Manual of Romance Languages in Africa (Manuals of Romance Linguistics) 3110626101, 9783110626100

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Manual of Romance Languages in Africa MRL 32

Manuals of Romance Linguistics Manuels de linguistique romane Manuali di linguistica romanza Manuales de lingüística románica

Edited by Günter Holtus and Fernando Sánchez-Miret

Volume 32

Manual of Romance Languages in Africa

Edited by Ursula Reutner

ISBN 978-3-11-062610-0 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-062886-9 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-062617-9 Library of Congress Control Number: 2023935916 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2024 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover: © Marco2811/fotolia Typesetting: jürgen ullrich typosatz, Nördlingen Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

Manuals of Romance Linguistics The international handbook series Manuals of Romance Linguistics (MRL) offers an extensive, systematic and state-of-the-art overview of linguistic research in the entire field of present-day Romance Studies. MRL aims to update and expand the contents of the two major reference works available to date: Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik (LRL) (1988–2005, vol. 1–8) and Romanische Sprachgeschichte (RSG) (2003–2008, vol. 1–3). It also seeks to integrate new research trends as well as topics that have not yet been explored systematically. Given that a complete revision of LRL and RSG would not be feasible, at least not in a sensible timeframe, the MRL editors have opted for a modular approach that is much more flexible: The series will include approximately 60 volumes (each comprised of approx. 400– 600 pages and 15–30 chapters). Each volume will focus on the most central aspects of its topic in a clear and structured manner. As a series, the volumes will cover the entire field of present-day Romance Linguistics, but they can also be used individually. Given that the work on individual MRL volumes will be nowhere near as time-consuming as that on a major reference work in the style of LRL, it will be much easier to take into account even the most recent trends and developments in linguistic research. MRL’s languages of publication are French, Spanish, Italian, English and, in exceptional cases, Portuguese. Each volume will consistently be written in only one of these languages. In each case, the choice of language will depend on the specific topic. English will be used for topics that are of more general relevance beyond the field of Romance Studies (for example Manual of Language Acquisition or Manual of Romance Languages in the Media). The focus of each volume will be either (1) on one specific language or (2) on one specific research field. Concerning volumes of the first type, each of the Romance languages – including Romance-based creoles – will be discussed in a separate volume. A particularly strong focus will be placed on the smaller languages (linguae minores) that other reference works have not treated extensively. MRL will comprise volumes on Friulian, Corsican, Galician, among others, as well as a Manual of Judaeo-Romance Linguistics and Philology. Volumes of the second type will be devoted to the systematic presentation of all traditional and new fields of Romance Linguistics, with the research methods of Romance Linguistics being discussed in a separate volume. Dynamic new research fields and trends will yet again be of particular interest, because although they have become increasingly important in both research and teaching, older reference works have not dealt with them at all or touched upon them only tangentially. MRL will feature volumes dedicated to research fields such as Grammatical Interfaces, Youth Language Research, Urban Varieties, Computational Linguistics, Neurolinguistics, Sign Languages or Forensic Linguistics. Each volume will offer a structured and informative, easy-to-read overview of the history of research as well as of recent research trends. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-202

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Manuals of Romance Linguistics

We are delighted that internationally-renowned colleagues from a variety of Romance-speaking countries and beyond have agreed to collaborate on this series and take on the editorship of individual MRL volumes. Thanks to the expertise of the volume editors responsible for the concept and structure of their volumes, as well as for the selection of suitable authors, MRL will not only summarize the current state of knowledge in Romance Linguistics, but will also present much new information and recent research results. As a whole, the MRL series will present a panorama of the discipline that is both extensive and up-to-date, providing interesting and relevant information and useful orientation for every reader, with detailed coverage of specific topics as well as general overviews of present-day Romance Linguistics. We believe that the series will offer a fresh, innovative approach, suited to adequately map the constant advancement of our discipline. Günter Holtus (Lohra/Göttingen) Fernando Sánchez-Miret (Salamanca) April 2023

Table of Contents Africa Ursula Reutner 1 Introduction

1

Northern Africa French Karima Ait Dahmane 2 Algeria 23 Fouzia Benzakour 3 Morocco 43 Lotfi Sayahi 4 Tunisia

71

Italian Lutz Edzard 5 Libya

85

Portuguese Aline Bazenga 6 Portugal: Madeira

95

Spanish Dolores Corbella 7 Spain: Canary Islands

115

Gérard Fernández Smith and Luis Escoriza Morera 8 Spain: Ceuta and Melilla 147

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Table of Contents

Western Africa French Moufoutaou Adjeran 9 Benin 169 Sabine Diao-Klaeger 10 Burkina Faso

193

Akissi Béatrice Boutin 11 Côte d’Ivoire 221 Silke Jansen 12 Guinea

241

Ingse Skattum 13 Mali 265 Catherine Taine-Cheikh 14 Mauritania 289 Oreste Floquet 15 Niger 319 Ursula Reutner 16 Senegal

337

Komlan Essizewa, Promise Dodzi Kpoglu, and Margot van den Berg 17 Togo 391

Portuguese Nélia Alexandre and Dominika Swolkien 18 Cabo Verde 413 Nicolas Quint 19 Guinea-Bissau

447

Table of Contents

Middle Africa French Bernard Mulo Farenkia 20 Cameroon 469 Guri Bordal Steien 21 Central African Republic

483

Issa Djarangar Djita 22 Chad 497 Jean-Alexis Mfoutou, Ursula Reutner, and Philipp Heidepeter 23 Congo-Brazzaville 507 Julien Kilanga Musinde 24 Congo-Kinshasa

537

Claude Frey and Ursula Reutner 25 Gabon 551

Portuguese David Paul Gerards and Benjamin Meisnitzer 26 Angola 579 Tjerk Hagemeijer 27 São Tomé and Príncipe

Spanish John M. Lipski 28 Equatorial Guinea

625

609

IX

X

Table of Contents

Eastern Africa French Gélase Nimbona and Anne Catherine Simon 29 Burundi and Rwanda 643 Samatar Abdallah Doualeh and Bruno Maurer 30 Djibouti 669 Gudrun Ledegen 31 France: Réunion and Mayotte

691

Ursula Reutner, Philipp Heidepeter, and Marc Chalier 32 Madagascar and Comoros 717 Guilhem Florigny, Elissa Pustka, and Joëlle Perreau 33 Mauritius and Seychelles 753

Italian Mauro Tosco 34 Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia

Portuguese Gregório Domingos Firmino 35 Mozambique 809

Overview Ursula Reutner 36 Country Key Facts Language Index 841 Linguistic Subject Index General Subject Index Person Index 867

827

849 855

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1 Introduction Language and culture – Africa is a continent rich in cultures, ethnicities, and languages. With more than two thousand languages spread over its area, multilingualism is a common reality. Paradoxically, the official languages are, with scarce exceptions, Indo-European, primarily English, French, and Portuguese. Many books address the situation of English on the African continent. This volume, therefore, focuses on the oft-neglected situation of the Romance languages. It is primarily aimed at scholars interested in their description but might also be useful for people concerned with the coexistence of languages in general. As languages of power in many African countries, Romance languages empower those who master them and discriminate against those who do not. Struggling worldwide against English domination, they themselves prevail over other languages, among which again various types of hierarchical relations exist as well. Understanding the origins of these power relations and describing their current manifestation is a special concern of this book. Yet, despite cultural contacts, on occasion, producing hierarchies and dominances that may result in human suffering and cultural impoverishment, they also have their merits. A no less strongly felt concern of this volume is to direct the attention to the cross-fertilization and mutual enrichment emerging from the encounter of cultures. In both concerns, languages often turn out to mirror societal developments. Their study, therefore, not only allows linguistic insights but also supplies precious information on extralinguistic evolutions. Colonial heritage – The Romance languages were mostly brought to Africa in the era of colonization. Today, they are spoken by very few as vernaculars, at least on the mainland. In some countries, they are not even very common as second languages but nevertheless chosen for government issues, teaching, written media, and literature. Current attitudes towards them range from their rejection as colonial vestiges charged with causing alienation to their glorification as languages of the elite imbued with overt prestige and also include their simple acceptance as a given reality facilitated through cultural appropriation and indigenization. In order to grasp the wide panorama of the existence of Romance languages in Africa, the countries selected for this volume encompass areas that were once or are still ruled by Belgium, France, Italy, Portugal, or Spain and include almost all African countries that were not primarily colonized by Britain. It is evident that this choice will not do justice to every trace of the Romance languages in Africa. Countries like Kenya, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Africa, or Tanzania did become British colonies but were first in contact with other European nations, including those that spoke Romance languages. Portuguese sailors, in particular, established a series of settlements, trading stations, and forts, which are not further considered in this volume, as the respective regions later came under the control of another European power that spread its language more sustainably. In addition to their emergence through colonization, Romance languages can also be identified in all African https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-001

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Ursula Reutner

countries due to migration to and from other African countries, tourism from Europe and the Americas, and expats or diplomats living in these countries, which is not a focus of this book either. With the exception of Italian, each of the Romance languages mentioned is the official language in at least one of the countries represented in this handbook. Linguistic ecology – Linguistic ecology is one of the factors that determine the role of the Romance languages as vehicular languages in each country’s daily life (cf. Mufwene 2001). This role tends to be weaker in countries with a single dominant vernacular. Kirundi, Kinyarwanda, Malagasy, or Shikomori are the almost undisputed vernaculars in Burundi, Rwanda, Madagascar, and Comoros. Various creoles are the first languages of many people in Cabo Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe, Mauritius, Réunion, and Seychelles. Other nations have a considerable variety of vernaculars, among which one takes up ample space in the oral sphere and stands out as an indigenous vehicular language: Sango, Wolof, and Guinea-Bissau Creole are spoken as first or second languages by most people in the Central African Republic, Senegal, and Guinea-Bissau, respectively. The Romance languages are more widely used in plurilingual countries with vehicular languages that vary by region or lacking dominant indigenous languages: in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Congo-Brazzaville (the Republic of the Congo with the capital Brazzaville), Congo-Kinshasa (the Democratic Republic of the Congo with the capital Kinshasa), Côte d’Ivoire, or Gabon, for instance. They are virtually unchallenged in the monolingual regions Madeira and Canary Islands. Quantitative distribution – French and Portuguese are the most important Romance languages in Africa, with Portuguese present in fewer countries, where it is, however, more established. Accurate numbers of speakers are difficult to come by and even more difficult to compare when the numbers are based on different sources (cf. Reutner 2017a, 14–19). The individual chapters provide a more precise insight into the language distribution of the respective countries, while a rough overview may look as follows: Speakers of Portuguese as a first or second language range from 62 % in Guinea-Bissau, 70 % in Mozambique, and 72 % in Angola to 90 % in Cabo Verde, 91 % in Sao Tomé and Príncipe, and almost everyone in Madeira (cf. OLP 2015). French enjoys a high status in more African countries than Portuguese but is used in many of them as a lingua franca by minority segments only. Not even a quarter of the population can hold a conversation in French in Rwanda (6 %), Burundi (9 %), Chad (13 %), Mauritania (13 %), Niger (13 %), Mali (17 %), and Burkina Faso (24 %), not even half in Comoros (26 %), Madagascar (26 %), Senegal (26 %), Guinea (27 %), the Central African Republic (29 %), Equatorial Guinea (29 %), Algeria (33 %), Benin (34 %), Côte d’Ivoire (34 %), Morocco (36 %), Togo (41 %), and Cameroon (41 %). At least half of the population speaks French only in Djibouti (50 %), Congo-Kinshasa (51 %), Tunisia (52 %), Congo-Brazzaville (61 %), and at the top of the list of mainland Africa, Gabon (65 %), as well as in Seychelles (53 %), Mayotte (63 %), Mauritius (73 %), and Réunion (88 %) in the Indian Ocean (cf. OIF 2022, 30s.). Setting aside the areas belonging to Spain, Spanish is well established in one African country, Equatorial Guinea (74 %, cf. IC 2022, 8s), whereas Italian could not survive in the long run at all.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Introduction

3

African states – National boundaries have typically been artificially drawn in Africa. They are, in many cases, relics of colonization, and therefore any classification based on them may be characterized as colonial as well. Borders are, however, decisive when it comes to describing the situation of the Romance languages, as the language policies applied vary by nation. In this optic, geographical classifications of Africa are unsatisfactory, as physiographic characteristics like climate, vegetation, and land formation do not coincide with national states and their policies. The same applies to linguistic classifications determined according to the spatial distribution of African languages and especially African linguae francae, as these usually transgress national boundaries, sometimes share their role with others, and often have the largest critical mass of speakers in one country only. Linguistic representations that differentiate between an officially French-, Portuguese-, or Spanish-speaking Africa and other parts can be based on the nations’ constitutions but still present the challenge that some countries are officially bi- or multilingual or do not explicitly establish official languages at all. The Romance languages are, therefore, analysed state by state, and each state is classified with regard to the Romance language that influenced it most compared to other European languages. Selected states – The areas selected for exploration here are thus nations with a longer historical presence of colonial powers speaking Romance languages. The result is a choice of thirty-eight countries: thirty-five African states and six territories belonging to France, Portugal, or Spain. Twenty-six states are considered in terms of French (twenty-five plus France, represented through two regions in the Indian Ocean), four in terms of Italian, six in terms of Portuguese (five plus Portugal, represented by one region in Northern Africa), and two in terms of Spanish (Equatorial Guinea together with Spain, represented by one region and two autonomous communities in Northern Africa). The twenty-five countries with a French past include Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia in Northern Africa, Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, and Togo in Western Africa, and Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, Congo-Brazzaville, Congo-Kinshasa, and Gabon in Middle Africa. The Frenchinfluenced states in Eastern Africa comprise Burundi, Rwanda, Djibouti, Madagascar, Comoros, Mauritius, and Seychelles; the two French regions are the departments Réunion and Mayotte. In most of these areas, French was introduced through France, while Congo-Kinshasa, Burundi, and Rwanda were colonized by Belgium. Italy reached out for Libya in Northern and Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia in Eastern Africa, among which Ethiopia stands out as the only African country besides Liberia that avoided becoming a colony. The Portuguese-influenced zones are Cabo Verde and Guinea-Bissau in Western Africa, Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe in Middle Africa, Mozambique in Eastern Africa, and the northern African region of Portugal, Madeira. Spanish is the official language in the northern African areas that belong to Spain –Canary Islands, Ceuta, and Melilla– and one of the official languages in one Middle African country, Equatorial Guinea. Some of the countries or territories sharing a few crucial aspects of their evolution are combined in one chapter to respect the size limits of this book. Other combinations would be conceivable, too. The final grouping not only results

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Ursula Reutner

from factual considerations but also the authors’ willingness to present more than one country or territory. African georegions – The selected states are presented in a geographical order from Northern, via Western and Middle to Eastern Africa. The grouping of the countries in this book follows the United Nations geoscheme. This choice intentionally separates a few countries often treated together in linguistic studies in order to illustrate other relations within the georegion. Madeira (PORTUGAL)

Ceuta (SPAIN)

Melilla (SPAIN) TUNISIA

MOROCCO

Canary Islands (SPAIN) WESTERN SAHARA

CABO VERDE

ALGERIA

LIBYA

MAURITANIA NIGER

MALI GAMBIA

EGYPT

SENEGAL

GUINEABISSAU

GUINEA

SIERRA LEONE

ERITREA

SUDAN CHAD

BURKINA FASO CÔTE GHANA D'IVOIRE

LIBERIA

DJIBOUTI NIGERIA

BENIN TOGO EQUATORIAL GUINEA SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE

ETHIOPIA

SOUTH SUDAN

CENTRAL AFRICAN CAMEROON REPUBLIC

SOMALIA REP. GABON OF THE CONGO

UGANDA KENYA DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO

RWANDA BURUNDI TANZANIA

SEYCHELLES COMOROS

ANGOLA

Mayotte (FRANCE) MALAWI

ZAMBIA

ZIMBABWE

NAMIBIA

Northern Africa

MOZAMBIQUE

MAURITIUS Réunion (FRANCE)

BOTSWANA

Western Africa Middle Africa Eastern Africa Southern Africa

SOUTH AFRICA

ESWATINI

MADAGASCAR

LESOTHO

Figure 1: African georegions

Northern Africa – Northern Africa is represented with six states in the handbook. Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia are regarded in relation to French and the languages it came in contact with, and Libya with a view to traces of its Italian past. The official language of the four countries is Arabic, in Algeria and Morocco alongside Tamazight. Four northern African areas belong to Portugal or Spain: Madeira, the Canary Islands, Ceuta, and Melilla. They are presented with regard to Portuguese and Spanish, respectively. Spanish also left traces in modern-day Morocco and the disputed territory of Western Sahara.

Introduction

Ceuta (SPAIN)

Madeira (PORTUGAL)

5

Melilla (SPAIN) TUNISIA

MOROCCO

Canary Islands (SPAIN)

ALGERIA

LIBYA

French Italian Portuguese Spanish Figure 2: Romance languages in Northern Africa

Western Africa – The eleven Western African states discussed in this handbook encompass nine with a French colonial legacy: Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Niger, Senegal, and Togo still declare French as sole official language, while Mauritania chose Arabic and Mali thirteen national languages. Benin, Guinea, and Niger also mention the intention to promote national languages in their constitution, and Senegal explicitly cites Jola, Maninka, Pulaar, Sereer, Soninke, Wolof, and all other codified languages. Cabo Verde and Guinea-Bissau are discussed with regard to Portuguese and its creoles.

CABO VERDE

MAURITANIA NIGER

MALI SENEGAL GUINEABISSAU French Portuguese

GUINEA

BURKINA FASO CÔTE D'IVOIRE TOGO

BENIN

Figure 3: Romance languages in Western Africa

Middle Africa – Our presentation of Middle Africa includes nine countries, six of which have French as their official or co-official language. Congo-Brazzaville, Congo-Kinshasa,

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Ursula Reutner

and Gabon stipulate it as their sole official language but also mention national languages in their constitution. Congo-Brazzaville and Congo-Kinshasa are even specific about this. Both cite Lingala and Kikongo or Kituba, the latter adds Swahili and Tshiluba. In the three other countries, French is co-official with another language: in Cameroon together with English, in the Central African Republic alongside Sango, and in Chad with Arabic. Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe established Portuguese as sole official language. Equatorial Guinea is classified here according to its main official language Spanish, though French and Portuguese are declared official languages in its constitution too. The country also witnessed the emergence of a Portuguese-based creole on the island of Annobón, and other Portuguese-based creoles developed in São Tomé and Príncipe.

CHAD

CAMEROON

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC

EQUATORIAL GUINEA SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE

GABON CONGOBRAZZAVILLE CONGO-KINSHASA ANGOLA (Cabinda)

French

ANGOLA

Portuguese Spanish Figure 4: Romance languages in Middle Africa

Eastern Africa – Eastern Africa is present with eleven countries and the two French departments Réunion and Mayotte. Seven of the eleven countries are considered in view of French, which is cited as co-official in the constitution of the former Belgian colonies Burundi and Rwanda and the former French colonies Djibouti, Madagascar, Comoros, and Seychelles. French also plays a major role in Mauritius, which is de facto dominated by English. It shares its co-official status with Kirundi and English in Burundi, Kinyar-

Introduction

7

wanda, English, and Swahili in Rwanda, Arabic in Djibouti, Shikomori and Arabic in Comoros, Malagasy in Madagascar, as well as Seychelles Creole and English in Seychelles. Other French-based creoles are essential means of oral communication in Réunion and Mauritius. Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia are discussed in relation to traces of Italian, and Mozambique regarding the situation of Portuguese. French

ERITREA

Italian Portuguese

DJIBOUTI ETHIOPIA

SOMALIA

RWANDA BURUNDI SEYCHELLES COMOROS Mayotte (FRANCE) MOZAMBIQUE

MAURITIUS Réunion (FRANCE)

MADAGASCAR

Figure 5: Romance languages in Eastern Africa

Africa – Southern Africa was not a focus of the colonial expansion of Romance-speaking countries, at least in its definition by the United Nations. As defined by the African Union, however, Southern Africa would include Angola. Figure 6 summarizes the panorama of Romance languages in Africa as presented in this handbook.

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Ursula Reutner

Ceuta (SPAIN)

Madeira (PORTUGAL)

Melilla (SPAIN)

ALGERIA

WESTERN SAHARA

CABO VERDE

TUNISIA

MOROCCO

Canary Islands (SPAIN)

LIBYA

MAURITANIA NIGER

MALI GAMBIA

EGYPT

SENEGAL

GUINEABISSAU

GUINEA

SIERRA LEONE LIBERIA

BURKINA FASO CÔTE D'IVOIRE

ERITREA

SUDAN CHAD

DJIBOUTI NIGERIA

GHANA

BENIN TOGO EQUATORIAL GUINEA SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE

ETHIOPIA

SOUTH SUDAN

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC CAMEROON

SOMALIA UGANDA

GABON CONGOBRAZZAVILLE CONGO-KINSHASA ANGOLA (Cabinda)

KENYA

RWANDA BURUNDI TANZANIA

SEYCHELLES COMOROS

ANGOLA

Mayotte (FRANCE) MALAWI

ZAMBIA

ZIMBABWE MOZAMBIQUE NAMIBIA

MAURITIUS Réunion (FRANCE)

BOTSWANA

French Italian Portuguese Spanish

ESWATINI SOUTH AFRICA

MADAGASCAR

LESOTHO

Figure 6: Romance languages in Africa

Roman Empire – The north African coastline was already coveted by the Romans, so the Romance languages introduced later encountered faint traces of their original language, Latin. The African part of the Roman Empire stretched from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Red Sea in the east and includes the coastal regions of what is today Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt: the former Roman provinces Mauretania Tingitana (with the capital Tingis, present-day Tangier), Mauretania Caesariensis (with Caesarea, today’s Cherchell), Africa Procunsularis (with Carthage), Cyrenaica (with the ancient city Cyrene), and Aegyptus (with Alexandria). They form part of the Romania submersa, where Latin was not present long enough to evolve into the Romance languages but functioned as substrate for other languages and also left some linguistic traces in place names. In turn, most regions depicted in this handbook were unknown to the Romans and can partially be described as Romania nova. Nevertheless, even the country names Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Libya, Mauritania, and the continent’s name Africa itself have Graeco-Roman roots. Other country names go back to the Romance languages and thus indirectly to Latin: Cabo Verde (< Pg. cabo ‘cape’, verde ‘green’), Cameroon (< Pg. cama-

9

Introduction

rões ‘shrimps’), Côte d’Ivoire (< Fr. côte ‘coast’, ivoire ‘ivory’), Gabon (< Pg. gabão ‘cloak’), São Tomé and Príncipe (< Pg. São Tomé ‘Saint Thomas’, príncipe ‘prince’), or Sierra Leone (Sp. sierra ‘mountain range’, It. leone ‘lion’). The list could easily be extended with numerous city names that testify to the labelling of several African places by people speaking Romance languages. Last but not least, it would have to refer to the replacement by autonyms, of which Burkina Faso ‘land of the upright people’ is certainly the most impressive (< Mooré Burkina ‘upright’, Dyula Faso ‘fatherland’, combined with Fula bè ‘person’ in Burkinabè). Eboracum Deva

BRITANNIA Londinium GERMANIA Colonia INFERIOR Agrippina

BELGICA Augusta Treverorum

Lutetia

LUGDUNENSIS

IA AN R Augusta RM Vindobona GE PERIO Vindelicorum SU Lauriacum

Limonum

AQUITANIA

RAETIA

Lugdunum

1

Burdigala

NORICUM

Mediolanum

2 TARRACONENSIS Salamantica

LUSITANIA Emerita Augusta

NARBONENSIS Caesaraugusta

Gades

BAETICA

Tingi

IA ETAN MAUR ANA IT TING

Tarentum

Carthago Nova

Caralis

MAURETANIA CAESARIENSIS

Utica Cirta

AFRICA PROCONSULARIS

Carthago

THRACIA Thessalonica

EPIRUS

Buthrotum

SICILIA

Philippopolis Byzantium

TUS

ON

TP

IA E

HYN

BIT

MACEDONIA

Ancyra

Trapezus

CAPPADOCIA

Nicaea

Caesarea

ASIA

ACHAIA

Panormus

Caesarea

Tomis

Durostorum

MOESIA SUPERIOR Dyrrhachium

MOESIA INFERIOR

Naissus

Salonae

Neapolis

Olbia

Apullum Sarmizegetusa

Aleria

ET

Napoca

DACIA

ROMA

SARDINIA

Corduba

Aquincum

DALMATIA

ITALIA CORSICA

Tarraco

Italica

Aquileia

Cremona

3

Narbo Massilia

Toletum

PA SU NN PE ON RI IA OR PANNON IA INFERIOR

1. ALPES POENIAE 2. ALPES COTTIAE 3. ALPES MARITIMAE

Corinth

GALATIA

Ephesus Athenae

Syracusae

Miletus

CILICIA Tarsus

LYCIA ET PAMPHYLIA

Antiochia

SYRIA Palmyra

CYPRUS

Salamis Tyrus

IUDAEA Hierosolyma

Leptis Magna Cyrene

Alexandria

Memphis

ARABIA Petra PETRAEA

PTUS

AEGY

CYRENAICA ET CRETA

Figure 7: Roman Empire under Hadrian

Chapter structure – The states are examined in separate chapters according to the following aspects: sociolinguistic situation, linguistic history, external language policy, linguistic characteristics, and internal language policy. The uniform application of this structure to the analysis of the linguistic situation in each country assists readers in easily finding the information they are looking for. Nevertheless, not all aspects will be available, and we ask for understanding in the event that the text does not supply a needed piece of information. Despite our attempts to treat each topic in each country uniformly, for various reasons, it has been difficult to completely avoid some disparities between sections and countries. First, several aspects might play a more prominent role in some areas than in others. Second, research on some countries is rather scarce and does not yet cover all relevant aspects. Third, authors might be more specialized in some

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topics than in others, which can be reflected in the proportions dedicated to the different sections. In addition, the chapters on Libya, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia must deviate from the plan. Since Italian is not vital as an everyday language on the African continent, the reports on these countries cannot offer linguistic characteristics and internal language policies; hence our focus on the Italian traces in African languages and African influences on Italian. Focus on plurilingualism – Our special interest lies in the relations of the Romance languages with the languages they coexist with. In almost all African states and regions, the Romance languages are embedded in autochthonous plurilingual environments or in contact with a creole based on one of them. The first section of each chapter thus responds to the following questions: Which languages are used in the country and where? Which social group uses which language? How many people speak and/or understand each language? The second part deals with historical aspects: What was the situation before the area came into contact with Europeans? How was the Romance language imported to and established in the country? Which historical events have contributed to its further development? The third section focuses on statutory aspects: Which languages are stipulated as official by the constitution? Are there any specific laws that have been promulgated in order to encourage the choice of the Romance language or to reinforce African languages? It describes which languages are used by public authorities, in the educational system, the media, and fine arts, and which factors are decisive for the language choice in each domain. Which languages are used by the government for legal texts, identity documents, stamps, and public signage? Which ones emerge in the oral and written communication of the administration? Which ones do politicians prefer in official speeches and election campaigns? Which ones appear in the judicial system? Which ones prevail in the context of cults and religion? Which are the teaching languages in public and private schools and which ones are taught? Which languages dominate in newspapers, on radio, television, and the internet? And which languages appear in oral and written literature, films, and song lyrics? The fourth segment is dedicated to the characteristics of the Romance languages in pronunciation, grammar, and lexicon. It portrays their internal development and the influences of African languages on them. The reader will find numerous examples of features not common in mainland Europe, some of which are spread in several African countries. The presentation focuses on stabilized features that form part of an endogenous norm but also discusses the impact of frequent learner varieties, which constitute an essential part especially of African French due to its predominant acquisition as a second language. Drawing the line between errors and general usage sometimes proves challenging. The same holds true for assigning the identified features to different types of norms and, in a second step, their countries to various degrees of pluricentricity. The fifth section, therefore, analyses the evaluation, codification, and social distribution of the African varieties. It first chronicles attitudes towards them and attempts at linguistic purism, then deals with their registration in dictionaries and grammars, and finally discusses their actual usage by public authorities,

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in education, the media, and literature (for more details on these sections cf. Pöll 2017; Reutner 2017a). Mono-, bi- and plurilingual states – The constitutions of twenty-three out of the thirty-eight nations with a notable Romance past suggest that the states are monolingual. Eleven are officially monolingual French (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, France: Réunion and Mayotte, and Togo only mention French in their constitutions; Congo-Brazzaville, Congo-Kinshasa, Gabon, Guinea, Niger, and Senegal also explicitly name national languages). Six are officially Portuguese-speaking (Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Portugal: Madeira, and São Tomé and Príncipe), three Arabic-speaking (Libya, Mauritania, and Tunisia), and one each officially uses Spanish (Spain: Canaries, Ceuta, and Melilla), English (Mauritius, which does not explicitly stipulate an official language but declares English as working language of its Assembly), or Amharic (Ethiopia, whose constitution also avoids defining an official language but establishes Amharic as working language of its government; Afar, Oromo, Somali, and Tigrinya were declared additional working languages in 2020). Eight countries are officially bilingual: Arabic-Tamazight Algeria and Morocco, Arabic-French Chad and Djibouti, Somali-Arabic Somalia, English-French Cameroon, the Sango-French Central African Republic, and Malagasy-French Madagascar. Seven countries are officially plurilingual: trilingual Kirundi-French-English Burundi, Shikomori-French-Arabic Comoros, Spanish-French-Portuguese Equatorial Guinea, Creole-English-French Seychelles, Tigrinya-Arabic-English Eritrea (which also does not proclaim an official language but explains that the three languages are predominantly used in its commerce and government affairs), as well as Rwanda, officially quadrilingual Kinyarwanda-French-EnglishSwahili since 2017, and Mali, which relegated French to a working language in July 2023 and declared Bambara, Bobo (Bomu), Bozo, Dogon, Fula (Fulfulde), Hassaniyya, Kassonke (Xaasongaxango), Maninka, Minyanka (Mamara), Senufo, Songhay, Soninke, and Tamasheq official. Recent coups – Major changes are currently taking place in the former French colonies in Western and Middle Africa, where eight successful coups took place between August 2020 and August 2023: Chad (2021), Guinea (2021), Burkina Faso (two in 2022), Mali (2020, 2021), Niger (2023), and Gabon (2023). Some of them may also have linguistic implications and could entail changes in official languages, for instance. Languages in contact – Many more languages are in contact with the Romance languages than the ones mentioned in the constitutions. They primarily constitute vernacular, sometimes also vehicular languages, and are increasingly conquering spheres traditionally reserved for official languages. Some vehicular languages are even spread in several countries and might develop conspicuous pluricentricity in the process of their ongoing institutionalization. Most of the languages in contact with the Romance languages can be grouped into three of the four major language families established by Greenberg (1949/1950; 1954) –Afro-Asiatic, Niger-Congo, and Nilo-Saharan– even though the classifications have been revised several times since then (cf., e. g., Güldemann 2018; Vossen/Dimmendaal 2020, and Figure 8, p. 13). Other languages belong to the  

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Austronesian family or are creoles that emerged from the contact between Romance and African languages in the context of slavery. All of these languages would deserve much more attention than what can be given to them in this volume focusing on the Romance languages. Creoles – Romance-based African creoles are derived from French and Portuguese: French-based creoles are spoken in Mauritius, Rodrigues, Réunion, and Seychelles. Portuguese-based creoles include the Upper Guinea and the Gulf of Guinea creoles: Upper Guinea creoles evolved in Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, and the Senegalese Casamance, once coveted by Portugal. The Gulf of Guinea creoles emerged in Equatorial Guinea and São Tomé and Príncipe. Romance-based creoles appear in this volume only in their function as languages in contact with the Romance languages and are presented in more detail using the example of Guinea-Bissau Creole. Some scholars also describe Kituba, Lingala, and Sango as creoles. Yet, calling each language that arose through the encounter of different cultures a creole would make almost all languages creole, as language evolution usually involves many kinds of language contact. English would ultimately also be considered a creole, which would not advance language classification but only ignore the special situation of real creoles. Therefore, we prefer to restrict the term creole to the languages which came up in the specific sociocultural context of plantation settlement colonies (cf., e. g., APiCS; Chaudenson 1992; Reutner 2005, 7s.; Mufwene 2020, 302; 2022, 217; 2023, 79). Naming languages – Drawing boundaries between languages is a controversial undertaking, and some argue that the practice of delineating languages is itself a vestige of colonialism and coloniality (e. g., Pennycook/Makoni 2020, 47ss.). Though this argument may have merit, for the purposes of this volume it is necessary to recognize languages as, in principle, distinct from one another, which does not deny manifold phenomena of code-switching and code-mixing and the sometimes-blurring boundaries between languages and varieties. In this matter, we have adopted the language demarcation as described by Ethnologue (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). There is a further problem of classification, however, which arises from the fact that many African languages bear different names depending on the group referring to them. Fula, for example, is named Peul by the French, and, stretching as a continuum of dialects across almost twenty countries, is referred to as Pulaar or Pular in the West of its territory and as Fulfulde in the East. Though no single reference will be perfect in every case when it comes to such a fluid and vibrant cultural expression as language, in the interests of clarity and consistency, we have chosen to use the language names as given by Glottolog (cf. Hammarström et al. 2023) unless there are well-established autonyms that deviate.  

 

13

Introduction

Madeira (PORTUGAL)

Ceuta (SPAIN)

Melilla (SPAIN) TUNISIA

MOROCCO

Canary Islands (SPAIN)

L I B YA

ALGERIA

EGYPT

WESTERN SAHARA

MAURITANIA GAMBIA

MALI NIGER

CHAD

SUDAN

ERITREA

SENEGAL BURKINA FASO

GUINEA GUINEABISSAU SIERRA LEONE

LIBERIA

CÔTE D'IVOIRE GHANA TOGO

0°

DJIBOUTI

Equator

ETHIOPIA

NIGERIA BENIN EQUATORIAL GUINEA SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE

SOUTH SUDAN

CENTRAL AFRICAN CAMEROON REPUBLIC

SOMALIA CONGOBRAZZAVILLE GABON

UGANDA

KENYA

0°

RWANDA CONGO-KINSHASA BURUNDI

ANGOLA (Cabinda)

TANZANIA

SEYCHELLES COMOROS

ANGOLA

Mayotte (FRANCE)

ZAMBIA

MALAWI ZIMBABWE MAURITIUS BOTSWANA

Afro-Asiatic Nilo-Saharan Niger-Congo Khoisan

MOZAMBIQUE

Réunion (FRANCE)

NAMIBIA SOUTH AFRICA

ESWATINI

MADAGASCAR

LESOTHO

Austronesian Indo-European

Figure 8: African language families

Country key facts – The overview of the countries at the end of the book lists the official languages alongside a selection of major other languages. The official languages are cited according to each country’s most recent constitution as far as possible, the other languages according to Ethnologue and Glottolog. The data relating to the area and population of independent countries is drawn from the World Factbook (cf. CIA 2023) and that of dependent territories is supplied by the statistics institutes of France, Portugal, and Spain (cf. DREM 2022; INE 2022; INSEE 2022). The percentages of speakers are indicated according to the International Organization of La Francophonie, the Portuguese Language Observatory, and the Cervantes Institute (cf. OIF 2022; OLP 2015; IC 2022). For rea-

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sons of consistency, comparable sources available for all states were selected. More precise or recent figures for the individual states can be found in the corresponding chapters. The overview also shows the respective flags, which are significant and often telling national symbols. Many of them use the Pan-African colours green, yellow, and red, for instance, some of them ideograms like five-pointed stars or the crescent. Descriptions of Romance languages in Africa – Numerous monographs focus on one Romance language in one specific African country. Some also consider more African countries (e. g., Dumont 1990; Bamgboṣe 1991; 2000; Manessy 1994; Abolou 2012; Brandão 2018), as do countless conference proceedings. Reference books often encompass one Romance language in multiple African countries without necessarily treating all relevant African nations or all linguistic and sociolinguistic levels, and usually addressing zones outside Africa, too. Examples include the general handbooks for French by Holtus/Metzeltin/Schmitt (1990) and Polzin-Haumann/Schweickard (2015), the handbooks on the French-speaking world by Valdman (1979), Robillard/Beniamino (1993–1996), Pöll (2001), Reutner (2017b), and Hardy/Herling/Patzelt (2019), specialized books on French worldwide like Gess/Lyche/Meisenburg (2012) or Detey et al. (2016), and the language histories of Picoche/Marchello-Nizia (1989), Antoine et al. (1995; 2000), or Chaurand (1999). Works on the Italian language in more than one African country are rare but exist (e. g., Ricci 2005). Portuguese outside Portugal is widely explored as to its existence in Brazil. The general handbooks by Holtus/Metzeltin/Schmitt (1994) and Martins/Carrilho (2016) also take account of Portuguese in several African countries, as do specialized books on Portuguese worldwide like Álvarez López/Gonçalvez/Ornelas de Avelar (2018), as well as grammars such as Vázquez Cuesta/Mendes da Luz (1989) or Raposo et al. (2013). Spanish is investigated as a world language including Equatorial Guinea in Herling/Patzelt (2013), whereas most publications on Spanish worldwide focus on its presence in Latin America and only refer to the Canary Islands as basis for Latin American Spanish, as, for example, Lipski (1994), López Morales (2005), and Eckkrammer (2021). Still others unite the Romance languages but only treat a selection of the relevant African countries or include countries outside Africa among them, as Ernst et al. (2003), for instance. Features compared to other handbooks – Three aspects set this handbook apart from other descriptions of the Romance languages in Africa. They concern its scope, organization, and linguistic approach. The scope of this volume provides a fairly complete panorama of the Romance languages in contemporary Africa by presenting descriptions of all applicable Romance languages in all African countries where they have a certain tradition. The organization of the chapters is special in three aspects. First, it follows a coherent structure thanks to uniform criteria of analysis, which facilitates comparisons between the sections of different chapters. Second, it illustrates all phenomena cited as linguistic characteristics with examples, always provides their standard equivalents, and supplements both the regional and standard forms in the pronunciation part with IPA transcriptions to help students and second-language users of the Romance languages. Third, it systematically offers English translations for the examples and quota 

 

Introduction

15

tions in other languages in order to make the information easily accessible to a wider audience than the scholars investigating one of the Romance languages. The linguistic approach allows examining the different countries from an integrative perspective, achieved by focusing on multilingualism. It combines the description of mere linguistic features with the discussion of language planning and other sociolinguistic aspects, which are often treated separately, though actually mutually dependent. Features compared to the Handbook of the French-Speaking World – The idea of planning this handbook came up while working on the Manuel des francophonies (Reutner 2017b). This includes work on some African countries (cf. Boukari 2017; Daff 2017; Derradji 2017; Drescher 2017; Frey 2017; Kriegel 2017; Jablonka 2017; Randriamarotsimba 2017). However, a treatment of the complete French-speaking area in Africa was beyond its scope and thus suggested a separate handbook specifically for French in Africa. The proposal then arose to also deal with the other three Romance languages of interest for Africa and to describe the four of them in their African environments using English as publication language. The unique structure and coherent perspective developed for the Manuel des francophonies proved to be very helpful for a uniform representation of different countries and therefore was to be retained and applied to all pertinent African countries. In summary, three aspects distinguish the Manual of Romance Languages in Africa from the Manuel des francophonies. This handbook treats all African countries with French history, whereas the preceding one only presents a small selection. This new volume goes beyond the French-speaking world and also examines African countries with Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish history, as comprehensively as possible. Last but not least, though most authors have languages other than English as their first language, it uses English as a lingua franca to enable a smooth transfer of knowledge and to bridge the different Romance languages without privileging one of them (cf. Reutner 2021). International partners – Describing the language situation of thirty-eight countries wouldn’t be possible without exchanges involving specialists from all over the world. Beyond advice from and discussion with a multitude of colleagues from different disciplines, this volume was created in collaboration with forty-four scholars working in twenty-two countries, who contributed as authors. Ten of them work in Algeria, Benin, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Chad, Ghana, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles, and Togo: Moufoutaou Adjeran from Benin’s University of Abomey-Calavi (Université d’Abomey-Calavi), Karima Ait Dahmane from Algeria’s University of Algiers (Université d’Alger 2 Abu el Kacem Saâdallah), Issa Djarangar Djita from Chad’s University of N’Djamena (Université de N’Djamena), Komlan Essowe Essizewa from Togo’s University of Lomé (Université de Lomé), Guilhem Florigny from the University of Mauritius, Gregorio Firmino from Mozambique’s Eduardo Mondlane University (Universidade Eduardo Mondlane), Promise Dodzi Kpoglu from the University of Ghana, Gélase Nimbona from the University of Burundi (Université du Burundi), Joëlle Perreau from the University of Seychelles, and Dominika Swolkien from the University of Cabo Verde (Universidade de Cabo Verde). Four authors are employed in Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Switzerland: Elissa

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Pustka at Austria’s University of Vienna (Universität Wien), Anne-Catherine Simon at Belgium’s University of Louvain (Université catholique de Louvain), Margot van den Berg at Utrecht University (Universiteit Utrecht) in the Netherlands, and Bruno Maurer at the Swiss University of Lausanne (Université de Lausanne). Two authors shared their work from Canada, Norway, and the United States of America, each: in Canada, Fouzia Benzakour from Sherbrooke University (Université de Sherbrooke) and Bernard Mulo Farenkia from Cape Breton University; in Norway, Guri Bordal Steien from the Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences (Høgskolen i Innlandet) and Ingse Skattum from the University of Oslo (Universitetet i Oslo); in the United States, John M. Lipski from Pennsylvania State University and Lotfi Sayahi of the University of New York at Albany (SUNY Albany). Three authors work in Italy, Portugal, and Spain, each: in Italy, Béatrice Akissi Boutin and Oreste Floquet from the University of Rome (Sapienza Università di Roma) and Mauro Tosco from the University of Turin (Università di Torino); in Portugal, Nélia Alexandre and Tjerk Hagemeijer from the University of Lisbon (Universidade de Lisboa) and Aline Bazenga from the University of Madeira (Universidade da Madeira); in Spain, Dolores Corbella from the University of La Laguna (Universidad de La Laguna), as well as Gérard Fernández Smith and Luis Escoriza Morera from the University of Cadiz (Universidad de Cádiz). Seven authors contributed from Germany: Sabine Diao-Klaeger from the University of Koblenz-Landau (Universität Koblenz-Landau), Lutz Edzard and Silke Jansen from the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg (Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg), David Paul Gerards from the University of Mainz (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz), Philipp Heidepeter and Ursula Reutner from the University of Passau (Universität Passau), and Benjamin Meisnitzer from the University of Leipzig (Universität Leipzig). Eight authors participated from France: Marc Chalier and Claude Frey from the University of Paris (Université Sorbonne (Nouvelle) – Paris 3 and 4), Samatar Abdallah Doualeh from the University of Montpellier (Université Paul Valéry – Montpellier 3), Julien Kilanga Musinde from the University of Angers (Université d’Angers), Gudrun Ledegen from the University of Rennes (Université Rennes 2), Jean-Alexis Mfoutou from the University of Rouen (Université de Rouen), as well as Nicolas Quint and Catherine Taine-Cheikh from the research units Language and Cultures of Africa (Langage, langues et cultures d’Afrique – LLACAN) and Languages and Cultures of Oral Tradition (Langues et civilisations à tradition orale – LACITO) of the French National Centre for Scientific Research (Centre national de la recherche scientifique – CNRS). Personal note – This group of authors includes persons from Africa, Europe, and America alike, women and men, younger and older scholars, people from various ethnic affiliations, diverse sociocultural backgrounds, and with different ideological orientations. The present examination of the Romance languages in Africa is inevitably, in some respects, shaped by these factors. I hope that the wide range of contributing authors, the variety of quoted studies, and the abundant statements of interviewed people can, to some degree, address the limitations of our perspectives. For me, modernday studies on Africa in humanities from all sides are a sign not only of interest in the continent but also of appreciation for African cultures and for what we can learn from

Introduction

17

them. Yet, similar to some women who argue that mainly women can discuss certain women’s issues, though other women may be delighted if women’s issues are a focus of male research too, also some black people might have a strange feeling if scholars from other races talk about the language situation in areas with primarily black population and, consequently, promote “black linguistics” (e. g., Makoni et al. 2003). In linguistics, there have always been issues of ownership and how to meaningfully involve community studies. We all would definitively like to see more Africans investigating the language situation in Africa. Nevertheless, my hope is that we all agree that human beings cannot simply be assigned to monocultural blocks. In my mindset, people are composed of a variety of visible and, above all, invisible aspects, of the experiences they have had in their lives, and the exchanges they have had with others. Most Western authors involved with this volume, for example, have studied or worked in African countries, and so have many African authors in Western ones. These exchange between the Global North and South have influenced the academic approaches and research standards of both sides and contributed to the dehegemonization of knowledge. I am, nonetheless, well aware that a Western bias on African situations cannot always be avoided. I also acknowledge the historical debt some European countries bear in relation to Africa. I see the atrocities various Europeans committed on African people and feel deep empathy and –within the bounds of what is possible for an outsider– pain. Though Western or Western-influenced investigation on the presence of Romance languages in Africa runs the risk of being suspected of continuing the history of linguistic imposition, in my opinion, inter- and transcultural exchanges are preferable to avoidance. I firmly believe that they represent a better way to deal with the past than exclusion and are the best possible approach to finally create a more egalitarian future. Academic studies on the continent from various angles will help raise awareness of its importance and finally put Africa in the place it deserves according to its geographical size, its population numbers, its history, ethnic groups, cultural affluence, and in its role as the cradle of humankind. Acknowledgements – Here I would like to express my gratitude to the international partners for their collegial participation throughout the editing process, their constant reflection and ideas for advancing the handbook’s thoroughness, and their fruitful, pleasant, and academically enriching cooperation. Also, the publication of this volume would not have been possible without the precious help from the team in Passau. For finding authors who are specialists in the respective field, able to write in English, and willing to adhere to the strict chapter structure, I wish to thank Sandra Marinaro, in particular, who identified and contacted countless people in the databases. Special thanks also go to Marc Chalier, Bettina Eiber, Theresa Hartl, Philipp Heidepeter, Monica Lehnhardt, and Jelena Stojcinovic, who were of great help in proposing adaptions of the manuscripts received to the required structure and stylistic guidelines. In addition, I would like to thank Susannah Davis and Eartha Melzer for their intensive linguistic and content-related review, Luca Göttle for her help with formatting the references, Ildiko Koprivanacz for her assistance with creating the indices, as well as Günter Reutner for his spontanteous help whenever  

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necessary. I am also grateful to the University of Passau for funding numerous trips to Africa and the staff of the university library for their excellent support in ordering books from all over the world for consultation and fact checking. On the part of the publisher, I thank Christine Henschel, Günter Holtus, and Fernando Sánchez-Miret for their priceless final review of the manuscripts. They have all invested a great deal of time, energy, and suggestions into this endeavour and have thus all contributed to this first uniform description of Romance languages in Africa. May this work contribute to making the topics dealt with more widely known and accessible and may it lead to many more studies on the Romance languages in Africa, on their characteristics, sociolinguistic situation, and linguistic ecology, and, above all, on the transformation they experience through language contact as well as on their role as mirrors of society.

References Abolou, Camille Roger (2012), Les français populaires africains. Franco-véhiculaire, franc-bâtard, franco-africain, Paris, L’Harmattan. Álvarez López, Laura/Gonçalves, Perpétua/Ornelas de Avelar, Juanito (edd.) (2018), The Portuguese Language Continuum in Africa and Brazil, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins. Antoine, Gérald, et al. (edd.) (1995), Histoire de la langue française. 1914–1945, Paris, CNRS. Antoine, Gérald, et al. (edd.) (2000), Histoire de la langue française. 1945–2000, Paris, CNRS. APiCS = Susanne Maria Michaelis et al. (edd.) (2013), The Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online, Leipzig, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, https://apics-online.info/ (2/3/2023). Bamgboṣe, Ayọ (1991), Language and the Nation. The Language Questions in Sub-Saharan Africa, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press. Bamgboṣe, Ayọ (2000), Language and Exclusion. The Consequences of Language Policies in Africa, Hamburg/ London, LIT. Boukari, Oumarou (2017), Côte d’Ivoire et Burkina Faso, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel de francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 476–507. Brandão, Sílvia Figueiredo (2018), Duas variedades africanas do português: Variáveis fonético-fonológicas e morfossintáticas, São Paulo, Blucher. Chaudenson, Robert (1992), Des îles, des hommes, des langues. Essai sur la créolisation linguistique et culturelle, Paris, L’Harmattan. Chaurand, Jacques (ed.) (1999), Nouvelle histoire de la langue française, Paris, Seuil. CIA (2023), The World Factbook. Explore All Countries, Washington, Central Intelligence Agency, https://www.cia. gov/the-world-factbook/countries/ (2/3/2023). Daff, Moussa (2017), Sénégal, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 552–572. Derradji, Yacine (2017), Algérie, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 431–452. Detey, Sylvain, et al. (edd.) (2016), Varieties of Spoken French, Oxford, Oxford University Press. DREM (2022), Madeira em números 2021. Uma visão abrangente da realidade da Região Autónoma da Madeira durante o ano de 2021, Funchal, Direção Regional de Estatística da Madeira, https://estatistica.madeira. gov.pt/download-now/multitematicas-pt/multitematicas-mn-pt/multitematicas-mn-publicacoes-pt/ send/34-madeira-em-numeros-publicacoes/15538-madeira-em-numeros-2021.html (2/3/2023). Drescher, Martina (2017), Cameroun, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 508–534.

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Dumont, Pierre (1990), Le français langue africaine, Paris, L’Harmattan. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Eckkrammer, Eva Martha (ed.) (2021), Manual del español en América, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter. Ernst, Gerhard, et al. (edd.) (2003), Romanische Sprachgeschichte/Histoire linguistique de la Romania. Ein internationales Handbuch zur Geschichte der romanischen Sprachen/Manuel international d’histoire linguistique de la Romania, vol. 1, Berlin/New York, De Gruyter. Frey, Claude (2017), Burundi, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 535–551. Gess, Randall/Lyche, Chantal/Meisenburg, Trudel (edd.) (2012), Phonological Variation in French. Illustrations from three continents, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins. Greenberg, Joseph (1949/1950, 1954), Studies in African linguistic classification, Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 5, 79–100, 190–198, 309–317. Güldemann, Tom (ed.) (2018), The Languages and Linguistics of Africa, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter. Hammarström, Harald, et al. (edd.) (2023), Glottolog 4.7, Jena, Max-Planck-Institut, https://glottolog.org/about (2/3/2023). Hardy, Stéphane/Herling, Sandra/Patzelt, Carolin (edd.) (2019), Weltsprache Französisch – Variation, Soziolinguistik und geographische Verbreitung des Französischen. Ein Handbuch für das Studium der Frankoromanistik, Stuttgart, Ibidem. Herling, Sandra/Patzelt, Carolin (edd.) (2013), Weltsprache Spanisch – Variation, Soziolinguistik und geographische Verbreitung des Spanischen. Ein Handbuch für das Studium der Hispanistik, Stuttgart, Ibidem. Holtus, Günter/Metzeltin, Michael/Schmitt, Christian (edd.) (1990), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, vol. V/1: Französisch. Français, Tübingen, Niemeyer. Holtus, Günter/Metzeltin, Michael/Schmitt, Christian (edd.) (1994), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, vol. VI/2: Galegisch, Portugiesisch. Gallego, Português, Tübingen, Niemeyer. IC (2022), El español: una lengua viva. Informe 2022, Madrid, Instituto Cervantes, https://cvc.cervantes.es/ lengua/espanol_lengua_viva/pdf/espanol_lengua_viva_2022.pdf (2/3/2023). INE (2022), Población residente por fecha, sexo y edad, Madrid, Instituto Nacional de Estadística, https://www. ine.es/jaxiT3/Tabla.htm?t=9681 (2/3/2023). INSEE (2022), Recensement de la population, Paris, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, https://www.insee.fr (2/3/2023). Jablonka, Frank (2017), Maroc, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 453–475. Kriegel, Sibylle (2017), Burundi, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 686–703. Lipski, John M. (1994), Latin American Spanish, London/New York, Longman. López Morales, Humberto (22005 [1998]), La Aventura del Español en América, Madrid, Espasa Fórum. Makoni, Sinfree, et al. (edd.) (2003), Black linguistics. Language, society, and politics in Africa and the Americas, London/New York, Routledge Manessy, Gabriel (1994), Le français en Afrique noire. Mythe, stratégies, pratiques, Paris, L’Harmattan. Martins, Ana Maria/Carrilho, Ernestina (edd.) (2016), Manual de linguística portuguesa, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter. Mufwene, Salikoko S. (2001), The Ecology of Language Evolution, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Mufwene, Salikoko S. (2020), Creoles and Pidgins. Why the latter are not the ancestors of the former, in: Evangelia Adamou/Yaron Matras (edd.), The Routledge Handbook of Language Contact, London, Routledge, 300–324. Mufwene, Salikoko S. (2022), Kituba, Kileta, or Kikong? What’s in a name?, in: Carole de Féral (ed.), Le nom des langues III. Le nom des langues en Afrique sub-saharienne: pratiques dénominations, catégorisations. Naming Languages in Sub-Saharan Africa: Practices, Names, Categorisations, Louvain-la-Neuve, Peeters, 211–222.

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Mufwene, Salikoko S. (2023), Linguistic Hybridization in the Emergence of Creoles, The Cambridge Journal of Postcolonial Literary Inquiry 10/1, 74–89. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, https://observatoire.francophonie.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Rapport-La-languefrancaise-dans-le-monde_VF-2022.pdf (2/3/2023). OLP (2015), Falantes de português. Dados estatísticos, Lisbon, Observatório da Língua Portuguesa, http://observalinguaportuguesa.org/falantes-de-portugues-2/ (2/3/2023). Pennycook, Allistar/Makoni, Sinfree (2020), Innovations and Challenges in Applied Linguistics from the Global South, London, Routledge. Picoche, Jacqueline/Marchello-Nizia, Christiane (1989), Histoire de la langue française, Paris, Nathan. Pöll, Bernhard (2001), Francophonies périphériques. Histoire, statut et profil des principales variétés du français hors de France, Paris, L’Harmattan. Pöll, Bernhard (2017), Normes endogènes, variétés de prestige et pluralité normative, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 65–86. Polzin-Haumann, Claudia/Schweickard, Wolfgang (edd.) (2015), Manuel de linguistique française, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter. Randriamarotsimba, Vololona (2017), Madagascar, Comores et Mayotte, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 660–685. Raposo, Eduardo B.P., et al. (edd.) (2013), Gramática do Português, Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Reutner, Ursula (2005), Sprache und Identität einer postkolonialen Gesellschaft im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Eine Studie zu den französischen Antillen Guadeloupe und Martinique, Hamburg, Buske. Reutner, Ursula (2017a), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Reutner, Ursula (ed.) (2017b), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter. Reutner, Ursula (2021), Frankophonien weltweit. Elemente für eine vergleichende Analyse, Romance Philology 75, 87–103. Ricci, Laura (2005), La lingua dell’impero. Comunicazione, letteratura e propaganda nell’età del colonialismo italiano, Rome, Carocci. Robillard, Didier de/Beniamino, Michel (edd.) (1993–1996), Le français dans l’espace francophone, 2 vol., Paris, Champion. Valdman, Albert (ed.) (1979), Le français hors de France, Paris, Champion. Vázquez Cuesta, Pilar/Mendes da Luz, Maria Albertina (41989 [1971]), Gramática da língua portuguesa, Lisbon, Edições 7º. Vossen, Rainer/Dimmendaal, Gerrit J. (edd.) (2020), The Oxford Handbook of African Languages, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

Northern Africa French Italian Portuguese Spanish

Karima Ait Dahmane

2 Algeria Abstract: This chapter highlights several aspects of the sociolinguistic situation in Algeria during and after the colonial period. How is the French language represented in history and today? What languages are taught at school and at university? How to manage within the framework of Algerian multilingualism the relationship with the French language and the promotion of national languages (Arabic and Tamazight)? Will French disappear in the face of the emergence of English? These questions make it possible to put, on the one hand, language teaching policy back into a historical perspective and, on the other hand, to discuss the model of the monolingual state. To illustrate our point, we use legislative texts, school directives, surveys, and other official texts which define the linguistic and educational policies of the country since its independence, and we then focus on the linguistic characteristics of the French spoken in Algeria. Finally, we will have a look at linguistic representations, stereotypes, and attitudes towards languages. Keywords: French, Algeria, multilingualism, Arabization, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation The sociolinguistic situation in Algeria is complex. The coexistence of languages has its origin in the very history of the Maghreb. Three languages, Arabic, French, and Tamazight, as well as regional varieties of each, are in use in the country. Algerian Arabic or Darija – Algerian Arabic is the main lingua franca in Algeria and used by 70 % to 90 % of the population. It does not benefit from an official status but has established itself as a common language of Algerians by the force of social dynamics and because it has many similarities with the Arabic spoken by the Maghreb people. It is spoken by 31.4 million people in Algeria, among which 27.1 million use it as a first language (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Algerian Arabic covers the whole territory of Algeria. In the West, we have the Oran variety, which dominates with that of Tlemcen, in the Centre, the language of the capital Algiers, in the East, three urban dialects: the variety of Sétif, capital of the High Plains (Hauts Plateaux), Constantine Arabic, and Annabi, which presents linguistic facts common to the other Arabic dialects of Algeria, but also a set of characteristics bringing it closer to Tunisian Arabic, as the city of Annaba is 600 km away from the capital Algiers, yet only 106 km away from the Tunisian border. These different varieties of Algerian Arabic are influenced by other languages (e. g. Tamazight, French, Spanish, Turkish, Italian). Thus, we can distinguish Algerian Arabic (especially influenced by Tamazight and Turkish), Oran Arabic (influenced by Spanish), Constantine Arabic (influenced by Italian), and Tlemcenaian Arabic (influenced by Spanish). All of these varieties are the vehicle for a rich and varied popular culture and  

 

 

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-002

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demonstrate a formidable resistance to the stigma and rejection that the dominant cultural norms convey towards them. Modern Arabic – Modern Arabic is the national and official language of the country. It is taught at school and understood by 28.7 Algerians (Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). It is the codified and learned variety that is used in writing. Institutional Arabic is not spoken spontaneously by anyone but is adapted to the educational and economic needs of the literary Arabic linguistic system. It is the language of the media, school, university (social, human, and legal sciences), diplomatic exchanges, and administration. Classical Arabic – Classical Arabic was introduced in the Maghreb in the seventh century with the first wave of Islamization in urban centres, as the language of study of the Quran, then in the eleventh century with the Arab military conquest of the Maghreb. This language developed in the nineteenth century during the cultural movement Nahda ‘(lit.) awakening, Renaissance’, led by the modernist elites of the Middle East. It enjoys the status of a sacred language, that of classical literature, hadiths, and the interpretation of the Quran. Classical Arabic is used in literature and theology. French – French was introduced to Algeria in 1830, during the military conquest of the country. At the moment of independence, Algeria inherited a French-speaking elite that maintained French as the language of economic, scientific, and technical power. Today, there are no reliable Algerian statistics on the exact number of French speakers, which amounts to several million: ‘We can estimate at several millions (around 8 million) the number of speakers who master the French language more or less correctly. Accurate quantitative assessment is certainly difficult to achieve when statistical data regarding the use of a particular language is deliberately obscured’.1

According to the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF), Algeria has the second largest French-speaking population in the world with 14.9 million speakers (OIF 2022, 35), although Algeria is not a member of the OIF. French remains a working language. It is very present in the discourse of political leaders and the publication of books in the field of higher education. Geographically, French is spoken more often in large cities, coastal towns, and in Kabylia. French speakers are predominantly bilingual or multilingual. Many families in Algeria have parents in France, and often even parents of French nationality. It should also be noted that France remains the country’s main economic partner, which is why English does not really compete with French. Tamazight – In Algeria, authorities prefer to use the word Tamazight ‘(lit.) free man’ instead of Berber that derives from barbarian. Today, Tamazight refers to the regional linguistic varieties Kabyle of Kabylia, Chenoui of the massifs of Chenoua, Chaouia, a 1 “On peut évaluer à plusieurs millions (8 millions environ) le nombre de locuteurs maitrisant plus ou moins correctement la langue française. L’évaluation quantitative précise est certes difficile à réaliser quand les données statistiques concernant l’utilisation de telle ou telle langue sont volontairement occultées” (Queffélec et al. 2002, 37).

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spoken language used by groups of ancient Berber tribes who installed in the Aurès and represent part of the resistance to various conquests, Tumzabt (Mozabite) of Mzab, and Tamahaq spoken by the Tuareg of Hoggar-Tassili. Tamazight, the historical language of the Maghreb, is attested by lybic inscriptions dating from the Neolithic period (cf. Ould-Braham/Souag 2021). Tamazight speakers are generally bilingual or trilingual, and they also use Algerian Arabic and/or French. People considered monolingual by the state are mainly illiterate persons living in remote areas. It is difficult to estimate the exact number of speakers because there are no systematic and reliable linguistic censuses in the country. Moreover, politically, the linguistic war waged by the partisans of the total Arabization of Algeria against French also excludes Tamazight. Any assessment of the actual use of Tamazight is problematic, even if officially, it is recognized as a national language and an official language in Algeria since 2016 (cf. C-DZ 2016). There are estimations of about 25 % of the population being Tamazight-speaking, representing seven to eight million people (cf. Derradji 2017, 432), or about 8.5 million native speakers (cf. Chaker 2008, 4311) out of a total of 31 or 32 million inhabitants in 2004 (cf. Chaker 2004, 17). Geographically, the main Tamazight regions are Kabylia (Tizi-Ouzou, Béjaïa, Bouïra, Boumerdès) and Algiers (the capital has the largest number of people of Kabyle origin with more than two million). The Chenoui (approximately 750,000 people) are present in the wilaya of Tipaza and on the coast of the wilaya of Chlef to the west of Algiers. The number of Chaouia-speakers is estimated at around one million people living mainly in Batna and Ain-Beida, that of Tumzabt is estimated at 200,000 people living mainly in Ghardaïa. English – Globalization has played an important role in the expansion of English as the first international language. According to Euromonitor International (2012), it is spoken by 7 % of Algerians in 2012. The rising number of English learners can be explained by the fact that many Algerians emigrated to the United Kingdom during the black decade, while others are looking for work in the Gulf countries Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait. Spanish – Spanish is a widespread language in the West of the country. Spanish military colonization of the coastal towns (Oran, Mers El Kébir, Bougie) in the fifteenth century, the proximity of the Oran coast to Spain, the significant flow of youth migration, and social and economic exchanges have helped strengthen the presence of this language in the Arabic and French dialects of this region. Algeria has 223,000 speakers of Spanish, and among those, 175,000 use it as a first language and 48,000 as a second language (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023).  

 

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2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French In 1830, the presence of French soldiers brutally introduced French and drastically changed the situation in the country. Some officers’ intended to restore the Christian faith in Africa by giving themselves a mission of Catholic reconquest. Others believed that they were participating in a broad movement for the emancipation of peoples. In either case, French spread in Northern Africa as the alleged bearer of civilization. Teaching Arabic and Tamazight languages to Europeans, and especially to members of missionary congregations and state agents (civil servants, teachers), was encouraged for pragmatic reasons, so as to enable them to understand the population and to be understood. The main objective was spreading French. The decree of 14 July–6 August 1850 created six Arab-French schools for boys in Algiers, Constantine, Annaba, Oran, Blida, and Mostaganem, and four for girls in Algiers, Constantine, Oran, and Bône. Their study programme focused on reading and writing in Arabic and French. From 1883 to 1922, the attitude of the local population towards the French education system shifted from categorical refuse to demand for the right of education. During the 1930s, the Algerian bourgeoisie felt a special need to teach their children French. The Algerian reformer Abdelhamid Ben Badis (1889–1940) still believed that bilingual Arabic-French education offered the Algerian youth the experience of an essential dual culture: ‘Ben Badis was not afraid to undertake at the same time to change the language, to purify the mores, to restore the dogma to its purity, to abolish the animist, maraboutic, and Sufic superstitions. He showed the way for nationalists to escape the assimilation with which Europe threatens them’.2

However, in 1937, the association of Ulamas (Association d’Oulémas) imposed the creation of madrasas and Arab-Muslim schools to thwart the policy of assimilation with the slogan ‘Islam is our religion, Arabic is our language, Algeria is our homeland’ (“l’Islam est notre religion, l’arabe est notre langue, l’Algérie est notre patrie”). The colonial authorities worried about the threat posed by the madrasas. On 10 July 1951, a decree transformed the old madrasas into Franco-Muslim high schools (Lycées d’enseignement franco-musulman) and left students the choice of preparing for a high school exam (baccalauréat) or diploma oriented towards studies in Arabic and Islamic disciplines.

2 “Ben Badis n’a pas craint d’entreprendre à la fois de changer la langue, d’épurer les mœurs, de rendre au dogme sa pureté, d’abolir les superstitions animistes, maraboutiques, et soufiques. Il a montré la voie aux nationalistes pour échapper à l’assimilation dont l’Europe les menace” (Desparmet 1933, 15).

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2.2 Arabization After a seven-year war of liberation which began on 1 November 1954, Algeria gained independence on 5 July 1962 and adopted a socialist economic system and an Arabization policy under the control of the Islamist National Liberation Front (Front de Libération Nationale – FLN). The regime in place decided to question the French domination by opting for the dissemination of Modern Standard Arabic. The country adopted a policy of Arabization to respond to fundamental issues, such as the construction of national identity (Taleb-Ibrahimi 1995, 184) and cultural independence. Politically, it was all about becoming part of a dynamic of Arab nationalism (alQawmiyya al-ʿArabiyya), a political project of an Arab nation with a religious origin based on the concept of ofumma ‘Muslim community or nation’, according to which all Arabs are united by a common history, culture, and language. However, administrations and businesses continued to work in French. Staff were unable to speak or write Arabic correctly. They most often used French as the first language of communication in society. Almost all of the texts governing the Arabization policy of several sectors of the State, the administration, and the school were promulgated in the 1970s (cf. 3.3). Throughout this period, Arabization intensified by creating conflicts between the elites. In April 1977, during a cabinet reshuffle, Mostefa Lacheraf was appointed Minister of Education, and Abdellatif Rahal Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research. These appointments show that: ‘President Boumedienne was undoubtedly sensitive to the tensions caused by the agrarian revolution and the Arabization, and eager to make prevail the progressive aspect of his action’.3

Arabization is based on the inseparable relationship between Arabity and Islam. This caused the indignation of several Algerian intellectuals, including Kateb Yacine, who wondered ‘if we are Arabs, why do they want to Arabize us?’ (“Si nous sommes arabes, pourquoi nous arabiser”). The elite was aware that this policy is directed “against” the French language, as Abaci underlines: ‘Algerian language policies were designed against French since their primary objective was to restore the Arabic language to its place and its glorious prestige, to eradicate French and reduce mother tongues’.4

Following the protest of 5 October 1988 in Algeria, a process of openness and democratization was put in place by the government in order to take into account the linguistic

3 “Le président Boumediene était sans doute sensible aux tensions provoquées par la révolution agraire et l’arabisation, et désireux de faire prévaloir le volet progressiste de son action” (Grandguillaume 2002, 146). 4 “Les politiques linguistiques algériennes ont été conçues contre le français puisque leur objectif primordial a consisté à rendre à la langue arabe sa place et son prestige glorieux, éradiquer le français et minorer les langues maternelles” (Abaci 2012, 25).

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and cultural diversity which characterizes the country. Algeria was a French colony for one hundred thirty-two years, but recovering the national language did not have to mean eliminating French; each language has its importance, its richness, and its degree of rooting in a geographic territory. In the current context, the choice of the first foreign language contributes to fueling conflicts between the elites instead of resolving them. If the supporters of Arabization say that French is a “colonial language”, English is also far from being a neutral language in the African context. It should be remembered that the expansion of this language is closely linked to the role played by Great Britain as a colonial power for three centuries. Echoing Hagège’s words, ‘Anglo-American cannot be a true international language, that is to say a neutral instrument allowing everyone to communicate everywhere. It is the vector of a culture which risks swallowing up all the others by making them negotiable objects’.5

He explains that modernization, the era of globalization, and the internationalization of English are leading to the disappearance of many languages and cultures. The problem does not lie with English as a cultural language, but with the monolingual and assimilative models that can threaten all languages.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Immediately after independence, the Algerian government took political decisions and administrative measures to resolve the problems posed by the coexistence of several languages and dialects. The Tripoli programme (Programme de Tripoli) attempts to fight against the predominance of French in Algeria by restoring the dignity of Arabic. Here is an excerpt from a text adopted by the first Congress of the National Liberation Front Party (FLN) in 1962: ‘Algerian culture will be national, revolutionary and scientific. Its role as national culture will consist, in the first place, in restoring to the Arabic language, the very expression of the cultural values of our country, its dignity and its effectiveness as a language of civilization’.6

5 “L’anglo-américain ne peut pas être une véritable langue internationale, c’est-à-dire un instrument neutre permettant à chacun de communiquer partout. Il est le vecteur d’une culture qui risque d’engloutir toutes les autres en faisant d’elles des objets négociables” (Hagège 2000, 364). 6 “La culture algérienne sera nationale, révolutionnaire et scientifique. Son rôle de culture nationale consistera, en premier lieu, à rendre à la langue arabe, expression même des valeurs culturelles de notre pays, sa dignité et son efficacité en tant que langue de civilisation” (art. 26, cited in Leclerc 2021).

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In the first constitution, the Algerian authorities wanted to restore Arabic as the only official and national language without taking into account the multilingualism characterizing the country. The constitution opens with a preamble that emphasizes socialism, the democratic revolution, and other values opposed to those of the colonial system. ‘Islam and the Arabic language have been effective forces of resistance against the colonial regime’s attempt to depersonalize Algerians. Algeria must affirm that the Arabic language is the national and official language and that it draws its spiritual strength mainly from Islam’.7 ‘The effective establishment of Arabization must take place as soon as possible on the territory of the Republic. However, as derogation from the provisions of this law, French may be used provisionally besides Arabic’.8

In 1975, tensions worsened between students (Arabists and Francizers) after a national conference on Arabization. In a speech of 10 April 1975 on the occasion of the conference on Arabization, President Houari Boumedienne refers to French as a foreign language as opposed to Arabic: ‘The Arabic language and the French language cannot be compared, since French is only a foreign language which benefits from a particular situation because of the objective historical considerations which we know’.9

The National Charter of 1976 renews the definition of the status of Arabic already mentioned in the constitution of 1963 and emphasizes that the state is committing the country to a new stage, that of the generalization of Arabization in official bodies: ‘The Algerian people are attached to the Arab homeland of which they are an inseparable element. […] the other constitutive elements of the Algerian nation were gradually added from the seventh century onwards, namely its cultural, linguistic and spiritual unity […] the Islam and Arab culture were a framework that was both universal and national […]. From now on, it is within this double framework [...] that the choice of our people will be determined and their development will take place’.10

7 “L’Islam et la langue arabe ont été des forces de résistance efficaces contre la tentative de dépersonnalisation des Algériens menée par le régime colonial. L’Algérie se doit d’affirmer que la langue arabe est la langue nationale et officielle et qu’elle tient sa force spirituelle essentiellement de l’Islam” (C-DZ 1963, Pmbl.). 8 “La réalisation effective de l’arabisation doit avoir lieu dans les meilleurs délais sur le territoire de la République. Toutefois, par dérogation aux dispositions de la présente loi, la langue française pourra être utilisée provisoirement avec la langue arabe” (C-DZ 1963, art. 76). 9 “La langue arabe et la langue française ne sont pas à comparer, celle-ci n’étant qu’une langue étrangère qui bénéficie d’une situation particulière du fait des considérations historiques objectives que nous connaissons” (Boumedienne 1975, cited by Morsly 2015, 120). 10 “Le peuple algérien se rattache à la patrie arabe dont il est un élément indissociable. […] les autres éléments constitutifs de la nation algérienne, à savoir son unité culturelle, linguistique et spirituelle […] l’islam et la culture arabe étaient un cadre à la fois universel et national […]. Désormais, c’est dans ce double cadre […] que va se déterminer le choix de notre peuple et se dérouler son évolution” (CN 1976, 1.I).

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Arabist students demonstrated in 1980 for an acceleration of Arabization in all sectors while, in the same year, major protests in favour of the Tamazight language and culture were organized in Kabylia. The Kabyles have always opposed the Arab-Muslim state from which they consider themselves excluded as an ethnic group. They say that Algeria is not Arab but Algerian. The first leaders of the country, all Arabic speakers, preferred to keep power for themselves rather than share it with French speakers or Tamazight speakers. For these leaders, the notion of Berberophony was perceived as a pure invention of French colonialism in order to divide the great Arab nation, pretending that Tamazight speakers didn’t exist. The constitution of 1989 establishes Arabic as only national and official language. ‘Arabic is the national and official language’.11

In December 1990, the popular assembly, mainly FLN, adopted the law generalizing the use of Arabic and made the use of this language compulsory from 5 July 1992. This decision was not directly applied, especially after the assassination of President Boudiaf (29 June 1992), but had to be relaunched in December 1996 and was then applied on 5 July 1998. Elected on 15 April 1999, Abd al-Aziz Bouteflika spoke French in some of his public statements in Algeria and abroad. ‘it is unthinkable […] to study exact sciences for ten years in Arabic when they can be studied in one year in French or in English’.12

It is interesting to identify the reasons why Arabic speakers have, since 1962, negative attitudes that push them to reject French in a multilingual country. The conflict is explained by political and ideological rather than by linguistic and cultural reasons, as Bouteflika explains in a presidential speech delivered on 18 May 1999 on the occasion of the national student day: ‘The problem that was revealed at that time consisted of a conflict between Arabists and Francizers. This conflict was in no way linguistic or civilizational, we must say frankly to the Algerian people. It was in fact a power conflict between French-speaking leaders occupying key positions, and Arabists, who wanted to access the same positions. The conflict was therefore neither civilizational nor cultural, but political between those who tried to maintain their positions and those who wanted to reach it’.13

11 “L’arabe est la langue nationale et officielle” (C-DZ 1989, art. 3). 12 “Il est impensable […] d’étudier des sciences exactes pendant dix ans en arabe alors qu’elles peuvent l’être en un an en français ou en anglais” (Bouteflika in Le Matin d’Alger 22/5/1999). 13 “Le problème qui était posé à cette époque consistait en un conflit entre arabisants et francisants. Ce conflit n’était en rien linguistique ou civilisationnel, nous devons le dire en toute franchise devant le peuple algérien. Il s’agissait en fait d’un conflit pour le pouvoir entre cadres formés en français et occupant des pos-

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The successive charters and constitutions make no reference to Tamazight, which appears to be a language doubly threatened, by the expansion of Algerian Arabic linked to the rural exodus on the one hand and by that of standard Arabic predominant in education on the other. In this context, various actions were carried out to fight against the marginalization of the Tamazight language, in particular the demonstrations in Tizi-Ouzou, Béjaïa, and Algiers, and a school strike in 1994 massively attended in Kabylia. After decades of struggle, the Tamazigh language was incorporated into the text of the constitution of 1996 and recognized as a component of the historical and national identity of Algeria. ‘1 November 1954 was one of the peaks of its destiny [the destiny of Tamazight]. The result of a long resistance to attacks against its culture, its values and the fundamental components of its identity which are Islam, Arabism, and Amazigh, 1 November have firmly anchored the struggles present in the glorious past of the nation’.14

Later, in 2016, Tamazight furthermore becomes a national and official language: ‘Tamazight is also a national and official language. The state works for its promotion and development in all its linguistic varieties in use on the national territory. […] The Academy [of the Tamazigh language] is responsible for establishing the conditions of the promotion of Tamazight in order to materialize, in the long term, its official language status’.15

3.2 Languages used by public authorities The use of a given language in administration always conveys prestige to it, as it is associated with the power exercised by political and administrative structures. Law 91/5 of 1996 stipulates: ‘The use of any foreign language in the deliberations and debates of official meetings is prohibited’.16

tes clefs et ceux, arabisants, qui voulaient accéder aux mêmes postes. La confrontation n’était donc ni civilisationnelle ni culturelle, mais politique entre les uns qui tentaient de se maintenir à leurs postes et les autres qui voulaient y parvenir” (Bouteflika 1999 in Le Matin 22/05/1999, cited by Bennadji 2000, 111). 14 “Le 1er Novembre 1954 aura été un des sommets de son destin [du Tamazight]. Aboutissement d’une longue résistance aux agressions menées contre sa culture, ses valeurs et les composantes fondamentales de son identité que sont l’Islam, l’Arabité et l’Amazighité, le 1er Novembre aura solidement ancré les luttes présentes dans le passé glorieux de la Nation” (C-DZ 1996, Pmbl.). 15 “Tamazight est également langue nationale et officielle. L’État œuvre à sa promotion et à son développement dans toutes ses variétés linguistiques en usage sur le territoire national. […] L’Académie [de la Langue Amazighe] est chargée de réunir les conditions de la promotion de Tamazight en vue de concrétiser, à terme, son statut de langue officielle” (C-DZ 2016, art. 4). 16 “L’utilisation de toute langue étrangère dans les délibérations et débats des réunions officielles est interdite” (Law 91/5, art. 5).

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Despite this, the French language continues to be spoken by presidents, ministers, and elites. ‘Without being the official language, it conveys officiality, without being the language of instruction, it remains a language of the transmission of knowledge, without being the language of identity, it continues to shape in different ways and through several channels, the collective imagination. It is common knowledge that most of the work in central or local administration and management structures is carried out in the French language’.17

The use of this language by the president of the Republic and political leaders determines its degree of officiality. The legislative and regulatory texts like the Official Journal of the Algerian Republic, correspondences, or driving licences are translated into French. The websites of sovereign institutions are accessible to the general public in both languages Arabic and French. Civil status documents in French are optional and can be requested if they are required, for example, for a visa. French remains necessary in international relations and in large companies (for example Sonatrach, Sonelgaz, Saidal, Air Algérie, banks, and hospitals). It is used in urban spaces for graffitis and signs, and in particular in the capital, is exploited by different socio-economic actors (e. g. traders, publicists, graffiti artists) who seek by all means to attract the attention of passersby. Everyone uses the space and the Arabic, French, and Tamazight languages according to their interests. Most of the company and road signs (e. g. Air Algérie, Rue DidoucheMourad, Saidal), as well as advertising slogans (e. g. ta famille t’attend ‘your family is waiting for you’) are bilingual. On shop signs, inscriptions in French such as cafétéria ‘cafeteria’, boulangerie ‘bakery’, imprimerie ‘printing house’, or supérette ‘mini-market’ are present.  

 

 

3.3 Languages used in education The orientation of the educational policy depends largely on the adopted national language policy because one of the school’s missions is to disseminate the national culture, which should allow the transmission of the official ideology. The Algerian education system has experienced three periods. Progressive Arabization of public school – In public primary school, if the first three years have been completely Arabized, the following three years were distributed according to the two languages of instruction: Arabic and French, which was introduced as the language taught in the third year of primary school. To solve the problem of supervi-

17 “Sans être la langue officielle, elle véhicule l’officialité, sans être la langue d’enseignement, elle reste une langue de transmission du savoir, sans être la langue d’identité, elle continue à façonner de différentes manières et par plusieurs canaux, l’imaginaire collectif. Il est de notoriété publique que l’essentiel du travail dans les structures d’administration et de gestion centrale ou locale, s’effectue en langue française” (Sebaa 2002, 85).

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sion, it was necessary to launch an appeal to France and the Arab countries to send associate teachers. Hundreds of French, Egyptian, Palestinian, Syrian, and Iraqi teachers have supported Algeria’s enormous educational effort. This double cooperation contributed to creating conflicts between Arabic- and French-speaking elites, between conservatives and modernists, between Berbers and Arabs. The Arabists were in favour of total Arabization, the Frenchists were in favour of Arabic/French bilingualism. Total Arabization of public school – The country has moved from an exclusively French-speaking education to an exclusively Arabic-speaking public school, passing through an intermediate phase of transition of a few years, that of a bilingual school. The process of total Arabization was completed in 1986 and, at the start of the 1988– 1989 school year, secondary education was completely Arabized. However, despite the quantitative progress in education, the quality of Arabization and French education had deteriorated. Therefore, towards the end of 1989, private schools were created in the big cities, very conducive to teaching in French. Thousands of parents had registered their children in these schools in order to offer them bilingual training guaranteeing a better command of French. But for the sake of harmonization and standardization of the system, these establishments were required to comply with new official texts. Thus, scientific subjects were again taught in Arabic with, however, the possibility of planning consolidation sessions in French outside of regular class hours. Arabization has not continued in technical and scientific disciplines at the higher level. This policy has negatively influenced the quality of teaching; the level of language proficiency continues to decline, and learners do not master Arabic, French, or English. This could be due to the failure of the educational policies pursued so far, to the lack of teachers, and to unsuitable methods. New high school graduates who enroll in scientific and technical fields experience enormous difficulties in continuing their studies because of the decrease in the practice of French in high school. Orientational Law on National Education – The Orientational Law on National Educational (Loi d’orientation sur l’éducation nationale) of 2008 explains the place, roles, and objectives assigned by the legislator to languages in society and in the Algerian education system (art. 2) and states that education is provided in Arabic at all levels of education (art. 33). The teaching of foreign languages is addressed in the same law. Even if the teaching of French is provided as a first foreign language throughout the school curriculum (primary, college, secondary, university), no official reference text says so clearly (art. 4, 35): ‘the Algerian school aims to train a citizen with indisputable national points of reference, deeply attached to the values of the Algerian people, capable of understanding the world around them, of adapting to it and of acting on it and to open up to universal civilization’.18

18 “L’école algérienne a pour vocation de former un citoyen doté de repères nationaux incontestables, profondément attaché aux valeurs du peuple algérien, capable de comprendre le monde qui l’entoure, de s’y adapter et d’agir sur lui et en mesure de s’ouvrir sur la civilisation universelle” (Law 8/4, art. 2).

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‘Education is provided in the Arabic language at all levels of education, both in public establishments and in private educational and teaching establishments’.19 ‘Allow mastery of at least two foreign languages as an opening to the world and means of access to documentation and exchanges with foreign cultures and civilizations’.20 ‘The teaching of foreign languages is provided under conditions set by regulation’.21

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – Before October 1988, Algeria had only three French-speaking dailies, namely El Moudjahid, Alger Républicain, and Horizons, with a fourth, Algeria News, being a weekly. Today, the country has fifty-one titles in Arabic and forty-four in French. The number of weekly newspapers in these languages is twenty-three and twelve, respectively. A recent survey was carried out by the channel Beur TV (for the Media Television section) to measure the audience and the credibility of the Algerian media, on a sample of 2,165 elderly people, during the period from 26 February to 3 March 2012. It follows that, for the written press, there would be 12,491,425 newspaper readers, 61 % of whom are men. The ranking of French-speaking dailies is as follows: El Watan 8.65 %, Liberté 6.34 %, Le Soir 4.56 %, Le Quotidien d’Oran 4.47 %, Le Buteur 1.20 %, El Moudjahid 1.44 %, L’Expression 1 %. Arabic-language dailies are classified as follows: Echourouk 20.32 %, El Khabar 19.50 %, Ennahar11.34 %, El Hadef 10.50 % (cf. Miliani 2013, 181–191). The overall share of Arabic-language newspapers, if we take the eleven publications, represents more than 60 % of readers, while publications in French represent a little less than 30 %. It should be noted that the French-speaking press has suffered a real loss of readership since the 1990s for three main reasons: the process of Arabization of the administration, Arabized schooling, and the creation of online newspapers. Audiovisual media – The Algerian media space has been enriched by the creation of the private channels EnnaharTV, Echourouk TV, Al Djazairia, Dzair TV, Numidias News, HoggarTV, and KBC, all Arabic-speaking. Canal Algérie is the only television channel that broadcasts programmes in French almost every evening. But the satellite dish has increased the interest of Algerians in French channels, in particular TV5 MONDE, TF1, F3, M6, and France 24. Radio Chaine 3 also offers programmes and political debates in French to the general public in Algeria.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

19 “L’enseignement est dispensé en langue arabe à tous les niveaux d’éducation, aussi bien dans les établissements publics que dans les établissements privés d’éducation et d’enseignement” (Law 8/4, art. 33). 20 “Permettre la maîtrise d’au moins deux langues étrangères en tant qu’ouverture sur le monde et moyen d’accès à la documentation et aux échanges avec les cultures et les civilisations étrangères” (Law 8/4, art. 4). 21 “L’enseignement des langues étrangères est assuré dans des conditions fixées par voie réglementaire” (Law 8/4, art. 35).

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4 Linguistic characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation The differences in the phonological systems of Arabic and French lead to interferences. They are usually due to the existence of French phones that do not exist in Arabic, such as the vowels [y], [e], [ɛ], and [ə] and the consonants [p], [v], [g], and [ɲ]. They are adapted by pronouncing phonemes of articulatory proximity existing in Arabic. These interferences are linked to an incompetence of the bilingual speaker in the second language and more evident in speakers who have limited knowledge of the language they are using. From this point of view, Hagège considers interference as ‘an involuntary crossing between two languages. On a large scale, interference denotes incomplete acquisition of a second language’.22

Oral vowels – The difference between the Arabic and French phonological systems often affects the pronunciation of French vowels: [ɛ] is replaced by [a] as in phénomène [fenɔman] instead of [fenɔmɛn], [y] is confused with [i] for example in surtout [siʁtu] instead of [syʁtu], [ə] is often confused with [o] as in menace [monas] instead of [mənas], [y] is realized as [e] in obtenu [obtone] instead of [obtəny]. The Arabic speaker may pronounce [i] instead of [e] as in découvrir [dikuvʁiʁ] instead of [dekuvʁiʁ], television [tilivizjɔ̃] instead of [televizjɔ̃], or freiner [frini] instead of [fʁene]. Nasal vowels – The nasal vowels [ã] and [ɔ̃] are frequently confused, even with [o]: bonjour is realized as [bãʒuʁ] or [boʒuʁ] instead of [bɔ̃ʒuʁ], bon as [bã] instead of [bɔ̃]. Also, [ɑ̃] is replaced by [ɔ] for example in normalement [nɔrmalmɔ] instead of [nɔʁmalmɑ̃], and [ɛ] appears instead of [ε̃] as in ceinture [sɛntura] instead of [sɛ̃tyʁ] (the phoneme [a] marks the feminine). Consonants– The fact that Arabic has more consonants than French, while some of the French consonants do not exist in Arabic, causes differences in pronunciation. For example, [r] and [ʁ] are considered in French as two variants of the same phoneme. In Arabic, these two phonemes stand in opposition to each other. In Algeria, true French speakers generally have a similar accent to that of native speakers, especially women. Men realize the rhotic consonant and the voiceless dental plosive consonant respectively as [ʁ] or [r] and [t] or [tˁ] (e. g. table [tˁable] instead of [tabl]). Furthermore, some Arabic speakers pronounce [b] instead of [p], as in parebrise [baʁbʁiz] instead of [paʁbʁiz], poste [bosta] instead of [post], and [f] instead of [v], as in valise [faliz] instead of [valiz].  

22 “un croisement involontaire entre deux langues. À grande échelle, l’interférence dénote l’acquisition incomplète d’une langue seconde” (Hagège 2000, 239).

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4.2 Morphology According to Tabouret-Keller, ‘linguistic interference determines disturbances in the interaction of syntax rules and in that of the specific functional marking of sentences’.23

This involves the introduction of linguistic units from one language to another and happens when bilingual speakers transfer grammatical characteristics from their first language to their second language. Gender – One of the characteristics of French spoken in Algeria is the confusion of gender when the gender of the equivalent in Arabic affects that of French. Some Arabic speakers may use une accident instead of un accident, as the Arabic word is feminine haditha with the phoneme /a/ marking the feminine, le logique instead of la logique, as the Arabic word is masculine al mantaq, or un couleur instead of une couleur, as the Arabic word is masculine al lawn. Number – In Arabic loans, the plural can appear marked by the ‑s of the French language like in harkis instead of harki ‘traitors’ or darkis instead of darki ‘gendarme’. The plural can also be formed according to the Arab system, as in achahid ‘martyr’ vs chouhada ‘martyrs’, amoudjahid ‘Algerian fighter’ vs moudjahidin ‘Algerian fighters’, or bear the marks of the two linguistic systems as in cheikh ‘sheik’ vs chouyoukhs ‘sheiks’ or djoundi ‘soldier’ vs djounouds ‘soldiers’. Determinants – Determination can also be made by the markers of the Arabic language (classical or dialectal) al and el, so that amir el muminine ‘prince of believers’, al jihad ‘holy war’, or al idjtihad ‘effort of reflection in religious interpretation of the texts of the Sufi masters’ may appear in French instead of forms with le or la. Adverbs and prepositions – There is also confusion between some adverbs and prepositions. Examples of this are the use of trop instead of très, as in il est trop fort instead il est très fort, of de and à, as in Je l’ai emprunté de [instead of à] mon ami, or of chez and avec, as in Le livre est chez [instead of avec] Paul. This happens due to direct translations from Arabic. Word order – The Arabic may also transpose into French the structure of the Arabic verbal sentence that begins with a verb, which results in Va le garçon à l’école ‘(lit.) goes the boy to school’ instead of Le garçon va à l’école.

23 “L’interférence linguistique déterminera des perturbations dans le jeu des règles de la syntaxe et dans celui du marquage fonctionnel spécifique de syntagmes” (Tabouret-Keller 2008, 10).

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4.3 Lexicon The particularities of the lexicon include preserved and innovated forms, which are subcategorized in this chapter according to the system of Reutner (2017, 47), in those taking place without (internal) and with foreign influence (external). Internal innovation can affect the form or the meaning of a word, external innovation different types of borrowing. Internal innovation of form – Internal innovations of form emerge as a result of word formation processes. The most common mechanisms are derivation by prefixation like in inter-wilaya (< inter‑ + wilaya), inter-daïra (< inter‑ + daïra), or by suffixation in words such as algérianiser ‘to algerianize’ (< Algérie + ‑iser), ḥallaliser ‘to make halal, religiously acceptable’ (< hallal + ‑iser), digoutage ‘disgust’ (< dégôut + ‑age), or parkingeur ‘young unemployed person who is paid when showing a motorist a parking space in the neighbourhood’ (< parking + ‑eur), with suffixation being particularly productive (cf. Reutner 2017, 47; Derradji 2017, 448). Internal innovation of meaning – Words evolve in their meaning and move away from French as a native language to designate what is really experienced by the speaking subject. If halal traditionally only refers to meat, nowadays it applies to a whole range of food products. The new uses of the adjective halal give the quality halal to the non-prohibited version of something usually prohibited for consumption by Muslims, such as halalbeer, called halal because of the absence of alcohol that authorizes its consumption by Muslims. External innovation: loan words and xenisms – Another form of lexical innovation is borrowing which is considered as an enrichment of the target language. Indeed, during the conquest of Algeria, French soldiers borrowed many words from Algerian Arabic, like bled ‘country’, caïd ‘chief’, casbah ‘citadel’, inchallah ‘God willing’, jihad ‘Holy war’, madrasa ‘school’, ramadhan ‘month of fasting’, toubib ‘doctor’, or zaouïa ‘Koranic school’. These borrowings have become fully integrated lexical units in the French language, listed in the various French dictionaries after having undergone phonetic and/or phonological modifications in order to be easily pronounced by native French speakers. Xenisms include zaɛmâ ‘like what’ from Tamazight or ḥchuma or hchouma ‘modesty, respect, shame’ from Arabic (for more information cf. Cheriguen 2002). Political and ideological positions – Many political and ideological positions are expressed by suffixation with ‑ism and ‑iste, as in hirakiste ‘person who defends the ideas of the hirak’ (< hirak ‘popular protest movement’ + -iste). The hirakists are positioned against the doctrine named bouteflikism ‘political doctrine of the former President Bouteflika’ (< proper name Bouteflika + ‑isme) and the people called cachirists ‘supporters of Bouteflika’ (< cachir ‘sausage made from beef or chicken’ + ‑iste). Algerians also invented the verb vendredire, in the context of the hirak, which means ‘to manifest joyfully and peacefully every week for change and prosperity, to bring down the dictatorial regime peacefully’ (< vendredi + dire).

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French loans in Arabic – Several French words have also become Algerian (cf. Aït Amrane 2009), for example biro ‘office’ (< Fr. bureau), fermli ‘nurse’ (< Fr. infirmière), foulara ‘scarf’ (< Fr. foulard), litra/ritla ‘liter’ (< Fr. liter), midity ‘humidity’ (< Fr. humidité), or table ‘table’ (< Fr. table).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Language attitudes Our study (cf. Ait Dahmane 2015, 146) is based on a sociolinguistic survey that was conducted in 2015 among students of the University of Algiers 2 who, like most young people of the twenty-first century, are immersed in the world of information and communication technologies. The first results of our semi-directive survey show an evolution of representations vis-à-vis languages, in particular French. The Algerian school should primarily focus on the quality of teaching and the level of knowledge acquisition. In this perspective, it seems useful to remember that Algerian learners are qualified trilingual illiterates in the sense that they master neither the official national languages (Arabic or Tamazight) nor foreign languages (cf. 3.3). Some of the interviewed students see French as a ‘a language without future’ (“une langue sans future”). If the French language is not always mastered, especially in rural areas and the South, ‘it is because it is not taught (or is not taught well)’ (“ce n’est pas enseigné (ou ne pas bien enseigné”). This interview allows us to say that French is unlikely to disappear because it continues to be spoken in certain families for five generations already and in certain socio-professional circles in Algeria. According to the statements, French is ‘a language of literature’, ‘of culture’, ‘of sharing’ and ‘of exchange throughout the five continents’ (“une langue littéraire”, “de culture”, “de partage”, “d’échange entre cinq continents”).

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Algerian French dictionaries are rare and inaccessible. The Algerian Arabic-French bilingual dictionaries essentially have a federative vocation (cf. Aziri 2012; Tadjer 2013). At present, we see that the French language retains borrowings belonging to a political-religious theme such as halal, hijab, sharia, imam, jihadist, salafist, or fetwa (PR, s.v.). These are words newly used by French speakers, especially in the media. These linguistic signs appeared at the same time as certain events, such as the fight against terrorism in the world, the Arab Spring, or the attacks in France. There are also words of Algerian origin that have just joined French dictionaries, in particular Le Petit Larousse illustré, for example taxieur ‘taxi driver’ and cuissettes ‘shorts’ (PLI 2020, s.v.).

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5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – While Arabization has been a nationalist claim formulated since the 1970s, the idea of suppressing the use and dissemination of French has never seriously crossed the minds of Algerian leaders and politicians. On the contrary, it is obvious that, in practice and in absence of the media, many of them continue to use French with typical Algerian forms and code switching. Examples of this are the usage of words that have a religious meaning like Saha ‘thank you’ or Salam, which is the shorthand for the expression Assalamou alaykoum wa Rahmatou allahi wa Barakatou ‘Peace, mercy, and blessings of God be upon you’. Variety used in education – The teaching of French follows official instructions from the Ministry of National Education, which are passed on to teachers by education inspectors. The official texts insist on the comprehension of texts, normative grammar, and vocabulary. The inspectors ask the teachers to allow the pupils the use of general dictionaries in their French classes in order to check the meaning of the words and to correct their “mistakes”. Some classics of French literature such as Victor Hugo, Émile Zola, or Antoine de Saint-Exupéry appear in Algerian textbooks to open up to Frenchspeaking cultures. Teachers also use authentic and current documents (e. g. newspapers, literary texts, French songs, poems), which are important for discovering the specificities of the culture of the Other because they include socio-cultural elements (e. g. language, architecture, town planning, habits, or clothing) and information on the cultural, social, economic, and political development of a foreign country. However, Algerian French is not excluded from the school either, since the texts of renowned French-speaking Algerian writers are also used as teaching aids with reference to the Algerian sociocultural context. Variety used in the media – Algerian journalists have become aware of the importance of linguistic issues in establishing an identity specific to their writing. The particular use of the French language in most of the media manifests itself through borrowings, coding alternation, and very rich language creativity. Especially users of social networks use a hybrid language, the result of crossbreeding between several varieties, even if the main medium is French. Variety used in literature – Literary creation in Algeria uses the two national languages, but also French: big names in Algerian literature like Mohamed Dib, Kateb Yacine, Mouloud Mammeri, Mouloud Feraoun, Assia Djebar, Tahar Djaout, or Rachid Mimoun transmitted the love of French to the generation of independence writers like Yasmina Khadra, Mustapha Benfodil, or Kamel Daoud, who also chose to write in French. Their works have received international literary awards. The authors write in French because it is their language of training, while trying to assert their identity by using words belonging to their first language such as Allah ‘God’ salem ‘hello’, cheikh ‘Master’, harki ‘traitor’, bled ‘country’, or yemma ‘mother’. They play on all registers to find the right expression. An example of a neologism reflecting this creativity is the popular feminine expression avoir la koulchit ‘to have pain everywhere’ or koulchay ‘every 

 

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thing’. Literary and artistic creation is rooted in one, two, or three languages (dialectal Arabic, Kabyle, or French). Writers play with the languages that mark their sociolinguistic space in order to enhance them. Conclusion – Finally, the Algerian linguistic situation is certainly complex, but it is not fixed. It would be useful to keep the knowledge of French, to teach it better in order to make it coexist in a complementary way with the national languages.

References Abaci, Amal (2012), Presse francophone en Algérie: entre discours officiel et réalité linguistique. Le cas du Quotidien d’Oran, rubrique tranche de vie, in: Abdenbi Lachkar (ed.), Langues et Médias en Méditerranée, Paris, L’Harmattan, 24–32. Aït Amrane, Aomar (2009), Dictionnaire des mots d’origine française dans la Daridja algérienne: les influences du passé sur la langue algérienne, Algiers, Dar Khettab. Ait Dahmane, Karima (2015), Plurilinguisme et enseignement du français en Algérie. Quels enjeux? Quelles représentations?, Revue Lettres et langues 10, 139–154. Aziri, Mohamed Nazim (2012), Dictionnaire des locutions de l’arabe dialectal algérien, Algiers, Enterprise National ANEP. Bennadji, Cherif (2000), Chronique politique 2000, Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord 39, 109–126. C-DZ (1963) = Assemblée nationale constituante (1963), Constitution de la République Algérienne Démocratique et Populaire, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 64, 888–895, https://www.joradp.dz/FTP/Jo-Francais/1963/F1963064.pdf (2/3/2023). C-DZ (1989) = République algérienne démocratique et populaire (1989), Constitution du 23 février 1989, in: JeanPierre Maury (ed.), Digithèque de matériaux juridiques et politiques, Perpignan, Université de Perpignan, https://mjp.univ-perp.fr/constit/dz1989.htm (2/3/2023). C-DZ (1996) = République algérienne démocratique et populaire (1996), Constitution de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 76, 6–27, https://www.joradp.dz/trv/fcons.pdf (2/3/2023). C-DZ (2016) = République algérienne démocratique et populaire (2016), Constitution de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 14, 4–38, https://www.joradp.dz/FTP/JO-FRANCAIS/2016/F2016014.pdf?znjo=14 (2/3/2023). Chaker, Salem (2004), Langue et littérature berbères, Paris, Clio. Chaker, Salem (2008), Langue (berbère), Encyclopédie berbère 28–29, 4311–4360, http://journals.openedition. org/encyclopedieberbere/314 (2/3/2023). Cheriguen, Foudil (2002), Les mots des uns, les mots des autres. Le français au contact de l’arabe et du berbère, Algiers, Casbah. CN (1976) = République algérienne démocratique et populaire (1976), Charte Nationale, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 61, 714–770, https://www.joradp.dz/HFR/Index.htm (2/3/2023). Derradji, Yacine (2006), Vous avez dit langue étrangère, le français en Algérie?, in: Véronique Castellotti/Hocine Chalabi (edd.), Le français langue étrangère et seconde. Des paysages didactiques en contexte, Paris, L’Harmattan, 45–52. Derradji, Yacine (2017), Algérie, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 431–452. Desparmet, Jean (1933), Les guides de l’opinion indigène en Algérie, Bulletin du Comité de l’Afrique française 16, 11–16.

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Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Euromonitor International (2012), The Benefits of the English Language for Individuals and Societies: Quantitative Indicators from Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia and Yemen. A custom report compiled by Euromonitor International for the British Council, https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/sites/teacheng/ files/Euromonitor%20report%20final%20July%202012.pdf (2/3/2023). Grandguillaume, Gilbert (2002), Les enjeux de la question des langues. Les langues de la Méditerranée, Paris, L’Harmattan, 141–165. Hagège, Claude (2000), Halte à la mort des langues, Paris, Jacob. Law 2/3 = Constitutional Council (2002), Law 02–03 of April 10 on constitutional revision, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 25, 11 https://www.joradp.dz/FTP/JO-FRANCAIS/2002/ F2002025.pdf?znjo=25 (2/3/2023). Law 8/4 = République algérienne démocratique et populaire (2008), Loi d’orientation sur l’éducation nationale. N° 08–04 du 23 janvier 2008, Bulletin officiel de l’éducation nationale, Algier, https://www.education.gov. dz/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/loi0804Fr.pdf (2/3/2023). Law 91/5 = Assemblée nationale constituante (1991), Loi n° 91-05 du 16 janvier 1991 portant généralisation de l’utilisation de la langue arabe, Journal officiel de la République algérienne démocratique et populaire 3, 38–41, https://www.joradp.dz/FTP/JO-FRANCAIS/1991/F1991003.pdf?znjo=03 (2/3/2023). Leclerc, Jacques (2021), Algérie. Charte d’Alger, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/CEFAN, https://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/algerie-charte_d%27alger1964.htm (2/3/2023). Miliani, Hadj (2013), La presse écrite en Algérie: Positionnements médiatiques et enjeux linguistiques, Multilinguales 1, 181–191. Morsly, Dalila (2015), La langue française dans les textes politiques officiels en Algérie, Revue Lettres et langues 10, 120–131. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Ould-Braham, Ouahmi/Souag, Lameen (2021), For a history of the Berber language in its diversity and complexity, Berber Studies and Documents 45–46, 5–35. PLI = Isabelle Jeuge-Maynart (ed.) (2020), Petit Larousse illustré, Paris, Larousse. PR = Alain Rey/Josette Rey-Debove (edd.) (2022 [1967]), Le Petit Robert. Dictionnaire alphabétique et analogique de la langue française, Paris, Le Robert. Queffélec, Ambroise, et al. (2002), Le français en Algérie. Lexique et dynamique des langues, Bruxelles, De Boeck Duculot. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Sebaa, Rabah (2002), L’Algérie et la langue française. L’altérité partagée, Oran, Dar el Gharb. Tabouret-Keller, Andrée (2008), Langues en contact: L’expression contact comme révélatrice de la dynamique des langues. Persistance et intérêt de la métaphore, Journal of language contact 2, 7–18. Tadjer, Said (2013), Dictionnaire algérien-français, https://archive.org/stream/dictionnaire-algerienfrancais#page/n3/mode/2up (2/3/2023). Taleb-Ibrahimi, Khaoula (1995), Les Algériens et leur(s) langue(s). Éléments pour une approche sociolinguistique de la société algérienne, Algiers, El Hikma.

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3 Morocco Abstract: This chapter describes French in Morocco in its social reality. It begins with the complex sociolinguistic situation in a country where French appears as a language in contact that competes with several local languages. The historical overview serves to improve the understanding of the survival and development of French despite the Arabization policy implemented after the country’s independence. The chapter also outlines Morocco’s language planning policies. It refers to linguistic legislation and especially to the use of languages, particularly focusing on the turpitudes of French as a language of instruction. To conclude the analysis of French in an area of contact, the chapter identifies characteristics of French in its local multicultural and multilingual environment and discusses their evaluation. Keywords: French, Morocco, sociolinguistics, education, langue policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation Physical geography – Morocco is located in the North-West of the African continent; it covers an area of 446,550 km2 without Western Sahara, extends along the Atlantic coast over a distance of about 3000 km, and is separated from Spain by only about 14 km. Bordered to the east by Algeria and to the south by Mauritania, it also has two maritime borders, the Mediterranean Sea to the north (512 km) and the Atlantic Ocean to the west (2934 km). This geographical situation is at the origin of Morocco’s multiple contacts. As a country that is at the same time Maghrebian, Arab, Muslim, Saharan, African, Mediterranean, and Oceanic, it constitutes a link between Africa and Europe. This situation explains why it was and still is a crossroads where ethnic groups, cultures, and languages, as diverse as they are, meet, cohabit, and clash (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 13). Powerful mountain ranges (the Rif ranges in the North, the Middle Atlas and High Atlas Mountains in the Centre, and the Anti-Atlas in the South) divide its territory. Morocco is also characterized by the extent of its plains (developed along its Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts) and its pre-Saharan and Saharan plateaus. Its highly varied climate includes four climatic zones: the Atlantic zone in the mild and humid West, the mountain zone, which is characterized by microclimates (cold, rain, frost, and snow in the winter, storms in the summer), the very continental eastern zone, and the Saharan zone marked by low rainfall and significant thermal differences. From an administrative point of view, Morocco has been divided into regions since 2015, which are subdivided into wilayas, themselves again subdivided into provinces and prefectures. Demolinguistic data – According to data from the Office of the High Commissioner for Planning (Haut-Commissariat au Plan – HCP) and the latest official census, Morochttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-003

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co’s current population is estimated at about 33.8 million inhabitants. Population growth has dropped considerably over the past three decades to a rate equivalent to the world average: from 2.58 % per year between 1960 and 1971 to 1.25 % between 2004 and 2014. The population is characterized by its youth. About 28.2 % of Moroccans are under 15 years of age, 62.4 % are between 15 and 59 years, and only 9.4 % are 60 years and older (HCP 2014, 9–15). Though in the twentieth century primarily a country of emigration, Morocco has also taken in an increasing number of foreigners from sub-Saharan Africa due to numerous agreements since the 2000s. Of the 86,001 foreigners registered in 2014, sub-Saharan nationals represent about 26.2 %, Europeans 40 % (63.5 % of whom are French), Arabs 20 %, North Africans 13 %, and Americans 2.3 % (HCP 2018, 13). The Moroccan population is very unevenly distributed across the territory, currently divided into twelve economic regions. The Centre and North-West concentrate more than half of the population, while the rest of it is spread between the southern, north-central, eastern, and south-central regions. The urban population has increased significantly, from 42.8 % in 1982 to 60.4 % in 2014. The rural population, which is clearly decreasing, is expected to reach only 25 % by 2022 (HCP 2014, 12). Economy – The primary sector occupies a dominant position in the Moroccan economy, with 39.6 % of the gross domestic product (GDP). It is followed by the tertiary sector including public administration with 39.2 %. The secondary sector represents 21.2 % of the GDP (Dupret et al. 2015, 117). The national unemployment rate is quite high (9.7 % in 2015). However, it is higher in urban areas with a rate of 14.6 %, compared to only 4.1 % in rural areas. Young people are the most affected by unemployment, with a rate of 13.9 % among 15–24 years old (HCP 2018, 150ss.). Politics – Morocco is a constitutional monarchy and forms the Arab Maghreb Union (United Maghreb) with Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, and Mauritania. Even if political differences weaken this Union, the common history of these states, their geographical location, and the deep links between their people sharing the same culture make the Maghreb a common reality. Languages – The linguistic situation in Morocco is generally presented as complex, diverse, and heterogeneous. The presence of several languages in Morocco makes its linguistic area a prototypical place for languages in contact. This situation has its origin in a history of conquest and domination. Today, several languages and varieties, mastered to varying and unequal degrees, cover the Moroccan linguistic field. These are, on the one hand, the national ethnic languages: Amazigh, manifested through dialectal varieties, and Arabic practised in form of a continuum consisting of Classical Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic, and Moroccan Arabic or Darija. On the other hand, there are the colonial foreign languages: French rooted in the Moroccan society but whose status stays opaque, and, to a lesser extent, Spanish present in the northern and southern border areas. In short, French in Morocco is a component of a bouquet of languages that interpenetrate one another, but where each of them tries, through legitimacy, historicity, or modernity, to rebuild or consolidate a comfortable place in an unfinished identity recon 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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struction project. In the following section, we present the status and place of each of the languages in contact.

