church Slavonic on the territory of Rus’ and the vernacular in the course of the centuries, the diglossic situation was quite stable for a long time; both varieties coexisted with a more or less clear functional distribution from the 11th until the 17th century. In the 18th century however, this relatively stable situation changed. The vernacular started being used in more and more domains and the importance of Church Slavonic diminished. Eventually, Modern Russian emerged as a compromise between the vernacular and Church Slavonic. It was subject to ausbau that relied heavily on conscious copies5 from Church Slavonic. The situation discussed above leads to the following research questions: What impact did the varieties have on each other in their process of diachronic development? To what extent does the genetic relatedness and structural congruence6 of the varieties determine the linguistic outcome of the language contact? Or, in other words: What are the linguistic consequences when siblings come into contact? With reference to several contactlinguistic frameworks (such as Johanson’s Code copying framework, e.g. Johanson 2002, 2008, or van Coetsem’s two transfer types, e.g. van Coetsem 1988, 2000), I analyze which elements were copied and which were not. The ultimate goal of the contribution is to show that structural compatibility has an impact on the amount and quality of copying insofar as it facilitates transfer.7 In addition, I demonstrate the significance of deliberate copying and other extralinguistic factors. Furthermore, I show that widespread bilingualism is not always necessary for contact-induced change to occur. I shall divide my analysis into two sections, the first one dealing with the linguistic situation up to the 17th century with Church Slavonic as the main literary lan4

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For the application of Ferguson’s (1959) concept of diglossia on the pre-modern Russian language situation cf. Uspenskij (2002: 24–31). The fact that a hybrid ˇ ivov (1996) to the rejection of the rigid diChurch Slavonic register exists led Z glossic model. However, in my opinion, the model can, in principle, be maintained if one allows for some hybrid tendencies. By the notion of copies instead of loans or borrowings I follow Johanson (2008: 62) who rightly states that copying is the more appropriate term due to the fact that the source language does not lose an element in the copying/borrowing process. By the notion of congruence I understand structural compatibility, i.e. identical typological features, similar material and/or patterns. Cf. Muysken (2000: 6) who uses the term “congruent lexicalization”. Cf. Johanson (2002: 306): “One important factor affecting the outcome of contact is the typological distance between the codes involved. Copying may be easier when the codes have essential structures in common”.

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guage and the second one dealing with the situation from the 18th century onwards with the emergence of Modern Russian. Specific problems in conducting the analysis arise due to the scarcity of obtainable data in digital form, which makes it impossible to conduct quantitative analyses. Studies that aim to analyze contact-induced changes are, essentially, diachronic studies. Non-impressionistic, empirical diachronic research should be based on a reasonable amount of data, ideally available as an annotated corpus. However, a diachronic corpus that meets all our needs – i.e. covers a long period of time, consists of both Church Slavonic and vernacular texts, is POS-tagged, etc. – does not exist.8 As a result, wishing to analyze the outcomes of diachronic contact between Church Slavonic and the Russian vernacular, one has to be less selective and more opportunistic when it comes to the choice of sources. Application of quantitative corpuslinguistic methods is, thus, hardly feasible; one has to make do with qualitative, at best corpus-assisted (rather than corpus-based) methods as well as with a combination of analogue and digital sources.

2.

First phase: 11th–17th centuries

As noted above, on the territory of Kievan Rus’ genetically related and structurally similar Slavic varieties – i.e. the Old Russian vernacular and genetically South Slavic Church Slavonic – came into close contact due to the importation of Church Slavonic as a literary language in the 11th century. Since the disintegration of Common Slavic took place merely a few centuries before, there were few structural differences between the varieties involved.9 Both varieties had a rich inventory of inflectional forms and categories, such as seven cases and numerous tense forms at their disposal. With respect to prosody and phonetics it should be noted that there were no speakers that spoke Church Slavonic as a mother tongue. For this reason, Russian Church Slavonic was pronounced with a Russian accent, i.e. the phonological systems did not differ. Some Common Slavic sounds or sound clusters were merely realized differently, e.g. the *CorC-groups with metathesis in Church Slavonic as opposed to polnoglasie in Russian (cf. grad ‘town’ vs. gorod ). 8

9

For the discussion of existing corpora and potential corpus surrogates see Rabus (2011b). It should be added that the National Corpus of Russian does actually provide us with diachronic research capabilities. However, as of 2012, the oldest texts are from no earlier than 1700, moreover, there are very few texts from the 18th century and they are predominantly poorly POS-tagged. Cf. Uspenskij (2002: 286) who states that at the beginning of Church Slavonic literacy in Rus’ both varieties involved were very close to each other.

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Syntax seems to be the category where many differences between Church Slavonic and Russian are attested. This is due to the fact that the Church Slavonic syntax was highly dependent on Greek and absorbed some features such as simple negation in addition to typical Slavic multiple negation10, some government rules, or absolute participle constructions (for the impact of Greek on Church Slavonic see Uspenskij 2002: 52–62; Birnbaum 1996). Summarizing the similarities and differences between Church Slavonic and Russian in the time shortly after the baptism of Rus’, it is evident that the similarities outweigh the differences. It is, thus, not at all surprising that the speakers of the language accepted Church Slavonic as an archaic, sophisticated and somewhat odd version of their mother tongue. However, the degree of ausbau was naturally significantly higher in Church Slavonic. This is manifest, above all, in lexis and in syntax. The Church Slavonic–Russian contact is to be classified as an atypical language contact situation in that there were no native speakers of Church Slavonic in the strict sense. Hence, no direct face-to-face interaction between speakers of Russian and Church Slavonic took place. Still, from a psycholinguistic point of view, language contact took place in the minds of the learned Russians who had mastered Church Slavonic as a second language quite well, comparable to learned pre-modern people in the West who had a good command of Latin. Since Church Slavonic was written rather than spoken – Slavic pre-modern culture is well known for its (written) translations of Greek texts as well as for copying Slavic manuscripts11, whereas there are only few oral Church Slavonic registers such as homiletics – it seems to be appropriate to take up Verkholantsev’s (2008: 11) notion of “literacy contact”12 or, more generally, Thomason’s (2001: 20) term “learnèd contacts” in order to characterize this atypical – and asymmetric – language contact situation. The external, scientific characterization of Church Slavonic as being relevant predominantly in its written form is actually in line with the internal, local characterization of the pre-modern Slavs themselves: they used to call Church Slavonic words and constructions knizˇnye ‘bookish’. To sum up: The Church Slavonic–Russian contact situation in pre-modern times is a good example of a diglossic situation where closely related va10

11 12

Cf. Vecˇerka (1989: 127) who states that in selected Old Church Slavonic texts mononegative constructions are used, albeit less often than polynegative ones. According to Feder (2008: 385) some 800 000 Church Slavonic manuscripts exist. Literacy contact “indicates the contact of literacy conventions in one language with literacy principles in another language”, moreover it “reflects a situation of contact between two writing systems in the mind of a literate individual”.

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rieties are involved. The situation was quite stable insofar as the concept of varieties used complementarily remained intact; there was no such thing as “conceptual convergence”. But nevertheless the structural congruence as well as the long and intense contact yielded (mainly unconscious) copies both from Church Slavonic to Russian and vice versa. 2.1. Church Slavonic–Russian copies The vast majority of pre-modern East Slavs were illiterate.13 Therefore, they did not come into close contact with Church Slavonic except for the chants and lectures during church services. Bearing that in mind, the overall level of contact was, at best, casual (but cp. Freydank 1984: 317). However, due to the scarcity of purely vernacular written data, valid claims about the impact of Church Slavonic on the Russian vernacular cannot be made. Although diachronic dialect changes and leveling did occur (cf. e.g. the Old Novgorod dialect, Zaliznjak 1995), one cannot determine whether these changes were due to the influence of the written High Variety [H] or to non-contactinduced change. Some scholars assert that, in principle, H should have an impact on L, “so daß H sekundär auch zur sprechsprachlichen Norm wird” [so that H, in a secondary process, becomes also the spoken norm] (Binder 2000: 56, her italics, cf. also Auer 2005). The proposed influence of Church Slavonic on the vernacular eventually took place, but predominantly in the 18th century. This shall be dealt with later on. In the next section I shall dwell on the reverse impact, viz. the impact of the Russian vernacular on Church Slavonic. 2.2. Russian–Church Slavonic copies Since most users of Church Slavonic in Rus’ were native speakers of an East Slavic dialect, it is not surprising that their East Slavic mother variety had an impact on Church Slavonic which, for its part, was a language that had to be learned by formal instruction. This impact can be classified as Source Language (SL) agentivity (imposition) in the sense of van Coetsem (1988: 3).14 13

14

This does not hold true for Novgorod, where many inhabitants, including many women, could read and write, which is shown by the existence of the so-called birch-bark letters (cf. Zaliznjak 1995). “If […] the source language speaker is the agent, as in the case of a French speaker using his French articulatory habits while speaking English, the transfer of material from the source language to the receipient [ ! ] language is imposition (source language agentivity)” (van Coetsem’s italics).

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Essentially, the copies that came about with the SL agentivity processes constituted the special variant of Church Slavonic in Rus’, the so-called Russian recension of Church Slavonic. These copies occurred in several linguistic domains and follow a pattern that complies quite well with typical SL agentivity (or, according to other frameworks or traditions: interference or substrate) patterns. In particular, features pertaining to the sound system of Church Slavonic were copied; less so morphosyntactic, morphological or semantic features and few lexical items. Examples for copies from the Russian sound system include the replacement of /õ/ by /u/ in words such as m˛oka ‘martyrdom’, which was pronounced /muka/. Another example of changes in the sound system that can be ascribed to copies from the Russian vernacular is the rendition of Common Slavic *dj. Only ten of 61 tokens found in the Regensburg Diachronic Corpus of Russian15 exhibit the South Slavic rendition zˇd in finite forms of videˇti ‘to see’ such as in vizˇdu ‘I see’; the rendition with East Slavic zˇ such as in vizˇju ‘I see’ is, thus, more than five times higher. Moreover, most of the South Slavic renditions occur in the East Slavic version of Sˇestodnev; this is, however, a text of South Slavic origin that has merely been copied in Russia. In these cases (and in several more documented by Uspenskij 2002, ch. 7) we witness the imposition of Russian pronunciation habits on Church Slavonic and, thus, the change of the phonological system of Church Slavonic. This can be explained by the fact that the analyzed situation is a situation of learnèd contact, not of direct face-to-face interaction. Because of this, very few people in Rus’ knew how South Slavs pronounced Church Slavonic. As a result, they imposed their native East Slavic pronunciation when reading written Church Slavonic texts. In these cases, structural and material congruence facilitated copies: By virtue of this congruence, it was easy to impose muka on m˛oka etc. Several Russian sound features have, however, not been imposed on Church Slavonic. Those include forms such as the Russian polnoglasie CoroC as opposed to the South Slavic rendition of Common Slavic *CorC groups as CraC. Corpus evidence from the Regensburg Diachronic Corpus of Russian shows that there are no occurrences of Russian gorod ‘town’ or golos ‘voice’, as opposed to hundreds of their South Slavic counterparts grad and glas, respectively. Why have some Russian sound features, such as u instead of o˛, been imposed on the Russian recension of Church Slavonic, while others, such as golos instead of glas, have not? This can be explained within van Coetsem’s 15

http://www-korpus.uni-regensburg.de/diakorp/ (2011-08-10).

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framework. According to him, the ease of transferability varies “depending on whether the item refers to the syntagmatic dimension, which concerns the redistribution of existing elements, or the paradigmatic dimension, which concerns the introduction of new items” (van Coetsem 2003: 40, his italics). The adoption of o˛ and, to lesser degree, zˇd by speakers of Russian would be an introduction of new phonological elements into Church Slavonic; these elements belong, thus, to the paradigmatic dimension and are comparably hard to copy. Glas instead of golos, however, consists of a combination of phonemes common in autochthonous Russian words such as brat ‘brother’, which is the reason why it was easier to retain such clusters of sounds. On the morphological level there are some copies of case endings that are quite unspectacular and can be explained by analogy or economy (Trunte 2001: 186). One interesting phenomenon is the copy of the soft ending in the 3rd person of the present tense t’ instead of South Slavic hard -t (Kiparsky 1967: 189–190). Otherwise, despite dynamic changes in the morphology of the vernacular, e.g. the loss of numerous tense forms (cf. Kiparsky 1967: 220–237), Church Slavonic morphology remained remarkably intact. It comes as no surprise that there are few lexical copies from Russian to Church Slavonic. First, in SL agentivity or substratum situations it is typical that other features are borrowed more easily and more frequently (cf. e.g. Thomason 2001: 75); second, and equally importantly, most of the basic lexicon of Russian and Church Slavonic is identical or can be easily transferred on the level of morphemics or by the substitution of sounds or sound clusters to match the pattern of the target language.16 After the so-called Second South Slavic influence17 in the 14th/15th centuries, many of the copies mentioned above were deleted in order to purify Church Slavonic. In particular, among others, instances of zˇ (< *dj ) were replaced by South Slavic zˇd (Uspenskij 2002: 311–312). As a result of this conscious effort to reduce contact-induced copies, the linguistic distance between Church Slavonic and the Russian vernacular increased (Uspenskij 2002: 286). The following figure illustrates the relationship between Church Slavonic and Russian in pre-modern times. 16

17

Cf. Uspenskij (2002: 287) who states that the main differences between Church Slavonic and Russian can be located not at the lexical, but rather at the morphemic level. He mentions hypercorrect forms such as plan ‘imprisonment’ instead of pleˇn brought about by wrong transformation of Russian polon that goes back to Common Slavic *peln-, not *poln-. For more information on the results and the socio-historical circumstances of the 2nd South Slavic influence see e.g. Talev (1972).

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Figure 1: Relationship between Church Slavonic (ChSl) and Russian (R) in pre-modern times

As one can see, as time went by, (mostly unconscious) copies from Russian into Church Slavonic led to converging tendencies; conscious deletions of copies18 that came about during the Second South Slavic influence led to divergence and the restoration of the diglossic situation. This diglossic situation came to an end with the emergence of the modern Russian literary language in the 18th century. Modern Russian can be qualified as a result of contact between Church Slavonic and the Russian vernacular, viz. a compromise between High and Low Variety.19 The specific circumstances of this contact and the implications of the compromise shall be discussed in the next section.

3.

Second phase: 18th century and beyond

During the reign of Peter the Great (1682–1725), Russia opened a “window to Europe”. Science and administration developed rapidly, which brought about the need for a polyfunctional language that could be used in these non-clerical domains. Being a language predominantly used in religious and other non-practical spheres, the previous literary language Church Slavonic could not meet this need. Moreover, since Peter disempowered the church by installing the Holy Synod instead of the patriarch, the dominant position 18

19

It has to be noted, though, that not all Russian copies into Church Slavonic were deleted in the course of the 2nd South Slavic influence. Corpus evidence suggests that the vernacular soft ending in the 3rd person of verbs -t’ has been partly retained in H texts written well after the 2nd South Slavic influence, e.g. in the Great Reading Menology, cf. Rabus, Savic´ and Waldenfels (2012). For more information on this largest collection of Church Slavonic texts cf. Weiher, Sˇmidt and Sˇkurko (1997: 39); a corpus containing parts of the Great Reading Menology can be found on www.vmc.uni-freiburg.de. ˇ ivov (1996), the emergence of modern Russian can be seen as a According to Z continuation of the hybrid register of the chronicles and other genres.

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of the church language was lost. As a result (and triggered by Peter’s introduction of a new “civil” alphabet, the so-called grazˇdanskij srift20), a vernacular-based literary language evolved. This evolution was not always targetoriented and sometimes chaotic (Uspenskij 1985: 3); still, in the long run it led to the ultimate replacement of Church Slavonic as a literary language by modern Russian.21 This new literary language can be classified as a somewhat hybrid language, as a compromise between the East Slavic vernacular and the Russian recension of Church Slavonic, since numerous Church Slavonic elements had been copied and found their way into the new literary language. These copies can be found in several sub-systems of the language. As opposed to the processes observed in pre-modern times, the main direction of copying in the course of the emergence of Modern Russian was from the former H Church Slavonic to the vernacular. Because of this, one can with some right assume Recipient Language (RL) agentivity (borrowing) in the sense of van Coetsem (1988: 3).22 This means that typical borrowing hierarchies such as Thomason’s Borrowing Scale (e.g. 2001), that state that first of all lexical loans occur, then later on borrowings on the level of structure, should, in principle, be valid.23 In fact, in modern Russian numerous copies of Church Slavonic lexemes exist, e.g. scientific terminology is predominantly Church Slavonic. Moreover, some copies of words that belong to the basic vocabulary can be found, such as the ordinal numeral vtoroj ‘second’ as opposed to the autochthonous East Slavic drugoj (cf. Kiparsky 1967: 185). Altogether, Church Slavonic lexemes in modern Russian amount to a third of the vocabulary (Kiparsky 1975: 20

21

22

23

More information on the relationship of the Old Cyrillic and the civil alphabet in 18th-century Russia is provided by Buncˇic´, Kislova and Rabus (forthcoming). Uspenskij (2002) argues that the relatively stable situation of diglossia that was characterized by the complementary distribution of the varieties involved was eventually replaced by a dynamic situation of bilingualism insofar as the respective varieties could both be used in one and the same domain and, thus, competed with each other. “If the recipient language speaker is the agent, as in the case of an English speaker using French words while speaking English, the transfer of material (and this naturally includes structure) from the source language to the recipient language is borrowing (recipient language agentivity).” However, since Russian scholars of the 18th century were extensively (and – concerning Slavic languages – exclusively) trained in Church Slavonic writing, it could also well be the case that with respect to writing, Church Slavonic was the psycholinguistically stronger language; this would have resulted in SL agentivity. The issue of psycholinguistic dominance in the Church Slavonic–Russian language situation should be investigated in future studies. In Rabus (2011a) it is demonstrated how the Church Slavonic–Russian copies can be classified according to Thomason’s Borrowing Scale.

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74) or to more than fifty percent, according to other authors (Keipert 1999: 740 with reference to Sˇachmatov; but cf. also Chjutl’ Vort 1968: 116). Furthermore, numerous structural elements were copied into Russian (cf. also Haarmann 1999: 795) and subsequently conventionalized, such as suffixes that can be used to shape participles, e.g. -s‰ij, -vsij, -imyj, or -aemyj; moreover, derivational affixes to produce nouns with an abstract meaning, e.g. -tel’, -ie; or inflectional affixes such as the hard -t instead of soft -t’ in the 3rd person of the present (cf. Rabus 2011a and the contributions mentioned there). Besides these global copies from Church Slavonic to Russian, examples of selective copying exist. According to some scholars, the spread of the ending -a at the expense of -u for the genitive singular in masculine nouns, an instance of frequential copying, is due to Church Slavonic–Russian contact (cf. Sˇachmatov and Shevelov 1960: 38). The contact-induced origin of this phenomenon is, however, challenged by several scholars (cf. e.g. Kiparsky 1967: 28 who mentions interesting contributions to this issue by other authors). However, many structural elements of Church Slavonic, such as the complex tense system or some syntactic peculiarities, have not been copied. This is in part because the concept of simplicity – prostota – was crucial for the scholars involved in the discussions on how the literary language should ˇ ivov 1996, 2009). These discussions led to the rejection of cerlook24 (cf. Z tain “bookish” elements. Thus, in the course of the 18th century, the literary language of Russia was shaped through effort manifest not only in the conscious rejection of complicated “bookish” elements, but also in the conscious adaption of copies of Church Slavonic lexical and structural elements, in order to expand the capabilities of the new vernacular-based literary language.