1.1 First official language: Arabic Arabic – Arabic is the official language of the State. It has de jure status, but the most recent constitutional text does not explicitly explain what variety of Arabic is meant: Modern Standard Arabic, Classical Arabic, or Moroccan Arabic. Modern Standard Arabic – Modern Standard Arabic has appeared due to the impulse of intellectuals. It is propelled into an area of linguistic contact and influenced by both spoken Arabic and French. It is characterized by a certain structural flexibility, by many words borrowed from French, and, more particularly, by a terminology that immediately connects it to the modern world (for example, at-tiknulūžiyya ‘the technology’ < Fr. la technologie, as-strātižiyya ‘the strategy’ < Fr. la stratégie, at-telvaza ‘the television’ < Fr. la télévision). It has also adopted the Subject-Verb-Object order instead of the basic Verb-Subject-Object order of Classical Arabic, for example al-bint ta-qum-u ‘alā as-sā‘a as-sābi‘a ‘the girl gets up at seven o’clock’ < la fille se lève à sept heures instead of ta-qum-u al-bint-u fī as-sā‘a as-sābi‘a ‘gets up the girl at seven o’clock’ (Chatar-Moumni 2015, 78). The evolution of Modern Standard Arabic led to many subvarieties. These varieties are employed in domains in which Classical Arabic cannot be used. Modern Standard Arabic is an urban language. It is the working language of writers, journalists, teachers, and administrators. It is used orally in the media and mastered by the educated social group, but it is not its daily talk. Classical Arabic – Classical Arabic is also an urban language and only mastered by the most educated speakers (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 63–67). It functioned and still functions as a reference language because it is the language of the Koran. It is the prerogative of the Arab-Islamist elites and not the daily idiom of any social group, but confined to religious and cultural domains like liturgy and other specific aspects of Arab-Muslim culture. Moroccan Arabic: Darija – Moroccan dialectal Arabic is spoken by most of the population (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 63–67). It is, like other Arabic dialects of the Maghreb, the daily language of the masses except in the Amazigh-speaking areas. It functions as vernacular language of the majority and also plays the role of a vehicular language, as it allows communication at the national level between speakers of Arabic and Amazigh. Being a local language, Moroccan dialectal Arabic is used in all informal domains and in everyday life. It is unevenly distributed across the country and takes the form of distinct varieties: urban or rural, Bedouin, and Hassaniyya spoken in southern Morocco. Essentially oral, lively and popular, it is socially marked in the sense that it is the sole idiom of the social groups with low and medium economic power, which have no other language than Darija. Currently, it is experiencing a certain revaluation as a language of popular cultural heritage.

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1.2 National and co-official language: Amazigh Amazigh language – The term Amazigh ‘(lit.) language of the free men’ is recent and considered more appropriate than Berber. Amazigh is used by about 40 % of the population (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 63–66), but was for a long time confined to the informal domain. For decades, intellectuals have fought for its official recognition because it is linked to identity values that have been marginalized by the Arabization policy following French decolonization. The awareness of Amazigh speakers has gradually led to a language policy that promotes its emergence in official domains, traditionally reserved to Modern Standard Arabic and French. Thus, the Royal Institute of Amazigh Culture (Institut Royal de la Culture Amazighe – IRCAM) was created on 17 October 2001. Under the king’s supervision, IRCAM is responsible for safeguarding, promoting, and strengthening the place of Amazigh culture in the national educational, sociocultural, and media space as well as in the management of local and regional affairs (IRCAM 2020). Article 5 (annexed) of the constitution recognizes two official national languages, Arabic and Amazigh, as a common heritage for all Moroccans without exception. Amazigh is mostly used in its dialectal forms: Tarifiyt or Riffian is present in the North-East in general and in the Rif mountain range in particular. Tamazight occupies an area comprising the Middle Atlas and the eastern part of the High Atlas. Tachelhit is spoken in the southern part of the High Atlas, the whole Anti-Atlas and the Sous plain.  

1.3 Main imported foreign language: French French was only truly imposed upon Morocco with the establishment of the protectorate, which made it the official language of its institutions. More than sixty years after the end of the protectorate, it is still present in Moroccan life and society not only as a residue of colonial domination but also as a language of modernity and openness to the Western world. French is spoken by those who have attended schools (Benzakour/Gaadi/ Queffélec 2000, 70–73). Its situation has fluctuated with the Arabization policy, though the effects of this policy are limited. The status of French remains its weak point, since there is no official document clarifying it; hence its ambiguous perception. The National Charter of Education and Training (Charte nationale d’éducation et de formation du Maroc – CNEFM), promulgated in 1999, devotes two articles to the mastery of foreign languages, but only indirectly implies that French is the first foreign language. The constitution merely states that learning and mastering foreign languages is necessary. French therefore enjoys a de facto status but not a de jure one. The difference between its concrete reality and opaque status can be read as an indication of the ever-stifled sociolinguistic conflict between French-speaking technocrats, Francophobic Arab elites, and Amazigh-speaking militants, driven by the desire to obtain full official recognition of their language and culture. This latent conflict is at the heart of many other issues. In the foreground, there are power issues but also ideological struggles, as well as cultural and

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identity claims. The statuary discomfort of the French language in Morocco, as in the other Maghreb countries, has not prevented it from taking root in this former colonial region. Institutional French is used as a school language, mainly in academic and official domains. French is mainly spoken in major Moroccan cities like Casablanca, Rabat, Fez, Marrakech, and Tangier. It is poorly distributed in rural areas and marginalized in urban peripheries, though it is taught in rural and peripheral public schools. Even in the spheres of the French-speaking elite, French is rarely used in informal situations, at home, or between friends. French-Arabic code-mixing, with a French predominance, is frequent. In everyday life, French exists in the form of varieties: basilectal, mesolectal, and elitist French (cf. 4). Percentage of French speakers and criteria used – How many French speakers are there in Morocco? Statistics differ according to organizations, surveys, and polls. According to the International Organization of Francophonie (Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie – OIF), 31 % of Moroccans who are 10 years old or older can read and write French (OIF 2022, 27). According to the 2014 census, 36 % of Moroccans who are 10 years old or older can speak and write French (HCP 2014, 27). This corresponds to 67.8 % of literate people. The differences are probably due to the criteria and the sources of information used. First, we have to agree on what a French speaker is. Linguistically, a French speaker can be defined as any person with sufficient skills to conduct a conversation in French. This definition implies other parameters such as the way French is learned and its practice in everyday life. In the case of Morocco, French is above all the language of school. The institutional nature encourages surveys to be limited to literate people. Yet, there are many Moroccans, such as unofficial tourist guides or domestic workers serving French people living in Morocco, who have learned French on the job and are able to conduct a conversation in French, even if the variety they speak is a very limited French. On the other hand, there are literate people, especially Arabists and even some who learned writing in rural public schools, who are unable to communicate in French since the practice of the language was limited to the classroom. Briefly, for statistics closer to reality, these parameters should be considered, which brings us to a range of 30 % to 40 % of French speakers in Morocco. These figures are evolving insofar as a new reform concerning the refrancization of scientific subjects in the Moroccan educational system could soon be introduced.  

 

 

 

 

1.4 Other imported foreign languages: Spanish and English Spanish – The Franco-Spanish Treaty (1912) established the Spanish protectorate and strengthened the presence of Spanish in the northern and southern areas of the country. As the official language of the protectorate’s institutions, it functioned as a lingua franca between the communities of different religions or nationalities. Since independence (1956) and the recovery of the southern areas, Spanish has steadily declined due to the French- and then Arabic-speaking option of the unified Moroccan education. It only re-

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tains a small presence in the southern and northern border cities. However, it remains dominant in Ceuta and Melilla occupied by Spain (###8 Spain: Ceuta and Melilla). If many northern Moroccans today still speak this language relatively well, they mainly owe it to border relations with Ceuta and Melilla. In the rest of Morocco, Spanish only has the status of a foreign language after English. English – English has no connotation related to a colonial past in Morocco and thus enjoys the status of a pure foreign language. It functions as a language of access to technology and modernity, which makes it a strong competitor to French. Its presence in the Moroccan linguistic area is weak but dynamic. It is mainly present in the great metropolis of Casablanca and in the country’s major cities. The first important contact of Moroccans with English only dates back to World War II with the establishment of American bases in Northern Africa. Not being in direct competition with local languages, English is becoming increasingly popular and is asserting itself in strategic domains like education, media, and higher education. British and American cultural centres provide English classes for both young people and adults (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 72).

2 History 2.1 Establishment of the French and Spanish protectorates Under the reign of Sultan Mulay Abderrahmane (1822–1859), Morocco’s relations with Europe became more and more difficult. The occupation of Algeria by France in 1830 was felt as a direct threat also in Morocco and revived the spirit of holy war. The sultan answered the call of the people of Tlemcen but was defeated in Oujda. He had to sign the Treaty of Tangier (1844) with France, under which the Moroccan government promised in the most formal way not to grant any assistance or relief to any enemy of France. Encouraged by the success of the French and British, who had signed a trade treaty with the sultan in 1856, Spain took advantage of his death in 1859 to launch a major attack. After the conquest of Tetouan, it imposed a peace treaty in 1860, which provided for the expansion of the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, the relocation of Spanish missionaries and consuls to the former capital Fez, and Morocco’s commitment to sign a trade treaty with Spain. In 1907, the General Act of the Algeciras International Conference (convened by Sultan Mulay Abdelaziz, the successor of Mulay Abderrahmane) adopted as principles the maintenance of the sultan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity but required reforms in the organization of the police and the creation of a state bank. France, under the pretext of maintaining order, obtained control of Rabat, Mazagan, and Safi, and Spain that of Tetouan and Larache. The control in Tangier and Casablanca was FrancoSpanish, as France and Spain intervened militarily after violent fires. Casablanca and Chaouia were finally occupied by France. In 1909, Mulay Abdelhafid, who became sultan in 1908, was forced to accept the General Act of the Algeciras International Conference in return for the recognition of his regime. Parallel with the French occupation, Spain in-

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vaded parts of the Rif. In 1911, Fez was attacked and besieged; the sultan decided to ask France for help. France, having obtained Germany’s neutrality through the Berlin Agreement of 1911, which gave it full freedom of action in Morocco in return for transferring part of the Congo, forced the diplomatically isolated Sultan Mulay Hafid to sign the Treaty of Fez officially named Organization of the French Protectorate in the Sherifian Empire (Organisation du protectorat français dans l’Empire Chérifien) that imposes the French protectorate in 1912. General Lyautey was appointed resident-general of the French Republic in Morocco. The status of the Spanish in Morocco was settled by negotiations that led to the Franco-Spanish Treaty of Madrid (1912). The treaty stipulated the division of Morocco into two protectorate zones (the French protectorate zone and the Spanish protectorate zone). As for the city of Tangier, it remained under international supervision. The protectorate Treaty of Fez (1912) preserved all the attributes of the sultan’s prestige and spiritual power. The resident-general of France in Morocco represented Morocco on the international scene, commanded the army, led the administration, promulgated the decrees signed by the sultan, and was responsible for the French community residing in Moroccan territory (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 28).

2.2 Independence The occupation gave rise to a political struggle in the cities. A nationalist movement driven by intellectuals began in Fez. Their actions were mainly based on contesting the deviations imposed on the spirit and letter of the Treaty of Fez (Kenbib 1996, 313). The most serious event that enabled the various opposition forces to unite was the Berber Decree (Berber Dahir) in 1930. Its promulgation provoked a vast protest movement in all cities and even shook the Spanish occupation zone. To support their movement, the nationalists decided to act on French and Moroccan public opinion. The magazine Maghreb was created for this purpose in 1932 in Paris. It published articles setting out the objectives of the nationalist movement. For the same purpose, the French-language newspaper L’Action du peuple was published in 1933 in Fez. In 1934, the Moroccan nationalists created the first political party, the Moroccan Action Committee (Comité d’action marocaine). In the same year, a reform plan was presented to the sultan, the resident-general of France, and the Quai d’Orsay in Paris. This document required the strict application of the protectorate Treaty of Fez and the non-interference of direct administration (Kenbib 1996, 314). The Action Committee, later split into two streams, was dissolved by the residence in 1937. In 1944, the Nationalist Party of Independence (Istiqlal), which emerged from the Action Committee, presented its manifesto in which it demanded that Morocco should be fully independent and governed by Sultan Mohammed Ben Youssef Ben Mohammed. The Palace and the nationalist movement closely collaborated. In 1951, the resident‑ general faced the sultan with an ultimatum to disown the Istiqlal party, otherwise he would be dismissed. In 1953, the sultan and the crown prince were arrested and then taken into exile for more than two years. As a consequence, France faced internal popula-

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tion uprisings and diplomatic problems abroad (Lugan 1992, 271). In 1955, after twentyseven months of exile, the sultan returned to Morocco. He became king under the name of Mohammed V. In 1956, France signed a document that officially recognized Morocco’s independence and unity, thus ending the French protectorate. In 1956, Spain renounced its sovereignty over the northern part of the kingdom and the Tangier area was reintegrated into Morocco.

2.3 Colonial French French as the official language of the protectorate was not widely spread among the indigenous population, at least in its institutional aspect. The overall results of the French educational policy were limited. Only a very small number of Moroccan Muslim children were able to go to school. On the eve of independence, the number of Moroccan executives trained in the school system set up by the protectorate was very low: only 269 high school graduates among 8 million Moroccans (Brignon et al. 1968, 15). These poor results did not prevent French schools from playing a decisive role in the educational system of independent Morocco. Selective and discriminatory, it had formed few but highly qualified Moroccans. These graduates of the French school represented the modern elite of a country that was officially independent but deeply Francized in its administrative structures. They significantly contributed to maintaining the French language and culture. As strong advocates of a policy of bilingualism, they consistently opposed the Arab elite, which had been trained in traditional schools and was often de facto, though not officially, excluded from power (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 57–61; Benzakour 2007, 45). Yet, under the protectorate, French not only spread through school but also through informal acquisition methods: direct contact with French and European settlers of different social and geographical origins in business relations, trade, military service, and domestic work. The multiplication of popular schools, which occurred later, also contributed to the spreading of French, especially in major cities and their suburbs, where 93 % of the French settlers lived. The situation was reversed after independence. Massive schooling extended the knowledge of French to a greater number of people but favoured an institutionalized French, whose mastery was increasingly deficient, over spontaneous French (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 57–61). At the same time, it uncovered various symbolic issues related to a colonial language that had been experienced by each group in different ways.  

2.4 Becoming French after independence: attempts at Arabization Throughout the protectorate period until independence (1912–1956), Morocco was subject to a strong policy of Francization. Since independence, Arabization has become an officially affirmed political option. It aimed at substituting French through Arabic in or-

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der to decolonize the country culturally and to restore the nation’s identity. The discourse on Arabization focused on legitimizing Arabic as a language not only of the Arab-Muslim heritage but also, at least potentially, of modernity (Boukous 1995, 76). Language policy was, therefore, Arabization policy. As early as 1956, measures were adopted to allow the use of Arabic in the domains that were up to then dominated by French. However, French was so strongly anchored in society that the change of language was not only a linguistic operation but also had social, political, and cultural consequences, which made this issue very conflictual (Grandguillaume 1983, 70–94). In 1960, Morocco created the Institute of Studies and Research for Arabization (Institut d’Études et de Recherches pour l’Arabisation – IERA) to respond to the desire to promote and implement the Arabization policy in the country’s two key sectors: education and administration. Ideally, in a multilingual society, glottopolitics, that is the definition of the status of languages, the recognition of one or more official languages, and the possible distinction between national and official languages, should take into account sociolinguistic data. But many extralinguistic factors can work against the current, such as historical, ideological, and sociodemographic factors like urban concentrations or rural exodus. These factors are relevant not only for the country in question but also for cooperation with and development policies pursued by former colonizing countries or other powerful Western states. All these parameters were not taken into consideration when the decision was made to Arabize the country. As a consequence, the attempts were a failure, and this for various reasons. From the outset, multiple questions arose and differences in design appeared. Should there be a total or a partial Arabization of education? An immediate or a long-term Arabization? An “Arabization-translation” (which would have consisted in translating the contents of modern education into Arabic) or an “Arabization-conversion”, which would have implied the desire to refer to the local culture different from the one conveyed by French (Grandguillaume 1983, 31). These divergent options mask political and social issues. Depending on the mode of Arabization, different social groups are favoured or disadvantaged. To clarify these issues, the Arabization policy was the subject of several official symposia. Even if education was and still is the main issue and the sensitive sector of the Arabization policy, the process was not restrictive. It also affected the administration and the environment in various ways. Ultimately, the aim was to apply the Arabization process to all forms of social and intellectual life, but with a focus on the education sector. The stakes were high: The intention was to reduce French to a foreign language with a special status and to legitimately make Arabic a language of modernity, capable of competing with French on its own territory. This policy very quickly gave rise to heated debates between the strongest supporters of Arabization and the most hostile critics of its realization (El Gherbi 1993, 55; cf. Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 59). In reality, the different positions dictated by ideologies specific to each side are more complementary than irreconcilable. Theoretically, the maintenance of ArabicFrench bilingualism is unanimously accepted by all parties but in different proportions: bilingualism with French predominance on the one side, and bilingualism where Arabic would be dominant on the other. In any case, between the three trends that appeared in

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the aftermath of independence (pure and simple Arabization, sharing between French and another vehicular language, and maintaining the status quo), the circumstances imposed a cautious Arabization that in no way affected the spreading of French, which was promoted by the generalization of schooling. This balanced and median position is mirrored by the official position, which advocates a certain form of bilingualism in education.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation The various Moroccan constitutions that have been adopted since the proclamation of independence say nothing about the status of French in Morocco. The latest constitution of 2011 specifies that Arabic is the official language of the State. It stipulates that Amazigh is also the official language of the State but only ‘as the common heritage of all Moroccans without exception’.1 Concerning international foreign languages and especially French, the constitution simply emphasizes that their learning and mastery is a necessity. In other words, apart from Arabic and Amazigh, the other languages used in Morocco only have a de facto status.

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere The Arabization of the administration was promoted very early. Already in 1956, a number of measures were taken in this direction, but they were neither consequently continued nor global: Some sectors, such as justice, were completely Arabized, while others, such as education, remained and still remain bilingual, but with an increasingly obvious domination of Arabic, and still others, as the financial sector, for instance, are more Francized than Arabized. Official texts – Official documents (constitution, laws, decrees, ministerial decrees) are promulgated in Arabic and French. Though French is only an unofficial language, the texts are first produced in French as most of the authors have been trained in this language, and only then translated into Arabic. The Official Bulletin of the Kingdom of Morocco (Bulletin Officiel du Royaume du Maroc) is published in two versions: in Arabic (bi-weekly) and French (bi-monthly). Yet, texts from political parties are written exclusively in Arabic. Administration – Despite the implementation of an Arabization policy for the administration, some officials also use French. Nevertheless, the use of Arabic is becoming

1 “[…] en tant que patrimoine commun à tous les Marocains sans exception” (C-MA, art. 5).

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more and more dominant. In their oral contacts with administrative officials, people generally use Darija. Communication also occurs in Amazigh if both the citizen and the administrator are Amazigh speakers. When the interlocutors have a high social position and/or when they are in a formal situation, they use French and sometimes French-Arabic code-mixing, and this especially when they are unable to translate some aspects into French. Mixed discourse is frequently used between literate speakers in informal situations. Administrative correspondence is written in Modern Standard Arabic; the use of French is tolerated in some domains but completely excluded in the areas of Justice and Islamic Affairs. In other areas less affected by Arabization, such as the Ministry of Public Health or the Ministry of the Interior, French remains important. Justice – The texts specify that only Arabic should be used in the drafting of all documents of the legal sector. Verdicts must be pronounced in Arabic. The language of oral communication is either Modern Standard Arabic or Darija. Plaintiffs, defendants, and witnesses communicate in Darija; if they are Amazigh speakers, they may use Amazigh if the judge understands this language and authorizes them to do so. Otherwise, they are assisted by a translator. French is no longer accepted as a language of communication, even though there are French-speaking judges and lawyers. Pleadings must be in Arabic, and a lawyer who does not speak Arabic may be replaced by an Arabic-speaking colleague. Religion – In the religious field, the use of Classical Arabic is almost exclusive. Religious instruction is provided in this language. In mosques and especially in rural areas, except for Friday preaching, which is in Classical Arabic, the imam can also communicate with the faithful in Darija or Amazigh to explain the Koran and the precepts of Islam, if he understands it and if his interlocutors are Amazigh speakers. Religious radio and television broadcasts are broadcast either in Modern Standard Arabic or Darija (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 85ss.). Advertising – Advertising is well appreciated by the public and tries to identify different kinds of customers: bilinguals, French and Arabic speakers, formally educated and non-literate persons, and people living in urban and in rural areas. Advertising messages are primarily broadcast in French, Darija, and Arabic, less so in Amazigh.

3.3 Languages used in education The presence of two languages of instruction in the Moroccan school system, Arabic in primary and secondary schools and French in technical and scientific university education, is the source of all kinds of controversies for many reasons. The Arabization of primary and secondary education has not reduced the cultural and identity divide by simply giving the Arabic language the place it had before the protectorate. Worse still, it has only increased the learners’ academic difficulties. By maintaining French as the language of instruction in higher education while primary and secondary schools operate exclusively in Arabic, the students’ mastery of French has naturally been reduced, even

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though the time allocated to its teaching as a subject has been strengthened in both cycles of basic education. This linguistic choice constitutes a serious handicap, since the linguistic and communicative competence of French is the sine qua non for pursuing scientific and technical university studies. This dysfunction is not unrelated to the school failure and the unanimously recognized crisis, which currently affects the educational system. It has also provoked student revolts, denouncing that Arab diplomas do not offer the same opportunities on the labour market as French diplomas, and above all gave rise to the king’s highly critical speech of 2013 devoted exclusively to the failures of Moroccan education. The discontent with Arabized education and the enthusiasm for private education operating in foreign languages, which persists despite the high tuition fees, are another proof of the distrust in Arabized public education. The documented, studied, and unanimously diagnosed deficiency of the current educational system has led to the proposal to refrancize scientific subjects from primary school onwards. This option is supported by the minister of National Education, who clearly expressed, at a press conference held in 2019, the need to teach scientific subjects in standard French from primary school onwards in order to reduce the gap between public and private education. In response to calls for the Arabization of higher education, the responsible minister warned against isolating Morocco from international dynamics because scientific and technological knowledge is not produced in Arabic but mainly in English and French. The refrancization of scientific subjects is increasingly necessary as partnerships between Morocco and France are multiplying in the field of education. More and more French institutions of higher education are setting up in Morocco (e. g., Polytechnique, Centrale, École Supérieure des Sciences Économiques et Commerciales/ESSEC, Sciences Politiques/Sciences Po). These French schools of excellence are highly valued by the Moroccan authorities. Conclusion – In short, marginalized in higher scientific and technical education and probably soon replaced by French in the teaching of scientific subjects at primary and secondary level, Arabic is confined to its function as the language of Arab-Muslim tradition and limited as a language of modernity. Its mastery only allows access to traditional religious professions or professions related to justice (magistrates, lawyers, notaries), while French opens up the entire modern labour market (engineers, company executives, etc.). The gap created by the current choice of different teaching languages in primary and secondary on the one hand, and scientific higher education on the other, imposes high investments on the learners, which are often difficult to pay for. Moreover, teaching French as a subject with more hours, alongside Arabic as the language of instruction, introduces a Western way of thinking, society, and culture. This does not fit well with the Eastern mode of thinking conveyed by standard Arabic.  

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3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – After independence, the French press continued to appear on the Moroccan market for more than ten years with two major daily newspapers: Le Petit Marocain and La Vigie Marocaine. This survival of the foreign press had the effect of stimulating French-speaking national products in order to compete with the colonial press. The maintenance of French immediately after independence is due to ideological, practical, and technical reasons: Journalists were primarily trained at French schools, printing in Arabic was more expensive, and material of the French-speaking press was still present in the country. When the colonial press gradually disappeared, the French-speaking Moroccan press continued to exist and develop. Its large distribution explains why information is still bilingual in Morocco and even multilingual, as French-speaking dailies, such as L’Opinion for example, regularly include pages in English and Spanish intended for readers in the former Spanish areas. Periodicals in English such as Morocco Today, which appears episodically, can also be found. In general, preference is given to Arabic, but French has a privileged place. This linguistic plurality shows that the official language does not have to be the only language of information, especially as there is no legislation that regulates the use of foreign languages in the media (Charnet 1985, 117). Yet, the use of French is far from being innocent; it is intentional, willed, and deliberate. French is no longer perceived as the language of the colonizer but as the language of the bilingual journalist addressing a bilingual readership. It is an acclimatized idiom that seeks to reach the target audience but above all to compete with the foreign press distributed in Morocco, particularly the French one (Le Monde, Le Figaro, L’Équipe, Paris Match, Jeune Afrique, Le Nouvel Observateur, Elle, etc.). Currently, the Moroccan press publishes daily newspapers, weeklies, and magazines mainly in Arabic and French. French publications adopt either a title in French, as in the case of Libération, which echoes the French newspaper, or in Arabic, as in Al Bayane ‘(lit.) the manifesto’, to better mirror the specificity of Moroccan French, a variety adapted to the use of local readers. In 1992, there were 262 titles in Arabic and 144 in French (HCF 1993, 445). While there are no daily newspapers in Amazigh, there are magazines, periodicals, and weeklies devoted to Amazigh culture written in French, Arabic, or Amazigh. In recent years, Moroccan newspapers and the most important magazines have added an online version. In summary, it would be inappropriate to attribute excessive importance to the French press in the diffusion of French, as it only concerns a socially influential but limited competent readership and has no major impact on the general public (Charnet 1985, 118). Moreover, whatever the language, press consumption remains low, the majority of Moroccans is more willing to turn to other media, particularly radio and television. Radio – Radio is a means of information and entertainment that reaches a very wide audience: Almost all Moroccan households, both in urban and rural areas, have a receiver. The language used on radio, therefore, has a wide impact. For a long time, the radio landscape was dominated by the national chain, Moroccan Radio and Television (Radiodiffusion Télévision Marocaine – RTM), which offers two channels, one in Modern

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Standard Arabic (rarely in Darija) and the other one in French with daily programmes also in English and Spanish. Regional stations broadcast in Modern Standard Arabic, Darija, and Amazigh dialects. The year 2002 marked a turning point in the field of audiovisual communication with the creation of the High Authority for Audiovisual Communication, the abolition of the state monopoly on radio and television broadcasting, and the publication of a law on audiovisual communication. This change resulted in 2006 in the High Authority issuing licences for establishing and operating new radio services, which would enrich the existing panorama, among them Atlantic Radio, Hit Radio, and Radio Sawa. Other stations have been set up since then and broadcast in Modern Standard Arabic, Darija, French, Spanish, and English. The radio station Mediterranean International (Medi 1), a private station with Moroccan and foreign capital and a 12.3 % share of the Moroccan audience, broadcasts in French and Arabic. The bilingualism practised by this radio station is special in that the presenter passes very frequently and without transition from one language to another. Foreign radio stations are mostly listened to by the intellectual elite, RFI in French and BBC in Arabic, for instance. Television – Television is perfectly established in Morocco. It is even present in rural areas without electricity in the homes of somewhat wealthy farmers, who connect the device to a battery. It is perceived as an access to the world of entertainment, education, and information and is received in a very diversified panorama since the proliferation of satellite dishes and access to internet networks, whose costs are increasingly affordable. Television: TVM – Moroccan Television (Télévision marocaine – TVM), which has long held a monopoly as a single channel, offers programmes in Arabic and French: French films, American films translated into French, Latin American, Turkish, and, more rarely, Indian serials dubbed in French or Darija, documentaries in French or Modern Standard Arabic. Egyptian songs and cinema, which have long held a prominent place in the programming, are increasingly being replaced by Moroccan songs and cinema, more rarely by songs and cinema from other Maghreb countries. Popular songs in Darija and Amazigh dialects are often programmed on television. Newscasts are mainly given in Modern Standard Arabic. Newscasts in French, Spanish, and Amazigh are presented after the Arabic version. Television: SNRT – The National Moroccan Broadcasting and Television Company (Société nationale de radiodiffusion et de télévision – SNRT, formerly RTM) currently has a network of eight channels: Al Aoula (formerly TVM, a general public channel), Laayoune TV (a regional channel for the Moroccan Sahara), Arryadia (a 100 % sports channel), Athaqafia (a knowledge and culture channel), Al Maghrabia (satellite channel for Moroccans abroad), Assadissa (Mohammed VI channel of the Koran), Aflam TV (a channel dedicated to fiction) and Tamazight (a general Amazigh television, offering entertainment programmes, newscasts, political debates, reports, and religious programmes in Amazigh). Television: 2M International and Media 1 – SNRT is competing with two other channels, 2M International and Medi 1 TV. 2M International was founded in 1989. First pri 

 

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vate and encrypted, it was nationalized and decrypted in 1997. As a result, its audience has considerably increased. The programmes include one newscast in French and two newscasts in Arabic. A large part is devoted to American and European cinema: the diffusion of films, the broadcasting of award ceremonies, and the presentation of new films and reviews. The channel gives way to modern Western and Eastern music, as well as Egyptian, Maghrebian, sub-Saharan African, Lebanese, and Palestinian films. Medi 1 TV, a private Moroccan news channel, was created in 2006 under the name Medi1 Sat by the French and Moroccan public authorities to promote French and Maghrebian cultures throughout the Mediterranean basin. It became totally Moroccan in 2008 and took the name Medi 1 TV. Since its creation, it has been oriented towards the Maghreb and, since 2016, towards French-speaking Africa. The channel is now generalist and available in French and Arabic. As on both channels programmes in French are not subtitled in Arabic, viewers who have not attended school only have the visual message. Television: international channels – All Moroccan channels can be watched free of charge live on the internet. Foreign channels like TV5, the French channels TF1, France 2, La Cinquième, ARTE, Canal Horizon, and other European, American, Arab, and Asian channels are received by satellite and increasingly by internet (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 98). Internet – Social media has ‘exploded’ in Morocco, in terms of importance and usage, in a very short period of time. User numbers of Facebook and other social networks are constantly growing. Websites are proliferating. This enthusiasm for the internet is a golden opportunity for the development and dissemination of local oral languages and speakers, and particularly for Darija. Many spontaneous productions are written in Darija, especially on Facebook. Both Arabic and Latin alphabets are used, sometimes separately, sometimes in alternance. Modern Standard Arabic is practically absent, but French is widely used.

4 Linguistic characteristics French appears in the form of a continuum of varieties in Morocco: marginalized varieties, which may be more or less deviant from standard French, standard French itself, and a mesolectal Moroccan variety, which is more suitable to local culture than standard French. Basilectal French – French in Morocco is first and foremost a school language, acquired as a language of knowledge rather than a language of communication. However, there is a rudimentary French, learned on the job, which serves as an idiom of communication for staff with little or no school education: domestic servants, gardeners, and service agents of private Franco-Moroccan companies serving a French-speaking population, for instance. It is an approximate French with limited functions, marked by phonetic variation, a simplified or erroneous syntax, and a very limited vocabulary. Since the beginning of the Arabization policy, another low variety has emerged: the French of

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Arabized literates. It is characterized by systematized and fossilized deviant structures, a mixture of researched expressions, erudite constructions, traces of Arabic, extreme or incorrect turns, and simplifications. Elite French – The French of the urban elite is standard French (“bon usage”). It is the language of the educational institutions, which are oriented towards the exogenous norm, and mirrors a foreign environment, far removed from the concerns of the majority of Moroccan French speakers. The reproduction of this model shows a desire to preserve a language inherited from colonialism as it is. In the Moroccan speaker’s imagination, it is associated with the culture and way of life of Western society. It is the property of the ruling social elite and inaccessible to most French speakers. Elite French is not a collective language and only generates linguistic insecurity and demotivation among those who do not master it. It has recently been reduced due to various factors: linguistic isolation, the Moroccanization of teaching staff, and the increased access to higher education for the urban proletarian milieu (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 114; Benzakour 2001, 77). Mesolectal French – The variety practised by the majority of the French-speaking literate Moroccan population is an idiom in close contact with local languages. It is a variety in constant adaptation with its sociocultural environment that exhibits significant deviations from the exogenous norm. According to its users, it is therefore felt to be less French. It is a remodelled variety and more in line with the requirements of the local area than standard French. This local French or acclimatized French emerged to describe Moroccan society in all its sociocultural and environmental richness. It constitutes the daily language of many speakers and is characterized by specific accents, a morphosyntax that slightly deviates from the standard and especially by significant and obvious lexical particularities. The mesolectal variety is regularly enriched with neologisms of all kinds, which give it a real local colour. Different communicative, connotative, or simply playful needs have greatly contributed to transforming French that, as writing and speeches progress, exchanges its status as a foreign language for a more identity-based idiom with a strong proportion of migrant words, mainly from Arabic. The linguistic features presented below concern mesolectal French.

4.1 Pronunciation The difference between the phonological and phonetic systems of Arabic and French may explain some vocalic features more typical of mesolectal French than of elite French. Absence of /e/ – The absence of /e/ in the vocalic system of Arabic often results in the more or less marked closure of /e/ into /i/. This trend can be observed even among users who have a good knowledge of French. It explains the frequent confusion of the pronouns il ‘he’ and elle ‘she’, both pronounced [il]: Rachida, elle [il] vient de partir ‘Rachida, she has just left’ (cf. 4.2, Gender pronouns). It occurs more frequently in a phonetic envir-

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onment where /e/ precedes or follows /y/, another phoneme missing in Arabic, that is often also pronounced as /i/, as in minutieux [minisjø] ‘meticulous’ instead of /minysjø/, multitude [myltitid] or [miltityde] ‘multitude’ instead of /myltityd/, or inutile [ynitil] or [initil] ‘useless’ instead of /inytil/. Nasal vowels – Jablonka (2017, 465) also points out that, due to the fact that Arabic has only oral vowels, it may happen that nasal consonants are inserted between the nasal vowel of French and the consonant that follows, as in présente [pʁezɑ̃nt] ‘present’ instead of [pʁezɑ̃t]. In some cases, the nasal vowel is even replaced by an oral vowel, as in vient de [vjɛndə] ‘comes from’ instead of [vjɛ̃də]. Final consonants – The systematic pronunciation of certain final consonants, which are partially silent in current Parisian French, seems to be a recurrent feature of Moroccan mesolectal French. This is the case for example of t in but [byt] ‘goal’, août [ut] ‘august’, or exact [ɛɡzakt] ‘exact’, and of s in détritus [detʁitys] ‘waste’, ananas [ananas] ‘pineapple’, or os [ɔs] ‘bones’ in the plural. The s is also pronounced in plus [plys] ‘more’ in its comparative function or in locutions like ni plus [plys] ni moins ‘neither more nor less’. The final l in persil [pɛʁsil] ‘parsley’ and baril [baʁil] ‘barrel’, as well as the f in bœufs [bœf] ‘beefs’ in the plural form are consistently pronounced. Liaison – The voiceless [s] is also frequently used in liaison instead of the voiced [z]: plus ou moins [plysumwɛ̃] instead of [plyzumwɛ̃] ‘more or less’. /p/ and /v/ – One can suppose that some consonants such as /p/ and /v/, non-existent in Arabic, are realized by their respective voiced/unvoiced variant /b/ and /f/, as in potable ‘potable’, pronounced [bɔtabl] instead of [pɔtabl], and véhiculé ‘conveyed’, pronounced [feikyle] instead of [veikyle]. These variants, operated in basilectal French of people who gained their literacy in Arabic and primarily speak Arabic, are rather rare among speakers of mesolectal French since the interference effect comes mainly from dialectal Arabic. But even Darija integrated /p/ and /v/ through French loans such as télévision ‘television’, pronounced [tilivizjɔ̃] instead of [televizjɔ̃], valise ‘suitcase’, pronounced [valiza] instead of [valiz], vélo ‘bike’, pronounced [vilo] instead of [velo], or pare-prise ‘windscreen’, pronounced [parbriz] instead of [paʁbʁiz]. Pronunciation of Arabic loans – The borrowing of words raises another problem. The continuum between the different varieties of French spoken in Morocco makes the pronunciation of many words borrowed from Arabic variable. In particular, it may vary depending on the situational context, the partners involved in the interaction, and their level of formal education. Thus, many loans, which are common and perfectly integrated into mesolectal French, can keep their original pronunciation, and thus add new consonants to French. This is the case in mâalem ‘master-artisan’, pronounced [mʕalam] with the Arabic [ʕ] or [maalam], where /a/ replaces /ʕ/, or qacida ‘lyric poem put into music’, pronounced [qasida] or [kasida]. The phonetic variation is mirrored by a multiple and unstable spelling, as in alem ‘savant, scholar in theology’, spelled or , and djellaba ‘traditional long dress’, written or . This variation does not affect the old loanwords from Arabic, attested in French dictionaries and totally or partially integrated in the French lexicon, such as ramadan ‘Ramadan’, souk

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‘souk’, or casbah ‘kasbah’. Their pronunciation and graphical form are already firmly adapted to standard French (Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 122). Origin of this variation – The variation in the pronunciation of borrowings from Arabic is due to the coexistence of two types of French speakers. There are, on the one hand, those who have perfectly internalized the phonetic system of French and therefore practise standard French pronunciation. Bilingual speakers, on the other hand, who are more accustomed to the phonetic system of their first language, prefer the Arabic pronunciation. Ar. caïd ‘head, chief’, for example, is pronounced [kaid] by the Frenchspeaking elites but may be pronounced [kaid] or [qaid] by bilingual speakers.

4.2 Morphosyntax Several sensitive syntactic points separate mesolectal from standard French. Relative clause – A first feature results from the phenomenon of fossilization: the regularization that affects the relative subordinates. It is reinforced by an anaphora in the relative, which takes up the antecedent, as in le pays que je l’aime bien ‘the country that I like it’ instead of le pays que j’aime bien ‘the country that I like’, a sentence that can be heard on Moroccan national radio. This process is certainly supported by the deviations from the norm observed in popular French, where the relative pronoun is generalized in que ‘that’, like in mon mari que je suis sans nouvelle ‘my husband that I have no news’ instead of mon mari dont je suis sans nouvelle ‘my husband from whom I have no news’ (Guiraud 1965, cited in Akouaou 2001, 184). However, in Moroccan French, it can be mainly explained as interference effect. The syntax of Arabic is a syntax of juxtaposition, which only presents subordination with one relative, que ‘that’, followed by an anaphora in the relative. The regularization reinforced by anaphorization is done in accordance with this syntactic structure in Moroccan French (Akouaou 2001, 187). Gender pronouns – The pronouns il(s) ‘he, they’ and elle(s) ‘she, they’ are sometimes used as variants. This variation could have a phonetic origin, as the absence of the vowel /e/ in Arabic leads to replace the /e/ of elle ‘she’ by the closed neighbouring sound /i/ and therefore to realize elle ‘she’ as il ‘he’: Les femmes, ils ont beaucoup de choses à nous dire ‘women, they [masc.] have a lot of things to tell us’ instead of Les femmes, elles ont beaucoup de choses à nous dire ‘women, they [fem.] have a lot of things to tell us’ (cf. 4.1, Absence of /e/). Prepositions – Even speakers with a good knowledge of French sometimes have trouble choosing the right preposition due to both the limited nature of the prepositional system in Arabic and the persistent fossilization. The variation mainly affects the pairs of prepositions sur/dans ‘on/in’ (e. g. il dort sur son lit ‘he sleeps on his bed’ instead of dans son lit ‘in his bed’), dans/en ‘in/to’ (e. g. il est parti dans l’Afrique ‘he went in Africa’ instead of en Afrique ‘to Africa’), de/à ‘from/to’ (e. g. il commence de comprendre ‘he begins from understanding’ instead of à comprendre ‘to understand’), dans/à ‘in/on’ (e. g. j’ai entendu la nouvelle dans la télévision ‘I have heard the news in television’ instead of  

 

 

 

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à la télévision ‘on television’), and pour/de ‘for/about’ (e. g. il se plaint pour sa situation ‘he complains for his situation’ instead of de sa situation ‘about his situation’). Dislocated structures – Mesolectal French from Morocco also presents the almost systematic use in both written and oral forms of dislocated structures, where the detached component is a proper noun, a pronoun, or a nominal phrase, and the element representing it a pronoun, like in Nous, on se souvient pas de ce que lui, il a dit ‘We, we don’t remember what he, he has said’ instead of de ce qu’il a dit ‘what he has said’. Existential – Jablonka (2017, 466) reports the very frequent use of an invariable present and in particular of (il) y en a ([jãna]) with its variants, as in (il) y en a des gens qui parlent bien français ‘There are people who speak good French’ or (il) y en a des choses qu’on peut pas les dire en arabe ‘There are things that cannot be said in Arabic’. Grammatical gender – The grammatical gender of lexemes borrowed from Arabic is quite well controlled. The gender markers generally comply with the system of French and are taken from the original language, as in une fetwa ‘a legal consultation based on sharia’ and un minbar ‘a pulpit of a mosque reserved for the preacher’. However, there are some variants, as in un/une djellaba ‘a traditional long dress’. The gender of adjectives derived from lexemes borrowed from Arabic conforms with the rules of French (e. g., un arrêté viziriel ‘a ministerial decree’, une décision vizirielle ‘a ministerial decision’). Yet, sometimes the adjective keeps the form of the Arabic feminine, like in jebli, which in the feminine shows the Arabic feminine marker ‑a instead of the French ‑e: un vêtement jebli/une robe jeblia ‘a dress worn by a woman from a mountainous area’ instead of *une robe jeblie. It can finally become invariable, as in halal ‘not prohibited by Islam’ (e. g., un produit halal ‘a halal product’, une viande halal ‘a halal meat’). Grammatical number – The grammatical agreement in number is more problematic. Many integrated loans may take plural forms from either the original language, French, or both languages as alternatives or hybrids. The Arabic plural marker is usually used, for example, with alem ‘erudite man, scholar in theological sciences and Muslim law’ or cheikh ‘chief of a tribe or urban or rural territorial division’: des oulama and des chioukh. Other nouns use the marker of the French plural in ‑s, as imam ‘imam’ or chaouch ‘service agent(s) in an administration or a private company’: des imams and des chaouchs. Again others admit the two plural forms. These forms may occur as alternatives, as in cherif ‘honorary title given to any descendant of the prophet’ or hammam ‘establishment of public baths’: des cherifs or des chorfa and des hammams or des hammamat. Yet, the plural forms of both systems can also be combined as in the case of adel ‘auxiliary of Islamic justice in charge of the procedure’ and cheikha ‘artist who is both a singer and a dancer’: des adouls, des cheikhates. Some borrowings can also appear in the three plural forms. This is the case with the already mentioned noun cheikh: des cheikhs, des chioukh, des chioukhs. Article – The definite Arabic article al also raises some problems. Many borrowings are attested with the Arabic article. Some may be used with either the French or the Arabic article: le mouloud or al mouloud ‘the celebration of the Prophet’s birth’. However, loans from Classical Arabic, especially those referring to the Islamic religion, are only  

 

 

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used with the Arabic article, even if they are frequent: e. g. Al Icha ‘night Muslim prayer’ (cf. 4.3, Religion). Coming from a sacred language, they are perceived as invariable, which explains the difficulty in integrating them into the system of a secular language such as French. The French article, however, tends to replace the Arabic article when the locution appears in a phrase: la prière du Fajr ‘the prayer of the Fajr’ (Benzakour/ Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 122s.). Grammatical recategorization – In mesolectal French, grammatical recategorization can be observed. A transitive verb can become intransitive, as, for example, inviter ‘to invite’ in il invite beaucoup dans son riad, surtout au mois de ramadan.2 It can also be recategorized as a pronominal verb, as, for example, s’accaparer ‘to monopolize’ in rien n’a vraiment changé, c’est toujours les fils de riches qui s’accaparent du marché de l’emploi moderne.3 Periphrastic future – We observe the almost systematic use of the periphrastic future form aller + infinitive, both orally and in writing (i). We also note the regular use of the conditional or the periphrastic future after the hypothetical si ‘if’ (ii):  

“ainsi les Casablancais vont pouvoir apprécier des spectacles [instead of pourront apprécier] qui vont être donnés [instead of qui seront donnés] vendredi prochain à partir de 19h par des troupes populaires” (Liberation, 14 March 2008).4 (ii) “La rencontre va être [instead of sera] intéressante si les hooligans ne vont pas se mêler [instead of ne se mêlent pas]” (L’Opinion, 31 January 2003).5 (i)

4.3 Lexicon Mesolectal French is a language with a multiple identity, which mirrors a local culture as rich as it is diversified (cf. Benzakour 2012). Its lexicon is the living expression of the permanent dialogue with the native languages involved. The generous welcome given to borrowed and hybrid words is an eloquent example of this. A glance at the lexicon of French as it is used today in Morocco, or even better, a click on the Panfrancophone Lexicographical Database of Morocco (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone Maroc – BDLP-M) is enough to bring out the soul of an entire society that is expressed in its cultural words. Words not filling lexical gaps – To give an idea, let us have a look at some of the words that strongly characterize Moroccan mesolectal French. We notice that the words

2 “he often invites in his riad, especially in the month of Ramadan’. 3 ‘nothing has really changed, it is always the children of the rich who monopolize the modern labour market’. 4 “Thus the people of Casablanca will enjoy the shows that will be given by popular troupes next Friday from 7 p.m.’. 5 “The meeting will be interesting if the hooligans do not mingle’.

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borrowed from Arabic that are used together with their equivalents in standard French function as a kind of relevant sociocultural indicator due to their connotative richness. They are often internal images, full of sociocultural references drawn from the territory and nourished by memories. They convey a deep impression of the local sociocultural experience and the popular imagination and mirror a whole set of values that the speakers associate with the borrowings based on their personal or shared experience of the referent (Benzakour 2000, 318–322). In other words, the borrowings are semantically more loaded than the French terms, which are limited to their denotative function. They have a very strong evocative power, which explains their vitality and their integration into Moroccan French. The lexeme makhzen, for instance, that is borrowed from Darija, forms a pair with the French word autorité ‘authority’. Yet, it also evokes an enforcement officer, armed with a baton and ready to strike, and thus connotes the idea of fear of authority and repression: a whole experience transmitted through a simple word. The lexicon relating to the Moroccan cultural universes is marked by multiple aspects and is especially nourished by the two national languages: Amazigh and Darija. Of all Maghreb countries, Morocco is the one that stands out most for its jealously guarded traditions: clothing, culinary, artistic, and craft traditions, but also for its historical vestiges, its ethnic and linguistic diversity, the importance of the Muslim religion that guides the daily life of the whole society. Borrowings and hybrids derived from borrowings constitute the main part of Moroccan French and are typical of this former colonial region. An examination of the Moroccan lexicon provides a concrete way of illustrating the encounters of languages and cultures within the acclimatized French that describes them. Words filling lexical gaps – Various quotes from a variety of sources attest to and illustrate, for example, the frequent use of khôl ‘blush used by women to blacken their eyelids, eyelashes, or eyebrows’, borrowed from Moroccan Arabic, even in standard French. They appear in newspapers, literary writings, and the media and show a total integration of a Moroccan cultural word into international French. This also applies to other words that came up in Morocco and then expanded all over the French-speaking world, in the terminology of Reutner (2017, 37) original diatopisms, (diatopismes d’origine), among which some of the statalisms and religious terms. Statalisms – Statalisms like baladia ‘municipality’, mokataâ ‘administrative district’, wissam ‘decoration awarded by the king to a personality to reward services rendered to the nation’, or chergui ‘drying east wind, hot in summer and cold in winter’ are Moroccanisms in the official or public domain. Religion – The field of religious rituals shows words such as imam ‘worship leader in a mosque’, the names of the five obligatory prayers Salat Fajr ‘first prayer, observed at dawn’, Salat Dhuhr ‘second prayer, observed at the early of afternoon’, Salat Asr ‘third prayer, observed at the middle of afternoon approximately’, Salat Maghrib ‘fourth prayer, observed at sunset’, and Salat Icha ‘fifth and last prayer, observed at night’, habous ‘institution under Muslim law dealing with the management of endowments’, Achoura ‘commemoration of the death of Hossayn, grandson of the prophet Mohammed, which takes place on the tenth day of Moharram [first month of the Islamic ca-

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lendar]’, or nuit sacrée ‘sacred night during which the Koran was revealed to the Prophet Mohammed; celebration of this night’ (cf. i). Traditional arts, handicrafts, and religious rituals – A typical lexical field containing local items is that of traditional arts and crafts with words such as halqa ‘circle formed by the crowd in a public square around a fairground artist [storyteller, singer, or snake charmer], preacher, or charlatan’ (cf. ii), gnaoua ‘dancer or mystical singer of black origin organized in a popular brotherhood who uses trance and exorcism in his or her ceremonies’ (cf. iii), zellige ‘mosaic tileworks’ (cf. iv), or zlaïgi ‘master craftsman who lays the tiles’. The importance and diversity of the quotes show the extent and anchoring of these borrowings in a variety of French that has become a language of interculturality and linguistic plurality. Through its hypertext and hypermedia links, the database BDLP-M reveals even better the whole cultural universe particular to this region. The images, sounds, texts, and references that accompany, for example, the term gnaoua, all contribute to immersing us into the Morocco of popular arts so different from that of Amazigh Morocco or Arab-Muslim Morocco. “Le Mausolée du Sultan Alaouite Moulay Abdallah à Fès a abrité, lundi soir, une grande cérémonie religieuse organisée au lendemain de la nuit sacréeˮ.6 (ii) “Il se souvient d’un récit qui court de contour en contour sur le souk, les halqas formés autour d’eux par des spectateurs émerveillésˮ.7 (iii) “Les danseurs et musiciens noirs, les gnaouas devaient venir de Marrakechˮ.8 (iv) “Bois et plâtre sculptés, marbre, zellige, rien n’a été trop beau pour cette mosquéeˮ.9 (i)

Clothing – The lexicon of traditional clothing offers a real parade that takes us from caftan ‘traditional long and loose dress, decorated with a kind of braid made of gold or silk threads’ to djellaba ‘traditional long dress with sleeves and hood worn by men and women’ and babouche ‘traditional embroidered leather shoe without quarter or heel, worn by men and women’. Many Arabisms furnished by Moroccan French spread out in front of us long and loose traditional outfits which Moroccan women use when going out to protect themselves from prying eyes, such as haik ‘long piece of cloth in which Muslim women drape themselves and hide their shapes to get out’, as well as long and wide traditional clothes of men, such as burnous ‘traditional coat’, and veils used by men, like litham ‘piece of cloth with which men cover their faces in the desert to protect themselves from sandstorms’. Cultural role of borrowings – The lexical gap, which is often doubled by a phonetic gap (cf. 4.1), allows those people who have chosen French as their working or writing

6 “On Monday evening, the Mausoleum of the Alaouite sultan Mulay Abdallah in Fez hosted a major religious ceremony organized the next day of the sacred night’. 7 “He remembers a story that runs from narrator to narrator on the souks, the halqas formed around them by marvellous spectators’. 8 “The black dancers and musicians, the gnaouas, were expected to come from Marrakech’. 9 “Sculpted wood and plaster, marble, zellige, nothing has been too beautiful for this mosque’.

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language to open up to a familiar cultural universe, named by Arabic borrowings that they have long tried or are still trying to ignore. The image of the language mirrored in this variety seems to be closer to the daily life and social reality of Moroccans than that of standard French, which mirrors a very foreign universe even for the urban elite. Cultural words quite naturally occupy a prominent place in Moroccan French and find a certain legitimacy due to the number and diversity of their usage. Their power to evoke a cultural universe that elite French fails to describe can only plead in favour of the legitimization of this variety of the territory. Can acclimatized French, which has become a language of the multiple, be recognized by the French-speaking elite? The future will tell (cf. Benzakour 2012).

5 Internal language policy An important point raised by mesolectal French is that of its legitimacy: Is it stigmatized or rather admitted and recognized as an expression of plural identity and cultural diversity?

5.1 Linguistic purism Elite French is high-quality French, an academic language; it is represented and disseminated through the classical literary language. This inaccessible model is assumed to be the language of the educational institutions, which are supposed to spread the exogenous academic standard. Its reproduction shows a desire to assimilate to native speakers from France and, more particularly, to the culture of Paris. Such an attitude leads to maintaining French in an original, almost mythical purity. It turns French inherited from colonialism into a purely foreign language, one that must be mastered to preserve the social prestige it provides. The most important consequences concern education. Elite French occupies the highest pole on the continuum of varieties of French used in Morocco. Its usage goes along with fundamental symbolic issues. It is a high variety that continues to hold the key to the modern job market and represents the vehicle for science and technology, and it competes in this regard with Modern Standard Arabic, which also invades the domains of education, administration, the press, modern literature, and, especially in its oral form, the media. Yet, it seems difficult to speak about both languages as two high varieties that coexist equally. Arabic has an explicit legal status as the official language of the country and enjoys a strong Islamic aura. It is quite the opposite of French, which finds itself in an uncomfortable situation, as it is affected both by its colonial past and its never explicitly clarified status as first foreign language. Yet, in the imagination of the Moroccan speaker, French also remains associated with the culture and lifestyle of Western society. It is perceived as the language of social prestige, self-esteem, and the affirmation of a Western sociocultural status. It is the language of

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the social elite: executive managers of public affairs and directors of private companies or companies with foreign capital inflows. Does it play the role of the dominant language compared to standard Arabic, which it strongly competes with? The situation seems more complex, and it may be more judicious to consider it in terms of the mechanisms of regulation, adaptation, and accommodation that speakers develop to manage situations of linguistic contact in their communication experience (cf. Jablonka 2017, 468). But nothing is really stable. Thus, elite French as a source of linguistic insecurity for those who do not master it has recently declined in favour of mesolectal French. The reasons for such a process are multiple: First, elite French is linguistically isolated because it requires significant financial and intellectual investments; it is not a cultural enrichment for all, and affects only a small part of society, even if this small part constitutes an economically and politically privileged social group. Second, the teaching staff consciously or unconsciously transmit a locally marked French. Third, higher education is increasingly opening up to the urban proletarian. Finally, speakers begin to become aware of the recently recognized and formalized linguistic and cultural diversity (Benzakour 2008, 87; cf. also 4, Elite French and Mesolectal French, and 5.2).

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics On first observation, there has been no effort in the past to codify an endogenous standard of French in order to manage the different varieties practised in Moroccan society. Concerning the lexicon used in Morocco, there are no general dictionaries other than those of standard French, like the Petit Robert (PR), Petit Larousse (PL), or Trésor de la langue française (TLF). Certainly, the Dictionnaire universel francophone (DUF) is largely opening up its nomenclature to the lexical particularities of African communities, but it is, on the one hand, a French dictionary of France, so that the lexical particularities of African French are only defined by their comparison with those of France and, on the other hand, it is rarely used in Morocco. The only differential lexical inventories that have attempted to describe the lexicon of endogenous French and especially that of the mesolectal variety are the project of Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec (2000) and the BDLPM. The realization of the first has the merit of having undermined the cliché of a unitary and universal language and having shown that a language can be fragmented into several subsystems. It made its authors aware of the possible existence of a local subvariety. Furthermore, as it describes a variety in its social life, the question arose whether it would be able to change, at least slightly, the perception of local French speakers and lead the elite to have another look at an idiom in its real and daily practices instead of systematically considering French as a mythical language to perpetuate. When it was published, discordant voices were raised around the variety of French it describes. Some speakers (journalists, essayists, writers, etc.) expressed their support for the codification of this variety with which they could easily identify themselves because they have adapted and used it. Others, especially educators and researchers, were instead denoun-

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cing a French infested with words borrowed from Arabic which would harm the mythical French standard (cf. Benzakour 2008, 92). The existence of two opposite attitudes within a micro-sample of intellectuals suggests that a local norm has already emerged. The positive perception among journalists has announced the birth of a social norm that is developing and strengthening an endogenous linguistic norm, which is still in the early stages and already threatened by an entirely conservative core group with strong power of legitimization. The difficulty of the paper-based lexical inventory is its low distribution and limited access. The online availability of the BDLP-M and the research perspectives it offers have made it possible to ensure that knowledge about endogenous French is more widely distributed among the French-speaking Moroccan population and also reaches the younger generations. Increasing its visibility, especially among those who are still trying to deny its existence, remains a challenge. Yet, the inclusion of local lexicon in a panfrancophone database could perhaps help to change the value system. It gives some legitimacy to the local variety, which is widely practised by the French-speaking population and in informal communication situations even by the elites, though many of them refuse to recognize it. The paper and online lexicons have probably given some recognition to the acclimatized variety. They are a small step towards the awareness of the existence of an endogenous French, even if it is still seeking legitimacy (cf. Benzakour 2008, 95s.).

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – The exogenous norm is used with statalisms and other necessary lexical particularities (cf. baladia, mokataâ, wissam, or chergui in 4.3). It is especially common when the interlocutors have a high social position and/or when they are in a formal situation. French can also be replaced by the predominantly French-Arabic code-mixing, particularly when the speakers fail to translate some concepts into French. Code-switching is frequently used between cultivated speakers in informal situations too (cf. Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 86s.). Variety used in education – The school system is constrained by dogmatism and the imposition of foreign standards, which extinguish any creative and innovative effort. Instead of meeting the expectations of learners by making them acquire language skills, the teaching of standard French only engenders linguistic insecurity, discouragement, and demotivation, which in the 1990s resulted in disaffection with school (Benzakour 2001, 79). This situation was aggravated by a hesitant Arabization policy which led to a dysfunction in the teaching of standard French in certain scientific pathways, hence the attempts to refrancize them. In any case, the teaching of languages, whether French, Arabic, or any other language, is not accompanied by real internal language planning that is explicitly specified in texts emanating from Moroccan language policy. Even the National Charter of Education and Training says nothing about the management of languages and their varieties. Teaching of standard French follows the official instructions

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from the Ministry of National Education. They are available on the ministry’s website and passed on to teachers by regional education inspectors and coordinators. The instructions of the academic institution recommend the teaching of normative grammar. The reference dictionaries to use are those of standard French. The teaching of literature was, for a long time, mainly devoted to the classics of French literature. Authors like Victor Hugo, Balzac, Zola, Saint-Exupéry, Verlaine, and Rimbaud are listed in school textbooks most often drawn up on the French model by education inspectors, which allows for an opening towards French culture and civilization. Yet, over the past two decades, we have noted the introduction of renowned Maghrebian and, incidentally, African texts, such as La boite à merveilles ‘The marvelous box’ (1954) and La mémoire tatouée ‘The tattooed memory’ (1971) by the Moroccan authors Ahmed Sefrioui and Abdelkebir Khatibi, or Le fils du pauvre ‘The son of the poor’ (1950) by Mouloud Feraoun from Algeria and L’enfant noir ‘The black child’ (1953) by Camara Laye from Guinea. Even if these books are primarily introduced because of their content (Laye, for example, is taught and read at school when poverty is the topic of discussion), they also bring along a certain exposure of the students to African French varieties. Variety used in the media – Mesolectal French is widely used in the written press which therefore also constitutes an important basis of Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec (2000) and the BDLP-M. Orally, local French is heard in the audiovisual media when the invited interlocutors take part in lively debates of programmes in French. On television in French, the newscasters and the hosts are preferably either Franco-Moroccans or graduates from French schools. They are supposed not to speak the local mesolectal French but standard French. As to the internet, the lexical particularities of mesolectal French are very frequent in social media. Exchanges usually use mesolectal or approximate French, while academic and/or elitist varieties are less common. Variety used in literature – Literature in French is flourishing in Morocco. It has produced and continues to produce original works both in terms of writing and themes. These writings are part of interculturality and bilingualism, as evidenced by the title of the novel Amour bilingue (1983) by Khatibi. The readership of Moroccan literature continues to grow, and it is an integral part of Moroccan culture. Its interest and survival are the multiple, the plural (cf. Benzakour/Gaadi/Queffélec 2000, 100s.). The literature makes extensive use of cultural words from mesolectal French. They give the text an authentic local colouring, name universes unknown in France, anchor the texts in the Moroccan soil, and thus find there a certain legitimacy. Moroccan lexicon is used by renowned authors such as Ben Jelloun or Sefrioui without further comments or as lexical particularities indicated as such by the use of italics, quotes, glosses, or explanations in footnotes and at the end of the book (cf. Reutner 2023, 256–261). An example of the natural use is nuit sacrée, which constitutes the title of Ben Jelloun’s prix Goncourt winning novel La nuit sacrée (1987), examples of a marked usage are Achoura and djellaba (i–ii, cf. also 4.3):

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(i)

Marrakech appartenait aux enfants, du moins depuis ce matin et pour quelques jours. La ville célébrait pour eux la Achoura (Ben Jelloun 1981, 141).10 (ii) Ce jour-là ma mère m’expédiait à l’école avec, pour vêtement, une simple chemise sous ma djellaba (Sefrioui 1954, 15, 187s.).11

References Akouaou, Ahmed (2001), Les idiosynchrasies en subordonnée relative. Entre la causalité interne et l’analogie externe, Le français en Afrique 15, 183–191. BDLP-M = Fouzia Benzakour (2005), BDLP Maroc, in: Claude Poirier et al. (edd.) (2001–2014), Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone, Quebec/Paris, TLFQ/AUF, http://www.bdlp.org/accueil.asp?base=MA (2/3/2023). Ben Jelloun, Tahar (1981), La prière de l’absent, Paris, Seuil. Benzakour, Fouzia (2000), Le français au Maroc. Le problème des doublets: entre dénotation et connotation, in: Danièle Latin/Claude Poirier (edd.), Contacts de langues et identités culturelles: perspectives lexicographiques. Actes des quatrièmes journées scientifiques du réseau “Étude du français en francophonie”, Quebec, Presses de l’Université Laval, 313–323. Benzakour, Fouzia (2001), Français de référence et français en usage au Maroc. Une adéquation illusoire: l’exemple de l’écart lexical, Cahier de l’Institut de Linguistique de Louvain 27/1–2, 75–87. Benzakour, Fouzia (2007), Langue française et langues locales en terre marocaine: rapports de force et constructions identitaires, Hérodote. Revue de géographie et de géopolitique 126, 45–56. Benzakour, Fouzia (2008), Le Français en terre marocaine. Norme(s) et légitimation, in: Claudine Bavoux/ Lambert-Félix Prudent/Sylvie Wharton (edd.), Normes endogènes et plurilinguisme. Aires francophones, aires créoles, Lyon, ENS, 85–97. Benzakour, Fouzia (2012), Le français au Maroc. De la blessure identitaire à la langue du multiple et de la “copropriation”, Repères DoRiF 2/1, 47–54. Benzakour, Fouzia/Gaadi, Driss/Queffélec, Ambroise (2000), Le Français au Maroc. Lexique et contacts de langues, Brussels, Duculot. Boukous, Ahmed (1995), Société, langues et cultures au Maroc. Enjeux symboliques, Rabat, Publications de la faculté des lettres et sciences humaines de Rabat. Brignon, Jean, et al. (1968), Histoire du Maroc, Paris, Hatier. C-MA = Royaume du Maroc (2011), La Constitution. Édition 2011, Rabat, Secrétariat Général du Gouvernement, http://www.sgg.gov.ma/Portals/0/constitution/constitution_2011_Fr.pdf (2/3/2023). Charnet, Chantale (1985), La situation du français au Maroc, Marseille, Université d’Aix-Marseille I, Doctoral Thesis. Chatar-Moumni, Nizha (2015), Vers une standardisation de l’arabe marocain?, Écho des études romanes 11/1, 75–91. CNEFM = Royaume du Maroc (1999), La Charte Nationale d’Éducation et de Formation du Maroc, Rabat, Ministère de l’éducation Nationale, de la formation professionnelle, de l’enseignement supérieur et de la recherche scientifique, https://www.men.gov.ma/Fr/Pages/CNEF.aspx (2/3/2023). DUF = Michel Guillou/Marc Moingeon/Jacques Demougin (edd.) (1997), Dictionnaire universel francophone, Paris, Hachette.

10 “Marrakech belonged to the children, at least since this morning and for a few days. The city celebrated Achoura for them’. 11 ‘That day my mother sent me to school with a simple shirt under my djellaba for clothing’.

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Dupret, Baudouin, et al. (2015), Le Maroc au présent. D’une époque à l’autre, une société en mutation, Casablanca, Centre Jacques-Berque. El Gherbi, El Mostafa (1993), Aménagement linguistique et enseignement du français au Maroc. Enjeux culturels, linguistiques et didactiques, Meknès, La voix de Meknès. Grandguillaume, Gilbert (1983), Arabisation et politique linguistique au Maghreb, Paris, Maisonneuve & Larose. Guiraud, Pierre (1965), Le français populaire, Paris, Presses universitaires de France. HCF = Haut Conseil de la francophonie (1993), Étude de la francophonie dans le monde. Données 1993 et 6 enquêtes inédites, Paris, La Documentation Française. HCP = Haut-Commissariat au Plan (2014), Recensement général de la population et de l’habitat de 2014, Casablanca, Kingdom of Morocco. HCP = Haut-Commissariat au Plan (2018), Les indicateurs sociaux du Maroc, Casablanca, Kingdom of Morocco. IRCAM (2020), Présentation, Rabat, Institut royal de la culture amazighe du Maroc, http://www.ircam.ma/? q=fr/node/620 (2/3/2023). Jablonka, Frank (2017), Maroc, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 453–475. Kenbib, Mohammed (1996), Les protégés: contribution à l’histoire contemporaine du Maroc, Rabat, Faculté des lettres et sciences humaines. Lugan, Bernard (1992), Histoire du Maroc. Des origines à nos jours, Paris, Critérion. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. PL = Isabelle Jeuge-Maynart (ed.) (2020 [1905]), Le Petit Larousse illustré, Paris, Larousse. PR = Alain Rey/Josette Rey-Debove (edd.) (2022 [1967]), Le Petit Robert. Dictionnaire alphabétique et analogique de la langue française, Paris, Le Robert. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Reutner, Ursula (2023), Variation régionale et norme endogène dans la littérature africaine francophone, in: Gaston Kengue/Bruno Maurer (edd.), L’expansion de la norme endogène du français en Afrique francophone. Explorations sociolinguistiques, socio-didactiques et médiatiques, Paris/Philadelphia/ Cambridge, Archives contemporaines, 249–265. Sefrioui, Ahmed (1954), La boîte à merveilles, Paris, Seuil. TLF = Paul Imbs et al. (edd.) (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française informatisé: dictionnaire de la langue du XIXe et du XXe siècle (1789–1960), 16 vol., Paris, CNRS, http://atilf.atilf.fr/tlf.htm (2/3/2023).

Lotfi Sayahi

4 Tunisia Abstract: French in Tunisia has a long history that harkens back to the second half of the nineteenth century and the French occupation of the country (1881–1956). Today, French continues to have a strong presence in the education system, but it remains a second language that has not been indigenized. Levels of proficiency vary greatly depending on levels of education and even fields of specialization and professions. While we cannot speak of a local, stable, and clearly distinguishable variety of French in Tunisia, we can identify features that are common among learners of French in the country, which include instability of the vowel system and some morphosyntactic features such as restriction in mood selection. As French continues to play a major role in the education system, English as the global language of technology, entertainment, and digital media is increasingly attracting the attention of the younger generations. Keywords: Tunisia, French, Tunisian Arabic, diglossia, bilingualism

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages On account of its limited geographical extension (163,610 km2) and relatively small population (around 11.5 million people in 2019), Tunisia shows a level of ethnolinguistic diversity that is far from the higher levels often encountered elsewhere on the African continent. Unsurprisingly, the linguistic profile of Tunisia is closer to that of other Arabicdominant speaking nations than to the situation in the majority of African countries. As is the case in the rest of the Maghreb region, the autochthonous language is Berber, also referred to as Amazigh and Shilħa in Tunisia. Tunisian Berber today, however, shows a severe decrease in its use and transmission. Areas where it is still spoken are reduced to smaller enclaves in the south of the country, including on the Island of Djerba and in some inland villages such as Chenini, Douiret, and Zrawa. Historically, several factors have led to the displacement of Berber in Tunisia, including lack of official status, urbanization, migration, and the spread of Arabized education. Estimates of the number of Tunisian Berber speakers vary greatly, although solid proof of the existence of monolingual speakers today is still to be produced. References usually state that about 1 % of the general Tunisian population speak Berber (cf. Daoud 2011, 10; Gabsi 2003, 19; 2011, 142), but there are still no definitive empirical studies that can confirm or refute such statements. The negative attitude towards Berber by Tunisian institutions has not only limited its maintenance and description but even the simple task of gathering accurate data about its ethnolinguistic vitality in a rapidly changing society. What is certain is  

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that, despite recent attempts to revive it (cf. Bahri 2019, 100), since the introduction of Arabic at the beginning of the eighth century, speakers of Berber in Tunisia have been shifting to Arabic to a degree that Berber is currently a much-endangered language. Tunisian Arabic, on the other hand, is the native language of Tunisians nationwide. It exists within a classical diglossic situation that makes it the language of informal and extemporaneous communication. Tunisian Arabic shows significant divergence from standard Arabic that is comparable to what we find in the case of other Arabic dialects throughout the region. Conversely, the standard Arabic variety is the one used in education and formal domains, although recent studies have shown an increased overlap in domains of use between both vernacular Arabic and standard Arabic (cf. Sayahi 2019, 229s.). With regards to French and other European languages, they are introduced primarily through education. Hence, their distribution across the geography of the country has to do with levels of literacy which tend to be higher in urban settings than in more remote rural areas. The capital region area and the coastal cities in general show a stronger presence of French, and increasingly English, given the higher rates of literacy and the impact of tourism and digital media. Nonetheless, the fact that Tunisia has one of the highest rates of literacy in the continent (UNESCO Institute for Statistics 2019) and an educational system that mandates children to stay in school until their teenage years has meant higher exposure to the French language among the generations born after independence from France in 1956. This exposure has not, however, translated into the indigenization of French or even higher proficiency levels in this language by the general population, as will be discussed below.

1.2 Social distribution of languages Language proficiency and language use in Tunisia is closely tied to literacy and educational attainments. Tunisian Arabic is not recognized officially nor used in literacy development (cf. Sayahi 2015, 5). Historically, when they first begin attending school, Tunisian children start learning standard Arabic and two or three years later French, while other European languages are introduced in middle school and high school. Starting from the school year 2019–2020, the Ministry of Education has reinstated the onset of the teaching of French to the beginning of the second year of primary education (around the age of 7), while English is introduced during the fourth year of primary education (around the age of 9). As will be discussed in section 3.3, in the Tunisian educational system, French is used as language of instruction for science and technology starting from high school. This becomes even more pronounced at the university level where all instruction for careers in health, engineering, and the hard sciences is delivered predominantly in French. As a result, while standard Arabic serves as the language of initial literacy, it falls behind in terms of instrumental value both in the advanced stages of the educational system and also in the job market. Tunisian citizens who are better posi-

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tioned socioeconomically tend to be competent in French and they tend to make some usage of the language at work. This engenders a system where the language of instruction directly contributes to social divisions or what we may call a process of stratification by language of instruction. With regards to age, since independence, changing policies that oscillate between more extensive bilingualism and stronger Arabization proposals have created significant differences in levels of proficiency in French. It is true that older Tunisians tend to be less educated, but those who attended school did so in a bilingual system that helped them develop higher levels of competence in French. On the other hand, younger Tunisians, born after 1970, are more educated while their level of competence in French is less advanced overall. Add to this the role of individual factors and language attitude in the acquisition of a second language and the result is that there is a wide range of competences in French within each generation of Tunisians. Today the younger generations tend to have less competence in French than their peers from previous generations, both for the impact of Arabization and the role social media and digital communication play in increasing the exposure to English and the motivation to learn it. Finally, with regard to gender, a few studies have shown that women tend to develop higher levels of competence in French and make more usage of perceived prestigious features than men (cf. Dhaouadi 1996, 112s.; Trabelsi 1991, 91). Walters (2011, 104) argues that French is gendered in Tunisia in terms of native-like levels of competence being associated more with female speakers than male speakers to the degree that many Tunisians believe women to be generally more competent in French than men. Generally speaking, Tunisian women are performing well in the educational system, outnumbering men in many higher education institutions, which can be indirectly translated into higher levels of proficiency in French as well.

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Given its history and geographical position, the presence of European languages in Tunisia dates back to the Roman Empire. Even with the arrival of Arabic, contact with Romance varieties never ceased leading to the appearance of Lingua Franca in what was known then as the Barbary Coast around the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries (cf. Selbach 2008, 32). Before the French colonial period and during its earlier phases, other Romance varieties were also used in Tunisia by substantially large communities including Italian and Sicilian. Alberti Russell states that in the second half of the nineteenth century “Italians greatly outnumbered the French and that Italian was the lingua franca among Europeans” (1977, 12). The presence of French in Tunisia and Northern Africa in general changed dramatically with the beginning of the colonial period. The Treaty of

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Bardo in 1881 placed Tunisia under the direct control of France within the framework of a protectorate. French became the de facto language of administration. In addition, France established an elitist system that favoured the education of a certain sector of the population who were meant to serve in the lower ranks of the colonial administration while marginalizing the majority of the indigenous population. In fact, in 1931, merely 25 years before independence, a meagre 6.6 % of the Muslim population in Tunisia were educated (cf. Vermeren 2002, 16). This means that while French dominated the colonial administration and education, it did not permeate the different social layers given the limited rates of schooling. At the same time, Arabic continued to be used in unofficial Koranic schools providing some basic literacy skills for those who were able to attend them. The importance of French education during the protectorate period resides in the number of students who attended universities in France. This group of students, including the first president of independent Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba, formed an elite that shaped public life in Tunisia leading up to and following the independence from France. In addition, young Tunisian men were forced to serve in the French Army as part of the indigenous troops (les troupes indigènes), which also saw them becoming familiar with the French language, as were people who worked with French colonial settlers and administrators. Levels of competence, however, varied greatly and as a result, Arabic, and Berber in certain cases, remained the native language of the indigenous population and French was never nativized except among other Europeans, especially Maltese, and Jewish populations (cf. Manzano 2011, 63). The colonial period did not produce native speakers of French, but it did produce variable levels of familiarity with the language and, more importantly, an elite that was eager to install French as language of instruction in the postcolonial educational system.  

2.2 Milestones of its further development Paradoxically, the independence from France made it easier for French to spread in Tunisia. This was the result of the democratization of education and the push for a bilingual education system by the early postcolonial governments. Although the Tunisian constitution of 1959 declared Arabic the official language of Tunisia, French continued to be used in education and in public administration, except in the case of the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Justice, which were Arabized early on (cf. Hamzaoui 1983). The Tunisian Minister of Education in 1967, Mahmoud Messadi, clearly described the vision that the French-educated political elite had with regard to French, that of a medium for socioeconomic development: ‘French still has an important role to play in some Third World countries. We belong to the developing countries and we need to catch up with industrialized countries. For that we have French, which is both a language of work and culture. For us, it is less about learning a foreign language than to

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use an instrument that will allow us to cross the centuries of delay that keep us apart from the developed world. It will allow us to access modernity’.1

As a result, and as put by Foster: “By 1967 the Tunisians had succeeded in achieving what the French had failed to do, that is to make almost the whole of Tunisian education Francophonic” (cited in Payne 1983, 264). The successful democratization of education in the immediate period after independence saw French proficiency reach its highest level among educated Tunisian citizens. However, calls for Arabization leading to the limitation of the use of French became more successful during the last quarter of the twentieth century. Nonetheless, even today, there continues to be a rupture between elementary and secondary education, where the use of Arabic is much more robust, and tertiary education, where French dominates almost exclusively in areas of health sciences, natural and mathematical sciences, engineering, and technology fields in general. One important development in the attempts to retain the status of French in Tunisia is the hosting of the 2022 congress of the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) in Djerba on the organization’s fiftieth anniversary for the first time in Northern Africa. This is a significant development that signals both the awareness of the need to counter the growing interest in English in the Maghreb (cf. Daoud 2011, 21s.) and the threats that French faces in the region in general, especially since a key player like Algeria is not even a member of the OIF.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation The 2014 Tunisian constitution, a product of the Revolution of 2011, led to the establishment of a democratic system and confirmed Arabic as the only official language of the country. It does not give French, or Berber for that matter, any official status. Nonetheless, the Tunisian Ministry of Education (2017) recognizes French as the first foreign language in the Tunisian educational system and describes the objectives of its teaching as follows:

1 “Le français a encore un rôle important à jouer dans certains pays du tiers monde. Nous appartenons aux pays en voie de développement et nous devons rattraper notre retard sur les pays industrialisés. Pour cela nous disposons du français qui est à la fois une langue de travail et une culture. Pour nous, il s’agit moins d’apprendre une langue étrangère que d’utiliser un instrument qui nous permettra de franchir les siècles de retard qui nous séparent du monde développé. Il nous permettra d’accéder à la modernité” (Messadi 1967, cited in Belazi 1991, 53).

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‘As the first foreign language studied by the Tunisian student, French should contribute to his intellectual, cultural, and scientific training. For the students, it will be an additional means to: – Communicate with others; – Discover other cultures and civilizations and position themselves in relation to them; – Access scientific and technical information’.2

It is worth highlighting that this description by the Ministry of Education does not mention the historical presence of French in the country or the historical and socioeconomic ties with France itself as reasons for choosing French and not English to meet these objectives.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Since Arabic is the only official language of the country, politicians and public authorities use it as their medium of communication. Up to the Revolution of 2011, when all communication by political figures, including the presidents, was rare and often limited to highly formulaic speeches delivered on specific occasions as opposed to regular press conferences, standard Arabic dominated. The first president made some use of French and vernacular Tunisian Arabic (cf. Boussofara-Omar 2006, 63), but it is safe to state that French has not played a meaningful role in Tunisian political life. This changed to some extent following the Revolution (cf. Sayahi 2019, 229), since with the instalment of a democratic system, there has been more room for extemporaneous communication by public figures in the form of interviews and press conferences. The result is an increased use of Tunisian Arabic in the political domain where previously it was more limited. The increase in the use of Tunisian Arabic sometimes carries with it some insertions from French, especially if the discourse delivered is not a scripted text. In the case of scripted texts, even if they are produced in Tunisian Arabic, there are usually no insertions from French, as evidenced by recent speeches by some political figures and written communication by governmental agencies (cf. Sayahi 2019, 231). In the case of language use by public authorities outside the political arena, a difference exists between written and verbal communication. Currently, the majority of written communication occurs in standard Arabic, although some agencies may produce bilingual documents, as is the case with utilities companies. For example the national electric power company, Société Tunisienne de l’Électricité et du Gaz, provides bilingual bills while the national water supply company, Société Nationale d’Exploitation et de Distribution des Eaux, does not. While government-issued personal identification

2 “Étant la première langue étrangère étudiée par l’élève tunisien, le français devra contribuer à sa formation intellectuelle, culturelle et scientifique. Il sera pour l’élève un moyen complémentaire pour: – communiquer avec autrui; – découvrir d’autres civilisations et cultures et se situer par rapport à elles; – accéder à l’information scientifique et technique” (Tunisian Ministry of Education 2017, 3).

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cards are in Arabic only, Tunisian citizens can request a birth certificate in French from their city hall. In written communication, other public authorities, such as police officers and employees in the judicial system, communicate in standard Arabic. Verbal communication between public authorities and Tunisian citizens usually happens in Tunisian Arabic, including in the court system, customs, and the health system. If a policeman stops a motorist for a traffic violation, they will not use French but rather Tunisian Arabic. As is the case with political discourse, the use of Tunisian Arabic can lead to insertions from French especially lone noun insertions, as will be discussed below. While public figures may be able to use French if need be, levels of competence in the language tend to vary significantly, with the majority of lower-ranking civil servants having only a rudimentary proficiency in the language more often limited to understanding the communication but struggling to speak exclusively in French. Nonetheless, a monolingual French speaker in Tunisia would not have major problems communicating with public authorities for basic needs, especially in more urban settings.

3.3 Languages used in education When Tunisian children start their elementary education, instruction is officially in standard Arabic with the purpose of developing literacy in that variety first. Although Tunisian Arabic does not figure formally in the language-in-education policies, it is used for class management and among the students themselves. French is introduced as a second language starting from second grade for a total number of eight hours per week. This stays the same until middle school when French is used as language of instruction for computer science in seventh grade and throughout ninth grade. As students start high school, several more subjects are taught in French before students are separated into different streams. Mathematics, physics, chemistry, life sciences, biology, and technology are all taught in French in tenth grade. At this stage, French is still taught as a subject at the rate of five hours per week, the same number of hours as standard Arabic. Once students are separated into the different streams, those who choose the following tracks continue to use more French as language of instruction than those who follow the humanities track: mathematics, economics and business administration, computer science, experimental sciences, and technical sciences. All sections lead to the specialized national baccalaureate exams that the students take around the age of 18. By that time, the impact of education on competence in French has already started to materialize. Students in science and technology fields have acquired additional competence in French that others have not acquired. At the tertiary education level, French still dominates in the majority of the fields outside the humanities, law, and social sciences. Arabic is used predominantly in fields such as history and Islamic studies, while both French and Arabic are, for example, used in sociology and psychology. But in fields such as computer science,

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engineering, and medicine, French is the only language of instruction, as mentioned above.

3.4 Languages used in the media With regards to print media, there has been a decline in the number of newspapers in general and those published in French in particular. Today two major historical monolingual French publications still continue to appear in print: La Presse de Tunisie, started in 1936, and Le temps, which was started in 1975. Their impact has been limited further with the advent of digital media and multiplatform journalism, especially since the online presence of traditional publications remains rudimentary. Nonetheless, the presence of French in Tunisian media has benefitted somewhat from digital journalism as several media outlets opt to have their websites both in Arabic and French, allowing users to choose in which language to access the site. An example would be the websites of the different radio stations, including the most popular station in Tunisia Mosaique FM. Although these radio stations do not broadcast in French, their websites have a French version and their programming is more open to code-switching between Tunisian Arabic and French. Other news outlets have emerged benefitting from the freedom of the press that was enshrined in the constitution of 2014. These include bilingual news sites such as http://kapitalis.com/ and https://www.leaders.com.tn/, which publish a wide range of materials in French on their websites. Additionally, the presence of media outlets that publish in English in Tunisia has also begun to become noticeable and more competitive. In sum, while the use of French in the print press has declined, as has the print press in general, some new types of media organizations opt to have bilingual websites that sustain the use of French alongside an increasing presence of English-speaking media. With regard to audiovisual media, and looking at government-sponsored media first, it is clear that Arabic is the overwhelmingly dominant language. The state-owned national television company doesn’t broadcast in French, and the national radio company has one station that broadcasts in French, Radio Tunis Chaîne Internationale, with smaller periods of broadcasting in other European languages. None of the private radio stations has programmes exclusively in French. Programming on public television stations and private ones alike is often in Tunisian Arabic except when it is in scripted standard Arabic, as is the case with the news and other similar programmes. When using Tunisian Arabic, speakers may insert French elements, most often in the form of lone nouns (Poplack et al. 2015, 184s.). Although this may give the impression that French is highly present in Tunisian media, in reality, its use beyond single insertions is limited. In advertisement, Tunisian Arabic dominates, although insertions from French are typical and most often consist in nouns or verbs adapted to the structure of Tunisian Arabic. In the 1980s and the early 1990s, the presence of French media reached its peak in Tunisia as French channels were very popular at the time. However, with the increase in

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the open-to-air satellite channels and the appearance of pan-Arab outlets such as Aljazeera and other channels from Arabic-speaking countries, exposure to French media has diminished among the general Tunisian population. Viewership in Tunisia is fragmented among the different programmes produced not only in Tunisian Arabic, other Arabic varieties, and French but also in English. As American programmes dubbed in standard Arabic garner more attention across the Arab world, Tunisians increasingly consume that type of materials whereas the exposure to foreign materials of previous generations was dominated by programmes dubbed in French. One domain where Tunisian Arabic and French seem to enter in intense contact is digital social media. More and more people are writing in Tunisian Arabic, which many times involves switching to French. The use of French in mass media and social media is also increasingly challenged by the overwhelming global dominance of English. Tunisians are showing an increasing use of English due to their consumption of substantial amounts of materials produced in this language that were not easily available to them a few years ago. This is particularly true because the Tunisian youth has shown high rates of access to the internet and frequent use of social media in general (cf. Breuer/ Groshek 2014, 31).

4 Linguistic characteristics As is the case in any situation of second language acquisition, there are features that distinguish learners of French in Tunisia from other speakers of French (Garmadi-Le Cloirec 1977, 87). This reflects the effect of schooling, domains of use, and the influence of Tunisian Arabic as the native language of Tunisians.3 While user patterns of divergence from normative French vary according to individual factors, it is possible to identify some of the most common features that speakers of French in Tunisia exhibit, with the understanding that higher levels of competence, as they correlate with levels of education, may see more limited lexical and morphosyntactic interference from Arabic.

3 This is not to forget that there is a substantial Tunisian diaspora in France and other French-speaking regions where levels of competence are significantly higher, especially if we count the second generation of Tunisians who have native competence in French. Statistics show that in France, there are some 650,000 Tunisians (Kriaa et al. 2013, 10), which represents some 6 % of the entire Tunisian population. The significance of this group resides in the fact that many travel back to Tunisia on a regular basis and hence expose others to native competence in French. In this chapter, however, the focus is on Tunisians who acquire French in Tunisia with no significant residence outside the country.  

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4.1 Pronunciation At the segmental level, a notable difference between Arabic and the Romance languages in general has to do with the limited vowel inventory in Arabic and the absence of the voiced labiodental fricative [v] and the unvoiced bilabial stop [p]. In the case of the latter sounds, given the early exposure of Tunisians to the French language, it is rare to find cases of substitution of [v] with [f] and [p] with [b] by speakers who have some level of schooling. Nonetheless, older loans from French into Tunisian Arabic and loanwords used by uneducated speakers still show these substitutions as in the case of loanwords from French [fi:sta] (< veste ‘jacket’) and [byɛ:sa] (< pièce ‘piece/part’). Regarding the normative French [ʁ], although Arabic has a voiced velar fricative [ɣ], the French voiced uvular fricative still surfaces most often as a tap [ɾ], or even as a trill [r] in some contexts, especially in the speech of males (cf. Dhaouadi 1996, 109; Laroussi 1996, 717; Reutner 2017, 43). French vowels produced by Arabic-dominant speakers are less stable with frequent mid-vowel raising that leads to the production of [ɛ] and [e] as [i] and [ɔ] and [o] as [u] as in médecine [medsin] > [midisi:n] ‘medecine’. In some cases, the glide [ɥ] is realized as [w], leading to the realization, for example, of the word huit ‘eight’ as [wit] instead of [ɥit]. Nasal vowels also can be altered and produced as oral vowels leading to the articulation of the adjacent nasal as in engagé [ɑ̃ɡaʒe] > [onɡɑʒe] ‘comitted’. Issues of liaison, or the realization of latent consonants in word-final position when followed by a vowel or a glide, also show variation in French in Tunisia. There are cases where the non-articulation of these latent final consonants does not produce the resyllabification that is usually expected in normative French. An example can be found in the sentence mes pensées vont à eux ‘my thought go to them’ produced in a public address by the governor of the region of Sousse in which he did not articulate the final [t] in the word vont (Chlioui 2017). Finally, as expected, major variation is observed in the levels of stress and intonation as a result of significantly differing patterns in Tunisian Arabic. For example, while word stress falls on the final syllable in French, in Arabic, it can fall on any of the three final syllables depending on the structure of the syllable (Watson 2011, 2291), allowing for possible influence from Arabic on word stress in French as used in Tunisia and the region in general.

4.2 Morphosyntax Few studies have addressed grammatical features of French as it is used in Tunisia (cf. Garmadi 1966; Maume 1973; Garmadi-Le Cloirec 1974; Naffati 2004). The majority of the recent studies focus on error analysis in learner language, especially in the case of university students (cf. Mahjoub 2007; Mouhli 2007; Kalai 2011; 2019). In general terms, French in Tunisia shows influence from the native dialect of Arabic but also vernacular features that are common in Metropolitan French.

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In her study, Garmadi-Le Cloirec (1977, 90) showed that there is a reduction in the expression of French mood, shown in a higher use of coordinated as opposed to subordinate clauses as a strategy to avoid the subjunctive and the conditional. She offered the following examples: Je demande à Dieu il me donne des enfants ‘I ask God to give me children’ (lit. ‘I ask God he gives me children’) and Elle est sortie de l’école elle sait parler le français ‘When she left school, she knew how to speak French’ (lit. ‘She left school she knows how to speak French’). Garmadi-Le Cloirec (1977, 89) also identifies higher usage of the imperative mood, while Laroussi (1996, 717) notes variation in the expression of French tense by dominant Arabic speakers. Additional examples of what might be better considered lower levels of attainment in French in Tunisia, as opposed to the formation of a stable local variety, include several common errors. These include issues with the use of the copula verb, as Arabic doesn’t have a copula as such, auxiliary selection with intransitive verbs, and deletion and confusion of some prepositions, as in the case of de vs du or pour vs à. Finally, another possible source of error is the confusion of gender since Arabic and French both have grammatical gender, but many words receive a different gender in each language. Learners also show differences in the use of some variable features present in vernacular French such as the sociopragmatic constraints on the use of vous vs tu, topicalization of subject pronouns, ne deletion, and the increase in the analytical future as opposed to the morphological one.

4.3 Lexicon With regards to the lexicon, a few items found in Maghrebi French in general that relate to the local culture have entered general French. These include terms such as baraka ‘blessing’, bled ‘village’, and fellaga ‘rebel’. In French as used in Tunisia, we find local cultural items in written form and digital communication freely inserted from Arabic while fitting into French structure, but which are usually meant for a Tunisian audience. As expected, the majority of borrowings from Arabic into French in Tunisia are nouns with cultural reference, including words such as jebba ‘traditional costume’ and machmoum ‘small jasmine bouquet’. Some local usages, such as taxiste ‘taxi driver’, louagiste ‘longdistance taxi driver’, and kiosque ‘gas station’, are not found in general French (cf. Sayahi 2014, 196; Naffati 2004, 92). An interesting fact is the use of the Arabic and/or the French plural in some borrowings from Arabic into French. In some cases, the Arabic plural is maintained, (d)jîn > (d) jenoun ‘djinn’, in other cases the French plural is applied, chaouch > chaouchs ‘receptionist’, and in other cases, there can be hybrid plurals, ksar > ksours ‘palace’ (cf. Naffati 2004, 239). In addition, changes in transcribing these loanwords sometimes lead to morphophonological adaptation and the disappearance of the Arabic sounds that are not present in French such as the voiced pharyngeal fricative: omda [ʕumda] ‘local administrator’. Once a Tunisian Arabic word is used in French, other words can be derived. Naf-

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fati (2004, 240) provides 47 cases of derivations from an Arabic noun that include examples such as harqous ‘a temporary tattoo’ > harqousser ‘to make a temporary tattoo’. Finally, it is common for users of French in Tunisia to employ local abbreviations and acronyms that are not recognizable outside the country, such as names of government agencies and utilities companies including SONEDE (Société Nationale d’Exploitation et de Distribution des Eaux), STEG (Société Tunisienne de l’Électricité et du Gaz), and CNAM (Caisse Nationale d’Assurance Maladie).

5 Internal language policy The fact that French is not nativized and only acquired as a second language through formal instruction makes issues of purism closely associated with a positive attitude towards features of normative French as projected through school and French mass media. Community members that monitor the use of French often limit their comments on what constitutes a ‘pure’ variety of French to the use of the voiced uvular fricative and the absence of grammatical errors. More interesting with regard to the use of French in Tunisia is the perception that Tunisian Arabic is intertwined with French leading to a perceived generalized state of semi-illiteracy where younger generations are often described as unable to speak neither Arabic nor French. In reality, the fact that standard Arabic is usually a marked code for natural conversation in Tunisia and the lack of standardization of Tunisian Arabic allow for a wide range of contact phenomena that are typical of bilingual communities, including frequent code-switching and borrowing between French and Tunisian Arabic (cf. Sayahi 2011; 2014; 2019). Code-switching behaviour and borrowing have often led to negative attitudes in some sectors of bilingual communities and in the Tunisian case it takes a similar shape. Those who code-switch more often are accused of being pro-French and pro‑France, while those who show faulty use of French are accused of being unprofessional and utterly incompetent. Either way, higher levels of competence in French are still highly valued in Tunisia and go hand in hand with socioeconomic mobility given the robust presence of French in higher education. Among the younger generations, code-switching itself is a very common behaviour and is often accepted and even expected by the educated sectors of the population. In fact, ideologies of linguistic purity in Tunisia are much more concerned with standard Arabic than French.

References Alberti Russell, Janice (1977), The Italian community in Tunisia, 1861–1961: a viable minority, New York, Columbia University, Doctoral Thesis. Bahri, Soubeika (2019), Semiotic and Discursive Displays of Tamazight Identity on Facebook: A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Revitalization Efforts in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia, New York, City University, Doctoral Thesis.

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Belazi, Hedi Mohammad (1991), Multilingualism in Tunisia and French/Arabic code switching among educated Tunisian bilinguals, Ithaca, Cornell University, Doctoral Thesis. Boussofara-Omar, Naima (2006), Neither third language nor middle varieties but Arabic diglossic switching, Zeitschrift für arabische Linguistik 45, 55–80. Breuer, Anita/Groshek, Jacob (2014), Online media and offline empowerment in post-rebellion Tunisia: An analysis of Internet use during democratic transition, Journal of Information Technology & Politics 11/1, 25–44. Chlioui, Adel (2017), Le gouverneur de sousse, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ty7wtgdVRNM (2/3/2023). Daoud, Mohamed (2011), The sociolinguistic situation in Tunisia. Language rivalry or accommodation?, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 211, 9–33. Dhaouadi, Mohmoud (1996), Un essai de théorisation sur le penchant vers l’accent parisien chez la femme tunisienne, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 122, 107–126. Gabsi, Zouhir (2003), An outline of the Shilha (Berber) vernacular of Douiret (Southern Tunisia), Sydney, University of Western Sydney, Doctoral Thesis. Gabsi, Zouhir (2011), Attrition and maintenance of the Berber language in Tunisia, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 211, 135–164. Garmadi, Salah (1966), Quelques faits de contact linguistique franco-arabe en Tunisie, Revue Tunisienne des Sciences Sociales 8, 23–56. Garmadi-Le Cloirec, Juliette (1974), Le Français parlé en Tunisie: description synchronique de la phonologie et de la syntaxe du français parlé par les arabophones tunisiens de classe sociale moyenne, Paris, Université de Paris V, Doctoral Thesis. Garmadi-Le Cloirec, Juliette (1977), Remarques sur la syntaxe du français de Tunisie, Langue française 35, 86–91. Hamzaoui, Rachad (1983), L’arabisation au Ministère de l’Intérieur: la Brigade de la Circulation de la Garde Nationale, in: Richard M. Payne (ed.), Language in Tunisia, Tunis, Bourguiba Institute of Modern Languages, 211–260. Kalai, Lassaad (2011), L’erreur orthographique dans les productions écrites des élèves tunisiens: origine du dysfonctionnement et contribution à la maîtrise de la compétence orthographique, Paris, Université Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris 3, Doctoral Thesis. Kalai, Lassaad (2019), Contextualisation de l’enseignement de la grammaire française en Tunisie: Enjeux et limites, Paris, L’Harmattan. Kriaa, Mohamed, et al. (2013), Migration de travail en Tunisie: une lecture de la décennie 2002–2012, Tunis, République Tunisienne, https://perma.cc/FW5H-F8U7 (2/3/2023). Laroussi, Foued (1996), Le Français en Tunisie aujourd’hui, in: Didier de Robillard/Michel Beniamino/Claudine Bavoux (edd.), Le français dans l’espace francophone: description linguistique et sociolinguistique de la francophonie, vol. 2, Paris, Champion, 705–721. Mahjoub, Hamida (2007), Les capacités discursives, orales et écrites, en français langue de spécialité: le cas d’étudiants tunisiens dans les filières scientifiques, Lyon, Université Lumière Lyon 2, Doctoral Thesis. Manzano, Francis (2011), Le Français en Tunisie, enracinement, forces et fragilités systémiques: rappels historiques, sociolinguistiques et brefs éléments de prospective, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 211, 53–81. Maume, Jean-Louis (1973), L’apprentissage du français chez les Arabophones maghrébins (diglossie et plurilinguisme en Tunisie), Langue française 19, 90–107. Mouhli, Inès (2007), Formation universitaire et compétences scripturales: le cas d’étudiants littéraires tunisiens en première année français d’enseignement supérieur, Lyon, Université Lumière Lyon 2, Doctoral Thesis. Naffati, Habiba (2004), Le français en Tunisie: Étude sociolinguistique et lexicale, Lille, Atelier National de Reproductions des Thèses. Payne, Richard M. (1983), Language planning in Tunisia, in: Richard M. Payne (ed.), Language in Tunisia, Tunis, Bourguiba Institute of Modern Languages, 261–271.

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Poplack, Shana, et al. (2015), An exception to the rule? Lone French nouns in Tunisian Arabic, Penn Working Papers in Linguistics 21/2, 178–186. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Sayahi, Lotfi (2011), Code-switching and language change in Tunisia, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 211, 113–133. Sayahi, Lotfi (2014), Diglossia and Language Contact. Language Variation and Change in North Africa, Cambridge/ New York, Cambridge University Press. Sayahi, Lotfi (2015), A moving target: Literacy development in situations of diglossia and bilingualism, Arab Journal of Applied Linguistics 1/1, 1–15. Sayahi, Lotfi (2019), Diglossia and the normalization of the vernacular. Focus on Tunisia, in: Enam Al-Wer/Uri Horesh (edd.), The Routledge Handbook of Arabic Sociolinguistics, London, Routledge, 227–240. Selbach, Rachel (2008), The superstrate is not always the lexifier. Lingua Franca in the Barbary Coast 1530–1830, in: Susanne Michaelis (ed.), Creole Structures between Substrate and Superstrates, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 29–58. Trabelsi, Chedia (1991), De quelques aspects du langage des femmes de Tunis, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 87, 87–98. Tunisian Ministry of Education (2017), Programme de Français, Tunis, République Tunisienne, https://perma.cc/ RX27-VRJZ (2/3/2023). UNESCO Institute for Statistics (2019), Education in Africa, Montreal, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, http://uis.unesco.org/en/topic/education-africa (2/3/2023). Vermeren, Pierre (2002), École, élite et pouvoir: au Maroc et en Tunisie au XXe siècle, Rabat, Alizés. Walters, Keith (2011), Gendering French in Tunisia: Language ideologies and nationalism, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 211, 83–112. Watson, Janet (2011), Word Stress in Arabic, in: Marc Oostendorp et al. (edd.), The Blackwell Companion to Phonology, Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2290–3018.

Lutz Edzard

5 Libya Abstract: This chapter summarizes the information available about the (former) sociolinguistic setting of Italian in Libya in the context of the former Italian colonization of Libya and its aftermath. Hardly any information is available about specific linguistic features of the language of Italian expatriates or the Italian formerly spoken by native Arab speakers in Libya. However, Italian continues to play a strong role in the LibyanArabic lexicon (in realms such as cuisine, household items, mechanics, sports, and fashion), and interesting phonological phenomena can be observed in this context. Keywords: Libya, Arabic, Italian, loanwords, phonological adaptation

1 Sociolinguistic situation Geographical distribution of languages – Libya, currently (2023) under heavy turmoil, still belongs to the 22 members of the League of Arab States. The Semitic language Arabic is the only official language of the country. According to Pereira (2008, 56), about 14 % of the Libyan population, located in the Tripolitania and various oasis pockets, is still Berberophone (next to Semitic, another branch of Afro-Asiatic). Relevant Berber languages attested in Libya are Nafusi (spoken by ca. 220,000 speakers in the mountains of the same designation in western Libya), Ghadames (spoken by ca. 10,000 speakers in the oasis of the same designation), and Tamasheq, a variety of Tuareg (spoken by ca. 17,000 speakers, partially nomads). Toubou or Tubu, a Nilo-Saharan language (unrelated to Afro-Asiatic), especially its subgroup Teda(ga), is spoken by ca. 580,000 speakers in the South-East of Libya. Italian as a colonial language was essentially limited to the northern coast. Social distribution of languages – Today, Arabic is the only language with official status. As in the Arab world in general, there is diglossia (or better: polyglossia) in the Fergusonian sense, that is the parallel use of Modern Standard Arabic for written or formal oral use, and local dialects for informal everyday use. There is no official talk about “minority languages”, but the Berber and Nilo-Saharan speakers can be assumed to have a lower status in society. Italian, if at all, is only spoken (or mastered) by members of the oldest generation. It also plays a residual role in commerce, alongside the more dominant English and French.  

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2 Linguistic history From ancient times to modernity – For the ancient Greeks and Romans, the term Libya generally referred to the north African territory west of Egypt. Historically, Libyans can be considered ancestors of (part of) the Berbers. (Libyco‑)Berber counts as one of the six branches of Afro-Asiatic. Together with Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, and Jews, they made up the population of what today constitutes Libya. The Punic-speaking Phoenicians established a coastal empire in Northern Africa, extending also to the Tripolitania. The Arabization of Northern Africa in general and (modern) Libya in particular happened in two stages, in the seventh and eleventh century AD. Two dominant groups in this context, which penetrated the Cyrenaica and the Tripolitania, were the tribes of the Banū Hilāl and the Banū Sulaym (cf. Pereira 2008, 52s.). Northern Africa is characterized by a long history of language contact between Afro-Asiatic (mainly Semitic and Berber) and Indo-European (mainly Romance). This circumstance is also reflected in literary history. In the play Poenulus by Plautus (mainly verses 930–949, cf. Sznycer 1967, 11), a Punic slave utters a few words in his language, incidentally also an early voweled (vocalized) testimony of an otherwise unvoweled (Semitic) language. In the Tripolitania, corresponding to modern Libya, one has found Phoenician-Punic inscriptions in Latin script (cf. Levi della Vida 1963). The High Middle Ages witnessed a high degree of Italian-Arabic language contact that led to certain lexical traits in the language of chancellery, e. g. in the Venetian dialect (cf., e. g., Wansbrough 1996, 77s.). Maltese developed to a full-fledged mixed language made up of Romance (mainly Italian) and Arabic vocabulary and morpho-syntax (cf., e. g., Kontzi 1998). Modern Italian, both the standard language and (especially) the southern dialects, features a fair amount of Arabic loanwords (cf. Pellegrini 1972; Cifoletti 2007a; 2007b). Siebetcheu Youmbi (2009; 2011) provides statistical and sociolinguistic information about Italian in the African context. For a broader perspective concerning mutual linguistic contact between African and European, especially Romance languages, see for example Bal (1998), Edzard (2003a; 2003b), and Edzard (2011). Larcher (2001) provides a linguistic history specifically of Libya. Establishment of Italian – Italy started its attempt to colonize Libya in 1886, dogmatically even with references to the time of the Roman Empire. There even was a ministry of “Africa Italiana” established to oversee Italy’s interests and activities both in Libya and in what today constitutes Eritrea and Ethiopia. Milestones of its further development – In 1911, at the outset of the Italian-Turkish war, Italy colonialized the Tripolitania and the Cyrenaica in several stages until 1931 (cf. Miège 1968, 401ss.; Segrè 1974; Ahmida 1994). A unified colony (Libia Italiana, Lībīyā alʾĪṭālīya in Arabic), the “Italian fourth shore”, was proclaimed by governor Italo Balbo in 1934. In the course of the fascistization (fascistizzazione), Mussolini proclaimed the United Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana) in 1936, consisting of Italian Somaliland, Italian Eritrea, and the newly occupied Ethiopia. In 1940, around 110,000 Italian settlers lived in Libya, making up about 12 % of the local population at this point in history (cf.  

 

 

 

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Harris 1986, 7s.). In 1943, the Italian troops were pushed out of Italy, and in 1947, article 23 of the peace treaty between Italy and the Allied Forces confirmed the loss (or better: liberation) of all Italian colonies in Africa. Later, in 1970, one year after the Libyan revolution, Libyan chief of state Muammar al-Qaddafi had all the remaining Romance-speaking inhabitants, who had not adopted Libyan citizenship, expelled. In the early 2000s, a few hundred Italians were readmitted to Libya. In 2006, the Italian embassy in Libya estimated that there were about 1,000 Italians (original Libyan Italians) in Libya. The extant number of people with mixed Italian-Libyan descent has been estimated at about 10,000. In 2009, Muammar al-Qaddafi and Silvio Berlusconi concluded an economic cooperation treaty. When the National Transitional Council took over power in 2011, some more Libyan Italians were allowed to resettle in Libya (mostly elderly people in Tripoli and Benghazi). There still exists an Italian Association of Repatriates from Libya (Associazione Italiani Rimpatriati dalla Libia). As of this writing (2023), the future of this community may be in limbo due to political circumstances. Beyond Libya, about 40,000 emigrated or dispatched Italians resided in neighbouring Egypt until the Suez Crisis of 1956/ 1957 (Hull 1985, 243). Likewise, Tunis had a small Italian community, alongside the French community.

3 External language policy Legislation – In the timespan from 1931 up to 1945, Italy, step by step, tried to impose the Italian language as an administrative language. In 1939, the united Cyrenaica, Tripolitania, and Fezzan attained the status of an Italian province. The Libyan Constitution of 1951 does not explicitly mention the issue of official languages. However, article 11 states that “Libyans shall be equal before the law […], without distinction of religion, belief, race, languages, wealth, kinship, or political or social opinions” (C-LY 1951, art. 11). The Green Book (in Arabic al-Kitāb al-ʾaḫḍar), published by Muammar al-Qaddafi, which replaced the Constitution of 1951 in 1975, called for a common language for humankind, without any reference to specific languages (C-LY 1975, 102). Finally, article 1 of the new Constitution of 2011 does not mention Italian and only states the following: “Libya shall be an independent democratic state in which the people shall be the source of all powers. Its capital shall be Tripoli, Islam shall be its religion, and Islamic Shariʿa shall be the main source of legislation. The State shall guarantee for non-Muslims the freedom to practise their religious rituals. Arabic shall be the official language, while the linguistic and cultural rights of the Amazigh, the Toubous, the Touareg, and the other components of the Libyan society shall be guaranteed” (C-LY 2011, art. 1).

Languages used by public authorities – After the period of Italian colonization, Arabic has been the only language used by authorities. In the case of Libya, this also holds true for most diplomatic documents. Still, one finds also Italian technical terms within the Arabic context, e. g. prefettura or strada litoranea (a coastal road from Tunis to eastern  

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Libya) with its adjacent case cantoniere. Italian influence thus was restricted to loan words (see below) and toponyms (cf. notably Nallino 1915). Languages used in education – During the colonization, schooling in Italian only reached a minority of children. Ever since, the strict policy of Arabization has greatly reduced illiteracy in the country. From 1984 until 1994, foreign languages were not taught at all in the Libyan school system. Foreign language courses in the university system continued, however. According to Pereira (2007, 93), who cites a Libyan national report, there were 2,814 Libyan teachers in Libyan universities as compared to 2,714 foreign teachers in 2001. Languages used in the media – Italy never pursued a dedicated language policy comparable to French Francophonie. Still, Libyan newspapers published in Italian are found early on. The first one was L’eco della stampa, founded in 1892, the second one Il giornale di Tripoli, founded in 1910. Later the colonial administration abolished these newspapers and replaced them with two new bilingual ones: Barīd Ṭarābulus ‘The Tripoli Post’ and Nuova Italia (cf. D’Anna 2018, 172). At present, no Italian media operate in Libya.

4 Linguistic characteristics The purpose of this contribution is not to propagate any clichés regarding the linguistic competence of the native Libyan population. Rather, the mechanisms of language contact deserve proper investigation (cf. Thomason/Kaufman 1988). As of now, no description of (Libyan) Arabic in Italian is available (inquiries of my own; D’Anna 2018, 174; personal communication; Siebetcheu Youmbi 2009; 2011; personal communication). Some phonological features of Italian loanwords in Libyan Arabic may point to southern (Sicilian) Italian dialects as linguistic input. But no evidence either of an expatriate Italian used by Italian settlers and immigrants and influenced by Arabic vocabulary or of a possible substandard Italian used by Libyans themselves (comparable to the former “mixed” Italian in Ethiopia described by Marcos 1976) is accessible. The main sources for the traces of Italian in (Libyan) Arabic treated in the following chapters are the publications on Italian loanwords by Rossi (1935) and Abdu (1988), supplemented by additional data, e. g., in Yoda (2005). The Libyan varieties of Arabic have been studied by Cesàro (1939), Curotti (1933), Panetta (1943), as well as in several publications by Pereira and others. The following description, which mainly focuses on the Tripoli area, greatly depends on Pereira (2009; 2010), and especially D’Anna (2018).  

4.1 Pronunciation The synchronic phoneme inventory of Libyan Arabic contains some phonemes not found in standard Arabic but found (mostly via loanwords) in the Libyan variety, notably č /tʃ/, /g/, and /v/. As D’Anna (2018, 175) notes, ǧ /dʒ/ poses a problem, as this standard

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Arabic phoneme indeed corresponds to Italian /dʒ/ but is realized as ž [ʒ] in Libya, thus creating possible confusion. Other Italian phonemes not found in either standard or Libyan Arabic are /p/, the affricates /ts/ and /dz/, as well as the palatal lateral approximant /ʎ/ and the palatal nasal /ɲ/. Conversely, Italian phonemes, even when present as such in Arabic, are often represented by other phonemes, notably velarized (“emphatic”) ones. Plosives – The phoneme /p/ supposedly poses problems to Arabs, but in the Libyan dialect, a differentiated picture emerges. Mostly, /p/ indeed winds up as [b], as in maršabēdi [marʃabeːdi] ‘pavement’ (< It. marciapiede). But in other cases, one also finds a variegated pronunciation, e. g., in the case of sbageṭi ~ spageṭi [sbɑːɡeːtˤi] ~ [spɑːɡeːtˤi] ‘spaghetti’ (< It. spaghetti). In cases where only [p] is found, e. g. spīritu ‘spirit, alcohol’ (< It. spirito), D’Anna (2018, 175) assumes only written (as opposed to oral) transmission of the respective lexical item. Fricatives – The situation is more complex in the case of the Italian voiced fricative /v/. In intervocalic position, it is often devoiced, e. g., kašafita [kaʃafiːta] ‘screwdriver’ (< It. cacciavite). In other cases, the Arabic bilabial glide prevails over the Italian /v/, e. g., in ṭawla [tˤawla] ‘table’ (< It. tavola) or lawāžu [lawaːʒu] ‘car washing’ (< It. lavaggio). In yet other cases, often in the vicinity of the trill /r/, the /v/ is despirantized and realized as [b], e. g., in kūrba [kuːrba] ‘curve’ (< It. curva) or bābūr [baːbuːr] ‘steamship, kerosene stove’ (< It. vapore). D’Anna (2018, 176) points out, though, that the latter phenomenon may also be attributed to dialectal forms of southern Sicily, as spoken by part of the Italian settlers and immigrants, which present the same transition. In a majority of cases, though, the Italian /v/ seems to be preserved, e. g., in lavandinu [lavandiːnu] ‘sink’ (< It. lavandino). Affricates – The realization of the four Italian affricates /ts/, /dz/, /tʃ/, and /dʒ/ is somewhat erratic. While /ts/ can be simplified to [s] and [sˤ], /tʃ/ can yield [ʃ], [ʒ], or [s]. In case of gemination of the affricates, chances of preservation in Libyan Arabic somewhat increase (cf. D’Anna 2018, 177). The phonemes /dz/ and /dʒ/ are usually simplified to [z] and [ʒ], respectively. This reflects the situation in Libyan Arabic, where /zōʒ/ (standard Arabic zawʤ) yields [zōz] ‘two’ (properly “pair”) and /ʒəns/ (standard Arabic ʤins) yields [zəns] ‘species, kind’ (cf. Pereira 2009, 549). Laterals and Nasals – According to D’Anna (2018, 178), the two palatal phonemes in Italian, the palatal lateral approximant /ʎ/ and the palatal nasal /ɲ/ are dissimilated into sequences of [lj] and [nj], respectively. Thus, one winds up with, e. g., būtīlya [buːtiːlya] ‘bottle’ (< It. bottiglia) and lazānya [lazaːnya] ‘lasagna’ (< It. lasagna). Pharyngealized consonants – As stated above, (Libyan) Arabic also features consonantal phonemes not found in Italian. Interestingly, in the vicinity of low vowels, Italian /t/ and /s/ often are represented by the pharyngealized consonants [tˤ] and [sˤ], respectively, e. g. (< It. tavola), cited already above, or rizoṭu [rizoːtˤu] ‘risotto’ (< It. risotto). Vowel length – In contrast to (Libyan) Arabic, vowel length is not phonemic in Italian. Stressed Italian vowels are usually rendered by long vowels in (Libyan) Arabic, even before tri-consonantal clusters, e. g., nāstru [naːstru] ‘ribbon’ (< It. nastro, cf. D’Anna  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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2018, 180). The situation is more complicated, or else, free distribution prevails when it comes to unstressed short vowels. Next to samēnsa [sameːnsa] ‘roasted seeds’ (< It. semenza) one encounters žirdīna [ʒirdiːna] ‘garden’ (< It. giardino). Vowel harmony also appears to play a role, e. g., in markānti [markaːnti] ‘merchant’ (< It. mercante). Phonological processes – Assimilation and dissimilation can be observed as well. Consonantal assimilation occurs in cases such as kāčču [kɑːttʃu] ‘kick’ (< It. calcio) or kubbāniyya [kubbaːniːja] ‘company’ (< It. compagna). Dissimilation obtains in cases such as birmēstu [birmeːstu] ‘permission’ (< It. permesso). An obligatory contour principle (OCP) effect holds in cases, where two times /r/ or /l/ appear in subsequent syllables in an Italian word; such sequences are disallowed and hence get dissimilated in Libyan Arabic. Thus, one arrives at skarbēllu [skarbeːlu] ‘chisel’, with dissimilation of the first /l/ in Italian scalpello or rigōli [rigoːli] ‘penalty kick’, with dissimilation of the second /r/ in Italian rigore (cf. D’Anna 2018, 181s.).  

4.2 Morphology Reanalysis – As can be observed in Arabic borrowings from other languages in general, an initial al or even a mere initial l in the foreign languages tends to be re-analysed as the Arabic definite article al‑ (with allomorphs, the l of the definite article assimilates to following alveolar consonants) and thus to be dropped (“deglutinized”). The classical case is ʾIskandar ‘Alexander’, which points to an Arabic re-analysis of Alexander as al-ʾIskandar (the metathesis ks → sk is irrelevant here). In this context, D’Anna (2018, 182) cites relevant cases such as bērgu [beːrgu] ‘hotel’ (< It. albergo) or ʾastēk [ʔasteːk] ‘elastic’ (< It. elastico). An example featuring an initial alveolar consonant is takku [takːu] ‘attack’ (< It. attacco), as if attacco were assimilated from a hypothetic al-tacco. By sheer analogy, loanwords such as fīšu [fiːʃu] ‘office’ (< It. ufficio) or even farīnza [fariːnza] ‘difference’ (< It. differenza) can be accounted for in this way. In the latter case, one assumes a re-analysis of the initial di as the Italian genitive marker di ‘of’ (D’Anna 2018, 183). Analogical transfer – Both Arabic and Italian share the tendency to mark the feminine gender with a word-final ‑a. D’Anna (2018, 183) plausibly assumes that Libyan Arabic nouns such as martēlla [marteːlːa] ‘hammer’ (< It. martello) and mullīna ‘mill’ (< It. mulino), where no phonological reason exists for changing final ‑o to final ‑a, can be explained by analogical transfer of the final ‑a in the standard Arabic lexemes miṭraqa and ṭāḥūna for ‘hammer’ and ‘mill’, respectively. These words are feminine in Arabic, as opposed to Italian martello and mulino, which both are masculine. In other cases, the homophonous Arabic noun-of-unity ending ‑a may be assumed to have interfered, e. g., in bzella [bzelːa] ‘pea’ (< It. pisello). Impact of Arabic-Semitic noun patterns – Equally noteworthy is the impact of Arabic-Semitic noun patterns, typically based on three consonants (“radicals”), on the realization of Italian loanwords in Libyan Arabic. An example is the noun pattern //C1aC2C2āC3a//, which typically denotes tools or female professionals. The circumstance that the  

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Italian word baracca ‘hut, shed’ winds up as barrāka [barːaːka] in Libyan Arabic then derives from the association with the mentioned noun pattern //C1aC2C2āC3a//: the consonants b, r, and k are mapped onto the consonantal slots C1, C2, and C3 of this pattern, respectively. Another example is provided by Libyan Arabic māṭūṛ [maːtˤuːrˤ] ‘motor’ (< It. motore), which is accounted for by the mapping of the three consonants m, t, and r onto the consonantal slots C1, C2, and C3 of the pattern //C1āC2ūC3//, respectively. Finally, this being a common Semitic phenomenon, Libyan Arabic also aligns Italian nouns and verbs with tri-consonantal Arabic verbal patterns. Examples include Libyan Arabic firəm ‘he signed’ (the third person singular masculine being the citation form in Semitic, comparable to the infinitive in other language areas), where the three consonants f, r, and m are extracted from either the Italian verb firmare ‘to sign’ or the noun firma ‘signature’, and mapped onto the three consonantal slots of the verbal pattern //C1iC2əC3//, thus yielding Libyan Arabic firəm. Incidentally, exactly the same happened in the other African area, where Italy had colonial ambitions, to wit Ethiopia and Eritrea. In Amharic, the official language of Ethiopia, the verb ‘to sign’ is färrämä, based on a verbal pattern //C1äC2C2äC3ä// (cf. Edzard 2003a, 971). Another interesting example is the participial Libyan Arabic form mfaryiz ‘out of order’, which is based on the extraction of the four consonants and glides f, r, y, and z out of Italian fuori uso ‘out of order’, and their mapping onto the quadri-literal participial pattern //m C1aC2C3iC4// (cf. D’Anna 2018, 184).

4.3 Lexicon Based on the studies by Abdu (1988) and others, the overall number of Italian loanwords in Libyan Arabic is estimated at about 700 lexical items. As can be inferred from the previous sections, such Italian loanwords are attested largely, but not exclusively, in the realms of food and technical jargon. Culinary examples, in addition to the already mentioned ones, are sardīna [sardiːna] ‘sardine’ (< It. sardina), ʾanšūga [anʃuːɡa] ‘anchovy’ (< It. acciuga), ʾangvīla [aŋviːla] ‘eel’ (< It. anguilla), lūbbu [luːbbu] ‘sea bass’ (< It. lupo), and mārlūtsu [maːrluːtsu] ‘cod’ (< It. merluzzo). Technical and household terms include lemmata such as kančēlo [kanʧeːlo] ‘iron gate’ (< It. cancello), (ʾu)ṭānṭa [(u)tˤɑːntˤɑ] ‘truck [a certain Italian model]’ (< It. ottanta ‘eighty’), simāforo [simaːforo] ‘traffic lights’ (< It. semaforo), dōmāni [doːmaːni] ‘steering wheel’ (< It. due mani ‘two hands’), stārsu [staːrsu] ‘steering wheel’ (< It. sterzo), frēnomāno [freːnomaːno] ‘hand brake’ (< It. freno a mano), and ṭasa [tˤasa] ‘cup’ (< It. tazza, examples taken from Pereira 2007, 90). In sports, notably soccer, Italian-based terms figure as well, e. g., kāčču [kɑːttʃu] ‘kick’ (< It. calcio) or tēsta [teːsta] ‘hit with the forehead’ (< It. testa ‘head’). Another relevant semantic realm is fashion, where one encounters, e. g., ǧibōto [ʤiboːto] ‘jacket’ (< It. giubotto).  

 

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Pereira, Christophe (2007), Urbanization and dialect change: the Arabic dialect of Tripoli, in: Catherine Miller et al. (edd.), Arabic in the City. Issues in dialect contact and language variation, London, Routledge, 77–96. Pereira, Christophe (2008), Libya, in: Kees Versteegh (ed.), Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics, vol. 3, Leiden, Brill, 52–58. Pereira, Christophe (2009), Tripoli Arabic, in: Kees Versteegh (ed.), Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics, vol. 4, Leiden, Brill, 548–556. Pereira, Christophe (2010), Le Parler arabe de Tripoli (Libye), Zaragoza, Istituto de Estudios Islámicos y del Oriente Próximo. Rossi, Ettore (1935), Vocaboli stranieri nel dialetto arabo della città di Tripoli, in: Bruno Migliorini/Vittore Pisani (edd.), Atti del III Congresso Internazionale dei Linguisti, Roma, 19–26 settembre 1933–XI, Firenze, Le Monnier, 186–193. Segrè, Claudio G. (1974), Fourth Shore. The Italian Colonization of Libya, Chicago/London, University of Chicago Press. Siebetcheu Youmbi, Raymond (2009), La diffusione dell’italiano in Africa: prospettive di ricerca, Studi italiani di linguistica teorica e applicata 38, 147–191. Siebetcheu Youmbi, Raymond (2011), Africa, in: Massimo Vedovelli (ed.), Storia linguistica dell’emigrazione italiana nel mondo, Rome, Carocci, 477–510. Sznycer, Maurice (1967), Les passages puniques en transcription latine dans le “Poenulus” de Plaute, Paris, Klincksieck. Thomason, Sarah Grey/Kaufman, Terrence (1988), Language Contact, Creolization, and Genetic Linguistics, Berkeley, University of California Press. Wansbrough, John (1996), Lingua Franca in the Mediterranean, Richmond, Curzon. Yoda, Sumikazu (2005), The Arabic Dialect of the Jews of Tripoli (Libya), Grammar, Text and Glossary, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz.

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6 Portugal: Madeira Abstract: The spoken varieties of Portuguese in the archipelago of Madeira form part of the group of Insular Dialects of European Portuguese and may be classified as settler or transported varieties. This chapter describes the complex sociolinguistic characterization of this Portuguese archipelago, with special attention to the educated variety of Madeiran Portuguese. It presents an overview of the historical context of the settlement of Madeira, and it outlines the contemporary political situation taking account of diverse, interdisciplinary perspectives. The chapter discusses usage and attitudes towards specific linguistic phenomena with illustrative examples. Linguistic and cultural contacts, the peripheral location of the archipelago relative to Europe, internal isolation over a long period, and the natural vulnerability of the islands have all contributed to the construction of a regional identity and, through the Madeiran elite, to the recognition of that identity within the rest of Portugal and Europe. In all, the chapter seeks to contribute to a deeper, more systematic, and up-to-date understanding of the linguistic situation of Madeiran Portuguese. Keywords: settler variety, island dialect, sociolinguistics, language history, European Portuguese

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geography and population The archipelago of Madeira is comprised of the inhabited islands of Madeira (740.2 km2) and Porto Santo (42.5 km2), the uninhabited Ilhas Desertas ‘(lit.) deserted islands’ (14.2 km2) and Ilhas Selvagens ‘(lit.) wild islands’ (3.6 km2), and a group of sixteen islets. It is situated south-west of Portugal and around 700 km from the African coast in the North Atlantic. The largest island, Madeira, is volcanically formed. In geomorphological terms, it is marked by sharp relief and a very high peak. There are steep cliffs and ravines along the north-facing hillsides. On the southern and south-eastern slopes, the relief is less accentuated, with areas commonly known as calhau ‘(lit.) pebble (beaches)’ used as wharves and ports. This archipelago is dominated by one island (Madeira), characterized by a hypo-insularity, within the typology proposed by Taglioni (2011). It is politically autonomous, although it is not an independent state; the dominance of the main island affects all matters relating to the territory, economics, social life, and more. Eleven municipal councils make up the archipelago. Ten are located on the island of Madeira (Santana, Machico, Santa Cruz, Funchal, Câmara de Lobos, Ribeira Brava, Ponta do Sol, Calheta, Porto Moniz, and São Vicente). The eleventh is the island of Porto Santo. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-006

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The south-facing capital city of Funchal is located on Madeira island. From the time of its initial settlement around 1420, this spacious port city was used extensively during the period of Portuguese territorial expansion in Northern Africa, both for exploratory travel and for the provision of cereals to the African market. The economic cycles of sugar and wine production that followed turned Funchal into an important outpost for commerce and supply, and the city attracted an increasing number of ships and merchants from diverse places, and particularly British traders. Official data from 2018 records the population of the archipelago at 254,157 inhabitants (2.5 % of the total population of Portugal). Around 70 % of that population (182,605 inhabitants) were residing in three councils: Funchal, Câmara de Lobos, and Santa Cruz, which are all located in the south of Madeira island. The remaining population of the archipelago (71,340 individuals) was distributed across the other eight councils, each having a much smaller number of inhabitants. Data on population density confirms the asymmetry of population distribution: there are 1367 inhabitants/km2 in Funchal, 646.6 inhabitants/km2 in Câmara de Lobos, and 549 inhabitants/km2 in Santa Cruz. By contrast, in Porto Moniz there are only 28.3 inhabitants/km2, in São Vicente 65.3 inhabitants/km2, and in Calheta 97.4 inhabitants/km2 (PORDATA 2019, 8s.). Madeira is more vulnerable to natural disasters than mainland Portugal, and it has a lower capacity for effective response, principally because it is a small island territory (Perdigão 2017, 72). The predisposition of the territory to hurricanes, storms, floods, landslides, volcanic eruptions, and so on has a significant effect on the economy of the region. Madeira is considered to be an underprivileged region that faces specific challenges due to its peripheral location and relative isolation. It benefits from an exceptional political-administrative status within Portugal – that of the Autonomous Region of Madeira (Região Autónoma da Madeira). Madeira is also one of a group of ultraperipheral European regions and so benefits from a higher level of funding (Baldacchino/Pleijel 2010, 89). Most of the active population is engaged in the tertiary sector, with employment in tourism being preponderant (Almeida/Rodrigues 2010, 14). Tourism has existed for many centuries, since the colonial period (Almeida 2016, 148). Between January and November 2019, 1,496,322 tourists visited Madeira, of whom 318,604 (21.2 %) were from Portugal (cf. DREM 2020). Most foreign visitors to the island came from Europe (1,117,728), with 297,742 (26.6 %) from the UK, 284,183 (25.4 %) from Germany, and 167,422 (14.9 %) from France (DREM 2020, 23). Agriculture also plays an important role on the islands, especially in social and cultural terms. Small-scale family production is predominant in this sector, reflecting the fragmented, dispersed, and uneven population density. Funchal is the most populous Portuguese city outside the mainland and the sixth largest nationally, after Lisbon (Pg. Lisboa), Oporto (Pg. Porto), Vila Nova de Gaia, Amadora, and Braga. Funchal is marked by socioeconomic imbalance. The population with the lowest income is located largely in the more peripheral western and northern parishes, where there are a greater number of social clusters engaged in subsistence  

 

 

 

 

 

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farming. Thus, even within the city, there are significant contrasts between the urban and the semi-rural. In 2019 (cf. PORDATA 2020), the social distribution of residents of the archipelago aged over 15 by educational level was as follows: 54.5 % had completed at least some of the stages (ciclos) of compulsory basic education (stage 1: years 1–4, stage 2: years 5–6 stage 3: years 7–9); 21.8 % had also completed secondary and/or further education; and 15.7 % had completed higher education. The illiteracy rate was around 7.6 %, representing a significant reduction compared to the situation observed in 2001, when the rate was 12.7 % overall, with large variations between the southern, urban areas of Funchal and Santa Cruz (8.4 % and 9.4 % respectively), and the northern, rural regions of Santana (23.8 %), São Vicente (22.3 %), and Porto Moniz (21.8 %). The north/south imbalance that characterizes Madeira is reflected in levels of educational attainment. In the same period, a general increase in those who have some training beyond compulsory schooling was observed, and this tendency is in line with the pattern of social distribution by educational level in mainland Portugal. Portuguese is the majority first language throughout the archipelago, and the exclusive first language in areas that are non-urban, have a smaller population, and/or are more isolated. On the south coast of Madeira island, urban areas are characterized by greater linguistic diversity. In those areas, the younger and more highly educated Madeiran population, as well as tourism sector workers, are able to communicate in more than one language in addition to their Portuguese mother tongue. The urban south coast is also home to most of the foreign resident communities, where other languages are spoken (such as English, Spanish, German, Mandarin, and Russian), which are minority languages locally.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1.2 Language Portuguese is the sole official language of the Autonomous Region of Madeira and the first language of most of the population. Nonetheless, most inhabitants possess some level of proficiency in more than one language. A number of factors influence this situation: (i) second-language learning is obligatory from school year 5 in the current curriculum, (ii) there is a significant presence of foreign communities and speakers of other languages, (iii) many Madeirans have learned another language through emigration, and (iv) there is substantial contact with tourists of other nationalities who visit the island. In relation to (i), it can be assumed that in 2019, 68.4 % of the population of the archipelago over the age of 15 would have had multilingual competencies, with knowledge of at least one second language acquired through their formal education, in addition to Portuguese as their first language (cf. PORDATA 2020). The legally-resident foreign population (ii) in 2018 accounted for 7,535 inhabitants, or around 3 % of the total population (PORDATA 2019, 9). 81.6 % of this population reside  

 

 

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in four councils on the south coast of Madeira island: Funchal (4181 of 104,286 inhabitants in total, or 4 % of the population), Santa Cruz (1031 of 44,581 inhabitants, or 2.3 %), Ribeira Brava (305 of 12,420 inhabitants, or 2.4 %), and Calheta (630 of 10,883 inhabitants, or 5.7 %). The largest foreign population is from the United Kingdom (997 of 7,535, or 13.2 %), although this group is still smaller than all residents from other European countries combined (2,026) or from the Americas (1,753). Many foreign residents of Madeira originate from places where the official language is Portuguese, such as Brazil (820 residents) and African countries (169), making a total of 989, or around 13 % of the total foreign resident population of the island. People from Venezuela are counted among foreign residents from South America. There is a large Luso-Venezuelan community in Madeira. Only those who do not have Portuguese citizenship are included in official figures, but unofficial estimates suggest that there are around 8,000 Luso-Venezuelans in Madeira, the majority of whom have come to the islands in the last decade and have therefore had a significant impact on the island community. This figure includes Madeiran emigrants returning from Venezuela and their descendants who were born in that country; in both cases, these residents have Portuguese or dual nationality. In addition to Luso-Venezuelans (iii), the large community of former emigrants who have resided abroad for at least one year includes those who have returned from countries such as the UK and South Africa. The 2011 Census data suggests that this community represents 18.2 % of the total population of Madeira. Migration and movement to other places and continents (for example the Canaries, the West Indies, Brazil, Hawaii, Curaçao, Venezuela, Angola, and South Africa) is a longstanding feature of Madeiran social history and cultural tradition, and there have been successive waves of migration since the sixteenth century (Vieira 2001), and especially during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Oliveira 2013, 125–130). Finally (iv), it is important to take account of fleeting or occasional contact with speakers of other languages through tourism (cf. 1.1).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 Linguistic history Discovery of the island – Historiography relating to the discovery of the archipelago of Madeira is not conclusive with regard to either the date or the way in which the islands were encountered. Newitt (2005, 2–7, 10s.) argues that several intercontinental commercial routes were in existence before the Portuguese maritime explorations, which therefore cannot be classed as discoveries per se. Officially, the discovery and claiming of the islands on 1 July 1419 and their subsequent occupation is attributed to João Gonçalves Zarco and Tristão Vaz on behalf of the Portuguese Crown (Zurara 1841 [1473]; Frutuoso 2007 [1586–1590]). That date is celebrated as the Official Holiday of the autonomous region (Dia da Região). However, the archipelago of Madeira was represented geographically on maps that predate the Portuguese claims, such as the Insyla Capraria by Angel-

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ino Dulcert (1339), the Medici-Laurentian Portolan atlas (1351), the Pinelli-Walckenaer atlas (ca. 1384), which is a more faithful cartographic representation than these earlier maps, and other Catalan and Italian maps such as that drawn by Nicolau Pasqualini (1408), which includes the designation “Madiera” (Vieira et al. 2001, 14; Pinto/Rodrigues 2013, 15). This documentary evidence indicates that the discovery was probably the result of expeditions undertaken by Genovese, Catalan, or Venetian sailors. Yet another version of events has become a foundational myth in the archipelago: the Englishman Robert Machim is said to have been the first to discover the island, landing at a place that was named Machico in his honour (cf. Livramento 2016). This hypothesis appears in the Record (Relação) of Francisco Alcoforado, who nonetheless attributes the claim of the territory for Portugal and the settlement of the archipelago to Zarco and Vaz (Pinto/Rodrigues 2013, 17). Establishment of Portuguese – Chroniclers of the time are categorical in their assertions that there was no native population in Madeira: Cadamosto affirmed in 1455 that the island was previously unknown and had never been inhabited (Vieira 1994, 40). There is consensus that the Portuguese Crown, particularly Prince Henry the Navigator, initiated the occupation and settlement of the territory, although there is some controversy around the precise date of the first settlement. It is only possible to say with certainty that colonization commenced at the end of the first quarter of the fifteenth century after a failed 1424 expedition by Dom Fernando de Castro to the Canary Islands (Pinto/Rodrigues 2013, 17s.). The Portuguese language was established with the arrival of the first settlers in the early fifteenth century after preliminary journeys by Bartolomeu Perestrelo and Gonçalves Zarco in 1419. Settlers came from all parts of the kingdom, with the majority from the North (cf. Albuquerque/Vieira 1987; Melo 1988; Vieira 2007). Most of these early Portuguese settlers were from the lower social orders – pageboys, servants, and even exiles. Other settlers were second sons or belonged to the minor aristocracy and were driven by the ambition for greater titles and land rights (cf. Gonçalves 1958). The second phase of settlement, from 1450 to 1550, was a period of development in terms of demography, agriculture, trade, and commerce. A significant number of foreigners were attracted to the island by the sugar trade. Many were Italians (Genovese and Florentine), but there were also French, Flemish, and Castilians. They established residences on the island, principally in Funchal, which emerged from the beginning as the main centre of population, and also in other areas along the south coast where there were sugarcane fields and plantations (Vieira 1999; 2016; Vieira et al. 2001, 23–26; Pinto/ Rodrigues 2013, 20). In the mid-sixteenth century, the sugarcane plantations gave way to vineyards, commencing a new economic cycle –wine– in which the British would have a significant role (Pinto/Rodrigues 2013, 19). Later, German settlers would arrive, although they were fewer in number, and this nationality was engaged especially in the embroidery industry (Vieira et al. 2001, 125). From the beginning of its history, the European population in Madeira had contact with other ethnic communities of enslaved people (Arabs, Guanchinets – the native peo-

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ple of the Canary Islands, and black people from the Gulf of Guinea, cf. Vieira 1991). The majority of Mediterranean societies made use of enslaved people in roles that varied from domestic service to soldiers, sailors, tradespeople, and rural workers. The slave trade was likely what had attracted Genovese and other merchants to explore and establish administrations along the Atlantic coast of Morocco and the Canary Islands throughout the fourteenth century (cf. Newitt 2005, 6, 29s.). The large population of Portuguese colonizers was nonetheless insufficient for extensive agricultural exploitation of the island due in part to the steep terrain and dense forests. The labour of enslaved people was employed, and at the end of the fifteenth century, they represented 12 % of the total population of the island, that is, around 2,000 inhabitants (Pinto/Rodrigues 2013, 19). There are multiple toponymic traces of the presence of enslaved people on the island: the Canary Islands are represented in the Pico Canário ‘Canarian Peak’ in Santana; the North African Mouros ‘Moors’ appear in the road name Rua de Mouraria ‘Moortown road’ in Funchal, and in the place names Lombo do Mouro ‘Moor’s Hill’ in Paúl da Serra, and Cova do Mouro ‘Moor’s Ditch’ in Porto Moniz; black Africans from the Gulf of Guinea are named in the Cova do Negro ‘Black’s Ditch’ in Ponta do Pargo, Serra de Água, and Porto Moniz, Furnas do Negro ‘Black’s Grottos’ in Porto Moniz, Quebradas do Negro ‘Black’s Gully’ in Achadas da Cruz, and the road name Rua das Pretas ‘Black Women’s Road’ in Funchal (Vieira et al. 2001, 140). From its inception, island society was shaped by social difference. On the one hand, there were the rich, landowning families from the islands or from overseas; on the other, the majority of the population, enslaved or otherwise, was devoted to agricultural activity or trade, and suffered very difficult living conditions. The British came to be the most important foreign presence in Madeiran daily life, and this influence would persist through the centuries (cf. Vieira 2016). There were British residents on the island in the sixteenth century. After the restoration of independence from Spain in 1640, the Portuguese Crown welcomed an increased British presence and conceded greater privileges to that group. The affirmation of British hegemony in the Atlantic and Indian oceans from the seventeenth century transformed Madeira into an indispensable maritime base and a crucial supply port for ships in the wine trade. Various Navigation Acts (Atos de Navegação, 1660/1665) opened the way for the island to enter the area of influence of the British Empire and were confirmed with treaties such as the Methuen Treaty (1703). In effect, Madeira functioned as a colony of the British Crown. This situation would be made official during the Napoleonic wars: between 24 December 1807 and 24 April 1808, Madeira was twice occupied by British troops under the pretext of protecting the island from imminent French attacks (Oliveira 2013, 105). Milestones of its further development – From the earliest occupation of the island, the relationship between Madeira and the mainland was effectively colonial. Madeira was far away from the centre of power, and the realization that all institutional relationships were defined by colonialism sparked a movement in favour of autonomy (cf. Vieira 2018, 11–21). Rodrigues (2010, 210s.) argues that the regional historical narrative of  

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a deep-rooted contrast between the islands and continental Portugal started to take shape as early as the seventeenth century, with the epic poem Insulana, by Manuel Tomás (1635), which depicts island life. Around two centuries later, another heroic poem, Zargueida (1806) by Francisco de Paula Medina e Vasconcelos was dedicated to João Gonçalves Zarco, the official discoverer of Madeira. Defences of Madeiran interests intensified around the end of the nineteenth century. The topic was debated in the press, starting with the publication Patriota Funchalense, and spreading to other press outlets on the island (Vieira et al. 2001, 257). The discussion continued into the twentieth century with the so-called golden generation of island intellectuals such as Alberto Artur Sarmento, Cabral do Nascimento, Ernesto Gonçalves, Fernando Augusto da Silva, and Carlos Azevedo de Menezes, the authors of the Elucidário Madeirense, a culturally important reference work published in 1921 and 1940. Political and financial relations between mainland Portugal and the island deteriorated over time and were marked by a consistent failure on the part of the central government to attend to the needs of the island, leading to a sense of abandonment among its inhabitants. These relations had distinct legal and institutional frameworks, and it is possible to identify three key periods: (i) Madeira as a colony of the kingdom from 1426 to 1822 (the year of the Liberal Revolution in Portugal), (ii) Madeira as an adjacent district, a status that was established in 1822, and (iii) the recognition of Madeira as an autonomous region, in 1976. In the first of those periods, the king Dom Duarte conceded the two islands to Prince Henry the Navigator in 1433. This important act removed the direct dependency of settlers on the Portuguese Crown. Prince Henry delegated the organization and administration of the territories by means of three hereditary land grants (cf. Carita 2016): Machico was granted to Tristão Vaz Teixeira (1440), Porto Santo was given to João Bartolomeu Perestrelo (1444), and João Gonçalves Zarco was awarded the administration of Funchal (1450). Under the Constitution of 23 September 1822, which followed the Liberal Revolution, the archipelagos of Madeira and the Azores ceased to be associated with the overseas provinces (or colonies) and were annexed to continental Portugal through their designation as ‘adjacent islands’ (ilhas adjacentes). The new terminology was retained in the Constitutional Charter of 1826, and the subsequent constitutions of 1838 and 1911, although it was not accompanied by any great change in other respects (Vieira et al. 2001, 248s.). Following the First Republic (1910–1926), the designation was maintained in the period of National Dictatorship, as set out in the Foundational Law for the Administration of the Territories and Islands (Lei de Bases da Administração do Território e das Ilhas Adjacentes, Law 1967 of 30 April 1930) and the 1933 Constitution. Following the Carnation Revolution of 25 April 1974 and the restoration of democracy, article 6 of the Constitution of 2 April 1976 established a special status for the archipelagos of Madeira and the Azores as autonomous regions with separate political and administrative legal powers. On 19 July 1976, the Regional Assembly of Madeira was in-

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augurated. On 1 October of the same year, the first Regional Government was elected. The symbols of autonomy –the flag, shield, official seal, and anthem– were approved by the Regional Assembly on 28 July 1978. On 1 July 1985, the official holiday of the region was celebrated for the first time. On 5 July 1991, the first Political-Administrative Statute was published, and this formed the basis for the revised, definitive version, which was passed in 1999 and remains in force to this date.

3 External Language Policy 3.1 Legislation The most recent version of the Portuguese Constitution (12 August 2005) states explicitly that the official language is Portuguese (art. 11.3). This stipulation extends to Madeira as part of the Portuguese territory (art. 5.1), despite its autonomous status.

3.2 Languages used in administration Portuguese is the language used in all official organizations. It is the sole language of expression used in public by all political figures, both nationally and locally, in interviews, communications, and other contributions. It is the main language used in signage. Nonetheless, and due to tourism and the long tradition of foreign residents, the linguistic landscape of the island is marked by the presence of multiple additional languages, especially English, and particularly in urban settings such as Funchal and other towns on the south side of Madeira (cf. Macedo/Bazenga 2019).

3.3 Languages used in education Portuguese is the language of the state education system, both in oral and written usage and at all levels. Second language learning is obligatory, in addition to Portuguese. Article 9 of Decree-Law 139 (2012) relates to the teaching of foreign languages and makes English as a foreign language compulsory for the five years covering stages 2 and 3 of the national curriculum. Where schools have sufficient resources, the law allows for English language tuition focussing on oral expression from stage 1. In stage 3, the final part of compulsory education, a second foreign language such as French or German is introduced. The law also provides for the tuition of Portuguese as a second or other language where appropriate (art. 10).

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3.4 Languages used in the media There are a number of local private stations (Santana, Posto Emissor do Funchal – PEF, Radio Zarco, Radio Palmeira, Megafone Radio, Radio Calheta, Jornal da Madeira, TSF Madeira, Radio Festival, Radio Popular, Radio Cantinho da Madeira, Radio Sol, Radio Miradouro) as well as the public station Radiodifusão Portuguesa (RDP), which has been broadcasting in the ARM via a Regional Broadcasting Centre since 1980. This centre is autonomous in terms of its financial administration and management and is also responsible for the television channel Radio Televisão Portuguesa (RTP) Madeira and for the RDP-Madeira radio stations Antena 1 and Antena 3. Both stations present regional productions, such as Madeira Viva ‘Madeira Alive’, Casa das Artes ‘House of Letters’, Atlântida Madeira ‘Madeira Atlantis’, and Passeio Público ‘Promenade’, all of which are talk shows with a focus on local guests and/or reports on local events and themes of regional and cultural interest such as the Book Fair, the Flower Festival, music festivals, book launches, and exhibitions.

4 Linguistic characteristics The spoken varieties of Madeiran Portuguese have been the subject of few descriptive studies. Most studies prior to 2010 focused on the lexical and phonetic fields to the detriment of studies of syntax (cf. Bazenga 2014). Brissos/Gillier/Saramago (2016, 31) note that the classification and characteristics of Madeiran dialects remain under-researched. In their study, these authors conclude that there are two basic groups of Madeiran varieties of Portuguese: those from the west of Madeira and from Porto Santo, and those from the centre and east of Madeira island. This linguistic configuration corresponds to the social and geographical dichotomies that have been observed above (cf. 1). These two groups do not reflect the great internal phonetic diversity that has been observed (Cintra 2008). The variety of accents and their perception by Madeiran speakers (Andrade 2014) may be related to the mountainous characteristics of the landscape and the difficulty in establishing roads, particularly on the densely populated island of Madeira. Up to the end of the nineteenth century, roads were scarce and difficult to access. The tortuous geographical conditions made road construction difficult. In general, routes were travelled on foot, by horse, or in a carrying net (a type of rudimentary litter). Maritime transport of people and goods, by ferry or other types of boat, linked the various ports on the north and south coasts and on Porto Santo (cf. Vieira/Janes 2017). For many island residents, travelling to Funchal implied a long, difficult, and potentially dangerous adventure along trails and tracks, and it was, therefore, a rare occurrence for most people even well into the twentieth century. As such, individual towns and settlements were relatively isolated even from one another (cf. Londral 2016). This type of internal isolation may have contributed to the conservation of local spoken varieties, with unique traits which mark out the speaker as coming from a certain place.

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In the last decade, research on linguistic variation in Madeira has tended to focus on the variety spoken in Funchal, and especially on syntax. In these sociolinguistic studies, certain grammatical particularities have been identified that are more frequent among speakers with a lower level of education. To date, there has not been a systematic study of the educated variety of Portuguese spoken in Madeira, nor of the Portuguese spoken by the elites in this island society. Nevertheless, it is possible to formulate some hypotheses regarding the linguistic characteristics of elite Madeiran society based on existing studies of linguistic variation, and especially those which include social variables in their analysis.

4.1 Pronunciation Notable academic work on phonetic description of the varieties of Portuguese spoken in Madeira includes Brüdt (1937), Macedo (1939), Rogers (1946), Pereira (1952), Rezende (1961), Nunes (1965), Cintra (2008), Andrade (1994), Saramago/Segura (1999), Rebelo (2005), Rodrigues (2015). Segura (2013, 106–110) lists the most common phonetic phenomena in the archipelago: (i) the diphthongization of the stressed vowels /i/ and /u/, such as in navio [nɐvɐjɨ] ‘ship’ or lua [lɐwɐ] ‘moon’ instead of [nɐviu] or [luɐ], and of /o/, such as in boa [bɐwɐ] ‘good (f.)’ instead of [boɐ]; (ii) the palatalization of /l/ before or (less frequently) after /i/ and /j/, articulated as [ʎ], such as in aquilo [ɐkiʎu] ‘that’ or família [fɐmiʎɐ] ‘family’ instead of [ɐkilu] or [fɐmiljɐ]; a process that can also occur across word boundaries, such as in peguei lume ‘I turned the light on’ [pɨɡɐj ʎúmɨ] instead of [pɨɡɐj ɫúmɨ]; (iii) the reduction of the unstressed /ɐ/ at the end of a word, as [ɨ] or its elision, which affects all words independently of their lexical category, such as in cinco [sĩkɨ] ‘five’ or falo [falɨ] ‘I speak’ instead of [sĩku] or [falu]; (iv) the assimilation (semivocalization or vocalization) of the final fricative /s/ where an external sandhi (a phonetic process characterized by the modification of the sound of a word or morpheme when juxtaposed with another, especially in fluent speech) occurs (except where it is a voiceless plosive), resulting in [j] and [i], such as in as vacas [ɐj vakɐʃ] ‘the cows’ or os bichos [uj biʃuʃ] ‘the animals’ instead of [ɐʃ vakɐʃ] or [uʃ biʃuʃ]; (v) the formation of a rising diphthong on the stressed syllable of a word by means of the insertion of the semivowels /j/ or /w/, such as in burros [bjuʁuʃ] ‘donkeys’, inverno [ĩvjɛɾnu] ‘winter’, caminhou [kɐmiɲwɐ] ‘he walked’, avô [ɐvwɐ] ‘grandfather’, or carro [kwɐʁu] ‘car’, instead of [buʁuʃ], [ĩvɛɾnu], [kɐmiɲo], [ɐvo], or [kɐʁu] (Segura 2013, 109). In addition to these features, scholars have also noted (vi) the loss of nasality in words ending in the diphthong ‑em [-ɐ̃j], such as in paragem [pɐɾaʒɨ] ‘stop (n)’ instead of [pɐɾaʒɐ̃j], and the monophthongization of ‑oi- [‑oj‑], such as in depois [dɨpoʃ] ‘after’ instead of [dɨpojʃ], and ‑ai- [‑aj‑], such as in mais [mɐʃ] ‘more’ instead of [majʃ] (Boléo 1975, 338), and (vii) paragoge, in particular the addition of a final vowel ‑e [ɨ], such as in abril [ɐbɾiʎɨ] ‘April’ or azule [ɐzulɨ] ‘blue’ instead of [ɐbɾil] or [ɐzul], which can also affect all infinitive verbs, such as, for example, comer [kumeɾɨ] ‘to eat’ or falar [fɐlaɾɨ] ‘to

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speak’ instead of [kumeɾ] or [fɐlaɾ] (Nunes 1998, 82s.); (viii) the monophthongization of the diphthong ‑ões [‑õjʃ]̃ at the end of a word, which is characteristic of Funchal, such as limões [limõʃ] ‘lemons’ instead of [limõjʃ] (Andrade 1994, 17).

4.2 Morphosyntax In terms of syntax, a study by Bazenga/Andrade (2017) observes the occurrence of nonstandard variants in dialectal data from informants with a lower level of formal education. The following examples are selected from the Syntax-oriented Corpus of Portuguese Dialects (Corpus Dialectal para o Estudo da Sintaxe – CORDIAL-SIN), and show phenomena such as the construction of the double subject a gente se (Martins 2009, 180), as in “A gente não se come mas os de Lisboa diz que comem daquele” (CORDIALSIN, CLC) instead of Nós não comemos, mas os de Lisboa dizem que comem daquele ‘We don’t eat it, but they say that people from Lisbon eat that’; aspect constructions using the gerund, as in “toda a gente estava desejando de chegar ao Natal” (CORDIAL-SIN, PST) instead of toda a gente estava a desejar chegar ao Natal ‘Everyone wanted Christmas to come’; the construction of the impersonal existential with the verb ter ‘to have’, as in “Porque aqui à nossa frente, tinha um alto, tinha um moinho de vento” (CORDIAL-SIN, PST instead of Porque aqui à nossa frente, havia um alto, tinha um moinho de vento) ‘Because here in front of us there was a hill and a windmill’; and the possessive pronoun without an article, which is only observed in Madeira and the Azores, as in “Mas meu pai tinha era gado, fazendas” (CORDIAL-SIN, PST instead of Mas o meu pai tinha era gado, fazendas) ‘But my father, he had cattle, farms’ (cf. Carrilho/Pereira 2013, 75). Other studies focus on variable phenomena, such as pronominal syntax and verbal agreement (e. g., Bazenga 2019a; 2019b; Vieira/Bazenga 2013; Rodrigues/Bazenga 2019), using the theoretical and methodological principles of variationist sociolinguistics and the Sociolinguistics Corpus of Funchal (Corpus Sociolinguístico do Funchal – CSF). In general, findings point to the educational level as a relevant factor. The less contact a speaker has with the standard variety via their formal education, the less that variety will be present in speech, and at the same time, the more non-standard Portuguese varieties will persist. This is especially true of the form ele ‘he’ when employed as an anaphoric direct object, such as in eu vi ele ‘I saw he’ instead of the standard form eu vi-o ‘I saw him’ (cf. Bazenga 2019a, 745ss.). It also applies in the variable use of third-person plural variants, that is in addition to the standard morpheme ‑am (as in the present form eles falam ‘they speak’ or the preterite form eles falaram ‘they spoke’) also in the non-standard morphemes ‑em as in eles falem instead of the standard eles falam, in the imperfect past tense eles falavem instead of eles falavam, and ‑o/‑õ, such as eles falarõ in the simple future tense instead of eles falarão (cf. Bazenga 2019a, 736ss.). Furthermore, Andrade (2014) observes several syntactic phenomena that are characteristic of the educated variety of Portuguese spoken in Madeira, and which neither attract attention nor form an object of negative evaluation by Madeiran speakers. These  

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phenomena are also attested to in the CSF, by degree-educated speakers: a preference for the elision of the object pronoun or the non-realization of the anaphoric direct object, as in “deitam o lixo lá em baixo onde é que [Ø] vão pôr?” (CSF, FNC-MC3_309) instead of the standard strategy which corresponds to the use of the clitic o, as in deitam o lixo lá em baixo onde é que o vão pôr? ‘They put the rubbish down there where are they going to put it?’, and the use of the gerund with the aspect verbs estar ‘to be’, ficar ‘to remain/to be’, and andar ‘to go about/to be’ as an alternative to the sequence of an aspect verb followed by the preposition a and the infinitive, but giving an equivalent semantic interpretation, as in “parece que o advogado não tá fazendo nada” (CSF, FNC10_HC3.1) instead of parece que o advogado não tá a fazer nada ‘It seems as though the lawyer is not doing anything’.

4.3 Lexicon Vocabulary has been the most extensively studied aspect of the varieties of Portuguese spoken in the archipelago of Madeira (cf., e. g., Rebelo/Nunes 2016). The following section presents typical formation types and semantic fields and discusses the vitality of some words. Formation types – The lexical characteristics of Madeiran Portuguese include all types of formation ranging from archaisms to internal innovation (formal and semantic) and external innovation by borrowing (cf. Reutner 2017, 47–51): examples of archaisms are azougar ‘to die [animals]’ instead of morrer, or bizalho ‘chick’ instead of pintainho; examples of formal innovation by using the derivational suffix ‑inho(a) are dentinho ‘appetizer’ (< dente ‘tooth’ + ‑inho) instead of acepipe or petisco, lapinha ‘nativity scene’ (< lapa ‘cave’ + ‑inha) instead of presépio, vaginha ‘runner bean’ (< vagem ‘pod’ + ‑inha) instead of feijão-verde, or picadinho ‘Madeiran dish made with diced beef’ (< picada ‘diced beef’ + ‑inho); examples of loanwords are tratuário ‘pavement’ (< Fr. trottoir) instead of passeio (cf. Bazenga 2015, 116), semilha ‘potato’ (< Sp. semilla ‘seed’) instead of batata ‘potato’, as well as gofio ‘traditional dish from the Canary islands, made with barley flour’ (< Sp. gofio), or poncha ‘traditional Madeiran alcoholic drink’ (< Engl. punch). It also presents phonetic variants of lexical expressions that already exist in standard Portuguese, such as aquintrodia ‘the other day’ instead of aqui no outro dia, and typical interjections such as Estepilha!, as an expression of amazement, impatience, or indignation instead of, for example, Caramba!, as well as Basta que sim!, Ca nada!, or Ah mãe! to express, respectively, ironic agreement (as in Quem diria!… in the standard variety of Portuguese), negative reaction (as in Claro que não!) or a surprised reaction (Oh, Meu Deus!). Fauna, flora, dishes, and drinks – As for the semantic fields, the vocabulary contains innovations from rural speakers related to endemic fauna and flora, such as bis-bis ‘regulus madeirensis’ for a small endemic bird from Madeira and ensaião ‘aeonium glandulosum’ or massaroco ‘echium candicans’ for plants endemic to Madeira. It also presents the names of typical dishes and drinks (see gofio and poncha above), as well as chino ‘cup of coffee’ instead of abatanado, and chinesa ‘cup of coffee with milk’ instead of meia de leite.  

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Sugar terminology – Madeiran Portuguese also has an important role in the diffusion of the sugar terminology from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic area in the fifteenth century in the Canary Islands, Cabo Verde, and São Tomé, and in Brazil in the sixteenth century. In this process, in addition to words of Mediterranean origin such as the Arabic loanword alfenim ‘type of sweet made from sugarcane’ and the Castilian loanword trapiche ‘sugarcane mills’, some new lexical units related to the cultivation of sugar have appeared in Madeira, such as açucar mascavado ‘brown sugar’ and rapadura ‘unrefined whole sugarcane’, which became Madeiran loanwords to other languages and varieties, namely Canarian and American Spanish as well as Brazilian and African Portuguese (Nunes 2018; Vidal-Luengo 2018). Thus, Madeira appears as the epicentre of a shared linguistic and cultural heritage on both sides of the Atlantic, in Africa and the Americas. Vitality – Nunes (2014; 2017) observed the vitality of some Madeiran regionalisms in a community of educated urban island speakers in the city of Funchal. His findings confirm speakers’ knowledge and frequent use of around fifty regionalisms selected from the glossary produced by Figueiredo (2011). These include buzico ‘kid’ instead of miúdo, tranca ‘peg’ instead of mola, or cramar ‘to complain’ instead of queixar-se, bilhardeiro ‘gossiping person, gossipmonger’ instead of bisbilhoteiro/coscuvilheiro, desterrar ‘to waste, to lavish’ instead of desbaratar/esbanjar, patinhar ‘to stamp down’ instead of calcar or pisar, rebendita ‘act of retaliation’ instead of ato de retaliação/de vingança, resondar ‘to scold’ instead of refilar, as well as the expressions already mentioned, namely lapinha ‘nativity scene’, semilha ‘potato’, tratuário ‘pavement’, or vaginha ‘runner bean’. Speakers’ age, gender, and level of formal education did not affect usage. This indicates a tendency among speakers to value and use Madeiran words and sayings as an expression of regional identity (Nunes 2014, 367), which takes precedence over any linguistic prejudice associated with folk sayings.

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism When Madeiran speakers are asked about Portuguese linguistic diversity, they generally express a preference for the Madeiran accent: ‘the accent? I like our accent our Madeiran accent is nice’.1 They are also conscious of internal variations: ‘the accent of people from Funchal is different from that of people from Câmara de Lobos, which is different again from that of people from Ribeira Brava’.2 Nevertheless, not all Madeiran accents

1 “[O] sotaque? Gosto do nosso sotaque o nosso sotaque madeirense é bonito” (CSF, FNC11_MB2). 2 “[S]otaque do Funchal dos funchalenses é diferente dos de Câmara de Lobos é diferente dos da Ribeira Brava” (CSF, FNC11_MA3).

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are appreciated. This is the case, for example, with the Câmara de Lobos accent: ‘it’s more of a fisherman’s accent because not everyone from Câmara de Lobos speaks like that’.3 Some speakers express a preference for the continental varieties of European Portuguese: ‘I am Madeiran, but I prefer the Lisbon accent’.4 One of the reasons identified, for example, in this excerpt from an interview with a female speaker, is that the variety in question is considered to be more correct: ‘Which accent or way of speaking do you like most, Fátima? – From Coimbra – Coimbra? Why Fátima? – Because that is where they speak the most correct Portuguese’.5 The same reasoning explains why it is often recommended that people use the standard European Portuguese variety to the detriment of the regional variety: ‘My mother used to tell me that I should talk with a more mainland-type accent’.6 Of particular relevance here is that the majority of mainland speakers, or those not born in Madeira, consider the Madeiran way of speaking to be both different from their own and difficult to understand, as is confirmed in studies by Ferreira (2004) and Haddar (2008).

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Most descriptions of linguistic characteristics of Madeiran varieties are to be found in scholarly publications. During the twentieth century, several undergraduate dissertations in Romance Philology addressed Madeiran dialects and modes of speech (falares), presenting lexical surveys organized as glossaries. There were also several works dealing with Madeiran vocabulary. The most recent of these is Figueiredo (2011), with three hundred fifty lexical entries in the glossary. In addition to these publications, some Madeiran regionalisms can be found in general dictionaries: for example, in the Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (DPLP), about thirty-five Madeiran words are referenced, among them tratuário, buzico, tranca, or cramar (cf. 4.3). There are references to the dialects or varieties spoken in the Archipelago of Madeira in several Portuguese grammar books. Of particular note are: O Falar do Arquipélago da Madeira ‘Speech Patterns in the Archipelago of Madeira’ in the Gramática da Língua Portuguesa (Cuesta/Luz 1971, 139–144), Os dialectos das ilhas atlânticas ‘the dialects of the Atlantic islands’ in the Nova Gramática do Português Contemporâneo (Cunha/Cintra 1984, 19), and, more recently, a section on Madeiran dialects in chapter 5 Variedades Dialetais do Português Europeu ‘Dialect Varieties of European Portuguese’ (Segura 2013, 106–110) in the Gramática do Português (Raposo et al. 2013). These three

3 “[É] mais o sotaque dos pescadores porque nem toda a gente de Câmara de Lobos fala assim” (CSF, FNC10_MB2). 4 “[S]ou madeirense mas gosto mais do sotaque de Lisboa” (CSF, FNC10_MB2). 5 “[Q]ual é o sotaque ou pronúncia que a Fátima mais gosta? – de Coimbra – Coimbra? porquê Fátima? – porque é onde se fala o português mais correto” (CSF, FNC10_CM3). 6 “[A] minha mãe dizia-me que devia falar com um sotaque mais continental” (CSF, FNC11_MBC).

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grammars only give a description of the phonetic particularities, however, and do not address other syntactical or lexical linguistic phenomena.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics As Rebelo (2015) observes, regional features continue to be present in spontaneous speech, even among university-educated public figures. Although there are no studies of the educated variety that is spoken in Madeira, it is nonetheless possible to observe the presence of regional features in this variety. A sample of interviews from informants with a higher education qualification, which is taken from the CSF, reveals the occurrence of specific phonetic characteristics, such as the palatalization of the /l/ after an /i/, paragoge (the addition of a final ‑e [‑ɨ]), and the monophthongization of the diphthong ‑ões [‑õjʃ] at the end of a word, which are indicated in the list presented in 4.1 at points (ii), (vii), and (viii). Variety used in education – The regional curriculum has introduced some notable initiatives aimed at better representing the Madeiran context. The ‘Reading Chest’ (Baú de Leitura) project is aimed at students in the three stages of compulsory education, while the Regional Reading Programme works in conjunction with other documents for guidance on the teaching and learning of Portuguese as a first language. Unlike the National Reading Programme, the Regional Education Authority’s Reading Programme specifically includes Madeiran authors such as Irene Lucília, Octaviano Correia, Isabel Fagundes, and Francisco Fernandes. Variety used in the media – The standard form of Portuguese is used in the media (press, radio, television, official websites of the regional government and other regional organizations). Regional specificities are mainly acknowledged through content, which focuses on situations and topics that reflect local life, or local culture and language (Cá nada on RTP Madeira, which is a TV series with ten episodes focusing on Madeiran language and consisting of a documentary followed by a debate with a studio guest). In the case of radio and television, local colour is observed not only in the subject matter, but also in the accent of presenters, who can be easily identified as Madeiran. Common regionalisms are also frequently used in the regional press. Variety used in blogs – There are a number of blogs by Madeiran authors. Nelson Veríssimo, in Passos na Calçada ‘Footsteps on the Pavement’, compiles a list of around one hundred blogs, several of which are published by journalists (Ultraperiferias ‘Ultraperipheries’, O Rabo do Gato ‘The Cat’s Tail’) and politicians (Apontamentos Sem Nome ‘Notes without a Name’). As with numerous regional business and organization names (cf. Santos/Rebelo 2019), many of the names of these blogs refer to regional identity through the use of the noun Madeira or the adjective Madeirense (e. g., Farpas da Madeira ‘Madeiran Barbs’, A paródia madeirense ‘Madeiran Parody’, Madeira gentes e lugares ‘Madeira people and places’, Madeira hoje e sempre ‘Madeira today and always’, Madeira, minha vida ‘Madeira, my life’). Others make use of regionalisms to mark out  

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Madeiran identity (Basta que sim, uma afirmação clara de ser madeirense ‘You don’t say, a clear affirmation of being Madeiran’, Bilhardeiro, Buzico, cf. 4.3), while others still refer to toponyms (Cais regional ‘Regional Quay’ or the viewpoint Terreiro da luta ‘(lit.) Shrine to the Battle’). Also worthy of mention are the Facebook pages Compadre Jodé ‘Buddy Jodé’, with 43,600 followers, and Madeirense Puro ‘Pure Madeiran’, with 32,400 followers, and which describes itself as ‘made by Madeirans, for Madeirans, Pure Madeiran® is a site of memories that we want to keep alive’.7 Variety used in literature – Representations of Madeiran linguistic characteristics (cf. Rebelo 2015) in literature most commonly refer to the most down-to-earth varieties. Only servants, peasants, and other figures corresponding to speakers from the lower end of the social scale are marked out. Through the representation of such figures, authors (Veríssimo 1990, 29–39, 119–130, 151–164) pick out the most conspicuous features of Madeiran speech. This example, taken from Jardim’s novel Saias de Balão (‘Ball Gowns’, 1946), illustrates the diphthongization of the tonic /i/, which is considered to be typical of Madeira: “Menêina [instead of menina], nã vaia p’ra riba!… Menêina vai-se pisar!… Menêina” (Jardim 1946, 32).8

In the novel Minha Gente (‘My Folk’, 1951), António Marques da Silva tries to represent the speakers of the São Jorge area (Santana) in the north of the island by using Madeiran regionalisms as mercar instead of comprar, and transcribing some phonetic features, such as the assimilation (semivocalization or vocalization) of the final fricative /s/, loi dias instead of os dias, and the diphthongization of the stressed vowel /i/ in barreiga instead of barriga (cf. 4.1), as well as the alternative formulation O meu desgosto é não poder pôr-me desta terra pá rua. Ainda que queira comprar um casaco pá missa, não posso. Anda-se atolado em lameiro todos os dias e o que se ganha mal dá pá barriga: “O mê digosto é nã poder botar-me desta terra pá rua. Ainda cum queira mercar um casaco pá missa, nã se pode. Anda-se atolado em lameiro todo loi dias e o que se ganha mal dá pá barreiga…” (Silva 1985, 13).9

The writer Horácio Bento de Gouveia is noted for the vast representation of folk Madeiranisms in his work (Santos 2007), in both syntactic and phonetic features. In the novel Torna-Viagem: o Romance do Emigrante ‘Return Trip: The Emigrant’s Story’ for example, nevoeiro [nɨvwɐjru] appears as navoeiro [nɐvwɐjru] with the orthographic representa-

7 “[F]eito por madeirenses para os madeirenses, o Madeirense Puro® é um lugar de memórias que queremos eternizar” (Facebook 2020). 8 ‘Miss, don’t go to the riverbank!… miss you’re going to trip up! … Miss’. 9 ‘I hate not being able to find my way to the street. Even if I want to buy a Sunday coat, I can’t. I end up bogged down in mud all the time and what I earn barely pays to fill my belly…’.

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tion of a non-standard pronunciation of the unstressed vowel in the first syllable of the word: “Q’ aconteceu? – O navoeiro matou mê filho!” (Gouveia 1995, 56).10

References Albuquerque, Luís de/Vieira, Alberto (1987), O Arquipélago da Madeira no Século XV, Funchal, Secretaria Regional do Turismo e Cultura. Almeida, António (2016), Modelling tourism demand in Madeira since 1946: and historical overview based on a time series approach, Journal of Spatial and Organizational Dynamics 4/2, 145–156. Almeida, António/Rodrigues, Ricardo (2010), A Experiência de Desenvolvimento Socioeconómico Regional: uma Abordagem Multidisciplinar sobre a Madeira, Funchal, Universidade da Madeira. Andrade, Catarina G. (2014), Crenças, Perceção e Atitudes Linguísticas de Falantes Madeirenses, Funchal, Universidade da Madeira, Master Thesis. Andrade, Ernesto d’ (1994), Algumas Particularidades do Português Falado no Funchal, in: Associação Portuguesa de Linguística (ed.), Actas do IX Encontro da Associação Portuguesa de Linguística/Coimbra (1993), Lisbon, Colibri, 17–29. Baldacchino, Godfrey/Pleijel, Christian (2010), European Islands, Development and the Cohesion Policy: A Case Study of Kökar, Åland Islands, Island Studies Journal 5/1, 89–110. Bazenga, Aline (2014), Variedade Madeirense do Português no projeto Dicionário Enciclopédico da Madeira, in: José Eduardo Franco/Cristina Trindade (edd.), História, Que saber(es) para o século XXI? História, Cultura e Ciência na/da Madeira, Lisboa, APCA/Esfera do Caos, 381–401. Bazenga, Aline (2015), Tratuário, in: Ana Salgueiro/Paulo Miguel Rodrigues (edd.), Cabral do Nascimento. Escrever o mundo por detrás de um monóculo e a partir de um farol, Funchal, Imprensa Académica, 116– 118. Bazenga, Aline (2019a), Aspetos da Sintaxe do Português Popular Falado no Funchal, Revista do Arquivo Histórico da Madeira. Nova Série 1, 727–758. Bazenga, Aline (2019b), A variação entre ter e haver em construções existenciais numa variedade insular do PE (Funchal), in: Ernestina Carrilho et al. (edd.), Estudos Linguísticos e Filológicos Oferecidos a Ivo Castro, Lisbon, Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, 181–216. Bazenga, Aline/Andrade, Catarina (2017), Sintaxe, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/sintaxe (2/3/2023). Boléo, Manuel de P. (1975), Estudos de Linguística Portuguesa e Românica, vol. 2, Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra. Brissos, Fernando/Gillier, Raissa/Saramago, João (2016), O problema da subdivisão dialetal madeirense: estudo dialetométrico da variação lexical, Revista da Associação Portuguesa de Linguística 2, 31–47. Brüdt, Kate (1937), Madeira. Estudo Linguístico-Etnográfico, Boletim de Filologia 5/1–2, 59–91. Carita, Rui (2016), Capitanias, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/capitanias (2/3/2023). Carrilho, Ernestina/Pereira, Sandra (2013), On the areal dimension of non-standard syntax: Evidence from a Portuguese dialect corpus, in: Alena Barysevich/Alexandra D’Arcy/David Heap (edd.), Proceedings of Methods XIV. Papers from the Fourteenth International Conference on Methods on Dialectology 2011, Bern, Lang, 69–79.

10 ‘Wh[at] happened? – The fog killed my son!’.

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Cintra, Luís Filipe Lindley (2008), Os Dialectos da Ilha da Madeira no Quadro Geral dos Dialectos GalegoPortugueses, in: José Eduardo Franco (ed.), Cultura Madeirense. Temas e problemas, Oporto, Campo das Letras, 95–104. CORDIAL-SIN = Ana Maria Martins (ed.) (2000), Corpus Dialectal para o Estudo da Sintaxe, Lisbon, Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, https://clul.ulisboa.pt/en/projeto/cordial-sin-syntax-orientedcorpus-portuguese-dialects (2/3/2023). CSF = Bazenga, Aline (2012), Corpus Sociolinguístico do Funchal, Funchal, Centro de Investigação em Estudos Regionais e Locais da Universidade da Madeira, https://cierl.uma.pt/?page_id=367 (2/3/2023). Cuesta, Pilar Vázquez/Luz, Maria Albertina Mendes da (1971), Gramática da língua portuguesa, Lisbon, Edições 7º. Cunha, Celso Ferreira/Cintra, Luís Filipe Lindley (1984), Nova gramática do português contemporâneo, Lisbon, Sá da Costa. Decree-Law 139 = Ministério da Educação e Ciência (2012), Decreto-Lei n.º 139/2012, Diário da República 129, 3476–3491, https://dre.pt/pesquisa/-/search/178548/details/maximized (2/3/2023). DPLP = Priberam Informática (2021), Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Porto, Lello, https://dicionario. priberam.org/sobre.aspx (2/3/2023). DREM = Direção Regional de Estatísticas da Madeira (2020), Estatísticas do Turismo da Região Autónoma da Madeira. Resultados Provisórios Janeiro de 2020, Funchal, Direção Regional de Estatística da Madeira, https://estatistica.madeira.gov.pt/download-now-3/economic/turismo-gb/turismo-publicacoes-gb/ finish/270-publicacoes/12155-turismo-fevereiro-pe-e-janeiro-po-de-2020.html (2/3/2023). Facebook (2020) = Madeirense Puro (2020), Madeirense Puro by GONNA, https://www.facebook.com/ madeirensepurobygonna (2/3/2023). Ferreira, Carla Sofia da Silva (2004), Percepções e atitudes linguísticas das variedades diatópicas de Portugal. Um contributo para a Dialectologia perceptual, Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra, Master Thesis. Figueiredo, Ana Cristina Alves Martins de (2011), Palavras d’aquintrodia (estudo sobre regionalismos madeirenses), Lisbon, Fonte da Palavra. Frutuoso, Gaspar ([1586–1590] 2007), As Saudades da Terra, in: Álvaro Rodrigues de Azevedo (ed.), Au Saudades da Terra. Fac-Símile, Funchal, Empresa Municipal Funchal 500 Anos. Gonçalves, Ernesto (1958), Os “Homens bons” do Concelho do Funchal em 1471, Das Artes e da História da Madeira 5/4, 1–8, 73–79. Gouveia, Horácio Bento de (1995), Torna-Viagem: o Romance do Emigrante, Coimbra, Coimbra. Haddar, Sarah Gonçalves Martins (2008), Percepções, estereótipos e atitudes linguísticas albicastrenses: um estudo de dialectologia perceptual, Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra, Master Thesis. Jardim, Ricardo (1946), Saias de Balão (Na Ilha da Madeira): Romance Funchal, Funchal, C.M. do Funchal. Livramento, Marco (2016), Lenda de Machim, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/machim-lenda-de (2/3/2023). Londral, Ana Rita (2016), Vias rodoviárias, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/vias-rodoviarias (2/3/2023). Macedo, Deolinda Bela de (1939), Subsídios para o Estudo do Dialecto Madeirense, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Macedo, Marlene/Bazenga, Aline (2019), Produção de uma Paisagem Linguística em Espaços Públicos e Comerciais na Ilha da Madeira, unpublished manuscript presented at the XI SOPCOM Conference, 13–15 November 2019, Universidade da Madeira. Martins, Ana Maria (2009), Subject Doubling in European Portuguese Dialects: The Role of Impersonal Se, in: Enoch O. Aboh et al. (edd.), Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2007, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 179–200. Melo, Luís de Sousa (1988), O problema da origem geográfica do povoamento, Islenha 3, 20–34. Newitt, Malyn (2005), A History of Portuguese Overseas Expansion 1400–1668, London, Routledge. Nunes, João da Cruz (1965), Os Falares da Calheta, Arco da Calheta, Paúl do Mar e Jardim do Mar, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Bachelor Thesis.

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Nunes, Naidea (1998), Os “dialectos madeirenses” e a história da língua portuguesa, in: Livro de Comunicações do Colóquio “Cultura de Periferias Insularidades”, Funchal, Câmara Municipal do Funchal, Departamento de Cultura, 81–89. Nunes, Naidea (2014), Variação social e vitalidade de alguns regionalismos madeirenses no português falado na cidade do Funchal, Confluência 46, 335–370. Nunes, Naidea (2017), Regionalismos madeirenses: estudo lexicológico da variação dialetal e sociolinguística na Ilha da Madeira, Revue de linguistique romane 81, 433–475. Nunes, Naidea (2018), O léxico da cultura açucareira na construção do mundo atlântico: Madeira, Canárias, Cabo Verde, S. Tomé e Príncipe, Brasil, Venezuela e Colômbia, Veredas. Revista da Associação Internacional de Lusitanistas 29, 124–149. Oliveira, Isabel Tiago de (2013), O arquipélago da madeira: dinâmicas demográficas de 1890 a 2011, in: Carlota Santos/Paulo Teodoro de Matos (edd.), A Demografia das Sociedades Insulares Portuguesas. Séculos XV a XXI, Braga, Centro de Investigação Transdisciplinar “Cultura, Espaço e Memória”, 105–135. Perdigão, Cristina S.A. (2017), O Turismo na Madeira. Dinâmicas e ordenamento do turismo em territórios insulares, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Pereira, Maria do Carmo Noronha (1952), Tentativa de um Pequeno Atlas Linguístico da Madeira e Algumas Considerações Fonéticas, Morfológicas e Sintácticas do Falar Madeirense, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Bachelor Thesis. Pinto, Maria Luís Pinto/Rodrigues, Teresa Maria Ferreira (2013), O povoamento das ilhas da madeira e do porto santo nos séculos XV e XVI, in: Carlota Santos/Paulo Teodoro de Matos (edd.), A Demografia das Sociedades Insulares Portuguesas. Séculos XV a XXI, Braga, Centro de Investigação Transdisciplinar “Cultura, Espaço e Memória”, 15–53. PORDATA (2019) = Fundação Francisco Manuel dos Santos, Retrato da Madeira, Edição 2019, Lisbon, Bases de Dados Portugal Contemporâneo, https://www.pordata.pt/ebooks/MA2019v20190712/mobile/index.html (2/3/2023). PORDATA (2020) = Bases de Dados Portugal (2020), População activa: total e por nível de escolaridade completa, Lisbon, Fundação Francisco Manuel dos Santos https://www.pordata.pt/DB/Municipios/Ambiente+de +Consulta/Tabela (2/3/2023). Raposo, Eduardo B.P., et al. (edd.) (2013), Gramática do Português, vol. 1, Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Rebelo, Helena (2005), O Falar do Porto Santo – Contribuição para o Estudo do Vocalismo e Algumas Considerações Sobre o Consonantismo, Funchal, Universidade da Madeira, Doctoral Thesis. Rebelo, Helena (2015), Algumas Representações Literárias das Vogais Orais Madeirenses: Os Sistemas PréAcentuado e Pós-Acentuado, in: Roberto Samartim et al. (edd.), Estudos da AIL em Ciências da Linguagem: Língua, Linguística, Didática, Santiago de Compostela/Coimbra, AIL, 127–144. Rebelo, Helena/Nunes, Naidea (2016), Regionalismos madeirenses, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/regionalismosmadeirenses (2/3/2023). Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rezende, Maria Ângela Leotte (1961), Canhas e Câmara de Lobos: estudo etnográfico e linguístico, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Bachelor Thesis. Rodrigues, Bruno (2015), Variedade dialetal madeirense: análise acústica das vogais tónicas orais, Aveiro, Universidade de Aveiro, Master Thesis. Rodrigues, Lorena/Bazenga, Aline (2019), Variação linguística dos pronomes pessoais de terceira pessoa no português falado no Brasil e na Madeira, in: Lurdes de Castro Moutinho et al. (edd.), Estudos em variação linguística nas línguas românicas, Aveiro, Universidade de Aveiro, 236–247. Rodrigues, Paulo Miguel (2010), Da insularidade: prolegómenos e contributo para o estudo dos paradigmas da Madeirensidade (1910–1926), Anuário 2010 do Centro de Estudos de História do Atlântico 2, 210–228.

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Rogers, Francis Millet (1946), Insular Portuguese Pronunciation: Madeira, Hispanic Review 14/3, 235–253. Santos, Thierry Proença dos (2007), De Ilhéus a Canga, de Horácio Bento de Gouveia: a narrativa e as suas (re) escritas (com uma proposta de edição crítico-genética e com uma tradução parcial do romance para francês), Paris, Université Sorbonne Nouvelle, Doctoral Thesis. Santos, Thierry Proença dos/Rebelo, Helena (2019), Madeira: acerca da polimorfia de palavras construídas a partir de um topónimo, Revista Pensardiverso 7, 93–129. Saramago, João/Segura, Maria Luísa (1999), Açores e Madeira: Autonomia e Coesão Dialectais, in: Isabel Hub Faria (ed.), Lindley Cintra. Homenagem ao Homem, ao Mestre e ao Cidadão, Lisbon, Cosmos/Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, 707–738. Segura, Maria Luísa (2013), Variedades Dialectais do Português Europeu, in: Eduardo P. Raposo et al. (edd.), Gramática do Português, vol. 1, Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 85–142. Silva, António Marques, (1985), Minha gente: crónica romanceada, Funchal, Secretaria Regional do Turismo e Cultura. Taglioni, François (2011), Insularity, Political Status and Small Insular Spaces, Shima. The International Journal of Research into Island Cultures 5/2, 45–67. Tomás, Manoel (1635), Insvlana, Antwerp, Ioam Mevrsio. Vasconcelos, Francisco de Paula Medina e (1806), Zargueida, descobrimento da Ilha da Madeira: poema heroico, Lisbon, Off. Simão Thaddeo Ferreira. Veríssimo, Nelson (1990), Narrativas Literárias de Autores da Madeira Séc. XX, Funchal, Secretaria Regional do Turismo, Cultura e Emigração/Direcção Regional dos Assuntos Culturais. Vidal-Luengo, Ana Ruth (2018), Vitalidad diacrónica y sincrónica de arabismos léxicos en el español atlántico: Madeira, Canarias, América, Studia Neophilologica 90/1, 90–110. Vieira, Alberto (1991), Os escravos no Arquipélago da Madeira séculos XV–XVII, Funchal, Centro de Estudos de História do Atlântico. Vieira, Alberto (1994), O infante e as ilhas, Funchal, Centro de Estudos de História do Atlântico. Vieira, Alberto (1999), Os italianos na Madeira: séculos XV–XVI, Arquipélago-História 2ª série 3, 11–28. Vieira, Alberto (2001), As migrações e os descobrimentos portugueses. Séculos XV e XVI, in: Região Autónoma da Madeira (ed.), Imigração e Emigração nas ilhas, Funchal, Centro de Estudos de História do Atlântico, 27– 62. Vieira, Alberto (2007), A Emigração portuguesa nos Descobrimentos: Do Litoral às Ilhas, Portuguese Studies Review 15/1–2 (ed. Alberto Vieira, The Evolution of the Portuguese Atlantic: Essays in Honour of Ursula Lamb), Trent, Trent University, 63–101. Vieira, Alberto (2016), Ingleses, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/ingleses (2/3/2023). Vieira, Alberto (2018), Arquipélagos e ilhas, entre memória, desmemória e identidade, Cadernos de Divulgação do CEHA 4, 1–58. Vieira, Alberto, et al. (2001), História e Autonomia da Madeira, Funchal, Secretaria Regional de Educação. Vieira, Alberto/Janes, Emanuel (2017), Transportes, in: APCA (ed.), Aprender Madeira, Funchal, Agência de promoção da cultura atlântica, http://aprenderamadeira.net/article/transportes (2/3/2023). Vieira, Sílvia/Bazenga, Aline (2013), Patterns of Third Person Plural Verbal Agreement, Journal of Portuguese Linguistics 12/2, 7–50. Zurara, Gomes Eanes de (1841 [1473]), Chronica do descobrimento e conquista de Guiné, ed. Jean-Pierre Aillaud, Paris, Fain/Thunot.

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7 Spain: Canary Islands Abstract: This chapter describes the geographical and linguistic situation of the Canary Islands since its (re)discovery at the end of the thirteenth century until today. The strategic position of this archipelago as a bridge between Europe, Africa, and America contributed decisively for the Catholic Monarchs to consider this enclave as a priority in their expansionist policy vis-à-vis the Portuguese Crown and their claims over the Atlantic. This led to the adoption of Castilian throughout the archipelago at the expense of preexisting Aboriginal languages and against the other Romance languages (Portuguese and French) that had had some implantation in some of the islands during the last stage of the Late Middle Ages. The variety of Spanish spoken today in the Canary Islands reflects all this crossroads of cultures and, in a special way, the uninterrupted relationship with Latin America. Likewise, the unique characteristics of the Canarian modality are analysed, as well as some aspects related to linguistic purism and recent regional legislation which advocates the study of this variety as a relevant section of the intangible heritage of the autonomous community. Keywords: Spanish, Canary, linguistic characteristics, purism, legislation

1 Sociolinguistic situation The Canary Islands form, with Madeira, Azores, the Wild Islands, and Cabo Verde, a large volcanic ecosystem located in the north-western part of the African continent. From a historical point of view, the Canarian archipelago stands out from the rest of this group for having been the first African island territory to become credible news in the low-medieval chronicles of the Atlantic expansion, for being the only one that had Aboriginal population at the arrival of European settlers, and because it was also a Castilian enclave in an area frequently navigated by Portuguese sailors during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The pre-Hispanic peoples that inhabited the Canary Islands before the arrival of the conquerors suffered a drastic and rapid acculturation, and the islands were used in a strategic manner as provisioning ports and starting point of the transatlantic route since 1492. From that moment on, a tricontinental dialogue between Europe, Africa, and America began, which immediately resulted in an initial wave of globalization and the opening of trade and emigration routes, in many cases clandestine, maintained uninterruptedly until the mid-twentieth century. This is one of the reasons why, although geographically the Canary archipelago is located at a distance of only about one hundred kilometres from the African continent, historically the turning towards the New World has marked the Canarians who identify, from a sociocultural point of view, more with https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-007

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Europe and with America. Additionally, the Spanish spoken in the islands has, because of the time of its implementation and by its own evolution, specific characteristics that bring it closer to the Western Andalusian and American varieties, especially to the Caribbean of Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Venezuela, within the socalled “Atlantic Spanish” (cf. Corbella 2021). The Canary archipelago consists of the eight islands El Hierro, La Palma, La Gomera, Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, and La Graciosa, although the latter, the island with the smallest territory, considered as an islet until mid-2018, administratively depends on Lanzarote. The total population amounts to 2,153,389 inhabitants. Most of the inhabitants reside on the two capital islands Gran Canaria and Tenerife (cf. Table 1). Table 1: Census of inhabitants of each island (ISTAC 2019a) Island

Inhabitants

Percentage

Tenerife

917,841

42.62 %

Gran Canaria

851,231

39.53 %

Lanzarote

152,289

7.07 %

Fuerteventura

116,886

5.43 %

La Palma

82,671

3.84 %

La Gomera

21,503

1.00 %

El Hierro

10,968

0.51 %

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Although each island has its own characteristics, a certain unity can be observed between those that make up the eastern province (Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, and Fuerteventura) and the islands of the western province (Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera, and El Hierro) from a linguistic point of view. Each of these two groups constitutes a distinct political unit (recognized since 1927), and their linguistic unification has been especially favoured by socioeconomic relations and growing airport connectivity. Even the average age of the inhabitants of both provinces is slightly different, with a younger population in the eastern province and a relatively older age group in the western, according to the Canary Island Statistics Institute (ISTAC 2019b). All these elements enable us to point out the existence of two linguistic models that are very close to each other but with their own singularities: one that radiates from the city of Las Palmas, on the island of Gran Canaria, and another that reflects the speech of the metropolitan area of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and La Laguna, on the island of Tenerife. Approximately 4.48 % of the total population is of foreign origin, and around half of the foreign residents are from the European Union (ISTAC 2019c). The tourism sector is the driving force of the Canarian economy, which is why a significant amount of these  

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residents work in that sector. The rest of the immigration is, in this order, from Hispanic American countries (Venezuela and Cuba, but also from Ecuador and Colombia in recent years), Africa (mostly from Morocco and, to a lesser extent, sub-Saharan Africans), and Asia (with a traditional colony of Indians linked to the Canary Islands’ free ports and, in more recent times, immigrants from China, which is caused by the growing African economic market). There is a flow of irregular immigration, which is quite important in the eastern province due to its proximity to the African continent and the decolonization process of the Sahara. This large presence of foreign residents in the archipelago means that around 20,983 pupils attending school come from these countries (ISTAC 2019d). The integration of these immigrants into Canarian society and the adoption of the linguistic variety of Spanish spoken on the islands depends largely on the nationality of the resident. Nonetheless, as is often the case, the younger generations are the ones who achieve a greater degree of adaptation. The interferences caused by the influences that the languages of these immigrants can exert or have exerted on the Canarian modality are usually limited to the lexicon. However, these loanwords have not been generalized throughout the archipelago but in those localities where the different groups have taken root. From the ethnographic point of view, the survival of the Silbo Gomero, a pre-Hispanic whistling language used by the island’s shepherds, stands out. In the French chronicle entitled Le Canarien, written between 1402 and 1404 and preserved in two manuscripts dated around 1420 and 1490, when describing the island of La Gomera it was indicated that ‘[it] is the land inhabited by many people who speak the strangest language of all the regions of this area, as they speak with the lips as if they had no tongue; it is said around here that a powerful prince had them taken there on account of some crime they had committed and had their tongues cut out’.1

This language without words, as the French anthropologist René Verneau called it in the title of his essay Le langage sans paroles (1923), was not a system of communication exclusive to La Gomera, as it also existed in the islands of Tenerife, Gran Canaria, and El Hierro and was maintained after the conquest of the archipelago by the Castilians. Presently, it only survives in La Gomera and is sporadically used by some shepherds on the island of El Hierro. The existence of this type of language should not be attributed, as the authors of Le Canarien point out, to the legend of the “cut-off tongues” (cf. Aznar/Pico/ Corbella 2003, 133), a punishment that the Vandals apparently applied to their enemies when they invaded Northern Africa in 429. Its origin is actually based on a resource created by the islanders to solve the rugged orography of La Gomera, which is full of deep

1 “est le païs habité de grant peuple qui parole plus estrange langage de tous les aultres païs de par dessa, et parlent des baulievrez auxi que c’ilz fussent sans langue; dit-on par dessa que un grant prince, pour auscun meffait, les fist la mettre et leur fist tailler les langues” (Aznar/Pico/Corbella 2003, 133).

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ravines (like the rest of the western islands of the archipelago). The whistling facilitated communication between the two sides of the valley without having to travel a considerable distance on almost impassable paths. This mode of language transforms the phonemes that constitute common voices into more or less continuous tonal whistles, with a seemingly simple system of vowels and consonants (Trujillo 1978, 40s.), which is capable of transliterating complete sentences. Its use persisted until the mid-twentieth century, but the appearance of more advanced means of communication, the massive emigration towards the capital islands, and the progressive abandonment of the shepherding led to a situation in which the whistling was considered practically extinct. The initiatives for its revitalization arose in the 1980s, so much so that in 1999 the parliament of the Canary Islands included it in the catalogue of the ethnographic heritage of the archipelago. Since then, it has been taught as a subject in the school curriculum of secondary and primary schools on the island of La Gomera. Ten years later, in 2009, UNESCO awarded it the status of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

2 Linguistic history The appearance of the Canary Islands in the cultural history of the West is inevitably linked, since its inception, to the legendary image that the Greek (Makáron Nêsoi ‘the Isles of the Blessed’), Latin (Fortunatae Insulae ‘the Fortunate Isles’), and Arab (al-ŷazā ’ir al-jālidāt ‘Eternal Islands or ‘Islands of Happiness’) texts had transmitted, that is, to the concept of Champs Élysées that Homer coined in the song IV of the Odyssey, in reference to the places where the heroes and souls resided after abandoning life (Martínez 2006, 58). Those fabulous islands were associated with possible real places after Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia (23–79), a work in which the Latin author cited, among others, the island Ninguaria (according to Pliny) or Nivaria (according to the version of Gaius Julius Solino in the fourth century), for the perpetual snows that it contained, identified later with the presence of the Teide peak in Tenerife and the island of Canaria, due to the high number of enormous dogs that lived in it. This tradition would continue throughout the Middle Ages and was followed by authors such as Saint Isidore of Seville who, in his Etymologiae, mixed the classical image, ‘The Fortunate Islands signify by their name that they produce all manner of good things, as if they were happy and blessed with an abundance of fruit’,2 with a possible geographical ascription: ‘They also lie in the Ocean opposite the left of Mauritania, very near the West, and separated from one another by the sea’.3 2 “Fortunarum insulae vocabulo suo significant omnia ferre bona, quasi felices et beatae fructuum ubertate” (Isidorus Hispalensis 1971, XI, vi, 8). 3 “Sitae sunt autem in Oceano contra laevam Mauretaniae, occiduo proximae, et inter se interiecto mari discretae” (Isidorus Hispalensis 1971, XI, vi, 8).

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2.1 Establishment of Spanish Although there is evidence that at the end of the thirteenth century and the beginning of the following century, some European and Arab sailors had landed on the islands, that utopian halo that surrounded the very existence of the archipelago was not definitively cleared until, in 1341, Boccaccio placed the Canary Islands in a real physical space in a story entitled ‘Of Canaria and Other Islands Recently Discovered in the Ocean’.4 In this short story, the illustrious humanist gave an account of the expedition that, for commercial purposes and under the Portuguese flag, the Genoese Nicoloso da Recco and the Florentine Angelino Corbizzi had undertaken during the first half of the fourteenth century. Within the low-medieval European culture, the literary rediscovery of the archipelago and its inhabitants was continued in other later accounts that, similarly, corroborated the geographical and ethnographic data offered by the Italian writer. From a linguistic point of view, Boccaccio’s text offered data on pre-Hispanic peoples and insisted on the difficulty faced by Europeans in communicating with Aboriginal people, who spoke a different language in each of the islands, with no possibility of intercomprehension among themselves. Those pre-Hispanic languages of the islands were related to the Berber (today called Amazigh) languages of the north African communities. And there were, in effect, a series of dialect variants that could be explained by the isolation itself that the insular space supposed, or by the different places of origin from the Maghreb, being ethnic groups that, although belonging to the same geographical area, possessed multiple features that distinguished them in the material expressions of their culture, in their habits and customs, and in general in their religious manifestations. Even so, it is very difficult to quantify the number of inhabitants on the archipelago at that time, since descriptions do not offer reliable figures (Aznar/ Corbella/Tejera 2012, 80). Portuguese, Catalan, Majorcan, and Castilian vessels continued to approach the islands’ coasts throughout the fourteenth century, on most occasions to capture their inhabitants and traffic them in the markets of Lisbon, Seville, Valencia, or Genoa. Three of those slaves collaborated as interpreters (Sp. trujamanes or lenguas, in the texts of the time) in the first expedition of conquest of the Canary Islands, commanded by the Frenchmen Jean de Béthencourt and Gadifer de la Salle in 1402 (Corrales/Corbella 2019, 300). The immediate result of that deed was the vassalage of the islands called de señorío ‘administered by a lord [in our case Béthencourt]’ (Lanzarote, Fuerteventura, La Gomera, and El Hierro) to the Castilian possessions of King Ferdinand III in 1403. A group of French accompanied Jean de Béthencourt on the second expedition he undertook to the islands around 1420, this time with the title of “King of Canaria”, since the territory had been granted in a fiefdom by the Castilian King. According to some chronicles of the time, those first settlers retained their French language until the late fifteenth century.

4 “De Canaria et insulis reliquis ultra Ispaniam in Oceano noviter repertis” (Boccaccio 1993 [1336–1341]).

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The annexation of the rest of the islands called realengo ‘administered by the crown’ to the kingdom of Castile would take place in the last years of that century: Gran Canaria in 1483, La Palma in 1493, and Tenerife in 1496. In spite of that early ascription to the Spanish Crown, Portugal did not give up its efforts to settle in one of the conquered territories, mainly Lanzarote and La Gomera, and even claimed the dominance of the entire archipelago before the papal power until the Treaty of Alcáçovas‑Toledo (1479), the Bula Inter caetera (1493), and the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) definitively set the limits and rights of Castile over the conquered and conquering islands. After that first stage of miscegenation, multiculturalism, and coexistence of Aboriginal, French, Portuguese, and Castilian, the sixteenth century would mean the total loss of pre-Hispanic speech and the final assumption of Spanish as a hegemonic and unique language, to the detriment of the other Romance languages. And although some indigenous people still needed interpreters, little by little, the number of Aboriginal speakers was confined to certain areas until, in a few decades, they definitively adopted the language of the conquerors. In a power of attorney granted on 5 July 1514 by the Grancanarians to manage in Court the exemption of military service outside the archipelago, petitioners pleaded in their favour the consummation of ethnic assimilation, since ‘we speak and are owned by Castilians themselves’.5 Hence the comment that Brother Martín Ignacio de Loyola made as he passed through the islands a few years later, in 1584: ‘All these seven islands are populated by Spaniards who live giftedly, among which there are today some natives of the already-mentioned Guanchas, who are very Hispanicized’.6

2.2 Milestones of its further development The linguistic history of the Canary Islands presents two completely different periods marked by the drastic replacement of pre-Hispanic languages by Spanish as a hegemonic and unique language, with an intermediate stage of bilingualism that would last until the mid-sixteenth century. From the first phase, no more data is preserved than those that historians and scribes could hear and transcribe through their own linguistic and writing habits, as well as the features that can be deduced from toponomastic studies. The acculturation of the Aborigines became effective for multiple reasons, among others because, as the chronicler of the conquest of Gran Canaria Pedro Gómez Escudero affirmed, Spaniards

5 “Hablamos e somos habidos por propios castellanos” (in Rumeu de Armas 1996, 274). 6 “Todas estas siete islas están pobladas de Españoles que viuen regaladamente, entre los cuales hay el día de oy algunos naturales de los guanchas ya dichos, que estan muy españolados” (Monterrey 2003, 352).

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always contested the name of things and despised their words, and when they attempted to study their customs in greater depth there was no one to account for them (Morales Padrón 1993, 435). Undoubtedly, the demographic circumstances of the Canary Islands were very different from those of the Americas and those of continental Africa, so it was easier to teach Spanish to the colonized or simply to force them to join if they intended to improve their vital situation, than to consider developing a deep knowledge of their language, in the style of what would be done in America, where the grammars and lexicons of Amerindian languages written by missionaries are innumerable, bound by the varied and extensive communication needs. The second stage began to become effective when the Catholic Monarchs became aware of the interest and strategic situation of the Canary archipelago, especially from the commission they made to Esteban Pérez de Cabitos in 1476 to resolve the ownership of the island of Lanzarote and establish the rights of conquest over the unconquered islands, with the monarchical desire for greater intervention in the archipelago, the result of the policy of consolidation of the State and the intensification of the struggle with Portugal for the Atlantic (Aznar Vallejo 1990, 17). From there, the Crown reserved the exclusivity of the conquest of the rest of the islands de realengo and the right to sign peace with the Aboriginal sides. It was these political conditions that propitiated the linguistic code swift that, in a few decades, became fully effective. From a historical point of view, there are two aspects that are fundamental in understanding the evolution of the type of Romance that replaced the Aboriginal languages of the Canary archipelago. In the first place, the Andalusian base of the variety of Spanish implanted in the islands is unquestionable, given the importance that people from this region of the mainland had in the conquest and later settlement of the archipelago. The enfeoffment of the islands de señorío by the first conqueror, the Norman Jean de Béthencourt, was carried out in Seville before the Castilian king, and it was precisely the Sevillian merchants who were most interested in that annexation. Similar origins were shared by the first governors, the so-called adelantados, of the islands de realengo in the last quarter of the fifteenth century, and the population and regular clergy were also mostly Andalusian. Secondly, the parallelism with America was reflected from the end of that same century: the Canary Islands were included among the New World novelties, and their people were, and still are today, identified as coming from the West Indies. This is the reason for the concomitances and similarities that mark the linguistic history of the archipelago and American Spanish, which cannot be understood if they are not placed in the global context of the overseas expansion in which they arose and in the human and cultural ties that have been maintained during the later centuries.

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3 External language policy Once the territory had been consolidated since the end of the fifteenth century, no language legislation was established on the imposition of Spanish or on the teaching of the Canarian variety until the arrival of democracy in the last quarter of the twentieth century. Spanish is the first language of all Canarian speakers, as well as the only language used by the administration, in education, and in the media.

3.1 Legislation Spain – In the area of language legislation, the 1978 Spanish Constitution, apart from recognizing the different languages of the State in its article 3, devotes a section to the regional varieties of Spanish, expressly recognizing the interest of their conservation: 1. 2. 3.

Castilian is the official Spanish language of the State. All Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it. The other Spanish languages shall also be official in the respective Autonomous Communities in accordance with their Statutes. The wealth of the different language modalities of Spain is a cultural heritage that shall be the object of special respect and protection (C-ESe).7

Autonomous Communities – The subsequent development of what is established in this article of the Spanish Constitution was carried out through the statutes of the different Communities and the laws of linguistic normalization, both in what corresponds to the Autonomous Communities with another language of their own and, therefore, co-official (such as Catalonia, the Basque Country, Galicia, Valencia, or the Balearic Islands), and in what concerns the protection of the distinguishing features of the same Spanish language according to the different regions (e. g. the Andalusian variety, or Canarian). Canary Islands – The first Statute of Autonomy of the Canary Islands, published in 1982, did not explicitly mention the conservation of the linguistic heritage. It was in the Reform of the Statute of Autonomy of the Canary Islands published at the end of 2018, that the exclusive competence of the archipelago in ‘the defence, promotion and study of the Spanish of the Canary Islands, as a linguistic variety of Atlantic Spanish’8 and the  

7 1. El castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado. Todos los españoles tienen el deber de conocerla y el derecho de usarla. 2. Las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comunidades Autónomas de acuerdo con sus Estatutos. 3. La riqueza de las distintas modalidades lingüísticas de España es un patrimonio cultural que será objeto de especial respeto y protección (C-ES, art. 3). 8 “La defensa, promoción y estudio del español de Canarias, como variedad lingüística del español atlántico” (EA-CA, art. 37.7).

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need to safeguard ‘the intangible assets of Canarian popular culture and the linguistic particularities of the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands’9 were taken into account. This competence in linguistic matters assumed by the Autonomous Government has been developed through the Law on Cultural Heritage of the Canary Islands. This law considers and qualifies as an integral part of the “Intangible Heritage” of the archipelago several features related to linguistic aspects: ‘(a) Oral traditions and expressions, including the linguistic forms and particularities of the Spanish language of the Canary Islands, terminology and graphics of Aboriginal origin, the Silbo Gomero and other manifestations of the whistle language, proverbs, poems, ten-line stanza, legends, as well as their forms of expression and transmission’.10

3.2 Languages used by public authorities The language used by public bodies is Spanish. There is no trace of Aboriginal languages except for some words and place names.

3.3 Languages used in education It was only after the legislative renewal, favoured first by the Spanish Constitution of 1978 and then in 1982 with the publication of the Statute of Autonomy of the Canary Islands, that competencies in the field of education were transferred to the Autonomous Community. Teaching in the Canary Islands is carried out in Spanish, as in the rest of the monolingual Castilian-speaking territory of Spain, and is currently ruled by Organic Law for the Improvement of Educational Quality (Ley Orgánica 8/2013, de 9 de diciembre, para la mejora de la calidad educativa – LOMCE). This general law was published in 2013 and establishes the basic competencies, objectives, contents, methodological and evaluation criteria that schoolchildren must meet at each educational level. As it happens with the legislation in the field of languages, this regulation constitutes the general reference by which the whole nation is ruled, and it is up to the different Autonomous Communities to develop by means of decrees or autonomous laws the set of basic contents that the students must acquire in each level of education. The provisions adopted by the government

9 “Los bienes inmateriales de la cultura popular canaria y las particularidades lingüísticas del español hablado en Canarias” (EA-CA, art. 137.1). 10 “Las tradiciones y expresiones orales, incluidas las modalidades y particularidades lingüísticas del español de Canarias, la terminología y grafismos de origen aborigen, el silbo gomero y otras manifestaciones del lenguaje silbado, refranes, poemas, décimas, leyendas, así como sus formas de expresión y transmisión” (Law 11/2019, art. 106a).

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of the Canary Islands have insisted that the students, on completing the various stages of their education, should become aware of the characteristics of their mode of speech.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – The history of the Canarian press is relatively recent since, with the exception of a few isolated precedents, the first newspaper to be published with a certain regularity and continuity, El Correo de Tenerife, began publication in 1808. Today, the newspapers with the highest circulation are La Provincia, Canarias7 (both published in Gran Canaria) and El Día and Diario de Avisos (published in Tenerife). The transition from analogue to digital format has been decisive in the fact that other newspapers with a long tradition, such as La Tarde or La Opinión de Tenerife, have ceased publication or have merged with other publishers in recent years. All the historical press can be consulted on the portal Jable (created in 2008 by the Library of the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, cf. Jable) and on the portal Prensa canaria digitalizada (created also in 2008 by the Library of the University of La Laguna, cf. ULL). Audiovisual media – As public entities, Spanish Radio and Television (Radio Televisión Española – RTVE) and the Public Radio and Television of the Autonomous Community of the Canary Islands (Radio y Televisión Públicas de la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias – RTVC) have coverage in the Canary Islands. The RTVE began its activity in 1964 and currently has two production centres in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Santa Cruz de Tenerife, as well as a network of collaborators in all the islands. These centres are responsible for local programming, such as regional news services like Telecanarias, or specific programmes with Canarian or Atlantic content that are broadcast by channels 1 and 2, sometimes in disconnection with the mainland and on other occasions with national or international coverage. The RTVC, on the other hand, is a public entity dependent on the Government of the Canary Islands that began its broadcasts in 1999. It also has a network of collaborators in the islands and in Madrid. It is funded by regional budgets, and its management is governed by Law 13/2014, recently amended by Law 6/2018.

4 Linguistic characteristics The characteristics of Canarian Spanish are not exclusive to this variety but, to a large extent, some of its linguistic peculiarities are also characteristic of other areas such as Andalusia and the American continent. For this reason, some researchers have described the dialect of the islands as a ‘transit speech’ (“hablas de tránsito”), an argument that today is unsustainable (Almeida 2014, 40). In the last decades, there has been an increasingly evident change towards a horizontal dialectal convergence, which is levelling out and losing those features less geographically extended or stigmatized in favour of a

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standard regional regiolect or modality that contemplates the most generalized features in the whole archipelago.

4.1 Pronunciation A set of phonetic and phonological features give Canarian Spanish a character that, in an impressionistic way, has been traditionally described as less resounding and much sweeter, more rested and musical than peninsular Spanish (Corrales/Corbella 2004, 78). Intonation – Prosodic studies show a clear difference between Canarian and general intonation of northern Spanish. This fact becomes evident in interrogative sentences, characterized by a high-descending or circumflex pattern against the most common ascendant of Castilian Standard, as can be seen in the following graph, taken from Dorta (2008, 127):

Figure 1: Diagram of the pattern of non-pronominal interrogative sentences in Castilian Standard

Figure 2: Diagram of the circumflex pattern of non-pronominal interrogative sentences in Canarian Spanish

Articulation of [s] – Another factor that contributes to the uniqueness of the Canarian pronunciation is the predorsodental articulation of the [s̪ ], compared to the Castilian apical articulation [s̺ ]. One of the most recognized novelists of the islands, Agustín Espinosa, sustained that in the realization of this sound ‘The apex (the essentially articulatory instrument of the Castilian S) descends, passively, over the lower incisors. The Castilian concavity has turned around (concave > convex)’.11 There are no previous metalinguistic comments on this type of articulation, which must have been widespread across the islands since the time of the introduction of Spanish, and which is also present in some parts of Andalusia and is characteristic of Portuguese.

11 “El ápice (el instrumento esencialmente articulatorio de la S castellana) desciende, pasivo, sobre los incisivos inferiores. El cuenco castellano se ha tornado tortuga (cóncavo > convexo)” (Espinosa 1927, 8s.).

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Seseo – As in some areas of Andalusia, Extremadura, and across America, in the Canarian variety, since its inception, the seseo was consolidated so that, within the readjustment and simplification of the medieval sibilant system, the distinction between /s/ : /θ/, was lost to favour of the voiceless alveolar fricative /s/, articulated as a predorsodental in the Canary Islands, as indicated in the previous point. The generalization of this phenomenon among the first settlers, present in all the preserved handwritten documentation, could also be favoured by the Portuguese settlers, so abundant in the islands during the sixteenth century, and whose language is seseante (Alvar 1990, 60). Realization of final -s – Another phenomenon associated with the relaxation of joint tension is the pronunciation of the [s] in final position, in all types of contexts, i.e., preconsonantal, prevocal, or prepausal, which also occurs in some areas of America, Andalusia, Extremadura, and Murcia. In the Canary Islands, the final result presents four possibilities: the transformation of the sibilant consonant into an aspirate which would be the usual realization in the archipelago (e. g. las moscas [lahˈmohkah] instead of [lasˈmoskas]), the loss, a less frequent solution as compared to other areas such as Andalusia (e. g. pazguato [paˈɣwato] instead of [paθˈɣwato], Santa Cruz [santaˈkru] instead of [santaˈkruθ], adios [aˈðjo] instead of [aˈðjos]), the maintenance, typical of the island of El Hierro, or the assimilation of manner, which distinguishes speakers from the capital of and from northern Gran Canaria that modify the articulation fricative + plosive > plosive + plosive (e. g., [s] + [d] > [d] + [d], las dos [ladˈdoh] instead of [lasˈdos]). In the costumbrist tradition, this phonetic change has often been represented with a nasal spelling: lan vacas ‘las vacas’, lan doce ‘las doce’. In recent studies, amongst the youngest speakers of the island of El Hierro, there has been a drastic reduction in sibilancy and a progressive increase in aspirational performance motivated by the comparison with the regional norm. Pronunciation of and – The Castilian fricative sound associated with the spellings and suffers lenition or weakening in Canarian Spanish in such a way that it is pronounced as an aspiration [h] and never with the voiceless velar fricative [x], typical of peninsular Spanish. It is not possible to know with certainty whether [x] was articulated in the past in the archipelago but, at least since the seventeenth century, lapses with spellings that would represent the phoneme as a simple aspiration are indeed frequent (e. g., gente [ˈhente] instead of [ˈxente], or enjambre [enˈhambre] instead of [enˈxambre]). Yeísmo – In all the islands, the neutralization of the oposition /ʎ/ : /ʝ/ > /ʝ/ (e. g. calle [ˈkaʝe] instead of [ˈkaʎe]) is common, given that the two capitals of the archipelago are yeistic and act as a model for the rest of the speakers. Even so, in some areas of the island of Tenerife, La Gomera, and La Palma the distinction is still maintained (Almeida/ Díaz 1989, 68–71). Whilst bibliography also reveals the maintenance of the opposition as a widespread phenomenon on the island of El Hierro, recent fieldwork shows that equalization is gaining ground in the younger generations (García Cabrera 2019, 57). Pronunciation of – Although there is a lot of variation between the islands, in the Canary Islands, as is the Caribbean, the voiceless affricate postalveolar of normative Castilian [ʧ] is pronounced as a voiced palatal plosive, very close to [ɟ], for example mu 

 

 

 

 

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chacho [muˈɟaɟo] instead of [muˈʧaʧo], although sometimes it may also have an affricate realization (Dorta 1997). Aspiration of initial h- – An archaising and stigmatized trait, the maintenance of the aspiration of the initial h- as a voiceless glottal fricative, is common in popular speech: haba [ˈhaβa] instead of [ˈaβa], hedentina [heðenˈtina] instead of [eðenˈtina], or hembrerío [hemβreˈrio] instead of [emβreˈrio]. Confusion of liquids – This phenomenon is also present in areas of peninsular and American Spanish, relegated to popular and semi-cultural levels, e. g., dulce > [ˈdurse] instead of [ˈduḷθe], considered vulgar and, therefore, stigmatized. In consonant groups /rn/ and /rl/, the vibrant phone is usually assimilated or aspirated (carne [ˈkahne] or [ˈkan:e] instead of [ˈkarne], Carlos [ˈkahloh] or [ˈkall:oh] instead of [ˈkarlos]).  

4.2 Morphosyntax Tradition and innovation come together in the grammar of the Spanish of the islands and although most of the features that it possesses are not exclusive to the archipelago, as a whole, they characterize, as was the case with phonetics, the speaker of this region. The readjustment of the pronoun system, the frequency of use of the simple perfect, and the inversion in the order of some of the elements of the phrase are the most significant aspects. Stressed pronouns – The plural ustedes as opposed to vosotros is of generalized use in all the speech registers, and it constitutes the most frequent variant, as in much of southern Spanish, in combination with the verb form in the third person plural: ustedes lo compran instead of vosotros lo compráis. Less common is the use of ustedes in combination with the verb form in second-person plural: ustedes estáis, which has been recorded in a few rural areas of El Hierro, La Palma, and La Gomera, as in western Andalusia, or the maintenance, as an archaism, of vosotros (vosotros coméis, in some localities of El Hierro, La Palma, La Gomera, and Tenerife). In recent times, among the young generations of the cultured stratum of Gran Canaria and, occasionally, among cultured and semi-educated speakers of Tenerife and in imitation of the Castilian form, it has been possible to collect some uses of the standardized form vosotros. Possessive pronouns – To indicate possession, su and sus are used referring to the second person as a courteous form, which is sometimes specified by adding de usted or de ustedes. When it comes to the third person, de él, de ella, de ellos, de ellas is always indicated. The readjustment suffered by the system of personal pronouns meant a rearrangement of the possessive scheme and an increase in the frequency of analytical structures: esa gorra es de usted instead of esa gorra es suya, para su tierra de él instead of the standard para su tierra. Unstressed pronouns – Regarding the usage of unstressed third-person pronouns, normative Spanish uses different forms depending if the pronoun acts as direct object (lo,

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la, los, las) or indirect object (le, les). If these syntactical variants are not used properly, they may result in linguistic phenomena known as leísmo (les contrataron instead of las contrataron or los contrataron), laísmo (la pidió un beso instead of le pidió un beso) and loísmo (no hay que darlo más vueltas instead of no hay que darle más vueltas, NGRAE 2009, 1212–1229). In the Canaries, according to Catalán (1989, 155), the regional norm does not make concessions to leísmo, loísmo, and laísmo: the accusative is lo–la, los–las and the dative le–les without exceptions. Subsequent research has shown that the use was not as categorical as pointed out by this dialectologist, and texts serve as a confirmation that there is, and has been from an early age, a so-called animate leísmo (Les recogía a diario en la guagua instead of Los recogía a diario en la guagua), also called ‘courtesy leísmo’ (“leísmo de cortesía”), that is a polite-address construction using the pronoun le as the third person pronoun usted when referring to a person or group that is being addressed formally, which is still maintained today, as well as an inanimate leísmo, of much more limited use (Se tiene noticia que allí le hay instead of Se tiene noticia que allí lo hay). As Álvarez Martínez states (1987, 16), the Canarians systematically reject laísmo or loísmo, but they are in some ways ‘passive leístas’ (“leístas pasivos”), that is, speakers who are not surprised by the use of leísmo. It has also been recorded, even among educated speakers, the use of los instead of the singular lo in sentences such as se los dije o se los diré instead of se lo dije (a ellos) or se lo diré (a ellos), a construction considered colloquial in the oral language of large areas of America, in which the clitic pronoun lo adopts the plural mark to which the dative pronoun se refers (NGRAE 2009, 2663). Verbs – In the record of verb tenses, the preference of using the preterite (fui) over the present perfect (he venido) stands out. In addition, the present perfect, as opposed to normative Spanish, indicates a lasting (or repeated) action that extends to the present or an action that has produced a state that persists at the moment of speaking, while the preterite continues to be used to express specific actions, even if they have occurred in the extended present, or even at a time immediately prior to the grammatical present (Catalán 1989, 154). It is also common, at popular levels and even in semi-educated and cultured ones, to use haber as a personal verb, in agreement with the direct object: Luego habían (plural) unos extintores gigantescos instead of Luego había (singular) extintores gigantescos, in a recent example extracted from the Canary press (La Provincia 19/8/2007, 47, in Jable). This use is widespread in Latin America. The pan-Hispanic dictionary of doubts (Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas – DPD, s.v. haber) criticizes this use by indicating that many speakers erroneously interpret the noun that follows the verb haber as its subject and, consequently, put the verb in the third person of the plural when said noun is plural. Word order – Certain inversions in the order of the elements of the sentence are common in Canarian Spanish at all levels of speech. When the adverb más is combined with the indefinite pronouns nada, nadie, ninguno, or nunca, it is normal for it to precede them: le prohibieron verlo más nunca, no la tiene más nadie que el público instead of le prohibieron verlo nunca más, no la tiene nadie más que el público. This order has been attributed to the influence of Portuguese, but it is also common in other areas such as

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Galicia, León, Aragon, Andalusia, and Latin America. In the comparative structures el que más or el que menos (including all other variants with lo/la/los/las), the adverbs of quantity más or menos usually take precedence over the relative: lo menos que tiene que hacer, lo más que se le puede echar en cara, gofio era lo más que se comía instead of lo que menos tiene que hacer, lo que más se le puede echar en cara, gofio era lo que más se comía. This phenomenon, also present in some areas of America, used to be typical of colloquial speech, but in recent years it also appears in high registers: el más que lo estropee in polls of the cultured norm (Samper/Hernández/Troya 1998, inf. 5), somos los menos que nos hemos pronunciado sobre este tema in the Diary of meetings of the Canarian parliament (15/4/2009, nº 66, 37, in Jable). The Canarian speaker is not aware of the placement of the adverb ya in front of the subject personal pronoun instead of the pronoun + ya combination of normative Spanish: Ya nosotros habíamos sufrido el impacto, como ya ustedes saben, cuando ya yo era casada instead of Nosotros ya habíamos sufrido el impacto, como ustedes ya saben, cuando yo ya era casada, documented at all levels of speech. This is the maintenance of the classical order that appeared in Don Quixote and that has also been preserved in America, in the speech of Seville, Ciudad Real, and Zamora. Diminutives – In toponymic use, it can be noted that, primitively, the usual suffix used on the islands was ‑illo. At present, the suffix ‑ito, even incorporated into some adverbs like lueguito and, on certain occasions, lexicalized, e. g., abobito ‘Eurasian hoopoe’, is more frequently used. Infixes are not commonly used in the formation of the diminutive: solito ‘solecito’, cochito ‘cochecito’. Gradation – A feature particularly common among the speakers of Gran Canaria that distinguishes them from speakers of the other islands stands out: the frequent use of the combination of the adverb bien with the suffix ‑ísimo to indicate the maximum gradation: el test me salió bienísimo, hemos dormido bienísimo instead of el test me salió muy bien, hemos dormido muy bien or perfectamente.  