Figure 2: Relationship between Church Slavonic (ChSl) and Russian (R) in the 18th century

24

Notably, due to the still high percentage of analphabets, merely a very small percentage of Russians participated in the processes that led to the emergence of the new literary language (cf. Keipert 1999: 767).

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Clearly, the events that took place in the 18th century eventually led to the complete convergence of the varieties involved25 and to the emergence of the vernacular-based modern Russian language that was still highly influenced by Church Slavonic. As a matter of fact, even after the varieties converged, Church Slavonic did not cease to exist. Still, it must be seen as a fossilized, artificial language that can only be used in very few domains such as liturgy.

4.

Discussion

As one can see, in both phases analyzed above, the contact between Church Slavonic and Russian yielded numerous copies, albeit in different directions and with partly different concrete manifestations. On the other hand, there are some variables (such as -t’ vs. -t) that were subject to copying processes in both directions, despite the fact that Russian–Church Slavonic copying processes in pre-1700 can be classified as SL agentivity, whereas Church Slavonic–Russian copying processes in post-1700 represent an instance of RL agentivity. Bearing that in mind, one has to ask how it was possible that these different mechanisms brought about similar results with respect to some copies. Moreover, the question arises as to why copies in the amount and quantity attested actually occurred and by what conditions and circumstances they were triggered. The answer to both questions seems to lie in the structural congruence of both varieties. According to Muysken (2000: 123), congruence leads to convergence, because of two factors, namely diamorphs26 as well as “a general structural equivalence, both categorial and linear”. This assertion holds for the Church Slavonic–Russian contact situation: Numerous common words and morphemes exist that can trigger mixing, which eventually leads to convergence. Regarding structural equivalence, many categories exist in almost identical or parallel manner27 which also facilitates convergence. It is, thus, comparatively easy to substitute, say, -t with -t’ and vice versa. Items that have not been copied, such as the numerous complex Church Slavonic tense forms, are usually items or categories not equivalent in the varieties involved – Russian did not change its simplified past tense system that goes back to the old l-participle. However, some elements were copied despite 25

26 27

Cf. the more philologically oriented approach by Kiparsky (1975: 71) who talks about a “kirchenslavisch-russische[s] Amalgam”. For the notion of diamorphs cf. Muysken (2000: 133). E.g. the inherited case structure with the maintenance of numerous Indo-European cases.

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the fact that they were not perfectly compatible in both systems, such as e.g. some of the participle formants mentioned above.28 One can speculate that these elements were – consciously – integrated due to functional considerations: New participles provided the vernacular with new communicative possibilities, whereas, because of the existence of an elaborate system of verbal aspect and aktionsarten, additional tenses would not have expanded the capabilities of the language. Undoubtedly, this issue needs further research. Our findings confirm Braunmüller’s (2009: 66) assertion “that convergence between genetically closely related languages is the default case”. As postulated by Braunmüller, the endstation of mutual contact is a hybrid, maybe even “creoloid” (Braunmüller 2009: 67) idiom, namely the modern Russian language. However, the case study presented in the current paper shows that widespread bilingualism is not an indispensable prerequisite for a high amount of copying and, consequently, convergence. Instead, few bilinguals and “literacy contact” are sufficient to bring about significant contactinduced changes. Still, the question arises why the endstation – convergence of the two varieties – was not reached until the 18th century. It seems that extra-linguistic factors played a crucial role. As a matter of fact, the possibility of real convergence and the emergence of one convergent variety actually existed in earlier times, which can be seen in figure 1. However, the restorative attitudes of the protagonists as well as the puristic tendencies during the 2nd South Slavic influence prevented the varieties from converging that early. Thus, extra-linguistic factors such as the will to preserve and restore the Church Slavonic tradition had a crucial influence on the outcome of the language interaction processes. The same holds for the phase of eventual convergence in the 18th century. Peter’s program of modernization and west-orientation was the extra-linguistic prerequisite to trigger the linguistic development and the conscious ausbau of Russian that finally led to the convergence of the varieties in question.

28

As is evident from other Slavic vernaculars unaffected by Church Slavonic influence, such as Polish, some participles existed in vernaculars, which leads to the assumption that they were also integrated in the vernacular Russian system. This assertion is also supported by corpus evidence.

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349

Conclusion

The diachronic analysis of Church Slavonic–Russian contact confirms the assertion that, in the long run, closely related, and, thus, structurally congruent varieties – siblings – in contact converge. However, neither widespread bilingualism nor direct accommodation in face-to-face interaction seems to play an indispensable role for this to happen. On the contrary, a few people with a good command of both varieties who make a conscious effort to manipulate language are sufficient to cause significant changes in language. Thus, when analyzing the outcomes of contact between closely related and/or congruent varieties, it seems important to bear in mind the significance of deliberate copying (or deliberate retraction of copies) as well as the impact of other extra-linguistic factors.

References Auer, Peter 2005 Europe’s sociolinguistic unity, or: A typology of European dialect/standard constellations. In: Nicole Delbecque, Johan van der Auwera and Dirk Geeraerts (eds.), Perspectives on Variation. Sociolinguistic, Historical, Comparative, 7–42. (Trends in linguistics 163.) Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Binder, Vera 2000 Sprachkontakt und Diglossie: Lateinische Wörter im Griechischen als Quellen für die lateinische Sprachgeschichte und das Vulgärlatein. (Romanistik in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Beihefte 3.) Hamburg: Buske. Birnbaum, Henrik 1996 Language contact and language interference: the case of Greek and Old Church Slavonic. Suvremena lingvistika 22 (1–2): 39–44. Braunmüller, Kurt 2009 Converging genetically related languages: Endstation code mixing? In: Kurt Braunmüller and Juliane House (eds.), Convergence and divergence in language contact situations, 53–69. (Hamburg studies on multilingualism 8.) Amsterdam: Benjamins. Buncˇic´, Daniel 2006 Die ruthenische Schriftsprache bei Ivan Uzˇevy‰ unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Lexik seines Gesprächsbuchs Rozmova/Beseˇda. (Slavistische Beiträge 447.) München: Sagner. Buncˇic´, Daniel, Ekaterina Kislova and Achim Rabus forthcoming Russian in the 18th century: diaphasic diglyphia. In: Daniel Buncˇic´, Sandra Lippert and Achim Rabus (eds.), Biscriptality – sociolinguistic and cultural scenarios. Chjutl’ Vort, Gerta 1968 Rol’ cerkovnoslavjanskogo jazyka v razvitii russkogo literaturnogo jazyka: K istoricˇeskomu analizu i klassifikacii slavjanizmov [The role of the Church Slavonic language in the development of the Russian literary language: a historical analysis and classification of Slavonicisms]. In: Henry Kucˇera (ed.), American contributions to the International Congress of Slavists, 95–124. (Slavistic printings and reprintings 80.) The Hague, Paris: Mouton. Feder, Vill’jam [Veder, William] 2008 O metodologii i perspektivax tekstologii [On the methodology and perspectives of textology]. Die Welt der Slaven LIII (2): 381–386. Ferguson, Charles 1959 Diglossia. Word 15: 325–340.

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Freydank, Dietrich 1984 Review of Uspenskij (1983) and Hüttl-Folter (1983). Russian Linguistics 8 (3): 313–325. Haarmann, Harald 1999 Zu den historischen und rezenten Sprachkontakten des Russischen. In: Helmut Jachnow (ed.), Handbuch der sprachwissenschaftlichen Russistik und ihrer Grenzdisziplinen, 780–813. (Slavistische Studienbücher N.F. 8.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Hüttl-Folter, Gerta 1983 Die trat/torot-Lexeme in den altrussischen Chroniken: Ein Beitrag zur Vorgeschichte der russischen Literatursprache. (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-historische Klasse. Sitzungsberichte 420.) Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Johanson, Lars 2002 Contact-induced change in a code-copying framework. In: Mari C. Jones and Edith Esch (eds.), Language change: The interplay of internal, external and extra-linguistic factors, 285–313. (Contributions to the sociology of language 86.) Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johanson, Lars 2008 Remodeling grammar: Copying, conventionalization, grammaticalization. In: Peter Siemund and Noemi Kintana (eds.), Language contact and contact languages, 61–79. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Keipert, Helmut 1999 Geschichte der russischen Literatursprache. In: Helmut Jachnow (ed.), Handbuch der sprachwissenschaftlichen Russistik und ihrer Grenzdisziplinen, 726–779. (Slavistische Studienbücher N.F. 8.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Kiparsky, Valentin 1967 Russische historische Grammatik. Volume II: Die Entwicklung des Formensystems. (Slavica. Neue Folge.) Heidelberg: Winter. Kiparsky, Valentin 1975 Russische historische Grammatik. Volume III: Die Entwicklung des Wortschatzes. (Slavica. Neue Folge.) Heidelberg: Winter. Maier, Ingrid 1997 Verbalrektion in den “Vesti-Kuranty” (1600–1660): Eine historischphilologische Untersuchung zur mittelrussischen Syntax. (Studia Slavica Upsaliensia 38.) Uppsala: AUU. Muysken, Pieter 2000 Bilingual speech: a typology of code-mixing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pikkio, Rikkardo [Picchio, Riccardo] 2003 Slavia orthodoxa i Slavia romana [Slavia orthodoxa and Slavia romana]. In: Rikkardo Pikkio and Natalja N. Zapol’skaja (eds.), Slavia Orthodoxa – literatura i jazyk, 3–82 (Studia philologica). Moskva. Rabus, Achim 2011a Russkij jazyk v mezˇslavjanskom jazykovom kontakte (na primere cerkovnoslavjansko-russkogo i pol’sko-russkogo kontaktov) [The Russian language in intra-Slavic language contact (as examples: Church-Slavonic Russian and Polish-Russian contact)]. In: Katrin B. Karl, Gertje Krumbholz and Marija Lazar (eds.), Beiträge der Europäischen Slavistischen Linguistik (Polyslav) 14, 192–200. München, Berlin: Sagner. Rabus, Achim 2011b Unicode and OpenType – a practical approach to producing Church Slavonic scientific editions. In: V. A. Baranov (ed.), Pis’mennoe nasledie i sovremennye informacionnye technologii, 88–104. Izˇevsk. Rabus, Achim 2011c Wie lateinisch ist das europäische Mittelalter? Ein Beitrag aus der Perspektive der Slavistik. In: Balázs J. Nemes and Achim Rabus (eds.), Vermitteln – Übersetzen – Begegnen: Transferphänomene im europäischen Mittelalter und in der frühen Neuzeit. Interdisziplinäre Annäherungen, 251–264. (Nova Mediaevalia 8.) Göttingen: V & R Unipress. Rabus, Achim 2012 Überlagerung vertikaler und horizontaler Einflüsse: Der Einfluss des Kirchenslavischen und Polnischen auf das Russische. In: Irina Podter-

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gera (ed.), Schnittpunkt Slavistik. Ost und West im wissenschaftlichen Dialog. Festgabe für Helmut Keipert zum 70. Geburtstag. Teil 2: Einflussforschung, 195–209. Göttingen: V & R Unipress. Rabus, Achim, Stefan Savic´ and Ruprecht v. Waldenfels 2012 Towards an Electronic Corpus of the Velikie Minei Cˇet’i. In: Anisava Miltenova (ed.), Preotkrivane: Suprasa˘lski sbornik: staroba˘lgarski pametnik ot X vek (Rediscovery: Bulgarian Codex Suprasliensis of 10th century), 343–353. Sofia: Iztok-Zapad. Sˇachmatov, Aleksej A. and George Y. Shevelov 1960 Die kirchenslavischen Elemente in der modernen russischen Literatursprache. (Slavistische Studienbücher 1.) Wiesbaden. Talev, Ilya 1972 Some problems of the second South Slavic influence in Russia. (Slavistische Beiträge 67.) München: Sagner. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001 Language contact: An introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Trunte, Nikolaos 2001 Slavenskij jazyk: ein praktisches Lehrbuch des Kirchenslavischen in 30 Lektionen. Volume 2: Mittel- und Neukirchenslavisch. (Slavistische Beiträge 370.) München: Sagner. Uspenskij, Boris A. 1983 Jazykovaja situacija Kievskoj Rusi i ee zna‰enie dlja istorii russkogo literaturnogo jazyka [The language situation in Kievan Rus’ and its significance for the history of the Russian literary language]. Moskva: Izd-vo MGU. Uspenskij, Boris A. 1985 Iz istorii russkogo literaturnogo jazyka XVIII – na‰ala XIX veka: Jazykovaja programma Karamzina i ee istori‰eskie korni [On the history of the Russian literary language from the 18th to the beginning of the 19th century. Karamzin’s language progam and its historical roots]. Moskva. Uspenskij, Boris A. 2002 Istorija russkogo literaturnogo jazyka (XI–XVII vv.) [History of the Russian literary language (11th–17th centuries)]. Moskva: Aspekt press. van Coetsem, Frans 1988 Loan phonology and the two transfer types in language contact. Dordrecht/Providence R.I.: Foris Publications. van Coetsem, Frans 2000 A general and unified theory of the transmission process in language contact. (Monographien zur Sprachwissenschaft 19.) Heidelberg: Winter. van Coetsem, Frans 2003 Topics in Contact Linguistics. Leuvense Bijdragen – Leuven Contributions in Linguistics and Philology 92 (1–2): 27–99. Vecˇerka, Radoslav 1989 Altkirchenslavische (altbulgarische) Syntax. Volume 1. (Monumenta linguae Slavicae dialecti veteris 27.) Freiburg i. Br.: Weiher. Verkholantsev, Julia 2008 Ruthenica Bohemica: Ruthenian translations from Czech in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Poland. (Slavische Sprachgeschichte 3.) Wien: LIT. Weiher, Eckhard, Sigurd O. Sˇmidt and Aleksandr I. Sˇkurko (eds.) 1997 Die großen Lesemenäen des Metropoliten Makarij: Uspenskij spisok = Velikie minei ‰et’i Mitropolita Makarija. (Monumenta linguae Slavicae dialecti veteris 39.) Freiburg i. Br: Weiher. Zaliznjak, Andrej A. 1995 Drevnenovgorodskij dialekt [The Old Novgorod dialect]. (Jazyk, Semiotika, Kul’tura.) Moskva: Sˇkola Jazyki Russkoj Kul’tury. ˇZivov, Viktor M. 1986 Azbucˇnaja reforma Petra I kak semioticˇeskoe preobrazovanie [The reform of the alphabet by Peter I. as a semiotic transformation]. In: Semiotika prostranstva i prostranstvo semiotiki, 54–67. (Trudy po znakovym sistemam XIX.) Tartu. ˇ ivov, Viktor M. 1996 Jazyk i kul’tura v Rossii XVIII veka [Language and culture in Z 18th-century Russia]. Moskva. ˇZivov, Viktor M. 2009 Language and culture in eighteenth-century Russia. (Studies in Russian and Slavic literatures, cultures and history.) Boston: Academic Studies Press.

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Markus Giger (Basel) and Kalina Sutter-Voutova (Basel)

Transparency of morphological structures as a feature of language contact among closely related languages Examples from Bulgarian and Czech contact with Russian

1.

Introduction: The Slavonic languages at the beginning of the 19th century

At the beginning of the 19th century, there was only one independent state built by a Slavonic nation, Russia.1 The majority of Slavonic speaking peoples lived in the multiethnic Habsburg and Ottoman empires, where most of today’s Slavonic standard languages were only on the threshold of standardization and had a rather narrow range of functional domains. The languages spoken by dominate social elites were German (in the Czech lands), and Greek and/or Turkish (in Bulgaria). The involved nations are described by M. Hroch (2005: 43, 199) as “socially incomplete” nations, meaning that as they first emerged, they were greatly in lack of social, cultural and educational elites. People affected by this situation included Bulgarians, Byelorussians, Kashubians, Croats, Czechs, Macedonians, Slovaks, Slovenes, Sorbs, and Ukrainians.2 In these circumstances, the language-question was one of the most vital issues (cf. e.g. Venediktov 1981; Beˇlina and Pokorny´ 1993: 60–85). The nationally conscious elites developed a deliberate interest in Russian and transferred linguistic devices from Russian into the individual languages3 in order to support the long-anticipated expansion of functional domains and, 1

2

3

At that time, Montenegro was also considered independent, but as a small and rather isolated country on the Balkans, it could not have had a large impact on other Slavonic languages and cultures; although it was deeply engrossed with romantic ideas, as seen in the novella ™ernogorcy, written by the Russian slavophile writer F. V. Bulgarin (1829/30), and translated promptly into Czech by V. Hanka (1833). The phenomenon was, of course, by no means restricted to Slavonic peoples and languages: Estonians, Finns, Lithuanians, Latvians, Romanians and their languages were in a similar situation. This does not hold, of course, for Byelorussian and Ukrainian, whose proponents sought to distinguish their language from Russian.

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indeed, to strengthen what was perceived as the “Slavonic shape” of the emerging standard language (Cooper 2010: 79). Though predominantly lexical, some of these devices were grammatical in nature (cf. Giger 2008, 2013). Such processes must be seen in the context of emerging historical linguistics and Slavonic philology especially. In the paper, we try to demonstrate the special importance of the close genetic relatedness among languages involved, which make loans, especially grammatical loans, morphologically transparent. In this situation, transfer of highly bound morphemes is possible which reminds contact between dialects. In addition to this, this special kind of language transfer is made possible due to the fact that we are facing with intentional language contact between (emerging) standard languages.

2.