4.3 Lexicon The presence of a specific lexicon in the speech of the islands is evident from the oldest of records, since it was essential to have new terms or metaphorical meanings to designate a different and totally unprecedented reality for Western culture. This differential lexicon is not always exclusive to the archipelago, but it retains regional and social features typical of the time when Castilian became official in the territory and of the origin of the Spanish settlers, which was, as indicated, mostly Andalusian. This is why some words typical of the peninsular South survived in the island’s speech, such as afrecho ‘bran’ instead of salvado, alcaucil ‘edible head of the artichoke’ instead of cabeza de alcachofa, atrabancar ‘to cram’ instead of abarrotar, or tarajal ‘kind of bush’ instead of taray, or the maintenance of ancient words that, from a historical point of view, are considered Castilian archaisms, although their use is still fully valid in the island’s speech,

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such as alongar ‘to come closer’, arveja ‘pea’, chiquero ‘pigsty’, chivo ‘male goat’, comelón ‘glutton’, cuchara ‘flat bricklayer’, derriscadero ‘cliff’, durazno ‘peach’, fundamento ‘seriousness, formality’, or gaveta ‘drawer of any furniture’ (instead of alargar, guisante, pocilga, macho cabrío, comilón, llana, despeñadero, melocotón, seriedad, or cajón). Canarian lexicographical sources offer extensive documentation on all this regional vocabulary, its etymology, and validity of use (Corbella 2018a). As in the rest of the Hispanic domain, an important part of this traditional lexicon has been relegated to rural speech or has been lost among the younger generations because the traditional professions, games, sports, and customs to which they alluded are no longer usual. Another part of this vocabulary has been confined to the passive lexicon of older speakers, replaced in youth speech by the corresponding terms in Spanish. This is the case of words such as the Portuguese fonil ‘funnel’, which has been replaced by its synonym embudo, or the traditional entrudo, typical of the island of La Palma, replaced by carnaval. But even so, many other words that distinguish the origin of a Canarian speaker from the resident in any other region of the Hispanic domain are still commonly used. In total, a little over 20,000 elements form this differential lexicon of the speech of the islands. On some occasions, they are terms exclusive to the archipelago; on other occasions, they are Spanish words that have assumed a new meaning. Out of these words, about 2,500 present a shared use with America (Corrales/Corbella 2010) and a little more than a thousand have their immediate origin in Portuguese. Altogether, these facts grant a peculiar physiognomy to the speech of the islands and distinguish it from other varieties. The Canarian lexicon is also characterized by the numerous metaphoric and metonymic uses that have enabled the creation of new meanings for terms from the Spanish common fund, the generalization of terms characteristic of marine terminology, the development of series of derivatives with frequent suffixes such as ‑ero or ‑ento/‑iento, due to the influence of Portuguese, and the use of an abundant specific phraseology, sometimes coincident with America, as with the phrase llenarle a uno la cachimba ‘to make someone run out of patience’ (lit. ‘to fill up somebody’s hookah’), the noun phrase papita suave ‘something easy’ (lit. ‘soft potato’), or the adverbial phrase ni el médico chino ‘no one’ (lit. ‘not even a Chinese doctor’). Prehispanisms – There are very few Aboriginal terms that have been preserved in the active lexicon of all Canarian speakers because, as indicated, the period of bilingualism was limited to two or three generations after the conquest of the islands de realengo, given that the acculturation and substitution of native languages were almost immediate. The lists of pre-Hispanic words transmitted in the chronicles and travel books are meagre and, in general, these word sets allude to a past historical reality of which, except in the field of ethnographic and historical studies, there is hardly any knowledge because they never became integrated into the speech of the colonizers, such as ahemón ‘water’, añepa ‘spear’, banot ‘throwing spear’, benisahare ‘place for captives’, cancha ‘dog’, chaco ‘volcano’, chamoriscán ‘ravine’, ciquena ‘sheep’, efequén ‘oratory’, or faicán ‘priest’. An important exception are the terms guanarteme and mencey, which designated the ‘Aboriginal kings’ of Gran Canaria and Tenerife, respectively– in the first Eu-

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ropean chronicles they are identified as duques ‘dukes’– words preserved in the popular imagination due to the preeminence of these figures in the socio-political organization of pre-Hispanic peoples. Among the terms that maintain full vitality in island speech are two indigenisms that have migrated to some regions of America: gofio ‘toasted cornmeal’ and tabaiba ‘plant of the Euphorbiaceae family’. Other words, such as baifo ‘young goat’, goro ‘small place surrounded by stones’, pírgano ‘stem or nerve of the palm leaf’, sirinoque ‘popular song and dance’, tenique ‘hard and compact stone’, tabona ‘obsidian’, tagóror or tagoror ‘flat and circular place where assemblies were held’, or tamarco ‘circular dress’, despite having become incorporated into the speech of the islands and having even acquired new figurative and metaphorical meanings, are little by little falling out of use although they constitute the basis of new derivatives (e. g., embaifamiento ‘drowsiness, sleepiness’, embaifarse ‘to become discouraged’, baifada ‘foolishness or stupidity’, baifar ‘to make mischief’, baifudo ‘said of a person: thick’) and continue being used in idioms (e. g., estar como una baifa ‘to be crazy’, írsele a alguien el baifo ‘to forget what one was going to say or do’). Toponomastic studies are the ones that have analysed this Aboriginal legacy, which has been estimated at around 4,000 toponyms, with the utmost rigour, and the ones that have clarified the somewhat hidden meanings in them (Trapero/Santana Martel 2018). Lusitanianisms – From the fifteenth century and throughout the sixteenth century, including the period of the Iberian Union from 1580 to 1640, a relatively large number of Portuguese loans were incorporated into the Spanish of the islands that single out the Canarian lexicon compared to other modalities. The new Portuguese settlers who arrived in the archipelago were established, in general, in very specific nuclei and dedicated themselves to agriculture, livestock, orchilla collection, fish extraction, and other craft trades. After a period of bilingualism, which on islands like La Palma reached the beginning of the seventeenth century, those Portuguese emigrants completely assimilated the language of the Castilian elites and integrated, as any other element, in the cultural patchwork of the new society. Unlike what happened with prehispanisms, contacts with the Portuguese settlers affected all the semantic fields, left lasting traces on all linguistic levels, and served to integrate into Canarian Spanish not only nouns but also numerous verbs, adjectives, and a meaningful phraseology. Words of Portuguese origin include, e. g., the names of the most frequent species in the laurel forests preserved in the most rugged islands, among which are the names of trees such as loro ‘Laurus novocanariensis’ (< Pg. louro), palo blanco ‘Picconia excelsa’ (< Pg. pau branco), viñátigo ‘Persea indica’ (< Pg. vinhatico), aderno ‘Heberdenia excelsa’ (< Pg. aderno), acebiño ‘Ilex canariensis’ (< Pg. azevinho), follado ‘Viburnum rugosum’ (< Pg. folhado), faya ‘Morella faya’ (< Pg. faia), marmulano ‘Sideroxylon canariensis’ (< Pg. marmulano), or barbusano ‘Apollonias barbujana’ (< Pg. barbuçano), which corroborates the intensity of this contact and led to the replacement of the indigenous terminology for these species, not by Castilian words, as could be expected, but by lusitanianisms also present in the speech of Madeira. Also part of the Canarian  

 

 

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lexicon are geolectal terms of Galician-Portuguese origin, very common at all levels of speech in the islands, such as aguachento ‘waterlogged’ (< Pg. aguacento), amularse ‘to hinder oneself’ (< Pg. amuar), burgao ‘periwinkle’ (< Pg. burgau), callao ‘pebble’ (< Pg. calhau), cambullón ‘commercial activity that used to be carried out on gunwales’ (< Pg. cambulhão), chopa ‘saddled seabream’ (< Pg. choupa), enchumbar ‘to soak’ (< Pg. chumbar or enchumbar), engodo ‘bait’ and engodar ‘attract with bait’ (< Pg. engodo and engodar), entullo ‘set of stones and other materials’ and entullar ‘to fill’ (< Pg. entulho and entulhar), and its antonym desentullar (< Pg. desentulhar), desinquieto ‘restless’ (< Pg. desinquieto), fañoso ‘twangy’ (< Pg. fanhoso), fechillo ‘latch’ (< Pg. fecho), jeito ‘skill’ and ajeitado ‘skilful’ (< Pg. jeito and ajeitado), laja ‘flat and thin stone’ (< Pg. laje), magua ‘grief, sorrow’ (< Pg. mágoa), masapé ‘clay’ (< Pg. massapé), médano ‘dune’ (< Pg. médão), opado ‘swollen’ (< Pg. opado), pegar a ‘to start’ (< Pg. pegar a), peta ‘hump’ and petudo ‘huntchbacked’ (< Pg. peito and peitudo), picar (el ojo) ‘to wink’ (< Pg. piscar os olhos), rente ‘right above’ (< Pg. rente), rolo ‘roll’ (< Pg. rolo), seba and its collective sebadal ‘seaweed’ (< old Gal.-Pg. seba), sequero ‘dry land’ (< Pg. sequeiro), serventía ‘easement’ (< Pg. serventia), sorriba ‘dismantling’ sorribar and ‘to dismantle’ (< Pg. surriba and surribar), tanque ‘deposit’ (< Pg. tanque), tupir ‘clog’ and its antonym destupir (< Pg. entupir or tupir), or idioms like no tener papas en la boca ‘not to mince one’s words’ (< Pg. não ter papas na língua), salado como la pilla ‘very salty’ (< Pg. salgado como pilha), or estar como acabante ‘to be fed up’ (< Pg. acabante). Terminology concerning sugar constitutes another Portuguese contribution to the Canarian vocabulary. As soon as the conquest of Gran Canaria was completed, in 1483 the governor of the island, Pedro de Vera, sent for fruit trees and sugar cane to Madeira. Together with the sugar cane seedlings from the Portuguese island also came the officers and skilled workers of this agribusiness that was decisive for the entry of the islands in international circuits (Corbella 2018b). That terminological set, which was coined in Madeira and turned into Spanish in the Canary Islands, was the one that would later take root in the great American colonial estates. Thus words like bagazo ‘bagasse’ (< Pg. bagaço), bagacero ‘person in charge of the bagazo’ (< Pg. bagaceiro), banco ‘mill ground base’ (< Pg. banco), cachaza ‘cachaça’ (< Pg. cachaça), caldera ‘large copper cauldron’ (< Pg. caldeira), casa de purgar ‘purge house’ (< Pg. casa de purgar), chumacera ‘rowlock’ (< Pg. chumaceira), cobres ‘set of cauldrons’ (< Pg. cobres), fornalla ‘burner’ (< Pg. fornalha), furo ‘hole’ (< Pg. furo), forma (or horma) ‘conical mould’ (< Pg. forma), mascabado ‘muscovado’ (< Pg. mascavado), rapadura ‘caramel crust of sugar’ (< Pg. rapadura), sino ‘bell-shaped mould’ (< Pg. sino), tachero ‘person in charge of tachas’ (< Pg. tacheiro), tacha ‘small copper cauldron’ (< Pg. tacho), tarea ‘unit of wood measure (around five cubic metres)’ (< Pg. tarefa), trapiche ‘sugar cane mill’ (< Pg. trapicha de bestas), or zafra ‘sugar harvest’ (< Pg. çafra), common in the Dominican Republic, Cuba, or in colonial Mexico, constitute documented lusitanianisms in the Canary archipelago before the establishment of mills in America. Americanisms – The ports of the archipelago became, since the end of the fifteenth century, the doors and market of America. They were used by ship’s crews to replenish

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forces before entering the Ocean again, to repair the ships and, above all, for the provisioning of the supplies that had not been stowed in the Andalusian ports. Another fact that has marked relations with America has been the continuous diaspora of the Canaries throughout the centuries, an emigration that, on its outward journey and, in the best of cases, on its return, has contributed so that little by little cultural analogies and linguistic ties between the two communities have grown closer. From Uruguay to the southern United States, Canarian families settled in different towns and villages, many of them founded by islanders, such as Santa Fe de Bogotá in 1536, Montevideo in 1726, San Antonio de Texas in 1731, Villa de Bacalar in 1773, or Barataria in 1779, apart from numerous other enclaves in the Antilles, both insular and continental, where the Canarian footprint is still evident. That emigration, denominated by historians as “white slavery”, did not decline during the period of independence but, on the contrary, intensified throughout the nineteenth century towards Cuba and, until the mid-fifties of the twentieth century, to Venezuela. All these factors contributed to the early presence of some Indo-Americanisms in the speech of the islands, such as the Quechuism papa ‘potato’, of general use in the Canary Islands as in Andalusia, instead of the form patata of the rest of the peninsular regions, the Nahuatlism huacal or guacal ‘container to transport fruits and vegetables’, a term that was used quite regularly in the commercialization of bananas, or the Taíno bohío or (in Andalusian) bujío ‘cabin’, incorporated into the Canarian lexicon from a very early time, although of little use today. In these cases, as well as in the Guanchisms or Prehispanisms that have taken root in America, it is possible to recognize the path that these words have followed by the Atlantic, since their origin indisputably shows the direction of the loan. On other occasions, only the coincidence of use can be pointed out, so that the historical study can reveal its trajectory. It is what has happened with Anglicisms widespread in the islands like guagua (< possibly En. waggon) ‘bus’ whose documentation demonstrates an unquestionable Cuban origin, as well as fotingo ‘ramshackle car’, another very frequent Cubanism until the mid-twentieth century, relegated today to passive lexicon, derived from the advertising slogan foot it and go. This Atlantic vocation of the Canary-American lexicon is perfectly reflected in the Canarianisms that the dictionary of the Spanish language (Diccionario de la Lengua Española – DLE) has introduced, in which almost half of the words marked as typical of the archipelago have a similar use in America, like acortejarse ‘to cohabit’, acotejar ‘to arrange’, aguaviva ‘jellyfish’, alhorra ‘smut’, arranquera ‘to be broke’, bemba ‘thick lip’, bienmesabe ‘almond dessert’, cambullón ‘commercial activity and bartering of goods made on ships, especially with foreign vessels’, casal ‘an animal couple’, concuño ‘spouses’s brother in law’, destiladera ‘distilling device’, destupir ‘to unclog’, droga ‘debt’, emburujar ‘to jumble up’, empatar ‘to join together’, enchumbar ‘to soak’, esmorecer ‘to falter’, esquinera ‘corner cabinet’, fajada ’a fight’, fajar ‘to fight’, guagua ‘bus’, guindar ‘to hang’, jaca ‘breed of gamecock’, jalón ‘pull’, lebrancho ‘mullet’, marrón ‘sledgehammer’, penco ‘despicable person’, pileta ‘trough’, piña ‘punch’, pitanga ‘Brazilian cherry’, pitanguero ‘Brazilian cherry tree’, rosca ‘larva’, saco ‘jacket’, tanque ‘(water/fuel) tank’, te-

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rrera ‘one-storey (house)’, tolete ‘slow-witted’, tonga ‘pile’, velador ‘bedside table’, zafado ‘daring’, or zarandajo ‘contemptible’ (Corbella 2016, 144). Gallicisms – Although French could have been one of the sources of Canarian Spanish, due to the prolonged presence of conquerors and colonizers of this origin, the linguistic footprint that has survived proves to be minimal. A result of French influence seems to be the creation of the compound malpaís ‘lava field’ (< Fr. mauvais pays), at a time when the loan país had not yet been incorporated into Spanish. French may have also influenced the frequency of use of jable ‘sand’ (< Fr. sable), at least in the eastern islands. More controversial is the Gallic origin of the demonym guanche ‘Aboriginal of the island of Tenerife and, by extension, of the entire archipelago’, traditionally considered of pre-Hispanic origin (Llamas Pombo/Trapero 1998; Hernández 2019, 54). Arabisms – The proximity to Africa has not led to the introduction of a quantitatively important number of terms from the nearby continent in Canarian Spanish. Most of the Arabisms present in the vocabulary of the islands and incorporated in modern times were introduced indirectly through Portuguese, such as albafar ‘Hexanchus griseus’, alcatriña ‘Squalus megalops’, or anequín ‘Isurus oxyrinchus’. Another small group seems to be related to the Hassaniyya dialect of southern Morocco to Senegal, such as majalulo ‘young camel’, and a few words derive from Berberisms of the Moroccan population due to the relationship that the eastern islands had with African fisheries located in the Canarian-Saharan bank, such as arife ‘calm and hot weather’, or tasarte ‘tuna species’ (Corriente 2001; 2011). A relatively large group of sub-Saharan slaves was engaged in the hard work at Canarian mills during the first sugar cycle, although there are hardly any linguistic traces except the Africanism buganga ‘fermented drink’, recorded exclusively in the island documentation of the end of the sixteenth century and principles of the seventeenth century and related to the Cubanism frucanga and the Brazilianism ganga, of similar origin. Anglicisms – In closer stages, a unique source of the Canarian lexicon has been English. Apart from some indirect Anglicisms introduced especially from contacts with Cuba, the beginnings of tourism and commercial traffic in the ports –where what a customary author called pichingle (< En. Pidgin English) was developed– have favoured the entry of a few terms, usually orally, like chercha ‘place in the cemetery intended for those who professed a confession other than Catholic or those who died in concubinage or by suicide’ (< En. churchyard, today unused), choni ‘English’ (< En. Johnny, also serving as a basis for the adverbial phrase de choni ‘naively’), guinche ‘winch’ (< En. winch), naife ‘knife, pocket knife’ (< En. knife), piche ‘tar’ (< En. pitch), queque ‘cake’ (< En. cake), flit or flis ‘insecticide’ (< En. flit, trade name), or the varieties of papas ‘potatoes’ known as chinegua (from En. King Edward), autodate (< En. up to date), or recara (< En. red care).

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5 Internal language policy For centuries, islanders have debated between linguistic purism and regionalism. The northern peninsular model was the norm, and popular expressions were regarded as cacologies. Although this trend has been reversed in recent decades, globalization and mass media are important factors acting in favour of unification and the loss of linguistic identity.

5.1 Linguistic purism Given the remoteness, initiatives were carried out at least since 1515, so that there were ‘teachers of first letters and grammar’ (“maestros de primeras letras y gramática”) in charge of teaching the basic notions of writing, reading, and arithmetic, although only a minority of the population would have access to this knowledge. Over the centuries, within that established idiomatic unit, the existence of very marked social variations became evident. The English sailor and merchant George Glas noted: “The descendants of this mingled nation are now denominated Spaniards, and use no other language than the Castillian: the gentry speak it in perfection, but the peasants, who inhabit the remote parts of the islands, in a manner almost unintelligible to strangers: their pronunciation being such as not unaptly to be compared to a man talking with something in his mouth” (Glas 1764, 281).

The description of some of the specificities of the Canarian varieties, especially within the phonetic and lexical dimensions, began quite early, sometimes with a marked corrective character compared to the standard represented by the northern Spanish norm. These puristic comments began to be frequent among the authors of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The enlightened Canarian author José de Viera y Clavijo, in his work El síndico personero general ‘The Trustee General’ from 1764, recriminated some particular features of island speech, such as the seseo, which he attributed to ‘a defect that we can consider as endemic or typical of our country’ (“un defecto que podemos considerar como endémico o propio de nuestro país”, 2012, 108), and recommended reading ‘The booklet of the Spanish spelling, which the Academy of the Language gave birth to in Madrid’ (“el librito de la ortografía castellana, que la Academia de la Lengua dio a luz en Madrid”, 2012, 108): ‘We pronounce with the same sound three letters that Castilians know how to distinguish fairly well. The c, when it precedes e or i, the s, and the z are in our mouths the same thing. Well, many of us easily lose our judgement when we want to write but we do not want to observe. Our scribes, some write sertificación, others zertificación, and others, the ones who succeed, certificación’.12

12 “Nosotros pronunciamos con un mismo sonido tres letras que los castellanos saben distinguir bastantemente. La c cuando precede a e o i, la s y la z son en nuestras bocas una misma cosa. ¿Pues que muchos

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The pedagogue Juan de la Puerta Canseco (1857), on the other hand, had a similar opinion that led him to publish a small booklet on the pronunciation of the letters c, s, and z. Earlier, in 1853, when referring to the spelling of the sibilants, he described the fact that the c and s are generally confused when followed by e and i as an ‘inveterate abuse of pronunciation’ (“abuso inveterado de pronunciación”, 1853, 310). And he added: ‘This defect considerably increases the difficulty of spelling in this part; nevertheless, we will see to give you some practical rules to remedy this provincialism. The Academy of the Spanish Language does not deal with this issue, because it does not seem possible that the pronunciation of two letters so different could ever be confused’.13

Still at the beginning of the twentieth century, Juan Reyes Martín, born in Tenerife, though this time in reference to morphosyntax and lexicon, notes similarly: ‘Among the devastating picture of illiteracy, and even in other social classes of a certain degree of culture, unfortunately such a cluster of provincialisms, barbarisms, solecisms, and other innumerable vices of diction nests; our rich and pompous language is beset with such a hotchpotch of nonsense and vulgarity, which disfigure and enervate it awkwardly, turning it into diminished debauchery, into a ridiculous and unpleasant ramble’.14

The low cultural level has been one of the structural characteristics of the Canarian population, a factor that has influenced the deep sociolinguistic differences and the attitude towards the use of the variety itself. Insularity, the fragmentation of the territory, the remoteness of the peninsular cultural centres, the absence of inter-island mobility, the scarcity of economic resources, and the dependence on the central power have contributed to this, so that, at the end of the nineteenth century, the illiteracy rate exceeded 75.26 %. Although this figure was reduced to 69.40 % in 1920, the arrival of the Franco dictatorship (1939–1975) determined that the literacy process had a slower development in the archipelago than in other Spanish regions, such as Catalonia and the Basque Country, hence the comment of linguist Diego Catalán:  

 

perdamos fácilmente el tino cuando queremos escribir y no queremos observar? Nuestros escribanos, unos escriben sertificación, otros zertificación, y otros que son los que aciertan certificación” (Viera y Clavijo 2012 [1764], 108). 13 “Este defecto aumenta considerablemente la dificultad de la ortografía en esta parte; sin embargo veremos de daros algunas reglas prácticas para remediar este provincialismo. La Academia de la lengua no se ocupa de ello, porque no parece posible que la pronunciación de dos letras tan distintas pueda nunca confundirse” (Puerta Canseco 1853, 310). 14 “Entre el desconsolador cuadro del analfabetismo, y hasta en otras clases sociales de cierto grado de cultura, anida desgraciadamente un cúmulo tal de provincialismos, barbarismos, solecismos y otros innumerables vicios de dicción; se atosiga con tal baturrillo de dislates y ramplonerías nuestro rico y pomposo idioma, que lo desfiguran y enervan torpemente, convirtiéndole en menguado libertinaje, en ridícula y desapacible monserga” (Reyes Martín ca. 1918, v).

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‘In general, a rather poor primary and secondary education has not been enough to provide the Canarian man with a mastery of written language that allows him to express himself in it with correctness and ease; thus, even the allegedly selected minority of students and university graduates (not excluding those of letters) tend to become entangled in the enormous jumble constituted by the poorly perceived duality of linguistic norms’.15

This level of illiteracy has meant that the Canarian variety has historically lacked recognition and prestige among the same speakers of the archipelago. The generalization of the media in the second half of the twentieth century, favourable school policies, the democratization of culture, and the decentralization of the state since the constitution of 1978 have meant a very significant advance, and the illiteracy rate has remained reduced at the beginning of the twentieth century to 7.57 % (mostly concentrated in the population over fifty years old), a higher level to that of the rest of the Spanish communities (ISTAC 2019e). This fact has influenced, on the one hand, the weakening of the prestige of the peninsular or standard norm and, on the other, the revitalization and positive revaluation of the linguistic variety itself (Morgenthaler García 2008, 388), although a recent study carried out among university students of Gran Canaria reveals that 43.6 % of the respondents consider that the most prestigious variety is still the Castilian one (Hernández Cabrera/Samper Hernández 2018, 5).  

 

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Scientific studies on the Spanish of the Canary Islands began with the publication of Manuel Alvar’s monograph on the Spanish of Tenerife (Alvar 1959). In 1987, Álvarez Martínez published a grammar; a year later, Corrales/Álvarez Martínez/Corbella (1998) contributed a bibliographical guide, with a second edition in 1998, which contains all the references published up to that date on the speech of the archipelago. In 1989, Almeida/ Díaz published a work of synthesis on the synchrony of this modality and, finally, in 1996, Medina/Corbella (1996) brought forward some of the themes that have been developed in these two decades of the twenty-first century, especially with regard to the studies of historical lexicography and phonetics. All of this has made this variety one of the better-analysed in the pan-Hispanic linguistic panorama. Two facts corroborate this statement. In the first place, the speech of the islands nowadays has unique, pioneering works in Spanish dialectology, such as the linguistic and ethnographic atlas (ALEICan), as well as a contemporary (TLEC) and a historical (DHECan) dictionary. Secondly, the analysis of the phonetic, morphosyntactic,

15 “Por lo común una formación primaria y secundaria bastante deficiente no ha bastado para dotar al hombre culto canario de un dominio de la lengua escrita que le permita expresarse en ella con corrección y soltura; así, incluso la minoría pretendidamente selecta de estudiantes y licenciados universitarios (sin excluir los de letras) suele enredarse en la enorme maraña constituida por la dualidad mal percibida de normas lingüísticas” (Catalán 1989, 155).

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and lexical characteristics of Canarian Spanish has been integrated into large international projects, such as studies on the educated norm, the popular norm, the lexical availability, or on beliefs and linguistic attitudes, conducted at the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria by Samper Padilla and his team in coordination with the Latin American Association of Linguistics and Philology (Asociación de Lingüística y Filología de América Latina – ALFAL) and with the Project for the study of beliefs and attitudes regarding varieties of Spanish in the twenty-first century (Proyecto para el estudio de las creencias y actitudes hacia las variedades del español en el siglo XXI – PRECAVES XXI), in Hispanic research such as the Audible Corpus of Spoken Rural Spanish (Corpus Oral y Sonoro del Español Rural – COSER), directed by Fernández Ordóñez, or in European macro-projects such as the Multimedia Atlas of Prosody in the Romance Space (Atlas Multimedia de la Prosodia del Espacio Románico – AMPER), whose Canary-American extension has been developed by Dorta at the University of La Laguna. These publications and research have provided the Canarian variety with the necessary scientific instruments to describe their characteristics and to establish their position within the multicentrism that defines the Spanish language.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used in the public sphere – The use of the Canarian modality is generalized among the islands’ politicians, with the southern phonetics, the grammatical turns typical of this region, and the dialectal lexicon, especially of the reference type. The Autonomous Government of the islands has assumed as part of its intangible heritage everything related to the dialectal particularities of the speech of this territory, Silbo Gomero, the culture of oral transmission, and the Aboriginal linguistic legacy preserved in the toponymy. In this last area, Law 11/2019 establishes the protection of the traditional toponomy ‘as an instrument for the definition of the geographical designation of territories, as well as the term “Canarias” in the broad sense and the terminology derived from it’.16 In addition, it is also specified that ‘it shall be ensured that scientifically accepted Aboriginal toponymy that is not in common use appear alongside the current road signs’.17 Variety used in primary education – In the case of Primary Education in the archipelago, the development of the LOMCE curriculum was established by Decree 89. This regulation establishes that, in the educational centres of the islands, one of the objectives to be achieved is the recognition and respect for the prestigious varieties of Spanish of the Canaries in order to learn to respect diversity and to assume it under equal conditions, 16 “[...] como instrumento para la concreción de la denominación geográfica de los territorios, así como el término ‘Canarias’ en sentido amplio y la terminología que de él se derive” (Law 11/2019, art. 106b). 17 “La toponimia aborigen científicamente admitida que no sea de uso habitual se procurará que figure junto a la actual señalética de carreteras” (Law 11/2019, art. 106b).

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so that the students feel safe and culturally legitimized in their use of the language. The contents to achieve this objective are developed in the different courses of this educational stage, generally in a transversal way in the different subjects, and especially in the subjects corresponding to the area of Spanish Language and Literature. However, not all textbooks, which are generally made by national publishers, have adapted these contents to the territory of the Canary Islands or to their mode of speech. These textbooks are usually written with grammatical and lexical characteristics of (northern) peninsular Spanish, and there are very few sections dedicated to the description of specific peculiarities, especially morphological aspects, such as the generalized use of ustedes instead of vosotros for second-person plural, or of the lexicon with the absence of the usual geolectal synonyms in insular speech in the texts. This has led to the publication of books with specific content among the islands’ publishers, monographs dedicated to offering Canarian teachers adapted materials for school, with activities and authors that show the linguistic variants and vocabulary representative of this region. Variety used in secondary and upper secondary education – The objectives and aims of these two educational stages, established in general terms by the LOMCE, were set for the island territory by Decree 315. Subsequently, Decree 83 developed this curriculum, the competencies, and the evaluation criteria, above all with regard to the employment and recognition of the cultured variety of the Spanish of the Canaries at least in the courses of Compulsory Secondary Education, taking into account the linguistic and cultural links existing between the Canary Islands and Latin America. One new feature in the section on social and civic competencies is the incorporation of a detailed description regarding the need to educate in respect for linguistic diversity: ‘Collaborating in the elimination of social clichés about geographical distribution and in the revaluation of different forms of speaking Spanish, something that is especially important in an autonomous community like the Canary Islands, where the cultured variant of the language spoken is very different from the one its inhabitants hear and read in the media and other cultural resources. The problems of insecurity (oscillations in the use of /s/ and /θ/, between ustedes and vosotros…) that this situation generates in the speakers, far from disappearing, are increasing. We should not underestimate the effect that these circumstances may have both on the confidence of the linguistic communication of each individual speaker and on the informal discrediting of our dialectal variety. Teachers witness these aforementioned situations in the classrooms on a daily basis and education is probably the best (and only) scenario to reverse this process. It is not a matter of delving into cultural differences, but of knowing the causes and reasons, in order to learn to respect diversity and to assume it under equal conditions, thus making the students feel safe and culturally legitimated’.18

18 “Colaborando en la desaparición de tópicos sociales sobre la distribución geográfica y en la revalorización de distintas formas de habla del español, algo que es especialmente importante en una Comunidad Autónoma como la canaria, en la que se habla una variante culta del idioma muy distinta a la que sus habitantes escuchan y leen en los medios de comunicación y otros soportes de cultura. Los problemas de inseguridad (oscilaciones en el empleo de /s/ y /θ/, entre ustedes y vosotros…) que esta situación genera en los hablantes y las hablantes, lejos de desaparecer, van en aumento. No conviene menospreciar el efecto que puedan tener estas circunstancias tanto para la seguridad en la comunicación lingüística de cada ha-

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The novelty, in this case, derives from the detail with which the arguments are described and, furthermore, from the fact that this type of competence should have been contemplated among the objectives of the subjects of language and literature and only in a transversal way in the social and civic competencies. Variety used in university education – Although it follows general guidelines set by the state, the Spanish university system establishes the autonomy of each of its centres, which is why their study plans are different. The two Canarian public universities include in the curricula of their degrees in Spanish Language and Literature (Español: Lengua y literatura, University of La Laguna) and the Spanish Language and Hispanic Literatures (Lengua española y literaturas hispánicas, University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria) specific subjects on ‘Spanish in the Canary Islands’ and ‘Atlantic Spanish: the Canary Islands and America’, respectively. In these subjects, content on the linguistic modality of the archipelago and its characteristics is taught. Variety used in the print media – The Canarian press has not been foreign to records of the Canarian variety, with writings that have captured the life and daily speech of the islanders, such as those of the Grancanarian writer and journalist María Dolores de la Fe or the chronicler Leandro Perdomo from Lanzarote, its popular traditions, and the most remote demonyms that designate the inhabitants of the most secluded towns and villages. Island newspapers such as Canarias7, La Provincia, El Día, Diario de Avisos, or the now-extinct La Tarde and La Opinión de Tenerife constitute an inexhaustible source of regionalisms, available today through the platform Jable. There are no style guides for the written press currently published on the islands. The now-extinct newspaper La Opinión de Tenerife did have specific rules that encouraged the use of frequently used Canarisms (such as guagua instead of bus for ‘bus’, or estación de guaguas instead of estación de autobuses for ‘bus station’). Normally, the press uses normative Spanish with general words that can be understood by the majority of the readers. However, the language of the journalists usually gives away their Canarian origin either intentionally (because the contents require it) or unconsciously (especially through some of their grammatical turns and lexicon). Variety used in the audiovisual media – Both RTVE and RTVC’s Canarian contents are broadcast in Spanish. However, in the case of RTVC, the autonomous regulation establishes that this public entity must observe the following principles regarding the Canarian linguistic modality: ‘q) To promote the historical, cultural, educational, and linguistic values of the Canarian people in all their richness and variety.

blante en particular, como para el desprestigio informal de nuestra variedad dialectal. El profesorado es testigo de ello día a día en las aulas y, probablemente, sea la educación el mejor (y único) escenario para revertir ese proceso. No se trata de ahondar en diferencias culturales, pero sí de conocer las razones y los porqués, para aprender a respetar la diversidad, y asumirla en igualdad de condiciones, sintiéndose el alumnado así seguro y legitimado culturalmente” (Decree 83, 17925s.).

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r) To promote the recognition and use of the linguistic modality of Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands’.19

In regards to the broadcasting of advertising content, RTVC is also subject to specific regulations that take into account the linguistic aspects: ‘1. The texts of the adverts must make a correct use of the language, understanding in this correct use the specialities of pronunciation and the turns and colloquial expressions typical of the Canarian speech [...]. 3. The pronunciation and expressions or turns of phrase characteristic of the Canarian language may not be used, under any circumstances, with a pejorative intent or with a desire to discredit it socially, culturally, or in any other way in comparison with other linguistic variants’.20

Variety used in literature – Some phonic characteristics such as seseo appear in the handwritten documentation and in the texts closest to orality since the arrival of the Spaniards in the islands, and in a more or less intentional way the presence of Canarian lexicon in literature is also noticeable from the first Canarian writers during the Renaissance such as Bartolomé Cairasco or Antonio de Viana to the most recent. Authors as rigorous in the selection and use of their linguistic records as Benito Pérez Galdós, perhaps the most universal Canarian, are not oblivious to their modality of origin and unconsciously employ numerous diatopisms (e. g., ahijidos ‘shout of joy’, (Alejandro) en puño ‘tightfisted (Alexander)’, alongarse ‘to lean out’, aplatanado ‘lethargic’, arveja ‘pea’, bardo ‘hedge fence’, bizcochón ‘sponge cake’, cachucha ‘cap’, caja del pecho ‘thoracic cavity’, canelo ‘cinnamon-coloured’, casa terrera ‘one-storey house’, a la pela ‘to give somebody a piggyback’). Others, such as the postmodernist Alonso Quesada, throughout the whole of his work, but especially in the articles that make up the series Crónicas de la ciudad y de la noche ‘Chronicles of the city and of the night’ (1919), or the surrealist Agustín Espinosa in his novel Crimen ‘Crime’ (1934) do not hesitate to include Canarianisms to contextualize the environment of their compositions. All kinds of linguistic dialects are present in the extensive costumbrist literature that developed in the last years of the nineteenth century and, especially, during the first half of the following century, which used language as one of the cultural referents of the island’s identity and idiosyncrasy,  

19 “q) Promover los valores históricos, culturales, educativos y lingüísticos del pueblo canario en toda su riqueza y variedad. r) Promover el reconocimiento y el uso de la modalidad lingüística del español hablado en Canarias” (Law 6/2018, art. 3q/r). 20 “1. Los textos de los anuncios deberán hacer un uso correcto del lenguaje, entendiéndose comprendido en dicho uso correcto las especialidades de pronunciación y los giros y expresiones coloquiales propias del habla canaria […]. 3. La pronunciación y expresiones o giros propios del habla canaria no podrán usarse, bajo ningún concepto, con afán peyorativo o de descrédito social, cultural o de cualquier otra índole de la misma frente a otras hablas lingüísticas” (Resolution 12/2001, art. 18).

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with authors such as Ángel Guerra, Benito Pérez Armas, Luis and Agustín Millares or Francisco Guerra Navarro.

References ALEICan = Manuel Alvar (1975–1978), Atlas lingüístico y etnográfico de las Islas Canarias, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria. Almeida, Manuel (2014), El concepto de “hablas de tránsito” y el español canario, Revista de filología románica 31/1, 37–47. Almeida, Manuel/Díaz, Carmen (1989), El español de Canarias, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, s.e. Alvar, Manuel (1959), El español hablado en Tenerife, Madrid, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Alvar, Manuel (21990 [1974]), A vueltas con el seseo y el ceceo, in: Manuel Alvar (ed.), Norma lingüística sevillana y español de América, Madrid, Ediciones de Cultura Hispánica, 45–60. Álvarez Martínez, María Ángeles (1987), Rasgos gramaticales del español de Canarias, La Laguna, Instituto de Estudios Canarios. Aznar Vallejo, Eduardo (1990), Pesquisa de Cabitos, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria. Aznar, Eduardo/Corbella, Dolores/Tejera, Antonio (2012), La Crónica de Guinea. Un modelo de etnografía comparada, Barcelona, Bellaterra. Aznar, Eduardo/Pico, Berta/Corbella, Dolores (2003), Le Canarien. Manuscritos, transcripción y traducción, La Laguna, Instituto de Estudios Canarios. Boccaccio, Giovanni (1993 [1336–1341]), De Canaria et insulis reliquis ultra Ispaniam in Occeano noviter repertis, Sintaxis 30/31, 134–136. C-ES = Cortes Generales (1978), Constitución Española, Boletín Oficial del Estado 311, https://www.boe.es/eli/es/ c/1978/12/27/(1)/con (2/3/2023). C-ESe = Cortes Generales (1987), The Spanish Constitution, Madrid, Agencia Estatal Boletín Oficial del Estado, https://www.boe.es/legislacion/documentos/ConstitucionINGLES.pdf (2/3/2023). Catalán, Diego (21989 [1964]), El español de Canarias, in: Diego Catalán (ed.), El español. Orígenes de su diversidad, Madrid, Paraninfo, 145–201. Corbella, Dolores (2016), La selección de canarismos del DRAE, Revue de linguistique romane 80, 101–160. Corbella, Dolores (2018a), La lexicografía diferencial canaria: hitos y referencias, in: María Álvarez de la Granja/ Ernesto Gonzáles Seoane (edd.), Léxico dialectal y lexicografía en la Iberorromania, Madrid/Frankfurt, Iberoamericana/Vervuert, 205–228. Corbella, Dolores (2018b), Arqueología lingüística: precedentes del léxico azucarero americano de la época colonial, Revue de linguistique romane 82, 377–408. Corbella, Dolores (2021), Las islas Canarias en la gestación del español americano, in: Concepción Company (ed.), Hablar y vivir en América, Mexico City, El Colegio Nacional-UNAM, 25–75. Corrales, Cristóbal/Álvarez Martínez, María Ángeles/Corbella, Dolores (21998 [1987]), El español de Canarias. Guía bibliográfica, La Laguna, Instituto de Estudios Canarios. Corrales, Cristóbal/Corbella, Dolores (2004), Primeros testimonios e impresiones sobre el habla canaria, Anuario de Estudios Atlánticos 50, 71–120. Corrales, Cristóbal/Corbella, Dolores (2010), Tesoro léxico canario-americano, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria. Corrales, Cristóbal/Corbella, Dolores (2019), Contactos lingüísticos en las Canarias prehispánicas: aculturación y pervivencia léxica (ss. XIV–XVI), in: Esther Chaves-Álvarez et al. (edd.), Un periplo docente e investigador. Estudios en homenaje al profesor Antonio Tejera Gaspar, La Laguna, Secretariado de Publicaciones de la Universidad de La Laguna, 297–317.

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Corriente, Federico (2001), Los arabismos del español de Canarias, Estudios Canarios. Anuario del Instituto de Estudios Canarios 45, 187–203. Corriente, Federico (2011), A vueltas con los arabismos del español de Canarias, Estudios Canarios. Anuario del Instituto de Estudios Canarios 55, 365–389. Decree 315 = Consejería de Educación y Universidades (2015), Decreto 315/2015, de 28 de agosto, por el que se establece la ordenación de la Educación Secundaria Obligatoria y del Bachillerato en la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias, in: Boletín Oficial de Canarias 169, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/boc/2015/169/002. html (2/3/2023). Decree 83 = Consejería de Educación y Universidades (2016), Decreto 83/2016, de 4 de julio, por el que se establece el currículo de la Educación Secundaria Obligatoria y el Bachillerato en la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias, in: Boletín Oficial de Canarias 136, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/boc/2016/136/001.html (2/3/2023). Decree 89 = Consejería de Educación, Universidad y Sostenibilidad (2014), Decreto 89/2014, de 1 de agosto, por el que se establece la ordenación y el currículo de la Educación Primaria en la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias, Boletín Oficial de Canarias 156, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/boc/2014/156/001.html (2/3/2023). DHECan = Cristóbal Corrales/ Dolores Corbella (22013 [2001]), Diccionario histórico del español de Canarias, La Laguna, Instituto de Estudios Canarios, http://www.frl.es (2/3/2023). DLE = Real Academia Española y Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014), Diccionario de la Lengua Española, Barcelona, Espasa, http://www.rae.es (2/3/2023). Dorta, Josefa (1997), Datos acústicos y percepción de la [ĉ] adherente de Canarias y de la pre-palatal castellana, in: Manuel Almeida/Josefa Dorta (edd.), Contribuciones al estudio de la lingüística hispánica: Homenaje al profesor Ramón Trujillo, Tenerife, Montesinos, 57–72. Dorta, Josefa (2008), La entonación de las interrogativas simples en voz femenina. Zonas urbanas de las islas Canarias, in: Adrian Turculeț (ed.), La variation diatopique de l’intonation dans le domaine roumain et roman, Iaşi, Editura Universității Alexandru Ioan Cuza, 123–150. DPD = Real Academia Española y Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2005), Diccionario panhispánico de dudas, Madrid, Santillana. EA-CA = Jefatura del Estado (2018), Ley Orgánica 1/2018, de 5 de noviembre, de reforma del Estatuto de Autonomía de Canarias, Boletín Oficial del Estado 268, https://www.boe.es/eli/es/lo/2018/11/05/1 (2/3/2023). Espinosa, Agustín (1927), Vidas paralelas. Eses españolas. La S de Castilla. La S de Canarias, La Rosa de los Vientos 3, 8s. García Cabrera, Amanda (2019), Variación y cambio lingüísticos en una comunidad de habla tradicional de la isla de El Hierro, Madrid, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Doctoral Thesis. Glas, George (1764), A Description of the Canary Islands, London, s.e. Hernández Cabrera, Clara/Samper Hernández, Marta (2018), Creencias y actitudes de los jóvenes universitarios canarios hacia las variedades cultas del español, Boletín de Filología 53/2, 1–23. Hernández, Juan O. (2019), La formación histórica de gentilicios hispánicos en la Romania, Revista de filología románica 36, 45–61. Isodorus Hispalensis (1971), Etymologiarum sive originum, edited by Wallace Martin Lindsay, vol. 2, Oxford, Clarendon. ISTAC (2019a), Población. Municipios por islas de Canarias y años, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Instituto Canario de Estadística, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/istac/jaxi-istac/tabla.do?uripx=urn:uuid: d73bd9de-e6ed-4821-808a-616b34df9655&uripub=urn:uuid:febb02fd-d4fd-4e6d-bed4-0496d4a95f88 (2/3/2023). ISTAC (2019b), Edades medias de la población. Municipios por islas y años, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Instituto Canario de Estadística, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/istac/jaxi-istac/tabla.do?uripx=urn: uuid:68b2e275-08f9-46ed-80a9-ff1b759f97a2&uripub=urn:uuid:03355948-8e10-44df-bed0-94908f589a 96 (2/3/2023).

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ISTAC (2019c), Saldo migratorio según sexos y lugares de nacimiento, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Instituto Canario de Estadística , https://datos.canarias.es/catalogos/estadisticas/dataset/7231db75-2c4e-4329-b1 b8-176636a6706a (2/3/2023). ISTAC (2019d), Saldo migratorio según sexos y grupos de edad. Islas Canarias y años, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Instituto Canario de Estadística, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/istac/jaxi-istac/tabla.do?uripx=urn: uuid:e95b1521-e26e-4ebc-8ce1-28e2c38e50cd&uripub=urn:uuid:03355948-8e10-44df-bed0-94908f589 a96 (2/3/2023). ISTAC (2019e), Población de 16 y más años según nivel de estudios, sexos y grupos de edad. Canarias. 2018, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Instituto Canario de Estadística, https://datos.canarias.es/catalogos/ estadisticas/dataset/poblacion-de-16-y-mas-anos-segun-nivel-de-estudios-sexos-y-grupos-de-edadcanarias-2018 (2/3/2023). Jable = Biblioteca de la Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (2008–), Archivo de prensa digital de la ULPGC, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, https://jable-ulpgc-es. bibproxy.ulpgc.es/ (2/3/2023). Law 11/2019 = Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias (2019), Ley 11/2019, de 25 de abril, de Patrimonio Cultural de Canarias, Boletín Oficial del Estado 140, https://www.boe.es/eli/es-cn/l/2019/04/25/11 (2/3/2023). Law 13/2014 = Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias (2015), Ley 13/2014, de 26 de diciembre, de Radio y Televisión Públicas de la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias, Boletín Oficial del Estado 32, https://www.boe.es/eli/escn/l/2014/12/26/13 (2/3/2023). Law 6/2018 = Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias (2019), Ley 6/2018, de 28 de diciembre, de modificación de la Ley 13/2014, de 26 de diciembre, de Radio y Televisión Públicas de la Comunidad Autónoma de Canarias, Boletín Oficial del Estado 22, https://www.boe.es/eli/es-cn/l/2018/12/28/6 (2/3/2023). Llamas Pombo, Elena/Trapero, Maximiano (1998), ¿Es guanche la palabra guanche?, Anuario de Estudios Atlánticos 44, 99–196. LOMCE = Jefetura del Estado (2013), Ley Orgánica 8/2013, de 9 de diciembre, para la Mejora de la Calidad Educativa, Boletín Oficial del Estado 295, https://www.boe.es/buscar/pdf/2013/BOE-A-2013-12886consolidado.pdf (2/3/2023). Martínez, Marcos (2006), Las Islas Afortunadas en la Edad Media, Cuadernos del Cemyr 14, 55–78. Medina, Javier/Corbella, Dolores (1996), El español de Canarias hoy: análisis y perspectivas, Frankfurt/Madrid, Vervuert/Iberoamericana. Monterrey, Tomás (2003), Estudio y traducciones del capítulo sobre Canarias en la Historia del Gran Reino de China (1586), de González de Mendoza, Estudios Canarios. Anuario del Instituto de Estudios Canarios 48, 335–358. Morales Padrón, Francisco (21993 [1978]), Canarias: Crónicas de su conquista, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria. Morgenthaler García, Laura (2008), Identidad y pluricentrismo lingüístico. Hablantes canarios frente a la estandarización, Madrid/Frankfurt, Iberoamericana/Vervuert. NGRAE = Real Academia Española/Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2009), Nueva gramática de la lengua española, Madrid, Espasa. Puerta Canseco, Juan (1853), Ortografía, El Instructor 20, 309–312. Puerta Canseco, Juan (1857), Ejercicios de lectura para la buena pronunciación de las letras c, s y z, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Juan M. Romero. Resolution 12/2001 = Consejería de Presidencia e Innovación Tecnológica (2002), Ente Público Radio Televisión Canaria. Resolución de 21 de diciembre de 2001, del Director General, por la que se hace público el acuerdo del Consejo de Administración que aprueba las normas reguladoras de la emisión de publicidad por la Televisión Canaria, Boletín Oficial de Canarias 7, http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/boc/2002/007/001.html (2/3/ 2023). Reyes Martín, Juan (ca. 1918), Serie de barbarismos, solecismos, aldeanismos y provincionalismos que se refieren especialmente al vulgo tinerfeño, coleccionados y traducidos al lenguaje corriente con notas explicativas y comprobativas, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, s.e.

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Rumeu de Armas, Antonio (1996), España en el África Atlántica (Documentos), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria. Samper, José Antonio/Hernández, Clara E./Troya, Magnolia (1998), Corpus de Gran Canaria, in: José Antonio Samper/Clara E. Hernández/Magnolia Troya (edd.), Macrocorpus de la norma lingüística culta de las principales ciudades del Mundo Hispánico, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria/Asociación de Lingüística y Filología de la América Latina. TLEC = Cristóbal Corrales/Dolores Corbella/María Ángeles Álvarez (1996 [1992]), Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Canarias, Madrid/Canarias, Real Academia Española/Gobierno de Canarias. Trapero, Maximiano/Santana Martel, Eladio (2018), Diccionario de toponimia de Canarias: los guanchismos, Santa Cruz de Tenerife/Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Idea. Trujillo, Ramón (1978), El silbo gomero: análisis lingüístico, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Interinsular Canaria. ULL (2008–) = Biblioteca de la Universidad de La Laguna (2008–), Prensa canaria digitalizada, San Cristóbal de La Laguna, Universidad de la Laguna, https://www.ull.es/servicios/biblioteca/servicios/prensa-canariadigitalizada/ (2/3/2023). Verneau, René (1923), Le langage sans paroles, L’Antropologie 33, 161–168. Viera y Clavijo, José de (22012 [1994]), El síndico personero general [1764], Santa Cruz de Tenerife/Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Idea.

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8 Spain: Ceuta and Melilla Abstract: Ceuta and Melilla are two of the very few communities in which Spanish endures in the African continent. The fact that these cities are a part of the Spanish state entails that Spanish is the only official language in both territories. The use of Spanish reveals dialectal features that are shared by other southern zones of the Iberian Peninsula, where most of the inhabitants of Ceuta and Melilla originally come from. A larger group of the population, who has Spanish as their native language, coexists with different ethnic groups that speak other African languages. Such a situation causes interesting language contact phenomena and has also fostered official pleas for the recognition of those other languages within the public domain, since Spanish is the only subject of language policy in both communities. Keywords: Spanish, language contact, diglossia, official language, multiculture

1 Sociolinguistic situation Ceuta and Melilla – Ceuta and Melilla are two north African cities situated in the Moroccan territory, in the north and north-east, respectively, of the country. Both cities are located at different points of the Mediterranean coast of the Alawite Kingdom, close to other small enclaves belonging to Spain, like the Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera, the Peñón de Alhucemas, the Perejil Island, and the Chafarinas Islands, every one of them smaller than 1 km2. Ceuta – Ceuta is a 19 km2 city located in the North of Africa, on one side of the Strait of Gibraltar. Its integration in the African continent and its proximity to Spain make it a strategic point and a bridge between continents, being the African city that is closest to Europe, only twenty kilometres away. For different reasons, which are gathered at least partially in the section about the history of the city, the city’s population has grown in the last century and currently surpasses 80,000 inhabitants. The data from the National Statistics Institute (Instituto Nacional de Estadística – INE) presented in Table 1 reflect this growth. The population is characterized by different cultures such as the European-Christian, the Arabic-Muslim, the Jewish-Hebraic, or the Hindu-Brahmanist, among others, although most of the population regard themselves as a part of one of the first two cultures (cf. Ayora Esteban 2010, 24). Inhabitants of Spanish origin have always been the biggest group, but the number of Muslims, originating from Morocco, has grown in the last decades. Official data account for only 5,657 foreigners in 2010, 4,608 of them being Moroccans (INE 2020), but different authors consider that there is a larger presence of Muslim population. Jiménez Gámez mentions studies establishing that back in 1985, when the Imhttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-008

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migration Law (Ley de Extranjería) by which the Ceutan Muslims attained the Spanish nationality was published, there were more than 12,000 Muslim inhabitants in Ceuta, and declares that in recent years the Muslim population may have reached up to 40 % of the total (cf. Jiménez Gámez 2010, 439; Jiménez Gámez et al. 2011, 133). Also, the existence of a number of Arabic commuters that work daily in Ceuta can help us understand the importance of these facts in the configuration of the city (cf. Ayora Esteban 2010, 39).  

Table 1: Evolution of Ceutan and Melillan population (INE 2020) Year

Population Ceuta

Melilla

1900

13,843

10,182

1910

24,249

/

1920

35,453

40,929

1930

20,293

69,133

1940

65,982

64,684

1950

58,909

76,247

1960

64,728

72,430

1970

62,607

60,843

1981

65,264

53,593

1991

73,208

63,670

2001

71,505

66,411

2011

83,517

81,323

2019

84,777

86,487

Melilla – The city of Melilla is located in the North-East of Morocco, on the Mediterranean coast, in front of the Alboran Sea, at 183 km off the coast of Málaga and at 156 km off the coast of Almería. Nador, the capital of the Moroccan province with the same name, in the Rif area, is located only 20 kilometers away. Melilla covers an area of approximately 12.3 km2. Its characteristics, from a sociolinguistic point of view, are similar to those of Ceuta, although some particularities exist that will be conveniently highlighted. Similarly to Ceuta, Melilla has experienced a progressive increase not only of the population in general (cf. Table 1) but also of foreign population, mainly coming from Morocco. According to 2018 data provided by INE, the number of foreign residents in the city reached up to 20,439, from which 19,669 would have been born in Morocco. Furthermore, according to the same statistic, the number of people born in Morocco who held the Spanish nationality amounted to 8,884 (INE 2020). However, as is the case of Ceuta, it is very difficult to determine the actual number due to the high amount of people who

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cross the border every day for work or trade, especially through the Beni Ensar frontier, in the south, but also through Farhana, in the west. With regard to the socio-demographic and cultural aspects, the composition of the city of Melilla is equally diverse as it is in Ceuta. Even more, and especially after the celebration of the fifth centenary of the incorporation of the city to the Crown of Castile in 1997, many stand for calling Melilla ‘the city of the five cultures’ (“la ciudad de las cinco culturas”, cf., e. g., N.N. 2018). Indeed, the occidental Christian European culture, the Amazigh culture, mainly Muslim, the Sephardi Jews, the Hindu culture, and the Romani culture, also mainly Christian, are present in Melilla. While in Ceuta, the occidental European group, of Spanish origin, has always been the majority, in Melilla, the number of inhabitants of a Berber origin, mainly Muslims, has been increasing in the last decades. At present, its number probably surpasses 40 % of the population (for the evolution of the population of Melilla according to its religious creed, cf. Doppelbauer 2008, 312). Regarding the rest of cultures represented in the city, the members of the Jewish community would be the most numerous, some 1,000 people, according to Benhamu Jiménez (2017, 17), while Romanies are distributed in a few tens of families and Hindus hardly add up to fifty.  

 

1.1 Language distribution Ceuta – From a linguistic point of view, three are the most important languages in Ceuta: Spanish, the only official language, as we will note later, Arabic, and Darija, derived from a variety of Classical Arabic, which has only an oral form and is therefore considered a dialect of Arabic by some authors (cf., e. g., Ayora Esteban 2010; Antón 2011; Molina Martos 2006; Rivera Reyes 2010). By linking the demographical data and the linguistic variants, two different population groups can be characterized, which shape the sociolinguistic map of the city: a dominant and larger group of citizens from a peninsular Spanish origin, monolingual speakers of Spanish, and a group of citizens from a Muslim origin, called the main minority, whose first language is Arabic, that uses Classical Arabic for religious purposes, while very few of them has access to this language through the news or literature, and dialectal Arabic or Darija for all other purposes, which coexists with the first group in a city where Spanish is the official language in the public sphere. In this sense, the Muslim population, depending on their knowledge of Spanish, may face a double situation of diglossia (cf. Rivera Reyes 2006, 6s.; 2010, 224), which takes place between Classical and Modern Arabic in interactions between Arabic-speaking citizens, and the diglossia established between Arabic and Spanish, the latter being the only language used in formal communication. Melilla – Regarding linguistic aspects, two languages have an enormous presence in Melilla, among others, although with a different status as can be supposed. There is a main group, of Spanish origin, with Spanish, the only official language, as a first language and monolingual, whose main economic activity is the service sector. On the other hand, a numerous group of Melillans of Berber origin can be found, who practise the Islamic  

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religion and mainly engage themselves in trading and business activities. This group belongs to the Berber culture, and its first language is Tamazight, an only oral language also known as Berber or chelja/cherja (the latter and its variants are inappropriate denominations, according to Tilmatine 2009, 19), whose speakers, when bilingual, face a situation of diglossia with respect to Spanish. Among its dialects, Melillans use ‘the taqer’act, common in the area surrounding Melilla but included in the speech of the Rif mountains, the tarifit’ (“el taqer’act, propio de la zona circundante a Melilla pero incluido en el habla de las montañas del Rif, el tarifit”, Fernández Smith et al. 2008, 17). Additionally, there is a scarce presence of three other languages in accordance with the other cultures present in the city. There is a group of Sephardi Jews who practise Judaism and work mainly in trading as well. Their mother tongue is not Hebrew, even though ‘they study it when they turn three years old in the Talmud-Torá of the city as a language of liturgy and folklore’ (“la estudian desde los tres años de edad en el Talmud-Torá de la ciudad como lengua de liturgia y de folclore”, Fernández Smith et al. 2008, 17), but the jaquetía, an occidental variety of Judeao-Spanish, which is thus also present in everyday speech (Molina Martos 2006, 4ss.; Benhamu Jiménez 2017, 7ss.). Another group is present, the Romani, whose traditional language Romani (Sp. caló) comes from Prakrit, a popular variety of Sanskrit. Only some elders have Romani as their mother tongue, while its use resides mainly in some popular expressions and common words. This group works in itinerant selling. Finally, a group of Melillans from a Hindu origin can be also found, most of them traders who come from the Pakistani province of Sind and who consider Sindhi as their linguistic heritage. Like the Romanies, the language is unknown by most of the youngsters, and its use is restricted to the household and to religious purposes.

1.2 Development of language groups Ceuta – While the population of Spanish origin has been progressively growing through the arrival of civil servants and military personnel that configure the upper classes of the Ceutan society, a great part of the inhabitants of African origin belong to the lowest social groups. These people usually dwell in the suburbs of the city. Their occupational activity is strongly related to trading or to activities developed by unskilled labour. These people are sometimes linked to criminal activities, and they are generally characterized by high birth rates and low literacy levels (cf. Ayora Esteban 2007, 37s.). The lack of access to schooling of this part of the population has a linguistic consequence. Arabicas-a-mother-tongue speakers who enter the education system and finally graduate become bilingual speakers who must face the diglossic situation already described with regard to Spanish, the prestigious language. But people who do not have access to the education system or who fail to fulfil its requirements use an actual mix of languages that reveals a lack of communicative skills when it comes to speaking Spanish. Melilla – The Melillan population has been increasing along its recent history with the arrival of workers from the Iberian Peninsula, especially civil servants and military

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personnel. Nonetheless, it has also decreased simultaneously due to emigration in the opposite direction (Molina Martos 2006, 13). In this sense, during the 1980s, García Velasco (1985) published a brief analysis about the characteristics of the Melillan labour force, in which he highlighted the economic dependency of the city in the services, as well as the high percentage of people enrolled in the sector Public Administration, Defence, Social Security, Education and Health (Administración pública, Defensa, Seguridad social, Educación y Sanidad). These groups are made up of civil servants and government employees, who generally hold higher education degrees or, at least, secondary studies, since this is a requisite in Spain in order to apply for many of these positions. However, the Muslim population of Berber origin, which has progressively increased, registers a strong tendency to grow due to their higher birth rates and continuous settlements in the city (Ruiz Domínguez 1997, 23). But their productive activity is generally limited to trading and professional activities that require a lower qualification. This occurs on account of the higher dropout rates observed in this social group (Ministerio de Educación 2010, 243). Those who finish an adequate education find themselves, as bilingual speakers, in the situation of diglossia imposed by the Spanish preeminence already described.

2 Linguistic history Ceuta – Aside from some theories of remote past origins, the city of Ceuta is considered to have been founded by the Romans, which implies the use of Latin by its population at least until the Islamic domination from year 709 to 1415, even though Latin to a certain degree remained in use among the Mozarab population. In any case, the most recent connection of the city with Romance languages comes with the Portuguese conquest in 1415. The integration of Portugal as a Spanish province in 1580 reflects the entry of Spanish in the linguistic community of the city. That presence was intensified with the independence of Portugal in 1640 and the final incorporation of Ceuta into Spain in 1688. The linguistic traces of Portuguese in the city are rare and solely remain in some toponyms, demonyms, or proper names (cf. Ayora Esteban 2007, 26). Several different historic circumstances single out the evolution of the city and demonstrate a configuration in which Spanish speakers prevail. First, it must be emphasized that Ceuta, as a symbol of Spanish sovereignty in the North of Africa, held a prison famous for its harshness, El Hacho, where dangerous prisoners from Spain and Africa were imprisoned during the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. This promoted the arrival of Spanish people from the peninsula, essentially civil servants, military personnel, and prisoners, who established themselves along with their families. The city limits expanded after the Spanish-Moroccan War (1859–1860), and the declaration as a free port promoted its commercial rise and the arrival of new perninsular Spaniards, mostly from the south of Andalusia, but also in a lesser rate of Jews and Muslims. Another important migration flow of Spanish population coming from Morocco took place in the second half of the twentieth century after Morocco’s independence in 1956 (cf. Doppelbauer 2008, 306s.).

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The city character has been defined in the last decades. Since 1995, Ceuta is an autonomous city (ciudad autónoma) of Spain; previously, it belonged to the province of Cádiz as a place of sovereignty (plaza de soberanía). In spite of the lack of legislation and its limited political competencies, the Spanish character of the city is undeniable from a political point of view, as it depends on Cádiz regarding judicial and ecclesiastical issues, its university facilities belong to Granada, and the military to Seville. The status of the city has recently favoured a political debate around its transformation into an autonomous community (comunidad autónoma). Some authors brand the current situation of Ceuta as a structural crisis caused by several factors, among them the lack of importance of its port in the new international distribution channels, the increase in unemployment rates and poverty, especially among the disadvantaged, the fall of tourism from Spain, and, on the contrary, the increase of smuggling and illegal traffic of people and substances (cf. Jiménez Gámez 2010, 433s.). Melilla – The city of Melilla was founded by the Phoenicians in the eighth century BCE. Its former name, Rusadir, has a Punic origin. After this first settlement, the city suffered consecutive periods of domination by the different ancient empires, as happened all over Northern Africa. Thus, the city was populated by Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines, Visigoths, and, from year 700, Arabs and Berbers (Tariq, who commanded the Muslim invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, was a Berber, cf. Alonso García 1983, 9). The introduction of Spanish in the city occurs in 1497 when Pedro de Estopiñán y Virués conquered the city for the Catholic Monarchs, representing the house of the Duke of Medina Sidonia (for a summary of these historical events, cf. Fernández García 2015, 107s.). After the conquest, many Andalusian armies arrived, providing their own linguistic features. From that moment on, different types of Spanish speakers migrated to Melilla, not only Spaniards from different parts of the country but also from the bordering Moroccan territory, all of which contributed to the heterogeneity of the linguistic features found in current Melillans. During the centuries following the Spanish conquest of Melilla, the city was highly militarized due to countless attacks, raids, and invasion attempts by different Moroccan sultans. Bastions, walls, and fortifications were built, in addition to a prison, like in Ceuta. These events, as well as the Christianization, which implies the building of churches, chapels, and the establishment of religious orders, support the idea of a city formed by Spanish settlers of different origins (Fernández García 2015, 108). Another historical milestone for the city took place in 1862, when the geographical limits of Melilla were definitely established. This event occurred after an agreement between the Spanish sovereigns at that time and the Moroccan sultan after the SpanishMoroccan War between both countries. The agreement stated that the city territory would be measured regarding the maximum distance a 24-pound cannonball could traverse. For that purpose, the cannon called “El Caminante” was fired on 14 June 1862 from the Victoria Grande fort, therefore setting the city limits as they are known today (Doppelbauer 2008, 307). A few years later, by the end of the nineteenth century, a new migration wave took place. Even though they were already settled in different territories in Northern Africa, especially in Tétouan, since 1492 (Moreno Fernández 1998, 189; Moli-

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na Martos 2006, 4), numerous Sephardi Jews were attracted by the ‘commercial opportunities in the maritime sector’ (“oportunidades comerciales en el sector marítimo”, Benhamu Jiménez 2017, 16) and benefited from the trade with Morocco due to their knowledge of Arabic in a city that was already declared as a free port and which had a larger civilian population (Molina Martos 2006, 5; Doppelbauer 2008, 309). In addition, the conflict between Spain and Morocco led to the arrival of military personnel from different areas of Spain. Subsequently, the independence of Morocco in 1956 led to an important migration flow of Spanish speakers to Melilla, therefore consolidating the status of Spanish in the city and the presence of an actual civilian and not only military population. It was in the 1950s when the influx of a group of Hindus fleeing the Indo-Pakistani War (1947) was registered. Finally, with the enactment of the Immigration Law by the Spanish Government in the 1980s, a process of legalization and nationalization of residents of Berber origin, many of them born in Melilla, caused a new rise in its population (Fernández García 2015, 110). Before becoming an autonomous city, Melilla was part of the province of Málaga as a place of sovereignty. Like Ceuta, Melilla is administered by different administrative entities since, from a religious point of view, it belongs to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Málaga, while its university campus belongs to the University of Granada, and its secondary and primary school teachers depend on the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training (Ministerio de Educación y Formación Profesional) of the Spanish Government, as none of the two cities hold the competences in the educational field that most autonomous communities enjoy.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Spain – In Ceuta and Melilla, the maximum legal benchmark is the Spanish Constitution published in 1978. In this document, the only mention to the languages spoken in the Spanish State appears in the third article of the preliminary: “1. Castilian is the official Spanish language of the State. All Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it. 2. The other Spanish languages shall also be official in the respective Autonomous Communities in accordance with their Statutes. 3. The wealth of the different language modalities of Spain is a cultural heritage which shall be the object of special respect and protection” (C-Ese, art. 3).1

1 “1. El castellano es la langua española oficial del Estado. Todos los españoles tienen el deber de conocerla y el derecho de usarla. 2. Las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comu-

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The Spanish Constitution determines Spanish as the official language (calling it Castillian) and delegates to each of the Statutes of Autonomy the possibility of promoting other languages or linguistic varieties also considered to be Spanish. Ceuta and Melilla – The Statutes of Autonomy of both cites were approved on 13 March 1995 by consecutive organic laws (Ley Orgánica 1/1995, de 13 de marzo, de Estatuto de Autonomía de Ceuta – EA-C and Ley Orgánica 2/1995, de 13 de marzo, de Estatuto de Autonomía de Melilla – EA-M). They give Ceuta and Melilla the status of autonomous cities and restate their belonging to the Spanish nation. The statutes establish in the respective fifth article, among the basic objectives of the cities’ institutions, ‘the promotion and fostering of values such as the understanding, respect, and appreciation of the cultural [Melilla: and linguistic] plurality of the Ceutan [Melillan] population’ (“la promoción y estímulo de los valores de comprensión, respeto y aprecio de la pluralidad cultural [y lingüística] de la población ceutí [melillense]”, EA-C/EA-M, art. 5h). Aditionally, Melilla makes a reference to the linguistic diversity. In the field of education, the competencies of both autonomous cities are limited to one article, with almost identical wording, in both Statutes of Autonomy, which note the following: ‘For the general organization of education, the city of Ceuta [Melilla] will entrust the State Administration with the teaching special features to be applied in schools, attending those needs estimated as priorities of the Ceutan [Melillan] community’.2

In spite of this, Spanish continues to be, as in Ceuta, the only language used in the fields of education, mass media, and public administration. The same conclusions can be drawn with regard to how political representatives deal with the linguistic status of Spanish, Tamazight, and Arabic in Melilla, mainly from a nationalist point of view, as Fernández García (2016, 25ss.) pinpoints, where the Coalition for Melilla (Coalición por Melilla – CpM) is the only political party that claims a higher status for the Tamazight language.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Ceuta – The defence of multiculturality in the city is frequently manifested in an institutional way. A recent slogan to promote the city was ‘Ceuta, four worlds to discover’ (“Ceuta: cuatro mundos por descubrir”, Galindo Morales 2005, 305) referring to the Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and Hindu cultures. However, there is no mention to the presence of their languages besides Spanish in the Statute of Autonomy nor in any Royal Decree-Law or any other legal text referring to the official language. Many different politi-

nidades Autónomas de acuerdo con sus Estatutos. 3. La riqueza de las distintas modalidades lingüísticas de España es un patrimonio cultural que será objeto de especial respeto y protección” (C-ES, art. 3). 2 “En el marco de la programación general de la enseñanza, la ciudad de Ceuta [Melilla] propondrá a la Administración del Estado las peculiaridades docentes a impartir en los centros, atendiendo a las necesidades que se estimen prioritarias para la comunidad ceutí [melillense]” (EA-C/EA-M, art. 23).

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cal parties, like Democratic Ceutean Union (Unión Democrática Ceutí – UDCE), Democratic and Social Party of Ceuta (Partido Democrático y Social de Ceuta – PDSC) or the current Caballas Coalition (Coalición Caballas) and the Movement for Dignity and Citizenship (Movimiento por la Dignidad y la Ciudadanía – MDyC) have unsuccessfully proposed the inclusion of Darija and Arabic as languages that should be recognized by local laws. Some of their leaders have stated that the lack of recognition of the city’s multilingualism causes the separation of the Christian and Muslim population and only grants national pride to the former. On the contrary, several political representatives of national parties insist on the argument that the only indigenous language of Ceuta is Spanish. The representative of the Ceutan government Juan José Imbroda (*1944) has branded Darija as a foreign, non-traditional dialect and a product of recent immigration flows (Fernández García 2016, 27). Spanish is the only language used in the traditional fields of language policy and planning: education, mass media, and public administration. Spanish is generally used within all public administration activities. For example, traffic signs, institutional advertising, and information on the official webpage of the autonomous city are only seen in Spanish. Melilla – In Melilla, Spanish is also the language used by the Administration to communicate with the citizens. Laws and regulations, announcements, traffic signs, and the city’s official web page are all written in Spanish, as this is the only language used by public employees in their activities. With regard to institutions and political organizations, the Melillan Assembly, in charge of the government of the city, is formed by national parties like Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE), Partido Popular (PP), Ciudadanos (C’s) and, very recently, Vox, but a nationalist/localist party should also be mentioned due to its rather important current representation: the Coalition for Melilla, funded in 1995 and lead since then by Mustafa Hamed Moh Mohamed Aberchán, who defends a closer attention to the cultural diversity of the city, particularly to the Berber group. The party presented its candidacy for the Congress of Deputies only in 2019 and did not obtain representation. In this political programme, the following goal is expressed: ‘Creation of an institute for research, study, and normalization of Tamazight. Due to the increasing demand of citizens towards the knowledge of this millenary language, as is Tamazight, spoken by near 50 % of the people of Melilla [sic]. The said language is present in everyday use, although its speakers lack a linguistic and cultural knowledge of it. The goal of this institute will be the promotion of its use, its spreading through mass media and its teaching, with respect for people’s willingness to learn it’.3  

3 “Creación de un Instituto para la investigación, estudio y normalización del tamazight. Ante la demanda creciente de la ciudadanía para el conocimiento de esta lengua milenaria, como es el tamazight, hablada por casi el 50 % de la población melillense [sic]. Dicha lengua es de uso cotidiano, pero sus hablantes no tienen una formación lingüística-cultural de la misma. El objetivo de este instituto será promover su uso, su difusión en los medios de comunicación y su enseñanza, respetando la voluntariedad de su aprendizaje” (CpM 2019).  

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Moreover, in a section about the ‘Reform of the statute of autonomy and new local administration model’ (“Reforma del estatuto de autonomía y nuevo modelo de administración local”), there is a reference to the ‘Recognition, defence, promotion and protection of the Tamazight language according to the suggestions of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages’ (“Reconocimiento, defensa, difusión y protección de la lengua tamazigth siguiendo las recomendaciones de la Carta Europea de las Lenguas Minoritarias y Regionales”, CpM 2019). On the contrary, there is no reference to the linguistic reality in the other national parties’ political programmes, PP, PSOE or Ciudadanos. Since its birth, the representation of the Coalition for Melilla in the Government of the autonomous city has been, except on one occasion, steadily increasing in all of the local and regional elections (cf. Table 2). This might entail that, maybe in a medium term, policies directed towards the promotion of the Amazigh language in the city of Melilla will be seen. Table 2: Election results of the Coalition for Melilla Year

Votes

Percentage

1995

4,072

15.47 %

1999

5,833

20.44 %

2003

7,392

26.33 %

2007

6,245

21.71 %

2011

7,394

23.66 %

2015

8,450

26.41 %

2019

10,472

30.62 %

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this sense, some progress has already been made. In 2014, a Social Pact for Interculturality (Pacto Social por la Interculturalidad) was signed between the Government of the autonomous city, the Melillan Institute of Cultures, and the Local Information Society of Melilla, Melilla Television Management. All signing parties committed to promoting television programmes in Tamazight. The agreement was decided in compliance with article 7 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (Council of Europe 1992), which, as can be read in the signed pact in relation to Tamazight, should secure ‘effective policies for the protection, promotion and preservation of this language, which is considered an indissoluble part of the intangible cultural heritage of Melillans’ (“políticas efectivas para la protección, promoción y preservación de dicha lengua, a la que se considera parte indisoluble del patrimonio cultural inmaterial de todos los melillenses”, cf. PSI). Even though the Coalition for Melilla has been supported by Spanish left-wing parties and nationalist parties from other Spanish regions, co-officiality of Tamazight looks like an unfeasible objective in the medium term. Accordingly, we find testimonies such as Tilmatine’s, who predicts a process of substitution, “language loss”

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(2009, 28), in his words, in a foreseeable future, because, as this author states, ‘many young Ceutan “Arabs” and Melillan “Berbers” no longer understand their language of origin’ (“muchos de los jóvenes ‘árabes’ ceutíes y ‘bereberes’ melillenses ya no entienden su respectivo idioma de origen”, 2009, 28). Similarly, with regard to the influence of Spanish linguistic nationalism in monolingual Spanish speakers from Ceuta and Melilla, Fernández García (2016, 43) finds that these do not value the presence of the other two languages, and that bilingual speakers show indifference towards these languages, as if they have somehow interiorized a representation of their language as inferior (2015, 122). From this standpoint, the situation does not predict a better future for these languages. However, any progress achieved, although scarce, should be taken into account, since it could revert this tendency to catastrophism and favour the acceptance of these languages by both societies. Undoubtedly, both societies are cultural and linguistic melting pots that have been living together, more or less peacefully, for centuries.

3.3 Languages used in education Ceuta – In education, the most analysed of the three ambits (cf. Ayora Esteban 2010; 2017; Ayora Esteban/Chaib 2014; Jiménez Gámez 2010; Jiménez Gámez et al. 2011; Rivera Reyes 2006), Spanish is the only language in public schooling, in spite of the presence of a percentage of students that do not use it as a mother tongue, within a teaching programme characterized by the fostering of a substractive bilingualism which favours Spanish. This data might justify to a great extent the high dropout rate, which amounts to 52.7 % in Ceuta, while the average rate in Spain is 29.6 % (cf. Jiménez Gámez et al. 2011, 136). In the Assembly of the autonomous city of Ceuta, the possibility of instituting a bilingual model of education has been brought up at times, but that option has been rejected up to now. It should be pointed out that the Institute for Languages (Instituto de Idiomas), created in 1974 through a collaboration agreement with the University of Granada, teaches Arabic and Darija courses, as well as other modern languages. Melilla – As it is the official language in Melilla, Spanish is the only language of instruction used in public or private schooling, even though there is a number of students who declare to have a different mother tongue, mainly Tamazight (Fernández Smith et al. 2008, 38s.; Ministerio de Educación 2010, 59ss.; Jiménez Jiménez et al. 2017, 164). However, even though there is not a real chance to do so, many parents oppose to school their children in Tamazight due to its irrelevance in social progress (Doppelbauer 2008, 319).  

 

3.4 Languages used in the media Ceuta – All local newspapers (El Faro de Ceuta, El Pueblo de Ceuta, and Ceuta al día) only publish in Spanish, all local audiovisual media (Radiotelevisión Ceuta and Ceuta television) only broadcast in Spanish, and local websites with information about the city (ceu-

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taldia.com, laverdaddeceuta.com, or ceutaactualidad.com) are only available in Spanish. Nevertheless, there is easy access to information in Arabic or other languages thanks to stations located in surrounding territories. Melilla – The situation is similar in Melilla, regardless of the addition of the aforementioned reference to linguistic aspects in its Statute of Autonomy. Merely adding an adjective does not essentially suppose a difference regarding language policy and planning carried out by the local authorities. Thus, Spanish is the only language used by the media, written or audiovisual, in Melilla. This includes local newspapers like El Faro de Melilla, Melilla Hoy, and the recently extinct El Telegrama de Melilla (former El Telegrama del Rif, closed in 2015 after 113 years of history), as well as the local television station Televisión Melilla, in spite of the above-mentioned Social Pact for Interculturality that they signed. Tamazight speakers have access to Moroccan media broadcasts that, however, do not use their language but Darija and Classical Arabic, except for the channel Tamazight TV in Tamazight.

4 Linguistic characteristics Ceuta – Unfortunately, there are no detailed linguistic descriptions of the peculiarities of the Spanish spoken in Ceuta. Among the few authors that gather some of the most meaningful features from the different levels of linguistic analysis that characterize Ceutan Spanish, we will base our study on the data collected by Ayora Esteban (2007), one of the few authors that have published a linguistic monography dedicated to this linguistic community, which we will refer to in this section. Since more than half of the Ceutan speakers coming from the Iberian Peninsula have an Andalusian origin, most of the linguistic features that characterize the city are shared with Andalusian areas where they originated. Melilla – With respect to Spanish in Melilla, we do not count either with enough scientific studies describing its features in a detailed way. However, specialists who have studied some of its aspects coincide in pointing out its relation with Andalusian varieties (Moreno Fernández 1998, 190; Fernández Smith et al. 2008, 70), with some common features with the southern standard (norma meridional) and some from the western Andalusian (Molina Martos 2006). This can be expected, as many of the Melillan arriving from the peninsula came from Andalusia, as well as the fact that many have Andalusian ascendants, already since the foundation of the city in 1497. Therefore, linguistic features from different parts of Andalusia have been historically brought to the community.

4.1 Pronunciation Ceuta – From a phonetic point of view, manifestations of the phonetic erosion and loss that are usual of southern Spanish can be found here too, such as the aspiration of /s/ in an implosive position or before consonant at the end of a word, for example moska

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[ˈmohka] instead of [ˈmoska] or libros [ˈliβɾoh] instead of [ˈliβɾos], the deletion of final /l/, /r/ or /ɾ/ as in árbol [ˈaɾβo] or calor [kaˈlo] instead of [ˈaɾβol] and [kaˈloɾ], or the general aspiration of final consonants. In some cases, this aspiration phenomenon can turn into a sound loss. There is also confirmation of cases of consonant gemination in contexts of /s/ at the end of a syllable before consonant like in mismo [ˈmimmo] instead of [ˈmismo], of aspiration of the phoneme /x/ like in gente [ˈhente] instead of [ˈxente], or of the loss of voiced fricative consonants between vowels, for example pescado [pesˈkao] instead of [pesˈkaðo]. Ayora Esteban (2007, 32s.) has partially analysed the sociolinguistic value of some of these features besides their diatopic character. Melilla – On the phonetic-phonological level, our reference is the study by González Las (1991), carried out with a sample of 20 informants, half men and half women, belonging to different age groups and sociocultural backgrounds. Concerning this investigation, Moreno Fernández concludes that ‘Melillan speech is clearly related to the Andalusian varieties, even though it has some peculiarities of its own’ (“el habla de Melilla está claramente relacionada con las modalidades lingüísticas andaluzas, si bien posee algunas peculiaridades”, 1998, 190). The Melillan speech shares with Andalusian varieties the loss of intervocalic /d/, as in abogado [aβoˈɡao] instead of [aβoˈɡaðo], yeismo, that is the merge of palatal phonemes /ʝ̞ / and /ʎ/ in favour of /ʝ̞ /, as in llave [ˈʝ̞ aβe] instead of [ˈʎaβe], or the aspiration of final implosive phonemes, as the /s/ in pasto [ˈpahto] instead of [ˈpasto], even though the difference between /r/ and /l/ is usually maintained, and the opposition /s/ : /θ/ exists, although seseo, that is the neutralization of /s/ : /θ/ in favour of /s/, is present among speakers belonging to a low sociocultural stratum, for example cocina [koˈsina] instead of [koˈθina]. On their side, Molina Martos (2006, 14) and Moreno Fernández (1998, 190s.) emphasize the contribution of González Las (1991) when identifying a sociolinguistic difference among the higher classes, whose speech would be closer to the Castillian standard, while the lower classes’ speech would be closer to the Andalusian standard. This is associated with the constant population flows from the Iberian Peninsula (cf. Ruiz Domínguez 1997, 23s.).

4.2 Morphosyntax Ceuta – With regard to the morphosintactic level, some of the few peculiarities found in Ceutan people’s use are common linguistic marks in informal Spanish or everyday speech. The use of the infinitive form instead of the imperative one can be mentioned, for example venir instead of venid, as well as the use of the regular form of the past tense pretérito indefinido of the verb andar, andé, instead of anduve. Other uses, like the preference for the diminutive morpheme {‑ito} or the use of the second person form ustedes in informal contexts instead of vosotros bring Ceutan Spanish closer to the one used in the southern part of the Iberian Peninsula. Melilla – In regards to the morphosintactic level, there are no special issues in Melillan Spanish different from the usual in southern speakers from the Iberian Peninsula or

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those expected in informal Spanish, such as the use of the infitive form of verbs instead of the imperative, the regularization of the past tense pretérito indefinido of the verb andar ‘to walk’, or the use of the formal variant of the second person ustedes in informal contexts.

4.3 Lexicon Ceuta – From a lexical point of view, the few studies carried out show some characteristic words and terms in the community (cf. Ayora Esteban 2007, 34, 141, 172). There are some specific words like pavana ‘seagull’, perrito ‘loaf of bread’, candao ‘Moroccan’ (< Sp. candado ‘device that keeps a door, window, box, etc. closed’), gayumbero ‘drug dealer, person who wears drugs in his underpants’ (< Sp. gayumbos ‘underpants’), viser ‘security guard’ (< En. superviser), or mani ‘sweater, turtleneck’ (< En. Mannix ‘television character’). However, the lack of exhaustive investigations on Spanish lexis prevents us from confirming the degree of uniqueness of such linguistic uses. All of the lexical monographies regarding Spanish localities are, dialectologically speaking, independent non-contrastive studies, that is, the uses of words in a given community are collected, but it cannot be established whether these are originary or exclusive in that community. Moreover, a proper analysis of Spanish lexicon from a global point of view is not available, besides the descriptions of particular communities or of diatopic marks of use found in dictionaries such as the Diccionario de la Real Academia Española (DRAE), which do not seem to be taking into account a sociolinguistic proof of any kind. With regard to the Ceutan lexicon, it is important to highlight the investigation by Ayora Esteban (2007), as the core of her research is the gathering of the available lexicon in preuniversity students from the city of Ceuta. The available lexicon is the one speakers have in their mental lexicon to talk about a specific topic. There is a great amount of studies about it in Spanish throughout the Hispanic world, mainly due to the effort of Humberto López Morales, who has carried out and led the Panhispanic Project of Lexical Availability (Proyecto Panhispánico de Léxico Disponible) during the past decades, and in whose methodological framework the analysis of Ceuta by Ayora Esteban is developed. The dictionaries of lexical availability in Ceutan students are not useful to determine the specificity of the Ceutan lexicon unless a comparison of these results is carried out with those of studies about other Hispanic communities. Such a comparison has not been conducted yet, but could be so soon, given the advances achieved by this project up to now, so we can expect these to be a key for determining the existence of specific lexical features in Ceuta in the near future. Nonetheless, they already contribute with ethnolinguistic information that also define the city. In Ayora Esteban’s investigation, there are words in Ceuta that show the contact with Arabic like zaragüelles ‘type of Arab clothes’, taifor and matarba ‘type of Arab furniture’ or harira, kaddid or kefta ‘type of Arab food’ (cf. Ayora Esteban 2007, 141s.).

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Melilla – Regarding the lexical aspects, Spanish in Melilla has a similar reference study as in Ceuta, an investigation about lexical availability in preuniversity students in Melilla carried out for the Panhispanic Project of Lexical Availability, led by Humberto López Morales (Fernández Smith et al. 2008). Truly, these studies fail to prove the exclusivity or uniqueness in a given community of certain lexical elements pertaining to a repertory without comparing them to other communities. In the case of Melilla, this information turns out to be decisive, since the influence of the Amazigh language can be seen in some uses, although scarce, influence to which Melillan speakers have been exposed in an exclusive way for centuries. Even so, this investigation proved that the language contact situation between Spanish and Tamazight showed very little reflection on the available lexicon in that age group. Moreover, the samples of local lexicon, or dialectisms, were scarce, with just a 0.44 % of the collected vocabulary that could be tagged as typical of Melillan speakers, even though it is not always exclusive to them. Some examples are Coa ‘bus’ (acronym for the local transportation company Cooperativa Omnibus de Automóviles), hachichero ‘hashish dealer’, and the children’s game ziriguizo ‘rayuela’, but also words of Berber origin, or Arabic but assimilated by the Amazigh language, referring to culinary aspects, given the social aspects of language use, restricted to familiar contexts and everyday activities, such as for example harera ‘a type of soup’, tayín ‘cooking recipient’, pastela ‘pastry’, chubarquía ‘Morroccan dessert’ (with many orthographic variants due to the lack of standarization of Tamazight).  

5 Internal language policy Ceuta and Melilla – Tilmatine (2009) describes a situation for both autonomous cities in which the relation between Spanish and the language spoken by citizens of Moroccan origin, either Arabic-Moroccan dialect (the author does not use the term Darija) or Tamazight, is one of dominant-dominated language. The first language, the prestigious one, is used in the official ambits of education and public administration and, the second one, less prestigious, is used in non-official contexts, in the street and at home. In a table in which we recognize the categories for language dominance stated by Weinreich (1953, 75ss.), Tilmatine (2009, 23) summarizes the differences that cause Spanish to be the language that secures social success and access to employment, which Weinreich denominates as social advance (1953, 78), while Ceutan-Arabic dialect and Melillan Tamazight never favour their speakers in reaching that social status. Tilmatine has also tried to standardize the Amazigh language (Tilmatine et al. 1998) and its denominations (Tilmatine 1998–1999), and described the names used in Ceuta and Melilla, as well as in the surrounding Moroccan territories, to designate the people and the languages from both cultures, sometimes in a pejorative form, which stresses the idea that there is, somehow, a social, cultural and, by extension, linguistic conflict (cf. Tilmatine 2009; 2011).

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Ceuta – The multilingual and diglossic character of Ceuta has an outcome in studies about the relation among the ethnic groups living in the city and their languages, stressing its importance in order to carry out proper language planning by the local authorities. Darija speakers constitute a peculiar ethnic group from a lower sociocultural and economic stratum, somehow marginal. These two social differences (ethnicity and stratum), along with the language, correlate and can lead to some conflicts among citizens. In that sense, Jiménez Gámez (2010) analyses social stereotypes in different ethnic groups within the community and justifies the need for dialogue between them as well as an appropriate policy to favour it. From a linguistic point of view, there are several studies interested in the evaluation of Spanish and Darija by the Ceutan population. A recent investigation by Fernández García (2016) with 144 students between 14 and 19 years old, Muslims and Catholics alike, reveals interesting aspects on this topic. Besides the fact that most of the informants consider bilingualism to be an advantage, the dual assessment of Darija is also interesting, as it is probably related to its situation of double diglossia previously mentioned. Even though the majority shows a positive attitude towards the use and learning of this variety and the ones that know it recognize that they use it frequently, when asked about which languages they consider more important, the Darija ranks very low when compared to English, Spanish or Arabic (Fernández García 2016, 34s.). This data confirms other similar information from former studies. Ayora Esteban and Chaib, in an investigation with 50 primary school students between 11 and 13 years old, all of them Darija-as-a-mother-tongue speakers, find out that 86 % of the informants want their children to speak Darija in the future, 84 % think that Ceutan local services should use Darija as well as Spanish, 66 % think that Darija should be taught at school, but, at the same time, 64 % think that in the future they will speak Spanish rather than Darija (Ayora Esteban/Chaib 2014, 11s.). The fact that part of the population identifies itself with one of the most usual languages in the city, as well as the positive rating derived from its everyday presence contrast with its low social value, probably derived to a great extent from its exclusion of the public sphere. Melilla – In the case of Melilla, most of the studies regarding the coexistence of languages and cultures, mainly Spanish and Berber, are related to the fields of social sciences, didactics and school organization, educational assessment and intervention, evolutionary psychology, or even didactics of musical, physical and artistic expression. This is due to the role of the Faculty of Education and Sport Sciences (Facultad de Ciencias de la Educación y el Deporte) located in the city, which is an important core for research groups and specialists who have studied these topics. There are, indeed, other organizations, institutions, and associations that address the sociocultural and historic reality of Melilla from different perspectives, such as the Museum of Melilla, with a permanent collection dedicated to Amazigh culture, or the Institute of Cultures of Melilla, which promotes and organizes activities focused on Amazigh language and culture and which maintains, with very short funds (Doppelbauer 2008, 318), a Permanent Seminar on Tamazight Language and Culture intended to be the Amazigh Language Academy,  

 

 

 

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under the care of professor Jahfar Hassan Yahia. On their webpage, visitors can download a copy of the Manual of Riffean conjugation (Manual de conjugación rifeña), written by the same professor, although in Spanish. However, the Association of Melillan Studies, dedicated to the study and dissemination of knowledge of Melillan heritage and culture, does not include a single reference to Amazigh culture or its language, even though it must have necessarily been addressed in some of their activities. Likewise, searching the online catalogue of the Melillan Public Library only returns three or four bibliographic references about Tamazight, Berber, or Riffian language. We can also point out specific linguistic studies about this reality. Like in Ceuta, the study by Fernández García already commented shows that Tamazight speakers from Melilla rate English, Spanish, or Arabic higher (2016, 35). Moreover, there is a previous article by Fernández García (2015), analysing specifically the situation of Melilla with the same sample of 144 students from 5 secondary studies schools in the city that exactly illustrates the attitudes and perceptions of teenagers towards the cultural and linguistic reality of Melilla. The majority of students in Melilla seem to have a positive attitude towards bilingualism and towards the fact that Tamazight is spoken in their city, but again Tamazight ranks in fourth place regarding which language is considered most important by these students, after English, Spanish, and Arabic (Fernández García 2016, 35), the latter being the language related to the Muslim religion. Fernández García (2016, 36) attributes the lack of prestige of Tamazight to its rural origin, non-standardization, and oral character. Consequently, when asked which language they would like to learn, students in Melilla answer English, Arabic, and French (2016, 36). For those who know Tamazight along with Spanish (a scarce 8.3 % of 169 subjects aged 16–24, according to Ministerio de Educación 2010, 122), this language can be regarded as an example of vernacular type of languages which serves here “to identify their speakers as members of particular ethnic or other sociocultural groups” (Ferguson 1970, 49) as its social function, since it is used in some contexts as a means of self-affirmation within their group (Fernández García 2016, 38). Finally, Fernández Smith et al. carried out an analysis of these denominations from the data obtained from the sociolinguistic surveys that accompained the lexical availability questionnaires distributed to last-year students of secondary education in Melilla, and in which they were asked about their mother tongue. These results represented an approximate measure of the limited access of Tamazight native speakers to these educational levels, as only 15 out of 315 informants indicated Tamazight as their mother tongue, including among their answers the multiple registered spelling variants of the term, as well as other denominations already commented on such as chelja or Berber. Another four informants declared themselves bilingual, Tamazight being their first response, and two others with Spanish as their first choice (2008, 36ss.). Aside from these questions, it would be interesting to deepen, by means of research studies dealing with the attitudes and beliefs of these speakers, perhaps on a larger scale and with other qualitative instruments and categories, the valuable work carried out by Fernández García (2015), which already points clearly towards a situation of subtractive bilingual 

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ism favoured by the diglossia, characterized by a positive attitude towards the Tamazight language but passive and indifferent to its use and promotion.

References Alonso García, Manuel J. (1983), Sustrato beréber, sustrato hispano-romano y sustrato hebreo en el Norte de África: dialéctica Norte-Sur, contactos, analogías y comportamiento lingüístico, Publicaciones, Escuela Universitaria del Profesorado de E.G.B. 1, 9–64. Antón, Marta (2011), Consideraciones sociolingüísticas sobre el bilingüismo hispano-árabe en Ceuta (España), Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana 9/2, 121–141. Ayora Esteban, María Carmen (2007), Disponibilidad léxica en Ceuta. Aspectos sociolingüísticos, Cádiz, Universidad de Cádiz. Ayora Esteban, María Carmen (2010), Diversidad lingüística y cultural en un ámbito educativo de lenguas en contacto, Pragmalingüística 18, 30–52. Ayora Esteban, María Carmen (2017), La competencia sociolingüística y los componentes culturales dentro del proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje del español en un contexto de submersión lingüística, Pragmalingüística 25, 31–49. Ayora Esteban, María Carmen/Chaib, Farah Mohamed (2014), El valor predictivo de las actitudes lingüísticas en la educación primaria en una comunidad de habla: el caso de los hablantes de dariya en Ceuta, Tonos Digital. Revista de Estudios Filológicos 26, 1–15. Benhamu Jiménez, David (2017), La jaquetia de la comunidad judía de Melilla en el siglo XXI: entre remanentes léxicos, la intimidad e Israel. Aproximación aplicada a una etnovariedad desde la sociolingüística cognitiva y su relación con la percepción, Madrid, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, Doctoral Thesis. C-ES = Cortes Generales (1978), Constitución Española, Boletín Oficial del Estado 311, https://www.boe.es/eli/es/ c/1978/12/27/(1) (2/3/2023). C-ESe = Cortes Generales (1987), The Spanish Constitution, Madrid, Agencia Estatal Boletín Oficial del Estado, https://www.boe.es/legislacion/documentos/ConstitucionINGLES.pdf (2/3/2023). Council of Europe (1992), European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, European Treaty Series 148, https://www.coe.int/en/web/conventions/full-list/-/conventions/rms/0900001680695175 (2/3/2023). CpM (2019), Programa 2019. El Principal Valor de Melilla: Nuestra gente, Melilla, Coalición por Melilla, http:// coalicionpormelilla.org/el-principal-valor-de-melilla-nuestra-gente/ (2/3/2023). Doppelbauer, Max (2008), Las lenguas en las sociedades de Ceuta y Melilla, in: Max Doppelbauer/Peter Cichon (edd.), La España multilingüe. Lenguas y políticas lingüísticas de España, Vienna, Praesens, 304– 323. EA-C = Jefatura del Estado (1995), Ley Orgánica 1/1995, de 13 de marzo, de Estatuto de Autonomía de Ceuta, Boletín oficial del estado 62, https://www.boe.es/buscar/doc.php?id=BOE-A-1995-6358 (2/3/2023). EA-M = Jefatura del Estado (1995), Ley Orgánica 1/1995, de 13 de marzo, de Estatuto de Autonomía de Melilla, Boletín oficial del estado 62, https://www.boe.es/buscar/doc.php?id=BOE-A-1995-6359 (2/3/2023). Ferguson, Charles A. ([1970] 1996), The Role of Arabic in Ethiopia: A Sociolinguistic Perspective, in: Thom Huebner (ed.), Sociolinguistic Perspectives. Papers on Language in Society 1959–1994 Charles A. Ferguson, New York/ Oxford, Oxford University Press, 48–58. Fernández García, Alicia (2015), Repensar las fronteras lingüísticas del territorio español: Melilla, entre mosaico sociológico y paradigma lingüístico, Estudios de Lingüística de la Universidad de Alicante 29, 105–126. Fernández García, Alicia (2016), Nacionalismo y representaciones lingüísticas en Ceuta y en Melilla, Revista de filología románica 33/1, 23–46. Fernández Smith, Gérard, et al. (2008), Léxico disponible de Melilla: estudio sociolingüístico y repertorios léxicos, Madrid, Arco.

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Galindo Morales, Ramón (2005), Cambios curriculares en ciencias sociales para responder a la multiculturalidad, in: Carmen García Ruiz/Ernesto Gómez Rodríguez et al. (edd.), Enseñar ciencias sociales en una sociedad multicultural. Una mirada desde el Mediterráneo, Almería, Universidad de Almería, 305–343. García Velasco, Manuel M. (1985), La población activa de Melilla según el censo de 1981, Publicaciones. Escuela Universitaria del Profesorado de E.G.B. 8/2, 5–18. González Las, Catalina L. (1991), El español en Melilla. Fonética y fonología, Melilla, Ayuntamiento de Melilla. Herrero Muñoz-Cobo, Bárbara (2014), El árabe ceutí. Un código mixto como reflejo de una identidad mestiza, Ceuta, Instituto de Estudios ceutíes. INE (2020), Alteraciones de los municipios en los Censos de Población desde 1842, Madrid, Instituto Nacional de Estadística, https://www.ine.es/dyngs/INEbase/es/operacion.htm?c=Estadistica_C&cid=125473617699 8&menu=resultados&idp=1254735572981 (2/3/2023). Jiménez Gámez, Rafael Ángel (2010), ¿Diálogo o confrontación de culturas en Ceuta? Un estudio de caso en un Instituto de Educación Secundaria, Revista de Educación 352, 431–451. Jiménez Gámez, Rafael Ángel, et al. (2011), Explorar y comprender el fracaso escolar en el contexto multicultural de Ceuta. Respuestas de la institución escolar, in: Francisco Javier García Castaño/Nina Kressova (edd.), Actas del I Congreso Internacional sobre Migraciones en Andalucía, Granada, Instituto de Migraciones, 133–147. Jiménez Jiménez, María Ángeles, et al. (2017), El proyecto lingüístico de Centro (PLC) para afrontar los retos de la sociedad plurilingüe de Melilla, in: José Luis López Belmonte (ed.), Aportaciones a la educación intercultural y a la diversidad cultural, Melilla, Sindicato Autónomo de Trabajadores de la Enseñanza SATE-STEs, 159–187. Ministerio de Educación (2010), El abandono escolar temprano en las ciudades de Ceuta y Melilla, Madrid, Secretaría General Técnica. Molina Martos, Isabel (2006), Sociolingüística del español en el Norte de África, Madrid, Liceus. Moreno Fernández, Francisco (1998), El español en el Norte de África (con especial referencia al español en Argelia), in: Celia Casado (ed.), La lengua y la literatura española en África, Madrid, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, 187–202. N.N. (2018), Janucá: celebrando la victoria de la luz sobre la oscuridad, El Faro Melilla (4/12/2018), https:// elfarodemelilla.es/januca-victoria-oscuridad/ (2/3/2023). PSI = Ciudad Autónoma de Melilla (2014), Pacto Social por la Interculturalidad, Boletín Oficial de Melilla 5131, https://bomemelilla.es/bome/BOME-B-2014-5131/articulo/1082# (2/3/2023). Rivera Reyes, Verónica (2006), Importancia y valoración sociolingüística del darija en el contexto de la Educación Secundaria pública en Ceuta, Tonos. Revista Electrónica de Estudios Filológicos 12, https://www.um.es/ tonosdigital/znum12/secciones/Estudios%20U-CEUTA.htm (2/3/2023). Rivera Reyes, Verónica (2010), Características del bilingüismo español-árabe-dariya en Ceuta, in: Christian Abelló Contesse/Christoph Ehlers/Lucía Quintana Hernández (edd.), Escenarios bilingües: el contacto de lenguas en el individuo y la sociedad, Bern, Lang, 211–236. Ruiz Domínguez, María del Mar (1997), Estudio sociolingüístico del habla de Melilla, Almería, Universidad de Almería, Doctoral Thesis. Tilmatine, Mohand (1998–1999), Una cuestión de denominación: ¿bereber, amazigh o amazige?, El Vigía de Tierra 4/5, 65–75. Tilmatine, Mohand (2009), Ceuta y Melilla: elementos para una aproximación sociolingüística, in: Thomas Stolz/ Dik Bakker/Rosa Salas Palomo (edd.), Romanisierung in Afrika. Der Einfluss des Französischen, Italienischen, Portugiesischen und Spanischen auf die indigenen Sprachen Afrikas, Bochum, Brockmeyer, 17–30. Tilmatine, Mohand (2011), El contacto español-berber: la lengua de los informativos en Melilla, Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana 9, 15–45. Tilmatine, Mohand, et al. (1998), La lengua rifeña. Tutlayt Tarifit. Gramática rifeña – Léxico básico. Tajerrumt N Tarifit – Tamawalt, Melilla, Ciudad Autónoma de Melilla. Weinreich, Uriel (1953), Languages in Contact. Findings and Problems, Paris/The Hague, De Gruyter Mouton.

Western Africa French Portuguese

Moufoutaou Adjeran

9 Benin Abstract: French has coexisted with the national languages of Dahomey, currently known as the Republic of Benin, since the French conquest. It has a privileged status as official language according to the constitutional and legislative dispositions to the detriment of the national languages. This chapter illustrates the geographical and social repartitions of the languages spoken in Benin and the establishment of Portuguese, English, and French from Dahomey to Benin. Even though French is the official language for administration, education, and media, most Beninese do not speak it. National languages are used in oral communication, on radio and television, and, to a lesser degree, on the internet and in schools. The increasing presence of English constitutes a serious threat to the future development of French in Benin. Keywords: French, Benin, sociolinguistics, language contact, language politics

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages Overview – The capital of Benin is Porto-Novo, while Cotonou is the seat of Government. Despite the small size of the country (112,622 km2), there are fifty-two languages spoken in Benin, which belong to three groups: Kwa languages include all languages spoken in the southern part of Benin, that is, the departments Atlantique, Collines, Couffo, Littoral (comprising Cotonou), Mono, Ouémé, Plateau, and Zou. Gur (Voltaic) languages cover most of the languages spoken in the northern part of the country, that is, the departments Alibori, Atacora, Borgou, and Donga. The third group includes some languages spoken in the northern part of the country that are not part of the first two groups, among them Boko, Borgu Fulfulde, and Dendi. Kwa: Ede and Gbe – The main subgroups of the Kwa languages in Benin are the Ede and Gbe continua, within which there is glossonomic unity and inter-comprehension so that their varieties are technically to be considered as dialects of the same language (cf. Capo 2009, 63). The Ede continuum includes eleven languages which, from a glossonomic perspective, designate language by the lexeme ede, namely (Ede) Ana, Ede Cabe, Ede Ica, Ede Idaca, (Ede) Ifè, Ede Ije, (Ede) Mokole, Ede Nago, and (Ede) Yoruba, that are all present in Glottolog, as well as Ede Ajase and Ede Kétu that are additionally mentioned by Kluge (2011a, vii). The Gbe continuum includes twenty-six languages which designate language by the lexeme gbè, namely Alada, Aja (with Dogbo and Hwe), Ajra, Aguna, Ayizo, Ci, Defi, Fon, Gbesi, Gen, Gun, Phela, Phla, Se, Seto, Tala, Tofin, Toli, Saxwe, Maxi, Waci, and Weme, which are all to be found in typological databases such as Glottohttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-009

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log or Ethnologue, as well as Agonlin (variety of Maxi), Movolo, Raxe and Xevie, which Kluge (2011b, 16) also mentions. Anii is another Kwa language, however without belonging to one of the two continua. Table 1: Speaker numbers and percentages (extracted from INSAE 2013a) % Ede

total Gbe

Gur

others

Yoruba Aja et et al. al.

Fon et al.

Baato- Ditam- Yom, num et mari et Lukpa al. al. et al.

Dendi et al.

Borgu French Fulfulde

11.4

14.3

39.7

9.4

6.1

3.9

3.5

8.6

0.8

10,008,749

Urban

12.3

14.2

44.3

8

4

3.4

4.9

4.1

1.6

4,460,503

Rural

10.7

14.3

36.1

10.6

7.7

4.3

2.3

12.2

0.1

5,548,246

Benin Milieu

Département Alibori

4.9

0.2

0.9

37.2

1.2

0.2

21

26.5

0.1

867,463

Atakora

0.8

0.3

1.2

19.1

59.3

2.3

2

12.4

0.4

772,262

Atlantique 2.9

12.5

81

0.4

0.2

0.3

0.5

0.1

1.1

1,398,229

Borgou

6

0.9

4.4

37.1

7.6

3.4

4.8

33

0.5

1,214,249

Collines

46.9

1.7

38.5

0.4

2.7

2.5

0.4

5.6

0.1

717,477

Kouffo

0.2

90.5

8.9

< 0.1

< 0.1

< 0.1

< 0.1

< 0.1

0.1

745,328

Donga

6.5

3.3

1.1

1.4

3.9

54.6

11.6

15

0.2

543,130

Littoral

8

14.3

61.3

0.6

0.2

1.3

1.9

0.2

5.4

679,012

Mono

0.3

70.9

27.3

0.1

< 0.1

< 0.1

0.1

0.1

0.2

497,243

Ouémé

8.9

5.8

81.4

0.1

0.1

0.3

0.2

< 0.1

1.2

1,100,404

Plateau

69.2

0.8

28.9

< 0.1

0.1

0.1

0.1

0.2

0.1

622,372

Zou

2.7

1.8

93.4

0.1

0.1

0.1

0.2

0.7

0.1

851,580

Gur – The Gur languages are characterized by a great linguistic heterogeneity. Consequently, there is no inter-comprehension among speakers of different languages, such as Baatonum spoken by the Baatombu, Biali spoken by the Berba, Ditammari spoken by the Bétammaribé, Foodo spoken by the Bazence, Mbelime spoken by the Bèbèlibè, Nateni spoken by the Natemba, Tem (Kotokoli) spoken by the Temba (Kotokoliyima), Waama spoken by the Waaba, or Yom and Lukpa spoken by the Yowa.