Russian influence on other Slavonic languages in the early 19th century

Lexical borrowing and the borrowing of word formation devices from Russian into other Slavonic languages in the 19th century is very well documented (cf. Czambel 1887; Havránek 1936: 86–96; Damerau 1960; Lägreid 1973; Sekaninová 1976; Andrejcˇin 1977: 126–141; Gadányi and Moiseenko 1999; Ajdukovic´ 1997, 2004). At this point, it may be sufficient to show a few examples: (1) Bulgarian medleno < Russian medlenno ‘slowly’ petno < Russian pjatno ‘stain’ -tel < Russian -tel’ (suffix forming agent nouns) (Damerau 1960: 29, 93, 109) (2) Slovenian izobilje < Russian izobilie ‘abundance’ slovar < Russian slovar’ ‘dictionary’ -stvo < Russian -stvo (suffix forming collective nouns) (Lägreid 1973: 67, 70, 80) The borrowing process also involved the transference of certain morphosyntactic structures. This could mean the reactivation of older genuine structures under the influence of Russian. For instance, the older Bulgarian determined adjective ending of the masculine singular -ij as in ve‰nij ‘the eternal’ was analogous to ve‰nyj in Russian (Andrejcˇin 1977: 89), and that is why it was

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reactivated and started to compete with the modern Bulgarian form ve‰nijat. The Russian present converb form in -a as delaja is also thought to have influenced the Slovene converb ending -(aj)e as in delaje ‘working’, as opposed to the modern and more frequently used Slovene form delajo‰ (Jesensˇek 1995: 56, 1998: 84–85). Russian impact may even have revived other syntactic models, like the modal infinitive in Czech (Porák 1968: 346). Indeed, it is possible that entirely new linguistic models were created using models from Russian, e.g. certain participial constructions. Common Slavonic had four inflectable participles: – – – –

active present participle in *nt(j) (Old Church Slavonic -y/˛o/¬(st)-) active past participle in *(v)u˘(sj) (Old Church Slavonic -(v)ч/ц(s)-) passive present participle in *m (Old Church Slavonic -m-) passive past participle in *n/*t (Old Church Slavonic -n/t-)

In some Slavonic languages, there is an additional active past participle in -l: Bulgarian nasjadali ‘seated’ and Czech prˇisl¤ ‘come’. The inflectable participles also fulfilled the function of converbs, cf. Old Church Slavonic: (3) (M˛ozˇi) r˛ogaach˛o s¬ emu bцj˛oˇste Men mock-ipf.3pl refl him-dat beat-ptc.pres.act.nom.pl.m i, him-acc ‘(The men) mocked him, beating him’ (Luke 22: 63). In the history of most individual Slavonic languages, the inflectable active participles would turn into uninflectable converbs or get lost entirely.4 The combined influence of Church Slavonic on Russian and Russian on minor Slavonic languages, however, brought about a “revival” of attributively used inflectable active participles.5

4

5

Cf. on Slavonic in a comparative overview Wiemer (forthcoming, 2.2.1.). In literary Czech, the converb remained inflectable for gender and number. As for the Russian influence on other Slavonic languages in the domain of converbs, cf. 3.1 on Bulgarian, Dvorˇák (1978: 85–88, 92, 97) and Jesensˇek (1995) on Czech and Slovene, respectively. These are merely instances of frequency copying. Cf. also footnote 19.

Transparency of morphological structures

3.

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Two case studies: the Bulgarian present converb and the Czech past active participle

3.1. The case of the Bulgarian converb in -ki After the so-called “revival” (i.e. the forming of the Bulgarian nation) had begun, there was a strong upsurge of cultural developments: the first schools were founded, the first grammars and other books were printed and the first steps were taken opposite from religious texts, which had dominated literature up until that point. Though Greek, Turkish and many dialects were spoken within the country, Russian had more strongly begun to influence Bulgarian lexically and, though to a lesser degree, morphologically and syntactically as well. One should not underestimate the role of Church Slavonic, as its influence often coincides with Russian. Many Church Slavonic words and devices of word formation were implemented into new Bulgarian through Russian, as with the suffix -tel, mentioned above. The most important discussion among language activists concerned which variety should be chosen as the basis for new Bulgarian: Church Slavonic, the actual spoken language in one of the regional varieties, or a mixture of them. Towards the middle of the 19th century, the new standard language was created upon the Eastern dialect. The present converb form in -ki, which was presumably imported into Bulgarian from Serbian through Macedonian/Western Bulgarian dialects, is an exception in that in the beginning it is a spoken, not a bookish form, as opposed to the following competing suffixes (cf. Andrejcˇin 1977: 41). In addition to the active present participle (suffix -st), passive present participle (-m), active past participle (-l)6 and passive past participle (-n/-t) in 19th century Bulgarian, there was a functioning system of present7 converbs – the Old Church Slavonic forms with the nominative plural masculine suffix -ste the nominative singular feminine forms in -sti, which in the 10th and 11th centuries had already started to split from case-flexion and to tend to an unalterable form (Duridanov 1956: 148; Conev 1934: 553; Ivanova-Mircˇeva and Charalampiev 1999: 161).

6 7

The Russian active past participle in -(v)s- was also used accordingly. The Russian past converb ending in -v- was used very rarely; when it was, it was in accordance with Russian semantics and usage.

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(3) Zatova tuk ste Vi izlozˇa samo po-glavnite faktove ot zˇivota˘t mi do dnes, na koi osnovajuste se, Vase Visokopreosvestenstvo, mozˇete napravi potrebnoto preporu‰itelno (…). (Drumev 1893: 52) ‘That is why I am going to expound only the main facts of my life up until today, basing on which, Your Highness, you can render your recommendation (…).’ Those forms show the shape of the present converb, which, according to historical phonetics, had to be expected in standard Bulgarian8. Furthermore, the short forms of the present active participle were also used in the function of converbs (cf. Pa˘rvev 1969): (4) Odavno este slusast ot nasi ednorodni ba˘lgari za vase imja, (…) zˇelajach da sja li‰no vidimi, (…). (Rakovski 1858: 23) ‘Already for a long time hearing from our compatriots about your name, (…) I wanted to meet you personally, (…).’ Concurrently, though rarely, the suffix -aja borrowed from Russian was used: (5) Az ozˇivejki i zˇivim kato se uslazˇdavam gledaja narodot nas presladkij i radi tova ne me ostava negovata dobrota da budem lukav. (Chadzˇikonstantinov-Dzˇinot 1851: 2) ‘I, surviving, and I live while I enjoy watching our lovely people, and that is why his goodness does not let me being deceitful.’ What can be stated with certainty is that the form with suffix -ki appeared first in the Macedonian dialects. It has been assumed that this Macedonian suffix was originally influenced by Serbian9 in view of the fact that suffixes of the present active participles in Russian (-s‰-/-‰-), Bulgarian (-st-/-ki), Macedonian(-k´ i) and Serbian (-c´i) are all derived from the Common Slavonic suffix *tj and, therefore, etymologically identical. This facilitated the replacement

8

9

Common Slavonic *nt(j) >> Old Church Slavonic -y/˛o/¬(st). For suffixes in Russian/Bulgarian/Macedonian/ Serbian, see below. The possibility of a Turkish influence (suffix -ken) on the Macedonian/Bulgarian converb suffix -ki is mentioned already in the early 19th century by Rilski (1835: 182) and resumed by Pa˘rvev (1975: 307) and Kucarov (2007: 124). Furthermore, the topic has been shortly discussed by Va˘lcˇev (2008: 303), who questions the infiltration by West-Bulgarian dialects/Macedonian.

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of one of these forms by another. Here, the morphological transparency can be considered as naturally given, the similarities as perceived. Table 1: Reflexes of the Common Slavonic suffix *tj Russian

Bulgarian

Macedonian

Serbian

-s‰-/-‰-

-ˇst-/-ki

-k´ i

-c´i

gljadjaˇs‰ij gljadju‰i

gledaˇst gledajki

gledajk´ i

gledajuc´i

One may ask themselves how the spoken forms of the converb in Bulgarian, borrowed from Macedonian dialects, were established in standard language, limiting the use of the bookish Old Bulgarian (Old Church Slavonic) and Russian forms towards the end of the 19th century. Three factors have been mentioned in the literature. First, it has been pointed out that it was a deliberate decision (cf. Thomason 2008: 47) of the people who were in one way or another involved in the process of standardization of Bulgarian, to accept and use the borrowed converb-forms in their own language. This finally led to an intervention into the language of the whole user community of the emerging standard language. The fact that the function of the borrowed converb-suffix was already available in Bulgarian grammar made the transfer easier – the spoken forms were used frequently in religious literature at the beginning of the 19th century, in prose and journalistic texts.10 They were used more and more often towards the end of the century, when for example Ivan Vasov is attested as being one of those who sealed the standardization of the Macedonian suffix -ki by using it strikingly often (cf. e.g. Rusinov 1999: 300). (6) Zaˇstoto toj, govorejki, ulavjase naj-tichite sepoti ot neodobrenie naokolo si i (…). (Vazov 1895: XXXIV) ‘Because he, speaking, heard the lowest whisperings of disapproval around him and (…).’ Secondly, the old literary forms with the suffix -ste and -sti are ambiguous regarding the New Bulgarian neutral singular form of the present active participle peeste ‘singing’, respectively its plural form peesti. The assumption was made that due to this obstacle the native speakers chose the unambiguous 10

These issues will be discussed in more depth in a monograph by Markus Giger, Kalina Sutter-Voutova and Sonja Ulrich which is currently being prepared.

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form in -ki for expressing a simultaneous secondary predication (cf. e.g. Andrejcˇin 1963: 163). It fit into the language of Western authors as well, who used it spontaneously, and also that of Eastern authors, who accepted it because of its functional advantages. Furthermore Russian was used by language activists as a model for the formal distinction of the suffixes of the active present participle (Russian -s‰-/-‰-) and converb (Russian -aja). Last but not least the factor that the Old Bulgarian and Russian forms were bookish, the Macedonian form was on the other hand spoken, contributed to the choice of the latter form for Standard Bulgarian. After all, the basis for New Bulgarian was the spoken Eastern Bulgarian Dialect, not a bookish variety. We assume that the case of the Bulgarian suffix -ki is a gradual transition from the reactivation of genuine structures (Old Church Slavonic participles) towards the creation of new linguistic models (Macedonian suffix -ki), both upon the example of Russian11, which was considered as higher style (cf. Andrejcˇin 1977). The creation of a new linguistic model is based on the transparency of morphological structures. 3.2. The case of the Czech active past participle in -(v)sí At the beginning of the 19th century in the area of active participle forms, Czech had a present and past converb, an active present participle and a nonfully paradigmatic active past participle in -l, built from a part of the intransitive telic verbs (restrictions are not only semantic, but also formal). Until 1830, under Russian influence a new theoretically fully paradigmatic active past participle in -(v)sí was introduced. The following table shows active past converbs and participles in Czech at the beginning of the 19th century in comparison to Russian and the change in the first decades of the 19th century (areas of change are shown in bold):

11

And other Slavonic and non-Slavonic, already standardized languages, cf. Andrejcˇin (1977: 41).

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Table 2: Russian and Czech active past participle forms at the beginning of the 19th century

1800

1830

Russian

Czech

converb sdelav(si) ‘having done’

converb udeˇlav, -si, -se ‘having done’

participle sdelavsij, -aja, -ee ‘the one, who has done’

x (l-participle prˇisl¤, -á, -é ‘the one who has come’ with some intransitive verbs)

converb sdelav(si)

converb udeˇlav, -si, -se

participle sdelavsij, -aja, -ee

participle udeˇlavsˇí, -í, -í (in addition to prˇisl¤ now also prˇisˇedsˇí)

The new active past participle in -(v)sí originates from within the circle of activists around Josef Jungmann during the Czech National Revival. The first grammar attesting the form was published in 1818 by Frantisˇek Novotny´ z Luzˇe (Nowotny´ z Luzˇe 1818), who was also an important contributor to Jungmann’s epochal dictionary.12 The participle is not mentioned in the monumental grammars by Josef Dobrovsky´ (Dobrowsky 1809, 1819), the doyen of bohemistics at that time. On the other hand Jan Nejedly´, an ideological opponent of Josef Jungmann concerning issues of Czech orthography and vocabulary reforms in the 1820s, while ignoring it in his Czech textbooks for Germans in 1804 and 1821, adopts it in the 1830 edition (Negedly´ 1804, 1821, 1830). The first example in a text known to me comes from Josef Jungmann and dates from 1819: (7) ™ím více a touzˇebneˇji jsem Vás o‰ekával mneˇ se slíbivsího k navstívení, tím nesnadneˇji nesplneˇní slibu toho jsem nesl; snad to jesteˇ státi se mu˚zˇe! (Letter of Josef Jungmann to Antonín Marek, 06. 06. 1819; Jungmann 1882: 458) ‘The more and more longingly I waited for you, you having promised to come to see me, the harder I bear the non-keeping of this promise; perhaps it can happen yet!‘

12

The new form is just mentioned in the verbal paradigms, no comment or information on use is given.

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The introduction of the new form was not uncontested: adherents of a more “colloquial” codification of Standard Czech fought against it, but without success: Nota. Einige von den neuesten Schriftstellern versuchen es, transitiven und intransitiven Zeitwörtern ein Beiwort vergang. Zeit wirkender Form auf wsˇí wsˇí wsˇí zu geben. Nach ihnen wäre recht: List uzˇlutnuwsˇí opadáwá, onemocnˇewsˇí sestra, Dawidowi zemrˇewsˇímu, ze prˇícin prˇedbeˇhewsˇích, ozˇrawsˇím se, zhniwsˇích, wloudiwsˇí se, u. so eine Menge wsˇí. [Some of the newest writers try to give transitive and intransitive verbs an active past participle in wsí wsí wsí. According to them the following would be correct: List uzˇlutnuwsí opadáwá, onemocnˇewsí sestra, Dawidowi zemrˇewsímu, ze prˇícin prˇedbeˇhewsích, ozˇrawsím se, zhniwsích, wloudiwsí se, and lots of wsí.] (Ziak 1842: 254)13

Since the 1830s the active past participle in -(v)sí has been a solid part of the Czech verbal system; it has remained a bookish device, but it still has its niche in word formation and syntax (evidence of more than 6800 examples in a 700-million-corpus of Czech newspaper texts from 1995–2007; cf. Giger 2010a). There is no overt evidence that the Czech active past participle in -(v)sí has been modelled on the Russian active past participle (the first author known to us to say so is the Slovak L’udovít Sˇtúr in his 1846 Slovak grammar14). Nevertheless, the process is quite clear: There is no doubt that the new participle appeared in Czech shortly before 1820 and in the Jungmann-circle. Jungmann and his fellow campaigners (who at that time included most notably Václav Hanka, Antonín Marek, the Presl brothers and Jungmann’s son Josef Josefovicˇ; in a broader sense also the contributors to Jungmann’s dictionary such as Frantisˇek Novotny´ z Luzˇe etc.) were well acquainted with Russian. They used the Russian Cyrillic alphabet in their letters to confuse the Austrian secret service; they translated from Russian and published such translations; they were delighted to have the opportunity to speak to real Russians during the Napoleonic wars and they were – at least at certain mo13

14

Vsí in Czech is a genitive plural form of ves ‘louse’, so to a reader well acquainted with Czech, a linguistic joke is apparent: Ziak denounces the new form as a “lousy” participle. “Z minuljeho prestupnjeho menoslovja majú prídavnje mená Rusi na pr. z chod’ivsˇi, vymyvsˇi tvorja chod’ivsˇí, ja, je vymyvsˇí, ja, je cˇo Cˇesi prijali a my fljezˇ, ak sa nám lúbi, prijafl muozˇeme” (Sˇtúr 1846: 131) ‘From the past converb the Russians have participles, e.g. from chodivsi, vymyvsi they build chodivsij, chodivsaja, chodivsee, which the Czechs accepted and if we like, we too, can introduce it’. This was, by the way, the moment when the active past participle in -vsí was introduced into Slovak (cf. Giger 2011).

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ments – ready to give up Czech in favour of Russian, in order to support the unity and strength of Slavonic.15

4.

Transparency of morphological structures, Slavonic philology and hierarchies of probability of linguistic transfer

What should be emphasized is that due to the close genetic relationship16 between the languages, the morphological structures discussed here were transparent. Already Weinreich (1974: 32), speaking about dialect convergence, highlighted the fact that congruent systems and a large common vocabulary make the transfer of highly bound morphemes easier: Bulgarian/ Macedonian converb suffixes are etymologically identical with their Russian and Serbian counterparts, and the identity of the Czech converb suffix -vswith its Russian counterpart (used not only in converbs, but also in attributively usable participles) is evident even to the uneducated observer. In this sense the processes mentioned might have something in common with contact among dialects (cf. also Thomason 2008: 7). In addition, awareness of contemporary historical linguistics is an important feature in processes of this kind: e.g. as for Bulgarian petno mentioned in example (1) it is quite plausible that in the course of its derivation from Russian pjatno the introducers knew the origin of pjatno from Common Slavonic *p¬tцno (or *p¬tчno), which would have resulted in Bulgarian petno, if it had developed there spontaneously (Common Slavonic front nasal results in Russian a after a palatalised consonant, but in Bulgarian e); cf. also other similar imitations of spontaneous developments, e.g. Slovak kfiud < Czech

15

16

Cf. Giger (2008: 140, 2010b: 14–15) with further literature. For Frantisˇek Novotny´ z Luzˇe, the model of Old Church Slavonic might have been more relevant than that of Russian. This is, however, less important than it might seem at the first glance, because the Russian active past participle in -(v)sij is itself a Church Slavonic device in modern Russian (cf. Bulachovskij 1958: 234, 238). While Russian and Czech are also rather close typologically, between Russian and (Modern Standard) Bulgarian, there is a certain typological gap, because Bulgarian (as well as Macedonian) lost its inflected noun endings (Old Church Slavonic shows a full nominal declension system). Leaving aside the fact that this is not relevant to the verbal forms discussed here, it did not in general impede intentional language contact, because this was based on the genetic relationship. Nevertheless, one of the processes going on in 19th century Bulgarian was the growing acceptance of the analytical nominal system of the spoken language in the standard (articles, no case inflection).

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klid (< Old Czech kfiud)17, Upper Sorbian wuspeˇch < Czech úspeˇch < Russian uspech18 etc. As for our participial constructions in Czech, the syntactics of the suffix -vs- were changed (previously it had not been compoundable with an attribute ending); in Bulgarian a new pattern with a converb morphologically different from the participle was established.19 It is important to note that the transfers discussed here were results of deliberate decisions of the speech community. Participial forms – being devices of Church Slavonic and Russian – are prestigious as such, as can be seen e.g. in the following citation from an 1838 Czech grammar: Eben so nothwendig ist es, den Lernenden gleich im voraus mit den slawischen Transgressiven bekannt zu machen, weil sie ebenfalls etwas Eigenes haben, dem in andern Sprachen, die griechische ausgenommen, nichts gänzlich entspricht. 17

18

19

Kfiud is said to be a Bohemism in Slovak (e.g. Sokolová 1995: 188). If this is true, it means that those who borrowed the word were aware of Czech sound changes, otherwise it should have resulted in Slovak klid, which, by the way, is attested in historical Slovak (HSSJ 2: 58). This is not the case mentioned by Thomason (2007: 6) where speakers change forms deliberately because they know the correspondences between two varieties involved. While this is quite usual between Czech and Slovak, leading to forms like Slovak spústa < Czech spousta (speakers are well aware that Slovak ú corresponds most often to Czech ou, cf. Dolník 1993: 3–4), it is not the case with kfiud, because without knowledge of historical phonology and etymology it is not possible to reconstruct which Czech i corresponds to Old Czech (and potential Slovak) u. Cf. Jencˇ (1999: 168–179) on Czech loans in Upper Sorbian and Havránek (1936: 86–96) on Russian loans in Czech. Prothetic w- before initial Slavonic u- occurs regularly in Upper Sorbian; however, in the 19th century the process was not productive anymore and non-Slavonic loans such as uniforma or uniwerzita do not show prothetic w- before u-. In neither of the two cases do we have “Global Copying” in the sense of Johanson (2008: 64), but rather Selective Grammatical Copying (Johanson 2008: 66–68): there is no Material Copying, as no morphology is taken over from Russian: In the Bulgarian case a dialectal shape of a common suffix is introduced into the new standard language in order to differentiate the active present participle (re-established with Old Church Slavonic morphology, but on a Russian model) and the converb, in the case of Czech the common suffix -vs- is combined with case endings needed for an attributive participle, just as can be seen in Russian, so this is a case of change of combinational properties. In the case of Bulgarian the process leads quite certainly to a change in frequency as well, because it can be taken for granted that frequency (and also productivity) of the converb in -k´ i in Macedonian dialects of the early 19th century was not the same as that of the new form in -ki in elaborated Standard Bulgarian at the end of the century. Here they were rather oriented towards frequency and productivity of the Russian converb (cf. also footnote 5).

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[It is necessary as well to introduce the learner in advance to the Slavonic converbs, because they have something of their own, which cannot be found in other languages, except Greek] (Waneˇk and Franta 1838: 120)

There is no doubt that “something of their own, which cannot be found in other languages except Greek” is also something prestigious, in the discourse of the period (cf. Macura 1995: 48 on the prestige of Classical Greek and Sanskrit in the language discourse of Czech National Awakening). Similar to other cases of deliberate contact-induced language change, hierarchies of probability of transfer are seemingly violated (Thomason 2008: 10): according to Thomason (2001: 70) transfer of participial constructions belongs to a set of transfers occurring in cases of intense language contact and widespread bilingualism. This was the case neither for Bulgarian/Russian nor for Czech/Russian in the early 19th century – knowledge of Russian was restricted to a few activists of the national movement. In other words, we are confronted with “take-over insertions” in the sense of Johanson (2008: 63) with transfer from an (often not even well mastered) L2 to L1. Nevertheless, the transfer did occur and was – to a certain degree – successful. Explanations are – in addition to the deliberate decision of the speech community already mentioned – that the change does not concern vernacular, but elaborated varieties (the emerging standard languages) and that these new standard varieties had at the moment of introduction of the new forms a very narrow range of users and functional domains. The introduction of new participial constructions contradicts the typological development of the colloquial languages, which lost in both cases most participial constructions, but it fits perfectly with the conception of an archaising (more “Slavonic”) standard language popular among the nationally-conscious elites. As the nationally-conscious elites succeed in connecting this conception with their national programme (re-codifying the standard language as a part of nation building), they succeed in implementing the transfers discussed, at least in the elaborated standard or some of its layers.20 The further evolution is already a language-internal development (cf. Johanson 2008: 70–71): both devices discussed here are bookish and to a certain degree archaic. The Czech active past participle in -(v)sí can no longer 20

This fits well to Johanson’s (2008: 63) statement that the reason for “insertional copying” is social, i.e. the wish to communicate in a prestigious way. It is, however, not the same manner as the social environment, but a manner that is different from the social environment and close to a more prestigious standard language. This helps to constitute a new identity (cf. Thomason 2008: 10): a non-Ottoman or non-Habsburg identity, a Slavonic identity.

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be derived from verbs in the imperfective aspect, although this was possible in the 19th century and in the Russian model. Along with its stylistic shape when being built from any perfective verb, it occupies also a derivational niche: a few verbs (mainly two roots) in Modern Standard Czech which do not build other past participles (neither in -l nor in -n/t-) are responsible for nearly the half of the evidence used in Giger (2010a). This, of course, has nothing to do with Russian.

5.

Conclusion

The case of the Bulgarian present converb and the Czech active past participle shows how genetic relationship played a crucial role for language contact between emerging Slavonic standard languages in the 19th century. As the forms built according to foreign models were morphologically transparent and the language contact was intentional, being pushed forward by academically trained philologists, we find results of language contact that are hardly to be expected in a situation of spontaneous language contact between vernacular varieties, especially if these varieties are not related. These results of language contact may contradict established language contact hierarchies, especially if we consider the low degree of bilingualism between Bulgarian and Russian, and respectively Czech and Russian in the 19th century.

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Rolf Kailuweit (Freiburg)

Avoiding typological affinity: “negative borrowing” as a strategy of Corsican norm finding

1.

Introduction

Corsican is a relatively new Romance language and is therefore still in the process of norm finding1 and elaboration.2 The formation of a standard differs from “ordinary” dialectal change in that it involves a social interaction with at least partially conscious proposals and acceptations. Grammarians, school teachers, writers, editors, etc., make choices3 and a larger, more or less educated public adopts or declines the recommended forms. Obviously, proposals do not come out of the blue. When writers and educators try to fill a lacuna or decide on a variation, they normally refer to the model of a more elaborated language (ausbau language in the sense of Kloss 1967), especially of the language they are used to employing in formal speech. Hence, for centuries Latin was the favorite “quarry” while establishing the 1

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I propose “norm finding” as a more general concept in the sense of “corpus planning” that implies language policy as an activity of an authoritative group (cf. Hornberger 2006). Elaboration is taken as the English translation of the term ausbau coined by Kloss in the 1960s to describe a process of norm finding that leads to recognized standard language. The term development proposed by Kloss himself (Kloss 1967) will not be used because it implies comparison and evaluation, and the notion of one language being better than the other. This is not the case, although different degrees of elaboration do make linguistic varieties more or less suitable for usage in formal domains (legislation, judiciary, religion, science, etc.) (cf. Hymes 1992). In opposition to Hornberger’s framework on language policy and language planning (Hornberger 2006), I shall deny the clear-cut difference between two aspects of language planning: codification of language’s form and elaboration of language’s function. Function and form are entangled to the extent to which new domains require a higher differentiated lexicon and a more complex syntax. Hence, the term elaboration refers to both. It describes a process of forming new linguistic items and structures (a new “code”) in order to cope with new linguistic functions. Proposals in norm finding processes do not only come from political institutions, but from educated speakers and writers who care about the language varieties they use and intervene deliberately in their elaboration (Kailuweit 1998). As Kabatek (1996) points out, to some extent the speakers become linguists in the process of language planning.

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standard varieties of Romance languages.4 According to one of the main assumptions in contact linguistics, namely that typological similarity facilitates mutual structural influence (Weinreich 1953; Siegel 2008; Matras 2009; Johanson 2002, this volume), it is quite probable that linguistic relatedness and typological congruence between Latin and the Romance languages facilitated the borrowing, transfer and copying processes. Although Arabic was the language of a highly elaborated and prestigious culture for centuries in medieval Spain, the morphosyntactic loans from Arabic are insignificant in comparison to the loans from Latin (Penny 1991: 13). Nonetheless, as far as ausbau is concerned, not only should linguistic relatedness and typological congruence be taken into account, but also the attitudes of experts and non-specialists towards the source languages that the cultural context imposes. In the case of Corsican, the most familiar models that one must look into are standard French and standard Italian. For various sociopolitical reasons5 that I shall explain in greater detail in the course of this chapter, both languages provide a model that is generally perceived as something to be avoided rather than to be followed. Needless to say, social motivation for a conscious linguistic change has been detected by other researchers in situations of endangered languages and dialects, and shift-induced interference: a group of speakers highlights one linguistic feature to show distinction from other groups, even if the groups speak the same language or dialect.6 However, as far as I can see, the specific ambiguity of following a model of another cultured language and avoiding its particular solutions can only be understood if ones takes the linguistic change seriously that follows elaboration. The fact that varieties intended for more formal situations differ considerably from unmarked everyday language has been often neglected in the literature.7 Hence, it seems necessary to introduce a new term that describes a special strategy in an ausbau process which goes beyond the simple and fre4

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Posner (1996: 141–149) refers to the subjunctive, the “accusative and infinitive” and the negation as three examples of modern uses of Romance languages “that might not have survived without the buttress of Latinate grammar” (141). In the centralized national state of France, French is the language of breadwinning. However, many Corsicans perceive the French dominance over the island, which dates back to the late 18th century, as the result of a colonization process. Traditionally, Italian was the cultured language for Corsicans, but its prestige was impaired as a result of Mussolini’s occupation of the island during WW2. See Thomason this volume and references therein. Cf. Thomason and Kaufman 1988; Campell and Muntzel 1989; Schilling-Estes and Wolfram 1999; Thomason 2001a and 2001b.

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quently observed aspect of performing distinctiveness by producing or avoiding certain feature in everyday communication. I shall call “negative borrowing” a strategy that in a process of ausbau weighs the dialectal variation in the light of a model language and opts for employing or further elaborating the local form that is the most dissimilar in comparison to the model. The concept is partly inspired by Jerger’s claim that the same language – French for Corsican – can be a positive model on a constructional level and a negative model on a level of linguistic expression (Jerger 2004: 235). On a constructional level, the model language provides a checklist of linguistic items that must be dealt with in the ausbau process. On a level of linguistic expression, the specific solutions of the model language are excluded in order to keep the language in the process of elaboration dissimilar to the model. The concept of “negative borrowing” collates the two aspects, but it primarily refers to a specific strategy in the process of elaboration. In fact, a word or construction of the model language can function as a kind of linguistic eraser: local expressions that are perceived as too similar to the model are erased. A paradigmatic example in the field of lexicography is the polemic discussion about the Catalan word for ship. Barco, homonymous with the Spanish form, was the current word for ship in spoken Catalan until the 1980s. Although linguists proved that barco had been used in Catalan for centuries and that it was incorporated into the language in a time when the ending -o for a masculine singular still fitted into the morphological system,8 the form was considered intolerable in public discourse due to the Spanish parallelism. At school, pupils were taught that the correct Catalan expression is vaixell, a word that sounded old-fashioned and pretentious to most adult speakers. As a result of successful school teaching, by 1990 it seemed anachronistic that some linguistically “tolerant” journalists were defending barco (Tubau 1990; Kailuweit 2002). Barco had been erased from standard Catalan by “negative borrowing”. It must be pointed out that “negative borrowing” is not just a new term for the old phenomenon of linguistic purism. In the case of “negative borrowing”, the proper language is not an ideal that has reached its level of perfection in the past and is now in danger due to foreign influences. On the contrary, the proper language aspires to a level of elaboration that a model language has already achieved. In order to reach this level, the model lan8

By the way, the term barco was perfectly integrated in a Catalan word family, too: barca (‘boat’), embarcador (‘wharf ’), embarcació (‘watercraft’), embarcar-se (‘to embark’).

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guage is a permanent guide, but the specific solutions for the language in the process of elaboration must be as dissimilar to the model as possible.9 “Negative borrowing” can also have another effect, as we will see in the following sections. By comparing the linguistic inventory of the language in the process of elaboration to that of the model language, every form or construction suitable for formal use, but absent in the model language is a feature to be considered and further elaborated: the core grammar of the language in the process of elaboration is defined not by internal aspects, but in comparison with the model language – its lacunae and dissimilarities. Hence, after a short outline describing the historical situation that led to the differentiation of Corsican as an ausbau language (section 2), I shall analyze non-specialist orientated,10 normative discourse concerning the elaboration of Corsican today (section 3). I shall illustrate the fact that many terms of the Corsican written varieties are designed to avoid obvious parallels not only with French, but also with Italian. The hypothesis that I aim to prove will be that Corsican norm finding is highly influenced by “negative borrowing” to assure – according to Marcellesi’s ([1983] 2003) theory of linguistic marking (section 4) – the status of Corsican as an independent language. 9

10

An anonymous reviewer interprets the term “negative borrowing” strategy as indicating the social distinctiveness between one group and another. S/he claims that the phenomenon itself is well attested, and is neither novel nor restricted to the case study presented here. I only partly agree with this view. The motivation of “negative borrowing” is of course to perform distinctiveness, but this motivation leads to considerable structural changes in the formal varieties of the diasystem (in the sense of Coseriu 1974 and Berruto 2004). The same reviewer asserts that “Corsican, whether thought of as a language or as a variety of a language, is a full linguistic system, and has been for around two hundred years, at least”. This is obviously not the case. “Corsican” has never been one full linguistic system, but a cluster of dialects with Tuscan as an umbrella language (dachsprache in the sense of Kloss). Becoming a language of its own is not only a question of social status or prestige as one might suggest defending a concept of variation and style that neglects the diasystematic organization of a historical language (cf. Eckert/Rickfort 2001). In the case of Corsican, it entails the elaboration of new varieties with a lexicon and syntax suitable to substitute Tuscan in representative functions. In this chapter, “non-specialist linguistics” will be used in a broader sense and not as euphemistic synonym of “folk linguistics”. I will consider as non-specialist orientated linguistic discourse any linguistic discourse that is directed to a broader public in order to inform and entertain the addressees or even influence their linguistic practice. The addressers of non-specialist linguistic discourse could be non-specialists or experts as far as their scientific education is concerned. Especially when I refer to the writings of Corsican (socio)linguists as instances of non-specialist orientated linguistic discourse, I do not cast doubt on their expertise, but only highlight the fact that they intend to reach a non-expert audience.

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Nevertheless, the ausbau of Corsican seems to be restricted by the requirements of its function as a compensatory language, a function that also facilitates the “negative borrowing” strategy (section 5).

2.

Historical background: ausbau as a criterion of linguistic independence

The initial statement that Corsican is a relatively new Romance language needs further explanation. The island was dominated by the Roman Republic from 237 BC on. As Giacomo-Marcellesi (1988: 822) points out, latinization was complete and ran parallel with Sardinia and Southern Italy due to both a common substrate and similar social conditions, especially the settlement of retired soldiers from the Naples and Messina regions. Judging by the absence of linguistic and metalinguistic indicators, during the Middle Ages the Latin in Corsica did not develop into an independent Romance language. The island was ruled by Pisa, causing the Neolatin spoken varieties to be overlaid with dominant Tuscan elements. From 1282, Corsica belonged to the Genoese who continued to use the Tuscan-centered written variety of Italian in prestige domains. As in many other parts of the Italian speaking territory, the local dialect formed a continuum with the language of Dante and Boccaccio: the more formal a situation, the higher the necessity to adapt to the prestige variety. Therefore, the Corsican language was considered a Tuscan dialect from the beginnings of Romance linguistics (Diez 1836: 82), a classification that has been challenged only in the last few decades. The criteria with which we classify Romance languages are heterogeneous. When Diez differentiated between the national languages French, Spanish and Portuguese, Italian, the language of culture, Provençal (Occitan), the language of the medieval poetry of the troubadours, and also Walachian (Romanian) in his work Grammatik der romanischen Sprachen, he applied avant la lettre the two criteria that had been established by Kloss in the 1960s: languages can distinguish themselves from one another either by their immanent distance (abstand) or by their level of elaboration (ausbau) (Kloss 1967). Distance appears as both an external and horizontal criterion that bundles and separates primary varieties – genolects in my terminology (Kailuweit 1997: 18–24). In this way, Walachian was primarily a language of distance in Diez’s day and age, a cluster of Romance varieties in a Slavic, Germanic, Hungarian, Albanian, Turkish and Greek surrounding. In contrast, the other five languages correspond to the criterion of ausbau which is, to some extent, internal and vertical. As national languages they possess a norm – a representative grammolect in my terminology (Kailuweit 1997: 18–24) which is applied in the state apparatus and

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taught in schools. Before the language reaches national status, the written culture (especially literature, such as in the case of Italy) is the main point of orientation towards which a language area is able to develop. Provençal (Occitan) has achieved the status of an independent language thanks to the prestige of medieval literature which generally, however, does not form part of the accepted corpus of orientation for modern usage. The examples show that the grammolectal constitution of a language is media-oriented from the very beginning, seeing as it surpasses the linguistic immediacy, the so-called face-to-face level. The use of the media does not only, however, exceed the horizon of day-to-day communication, but at the same time corresponds to a functional extension and structural elaboration. The grammolectal, mediatized variety adopts functions that are non-existent in genolectal day-to-day communication and does so with the help of a level of formalization that demands reflection and additional study. Potential social mobility is so strongly linked to the acquisition of the standard variety of a (national) language community because the access to the standard is generally socially selective (Bourdieu 1982). On the base of these preliminary thoughts it becomes clear that the assumption of further Romance languages in French, Spanish or Italian territory is precarious. These languages can hardly be considered languages of abstand, due to the fundamental typological similarities and the imprecise dialectal borders. The level of ausbau is therefore decisive, as is the speakers’ acceptance. In the case of Corsican, the process of ausbau is still under way (Goebl 1988; Jerger 2004; Farrenkopf 2011). In ausbau processes, one usually differentiates between corpus planning and status planning (Kloss 1969; Hornberger 2006). The elaboration of the corpus consists not only of an intermedia transcription, in which the day-to-day speech is transported into writing, but also in the adoption of foreign models of formal speech. The status, on the other hand, is a result of the usage of the elaborated items in prestigious forms of media. It is no coincidence that the beginning of the systematic elaboration of the Corsican written culture dates back to the late 19th century, when French replaced Italian in the areas of written language. When Corsica was purchased by the French crown in 1764 and fully incorporated into France in 1796, the influence of written Italian faded away. However, it was only at the end of the 19th century that French became a reasonably well-known and commonly used language in all written domains, thanks to Jules Ferry’s education policy. Interestingly, the first systematic attempts to establish Corsican as an independent (written) language date from the same time (Blackwood 2008: 11–37; Adrey 2009: 160–176). Cut off from Italy for political reasons and thus, in Kloss’ (1967) words, having lost its “umbrella language”,

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spoken Corsican seemed to be too different to be considered a spoken variety of French. Therefore, standard French never acquired the status of a natural means of formal expression for native speakers of Corsican varieties. Nonetheless, throughout the 20th century, spoken French spread at the expense of Corsican, giving birth to a process of language shift that threatens the future of the Corsican varieties in their function as mother tongues. Today, the majority of Corsicans classify their genolectal competence as French, but it is difficult to estimate how many Corsicans still master the Corsican language as a genolect. Going by the 1999 statistics of the Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (INSEE)11 a mere 6–10 % of all Corsican genolect speakers born before 1965 passed on this competence to their children (retransmission habituelle). Thus, the number of Corsican genolect speakers has been decreasing by a factor of 10. Nonetheless, the same study proves an increasing degree of occasional transmission (transmission occasionelle) that reaches 65 % for the parents’ generation born in 1965. In my opinion, the transmission occasionelle must be interpreted in the light of a tendency that at first view seems to contrast paradoxically with the reduction of linguistic competence in the genolectal area: despite a loss of genolect speakers, Corsican has been developing linguistically for several decades. It is used in various kinds of texts, from literature to scientific prose, but does not compete with French in any more than a symbolic way. Due to the fact that Corsican itself occupies grammolectal domains, a diglossic dimension arises. In the light of Ferguson’s (1959) classical examples – Swiss German, Modern Arabic, Haitian Creole, among others – I wish to redefine diglossia as a hierarchic language contact situation whose relative stability is conspicuous, given that the B-language could potentially insert itself into the functions of the A-language. Based on this claim, in the field of Catalan sociolinguistics a theory has been developed that diglossia is in fact not of long-term stability, but ends with the replacement of the B-language by the A-language or with the so-called normalization of the B-language and the reduction of the A-language (language conflict) (Aracil 1986: 25). The aim of corpus and status planning would therefore not be bilingualism, i.e. balanced competence of both languages in the whole linguistic community, but the reacquisition of monolingualism in the B-language. It is evident that in this case, state independence is a necessary condition but indeed not a sufficient one, as the current status of Gaelic in the Republic of Ireland proves.