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171

French – In this linguistic tour of Babel, French has enjoyed the prestigious status of official language since the colonial period. It is spoken in all areas of Benin. Table 1 gives details about the language distribution by department and by milieu of residence. It shows that French is more spread in urban than in rural areas (1.6 % vs 0.1 %) and especially in the departments Littoral (5.4 %), Ouémé (1.2 %), and Atlantique (1.1 %). The majority of Beninese speak at least one of the Beninese languages.  

 

 

 

 

1.2 Social distribution of languages The Republic of Benin is a multilingual country. The Beninese languages cohabit with foreign languages and especially French, which is particularly spread in the administrative and educational spheres. French and the local languages are spoken by men and women alike (cf. Table 2). Although the presence of French hinders the development of Beninese languages in administration and education, these have a great chance to resist the competition in familial contexts, being transferred to children in a natural frame by their parents. It is precisely in the practice of oral communication that the very marked presence of local languages and thus the multilingualism which characterizes the country can easily be noticed. Rarely, French appears in the oral communications between citizens who understand at least one Beninese language. Table 2: Percentage of languages according to gender (extracted from INSAE 2013b) total

%

all

male

female

male

female

total

10,008,749

4,887,820

5,120,929

48.8

51.2

Yoruba et al.

1,142,483

552,001

590,482

48.3

51.7

Aja et al.

1,428,890

682,052

746,838

48.8

51.2

Fon et al.

3,974,775

1,926,124

2,048,651

49.8

50.2

Baatonum et al.

943,711

465,355

478,356

48.3

51.7

Ditammari et al.

606,612

299,459

307,153

50.2

49.8

Yom, Lukpa et al.

393,094

195,966

197,128

50.7

49.3

Dendi et al.

346,751

171,928

174,823

49.5

50.5

Borgu Fulfulde

858,925

431,948

426,977

49.1

50.9

other foreign languages

89,610

45,768

43,842

51.1

48.9

such as French

79,797

40,104

39,693

50.3

49.7

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Moufoutaou Adjeran

Diglossic situation – Since the independence in 1960, French still occupies the high position, while Beninese languages occupy the low one. French dominates the formal spheres, such as administration, schools, government, and the national assembly, while the Beninese languages are used in informal situations such as communication in the family or in the markets (cf. Manzano 2003, 53). The collective imagination holds that local languages are “non-languages” since they play subsidiary roles and are mostly absent from schools and the administration. Beninese languages, presented as less prestigious, do not allow access to positions in public administration, where only those who speak French have access and which is the only source of stable employment in Benin. The status of French as an official language, which goes hand in hand with a privileged status in the most prestigious activities, is often a source of power. From this point of view, French becomes a language of exclusion for the majority of the population and a language of promotion for the privileged minority. The absence of legislation, or its non-application when it exists, has benefited French to the detriment of the Beninese languages, which have been diminished. French absorbs the local languages and causes their decline. The moral of this observation is that the prestige or stigmatization of a language does not derive from its intrinsic linguistic characteristics, but from the social functions it performs or the activities in which it is involved, as well as from the consideration shown to its speakers. Triglossic situation – More recently, language policies have boosted the relationship between languages in Benin. The diglossic situation described above becomes more complex. There is a clear distinction between three functional levels: French on top dominating Beninese languages, Beninese languages in the middle dominating other Beninese languages, and varieties of these languages at the bottom dominating other varieties. First, French maintains its prestigious status as an official language, but now shares several fields with some Beninese languages that enjoy a more privileged status than others. Vehicular languages like Aja, Baatonum, Dendi, Ditammari, Fon, Gen, Gun, and Yoruba facilitate communication among people from different areas of Benin. In general, Yoruba is of particular importance as it is not only a vehicular language that is also spoken in the neighbouring countries Togo and Nigeria, but is also more standardized for written contexts than other languages. The vehicular languages mentioned above are used in the field of education, in television, and in radio broadcasting, where other languages also appear. Second, these languages dominate the other Beninese languages because they no longer share the same fields of use with the latter, nor do they fulfil the same social functions. Third, some language varieties dominate other varieties of the same language: for example, the two varieties of Aja, Dogbo and Hwe, are now used in different situations and fulfil complementary functions. Hwe becomes the standardized high variety used on formal occasions, such as education, religion, the civil service, or the press, while Dogbo is the low variety used for communication needs inherent in everyday life (cf. Adjeran 2016, 384). The situation thus presents a functional division between the languages and language varieties. Since the situation in Benin compri-

Benin

173

ses three levels of distribution and not two, one could actually use the concept of triglossia (cf. Calvet 1998). Blurring boundaries – However, the boundaries of the triglossic situations are not watertight. On the one hand, the functional distribution is moving, and on the other, the effects of political powers can modify the situation, the previously low varieties being able to become superimposed. They could thus be codified and used in formal domains. In the Beninese context, triglossia is part of a pattern of various overlaps. There is no fixed functional (or practical) situation in the country. Each of the Beninese languages can find itself in a valued or devalued position. This invites to present the triglossic relationship as contextual: speakers may value a language in one interactional setting, which may lose its prestige to occupy a disadvantaged position in another context, and this without precondition. Benin’s language practices function in this way, anchored only in the stabilized pole of the official language policy. In this sense, triglossia would no longer be different from multilingualism, which refers to the use of different codes in an interaction, leading to the question of whether multilingualism (with types of particularization such as social, dominant, additive, etc.) and triglossia (which appears as a hierarchical and socio-functional organization of languages) should be used as parallel concepts and where the boundaries between both concepts are. Triglossia would only be tangible at the extremities. These ends could correspond to the poles of the official language policy. The latter would have always allowed the political power of Benin to place, implicitly or not, the Beninese languages in a position of dominance in relation to French. We thus note that triglossia appears on the one hand as a macro-sociolinguistic framework of representations supported in part by the State in order to maintain a national linguistic policy, and is described on the other in everyday micro-interactions, where the strict hierarchy, however, no longer makes sense.

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of Portuguese, English, and French Dahomey, currently known as the Republic of Benin, witnessed the presence of the Portuguese in the seventeenth, the English in the nineteenth, and the French up to the late nineteenth century. The presence of all three powers has been reinforced by the slave trade, and each colonizer –Portuguese, English, and French– constructed its fort. Portuguese – The teaching of Portuguese in Dahomey started in 1680 in Ouidah in a school run by Catholic priests who were among the first missionaries settling on the Dahomey coast, where the Portuguese established a trading fort for slave trade. The teaching was delivered in Portuguese to about forty students. However, this attempt was ephemeral because these missionaries were decimated by tropical fevers, so the establishment of Portuguese was achieved less through religion than through formal ways of education. Although Portuguese did not have a long presence in the educational system,

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it left remarkable traces through Portuguese borrowings in Fon and the related languages which are spoken in the coastal area of the country, such as for example abunέka ‘doll’ (< a boneca), abusútu ‘absolution, (lit.) absorption’ (< absorção), abusolusánwun ‘absolution’ (< absolução), afinέti ‘pin’ (< alfinete), akánma ‘bed’ (< a cama), akansán ‘pasta of maize’ (< a caçabe), aklubá ‘vat, bucket’ (< a cuba), aklúzun ‘cross’ (< a cruz), akͻnta ‘account, accounting, calculation’ (< a conta), amísa ‘church service’ (< a missa), amͻkέkԑ ‘omelette with seasonings’ (< a moqueka), anjù ‘angel’ (< anjo), asԑnsánwun ‘Ascension, ascent of Christ into heaven’ (< ascenção), or asinyͻnla ‘Assumption, ascent of Virgin Mary into heaven’ (< assunção). They show that the borrowings are mostly related to religion on the one hand (abusútu, abusolusánwun, aklúzun, amísa anjù, asԑnsánwun, asinyͻnla), and to agriculture and nutrition on the other hand (akansán, aklubá, amͻkέkԑ). Today, the only Portuguese heritages still visible in Benin apart from the borrowings is the Portuguese fort which remained a Portuguese enclave until 1961 before it became the History Museum of Ouidah (Musée d’histoire de Ouidah) in 1967 (cf. Tall 2009, 160). English – In 1856, pastor Marshall and the Wesleyan Missions Society, a community of Methodist missionaries, opened the first school in Agué and delivered the lessons in English. In 1867, they opened another school in Xogbonu, the current Porto-Novo (also known as Yor. Adjashe and Gun Hogbonou). French – A first French colony was established in 1805 and existed until 1814 before becoming a French protectorate again as part of French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF). In 1861, father Francesco Borghero, from the Society of African Missions of Lyon (Société des missions africaines de Lyon), opened a school in Ouidah. In 1891, the first secular schools were created in Porto-Novo. After the conquest of Dahomey (1890–1894) and the creation of the colony of Dahomey (1894) by the decree of 22 June 1894, public education and instruction was organized by the Governor General of French West Africa. Also in 1894, General Alfred Amédée Dodds created a school for the princes and sons of chiefs of Dahomey. In 1902, a school with the same status was created which later gave access to all social strata of the country. By the decree of 24 November 1903, the Governor General Ernest Nestor Roume created the AOF service of primary education. The goal was clear and precise: ‘If the study of French was the whole curriculum of lower levels, the older students would receive simple and precise notions of common law and good auxiliaries of our administrations, our agricultural and commercial enterprises’.1

A higher stage is reached with the creation of the Superior Primary School of Porto-Novo in 1913. The French introduced structures to accompany and reinforce the hegemonic colonial system, relying on local translators:

1 “Si l’étude du français était tout le programme des classes inférieures, les grands élèves recevraient des notions simples et précises de droit usuel et de bons auxiliaires de nos administrations, de nos entreprises agricoles et commerciales” (Decree 11).

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‘The translator of the colonies, that skillful agent or mediator whose main task was to fill the linguistic and cultural gap between the colonizer and the indigenous peoples, was in reality a more complex character. His role, which on the surface consisted in bringing together two antagonistic and hostile worlds, made him a character of dual nature, ambiguous without ever being false’.2

2.2 The political development after independence The Republic of Dahomey, after having had the status of a self-governing French colony since 1958, gained full independence on 1 August 1960. After military coups in 1963, 1965, 1969, and 1972 and changes between dictatorial and democratic governments, Mathieu Kérékou established a socialist one-party regime that lasted until 1989. Decisions by the socialist government to promote Beninese languages between 1972 and 1975 were not successful and could thus not change the diglossic situation. In 1975, the country’s name was changed to People’s Republic of Benin (République populaire du Bénin) as a more neutral way to represent all ethnicities of the country. With the introduction of the new constitution in 1990, which marked the end of the socialist system, the name was officially reduced to Benin. Nicéphore Dieudonné Soglo was the first president of this new democratic era until 1996 when Kérékou regained power. He was followed by Thomas Boni Yayi in 2006 and Patrice Talon in 2016.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Since the access of Benin to international sovereignty, the successive governments have maintained the linguistic policy inherited from the former colonizer that made French the sole official language. The constitution from 1990 states in its first article that ‘the official language is French’.3 It grants the different communities the freedom to use their own languages, without however giving official status to selected Beninese languages; all Beninese languages are regarded as national languages:

2 “L’interprète des colonies, cet habile agent ou médiateur dont la tâche principale était de combler le vide linguistique et culturel entre le colonisateur et les peuples indigènes était en réalité un personnage plus complexe. Son rôle qui, en apparence, consistait à rapprocher deux mondes antagonistes et hostiles, faisait de lui un personnage de nature double, ambiguë sans jamais être fausse” (Tryuk 2013, 216). 3 “La langue officielle est le français” (C-BE, art. 1).

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‘All communities comprising the Beninese nation enjoy the freedom to use their spoken and written languages and to develop their own culture while respecting those of others. The State must promote the development of national languages of intercommunication’.4

These are granted a special role in the diffusion of human rights: ‘The State must equally assure the diffusion and teaching of these same rights [human rights] in the national languages by all means of mass communication, and particularly by radio and television’.5

Many laws beyond the constitution have reinforced French in its privileged status as the only official language in Benin, ranging for example from the Dahomean Nationality Code (1965) to the Code of Criminal Procedure (2012).

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Official documents – Official documents such as for example administrative correspondences, banknotes, stamps, public bills, national identity cards, official announcements, notarial acts, and legal reports are written in French. Documents from other states have to be translated into French on request: ‘1) The document [coming from a foreign state] is delivered in the language of the State of origin. 2) However, the addressee who does not know the language in which the document is written can refuse the notification and demand that it is translated or accompanied by a translation into French at the behest and expenses of the requesting party’.6

Law 7 (2002) confirms the status of French for acts of recognition and civil status records:

4 “Toutes les communautés composant la Nation béninoise jouissent de la liberté d’utiliser leurs langues parlées et écrites et de développer leur propre culture tout en respectant celles des autres. L’État doit promouvoir le développement de langues nationales d’intercommunication” (C-BE, art. 11). 5 “L’État doit également assurer dans les langues nationales par tous les moyens de communication de masse, en particulier par la radiodiffusion et la télévision, la diffusion et l’enseignement de ces mêmes droits” (C-BE, art. 40). 6 “1) L’acte est notifié dans la langue de l’État d’origine. 2) Toutefois, le destinataire qui ne connaît pas la langue dans laquelle l’acte est établi peut en refuser la notification et demander que celui-ci soit traduit ou accompagné d’une traduction en langue française à la diligence et aux frais de la partie requérante” (Law 7/2, art. 97).

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‘Acts of recognition certificates are drawn up on a sheet of paper in the register of birth certificates following the procedures laid down by the current regulations. Civil status records are drawn up in the official language’.7

Testaments may be written and dictated in another language than French provided that the testator, the registrar, and the witnesses understand that language. French remains essential since the testament must still be translated into French: ‘A holographic testament can be written in a language other than French. It shall be null and void if it appears that the testator, being illiterate or not knowing the language in which the will is drawn up, has reproduced characters the meaning of which he did not know’.8 ‘The will may be dictated in a language other than French if the registrar and the witnesses understand that language. It shall then be drawn up in French by the executor, who shall write it or have it written as it is dictated’.9

In working contexts, official documents written in another language must be translated into French. Law 4 (1998) fixes the use of French for apprenticeship contracts: ‘The contract of apprenticeship must be recorded in writing, under penalty of nullity. It shall be drawn up in the official language’.10

The same applies to agreements with trade unions: ‘The collective agreement must be written in the official language’.11

Official signs – French dominates written odonyms, as shown in the street signs in Cotonou (e. g., Rue de l’Archevêché ‘Archbishopric Street’, Rue Azagnandji ‘Azagnandji Street’, Rue du Marché ‘Market Street’, Rue de l’Administrateur Gange ‘Administrator Gange Street’, cf. Figure 1) and Abomey-Calavi (e. g., Rue de l’Herbier ‘Herbarium Street’, Rue du Tchad ‘Chad Street’, cf. Figure 2). The same applies to signs which provide information on official buildings, as for example at the Ministry for the Environment (Ministère en  

 

7 “Les actes de reconnaissance sont dressés sur un feuillet du registre des actes de naissance suivant les modalités prévues par la réglementation en vigueur. Les actes de l’état civil sont rédigés dans la langue officielle” (Law 7/1, art. 874). 8 “Le testament olographe peut être rédigé en une langue autre que le français. Il est nul s’il apparaît que le testateur, illettré ou ne connaissant pas la langue dans laquelle le testament est rédigé, a reproduit des caractères dont il ignorait la signification” (Law 7/1, art. 874). 9 “Le testament peut être dicté dans une langue autre que le français, lorsque l’officier rédacteur et les témoins comprennent cette langue. Il est ensuite rédigé en langue française par l’officier instrumentaire, qui l’écrit ou le fait écrire au fur et à mesure de la dictée” (Law 7/1, art. 877). 10 “Le contrat d’apprentissage est constaté par écrit à peine de nullité. Il est rédigé dans la langue officielle” (Law 4, art. 65). 11 “La convention collective doit être écrite en langue officielle” (Law 4, art. 124).

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charge de l’Environnement, cf. Figure 3), the General Office of Forests and Natural Resources (Direction générale des forêts et de ressources naturelles, cf. Figure 4), and the Faculty of Arts and Humanities (Faculté des Lettres, Arts et Sciences Humaines, cf. Figure 5).

Figure 1: Street signs in Cotonou, © Moufoutaou Adjeran

Figue 2: treet signs in Abomey-Calavi, © Moufoutaou Adjeran

Figure 3: Administrative sign in Cotonou, © Moufoutaou Adjeran

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Figure 4: Administrative sign in Cotonou, © Moufoutaou Adjeran

Figure 5: Administrative sign at the University of Abomey-Calavi, © Moufoutaou Adjeran

In a clear manner, the State is involved in a minoring policy of Beninese languages. The formal recognition of the country’s multilingualism through the identification of an official language and national languages does not go along with the promotion and the use of Beninese languages in the public sphere. Orality – Political authorities in Benin use both French and Beninese languages but in distinct situations. French is the language of official speeches and addresses to the nation. Beninese languages are widely spoken during election campaigns due to the fact that many people do not master French very well. In the Council of Ministers and the National Assembly, debates are exclusively held in French. However, the official generalization of French and its status as the only working language within politics and beyond is diminishing in practice. Beninese languages, mainly the vehicular ones, become more and more present. Law 7 (2008) fixes that other languages than French can be used in court but have to be translated into French: ‘Parties and witnesses who do not speak the language in which the process is conveyed have the right to use the language of their nationality or of the national language, assisted by a sworn interpreter’.12

12 “Les parties et les témoins qui ne parlent pas la langue dans laquelle se déroule la procédure ont le droit de se servir de la langue de leur nationalité ou de la langue nationale, assistés d’un interprète assermenté” (Law 7/2, art. 497).

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3.3 Languages used in education French – Since 1894, French has been the privileged language in schools. From 1960 on, the government was in charge of the education policy and continued the levels of teaching established during the colonization so that schools should practically follow the curricula of the primary schools of the metropole (France) with lessons that were, in fact, directed to the European children of the colony and the assimilated ones as well. Today, elementary primary teaching is provided through village, regional, and urban schools. Several laws by different governments since 1960 have reinforced the status of French, such as Law 17 (2003) which fixes French as the educational language, alongside English and national languages at this stage: ‘Education shall be provided mainly in French, English, and national languages’.13 ‘Nursery education aims essentially at awakening and stimulating the physical, psychological and mental functions of the child. […] It is taught in French, English, and one of the major national languages in the locality or any other language’.14

National languages – National languages, which previously accompanied the teaching by the initiative School and National Languages in Africa (École et langues nationales en Afrique – ELAN), have been taught intermittently since 1960 and were used as a teaching language, too, with didactic materials being provided in these languages. Temporarily, the use of national languages both as taught and a teaching language was legally fixed in Law 17 for all levels from nursery to higher education: ‘National languages shall be first used as a subject and then as a vehicle for teaching in the educational system. Consequently, the State shall promote research with a view to elaborating pedagogical tools for the teaching of national languages at the nursery, primary, secondary, and higher levels’.15

However, the experimental official introduction of national languages with the ELAN initiative was formally suspended in 2018 after an evaluation of the teaching programmes: ‘After the analysis of different achievements and obtained results as well as the different difficulties which constituted obstacles to the experimentation of the programme, it became necessary to rethink and to give another orientation to the policy of introducing national languages in the educa-

13 “L’enseignement est dispensé principalement en français, en anglais et en langues nationales” (Law 17, art. 7). 14 “L’enseignement maternel vise essentiellement l’éveil et la stimulation des fonctions physiques, psychologiques et mentales de l’enfant. […] Il est dispensé en français, en anglais et en une langue nationale majoritaire dans la localité ou toute autre langue” (Law 17, art. 23). 15 “Les langues nationales sont utilisées d’abord comme matière et ensuite comme véhicule d’enseignement dans le système éducatif. En conséquence, l’État doit promouvoir les recherches en vue de l’élaboration des instruments pédagogiques pour l’enseignement des langues nationales aux niveaux maternel, primaire, secondaire et supérieur” (Law 17, art. 7).

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tional system in Benin. Thus, the Government of Benin has decided to mark a pause after this first phase of the initiative of ELAN in order to define a new vision of bilingualism in the formal educational system’.16

Many private initiatives were born after this suspension. The vehicular languages Aja, Baatonum, Dendi, Fon, Gun, and Yoruba are still taught in their respective regions in some schools spread all over the national territory (e. g., Bantè, Porto-Novo, Kétou). Beyond that, however, Beninese languages are reduced to their use in informal communication, although the actual teaching provided in the first language would help to avoid years of delay in the acquisition of knowledge. The neglect of Beninese languages implies important psychological consequences and is at the origin of enormous rates of school dropout:  

‘The young African is at least five years behind his French classmate when he goes to school since the French child [unlike the African child] learned his mother tongue by the most active and the most effective method there might be, which is through life and action’.17

English – Since the first English schools in the nineteenth century (cf. 2.1), teaching and learning of English remains a reality in the educational system at all school levels of primary and secondary schools as well as at university level with the creation of the department of Literary Studies, Linguistics and Humanities in 1974. English is taught in the faculties, institutes, and colleges of the four public universities in Benin as well as in private institutes of higher education. The University of Abomey-Calavi (UAC) even requests a certificate of English proficiency in order to get admission to any Master programme. This language therefore receives particular attention from the administrative and political authorities, as shown by Decree 98 (2019) with which Benin has formalized its teaching: ‘The teaching of English in primary schools is established in Benin. The teaching of English starts with an experimental phase from the resumption of the scholar year 2017–2018 in primary 1. It progressively spreads from primary 1 to primary 6’.18

16 “À la suite de l’analyse des différents acquis et résultats obtenus ainsi que les difficultés de tous ordres qui ont entravé l’expérimentation du programme, il s’est avéré nécessaire de repenser et de donner une autre orientation à la politique d’introduction des langues nationales dans le système éducatif formel au Bénin. Ainsi, le Gouvernement du Bénin a décidé de marquer une pause après cette 1ère phase de l’initiative ELAN afin de définir une nouvelle vision de la politique en matière de bilinguisme dans le système éducatif formel” (Courrier 2/2018). 17 “Le jeune africain a au moins cinq ans de retard sur son homologue français quand il rentre à l’école car le petit français a appris sa langue maternelle par la méthode la plus active et la plus efficace qui soit, c’est-à-dire par le truchement de la vie et de l’action” (Ki-Zerbo 1972, 468). 18 “Il est institué au Bénin l’enseignement de l’anglais dans les écoles primaires. L’enseignement de l’anglais démarre par une phase expérimentale à compter de la rentrée scolaire 2017–2018 dans les classes du Cours d’Initiation (CI). Il s’étend progressivement du CI au CM2” (Decree 98).

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This increasing use can be justified by the hegemony of the English language worldwide as well as by the close contact to neighbouring English-speaking countries. English finds, in Benin, a fertile soil for its future development. Its (experimental) introduction as a subject in primary and secondary school as well as at university where it is taught as a subject and a medium of teaching is an index of a persistent future for teaching and learning English in Benin. Portuguese – The last attempt to relaunch the teaching of Portuguese in Benin at university level goes back to 2019. However, the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research (Ministère de l’Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche Scientifique) decided that ‘the priority would be given to the teaching of the local languages in secondary schools instead of Portuguese’19 so that there is no great expectation for the future development of Portuguese in Benin.

3.4 Languages used in the media Press – Newspapers in Benin are written in French only. During the socialist period, there were newspapers in Beninese languages which however do not appear anymore since the democratic governments failed to preserve this asset. Radio and television – The Office of Radio Diffusion and Television of Benin (Office de Radiodiffusion et Télévision du Bénin – ORTB) was founded in 1972, and national television was launched in 1978. As to radio, French and Beninese languages share the national radiophonic space with the latter occupying the greatest portion. This is especially true for local radios that broadcast primarily in Beninese languages. A prime example is Radio Bénin Alafia which was created in 2015 and which is dedicated to local languages only, including seventeen of them. French, in contrast, is very present on the national Radio of Cotonou (Radio Nationale). Since the 1980s, eighteen Beninese languages (Aja, Anii, Baatonum, Biali, Boko, Borgu Fulfulde, Dendi, Ditammari, Fon, Gen, Gun, Lukpa, Nateni, Saxwe, Tem, Waama, Yom, Yoruba) have been sharing the airtime besides English and French (cf. Houalakouè 1987, 4) and are still present. As to television, French is the most spoken language, although seven other languages (Baatonum, Dendi, Ditammari, Fon, Gen, Gun, Yoruba) are also present (cf. ORTB 2021). For both national radio and television, the proportion of Beninese languages has been decreasing: while in the past, 2,520 of 5,940 minutes (42.42 %) of a weekly programme were devoted to them (cf. Houalakouè 1987, 4), their proportion has decreased to 2,746 of 10,080 minutes (27,24 %) for radio (cf. ORTB 2021) and to 2,200 of 10,010 minutes of broadcasting time (21.97 %) for television. The situation has remained stable since the promulgation of Law 10 (1997) on  

 

 

19 “[L]a priorité soit accordée à l’enseignement des langues locales dans les lycées et collèges au lieu du portugais” (Note 503).

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the liberation of the audiovisual space and special penal provisions related to media offences, which led to a timid revolt of local languages spoken on the television sets. Internet – French is much present on the internet in Benin. Apart from that, Yoruba is the only other African language having an online presence, with the search engine Google and operating systems of mobile phones and computers being available in Yoruba. The availability of the Yoruba keyboard incorporated in the system of computers facilitates the use of this language on the internet. Here, Benin benefits from the use of Yoruba especially in Nigeria that contributed to the online visibility of this language.

4 Linguistic characteristics 4.1 Phonetics Phonetic variation is associated with the notion of accent. For example, a Senegalese speaker can be easily distinguished from a Beninese speaker. However, even within the territory of Benin, phonetic variation can be found, which mirrors the differences between the languages of the Ede continuum, the Gbe continuum, Gur, and other languages such as Dendi. Since the languages spoken in Benin do not share the same inventories internally, it is not easy to establish a typology of specific Beninese features without considering the specificities of the continua that characterize its linguistic landscape. Schwas – The phonetic realization of the schwa shows differences from those of standard French (cf. Adjeran 2013, 288). The central vowel [ə] as used in standard French does not appear in the vowel systems of the Ede continuum, which includes /i/, /e/, /ɛ/, /a/, /ɔ/, /o/, /u/, /ɔ̃/, and /ɛ̃/, and of the Gbe continuum, which includes /i/, /e/, /ɛ/, /a/, /ɔ/, /o/, and /u/. Therefore, speakers substitute the schwa with [e], which is the closest vowel to [ə], such as in semaine de Pâques ‘Easter week’ [semɛndepak], ça fait que ‘that’s why’ [safɛke], or se promener ‘to go for a walk’ [seprɔmene], instead of [sǝmɛndǝpak], [safɛkǝ] or [sǝprɔməne]. It is very likely that, among primary learners, this substitution is systematic, i.e. all /ə/ become [e] regardless of the context. Speakers of Gur languages do not experience this phenomenon since the central vowel /ǝ/ exists in the languages of this continuum (cf. N’ouéni 1983, 82, quoted by Sambiéni 2008, 94). Close-mid front unrounded vowels – The phonetic realization of /e/ is not a problem for speakers whose first language belongs to the Ede, Gbe, and Gur continua, since it exists in these languages, so that, for example, péché ‘sin’ [peʃe], étaller ‘to spread out’ [etale], or thé ‘tea’ [te] are realized in the same way as in standard French. Sometimes, certainly through hypercorrection, /e/ is realized [ø] when it would remain [e] in standard French. This is usually the case when it is preposed to the consonant /r/, as in sérieux ‘serious’ [sørjø], série ‘series’ [søri], or sérieusement ‘seriously’ [sørjøzemɑ̃] instead of [seriø], [seri] or [serjøzmɑ̃]. Close-mid front rounded vowels – Moreover, it can be noticed that /ø/ is realized as [e] among speakers whose first languages belong to the Ede, Gbe, or Gur continuum,

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such as in dangereux ‘dangerous’ [dɑ̃ʒere], la queue ‘the tail’ [lake], mange peu ‘eat little’ [mɑ̃ʒpe], or un peu ‘a little’ [ɛ̃pe], instead of [dɑ̃ʒərø], [lakø], [mɑ̃ʒpø], or [œ̃ pø]. Voiceless postalveolar fricatives – Differences in the realization of /ʃ/ in Gur and other languages such as Dendi and Baatonum are based on the presence or absence of /ʃ/, which is also perceptible in the practice of French. Gur speakers realize [ʃ] as [s] as syllable onset at the beginning of a word, such as for example chasse ‘hunting’ [sas], chaise ‘chair’ [sɛz], chambre ‘room’ [sɑ̃bʀ], and chute ‘fall’ [syt] instead of [ʃas], [ʃɛz], [ʃɑ̃bʀ], and [ʃyt], or in medial position within a word, such as cacher ‘to hide’ [kase], déssoucher ‘to desecrate’ [desuse], échauffement ‘warming up’ [esofmɑ̃], échapper ‘to escape’ [esape], échéance ‘deadline’ [eseɑ̃s], effaroucher ‘to frighten’ [efaʀuse], enchâsser ‘to embed’ [ɑ̃sase] instead of [kaʃe], [desuʃe], [eʃofmɑ̃], [eʃape], [eʃeɑ̃s], [efaʀuʃe], [ɑ̃ʃase], as well as in word-final position as the syllable offset, such as in or torche ‘torch’ [tɔʀs] instead of [tɔʀʃ]. Speakers of the Ede and Gbe languages do not experience this phenomenon since the fricative /ʃ/ exists in their languages.

4.2 Morphosyntax Problems of identification – In itself, the counting of syntactic phenomena does not appear to be as conclusive as that of phonological facts, since the occurrences of an allophone can be compared with the occurrences of another allophone in the case of phonology, whereas the forms to be matched are not as easily identifiable in the case of syntax. They must function in the same way in the system, i.e. they must be syntactically equivalent but also have the same meaning. However, the lexicon, the word order, but also the communication context often interfere to create differences in meaning between various sentences which could be taken as variants but are no longer semantically equivalent. Moreover, it is impossible to compare existing forms quantitatively with those that could have been realized, just as it is impossible to predict the occurrence of one construction over another. Form-avoidance strategies involve so much distance from a form that they are often unlikely to be interpreted as such strategies. The concept of variables is therefore difficult in syntax, at least as applied to our examples. Variations from standard French are, however, easily identifiable. Work already done on French spoken in Benin (cf. Adjeran 2017a, 62s.) tested the distance to (elevated) standard French in conversation. It can be seen that elevated language use is close to standard French, while the “popular” use is further away from it. The comparison of formal and informal conversations confirms the difference in style of these two situations. The following examples come from the daily practice of French by the Beninese and have been observed in formal and informal conversations on the street or in public transport. The total number of syntactic variants recorded in informal situations is higher than for formal situations. However, the speakers who show the greatest difference between the two styles are not homogeneous.

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Adverbials – The adverbial là ‘there’ postposed to a nominal phrase introduced by a demonstrative determiner (i) or not (ii) as well as postposed to a verbal phrase (iii) is used in spoken French in Benin and often perceived as specifically African in literature, although it is likely that it appears in spoken European and Canadian varieties, too (cf. Boutin 2007, 168). (i) “Et justement, dans ces produits chinois là, vous avez des produits à base de plantes”.20 (ii) “Le sang de la chèvre là, elle fait, griller ça, c’est très bon”.21 (iii) “Donc, quand je commence là, elle s’émotionne”.22

Noun phrase – Within a noun phrase, determiners and partitives can be absent (cf. Boutin 2007, 168; Knutsen 2007, 15): (iv) “On mange sauce graine, sauce arachide [instead of de la sauce graine, de la sauce arachide]. On mange plus sauce tomate [instead of de sauce tomate]”.23

Verb phrase – In the syntax of the verb, we note the use of the direct pronoun la instead of the indirect pronoun lui (v–vi), and the use of the preposition de instead of the standard form pour in interrogative sentences (vii–viii). (v) “Cette fille est têtue; je la [instead of lui] dis ça tout le temps”.24 (vi) “Gladys est partie, n’oublie pas de la [instead of lui] dire ça”.25 (vii) “De partir ou de venir [instead of Pour partir ou pour venir]?”.26 (viii) “Tu ne viens pas de [instead of pour] manger?”.27

Beyond that, the imperfect use of aller ‘to go’ can be observed as an alternative to the standard French conditional form as in example (ix): (ix) “Les sapeurs-pompiers ont fait leur travail, parce qu’ils ont été surpris, en principe, on n’allait pas pouvoir [instead of on n’aurait pas pu] s’en sortir” (Interview with the Director of the fire brigade during the fire at the Dantokpa market in Cotonou).28

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

‘And precisely, in these Chinese products there, you have plant-based products’. ‘The blood of the goat there, it makes, toast it, it’s very good’. ‘So, when I start there, she gets emotional’. ‘We eat seed sauce, peanut sauce. We eat more tomato sauce’. ‘That girl is stubborn; I say it to her all the time’. ‘Gladys is gone, don’t forget to tell her that’. ‘To leave or to come?’. ‘Aren’t you coming to eat?’. ‘The firemen did their job, because they were surprised, in principle, we were not going to make it’.

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4.3 Lexicon Complementary to what is observed for morphology, an essential part of the lexicon considered as standard French is attested in Benin. Moreover, a significant part of the Beninisms –lexemes that are particular to the practice of French in Benin– are found in other regions of the French-speaking world, too. Many of them, widely disseminated and shared by various types of speakers, express the country’s daily evolution in key areas such as politics, administration, and social relations. Borrowings – Interjections derived from the Beninese languages are, for example, the exclamation of surprise yégè! (< Fon yégè! ‘saint, deity’), the exclamations of pity có! (< Fon có! ‘although’), ò púí! (< Aja ò púí! ‘My God!’), and ayé mi o! (< Yoruba ayé mi o! ‘Oh, my life!’). Lexemes beyond interjections include examples such as apatam (< Ewe apatam ‘small shed’), kèkènon (< Fon kɛ̀kɛ̀nɔ̀ ‘motorbike taxi’), klébés (< Yoruba kélébé ‘broker’), mèdjômè (< Fon mɛ̀jɔ̀mɛ̀ ‘respectable person’), to-tché (< Fon tòcè ‘my country’), and yovo (< Fon yovo ‘white person’), where the meaning remains the same as in the original language. Examples where a different meaning can be observed include boo ‘art by which someone transforms a natural object into a symbolic object’ (< Fon bòó ‘talisman’), kpayo ‘person of dubious quality’ (< Yoruba kpàyↄ ‘bad quality’), tchoco-tchoco ‘slogan’ (< Gun cókócokò ‘anyway’), and nyinwè ‘self-centred discourse’ (< Fon nyɛwɛ̀ ‘this is me’), all indicating the desire of speakers to give an identity to the practice of French by introducing these lexemes from Beninese languages. Nyinwè is based on the statement of former President Thomas Boni Yayi who, in one of his speeches, insisted on his achievements through the use of this lexeme as if to say “I am the one who does everything”. Journalists see this as a sign of egoism on the part of the former Head of State, so that nyinwè is an example for a satirical borrowing. Borrowings with French affixes: hybrids – The practice of French in Benin shows lexical alternations, which induce hybrids. In these language mixtures, the lexical alternations make the formal identification of a language impossible and mostly irrelevant. Their structure has hybrid features in terms of the simultaneous use of a varied linguistic repertoire within a single lexical unit. This language mixture does not hinder communication, nor does it cause any problems of understanding or clarification among speakers who have French in common. The Beninese languages provide most of the lexical elements, while the contributions of French are essentially affixes. The structure of lexical alternations shows a functional distribution. The first level role is assigned to Beninese languages, the second level one to French. This leads to a situation of lexical diglossia in which the structure of the lexical unit is indicative of the presence of several languages and where one language always performs the high function (lexical base) while another always performs a low function (affix). Hybrids are used in different fields, ranging from scientific to ordinary language (e. g., WhatsApp, song lyrics). Examples from scientific works are based on the lexeme boo and include derivations such as boologie ‘science of boo’ (< boo + -logie), boodicée ‘existence of the boo’ (< boo + ‑dicée), or boologue ‘specialist in boologie’ (< boo + ‑logue, cf. Assogba 2016, 19/75/127). These exam 

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ples are expressions of an identity display. The lexemes related to boo are a revealing mark of an endogenous practice characteristic of Benin. The use of these lexemes in science is part of the authors’ desire to formalize them by giving them a certain authenticity. The sole use of French to render this practice would annihilate this desire. More examples for hybrids are gbotèmiser ‘to bewitch’ (< Yoruba gbotièmi ‘listen to me’ + ‑iser), yↄkpↄphiles or vikpɛnphiles ‘paedophiles’ (< Fon yↄkpↄ/vikpɛn ‘child’ + ‑philes). Hybrids formed on the basis of names – Several hybrids are formed on the basis of names of public figures, such as the former mayor of Cotonou Barnabé Dassigli, the exdirector of the National Agency of Terrestrial Transports (Agence Nationale des Transports Terrestres – AnaTT) Thomas Agbeva, or the former presidents Kérékou, Soglo, or Boni Yayi, and include verbal creations such as dassigliser ‘to fall unconscious during a hearing on the handling of public affairs’ (< Dassigli + ‑(i)sé), agbévatiser ‘to divert public funds’ (< Agbeva + ‑(t)iser), and yayiboniser ‘to distract from the social struggle’ (< Yayi + Boni + ‑ser), as well as nominal creations using the suffixes -isme and -iste such as kérékouisme ‘President Kérékou’s management of political authority’ (< Kérékou + -isme), sogloisme ‘President Soglo’s management of political authority’ (< Soglo + ‑isme), yayisme ‘President Yayi’s management of political authority’ (< Yayi + ‑isme), kérékouiste ‘supporter of President Kérékou’ (< Kérékou + ‑iste), sogloiste ‘supporter of President Soglo’ (< Soglo + -iste), and yayiste ‘supporter of President Yayi’ (< Yayi + ‑iste). Interpretation of hybrids – Hybrids are based on the search for expressiveness. They have a resonance of political satire that denounces the authoritarian and sometimes abusive political drifts of African politicians. Thus, they manifest the social and political dynamics of the country. It is also the expression of an active participation of the population in the management of their common homeland when dealing with leaders who are concerned neither about the good management of public funds nor about the plight of their people. In short, the use of hybrids is an ideological practice that is not always adhered to by African politicians who do not see it as an act of freedom of expression and a clear manifestation of democracy but as an act of insubordination and opposition to their political vision. If French has always held a comfortable position in many subSaharan countries, based on the observed lexical diglossia, it seems logical to postulate that the practice of lexical alternations exposes the always manifested will of the citizens of these countries to see local languages occupy a place of choice in the teachinglearning process and in the administration. This practice expresses an (unconscious) opposition to the imperialism of the French language in these countries and is reflected in the practice of lexical alternations in different situations and in different domains. Composition – Examples for Beninese compounds include bonne assise ‘showing of gratitude to someone who pays you a visit occasionally until they leave’ (< bonne ‘good’ + assise ‘sitting’), pâte-noire ‘oka èlubo, dried yam pod paste’ (< pâte ‘dough’ + noir ‘black’), poulet-bicyclette ‘local poultry’ (< poulet ‘chicken’ + bicyclette ‘bicycle’), moins-un ‘by a small margin, almost’ (< moins ‘less’ + un ‘one’), and (voiture) venue de France ‘second-hand car from overseas, (lit.) (car that) came from France’, the latter being a symptomatic example for the after-effects of colonization, since not all second-hand cars ar-

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riving in Benin come from France. A more complex compound where a whole sentence functions as a noun is mon mari est capable ‘Japanese Mate motorbike, (lit.) my husband is capable’ in sentences such as Tu peux partir avec mon mari est capable ‘you can go with the Japanese Mate motorbike, (lit.) you can go with my husband is capable’. Women use this expression in reference to this motorbike, which had its glory days in the 1990s, to show their husbands’ level of wealth and their ability to buy valuable goods such as motorbikes for them at prices that are not affordable to everyone. Semantic change – The existence of words with forms that exist with a different meaning in standard French is illustrated by examples such as béninoise ‘beer produced in Benin’ instead of ‘Beninese’, chercheur ‘pig’ instead of ‘researcher’, gazer ‘to accelerate’ instead of ‘to intoxicate with gas’, il y a trois jours ‘a long time ago’ instead of ‘three days ago’, indexer ‘to point a finger at s. o.’ instead of ‘to index’, sucrerie ‘soda’ instead of ‘sugar factory, sweet’, and traceur ‘ruler’ instead of ‘person who traces’. A more complex example is viander. While it is used as a verb ‘to graze’ in standard French, it represents a noun in the Beninese context where it serves as a translation of the Fon expression é dó làn ‘this has a lot of meat’ and is metaphorically used in the sense of ‘job that pays off’.  

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism Historically, studies of the practice of French in French-speaking Africa have not emphasized the case of Benin because the French practised there does not deviate too much from the norm. This situation is corroborated by its intellectual elite, which made Dahomey, now Benin, famous throughout West Africa. It is in this logic that Alokpon (2015, 35) rightly points out that from the colonial period to the 1960s, Dahomey was known for the extraordinary intelligence of its elite and their great mastery of French, which, in 1948, had prompted Emmanuel Mounier to designate the country as the ‘Latin quarter of French West Africa’ (“quartier latin de l’A.O.F.”, Mounier 2007, 171). In the preface to Paul Hazoumé’s novel Doguicimi (1938), which was attributed the French Language Price (Prix de la langue française) by the French Academy (Académie française) in 1939, Georges Hardy gave the most moving and laudatory, but also the most tendentious account of the Dahomean elite of the colonial era: ‘it is, of course, a singular merit for France to have made such intellectual and moral conquests just after the installation of colonial rule’.29 Today, the practice of French in Benin is not tinged with a strong purism. However, educated circles insist on the practice of French according to the norms of standard

29 “C’est pour la France, bien entendu, un singulier mérite que d’avoir, au lendemain même de l’installation coloniale, opéré de telles conquêtes intellectuelles et morales” (Hardy 1938, 10).

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French, and the Beninese elite still distinguishes itself by the quality of the French it speaks. Regionalisms are less important than in other countries such as Côte d’Ivoire and Cameroon, so there is no functional division between Beninese French and standard French. However, spontaneous French spoken in Benin is increasingly marked by Beninese specificities as it moves away from the pressure of the academic norm and is less supervised. It remains to be seen whether lexical variation brings out more or less specificities and whether this entails the banishment of features relating to French spoken in Benin. A significant part of the lexicon, which plays an essential role in establishing the legitimacy of an endogenous variety, is now being positively evaluated by French-speaking Beninese. The lexical variable seems to be a constituent of the practice of spoken French in Benin in terms of its dynamics. Regarding morphosyntactic features, differences in style between the formal and informal conversations might reflect an attitude towards language that is not determined by the level of education, profession or age. It is impossible, at this stage of the analysis, to observe an implicational scale between these variants. The comparison of both registers shows that the speakers are aware of the formulas to be banned from their speech in the formal context, and there is an inhibition of Beninese syntactic features in the formal style.

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics The dictionaries, grammar, and spelling are those of standard French. This may be due to the fact that Beninese speakers of French, especially those who belong to an educated elite, do not consider their French to be a specific variety of French, despite the characteristics that can be identified as explained above.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – The occupation of administrative posts is subject to the mastery of standard French. Political authorities use French as the official and working language, sometimes recurring on local characteristics. Variety used in education – The French language used in education is less and less in line with international or school standards. A possible reason is the democratization of education and successive crises in the educational sector. Variety used in the media – The practice of French reveals situations that are favourable to borrowings and lexical alternation. They can be found in interactive political broadcasts on radio and television channels, on social networks, and in (printed or digital) newspapers. The expressions presented in 4.3, klébés (i), kpayo (ii–iii), kèkènon (iv), tchoco-tchoco (v), or to-tché appearing as title of a song (vi), nyinwè (vii), mèdjômè (viii), or yovo (ix–x), all indicate the desire of speakers to give an identity to the practice of

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French by introducing these lexemes from Beninese languages. Yovo in example (x) has a double connotation. First, it refers to white people and second, by analogy, to the depigmentation engaged in by the summoned singer-artists in a satirical way. “Les conducteurs de taxi excédés par le rançonnement des ‘klébés’” (L’autre quotidien, 19/6/ 2015).30 (ii) “Le kpayo tue une mère et ses quatre enfants” (L’informateur, 19/6/2012).31 (iii) “[L]e poste de ‘premier ministre’ étant ‘kpayo’ chez nous” (Fraternité, 23/6/2015).32 (iv) “C’est cette façon que les kèkènon [...] des liens de confidentialités inébranlables” (Le Révélateur, 22/6/2015).33 (v) “justifiant sa présence [...] le leader des tchoco-tchocos a revélé que [...] afin de ‘s’éterniser’ au pouvoir” (La Nouvelle Tribune, 15/1/2015).34 (vi) “après une heure et demie de chaleur musicale, le concert a pris fin sur le morceau ‘To-tché’” (Fraternité, 4/10/2016).35 (vii) “La longue tirade du nyinwè devenue le sobriquet favori de Boni Yayi dans le pays est en passe de tourner un label d’idiotie” (L’évènement précis, 22/6/2015).36 (viii) “On les prenait pour des ‘mèdjômè’, des gens de la high society” (La Nouvelle Tribune, 5/2/ 2014).37 (ix) “Le gouvernement montre patte blanche aux yovo hollandais” (First info, 4/2/2015).38 (x) “Pélagie la vibreuse, Kemy, Zenab [...] à profusion sur les chaînes de la télévision de la place, toutes sont devenues des ‘Yovo’” (La nouvelle Tribune, 5/2/2014).39 (i)

Variety used in song lyrics and literature – Song lyrics may include hybrids, such as yↄkpↄphiles or vikpɛnphiles ‘paedophiles’ in texts of the band H2O Asuka. Literary writings from Félix Couchoro (L’esclave, 1929), Jean Pliya (L’Arbre fétiche, 1977), or Olympe Bhêly-Quenum (Un piège sans fin, 1960) however attest the use of standard French. Only the names of the characters and the spatial clues refer to Beninese realities.

30 ‘Taxi drivers fed up with the ransom of whistle-blowers.’ 31 ‘The man of dubious quality kills a mother and her four children’. 32 ‘The post of “prime minister” being of dubious quality in our country’. 33 ‘This is how motorbike taxis [...] unbreakable bonds of confidentiality’. 34 ‘Justifying his presence [...], the leader of the slogans revealed that [...] in order to stay in power’. 35 ‘after an hour and a half of musical heat, the concert ended with the song “To-tché”’. 36 ‘The long tirade of self-centred discourse which has become Boni Yayi’s favourite sobriquet in the country is about to become a label of idiocy’. 37 ‘They were taken for “respectable people”, for people from the high society’. 38 ‘The government shows its credentials to the white Dutch’. 39 ‘Pélagie la vibreuse, Kemy, Zenab [...] in profusion on television channels, all of them have become “white people” [also referring to the singer who was undergoing a process of depigmentation]’.

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References Adjeran, Moufoutaou (2013), Interférences phonologiques chez les apprenants locuteurs natifs cabe: le schwa, Revue Spéciale Journées Scientifiques FLASH 3/7, 283–295. Adjeran, Moufoutaou (2016), L’aja, une langue du Sud Bénin: variétés dialectales et situation diglossique, Particip’Action 8/1, 374–391. Adjeran, Moufoutaou (2017a), Le français au Bénin: emprunts, niveaux d’appropriation et typologie fonctionnelle, in: Jean Paul Balga/David Aaikaye (edd.), Le français et les langues africaines aux lendemains des indépendances en Afrique francophone: bilan et perspectives, Paris, L’Harmattan, 73–90. Adjeran, Moufoutaou (2017b), De la pertinence des variables linguistiques pour l’étude de la variation diatopique et diaphasique du français parlé au Bénin, Lɔŋgbowu 3, 59–74. Adjeran, Moufoutaou (2020), Alternance lexicale: structures, situations et domaines d’emploi, Multilinguales 13, https://journals.openedition.org/multilinguales/pdf/4814 (2/3/2023). Alokpon, Jean-Benoît (2015), Le français en Afrique: un continent entre rêve et nostalgie, in: S’approprier le français. Pour une langue conviviale. Actes du colloque de Bruxelles (2013), Louvain-la-Neuve, De Boeck Supérieur, 35–45. Assemblée Nationale (1998), Loi n° 98–004 du 27 janvier 1998 portant code du travail au Bénin, Cotonou, République du Bénin, http://www.ilo.org/dyn/natlex/natlex4.detail?p_lang=en&p_isn=49604 (2/3/2023). Assogba, Raymond Coovi (2016), Épistémologie de la boologie, Abomey, Éditions Naguézé. Boutin, Béatrice Akissi (2007), Déterminant zéro ou omission du déterminant en français de Côte d’Ivoire, Le français en Afrique 22, 161–182. Brunschwig, Henri (1983), Noirs et Blancs dans l’Afrique Noire Française, Paris, Flammarion. C-BE = Assemblée Nationale (1990), Loi N° 90–32 du 11 décembre 1990 portant Constitution de la République du Bénin, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, http://www.unesco.org/education/edurights/media/docs/cd9ad071 58c52d423f4fb125ea5a53999323b886.pdf (2/3/2023). Calvet, Louis-Jean (1998), L’insécurité linguistique et les situations africaines, in: Louis-Jean Calvet/Marie-Louise Moreau (edd.), Une ou des normes? Insécurité linguistique et normes endogènes en Afrique francophone, Paris, Agence de la francophonie, 7–38. Capo, Hounkpati Christophe (2009), Typologie et classification des langues béninoises: un point, in: Toussaint Yaovi Tchitchi (ed.), Langue et Politiques de Langues au Bénin, Cotonou, Ablode, 57–74. Courrier 2/2018 = République du Bénin (2018), Courrier n°0202/MEMP/DC/SGM/DAF/DPP/DIIP/SP du 12 février 2018, Porto-Novo, République du Bénin. Decree 11 = Gouvernement général de l’Afrique occidentale française (1903), Arrêté du 24 novembre 1903, Paris, French Republic. Decree 98 = République du Bénin (2019), Arrêté interministériel N°098/MEMP/MEF/DC/SGM/DAF/CTJ/DIIP/INFRE/ SA036SGG19 du 31 décembre 2019, Porto-Novo, République du Bénin. Hardy, Georges (1938), Préface, in: Paul Hazoumé, Dougicimi, Paris, Larose, 9ss. Houalakouè, Jean (1987), Utilisation des langues nationales pour l’information des masses: bilan et perspectives, Presentation at the National Seminar “L’information des langues nationales: une nécessité pour la participation de nos masses au développement”, Cotonou, INFOSEC (unpublished). INSAE (2013a), Langues parlées selon le département et le milieu de résidence. Distribution en pourcentage de la population par groupe linguistique selon le département et le milieu de résidence en 2013, Cotonou, Institut National de Statistiques et d’Analyses Économiques, personal communication (2/3/2023). INSAE (2013b), Population selon les langues parlées. Distribution en pourcentage de la population par sexe selon les langues parlées, Cotonou, Institut National de Statistiques et d’Analyses Économiques, personal communication (2/3/2023). Ki-Zerbo, Joseph (1972), Éducation et développement, Perspectives 2/4, 457–476. Kluge, Angela (2011a), A sociolinguistic survey of the Ede language communities of Benin and Togo, Lomé/Togo, SIL-TOGO.

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Kluge, Angela (2011b), Sociolinguistic Survey of Ewe language communities of Bénin and Togo, Lomé/Togo, SILTOGO. Knutsen, Anne Moseng (2007), Variation du français à Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire). Étude d’un continuum linguistique et social, Oslo, University of Oslo, Doctoral Thesis. Law 4 = Présidence de la République (1998), Loi n° 98–004 du 27 janvier 1998 portant code du travail au Bénin, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, https://sgg.gouv.bj/doc/loi-98-004/download (2/3/2023). Law 7/1 = Présidence de la République (2002), Loi n°2002-07 du 24 août 2004 portant code des personnes et de la famille, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, https://sgg.gouv.bj/doc/loi-2002-07/download (2/3/2023). Law 7/2 = Présidence de la République (2008), Loi n° 2008–07 du 28 fevrier 2011 portant Code de procédure civile, commerciale, sociale, administrativeet des comptes, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, https://sgg.gouv. bj/doc/loi-2008-07/download (2/3/2023). Law 10 = Présidence de la République (1997), Loi n°97-010 du 20 août 1997 portant libéralisation de l’espace, de presse et de communication audiovisuelle en République du Bénin, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, https://sgg. gouv.bj/doc/loi-97-010/download (2/3/2023). Law 17 = Assemblée Nationale (2003), Loi n° 2003–17 du 11 novembre 2003 portant Orientation de l’Éducation Nationale en République du Bénin rectifiée par la loi n° 2005–33 du 06 octobre 2005, Cotonou, Republic of Benin, http://www.unesco.org/education/edurights/media/docs/a244de65e69a2204a88fd68a9c4369 4f2ed04564.pdf (2/3/2023). Manzano, Francis (2003), Diglossie, contacts et conflits de langues… À l’épreuve de trois domaines géolinguistiques: Haute Bretagne, Sud occitano-roman, Maghreb, Cahiers de sociolinguistique 1/8, 51–66. Mounier, Emmanuel (2007 [1948]), L’éveil de l’Afrique noire. Préface de Jean-Paul Sagadou. Présentation de Jacques Nanema, Paris, Presses de la Renaissance. Note 503 = République du Bénin (2019), Note n°0503/MAEC/SG/SGA/DAM/S3 du 25 janvier 2019, Cotonou, Republic of Benin. N’Ouéni, Raphaël Windali (1983), Contribution à l’étude phonologique du parler biali de Matéri avec application à l’établissement d’une orthographe pratique, Godomey, Université Nationale du Bénin, Master Thesis. ORTB 2021 = Office des Radio et Télévision du Bénin (2021), Service des programmes de l’ORTB, Cotonou, République du Bénin. Sambiéni, Coffi (2008), La reconstruction interne du byali, gur oriental, Bénin, Nordic Journal of African Studies 17/2, 89–112. Tall, Emmanuelle Kadya (2009), Guerre de succession et concurrence mémorielle à Ouidah, ancien comptoire de la traite, Politique africaine 3/115, 155–173. Tryuk, Małgorzata (2013), L’interprète en Afrique coloniale. Intermédiaire culturel et linguistique ou traitre?, Synergies Pologne 10, 215–224.

Sabine Diao-Klaeger

10 Burkina Faso Abstract: The chapter starts with an overview of the sociolinguistic situation of Burkina Faso, that is the geographical and social distribution of languages in the country and the number of first, second, and third language speakers. It further outlines the linguistic history of the Land of Upright People, describing how French arrived in Burkina Faso and how it developed before and after independence. The section on external language history shows the most important laws with respect to the usage of French as well as the national languages and their presence in administration, politics, education, and the media. This is followed by a chapter on linguistic characteristics of Burkinabe French concerning pronunciation, morphosyntax, and the lexicon. The last part focuses on linguistic purism and describes the variety and the characteristics of French used in literature, by public authorities, at school, and in the media. Keywords: French, Burkina Faso, sociolinguistics, language policy, Francophonie

1 Sociolinguistic situation In Burkina Faso we are dealing with an embedded diglossia (“diglossie enchâssée”), that is a ‘linguistic situation […] characterized by an “interlacing” of two diglossia: French/ African lingua(e) franca(e) […] on the one hand, African lingua(e) franca(e)/vernaculars on the other hand’.1 Depending on the interlocutor, the Burkinabe use their first language or, if this is not a lingua franca, the African lingua franca of the area in which they live and/or French as a ‘canopy’ lingua franca – if they have the necessary competence to do so.

1.1 French French is generally not the first language of the Burkinabe. An exception, but one which is unlikely to be significant in terms of numbers (there are no studies on the subject), is parts of the (urban) educational elite, who raise their children in French or bilingually. It is difficult to provide truly reliable data on the number of speakers of French as a second language in Burkina Faso for two reasons: Firstly, there is still a lack of large-scale sociolinguistic studies, and secondly, the definitions of what the authors understand by

1 “situation linguistique [...] caractérisée par un ‘emboîtement’ de deux diglossies: français/véhiculaire(s) africain(s) [...] d’une part, véhiculaire(s)/vernaculaires africains d’autre part” (Beniamino 1997, 129). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-010

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French-speakers differ widely (for a discussion of how to define and quantify Francophonism in Africa, cf. Diao-Klaeger 2015). However, currently, about 20 to 25 % of the Burkinabe can be estimated to be French-speaking. In its latest report, the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) lists the country with 24 % French-speakers (OIF 2019, 32), defined as ‘those who, theoretically, learned to read and write in French’ (“ceux qui ont, théoriquement, appris à lire et à écrire en français”, OIF 2019, 92). According to the review of Bougma (2010) of census data from 1985, 1996, and 2005, 25.19 % of the Burkinabe are proficient in spoken and written French, and the number has increased steadily since the 1980s. There is, however, a very strong urban-rural divide: For urban areas, 56.39 % of the population are reported to be French-speaking, compared to only 14.51 % in rural areas (Bougma 2010, 40). It should be noted that the less educated or non-erudite are not included in these statistics. In the most recent national census, conducted in 2019 and published in 2022, unfortunately, only the ‘main languages fluently spoken’ (“principales langues couramment parlées”) were surveyed. What is meant by this is not entirely clear, as these are also referred to as the ‘main languages of communication’ (“principales langues de communication”, CNR 2022, 48). French is listed here in sixth place with 2.2 % speakers only. This extremely low figure seems to indicate that the issue here is actually not competencies but the use as principal language of communication.  

 

 

 

 

 

1.2 National languages Burkina Faso (in 2023 about 22.1 million inhabitants) is home to about 65 ethnic groups with a more or less corresponding number of different languages. How many languages are considered as languages of Burkina Faso depends on the source and the census consulted and on their definition of ‘language’. The Ethnologue for example lists 70 languages (including the mixed language N’ko without L1 speakers, and French, cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2020), SIL Burkina Faso 71 (including French, cf. SIL 2021). Most of them belong to the Niger-Congo phylum: Gur or Voltaic/Mabia languages (about 60 %), e. g. Mooré (Mòòré in Figure 1), Gourmanchéma (Gourmanché), Dagaare (Dagara), Lyélé, Cerma, Nuni, Lobiri, or Sissala. Others belong to the Mande group (about 20 %), e. g., Dyula (Jula) or Bissa. There are also the West Atlantic language Fulfulde, the Kru language Siamou, and the two Dogon languages Jamsay Dogon and Tomo Kan Dogon. The AfroAsiatic phylum is represented by Tamasheq (Tamacheq), spoken by the Tuareg, and Hausa. These languages are joined by Songhay (Songhai), whose classification is still controversial (Ethnologue and SIL Burkina Faso classify it as Nilo-Saharan). Figure 1 shows the distribution of the African languages in the country:  

 

 

 

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Figure 1: Burkina Faso’s languages (Neukom 2014)

About 70 % of the population have at least a passive command of one of the four most spoken languages, i.e. Mooré, Fulfulde, Gourmanchéma, and Dyula. Mooré, the first language of the Mossi, is spoken by a total of 51.45 % of the population as a first, second, or third language and serves as the lingua franca in the capital Ouagadougou and in the central part of the country alongside French. Fulfulde is the first language of the Peul. It is spread mainly in the North of the country and spoken by 9.31 % of the population, also as a first, second, or third language. Gourmanchéma is the language of the Gurma and used by 5.84 % of the population, mainly in the East of the country. Dyula is spoken by 5.36 % of the Burkinabe and is not bound to the ethnic group Dioula. It is the lingua franca of the second largest city, Bobo-Dioulasso, as well as of the West of the country (cf. Bougma 2010, 17s.). According to the most recent census about the principal languages of communication, 97.6 % of the population use the national languages: 52.2 % Mooré, 7.8 % Fulfulde, 6.8 % Gourmanchéma, 5.7 % Dyula, and 3.3 % Bissa; the other national languages are spoken by 2 % or less (CNR 2022, 48).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Written records mentioning the Upper Volta region do not date back further than to the nineteenth century. What is known of the earlier history, however, is that the Mossi, a people from the South (Chad, Ghana), took over the rule of the region from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries onwards. Four Mossi kingdoms finally dominated the other tribes in the area for centuries: Tenkodogo, Wagadugu, Yatengo, and Gurma. Apart from the Mossi kingdoms, there were several other independent territories in the pre-colonial period (Krings 2004, 111). This is how the ethnic mosaic that still characterizes the Burkinabe population today was created. In 1897, France occupied the territory of today’s Burkina Faso and called it Upper Volta (Haute Volta). The onset of colonialization is thus rather late compared to other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, which is due to the low economic importance of the area. The Upper Volta region was simply of little interest to Europeans since it lacks significant mineral resources and has no access to the sea. In January 1897, the Mogho Naaba, King of the Mossi, was forced to sign a peace agreement with France. The territory initially became a protectorate of France. From 1904 to 1919, together with the French Sudan (Soudan français), it was made part of the colony Upper Senegal and Niger (Haut-Sénégal et Niger) and thus member of French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF). In 1919, the independent colony of Upper Volta was established (cf. Hien 2003, 703– 708). As elsewhere in her colonies, France pursued a repressive policy towards indigenous cultural practices and languages. In particular, the use of languages other than French was prohibited at school.

“This cultural oppression and repression […] created a linguistic vacuum around the French. French had the privilege of exclusivity, when it came to written languages. As for Burkina Faso languages, they were confined to the ghetto of orality […] none of them was able to take over from the French language at independence” (Hien/Napon 2017, 34s.).

2.2 Milestones of its further development On 5 August 1960, Maurice Yaméogo, the first president of Upper Volta, proclaimed the independence of the country. As in other African states, however, the language of the former colonizers was chosen as the official language of Upper Volta: ‘The heirs to colonial power thus retained French as the only official language of Burkina Faso in order to maintain their dominance over the mass of the illiterate rural population. The argument was that this language served as a link between the different ethnic groups in Burkina. In fact, the diver-

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sity of languages in contact in Burkina (about sixty) made it difficult to choose one or more national languages if one did not want to run the risk of disadvantaging certain ethnic groups.’2

In 1966, Yaméogo had to abdicate after a popular uprising. This was followed by numerous coups d’état and coup attempts, with various forms of government (military rule, republic) succeeding one another at short intervals. In one of these coups, on 4 August 1983, Thomas Sankara came to power. He regarded the name Haute Volta as a symbol of the colonial past and changed it to Burkina Faso ‘the land of upright people’ (“le pays des hommes intègres”) in 1984. Three of the four most important national languages contributed to the new name: Burkina is a Mooré term, meaning ‘sincerity’ or ‘incorruptibility’, Faso is from Dyula, meaning ‘court’ or, in the figurative sense, ‘homeland’; the invariable derivational morpheme ‑bè to designate the inhabitants of the country (les Burkinabè) comes from Fulfulde. The in Burkina is pronounced [u] by the Burkinabe, in hexagonal French as [y]. Sankara’s motto as president was Fidel Castro’s ‘Fatherland or death, we will win’ (“Patria o muerte, venceremos”). He was a pan-African socialist revolutionary who fought, among other things, for the improvement of the position of women in society (he, for instance, banned female genital mutilation, promoted the school attendance of girls, opposed polygamy and domestic violence), against corruption and for the transformation of economic structures (debt relief, self-sufficiency, local production), and for reforestation. In 1987, Sankara, the “Che of Africa”, and twelve of his government members were murdered in a coup led by his political companion and best friend Blaise Compaoré. Compaoré is believed to have been supported by France, Libya, and Côte d’Ivoire. Compaoré became president of Burkina Faso and remained in power for 27 years. His style of government was characterized by corruption, cronyism, and intimidation of oppositional tendencies. Although he had elections held, he basically installed a kind of dictatorial democracy – always with French support. In 2014, Compaoré tried to amend article 37 of the Constitution again (as he did in 2004 and 2010) to allow for a fifth term in office. This led to mass protests in the country. More than 100,000 protestors took to the streets on 30 and 31 October 2014. The youth of Burkina Faso played a special role in this movement, in particular students and artists, such as the rapper Smokey and the reggae musician Sams’K Le Jah, who founded the citizens’ movement Balai citoyen ‘Citizens’ broom’. On 31 October 2014, Compaoré resigned and fled to the neighbouring Côte d’Ivoire. Michel Kafando became interim president. In September 2015, shortly before the scheduled elections, General Diendéré (who is also suspected of having been partly

2 “Les héritiers du pouvoir colonial ont donc maintenu le français comme seule langue officielle au Burkina Faso afin de perpétuer leur domination sur la masse paysanne analphabète. L’argument utilisé fut que cette langue servait de trait d’union entre les différentes ethnies en présence sur le territoire burkinabè. En effet, la multiplicité des langues en contact au Burkina Faso, une soixantaine, rendait difficile le choix d’une ou de plusieurs langues nationales au risque de léser certains groupes ethniques” (Napon 1992, 10, quoted in Youl 2020, 173).

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responsible for the 1987 assassination of Thomas Sankara) staged a coup, later called ‘the world’s stupidest coup d’état’ (“le coup d’état le plus bête du monde”), with the help of the Presidential Security Regiment (Régiment de sécurité présidentielle – RSP), a military unit which Compaoré had set up as his personal guard in 1995. Again, mass protests were taking place in the country. The Economic Community of West African States (Communauté économique des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest – CEDEAO) under Macky Sall, the president of Senegal, tried to mediate, but only addressed the demands of the putschists. The pro-government army then advanced from the provinces to the capital. Diendéré surrendered, the coup ended after only one week, and the RSP was dissolved. Kafando returned to office. The first free elections after 55 years took place in November 2015. Roch Marc Christian Kaboré with his party People’s Movement for Progress (Mouvement du Peuple pour le Progrès – MPP) became the new president of Burkina Faso; he was re-elected in November 2020. After a coup against Kabore’s government, the military took power in Burkina Faso in January 2022, under the leadership of Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba. The latter was, in turn, overthrown in September 2022 by rival military forces led by Ibrahim Traoré.

3 External Language Policy 3.1 Legislation The Burkinabe Constitution dates from 1991 and was last revised in 2015 (the revised passages do not address language issues). Article 35 of the Constitution states: ‘The official language is French. The law sets the conditions for the promotion and formalization of the national languages’.3

Which of the local African languages are considered national languages is specified in a law for the promotion and formalization of the national languages, which states: ‘All languages spoken by ethnic groups in Burkina Faso are national languages’.4 ‘The list of national languages is established by decree of the Council of Ministers’.5

Unfortunately, this list has not been developed to date, although in 2019 the Permanent Secretariat for the Promotion of National Languages and Citizenship Education (Secré-

3 “La langue officielle est le français. La loi fixe les modalités de promotion et d’officialisation des langues nationales” (C-BF, art. 35). 4 “Toutes les langues parlées par les groupes ethniques du Burkina Faso sont des langues nationales” (Law 33, art. 10). 5 “La liste des langues nationales est établie par décret pris en Conseil des ministres” (Law 33, art. 11).

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tariat permanent de promotion des langues nationales et de l’éducation à la citoyenneté) was created within the Ministry of National Education, Alphabetization and Promotion of National Languages (Ministère de l’éducation nationale, de l’alphabétisation et de la promotion des langues nationales).

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Administration – French, and only French, is used in official documents and correspondence as well as on banknotes (West African CFA Franc), or stamps. A law concerning persons and families (Code des personnes et de la famille) from 1989 provides that all civil status documents must be written in the official language (art. 80). Holograph testaments can be written in another language (art. 923). According to the Labour Law (Code du travail), internship contracts must be drawn up in the official language, vocational training contracts in the official language and, if possible, in the language of the trainee (art. 13). Civil servants must be able to read and write French (art. 333). Although most of the top-down items, that is, for example, public road signs, (the rare) street names and place names, or public signs on government buildings, in Burkina Faso’s linguistic landscape are in French, bi- or multilingual signage has become increasingly common in recent years. Traoré (2018) gives examples of ministerial signs with educational measures (e. g., anti-excision messages) and signposts indicating the Emergency Ward (Urgences médicales) or the Courthouse (Palais de Justice) in two or more (up to six) languages, in every case French plus one or more national languages. Which national languages are used depends on the region/city (e. g., Mooré plus others in Ouagadougou, Dyula in Bobo-Dioulasso, Gourmanchéma in Fada N’Gourma). However, as stated above, monolingual French signs are clearly dominant. The impact of signs in the linguistic landscape is stressed in a study by Pitroipa (2008). He analysed the linguistic profile as well as the representations of culture and identity among young literate Burkinabe (453 student teachers from the national schools for primary school teacher training, Écoles normales d’éducation primaire – ENEPs, of Loumbila, Fada N’Gourma, Bobo-Dioulasso, Ouahigouya and Gaoua, i.e., from all over the country ranging from 19 to 33 years of age, with varying academic backgrounds, a perfect sample of the country’s educated youth) and concludes:  

 

‘[…] the statistics indicate […] that the student teachers were in contact with French quite often through commercial and public displays. This contact with the linguistic landscape was therefore predominantly in French’.6

6 “Les statistiques indiquent […] que les élèves-maîtres ont été en contact assez souvent avec le français par l’intermédiaire des affichages commerciaux et des affichages publics. Ce contact avec le paysage linguistique a donc été francodominant dans l’ensemble” (Pitroipa 2008, 152).

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The case is more complex and diverse in spoken interactions in the administrative domain. While French dominates also in this context, speakers frequently resort to the respective local African lingua franca (and sometimes also to their first language, depending on their interlocutors) in addition to French. Slezak describes this as follows for Banfora (the fifth-biggest town in the country and the capital of the Comoé province in south-western Burkina Faso, where Dyula is the lingua franca): ‘[Dyula] is used alongside with French, especially where one of the two languages is not sufficient for a successful conversation, for example, at school or in an administrative context. Dyula takes on the important function of informal communication in more official communication situations. This is why the majority of interviewees say that in such situations, they speak either French (55 %), Dyula (42 %), or both (10 %).7  

 

 

Why we arrive at a total of 107 % here is not explained. Pitroipa comes to the following conclusion:  

‘Student teachers tend to use French more often in the service sector. Since the language of administration is French, the respondents prefer this language in administrative contexts’.8

Maïga/Napon/Soré surveyed 819 people across the country in 2012. 67.9 % of their respondents said that the national languages are used in an administrative context; only 32.1 % believe that French is the most used language. The national languages mentioned in this context include Dyula (29.4 %), Mooré (18.8 %), and Fulfulde (7.6 %, for their results in detail, cf. Maïga/Napon/Soré 2015). The strengthening of the role of national languages in the domain of administration is stated explicitly as a political aim in the Sector Plan for Education and Formation (Programme sectoriel de l’éducation et de la formation – PSEF), the official development plan for 2012–2020:  

 

 

 

 

‘to promote a language policy allowing the use of national languages in administration, commerce, etc.’.9

7 “[…] [dyula] est utilisé parallèlement au français, notamment là où une de ces deux langues ne suffit pas pour une communication réussie, par exemple à l’école ou dans un context administratif. Le dyula occupe dans des situations de communication plutôt officielles la fonction importante de communication informelle. Par conséquent [sic] la majorité des interviewés déclarent parler dans ce genre de situation soit le français (55 %) [sic] soit le dyula (42 %) [sic] soit les deux (10 %)” (Slezak 2007, 173). 8 “Dans les services, les élèves-maîtres ont tendance à utiliser souvent le français. La langue de l’administration étant le français, les enquêtés préfèrent utiliser très souvent cette langue lorsqu’ils se rendent dans les administrations” (Pitroipa 2008, 224). 9 “promouvoir une politique linguistique permettant l’usage des langues nationales dans l’administration, le commerce, etc.” (PSEF 2013, 82).  

 

 

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However, Yoda/Sanon-Ouattara/Batchelor show that a great deal still needs to be done to implement this goal, using the example of communication in the health sector: ‘Health communication does not reflect the multilingual context of Burkina Faso where French […] has the lion’s share. Apart from the audiovisual sector and some newspapers where there is significant use of multilingual communication and interlingual translation, the country’s three national languages [N.B.: I would rephrase here and speak of “three of the national languages”], namely Mooré, Dyula, and Fulfulde, are neglected in health communication because of their inferior status compared to French’.10

Not only is written communication in the health sector (for example reports, development plans, brochures) in French, but also communication between doctor and patient, often with the help of lay translators, because doctors often (or even usually) work in areas whose languages they have no command of (cf. Yoda/Sanon-Ouattara/Batchelor 2019, 273). Politics – The use of French and the national languages in Burkinabe politics has not yet been the subject of (systematic) studies. Official speeches by the president, members of parliament, or mayors, and the contributions of deputies in parliament are in French. “To communicate with the population, few politicians make use of local languages. It is understandable, in these circumstances, that messages in French cannot reach the majority of the population. We are, therefore, in a situation of non-transparency and inaccessibility to information. […] Indeed, aware that people are unable to read and understand the political programmes offered to them in French, some leaders will resort to demagogy and deceit, in order to solicit the vote of the electorate” (Hien/Napon 2017, 42).

Protest slogans shouted or displayed on signs during demonstrations or written on urban walls are generally (with some exceptions) in French (for a detailed analysis cf. Diao-Klaeger/Zongo 2019). The same is true for the political speeches and the protest songs by the movement Balai citoyen (cf. Degorce/Palé 2018).

3.3 Languages used in education During the colonial period, French was used as the sole language of instruction. The first school was established in Bobo-Dioulasso in 1898, followed by schools in Boromo (also 1898), Ouagadougou (1899), Léo and Koury (1900), Dori (1901), Gaoua (1902), and Tenkoodogo (1903, cf. Compaoré 1995, quoted after André 2007, 221). A local elite was to be

10 “La communication pour la santé ne reflète pas le contexte multilingue du Burkina Faso où le français […] se taille la part du lion. En dehors de l’audiovisuel et de certains journaux où l’on note une utilisation significative de la communication multilingue et de la traduction interlinguale, les trois langues nationales du pays, à savoir le mooré, le jula et le fulfuldé sont négligées dans la communication pour la santé en raison de leur statut inférieur par rapport au français” (Yoda/Sanon-Ouattara/Batchelor 2019, 278).

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taught the French language and culture in order to spread the French colonial vision and mission, or, as André puts it, ‘the assimilationist dimension of education [was] put [...] at the service of the colonial project’.11 This attitude was confirmed by the Brazzaville Conference in 1944. Since French was given the status of the sole official language after independence, it seemed only natural that it should also be retained as the language of instruction. Youl attributes this choice to the missing (socio)linguistic expertise in the 1960s and 1970s that would have been necessary to empower and develop the national languages, that is status planning and corpus planning in the sense of Haugen (1959). However, he also relates it to an underlying colonial narrative employed by those politically responsible – be it for the sake of convenience or in a calculated way: ‘This situation led the Burkinabe authorities to take refuge behind the colonial idea that French was the only means of linguistic unification of the country’.12 Today, French is still the main language of instruction in Burkina Faso, but things have slightly changed. Before we turn to the position of the national languages in the school system, the following figures from the OIF (2019, 140) on the role of French should be mentioned here: the total number of students enrolled in French was 4,080,943 in 2016, 2,873,049 attended primary schools and 1,058,163 were enrolled in secondary schools. The number of French teachers was 3,181 in preschool, 54,335 in primary, and 21,830 in secondary education. The educational policy law (Loi d’orientation de l’éducation) from 2007 states that the languages of instruction are French and the national languages, in pedagogical practice and in evaluations (art. 10). Burkina Faso (along with Mali and Niger) is the pioneer in French-speaking Africa in terms of introducing local languages at school. In the early 1970s, a rethinking regarding this issue started to gain momentum. From 1979 to 1984, Mooré, Dyula, and Fulfulde were introduced as languages of instruction in 168 elementary schools, first on an experimental basis (for details on the further development cf. Nikièma/Kaboré-Paré 2010; Maïga/Napon/Soré 2015). These initial three national languages have since been joined by Dagaare, Lyélé, Gourmanchéma, Cerma, Lobiri, Nuni, and Bissa as languages of instruction. In so-called satellite schools (“écoles satellites”), pupils are taught in the local language in the first three years of school. From the fourth year onwards, they then switch to a classical school with French as the language of instruction. In bilingual schools, both French and a local language serve as languages of instruction, with French being introduced progressively. Recent studies on the bilingual model are provided by David-Erb (2020) and Lingani (2015). David-Erb (2020, 164) notes that, although progress has been made in introducing national languages as the medium of instruction, there is

11 “la dimension assimilationniste de l’enseignement se met[tait] […] au service du projet colonial” (André 2007, 222). 12 “Cette situation a conduit les autorités burkinabè à se réfugier derrière la thèse coloniale selon laquelle le français était le seul moyen d’unification linguistique du pays” (Youl 2020, 173).

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no explicit development plan for their systematic integration into the formal education system. Others put it more optimistically: ‘The bilingual school, which has been tested in 28 of the country’s 45 provinces, is now in a consolidation phase that should lead to its general implementation into the educational system’.13

The language of instruction at the country’s universities is French. Courses on Mooré, Dyula, and Fulfulde can be taken at the University of Joseph Ki-Zerbo (Ouaga I). In nonformal education, that is above all in literacy programmes, mainly national languages are used (cf. Maïga/Napon/Soré 2015, 65, who give a good overview of the situation of literacy campaigns in the country, about 30 of them).

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – The print media are predominantly in French, partly because those in national languages are mainly aimed at relatively few people (mainly in rural areas) who have been alphabetized in those national languages (Youl 2020, 175). The Association of Editors and Publishers of Newspapers in National Languages (Association des éditeurs et publicateurs de journaux en langues nationales) lists sixteen newspapers as their members on their site, nine in Mooré, two in Dyula, and one each in Sissala, Gourmanchéma, Nuni, Lyélé, and Fulfulde (AEPJLN 2018). They are published monthly or quarterly and have circulations between 500 and 3,500. Tiao (2015, 283) talks about 65 newspapers in national languages but does not go into detail and cites as a source an interview he conducted in 2014 with the then president of the Higher Council for Information (Conseil supérieur de l’information – CSI). It seems that most of these newspapers have ceased to appear or never got beyond a project stage (cf. Sanon-Ouattara 2014, 214). They are published by NGOs, associations, or the Church, with the following aims: ‘the promotion of national languages and literacy, support for the self-promotion of the rural area through training and information, the creation of a literate environment conducive to maintaining the achievements of literacy, and finally the creation of a framework for exchange and communication between the actors and promoters of the rural areas’.14

What is certain is that newspapers in national languages play a marginal role in the media landscape; Ouédraogo (2018) regrets that despite government subsidies, newspapers

13 “L’école bilingue qui a été expérimentée dans 28 des 45 provinces du pays est aujourd’hui dans une phase de consolidation qui devrait aboutir à sa généralisation” (Maïga/Napon/Soré 2015, 69). 14 “la promotion des langues nationales et de l’alphabétisation, l’appui à l’autopromotion du monde rural par la formation et l’information, la creation d’un environnement lettré propice au maintien des acquis de l’alphabétisation et enfin la creation d’un cadre d’échange et de communication entre les acteurs et les promoteurs du monde rural” (Sanon-Ouattara 2014, 214).

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in national languages have problems to be (regularly) published. Sidwaya, one of the most influential and widely read daily newspapers in the country (circulation of 3,000), publishes information from the previous week’s editions in one of the three national languages Mooré, Dyula, and Fulfulde in each of its Monday, Wednesday, and Friday editions, in the style of a newsreel translated from the original French texts. Audiovisual media – Due to, among other factors, the rather high illiteracy rate (in 2018, 41.2 % total, 50.1 % male, 32.7 % female, cf. CIA 2021), audiovisual media are more accessible than print media to the Burkinabe. Balima (2005, 217) acknowledges the use of national languages in the audiovisual field moreover as a continuation of the oral tradition. He also emphasizes that a new social dynamic is being created here that includes many who are otherwise excluded from French-speaking practice. The Higher Council for Communication (Conseil supérieur de la communication – CSC) lists 164 radio and 35 television stations (plus 30 and 29 offshoot stations, respectively) for 2015 (cf. CSC 2015). These figures already demonstrate the immensely important role of radio: It is the number one medium not only for financial but also for infrastructural reasons, among which the lack of electricity in many rural areas:  

 

 

‘Television is too expensive. You need electricity. But for the radio, you only need 50 Francs worth of batteries. People communicate much more through the radio. Some people put the radio next to themselves and continue working in the fields while listening. [...] So TV is luxury’.15

Furthermore, radio stations, especially community radio stations, have the advantage that they often broadcast entirely in national languages and are close to their listeners in their choice of topics (cf. Tiao 2015, 31). However, Balima (2012, quoted after SanonOuattara 2014, 215) critically notes a clear imbalance between specific broadcast formats in French and in the national languages: Only 15 % of news programmes are broadcast in local languages. The national languages mainly compete with French in entertainment programmes (music, quizzes, and games). Commercial stations broadcast an average of 57.5 % in French, community radios of 11.5 %, some of them use up to six national languages (for more detail cf. Tionon 2004, 58s., 115ss.). Radio is thus a means of building bridges between the different languages spoken in the country, and also between different media. The radio press reviews, a very popular genre, report on the news published in the written press and thus make them available to the illiterate Burkinabe. The public television and radio company (Radiodiffusion Télévision du Burkina – RTB) broadcasts in French, with the exception of the daily 30-minute Journal télévisé in Mooré, Dyula, and Fulfulde. Its regional RTB2 stations broadcast approximately 80 % in national languages. The first RTB2 stations were introduced in 2010; the establishment of one RTB2 station in each of the thirteen Burkinabe regions is not yet accomplished.  

 

 

 

15 “La television coute trop chère [sic]. Il faut l’électricité. Mais pour la radio, il suffit les piles de 50 Francs. Les gens communiquent beaucoup plus à travers la radio. Il y a des gens qui déposent la radio à côté et ils cultivent en écoutant. […] Alors la télé, c’est le luxe” (a Burkinabe interviewed in David-Erb 2020, 246).

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Internet – The presence of French and the national languages on Burkinabe sites has not yet been the subject of systematic studies, and it is virtually impossible to obtain reliable quantitative or qualitative data concerning this point. However, the following comments can be made: Pitroipa, in his study on student teachers, states that his respondents always use French on the internet. He explains this by stating that, on the one side, African languages are not very widespread on the internet, and on the other side, that national languages are associated with a social practice and a pre-technological universe (Pitroipa 2008, 225s.). This statement is not necessarily transferable from 2008 to today, especially when one considers that only 0.9 % of the Burkinabe used the internet in 2008, compared to 21.4 % in 2020 (cf. Argaez 2021). According to Damome/Ouédraogo/Tapsoba (2020, they cite Alexa.com and Lefaso. net), the platforms most visited by Burkinabe are in French: the first five ranks are occupied by international sites (Yahoo.com, Google.com, Google.bf, Facebook.com, Google.fr), the Burkinabe news site Lefaso.net ranks sixth (50,000 daily visitors, 37,000 newsletter subscribers in 2016). Lefaso.net reports exclusively in French; also the reader comments under the articles are mostly – but not always – written in French. Next come Netafrique.net and Burkina24 (30,000 visitors daily), also reporting exclusively in French. Since May 2018, the Rãamde newspaper (Journal d’informations et de promotion des langues nationales) is online (www.raamde-bf.com).  

 

4 Linguistic characteristics The linguistic characteristics of French spoken in Burkina Faso depend on mainly two factors: the speakers’ first language and their level of education and, as a consequence, their level of competences in French. The following paragraphs mainly describe the characteristics of the French used in an elevated social context but also mention some important features of the varieties used by educationally disadvantaged speakers.

4.1 Pronunciation The pronunciation of the Burkinabe speakers of French differs significantly from the hexagonal one. Most of the Burkinabe characteristics can also be found in other African varieties of French. Some of these phonetic and prosodic features are typical for all speakers, irrespective of their first language and/or educational level, while some are not. Perception tests in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, and Senegal showed that persons listening to audio samples from different speakers could distinguish not only their ethnic origin but also their level of education (Boula de Mareüil/Boutin 2011, 367ss.). Some ethnic groups have accents that are more readily recognizable than those of other groups, as Prignitz illustrates with this metalinguistic comment by a retired civil servant aged 61:

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‘When I speak I am not ethnically situated; A Mossi you recognize ... I think it’s Bissa: you don’t have an accent. The Dyula also speak in a somewhat neutral way. About them you can’t immediately say: he’s from Bobo, from Ouaga; the Dagaare, yes, they lengthen the a’s like the Mossi. It’s broad: saana... The rhythm a bit, the Dagaare speak a bit staccato. Among the Peul it is more of a whistling sound’.16

A distinct group that needs to be mentioned is the so-called diaspos. These are Burkinabe who have re-immigrated from Côte d’Ivoire and are distinguished by their Ivoirian accent. Vowels – A characteristic feature that most speakers share is the replacement of the close-mid and the open-mid rounded front vowels /ø/ and /œ/ by [e]. If they are not rendered by [e], they are pronounced as [ø] also in closed syllables (cf. Prignitz 1996c, 556, who defines this as being part of the standard pronunciation). Examples are bon Dieu [bɔ̃dje] instead of [bɔ̃djø] and vieux [vje] instead of [vjø]. Napon (1998, 328) gives an example showing that cœur is being pronounced [kɛr] instead of [kœʁ]. The close rounded front vowel /y/ is sometimes replaced by its unrounded equivalent [i], as in plus [plis] instead of [plys] or une [in] instead of [yn]; this is characteristic of speakers with rather low or medium competences in French. The schwa, /ə/, is either not pronounced or rendered as [e], rarely also as [i]. This is most probably due to the fact that /ə/ does not exist in the phoneme inventory of the African languages spoken in Burkina (with the exception of Lyélé, cf. Batiana 1993, 206). Examples include petite [petit] instead of [pətit], devenu [divini] instead of [dəvəny], or depuis [depi] instead of [dəpɥi]. This is a feature shared by most of the speakers. Consonants – The rhotic consonant is pronounced as a voiced alveolar trill [r] or flap [ɾ]. This feature is common for all Burkinabe, with the exception of Mossi with rather low competencies of French. The latter realize the grapheme as a voiced or voiceless fricative ([ɣ] or [x], respectively), famous as the ‘Mossi’s “distinct rendering of r”’ (“la ‘prononciation spéciale du r’ chez les Mossi”, Ouoba 1990, 77). Another exception are the so-called chogobitant(e)s, Burkinabe who want to talk like a person from France (cf. 5.1). They pronounce the rhotic as a voiced uvular fricative [ʁ] like in standard French. Educationally disadvantaged speakers tend to replace the post-alveolar fricatives [ʒ] und [ʃ] by their alveolar counterparts [z] and [s] (although occasionally, [ʒ] is rendered as [s] and [ʃ] as [z]). Examples are jour, pronounced as [zu(r)] instead of [ʒuʁ], je [ze] instead of [ʒə], chance [sɑ̃s] instead of [ʃɑ̃s], or chaque [sak] instead of [ʃak]. In turn, some speakers produce hypercorrect pronunciations, e. g. pension [pɑ̃ʃjɔ̃] instead of [pɑ̃sjɔ̃], aussi [oʃi] instead of [osi], ici [iʃi] instead of [isi], or chose [ʃoʃ] instead of [ʃoz].  

16 “Quand je parle on ne me situe pas de manière ethnique; Un Mossi on sait ... je crois que c’est bissa: on n’a pas d’accent. Les Dioula aussi parlent de façon un peu neutre. Eux on ne pas [sic] tout de suite dire: il est de Bobo, de Ouaga; les Dagara oui ils traînent un peu sur les a comme les Mossi d’ailleurs. C’est lourd: saana... Le rythme un peu, le Dagara parle un peu saccadé. Les Peuls c’est plus sifflé” (Prignitz 2006, 195).

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Prosody – With some exceptions (e. g. Fulfulde), most Burkinabe languages are tonal languages, i.e. the pitch or movement of a tone has phonological status. This naturally influences the prosody of the French of Burkinabe speakers:  

‘French, which is not a tonal language, gives an impression of monotony to a listener whose ear is sensitive to the melodic pitch of syllables in his or her language. French speakers in Burkina Faso therefore tend to produce intonated syllables when speaking French’.17

Lafage called this prosody ‘melody “in waves” or “in saw teeth”’ (“mélodie ‘en vagues’ ou ‘en dents de scie’”, 1990, 776). However, speakers do not just transfer the tonal system of their respective first language one-to-one to French. Rather, a new tonal system seems to have emerged for French. According to Batiana (1993, 206), there is a French tonal norm in Burkina Faso. This seems quite plausible, but it has not yet been confirmed through studies.

4.2 Morphosyntax Analyses of the morphosyntax of French in Burkina Faso have been limited to a few spotlight-like descriptions so far, with the exception of the more encompassing overview given by Prignitz (1996a). The characteristics described in the following can be traced back to different influences, some of which overlap: features induced by the contact with the local African languages or interferences with the respective first language of the speakers, results of uncontrolled language acquisition (interlanguage, fossilization), as well as general processes of simplification and regularization and phenomena which are due to the fact that we are dealing primarily with spoken French (on line-syntax). The most important characteristics – the list is by far not exhaustive (cf. Prignitz 1996b) – concern verbal inflection, valency, serial verbs, prepositions, determiners, and comparison. Verbal inflection – Here we can observe a reduction or regularization of forms among speakers who are educationally disadvantaged; that is they conjugate irregular verbs or verbs in ‑re or ‑ir like those in ‑er: vous ditez instead of vous dites, il faut transmetter instead of il faut transmettre or j’ai ouvri instead of j’ai ouvert (examples from Diao-Klaeger 2018, 53, and Prignitz 1996b, 125). But there is not only reduction going on – also worth mentioning are two “new” forms of verbal inflection ‘at the highest competence level in French (academics, politicians, journalists)’.18 The first one is the peri-

17 “Le français qui n’est pas une langue à tons donne une impression de monotonie à un auditeur dont l’oreille est sensible à la hauteur mélodique des syllabes dans sa langue. Aussi les locuteurs francophones du Burkina Faso ont-ils tendance à produire des syllabes intonées lorsqu’ils parlent français” (Batiana 1993, 205). 18 “au plus haut niveau de compétence en français (universitaires, hommes politiques, de communication)” (Prignitz 1996b, 135).

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phrastic past tense j’ai eu à + infinitive, whereas in hexagonal French, one would use the passé composé. Examples include J’ai eu à jouer [instead of j’ai joué] dans pas mal de clips or Il a eu à tromper [instead of il a trompé] sa copine (Diao-Klaeger 2018, 53). Both statements have no modal but only aspectual value (that is there was no “need” to perform in many different videos or to cheat on his girlfriend); the verbal form expresses the completedness of the action. Another form frequently used is the imperfect of aller + infinitive to express the counterfactual conditional, a form also used in hexagonal French where it is diastratically and/or diaphasically marked: S’il y a mal d’habillement [instead of s’il est mal habillé], on va l’arrêter [instead of on l’arrête] et puis s’il peut [instead of s’il pouvait] retourner à la maison s’échanger [instead of changer ses vêtements] et puis ressortir ça allait nous faire [instead of ça nous ferait] plaisir quoi or il fallait [instead of il aurait fallu] la laisser à la maison (examples from Diao-Klaeger 2018, 54).

Valency – Transitive verbs are often used intransitively and vice versa, as in Peut-être on peut trouver [instead of on peut en trouver] là-bas (Diao-Klaeger 2018, 53) or Nous avons quitté [instead of Nous sommes partis] à vingt-trois heures (Rydalevsky 1998, 355), Il a duré [instead of Il a passé/il est resté] quinze jours à l’hôpital (Lafage 1985/1986), J’ai fréquenté [instead of Je suis allé à l’école] jusqu’au CM2 seulement (Lafage 1985/1986). This seems to be due to an influence of the first languages (cf. Manessy 1993, 19). Very often speakers use constructions with a direct object, in which the hexagonal standard would require an indirect object, like in On ne peut pas les [instead of leur] en vouloir or, vice versa, Ils leur [instead of les] questionnent (Prignitz 1998, 336). Serial verbs – Speakers of all competence levels tend to use serial verb constructions, a phenomenon that can be attributed to the influence of the African languages in contact with French. Examples from interactions with Burkinabe speakers include: On va goûter voir et puis dire instead of On va goûter et voir et puis dire comment on trouve cela/si c’est bon, Tu peux aller dormir revenir instead of Tu peux aller dormir et puis revenir, Faut acheter des trucs pour boucher les oreilles dormir instead of Faut acheter des trucs pour boucher les oreilles pour mieux dormir (Diao-Klaeger 2018, 53). Prepositions – The prepositions de and à are often replaced by semantically more motivated prepositions, as can be seen in Je le confirme avec [instead of à] tue-tête from a radio phone-in (Romero 2007, 63) or Les étudiants n’ont pas assez de connaissances générales sur les [instead of des] autres cultures, found in the written press (Gandon 1994, 71). Determiners – Educationally disadvantaged speakers often do not use the article (an interference from the first languages, which are class languages without determiners preceding the noun): Tu veux tissu(s) [instead of des tissus]?, Je vais acheter vélo(s) [instead of des vélos] (Napon 1998, 323). Not rarely, a -là is used behind the noun in a compensatory way (for details and possible explanations cf. Diao-Klaeger 2018, 55, 158ss.). Comparison – The comparative is often formed without the comparative adverb plus: Elles sont dangereuses [instead of plus dangereuses] que nous (Prignitz 2006, 204). Manessy (1993) attributes this to a ‘conception of comparison that appears to be pan-

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African and according to which one of the two objects being compared is evaluated for the quantity to be measured, the other being used as a standard’.19 What is interesting here is that the speakers who leave out the plus in this construction tend to use it in connection with synthetic forms of comparison: C’est encore plus mieux instead of C’est encore mieux.

4.3 Lexicon ‘Burkina Faso is both a sanctuary for a French language that is more chastened than in the land of Molière – with the daily monitoring of terms such as “nonobstant” [‘notwithstanding’] – and a springboard for joyful crossbred expressions’.20

Glez, a French-Burkinabe press cartoonist, columnist, lyricist, and deputy editor of 25 years of the satirical weekly Journal du Jeudi, comments here on the manifold facets of Burkinabe French: On the one hand, everyday lexemes are used that are marked as obsolete or literary in hexagonal French, but, on the other hand, nonce words de toute couleur continue being coined, and sometimes they are lexicalized. Many sections of the Burkinabe lexicon differ from hexagonal French in form and/ or meaning. We can distinguish internal innovations concerning form and/or meaning from external innovations, i.e. lexical or semantic loans (Reutner 2017, 47–51). Internal innovation concerns word formation and changes of meaning (the following examples are, where unmarked, my own observations). Internal innovation: word formation – A typical feature here is the change of the part of speech without changing the form (conversion and zero derivation). Verbs can become nouns, as in le travailler [instead of le travail] que je fais là, c’est dur hein (Napon 1998, 328), where travailler ‘to work’ is used in the sense of ‘work’. Nouns can become adverbs, as in Il a fait ça façon ‘He did it sloppily’, where façon ‘manner’ is used in the sense of ‘sloppily’. Nouns can become verbs, as in Je te moyen ‘I am stronger than you/I beat you’, where moyen ‘means’ is used as ‘to dominate’ (Lafage 1985–1986, s.v.). Certain derivational morphemes are very productive, such as ‑ment, as in carte de mangement ‘menu’, moquement ‘mockery’, ‑er, as in ambiancer ‘to spread festive cheer’, chicotter ‘to beat with a chicotte or any other object of corporal punishment’, choser/chosiner (passepartout verb), and in derivations from proper nouns like diendérer ‘to do a stupid thing’ (< general Diendéré, referring to his coup d’etat), mackysalliser ‘to lie’ (< Macky Sall, president of the CEDEAO during Diendéré’s coup d’etat), léoncer ‘to rest/fall asleep during

19 “conception de la comparaison qui paraît bien être panafricaine et en vertu de laquelle l’un des deux objets comparés est évalué, pour la grandeur à mesurer, par référence à l’autre pris pour étalon” (Manessy 1994, 223). 20 “Le Burkina Faso est tout à la fois le sanctuaire d’une langue française plus châtiée qu’au pays de Molière – avec la surveillance quotidienne de termes comme ‘nonobstant’ – et le tremplin de joyeuses expressions métissées” (Glez 2018).

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an important event’ (< Léonce Koné, vice president of the Congress for Democracy and Progress, Congrès pour la démocratie et le progrès – CDP, referring to him falling asleep during a mediation meeting went viral), ouaroter ‘to mismanage’ (< Stanislas Ouaro, minister of national education, referring to criticism of his school mismanagement during the Corona crisis). Other words are formed with -drome ‘place where you offer/consume XY’ (< very likely due to Ivorian influence), as for example allocodrome (< Baoulé or Bete alloco ‘plantain’ + drome), bandjidrome/banguidrome (< Dyula bandji/bangui ‘palm wine’ + drome), deguedrome (< Bambara dégué/dêguê/dèguè ‘millet yoghurt’+ drome). Internal innovation: change of meaning – Verbs are generally more flexible than in hexagonal French with respect to the frame they can occur in and in terms of their range of lexicalized denotations. To name just a few examples: envoyer is not only used in the sense of ‘to send’, but also in the sense of ‘to give/to bring/to pass’, for instance in Tu peux m’envoyer le sel s’il te plaît? ‘Can you pass me the salt, please?’. Gâter is a passe-partout verb that can replace verbs containing the seme [destruction], as for example abîmer ‘to damage’, détériorer ‘to deteriorate’, désorganiser ‘to disorganize’, salir ‘to soil’, déchirer ‘to tear’, perverter ‘to pervert’, or gâcher ‘to spoil’. Goutter (‘to drizzle’, instead of pleuvoir) means ‘to rain’. A parallel flexibility can be found with items other than verbs. Pull, for instance, refers to any long-sleeved clothing and is therefore also used instead of blouson ‘jacket’ or manteau ‘coat’. Jeton means not only ‘token, counter, chip’ but also ‘coin’, pièces refers to ‘identity papers’ (shortening of pièces d’identité), in addition to ‘rooms, coins, plays, pieces’, torche ‘electric torch’ is used instead of lampe de poche, sucrerie refers to ‘soft drinks’ instead of to ‘sugar refinery, sweets’, goudron refers not only to ‘tar’ but also to a ‘tarred road’, funérailles refers to the ‘ceremony one year after the funeral’ instead of to the ‘funeral’ (les obsèques). Internal innovation: varia – Other types of internal innovations are brand names like bic ‘pen’, lotus ‘paper handkerchief’, and coinages like poulets télévisés ‘grilled chicken sold in rotisseries’, du tic au tac ‘immediately’ or maquis ‘bar, disco’ (from Ivorian French). Lexical loans – Loanwords from the national languages are numerous in domains like, for example, food, drink, flora, fauna, or festivities, such as from Dyula dolo ‘millet beer’, fonio ‘millet’, mousso ‘woman’, and fourou ‘grilled sheep’s stomach stuffed with offal’, or from Mooré puskom ‘tamarind juice’ and filga ‘a harvest festival’. Loanwords in other domains are for example from Mooré yélé ‘problem’, yada yada ‘dubiously/incoherently/recklessly’, mouta mouta ‘obscurely/hazardously’, or touma touma ‘Be brave! Work well!’ and discourse markers from Dyula like de and ke (cf. 4.3; for a detailed description Diao-Klaeger 2018). There are also examples of loans from Arabic, as for example barka/baraka ‘thank you’ or walaï ‘je te jure’, and from English, as, for example, booster ‘to boost’, streaming, marketing, business, or taximan. Semantic loans/calques – In regards to loan words or loan phrases, examples like l’habit ‘garment’ (< Mooré fu͂ ́ ugù), rentrer avec femme ‘having sexual intercourse’ (< Mooré ke͂ ̀ né paaga), demander la route ‘ask permission to say goodbye’ (uncertain ori-

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gin; exists for example in Mooré bo͂ ̀os(e) sórè and Dyula kà síra dári), il y a la place ‘sit down’ (uncertain origin; exists for example in Mooré zi͂ ́ing(e) beèmɛ́ and Dyula sìgi-yɔrɔ bɛ́ yèn) can be found.

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism One of the basic requirements for social advancement in Burkina Faso is to speak French: “Being able to speak French, even poorly, or having a degree, is the key to social promotion. French also makes the law of the labour market” (Hien/Napon 2017, 41). Even bad French is thus better than no French at all. However, linguistic insecurity is widespread among speakers with low competence in French who describe their French as ‘sloppy/bad French’ (“français façon”). As early as 1996, Caitucoli points out: ‘The reference to a non-hexagonal prestige standard, the emergence of popular and/or slang varieties, the affirmation of national specificities, awareness of internal variation (social, stylistic), and the need to adapt one’s speech to the communication situation, all this points to the birth of a Burkinabe French’.21

There is an awareness that an endogenous norm exists. So if a Burkinabe speaks French the way a French person supposedly does, with a certain accent and by using sophisticated, complicated, “scholarly” words, the so-called “gros mots” ‘(lit.) long words’, he/she risks being treated as a chogobitant (cf. 4.1).22 These persons are considered to be somewhat arrogant, to be ‘someone who wants to say that he is above others; who wants to assimilate to the white man’.23 Batiana concludes: ‘If [...] a speaker goes beyond the verbal habitus born of a tacit social convention, to adopt the exogenous verbal habitus, [...] [t]his would mean that the author is guilty of wanting to mark a distance between him and the group of French speakers [...] [t]his could create a feeling of frustration among

21 “La référence à une norme de prestige non hexagonale, l’émergence de variétés populaires et/ou argotiques, l’affirmation des spécificités nationales, la prise de conscience de la variation interne (sociale, stylistique) et de la nécessité d’adapter son discours à la situation de communication, tout cela fait penser à la naissance d’un français burkinabé” (Caitucoli 1996, 83). 22 ‘[T]he origin of the word chogobit might come from the Burkinabe’s impression that the French continuously use [ʃ] in their pronunciation with a relatively deep voice’ (“[L]’origine du mot chogobit viendrait de l’impression qu’ont les Burkinabés que les Français réalisent beaucoup de [ʃ] dans leur prononciation avec une voix relativement grave”, Batiana 1993, 206). The chogobitant(e)s (sometimes also written as ) distinguish themselves, as mentioned in 4.1, also by their pronunciation (illustrated in more detail in Diao-Klaeger 2018, 47s.). 23 “quelqu’un qui veut dire qu’il est au-dessus des autres; qui veut s’assimilir au blanc” (Batiana 1993, 207).

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the other speakers who were already happy to identify as “legitimate” speakers because they spoke standard French’.24

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Dictionaries – Almost 40 years ago, Lafage (1985–1986) published the lexical inventary Premier inventaire des particularités lexicales du français en Haute-Volta (1977–1980), now of course out of date, but still the only “dictionary” available. Prignitz (1996b) is a glossary to her doctoral thesis on Burkinabe French (Prignitz 1996a). Mfoutou (2017) has compiled the dictionary of abbreviations and acronyms Dictionnaire des sigles et acronymes en usage au Burkina Faso and states: ‘The use of acronyms – a kind of internal stratification of the whole constituted by the French language in the Burkinabe communication space – makes it possible to distinguish literate speakers from non-literate ones. The former use them more than the latter. However, their use is interesting here in that, in addition to clarifying the transition from a situation of contact between the former types of speakers and the latter, it also clarifies the contact of French with endogenous Burkinabe languages, language behaviours in the plurilingual Burkinabe environment’.25

Grammars – There is no comprehensive grammar of the variety of French in Burkina Faso, and there are also no attempts at such a codification so far. There are, however, some publications on selected morphosyntactic characteristics (an overview can be found in Diao-Klaeger 2018, 35, the most detailed one still being Prignitz 1996a).

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – Language used by public authorities has not yet been the subject of systematic studies; thus, the following statements are only anecdotal:

24 “Si […] un locuteur outrepasse l’habitus verbal né d’une convention sociale tacite, pour adopter l’habitus verbal exogène, […] [c]ela signifierait que son auteur est coupable de vouloir marquer une distance entre lui et le groupe des francophones […] [c]ela pourrait créer un sentiment de frustration chez les autres locuteurs qui étaient déjà heureux de se sentir locuteurs ‘légitimes’ parce qu’ils parlent un français standard” (Batiana 1993, 207s.). 25 “L’usage des sigles et acronymes – sorte de stratification interne de l’ensemble constitué par la langue française dans l’espace communicationnel burkinabè – permet de distinguer les locuteurs lettrés des non-lettrés. Les premiers les utilisent plus que les seconds. Mais leur usage est ici intéressant en ce qu’en plus de clarifier la transition d’une situation de contact des premiers types de locuteurs avec les seconds, il clarifie tout autant le contact du français avec les langues endogènes burkinabè, les comportements langagiers dans l’environnement plurilingue burkinabè” (Mfoutou 2017, 26).

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“[…] many famous Burkinabè politicians such as Simone Compaore are well known for their frequent use of neologisms in their speeches. The words yada yada and tranquilos, mouta mouta, touma touma, words created in Burkina Faso, are frequently used in French by Burkinabè elites as well as the less educated people” (Hien 2020, 100).

President Kaboré, for instance, was cited in the news with the following statement made at a meeting with the Burkinabe diaspora in Dakar in 2016, where he uses mouta mouta (cf. 4.3): “Mais on ne peut pas s’assoir et dire c’est la Transition, on va faire du mouta mouta entre nous. Non! On a dit que plus rien ne sera comme avant, c’est terminé” (Rédaction Burkina24 2016).

Variety used in education – Tellingly, neither the Strategic Development Programme for Basic Education (Programme de développement stratégique de l’éducation de base 2012– 2021 – PDSEB) nor the Education and Training Sector Programme (Programme sectoriel de l’éducation et de la formation 2012–2021 – PSEF) expound the problems linked to the role of French as a language of instruction or raise the issue of which French to teach the pupils. The question of an endogenous norm and its teaching is not addressed in the sparse literature on the subject; the point of reference always remains implicitely standard French described as the language of Molière (la langue de Molière). When it comes to language, both programmes are content to talk about strengthening national languages and English as a foreign language in schools. However, there are problems in terms of competencies in French, both on the part of the teachers and the students. Lauwerier/Akkari stress the “precariousness of teaching conditions” (2019, 5), poor training, poor pay, classes that are too large and very heterogeneous, and so on. They also mention problems of comprehension and expression on the part of the pupils, the teachers, and their instructors and quote a teacher who argues that: ‘In fact, the language taught is a foreign language for us. The teacher must first be able to appropriate this tool correctly before being able to convey the message to the children. Well, the complexity of teaching lies precisely at this level’.26

Pitroipa notes that some of his interviewed student teachers have difficulties in pronouncing certain phonemes of French (for example, the post-alveolar fricative [ʒ] and the rounded front vowels) and therefore asks the following questions: ‘Are the subjects we interviewed really aware that they have difficulty articulating certain sounds in French? How can one teach the phonetics of a language without mastering the sounds of the lan-

26 “En fait, la langue enseignée est une langue étrangère pour nous. Il faut d’abord que l’enseignant luimême puisse s’approprier cet outil-là correctement avant de pouvoir transmettre le message aux enfants. Bon, la complexité justement de l’enseignement se trouve à ce niveau” (Lauwerier/Akkari 2019, 14).

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guage to be taught? These questions call for the teaching of French phonetics to be taken into account in the ENEP programmes’.27

The problem is more acute in rural areas than in urban ones (see the urban-rural divide mentioned above regarding the proportion of speakers of French). Ouedraogo interviewed twelve teachers and thirty-six students and conducted classroom visits for his doctoral thesis on the quality of teaching at the primary level. He states: ‘French is the only language of instruction in the classes surveyed. As the students’ second language, they encounter many difficulties. In the teachers’ opinion, some pupils have benefited from good teaching since the first year of preparatory school (CP1). However, many reach CM2 without mastering spoken, let alone written, French. Moreover, the schools involved in the exploration are located in rural areas, albeit on the outskirts of the city. In these areas, the population is largely illiterate. Pupils only speak French in the classroom. Even in the playground, they communicate in the national language. This poses difficulties in pedagogical communication’.28

In order to make themselves understood, teachers often resort to the students’ first language if they speak it. If this is not possible, they try to adapt their French to that of the students. According to Ouedraogo, ‘basic wording’ (“des tournures très élémentaires”, 2016, 158) is used especially in exams. Pitroipa quotes a primary teacher: ‘We face real difficulties with French because the children do not master French, especially in the CP1 classes here in Ndorola [...]. If I didn’t speak Dioula, I don’t even know how I would teach here’.29

In secondary school, the situation seems quite different. Here, at least in the urban area, a reappropriation of French takes place, and the pupils play with the language, especially on a lexical-semantic level (cf. Napon 1999; 2001; 2005).

27 “Les sujets que nous avons interviewés ont-ils véritablement conscience qu’ils ont des difficultés à bien articuler certains sons du français? Comment peut-on enseigner la phonétique d’une langue sans maîtriser soi-même les sons de la langue à enseigner? Ces questions appellent à une prise en compte de l’enseignement de la phonétique du français dans les programmes des ENEP” (Pitroipa 2008, 273). 28 “Le français est l’unique langue d’enseignement dans les classes enquêtées. En tant que deuxième langue des élèves, ceux-ci rencontrent de nombreuses difficultés. Pour les enseignants, certains élèves ont bénéficié d’un bon enseignement depuis le cours préparatoire première année (CP1). Mais beaucoup atteignent le CM2 sans maîtriser l’oral a fortiori l’écrit français. De plus, les écoles concernées par l’exploration sont situées en zone rurale bien que périphérique à la ville. Dans ces zones, la population est dans une large mesure illetrée. Les élèves ne parlent français que dans la classe. Même dans la cour de récréation, ils communiquent en langue nationale. Cela pose des difficultés de communication pédagogique” (Ouedraogo 2016, 157). 29 “Nous sommes confrontés à des difficultés réelles avec le français car les enfants ne maîtrisent pas le français surtout dans les classes de CP1 ici à Ndorola […]. Si je ne parlais pas le dioula, je ne sais même pas comment j’allais enseigner ici” (in Pitroipa 2014, 366).

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Variety used in the media – French in the Burkinabe media has only been studied so far concerning the print media. Raschi (2009) analysed press articles from different daily and weekly newspapers, like for example Sidwaya, Pays, Observateur Paalga, Bendré, Journal du Jeudi, L’Hebdomadaire, or Indépendent from 1 September 2006 to 1 March 2007. She gives examples of lexical and morphosyntactic phenomena that deviate from hexagonal French. What stands out, according to her review, are, among other phenomena, borrowings from national languages, sometimes with translation into French, for example Il y a le développement des infrastructures à l’image des marchés à bétail ou yaars, un péyô (petit marché) se tiendra le samedi (2009, 141), the omnipresence of the deictic suffix -là and the ‘fairly free use’ (“utilisation assez libre”, 2009, 148) of prepositions, some hypercorrections, and a rather high number of incongruences, such as a subject in the singular followed by a verb in the plural because other people are involved in the action, as in for example Le mardi 24 octobre 2006, le haut-commissaire de Kadiogo accompagné du Sécrétaire général ont rencontré le maire et le Conseil municipal (2009, 149). She concludes: ‘However, it has been shown that the originality of this journalistic production lies not in the content, but rather in the language [...] which gives [...] a certain linguistic particularity to the many articles. Thus, the standard and neutral French language of the Hexagon press is replaced by another language that is decidedly more Burkinabe, a production with national characteristics [...]’.30

Prignitz (1995), in a study of texts in these same newspapers in 1994, describes the use of discourse markers (but calls them interjections and particles) such as en tout cas, walaï, vraiment, and the use of proverbs. The satirical weekly Journal du Jeudi (which is not published anymore) in its column Moi Goama caricatures the way of speaking of an uneducated speaker in using a kind of phoneticizing spelling: Yen na ine porbileme que le zens-là y pagle dé zour-là, moi Goama ze sontait pas voulé mété mon bousse didans, mais cé toro fort zouska ma dipassé (Diallo 2016).31 Sagno comments: ‘The satirical press caricatures this symbolic violence by verbally imitating the speech of certain citizens. For example, the Journal du Jeudi, through its column “Moi Goama”, allows us to see these ways of speaking. Thus, the satirical press draws attention to a popular public that is reappropriating standard French, whose right to communicate or express itself is indispensable to the public space’.32

30 “Il reste cependant prouvé que l’originalité de cette production journalistique reside non pas au niveau des contenus, mais plutôt de la langue […] qui confère […] une certaine particularité linguistique aux multiples articles. C’est ainsi qu’à la langue française standard et neutre de la presse de l’Hexagone, s’en substitute une autre d’expression décidément plus burkinabè, une production aux caractéristiques nationales […]” (Raschi 2009, 152). 31 In standard spelling: Il y en a une problème que les gens-là ils parler des jours-là, moi Goama je n’étais pas voulé metter mon bouche là-dedans, mais c’est trop fort jusqu’à me dépasser, in hexagonal standard: Il y a un problème dont les gens parlent ces jours-là, moi, Goama, je ne voulais pas y ajouter mon opinion, mais c’est trop fort, je n’y peux rien. 32 “La presse satirique caricature cette violence symbolique en imitant verbalement le parler de certains citoyens. Le Journal du Jeudi, par exemple, à travers sa rubrique ‘Moi Goama’, permet de constater ces fa-

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Variety used in literature – Ouedraogo (1999) describes the use of basilectal French in the novels Papa, oublie-moi by Jean-Pierre Guingané and Rougbêinga by Norbert Zongo, both from 1990. In these novels, basilectal French is used by some characters. This exemplifies phonetic, morphosyntactic, and lexical features as described in 4, but also features going “beyond” them (for instance, insertions of vowels to create the syllable structure consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel and the omission of auxiliary verbs). According to Ouedraogo, the authors do this not only to represent the reality of basilectal French but also to make the reader laugh: ‘What is amusing in this case is that the characters are very serious and above all convinced of the quality of the language used’.33 Thus, a certain stigmatization can be observed here.

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çons de parler. […] La presse satirique attire ainsi l’attention sur un public populaire qui se réapproprie le français standard, dont le droit de communication ou d’expression est indispensable à l’espace public” (Sagno 2020). 33 “Ce qui amuse dans ce cas précis est que les personnages sont très sérieux et surtout convaincus de la qualité de la langue utilisée” (Ouedraogo 1999, 17).

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Akissi Béatrice Boutin

11 Côte d’Ivoire Abstract: The French spoken in Côte d’Ivoire has taken on a certain autonomy from the international standard of French. This current movement is determined by several factors, including historical and current contacts with Ivorian languages, the early diffusion of French outside formal places, and the appropriation of French by the entire population in the postcolonial period. This led first to the emergence of a national reference variety in the process of becoming the Ivorian standard, then to the appearance of Nouchi as the language of young people, and finally to its rapid expansion in society as a new mixed urban language. In this chapter, we approach the history and the sociolinguistic context of the evolution of French in this country, not to show its singularity, as this evolution could well occur in other African countries too. Keywords: plurilingualism, French, Côte d’Ivoire, Nouchi, standard

1 Sociolinguistic situation Côte d’Ivoire is at the intersection of four major language groups of the Niger-Congo family, Mande, Gur, Kru, and Kwa, which extend far beyond the country’s borders. Figure 1 shows that the political borders of Côte d’Ivoire enclose the intersection of these four groups, represented respectively in pink, brown, green, and yellow. The traditional distribution of these groups is based on their position in the nineteenth century but should not be considered fixed: ‘The mobility of individuals and groups was a constitutive element of the social and political organization of the communities that lived in the territory newly conquered by France’.1

The distribution of the different ethnic groups explains the traditional use of the different languages, while the mobility of their speakers accounts for the fact that they are today widespread throughout the country (cf. Figure 2). Due to the continuous mixing of the population, all Ivorian languages are likely to be spoken anywhere across the Ivorian territory, in towns as well as in villages. Already during colonization, some of these languages experienced an expansion due to migration: the displacement of people from north to south for forced labour during the construction of the Port of Abidjan and the

1 “La mobilité des individus et des groupes était un élément constitutif de l’organisation sociale et politique des communautés qui vivaient sur le territoire nouvellement conquis par la France” (Chauveau 2017, 10). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-011

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Abidjan-Niger railway line, and voluntary migration of coffee and cocoa farmers within the country and to neighbouring countries for small urban trade. In addition, the proportion of nationals of other African countries is very high in Côte d’Ivoire (26 %), which considerably increases the number of languages spoken. For example, Mooré, from the Gur group, spoken by the Mossi from Burkina Faso, has been part of the linguistic landscape of urban and rural Côte d’Ivoire since colonial times (Boutin/Kouadio N’Guessan 2016, 175s.).  

Figure 1: Linguistic groups in Western Africa in and around Côte d’Ivoire (cf. OECD 2006, 3)

Kwa – The Kwa group is the largest in number of speakers (38 % of the population of Côte d’Ivoire), located in the South-East and Centre of Côte d’Ivoire, with a language, Ega, landlocked in the Kru zone further west. In the interior, the main Kwa languages are Abé, Abidji, Abron, Ano, Anyin (Agni in Figure 2), Attié (Akye), Baoulé, Krobu (Krobou), while the Kwa lagoon languages are, from west to east, Avikam, Alladian, Adioukrou, Aizi (Ahizi), Ébrié, Mbato (Mbatto), Abure (Abouré), Nzima. The Kwa group extends to southern Nigeria, and the Kwa languages of Côte d’Ivoire still form a unit with those of Ghana, their place of origin for the last four centuries. Within Côte d’Ivoire, Baoulé has a role of lingua franca in the Kwa area and elsewhere, especially between Kwa speakers.  

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Figure 2: The main languages of Côte d’Ivoire (ACI 1972, B2a)

Mande – The Mande group is the second in number of speakers because of the role of Dyula, spoken by more than 60 % of the population as a lingua franca (in commerce, urban life, informal economy). This group is divided into southern Mande, which is older in Ivorian territory, and northern Mande, which has a larger number of speakers. The  

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northern Mande languages occupy the North-West, plus one language, Dyula (Samogo), landlocked in the North-East in the Gur area. The languages Bambara, Gbin, Kanika, Koro, Koyaga, Mahou, Maninka (Malinké), Toura, and Worodougou are formally very similar. The southern Mande group is located in the West, close to the border with Guinea and in the Centre-West, and mainly comprises Dan, Guro (Gouro), and Gban. The Mande group extends in the Sahelian zone to Senegal in the West and Burkina Faso in the East. Kru – The Kru group (Krou) is located in the South-West of the country, covers Liberia and extends into Sierra Leone. In Côte d’Ivoire, the eastern Kru languages are Bete, Dida, Godié, Kodia, Kouya, and Neyo, which all feature significant dialect variation. The western Kru languages are Krumen (Krou) and We. Gur – The Gur group is located in a large area in the North and North-East of Côte d’Ivoire. It consists of six languages which include many dialects: Senufo (Senoufo), with Djimini, Nafanan (Nafana), and Tagwana, which are close to it, Birifor, Cerma, Kulango (Koulango), Lobi, and Téén. The Gur group extends to Burkina Faso and to northern Nigeria. French – French is spoken throughout the Ivorian territory. In its report, the OIF (2019, cf. also Reutner 2017, 16s.) attests that more than 85 % of the inhabitants surveyed (more than a thousand adults and young people) declare to speak French daily, including with their families, at a satisfactory level, but it ultimately only counts 33 % of French speakers for this country (2019, 32, 42),2 thus not counting the majority of them because of the distance from the international standard. Certainly, French is present throughout the territory and often the only language of the 51 % of city dwellers (WB 2018), but it has diversified into several varieties, all far from the international standard, in a completely ‘decomplexified’ way (“décomplexée”, Kouadio N’Guessan 2008, 179). Nouchi, a mixed Ivorian slang and the language of young people, is widely used in urban areas and very present in Ivorian popular culture, which exports it beyond the borders of Côte d’Ivoire. Urban languages and plurilingualism – In urban areas where African languages in general are more threatened, the Maninka and the Baoulé have the reputation of being most attached to the family use and transmission of their language. However, numerous interethnic marriages and the omnipresence of French in all social situations have contributed to the weakening of the intergenerational transmission of languages for several generations. Many urban speakers now only speak French and foreign languages learned in secondary education. However, multilingualism is present in the city and in popular culture, and all speakers have developed at least some passive competence in several Ivorian languages. The only language that carries the hopes of maximum social advancement remains French. The inferiority complex attached to Ivorian languages since colonization is tenacious, and this often relegates them to a role of maintaining tra 

 

 

2 For a constructive critique of OIF data and its processing, cf., e. g., Sanaker/Holter/Skattum (2006), Boutin/Gadet (2012, 20s.), Diao-Klaeger (2015, 507–511).  

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dition while the feeling of ethnicity tends to crumble also due to the causes mentioned above.

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Contacts with European languages began in the fifteenth century when the Portuguese came into contact with coastal communities to trade in ivory, spices, cotton cloth, gold, and captives. The names of their trading posts have remained those of the towns of Sassandra, San Pedro, and Fresco (west coast). The Europeans have generally not been able to penetrate the interior of Africa before the second great wave of European colonization in the nineteenth century. At the end of the seventeenth century, the French traded in Assinie (East Coast), but it was not until the mid-nineteenth century that they also founded some trading posts like Grand Bassam or Fort Dabou. The other places of trade were difficult to reach for French boats, and they were often obliged to deal on board their own boats and even to negotiate in English (cf. Atger 1960, 446). During the transatlantic slave trade, the coast spanning from present-day Liberia in the West to Ghana in the East was called the Seed Coast (côte des graines) or the Bad People Coast (côte des males gens), Teeth Coast (côte des dents), or Gold Coast (côte de l’or). Arthur Verdier introduced coffee culture in the 1870s in Adiaké (far East Coast). In 1884, after the conclusion of a division in zones of influence between France and Great Britain, Marcel Treich-Laplène, an agent of Verdier, went exploring northwards, recognizing the course of the Komoé River, and reached Bondoukou and then Kong (1888), after having signed treaties on the way with the Bettie, the Agni, and the Abron. In 1889 the country was fully recognized by French explorers, and French colonization officially began in 1893. It lasted until 1960 despite several notable rebellions. French evolved as an official language in its standard variety, but also and above all, as a lingua franca in a simplified variety called ‘French of little Negros’ (petit-nègre) or ‘French of skirmishers’ (français-tirailleur). It is indeed in the early nineteenth century that the pidginized French originated in Senegal and was used for bargaining and by the French battalions of native soldiers. African languages that influenced the first pidginized French are those of the Mandingo group, including Bambara/Dyula spoken while trafficking, as well as by French explorers in Western Africa in the nineteenth century (Binger 1892).

2.2 Milestones of its further development After World War II, the living conditions and status of Africans in the colonies improved. In Côte d’Ivoire, the unions of indigenous coffee and cocoa planters started obtaining

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some of the fair treatment they asked for, and the French language, which enabled these advances, started gaining greater consideration. Félix Houphouët-Boigny entered the political scene. In 1946, he was elected by the Ivorians as a member of the Constituent Assembly of the French Union since its creation and passed a law in favour of the abolition of forced labour on 11 February 1946. In the same year, he became the first president of the African Democratic Group (Rassemblement Démocratique Africain – RDA).3 A few years later, he joined the French parliament before becoming Minister of State on 1 February 1956. He worked with Gaston Defferre, Minister of France Overseas, in the framework law to be voted on 23 June 1956, which granted greater internal autonomy to overseas territories and prepared them for independence. However, few Ivorians had access to standard French during the colonial era. In 1946, Félix Houphouët-Boigny was able, after some struggles, to send one hundred and thirty young people to France so that they could continue their studies in college and high school: it was “the adventure of 46”. However, the number of children in school did not reach 10 % at independence, and the first high school was only created a few years earlier in Abidjan for a few dozen students (Désalmand 1983). In 1958, a new constitution replaced the French Union (Union française) by the French Community (Communauté française). In 1959, Houphouët-Boigny, at the head of the RDA, created the Council of the Entente (Conseil de l’Entente), which brought together the French-speaking states of West Africa: Dahomey, Upper Volta, Côte d’Ivoire, and Niger. A few months later, he asked for the independence of all member countries on behalf of the Council of the Entente. On 7 August 1960, the independence of Côte d’Ivoire was proclaimed, and he became its first president. He remained so until his death on 7 December 1993. It was after independence that the French language extended considerably in Côte d’Ivoire due to several economic factors. Governments showed a permanent interest in education, with the stated aim of ensuring development in close connection with the economic policy of France. In the 1960s and 1970s, a major campaign was carried out, illustrated by slogans such as ‘100 % schooling’ (“la scolarisation à 100 %”), and the state prioritized focusing its efforts on the populations most neglected during colonization: those of the North and the West. It was established that each village must have its school, and if the government did not intervene, the peasants themselves contributed to building it. Gradually, schooling progressed. The state fully supported students at university level and devoted a third of its budget to education for twenty years. It did and does, in fact, deploy a considerable effort: cooperating teaching staff, sometimes ill-adapted, free schooling, student subsidies, numerous allowances and facilities for teachers, etc. During colonization, French spread in its standard and popular forms (Boukari 2017, 484).  

 

 

3 The RDA was founded in Bamako on 19 October 1946. Twelve countries of French Equatorial and French West Africa (AEF and AOF) are represented by a member party. These parties were at that time the only ones to be truly African.

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Lafage (1996, 590) calculates, using various sources, a rate of 35 % of Francophones in 1975, of which 63 % attended school and 37 % never did. During these years, the exposure to the French of France was reinforced by the strong presence of French people and other French speakers in the fields of education and economy. Another factor was that many Ivorians went to France to do or complete their studies due to the lack of higher education facilities. The 1980s marked a turning point with the Ivoirization of executives and, at the same time, the nativization of French. An endogenous standard far removed from the hexagonal one emerged from the different varieties of Ivorian French, tacitly at the beginning, then increasingly claimed by intellectuals and public speech professionals. Student slang and other sociolects are developing. During the military, social and political crisis between 2002 and 2011, Nouchi, one of these sociolects, spread among young people who were more visible and in favour of identity and national claims against the grip of external powers during the conflict (Boutin/Kouadio N’Guessan 2013; Boukari 2017). Today, several varieties of French continue to coexist and interpenetrate in Côte d’Ivoire: international standard French, French from Côte d’Ivoire in the process of standardization, ordinary Ivorian French, and Nouchi, all of which are imbued with the plurilingualism that characterizes the country (Boutin 2017).  

 

 

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation From the constitution of the first Ivorian Republic to the latest constitution of 2016, French is the only official language of the country, and all national languages are mentioned in the same way. The 2016 constitution establishes that ‘the official language is French’4 and that ‘the law sets the rules concerning: […] the conditions for the promotion and development of national languages’.5 The educational reforming law of 1977 assigns the task to promote national languages to the Institute of Applied Linguistics (Institut de Linguistique Appliquée – ILA, cf. Kouamé 2007) : ‘The introduction of national languages in official education must be conceived as a factor of national unity and the enhancement of the Ivorian cultural heritage’.6 ‘The Institute of Applied Linguistics is responsible for preparing the introduction of national languages in education, in particular by their description, codification, identification and recording of

4 “La langue officielle est le français” (C-CI, art. 48). 5 “La loi fixe les règles concernant: […] les conditions de promotion et de développement des langues nationales” (C-CI, art. 101). 6 “L’introduction des langues nationales dans l’enseignement officiel doit être conçue comme un facteur d’unité nationale et de revalorisation du patrimoine culturel ivoirien” (Law 584, art. 67).

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their grammars and lexicons, the development of school textbooks and the development of literary productions guaranteeing their cultural character’.7

To date, the national languages have not yet been officially designated, even if public opinion perceives that all Ivorian languages are a priori national and that each ethnolinguistic group has a language representative of the whole group: Baoulé, Maninka, Bete, and Senufo.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities In the political sphere, official representatives only use French. At the highest levels of the state, the president always speaks French, as do the deputies of parliament (National Assembly and Senate) and members of other state institutions, including the National Chamber of Kings and Traditional Chiefs (Chambre nationale des Rois et Chefs traditionnels), an institution bringing together all the traditional kings and chiefs of Côte d’Ivoire in its plenary sessions (C-CI, art. 175). We only note that no president of the Republic has spoken in an African language, but two presidents have spoken in Nouchi in particular circumstances: former president Henri Konan Bédié in an electoral campaign rally in Treichville Sports Park on 29 November 2009 in front of an audience of young people who were dumbfounded and enjaillés ‘happy’ to hear it, and the current president Alassane Ouattara speaking to the Secretary General of the OIF Abdou Diouf calling him a choco ‘charming’ president during the 39th Parliamentary Assembly of the Francophonie on 10 July 2013 at the Congress Mall of the Hotel Ivoire. French also is the only language used in administration, both in written and spoken form. Although Ivorian languages have a spelling and are codified, the population does not know how to use them in their written form. The Ivorian languages, therefore, are not used by official authorities. However, in both rural and urban areas, conflict settlements placed under customary authorities and traditional chiefdom can be carried out in national languages (cf. C-CI, art. 175).

3.3 Languages used in education French is the only language of instruction from preschool to higher education. Nevertheless, following several private or public experiences of literacy in national 7 “L’Institut de Linguistique Appliquée est chargée de préparer l’introduction des langues nationales dans l’enseignement, notamment par leur description, leur codification, l’identification et la consignation de leurs grammaires et lexiques, l’élaboration de manuels scolaires et le développement des productions littéraires garantissant leur caractère culturel” (Law 584, art. 68).

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languages within the framework of agro-pastoral projects, the Ministry of National Education has been experimenting since November 2000 with an initial bilingual education at the primary level, successively using the national languages and French within the Integrated School Project (Projet d’école intégrée – PEI). The project was initiated with ten languages in ten rural primary schools. It was partially interrupted by the military political crisis that Côte d’Ivoire experienced from 2002 to 2011, but more schools were created subsequently. However, Vahoua (2017) shows the complexity of the situation. Faced with the pedagogical innovation carried at arm’s length by teachers who are transferred to these posts by the state, the persistence of numerous structural and logistical deficiencies is undoubtedly due to weak political motivation. Several other literacy projects in national languages exist within formal education, such as the School and National Language in Africa initiative (École en langues nationales en Afrique – ELAN) piloted by the OIF, or within informal education. In traditional schools, teaching practices include a continual switching between standard or academic French and fluent Ivorian French. Parallel to the academic formulation of the theoretical content, the explanations, or at least a reformulation, are usually given to the students in Ivorian French (Kouamé 2013; Djé 2018). An important task of the teacher consists in helping pupils to distinguish between Nouchi or Ivorian French, which they use fluently, and standard French, which they have to acquire.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – The Ivorian general information press, in print as well as online, publishes mainly in French. There are sporadic articles or other journalistic texts in Ivorian languages, prevalently Nouchi. Some newspapers publish in Nouchi, such as the comic book journal Gbich! and other newspapers and media of the Gbich group and journals of other press groups such as Linfodrome, Monkiosk, and Mondialsport. Audiovisual media – The two public channels of the Ivorian Radio and Television (Radio Télévision Ivoirienne – RTI), RTI 1 and RTI 2, broadcast mainly in French. Programms aimed at a rural audience, advertisements, and interviews can give way to Ivorian languages. Nouchi is present in variety shows such as Showtime, C midi… The same observations can be made on the private New Ivorian Channel (Nouvelle Chaîne Ivoirienne – NCI), which started in 2019. Many other languages of the world are accessible on channels of the TNT encrypted television. Both radio chains of the RTI emit mainly in French. Radio Côte d’Ivoire, which targets elderly people, leaves little room for Ivorian languages, and Fréquence 2, which targets young people, presents several programmes in Nouchi. Private proximity radios follow the same strategy. Internet – On the internet, Ivorians mainly express themselves in French and Nouchi both in writing and in audiovisual media. We observe a revival of the valuation of Ivorian languages mainly through video clips.

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4 Linguistic characteristics The situation in Côte d’Ivoire prompts us to present not only French but also Nouchi as a variety of the mixed French typical of the country. The latter arises against the official variety of French that is generally qualified as the standard of Côte d’Ivoire since it admits a range of shapes much wider than the international standard. In the following subsections, we consider that the characteristics of international standard French, used in Côte d’Ivoire as elsewhere, are known; hence we will not recall them systematically.

4.1 Pronunciation Standard of Côte d’Ivoire – The standard of Côte d’Ivoire differs from the French or international standard on the phonological and phonetic levels, especially through additions, insofar as it has been stated that the standard of Côte d’Ivoire includes the international standard in its range of variation. According to the study by Boutin/Turcsan (2009, 137– 143) in Abidjan, the phonemic inventory presents several consonants and vowels in addition to all those of the international standard. The additional consonants are the double-articulated /kp/ and /ɡb/, for example, in the name of the culinary ingredient akpi or the local name for a mini-car gbaka, the affricates /tʃ/ and /dʒ/, the pre-nasalized /mb/, /nt/, /nd/ and /ŋg/, for example, in the name of the Mbatto ethnic group, the ntro sauce, the designation ndamance for a type of cow, or the patronymic N’Guessan. The additional vowels are the nasals /ĩ/ and /ũ/, the four classical nasal vowels in French being quite distinct, and the ten French oral vowels present. In phonetics, a first observation concerns the rhotic consonant, which admits a great variation between the apical zone and the velo-glottal zone [r, ɣ, ʁ, χ, ʕ, h] in the initial and internal position of a word, whereas it is rarely pronounced at the end of a syllable. However, the alveolar pronunciation [r] is predominant and the norm. The second observation is the great possibility of simplifying consonantal groups, especially liquids in coda position (multiplier [myltiplje], [mytiplje]) and final word consonants (ministre [ministrə], [minist], [minis]). Medium vowels are less dependent on the positional law than in the standard of France, insofar as the open-mid vowels /œ/ and /ɔ/ can be found at the end of a word in addition to /ɛ/, in particular, because the final is not pronounced. In this case, we observe a vocal lengthening (heure [œː], pécheur [pɛʃœː], or [ɔː]). The study by Boutin/Turcsan (2009, 148s.) also shows that a true schwa, as a central vowel that is always atone and can be elided, only exists in internal syllables where it is realized at a degree of 35 %. It is almost never realized at the end of words (97 %) and always realized in monosyllables (95 %) and at the beginning of words (97 %). In these two positions, the central vowel is as stable as any other vowel. The liaison follows current trends in international French: we do not observe any particularities with regard to compulsory liaison in any language style, and optional  

 

 

 

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links are more carried out in formal speaking and reading situations than in neat spontaneous speech. The prosody of the Ivorian standard differs from the international standard in three characteristics: The spoken chain is not always divided into phrases accented on the last syllable but into smaller groups, the accent is manifested by a high tone, and it can relate to the first syllable (certain proper nouns, acronyms…) or to grammatical words such as the determinants un ‘one’, leur ‘their’, the pronouns ceux ‘the ones’, eux ‘they’, and numerals. Nouchi – There is a variation in the pronunciation of Nouchi, which manifests its dual dependence on Ivorian French and Ivorian languages. Insofar as Nouchi does not include the French standard in its range of pronunciations, unlike the Ivorian standard, some of the elements of the international phonemic system are almost non-existent: the rounded vowels /y/, /œ/, and /ø/, the nasal vowel /œ̃ /, and the central vowel /ə/ tend to be realized as [i], [ɛ], and [e]. The rhotic consonant has the variation of the Ivorian standard without the velar realization of the French standard. In addition, one more step is taken concerning open-mid vowels: /ɔ/ can be found in the final position (not followed by a rhotic) in words like wôrô-wôrô [wɔrɔwɔrɔ] ‘municipal taxi at a fixed price’, and it is used to distinguish minimal pairs like chôcô [ʃɔkɔ] ‘to imitate the French accent’, and choco [ʃoko] ‘elegant’. High, low, medium and highpitched lexical tones extend to more or all words (Ahua 2007).8

4.2 Morphosyntax Standard of Côte d’Ivoire – The Ivorian standard admits a certain number of morphosyntactic peculiarities which, however, are not strictly speaking specific to the Ivorian standard when considered one by one since they can be shared with other French-speaking areas. They have been abundantly described, initially by Kouadio N’Guessan (1999). The examples we propose here are neither exhaustive nor definitive. In writing, there are some features that concern verbal and nominal syntax, and subordination. Many transitive verbs admit a double possibility of construction, either direct or prepositional, with the repercussion on the complement pronouns, such as for example importer quelqu’un instead of importer à quelqu’un (i) or exiger quelque chose à quelqu’un instead of exiger quelque chose de quelqu’un (ii–iii): (i)

“La confidentialité des communications de leurs usagers est ce qui les importe”.9

8 In our opinion, these are real lexical tones, unlike what is stated by the author who considers it important to note “the phonetic transcription of the raising and lowering of the voice on the vowelsˮ, but paradoxically specifies that “it does not have anything to do with tones” (Ahua 2007, 186). 9 ‘The confidentiality of the communications of their users is what matters [to] them’ (Boutin 2003, 22).

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(ii) “L’entêtement des responsables de ces établissements à exiger la rame de papier à chaque élève”.10 (iii) “Ce qui leur exige d’aller dans d’autres villes”.11

In addition, the lack of supplementation for transitive verbs is always possible when the complement is semantically restorable by the context, or it is generic, as in peiner instead of peiner à faire quelque chose (iv): (iv) “Même si ses irrespects, ingratitudes et dires avaient trop peiné pour que le cœur immédiatement se refroidisse”.12

The pronouns en ‘in’ and y ‘there’ in particular are easily omitted, as in (v) and (vi): (v) “Je suis encore à me demander [...] si le Centenaire ne les avait pas tous ignorés”.13 (vi) “Comment ces Parisiens étranges se prennent pour courir sans s’essouffler”.14

In the syntax of the noun, the determinant le/les ‘the’ (singular and plural) can introduce a new noun phrase (Knutsen 2007, 154s.), a disease name (faire la toux, la fièvre, le palu ‘having the cough, the fever, the malaria’), a weekday (vii–viii), or a period of the day (ix): (vii) “La Princesse Anne quittera notre pays le mercredi matin”.15 (viii) “Depuis le mardi dernier, Abidjan vit au fil des pages”.16 (ix) “Elle a eu cours le matin”.17

Among the facts evoked in Boutin (2008) concerning the syntax of the subordination, one can point out the extension of verbs admitting a completive, as réitérer with complement instead of réitérer (x), as well as the possible absence of the preposition de after certain verbs constructed with an infinitive complement, like prévoir instead of prévoir de or ambitionner instead of ambitionner de (xi–xii): (x)

“Nous avons rencontré Mme le secrétaire général et lui avons réitéré qu’il faut affirmer l’élection d’un président par la production des documents exigés”.18

10 ‘The stubbornness of those in charge of these establishments in demanding a ream of paper from each pupil’ (Boutin 2003, 21). 11 ‘What requires them to go to other cities’ (Boutin 2003, 21). 12 ‘Even if his disrespects, ingratitudes and sayings were too painful for the heart to immediately cool down’ (Kourouma 1990, 206). 13 ‘I am still wondering [...] if the Centenary had not ignored them all’ (Kourouma 1990, 177). 14 ‘How these strange Parisians manage to run without running out of steam’ (Dadié 1959, 20). 15 ‘Princess Anne will leave our country on [the] Wednesday morning’ (Boutin 2002, 273). 16 ‘Since [the] last Tuesday, Abidjan has been living through the pages’ (Boutin 2002, 274). 17 ‘She had lessons in the morning’ (Boutin 2002, 272). 18 ‘We met the secretary general and reiterated that we must affirm the election of a president by the production of the required documents’ (Boutin 2008, 71).

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(xi) “Prévoyez-vous emmener des artistes ivoiriens pour se produire aux Etats-Unis?”19 (xii) “Ce mouvement ambitionne mobiliser les Ivoiriens”.20

Orally, the ne ‘not’ is more often maintained than in international standard, even if the current tendency, shared in all French-speaking spaces, to non-realization in lexicalized sequences is also observed: faut pas, c’est pas, (il) y a pas, je pense pas, je sais pas (Lyche 2013). Nouchi – Nouchi is most stable at the morphosyntactic level because it participates in the grammar of popular Ivorian French (as described by Ploog 2002). Certain features of the Ivorian standard are present there, as well as others much more distant from the international standard. In the morphology of the verb, we report a clear extension of the analytical conjugation and an abandonment of the synthetic conjugation (Ahua 2008, 139–142; Boutin 2021, 164ss.). In Nouchi, verbs appear with their marks of persons and of verbal tenses from French, but with a fixed verbal form: je/tu/il/on/vous/ils kouman for the verb kouman ‘to speak’ in the present tense, je/tu/il/on/vous/ils dabassè for the verb daba ‘to eat’ in the imperfect or durative past, j’ai/tu as/il a béou for the verb béou ‘to leave’ in the past tense, je vais/tu vas/il va bacrô for the verb bacrô ‘to sleep’ in the future or intentional, or j’allais/tu allais faroté for the verb faroté ‘to show off’ in the periphrastic conditional. In the syntax of the noun, we note the frequent absence of a determinant (J’ai vu fire ‘I had problems, (lit.) I saw a fire’, Ahua 2008, 145), adverbs like là, même, aussi postponed to a noun phrase with a focusing role (Go là est devant ‘this/the girl is courageous, has no fear’, Ahua 2008, 147), ça/c’ in anaphora of a defined noun phrase or for a human referent (C’est go de qui ça? ‘Whose girlfriend is that?’, Ahua 2008, 146), and the epicene character of adjectives or the lack of agreement in gender for adjectives coming from French. In the syntax of the subordination, one can note the frequent absence of the relative subordinator (C’est moi j’ai gbungbran ‘It is I who has acted’, Le gars tu as monmon te dindin ‘The guy you have robbed is watching you’, Ahua 2008, 145). In addition, enunciative particles and prosodic morphemes like tones or lengthenings play the role of modelizers that certain adverbs have in standard French: Go là est kap deh [enunciative particle]! ‘This young girl is so beautiful!’ (Ahua 2008, 146), Drogba est rououge [lengthening] “Drogba is very strong” (Boutin 2021, 171).

4.3 Lexicon Standard of Côte d’Ivoire – Many words in the Ivorian standard date from the colonial era and are shared in French-speaking African spaces: banco ‘clay mixture used for

19 ‘Do you plan [to] take Ivorian artists to perform in the United States?’ (Boutin 2008, 75) 20 ‘This movement aims [to] mobilize Ivorians’ (Boutin 2008, 75).

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house construction’, boy ‘housekeeper’, canari ‘pottery’, concession ‘group of houses with a common courtyard’, fétiche ‘mystical-magic rite’, pagne or wax ‘2-yard cotton canvas printed with wax’. Other words are more specifically Ivorian through their cultural markings, but also extend beyond the borders: agouti ‘rodent highly prized for its flesh’, attiéké ‘manioc-based dish’, aloko ‘fried-plantains-based dish’, or apatam ‘round shelter, usually with a straw roof’. Some words from standard French have undergone a semantic change in Côte d’Ivoire, such as gros mot ‘rare or pedantic word’ instead of ‘dirty word’, dot ‘symbolic compensation offered by the future husband to the bride’s family’ instead of ‘dowry’, and piqûre ‘insect bite’, which lost the meaning ‘injection’ and has been replaced in this meaning by injection ‘injection’. Nouchi – The Nouchi lexicon has been described extensively (e. g., Ahua 2006; Kouadio N’Guessan 2006; Atsé N’Cho 2016). It changes very quickly and is particularly unstable, which clearly demonstrates the slang role of Nouchi. What is stable, however, are the types of changes carried out on French and the African or European source languages. They are common to all young slangs and current mixed urban dialects. First of all, Nouchi presents several borrowings, like enjailler ‘to satisfy, to please’ (< En. enjoy ‘to get pleasure from’), bôrô ‘lots, too much’ (< Dyula bɔrɔ ‘bag’), blô ‘being smart, showing off’ (< Baoulé blɔ ‘show off’), and lalé ‘phone’ (< Bete lale ‘to call’). It also shows affix hybridizations, as in vagabonya ‘wandering’ (< Fr. vagabond + Dyula nominal suffix -ya ‘state of being’, cf. Boutin/Dodo 2018), kpatali ‘beauty’ (< Baulé kpata ‘beautiful, pretty’ + Dyula nominal suffix ‑li), and décrou ‘show, discover’ (< Dyula kúru ‘to hide, to put down’ + Fr. privative prefix dé‑, cf. Boutin 2021, 164). Furthermore, verlanizations like in Poy city ‘Yopougon (a municipality in Abidjan)’ as well as onomatopoeic creations like gbomgbo ‘gun, shooter’ can be observed (cf. Ahua 2006, 144). Finally, changes of meaning can be noted, as in gbagbo ‘little towel’ and gbagboter ‘to walk a long way’, derived from Laurent Koudou Gbagbo, a former Ivorian president, who, while in opposition, wore a towel around his neck to lead long peaceful marches, Liverpool ‘banknote worth 1000 francs CFA’, alluding to the Liverpool football club team, because of the red colour of the banknotes and jerseys, tchatcho ‘to practice depigmentation’, derived from a song title of the creator of the Congolese rumba Koffi Olomidé who wrote a song of this name and underwent depigmentation himself, and the name of the tropical, colourful bird toraco/touraco coming to mean ‘banknote worth 10,000 francs CFA’ because two turacos are shown on the back of the banknote (cf. Boutin/ Dodo 2018, 64).  

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism The language question in Côte d’Ivoire is a paradoxical subject. On the one hand, French has been totally appropriated by the population for decades, and the French of Côte

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d’Ivoire has an identity role to such an extent that a certain linguistic purism is observable in some writings, as in the novels of Bernard Dadié of the years 1950: ‘[…] by dint of hearing “my commander, him there has said his wife he got a child”, “me, there’s no way I see Pernod”, for “my commander, he says his wife gave birth”, “I don’t see Pernod”, many Europeans had ended up with nerves on edge’.21

On the other hand, the frustration of not having an official African language remains. The population compensates for this by taking some liberties in the use of French, in which they can recognize themselves. The same holds for highest state authorities and the greatest Ivorian writers. Ahmadou Kourouma expresses a very well-known and representative position in an interview with Moncef Badday in 1970: ‘I adopt the language to the African narrative rhythm. No more. Realizing that classical French was a straitjacket that I had to overcome … This book is intended for Africans. I thought it out in Malinke and wrote in French, taking a liberty that I consider natural with the classical language… What had I done? Simply given free rein to my temperament by distorting a classical language too rigid for my thoughts to move in it. S. I translated Malinke into French, breaking French to find and restore the African rhythm’.22

The influence of African languages, far from being criticized, is the compensation taken on the constraint of French: ‘[It] is a very Ivorian habit to “twist the neck” of French words and phrases to adapt them to the communication needs of a heterogeneous population deprived of a real African vehicle both at the scale of the country itself and of a cosmopolitan city like Abidjan’.23

Among certain linguists, teachers, and public speaking professionals, there are regular demands for the recognition of Ivorian French, which is the weakness in the country’s language policy. As in other French-speaking African countries, the state is still far from creating its own institutions to supervise French, although academies or other regulatory institutions for international African languages exist in African countries. Nouchi,

21 “[…] à force d’entendre ‘ma commandant, lui y a dit son femme il a gagné petit’, ‘moi, y a pas moyen miré Pernod’, pour ‘mon commandant, il dit que sa femme a accouché’, ‘je ne vois pas le Pernod’, nombreux étaient les Européens qui avaient fini par avoir les nerfs à fleur de peau” (Dadié [1982] 1953, 115). 22 “J’adopte la langue au rythme narratif africain. Sans plus. M’étant aperçu que le français classique constituait un carcan qu’il me fallait dépasser… Ce livre s’adresse à l’Africain. Je l’ai pensé en malinké et écrit en français en prenant une liberté que j’estime naturelle avec la langue classique… Qu’avais-je donc fait? Simplement donné libre cours à mon tempérament en distordant une langue classique trop rigide pour que ma pensée s’y meuve. J’ai donc traduit le malinké en français, en cassant le français pour trouver et restituer le rythme africain” (Badday 1970, 2). 23 “[C]’est une habitude bien ivoirienne de ‘tordre le cou’ aux mots et aux phrases français pour les adapter aux besoins de communication d’une population hétérogène privée d’un véritable véhiculaire africain tant à l’échelle du pays lui-même qu’à celle d’une ville cosmopolite comme Abidjan” (Kouadio N’Guessan 2006, 177).

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still a very unstable mixed-ethnic slang, symbolically carries the hopes of the Ivorian society to one day have a language of its own which expresses both the unity of the country in its diversity and the autonomy taken from the European language.

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Van den Avenne (2017) sheds light on the forms of French from the early pre-colonial times and from the colonial era. In 1904, the deputy colonial administrator Maurice Delafosse devoted almost three pages to the “little negro” in his work, unique at the time. The skirmishers’ French is also known through the anonymous 35-page document published by the Universal Military Printing Office (s.a. 1916), intended for trainers of the Senegalese skirmishers. From its creation in 1966, the Institute of Applied Linguistics (Institut de Linguistique Appliquée – ILA) of Abidjan has truly honoured its mission of describing African languages and French in Côte d’Ivoire. An abundant and almost exhaustive scientific work was carried out, and books of initiation to African languages were marketed. For French, linguistic and literary studies are very numerous. Lafage (2002–2003) is, to date, the most enlightening work on the Ivorian lexicon. It not only contains peculiarities attested by learned speakers but also includes items from a wide diastratic and diaphasic range, assessed by a jury competent for each style, and items that transcend national borders. Subsequently, an Ivorian team from the ILA built the Côte d’Ivoire lexicographical database at the initiative of Jérémie Kouadio N’Guessan and under the responsibility of Koia Jean-Martial Kouamé, within the large project of the Panfrancophone Lexicographical Database (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone – BDLP, BDLPCI). However, it has been difficult so far to conceive the edition of grammar books or dictionaries of the Ivorian standard as long as it does not enjoy any official recognition, although it does exist de facto. The very different social position of Nouchi, on the contrary, encourages the publication of all types of dictionaries (Kadi 2017), websites (cf. WGL 2021, available since 2000, and more ephemeral ones), and illustrations of the language24 in various media.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – Like writers, French public-speaking professionals make use of the various formal characteristics of the standard language described above. This French is the one considered adequate for formal situations, perceived as

24 In the sense of Deffence et Illustration de la langue française ‘Defense and Illustration of the French language’ (1549) by Joachim Du Bellay in France.

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the official reference of the country, and the standard speakers want to follow in a situation that requires it. The Ivorian standard is precisely that of the public authorities. Since Félix Houphouët-Boigny, no president has manifested a communion with French literary culture in his language. The people prefer, in political speeches, the Ivorian way of using the language to beautiful expressions and rare words. Moreover, it is not uncommon for the highest state authorities or politicians to use popular French or Nouchi at times in certain speeches since President Gbagbo. Variety used in education – In schools, the difficulty for teachers is to teach an exogenous standard of which they do not always even perceive the outlines, given the pressure exerted by the standard of Côte d’Ivoire. The acquisition of this standard by the pupils takes a certain time because of the competition between popular French and Nouchi outside academic and strictly formal situations; it is rare for students to access it before high school. Variety used in the media – Finally, the media players perform standard Ivorian French in their own style. In addition, some broadcasts are mainly in Nouchi. Variety used in literature – The first Ivorian writers (François Joseph Amon d’Aby, Marius Ano N’Guessan) devoted themselves to writing oral literature through the mediation of French. With a few rare exceptions of bilingual editions, written Ivorian literature is entirely in French. This French precisely illustrates the standard of Côte d’Ivoire. Kouassi (2007) analyses in this way the grammatical, syntactic, lexical, and aesthetic forms of the first three great Ivorian writers, Bernard Dadié, Ahmadou Kourouma, and Jean-Marie Adiaffi. In the same vein, later writers such as Maurice Bandaman, Paul Yao Akoto, Tanella Boni, Micheline Coulibaly, Isaïe Biton Koulibaly, or Véronique Tadjo are aware of the exemplary role of their texts and strive to offer Ivorian readers a language they can identify with.

References ACI = Ministère du plan de Côte d’Ivoire (1972), Atlas de Côte d’Ivoire, Abidjan, ORSTOM/Université d’Abidjan. Ahua, Mouchi Blaise (2006), La motivation dans les créations lexicales en nouchi, Le français en Afrique 21, 143– 157. Ahua, Mouchi Blaise (2007), Élaborer un code graphique pour le nouchi: une initiative précoce?, Le français en Afrique 22, 183–198. Ahua, Mouchi Blaise (2008), Mots, phrases et syntaxe du nouchi, Le français en Afrique 23, 135–150. Atger, Paul (1960), Les comptoirs fortifiés de la Côte d’Ivoire (1843–1871), Outre-Mers. Revue d’histoire 168–169, 427–474. Atsé N’Cho, Jean-Baptiste (2016), Francophonie ivoirienne et créativité lexicale: comment fabrique-t-on les mots en nouchi?, in: Rachele Raus/Laurentiu Bala (edd.), Sur l’argot au XXIe siècle, Craiova, Universitaria Craiova, 93–109. Badday, Moncef S. (1970), Ahmadou Kourouma, écrivain africain, L’Afrique littéraire et artistique 10, 2–8. BDLP = Claude Poirier et al. (edd.) (2001–2014), Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone, Quebec/ Paris, TLFQ/AUF, http://www.bdlp.org (2/3/2023).

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BDLP-CI = Koia Jean-Martial Kouamé (2008), BDLP Côte d’Ivoire, in: Claude Poirier et al. (edd.) (2011–2014), Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone, Quebec/Paris, TLFQ/AUF, https://www.bdlp.org/base/C% C3%B4te%20d%27Ivoire (2/3/2023). Binger, Le Capitaine [Louis-Gustave] (1892), Du Niger au golfe de Guinée par le pays de Kong et le Mossi (1887– 1898), 2 vol., Paris, Hachette. Boni, Mel/Traore, Adama (2012), Aux origines de la domination française en Côte d’Ivoire: les traités de protectorat, Abidjan, Association Kemetmaat, https://dyabukam.com/index.php/fr/savoir/histoire/item/1 83-aux-origines-de-la-domination-francaise-en-cote-d-ivoire-les-traites-de-protectorat (2/3/2023). Boukari, Oumarou (2017), Côte d’Ivoire et Burkina Faso, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 476–507. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2002), Description de la variation: Études transformationnelles des phrases du français de Côte d’Ivoire, Villeneuve d’Ascq, Presses Universitaires du Septentrion. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2003), La variation dans la construction verbale en français de Côte d’Ivoire, Revue Québécoise de Linguistique 32/2, 15–45. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2008), Norme endogène ivoirienne et subordination, in: Sylvie Wharton/Claudine Bavoux/Lambert-Félix Prudent (edd.), Normes endogènes et plurilinguisme, Lyon, École Normale Supérieure, 61–84. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2017), La résistance du plurilinguisme à Abidjan, in: Augustin E. Ebongue/Ellen Hurst (edd.), Sociolinguistics in African Contexts: Perspectives and Challenges, Cham, Springer International, 13–33. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2021), Exploring Hybridity in Ivorian French and Nouchi, in: Ellen Hurst-Harosh/Raj Mesthrie (edd.), Youth language varieties in African urban centres, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 159–181. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Dodo, Jean-Claude (2018), View on the Updating of Nouchi Lexicon and Expressions, in: Ellen Hurst-Harosh/Fridah Kanana Erastus (edd.), African Youth Languages. New Media, Performing Arts and Sociolinguistic Development, London, Palgrave Macmillan, 48–65. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Gadet, Françoise (2012), Comment ce que montrent les français d’Afrique s’inscrit/ne s’inscrit pas dans les dynamiques des français dans une perspective de francophonie, Le français en Afrique 27, 19–34. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Kouadio N’Guessan, Jérémie (2013), Citoyenneté et politique linguistique en Côte d’Ivoire, Revue Française de Linguistique Appliquée 18/2, 121–133. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Kouadio N’Guessan, Jérémie (2016), Abidjan, une métropole de plus en plus francophone?, Le français en Afrique 30, 173–186. Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Turcsan, Gabor (2009), La prononciation du français en Afrique: la Côte d’Ivoire, in: Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks/Chantal Lyche (edd.), Phonologie, variation et accents du français, Paris, Hermès, 131–152. C-CI = Présidence de la République (2016), Constitution de la République de Côte d’Ivoire du 8 novembre 2016, Abidjan, République de Côte d’Ivoire, http://www.caidp.ci/uploads/52782e1004ad2bbfd4d17dbf1 c33384f.pdf (2/3/2023). Chauveau, Jean-Pierre (2017), Autochtonie nomade et État frontière. Conflit et post conflit en Côte d’Ivoire au prisme de la question agraire, unpublished manuscript. Dadié, Bernard Bilin (1959), Un nègre à Paris, Paris, Présence africaine. Dadié, Bernard Bilin (1982 [1953]), Climbié, Légendes africaines, Paris, Seghers. Delafosse, Maurice (1904), Vocabulaires comparatifs de plus de 60 langues ou dialectes parlés à la Côte d’Ivoire et dans les régions limitrophes avec des notes linguistiques et ethnologiques, une bibliographie et une carte, Paris, Leroux. Désalmand, Paul (1983), Histoire de l’éducation en Côte d’Ivoire, Abidjan, CEDA. Diao-Klaeger, Sabine (2015), Le français dans le monde: Afrique, in: Claudia Polzin-Haumann/Wolfgang Schweickard (edd.), Manuel de linguistique française, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 505–524. Djé, Adjoua Valérie (2018), La question des normes: français académique et français de Côte d’Ivoire dans les interactions verbales en classe, in: Laurent Puren/Bruno Maurer (edd.), La crise de l’apprentissage en Afrique

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francophone subsaharienne. Regards croisés sur la didactique des langues et les pratiques enseignantes, Bern, Lang, 55–71. Hammarström, Harald, et al. (edd.) (2023), Glottolog 4.7, Jena, Max-Planck-Institut, https://glottolog.org/about (2/3/2023). Kadi, Germain-Arsène (2017), Le nouchi de Côte d’Ivoire. Dictionnaire et anthologie. Plus de 1000 mots et expressions usuels, Paris, L’Harmattan. Knutsen, Anne Moseng (2007), Variation du français à Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire). Étude d’un continuum linguistique et social, Oslo, Université d’Oslo, Doctoral Thesis. Kouadio N’Guessan, Jérémie (1999), Quelques traits morphosyntaxiques du français écrit en Côte d’Ivoire, Langues 2/4, 301–314. Kouadio N’Guessan, Jérémie (2006), Le nouchi et les rapports dioula/français, Le français en Afrique 21, 177–191. Kouadio N’Guessan, Jérémie (2008), Le français en Côte d’Ivoire: de l’imposition à l’appropriation décomplexée d’une langue exogène, Documents pour l’histoire du français langue étrangère ou seconde 40/41, 179–197. Kouamé, Koia Jean-Martial (2007), Les langues ivoiriennes entrent en classe, Intertext 3–4, 99–106. Kouamé, Koia Jean-Martial (2013), Les classes ivoiriennes entre monolinguisme de principe et plurilinguisme de fait, in: Danielle Omer/Frédéric Tupin (edd.), Éducations plurilingues. L’aire francophone entre héritages et innovations, Rennes, Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 167–179. Kouassi Kouamé, Germain (2007), Le phénomène de l’appropriation linguistique et esthétique en littérature africaine de langue française. Le cas des écrivains ivoiriens: Dadie, Kourouma et Adiaffi, Paris, Publibook. Kourouma, Ahmadou (1990), Monnè, outrages et défis, Paris, Seuil. Lafage, Suzanne (1996), La Côte d’Ivoire: une appropriation nationale du français?, in: Didier de Robillard/Michel Beniamino (edd.), Le français dans l’espace francophone, vol. 2, Geneva, Champion, 587–602. Lafage, Suzanne (2002–2003), Le lexique français de Côte d’Ivoire, appropriation et créativité, Le Français en Afrique 16/17, 226–229. Law 584 = Gouvernement de Côte d’Ivoire (1977), Loi du 18 août 1977 n° 77-584 portant réforme de l’enseignement, Abidjan, République de Côte d’Ivoire. Lyche, Chantal (2013), Schwa et présence de la particule négative “ne” dans quelques français d’Afrique, Arena Romanistica 13, 236–261. OECD (2006), Atlas de l’intégration régionale en Afrique de l’Ouest. Les langues, Paris, Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, https://www.oecd.org/fr/csao/publications/38410200. pdf (2/3/2023). OIF (2019), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2019, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Ploog, Katja (2002), Le français à Abidjan. Pour l’approche syntaxique du non-standard, Paris, CNRS. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. s.a. (1916), Le français tel que le parlent nos tirailleurs sénégalais, Paris, Imprimerie Militaire Universelle L. Fournier. Sanaker, John Kristian/Holter, Karin/Skattum, Ingse (2006), La francophonie: une introduction critique, Oslo, Unipub forlag Oslo Academic Press. Vahoua, Kallet Abréam (2017), Le projet école intégrée (PEI) en Côte d’Ivoire: quel bilan après plus d’une décennie de fonctionnement?, Revue Ivoirienne des Sciences du Langage et de la Communication 9, 282–298. Van den Avenne, Cécile (2017), De la bouche même des indigènes. Échanges linguistiques en Afrique coloniale, Paris, Vendémiaire. WB (2018), United Nations Population Division. World Urbanization Prospects, Washington, World Bank, https:// data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.URB.TOTL.IN.ZS?locations=CI (2/3/2023). WGL 2021 = Ahouassa, Daniel (2021), Nouchi.com, Casablanca, Weblogy, http://www.nouchi.com/dico/ (2/3/ 2023).

Silke Jansen

12 Guinea Abstract: This chapter gives an overview of the history, development, and current status of French in Guinea, both from an external and internal point of view. Three phases can be distinguished within the history of French in Guinea: firstly, the implementation phase (nineteenth century to 1958), when French was introduced through the colonial apparatus and the educational system, secondly, the restriction phase under the First Republic (1958–1984), during which President Sékou Touré’s postcolonial language policies limited the use of French and promoted national languages in the educational sector and the media, and thirdly, the consolidation phase under the Second Republic (since 1984), that has seen the reversal of Touré’s policies and the reinvigoration of French as the only language of education. Currently, French is in expansion, progressively taking over the vernacular function traditionally performed by the three main national languages Pular, Maninka, and Susu. At the same time, French as spoken in Guinea is characterized by high variability. A national standard does not exit, and informal local norms are still in an emerging state. Keywords: French, Guinea, sociolinguistics, language policy, language contact

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages Guinea is a multilingual country. Depending on how they are counted, between 20 and 40 African languages, generally referred to as “national languages”, are spoken in the national territory (cf. Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 8s.; A.M. Diallo 2004, 17; Benson/Lynd 2011, 116, 122; Leclerc 2015; INS 2017a). The national languages listed by the INS (2017a, 86) include the three vehicular languages Pular, Maninka (Malinké), and Susu (Soso), as well as Badyara (Badiaranké), Baga, Bassari, Jahanka (Diakanka), Kissi, Kono, Konyanka (Koniaka), Kpelle (Kpèlè), Kuranko (Kouranko), Landoma (Landouma), Lele (Lélé), Manya (Tomamania), Mann (Mano), Mixifore (Mikiforè), Nalu (Nalou), Soninke (Maraka or Sarakolé), Toma, Wamey (Koniagui), and Yalunka (Dialonké).1 Most of them be-

1 Language naming is a sensitive issue in the African context because “official” language names were often imposed by colonial authorities and do not necessarily reflect local people’s perceptions (cf. A.M. Diallo 1998, 124s., for language names in Guinea). The language denominations chosen are according to Glottologue. In case the local denominations differ from the technical terms used in Glottologue, the denominations used in INS for the Guinean context are shown in parentheses. For Eastern Maninkakan, an academic term that refers to an ensemble of closely related languages and dialects which extends beyond https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-012

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long to the West Atlantic branch and the Mande branch of the Niger-Congo family (A. M. Diallo 1999, 10s.; Leclerc 2015; A. Diallo 2021, 66s.). With a few exceptions in the regions of Kindia, de Faranah, and Nzérékoré, West Atlantic languages are concentrated in the western, and Mande languages in the eastern part of the country. The most prevalent national languages are Pular from the West Atlantic group, and Maninka and Susu from the Mande group. According to the last census, 34,6 % of the Guinean population use Pular as their main language, while 24,9 % attribute this function to Maninka, and 17,7 % to Susu (INS 2017a, 85).2 The rest of the languages are spoken as main languages by less than 5 % of the population each (Leclerc 2015; INS 2017a, 85). No national language covers the whole territory of the country (A.M. Diallo 1998, 118; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 9; Bague 2002, 58). French and Arabic serve as supra-regional languages for the purposes of literacy and education. Since colonial times, Guinea has been considered to be divided into four “natural” or “geographical” regions, known as Maritime Guinea (Guinée maritime), Middle Guinea (Moyenne Guinée), Upper Guinea (Haute Guinée), and Forested Guinea (Guinée forestière, from the West to the East, cf. Goerg 2011). None of these regions are ethnically or linguistically homogeneous (Diakhaby 2017, 127), but each of them is associated with one national language that serves as the preferred lingua franca for interethnic communication. Pular has a vehicular function in Middle Guinea, Susu in the coastal regions of Maritime Guinea (also known as Lower Guinea or Basse Guinée), and Maninka in the region of Upper Guinea (Perrin 1988, 15s.; Sylla 1997, 145; Leclerc 2015; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 9; Bague 2002, 58; A.M. Diallo 2004, 17; A. Diallo 2014). In Forested Guinea, Kissi (West Atlantic), Toma, and Kpelle (both Mande) are the most widely used languages (Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 9; Diakhaby 2017, 19). The high degree of linguistic fragmentation in Forested Guinea promotes the use of French as a vehicular language (A.M. Diallo 2004, 20). Other lesserused languages spoken in the country include West Atlantic languages, such as Wamey, Baga, or Landoma, and Mande languages, such as, e. g., Kono. These languages are located in peripherical areas, mainly in the area bordering with Guinea-Bissau and Senegal, in the region along the coast, and in the forested mountain area in the SouthEast of the country (cf. Leclerc 2015). There seems to be a general tendency for speakers of lesser-used languages, especially in Forested Guinea, to migrate to the urban re 

 

 

 

 

the Guinean national territory, we hereafter use the term Maninka, which corresponds better to the Guinean context. 2 The census asked for the ‘main language spoken’ (“principale langue parlée”), a phrase which leaves open if the language was learned as a first or a second language. It is important to note that in postcolonial Africa, surveys can only provide a rough and simplified picture of the linguistic situation: multilingualism in various degrees and constellations is the norm, and ethnical boundaries are often based on social representations rather than on cultural or linguistic traits (Diakhaby 2017, 128). Linguistic and ethnic divisions may be influenced by colonial constructions and discourses (Goerg 2011; Diakhaby 2017, 116). These difficulties explain why Diallo (1991, 40s.), Leclerc (2015), and Diakhaby (2017) give other, although not completely different numbers.

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gions. This, together with increasingly negative attitudes towards their traditional languages, contributes to shifting to one of the three main national languages (Perrin 1988, 16; L.P. Diallo 1991, 270; A. Diallo 2014, 33; Diakhaby 2017, 131; A. Diallo 2021, 80s.). In the border regions to Senegal, Mali, Côte d’Ivoire, and Sierra Leone, some segments of the population also speak the neighbouring countries’ languages Wolof, Bambara, Dyula, and Krio (A.M. Diallo 2004, 19). The inhabitants of Guinea’s capital Conakry, located in Maritime Guinea, have traditionally been speakers of Susu (A. Diallo 2021, 79). While 37 % of Conakry inhabitants still use Susu as their main language, the capital also hosts speakers of Pular (34 %) and of other national languages as a consequence of internal migrations (INS 2017a; cf. also Leclerc 2015; A.M. Diallo 1999, 24; MEC 1979, 16). Speakers of lesser-used national languages use them in family contexts and tend to cluster together within the same communities in Conakry and other Guinean cities (cf. Hamidy Bah 2010, 344; A. Diallo 2021, 74ss.), leading to the formation of linguistic enclaves within an otherwise mainly Susu speaking area (A. Diallo 2013, 263s.; cf. L.P. Diallo 1991, 265s.). However, in contrast to the 1980s, linguistically homogeneous or even monolingual communities can barely be found in today’s Conakry, and Susu is losing its vernacular function to French (A. Diallo 2021, 76, 79s.). Because of its direct link to school enrolment and skilled work, the use of French has always been relatively widespread in Conakry in comparison to particularly rural areas (Perrin 1988, 94, 113s.; A.M. Diallo 1999, 25; A. Diallo 2013, 263), and French continues to gain new speakers, especially among young people (A. Diallo 2021).  

 

1.2 Social distribution of languages Virtually all Guineans are speakers of at least one national language, and most of them are bi- or multilingual. There are comparatively few speakers of French, who are typically members of the urban educated elite (Ploog 2007, 169). Generally, people acquire one (or more) of the national languages as their first language(s) and learn other national languages, and sometimes French and/or Arabic, as second languages (Perrin 1988, 15; Bague 2002, 65; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 119; A.M. Diallo 2004, 17; Benson/Lynd 2011, 113s.; Leclerc 2015). National languages are generally learned in informal contexts, for example in the urban centres’ neighbourhoods (A. Diallo 2021, 79). National languages dominate everyday life. The regional vehicular languages Pular, Maninka, and Susu are used in (semi‑)public domains, such as in shops, at sporting events, and in the workplace, but also, often alongside French, in conversations with teachers and representatives of public administration, at the post office or bank, and in interactions with the police (Perrin 1988, 117; A. Diallo 2013; Rozendaal 2017, 19). They enjoy a near-monopoly status (“quasi-monopole”, A. Diallo 2013, 260) in the marketplace, where speakers of different languages come together for informal communication. French is used only if no local language is available as lingua franca, or as an ethnically unmarked choice, in comparison to the local vehicular language. Lesser-used national

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languages are often restricted to local contexts or interactions with close family members and friends (cf. A. Diallo 2013, 260–263). While A. Diallo laments that “the local languages are actually excluded from actions concerning public life (education, parliament, court orders, etc.)” (2014, 32), Leclerc characterizes language use in Guinea as strategic multilingualism (“multilinguisme de stratégie”, 2015): the public apparatus is generally supposed to function only in French, but national languages are indeed used in public services, at least in oral conversations, depending on the goals and needs of the people involved. The language of the president (e. g., Maninka for Ahmed Sékou Touré, Susu for Lansana Conté) is often considered to be “the unofficial second language of the government” and is likely to become the preferred urban lingua franca (A. Diallo 2014, 22; cf. also Ploog 2007, 176). French, the country’s official language according to the constitution (cf. 3.1), is used in documents published by public authorities, in education, and in other formal contexts but has played only a minor role in the daily life of most Guineans, especially outside the urban centres. The last census does not even list French among the languages Guinean people use as main languages (INS 2017a, 86; cf. also the numbers given in Perrin 1988, 101ss.). It is traditionally considered to be the language used at school and the language which allows social advancement and international communication, especially in the West African context (Perrin 1988, 23; A. Diallo 2021, 82). In recent times, however, French is rapidly gaining ground, particularly in the capital: According to a recent survey by the Observatory of the French language (OLF, 2), 64 % of the adults and even 80 % of the adolescents living in Conakry use French as their main language. Internal migration operates as a motor for this development: people who move to the capital from other regions of the country are increasingly likely to learn French instead of the former vernacular Susu (A. Diallo 2021, 72s.). While earlier studies on linguistic attitudes reported that the regional vernacular is generally preferred over French (A.M. Diallo 2004), recent investigations indicate that national languages are more intimately linked to affection and personal and national identity than French, but a higher instrumental value is attributed to the official language (Rozendaal 2017, 28). This is directly reflected in speakers’ higher readiness to transmit French to their children, in comparison to national and even international languages such as English or Arabic (A. Diallo 2021, 82; OLF, 8). The exact proportion of French speakers in Guinea is unknown. Generally, it is considered to be rather small in comparison to other former French colonies in Western Africa due to linguistic policies in favour of national languages during the First Republic (1958–1984; cf. 3 and A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 118s.; 1999, 14; L.P. Diallo 1991, 47; Ploog 2007). Leclerc (2015) estimates that between 15 % and 25 % of Guineans speak French, a number roughly confirmed by calculations that were carried out by the Demographic and Statistic Observatory of the French-speaking area, according to which 25,43 % of the Guinean population is francophone (Beck et al. 2018, 42s.). This proportion approximately corresponds to literacy and enrolment rates, which have been used in earlier times as indicators to estimate the number of French speakers in the country (Perrin 1988, 126ss.). How 

 

 

 

 

 

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ever, given the high amount of speakers who learn French as a second language and master it to different degrees, these numbers should be treated with caution, as they essentially depend on who should actually count as a speaker of French. According to the few surveys available, the majority of francophone Guineans, 82 % according to Perrin (1988, 108–198) and 58 %, according to A.M. Diallo (2004, 28), have learned French primarily in school. Proficiency and use of French correlate with the level of education (cf. Bague 2002, 64; Kashema/Barry 2002, 122; cf. also Perrin 1988, 25), and is more widespread in urban than in rural areas (A.M. Diallo 1999, 25; cf. also Rozendaal 2017, 26). Only a small minority of Guineans have learned French as a first language – nobody in Perrin’s survey (1988, 101ss.) and only 1 % according to A.M. Diallo (2004, 19). Knowledge and practice of French is directly linked to the ability to read and/or write, abilities which are scarce, particularly in rural areas. Only 32 % of the country’s adolescent and adult population is literate, with 55,4 % in urban versus 17,6 % in rural areas (INS 2017b, 123; cf. also the numbers given in INS 2017a for different regions within the country). Today, the overwhelming majority of literates (at least 80 %, in some regions even over 90 %) read and write only in a “foreign language”, i.e. in French (INS 2017b, 140). Likewise, Rozendaal (2017, 24) reports that people between 20 and 44 years old in Conakry have stated that they have better reading and writing skills in French than in Susu. This contrasts sharply with the 1980s, when national languages had a prominent place in the educational system (e. g., in 1983, 41,6 % of the adult population was literate in a national language, cf. Perrin 1988, 26ss.; INS 2017b, 143; A.M. Diallo 1999, 23; Diallo/ Holtzer 2002, 10). Due to the long and intense history of Islamization in Middle Guinea, Arabic is used alongside French in written documents. This reflects the tradition of writing national languages with Arabic characters, which stems from pre-colonial times (Perrin 1988, 28; INS 2017b; A.M. Diallo 1999, 14, 23). In religious instruction and worship, Arabic and local languages are used by the Muslim population (A. Diallo 2013, 259s.), while Catholicism is carried out in French (Perrin 1988, 118). As a consequence, Catholic children generally attain a certain level of proficiency in French, even if they do not attend a public school (A. Diallo 2021, 78). Also beyond formal contexts and the educational system, French seems to have been expanding in Guinea since the end of the First Republic in 1984. Between the late 1980s and the early 2000s, the proportion of people who acquire and use French in their families or in other non-institutional contexts, especially with friends, increased significantly, from 10 % (family) and 4 % (friends) according to Perrin (1988, 108s.) to 18 % (family) and 12 % (friends) according to A.M. Diallo (2004, 28; cf. also 20s.; 2013, 262s.). French has also gained ground in the workplace (A.M. Diallo 2004, 20; Perrin 1988, 106, 115s.; A. M. Diallo 1999, 25; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 12). Particularly in the linguistically highly fragmented region of Forested Guinea, but also in parts of Lower Guinea and in Conakry, it has taken over the function of national vehicular languages as a lingua franca (A.M. Diallo 2004, 20). More recent publications (A. Diallo 2013; 2021) indicate that these trends seem to continue. The expansion of French seems to be particularly fast in urban areas,  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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where internal migration has strengthened the status of French as a regionally and ethnically unmarked means of communication (A. Diallo 2021, 80).

2 Linguistic history The history of French in Guinea can be divided into three phases: the implementation phase in colonial times, the restriction phase under the First Republic (1958–1984), and the consolidation phase under the Second Republic (since 1985, A. Diallo 2021, 67).

2.1 Establishment of French Commercial contacts between Europeans and the inhabitants of the west African coastal region go back to the fifteenth century and continued until the nineteenth century in the context of the transatlantic slave trade. In the early period of contact, French was used for interethnic communication, especially trading (L.P. Diallo 1991, 53, 194s.). Colonization properly began in 1818, when Gaspard Théodore Mollien “discovered” the city of Timbo, the capital of the Imamate Futa Jallon, a political, religious, and cultural centre. In today’s territory of Guinea, it is a stronghold of Islam. The first treaties between the French and local chiefs were signed around the middle of the nineteenth century. In the Berlin Conference (1884–1885), French claims were officially recognized by the European imperial powers, and in 1892/1893, the region became part of French West Africa. Local inhabitants resisted French occupation until 1912, the year the region was “pacified”. France established a colonial system very similar to other regions in French West Africa, where French served as the language of administration. In the early beginnings of the colonization process, Arabic was used for court decisions and official correspondence due to its traditional function as a language used for writing (A.M. Diallo 2002, 44). Sporadically, official documentation was also translated into local languages (Leclerc 2015). A French-speaking local elite slowly emerged, but the vast majority of people had no access to the colonial language (Leclerc 2015). French was first introduced as an educational language in missionary schools, the first of which was founded in 1876 in Boffa by the Order of the Holy Spirit (L.P. Diallo 1991, 13, 54; A.M. Diallo 1999, 15; A. Diallo 2014, 28). Other schools opened in Conakry (1890), Sobané (prefecture Boffa, 1897), Taboria (prefecture Dubréka, 1898), Boké et Faranah (both 1898; A.M. Diallo 1999, 15). The first secular public schools were established in 1902 (A.M. Diallo 1999, 15; Baldé 2002, 22, 28s.; A Diallo 2021, 68), and in 1926/1927, 34 schools existed in the country (A. Diallo 2021, 68). In addition to the educational system, the colonial administration, the military, commerce, and social life in the colony as well as missionary work contributed to the establishment of French (A. Diallo 2021, 69). Colonial schools did not seek to educate the masses. They tutored a small amount

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of the population, with the intention to create a (more or less) French-speaking, subaltern elite of intermediaries (“élite d’intermédiaires”, A.M. Diallo 1999, 15; cf. also L. P. Diallo 1991, 120), in order to guarantee the smooth functioning of the colonial machinery (1991, 120; cf. also Baldé 2002, 34; MEC 1979, 25, 35; A. Diallo 2021, 68). The very few pupils enrolled were recruited among children of local leaders, civil servants, and soldiers (Baldé 2002, 35ss.). Although French was the general and unquestioned means of instruction, the use of Arabic and local languages was tolerated to a certain degree until 1911. Arabic was banned because it was accused of encouraging people to convert to Islam and of hampering the spread of French in the region (Baldé 2002, 30). In a similar vein, African languages were formally excluded from public and private education in French West Africa in 1944 (Tinsley 2015, 242). In 1945, the French school system was established in Guinea and maintained until the country’s independence in 1958. These policies have created deep divisions in society between those who had had access to education and to French, and those who had not.

2.2 Milestones of its further development During the constitutional referendum that was held in 1958 within the French Union (the successor organization of the French Empire after World War II), Guinea was one of only two territories, together with Niger, which rejected the new constitution and opted for independence, as a consequence of an intense campaign by the Democratic Party of Guinea (Parti démocratique de Guinée – PDG). Its leader Ahmed Sékou Touré, a Mandinka, became the first president of the Republic of Guinea and established an autocratic one-party regime with a Marxist and Pan-African orientation. Touré’s presidency, which lasted from 1958 to his death in 1984, is known as the First Republic of Guinea (Première République de Guinée). The appointment of Sékou Touré was a milestone for language policy in that it led to a “unique experience with post-colonial policymaking” (Benson/Lynd 2011, 114; cf. also A. M. Diallo 1989–1990, 115; Sylla 1997, 148; A.M. Diallo 2004, 27). The president’s aim was to forge national unity and cohesion by returning to a “traditional” African cultural identity, formally concentrating on the educational sector (White Oyler 2001, 585; A.M. Diallo 2002, 48). National languages were introduced as a subject matter, but French continued to be the language of instruction (L.P. Diallo 1991, 274ss.; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 7s.; Diakhaby 2017, 184s.). In a country that was highly fragmented in ethnic and linguistic terms, with no African language shared by the whole population, French appeared as the only language that could incarnate national unity and solidarity, and at the same time connect the young nation to the international community (L.P. Diallo 1991, 256ss.; A.M. Diallo 2002, 48; White Oyler 2001, 586; Tinsley 2015, 243). However, when relationships to France deteriorated in the middle of the 1960s, Touré’s government redoubled its decolonization efforts in the cultural and educational field. Within the framework of the So-

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cialist Cultural Revolution (Révolution culturelle socialiste, cf. Sylla 1997, 144; A.M. Diallo 2002, 48), which was adopted in the 8th congress of the Democratic Party of Guinea in 1967, Touré implemented resolute politics to strengthen the position of national languages, and to relegate French to a secondary role. Measures were taken to empower Guinean people by educating the masses in national languages, as a counter-project to French elitist education (MEC 1979, 32s.). By these means, people’s minds should be decolonized, so that they would recover and take pride in “real” African values (MEC 1979, 35s.; L.P. Diallo 1991, 253). Beyond ideological reasons, the practical value of using national languages to educate and to broadcast information through mass media was emphasized (MEC 1979, 49). However, large swathes of the population opposed the use of national languages in education, and those who could afford it organized clandestine French classes for their children (L.P. Diallo 1991, 349ss.). This, of course, exacerbated economic and educational inequalities (1991, 379). Touré’s determined promotion of national languages through politics was successful in the sense that it finally relegated French to a secondary role in Guinea. According to A.M. Diallo (1989–1990, 118), people were looked at askance when talking French in public, and many people, even those who occupied high ranks in the party or worked in institutions open to the public, did not even speak or understand the language. On an international level, Guinea’s relationship to France and the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF), founded in 1970, was tense because the French language and the cultural politics implemented by France were regarded as a neocolonial attempt to maintain control over Africa (A.M. Diallo 1999, 10; Leclerc 2015; MEC 1979, 49). In retrospect, scholars have stated that Touré’s linguistic politics ultimately did a disservice to the country’s decolonization process. Being conceived as an explicit reversal of colonial language policies, it was still ideologically locked in the colonial mindset (Sylla 1997, 145; Tinsley 2015) and exacerbated the divisions between the French-speaking elite and the masses with no or limited access to French (Tinsley 2015, 242, 245). At the same time, tensions between different ethnic and linguistic groups arose from official pluralism and can be felt until today (Leclerc 2015; Diakhaby 2017, 134). Touré’s death in 1984 marked the beginning of the Second Republic of Guinea (Seconde République de Guinée) and brought another important turning point in the linguistic history of the country. Under Lansana Conté (a Susu leader), the military government immediately reversed Touré’s policies and reintroduced French at every level of the educational system. Together with the return of Guinean citizens from outside of Guinea, this strengthened the position of the French language in everyday life (cf. 1.2 and L.P. Diallo 1991, 403ss.; A.M. Diallo 1999, 24; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 8). When a new constitution was adopted in 1990, French was declared the official language of the country (A.M. Diallo 1999, 11).

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3 External language policy After Guinea’s independence, external language policies and legislations have focused primarily on the status of French and different national languages in relation to each other, with a special focus on the educational sector. Promoting national languages was a main concern during the First Republic. However, legislation promulgated under the Second Republic has strengthened the role of French when compared to both foreign and national languages. The Second Republic also took measures to ensure people’s linguistic rights. Besides education, linguistic legislation applies to language use in public space, in the judicial system, as well as to business and commerce.

3.1 Legislation Recent Guinean constitutions have regulated general aspects of status planning in the country. While the 1958 and 1982 constitutions do not contain any provisions dealing with language (cf. also Leclerc 2015), the 1991 constitution declares French to be the official language of the country, and obliges the State to promote the cultures and languages of the Guinean people: ‘The official language is French. The State ensures the promotion of the cultures and languages of the people of Guinee’.3

This article is maintained in the constitution from 2010, as well as the current constitution from 2020. In addition, the 2010 constitution prohibits discrimination for, amongst others, linguistic reasons: ‘No one should be privileged or disadvantaged by reason of their sex, birth, race, ethnicity, language, beliefs as well as their political, philosophical or religious opinions’.4

It furthermore commits the State to ensure the dissemination and teaching of the constitution, of Human Rights, and of literacy, as well as education through mass media in national languages: ‘The State has the duty to ensure the dissemination and teaching of the Constitution, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights of

3 “La langue officielle est le français. L’État assure la promotion des cultures et des langues du peuple de Guinée” (C-GN 1991, art. 1). 4 “Nul ne doit être privilégié ou désavantage en raison de son sexe, de sa naissance, de sa race, de son ethnie, de sa langue, de ses croyances et de ses opinions politiques, philosophiques ou religieuses” (C-GN 2010, art. 8).

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1981, as well as of all duly ratified international human rights instruments. The State must integrate human rights in literacy and education programs of different school and university cycles and in all training programs for military forces, public security forces and the like. The State must also ensure the broadcasting and teaching of these same rights in the national languages by all means of mass communication, in particular by radio and television’.5

These commitments are maintained in the current constitution from 2020 (cf. articles 9 and 32), which has an even stronger focus on linguistic rights, stipulating the right to inform arrested people about the motif of their arrest and their individual rights in a language that they understand: ‘Anyone arrested or detained has the right to humane treatment which preserves their dignity. She or he must be informed immediately of the reasons for her arrest or detention and of her or his rights, in a language understandable to her or him’.6

3.2 Languages used by public authorities In the context of his decolonization project, Touré took legal measures to enhance the use of national languages in public and official contexts, both of which were formerly restricted to French alone. A circular of 21 August 1969 stipulated that all bodies of law had to be issued in both French and national languages (A. Diallo 2014, 29). Party leaders had to write down and read out the outcomes of party meetings in the national languages, and the party’s devices, watchwords, and slogans had to be translated into national languages (A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 116; Sylla 1997, 147; A. Diallo 2014, 29). Translation into national languages was also mandatory for public announcements and advertisements, as well as designations and labels of goods and products (A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 116; A. Diallo 2014, 29). Finally, names in Guinean languages were to be assigned to rivers, streets, villages, and schools (A. Diallo 2014, 29). Another measure to strengthen the position of national languages was their inclusion in the compulsory diploma for applicants for positions within public services (Diplôme de culture révolutionnaire, also referred to as Diplôme de culture populaire, Sylla 1997, 147; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 116; 1999, 11; A. 5 “L’État a le devoir d’assurer la diffusion et l’enseignement de la Constitution, de la Déclaration Universelle des Droits de l’Homme de 1948, de la Charte Africaine des Droits de l’Homme et des Peuples de 1981 ainsi que de tous les instruments internationaux dûment ratifiés relatifs aux Droits humains. L’État doit intégrer les droits de la personne humaine dans les programmes d’alphabétisation et d’enseignement aux différents cycles scolaires et universitaires et dans tous les programmes de formation des forces armées, des forces de sécurité publique et assimilés. L’État doit également assurer dans les langues nationales par tous les moyens de communication de masse, en particulier par la radiodiffusion et la télévision, la diffusion et l’enseignement de ces mêmes droits” (C-GN 2010, art. 25). 6 “Toute personne arrêtée ou détenue a droit à un traitement humain qui préserve sa dignité. Elle doit être informée immédiatement des motifs de son arrestation ou de sa détention et de ses droits, dans la langue qui lui est compréhensible” (C-GN 2020, art. 10).

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Diallo 2014, 29). All this did not impede French from being the main language of authorities and public communication officials (Leclerc 2015), as can be easily seen from the fact that Touré always delivered his famous speeches in French. After the regime change in 1984, language policies in favour of national languages were revoked, and French was restored as the language of public life and administration. Today, French is the main language of the Government, the National Assembly (Assemblée nationale), the public Administration, the court system, the army, the police, and the educational sector (Leclerc 2015). This does not impede national languages being used to a certain degree in interactions with teachers, public servants, and the police (Perrin 1988, 117; A. Diallo 2013; Rozendaal 2017, 19). Most of the legislation since 1984 relates to language use in the legal system (especially in court), with a focus on the instrumental validity of French as an official language, as well as linguistic rights. Documents issued by foreign official bodies, such as public notaries, ministries, or courts, must be accompanied by a certified French translation before they can be legalized in Guinea (art. 201 of the Code foncier et domanial from 1999, see Leclerc 2015). If an accused and/or a witness in court does not understand the official language, an interpreter must be appointed until the end of the process, and translation of important documents must be provided, as stated in art. 108, 383, 437, 475 of the New Code of Penal Procedure from 2016 (Nouveau code de procédure pénal, and also art. 106 of the previous Code de procédure pénal from 1988, Leclerc 2015). Persons detained in police custody have to be informed about the reason for their detention and their rights in a language they understand (see art. 90, 708, 709, 806, 818, 822, 1015, 1257). In case of uncertainty about a suspect’s mastery of French, the authority in charge of the procedure must verify that the person understands and speaks French (art. 1256). Although documents and conversations in foreign languages are allowed in court, they must be translated into French (cf. art. 184, 900, and also art. 53 of the Code de procédure civile, économique et administrative from 1998, cf. Leclerc 2015). For jurors in trials, as well as for scrutineers in elections, it is mandatory to be able to read and write in French (cf. art. 72 and 82 of the Organic law I/91/012 from 1991, art. 252 of the Law 037 from 1998, art. 252 of the Code de procédure pénal from 1998, cf. Leclerc 2015). The instrumental function of French as a formal lingua franca is also emphasized in legislation around business and commerce. According to art. 8 of the Code for Public Markets from 1988 (Code des marchés publics), documents issued in the context of public procurement must be written in French. Art. 173 of the Public Health Code from 1997 (Code de la santé publique) states that tobacco products must show the inscription “La consommation du tabac est nocive pour la santé” ‘The consumption of tobacco is harmful for your health’ (cf. Leclerc 2015). Contrary to the instrumental function of French, the symbolic value of national languages for Guinean identity seems to prevail in legislation regarding cultural politics. This does not only apply to the State’s obligation to promote the cultures and languages of the Guinean people enshrined in the constitution, but also to the Civil Code (Code civil) of 1983 (art. 115, cf. Leclerc 2015), according to which people who apply for Guinean citi-

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zenship must know a national language in addition to French. Every child has the obligation ‘to respect national identity, languages and values’ (“de respecter l’identité, les languages et les valeurs nationales”, art. 7.2 of the Code de l’enfant guinéen from 2008, cf. Leclerc 2015). Finally, the new cultural politics outlined by the Ministry of Sports, Culture and Historical Heritage (Ministère des sports, de la culture et du patrimoine historique) detail concrete steps in order to promote national languages, among them the documentation and transcription of oral traditions in local languages, and their publication in bilingual editions (MSCPH 2018).

3.3 Languages used in education Directly after Guinea achieved independence, national languages were introduced as subject matters into public school curricula. In 1965, an education reform was launched with financial support from UNESCO (Perrin 1988, 52; White Oyler 2001, 593; Benson/ Lynd 2011, 116). It included a programme to raise the literacy rate, called Langue Nationale, which prescribed national languages as exclusive languages of literacy, and as a means of instruction throughout primary and a part of secondary education (MEC 1979, 50; Perrin 1988, 17s., 51s.; Sylla 1997, 146s.; A.M. Diallo 1999, 12; White Oyler 2001, 594; Bague 2002, 59; Benson/Lynd 2011, 116; Leclerc 2015; Tinsley 2015, 246; Diakhaby 2017, 184s.). The measures were applied to the at that time eight most widely spoken languages in the country (Pular, Susu, Maninka, Kissi, Toma, Kpelle, Wamey, and Bassari), which were considered to cover more than 90 % of the population (MEC 1979, 45; UNESCO 1980, 17; Perrin 1988, 17; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 115s.; A.M. Diallo 1999, 12; White Oyler 2001, 593; Benson/Lynd 2011, 116; Leclerc 2015; Diakhaby 2017, 184; A. Diallo 2021, 70). French was only introduced in post-primary education, first as a second language, and later also as a medium of instruction (UNESCO 1980, 57; Benson/Lynd 2011, 116). Higher education has always functioned exclusively in French (cf. Perrin 1988, 19), while only national languages were used to verify literacy and instruct adults (Sylla 1997, 145). The introduction of national languages into the educational system made it necessary to develop a notation system for each of them, to train teachers, and to write and print textbooks (Tinsley 2015, 246; Leclerc 2015; MEC 1979). All this comprised a major challenge for the country (UNESCO 1980, 18ss., 47; Tinsley 2015). To facilitate the implementation of these measures, new academic institutions were established (Guilavogui 1975, 442; MEC 1979, 51; UNESCO 1980, 17; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 118; Sylla 1997, 148), among them a Chair for Linguistics (1963) at the Polytechnical Institution of Conakry (Institut polytechnique de Conakry), an institution dedicated to the study and documentation of national languages. In 1972, the Language Academy (Académie des langues) was founded and entrusted with the task of developing writing systems, terminologies, textbooks, and grammars for national languages, as well as of improving teaching methods and teacher training (A. Diallo 2014, 30; UNESCO 1980, 54). In the same year, the National Service of Alphabetization (Service national d’alphabétisation – SNA)  

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was created with the mission to coordinate and conduct adult literacy campaigns in national languages (Guilavogui 1975, 442; UNESCO 1980, 70; Sylla 1997, 148). Although positive effects on children’s and adult’s literacy development should be expected from teaching them in their first languages (Sylla 1997, 146; Benson/Lynd 2011, 120), and a positive impact was reported by Guinean authorities (cf. UNESCO 1980, 18), most scholars have criticized the inefficiency of Touré’s language and education politics, denouncing his changes that have allegedly reduced the quality of education, particularly higher education. The failure of this project is attributed to a lack of materials, as well as poor planning and resource allocation (UNESCO 1980; Perrin 1988, 19ss.; A.M. Diallo 1999, 13, 17s.; Barry 2010, 94; Benson/Lynd 2011, 117; Leclerc 2015; A. Diallo 2021, 72). In addition, the selection of only eight out of more than twenty national languages aggravated tensions between certain ethnic groups (Perrin 1988, 20; Diakhaby 2017, 184), and the reduction of French instruction exacerbated inequalities between people with and without access to the former colonial language (Sylla 1997, 145; Tinsley 2015, 246). On the other hand, Perrin states that the expansion of enrollment to larger segments of society during Touré’s regime seems to have provided better access to French (Perrin 1988, 124). The use of national languages in education also contributed to “a stronger self-confidence of the speakers of the linguae francae in their respective areas and to the documentation of the languages in question” (A. Diallo 2014, 31; cf. also Sylla 1997, 149). In summary, mixed results can be drawn from reimagining education in national languages under the First Republic. It seems that the project largely failed because Guinean civil society did not support it – either because the international value of French made French appear more attractive as an educational language than national languages (A.M. Diallo 2004, 28), or because teaching in national languages became associated with an unpopular and undemocratic government (Benson/Lynd 2011, 117, 128; A. M. Diallo 2004, 28; cf. also the harsh criticism in L.P. Diallo 1991). After Touré’s death in 1984, the military government under Conté immediately decided to return to French as the only medium of instruction every level of the educational system. Besides the problems and criticism that education in national languages had faced, this decision was also motivated by the will to establish one national language for unification (“une langue nationale d’unification”, Leclerc 2015; cf. also Perrin 1988, 18, 58; A.M. Diallo 1999, 13, 22; White Oyler 2001, 598; Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 8; A.M. Diallo 2002, 49; Bague 2002, 59; Barry 2010, 95; Benson/Lynd 2011, 117; Tinsley 2015, 249). In addition, one of Conté’s political objectives was to end the international isolation Guinea had faced during the Touré era, and to adopt an international language as official language could only be conducive to this goal. A main obstacle to restoring French as a means of instruction was the teachers’ lack of preparation to use this language in class, which significantly reduced the quality of teaching (Barry 2010, 95). To compensate this deficit, the Centre for Linguistic Improvement (Centre de perfectionnement linguistique – CPL) was created in 1986 (Perrin 1988, 68ss.). In general, Guinean language politics have been oriented towards the promotion and diffusion of French since the middle of the 1980s while simultaneously propagating the cul-

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tivation of national languages as an integral part of national cultural heritage. The transformation of the former language academy into the Institut de recherche en linguistique appliquée, which was entrusted with the mission of promoting research and teaching not only of national languages but also of French and English (Perrin 1988, 21s.), is an eloquent symbol of this shift, as well as the inclusion of literary works from both France and francophone Africa in the canon of school readings (cf. L.P. Diallo 1991, 440, and the lists contained in Perrin 1988, annexe 8). In recent times, French has a prominent part in the Guinean school curricula, especially in first to sixth grade where between 13 and 15 hours weekly are dedicated to it (Barry 2010, 97s.). Local languages are sometimes taught as a subject in primary schools, but they are not used as a means to read and write with, nor for instruction. This is a problem for children who are sent to school without knowing French (Leclerc 2015). Preschool education is offered both in local national languages and (especially in Conakry) in French (Leclerc 2015; A. Diallo 2021, 76s.), but enrollment rates are very low (15 %, according to Leclerc 2015). In addition to French, English is the most important second language taught in schools, followed by Spanish and German (Leclerc 2015; cf. also A.M. Diallo 2004, 24s.). In light of their experiences during the Touré era, Guineans have opposed teaching national languages in school, and oppose using them as a means of instruction even more (cf. A.M. Diallo’s 2004 survey). Although recent figures are not available, it may be assumed that opening public education to teaching national languages and teaching in national languages would be controversial in the country. However, there seems to be a growing awareness of the pedagogical benefits children can gain from being literate and taught in their native language, and some activists and NGOs have started taking steps in this direction (cf. Benson/Lynd 2011). In its new plan for cultural politics, the Ministry of Sports, Culture and Historical Heritage (MSCPH 2018, 59s.) considers reintroducing national languages into the curriculum, but no concrete measures seem to have been taken so far. Given that around 89,1 % of the Guinean population are Muslims (cf. INS 2017a, 87), Arabic plays a certain role as an educational language in the madrasas or Quranic schools. However, few Guineans seem to have a real mastery of this language because the focus is on the teaching of Koranic verses and religious practices rather than of the Arab language itself (A.M. Diallo 1999, 13s.; 2002, 44; Baldé 2002, 31; A. Diallo 2021, 78).  

 

3.4 Languages used in the media Print Media – Print media has traditionally been an elite form of media in Guinea, and was published mainly in French. Even during Touré’s regime, when national languages were used for reading, writing and instruction, written texts in national languages were virtually unavailable (UNESCO 1980, 71; Perrin 1988, 20). A monthly magazine was cre-

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ated in four national languages for post-literacy work (Sylla 1997, 147), but it does not exist anymore. The only national daily newspaper is Horoya, the former organ of Touré’s party PDG (Perrin 1988, 45, 123). It has been a francophone newspaper since its beginning, although articles in national languages could be found from time to time during the First Republic (1988, 123). Today, Horoya is published exclusively in French. Foreign newspapers in English, Spanish, and Portuguese are also available in the country (Leclerc 2015). Radio – Traditionally, radio has been the most important mass medium in Guinea due to the constant high level of illiteracy (Leclerc 2015). Radio was first introduced in 1952 when the French established a small local radio station in Conakry, which was ironically referred to as Radio Banane (Camara/O’Toole/Baker 2013, 251). After independence, the station was renamed Voix de la Révolution (Perrin 1988, 40) and became the most prominent medium for the spread of “revolutionary” discourse and ideology (Pauthier 2013, 35). Until 1970, the station had two branches: a national branch, which transmitted in the eight national languages mentioned above, and an international branch, which was directed at the neighbouring countries with programmes in French, English, English Creole, and Portuguese (Perrin 1988, 40). Given that radio was the easiest way to reach large sectors of the population, especially in rural areas, Touré’s government used it as a tool to popularize education and promote national languages (MEC 1979, 78; Perrin 1988, 40). A circular from 1969 obliged radio and television to transmit about 80 % of the programme in national languages (A. Diallo 2014, 30). Indeed, according to different estimates, Guinean radio stations used national languages between 60 % and 75 % of the time during the First Republic (MEC 1979, 89; Perrin 1988, 41; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 117; Sylla 1997, 148). Lansana Conté’s government reduced the time that the national radio station dedicated to broadcasting in national languages and created rural radios (“radios rurales”) in Guinea’s four geographical regions, which broadcast in the respective vehicular language (i.e. Pular, Susu, Maninka, and Kissi, cf. White Oyler 2001, 598; A. Diallo 2014, 31). Still, in the late 1980s, all media consumption in Guinean languages largely outperformed media consumption in French (Perrin 1988, 121), but later, French gained ground: in his 2004 survey, Diallo (2004, 21) found that 45 % of the interviewed listen to radio programmes in French, versus 16 % in Maninka, 15 % in Susu, and 14 % in Pular. There are currently 48 radio stations in Guinea, both public and private (5 in Forested Guinea, 18 in Upper Guinea, 13 in Middle Guinea, and 12 in Maritime Guinea). National media strongly tends to use French, while most of the rural radios (also referred to as community radios, “radios communautaires”) use local languages for broadcasting, primarily transmitting programmes on traditional culture and folklore (MSCPH 2018, 60, 63). The 34 stations of Radio Rurale de Guinée currently broadcast in 24 national languages (cf. MIC 2018). The use of national languages in broadcasting is ensured by the constitution (cf. 3.1). Television – Television arrived in Guinea in 1977 and was fused with Voix de la Révolution to form Radio Télévision Guinéenne (RTG). Under the First Republic, television served mainly the same educational and propagandistic purposes as radio (Perrin  

 

 

 

 

 

 

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1988, 43; Camara/O’Toole/Baker 2013). At that time, only 25 % of the screen time was dedicated to programmes in French (Perrin 1988, 43). After the regime change, the use of French augmented to 70 % (Perrin 1988, 44). Until today, RTG is the only television station in Guinea (MSCPH 2018, 60). Still, most Guineans do not have access to this medium, which broadcasts mostly in French, although some programmes are transmitted in Pular, Maninka, and Susu (Leclerc 2015).  

 

4 Linguistic characteristics Due to the emphasis that Touré’s government put on national languages, there seem to be no studies on French in Guinea before the end of the 1980s (cf. Diallo/Holtzer 2002, 8). Even in current times, studies have been scarce, and little is known about the features of French language usage in Guinea. The most recent systematic studies are those related to the project Description du français de Guinée et implications didactiques (1999–2001), which was realized in the context of the CAMPUS programme (Coopération africaine et malgache pour la promotion universitaire et scientifique, cf. Simard 2004), and jointly conducted by universities located in Conakry and in Franche-Compté in France (Diallo/Holtzer 2002). For colonial times, a continuum of language competencies and uses can be assumed to have existed, from standard to elementary. The French of indigenous servants and soldiers was generally rejected as “petit-nègre” or “français tirailleur” (A. Diallo 2021, 69). This divide between “academic” French (in terms of the hexagonal standard) as used in the administration, the educational sector, and the judicial system, and informal language practices can still be observed today. The fact that the vast majority of French speakers learn French as a second language, in combination with the variety of first languages, results in a high degree of variability in the French spoken in Guinea (cf. A. Diallo 2021, 70, as well as Manessy’s 1994 idea of a continuum). The lower the level of formal education of speakers, and the more informal the context, the more discrepancies in relation to the academic norm can be observed (Simard 2002). However, not least because of Touré’s language politics, French has traditionally been less widely used as a lingua franca in Guinea in comparison to other African countries. This is probably the reason why French seems to have gone less far in the process of restructuration, meaning the stabilization of linguistic structures foreign to the academic norm (cf. Perrin 1988, 25; A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 122; L.P. Diallo 1991, 41; Ploog 2007). While French has expanded as a lingua franca over the past 20 years, new local norms may have crystallized. For example, A. Diallo (2021, 77) states that an informal French of Conakry (“un français informel de Conakry”) is progressively emerging. However, no studies are available on this subject. Against this backdrop, the following remarks can only be taken as an eclectic summary of features mentioned in the available literature, not as a description of any variety of Guinean French (if such thing as “Guinean French” or “Guinean varieties of French” exists at all).

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4.1 Pronunciation According to A.M. Diallo (1998) and A. Diallo (2018), there is a high degree of variation in the pronunciation of French in Guinea, both between different speakers and groups of speakers (inter-speaker variation) and within one and the same speaker (intra-speaker variation). Deviations from standard French can mostly be attributed to interference from first languages, and interpreted as substitutions of French phonemes that do not exist in the speakers’ first languages by their nearest approximations (A.M. Diallo 1998, 119; A. Diallo 2018, 61s.). Features found in spoken language – A. Diallo (2018) mentions the following features as being typical of speakers who have Susu as a first language: realization of French uvular /ʁ/ as a dental flap (e. g., riz [ɾi] instead of [ʁi]), depalatalization of the fricatives /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ towards [s] and [z] (e. g., chose [soz] instead of [ʃoz], barrage [baɾaz] instead of [baʁaʒ]), delabialization of the French vowels /ø/, /œ/ and /y/ (e. g., peut [pe] instead of [pø], neuf [nɛf] instead of [nœf], tu [ti] instead of [ty]), realization of the schwa /ə/ as the full vowel [e] (e. g., de [de] instead of [də]), simplification of sequences of two or three consonants, either by vowel insertion (e. g., les autres [lɛzotɾo] instead of [lezotʁ], or the place name Dubréka pronounced [dibeɾeka] according to the graphic reproduction Dibéréka in Diallo (2018, 67) instead of [dybʁeka]), or by consonant elimination (les autres [lɛzot] instead of [lezotʁ], parler [pale] instead of [paʁle], direct [diɾɛt] instead of [diʁɛkt]), and simplification of sequences of glides and vowels (suis [sy] instead of [sɥi]). Sporadically, hypercorrections can be observed (e. g., maison [møsõ] instead of [mezõ], soudure [sydyɾ] instead of [sudyʁ], mécanique [møkanikə] instead of [mekanik], A. Diallo 2018, 67). Features found in literary works – In addition, A.M. Diallo (1998, 118ss.) lists the substitution of [v] by [w], occasional lambdacism, the epenthesis (e. g., bruit [buɾuwi] instead of [bʁɥi], globe [ɡolob] or [ɡulob] instead of [ɡlɔb]]), a word-initial epenthetic [e] (e. g., sportif [espoɾtif] instead of [spɔʁtif], special [espesjal] instead of [spesjal]), vowel harmony (e. g., substitut [sybstyty], constitution [kõstytysyjõ]), as well as a tendency to close open vowels [ɛ] and [ɔ]. It is important to note, however, that A.M. Diallo (1998) describes imitations of French as spoken by Guineans in Guinean literary works (so-called eye-dialect), not on direct evidence, in contrast to A. Diallo, who analyses data gathered from Susu speakers from Conakry.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.2 Morphosyntax Only a handful of studies have been published on some of the grammatical characteristics of French as spoken in Guinea. The authors generally attribute these particularities to the fact that speakers transfer some qualities of their first language(s) into their French (M.S. Diallo 2002) and/or simplify French in the process of acquiring it as a second language (Hamidy Bah 2010, 346, 349). Further investigations would be needed to

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substantiate these hypotheses, and to determine the nature and the extent, as well as the social and situational distribution of the features. Features – Among the features most frequently mentioned is the use of the second person pronoun tu in an indefinite or generic sense, which would normally be expressed in French by on (for example Si tu le vois, on dirait que, cf. M.S. Diallo 2002, 73ss.; Simard 2002, 101s.). Another characteristic is the so-called ethical dative, that is the use of an indirect personal pronoun which indicates that the speaker has a certain interest in the activity described (cf. the addition of m’/me in Vous allez m’ajouter une courbe de tendance in teacher talk or Vous me le saluerez, M.S. Diallo 2002, 79), which M.S. Diallo (2002, 80) attributes to the influence of Pular or other national languages. Further, one can observe the neutralization of gender distinction in third-person plural subject pronouns (i.e. ils instead of elles, cf. 2002, 78) and the neutralization of case distinction in object pronouns (e. g., le instead of lui in Il faut le dire que j’arrive dans un instant or Montrez-la le chemin, cf. 2002, 85), as well as in relative pronouns (e. g., que instead of dont in La voiture que je t’avais parlé, la voiture que je t’ai vendue, cf. 2002, 86). In complement constructions with a preposition and an infinitive (e. g., commencer à faire), different parts of the construction (the preposition, the infinitive, or both) may be omitted, and/or unusual prepositions may be chosen (e. g., je commence les livres instead of je commence à lire les livres, or j’ai commencé à mon travail instead of je commence à travailler, cf. Bah 2010, 345). Due perhaps to calquing, some verbs appear to be semantically incompatible with their complements when judged against the hexagonal norm (e. g., Je ne gagne pas mon argent ‘I don’t get my money back’, cf. 2010, 346s.). Some publications mention that code-switching between French and national languages is a common practice in Guinea (cf. A.M. Diallo 1998, 123), but no systematic studies seem to be available on the subject.  

 

 

 

 

4.3 Lexicon Although there are few studies, the lexicon is still the best documented domain of French as spoken in Guinea. Differences found when compared to lexical use in other parts of the francophone world are generally attributed to borrowing from national and international languages and to the application of different processes of lexical innovation (semantic shifting, word formation mechanisms) on conventional French vocabulary (cf. A.M. Diallo 1998, 119ss.; A.M. Diallo 1999; Kashema/Barry 2002; Reutner 2017, 47–51). Until today, A.M. Diallo (1999) is the most comprehensive compilation of Guinean French vocabulary and the one from which we take the examples cited below unless indicated otherwise. Borrowing – Copies from national languages can typically be found in the semantic fields of flora and fauna, social life, music and dance, traditional activities, as well as other local realities (A.M. Diallo 1998, 122). Examples include the words balafon ‘type of traditional percussion instrument’ and corté ‘magical practice’ from

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Maninka, banane loko ‘banana which can only be consumed after having been cooked or fried’ from Kpelle, ioula ‘salesman’ and faliti ‘driver of a donkey cart’ from Maninka, foka ‘woven straw mat’ from Susu, or kagna, kagnah ‘corn flour mixed with peanut butter and honey or sugar’ from Pular. Copies of Arabic words are often linked to the Muslim religious sphere, e. g., cafre ‘disbeliever, criminal’, cheytane ‘Satan’, or hakè ‘immanent justice, sin’. English has contributed some words that relate to business and services, e. g., boy, boyesse ‘domestic servant’ (< En. boy), masta ‘boss, business man, entrepreneur’ (< En. master), or être daye ‘to be completely drunk’ (< En. to die). Internal innovations: meaning – Semantic shifts include metaphors such as béton ‘thick and heavy food, (lit.) concrete’ or caillou ‘hard, difficult, (lit.) pebble’ and metonymies like baptiser ‘to organize a baptism ceremony’, brousse ‘interior of the country in comparison to the capital, countryside in comparison to urban areas’, or douches ‘toilets’. In other cases, semantic shifts seem to reflect influence from national languages, as seen in bénir pour quelqu’un ‘to use Koranic verses to bless somebody’ or travailler quelqu’un ‘to try to influence somebody by occult practices’, which A.M. Diallo (1998, 121) attributes to Pular models. Internal innovations: form – Among the neologisms created by word formation processes, we find suffixations such as broussard ‘inhabitant of the interior of the country, or of the countryside’ (< brousse + ‑ard), diamantaire ‘person who became rich in diamond mining’ (diamant + ‑aire), indexer ‘to point one’s finger at somebody’ (< index + ‑er), or accidenter qn ‘to provoke an accident to the detriment of somebody’ (accident + ‑er, cf. A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 123). Examples of compound words (with and without prepositions) are noix de kola ‘kola nut’, jour de tour ‘in polygamic families, the day when the wife in question lives with her husband’, gare-voiture ‘bus station’, camion-poubelle ‘rubbish truck’, or rentrer-coucher ‘single room apartment’ (A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 126). Furthermore, truncations like couze ‘cousin’ (< Fr. cousin/cousine), beau ‘brother-/ father-in-law, or belle ‘sister-/mother-in-law’ (< Fr. beau-frère/-père, belle-soeur/-mère) can be found. Collocations and idioms – In addition, Diallo (1999) lists a number of collocations and idioms characteristic of the use of French in Guinea. Among them are donner au revoir ‘to inform the people close to oneself before an important journey, (lit.) to give goodbye’, eau glacée formée ‘frozen water in a freezer bag, sold for refreshment, (lit.) formed, iced water’, avoir l’esprit colon ‘to behave like a colonial administrator, (lit.) to have the spirit of a colonizer’, être un zéro ‘to be a good-for-nothing, (lit.) to be a zero’, interroger les cauris ‘to do fortune telling with cawrie shells, (lit.) to ask the caries’, or sortir des colas ‘to manifest one’s intention to marry a woman by presenting 10 kola nuts to her parents, in accordance with the tradition of the country, (lit.) to take out the kola nuts’ (A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 127). Some of these expressions seem to be direct translations from Guinean languages, for example avoir le feu dans le pantalon ‘to have urgent problems to solve, (lit.) to have fire in one’s trousers’, être ton pied mon pied ‘to be inseparable, (lit.) to be your foot, my foot’ (cf. A.M. Diallo 1989–1990, 121).  

 

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5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – Based on the few studies available, it appears that there is no genuine Guinean French standard. Rather, normative projections of “good” French are oriented towards the monocentric, academic norm of Parisian French, which also serves as the standard in school teaching. However, as in other African countries, there seems to be a gap between academic registers taught in school and everyday linguistic practices (Kashema/Barry 2002, 112). As becomes clear in Rozendaal’s (2017) study on language attitudes among Susu people in Guinea, there is a certain degree of awareness of this discrepancy among speakers, which seems to generate linguistic insecurity: on a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being the score of maximal approval, the phrase ‘I would like to speak French like the French people’7 scored above 4 in all age groups (Rozendaal 2017, 23). This stands in contrast with the phrase ‘In general, the Susu speak French well’,8 which scored only 3,00 (for the age group 20–26) and 3,13 (for the age groups 28–44, other age groups were not considered). The stylization of phonetical features of French in the mouth of Guinean characters in literary works, e. g., in Alpha Abdoullaye Diallo’s novel La vérité du ministre (1985, cf. A.M. Diallo 1998, 118), is another indication of metalinguistic awareness regarding discrepancies between the academic norm and actual linguistic practices among Guinean speakers of French. In one of the key passages of the novel, for example, the protagonist is tortured and interrogated by two officers, who talk to him in a form of French that deviates from the academic norm:  

“Avec moi on dire toujours la werité. Demande tout monde ici. Doumbouya il est trop wieil, il blagué toi. Tou connaître Sénibol moi zé le tassé, il dire wélité. Tou connaître Malx c’est ine l’allemand gros grand. Zé li tassé, il dire wélité. Toi-même là tou n’as pas courasse. Toi tou es comme la femme, ton crié, ton crié on ne toussê même pas […]” (A. A. Diallo 1985, 95).9

The text shows phonetic characteristics like the use of [i] or [u] instead of /y/ in ine for une and tou for tu, of [e] instead of [ə] in zé for je, [w] instead of /v/ in werité for verité and wieil for vieil, as well as [z] or [s] instead of /ʒ/ in zé for je and courasse for courage. Grammatically striking is the omission of prepositions and articles (demande tout monde ici instead of demande à tout le monde ici), the use of the infinitive or past participle instead of finite verb forms (on dire and il dire instead of on dit and il dit, tou connaître instead of tu connais, il blagué instead of il blague, ton crié instead of tu cries), and the reduction of allomorphs in wieil instead of vieux.