11

http://insee.fr/fr/themes/document.asp?reg_id=6&ref_id=7500 (accessed 30 September 2013).

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Corsica did not have the chance to become an independent state, which would have enabled Corsican to function as the official language. During the short phases of independence in the 18th century (1736 and 1755–69) there was an identity defining discourse (cf. Vergé-Franceschi 1996), but it did not result in a lasting promotion of linguistic independence, not least due to the language thinking that dominated in the period of Enlightenment: in the century of universalism the individual language played no significant role in the identity-forming processes. Just as the Catalans considered the universal language Spanish a means of expression of their cultural independence (Kailuweit 1997: 206–210), the referential language Italian and the universal language French were available to the Corsicans as possible cultured languages. It was not only the loss of linguistic competence in the Italian grammolect, but also the dominant linguistic attitudes in the 19th century that connected the articulation of cultural independence to the use of the mother tongue, i.e. to the genolectal competence. The absence of political independence and the economic underdevelopment that caused the emigration of a considerable proportion of the population – during the first half of the 20th century, Corsica was one of the most thinly populated regions in Europe – prevented Corsican from becoming a fully elaborated language used in all domains of literacy. The nationalist French linguistic ideology and its realization in language policy (Kailuweit 1997; Schiffman 2002) also played a role in this aspect. The propagation of French monolingualism that made its native competence a condition for participating in both economy and society, resulted in the decreased transmission of Corsican genolectal competence, as demonstrated in the INSEE study. In addition, after the fascist occupation of the island during the Second World War reintegration into Italophony was definitely out of the question. The only way of maintaining the local dialect seemed to be to convert it into a written language and to teach it at school.12 As far as norm finding for this new language is concerned, “negative borrowing” as a strategy comes into play to avoid similarities with both French and Italian and to guarantee the symbolic independence of the Corsican grammatical system. To sum up this section: Based on Kloss’ criteria of abstand and ausbau, Corsican achieved the status of an independent Romance language in a time span ranging from the late 19th century to post-WWII. Thus, one can observe a paradox that goes back to this period and that is gradually increasing due to the intensification of Corsican lessons at school and the possibilities 12

Corsican is taught to a percentage of pupils that is higher than for any other minority language in France (Comiti 2005: 69–79; Farrenkopf 2011: 110–117).

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offered by the new forms of media: the elaboration and spread of grammolectal competence is accompanied by a loss of genolectal competence. The question therefore remains as to what degree this particular situation influences the strategies underlying borrowing, transfer and copying processes that are at work in the formation of a elaborated variety of Corsican. This variety would symbolically represent the still existing dialectal cluster and assure the survival of Corsican at least as a second language learned at school.

3.

Non-specialist orientated discourse

In his study on linguistic attitudes, Ulrich Farrenkopf reports on his own experiences with what I would like to call “negative borrowing” in this chapter. He reports that in a Corsican class he assisted at the Lycée Giocante de Casabianca, the teacher advised his pupils to use manda instead of invia (‘he/she sends’) and di ogni locu instead of dappertuttu (‘everywhere’). Farrenkopf points out that all the forms are currently used. With regard to the first two words, the teacher recommended a form that is a homophone in standard Italian but non-existent in French and in the case of the last two, he recommended a form that also differs from standard Italian (Farrenkopf 2011: 80).13 The reported cases can obviously not be considered representative, although they may illustrate a more generalized attitude. Therefore, in this section I shall have a more systematic look at different manifestations of non-specialist orientated discourse, i.e. works that are directed toward a broader audience and that, intentionally or non-intentionally, have a certain impact on the readers’ linguistic attitudes and behavior. As we will see, even though the reviewed texts by no means advocate directly for “negative borrowing”, they nevertheless prepare the ground for this phenomenon. According to the foreword by Jacques Fusina, Jean-Marie Comiti, sociolinguist of the Corsican university at Corte, aims his essay La langue corse entre chien et loup (2005) at a broad audience. Comiti starts with the hypothesis of an early Corsican linguistic identity as the perception of a special flavor in the local Latin.14 He then comments on the formation of Romance languages 13

14

The current form of standard Italian is dappertutto. In ogni luogo exists as an alternative. “Considérons que le peuple corse a progressivement imprimé au latin une ‘corsité’ qui préside à son autonomie linguistique et lui confère son caractère propre. Cette nouvelle identité se constitue autour d’une matrice linguistique latine ayant subi très tôt les influences d’un substrat prélatin, d’une part, et ayant intégré, d’autre part, les éléments germaniques introduits par les grandes invasions qui n’ont pas épargné la Corse. D’autres influences viendront s’ajouter par la suite, notamment

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and highlights the sound changes that Corsican shares with Portuguese and Catalan (2005: 21–24). In the course of the essay he tackles the question of Tuscanization in order to unmask the widespread belief of a Tuscan-Corsican linguistic unity as a myth that conceals the Corsican monolingualism until the French dominance.15 The essay does not present a large quantity of linguistic data, but one detail is especially interesting in the context of “negative borrowing”. Comiti describes a tendency of Corsican to reduce the number of nominal classes from four – like in standard Italian – to two. Hence, instead of the masculine and feminine with the ending -e – paese, sale, ponte, nome, fiume, mare; corte, croce, pelle – we find the masculine forms paesu, salu, pontu, nomu, fiumu, maru and the feminine forms corta, crocia, pella (Comiti 2005: 116). Comiti does not directly suggest the use of these forms that are – as he points out – more or less accepted, but he raises the question as to whether we are dealing with a normal morphological change or with unacceptable “monstrosities”. He concludes that changes are inevitable for every living language and that the people have the right to establish the solution they perceive as functional (Comiti 2005: 116).16 Jean Chiorbioli’s17 Le corse pour le nuls (2010) is aimed not only at shortterm tourists, but also at those who have taken up their first or secondary residence on the island. These people are invited to learn some Corsican to communicate with their new neighbors and/or colleagues (Chiorboli 2010: 3–4). In his short introduction into the history of Corsican, Chiorboli insists on the linguistic independence of the island in spite of the impact (more or less profound) by all the languages of foreign rulers.18 Nonetheless, he ad-

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après la naissance des nouvelles langues romanes de proximité, mais sans jamais remettre en cause l’identité propre à la Corse” (Comiti 2005: 21). “On considéra alors le corse comme une variante locale du toscan en forgeant l’idée qu’il n’y avait dans l’île qu’une seule langue qui pouvait se décliner sous une forme savante, “haute”, et une forme populaire, “basse”. C’est ainsi qu’un fantasmatique monolinguisme toscan est né dans l’imaginaire collectif et que le monolinguisme corse, qui avait vécu comme une réalité linguistique incommodante, parfois dégradante, a été occulté, escamoté, évacué telle une tare que la conscience linguistique collective a jetée aux oubliettes” (Comiti 2005: 31). “Les mutation linguistiques sont le lot de toute langue vivante dont l’évolution est inévitable. C’est peut-être le dicton populaire (qui véhicule toute la sagesse du monde) qui semble répondre le plus efficacement à la question: a pratica vinci a grammatica (l’usage vient à bout de la grammaire)” (Comiti 2005: 117). Jean Chiorboli is professor for Corsican Language and Humanities at the University of Corsica (Corte). “… l’influence plus ou moins profonde du latin de Rome, des divers parlers italiens (notamment toscan et sarde) puis du français s’exerce sûr île, sans jamais

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mits that Corsican remains a part of Italo-Romance even though the island is integrated into the French speaking sphere of communication.19 In his short grammar we find a couple of potential examples for “negative borrowing”. One candidate would be the names of the week in a phonetically more southern form and without the ending -di (‘-day’) that we find in French and standard Italian (luni, marti, mercuri, etc.; French: lundi, mardi, mercredi, etc.; Italian: lunedì, martedì, mercoledì, etc.) (Chiorboli 2010: 96). As another candidate for “negative borrowing”, I would like to mention the paraphrase of obligation ci vole à + infinitive (Chiorboli 2010: 62). If Corsican allows for variation (ci vole à, bisogna, etc.),20 Chiorboli mentions just one form that has no functional parallel in standard Italian. Jean-Marie Arrighi – a school inspector for Corsican language teaching – also addresses his Histoire de la langue corse (2002) to a broad audience that is not restricted to Corsica.21 While discussing the relation of Corsican and Italian he tells a “joke”: Corsican is not an Italian dialect, but Italian should be considered a Corsican dialect, since Corsican is closer to Latin.22 He goes on to concede that Corsican incontrovertibly belongs to the Italo-Romance group, although its place in this group is debatable.23 Some pages later he insists on the similarity of Tuscan, Corsican and the North of Sardinia. In the Middle Ages, the three regions are supposed to have formed a linguistic unity.24 Hence, Corsican could claim the same heritage as Tuscan and, in fact, has conserved part of this heritage that standard Italian has already lost, as some lexical and morphological examples prove. One example is the main-

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gommer entièrement des caractères linguistiques spécifiques forgés au cours d’une évolution plurimillénaire” (Chiorboli 2010: 10). “Si la Corse […] reste dans l’aire linguistique de l’ensemble italo-roman, où elle a longtemps évolué, elle a cependant complètement basculé dans le champ de communication français” (Chiorboli 2010: 10). http://gbatti-alinguacorsa.pagesperso-orange.fr/grammaire/tournures.htm# ILFAUT (accessed 30 September 2013). “Cet ouvrage a d’abord pour but d’apporter au grand public – corse ou non – une information minimale, aussi objective que possible, sur les étapes historiques qui ont conduit à l’élaboration de la langue corse” (Arrighi 2002: 9). “Le grand avocat corse Moro-Giafferi, à la question d’un journaliste “le corse estt-il un dialecte italien?”, répondit: “c’est le contraire, c’est l’italien qui est un dialecte du corse, puisque le corse, c’est le latin”. Au delà de la boutade, c’est aussi une évidence qu’il énonçait” (Arrighi 2002: 35). “A l’intérieur de ces langues romanes, le corse […] se situe indiscutablement dans le groupe dit “italo-roman”. Il y a débat cependant sur sa place à l’intérieur de ce groupe” (Arrighi 2002: 36–37). “Durant la période médiévale, on doit considérer que l’ensemble Toscane-CorseNord de la Sardaigne constitue linguistiquement un tout” (Arrighi 2002: 43).

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tenance of avali (‘now’) that has been substituted by ora in standard Italian.25 This form is also mentioned by Giacomo-Marcellesi (1988: 823) as a typical Corsican marker, but one restricted to southern varieties. Thus, presenting this marker as Corsican tout court is a gesture that erases variation by “negative borrowing”. Arrighi concludes by adducing some examples of -u at the end of words instead of Tuscan -o and of the prepositional accusative in medieval Tuscan texts from the island that illustrate the regional linguistic flavor.26 Even though these phenomena are not restricted to Corsica – as he points out – in their totality they make Corsican stand out. In addition, although the markers may not mean the same to the specialists, they represent a highly important symbolic treasure for the inhabitants of the island.27 This last comment is especially interesting. It highlights the fact that what we might call the core grammar of Corsican is not determined by the linguistic system itself, but by a set of features representing dissimilarities with the model languages. We shall find this argumentation more explicitly in an expert-orientated discourse by Marcellesi that we shall analyze in the next section. To conclude this section I shall comment briefly on a more systematic study that was undertaken by Christian Jerger in 2004. In his dissertation, Jerger analyzes 30 Corsican dictionaries published between 1905 and 1999 (Jerger 2004: 80–82). These dictionaries oscillate between a descriptive and prescriptive claim. Hence, they can be considered instances of non-specialist orientated discourse in that one of their objectives, albeit not the primary objective, is to function as handbooks of reference for the formal use of Cor25

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“Il n’est dès lors pas absurde d’affirmer […] que le corse est, autant que l’italien officiel, héritier du toscan primitif et de sa littérature […] De cette ancienne communauté témoigne en particulier le lexique: de nombreux mots aujourd’hui disparus de l’italien, ou cantonnés à un usage poétique, restent usité en corse. C’est le cas de avà ou avali (maintenant), remplacé par ora en italien moderne, ou de nimu (personne) remplacé par nessuno. En morphologie, le corse a maintenu la forme de la première personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif, quand l’italien l’a alignée sur celle du subjonctif (andiamo en italien, andemu en corse) (Arrighi 2002: 44). “Ses traits caractéristiques [du corse, R.K.] se repèrent dans des textes notariaux ou baptismaux […] On y constate notamment la présence du u final au lieu du o toscan: “e statu battizatu ne la iesa di sanctu Iuvanni per me prete Paduanu”. Une communauté rurale qui élit un chasseur a “eleto a Colombanu”. On rencontre ici l’emploi corse du à avant le complément d’objet direct quand celui-ci est un nom de personne” (Arrighi 2002: 45–46). “Chacun de ses phénomènes pris isolément peut se retrouver quelque part ailleurs dans la Romania, mais la présence de l’ensemble de ces traits permet de reconnaître “le corse”. S’ils n’ont pas la même importance pour les spécialistes, ils ont un sens symbolique fort pour les habitants de l’île eux-mêmes” (Arrighi 2002: 46).

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sican. Jerger points out that as far as the explicit comment of French and Italian loan words is concerned, the reviewed dictionaries reveal a rather neutral attitude towards Italian loan words, whereas in the older editions and also in some of the newer ones, French borrowings are stigmatized (Jerger 2004: 180–183). In the field of neologisms, Jerger (2004: 201–203) observes a strong tendency to adopt forms of standard Italian, partly with smaller phonetic and morphological modifications (anapéstu; aerunàutu; aritimetica; annegazione). Corsican forms that avoid both the French and the Italian form – e.g. Corsican aberramento, French aberration, Italian aberrazione – are relatively rare (Jerger 2004: 204). Detailed scrutiny of the use of the morphemes -ista versus -istu for nomina agentis and -abile/ibile versus -evule for adjectives of “disposition” shows a tendency towards the learned suffix -ista in the first case and of the inherited form -evule in the second. While the use of -ista does not differ from the standard Italian solution, -evule is no longer productive in the model language (Jerger 2004: 230–236). Therefore, the choice of traditional -evule instead of the learned suffixes -abili/ibile can be considered a case of “negative borrowing” in the sense of the present study.

4.

Markers of “Corsicanness”

In an academic article first published in 1983, Jean-Baptiste Marcellesi develops a theory of linguistic marking as a central strategy to construct and maintain linguistic identity.28 A linguistic identity marker is a feature that is considered representative when identifying a certain language or variety. Marcellesi points out that markers need not be central features as far as the linguistic system as a whole is concerned.29 In addition – and this is especially important in the context of a theory of “negative borrowing” – the markers are not even necessarily the only forms for a certain function that are consistent with the normal usage. It is entirely sufficient for them to be perceived as symbolically representative.30 28

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A marker in Marcellesi’s terms would be – more or less – a stereotype (third order indexicality in the sense of Johnstone et al. 2006). This is not the place to discuss this terminological difference in detail. However, as the stereotype has a negative connotation, the term should be avoided in the context of norm finding. “Les indicateurs d’identité ne sont pas nécessairement des faits linguistiques importants, si on les considère d’un stricte point de vue de structure” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 210). “En réalité dans la communauté qu’ils caractérisent, il s’agit de traits dépendant fortement de la puissance symbolique que la communauté leur confère, provo-

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To retrack the question of Corsican linguistic identity, Marcellesi starts with an anecdote. He quotes a Catalan linguist and militant who defended the close relationship of Corsican and Italian at a conference in 1981, stating that the slogan libertà per i nostri fratelli incarcerati that he had read on the city walls of Ajaccio was identical to one on the city walls of Florence. Marcellesi comments that on the one hand, the example proves the ineffectiveness of the attempts of those who try to attest that Corsican differs greatly from Italian and is even closer to Portuguese from a linguistic point of view. On the other hand, the similarity of a certain construction does not prove anything with regard to sociolinguistic perception.31 What is really important for the perception of linguistic identity is the specific and to some extent arbitrary catalog of markers that stand for the linguistic community.32 Marcellesi ([1983] 2003: 212–215) goes on to list seven canonical markers of “Corsicanness”: the ending -u which corresponds to the standard Italian -o, the palatalized /t/ and /d/, the sandhi, the vowel raising of /e/ and /o/ to [i] and [u] when the tone of a derivative form changes to another syllable, the article, the compound future and the prepositional accusative. In the main part of his article, Marcellesi ([1983] 2003: 218–234) deals with two other markers, Corsican exclamative and subordinate structures that are dissimilar to their French and standard Italian counterparts. In between the two parts, we find some highly interesting considerations concerning the status and function of identity markers in the context of language teaching. He starts this section with the remark that students who haven’t learned a local

31

32

quant des entreprises de valorisation et de stigmatisation liées au degré de prise de conscience de l’identité et aux projets de définition de la communauté que forment les groupes culturellement hégémoniques qui la constituent et qui la structurent” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 210). “Dans un congrès récent (Montpellier, décembre 1981) un chercheur et militant catalaniste […] soutenait la cause de l’italianité de notre langue en faisant remarquer que l’inscription qu’il avait lue sur les murs d’Ajaccio en août 1981 (“libertà per I nostri fratelli incarcerati”) aurait pu être tracée, exactement identique, sur les murs de Florence. Cet exemple est extrême. Mais il suffit d’un côté à dénoncer la vanité des efforts de ceux qui continuent à écrire que le corse est très éloigné sur le plan strictement linguistique de l’italien, et même qu’il est plus proche du portugais. En sens inverse, la réalité linguistique étant ce qu’elle est, on met ainsi en évidence que les rapprochements de détail ne font rien à l’affaire […] cela ne prouve absolument rien quant à l’identité sociolinguistique” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 211). “Comme pour chaque langue ce qui fait la corsité, c’est la synchrasie, le mélange intime en une structure unique d’un ensemble de traits pancorse – dont chacun peut se trouver ailleurs, isolé – et d’un ensemble de variables différenciant, selon la géographie ou l’appartenance sociale, des Corses entre eux, qui permet de cerner la corsité linguistique” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 211).

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variety of Corsican as a first language need special orientation as far as the Corsican norm is concerned.33 This orientation should be based on the decision by norm-giving authorities that are acknowledged by the mass of speakers.34 The autonomy that the norm-giving authorities guarantee could be illusory, following an external norm either explicitly or implicitly, consciously or unconsciously.35 As far as the Corsican language is concerned, the process of identity marking oscillates between two poles: integration into the external, i.e. Italian model or the search for forms that are the most dissimilar to the model languages.36 Having taken this into consideration, the sentences libertà per i nostri fratelli incarcerati might be a perfect example of Corsican if one adopts a norm that is based on the northern dialects and their dominant orthography, but at the same time, this option relates identity to a historically and culturally motivated integration.37 The alternative, i.e. the search for the most dissimilar forms, is also problematic because it risks mixing up forms from different Corsican dialects – it is not always the southern forms that are most dissimilar in comparison to standard Italian.38 In conclusion, Marcellesi advocates a norm that is based on generally accepted markers of Corsican identity.39 Needless to say, the list of theses 33

34

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36

37

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39

“En effet dès qu’on est en situation d’enseigner la langue à des gens qui ne la parlent pas et qu’on n’est pas dans une situation privilégiée (unité dialectale dans un village par exemple), il n’est pas facile d’échapper au problème (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 216).” “Une langue aura son autonomie quand la communauté qui la parle aura ses instances normalisatrices propres, c’est une choses, et que ces instances normalisatrices sont reconnues par la masse parlante” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 216). “Mais cette autonomie peut fort bien n’être que factice: C’est le cas quand les instances normalisatrices de la communauté reproduisent explicitement ou implicitement, consciemment ou inconsciemment, un modèle extérieur à la communauté” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 216–217). “Les instances normalisatrices sont contraintes de naviguer entre deux points extrêmes: l’un est l’intégration au modèle extérieur […] L’autre point extrême opposé est la recherche de l’écart maximum par rapport au modèle extérieur” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 217). “Dans ce cas la recherche de l’identité est liée à l’intégration, à l’historicité de la communauté corse, à l’enracinement dans son passé culturel (qui n’est pas homologique avec son passé politique […])” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 217–218]. “Contrairement à ce que pourrait faire croire cette première série, l’écart maximum ne va pas toujours conduire aux variétés sudistes […] tout autant que la règle d’intégration non critique, la règle de l’écart maximum a ses impasses et ses absurdités” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 218). “C’est pourquoi nous pensons que la normalisation doit être éminemment critique et de ce fait prendre soigneusement en compte les indicateurs de corsité” (Marcellesi [1983] 2003: 218).

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markers is open and there will not be significant variation for all markers. Even so, I would like to raise the hypothesis (which further research will either confirm or confute) that linguistic markers of Corsican identity which compete with other dialectal and sociolectal forms are the best candidates for “negative borrowing”.40 If a form or construction is accepted as a marker of “Corsicanness”, then in the long run, varying forms will be erased that are more similar to the model languages. Variation in the field of linguistic features that are less salient as markers of identity must be more stable and allow for forms that are similar to the model languages.

5.

“Negative borrowing” and compensation

In the last section of this chapter, I will cast light on the relation between “negative borrowing” and what I wish to call the compensatory function of language maintenance (Kailuweit in print). The concept of compensation I refer to falls back on the “compensation theory” (Ritter 1961; Lübbe 1977; Marquard 1978). The works of the German philosopher Joachim Ritter and 40

An anonymous reviewer has commented that this hypothesis is circular, because in her or his view, “negative borrowing” means that the presence and/or absence of particular elements have become markers of Corsican identity since the forms differ from the other relevant languages. This is an incorrect interpretation of “negative borrowing”. Especially the diachronic process of elaboration and norm finding is completely ignored. “Negative borrowing” is a conscious or unconscious strategy in norm finding processes. It provides specific solutions at the level of expressions for structures that are taken as means of formalized (elaborated) speech from the model language(s). The specific solutions are taken from an array of varying dialectal (and/or sociolectal) forms. The effect of the ongoing process of “negative borrowing” will be that the form that is most dissimilar from the model gains in prestige and erases the alternative forms that are more similar to the model language(s) at least at the level of formalized speech (at school, in other domains of writing, etc.). This entails that the forms chosen by “negative borrowing” will become potential markers of linguistic identity (Corsican identity in our case), but not all dissimilar forms that are elaborated in a process of “negative borrowing” are already markers before this process sets on. In addition, not all existing linguistic markers of (Corsican) identity result from “negative borrowing”. Markers are by definition dissimilar, but in the sense of abstand. However, there are markers without variation (i.e. the ending -u which corresponds to the standard Italian -o) and if no process of elaboration takes places, an existing variation in which the marker is one form among others will not be affected, which is even more relevant. Hence, the hypothesis claims that a marker that competes with other dialectal forms is only a perfect candidate for consequent “negative borrowing” during a process of norm finding and elaboration, i.e. during a process that erases variation in favor of the form that is most dissimilar from the model.

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his students Hermann Lübbe and Odo Marquard revived the debate about the function of the humanities in the 1960s and 1970s. As a result of compensation, the humanities counterbalanced the loss of tradition, brought about by the processes of acceleration, rationalization and standardization that characterize modern times. Compensation can however be observed not only on a level of scholarship, but also in the practice of everyday life itself. Lübbe (1992) chooses the phenomenon of city planning as an example, while Marquard (2000: 122) transfers the ideas to the sphere of politics and points out that regionalisms are cultivated in a time in which the world is becoming increasingly standardized. Compensation by means of emphasis on regionality is carried out more often than not in relation to language and, in fact, in language areas in which minority languages and dialects are under pressure from national languages. The parameters that Lübbe sets out in his example from the field of city planning can be transferred to the Corsican setting. The “heritage neutrality” of modern architecture under the “constraints of functional demands”, which – as he points out – must be compensated for, relate, with regard to minority language such as Corsican, to nationalization, Europeanization, and globalization, which orientate language and cultural practice towards French and, increasingly, English. A sphere of communication is thereby created, which is too large to guarantee identity anchoring. An identity deficit arises, which must be compensated for. Lübbe’s premodern structural condition the compensation endeavors fall back on is accompanied by relics of traditional speech in the field of communication, which are still found among older generations in rural areas. Just as importance was placed upon not transmitting these language forms to future generations in an age of unbridled belief in progress, today there are language activists in many places (such as the citizens’ initiatives in Lübbe), who are encouraged by experts (dialectologists, sociolinguists) and demand the preservation of traditional, regional, or rather local speech and are willing to make a public effort. However, it is not the goal of compensation to develop a language policy which would lead to the ausbau of dialects and minority languages into fullfledged cultured languages as part of a nation-building process. It has much more to do with a limited, symbolic use, starting with the labeling of the public realm (Blackwood 2011) and ranging from interlacing regional words and phrases into conversation in the national language, i.e. in Corsican French, to instructing language in schools, which does not necessarily lead to a high grammolectal competence for the majority of school pupils. Lübbe’s statement that in the activists’ view, as a matter of principle, everything that is “old” and still exists is unquestionably worth preserving,

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undoubtedly implies a particular value judgment, which I do not wish to confer upon (individual) Corsican dialects. Regardless of value judgments, if one considers preservation as primarily compensatory, it seems more understandable that it will not amount to a standard debate in the form of a questione della lingua, but rather to an explicit and conscious process (to greater or lesser extent) of “negative borrowing”. The effect it has on grammolectalization is limited precisely because it is symbolic. If one does not wish to challenge the identitary status of Corsican, the efforts at grammolectalization can remain partial. These partial efforts thus offer a point of reference that transcends the practice of everyday life for the construction of a “diffuse solidary community” in which partial grammolectal competence can be punctually retrieved in order to compensate for identity loss. I would once again like to stress that such a compensatory practice appears to me to be just as legitimate as the effort to reverse language substitution processes. Ultimately, it is a necessary outcome of the modernization process, as demonstrated by the compensation theory with regard to the humanities. In this respect, describing language practice as compensation does not mean that this practice is perceived as inauthentic, but as an alternative way to maintain dialects and minority languages. The question as to how compensatory language maintenance influences the relationship between a minority language and a national language in the long run, and whether or not it can prevent extinction, will not be brought up here. It is clear, however, that as long as compensatory practice is a societal concern, the minority language will not become extinct, even if the competence of speakers does develop from a genolectal to a (limited) grammolectal one. In this context, it is important to take into consideration that compensation entails a practice that is necessarily cost-intensive, even if it seems cheaper in comparison to full-fledged “normalization” or the Reverse Language Shift program. It is not only the case that the production of linguistic presence in the public realm (labeling) and school instruction cost tax dollars, but compensation also demands a varying, but not insignificant input of time and money from the individual.41 Many Corsicans are clearly willing to provide these resources. Should things remain this way, there is hope that Corsican will persist at least as a compensational language. Nevertheless, it is uncertain whether the daily routine of compensatory practice amounts to 41

Attending facultative language courses at public schools or private institutions, buying teaching material and media products in Corsican or participating in Corsican social networks on the web, etc.

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cognitive dissonance, since the nature of the relationship between one linguistic strategy leading to identity by means of integration and another that aims to achieve identity by means of “negative borrowing” remains unclear.

6.

Conclusion

In this chapter, I have tried to prove that perceived similarities play an important role in the development of what one could call a sociolinguistic core grammar of Corsican. Similarities are important in a negative sense in that forms that are too similar to the model languages (French and Italian) tend to be excluded from the core grammar and substituted by forms that are more dissimilar. Nonetheless, what we have considered a feature in the process of elaboration is dictated by the model languages – by French in particular – that provide the textbooks and linguistic manuals on which the norm finding process is based. I have called this phenomenon “negative borrowing”: while structural patterns are taken from the model language, similarities must be avoided at the level of expression. One can observe two strategies that aim to guarantee a Corsican linguistic identity. The first only opposes French forms and tolerates similarities to standard Italian, the second consequently opts for solutions that are most dissimilar to both model languages. Jerger (2004: 318) highlights the contradiction between the two strategies and states that the first strategy remains dominant. Taking into account Marcellesi’s ([1983] 2003) theory of identity markers, one could pose the hypothesis that the more accepted an identity marker is, the higher the probability that it will become a good candidate for consequent “negative borrowing” if it competes with other dialectal or sociolectal forms, excluding similarities with both French and standard Italian. “Negative borrowing” may lead to a certain disharmony in the internal linguistic system (combination of forms stemming from different dialectal traditions). To take these risks seems to be more worthwhile in a context of linguistic compensation, in which the developing language does not function as the only language or as the dominant one in all domains, but rather as an important symbol for the speaker community that marks the identity of the community in times of inevitable nationalization, Europeanization and globalization. I would like to once again insist on the fact that I consider “negative borrowing” a perfectly legitimate strategy of norm finding. It is up to the Corsican speaker community to either accept or reject the proposed forms. The (foreign) linguist must describe, but not judge the strategies employed by Corsican language activists.

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References Adrey, Jean-Bernard 2009 Discourse and Struggle in Minority Language Policy Formation. Corsican Language Policy in the EU Context of Governance. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Aracil, Lluís V. 1986 Papers de sociolingüística. Barcelona: Edicions de la Magrana. Arrighi, Jean-Marie 2002 Histoire de la langue corse. Paris: Jean-Paul Gisserot. Berruto, Gaetano 2004 Sprachvarietät – Sprache / Linguistic Variety – Language. In: Ammon, Ulrich et al. (eds.), Sociolinguistics. An International Handbook of the Science of Language and Society, 188–195. 2nd edition, volume 1. Berlin, New York: de Gruyter. Blackwood, Robert J. 2008 Language policy. The State, the Activists and the Islanders. Language Policy on Corsica. (Language Policy 8.) Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer. Blackwood, Robert J. 2011 The linguistic landscape of Brittany and Corsica. A comparative study of the presence of France’s regional languages in the public space. French Language Studies 21: 111–130. Bourdieu, Pierre 1982 Ce que parler veut dire. L’économie des échanges linguistiques. Paris: Fayard. Campbell, Lyle and Martha C. Muntzel 1992 The structural consequences of language death. Studies in language contraction and death. In: Nancy C. Dorian (ed.), Investigating Obsolescence, 181–196. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chiorboli, Jean 2010 Le corse pour les nuls. Paris: Éditions First-Gründ. Comiti, Jean Marie 2005 La langue corse entre chien et loup. Paris: L’Harmattan. Coseriu, Eugenio 1974 Synchronie, Diachronie und Geschichte: das Problem des Sprachwandels. München: Fink. Diez, Friedrich Christian 1836–1838 Grammatik der romanischen Sprachen. Bonn: Weber. Eckert, Penelope and John Rickford (eds.) 2001 Style and Sociolinguistic Variation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Farrenkopf, Ulrich 2011 Die Entwicklung des Korsischen zur modernen Kultursprache. Eine Fallstudie zu Sprachausbau und Sprachpolitik. Bonn: Romanistischer Verlag. Ferguson, Charles A. 1959 Diglossia. Word 15: 325–340. Giacomo-Marcellesi, Mathée 1988 Histoire du corse. In: Günter Holtus, Michael Metzeltin and Christian Schmitt (eds.), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, Band 4: Italienisch, Korsisch, Sardisch, 820–829. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Goebl, Hans 1988 Korsisch, Italienisch und Französisch auf Korsika. In: Günter Holtus, Michael Metzeltin and Christian Schmitt (eds.), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, Band 4: Italienisch, Korsisch, Sardisch, 829–835. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Hornberger, Nancy H. 2006 Frameworks and Models in Language Policy and Planning. In: Thomas Ricento (ed.), An Introduction to Language Policy, 24–41. Malden, Mass. etc.: Blackwell. Hymes, Dell H. 1992 Inequality in language: Taking for granted. Penn Working Papers in Educational Linguistics 8 (1): 1–30. Jerger, Christian 2004 Lexikographie und Korpusplanung: Die Wörterbücher des Korsischen. Tübingen: Stauffenburg Verlag. Johanson, Lars 2002 Contact-induced change in a code-copying framework. In: Mari C. Jones and Edith Esch (eds.), Language Change. The Interplay of Internal, External and Extra-Linguistic Factors, 285–313. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johanson, Lars in this volume Intimate family reunions: Code-copying between Turkic relatives.

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Johnstone, Barbara, Jennifer Andrus and Andrew E. Danielson 2006 Mobility, indexicality, and the enregisterment of ‘Pittsburghese’. Journal of English Linguistics 34: 77–104. Kabatek, Johannes 1996 Die Sprecher als Linguisten. Interferenz- und Sprachwandelphänomene dargestellt am Galicischen der Gegenwart. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Kailuweit, Rolf 1997 Vom eigenen Sprechen – eine Geschichte der spanisch-katalanischen Diglossie in Katalonien (1759–1859). Frankfurt/Main: Lang. Kailuweit, Rolf 1998 Lengua y política en el s. XVIII – el español frente al francés. In: Claudio García Turza, Fabián González Bachiller and Javier Mangado Martínez (eds.), Actas del IV congreso internacional de la Asociación de Historia de la Lengua Española (La Rioja, 1–5 de abril de 1997), 497–506. Logroño: Universidad de La Rioja. Servicio de Publicaciones. Kailuweit, Rolf 2002 ’Català heavy – català light‘. Una polèmica de la ‘lingüística de profans’. Zeitschrift für Katalanistik 15: 169–182. Kloss, Heinz 1967 Abstand languages and Ausbau languages. Anthropological Linguistics 9 (7): 29–41. Kloss, Heinz 1969 Research Possibilities on Group Bilingualism: A Report. Quebec: International Center for Research on Bilingualism. Lübbe, Hermann 1977 Geschichtsbegriff und Geschichtsinteresse. Basel/Stuttgart: Schwabe. Lübbe, Hermann 1992 Im Zug der Zeit: verkürzter Aufenthalt in der Gegenwart. Berlin/ Heidelberg: Springer. Marcellesi, Jean-Baptiste 2003 Sociolinguistique. Épistémologie, Langues régionales, Polynomie. En collaboration avec Thierry Bulot et Philippe Blanchet. Paris: L’Harmattan. Marquard, Odo 1978 Kompensation. Überlegungen zu einer Verlaufsfigur geschichtlicher Prozesse. In: Faber, Karl-Georg, Christian Meier (eds.), Historische Prozesse, 330–362. München: Dt. Taschenbuch-Verlag. Marquard, Odo 2000 Philosophie des Stattdessen. Stuttgart: Reclam. Matras,Yaron 2009 Language Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Penny, Ralph 1991 A History of the Spanish Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Posner, Rebecca 1996 The Romance Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ritter, Joachim 1961 Die Aufgabe der Geisteswissenschaften in der modernen Gesellschaft. Münster: Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Westfälischen Wilhems-Universität. Siegel, Jeff 2008 The Emergence of Pidgin and Creole Languages. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. Schiffman, Harold F. 2002 French language policy: Centrism, Orwellian dirigisme, or economic determinism? In: Joshua A. Fishman (Series Ed.) and Li Wei, Jean-Marc Dewaele, and Alex Housen (Vol. Eds.), Contributions to the Sociology of Language: Vol. 87. Opportunities and Challenges of Bilingualism, 89–104. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Schilling-Estes, Natalie and Walt Wolfram 1999 Alternative models for dialect death: Dissipation vs. concentration. Language 75 (3): 486–521. Thomason, Sarah G. in this volume Contact-induced language change and typological congruence. Thomason, Sarah G. 2001a Language Contact: an Introduction. Edinburgh/Washington, DC: Edinburgh University Press, Georgetown University Press.

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Thomason, Sarah G. 2001b Contact-induced typological change. In: Martin Haspelmath, Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher and Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Language Typology and Language Universals, Sprachtypologie und sprachliche Universalien: An International Handbook, 1640–1648. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Thomason, Sarah Grey and Terrence Kaufman 1988 Language Contact, Creolization, and Genetic Linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Tubau, Ivan 1990 El català que ara es parla. Llengua i perodisme a la ràdio i la televisió. Barcelona: Empúries. Vergé-Franceschi, Michel 1996 Histoire de la Corse. Paris: Félin. Weinreich, Uriel 1953 Languages in contact. The Hague: Mouton.

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Juliane Besters-Dilger (Freiburg) and Kurt Braunmüller (Hamburg)

Sociolinguistic and areal factors promoting or inhibiting convergence within language families

1.