7 “Je souhaite parler français comme un Français” (Rozendaal 2017, 23). 8 “En général les Soussous parlent bien le français” (Rozendaal 2017, 23). 9 ‘With me they always say the truth. Ask everybody here. Doumbouya is too old, he makes fun of you. You know Sénibol. I bound him, he said the truth. You know Marx, he’s a tall and big German. I bound him, he said the truth. But you have no courage. You are like a women, you scream, you scream, without even being touched’.

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This manner of speaking is referred to in the novel as ‘tropicalized French’ (“français tropicalisé”, A. A. Diallo 1985, 95), an expression that highlights the local anchoring of this speech form, but also the perceived status difference to hexagonal French. The stylization of features from French as spoken in Guinea not only indexes the sociolinguistic condition of the character as a local and non-native speaker of French but also situates him within the Guinean geographic and ethnic context. According to the protagonist, some of the phonetic features the officer shows are directly associated with Forested Guinea: ‘He expresses himself in French, a picturesque French with a marked accent from the forested region, in which « r » is systematically replaced by « l » and « v » by « w »’.10

In addition to stylized local French, the author also puts in the characters’ mouth utterances in national languages (especially Susu and Maninka), as a reflection of Guinea’s multilingual situation. Finally, the novel also picks up the official rhetoric of Touré’s regime, for example, in the utterance “Pèrè pour Revolouchon!” (A. A. Diallo 1985, 176), a stylized version of the slogan ‘Ready for the Revolution’: “Prêts pour la Revolution”.

References Bague, Jean-Marie (2002), L’enseignement en Guinée: quelques évaluations institutionnelles, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 57–70. Baldé, Amadou (2002), L’implantation de l’enseignement public colonial en Guinée (1891–1905), in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 21–42. Barry, Abdourahmane (2010), Understanding the Guinean Education System: Evolution And Some Performance Indicators, The African Symposium 10, 91–103. Barry, Alpha (2007), Approche énonciative et prosodique de l’appel politique en Guinée, ROFCAN 22, 199–211. Barry, Alpha Ousmane (2002), La phraséologie d’antan dans le discours d’aujourd’hui, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 125–144. Beck, Baptiste, et al. (2018), Estimation des populations francophones dans le monde en 2018. Sources et démarches méthodologiques, Quebec, Observatoire démographique et statistique de l’espace francophone/Université Laval. Benson, Carol/Lynd, Mark (2011), National languages in education in Guinea-Conakry: re-emancipation in progress?, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 209, 113–129. C-GN (1991) = Republic of Guinea (1991), Constitution de la République de Guinée, in: Président de la République (ed.), Le droit guinéen, Conakry, Republic of Guinea, https://ledroitguineen.wordpress.com/a-propos/ constitution-du-23-decembre-1990/ (2/3/2023). C-GN (2010) = Republic of Guinea (2010), Constitution du 7 mai 2010, in: Jean-Pierre Maury (ed.), Digithèque de matériaux juridiques et politiques, Perpignan, Université de Perpignan, https://mjp.univ-perp.fr/constit/ gn2010.htm (2/3/2023).

10 “Il s’exprime en français, un français pittoresque avec un accent marqué de la région forestière et dans lequel les ‘l’prennent systématiquement la place des ‘r’ et les ‘w’ celles des ‘v’” (A. A. Diallo 1985, 94).

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C-GN (2020) = Republic of Guinea (2010), Constitution, Journal Officiel de la République. Numéro spécial, 14 Avril 2020, https://www.coursupgn.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/La-Constiution-Guine%CC%81 enne-de-2020.pdf (2/3/2023). Camara, Mohamed Saliou/O’Toole, Thomas/Baker, Janice E. (2013), Historical Dictionary of Guinea, Lanham/ Toronto/Plymouth, Scarecrow. Camara, Raymond Georges (2006), La Langue française en Guinée: Jeux et Enjeux, Synergies Afrique Centrale et de l’Ouest 1, 71–79. Diakhaby, Oumar (2017), L’ethnicité en Guinée-Conakry au prisme de l’organisation sociopolitique, Paris, L’Harmattan. Diallo, Abdourahmane (2013), Les langues de Guinée, Paris, Karthala. Diallo, Abdourahmane (2014), Language Contact in Guinea. The Case of Pular and Mande Varieties, Cologne, Köppe. Diallo, Abdourahmane (2018), Approximations phonologiques chez les locuteurs Sosophones du français informel, in: Klaus Beyer et al. (edd.), Linguistics across Africa. Festschrift für Rainer Vossen, Cologne, Köppe, 59–74. Diallo, Abdourahmane (2021), Quelques repères historiques et sociolinguistiques sur l’implantation du français à Conakry, The Mouth 8, 65–84. Diallo, Alpha-Abdoulaye (1985), La vérité du ministre. Dix ans dans les geôles de Sékou Touré, Paris, Calmann-Lévy. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou (1989–1990), Lexique français et réalités guinéennes, ROFCAN 8, 115–130. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou (1998), Le français et les langues guinéennes: conséquences du contact, Le français en Afrique 12, 118–126. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou (1999), Le français en Guinée: contribution à un inventaire des particularités lexicales, Vanves, Edicef. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou (2002), Langues et enseignement en Guinée, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 43–56. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou (2004), Usages et images des langues en Guinée, Le Français en Afrique 19, 9–36. Diallo, Alpha Mamadou/Holtzer, Gisèle (2002), Présentation, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 7–20. Diallo, Lamanara Petty (1991), Enjeux et avatars de l’enseignement du français en République de Guinée: contexte historique, aspects pédagogiques et perspectives de rénovation, Bordeaux, Septentrion. Diallo, Mamadou Saliou (2002), Adstrat local et transfert de structures: langues locales et français en Guinée, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franccomtoises, 71–88. Goerg, Odile (2011), Couper la Guinée en quatre ou comment la colonisation a imaginé l’Afrique, Vingtième Siècle 111, 73–88. Guilavogui, Galema (1975), The basis of the educational reform in the Republic of Guinea, Prospects 5, 435–444. Hamidy Bah, Abdoul (2010), La variation sémantique et syntaxique du complément dans le français des locuteurs non scolarisés de Conakry, Le Français en Afrique 25, 343–349. Holtzer, Gisèle (ed.) (2002), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franccomtoises. INS (2017a), Troisième recensement général de la population et de l’habitation (RGPH3). Rapport d’analyse des données du RGPH3. Thème: État et Structure de la population, Conakry, Institut National de Statistique, https://www.stat-guinee.org/images/Documents/Publications/INS/rapports_enquetes/RGPH3/RGPH3_ etat_structure.pdf (2/3/2023). INS (2017b), Troisième recensement général de la population et de l’habitation (RGPH3). Rapport d’analyse des données du RGPH3. Thème: Éducation: Scolarisation, Alphabétisation et Niveau d’instruction, Conakry, Institut National de Statistique. Kashema, Masageta B.M./Barry, Alpha Ousmane (2002), Alternance codique et emprunt lexical en français de Guinée, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 111–124.

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Leclerc, Jacques (2015), Guinée-Conakry, in: Aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/ CEFAN, http://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/guinee_franco.htm (2/3/2023). Manessy, Gabriel (1994), Le français en Afrique noire: mythe, stratégies, pratiques, Paris, L’Harmattan. MEC = Ministère de l’éducation et de la culture (1979), La politique culturelle de la Guinée. Étude réalisée par le MEC sous les auspices de la Commission national guinéenne pour l’Unesco, Paris, Presses universitaires de France. MIC (2018), Radio rurale de guinée, Conakry, Ministère de l’information et de la communication, https:// infocommunication.gov.gn/ministere/partenaires/direction-generale-de-la-radio-rurale-de-guinee/ (2/ 3/2023). MSCPH = Ministère des Sports, de la Culture et du Patrimoine Historique (2018), La nouvelle politique culturelle de la République de Guinée, Paris, L’Harmattan. OLF = Observatoire de la langue française (2018), Usages et avenir du français dans l’espace francophone du Sud, Paris, Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, http://observatoire.francophonie.org/wpcontent/uploads/2018/08/2018-Usages-Francais-Afrique-Maghreb-Liban.pdf (2/3/2023). Pauthier, Céline (2013), L’héritage controversé de Sékou Touré, “héros” de l’indépendance, Vingtième Siècle 118, 31–44. Perrin, Ghislaine (1988), La langue française en Guinée, Paris, Institut de recherches sur l’avenir du français, https://ireda.ceped.org/inventaire/ressources/iraf-guinee-10720.pdf (2/3/2023). Ploog, Katja (2007), Pour une approche comparative des dynamiques structurelles du français en Afrique, Linx 57, 165–176. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rozendaal, Jolanda (2017), Le français et le soussou en Guinée: usage et attitudes, Utrecht, Utrecht University, Bachelor Thesis, https://dspace.library.uu.nl/handle/1874/349013 (2/3/2023). Simard, Yves (2002), Étude des formes de sujets selon les “genres”, in: Gisèle Holtzer (ed.), Recherches sur le français en Guinée, Besançon, Presses universitaires franc-comtoises, 89–110. Simard, Yves (2004), La description du français parlé en Guinée, Le Français en Afrique 19, 75–89. Sylla, Ali Badara (1997), La politique linguistique de la Guinée de 1966 à 1984, Mots 52, 144–151. Tinsley, Meghan (2015), Proclaiming Independence: Language and National Identity in Sékou Touré’s Guinea, Postcolonial Studies 18, 237–256. UNESCO (1980), Guinea: Education: Priorities and Prospects, Paris, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. White Oyler, Dianne (2001), A Cultural Revolution in Africa: Literacy in the Republic of Guinea since Independence, The International Journal of African Historical Studies 34, 585–600.

Ingse Skattum

13 Mali Abstract: In Mali, French is a second language, acquired mainly through school. Though it is near to nobody’s first language, it is the sole official language and the dominant language at school and in the written sphere. The number of French speakers is estimated at about 17 % of the population by the International Organisation of la Francophonie. Thirteen of the country’s approximately twenty languages have the status of a national language, which implies codification, that is, official alphabets and orthographies, and a certain use in the media and at school. Bambara is by far the most spoken first language (almost half of the population), and the main lingua franca (nearly the entire population). French in Mali is spoken mainly among the upper class, and mainly at work – outside work, people most often speak one of the Malian languages. French is used as an instrument of social promotion, but since it is nearly exclusively used in formal settings, it has not developed into a local variety.  

Keywords: French, Bambara, interference, contact linguistics, bilingual education

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 French In Mali, French is a second language, acquired mainly through school. Though it is near to nobody’s first language, it is the sole official language and the dominant language of instruction. Any estimation of the number of Francophones is bound to be inaccurate. The Atlas of the French Language (Atlas de la langue française) distinguishes, for Africa, between ‘potential speakers’ (“locuteurs potentiels”, who have followed at least two years of school) and ‘real speakers’ (“locuteurs réels”, six years of school or more; Rossillon 1995, 79). This places Mali at the very bottom of Francophone countries in Africa south of the Sahara, with 5 % of ‘real’ speakers and 5 % of ‘potential’ French speakers (Rossillon 1995, 86). Canut/Dumestre (1993, 219) come to the same conclusion. Chaudenson (1991) however finds the sole criterion of schooling unsatisfactory and proposes a new analytical grid where two axes intersect: the status (the official functions of the language in the country: education, media, administration – a wider concept than the one usually understood by this term), and the corpus (the practices observed on the ground). Applying his grid to 21 Francophone countries throughout the world, he ranks Mali’s corpus nextto-the-last. The International Organization of la Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – which tends to overestimate the number of French speakers) finds that in Mali, French speakers constitute 17 % of the population (3,703,000 of the es 

 

 

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timated 21,474,000 inhabitants in 2022; OIF 2022, 31). A literacy rate of 33.1 % (Jeune Afrique 2019) thus seems unrealistic with French ruling the written sphere, while functional literacy in national languages is low, as shown for example in a study of the most important Bambara literacy programme (Dombrowsky/Dumestre/Simonis 1993). French in Mali is spoken mainly among the upper class, and mainly at work – outside work, people most often speak one of the Malian languages. French is used as an instrument of social promotion, and so the Francophone elite regularly try to expose their children to French, amongst others through private lessons, private schools, and schools abroad (Dumestre 1997; 2000). Very few among the elite however choose to speak French at home to help their children. Pupils from public schools as a rule master French poorly and use it rarely. Thus, French is prevented from developing into a local variety by being nearly exclusively used in formal settings.  

1.2 Other languages National languages – Estimations of the number of local languages vary greatly, due to migrations, language shift, widespread multilingualism, and, not least, different ways of distinguishing between dialect and language. The Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) thus counts 69 endogenous languages in Mali (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023), while most sources suggest around 20 languages (cf. Calvet 1992; Canut/Dumestre 1993). Of these languages, 13 have been given the status of national language (alternative language names in parenthesis): Bambara (Bamanankan), Bomu (Bwamu, Bobo), Bozo, Dogon, Fulfulde (Peul), Hassaniyya (Maure), Mamara (Minyanka), Maninka (Malinké), Songhay, Soninke (Maraka), Senufo (Syenara), Tamasheq, Xaasongaxango (Xasongo, for classification, cf. Skattum 2008, 104–115). This status implies codification, that is official alphabets and orthographies. All but Hassaniyya, an Arabic dialect written in Arabic letters, have been given an alphabet in Latin script. They are however very different in terms of usage (number of speakers and domains of usage), diffusion (local, regional, national or international), standardization (choice of dialect, development of orthographic rules), intellectualization (the existence of modern terminology), and dynamics (usage advancing, declining or remaining stable), as well as their internal relationship (dialect/language). The last census from 2009 gives the distribution of inhabitants according to the first and national languages spoken (cf. INS 2011, 75, table 4.7). Bambara is by far the most spoken first language, counting 46.3 % of the population. The other first languages are Fulfulde (9.4 %), Dogon (7.3 %), Soninke (6.4 %), Maninka (6.3 %), Songhay (5.6 %), Mamara (4.3 %), Tamasheq (3.5 %), Senufo (2.6 %), Bomu (2.1 %), Bozo (1.9 %), Xaasongaxango (1.2 %), and Hassaniyya (1.1 %). Foreign languages – Arabic, which is not considered a national language, has 0.3 % of first language speakers, and other foreign languages (which include French) constitute only 0.1 % of first language speakers among the population. Three of the national languages function as regional lingua franca: Fulfulde in the centre, Soninke  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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in the West, and Songhay in the North. The rest of the national languages are used locally. Multilingualism – Multilingualism is however extremely frequent. Though the Bambaraphones, who make themselves understood nearly everywhere, tend to be monolingual, minority language speakers are usually plurilingual (often speaking a local and a regional language plus Bambara). In the past, Malian languages have borrowed extensively from Arabic (amongst others religious terms, and days of the week), but these loans are now well integrated. The most important loans today are from French into African languages, but French also borrows some expressions, mostly from Bambara, rarely from other national languages. The borrowing has not developed into a mixed variety like in Dakar or Abidjan. Multilingualism in Mali has been studied inter alia by Barry (1990, survey at Djenne), Cissé (1992, linguistic policy), Calvet (1992, surveys at marketplaces in Bamako, Mopti, and Gao; 1994, urban sociolinguistic surveys from Bamako, Gao, Djenne), Dumestre (1994b, communication strategies), Canut (1996, linguistic dynamics), Cissé (2014, bilingual infants’ phonetic development). Bambara domination – Bambara and French are the only languages spoken at a national level. Though the heartland of Bambara lies in southern Mali, in Bamako and Segu, Bambara is progressing in all regions of Mali. Thus, Bambara is part of the linguistic repertoire of nearly 98 % of the population (INS 2011, 75) – an increase from the 80 % formerly proposed (Canut/Dumestre 1993, 221). The progress can be linked to Bambara’s role as a modern language: it is used in the capital and other cities, and in domains like films (Souleymane Cissé, Cheikh Oumar Sissoko, Abderrahmane Sissako), popular music (Salif Keita, Habib Koité, Oumou Sangaré, Rokia Traoré, Fatoumata Diawara), as well as in the communication with civil servants coming from Bamako to the urban centres of all regions. Though they master French, they normally use Bambara. Neither its dominating position nor its dynamic character are however new: since the great Mali Empire (thirteenth–fifteenth centuries), Manding languages (comprising among others Bambara and Maninka) have been among the most important in West Africa. Thus, rather than a diglossic situation between French and the national languages, in Mali we have a ‘trinomial French-Bambara-national languages’ (cf. Dumestre 1994a). The only serious resistance to Bambara domination is found in the North, among the Songhay and Tamasheq speakers, who are culturally quite different from the southern ethnic groups (cf. Canut 1996, 114–121). In this region, Songhay has functioned as a lingua franca for centuries, while the Tamasheq-speaking Tuaregs have been opposed to central authorities. Both of these groups in general prefer French in interethnic communication.  

 

2 Linguistic history The French arrived on the west African coast already in the seventeenth century, but it was not until the nineteenth century that France sought to extend its influence to the landlocked interior, establishing forts along the Senegal River to Medine in today’s

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Mali. At the Berlin conference in 1884–1885, where the European colonial powers divided the continent between them, France was granted territories in West and Middle Africa. The government-general of French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF), founded in 1895, included eight colonies, amongst them French Soudan, conquered between 1880 and 1895 and established as a colony on its own in 1892. French Soudan got its independence in 1960 and became today’s Mali, named after the prestigious Mali Empire. The French colonization imposed French administration and, not least, schools and language on the region. The impact of more than seventy years of French colonization is important but not as strong as in many other former colonies in sub-Saharan Africa. The late arrival of the French, the rich historical and cultural heritage (three medieval empires: Ghana eighth to eleventh centuries, Mali thirteenth to fifteenth centuries, and Gao fifteenth–sixteenth centuries, cf. Ki-Zerbo 1978) all contribute to Mali’s attachment to their own traditions and languages.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation The Constitution of the Third Republic (1992) states Mali’s linguistic policy concerning French as well as the national languages: ‘The sovereign people of Mali […] proclaims its determination to defend the rights of women and children as well as the cultural and linguistic diversity of the national community’.1 ‘French is the official language. The law decides on the modes of application to promote and officialize the national languages’.2

A law specifying the role of national languages was adopted in 1996. Article 1 underlines the right to cultural diversity, and article 3 defines their use: ‘The national languages enjoy equal rights, in accordance with the country’s cultural diversity and national unity’.3

1 “Le Peuple Souverain du Mali […] proclame sa détermination à défendre les droits de la Femme et de l’Enfant ainsi que la diversité culturelle et linguistique de la communauté nationaleˮ (C-ML 1992, Préambule). 2 “Le français est la langue d’expression officielle. La loi fixe les modalités de promotion et d’officialisation des langues nationalesˮ (C-ML, art. 25). 3 “Les Langues Nationales jouissent des mêmes droits dans le respect des diversités culturelles et de l’Unité nationaleˮ (Law 96, art. 1).

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‘The Council of Ministers determines, by decrees, the national languages’ alphabets, their modes of transcription and introduction into the educational programmes, as well as the translation of official texts into the national languages and the dissemination of such texts’.4

Later, in 2016, the Council of Ministers repealed and replaced this law, insisting on the equality and fair promotion of national languages, besides creating an office responsible for using them in public and private administration. Though the law, to my knowledge, has not yet been adopted, the change of focus may have been prompted by the growing Bambara domination: ‘It [the bill] acknowledges the right of the territorial communities and all citizens to promote the thirteen national languages. It establishes the right of the national languages to be treated on equal terms, in accordance with the country’s cultural diversity and national unity. It establishes a Language politics mediator’s office charged with contributing to promote the equal treatment of the national languages and their use in public and private administrations’.5

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere In spite of the declared intention to support national languages in public administration, French remains the main language. The National Assembly uses interpreters for those members of parliament who choose to speak in a national language: ‘Debates in the National Assembly are conducted in Mali’s official language. When needed, the deputies are assisted by interpreters following the conditions decided by the National Assembly’s Office. Such conditions must have been acknowledged by the president of the National Assembly’.6

The legal system also uses French. Because of the low number of French speakers, this constitutes a serious systemic constraint to the judicial rights of the population (cf. van Veen/Goff/Van Damme 2015).

4 “Des décrets pris en Conseil des Ministres fixent les alphabets des langues nationales, déterminent les modalités de leur transcription et de leur introduction dans les programmes d’enseignement ainsi que celles de la traduction et la diffusion des textes officiels dans les langues nationalesˮ (Law 96, art. 3). 5 “Il [le projet de loi] reconnaît aux collectivités territoriales et aux citoyens le droit de promouvoir les treize langues nationales. Il consacre l’égalité de traitement entre les langues nationales dans le strict respect de la diversité culturelle et de l’unité nationale. Il institue un Bureau du Médiateur de la Politique Linguistique chargé de contribuer à la promotion équitable des langues nationales et à leur utilisation dans les administrations publiques et privéesˮ (Conseil des Ministres 2016). 6 “Les débats à l’Assemblée Nationale se déroulent dans la langue officielle du Mali. En cas de nécessité, les députés sont assistés d’interprètes dans les conditions déterminées par le Bureau de l’Assemblée Nationale. Ces conditions doivent faire l’objet d’une décision du Président de l’Assemblée Nationaleˮ (Assemblée Nationale 2015, art. 4).

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Official documents are in French. Due to widespread illiteracy, public announcements (amongst others, summons and administrative notifications, nominations and transfers, exams and competitive examinations results) are given orally through radio and television, in both French and national languages. Mali’s linguistic landscape is typical of sub-Saharan Africa’s exographia: “a situation in which […] the likelihood of a robust, vital, majority language being absent from the [linguistic landscape] is high” (Mc Laughlin 2015, 215). General signage is scarce and nearly exclusively urban. Street signs are few and often bear numbers instead of names, a remnant of colonial practice (cf. Bertrand 1998, 104). The hotel La Coccinelle, for example, gives the following address on its site: “Route de Koulikoro rue 251, porte 82”. Shop, restaurant, and hotel signs are mostly in French. French may be mixed with English: “Le Loft de Bamako. A chic chill out hotel”, “Salon de thé. Barber shop” (L’atelier des couleurs 2011). Road advertisements often mix French with national languages, mostly Bambara (“Barika Tigi lave tout”) or English, when citing international brand names like Coca Cola. China is increasingly present in Africa, and Chinese signs can be seen, for example, on restaurants, usually combined with French. Mc Laughlin (2015) analyses bilingual signage French/Arabic, particularly in the North. In Mopti, oral toponymic usage implies Songhay, Fulfulde, Bambara, and Bozo (cf. Dorier-Aprill/Van den Avenne 2002, 151), while the written linguistic landscape is dominantly French, with some Fulfulde and Bambara signage. Bank notes use French for the value: Mille francs CFA (CFA = Communauté Financière Africaine) and the bank’s name Banque Centrale des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest. Stamps also carry French text for the value (200 F), the country (République du Mali), as well as the motif, for example Tombouctou “La mystérieuse”. Political speeches used to be pronounced nearly exclusively in French but are more and more often delivered in national languages, as are radio and television interviews with politicians.

3.3 Languages used in education Mali’s educational system consists of three levels: fundamental education (grades 1–6 = first cycle, and grades 7–9 = second cycle), secondary education (grades 10–11 plus classe terminale), and tertiary education (university). Like most Francophone countries, Mali teaches principally in French from grade 1. Mali is nonetheless a unique case among Francophone countries, having given state-financed bilingual education French/national languages without interruption since 1979 until lately. Many studies have looked at the language of instruction issue in Mali, amongst others Calvet (1988), Hutchison/Diarra/Poth (1990), Diarra/Haïdara (1999), Opheim (1999), Tréfault (1999), Thyness (2003), Skattum (2004; 2010b; 2018), Canvin (2007), Maurer (2007), Tamari (2009), Traoré (2009), as well as a special issue of the Nordic Journal of African Studies (Skattum 2000). Most concern bilingual education in the first cycle of fundamental school and conclude that it gives better results than the “classic” monolingual French schools, though several are critical of the pedagogical method used.

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From 1979, the expansion in bilingual education was substantial: from one to eleven languages, and from early to late exit.7 The number of bilingual schools reflects the sociolinguistic status of the national languages, Bambara being by far the most frequent language of instruction amongst the national languages. For example, in 1989–1990, of the then 104 bilingual schools, 83 used Bambara, 6 Fulfulde, 6 Songhay, and 9 Tamasheq (cf. Skattum 2010b, 248). In 1994, Malian authorities decided to generalize bilingual education. By 2005–2006 it had been extended to 2,550 primary schools (31.62 % of public schools). Subsequently, lack of follow-up and political will, however, brought serious setbacks. By 2008, the bilingual programme convergent pedagogy only had 2,338 schools representing 21.1 % of public schools (cf. Skattum 2010b, 250). Convergent pedagogy was criticized by Maurer (2007, 16ss., 28ss.), among other things for the lack of distinction between first and second-language didactics, and by other researchers (cf. Skattum 2000) for teacher training focusing nearly exclusively on French, and for education programmes giving more teaching hours and more textbooks in French. In 2008, Malian authorities stopped further expansion, and in 2011, they went from a late to an early exit, reducing bilingual education to first and second grade and confining it to Bambara language zones (cf. Haïdara 2019). In principle, they still support bilingual education through the Investment Programme for the Education Sector (Programme d’investissement pour le secteur de l’éducation – PISE) III, started in 2010 and extended until a normal political situation has resumed (cf. World Bank 2019). The political crisis that started in 2012 with Jihadist attacks in the North has, however, given a further blow to all education efforts, be they bilingual or French, and to all regions. In the North, schools were damaged and/or abandoned, and in the South, refugees from the North put pressure on already overcrowded classes (75 pupils per class on average in public schools in Bamako, according to the latest available statistics, cf. MEALN 2011). Between 2011 and 2013, previous progress eroded. The primary gross enrolment rate, which had reached 81.5 % in 2011, dropped to 69.3 % in 2013, and the primary completion rate dropped from 58.3 % in 2010 to 47.7 % in 2013 (World Bank 2019). In response, the World Bank started the Mali Emergency Education For All (EFA) project (2013–2017). Their activities are continued by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in collaboration with the Selected Integrated Reading Activity (SIRA) project until 2021. In 2019, the SIRA project concerns 300,000 pupils in 3,896 public schools, community schools, single-classrooms, and madrasas, but in Bambara only and restricted to 1st and 2nd grades (cf. USAID-Mali/SIRA 2019). This can hardly be called “Education for All”, and it follows that bilingual education has been completely abandoned by public authorities, depending on foreign aid like in other Francophone countries.  

 

 

 

 

 

7 Baker (2011, 216) defines “early exit” as maximum two years of first language instruction, but the African practice of 3–4 years of first language instruction is also early, considering the weak second-language input outside class compared to that of immigrant children in the West. “Late exit” means continuing through grades 5, 6 or later.

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In secondary education (lycées), French is still the sole language of instruction. At university level, French is taught in the Département des Lettres, like in France, while other languages are taught in foreign language departments of English, German, and others. There is still no department of African languages, though a proposal to this effect was made many years ago. Students are offered courses (unités de valeur) in national languages within different programmes, but no diploma of African languages exists. The Department of language sciences recently proposed a master of national languages, but the number of inscriptions was insufficient (personal information from Ibrahima Cissé, 19/3/2019). Regardless of the language of instruction, education quality in Mali is low due to high teacher absenteeism and inadequate teaching and learning conditions. As can be expected, the results are unsatisfactory: “In 2011, PASEC (Programme d’analyse des systèmes éducatifs de la CONFAMEN [sic]) data showed that 1 in 5 Malian students in second grade could not understand a sequence of simple sentences in writing and speaking […]. [For] students at the end of their fifth year, […] [the] rate for oral and written comprehension and writing was only 16 percent” (World Bank 2019, 6s.).

A test in 2015 (cf. USAID-Mali/SIRA 2016) gave even worse results for 2nd graders: 70 % of 2,826 pupils could not read a single word in French. These quantitative results are confirmed by a qualitative linguistic analysis of 5th graders’ French copies – which also showed that monolingual French tuition gave poorer results in French than bilingual education (cf. Skattum 2004). Under these circumstances, the criteria of two or six years of schooling to form a “potential” or “real” Francophone speaker is clearly an illusion.  

3.4 Languages used in the media Press – Low literacy rates give the written press in Mali a very limited readership. Under Moussa Traoré’s twenty-three-years dictatorship, it consisted of a single governmentcontrolled channel (L’Essor). His overthrow in 1991 spurred the creation of a great number of private publications. A survey in 1993 (cf. Skattum 1994) counted seventy-five French newspapers and journals in the streets of Bamako. Many of them lasted for a short time for lack of means, professional journalists and a Francophone readership. Thus, in 2003 print media included only thirty-nine private newspapers and journals in Bamako (cf. Wikipedia 2018). The 1993 survey also counted six monthly national language newspapers. As four of them were state-financed, they did not depend on sales and three of them still appear (personal information from Malian journalist Siaka Doumbia, 2019). Kibaru ‘(lit.) News’ in Bambara is the oldest (since 1972). Fulfulde and Soninke versions followed, while the Songhay version was discontinued. The two privately financed monthly newspapers in Bambara, Jɛkabaara ‘(lit.) Work together’ (since 1986) and Kalamɛnɛ ‘(lit.) The Torch’ (since 1992), have ceased to appear. Radio – Radio is the primary means of mass communication in Mali, where even the most remote village has transistors. From independence until 1991 there was only one

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radio channel, Radio-Mali, owned by the state. It changed its name to Office of Radio and Television of Mali (Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision du Mali, ORTM) when television was introduced in 1983. Today (2019), ORTM runs two FM radio stations at a national level, predominantly in French, but with several hours of Bambara language programming, as well as regional broadcasting in national languages. The introduction of democracy in 1992 led to many “free” radio channels in both French and local languages. At present, there are around 150 (300 according to Carrasco s.a.) private radio stations on FM (cf. Wikipedia 2019a), mostly in local languages. Television – ORTM also operates two TV channels, ORTM TV and TM2, with repeaters throughout the country. Most programmes are in French, but news are broadcast also in national languages, mainly Bambara. In 2004, Africable, promoted as ‘the channel of the continent’ (“la chaîne du continent”), a French-language, privately owned, panAfrican TV-channel, started broadcasting national news from nine West African countries. It is headquartered in Bamako (cf. Wikipedia 2019b).

4 Linguistic characteristics French in Mali shares many characteristics with French in the neighbouring countries and more widely, in Francophone Africa. While extra-linguistic factors are generally recognized, the respective roles of intra- and inter-systemic factors are subject to debate. On the one hand, some (e. g., Chaudenson/Mougeon/Beniak 1993; Gadet/Jones 2008) focus on inter-systemic motivations for French language change, finding that deviances from standard French are attested in earlier times or in other parts of the world. The high degree of multilingualism in African countries does indeed make it difficult to identify interferences (the learners’ unconscious transfer of features from first to second language) from any particular language on French. On the other hand, contact linguistics (cf. Ploog 2008) points to Manessy’s sémantaxe theory, defined as ‘the cognitive processes that form and organize information’ (“les processus cognitifs qui président à la mise en forme et à l’organisation de l’informationˮ, Manessy 1994a, 87). This theory attributes linguistic restructuration mainly to different semantic categorizations in African languages rather than to interferences stemming from a specific language. Others refer to the “interlanguage” process, the imperfect learning of a second language that opens up for borrowing or structural interferences from the first language. As Queffélec points out: ‘Local norms, which are relatively permissive, are subject to the influence of languages in contact and the dominant African linguae francae’.8 Several studies have focused on the possible transfer of characteristics from Malian languages to French.  

8 “Les normes locales, relativement permissives, subissent l’influence des langues en contact et des véhiculaires africains dominantsˮ (Queffélec 2008, 73).

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4.1 Pronunciation The influence of the first on the second language is particularly noticeable at the phonetic/phonological level. Two surveys conducted in Bamako and Segu look into this aspect: the Phonologie du français contemporain (PFC) project (cf. Durand/Laks/Lyche 2009) in collaboration with the Contemporary French in Africa and the Indian Ocean (CFA) project, that adapted the PFC protocol to the multilingual context and opened for syntactic and sociolinguistic considerations (cf. Lyche/Skattum 2011). In 2006 and 2008, recordings were made of informants selected according to age, gender, first language and level of instruction. Five first languages from typologically distinct groups were chosen: Bambara, Fulfulde, Senufo, Songhay, and Tamasheq. Their influence on the informants’ French pronunciation was also tested through a perception test in 2008 (Lyche/ Skattum 2010). The five languages share the lack of front rounded vowels, a pan-African trait that distinguishes them from French. They also show a rich span of realizations of the rhotic with a certain preference for the apical trill /r/. Songhay and Tamasheq share a preference for the syllabic structure CVC (or CVCC), as opposed to the other languages, where open CV syllables are preferred. Despite the lack of the French front rounded vowels, recordings show that /ø/ and /œ/ belong to the informants’ phoneme inventory but that the distribution differs from that of standard French since they occur only in stressed syllables (jeune [ʒœn]). When followed by a rhotic coda (syllable or word final), the rounded vowel is open like in standard French, but often closed in other contexts, for example, peuple [pøpl]. The vowel /y/ is more easily assimilated, but not by all speakers, as in étude [etid]. As a whole, one notes a high level of individual variation in the vocalic system. The behaviour of schwa, defined as a vowel either realized as [ø], [œ], [ə], or zero, deserves special attention. In the first syllable of polysyllabic words, the vowel is stable as in southern French. This is also the case for most clitics (je [ʒe]), a position where French has a schwa, but where the vowel is maintained in Mali. Only frequent words or expressions are subject to elision or lexicalization without a vowel: qu’est-c(e) que and n’est-c(e) pas. A real schwa seems to be present in the negation ne, where the vowel is reduced in about 50 % of the occurrences, as well as word internally (maint(e)nant). In Mali, the schwa tends to be realized as the non-rounded front vowel [e]: pas de temps [padetã]. Given the features [+front] [+rounded] characterizing a realized schwa, the feature [+front] is dominant. Besides, some words like chemise and petit seem stored in the speakers’ lexicon with non-rounded vowels: [ʃemiz], [peti]. The consonantal system differs from standard French mainly in the articulation of the rhotic. The acoustic analysis of the data reveals a clear difference amongst the informants as regards its presence/absence in a coda position or in a group with an obstruent. Thus, Songhay and Tamasheq speakers, whose first languages are CVC, generally maintain the rhotic in these positions: parti [parti], théâtre [teatr], while speakers of CV languages often delete it in the same positions: garçon [ɡaːsõ]. This is  

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a frequent realization in many French varieties in Africa and in French-based Creole languages. Liaison, be it categorical (compulsory) or variable (optional), is less frequent in Mali (and generally in Africa) than in standard French (Boutin 2014). In the 2006 PFC survey, categorical liaison was restricted to determiners + nouns (most frequent), pronouns + verb and the prepositions en, dans + noun phrase, all other contexts being variable. Liaison consonants /z/, /t/ or /n/ are known to convey morphological information, but in Mali, /z/ as the plural marker is clearly dominant. Liaison is closely linked to prosody. In Mali, it “is maintained when it fulfils a morphological role but exclusively within a tight prosodic unit, preferably a prosodic word defined as a potential stress-bearing domain” (Lyche/Skattum 2012, 95). Prosody is a distinguishing factor not only between French and African languages but also among African languages. While French is characterized by post-lexical prosody, the languages under scrutiny have lexical prosodies, but of different types: Songhay and Tamasheq are lexical stress languages while the others are tone languages, characteristics which are transferred to French. In a test where Mali speakers were asked to determine the first language of a recorded speaker, acoustic analyses of extracts from the most and the least well recognized informant of each language were performed. They confirm that a transfer of the prosodic systems to French does indeed take place, though in a complex and variable way (Lyche/Bordal 2013). A comparative prosodic study of French spoken by informants with four different first languages, in Mali (Bambara, Tamasheq), Central African Republic (Sango) and Senegal (Wolof), likewise showed that prosody could be transferred (cf. Bordal/Skattum 2014). Bambara and Sango use lexical tones while Wolof and Tamasheq use lexical stress. Melodic variation is thus attested in French between native speakers of the tonal languages and the stress-based languages, with lexically determined stress for speakers of tonal languages and postlexically determined stress for the others. As a result of these transfers, Mali speakers give prominence to lexical words. For instance, the syntagme grand honneur in the PFC text is pronounced with two prominences by all the African informants, while all the native French speakers of the PFC database stress the last syllable only. Likewise, monosyllabic functional words (stressless clitics, determiners and monosyllabic prepositions) are also frequently endowed with prominence. This proliferation of prominences may well contribute to the impression of an “African” accent – an observation which does not exclude the influence of different first languages. The studies on pronunciation here cited also show the crucial impact of sociodemographic factors: speakers of lower educational levels or less exposed to French tend to produce more interferences from their first language than do informants of higher educational levels.

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4.2 Morphosyntax French syntax in Mali is commonly believed to be close to standard French. According to Canut, for instance, ‘One finds very few syntactic characteristics of spoken French […] very close to the French spoken in France’ (“[O]n remarque très peu de spécificités syntaxiques du français parlé […] très proches du français parlé en Franceˮ, 1998b, 64). This is however true mostly of acrolectal French. Canut mentions some characteristics, like intensive reduplication (un peu un peu), the referent preceding the comment (la chaussure là + c’était un peu serré), intransitive use of certain transitive verbs (préparer ‘préparer le repas’), the closing là (on est allé payer un truc là) and the use of deictics in narratives (temporal adverbs as maintenant, determiners and demonstrative pronouns as for example celle-là, ça (Canut 1998a, 87ss.). These traits can also be found elsewhere in Africa. The oral verbal system is basically the same in France and Africa: two simple tenses, the present and the imperfect, and two composed tenses, the perfect and the periphrastic future (cf. Manessy 1994a, 158). The CFA survey however showed that the verbal subsystem of hypothetical constructions differs from that of standard French (the following examples of hypothetical constructions from the CFA survey are quoted in Skattum 2011). The informants, representing different social groups, were asked to tell their life story, and to answer two questions: ‘What would you do if you were rich/president?’ (“Qu’est-ce que vous feriez si vous étiez riche/Président?”). The interviews bring out 13 different tense combinations, the most frequent being the following three: Si + PR (présent), PR; Si + PR, FUT (futur); Si + IMP (imparfait), COND (conditionnel). (i) Si + PR, PR is the usual way of expressing not only a likely hypothesis (Si + PR, FUT in Standard French), but even an unlikely one (Si + IMP, COND in standard French). For instance, to the stimulus Si + IMP, COND, the informant DIM answers by the simpler form Si + PR, PR: “I [Interviewer]: Si tu avais beaucoup d’argent, si tu étais riche, qu’est-ce que tu ferais de cet argent? DIM: Si j’ai [instead of j’avais] beaucoup d’argent? Qu’est-ce que je fais [instead of ferais]?ˮ (CFA, interviewer/informant DIM).9

Si + PR, PR is the most frequent Si-construction of the CFA corpus. It is however generally used in a temporal sense (quand, toutes les fois que...). In more than half of these cases, the construction has a generic signification. In Africa, generic expressions are common; they categorize chance happenings of life, confirming a shared knowledge (cf. Manessy 1994b, 18). Below, the noun phrases le Blanc and les grands patrons are generic, being without a specific reference:

9 ‘I [Interviewer]: If you had a lot of money, if you were rich, what would you do with the money? – DIM: If I have [instead of had] a lot of money? What do [instead of would] I do?’.

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“[…] si [instead of quand] le Blanc il fait quelque chose pour nous, le(s), le(s) grand(s) patron(s), il prend ça, il mangeˮ (CFA, informant TRM).10

(ii) Si + PR, FUT is used to express an unreal past (Si + IMP, COND in standard French): “Si moi, je me suis assis que ah je sera riche sans travailler ça va pas aller heinˮ [instead of Si moi, je restais assis/m’étais assis,[en me disant]: ‘Ah, je serai riche’, sans travailler, ça n’irait pas] (CFA, informant DIS).11

The periphrastic form aller + infinitive is the normal future form in Africa (except for frequent verbs like être and avoir.) In France, periphrastic future expresses a time closer to the present and the process as less hypothetical than the simple future. Though periphrastic future is gaining ground also in France, it is still a complementary form to the simple future tense. (iii) Si + IMP, periphrastic COND is mostly used instead of the Si + IMP, COND construction. The synthetic conditional does not belong to the four basic tenses and hence is rare in oral French in Mali; of the few occurrences in this corpus, most are periphrastic. In standard French, the periphrastic conditional allerimp + infinitive seems limited to temporal use (prospective), while in Mali, speakers of different levels use it to express a past-as-unreal hypothesis: “Sinon, si j’avais les moyens, j’allais chercher une [instead of je chercherais/achèterais une maison] pour moi et mes femmesˮ (CFA, informant COT).12

Discourse markers, also called discourse particles or pragmatic particles, which are part of pragmatic studies, are at the crossroads of syntax and lexicon. Manessy (cf. 1992, 63s.) considers them the most salient characteristic of oral communication, in Africa as elsewhere. A systematic research of some 40 discourse markers in the PFC database revealed several distinctive features in Mali and other African countries (cf. Skattum 2012). Some items frequently studied in French turned out to be less or not at all represented in the African corpora, while others were more frequent or even new to the field. The most frequent one in Africa was bon. Its average (i.e. the number of occurrences divided by the number of informants, at three levels: Francophone, African, and Malian) was however double in Mali, maybe influenced by the interjection ayiwa, borrowed from Arabic and commonly used in Bambara. Its many meanings (cf. Bailleul 2000, s. v.) correspond well to those defined for bon. What first of all distinguishes the Malian

10 ‘[…] if [instead of when] the white man does something for us, the, the big boss(es), he (they) take(s) it, he (they) eat(s)’. 11 ‘Me, if I sit down that ah I am rich without working it won’t work, no’ [instead of Me, if I sat down saying to myself: “Ah, I shall be rich”, without working, it wouldn’t work]. 12 ‘Otherwise, if I had the means, I would look for one [a house] for myself and my wives’.

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corpus is however the extreme frequency of bon as a narration marker, at the place of progressive markers like ensuite and puis: “Je suis née à Sikasso, en ce moment Sikasso était euh/, une subdivision, au temps colon. Après, mon papa fut un, un fonctionnaire. Bon, on est parti à Kayes après, il est revenu à Bamako, bon, après, Kolokani. Bon. Après j’ai été mariée, lorsque j’ai été, je suis mariée, donc, j’ai continué avec mon mariˮ (PFC, informant NT).13

4.3 Lexicon Queffélec/Jouannet’s differential dictionary from Mali (1982) was part of the pan-African IFA project (1988 [1983]), which adopted a contrastive perspective to standard French. According to the authors, most of these lexical items are not particular to Mali. See for instance the lexical items absenter14 and consorts15 that are both attested in eight other African countries (cf. IFA 1988 [1983], 3, 138s.). Other works on Mali mention semantic extensions, e. g. the negation of adverbs like d’abord ‘first’, here meaning ‘not yet’, aussi ‘also’, here meaning ‘nor’, and a temporal use of seulement ‘only’, here meaning ‘as soon as’. They all suggest interference from Bambara, where these adverbs are used in both meanings (fͻlͻ ‘first, not yet’, fana ‘also, nor’, dͻrͻn ‘only, as soon as’). The expression ça a trouvé que ‘what happened was that’, is probably also influenced by a Bambara expression: a y’a sͻrͻ ‘what happened was that’, lit. ‘it found that’. Such interferences can be found in the whole sub-region of Manding languages (cf. Skattum 2010a). A pan-African trait is the frequent use of verbs with high distributional properties like faire ‘to do’ (faire la France ‘to visit, to live in France’, Canut 1998a, 88) and trouver ‘to find’ (j’ai trouvé un enfant/un diplôme ‘I got a child/a diploma’, CFA corpus, Mali and Central African Republic). The PFC and CFA corpora give us examples of elevated expressions probably picked up from schoolbooks, like présentement (marked as dated and regional in standard French) and comment dirai-je ‘what should I say’ (the inversion of je is rare). They are used orally at all educational levels.  

13 ‘I was born in Sikasso, at that time Sikasso was er/, a subdivision, in colonial times. Afterwards, my dad became a, a civil servant. Well, we left for Kayes, afterwards, he returned to Bamako, well, afterwards, Kolokani. Well. Afterwards, I have married, when I have, I was married, thus I continued with my husband’. 14 “absenter, v.tr. Manquer, ne pas trouver la personne qu’on était venu voir” (Queffélec/Jouannet 1982, 21). 15 “consorts (et…) loc. adv. Et cetera, et tout le reste, et les autres choses. Com. la locution qui s’applique aux êtres humains aussi bien qu’aux choses exprime l’idée qu’une énumération n’est pas complète mais qu’on veut éviter de l’allonger. Fréquent, écrit, oral, tous milieux” (Queffélec/Jouannet 1982, 80).

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Truncation is common in France, but rare in Mali. One of the PFC informants comments on this: ‘Those who have been to France, you feel that they try to use words, for example manif for manifestation. The rest of us speak in the simplest way. If I say instit you won’t understand me, so I say instituteur’.16

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – Mali’s internal French language policy is to respect the norm of standard French. There is no defined endogenous norm, though certain ways of saying are in general use. At the individual level, deviating morphological forms may be criticized, but to my knowledge, there is little criticism of African influence on French pronunciation, grammar or lexicon. If mixed language practices are commented, they rather target the “unpure” Bambara, contaminated by French in oral, every-day speech. Description of linguistic characteristics – No differential dictionary of French in Mali has been published since 1982, and no grammars or orthographies conceived especially for French in Mali have been published as far as I know, unlike in some other African countries. Variety used in the public sphere – The linguistic landscape is characterized by what Blommaert calls in the title of his book “grass-root literacy”, which means “a more or less stable orthography and language variety” (2008, 9): Couture Homme & Damme, Commercant Chaussure Ceinture Chaussette Silip (L’atelier des couleurs 2011). Variety used in education – Schoolbooks are often published in France, conceived for Francophone Africa and not for Mali in particular. The teachers at best speak an acrolect with some Malian or African particularities. Most use a mesolectal French, like the CFA informant TRZ (nine years of fundamental school and two years of teachers’ college): “Mon père est … quand je naissais il était gardien. […] Bon, ma maman, elle est ménagère, mais je l’ai, je l’ai perdue en 91. Bon, quant à parler de mon enfance, euh, après deux ans, bon, comme je j’ai été, après ma naissance je n’ai pas fait plus de deux ans, bon, mon frère, mon, mon frère suivant est venu. Mon frère qui, mon frère qui me suit là, lui, il est venu donc, […] Bon, malheureusement pour moi quand on partait à l’école, quand il [mon père] partait pour m’inscrire, ça trouvait que j’avais dépassé l’âge d’inscriptionˮ (CFA, informant TRZ).17

16 “Ceux qui ont fait la France, vous sentez qu’ils essayent d’utiliser des mots, par exemple manif pour manifestation. Nous autres, nous parlons de la manière la plus simple. Si je dis instit on ne va pas me comprendre, je dis instituteurˮ (PFC, informant ST). 17 ‘My father is … when I was born he was a caretaker. […] Well, my mom, she is a housewife, but I lost, I lost her in 91. Well, talking about my childhood, er, after two years, well, since I, I was, after my birth I didn’t do more than two years, well, my brother, my, my following brother arrived. My brother who, my

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The informant TRZ uses characteristics like bon, closing là (cf. 4.2), faire deux ans instead of vivre deux ans, ça trouvait que (cf. 4.3), and est venu instead of est né. The verbal tenses reveal a non-native speaker: quand je naissais, quand il partait, est/ai perdue. Such mesolects are socially “unmarked” in Africa (cf. Queffélec 2008, 71), and perceived as standard French by the children. Variety used in the media – The audiovisual state media tend to use acrolectal French, while private audiovisual media use a great deal of language mixing and codeswitching French/Bambara. Some of the news speakers chocobitent, that is they have a Parisian pronunciation, which tends to be mocked. The print press aims at using standard French but are linguistically insecure. Malian newspapers contain a large number of typing and spelling errors that can be attributed to ignorance of grammatical or etymological motivations for the orthography of (quasi)homonymic words. One finds frequent confusions of the infinite and past participle endings of verbs ending in -er, many adjectives and past participles without agreement, nouns without plural markers, or accents omitted or misplaced, as well as widespread mixing of small and capital letters and countless punctuation errors. Mute letters are often omitted or introduced in contradiction to rules. At the syntactic level, articles and prepositions, as well as inversion rules, pose problems, as do idiomatic expressions in general (cf. Skattum 1998, 43s.). Variety used in literature – Mali’s corpus of modern Francophone literature is small compared to that of other African countries, while its traditional oral literature in national languages is exceptionally rich. Many epics, folktales, songs, and proverbs are transcribed and translated into French, as reflected in the subtitle Au carrefour de l’oral et de l’écrit of an issue of the periodical Notre librairie, devoted to Malian literature (Vouarchex/Jacquey 1984). Traditional texts are also transformed into Western genres or woven into modern texts. The pioneer amongst Malian Francophone authors is Moussa Travélé, a colonial interpreter who published a bilingual collection, Proverbes et contes bambara (1977 [1923]). The Bambara text uses French-inspired orthography (no standard existed at the time), while the French text is written in standard French, with footnotes on cultural features and Bambara puns: “1. Les indigènes du Soudan ont extrêmement de retenue devant leurs beaux-parents, si bien que le moindre mouvement déplacé en la présence de ceux-ci est considéré comme honteux. 2. Les deux amis ont mal compris et ont pris le mot fènidialan (linge sec) pour firidialan (couscous sec)ˮ (Travélé 1977 [1923], 69).18

brother who follows me then, he, so he came […] Well, unfortunately for me, when we were leaving for school, when he [my father] was leaving to register me for school, it so happened that I had passed the age of registration’. 18 ‘1. The natives of Sudan are very reserved with their parents-in-law, so that the smallest uncalled-for movement in their presence is considered shameful. – 2. The two friends misunderstood and took the word fènidialan (dry cloth) to mean firidialan (dry couscous)’.

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Besides Travélé, only five writers published literary texts before independence (cf. Le Potvin 2005, 37). Among these is Amadou Hampâté Bâ, whose Kaïdara, récit initiatique peul (1994 [1943]) has become a classic. Bâ is the foremost representative of the traditional trend, not only in Mali but also at a continental and international level. His comment on the knowledge represented by oral literature is proverbial: ‘Every time an old man dies a library burns’ (“chaque vieillard qui meurt est une bibliothèque qui brûle”, address to Unesco’s General Assembly, quoted in Touré/Mariko 2005, 6). His writings include many traditional texts, as well as a novel (L’étrange destin de Wangrin, 1973) and posthumous memoirs (Amkoullel, l’enfant peul, 1991). All but a few bilingual Fulfulde/ French texts are in French. The style in the Traditional genres is solemn, poetic, and often archaic: “Ô hommes éblouis par la lumière! Allez dans le bois sacré du premier village. Offrez-y en holocauste le premier gibier que vous abattrez à la courseˮ (Bâ 1994, 253).19

The colourful and humorous descriptions of colonial society in novels and memoirs, on the other hand, are narrated in standard French, with dialogues reflecting different characters’ registers – both interspersed with Fulfulde and Bambara loanwords or calques, accompanied by linguistic and ethnological notes, e. g. on the so-called “petit-nègre” or “français tirailleur”:  

“‘Moussé Lekkol, poser ici, attendre commandant peler toi (16). Tu froid ton cœur (17), commandant lui pas pressé jamais. Cé comme ça avec grand chef’. Outré de voir ainsi maltraiter la belle langue française, Wangrin alla s’asseoir sans grand enthousiasme. (16) Appeler toi. (17) ‘Rafraîchis ton cœur’ (expression bambara), c’est-à-dire ‘sois patient’ˮ (Bâ 1973, 32, 430).20

After independence, the two best-known authors are Yambo Ouologuem and Massa Makan Diabaté. Ouologuem’s novel Le devoir de violence (1968) was hailed as “perhaps the first African novel worthy of the name” (Blair 1976, 305), but was later accused of plagiarism. The author displays an “extraordinary variety of tone and styles […] from the loftiest epic eloquence to the most colloquial or familiar jargon of Left Bank student or Place Blanche slut” (1976, 305). The novel opens with Arabic formulaic exclamations (frequent throughout the narrative), mock curses (also frequent, as are mock benedictions), and satiric use of depreciative terms like négraille and Nègres:

19 ‘Oh you, there, whom the light fascinates so! Go into the ancester-forest of the first hamlet of the lands you reach. Hunt, run, pursue, catch whatever game you find, then slit its throat as a sacrifice’ (Bâ 1988, 48). 20 ‘“(lit.) Misser Skool [instead of Mister school], put here, wait commandant caw [instead of call] you (16). You cold your heart (17), commandant he never hurry. Is like that with big chief.ˮ Outraged at this ill-treatment of the beautiful French language, Wangrin went to sit down without great enthusiasm. – (16) Call you. – (17) “Cool down your heartˮ (Bambara expression), that is, “be patientˮ’.

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“Nos yeux boivent l’éclat du soleil, et, vaincus, s’étonnent de pleurer. Masschallah! oua bismilla!... Un récit de l’aventure sanglante de la négraille – honte aux hommes de rien! – tiendrait aisément dans la première moitié de ce siècle; mais la véritable histoire des Nègres commence beaucoup, beaucoup plus tôt, avec les Saïfs, en l’an 1202 de notre ère, dans l’Empire africain de Nakemˮ (Ouologuem 1968, 9).21

Diabaté, like Bâ, first published a traditional text (the epic of Sunjata, founder of the Mali Empire, translated from Maninka into French, 1979), and later turned to modern literature. His most-read work is the Kita trilogy (1979; 1980; 1982). The style is ironic and full of loanwords and calques of colloquial Maninka, such as boutou-ba ‘big, bushy split’ (< Maninka bu ‘flesh’ + tu ‘forest’ + ba ‘big’, referring to his mother’s vagina), that the author explains in the text as “Sa fente touffue” and also in a footnote: “Il eut mieux valu que le pagne de ta mère se défit en plein marché. Tout le monde aurait vu tout à loisir, Boutou-ba! Sa fente touffue. Personne ne l’aurait épousée. Et tu ne serais pas né. 1. Boutou-ba: injure très grossière à l’endroit d’une femmeˮ (Diabaté 1983 [1979], 5s.).22

Conclusion – To conclude, French as practised today does not have an endogenous norm but is marked by the speakers’ first language and contact with other local languages, first of all Bambara. It also contains some pan-African traits, and of course shares intra-systemic characteristics with other parts of the Francophone world. Besides, French in Mali is highly variable. Being a second language, its use depends greatly on the level of schooling and exposure to spoken French. With the ongoing terrorist threat to the school system, as well as the expansion of Bambara, the French corpus may well diminish, and future generations have even less access to French. There is, however, no sign at present of a change in its status as official language and first language of social promotion.

References Assemblée Nationale (2015), Règlement intérieur du 15 octobre, Bamako, Republic of Mali, http://www. assemblee-nationale.ml/uploads/documents/anm_DRzViQOv.pdf (2/3/2023). Bâ, Amadou Hampâté (1973), L’étrange destin de Wangrin ou Les Roueries d’un interprète africain, Paris, Union générale d’édition. Bâ, Amadou Hampâté (1988), Kaïdara, trans. Daniel Whitman, Washington D. C., Three Continents.  

21 ‘Our eyes drink the dazzling sunlight, and, vanquished, are surprised to find themselves crying. Masschallah! oua bismilla!... A story of the bloody adventure of niggers – shame on the men who have nothing! – could easily be told within the first half of this century; but the real Negro story starts much, much earlier, with the Saïfs, in the year of our Lord 1202, in the African empire of Nakem’. 22 ‘It would have been better if your mother’s pagne had come undone in the middle of the market. Everybody would have seen her boutou-ba1 at their leisure! Her bushy slit. Nobody would have married her, and you would never have been born […] 1: Boutou-ba: a great insult to a woman’s genitals’ (Diabaté 2017, 5, 113).

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Catherine Taine-Cheikh

14 Mauritania Abstract: The use and status of the French language in Mauritania evolved considerably during the twentieth century. The peak was in the 1960s and 1970s, when Mauritania became independent and French was granted official language status. In 1991, thirty years after independence, French lost this status, with Arabic becoming the only official language in this multilingual Muslim country, where only part of the population has a variety of Arabic as their first language. French nonetheless continues to play an important role in public life and, for some, in private life as well. Its presence can be seen in particular in education, in the media and in borrowings by Mauritanian languages. Conversely, one notes the influence of local languages and realities on the French spoken in Mauritania. Keywords: French, Mauritania, sociolinguistics, language policy, Arabization

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 French Despite growing competition from English in recent years, French remains the most widely taught European language in Mauritania, and the foreign language with the most speakers. Its official status has varied over time and is currently only that of a foreign language. In practice, however, it is still quite often used as the language of communication between different communities, whether indigenous, immigrant, or foreign. There is also a very small native French-speaking community. The speakers are mainly found in the country’s two largest cities, Nouakchott, the capital, and Nouadhibou, the major economic centre in the North-West, with some additional growth in the South, especially in the South-East. In the Soninke community, where emigration was significant after the 1960s, the return journey brought back to Mauritania a number of young people who had grown up in the French suburbs. It is difficult to give precise numbers of French speakers, and even more difficult to determine what criteria are used to count the speakers of a language. According to the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF), Mauritania had 429,000 French speakers in 2010 and 604,000 in 2018. In March 2019, the Mauritanian website Ndarinfo used the percentage published by the OIF report in the headline: ‘Only 13 % of Mauritanians speak French’ (“Seuls 13 % des Mauritaniens parlent français”, s.a.). Although not verifiable, this percentage takes on meaning when compared to other figures taken from the same report. The  

 

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percentage is indeed much lower than for the three Maghreb countries: 36 % in Morocco, 33 % in Algeria, and 52 % in Tunisia (OIF 2022, 32–35). Apart from factors linked to emigration, the use and mastery (written and/or only oral) of French vary greatly within the native population. They depend to a great extent on the type and duration of schooling (which will be studied in more detail in section 3.3). Other factors are gender, social class, lifestyle, as well as housing, activity, and age. With regard to gender, girls are generally less educated than boys (at primary, secondary and university levels). With regard to social class, the upper strata of society are more and better educated than the lower strata, both among the traditional upper classes (especially the literate ones) and among the new upper classes, the majority of which have emerged from the previous ones, but also from a few selfmade men. Regarding the way of life and the habitat, it is clear that the nomadic population (a very large proportion until the 1970s) has always had less contact with the French language than the sedentary population, but their numbers are now much reduced. On the other hand, there is still a contrast between the small conurbations (villages and smaller towns) and the large conurbations, which are economically more dynamic and more open to foreigners. Concerning activities, it can be observed that certain professions and commercial activities entailing contact with the public or a varied clientele favour exchanges in French, even if they are reduced to the indispensable minimum, while others, such as legal activities carried out within the legislative framework of Islam, favour exchanges in Arabic. As for age, here again the use of French remains generally linked to schooling, but it does not directly follow the quantitative progress of schooling, only that of schooling in French, which reached its peak in the years following independence; it is therefore among men aged 65 and over that one finds the highest proportion of fluent French speakers. All these factors are important, but there is another factor that appears to be more specific to Mauritania, even if it also appears elsewhere mutatis mutandis: that of the ethnic (or ethno-cultural) origins. Generally speaking, the use of French and its appeal are much lower among Mauritanians whose first language is Arabic, the Moors, than among those whose language is Pulaar, Soninke, Wolof, or Bambara, generally referred to in Mauritania as Négro-Africains or Négro-Mauritaniens in French and Kwar (< Ar. Kwāṛ) in Mauritanian Arabic dialect. The vision of Mauritania as a “bridge between white and black Africa” was the (optimistic) vision of the first Mauritanian president Moktar Ould Daddah. It corresponds at least to the reality of a country that combines sociolinguistic features specific to the Maghreb countries with other features characteristic of the countries of the South Sahel.  

 

 

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1.2 Afro-Asiatic languages Arabic Language(s) – As Berber is almost no longer spoken in Mauritania, the Afro-Asiatic languages1 are essentially limited to Arabic. Like in all Arabic-speaking countries, there are several varieties of Arabic. However, as far as non-standard Arabic is concerned, Hassaniyya (< Ar. Ḥassāniyya or klām Ḥassān ‘(lit.) language of the Hassan’) is the only dialectal variety attested within the Mauritanian borders. Hassaniyya is the language of the Moors. Formed, at least in part, on the basis of the language spoken by the Banu Hassan (< Ar. Banū Ḥassān ‘(lit.) children of Hassan’), its history is originally linked to that of the Maqil Arabs (< Ar. Maˤqil). While the nomadic tribes of the Banu Hilal (< Ar. Banū Hilāl ‘(lit.) children of Hilal’) and Banu Sulaym (< Ar. Banū Sulaym ‘(lit.) children of Sulaym’) settled mainly in Algeria and Tunisia, the Maqil continued their migration to Morocco. At the end of the thirteenth century, some of them began to leave the Moroccan South, penetrate further south and Arabize the Western Sahara. The Arabization from around Guelmim to the Senegal River and from the Atlantic Ocean to the NorthWest of Mali was slow and took several centuries to replace the Berber language in use in the region, but it led to a remarkable unification of the language used locally by the Arabic-speaking population (on the history of Hassaniyya, cf. Taine-Cheikh 2018a). Mauritanians whose language is Hassaniyya make up 70 to 80 % of the country’s total population, i.e. around 3 out of 4 million (in 2018, cf. WB 2019). These data are approximate (demographic surveys have not included ethnic or linguistic figures since the partial SEDES survey of 1958), but they do count all first-language Hassaniyya speakers, regardless of their social status and the colour of their skin. Among Hassaniyya speakers (i.e. Moors as a whole), a distinction is generally made between the so-called white and black Moors. It is not uncommon to reserve the ethnoterm Moors for white Moors only, the Bidhan (< Hass. bīđ̣ân ‘(lit.) the white people’) and for the others –perhaps as numerous– to be called Sudan (< Sūdân ‘(lit.) black people’) or Haratin (< Ar. ḥṛāṭîn ‘former slaves’; on these various designations, which are based, among other things, on questions of skin colour, cf. Taine-Cheikh 1989; 2020a). The classification of the Haratin or former slaves is an important social and political issue on which opinions differ, but from a linguistic point of view there is no doubt that Hassaniyya Arabic is the first language of all Moors. For a long time, Hassaniyya was only used as a lingua franca in towns and villages where the Moors made up the majority of the population. It was common for a non-Arabic-speaking civil servant to acquire some use of it after a few years spent in Atar, Moudjeria, Akjoujt, or Néma. However, apart from families from mixed marriages, only certain Fulani groups (Karakoro valley in the south-central part of the country and the  

1 The semi-vowel /j/ is noted . The vowel length is noted by an overline (ˉ) for Arabic or a circumflex accent when the stress of the long vowel is noted. The pharyngeal /ħ/ is noted and the emphatic consonants /rˤ/, /sˤ/, /tˤ/, /dˤ/, etc., are noted here by a dot below: , , , , etc. and by two dots (ː) for Niger-Congo languages. In Hassaniyya (distinct from ə) denotes the mid aperture vowels [æ] and [e].

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Senegal delta) had an excellent command of Hassaniyya without belonging to the Moorish community. The situation has changed, especially in the big cities, with the progress of the officialization of Arabic. From the end of the twentieth century, Hassaniyya conquered some of the ground left by the French and made a notable breakthrough, not only in the streets among young people (especially around a ball), but also in shops and offices. According to Dia (2007), Hassaniyya has thus become, at least in the capital Nouakchott, a kind of lingua franca, though this new status does not necessarily go hand in hand with a positive attitude on the part of the new ‘speakers’. Finally, the attitude of Mauritanians towards Hassaniyya is difficult to separate from their attitude towards standard Arabic, as both are generally linked to, or at least influenced by, belonging to the community. The practice and mastery of standard Arabic (Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic) has varied over time, as will be seen in sections 2 and 3, but it is important to note that this does not concern the Moors, whether in the past (when there were people literate in Classical Arabic among the Black African elites), or in the present, when the teaching of Arabic concerns everyone. Moreover, even if the fact of being a Hassanophone undoubtedly facilitates the learning of standard Arabic, the benefit is limited for the Moors themselves, because Hassaniyya and literary Arabic remain two very different varieties. Berber Language – Assuming that Berber is still spoken by a few thousand people of varying ages and only in the South-West of the country (cf. Dubié 1940; Ould Cheikh 2008), fluent speakers are extremely rare and there have been no monolingual speakers for several decades. Although circumstances have pushed thousands of Malian Tuaregs to cross the border (particularly in 2012), the only variety of Berber that is specifically Mauritanian is Zenaga (Basset 1909; Nicolas 1953; Taine-Cheikh 2008; 2020b). There are numerous toponyms of Berber origin on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean where the Imraguen fishermen have settled but they do not have a specific language and have not been Berber-speaking for several centuries (Taine-Cheikh 2013). There are certainly many lexical borrowings in Hassaniyya from Zenaga (especially in certain lexical fields such as plants), but it is sometimes difficult to specify the source language and the target language, whether in the lexical field (Taine-Cheikh 2018b) or in the morphosyntactic field where parallel innovations are perhaps more frequent than real borrowings (Taine-Cheikh 2020c, 254s.). All in all, neither the influence of the Berber substratum nor the effects of contact should be overestimated: Zenaga remains a Berber language and Hassaniyya an Arabic language. While the Moors are highly probably of mixed origins (hence the name Arab-Berber, massively rejected by the interested parties themselves), the languages are not.

1.3 Niger-Congo languages Mauritanians with a non-Arabic first language all speak languages that are present outside Mauritania, particularly in the neighbouring countries of Senegal and Mali. The two

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designations, Negro-Africans and Negro-Mauritanians, are therefore objectively equivalent, but they refer to two different historical (and ideological) periods. In one case, the emphasis is placed on belonging to Black Africa (which is now more commonly referred to as sub-Saharan Africa) as opposed to Northern Africa (Arab or Arab-Berber). In the other case, there is a grouping of all black Mauritanian people, with a more or less explicit desire to integrate the Haratin, as opposed to Moors who are considered white – a kind of melanization of politics similar to the melanization of religion described by Abdel Wedoud Ould Cheikh (2004, 125), that is a way of looking at society from a racial perspective. Since all Haratin are native Arabic speakers (although they may be very marginally bilingual in some parts of the South), the designation Black Africans will be used henceforth for those who speak Niger-Congo languages. Black Africans make up between 20 and 30 % of the population (about one million people) and speak four different languages. These are classified among the vast grouping of the Niger-Congo phylum, but they belong to two distinct families: the Senegambian or (North-West) Atlantic languages (Pulaar, Wolof) on the one hand, and the Mande languages (Soninke, Bambara) on the other. Pulaar – The Haalpulaaren ‘(lit.) those who speak Pulaar’ are by far the largest group of Black Mauritanians: 15 to 20 % of the total population (about 700,000 people). Among them, one can traditionally distinguish between the sedentary farmers of Fouta Toro, in the Senegal valley (formerly called Toucouleurs), and the nomadic cattle breeders (the Fulani) who are much less numerous. However, they have the same surnames (e. g., Ba, Bal, Diallo, Kane, Sarr, Wane) and speak the same language. Pulaar and Fulani are not the only names for this language. Spanning from the Atlantic Ocean in Nigeria and Cameroon, it is also called Fulani or Fulfulde. Of all the North-West Atlantic languages, it is the one with the greatest geographical extension, far beyond Senegambia. Although its classification has been subject of discussion in the past, there is no longer any doubt that it belongs to the Senegambian or North-West Atlantic group. Pulaar consists of many dialects, distinguished in particular by intonation, borrowings from neighbouring languages and differences in lexical meaning. The grouping of dialects into two sets, proposed by some authors, is based essentially on the form of the morpheme used for the formation of the infinitive: ‑de for the western group and ‑go for the eastern group (Lacroix 1968, 1068). In Mauritania, Haalpulaaren are particularly numerous in Gorgol, Brakna, and Guidimakha. In the region of Kaédi, in Gorgol, where they make up half the population, Pulaar is used as a lingua franca, particularly among the Soninkés, who are also very numerous (around 25 %). Wolof – In Mauritania the Wolof are a very small minority whose historical cradle is in the Rosso region, at the mouth of the Senegal River. For several decades, before and after the country’s independence, Wolof extended somewhat beyond the borders of the Wolof first-language community. In addition to its role as a lingua franca in the Rosso region, it benefited from the important relations between Senegal and Mauritania, not only among Black Mauritanians, but also among the Moors. Many of the Moors (especially in the south-western region) used to go to Senegal for health care, education and  

 

 

 

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trade. The conflict that opposed the two countries in 1989 had, among other consequences, the repatriation of small Moorish traders who had settled permanently in the South and the lasting removal of Senegalese immigrants, if not of Wolof origin, at least generally Wolof-speaking, often specialized in a few activities such as fishing and car mechanics. Soninke – Soninke is a Mande language with almost 2,2 million speakers (Eberhard/ Simons/Fennig 2023). Most speakers are in Mali (more than one million). The Mauritanian community is only the third largest (with 180,000 people), after that of Senegal (400,000). As in neighbouring countries, there was considerable emigration from this community to France throughout the twentieth century, although mostly temporary migrations of younger sons. Galtier (2010, 1) distinguishes between two main dialects, depending on how /f/ is pronounced: while it is pronounced [f] in the area at the intersection of the three countries Mali-Senegal-Mauritania, it passes to [h] further east, as well as in Kaédi, which is situated to the far West. The traditional territory of the Mauritanian Soninke people corresponds essentially to Guidimakha (Sélibaby region), with a small community in Kaédi (Gataga district), but it was more extensive and probably more northerly in the past. However, though the toponyms Chinguetti and Birou come from Soninke sín-gèdé ‘the horse’s well, (lit.) of horse well’, the old name of Oualata, and biiṛu ‘hangars’ (Diagana 1990, 13), these two towns in the North-West, founded in the thirteenth–fourteenth and eleventh centuries respectively, are not considered to be founded (and inhabited at the time) by Soninke. Historically, the Soninke are linked to the medieval Ghana Empire which lasted from the seventh to the thirteenth centuries and preceded the Mali Empire founded by Sundiata Keita. The capital of the Ghana Empire was Koumbi Saleh, of which only ruins remain in south-east Mauritania. It is undoubtedly from the time of this Empire that dates the formation of Azer. This variety of Soninke mixed with Berber, which seems to have been used as a commercial language, notably by the Berbers (Masna) of Tichitt, Ouadane and Oualata, and was described by Monteil (1939) at a time when Azer had already practically disappeared. Bambara – Bambara, which is also a Mande language, is very little spoken in Mauritania. The Bambara (or their descendants who became Hassanophones) are only found in Eastern Mauritania, especially in Kiffa. Their presence is not unrelated to the fact that the borders between Mali and Mauritania were changed in 1944.

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French The establishment of French is a consequence of colonization, which took place later and was more superficial in Mauritania than in the other countries of French West Africa (Afrique de l’Ouest française – AOF). Although French penetration officially began in 1902, the constitution of Mauritania as an administrative colony only dates back to

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1920. However, even at that date and practically until the proclamation of independence in 1960, Mauritania continued to be administered from Saint-Louis and shared certain administrative services with Senegal. The French language was initially taught in colonial school but the effects of this education remained very limited until the end of World War II (for details, cf. de Chassey 1972, 414–499; Ould Zein/Queffélec 1997, 15–36). This was due to the existence of well established traditional Arabic language education in all ethnic communities. Such education comprised different levels, from Koranic school, which concerned the majority of the population, to the mahadra, which mainly concerned the upper (especially maraboutic) strata of Moorish society. While the Koranic school was intended for learning the alphabet and some verses of the Koran, some mahadras were true universities in the desert where students could stay and study for several years (see the biography of Shaikh Sidiyya, born around 1776, who continued his intellectual training at a mahadra in a confraternity centre until the age of 51, Ould Cheikh 1997, 202). Neither colonization nor independence put an end to traditional teaching in Arabic. The first school in French on the left bank of the Senegal River opened in Kaédi. In 1899, one year after its opening, it had forty-eight pupils. A second school opened in Boghé in 1912. Having become regional schools, they had very few pupils (189 pupils in 1927 and 220 pupils at the start of the 1939–1940 school year). Only the best pupils from the preparatory schools were admitted. However, the results of the preparatory schools were generally very poor, due to a lack of financial resources, qualified staff and public support. In 1939–40, there were still only eight preparatory classes (with a total of 230 pupils, plus twenty-one in elementary school). The Moors, because of their way of life and their attachment to traditional education, were particularly hostile to sending their children to colonial schools. The nobles prefered to send the children of craftsmen and Haratin instead of their own. To weaken this resistance, a school devoted to the sons of chiefs was opened in Boutilimit. Intended exclusively for the sons of noble Moors, the madrasa included several hours of Arabic per week in its programme – a particularity which did not exist in other schools. From five hours of Arabic and 22.5 hours of French in 1917, the programme in 1938 had one hour of Arabic for every two hours of French (i.e. 8 and 16 respectively). The number of pupils in the Boutilimit madrasa remained very low, with only 350 pupils attending between 1914 and 1939 (two thirds of which were in the period 1930–1939). Two other madrasas opened in Moorish country: Atar in 1930 and Kiffa in 1940. Throughout this period, the teaching of French to adults was not totally non-existent but was even rarer than the teaching of French to children. The decision at the end World War II to make education compulsory in French West Africa led to a steady increase in primary school enrolments from 1,500 in 1946 to 5,000 in 1955 and 11,200 in 1960. It was also at the end of the 1940s and the beginning of the 1950s that the first higher education school was created in Rosso (which was to become a secondary school, the only one in Mauritania at independence) and that the schooling of girls started. While

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camp schools appeared to develop schooling among nomads, the colonial administration abolished the specificity of the madrasa and reduced the teaching hours for Arabic. It also considered that the Arabic language should be reserved for Arabic speakers only and that extending it to all Muslims –which is to say all Mauritanians– would favour the confessional character of the language.

2.2 Milestones of its further development Neither internal autonomy (1958) nor independence (1960) radically changed the linguistic policy of francization, but Arabization was started. The constitutions of 22 March 1959 and 20 March 1961 stipulate that the national language is Arabic and the official language French. This means that French became the main language used both in education and administration. Arabic hours were increased in primary education to ten hours a week in preparatory classes and eight hours a week in elementary and middle school, but they were not compulsory. The attraction of school is fostered by the development of the capital: the foundation stone of Nouakchott, where the administration is concentrated, was officially laid in 1958. In 1960, there were only 500 pupils passing the secondary school entrance examination, and in 1968 there were still only 40 baccalaureate holders, but within a few years the numbers spiked (Ould Cheikh 1998, 240s.). Table 1: Trends in enrolment in basic education since 1960 (in Ould Cheikh 1998, 241) School year

Students

Enrolment rates

1960–1961

11,279

5.3 %

1965–1966

20,433

8.5 %

1970–1971

31,945

12.18 %

1976–1977

64,595

1981–1982

93,730

1986–1987

150,443

1990–1991

166,036

1994–1995

248,048

 

 

 

26.06 %  

62.6 %  

Major changes have not only been due to the economic situation (development of Nouakchott in 1960–1962, as well as Zouérat and Nouadhibou in the North between 1963 and 1966), the political situation (Sahara War), but above all to the climatic situation, with several waves of drought leading to a mass exodus to the cities during the 1970s. Schooling rates, much higher for boys than for girls, also vary greatly

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from region to region (14.23 % for the pastoral and very landlocked Hodh El Charghi region compared to 57.47 % for the mining region of Dakhlet Nouadhibou in 1980–1981). However, the increase in enrolment rates took place without the financial and human resources to keep up. In order to meet the demand for schooling, which, on the part of Arabic speakers, was accompanied by a desire to take greater account of Arabic, new teachers often came from the traditional teaching background of the mahadras. The demands were both for education and the opportunities it could offer. Indeed, administrative jobs and the competitions that gave access to them were becoming increasingly attractive after the massive sedentarization of nomads impoverished by the drought. From the first years of independence, Mauritanian society was marked by an opposition between the Moors demanding more Arabic and the Black Africans defending the dominant place of French (Taine-Cheikh 1994, 59). This opposition has given rise to several episodes of violence, generally triggered by changes in the school curriculum. For example, a manifesto signed by nineteen senior Black African officials supports the protests of ethnic Black African students against a January 1966 decree making the teaching of Arabic in secondary school compulsory for all. The clashes between Moors and Black Africans left a lasting mark on the school population, but they did not stop the inexorable march of Arabization (always too slow in the eyes of the Arab-speaking majority and always denounced by the Black African minorities). In 1967, an entirely Arabized year, which practically resumed the Koranic school curriculum (literacy and religion), was added before the six-year primary cycle. In 1973, a second year of Arabic was added to the primary school and an Arabic stream was introduced in secondary school, with only four hours of French. This beginning of a predominantly Arabic stream made it possible to take in pupils coming directly from the mahadras, whose level in French was often very low. In 1973, a reform took place in a climate of more or less unitary struggles against neo-colonialism, calling into question the links with the former colonizer. It resulted in the revision of the cooperation agreements, the nationalization of the Mauritanian iron mining company (Mines de fer de Mauritanie – MIFERMA), the creation of a national currency, the uguiya, to replace the CFA franc, and the membership in the Arab League. The new radio programme schedule gives a predominant place to Arabic (55.60 %) as compared to only 19.40 % for French. The role of the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry French Cultural Centre (Centre culturel français Antoine de Saint-Exupéry) in Nouakchott, inaugurated in 1965, is rivalled by the activity of Arab cultural centres: the Egyptian centre (opened in 1961), very influential among the students of the mahadras, the Libyan centre, which played a certain role in the training of typists (especially among women), and a few years later, the Iraqi, Syrian and Saudi centres. The 1978–1979 reform further intensified Arabization especially in education. In the so-called Arabic stream, imposed on all Arabic speakers, French classes were limited to five hours per week from the third year onwards. French remained the language of in 

 

 

 

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struction in the so-called bilingual stream open to Black Mauritanians, but in April 1979, the increasing weight given in examinations to Arabic and civics courses (still in Arabic) triggered a major protest movement. After the military came to power in 1978, a major reform was put in place which aimed to replace the bilingual stream by streams in national languages where each child would be taught in his or her first language (Arabic, Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof) and from primary school onwards would learn the language of another ethnic group which, for Black Africans, would necessarily be Arabic. In October 1982, twelve experimental classes were opened, but nothing was ready in 1985 to accommodate the pupils leaving these classes. On the whole, the 1980s were marked above all by a net decrease in the number of students in the French-speaking sector (in 1990–1991, only 8.4 % in primary school, compared to 20.8 % in secondary school and less than 30 % in Mauritanian higher education) and by the Arabization of certain vocational training courses leading to junior civil service jobs (nurses, secretaries, gendarmes, soldiers). Language policy had direct and indirect effects on the tumultuous relations between communities. In 1986, Black African intellectuals who were members of the African Liberation Forces of Mauritania (Forces de libération africaines de Mauritanie – FLAM), a movement founded in 1983, published a document entitled Manifesto of the Oppressed Black Mauritanian (Manifeste du négro-mauritanien opprimé), in which Arab-Berber power was denounced as racist. In 1987, the introduction of Arabic into the master’s certificate exams was directly responsible for the abortive coup d’état organized by Black African military cadres. It was not until 1999 that the various reforms were evaluated and an attempt was made to overcome the consequences of the massification of education, the bipartition of the school system and the retreat of French in favour of Arabic.  

 

 

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation The status of Arabic and French has changed considerably since independence. While the 1961 constitution proclaims that the religion of the Mauritanian people is Islam (hence the name Islamic Republic of Mauritania), only French is declared as the official language of the new state. Arabic did not become an official language like French until 1968. Finally, article 6 of the Ordinance of 20 July 1991 makes Arabic the only official language. This development is mirrored in the evolution of relations with neighbouring countries. Initially close to the Sahelian countries whose destiny it shared in French West Africa, independent Mauritania has gradually moved closer to the Maghreb countries (it has been part of the Arab Maghreb Union since its creation in 1989). It joined the Arab League or League of Arab States in 1973 and the Interna-

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tional Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) in 1980. Arabic is still considered a national language, alongside Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof. It is not specified whether Arabic, the national language, is distinct from Arabic, the official language. One might think that Hassaniyya Arabic is the national language, but Hassaniyya is not cited as such and there is more likely a refusal to distinguish between the two varieties of Arabic. An article in the new Nationality Code (2010) specifies that no person can be naturalized as a Mauritanian unless he or she is fluent in one of the four national languages.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Some sectors of the administration have been Arabized for a long time. This is particularly the case of the justice system, the Arabization of which was facilitated by the creation in 1979 of a Higher Institute for Research and Islamic Studies (Institut supérieur d’études et de recherches islamiques – ISERI). Open exclusively to Arabic language graduates, often from the mahadras, it has trained moral teachers and mosque preachers, but also the magistrates necessary for the application of the sharia, introduced by the military in 1978. Although private law (directly derived from Muslim law) was rapidly Arabized, the same cannot be said of public and international law, where French has remained at least partially in use. In most administrations, French has been gradually marginalized. Arabization has been facilitated by the high proportion of Hassanophones among employees in the civil service, territorial administration and members of the Armed Forces (more than 90 % according to Leclerc 2018, 13) although this does not mean that all these Hassanophones have good knowledge of standard Arabic. Arabization took place much more easily in culture than in the financial and accounting sectors, but progress in computer technology in Arabic (from the 1990s onwards) is reducing this gap. Long after the officialization of Arabic, French continued to play an important role. Even though French is no longer an official language, the official gazette (Journal officiel) continues to appear in both French and Arabic. All documents have a heading in both French and Arabic; Passports, identity cards, civil status papers and other administrative documents can be obtained in either language; Collective agreements must be written in both Arabic and French. With regard to public signage, only ten years after it became the sole official language Arabic began to be widely used alongside French on banners and city walls (Taine-Cheikh 2007, 46). To describe the characteristic situation of the 1980s and 1990s, one could speak of a paradoxical Francophonie (“francophonie paradoxale”, Ould Zein 1995, 76), since French continued to play an important role, not only in private companies and businesses, but also in administrative and political life. Bilingualism nonetheless continued to decline, particularly in the political arena, where French is used less and less. How 

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ever, the eviction of the language of the former colonizer continues to pose problems, especially for those (many of them Black Africans) who do not have a good command of Arabic as a working language. The discontent triggered by the decision taken by the Mauritanian parliament in January 2020 to no longer translate debates into French, even though French was not banned as such, is representative of the recurrent problems caused by the desire to replace the use of French with that of one of the four national languages.

3.3 Languages used in education Since the discontinuation of schooling in the three national languages Pulaar, Soninke, and Wolof, the languages of instruction are exclusively Arabic and French. Hassaniyya is not officially recognized, although Black African Mauritanians often complain about its use by Arabic teachers who are supposed to use standard Arabic. The effort made in the 1990s (particularly at the instigation of the World Bank) to expand the public primary system (both in the most neglected regions and for undereducated girls) produced quantitative results, but to the detriment of quality and the other levels of education, both secondary and higher education, which nevertheless expanded quantitatively during those years. However, with the assistance of French Cooperation, special attention was paid to the teaching of a second language in secondary education, since the results obtained in French in the Arabic stream and in Arabic in the so-called bilingual stream were considered particularly low. The events of 1989 had indeed revealed the depth of the gap between the Arabic-speaking and non-Arabic-speaking communities. The opening, now authorized, of public schools tends to compensate for the increasingly reduced number of bilingual classes, but this is not enough to maintain a significant level of French speakers. In July 2002, a survey of the language level of students admitted to the University of Nouakchott revealed that 81.2 per cent of them had a beginner’s level and were unable to follow courses in French. In order to meet the demand among civil servants and students, especially in the Moorish community, which the recent reforms have kept far away from the French-speaking world, French language courses are organized at the French Cultural Centre and, soon, at the French Alliance (Alliance Française) in Nouakchott. The latter, founded in 1994 by a Franco-Mauritanian Association, had only one hundred students in 1997, but soon experienced significant development within the framework of the French Alliances. Today there are four branches in addition to Nouakchott: in Atar, Kaédi, Kiffa, and Nouadhibou. It is there that French language diplomas are prepared, particularly professional diplomas relating to the use of Business French, which are much sought after in Mauritania in the context of vocational integration and training (OIF 2019, 161). For example, and according to its director Youssouf Athié (personal communication, 2/11/2020), the French Alliance in Nouadhibou, created in 1993, has on average 1,200 enrolments in various

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courses, from Literacy to B2 level (the equivalent of 300 hours of courses). Learners are mostly Arabic-speaking Mauritanians (but with 10 % foreigners, mainly Spanish and Chinese), with almost 40 % women. The average age group is 15–30 years old, the main motivation is academic (to attend high school or study abroad). The 1999 reform (Taine-Cheikh 2004, 212–215) did not put an end to the domination of Arabic nor to Arab-French bilingualism. It did however reshuffle the distribution of introducing a specialization of each language as the language of instruction, starting in primary school and dominating at the end of secondary school: literary subjects (literature, history, philosophy, religion, etc.) are taught in Arabic, while scientific and technical subjects are taught in French (calculus is taught in French from the third year, and earth sciences from the fifth year). The reform extends the use of French in subjects that are still largely French-speaking, both in technical high schools and universities, but does not allow French to play a role in opening students up to the Western world in the fields of culture and the humanities. This reform does not, however, apply to all schools in Mauritania, particularly the many public schools. A further exception is the Theodore Monod French High School (Lycée Français Théodore Monod) in Nouakchott of the Agency for French Education Abroad (Agence pour l’enseignement français à l’étranger – AEFE) network, which has 1,010 pupils from kindergarten to the final year of secondary school, of whom only 311 are French.  

 

3.4 Languages used in the media Press – For a long time, there was very little written press. At the end of the 1980s (Roques 1989), practically the only paper was the Chaab ‘(lit.) people’, a semi-official daily newspaper the first issue of which was published in 1975 and which has two versions (one in Arabic and one in French), and the weekly Mauritanie-Demain ‘(lit.) Mauritania-Tomorrow’ which is published in French. After the law on the liberalization of the written press in 1991 (Daddah 1994, 40), other titles appeared (Ould Zein/Quéffelec 1997, 48). All are monolingual (especially Black African publications, written in French), but some have two versions, the French version being more widely sold but not necessarily read by more readers. Some publications in Arabic allocate a small amount of space for written Hassaniyya, often for poetry or humorous local expressions. Online publications now tend to replace paper. These include Carrefour de la République Islamique de Mauritanie. CRIDEM ‘Crossroads of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania’ in French and Al-Akhbar ‘(lit.) The News’ in Arabic. As for sites publishing in Pulaar, Soninke, and Wolof, these seem to favour the use of Latin script (in use in neighbouring countries) over the Arabic script which was officially adopted in the 1980s. Radio – For decades, state radio, listened to even in remote camps, has played a very important role for Mauritanians (on its development up to 1994, cf. Ould Zein/ Queffélec 1997, 49). Some programmes were very popular, particularly those relating

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to traditional Moorish culture (music and poetry) or those aimed at Black African communities. The programme, which takes into account the official language policy, is regulated according to precise specifications. Outside the rural areas of the SouthWest, where radio stations broadcast more than 60 % of their programmes in Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof, the air time of these three national languages is limited to one hour daily, and that of French to two news editions (for a cumulative time of about twenty minutes): most of the time is therefore divided between standard Arabic and Hassaniyya (Leclerc 2018, 18). In addition to foreign radio stations, often listened to in French (RFI, Africa No 1, French service of the BBC), there are also private Mauritanian radio stations with very diverse content. In some regions of the South, local French is used in private stations. Television – State television, which came into being at the beginning of the 1990s, is also regulated according to precise specifications in which the national languages Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof have very little room. It broadcasts mainly in Arabic, but there are also local private channels and foreign channels accessible by subscription (such as Canal France International). Egyptian films and series from the Arab world or Latin America (novellas) have found a very receptive audience in Mauritania. The French Institute of Mauritania (Institut français de Mauritanie), formerly the Antoine de SaintExupéry French Cultural Centre, provides a venue for meetings and cultural events in Nouakchott. It is equipped not only with an important media library but also with a cinema where films in French are programmed.  

4 Linguistic characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation It is not easy to characterize Mauritanian French as it tends to vary, on the one hand, depending on the level of language mastery, and on the other hand, on the speaker’s first language. Generally speaking, however, it is strikingly difficult for Mauritanians to pronounce French. In the different languages spoken in Mauritania (Hassaniyya, Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof) there is a phonological distinction between short and long vowels, and there are some phonological vowels. Wolof is the only system with four degrees of aperture (it distinguishes between /e/ and /ɛ/, as well as /o/ and /ɔ/. Conversely, Hassaniyya, which has very few vowel dinstinctions, has [e] and [a] only as variants of a single phoneme /a/. Hassaniyya speakers who are not very proficient in French therefore tend to modify an adjacent consonant to better render the vowel, hence they may pronounce madame [madˤam] to avoid [medem] and gramme [ɡrˤam] or [ɡrˤaːm] to avoid [ɡrem]. Another difficulty lies in the pronunciation of /y/ which does not exist in any of the Mauritanian language systems. Speakers therefore tend to replace /y/ with /i/, or at least

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to differentiate them poorly, hence the almost general replacement of pulluler [pylyle] ‘to abound’ by pilluler [pilyle] ‘(lit.) to take the pill’. This may give rise to surprising statements, such as the following found in a student paper: À Nouadhibou les hommes pillulent [instead of pullulent] plus que les femmes ‘In Nouadhibou, men take the pill [instead of abound] more than women’. Speakers of Hassaniyya also find it difficult to distinguish between grammaire [ɡrammɛr] ‘grammar’ and grand-mère [ɡrãmɛr] ‘grandmother’ due to the absence of nasalized vowels in Arabic. They are probably also the origin of the distortion of rémunérer [ʁemyneʁe] into [renymere] and rémunération [ʁemyneʁasjɔ̃] into [renymeratjõ], as the nasals n and m are generally not present in the same word (cf. the formation of passive forms starting with m in Taine-Cheikh 1983, 79–82). In contrast, the absence of /p/ in Hassaniyya only causes problems for some speakers, who replace it with /b/, as is the case with borrowings from French (cf. the pronunciations of the borrowings of Fr. politique and poivre in section 4.3.3 below). Among Black Africans, it is rather the pronunciation of the fricatives /v/ and /ʃ/ that poses problems, but one also notes a difficulty in pronouncing certain double consonant attacks such as /st/ without adding an initial vowel, which leads to station [estatjõ], or a tendency to add a final vowel to respect the most common syllabic type consonant + vowel (CV).

4.2 Morphosyntax It is questionable whether the existence of responds in reverse order such as photo-roman ‘photo-novel’ instead of roman-photo, and point-rond ‘dot-round’ instead of rondpoint can be explained by the influence of the syntax of the first languages. The only language where the modifier precedes the modified element is Soninke, where the word order is often the opposite of what is found in Pulaar. Compare, for example, jaxa yimme ‘the sheep’s head, (lit). sheep head’ and ka di ‘in the house, (lit.) house in’ in Soninke and hore njawudi ‘the sheep’s head, (lit.) head sheep’ and nder galle ‘in the house, (lit.) in house’ in Pulaar. It would, however, be quite surprising if the Soninke language which until recently was not widely spoken in the capital, were the source of the above-mentioned phrases. Among the particularities of local French, one notes non-academic verb use. Some pronominal verbs are used without a pronoun such as cotiser ‘to contribute, to pay a contribution’ instead of se cotiser, désister ‘to desist’ instead of se désister, pousser ‘to push, to drive’ instead of se pousser. Some normally transitive verbs are used intransitively such as fêter ‘to celebrate a feast, (lit.) to celebrate’ and voyager ‘to go on a trip, (lit.) to travel’. One also finds some unusual expressions such as en état ‘in a state of pregnancy, pregnant, (lit.) in state’, faire la famille ‘to marry, to start a family, (lit.) to make the family’, rabâcher les oreilles ‘to say the same thing over and over again, (lit.) to re-talk ears’, être pour ‘to belong to, (lit.) to be for’, taper à pied ‘to go on foot, to walk,

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(lit.) to type on foot’, dans les temps ‘in time, in the past, (lit.) in the times’, hier nuit ‘last night, (lit.) yesterday night’. In addition, trop is used instead of très ‘much, very, (lit.) too much’ and there are non-regular adverbial uses of prepositions, as, for example, depuis (sometimes with a lengthening of the second syllable) ‘long time, long ago, (lit.) since’ instead of il y a longtemps, and devant ‘further forward, in the direction one is going, (lit.) in front of’ instead of plus loin vers l’avant, as well as the syntagm tout celui qui ‘anyone, anyone who’ instead of toute personne qui, and the conjunctive locution or que ‘while, whereas, (lit.) now that’ instead of alors que. Furthermore, there is often an imprecise use of functionals and conjunctions in local French. Ould Zein/Queffélec (1997, 75, 96) point this out for prepositions like avec ‘with’ (e. g., j’achète de la viande avec [instead of à, chez] un boucher ‘I buy meat with [instead of at, from] a butcher’) and dans (e. g., Je peux travailler dans [instead of pour] l’État ‘I can work in [instead of for] the state’). Lecointre/Nicolau (1995, 481s.) also observed, among vocational training students, the poorly mastered use of connectors such as alors que ‘whereas’, pourtant ‘yet’, c’est pourquoi ‘that is why’, à ce propos ‘about it’, en somme ‘in short’, ainsi ‘thus’, du moins ‘at least’, pourvu que ‘provided that’. They explain that par ailleurs ‘moreover’ is never differenciated from d’ailleurs ‘elsewhere’, en effet ‘indeed’ is confused with car ‘for, because’ when it is not used for de ce fait ‘thereby’. Tel ... et ‘such ... and’ is used for tant que ‘as long as’, à savoir ‘namely’ for par exemple ‘for example’, cependant ‘however’ for pendant ce temps ‘during this time’ and si ‘if’ for à condition que ‘provided that’. They give the following example as an illustration: la garantie ne s’applique pas à condition que [instead of si] l’appareil a été modifié ou transformé ‘the warranty does not apply provided that [instead of if] the device has been modified or transformed’.  

 

4.3 Lexicon 4.3.1 Traces of national languages in French Mauritanian French is marked by the existence of numerous “diatopisms of origin” which ‘represent specific realities that are not exported or non-exportable, but which need to be named everywhere in the world when they are mentioned’.2 Lexemes, imported into local French but originating in one or another of the Mauritanian national languages, were the subject of a broad survey in the work of Ould Zein/Queffélec (1997, 69–177). They are widely used in spoken language and also present in writing, but their spelling is not always well established. They cover different semantic fields, some of

2 “[…] représentent des réalités spécifiques non exportées ou non exportables, mais nécessitant une appellation partout dans le monde quand on en parle” (Reutner 2017, 37).

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which are particularly well represented. The following text offers an almost exhaustive inventory, grouped by theme and limiting the spellings given to one or two. The origin is given in brackets and takes account of the direct source language. Sometimes an indirect origin is specified when the form of the source language is borrowed from another language. Social categories – The field of social categories is very rich in terms of Arab origin. In some cases, the dialectal meaning is the same as in Classical Arabic, e. g., abd, pl. abid ‘slave’ (< Hass. ˤabd and ˤbīd), Arab ‘descendant of the Arab conquerors’ (< Hass. əˤṛab), cherif, pl. chorfa ‘person considered a descendant of the prophet Mohammed’, and the adjective cherifian ‘relative to the Cherif’ (< Hass. šrîv), qabila ‘tribe’ (< Ar. qabīla), naçrani, pl. nçara ‘Christian, European, especially French’ (< Hass. nəṣṛāni). In other cases, the term is taken with a dialectal meaning, e. g., lahma ‘Moor whose job is to keep animals’ (< Hass. laḥme ‘meat’), zénagui, pl. aznaga ‘Moor whose job is to keep animals, tributary’ (< Hass. āẓnāgi pl. āẓnāge), maâlem, pl. mallemin ‘member of a common caste whose occupation is working with metals, leather, etc.’ (< Hass. mˤallem), tiyâb ‘literate warriors’ (< Hass. tiyyāb ‘repented’), zāwi, zaoui, pl. zwaya, zawaya ‘member of the group of the literate in Arabic’ (< Hass. zāwi). The following three terms do not have a correspondent in Classical Arabic: igawen, igaouen ‘common caste whose members are singers, lauders, entertainers’ (< Hass. iggāwən), imraguen ‘common social group whose members make a living from fishing’ (< Hass. imrâgən), nemadi ‘member of a marginal social group that has hitherto lived from hunting and gathering’ (< Hass. nmādi). Apart from almamy ‘Fulani Muslim religious leader’ (< Ar. imām), the terms designating categories of the Haalpulaaren society are all terms of Pulaar origin (for more details cf. Wane 1969, 30s.): rimbé ‘free man’ (< Pul. ribe ‘those who are pure from all defilement’) and the designations of different types of free men such as torobé, pl. torodo ‘literate’ (< Pul. toroɗo), sebbé ‘the warriors’ (< Pul. sɛbe), and dyawambé ‘the courtiers and counsellors’ (< Pul. djawambe). The soubalbé (< Pul. subalɓe) have fishing as a traditional activity. The nyenbe (< Pul. njɛmɓe) refer to the casted men including the laobé (< Pul. laoɓe) who work with wood are part. The mathioubé (< Pul. matjuɓe) are the serfs or slaves. Apart from Wolof (< Wol. wɔlɔf), only gordiguène ‘homosexual’ (< Wol. gɔrdigɛn) and naar (< Wol. naːr), which is the name given to the Moors by the Senegalese, are cited as borrowings from Wolof. Activities and professions – The field of activities and professions is dominated by terms of Arab origin, including the talibé ‘pupil of a Koranic school’ (< Ar. ṭālib) which is only used among Black Africans, the Moors employing the term télamid ‘pupils, disciples of a marabout’ (< Hass. tlāmīd ‘pupils’). In addition to the domain of school, where one also finds mahadra ‘Koranic school, Muslim higher education establishment’ (< Hass. maḥəđ̣ṛa), there are administration terms such as hakem ‘prefect’ (< Ar. ḥākim), wali (< Ar. wāli) and wilaya (< Ar. wilāya), the wali being the representative of the central power at the head of the wilaya. In older times, one spoke rather of sorba ‘delegation of notables sent to discuss an important matter’ (< Hass. ṣuṛbe) or of ghazzi ‘group of looters, troop of raiders’ (< Hass. ġazzi) and of razzia ‘attack of a troop of looters’ (< Ar. ġaz 

 

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wa). Only tieb-tieb ‘barter, haggling’ (< Hass. tyebtyīb) and tieb-tiaba ‘people who indulge in bargaining’ (< Hass. tyebtyābe) are not related to literary Arabic. Here again it is Wolof that the other two borrowings in this category come from: on the one hand bana-bana ‘street vendor who sells retail [term bana has been adopted by some of Nouakchott’s well-stocked shops]’ (< Wol. baːnabaːna), hence ‘junk’, and on the other hand navetanes ‘football championship organized during the winter months’ (< Wol. navetan), also having the meaning ‘seasonal peanut farmers’. Religion – As far as religion is concerned, terms found in French stemming from Classical Arabic are numerous: nearly twenty, not counting formulas such as tabarakallah (to ward off the evil eye) or words of the same root such as tijani and tidjanism in relation to tijania ‘religious brotherhood named after the founder Abdul-Abbas-Ahmed Ibn Mohammed-Al-mokhtar-Al-Tidjani’. These include names of prayers (aacer and dohr), festivals (aïd and maouloud), pilgrimages (hadj and omra), religious functions (cadi and muezzin), laws and obligations (sharia, diya, zakat), prophetic words (fatiha, hadith), sermon (khotba), invocation (wird) and blessing (baraka). Only korité ‘Muslim feast that marks the end of fasting in the month of Ramadan’ (< Wol. korité) and tabaski (< Wol. tabaski < Christian Latin pascha ‘Easter’) are distinguished by their origin. Geographical terms – Among the geographical terms, two come from Pulaar. Walo (< Pul. waːlo) refers to the floodplain of the Senegal River which is farmed during the dry season, while diéri (< Pul. djeːri) refers to non-floodplain land. All the other terms come from Arabic and more specifically from Hassaniyya: laklé ‘active dune area’ (< Hass. ˤakle), badiya ‘countryside, bush’ (< Hass. bādiyye), baten ‘plateau or flank of a large dune’ (< Hass. bâṭən), batha ‘sandy dry river bed’ (< Hass. batḥa), dhar ‘steep cliff on the edge of a plateau’ (< Hass. ḍḥaṛ), goud ‘long corridor between two fixed dunes’ (< Hass. gewd), grara ‘sandy farmable area’ (< Hass. gṛâṛa), guelb ‘rocky crag’ (< Hass. gaḷb), guelta ‘pond, watering place of natural origin’ (< Hass. gəlte), irifi ‘continental trade wind’ (< Hass. irîvi), ogla ‘shallow well’ (< Hass. ˤəgḷa), sebkha ‘whitish salty depression, unsuitable for cultivation’ (< Hass. sebxa), tamourt ‘temporary pond occupying the shallows’ (< Hass. tāmūrt). The same applies to the category of habitat for adebaye ‘village of black Moors’ (< Hass. edebây < Son. dèbé ‘village’), bénia ‘small tent used as an annex to the main tent’ (< Hass. benye), tikit ‘shelter, hut built of dry palms or branches’ (< Hass. tikīt), ksar, kçar ‘fortified city’ and especially ‘small settlement, village’ (< Hass. kṣaṛ). Flora, fauna, cuisine – Concerning plants, animals and cuisine, Wolof has given a number of terms, including the two fish names thiof and yaboy (< Wol. thiof ‘grouper’ and yaboy ‘round sardinella’) and some plant names: bissap ‘roselle’ (< Wol. bisap [plant whose leaves are used for making drinks]), cram-cram ‘Cenchrus biflorus [thorny grass]’ (< Wol. xaːmxaːm), gonak ‘thorny tree’ (< Wol. gonake). The influence of Wolof is particularly present in food-related terms such as guedj ‘dried fish’ (< Wol. gɛdʒ) present in particular in the recipe for thiéboudène (< Wol. tjebudjɛn), mafé ‘meat or fish cooked in a peanut butter sauce’ (< Wol. maːfé) and dibiterie ‘shop where grilled meat is sold’ (< Wol. dibi ‘grilled meat’). Only the name of a variety of bean niébé (< Pul. ñebbe ‘beans’) and the name of a dish made of boiled niébés, hako (< Pul. haako ‘leaves’) have passed from Pu-

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laar. While Hassaniyya is the origin of an animal name (azouzal ‘castrated dromedary serving as a mount’ < Hass. ezūzāl), it is above all the origin of a series of plant names: ifernan ‘non-spiny shrub’ (< Hass. ivərnân), initi ‘Cenchrus biflorus [thorny grass]’ (< Hass. inîti), talha (< Hass. ṭalḥ), and tamat (< Hass. temāt), two varieties of acacia, teichot ‘Balanites aegyptiaca [thorny tree of the South]’ (< Hass. teyšəṭ), titarek ‘Leptadenia spartium, pyrotechnica [small leafless shrub with small yellow flowers]’ (< Hass. titārək), tourja ‘Calotropis procera [small, non-thorny latex tree]’ (< Hass. tūrže). Seven other terms borrowed from Hassaniyya are emblematic of the Moorish culture: blah ‘dates still insufficiently ripe’ (< Hass. blaḥ), guetna ‘date-picking period which is also an occasion for celebration’ (< Hass. gêṭne), aïch ‘millet cake [which can be eaten with sweet milk]’ (< Hass. ˤayš), tejmart ‘fruit of the baobab tree [the dried and powdered pulp of which is mixed with water to make a sour drink]’ (< Hass. težmaxt), tichtar ‘dried raw meat’ (< Hass. tīšṭāṛ), tagine ‘snack eaten outside meals’ (< Hass. tāžīn) and zrig ‘milk cut with water and sugar’ (< Hass. zrīg). Usual objects – The terms used to designate everyday objects all come from Hassaniyya: beit ‘leather case containing the smoker’s kit’ (< Hass. beyt), delou ‘large leather bag for drawing water’ (< Hass. delu), faro ‘large blanket made of lamb pelts’ (< Hass. vāṛu), guerba ‘goatskin bottle’ (< Hass. gərbe), iliwich ‘sheepskin used as a saddle and prayer mat’ (< Hass. iliwīš), loh ‘board on which the Koranic verses and other teachings are transcribed’ (< Hass. lowḥ), rahla ‘camel saddle always with a wide pommel’ (< Hass. ṛāḥle), rkiza ‘wooden tent support’ (< Hass. rkīze), tadite ‘wooden container used for milking animals (except camels)’ (< Hass. tādīt), tidikt ‘incense (light yellow gum-like grains)’ (< Hass. tīdəkt). Clothing – Five terms in the area of clothing come from Hassaniyya: daraa ‘loose garment worn by men, slit at the sides and going down to the mid-calf’ (< Hass. daṛṛâˤa), haouli ‘piece of fabric used as a turban’ (< Hass. ḥawli), melehfa ‘veil, clothing of Moorish women consisting of a long piece of very light fabric’ (< Hass. meləḥfe), séroual ‘traditional loose trousers’ (< Hass. sərwāl). Only foucoudiaye ‘rags sold at stalls or at home by street vendors’ comes from Wolof (< Wol. fukuɉaj). Arts – In the field of the arts, mainly poetry and music, there are two borrowings from Pulaar: beyti ‘religious poems’ (< Pul. bɛjti) and goumbala ‘chant’ (< Pul. gumbala). The others, with the exception of qassida ‘long poem in literary Arabic’ (< Ar. qaṣīda), are rather dialectal in meaning: azawane ‘Moorish music’ (< Hass. aẓawān), ghna ‘poetry in Hassaniyya’ (< Hass. ġne), tbel ‘large percussion drum carved out of a tree trunk’ (< Hass. ṭbel), and medh ‘religious song to the glory of the Prophet Mohammed’ (< Hass. medḥ). Yet others are specific to Hassaniyya. In addition to the musical mode of combat faghou (< Hass. vāġu), the names of the two musical instruments of the griots are the ardin (< Hass. ārdīn), played by women, and the tidinit (< Hass. tidinīt), played by men. These are also the names of the different prosodic forms of Moorish poetry: the gav (< Hass. gāv), poetry in four verses of a-b-a-b rhymes, the talaâ (< Hass. ṭalˤa), poetry in at least six verses of a-a-a-b-a-b rhymes, the distic called tabrâ (< Hass. təbṛāˤ) and the long poem with epic accents called theydina (< Hass. theydīne).