Introduction

1.0. Two language families form the background of this survey: the Scandinavian languages as part of the much larger Germanic language family, and the Slavic languages. Both of them are spoken in a geographic area which is or – in the case of the Slavic languages – at least was historically coherent, though two Scandinavian varieties are spoken on remote islands in the North Atlantic. 1.1. Two terms are the focus of this volume, (a) language families and (b) language contact. Both concepts are, however, far from being uncontroversial or self-evident. The concept of grouping languages together into (genetically) related language families makes use of a metaphor (family tree) and is therefore not unproblematic: metaphors suggest similarities that in most cases may live up to only one relevant point but give also way to other, misleading interpretations and wrong analogies. Language contact seems to be a less problematic concept because contact phenomena can be observed anywhere (Thurston 1987: 93), predominantly and most frequently in the lexicon but also in terms of grammatical replication (Heine and Kuteva 2005) or code copying (Johanson 2008, this volume). In our view, language contact starts out in the brains of multilingual individuals who master two (or more) languages/varieties at the same time with sufficiently high proficiency, and use them frequently in alternation (code-switching). Therefore interlingual “short-cuts” occur, such as borrowings, parallel morphosyntactic constructions and congruent lexicalization (Muysken 2000: ch.5)1, grammatical simplifications or, at least, decrease in complexity (cf. Sampson, Gil and Trudgill 2009). In a second step, the innovative contact phenomena can spread throughout a speech community and become elements of the recipient language. 1

“The languages share the grammatical structure of the sentence, fully or in part. The vocabulary comes from two or more different languages.” (Muysken 2000: 122).

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1.2. Convergences between languages can represent two completely different phenomena: on the one hand, the integration (understood as a process, not as a result) of grammatical constructions from one source to a so-called target language (in van Coetsem’s terms [2000]: source vs. recipient language activity), with the result that the differences between them diminish. Moreover, finding grammatical compromises or intermediate language forms2 may, however, occur only in extreme contact situations, such as the emergence of pidgins. (For a more general discussion of various convergence phenomena within genetically closely related languages see Braunmüller 2009.) On the other hand, convergence is part of a complex social phenomenon which says in its most general form that one should accommodate to the addressee’s variety in order to gain more social acceptance by the addressee (and, in some cases, the overhearers as well). Thus we had best distinguish between (a) individual, i.e. situational and interpersonal aspects of accommodation in a specific face-to-face conversation and (b) the collective political will to maintain (or even establish) mutual understanding between nations for historical, cultural or strategic reasons, which is the case between the speakers of the Scandinavian countries. Positive accommodation3 (convergence) can be considered a relevant precondition for lexical and grammatical borrowing, thus achieving more congruence across languages. The result of such a development may be a convergence area (“Sprachbund”; cf. sec. 3.2.: Sprachbund in the Balkans), where several neighboring but often genetically unrelated languages now show more common features than before this intense language contact had taken place. On the other hand, divergence seen in terms of the Communication Accommodation Theory (cf. Giles and Coupland 1991) is also rel2

3

Whinnom (1971: 105) has argued that pidgins may show proper stable norms of grammar and contain “certain linguistic items” (structures, etc.) which cannot be immediately attributed to the native or target language. One precondition for such a development is that no classical target language exists: typically the socially superior and thus linguistically dominant (often “colonial”) language and more than one substratal language are involved. Mufwene (2004: 480) argues in an essentially similar way: “Creoles and indigenized varieties are, nonetheless, similar outcomes of the non-native appropriation of a language by populations which have influenced it with features from languages they spoke previously.” Cf. Giles and Coupland (1991: 60–71) who define accommodation (in the broadest sense) as an adjustment of communication actions relative to those of the conversation partners, being aware of others accommodating – or failing to accommodate – to the speaker (p. 60). The framework is face-to-face talking. One of the aims of accommodation is to “index and achieve solidarity with or dissociation from a conversational partner, reciprocally and dynamically” (p. 61).

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evant, both from a social and grammatical point of view. Dialects, here defined as locally restricted varieties within a linguistic diasystem (Weinreich 1954), have to be divergent by definition, showing clear differences compared to their neighboring dialects, justifying their existence. Otherwise these local varieties would become superfluous, disappear or get levelled into (less specific) vernaculars. Trudgill (1996, 2000) has drawn a distinction between language and dialect contact. Language contact is the more general term and can be applied to any form of contact but typically between genetically unrelated varieties, whereas dialect contact presupposes the mutual intelligibility between genetically closely related or diffuse/non-focused linguistic varieties (Le Page and Tabouret-Keller 1985). This means that dialect contact, seen as contact within language families, can on the one hand promote convergence phenomena between related varieties because they are so similar to each other that borrowings and grammatical replications can occur anywhere and are, in cases of intense contact, almost inevitable. On the other hand, dialect has then to be seen in a much broader perspective: it can no longer be regarded as a distinct local variety with clear idiosyncratic features but rather as an ausbau language (Kloss 1978) and a language in its own right, which has to maintain its social and linguistic identity in order not to become marginalized and absorbed by other closely related (neighboring) varieties. Its characteristic linguistic features thus have to be highlighted and reinforced. 1.3. Language contact presupposes not only multilingualism at a high level of proficiency and fluency, frequent code-switching and finally possibly interchange between language systems, but also the favoring of social and often areal factors (such as close vicinity or being subjacent under a dominant roofing language). When speakers of two different varieties meet, two scenarios can occur: (A) One of the languages is more prestigious, dominant, more widespread or has more speakers, and the other one has only low prestige, is peripheral, locally restricted and has a minority of speakers. (B) Both languages have about the same social status and the same numbers of speakers. Moreover, when a widely acknowledged prestigious language also functions as a lingua franca (such as Latin and Low/High German in northern Europe in the Middle Ages and beyond) or as a language of higher education, science and religion (such as classical Greek or Latin in the Antiquity), its status will increase considerably and it will become a model for almost all vernaculars which become roofed by this language. Convergences, grammatical replications and parallel word order patterns increase, with the result that the vernaculars as recipient languages expand their grammatical structures and integrate repli-

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cations (i.e. copies) of the source language in order to live up to new communicative functions, for example, as an elaborate written and, to a certain extent, standardized language (see Höder 2010 for the roles of Latin and German in late medieval Sweden). 1.4. However, the size of the languages involved can also play an important role in contact situations. Big (and major) languages are not only big and often dominant with respect to the number of their speakers; they have also integrated many non-native speakers – with far-reaching consequences for the internal structures of these languages. This process may result in a decrease in structural complexity (grammatical simplification), but may be counterbalanced by the emergence of new forms and constructions. Therefore, these languages show a lesser degree of overspecification, due to a decrease in marking semantic distinctions overtly and obligatorily (McWhorter 2007: 1–21). On the other hand, small (and minor) languages are typically not learned by (adult) foreigners. These varieties are predominantly spoken in small, tightly networked societies and can thus preserve structural complexity on all grammatical levels much better than big languages. Moreover, speakers of small and minor linguistic communities have to be bi- or multilingual in order to being able to communicate with their neighbors, who often speak only their own language and do not understand any other small(er) languages in their vicinity. Minority languages can be considered a special case: they are typically more conservative, more resistant to language change than majority languages and show stable social structures and tight networks (Braunmüller 2003). This does not necessarily preserve them from inserting different loans and/or getting assimilated. 1.5. Some languages came into existence as a direct result of face-to-face contacts in trading situations between mutually unintelligible languages. The most well-known cases are pidgin and, seen from an historical point of view, the creole languages as well. However, creoles may also be the result of imperfect adult language learning, because they show many reductions and simplifications (cf. note 2). 1.6. Within the roofing languages (such as classical and Byzantine Greek, Latin or Church Slavonic but also Low and High German in northern Europe) we distinguish between two types: (a) those which serve as spoken languages and (b) those which do not, but are only read and written. The first ones are not only used as koinés, linguae francae or transnational trading languages but function also as model languages in education or religious affairs. Roofing languages of the second type (e.g. Church Slavonic) have only the last two functions. They form models for the implementation of new written

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and, later, standard languages in all grammatical domains, from the emergence of scripts to the establishing of text norms.

2.

The Scandinavian languages

2.1. General background 2.1.1. One of the most well-known facts about the (Mainland) Scandinavian languages is their mutual intelligibility: although Danish, Swedish and Norwegian (in both variants, Dano- and New Norwegian) are national languages they can, strictly speaking, also be regarded as ausbau languages: they still function as mutually comprehensible dialects as they did in the Middle Ages and beyond, when in fact they could be regarded as local varieties/dialects within a common diasystem, known at the time as “dönsk tunga” (‘Danish [sc. Nordic] tongue’; Melberg 1949–51). Today, this linguistic community still works very well, at least for the standard languages, but this way of direct mutual understanding between Danes, Swedes and Norwegians is endangered as far as the youngest generation is concerned, especially in oral communication (Delsing and Lundin Åkesson 2005). Inter-Scandinavian communication has never really been unproblematic (Börestam Uhlmann 1994; Zeevaert 2004; Golinski 2007) but the awareness of belonging to the same pan-Scandinavian community had, in the past, proved to be stronger and had been able to surmount any real (or only alleged) differences between the Mainland Scandinavian languages. 2.1.2. It could for example be the case that people in inter-Scandinavian meetings heavily emphasized the “total incomprehensibility” of spoken Danish but that such debates were conducted in Scandinavian varieties, including Danish – obviously without causing any severe problems! (That genetically closely related varieties may also be – or at least be treated as – mutually incomprehensible will be discussed in the Slavic language section 3). This means that one has to distinguish between (a) structural and lexical divergences between the Scandinavian languages that may impede the ease of communication exchange, at least for inexperienced speakers, (b) the inter-Scandinavian image of these languages (Danish: when spoken is almost incomprehensible for anybody outside Denmark; Swedish: pleasant to the ear like e.g. Italian; Norwegian: any dialect mixture seems possible) and (c) the pan-Scandinavian awareness of being part of an old, common culture (which actually includes all inhabitants of Northern Europe) that is strong enough to surmount all differences, at least between the Mainland Scandinavian varieties. Thus even wrong accommodations or overgeneralizations occurring in these

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ad hoc created inter-linguistic varieties are well-received. Even widely wellknown language specific words (often erroneously called “false friends”, such as rolig in Danish/Norwegian meaning ‘quiet’ but in Swedish ‘funny’, or totally divergent terms for the same thing, such as for ‘window’: vindu(e) in Danish/Norwegian vs. fönster in Swedish), are overtly used as “flagged (i.e. marked) terms” (Braunmüller 2002) in inter-Scandinavian communication in order to highlight that the speaker is very well aware of the differences between these languages and knows many or all of them, though s/he does not understand neighboring varieties entirely or without contextual supporting information. However, divergences of this kind do not really impede mutual understanding. Such a message has to be regarded as a political or cultural rather than a well-founded linguistic statement, showing that one is interested in conversing with Scandinavian neighbors directly and without using a lingua franca, notwithstanding some obvious lexical or structural differences, which actually may cause problems. In many of these cases the context will, however, help bridge the gap. This gap has been called “semi-communication” by Haugen (1966), but this term is quite misleading, especially for native speakers of English. It actually means “semi-bilingualism: receptive bilingualism accompanying productive monolingualism” (Hockett 1958: 327; cf. Börestam Uhlmann 1997: 241–242). 2.1.3. Icelandic and Faroese, the two Insular Scandinavian varieties located and isolated in the North Atlantic, are internally mutually comprehensible, but not with the Mainland Scandinavian languages. However, all speakers of Faroese also master Danish with very high proficiency, since the Faroe Islands are still part of Denmark. Moreover, their pronunciation shows signs of foreign language learning which makes their phonetics more “Scandinavian”, more like some sort of spelling pronunciation, and thus better understandable for Swedes and Norwegians. Danish as spoken by Icelanders shows similar features (see Hannesdóttir 2000). Generally speaking, Danish outside Denmark diverges in several aspects from the Danish language in Denmark and its norms due to intense language contact, emerging predominantly as congruent lexicalizations, grammatical replications and, of course, overt or covert lexical loans (see Petersen 2010 and Kühl 2011 for the Faroe Islands and Kühl 2008 and Westergaard 2008 for the vernacular spoken by the Danish/German minority in the GermanDanish border region). Though all Icelanders learn another Scandinavian language at school – in former times it was only Danish – they, especially the younger generations, clearly prefer to converse outside their home country only in English, no matter whether they master any other Scandinavian variety with fluency or not.

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Differences between the Insular Scandinavian and especially the Western Norwegian dialects also play a role when considering the internal divergences in (here) the western Scandinavian dialects (cf. Bandle 1973/2011: 98–100) but these are mostly due to phonological and lexical differences and can, strictly speaking, also be found anywhere else in Scandinavia, e.g. between (central) Sweden and the eastern Swedish dialects, as spoken in Finland. 2.1.4. In the Middle Ages and beyond, this area of direct, non-intermediated communication was much larger. As has been summarized elsewhere (Braunmüller 2004) a transnational diasystem developed in the Baltic during the era of the Hanseatic League (and continued during the Reformation in the 16th century), which extended from Jutland and Norway (Bergen) in the west to the borders of Russia in the east and the littoral areas of the Baltic Sea in the south (from Lübeck to Reval/Tallin). In oral face-to-face communication, people largely made use of their mother tongue for mutual understanding, like in Scandinavia today. In other words, Middle Low German and the older Scandinavian dialects were so genetically and typologically similar that tradesmen (and later craftsmen) saw no insurmountable hindrances in directly understanding even more distantly related Germanic dialects. Since (written) standardized languages were largely unknown and not available, people had learned to be very flexible in communication and tried to accommodate as much as possible. This linguistic flexibility resulted, however, not only in lexical and grammatical convergences but also, as far as Hansa trade is concerned, in considerable economic success, which reinforced receptive/ passive multilingualism, based on positive accommodation at any price. Only when writing letters or proceedings, and particularly in the publication of legal documents and treaties or even book-keeping, were Latin and later Low German used as linguae francae. They functioned in these cases as languages for specific purposes as well. 2.2. Areal dimensions As both the unimpeded communication in the Baltic during the era of the Hanseatic League and the direct inter-Scandinavian communication of today show, areal dimensions, combined with genetic relatedness, play the most important role in direct mutual understanding of the (Germanic/Scandinavian) languages in northern Europe. On top of that, the areal factor had been a vital precondition for what has been called “Scandinavism” in the beginning of the 19th century, when people, after the final defeat of Napoleon in 1813/14, joined together in order to form a new nation, which was not restricted to a single territory but covered a much broader historical, geo-

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graphical and cultural unit, “Scandinavia”. This area also included linguistically very distant countries like Finland, which had been lost to Russia in 1809 but had been part of Sweden, its culture and history for many centuries. The same applies, in principle, to the former Danish territories: Norway, Iceland, the Faroe Islands and, partly, the duchy of Schleswig. People there also feel Scandinavian, still seeing themselves as being part of a supra-national cultural unit based on a common historical, more homogenous linguistic background which can be dated back to the Viking Age/the early Middle Ages. The Scandinavian vernaculars can thus be regarded as the modern descendants of the dialects that once were roofed by the so-called “dönsk tunga” (sc. the common Ancient Nordic/Old Norse diasystem). 2.3. Social dimensions Social dimensions play a less important role for the coherence of the people(s) living in Scandinavia. Due to the closely intertwined history of northern Europe – though characterized by many mostly internal wars striving for local supremacy or territorial expansion – all Scandinavian countries are quite homogenous in the sociology of their population and their culture(s). We observe tight rural networks, which helped to preserve many of the idiosyncratic features of the local dialects, but we also meet, though only in Mainland Scandinavia, a great openness towards foreign loans, predominantly in vocabulary and word formation (Diercks 1993) but also in word order and grammatical constructions (Braunmüller 2006, 2008: 136–141). These languages have been subjected to many forms of adult language learning and have thus undergone grammatical simplification in their grammatical structures, which makes them typologically more alike, even if their national phonological and phonetic developments have been diverging significantly for centuries, as has been the case between the eastern Scandinavian languages Danish and Swedish since the High Middle Ages. Anyway, when two more or less related languages, based on similar social structures, come into contact with each other, the result will be less complex than the structures of the languages were before the contact had taken place (see McWhorter 2007: 15–17, also mentioning the contact between English and Old Norse). Another important factor both for typological and social change is the size of the population. Small populations, if not living isolated on remote islands (like Iceland or the Faroes), tend to get assimilated, such as the Swedish minority in Finland, though they live in close proximity with their linguistic home base Sweden. Unbalanced bilingualism and mixed marriages will

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sooner or later lead to the loss of the Swedish varieties there (cf. Tandefelt 1988), though they could have remained under the roof of the (neighboring) Swedish language. In this case, it is not linguistic factors that play the decisive role: Political factors and the mere size of the majority population (ca. 95 % are Finns) override theoretical linguistic options, genetic and historical ties. A similar development can be observed in South Schleswig where the Danish minority living south of the German-Danish border keeps their (local) Danish phonology but more or less accommodates to the majority language, German, by widely using overt and covert structural loans and trans-linguistic wordings. This form of convergence (mostly due to congruent lexicalization) facilitates not only frequent code-switching but makes everyday life easier as being a member of a minority within a region, where the majority language and another minority language, Low German, are linguistically related and determine all social relations. This close genetic relationship often makes it very difficult both to keep all related vernaculars spoken in the same area apart and, in the case of the minority language Danish, to stick to the linguistic and social norms of the language as it is used in Denmark (cf. Braunmüller 1996).

3.

The Slavic language family

3.1. General background The picture of the Slavic language family seems quite different from that of the Scandinavian languages. Apart from some neighboring languages, there is no mutual intelligibility between most of the 12–17 modern Slavic languages – whose number depends on the willingness to take into account the “new” languages which emerged since the 1990s –, although they have basic vocabulary (e.g., several body parts and domestic animals) and some grammatical features (e.g., the category of animacy and lexicalized verbal aspect) in common. Today, there is no shared identity of the kind “we are all Slavs”. Receptive or semi-bilingualism between native speakers of most standard languages, e.g. between Polish and Russian or Polish and Serbian, is not customary at all: people rarely know other Slavic languages in addition to their own and in general cannot understand them. A major problem is also the research situation: contrary to Scandinavian languages, intercomprehension4, 4

Intercomprehension is a cover-term for receptive (“passive”) bi/multilingualism, which has predominantly been used in connection with genetically related languages. Two popular approaches for achieving a reading knowledge, based on one

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i.e. the ability of Slavs to understand other Slavic languages without being able to speak them, has seldom been tested, and the few existing results show that understanding is in fact very limited (Besters-Dilger 2002; Heinz 2009). Therefore, for the Slavic language family we will not only focus on semicommunication but also on convergence between languages. Nevertheless, there are cases where semi-bilingualism in the sense of the Scandinavian languages – i.e. between Slavic languages whose specific development and status as independent languages was already recognized by scholars in the 19th century – is possible and occurs or used to occur quite often (e.g, Slovene-Croatian in the Yugoslavian state [Stabej 2007], SlovakCzech, Ukrainian-Russian; see below). But as we will see, in contrast to the Scandinavian languages, in these cases one can hardly speak of a “symmetrical” semi-bilingualism. If we include the newly emerging and/or only recently recognized Slavic languages such as Kashubian (officially acknowledged as a regional language by Poland since 2005), Montenegrin (an official language since 2006), Rusyn (in some countries acknowledged since the 1990s, recognized in Ukraine since July 2012), the triad Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (in 1850 in the “Vienna Literary Agreement” united as one single written language using two alphabets, with tendencies to revoke the agreement since the 1960s, and officially separated since the 1990s) and the pair Macedonian-Bulgarian (officially separated since 1934; however, the Macedonian language was first acknowledged by Bulgaria as late as 1999), there are, of course, many more possibilities of communication without any difficulty (Montenegrin-Serbian, Rusyn-Ukrainian, Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian, Macedonian-Bulgarian). But since these languages (mostly ausbau languages in the terminology of Kloss 1978) are so similar to each other and easily mutually comprehensible, the native speakers do not require any effort or special knowledge to understand each other. This is not a semi-, but more or less a full communication, and therefore the term semi-bilingualism does not fit very well. The similarity of the Slavic languages and therefore the possibility to practice semi-bilingualism is probably best described as a continuum, reaching from distance and incomprehensibility to near-perfect mutual intelligibility and extensive homogeneity. Additional interesting features in the Slavic-speaking world are (a) two East-Slavic mixed speeches (in the terminology of Hentschel, this volume), of the related languages (conceived as a pivotal “bridge language”), are Klein and Stegmann (2000) for the Romance and Hufeisen and Marx (2007) for the Germanic language family. A corresponding volume for the Slavic languages has, however, not been published yet (see www.eurocomslav.de).

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often named “Surzhyk” (in Ukraine) and “Trasyanka” (in Belarus) (see below). The question as to whether they can be classified as “mixed languages” or not is rather complicated because the “crude lexical:grammar split” (Matras and Bakker 2003: 16) as the main criterion has been abandoned and the definitions are now much more flexible (see also Auer, this volume). The term “‘fused lect’ (coined by Auer 1999) in statu nascendi” (Hentschel, this volume) or the definition as something “between language mixing and fused lects” (Kent 2010: 51) may probably fit better. There are (b) large areas of transitional dialects in the Northern (Polish-BelarusianUkrainian-Russian) and the Southern (Slovenian-Croatian-Serbian-Macedonian-Bulgarian) parts of the Slavic-speaking world. Around 1000 years ago Hungarians and Germans drove a wedge between the Northern and Southern Slavs, so that there are no transitional dialects between the North and South. Due to this long-lasting separation, one would expect a considerably differing grammatical and lexical development of the (more numerous) Northern and the Southern language groups. However, the intense cultural contact between Russian and Serbian and Russian and Bulgarian, especially in the 18th/19th century, which was based on shared religion, script, and religious roofing language (Church Slavonic) was the reason for the lexical differences being less strong than assumed. The difference in grammar between the South and the North consists of the preservation of a more complex verbal system (with more tense forms) in the South (except in Slovenian). The 19th century is of utmost importance for the Slavic languages, because it is responsible for a lot of lexical convergence: during the so-called “Völkerfrühling” (‘spring of peoples’), the elites of all those Slavic peoples who lived under the rule of a multiethnic empire (i.e. all apart from the Russians) felt the necessity to purify their languages from foreign, non-Slavic elements and to fill the gaps with Slavic words (slovanská vzájemnost ‘Slavic reciprocity’, Kollár 1837). They took these words from other Slavic languages: the Bulgarians from Russian, the Slovenians from Czech and Croatian, the Sorbs from Czech, etc. (Thomas 1989). This was the last time that the Slavic elites felt like members of a common nation which had to defend its language(s) against the non-Slavs. It was only after WWI that the Slavs reached their goal of building several independent states. Some of them remained multiethnic and were finally dissolved at the end of the 20th century, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the decline of communism, when, just twenty years ago, a second process of nation-building took place. During the second half of the 20th century, due to political reasons, Russian served as the lingua franca between Slavs, but is now in the process of losing this status to English, especially among the younger generation.

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In the following, we concentrate on some of the most promising cases mentioned above which are potential candidates for grammatical convergence: the Slovak-Czech (cf. Nábeˇlková, this volume) and the Ukrainan-Russian semi-bilingualism on the one hand, and the mixed speech Surzhyk on the other. We will discuss the importance of the areal and the social factors for convergence, understood as a process, for which, in our opinion, semibilingualism and incomplete learning are at least as important prerequisites as code-switching. 3.2. Areal dimension It is not by chance that all three cases (Slovak-Czech and Russian-Ukrainian semi-bilingualism and the mixed speech Surzhyk) concern neighboring languages. (1) Czech and Slovak are part of the North-Western group of Slavic languages and therefore not only neighbors, but also genetically and structurally similar. Until WWI, their speakers belonged to the two different halves of the Habsburg Empire: the Czechs to the Austrian and the Slovaks to the Hungarian part. When Czechoslovakia was founded in 1918, both peoples were unified in one state for the first time since 895 AD. However, Czech had served as the literary language for Slovaks since at least the 15th century, and their mutual relations were renewed several times (Nábeˇlková 2007: 54–55). Under the influence of contemporary ideas, a common Czechoslovak language was propagated. But even after the proclamation of a federal state in 1968 and full legal equality of both languages, Czech played a more important state role, and the Czech-Slovak bilingualism on the state level remained asymmetrical (Lipowski 2005). Semi-bilingualism in communication, however, was very common. Although the standardization process in the 19th century aimed to reinforce the differences between the two languages (one could say: to create more abstand in Kloss’ terminology), in colloquial speech these efforts did not bear fruit. Nevertheless, convergence is quite limited: nearly all examples in literature concern vocabulary and word formation (Nábeˇlková, this volume) and not grammar, and as a matter of fact Slovak has adapted itself more to Czech than vice-versa. Following the political separation of the two languages in 1993, Slovak has now become increasingly less comprehensible for Czech children, compared with their parents (Nábeˇlková 2007: 56). (2) The Ukrainian-Russian semi-bilingualism in Ukraine is different: When Ukrainian-speaking Ukrainians are addressed in Russian, they tend to answer in Russian, but not vice-versa. Russian-speaking Ukrainians and Rus-

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sians often claim not to understand Ukrainian, whereas Ukrainian-speaking Ukrainians admit that they have no problem understanding Russian. Although Ukrainian has been the only state language since 1996, there is still a certain share of the population who say that they can neither understand nor read it (let alone that they are actively competent in it). In eastern and southern Ukraine, Russian is the main language in all communication spheres. Therefore we can ascertain that there is no symmetrical bilingualism on the state level and also that semi-bilingualism is in this case not symmetrical (as in the case of Czech and Slovak, at least until 1993), since only one of the communication partners admits being able to understand the other and only one speaks his own language. That means: convergence will consist of a transfer of Russian language structures into Ukrainian but not vice-versa. (3) The Ukrainian mixed speech Surzhyk (as the Belarusian Trasyanka, see Hentschel, this volume), was initially probably a result of intense asymmetrical semi-bilingualism and was formed by two neighboring North-Eastern Slavic languages: Russian and Ukrainian (Trasyanka: Russian and Belarusian). Both are spoken on a territory which was originally not Russian-speaking but was affected by Russian rule, and in the 20th century by intense Russian immigration, industrialization and urbanization. When the rural population moved to the cities, they tried to accommodate (individual convergence, see above) and learned Russian, albeit incompletely. This is seen as a major reason for the emergence of these two mixed varieties. Today, they are also widespread in rural areas, whereas cities now tend to be Russian-speaking (apart from cities in West Ukraine). The phonetics/phonology of Surzhyk is predominantly Ukrainian; the vocabulary is mixed and contains, besides “pure” Ukrainian and Russian elements, many words which apply Ukrainian phonological rules to Russian words (e.g., Surzhyk vidnósennja ‘relations’, compared to Ukrainian stosunki and Russian otnosénija, with the typical replacement of otby vid- [v- before word-initial o- and o > i in a closed syllable] and the doubling of the consonant -n-); the grammar shows, e.g., Ukrainian inflection for the personal pronoun but predominantly Russian degrees of adjectives and in other domains a mix of both grammars. Similar to the mixed speech in Belarus, there is an ongoing debate as to whether Surzhyk is mixed spontaneously (Masenko 2011) or begins to develop functional specializations (Flier 1998; Del Gaudio 2010), i.e. is on the way to become a “fused lect”. However, it is difficult to state that the areal dimension is more important than others because Ukrainian and Belarusian are structurally and genetically very similar to Russian, and certain social factors also come into play (see below). It becomes clear from all three examples that if the areal dimension, i.e. the neighborhood of two languages or even their coexistence in one state,

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were the only or the most important trigger for convergence, both affected languages would show it to the same degree and there would probably be no asymmetry in semi-bilingualism. In fact, this is not the case. So far, all examples concerned neighboring languages which were genetically and structurally similar. If we look for a convincing example of areal contact leading to convergence without genetic similarity, the best example is the famous Balkan Sprachbund (convergence area) which includes, among others, the following Slavic languages: as central members Macedonian and Bulgarian, as a more peripheral member Serbian (especially the Torlak dialects) and, as some claim, as marginal members Croatian and even Slovenian. Here it is explicitly the geographical proximity or, more precisely, the existence of migrant herdsmen in the past which promoted convergence, and not genetic or structural proximity (see Misˇeska Tomic´ and Lindstedt, this volume). There must have been numerous cases of accommodation to the communication partner and receptive bilingualism which then promoted convergence between languages in such fundamental categories as loss of infinitive, analytical inflection of nouns, development of a postposed article and a possessive perfect, circumscription of the future by using the verb ‘to want’ etc. (cf. the idea of Hinrichs 1990 that most “Balkanisms” can be explained as linguistic elements facilitating listening comprehension). Additionally, the social factor of incomplete (second/adult) language learning by the Romance population, already living in the Balkans, has to be taken into account. Furthermore, convergence between genetically non-related languages took place; therefore this case does not fulfil the conditions for being investigated in this contribution. So the overall picture is: Areal contact can be an important factor promoting convergence but it is intertwined with others like genetic and structural similarity – as well as social factors. 3.3. Social dimension Regarding the Slavic languages, the social factors, both on the accommodational and political level, are clearly the dominant trigger which facilitates or inhibits convergence between languages, and decides in which direction convergence goes. It is most probable that convergence between languages starts with multiple convergences between speakers (in the sense of “accommodation to the addressee’s variety”). Thomason (2001: 66) enumerated several social vectors such as cultural pressure, socio-economic dominance, duration of the contact, number of speakers, and imperfect learning. Is it possible to weigh these factors for the Slavic languages?

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Convergence in the first sense, i.e. as integration of grammar from one language (source language) to another (target or recipient language) is mostly promoted by the social factor supremacy or simply power. Historically, political power was probably more important, today it is combined with socioeconomic power. Until WWI, Russian and Polish (until the three partitions at the end of the 18th century) were the only Slavic languages which, since premodern times, had a state of their own. All the others had belonged to multiethnic empires (the Holy Roman, the Polish-Lithuanian, the Habsburg, the Ottoman and the Russian empires) since the Middle Ages and were not spoken by the politically dominant nation. Those Slavic languages which belonged to the Polish state (Belarusian and Ukrainian until 1772/1795) or to the Russian state (Belarusian and Ukrainian after the three partitions of Poland, partly even from 1667 until 1991), were heavily influenced by the two successively dominating languages. After WWI, new bi- or multiethnic states appeared: the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. Whereas in the first, Russian became more and more important and dominated, apart from Slavic languages, around 100 non-Slavic languages, in both the other states one Slavic language dominated the other(s): Czech was the leading language of politics in Czechoslovakia, and Serbo-Croatian (with a slight preponderance of Serbian) in Yugoslavia. Therefore it is not surprising that in the 20th century a russification of Belarusian and Ukrainian and a bohemization of Slovak took place. The influence of Serbo-Croatian on other Yugoslavian languages was apparently weaker: Slovenians spoke two languages (Slovenian and Croatian) but did not mix them (Stabej 2007); the structure of Macedonian was, however, affected on the syntactic level (Misˇeska Tomic´, this volume). At the end of the last century, a second nation-building process (which we consider an additional social factor) took place: closely related peoples and languages developed in different directions, linguistic standardization (including orthographic reforms) highlighted the distance to the formerly dominant language. These processes led to linguistic divergence, at least on the level of the standard language (e.g., Slovak vs. Czech, Croatian vs. Serbian, and Ukrainian vs. Russian). Those languages which had always defended their independence continued to do so, what we could call nationpreservation (e.g., Slovenian vs. Croatian). Also important was the group of newly emerging languages (Montenegrin [Nikcˇevic´ 2001] with its own state, Rusyn [Magocsi 2004] spread over at least five states, Kashubian [Breza 2001] within Poland), which before had been regarded as dialects. In no other European area is the linguistic development currently as lively as it is in the Slavic region.

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Today, a difference exists in the fact that Russian is still the economically – and partly also politically and culturally – dominating power in Ukraine (as in Belarus), whereas Slovakia, Slovenia and Croatia have undergone an emancipation process. Russians constitute a large minority in Ukraine, and many national Ukrainians consider Russian their mother tongue. The myth of “East-Slavic brotherhood” successfully aims to create a shared identity. The mixed speech Surzhyk is for a large portion of the population the main code of communication. It is not uncommon for people to switch to Surzhyk, stigmatized from the point of view of the “language cultivators”, when they come home after work or school (where they had had to speak Russian or Ukrainian) and talk with family and friends (Del Gaudio 2010: 256). Its use is a signal of social proximity. Besides power and nation-building and -preservation, the demographic size of the two interacting language communities can also play an important role. In all three cases the dominant language possesses more speakers than the dominated. However, the Slovenian example makes clear that this feature, which is often called one of the decisive factors in language contact (Thomason 2001: 66; Nábeˇlková 2007: 53–54), is less important than thought. In addition, the length of interaction only has a relative influence. This can be shown when comparing different historical copying processes within Slavic languages (BestersDilger 2012). Imperfect learning is, however, an important issue, relevant for insertions Slovaks living in the Czech environment have made into Czech, for the mixed speech Surzhyk and also for the Balkan Sprachbund.

4.

Conclusions

Research into areal and sociolinguistic factors promoting or inhibiting convergence between languages of the same family is more difficult than research into convergence between genetically non- or less closely related languages belonging to different language families. The results of our study concerning “convergence between languages” show that neighboring languages – and neighborhood is the precondition for the influence of areal factors – of the same language family are in general genetically and structurally similar, and often we do not know enough about their prehistory in order to decide if convergence is acquired or has “always” existed. Additionally, since convergence can also mean that just the frequency of use of certain structures is adapted to that of a closely related language, this kind of research would require an enormous diachronic text corpus in order to prove that areal and/or sociolinguistic factors lead to an increased congruence between languages.

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The conditions to find out if areal factors have a decisive influence on convergence within language families are more favorable within the Scandinavian languages, because one can compare isolated languages on islands with those which always have been in close contact with neighboring members of the same language family. Moreover, there is apparently an areal factor promoting convergence in those languages which were in permanent contact, whereas isolated languages show other forms of convergence: Contact with other, genetically more distant languages, such as Danish as spoken on the Faroe Islands (and formerly in Iceland as well) or German and South Jutish in the German-Danish border region, will in the long run always result in at least covert convergence and covert replication. In short: more or less intense code mixing seems to be inevitable between bilinguals speaking genetically closely related languages (Braunmüller 2009). For the Slavic languages, the case is, on the one hand, similar, on the other more complicated. Firstly, one could claim that the two Sorbian languages in eastern Germany also constitute an island, because they have been surrounded by German-speaking regions since the second half of the 17th century (earlier they were direct neighbors of Poles in the East and Czechs in the South). They show, in fact, some archaic grammatical features which have been given up in most Slavic languages: the dual, in Upper Sorbian the tenses aorist and imperfect (which existed in Lower Sorbian until the 20th century), in Lower Sorbian the supine after verbs of motion. This seems to prove that language contact between two related languages always leads to less complex structures than those of an isolated language (cf. the Scandinavian languages). But secondly, the Slavs settled in already inhabited areas, and these different substrates and neighboring non-Slavic languages have influenced their language development. In other words: if there is a lack of convergence between two Slavic languages which are separated by mountains, it is difficult to decide if the mountains, the substrate or the non-Slavic (e.g., Germanic, Finnic, Baltic, Turkic) neighbor is the reason. Moreover, if there is a convergent linguistic feature in a contiguous area like the loss of the category of dual in Czech, Slovak, Polish, Belarusian and Ukrainian (Breu 1994: 42–44), the reason can be due to the areal factor or the parallel abandonment of an archaic category, either because of language-internal development or because of the influence of substrate(s). As for the Slavic languages, we might say that there is no indisputable case where the areal dimension is the most important factor for convergence – with the possible exception of the Balkan Sprachbund which does not really belong to our research question because of several influential non-Slavic members (central: Romanian, Albanian, Aromunian, peripheral: Greek, marginal: Turkish). The areal dimen-

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sion can probably never be the only factor promoting convergence since human volition and linguistic awareness are always involved. As far as sociolinguistic factors are concerned, the Scandinavian languages profit from the awareness of their speakers that they have always belonged to an old, common culture and have had much of their history in common for centuries (Kalmar Union 1397–1523, the Danish-Norwegian Union 1380–1814 and the Norwegian-Swedish Union 1814–1905). Therefore, sociolinguistic factors are less important. The Slavic languages are witness to a thousand year old schism, a strong power imbalance that has led to unsymmetrical semi-bilingualism and a late nation building process, which is in fact not yet finished for some languages and their speakers’ communities. The latter promotes divergence rather than convergence. Convergence in the second meaning, i.e. as a deliberate accommodation to the addressee’s variety, is widespread between speakers of Scandinavian languages, but not between Slavs, apart from some cases mentioned above. Thus the picture appears very inhomogeneous. We are confronted with manifold different situations. Nevertheless, one general conclusion can be drawn: Convergence, realized by deliberate accommodation and symmetrical semi- or receptive bilingualism, as practiced in the Scandinavian countries, presupposes political harmony, the will to understand each other without a mediating (foreign) language and a certain feeling of belonging together (cultural awareness). There is, however, no such social or political harmony between the Slavic-speaking countries at the beginning of the 21st century. As the Slovenian case shows, finally it is the strength of the ethnic and/or social identity, linguistic consciousness and the will of the speech community which influence convergence (in both meanings) in relation to other languages.

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