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Other categories – One of the terms in other categories comes from Wolof: khessal ‘practice of lightening the skin by applying certain depigmenting products, a product used to lighten the skin’ (< Wol. xesal). The others come from Arabic. Some have taken on a meaning of their own such as Hass. mniha ‘interest-free loan of animals by a rich or wealthy person to another in need’ (< Hass. mnīḥa), moud ‘measure for dry substances’ (< Hass ṃudd), ouguiya ‘monetary unit of Mauritania’ (< Hass. ugiyye), sahwa ‘modesty’ (< Hass. saḥwe), zeriba ‘fence made of thorny tree branches to park small livestock, closed field usually planted with date palms’ (< Hass. zrībe), ziyara ‘trip to a cemetery to visit a grave’ (< Hass. ziyyāṛa). The absence of Soninke loans in this list will undoubtedly have been noted. Diagana (1996, 170s.), in his article on the relationship between French and national languages, gives no more than that, but points out some particles, particularly rek and de(y) (< Wol.), widely used by Soninke, Haalpulaaren and Wolofs: like the gaˤ of Hassaniyya, they seem to serve to punctuate the discourse. Moreover, he gives some examples of calques, such as saying J’ai les yeux secs ‘I have dry eyes’ to mean, as in the Soninke an yaːwo n kaːwa ‘to have insomnia’. There are certainly other calques. In their work, Ould Zein/Queffélec give the case of grande tente ‘big tent’, bonne tente ‘good tent’ in the sense of ‘good family, noble family’. This is certainly calqued on Hassaniyya. I would add to the list court ‘short’ (< Hass. gṣīr) and long ‘long’ (< Hass. ṭwīl) to mean ‘small’ and ‘tall’, as well as the transitive uses of divorcing and marrying (a woman) (il l’a divorcée ‘he divorced her’ and il l’a mariée ‘he married her’), formed like the equivalents in Hassaniyya xalle vlāne ‘to divorce someone’ and šedd vlāne ‘to marry someone’, instead of the reflexive uses of standard French (ils ont divorcé and ils se sont mariés).

4.3.2 Word formation in French Neologisms – Many lexemes appear to be neologisms. The influence of national languages cannot be excluded here, especially in the case of Arabic, where derivations are very productive. These are often verbs from the first group, constructed often on the basis of nouns: commissionner ‘to commission, to charge someone with a commission’, compétir ‘to compete, to take part in competitions’, compresser ‘to compress, to lay off by compression, to reduce staff’, conscientiser ‘to raise awareness’, dévierger ‘to deflower, to make lose one’s virginity’, disponibiliser ‘to make financial, material and human resources available for the achievement of an objective’, enceinter ‘to make pregnant’, gommer ‘to starch with gum or starch’, siester ‘to take a nap’, cabiner ‘to go to the toilets’. There are also nominal neologisms such as balbastik ‘ice with variously flavoured water (mint or grenadine syrup)’, boycottiste ‘boycotter, person who boycotts’, cartouchard (student slang) ‘student who has repeated levels of his/her studies’, exclusiviste ‘(lit.) person who practises exclusion’, flamiste ‘partisan of the FLAM’, maîtrisard ‘master’s degree holder’, pokériste ‘poker player’, profitard ‘profiteer’, promotionnaire ‘classmate’, terminaliste ‘pupil in the final year of high school’, trichage ‘cheating on an examination’, essencerie ‘petrol station’, primature ‘services of the prime minister’, coxer ‘young

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employee working on board a transport vehicle’ (< Engl. coaxer ‘person who persuades by dint of cajoling’, ratement ‘failure (of a combustion engine)’, or bordelle ‘prostitute’. Meaning shifts – The most numerous cases are those that show shifts in meaning. Changes often concern very common French lexemes. For some verbs the meaning is simply modified, for example s’absenter ‘not to show up’ instead of ‘to be absent’, se baigner ‘to wash with a bucket of water, to shower’ instead of ‘to bathe’, attraper ‘to put aside’ instead of ‘to catch’, consulter ‘to examine [for a doctor]’ instead of ‘to consult’, déguerpir ‘to move [people]’ instead of ‘to leave’, gâter ‘to damage, to deteriorate an object to the point that it cannot function’ instead of ‘to spoil’, indexer ‘to point’ instead of ‘to index’, monter ‘to take up one’s workstation, to go to work’ instead of ‘to go up’ and descendre ‘to end one’s working day’ instead of ‘to go down’, durer ‘to stay, live or stay somewhere for a while’ instead of ‘to last’, payer ‘to buy’ instead of ‘to pay’, quitter ‘to go away, leave, disappear’ instead of ‘to leave’. There are also meaning shifts among nouns and adjectives, regardless of their frequency: popote ‘group of people who join together to share food and sometimes accommodation’ instead of ‘cooking’, portier ‘goalkeeper’ instead of ‘porter’, pot ‘tin can’ instead of ‘pot’, poubelle ‘rubbish heap, rubbish tip’ instead of ‘bin’, roman ‘book (not necessarily fictional)’ instead of ‘novel’, carent ‘incompetent, deficient’ instead of ‘carent’, cynique ‘(lit.) sneaky, concealed’ instead of ‘cynical’, marrant ‘boring, annoying’ instead of ‘funny’, or sérieux ‘kind, sympathetic, helpful’ instead of ‘serious’. Many lexemes are used with a more restrictive meaning than in standard French. Examples of verbs include the following: consommer ‘to drink alcoholic beverages’ instead of ‘to consume’, coucher ‘to have sex with someone’ instead of ‘to put to bed’, coudre ‘to make a garment’ instead of ‘to sew’ and couture ‘making, embroidery of a garment’ instead of ‘sewing’, couper ‘to break the Ramadan fast’ and ‘to buy a ticket (cinema, theatre)’ instead of ‘to cut’. Among the nouns one can find accident ‘car accident’ instead of ‘accident’, charbon ‘charcoal’ instead of ‘coal’, or goudron for ‘tarred road’ instead of ‘tar’. Nouns used in a different sense include: arachide ‘peanut [even when roasted]’ instead of ‘ground nut’, aventure ‘comic book’ instead of ‘adventure’, bande ‘audio cassette’ instead of ‘tape’, baptême ‘naming ceremony’ instead of ‘baptism’, brousse ‘region far from urban centres’ instead of ‘bush’ and broussard ‘who lives in a region far from urban centres’ instead of ‘bushman’, carré ‘undeveloped land’ instead of ‘square’, coiffure ‘haircut’ instead of ‘hairstyle’, concession ‘delimited land constituting the habitat of one or more families and comprising several constructions (huts or houses) and a courtyard’ instead of ‘concession’, contact ‘switch, electric switch’ instead of ‘contact’, dépense ‘sum necessary to feed a family on a daily basis’ instead of ‘expenditure’, écritoire ‘any instrument used for writing’ instead of ‘writing case’, fourneau ‘kind of brazier, generally made of sheet metal, used for charcoal cooking’ instead of ‘stove’, frère ‘any male individual from the same family, from the same generation, with whom one feels a common bond (ethnic group, caste, clan, tribe, country)’ instead of ‘brother’, invitation ‘reception, party, ceremony’ instead of ‘invitation’, jaquette ‘jacket’ instead of ‘morning coat’, grosse ‘carton of cigarettes’ instead of ‘big thing’, mèche ‘cigarette’ instead of ‘wick’, miche

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‘French baguette’ instead of ‘cob (of bread)’, or pion ‘anti-depressant pill’ instead of ‘pawn’. Semantic fields – The changes concern certain semantic fields more particularly, for both lexemes and expressions. The semantic field of schooling is productive (cf. also the neologisms above): apprendre ‘to educate oneself’ instead of ‘to learn’, intellectuel ‘person who has been to school and can therefore read and write’ instead of ‘intellectual’, faire les bancs ‘to study, to be at school’ instead of ‘to make the benches’, fondamental n./adj. ‘primary (education)’ instead of ‘fundamental’, ouverture ‘back to school’ instead of ‘opening’, passant ‘pupil or student who passes to the next class’ instead of ‘passing’, trouver le bac ‘to pass the baccalaureate’ instead of ‘to find the baccalaureate’. There are also examples from commerce: boutique ‘shop where one can buy ordinary consumer products’ instead of ‘shop’ and boutiquier ‘trader who runs a small a shop’ instead of ‘shopkeeper’, four ‘bakehouse’ instead of ‘oven’, standard ‘stall that sells music tapes and other recordings’ instead of ‘standard’, table ‘stall table on which a trader sells his wares’ instead of ‘table’ and tablier ‘salesman who displays his wares on a stall’ instead of ‘apron’. The field of work is also productive: affecter ‘transfer, move’ instead of ‘to assign’, débauche ‘leaving work’ instead of ‘dissolute living’, descente ‘leaving work’ instead of ‘going down’, missionnaire ‘person who carries out a mission on behalf of his or her employer’ instead of ‘missionary’, premier ministère ‘services of the prime minister’ instead of ‘first ministry’, séminariste ‘participant in a seminar, in a work meeting’ instead of ‘seminarian’. The semantic field of transport, cars and mechanics is richly endowed: apprenti ‘young employee working on board a transport vehicle’ instead of ‘apprentice’, encaisseur ‘young employee working on board a transport vehicle’ instead of ‘collector’, garage ‘bus station’ and ‘siding, cupboard’ instead of ‘garage’, porte-bagages ‘boot of a car, rear boot’ instead of ‘luggage rack’, salon ‘all the seats of a car, interior of a car’ instead of ‘living room’, cliquer ‘to emit an abnormal rattling noise [for the gearbox of a car]’ instead of ‘to click’, segmenter ‘to change the piston rings of a car’ instead of ‘to segment’, taxi-brousse ‘collective vehicle carrying eight or nine passengers on interurban journeys’ instead of ‘bush taxi’, venant de France ‘second-hand car imported from France or Europe’ instead of ‘coming from France’, véhiculé ‘person who owns a car’ instead of ‘conveyed’. Some examples fall within the scope of criticism, mockery and brawling: bandit ‘cunning person’ instead of ‘bandit’, cow-boy ‘cunning person, [hum.] mischievous boy’ instead of ‘cowboy’, bourrer ‘to tell false stories to make it interesting’ instead of ‘to stuff’, brûler ‘to tell false stories to make it interesting’ instead of ‘to burn’, botter ‘to hit’ instead of ‘to kick’, bastonner ‘to hit’ instead of to ‘beat’, chicoter ‘to hit’ instead of ‘to bicker’, comédien ‘jester’ instead of ‘actor’, farcer ‘to joke’ instead of ‘to play pranks’, fumiste ‘sycophant, flatterer’ instead of ‘practical joker’, maquereau ‘sycophant, flatterer’ instead of ‘pimp’, ramasser qqn ‘to remonstrate with someone’ instead of ‘to pick

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up someone’, saboter ‘to make fun of someone, to mock, to heckle’ instead of ‘to sabotage’. Finally, such examples fall within the scope of flirtation and sexual relations (cf. also the neologisms above): femme de joie ‘prostitute’ instead of ‘woman of joy’, crâneur ‘flirt, swinger’ instead of ‘whore, show-off’ and crâner ‘to flirt with women’ instead of ‘to show-off’, faire la femme ‘to flirt, to have affairs with women’ instead of ‘to make the woman’, tenter ‘to court a woman’ instead of ‘to try’, matrice ‘female genitals’ instead of ‘womb’, enjamber ‘to put your genitals between a woman’s thighs for enjoyment, without penetrating her’ instead of ‘to step over’, taper ‘to possess sexually’ instead of ‘to hit’, vedette ‘very beautiful woman’ instead of ‘star’. Special register – Among the lexemes that belong to the familiar and coarse register and often originate in slang, some are used in French, e. g., bouloter, boulotter ‘to work, to have a job’, clando ‘undocumented worker’, bagaux ‘luggage’, frigo ‘refrigerator’. Others show more or less marked semantic change, e. g., gober ‘to catch (a disease)’ instead of ‘to swallow’, godasse ‘man’s shoe’ instead of ‘shoe’, môme ‘girlfriend, fiancée’ instead of ‘kid, young girl’. Some of them correspond to real innovation, e. g., boudin ‘penis’ instead of ‘blood pudding’, clandoter ‘to share a room with the legitimate tenant (student slang)’ instead of ‘to be undocumented’ and merco ‘motor vehicle of the brand Mercedes’ (< Mercedes). Brand names – Unlike frigo and merco, which are used in abbreviated form, other brand names, which have entered the local French without distortion, have become generics, notably bic ‘any instrument used for writing’, célia ‘all high-fat powdered milk powder’, gloria ‘unsweetened condensed milk’, samsonite ‘attaché case, briefcase or trunk (whatever the brand) intended to hold precious things’. In this series, michelin (from the name of the tyre brand) is a special case as it does not mean ‘tyre’ but ‘wheel repairer who also washes cars’.  

 

 

4.3.3 Traces of French in national languages Loans shared by several languages – In the article quoted above, Diagana states: ‘French is in a paradoxical situation in Mauritania. On the one hand, it is declining both officially and in daily use by the population (Arabs, Haalpulaaren, Soninke and Wolof); on the other hand, it continues to influence the local languages’.3

3 “Le français connaît une situation paradoxale en Mauritanie. D’une part, il recule aussi bien sur le plan officiel que dans l’usage quotidien des populations (Arabes, Halpulaar’en, Soninkés et Wolofs); d’autre part il continue à influencer les langues locales” (Diagana 1996, 167).

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According to him, many words pass from French into the national languages in various areas of life. He gives only five examples, but shows the effects of phonetic and syllabic adaptation: Table 2: Borrowings from French and their adaptations into Soninke, Pulaar and Wolof

 

‘the school’

‘aeroplane’

‘policy’

‘carrot’

‘music’

French

l’école

avion

politique

carotte

musique

Soninke

lekkoli

abiyo

politiki

karoːti

misiki

Pulaar

lekkol

abiyoŋ

polotik

karot

misik

Wolof

ekkol

awiyon

politig

karoːt

–

In Hassaniyya one would have lekūṛ ‘school’, ḅolotīg ‘politics’, kaṛot ‘carrot’ and misīk ‘music’, but medəṛṣa is much more common than lekūṛ and the term for ‘plane’ is from Arabic (Hass. ṭayyāṛ). Maintening or replacing loans in Hassaniyya – While there is no shortage of French loans, they tend to vary over time. This is why a large share of the loans in use during colonization have been withdrawn, such as Hass. debbīš ‘telegram’ (< Fr. dépêche), Hass. kebbūṭ ‘capote (coat of the riflemen)’ (< Fr. capote), Hass. gūmyāt ‘meharists’ (< Fr. goumiers), Hass. keweyye ‘convoy’ (< Fr. convoi) or Hass. ṣaṛwaṣ ‘to be very close to the white colonizers’ (< Fr. service). This is true for realities that have disappeared (such as the currency Hass. sūvāyä ‘small coin’ (< Fr. sou) or misīk in the sense of ‘phonograph’ (< Fr. musique), but also for those that are now denoted by literary Arabic (e. g., Hass. minəstr ‘minister’ replaced by Ar. wazīr). However, this has not prevented the regular entry of new lexemes such as Hass. mubayl ‘mobile (telephone)’ (< Fr. mobile) and tlekse ‘to practise, to love luxury’ (< Fr. luxe), nor does it prevent the permanence of some older loans such as Hass. wete ‘car’ (< Fr. voiture), Hass. kemyûn ‘truck’ (< Fr. camion), Hass. maṛṣa ‘market’ (< Fr. marché), Hass. kīl ‘kilogram’ (< Fr. kilo), Hass. bṛāg ‘hut’ (< Fr. baraque), Hass. pōbaṛ ‘pepper’ (< Fr. poivre), Hass. beydūn ‘can’ (< Fr. bidon), Hass. rebīne ‘tap’ (< Fr. robinet), Hass. beyṣa ‘roll of cloth, piece of cloth’ (< Fr. pièce), Hass. bəṭṛən ‘oil’ (< Fr. pétrole). Note that some loans are still more common than the standard Arabic terms: Hass. kurāh/kurãh ‘electricity, current’ (< Fr. courant) rather than Ar. kahṛaba, Hass. baḷḷoh (< Fr. ballon) rather than Ar. kūra, Hass. bneygaṛ ‘vinegar’ (< Fr. vinaigre) rather than Ar. xall, Hass. būtīg ‘shop’ (< Fr. boutique) or Hass. magaẓayne ‘shop’ (< Fr. magasin) rather than Ar. ḥanūt, which has taken on the special meaning of ‘blacksmith’s bellows’ in Hassaniyya. Borrowings can take several forms, sometimes very similar as in Hass. ˁlimet or ˁālimet ‘matches’ (< Fr. allumettes), gāṛāž or egāṛāž ‘garage’ (< Fr. garage), gâẓ or gâṣ ‘gas’ (< Fr. gaz), iṣāṣ or iṣã (n)ṣ ‘petrol’ (< Fr. essence), lebtān or lebbiṭān ‘hospital, dispensary’ (< Fr. l’hospital), kīnîn or kīni ‘quinine’ (< Fr. quinine), or more distinct as in ṣaṛžan or ṣaṛṣaṛ ‘sergeant’  

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(< Fr. sergent), vāle or peyle (< Fr. pelle), guvəṛnāṛ or guṿəṛ/geṿəṛ ‘governor’ (< Fr. gouverneur), bəṛṭmāle or qoṛṭmāl ‘wallet’ (< Fr. porte-monnaie). From source to target language – In general, it is fairly easy to identify the source lexeme of a loan. A very frequent modification is vowel lengthening, especially that of the last (or only) syllable, e. g., in /gṛaːm/ ‘gram (measure of weight)’. Another common modification is consonant emphatization, notably /s/ > /sˤ/ as in /sˤantiːm/ ‘cent’ or /sˤalaːd/ ‘salad’ and /t/ > /tˤ/ as in /ṭown/ ‘tonne’ or /batˤrˤuːn/ ‘boss’, but also /d/ > /dˤ/ as in /maḍ̣adˤam/ ‘madam’ or /đ/ > /đˤ/ as in /đˤaːmət/đˤaːme/ ‘draughts’, /l/ > /lˤ/ as in /balˤaːye/ ‘broom (manufactured)’ (< Fr. balai) and /balˤge/ ‘arrogance’ (< Fr. blague). Note that the vowel realizations [a], [ā] and [o] are hardly to be found in Hassaniyya, except in the presence of emphatic consonants such as /rˤ, sˤ, tˤ, dˤ, đˤ/. Sometimes, however, the source of the loan is less obvious. This may be due to a distortion as in baṭṭa ‘can’ (< Fr. boîte), dəlwīr ‘oil’ (< Fr. de l’huile), būzāwi ‘butcher’ (< Fr. boucher) and aḷamān ‘fine’ (< Fr. l’amende) or a more or less extensive change (semantic change or change of the term used in French), as in ḅḅāṣ ‘ticket (aeroplane, taxi, etc.)’ (< Fr. passeport), rūsi ‘receipt’ (< Fr. reçu), tərki ‘shirt’ (< Fr. tricot), laṣo ‘cement’ (< Fr. la chaux). Among these cases are also special uses in the field of card games, e. g., for maḍam ‘lady (gambling)’ (< Fr. madame), maryāṣ ‘wedding’ (< Fr. mariage) and bâtər ‘shuffle cards’ (< Fr. battre). Formation of verbs – Hassaniyya uses a number of verbs that originate in French borrowings. Often the verbs are formed on loans of a nominal nature, e. g., laṣṣa/laṣṣa ‘to cement’ < laṣo ‘cement’ (< Fr. la chaux), bāḷa ‘to sweep with a broom’ < baḷāye ‘broom’ (< Fr. balai), bekkaṭ ‘to pack’ < bekkaṭ ‘package’ (< Fr. paquet), deywen ‘to clear’ < dīwâne ‘customs’ (< Fr. douanes), ḷawmen ‘to impose a fine’ < aḷamān ‘fine’ (< Fr. l’amende), ḅowteg ‘to keep a shop’ < būtīg ‘shop’ (< Fr. boutique), retret ‘to be retired’ < retrēt ‘retirement, pension’ (< Fr. retraite), tbaṭṛan ‘to be a boss, to become a boss’ < baṭṛūn ‘boss’ (< Fr. patron), stegvaṛ ‘to be appointed governor, to pretend to be governor’ < guṿəṛ/ geṿəṛ ‘governor’ (< Fr. gouverneur), telven ‘to phone’ < tīlfūn ‘phone’ (< Fr. téléphone). However, there are also non-denominative verbs such as vaṛṣa ‘to oblige, to compel’ (< Fr. forcer), bowṣa/bāṣa ‘to iron (the laundry)’ (< Fr. repasser), ˤarte ‘to arrest, to apprehend’ (< Fr. arrêter), ṣaṛže ‘to load (a vehicle)’ (< Fr. charger), kowmed ‘to give orders’ (< Fr. commander), weste ‘to search’ (< Fr. visiter), maṛše ‘to be current, to be in fashion’ (< Fr. marcher), ˤanter ‘to bring to the hospital, to hospitalize’ (< Fr. entrer, rentrer) and especially its passive form with u‑ (specific to Hassaniyya) uˤanter ‘to be hospitalized’. The form of the verbs is relatively varied, but less than that of the nouns. Some verbs are integrated as derived forms and a majority of them are integrated as quadrilateral root verbs (with four radicals). The only verb that appears to be irregular is genye ‘to win (especially a competition)’ (< Fr. gagner). To be regular, it would have to have a long first vowel *gānye or be a true *genye quadrilateral (but a root like GNYY seems to have no equivalent in Hassaniyya). The high proportion of verbs is one of the characteristics of the borrowings of Hassaniyya from French compared to those of French from Hassaniyya. The other specificity concerns the semantic fields, which also tend to differentiate. Apart from the semantic fields of the army and public services,  

 

 

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inherited from colonization and the beginnings of the modern State, the most significant field is undoubtedly that of industrialized objects (for more details, cf. Ould Mohamed Baba 2003).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Attitudes and description Attitudes – If there is one trait of French that Mauritanians have never sought to adopt, it is the guttural pronunciation of the r as practised in most of France. Not rolling the r as in the national languages is a sign of suspicious acculturation. In the 1960s and 1970s, when French was the training and working language of a small elite, it was fashionable to avoid code-switching between French and any of the national languages. This attitude became much less frequent when French ceased to be a well-mastered language among students, employees and intellectuals. In addition, there has always been a variety of French used in unofficial communication (both oral and written), which can be considered a form of local French. According to Leclerc (2018, 5), there are even two different sub-varieties: that of the Moors, influenced more particularly by Hassaniyya, and that of the Blacks, influenced above all by the Wolof language. To my knowledge, neither has been systematically criticized or stigmatized. Description – As far as I know, there is no grammar or dictionary of Mauritanian French. The work by Ould Zein/Queffélec (1997) remains the most informative in the description of linguistic characteristics.

5.2 Usage of linguistic characteristics Orality – Leaving aside not only what can be considered incorrect, but also what appears to be socially marked (vocabulary of schoolchildren or students, terminology of mechanics, etc.), it can be said that the majority of the characteristics identified above are likely to be used fairly widely in non-literary contexts. It is difficult to be very precise, although Ould Zein/Queffélec (1997) give various indications of the frequency and type of use (oral or written) of many lexemes. Variety used in the media – The written language of the media is generally very close to standard French, but there is also a tendency to give sway to the characteristics of local French. This tendency was embodied by a talented journalist, Habib Ould Mahfoudh, whose columns were gathered together in two anthologies (2012; 2018) after his untimely death. In his articles, he was so good at combining different language registers, from the slangiest to the most academic, and various varieties of French, from local French (even integrating entire phrases from Hassaniyya) to standard French, that he almost created his own language. The fact that his style is still being emulated by Mauritanian journal-

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ists and writers proves not only that it is appreciated, but also that it meets the needs and expectations of those who use French. Variety used in literature – Mauritanian literature in French, with its limited production (cf. Belvaude 1989; Martin Granel/Ould Mohamed Lemine/Voisset 1992; Bariou et al. 1995; Diagana 2004; 2008), has so far been dominated by the use of a high register. This is, in any case, the point of view defended by Diagana (2004) in the final chapter of his thesis where he explores the language and style of Mauritanian writers. However, he notes one exception, that of Harouna-Rachid Ly, whose writing differs from the aesthetics of other authors, both by the attestation of a sentence in pidgin (“petit-nègre”) and by the use of French words transcribed according to local pronunciation (such as yaawour for yoghurt and karenté dentité for identity card).

References Bariou, Jacques, et al. (edd.) (1995), Littérature mauritanienne, Paris, Clef (Notre Librairie 120–121). Basset, René (1909), Étude sur le dialecte zénaga, in: René Basset (ed.), Mission au Sénégal, vol. 1, Paris, Leroux, 1–279. Belvaude, Catherine (1989), Ouverture sur la littérature en Mauritanie. Tradition orale, écriture, témoignages, Paris, L’Harmattan. Chassey, Francis de (1972), Contribution à une sociologie du sous-développement: l’exemple de la R.I.M., Paris, Université Paris V, Doctoral Thesis. Daddah, Amel (1994), Le fragile pari d’une presse démocratique, Politique Africaine 55, 40–45. Dia, Alassane (2007), Uses and attitudes towards Hassaniyya among Nouakchott’s Negro-Mauritanian population, in: Catherine Miller et al. (edd.), Arabic in the City. Issues in dialect contact and language variation, London/ New York, Routledge, 325–344. Diagana, M’bouh Séta (2004), La littérature mauritanienne de langue française. Essai de description et étude du contenu, Paris, Université de Paris XII–Val de Marne, Doctoral Thesis. Diagana, M’bouh Séta (2008), Éléments de la littérature mauritanienne de langue française. “Mon pays est une perle discrète”, Paris, L’Harmattan. Diagana, Ousmane Moussa (1990), Chants traditionnels du pays soninké (Mauritanie, Mali, Sénégal...), Paris, L’Harmattan. Diagana, Ousmane Seydina (1996), Le français et les langues en Mauritanie: l’exemple français-soninké, in: Caroline Juillard/Louis-Jean Calvet (edd.), Les politiques linguistiques, mythes et réalités, Beyrouth/ Montréal, FMA/AUPELF-UREF, 167–174. Dubié, Paul (1940), L’îlot berbérophone de Mauritanie, Bulletin IFAN 3–4, 316–325. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). FLAM (1986), Le manifeste du négro-mauritanien opprimé, Dakar, Forces de libération africaines de Mauritanie, https://flam-mauritanie.org/le-manifeste-du-negro-mauritanien-opprime-fevrier-1966-avril-1986/ (2/3/ 2023). Galtier, Gérard (2010), Le soninké, Lyon, Sorosoro, http://www.sorosoro.org/le-soninke/ (2/3/2023). Lacroix, Pierre-Francis (1968), Le peul, in: André Martinet (ed.), Le langage. Encyclopédie de la Pléiade, Bruges, Gallimard, 1068–1089. Leclerc, Jacques (2018), Mauritanie, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/ CEFAN, http://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/mauritanie.htm (2/3/2023).

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Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2008), Dictionnaire zénaga–français. Le berbère de Mauritanie par racines dans une perspective comparative, Cologne, Köppe. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2013), Des ethnies chimériques aux langues fantômes: L’exemple des Imraguen et Nemâdi de Mauritanie, in: Carole de Féral (ed.), In and out of Africa: Languages in Question. In Honour of Robert Nicolaï, vol. 1: Language Contact and Epistemological Issues, Louvain-la-Neuve, Peeters, 137– 164. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2018a), Historical and typological approaches to Mauritanian and West Saharan Arabic, in: Clive Holes (ed.), The Historical Dialectology of Arabic: Linguistic and Sociolinguistic Approaches, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 293–315. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2018b), Ḥassāniyya Arabic in contact with Berber: the case of quadriliteral verbs, in: Stefano Manfredi/Mauro Tosco (edd.), Arabic in Contact, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 135–159. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2020a), “Hartani”: une enquête au pays des mots, L’Ouest saharien. Cahiers d’études pluridisciplinaires 10–11, 73–94. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2020b), Zenaga, in: Rainer Vossen/Gerrit J. Dimmendaal (edd.), The Oxford Handbook of African Languages, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 530–542. Taine-Cheikh, Catherine (2020c), Ḥassāniyya Arabic, in: Christopher Lucas/Stefano Manfredi (edd.), Arabic and contact-induced change: a handbook, Berlin, Language Science Press, 245–263. Wane, Yaya (1969), Les Toucouleur du Fouta Tooro (Sénégal). Stratification sociale et structure familiale, Dakar, Institut fondamental d’Afrique noire. WB (2019), Mauritania, Washington, World Bank, https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mauritania/ overview (2/3/2023).

Oreste Floquet

15 Niger Abstract: Although the arrival of the French army dates back to the end of the nineteenth century, Niger became a colony only in 1922. Today, Niger is made up of different ethnic groups which makes it extremely heterogeneous. French coexists with other national languages which are: Arabic, Buduma, Fulfulde, Gourmanchéma, Hausa, Kanuri, Tamasheq, Tasawaq, Tedaga, and Zarma. Niger’s language policy has always ensured that national languages were used in education. In fact, since the early 1970s Niger has promoted various projects to develop bilingualism in primary school. As in many other French-speaking states of sub-Saharan Africa, French is an exogenous language that coexists with other languages which are learned from childhood in the family environment. The linguistic study of the Nigerien variety remains a largely unexplored field and has, to date, mostly focused on data obtained from surveys carried out in Niamey. The phenomena found appear consistent with those universal tendencies at reducing the markedness that can usually be found in other places in French-speaking Africa. Keywords: French, Niger, sociolinguistics, language policy, Hausa

1 Sociolinguistic situation National Languages – The population of Niger, about 22 million estimated in 2018 (Amato/Iocchi 2020, 36), is made up of different ethnic groups from quantitative, geographical, socio-economic, and cultural points of view, which makes it extremely heterogeneous, with almost 70 % of the population being under 25 years of age. Numerically, the most important group is located in the South-East, Hausa-speaking, and representing about half of the Nigerien population. Heirs of the distant Kasar-Hausa ‘Hausa country’, the Hausa are divided between Niger, a former French colony, and Nigeria, a former English colony, and speak a language of the Chadic lineage. In the South-West, the Zarma represent the second largest group with just over 20 % of the total population (Amato/Iocchi 2020, 36). It is not yet clear whether or not their language belongs to the Nilo-Saharan branch due to the enormous differences that are present in the different varieties of this idiom, to such an extent that some question the very existence of a Zarma linguistic unity, which would be nothing more than the fruit of a theoretical abstraction (Nicolaï 1977; Platiel 1998; Moumouni 2015). The desertic North is essentially dominated by the Tuareg nomads, representing 10 % of the total number of Nigeriens, who speak Tamasheq, an evolved form of Berber, and by the Tasawaq, a small sedentary population. This is followed by small communities of Kanuri in the oases of Kaouar and Agram, beyond the Teneré, and of Fulfulde, present in various tribes scattered throughout the Sahel. In the extreme East, we find, in very small  

 

 

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percentages, Tedaga, Arabic, and Buduma, while at the opposite extreme, to the West, some Gourmanchéma. National languages do not always have adequate space in the school system and can, in some cases, even be at risk of extinction, such as Tasawaq (Sidibé 2016). Among these, Hausa and Zarma are certainly the most used, while Arabic, although not very widespread, nevertheless enjoys great prestige as the language of the Koran. In recent years, there has been an increase in populations migrating to Niger. These are essentially citizens of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) area coming mainly from the Hausa-speaking areas of Nigeria and Benin, who arrive in Niger both for economic reasons and because of the rejection policies of migratory flows to Europe following the approval of a law from 2015, whose objective is to prevent migrants from reaching the coasts of the Mediterranean (Amato/Iocchi 2020, 9–19; Hamadou 2018). It is important to note that only a fraction of Nigeriens speak another African language. Perrin (1986, 16) had already shown, almost forty years ago, that the Hausa, whose language is understood and spoken in all regions of the country, and the Zarma, more concentrated in their region of origin, feel less need to use a second language; only 3 % of the former and 8 % of the latter are bilingual. Hausa is therefore a vehicular language for only part of the population. French – As in many other French-speaking states of sub-Saharan Africa, French is not really a first or second language, if by the latter we mean a language learned at school at an older age; its condition is rather that of an exogenous, imported language that coexists with other languages which, on the other hand, are learned from childhood in the family environment (Singy 2004; Singy/Rouiller 2001; Sanaker/Holter/Skattum 2006, 161–247). In fact, the French language is used in schools, politics and the press; however, some informal conversations take place in one of the national languages. Foreign languages – Among foreign languages, English and Chinese are acquiring, in recent years, an increasingly important role, for reasons linked to the substantial material and financial investments of the USA and China (Beidou 2014, 233–234). Spanish also belongs to this group of foreign languages, which has been taught for some years now in high schools and universities (Beidou 2014, 206).  

 

2 Linguistic history Although the arrival of the French army dates back to the end of the nineteenth century, Niger became a colony only in 1922 and for this reason, Abadie (1927, 17) defined it as the ‘Mascot of French Colonies’ (“benjamine des colonies françaises”). The first capital was Zinder, then, from 1926, Niamey, at the time a small village chosen for strategic reasons and for its healthy climate. Niamey then became a metropolis that currently has about one million inhabitants. Within the process of decolonization that preceded the African independence of the 1960s and which had as a fundamental stage the referendum of 1958, in which the

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colonies were proposed to join a new French Community (Communauté française) by General de Gaulle, Niger stands out for not completely rejecting the associative proposal (as Guinea did by opting immediately for secession). Yet Niger did not approve it with the overwhelming majority that has manifested itself elsewhere. The years preceding the independence of 1960 are in fact marked by a rift that divides two parties, the Nigerien Progressive Party (Parti progressiste nigérien) and the left-leaning Sawaba party, and the ethnic groups they respectively represented, to a certain degree: the Zarma in the West, historically French-speaking, and the Hausa to the East, which ultimately correspond to two different postures towards France. This split is embodied by the figures of the future first president of the Republic of Niger, Hamani Diori, a proFrench, and his historical rival, Djibo Bakary, who was a supporter of the “no” in the 1958 referendum, when he was still prime minister, and close to the positions of Guinea led by Sekou Touré. It is debated whether the referendum was won by the “yes” due to Djibo Bakary’s inability to see the contradictions that his too progressive and nationalist politics had generated in the very mixed base that supported him (Fuglestad 1973, 322–330; Raynaut 1990, 3–8) or if the defeat of the “no” was wisely orchestrated by France (Walraven 2009), which considered Niger, unlike Guinea, a country of enormous strategic importance because of the long border with Algeria as well as for uranium, a mineral necessary for its energy supply and still today at the centre of a heated debate on the socio-political and health consequences of its extraction (Cajati 2011; Boukar 2011; Weira 2016). The rules of the French Community provided the possibilities of either becoming a department of France, to remain a territory of the Republic or to gain independence. Like many other countries, Niger soon opted for the latter solution. According to Fuglestad (1983, 10), Nigerien independence was not the result of a collective will of its people; no authentic nationalism existed before the 1960s and for many Nigeriens the idea of political independence did not make much sense since colonial power in Niger had always been weak and in any case had not represented a great discontinuity in Nigerien history. For a different analysis on the role of colonialism as a factor of rupture, at least in the western part of Niger, however, see the work of Olivier de Sardan (1984). In the years following the Diori presidency, the history of Niger has been marked by authoritarianism, single-party corrupt regimes and military coups of various duration and value (Maidoka 2008). The first, and most important, led the country for fifteen consecutive years from 1974 to 1989 and is linked to the figure of Seyni Kountché. The slow process of democratic transition that led to the first free elections began with the National Sovereign Conference (Conférence nationale) of 1991, a true landmark in Nigerien politics (Cannelli 2011; Apard 2015) that was born under the pressure of the fall of the Berlin Wall, but also as an imitation of the Conference of the Living Forces of the Nation (Conférence des forces vives de la nation) of Benin in 1990, as well as at the impulse of the famous speech by President Mitterrand in La Baule, in the same year, in which the French president promised greater support to those African countries that were on their way to a democratization process.

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3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation After its independence, the Republic of Niger chose French, emblem of the colonial administration, as official language, thus relegating the other African languages to the uncertain status of national languages. The various Nigerien constitutions have always sought to promote plurilingualism, while maintaining French as the only official language. The option for multilingualism has therefore never been questioned, contrary to what has happened in other countries, such as Burkina Faso or Guinea. Thus, French coexists with ten national languages which are: Arabic, Buduma, Fulfulde Gourmanchéma, Hausa, Kanuri, Tamasheq, Tasawaq, Tedaga, and Zarma. In recent years, Niger’s language policy, which has always ensured that national languages were used in education and in the media, is increasingly promoting their dissemination in the public administration, the judiciary, and health care, following a law from 2001.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Niger’s public administration speaks essentially French, and all road signs are in French. However, the linguistic history of contemporary Niger can be read as an ever-increasing antagonism between French and the national languages, which are strongly present in political discourse. These, especially Hausa, are gradually gaining ground and have the ambition to become fully-fledged institutional languages, which is a prelude to possible forms of colinguism (Balibar 1985), such as French-Wolof in Senegal. This sociolinguistic dynamic, which has nothing to do with what happens in Côte d’Ivoire, Gabon, or Cameroon, for example, where the number of speakers of French as a first language is greater than those who partially or exclusively speak another African language (Queffélec 2008), seems to reflect, in part, a more general change in Nigerien society and institutions that began with the democratization process of the 1990s. Niger, as a state, was built on the French model which affirmed the supremacy of French institutional structures and secularism over African and Muslim values. All the Nigerien constitutions reaffirm the separation of the state from religions, of the political order from the spiritual order. Furthermore, no political organization can be established on a sectarian basis despite the religion practised by over 90 % of the population being Sunni Islam. However, for about thirty years, secularism as such, and the French language that conveys it, have been criticized by some Islamic currents, more closely linked to the radical Arab tradition, which militate against the mystical Sufi tradition, which, on the contrary, believes religion must be separated from politics and is therefore considered pro-Western (Piga 2008; 2021; Sounaye 2009). Political power thus gradually began to move away from the Western model of secularism and universality to embrace a more identitarian model closely linked to religion and ethnicity, putting democracy itself at risk (Yacouba 2017);  

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an example is the fact that the prime minister is now taking oath on the sacred book of his confession, the Koran (Moumouni 2014, 207).

3.3 Languages used in education The French colonial school developed in Niger later than in the other countries of French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF). The first schools date back to the 1920s and were initially built in large urban centres. The teaching of the French language was such a priority that teachers were forbidden to speak local languages in class as well as students who, if caught in the act, were severely punished (Moumouni Dioffo 2019, 76). At the time of its independence, Niger had an enrolment rate of 3.6 %, one of the lowest in French-speaking Africa. Currently, despite the progress made, literacy still remains a major problem (Barreteau/Souley 1997), with an important gap between men and women (Goza et al. 2010; Lulli 2011, 173s.). In 2012, only 31 % of the population was literate; 70 % of school-age children are actually enrolled in the primary cycle, but only 44 % of them complete it (Diadé 1996; Amato/Iocchi 2020, 37). Since the early 1970s, due to numerous dropouts, the government, which at the beginning had even considered promoting 85 % of pupils from elementary school to the next grade, has promoted a project to develop bilingualism in primary school. The measure concerned only the five national languages with the greatest diffusion: Hausa, Zarma, Fulfulde, Kanuri, and Tamasheq. On the one hand, the desired outcome of this project was to enhance the students’ context of belonging, which, at the time and still today, saw them become of school age already speaking one or more of the national languages and often perceiving the school in French negatively because of suspicions of it being a tool to prepare students for forced labour; on the other hand, the academic achievements of the French monolingual school, heir to the colonial era, were largely insufficient (Barreteau 1996). There has not been a single model for promoting bilingualism, especially as regards with the relation between French and national languages in terms of teaching hours (Mallam Garba/Hanafiou 2010). Starting in the 1970s in experimental schools, the student’s national language was predominant during the first three years of the curriculum and French in the last three. However, the language within the school system has always been French and in practice it still is today despite the educational law of 1998 (loi d’orientation du système éducatif – LOSEN) sanctioning the right of national languages to also be represented in the primary education system both as teaching languages and as languages of learning (Saïbou Adamou/Hamidou 2008, 18s.). The bilingual pilot schools (école bilingue pilote) draw inspiration from the criticalities of the experimental schools and propose a single path in the national language and in the French language, but the project did not get any follow up because the funds deriving from the German-Niger cooperation have run out in 2003. Halfway between these first two options, the Soutéba (soutien à l’éducation de base ‘Sustaining basic education’) schools offer a chiasmus-shaped path, in which one begins with a predominance of one  

 

 

 

 

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of the national languages that gradually decreases in favour of French, which becomes dominant at the end of the cycle. This approach is reaffirmed in the study programme launched in 2015 and, as regards teaching French language and languages in general, inserted in a learning model called “by situations” (par situations) which has aroused quite some criticism about its real effectiveness (Maurer 2018). Whatever the model, the fact remains that bilingualism at school has remained confined to the primary level only and that French remains the language of those entering secondary and higher education, whether public or private. Some of the criticalities of multilingual teaching can be summarized as follows (Mamane 2016a; 2018): teachers are not always sufficiently prepared, especially on the written side, which applies to both French and national languages. Students very often lack the manuals adopted. But above all, the national language still tends to maintain a subordinate role because it is perceived as a tool for transmitting what is not clear in French, and not as an autonomous knowledge. Teachers are authorized to resort to multilingual teaching, alternating between French and a national language in their explanations, with the aim of facilitating the student’s comprehension; however, when they do, they often use the national language for the rudimentary translation of content previously expressed in French without any real benefit to the learner (Saïbou Adamou/Mohamed Sagayar 2015, 155ss.). However, it should be remembered that several studies have shown the benefits of bilingual education, in Niger and elsewhere (Benson 2002, 307; Hovens 2002, 257; Ismaël 2007). In general, students who have followed a bilingual schooling pathway are better in both the scientific and humanities disciplines. This would seem to indicate that the introduction of a foreign language, namely French, at the beginning of schooling, together with an equally foreign educational content, is likely to create a handicap in terms of cognitive development. These considerations are at the origin of a new institutional interest in the diffusion of bilingualism in schools. The use of Arabic in a country like Niger, which is among the most Islamized in the world, deserves a separate argument. In addition to Franco-Arab bilingual schools (where the teaching is done half in French, half in Arabic with the addition of Islamic education), which remain underdeveloped for now, although the very recent phenomenon of the multiplication of Turkish-funded private schools offering a Franco-Arab course of study must be noted, there is a very extensive network of about 40,000 Koranic schools. These are informal educational structures that are chosen by families wishing to complete the education of their children with a religious deepening since Islamic education is absent from the primary cycle of national school systems (Gandolfi 2003). The Koranic schools also offer training to adults who want to approach the reading of sacred texts. There is also a public university, the Islamic University of Say, unique of its kind, which offers courses in French and Arabic.

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3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – With the exception of the phase of the so-called developmental journalism in rural areas during the 1960s and 1970s, whose educational mission was to provide farmers and shepherds with practical information to help them improve their economic conditions and solve social issues, and which can now be considered definitively over (Frère 2000, 32–36), the press in Niger has always been exclusively French. Until the 1990s, the regime used it as a tool to cement national unity, thus maintaining the monopoly of information and freedom of expression (Frère 2000, 33). Even after the beginning of the democratization process which led to the development of a private press (Haské, Le Républicain, Anfani, Le Démocrate, Le Paon), whose ambition was to replace the governmental one (Le Sahel, Le Sahel Dimanche), Nigerien journalism continued to address exclusively the intellectual elite (Tudesq 1995, 39) and to express itself in French, in fact continuing a tradition that had its roots in the colonial period (Frère 2000, 295s.). And it did so in a context that until a few years ago was characterized by censorship, harsh penalties for journalists in the event of press infringements, primarily defamation, and the inability to access public documents (Drioli 2011). The situation has clearly improved, ranking 57th in 2020 according to Reporters Without Borders compared to 139th in 2009, despite the persistence of critical issues, such as the fact that journalists continue not to have regular contracts and are thus obliged to carry out parallel activities that have nothing to do with their job, or to provide reports on commission from external clients, very often politicians, which makes the quality of the informational content not always up to par, sometimes bordering actual propaganda, as was the case during the revolt of the Touareg (Frère 1995). However, there are two important changes to note. Compared to the French used in the previous era, the new private press of the 1990s partially breaks with the classic high and pompous style, starting to give space to a French of mesolectal level as well, closer to the one spoken every day. Furthermore, French is increasingly becoming the language that conveys the new democratic values and is therefore a positive symbol of modernity, and not of oppression. The first non-governmental newspaper in a national language was published only in 2005; it is Ra’ayi, a bimonthly newspaper of only six pages, in Hausa. Its diffusion remained rather limited because on the one hand, the editorial office was located in Niamey, a less Hausa-speaking city than Maradi or Zinder; on the other hand, because it had not aroused enthusiasm among the traditionally French-speaking intellectual elites who can speak Hausa but do not always know how to read it and who, last but not least, see the expansion of national languages as a threat to their own status (Abba 2009, 96–99). Radio – National languages represent about 70 % of the language used in radio programmes. In Niger, there are three types of radio (Perrin 1986, 21ss.; Abba 2009, 69–84): the national broadcaster, which follows step by step the activities of the government and other political authorities, private radios, which are more open to social and economic issues, and the so-called community radios, which differ from the private ones in that  

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they are managed by people who are not professionals of audiovisual journalism and who mostly provide proximity information. In the villages where a Radio Club operates, the host (often a teacher or a doctor) organizes a debate in one of the national languages with the aim of promoting the economic and social development of the country. The themes of the programmes concern agriculture, livestock, water and forests, health and also socio-economic problems. This participatory experience has been very successful and has often been supported by international institutions (e. g., UNICEF and WHO). Television – Television arrived in Niger as early as 1964. At the beginning, it had only pedagogical purposes and was aimed at an audience of elementary school children who, gathered in class, watched four television programmes a day, concerning various subjects, lasting about one quarter of an hour each. All this was done exclusively in French (Egly 1973). This experiment, which ended in 1979 and which for many observers is not entirely positive considering the illiteracy rate in Niger, is marked by what Alzouma (2011–2012, 166) calls the technologic messianism (“messianisme technologique”) or technologic determinism (“déterminisme technologique”, Alzouma 2011–2012, 184), meaning the confidence that technological development is the key element for the economic and social rebirth of Africa. The abandonment of the project was partly linked to the cost of creating and storing the audiovisual material and to the protests over the fact that the classrooms were not led by real teachers but by simple supervisors, trained, in a very rough way, only to comment on the videos. However, two socio-political factors must be added. For a long time, schools and television were seen, especially in the rural environment, as a symbol of neo-colonial domination. Furthermore, when the Nigerien political power grasped the importance of television as a vehicle for the affirmation of its power, it quickly decided to get rid of the experience of educational television to found a French-speaking national television in 1979 (Télé-Sahel). In 2001, a second national channel (Tal TV) was added, with limited broadcasting in Niamey. Like the public ones, most of the private television channels were born after the liberalization of the 1990s; they essentially present programmes in French, more rarely in the national languages, mainly in Hausa, Zarma, Fulfulde, Tamasheq, and Kanuri. As the majority of the population is illiterate, national languages are often used to convey important messages in the life of the nation, usually news headings or political-cultural debates, that are, not always satisfactorily, translated by journalists or translators. Many of the products that are disseminated are not designed and manufactured in Niger but are packages that are bought abroad (e. g., from Canal France international, TV5, Go Africa).  

 

4 Linguistic characteristics The linguistic study of the Nigerien variety is a still largely unexplored field which focuses mostly on data obtained from surveys carried out in Niamey, a city of about one million inhabitants who speak essentially Zarma and partly Hausa, moreover on quite small samples. The data that will be presented, therefore, cannot aspire to any complete-

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ness either from the analysis point of view or from the geographical point of view, but will be considered as an integral part of exploratory research which is still in progress.

4.1 Pronunciation Generally speaking, the phenomena found in the Nigerien variety of Niamey appear consistent with those universal tendencies at reducing the markedness that can usually be found in the historical evolution of phonological systems. These phenomena are similar to those found in other places in French-speaking Africa, such as the reduction of nasal vowels, considered to be strongly marked. Nasal vowels – From a phonological point of view, the situation follows the standard of four nasal vowel phonemes in opposition to each other. From a phonetic point of view, however, we detect a certain tendency to produce variants that are not very nasalized if not completely denasalized, and therefore less marked, which affects the unstressed vowels with a greater frequency. Schwa – Regarding the schwa, /ə/, we briefly recall that in standard French there are two main characteristics: the possibility of not being realized, and the richness of possible phonetic realizations. As in other African varieties, the central vowel in Niamey speech no longer alternates with zero. Since in African French, the only schwa that remains optional is the one inside a word (e. g., in bêtement [bɛtəmɑ̃] ~ [bɛtmɑ̃]), in Nigerien French the fall is very rare even in this position, for which médecin will almost always be pronounced [medesɛ̃] instead of [med(ə)sɛ̃]. Regarding the schwa timbre, [e] (instead of [ə]) is also attested, which attests a shift of the central vowel towards more peripheral and therefore less marked positions as well as a pressure of the written on the oral production (i.e. written realized as [e]). Consonants – As regards consonants, dentals are palatalized and the rhotic has multiple allophones with a clear predominance of [r] (Busà 2018). Liaison – Regarding the liaison, the only study available for now is that of De Flaviis (2018), analyzing the idolect of a secondary school French teacher belonging to the Zarma ethnic group. The results of the analysis are in line with general trends: the categorical liaisons (e. g., les amis [lezami]) are always realized while the variable ones (e. g., trop important [tʁopɛ̃pɔʁtɑ̃]) tend not to be, not only in spontaneous speech but also in reading.  

 

 

4.2 Morphosyntax There is a whole literature of listed morphosyntactic traits which can be considered typical of French spoken in Africa and which are not always reflected elsewhere in the French language (cf. Zang Zang 1998; Boutin 2007; Biloa 2012). A first interesting fact is that only some of these traits are found in the French spoken in the capital, namely in

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very small quantities; this seems to be repeated even where the speakers are not well educated (Floquet 2018a). The French spoken in Niamey would therefore still seem quite close to the standard; this seems to be confirmed by the fact that there is no awareness of an endogenous norm among Nigeriens, as is the case elsewhere. We point out some phenomena in which a difference with respect to the standard is however shown. This is the case with the simplification of the system of determinants to the advantage of the definite article, a well-attested phenomenon in other parts of Africa, as Zang Zang (1998, 317–335) points out. In Niamey, it can also involve the possessive article, for which the phrase le visage in l’enfant n’a pas lavé le visage will be interpreted as the equivalent of son visage, effectively transforming the sentence from unacceptable to acceptable, which is not possible in other varieties of French (Floquet 2018b). Another particular trait is the disappearance of the anaphoric personal pronoun, in the position of subject or object (direct or indirect), whose presence is instead mandatory in the standard, for example puisque moi suis touareg instead of puisque moi je suis touareg in standard French or elle a combien d’enfants? Alors ma mère elle a trois instead of elle a combien d’enfants? Alors ma mère elle en a trois in standard French. Rather than a phenomenon of transference originating from African languages (Noumssi 1999, 122), it would seem to be a process of syntactic simplification common to other varieties of French (Ploog 1999; Léglise 2012), which is however completely absent in those Nigerien speakers who adhere to the norm more easily. Regarding the verbal system, there are some cases of use of the present indicative to the detriment of other tenses and modes as in il faut que je sors instead of il faut que je sorte in standard French, a phenomenon found elsewhere in the French-speaking world, not only in Africa, as emerges from Mitchell (2009) for Gabon and by Rossi-Gensane (2010) for the European French. In formal written language, data by Sabi’u (2018) show a tendency of the definite article, a less marked element among the determinants as also the acquisitional data confirm (Véronique 2009), to supplant the other determinants, a phenomenon that is common in other French Africans (Celani/Celata/Floquet 2021, 29s.). Furthermore, a diathesis change can be observed, and the construction of verbs vary, for example il s’est divorcé for il a divorcé, even in standardized phrases such as il a failli laisser sa peau instead of il a failli y laisser sa peau or il fait toujours à sa tête for il en fait toujours à sa tête, a phenomenon also found in other areas of African French-speaking countries, for example in Cameroon (Zang Zang 1998, 387s.), where a different system of attribution of thematic roles seems to emerge (Celani/Celata/Floquet 2021, 31ss.) On the other hand, there is less occurrence of simplifications concerning the concordance of tenses, which tend towards a structural simplification in favour of the less marked pole, that is present instead of imperfect, future instead of conditional, simple forms instead of complex ones, and errors of the type unification for réunification or ce que for c’est que, which seem to have a nonstrictly linguistic explanation.

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4.3 Lexicon Loans – The multilingualism in which Nigeriens live has given rise to French words and expressions in which national languages like Zarma (Zar.), Hausa (Hau.), or Fulfulde (Ful.) transpire in filigree (Barreteau 1997; Sow/Mossi 2011; Reutner 2017, 47–51). This is the case of calques or neo-formations from Zarma, such as avoir le soleil ‘having hemorrhoids’ (< Zar. baranda woyno ‘having the sun [which burns like hemorrhoids]’), balseur ‘freeloader’ (< Zar. balsa ‘the fact of taking advantage’), roubeur ‘vain person’ (< Zar. rubu ‘vanity’) or from Hausa as for example reculer en arrière ‘backing away’ (< Hau. ja baya ‘pull back!’). In some cases, it is necessary to refer to the African cultures of origin to understand these calques. This is the case, for example, of the calque accepter avec un cœur or accepter avec deux; the first means ‘accept without hesitation’, that is, only with a good heart, since it is believed that there are two of them, the second ‘to accept with hesitation’ because the bad one also comes into play. We also report sauter la lune ‘to be late with the menstrual cycle, (lit.) jumping the moon’, with lune standing for ‘month’, or et les deux jours? ‘how have you been since the last time we met?, (lit.) and the last two days?’, where deux jours stands for an indefinite duration. There are obviously also complete loanwords such as chayi ‘tea or coffee with milk’ from Arabic, dan banga ‘security officer’ from Hausa, djantaré ‘woman of easy virtue’ from Fulfulde, faba-faba ‘low-cost public transport’ from Zarma. Data by Sabi’u (2018), obtained from a newspapers corpus, shows also Nigerisms in written language coming from national languages, e. g., gabdiment ‘in the manner of prostitutes’ (< Zar. gabdi ‘prostitute’ + ment), wassossiste ‘grabber’ (< Hau. wasoso ‘to grab’ + iste), or zaki ‘lion’ (< Hau. zaki ‘lion’). Changes of meaning – However, there are also neologisms that do not derive from contact with other languages but develop within French. This is the case of the semantic ones, such as, e. g., (la situation est) caillou ‘(the situation is) difficult, (lit.) pebble’, recevoir un dix chiffres ‘receive foreign transfer, (lit.) receive a ten figure’, béton armé ‘millet paste, (lit.) reinforced concrete’, bavure ‘impropriety that generates disorder, (lit.) saliva’, ça cloche/ça ne cloche pas ‘it’s ok/it’s not ok, (lit.) sounds good/sounds bad’, descente ‘end of work, (lit.) slope’, régulière ‘lover always available, (lit.) regular’, tablier ‘street vendor, (lit.) apron’, au revoir Europe ‘European car sold in Africa, (lit.) Goobye Europe’, café au lait ‘white coffee, (lit.) milk and coffee’, in which words or expressions in standard French acquire a different meaning. It should be noted that the students’ language is very rich in innovative vocabulary such as bâtiment R ‘university restaurant, (lit.) building R’, boucher ‘biology student, (lit.) butcher’, carnageur ‘student who devours all the meat at the university canteen, (lit.) student who makes a carnage’, carriériste ‘student who studies a lot, for a long time and with scarce profit, (lit.) careerist’, égorger ‘to finish a meal, (lit.) to slaughter’. Word formation – We point out some neo-formations, some of which are found in other parts of French-speaking Africa, such as rhuminer ‘to blow one’s nose’ (< rhume ‘cold’ + ‑iner), mangement ‘meal/thing that can generate profit’ (< manger + ‑ment), mangeocratie ‘public corruption’ (< manger ‘to eat’ + ‑cratie), pouvoiriste ‘who loves power’  

 

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(< pouvoir ‘power’ + ‑iste), cartouchard ‘student who failed many years’ (< cartouche ‘cartridge’ + ‑iste), lazaret lazaret ‘shared vehicles’ (< lazaret ‘hospital’ + lazaret), mange-mil ‘housewife’ (< manger ‘to eat’ + mil ‘millet’).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism Many educated Nigeriens (not just adults) have the impression that the French spoken in Niger is of a higher quality than that spoken in other Sahel countries. This perception could be dictated by the fact that Nigerien French is closer to the standard model due to the absence of an internal sociolinguistic dynamic that has generated a well-defined endogenous norm, as in the case of the Côte d’Ivoire, due to the fact that French remains the language of a small intellectual elite. After all, according to data from Sanaker/Holter/Skattum (2006, 213), which however dates back to 1995, the French speakers in Niger with at least six years of schooling behind them, the so-called real French speakers (“Francophones réels”), would be only 3 % of the population; the potential French speakers (“Francophones potentiels”), who speak French but could lose their competence, are about 8 % (Perrin 1986, 63–103; Rossillon 1995, 87).  

 

5.2 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used in education – The language within the school system has always been French. However, it should be noted that for some observers, the performance of French teachers shows an insufficient level of appropriation of the oral language and a general linguistic insecurity, which contrasts with a highly ritualized practice in the written language (Mallam Garba/Hanafiou 2010). This is mainly due to the inability of the state to pay teachers’ salaries regularly, which makes the profession unattractive, causing a huge recruitment problem, both quantitative and qualitative, because French teachers are few and often poorly trained. Saïbou Adamou/Mamane/Karidio (2021, 963–964) also points out that because of unsorted recruitment, there is a mismatch between the training received and the function performed. French teachers often operate without pedagogical objectives and evaluate without using criteria developed by specialists in the field. This situation explains the decline in the level of French, especially in writing. Mamane (2016b) lists the most frequent mistakes in the texts of middle school students: inappropriate lexicon, words borrowed from the first languages, mixing of verbal tenses, many spelling mistakes (for this aspect cf. also Floquet/Pinto 2019). It cannot be underestimated either that Niger is in the midst of a population boom, averaging more than seven children per woman and having the highest fertility rate in the world (Amato/Iocchi 2020, 36), which has a strong impact on the margins of maneuver for educational poli-

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cies. However, recent investigations in Niamey have shown that middle school students never express any insecurity about their linguistic intuitions or doubts about their legitimacy to make judgements about French sentences. They are therefore adolescents who legitimately consider themselves Francophone and who respond freely on the basis of their knowledge of the norm and their representation of it, however partial this may be. They therefore find themselves in an attitude of linguistic security and not of insecurity, contrary to teachers; and although, from a sociolinguistic point of view, they could be considered second language speakers, at a more psycholinguistic level, they perceive themselves as full-fledged first language speakers (Boutin/Floquet 2020). Variety used in the media – The language of the Nigerien press has not yet been the subject of systematic studies, contrary to other countries of the sub-region (Raschi 2010) with the exception of data by Barreteau (1997) and Sabi’u (2018), which however are obtained from a reduced and not very recent corpus. Variety used in literature – French-speaking literature makes its first appearance only on the threshold of independence, in 1959, with Ibrahim Issa, and since then it has coexisted with literary production in national languages, both of oral and written tradition, which historically precede it (Bertho 2019). The great authors of the first generation as well as those post-independence (Boubou Hama, Mahamane Dangobi, Abdoulaye Mamani, André Salifou) have often shared a passion for writing with a strong political commitment, which partly explains the themes they dealt with, often linked to the intertwining of colonialism and African traditions. Abdoulaye Mamani’s great masterpiece, Sarraounia (1980), is an illuminating example. In it, with an epic style and from an African perspective, Mamani tells of the resistance to the colonial conquest of the Hausa queen against the advance of the column led by two French officers, Voulet and Chanoine. The critic debates whether, in the intentions of the author, a socialist militant close to Djibo Bakari, there was the will to build a national myth by affirming the superiority of traditional African values (Tandina 1993; Yahaya 2015) or to denounce, through the figure of a woman, all the oppressions of the world pointing out the brotherhood between peoples as the only possible solution (Bertho 2011). From a linguistic point of view, the literary French of these writers is in line with the European literary standard and does not present any particular specificity. On the other hand, the current panorama is different, with an emergence of authors who propose new linguistic solutions. These can concern the use of Nigerisms and in general of forms that diverge from the European standard up to the actual mixing of French with words or entire phrases that come from African languages, generating in fact a literature that makes an aesthetic use of plurilingualism. This is the case of Le roi des cons (2019) by Idi Nouhou, an agile novel set in Niamey’s nocturnal world in which the protagonist tackles the themes of the difficult relationship with tradition, of marital relationships but also the desire for social ascent with all the limits it implies. In this text there are typically Nigerien expressions, such as belle à la diablesse ‘devilishly beautiful’ or elle avait cherché à me gris-griser ‘she tried to put a spell on me’ (with gris-griser ‘casting spell’), non-standard syntactic structures like sa soyeuse robe (instead of sa robe soyeuse

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‘her silk dress’) or il faisait très jour (instead of il faisait jour ‘it was dawning’), and various borrowings from African languages often already glossed in the text itself, for example (i) und (ii) that go in the direction of greater adherence to the oral language as it is spoken in the capital (Van Geertruijden 2019). “c’était du ‘dambu’, couscous de riz, avec une chair de pigeonneaux broyés avec du sésame rouge” (Nouhou 2019, 18).1 (ii) “Un griot traditionnel animait remarquablement la soirée avec sa voix rocailleuse et son ‘gurumi’, instrument à deux cordes” (Nouhou 2019, 101).2 (i)

Also noteworthy is the production of the impro-singer (slameur) Jhonel, a modern urban griot, who stylistically underlines his connection with the story-telling tradition (Jasare) by inserting fragments in African languages, typically Zarma, Hausa, or Fulfulde; this generates intertext with the poems of traditional griots from which, however, Jhonel wants to distinguish himself by the fact that he no longer has the powerful as an audience and their deeds as a theme, preferring rather to become an instrument of vindication of the weakest (Bertho/Bornand 2020).

References Abadie, Maurice (1927), La Colonie du Niger, Paris, Société d’éditions géographiques, maritimes et coloniales. Abba, Seidik (2009), La presse au Niger. État des lieux et perspectives, Paris, L’Harmattan. Alzouma, Gado (2011–2012), Technologies éducatives et développement: une brève histoire de la télévision scolaire au Niger, Tic&Société 5, 164–188. Amato, Fabio/Iocchi, Alessio (2020), Il Niger e le nuove frontiere dell’Europa, una ricerca su migrazioni e lavoro nell’Africa subsahariana, Bologna, Socialmente. Apard, Élodie (2015), Les modalités de la transition démocratique au Niger: l’expérience de la conférence nationale, in: Bernard Salvaing (ed.), Pouvoirs anciens, pouvoirs modernes de l’Afrique d’aujourd’hui, Rennes, Presses universitaires de Rennes. Balibar, Renée (1985), L’institution du français. Essai sur le colinguisme des Carolingiens à la République, Paris, Presses universitaires de France. Barreteau, Daniel (1996), Positions des partenaires de l’école sur les systèmes éducatifs et le multilinguisme au Niger, in: Caroline Juillard/Louis-Jean Calvet (edd.), Les politiques linguistiques, mythes et réalités, Montreal/ Beyrouth, AUPELF-UREF/FMA, 31–40. Barreteau, Daniel (1997), Les particularités lexicales du français au Niger. Des propos de Zek à la littérature écrite nigérienne, in: Claude Frey/Danièle Latin (edd.), Le corpus lexicographique. Méthodes de constitution et de gestion, Louvain-la-Neuve, De Boeck Supérieur, 159–174. Barreteau, Daniel/Souley, Aboubacar (1997), Analyse des résultats scolaires du primaire dans la communauté urbaine de Niamey, in: Daniel Barreteau/Ali Daouda (edd.), Systèmes éducatifs et multilinguisme au Niger: résultats scolaires, double flux, Paris/Niamey, Orstom, 15–93.

1 ‘It was some “dambu”, rice couscous, with pidgeon stew and red sesame’. 2 ‘A traditional griot was providing an evening of entertainment with his husky voice and his “gurumi”, a two- string instrument’.

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Beidou, Hassane (2014), Dynamiques linguistiques au Niger: cohabitation et/ou concurrence entre le français et les langues locales, Montreal, Université du Quebec à Montréal, Doctoral Thesis. Benson, Carolyn J. (2002), Real and Potential Benefits of Bilingual Programmes in Developing Countries, International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 5, 303–317. Bertho, Elara (2011), Sarraounia, une reine africaine entre histoire et mythe littéraire (Niger, 1899–2010), Genre & Histoire 1/2, s.p. Bertho, Elara (2019), Littératures du Niger, unpublished manuscript presented at the summer school Niger: una introduzione, Rome, Sapienza Università. Bertho, Elara/Bornand, Sandra (2020), Jhonel, une voix en lutte contre les inégalités, Cahiers de littérature orale, Hors-Série, 25–35. Biloa, Edmond (2012), Des traits syntaxiques et morphosyntaxiques des pratiques du français au Cameroun, Le français en Afrique 27, 121–136. Boukar, Hassane (2011), Le gravi conseguenze socio-sanitarie dell’estrazione dell’Uranio nell’Aïr, in: Adriana Piga/ Roberto Cajati (edd.), Niger, problematiche sociopolitiche, risorse energetiche e attori internazionali, Rome, CeMISS-IsIAO, 181–199. Boutin, Béatrice Akissi (2007), De et que subordonnants, et variation en français, Linx 57, 57–67. Boutin, Béatrice Akissi/Floquet, Oreste (2020), Norme officielle, insécurité linguistique et habiletés métalinguistiques: regards croisés à partir de deux corpus d’adolescents d’Abidjan et de Niamey, in: Valentin Feussi/Joanna Lorilleux (edd.), (In)sécurité linguistique en francophonies – perspectives in(ter)disciplinaires, Paris, L’Harmattan, 93–106. Busà, Veronica (2018), La production de /R/ chez les locuteurs de Niamey: une première enquête de terrain, Rome/ Paris, Sapienza Università/Université de Paris Nanterre, Doctoral Thesis. Cajati, Roberto (2011), L’uranio e l’economia del Niger, in: Adriana Piga/Roberto Cajati (edd.), Niger, problematiche sociopoliltiche, risorse energetiche e attori internazionali, Rome, CeMISS-IsIAO,123–136. Cannelli, Barbara (2011), Lo spartiacque della Conferenza Nazionale, fondamenti e vicissitudini di una transizione democratica, in: Adriana Piga/Roberto Cajati (edd.), Niger, problematiche sociopolitiche, risorse energetiche e attori internazionali, Rome, CeMISS-IsIAO, 31–52. Celani, Simone/Celata, Chiara/Floquet, Oreste (2021), Francese e portoghese in Africa: aspetti contrastivi, in: Simone Celani/Chiara Celata/Oreste Floquet (edd.), Lingue romanze in Africa, Rome, Sapienza Università, 15–38. De Flaviis, Giulia (2018), Le français au Niger: quelques aspects phonologiques de la prononciation d’un enseignant de français à Niamey, in: Oreste Floquet (ed.), Aspects linguistiques et sociolinguistiques des français africains, Rome, Sapienza Università, 53–72. Diadé, Boureïma (1996), Modes d’appropriation non scolaire du français au Niger, in: Caroline Juillard/Louis-Jean Calvet (edd.), Les politiques linguistiques, mythes et réalités, Montreal/Beyrouth, AUPELF-UREF/FMA, 163– 166. Drioli, Sonia (2011), Media e libertà di informazione in Niger: una strada in salita, in: Adriana Piga/Roberto Cajati (edd.), Niger, problematiche sociopoliltiche, risorse energetiche e attori internazionali, Rome, CeMISS-IsIAO, 237–254. Egly, Max (1973), L’image pédagogique à Télé-Niger, Communication et langages 18, 31–45. Floquet, Oreste (2018a), Una prima indagine sul francese parlato a Niamey, in: Alessandro Suzzi Valli (ed.), Comunicare l’Africa. Un’ermeneutica attuale delle lingue e dei linguaggi della comunicazione sociale, Rome, Aracne, 191–207. Floquet, Oreste (2018b), Remarques épilinguistiques et métalinguistiques sur l’expression de la possession inaliénable à partir de réponses à un test d’acceptabilité (Niamey, Toulouse, Rome), in: Oreste Floquet (ed.), Aspects linguistiques et sociolinguistiques des français africains, Rome, Sapienza Università, 35–52. Floquet, Oreste/Pinto, Maria Antonietta (2019), Conscience métalinguistique et maîtrise de l’orthographe: y a-t-il une relation? Une première enquête au Niger à partir d’un corpus de français au niveau du Collège, Cognitive Philology 12, 1–13.

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Ursula Reutner

16 Senegal Abstract: Senegal is a multilingual country dominated by French and Wolof. French is the sole official language, though spoken by only 25 % of the population. Wolof is the main vehicular language, which most Senegalese understand and 40 % use as their first language. Pulaar is the first language of almost a quarter of the population. Sereer, Maninka, Jola, and Soninke are other major national languages. Following an overview of the Senegalese languages and their geographical and social distribution, this chapter takes a look at historical aspects that partly explain the modern-day linguistic situation: the fate of African kingdoms and empires, the arrival of the Portuguese, Dutch, and British, the traces they left in onomastics, as well as the contact with French for almost four centuries. Senegal became the first French colony within sub-Saharan Africa, hosted the capital of French West Africa, sent the first deputy from sub-Saharan Africa to the French parliament, and produced the first Prix Goncourt winner from sub-Saharan Africa, Mohamed Mbougar Sarr. Senegal’s long-ruling presidents Léopold Sédar Senghor and Abdou Diouf were fierce defenders of Francophonie. They contributed to the paradoxical situation that a minority language functions as official, while the language spoken by the large majority remains unofficial. Nevertheless, Wolofization has progressed at the expense of other national languages and cultures. Today, national languages are used in the informal communication of the administration, in oral media, religion, music, and film, while French dominates the official written communication, the education system, and written media. Senegalese French is often characterized by a different pronunciation of front rounded vowels and mid vowels, the insertion of epenthetic vowels, a typical realization of the rhotic, a particular assignment and realization of stress, the appearance of new phonemes and morphosyntactic structures, as well as the enrichment of the lexicon. Some Senegalese are proud of their variety but also show purist attitudes. Code-mixing and code-switching are frequent and may result in Franwolof.  

 

Keywords: French, Wolof, Senegal, sociolinguistics, language planning

1 Sociolinguistic situation Country survey – Senegal is a multi-ethnic country with about 17.7 million inhabitants, most of them Muslim. Geographically the westernmost country of mainland Africa, it covers roughly 197,000 km2 and borders the Atlantic Ocean in the west and five other countries in the north, east, and south. Three of them have French tradition: in the north Mauritania, since 1991 an officially monolingual Arabic-speaking country with Pulaar, Soninke, and Wolof as declared national languages, in the east Mali, where French was replaced in its function as official language by thirteen national languages in 2023, and https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-016

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in the south Guinea, an officially French-speaking country, where Pular, Susu, and Maninka are the dominant national languages. The other southern neighbour is officially Portuguese-speaking Guinea-Bissau with Guinea-Bissau Creole as the national language and a strong percentage of Fula, Balanta, and Mandinka. The country is bisected by the English-speaking Gambia, the smallest state in continental Africa, where Jola, Pulaar, Maninka, Sereer, Wolof, and other languages are spoken, too. Senegal is administratively divided into the fourteen regions Dakar, Diourbel, Fatick, Kaffrine, Kaolack, Kédougou, Kolda, Louga, Matam, Saint-Louis, Sédhiou, Tambacounda, Thiès, and Ziguinchor, all named after their capitals and further organized into departments and arrondissements. While French is the only official language, it coexists with almost fifty other languages. Wolof is widespread as a vehicular language and explicitly listed in the constitution as a national language together with Pulaar, Sereer, Maninka, Jola, and Soninke. The literacy rate is in constant growth and currently amounts to 56 %, according to the CIA. The national statistics institute is more precise: 37 % of the Senegalese population older than 9 gained their literacy in French, 11 % in Arabic, 2 % in Wolof, 0,8 % in Pulaar, 0,3 % in Sereer, 0,1 % in Jola, 0,1 % in Maninka, and 0,04 % in Soninke. The high percentage of Arabic is due to the strong presence of Koranic schools in some areas (cf. Cormier et al. 2020; ANSD 2014, 84; 2023; CIA 2023b). Merging mosaic – Senegal is a linguistic and cultural mosaic composed of many different groups. Most of them are sub-Saharan African communities, which were influenced by Arab-Muslim and Western cultures. In the last few decades, they have been increasingly merging due to the powerful influence of Wolof and French on all of them and the transcultural contacts between them. Some people feel that they belong to a different group culturally than linguistically. Speaker numbers, therefore, are not necessarily identical with the percentages of the respective ethnic groups: Wolof (39.7 %), Pulaar (27.5 %), Sereer (16 %), Maninka (4.9 %), and Jola (4.2 %). They are much higher in the case of Wolof, slightly higher in the case of Pulaar, Maninka, and Jola, and lower in the case of Sereer. Apart from inter- and transcultural encounters that lead to blurring boundaries between the groups, some people also feel different affiliations in different situations or contexts (cf. Daff 1996, 566; Cissé 2005, 101; CIA 2023b), and this is all the more true as  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“[…] both ethnic and linguistic identities in Senegal are often constructed out of ideologies and […] the resulting classification is generally a gross simplification of an ethnically and linguistically complex society where individuals are of the multilingual and multi-ethnic” (Mc Laughlin 2008, 88).

Linguistic panorama: quantitative – The total number of Senegalese languages differs according to the criteria for which languages should be listed and varying distinctions between languages and varieties. The national atlas mentions nineteen ethnic groups (cf. Martin/Becker 1977d, 64), sometimes divided by different languages (cf. Doneux 1977, 68), Cissé (2005, 101) indicates around twenty linguistic groups, Daff (2017, 554) twentyseven languages, CIA (2023a) thirty-one languages, the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL 2023) thirty-six, Ethnologue (E) forty-six, and Glottolog (G) forty-nine. The following

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overview is based on the most detailed databases: Ethnologue and Glottolog (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Hammarström et al. 2021). Linguistic panorama: qualitative – Most Senegalese languages are part of the NigerCongo phylum, primarily Atlantic but also Mande. The Senegalese Atlantic languages have nominal classes and a CVC structure (consonant – verb – consonant); its Mande languages are tonal languages with a CV or CVCV structure (cf. Cissé 2005, 103). Following Glottolog, the Atlantic family includes the Bak languages with the Jola group comprising Jola-Fonyi, Gusilay, Keerak (Kerak in E), Bandial, Karon, Kuwaataay, Mlomp, Ejamat, Jola-Esulalu, and Kugere-Kuxinge. Other groups of Bak languages listed for Senegal are the Manjaku-Mankanya-Pepel languages (MMP) with Mandjak, Mankanya, and Papel, and the Balanta language Balanta-Ganja. Still other language families in the Atlantic group are the Wolof-BKK languages with Wolof including Gambian and Lebu Wolof, Gubeeher-Gufangor-Gubelor, Kasanga, Bainouk-Gunyaamolo-Gutobor (BainoukGunyaamolo in E), Bainouk-Samik, and Kobiana, the Cangin group with Saafi-Saafi, Ndut, Noon, Palor (Paloor in E), and Lehar (Laalaa in E), as well as the Fula-Sereer group with Fula (macrolanguage Fulah in E), Pulaar, Sereer (Serer-Sine in E), and Pular, the Tenda group with Wamey, Bassari-Tanda (Oniyan in E), and Bedik (Ménik in E), and the Jaad language Jaad-Badyara (Badyara in E). The Mande languages of Senegal belong to the Manding group with Western Maninkakan (also Maninka, Malinké), Mandinka (also Manding), Bambara (also Bamana), and Xaasongaxango (Xasonga in E), the Susu-Yalunka group with Susu and Yalunka (Jalunga in E), and the Soninkean group with Soninke. Glottolog also lists a standardized form of Mande, N’ko, as an artificial language, and the Mbour Sign Language. The Afro-Asiatic languages are represented by Hassaniyya from the Semitic and Zenaga from the Berber subgroup. The creoles found in Senegal include the Portuguese-based Upper Guinea Crioulo (Casamance Creole in E) and the Englishbased Krio. As for Romance languages, Glottolog only mentions the French variety Français Tirailleur. The different numbers in Ethnologue are due to the fact that the latter does not list Jola-Esulalu, Kugere-Kuxinge, Gambian and Lebu Wolof, Gubeeher-Gufangor-Gubelor, Kasanga, the Mbour Sign Language, Zenaga, and Français Tirailleur but also indicates Jola-Kasa, Bayot, Moore, Arabic, Kabuverdianu, and French. Table 1 shows these languages with the speaker numbers indicated by Ethnologue and highlights the languages cited directly by the constitution in yellow, red, and blue, and the other codified languages in green (cf. 3.1 National languages), thus using the colours of the French and Senegalese flags. Figure 1 informs about their geographical distribution.

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Table 1: Speaker numbers

Atlantic-Congo

Niger-Congo

Glottolog Bak: Jola

Ethnologue

Jola-Fonyi — —

Jola-Kasa

45,100

Bayot

24,200

Gusilay Keerak

Bak: MMP

Speakers 340,000

21,800 Kerak

18,200

Bandial

15,700

Karon

11,600

Kuwaataay

8,710

Mlomp

7,500

Ejamat

2,230

Jola-Esulalu

—

Kugere-Kuxinge

—

Mandjak

146,000

Mankanya

41,100

Papel

7,500

Bak: Balanta

Balanta-Ganja

116,000

Wolof-BKK

Wolof

12,208,000

Gambian Wolof

—

Lebu Wolof

—

Gubeeher-Gufangor-Gubelor

—

Kasanga

—

Bainouk-Gunyaamolo-Gutobor

Bainouk-Gunyaamolo

Bainouk-Samik

1,850

Kobiana Cangin

Fula-Sereer

30,000

500

Saafi-Saafi

200,000

Ndut

52,000

Noon

32,900

Palor

Paloor

22,000

Lehar

Laalaa

17,300

Fula

Fulah

(36,854,740)

Pulaar Sereer

4,150,000 Serer-Sine

Pular Tenda

150,000

Wamey Bassari-Tanda

1,660,000

25,400 Oniyan

18,200

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Mande

Senegal

Glottolog

Ethnologue

Speakers

Bedik

Ménik

5,200

Jaad

Jaad-Badyara

Badyara

2,540

Gur

—

Moore

Manding

44,800

Western Maninkakan

1,630,000

Mandinka

888,000

Bambara Xaasongaxango

84,700 Xasonga

Susu Yalunka Soninkean

44,800 Jalunga

13,300

Soninke

340,000 —

N’ko —

Mbour Sign Language AfroAsiatic

Semitic

—

Arabic

88,300

Hassaniyya Berber

Upper Guinea Crioulo English-based IndoEuropean

Romance

196,000 —

Zenaga

Portuguese-based —

Creole

12,100

Kabuverdianu

39,000

Casamance Creole

30,000

Krio

7,380

—

French

Français Tirailleur

—

4,640,000

Main national vehicular – Some Niger-Congo languages have special status as national languages. Wolof is the most widespread and significant of all. It is the most important national vehicular language and unites almost all Senegalese people. Roughly speaking, at least 40 % of Senegalese use it as their first and another 40 % as a second language, which amounts to more than 80 % being able to communicate in Wolof. Ethnologue indicates 12.2 million speakers of Wolof, among them 5.9 million first- and 6.3 million second-language speakers. Other sources describe 39.7 % of the population as Wolof and 80 % to 90 % as Wolof-speaking. Traditional Wolof areas comprise the zone extending from Dakar to Saint-Louis (Dakar itself, the northern part of Thiès, western part of Louga, and north-western part of Saint-Louis), as well as parts of the three regions north of the Gambia River (Fatick, Kaolack, and Kaffrine). The Wolof-speaking North-West of Senegal is very important within the country. From a historical perspective, it covers the area of the ancient provinces Walo, Jolof, Cayor, and partly Baul and Saloum, which also include the zones that were first Francized. From a present-day perspective, it comprises the most urbanized zones and the economically significant groundnut basin. Wolof people do not constitute a homogeneous group but are often seen as such by others. The Lebu people, traditionally fishermen, inhabit the Cap-Vert peninsula and Petite-Côte  

 

 

 

 

 

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and are today often subsumed as a Wolof subgroup (cf. Dreyfus/Juillard 2005, 26s.; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 47; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 10; Daff 2017, 554; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 83; WB 2021; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023).

Figure 1: Language distribution in Senegal (CIA 2023a)

Modern-day Wolofization – The modern-day linguistic centre of Wolof is Dakar. The power concentration in the capital augments its linguistic impact and strength. The mobility of the Senegalese population in general and especially of people from rural areas migrating to the capital in search of better living conditions increases the number of its speakers. The advent of free media also favours Wolof, as it is the national language mostly used in the media. Other factors reinforcing Wolofization are popular music in Wolof and the role of Wolof in Sunni Islam (cf. 3.2 Religion and 3.5 Music). The shift towards Wolof language and culture constantly progresses and implies the glottophagy of

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other languages. Mixed couples usually raise their children in Wolof, and the same applies to non-Wolof parents who have moved to Wolof-dominated zones. In the 1960s, for example, almost three-quarters of the pupils in Dakar and a third of the pupils in Ziguinchor had Wolof as their first language. More than a third of them had a father, mother, or both parents raised in another language. Sixty years later, the number of Wolof-speaking pupils is even higher. Though some parents raise their children in Wolof and another national language, others abandon their first language, which means that some national languages are less and less transmitted to the next generation. Therefore, Wolofization has also triggered resistance by other ethnic groups, notably the Halpulaar (cf. Mc Laughlin 1995, 154; Cissé 2005, 107; Dione 2007, 81; Calvet 2009, 98–106; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 3, 13s.; Diouf/Tidiane Ndiaye/Binta Dieme 2017, 200). Pulaar – Languages other than Wolof named in the constitution are Pulaar, Sereer, Maninka, Jola, and Soninke. Pulaar has around 4.1 million speakers. It is the most crucial national language after Wolof and is spoken primarily in the Centre-East from North to South, in the regions Saint-Louis, Matam, Tambacounda, and Kolda. The Halpulaar ‘speakers of Pulaar’ are composed of Tukulor, traditionally farmers and marabouts, and Fula, traditionally nomads and herders. The Fula dialect continuum extends across about twenty Western African countries (Ethnologue indicates a total of 36,854,740 first-language speakers of Fula) with different names. The name Fula is derived from Mande and primarily used in English besides Fulani from Hausa, while the French prefer Peul, a term borrowed from Wolof. Fula also comprises Fulfulde, spread in Benin, Cameroon, Chad, Mali, Nigeria, and Niger, and Pular, present in Guinea and Senegal (cf. Dreyfus/Juillard 2005, 28s.; Kane 2007, 73; Daff 2017, 554; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Sereer, Maninka, Jola, and Soninke – Roughly 1.6 million people use Sereer in the West-Centre of Senegal: in Kaolack and Fatick north-west to the upper border with the Gambia, as well as in Thiès further north of these regions. The Sereer are a Catholic community and received comprehensive formal education in Catholic schools. They occupy key positions in administration and economics and produced the country’s first president. Maninka is spoken by approximately 1.6 million people in the South-East, in Tambacounda, Kédougou, and Kolda. This zone is close to Mali, where the Mande languages and especially Bambara dominate. Jola has roughly 425,000 speakers and is primarily used in Casamance, in the south-western regions of Ziguinchor and Sédhiou. The Jola cohabit with other ethnic groups in Casamance, a region that, in contrast to the northern Sahel, is characterized by rainforest. Partially separated from Senegal by the Gambia, Casamance has kept its own identity in many respects and has even been striving for independence. Many of the Casamance ‘forest people’ (“forestiers”) are Catholic but also preserve their animist tradition. Soninke has around 340,000 speakers and is primarily spread in the eastern region of Tambacounda (cf. Dreyfus/Juillard 2005, 29–35; Kane 2007, 73; Daff 2017, 554s.; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Other languages – Hassaniyya Arabic, a variety of Maghrebean Arabic spoken by Mauritanians, was introduced by the Nar ‘Moors’ (↗14 Mauritania). Arabic-speaking immigrants from Northern Africa and the Middle East often manage small or medium busi-

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nesses: Algerians, Moroccans, Lebanese, and Syrians, for instance. Immigrants from Cabo Verde and Guinea-Bissau introduced Portuguese-based Upper Guinea creoles: Cabo Verdean and Guinea-Bissau Creole. Apart from these imported creoles, Senegal also has its creole: Casamance Creole. It is sometimes included in Guinea-Bissau Creole, though it is more conservative than most varieties in Guinea-Bissau. Regarding its less pronounced decreolization, it is close to the Guinea-Bissau creole of Cacheu, from which it differs due to the influence exerted by French and other aspects related to the Senegalese environment. Ethnologue indicates 30,000 speakers, 10,000 of whom use it as their first and 20,000 as a second language (cf. Biagui/Quint 2013; Bartens 2014, 728; Eberhard/Simons/ Fennig 2023). French – French is the only official language, though it is not the most widely spoken one. Only about a quarter of the Senegalese speak French. The International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation international de la Francophonie – OIF) indicates 26 % of French speakers in its latest report, the Atlas of the French Language (Atlas de la langue française) 24 % in 1993 (9 % as first and 15 % as second language) and 32 % in 2003 (11 % as first and 21 % as second language). Ethnologue specifies 4.6 million speakers composed of 4.5 million second- and only 100,000 first-language users. Translators without Borders indicate 76,000 (0,6 %) first-language speakers. French is a sign of distinction for some people and an instrument of exclusion for many others. It has become ‘both the source and justification of exorbitant social privileges’,1 and dominates in all official and formal public contexts. Therefore, it is still on top of the language hierarchy in terms of overt prestige and its primacy in written contexts, while Wolof is continually gaining ground (cf. Rossillon 1995, 88; Ngom 1999, 135; Diouf/Tidiane Ndiaye/Binta Dieme 2017, 206; OIF 2022; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; TwB 2023). Pluriglossia – The functional distribution of languages does not only refer to two languages in Senegal. Triglossia in the form of an embedded or overlapping diglossia (“diglossie enchasée”, Calvet 2009, 47) is not sufficient either, as more power relations are implied. Diglossia becomes pluriglossia as French dominates the major national vehicular Wolof, which is itself privileged compared to other national languages explicitly named in the constitution. They are themselves advantaged over additionally codified languages, which are again favoured vis-à-vis the languages lacking codification in Senegal (cf. Figure 2). The fivefold distinction can be fanned out even further when also taking into account the varieties of these languages (cf. Reutner 2017a, 52s.).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 “en même temps source et justification de privilèges sociaux exorbitants” (Beti 1979, 142).

 

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Figure 2: Hierarchy of languages

2 Linguistic history Tukulor – Senegal was already inhabited before the Common Era. Major kingdoms emerged later. The Tukulor established themselves in the ninth century in the Senegal Valley, close to the border to modern-day Mauritania. Contacts with the Almoravids and trading with Arabs introduced them to Hassaniyya and Islam. They adopted Islam in the eleventh century to their economic benefit and gradually Islamized the country against the resistance of more traditional groups like the Sereer. The Tukulor formed the core population of the Takrur kingdom, whose name might be the origin of Tukulor, reanalysed and reinterpreted later by the French as Toucouleur ‘Any colour’. Takrur managed to assert itself against its powerful competitor, the Ghana Empire, which was established in the first millennium by Soninke and dominated the East until the thirteenth century. Under Omar Saidou Tall (~1795–1864), the newly created Tukulor Empire gained control of large parts of Western Africa (cf. Faidherbe 1859, 112; Reutner 2020, 171ss.; 2023a, 126s.). Jolof – The Jolof Empire was founded in the fourteenth century by Ndiadiane Ndiaye (ruler from 1360 onwards), a legendary figure originally from the Walo kingdom and ancestor of all Wolof people. His name, probably of Sereer origin, is prevalent among Wolof, Tukulor, and Sereer today. The Jolof Empire controlled a large part of the territory of modern-day Senegal until its defeat in the Battle of Danki (1549), after which its former vassal kingdoms became independent: Cayor, which had won the battle, established its

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capital in Mboul and gave fierce resistance to the French until the death of its ruler (damel) Lat Dior Diop (1842–1886), who later became the Senegalese national hero. Walo remained independent after the battle until the French conquest in 1855. Baol, with its ruler (teigne) in Diourbel, split from Jolof in 1555, became a French protectorate in 1883 and was placed under French direct rule in 1894. The Sereer kingdoms of Sine and Saloum, with the capital Kahone, achieved independence from Jolof in 1550 and, though in the meantime defeated by the French, survived till 1969, when they were incorporated into the Republic of Senegal (cf. Becker/Martin 1977; Billange/Maurel 1977; Martin/Becker 1977a/b/c). Portuguese arrival – The Portuguese reached the westernmost tip of Africa in 1444: the Senegalese Cap-Vert peninsula, whose name still bears witness to the Portuguese (< Pg. Cabo Verde ‘Green Cape’). They explored the island of Gorée, which they called Ilha de Palma ‘Palmtree Island’, and founded various trading posts, among them those in today’s Rufisque, which they named Rio Fresco ‘Freshwater River’, and in the modernday seaside resort area Saly Portudal ‘Port of Ale [Beer]’. They also established Ziguinchor in 1645. Their primary interest in the area was in gold and slave trade, which was controlled in the sixteenth century by Lançados ‘(lit.) Throwns [between the Africans (< Pg. lançar ‘to throw’)]’, descendants of Portuguese seafarers and African women. Contacts with the Dutch – In the seventeenth century, the area caught the attention of other European powers competing with the Portuguese, especially the Dutch, French, and British. The Dutch West India Company (Geoctrooieerde Westindische Compagnie – GWC) bought the island of Gorée in 1627 and traded with gold, ivory, and slaves. Gorée later became a base for the trade with slaves purchased from belligerent kingdoms on the mainland. The island’s Dutch history explains its name, derived from Dutch Goede Reede ‘Good Roadstead, Good Harbour’ (cf. also the Dutch town Goedereede in South Holland). Anglo-French rivalry – The French founded a commercial outpost (comptoir) on Bocos Island (modern-day Babagueye) close to the mouth of the Senegal River in 1638. They established Saint-Louis on the nearby Ndar Island in 1659, named it after Louis IX (1214– 1270) and in honour of Louis XIV (1638–1715), and also conquered the island of Gorée in 1677. Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–1683) created the Company of Senegal (Compagnie du Sénégal) in 1673, while the British arranged their trade in Senegal through the Royal African Company founded in 1698. The following century was characterized by Anglo-French rivalry. Both powers competed, especially, for Gorée and Saint-Louis. The British victory in the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763), a milestone in Canadian history, as France ceded Canada to the British, ended in the Treaty of Paris (1763), which returned Gorée to France, while the British later purchased Saint-Louis, Podor, Galam, and other areas from France. The territories changed several times between France and Great Britain. After switching from Portuguese (1444–1588) to Dutch (1588–1629), to Portuguese (1629), and again to Dutch (1629–1664) affiliation, Gorée, for example, came to Great Britain (1663–1677), then to France (1677–1758), back to Great Britain (1758–1779), and finally to France. French victory – The French victory in the American War of Independence (1775– 1783) and the following Treaty of Paris (1783) resulted in the coveted Senegalese terri-

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tories being officially transferred to France, which kept them for nearly three centuries, except British invasions during the Napoleonic Wars (1809–1815). Contacts between European men and African women were common and created a mixed-race bourgeoisie. French-African Mulatto women living with a white man were called Signares (cf. 4.3 Borrowing of form). They gained power within the slave system as links between European and African merchants and were important networkers similar to the Nhara in Portuguese colonies. The Franco-African Métis community of Senegal shaped the social and cultural life, especially in Saint-Louis and Gorée. French colony – The gradual abolishment of slavery in the nineteenth century caused the decline of the island of Gorée. France penetrated further into the mainland and took over various kingdoms weakened through the lost income from the slave trade (cf. above Jolof). Senegal was established as a French colony in 1854, thus becoming the oldest French colony in sub-Saharan Africa. Louis Faidherbe (1818–1889) served as its governor from 1854 till 1865. Lacking sufficient French troops to control the territory, he started recruiting a local corps in 1857. This indigenous infantry became known as the Tirailleurs Sénégalais ‘Senegalese skirmishers, Senegalese riflemen’. It was continuously expanded and not restricted to Senegal but welcomed soldiers from other sub-Saharan colonies of France, too. The Tirailleurs developed a pidgin known as français tirailleur ‘skirmishers’ French, riflemen’s French’. They later fought in both World Wars and included intellectuals such as Ousmane Sembène (1923–2007; cf. 3.5 Film). The military was one way of fostering transregional contacts; another was the railway connecting Dakar to Saint-Louis. It was inaugurated in 1885 and formed part of the Dakar-Niger Railway, which was finished at the beginning of the twentieth century to connect Mali (formerly French Sudan) to the coast. Four Communes – In 1887, Dakar became a community of its own within the Four Communes (Quatre Communes). Saint-Louis and Gorée (including Dakar) had been declared communes in 1872 and Rufisque in 1880. Their residents had more political rights than others and received French citizenship in 1848. However, this only applied to a few of them: the so-called Evolved (Évolués), who had pursued higher education, were willing to assimilate, and spoke French. In 1879, the communes were allowed a seat in the French parliament. From then on, they enjoyed the first parliamentary representation of sub-Saharan Africa in Europe and the only one until World War II. Blaise Diagne (1872–1934), former mayor of Dakar, was the first West African to be elected to the French Assembly, where he represented his area from 1914–1934. He achieved full citizenship for everyone living in the Four Communes in 1916 (Loi Blaise Diagne) but also helped the French to recruit African soldiers for World War I. Capital of French West Africa – In 1895, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, French Guinea (today’s Guinea), and French Sudan (modern-day Mali) merged to form French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française). Senegal obtained an outstanding position within this federation as it hosted its seat: first in Saint-Louis and from 1902 on in Dakar. The federation grew in 1904 when Dahomey (modern-day Benin), Upper Volta (today’s Burkina Faso), Mauritania, and Niger joined. Dakar then united the federation’s administration,

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major educational institutions, and a significant military and commercial port. Colonial staff, the future elite to be trained in schools, the marine corps, and traders came together in Dakar. Many of them would occupy prominent positions in their countries after independence (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 46). Assimilation – French was the undisputed official language during the colonial period. It was imbued with sufficient prestige to allow access to the ruling class. African languages were banned from school premises. Pupils who used them in class were punished with a symbol they had to wear until the next pupils dared to use their language (↗23 Congo-Brazzaville). This method was not only applied to Africa but very common in all areas where French competed with strong autochthonous languages: Creole in the Caribbean, Alsatian, Basque, Breton, Catalan, Corse, Franco-Provençal, and Occitan in the Hexagon, for instance (cf. Broudic 2017; Coyos 2017; Kailuweit 2017; Polzin-Haumann 2017; Reutner 2005; 2017b; Cissé 2005, 104; and also 3.3 Methodology and contents). Languages other than French were depreciated in order to assert French. The aim of assimilating the colonized people, thus creating French people with black skin (“Français à peau noir”), fostered the alienation of their speakers, who felt ashamed of using their language. The practice was typical of French-speaking areas of Africa, mostly ruled directly, while local languages received some promotion in English-speaking parts of the continent, where indirect rule was more common. Yet, the prestige of French language and culture in Senegal was so high that assimilation was not only imposed by the French but also demanded by many Senegalese. The African elite, for example, fought to have the same curricula as those taught in France. The Four Communes protested against any adaption or facilitation to be recognized as full citizens (cf. Cissé 2007a, 131). Frantz Fanon (1952) later described the consequences of such struggles as ‘Black Skin, White Masks’ (“Peau noir, masques blancs”). Status of Wolof – Though autochthonous languages were greatly devalued in the French colonies, Wolof managed to take on a special role and functioned as an important vehicular language. In his quadrilingual French-Wolof-Pulaar-Soninke dictionary, Faidherbe comments on its wide geographical distribution and its role as a lingua franca: ‘Wolof is spoken in Saint-Louis, in Gorée, in Saint Mary of Gambia, in Walo, Cayor, and Jolof. Half of the people of Baol, Sine, and Salum understand it. It is the commercial language of all Senegal; half of the Trarza [people in the homonymous region of Mauritania that borders Senegal] speak it. It is also spread along the African coast up to Sierra Leone’.2

He also notes the emergence of an urban variety of Wolof spoken in Saint-Louis and characterized by French borrowings:

2 “La langue ouolof se parle à Saint-Louis, à Gorée, à Sainte-Marie de Gambie, dans le Oualo, dans le Cayor, dans le Djolof. Elle est comprise par la moitié des habitants du Baol, du Sine et du Saloum. C’est la langue commerciale de tout le Sénégal; la moitié des Trarzas la parle. Elle est encore répandue le long de la côte d’Afrique jusqu’à Sierra-Leone” (Faidherbe 1859, 112).

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‘Wolof of Saint-Louis is not the purest, but it is the one whose knowledge is the most useful’.3 ‘Many objects introduced by us [the French] to the country are designated in Wolof by the truncated French name and naturally have no equivalent in the languages from the inland’.4

Wolofization in history – The French made their first trade contacts with Wolof people and established their first cities in Wolof areas, which favoured the following rise of Wolof. Another factor was the construction of the railway in the nineteenth century, which opened up the groundnut basin. It transferred the economic centre from Saint-Louis further south into the ancient Wolof states Jolof, Walo, Cayor, and parts of Baol and Saloum. The new exchanges alongside the railway reinforced the Wolofization of Senegal together with others: the importance of the groundnut cultivation itself and its industrialization, the massive need for workers that attracted people from other ethnic groups into the groundnut plantations, as well as the economic interest of the marabouts in the groundnut production. The Murids successfully made their followers work in the groundnut fields as a service for the brotherhood and dominated the groundnut trade in cooperation with the colonial power. The cultivation of groundnuts, introduced by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century and the main product of exportation in the 1960s, is still today a decisive factor in Senegal’s economy: 45 % to 60 % of the cultivated territory in Diourbel, Fatick, Kaolack, Louga, and Thiès is used for groundnut cultivation, which is also strong in Casamance. Wolofization should later be further promoted by the migration of Wolof people into non-Wolof areas, the urbanization of Senegal, its rural exodus, and the attractiveness of the capital, as well as the media, mbalax music, and Sunni Islam (cf. 1 Modern-day Wolofization and Cissé 2005, 105; Ba 2007, 117; Sarr/ Thiaw 2012, 5ss.; Schiavone 2018, 23). Independence – Like many other African colonies of France, Senegal became an overseas territory (territoire d’outre-mer) in 1946 and proclaimed its independence in 1960. Previous wars, like the ones waged in Algeria and the former Portuguese colonies, were not necessary:  

 

“[…] a group of well-intentioned French politicians and civil servants, in cooperation with a number of ‘enlightened’ African leaders who were friendly toward France, such as Senghor and HouphouëtBoigny, conceived a plan to create a modern Africa within the colonial system […]. This complicity between African and French governing elites was crucial to the largely smooth transition from colonial rule to independence in French black Africa” (Chafer 2003, 158).

The country chose a flag with a singular green five-pointed star at the centre and uses three vertical colour bands: green symbolizing hope, yellow denoting wealth and the Sahel, and red standing for blood, sacrifice, and socialism. These colours of Africa’s oldest 3 “[…] le ouolof de Saint-Louis […] n’est pas le plus pur, mais c’est celui dont la connaissance est le plus utile” (Faidherbe 1859, 112). 4 “Beaucoup d’objets introduits par nous, dans le pays, sont désignés, en ouolof, par le nom français estropié, et n’ont naturellement pas de nom dans les langues de l’intérieur” (Faidherbe 1859, 111).

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independent nation Ethiopia are used by many African nations and thus express Senegal’s African roots. Yet, the colour arrangement is also inspired by the French Tricolour, which is not the only element where French heritage persists. The dominance given to the French language after independence is another. Senghor and Diouf – Léopold Sédar Senghor (1906–2001) became the country’s first president. He was a renowned politician, poet and one of the founders of Negritude. The members of this movement against Western domination, colonialism, and racism used French as their literary language, which Senghor defended as follows in 1954: ‘But they might ask me: “Why do we write in French?” Because we are cultural hybrids, because if we feel as Negroes, we express ourselves in French, because French is a universal language, and we address our message also to the French of France and to other people because French is the language “of gentleness and righteousness”’.5

It is not surprising that, in his role as president, he supported French as the sole official language of the newly founded Republic too. As a distinguished academic, Senghor strongly influenced the relationship with France and repeatedly praised French as ‘a wonderful tool’,6 ‘a very beautiful and very rich language’,7 ‘a precise and nuanced language, therefore clear’.8 He often stressed the role of French culture as an integral part of the country: ‘It cannot be said often enough, and history proves it, every great civilization is a biological but above all cultural mixture. We need to rely on our entire history, including colonial history, and even prehistory, in order to flourish and blossom’.9

Senghor served till 1980 and was followed by Abdou Diouf (*1935), who presided over the country till 2000. Both Senghor and Diouf played essential roles in the OIF. Senghor supported its foundation and served as vice-president of its High Council, Diouf became the OIF’s second secretary-general after Boutros Boutros-Ghali (1922–2016). Senghor was even elected member of the French Academy (Académie française) in 1983. The fortyyear reign of the Socialist Party of Senegal (Parti Socialiste du Sénégal – PS) lasted until 2000.

5 “Mais on me posera la question: ‘Pourquoi, dès lors, écrivons-nous en français?’ Parce que nous sommes des métis culturels, parce que si nous sentons en nègres, nous nous exprimons en français, parce que le français est une langue à vocation universelle, que notre message s’adresse aussi aux Français de France et aux autres hommes, parce que le français est une langue ‘de gentillesse et d’honnêteté’” (Senghor 1954, in 1984, 166). 6 “[…] un outil merveilleux” (in Larcher 2019, 150). 7 “[…] une langue très belle et très riche” (in Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 81). 8 “[…] une langue précise et nuancée, donc claire” (in Faty 2014, 20). 9 “On ne le dira jamais assez, et l’histoire le prouve, toute grande civilisation est métissage biologique, mais surtout culturel. Il est donc question de nous appuyer sur toute notre histoire, y compris la coloniale, voire sur la préhistoire, pour nous épanouir et fleurir” (Senghor 1977, 5).

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Wade and Sall – After twenty years of Senghor’s presidency and another twenty years of his hand-selected successor Diouf, Abdoulaye Wade (*1926) from the Senegalese Democratic Party (Parti Démocratique Sénégalaise – PDS) became the country’s third president. His former prime minister founded the Alliance for the Republic (Alliance pour la République – APR) and succeeded in 2012: today’s president Macky Sall (*1961), who is the first president born after independence and the first president married to a wife with both parents from Senegal. While Wade was Wolof, Sall was born in the Sereer zone and has Pulaar as his first language. Senegal’s Wolofization and the deethnicization of Wolof are evident in a Halpulaar politician speaking Wolof, a compulsory language for a Senegalese president and his family. Karim Wade (*1968), the former president’s son, for instance, was fiercely accused of not speaking Wolof, while his father was criticized for his proposal that all state employees should be able to read and write Wolof. Wolof speakers, in turn, fear that Sall might favour Halpulaar in administration, which demonstrates that the Wolofization is not uncontested (cf. Mc Laughlin 2008, 86s.; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 13s.; Larcher 2019, 152). Casamance – In Casamance, the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (Mouvement des forces démocratiques de Casamance – MFDC) radicalized its methods in the 1980s but signed a peace treaty with the Senegalese government in 2004. Yet, some factions continue fighting for independence (cf. Sall/Sallah 1994, 137).

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation French – French is the country’s sole official language and stipulated as such by the first article of the Senegalese constitution: ‘The official language of the Republic of Senegal is French’.10

Several considerations explain the choice of keeping the ex-colonial language even after the end of colonialism: a concern for continuity, the striving for internationalization and economic development, as well as the perception of French as a modern language, neutral within the country, and capable of fostering national unity. French also enjoyed the advantage of having been sufficiently elaborated for discussing all aspects of the modern world, while the national languages had not yet been fully codified. Moreover, they were disadvantaged by the fear of ethnic conflicts in the case of privileging one of them and the concern of fragmentation in the case of choosing several.

10 “La langue officielle de la République du Sénégal est le Français” (C-SN, art. 1).

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National languages – The constitution also considers Senegalese languages. In 1978, it declared Wolof as well as Jola, Maninka, Pulaar, Sereer, and Soninke as national languages; in the constitutional reform of 2001 under Wade’s presidency, it added all other codified languages (cf. also Dior 2022, 103): ‘The national languages are Jola, Maninka, Pulaar, Sereer, Soninke, Wolof, and any other national language that will be codified’.11

National languages: first group – The six languages directly named in the constitution were already codified in 1968. Decree 71 establishes an alphabet for these languages (art. 1), explains the pronunciation and alphabetic order of each letter (art. 2–3), and specifies that long sounds should be represented by double letters (art. 4): ‘The alphabet appearing in Table I, appended to this decree, is adopted for the transcription of Wolof, Sereer, Pulaar, Jola, Maninka, Soninke’.12 ‘The phonetic value of the letters of this alphabet is indicated in tables II, III, IV, and V annexed to this decree’.13 ‘The alphabetical order of the letters is that of Table I’.14 ‘Long vowels, opposed to short vowels, and geminated consonants, opposed to simple consonants, are designated by the doubling of the letter used’.15

National languages: other codified languages – In total, twenty-four languages are codified today: Hassaniyya received a decree in 1995, Balanta in 2000, Mankanya in 2001, Noon and Mandjak in 2002, Ménik (Bedik), Oniyan (Bassari), and Saafi-Saafi in 2004, Mandinka in 2005, Bainuk and Laalaa (Lehar) in 2006, Badyara in 2007, Yalunka (Jalunga) in 2009, Ndut in 2010, Bayot in 2011, Palor in 2012, and Wamey in 2014; in 2016 Braille also obtained a decree (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 47, for thirteen of them, the identical version in Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 79, as well as Daff 2017, 553s., for the rest of them). Their spelling and hyphenation are tackled in various decrees (cf. for Wolof the Decrees 75/ 85 and for all of them the Decrees 5). These decrees explain: ‘The objective of making Senegalese national languages languages of culture and, at the same time, of giving more means and efficiency to education, modernity, and development efforts requires that

11 “Les langues nationales sont le Diola, le Malinké, le Pulaar, le Sérère, le Soninké, le Wolof et toute autre langue nationale qui sera codifiée” (C-SN, art. 1). 12 “L’alphabet figurant au tableau I, annexé au présent décret, est adopté pour la transcription des langues wolof, sérère, peul, diola, mandingue, sarakolé” (Decree 71, art. 1). 13 “La valeur phonétique des lettres de cet alphabet est indiquée dans les tableaux II, III, IV et V annexés au présent décret” (Decree 71, art. 2). 14 “L’ordre alphabétique des lettres est celui du tableau I” (Decree 71, art. 3). 15 “Les voyelles longues, opposées aux voyelles brèves, et les consonnes géminées, opposées aux consonnes simples, sont indiquées par le redoublement de la lettre utilisée” (Decree 71, art. 4).

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these languages are written, introduced into the education system, and used in official and public life’.16

National languages: vague status – The texts are rather vague about the concrete meaning of the status as national languages. Cissé underlines that naming a language national is not enough: ‘Baptizing a language as a national language does not give it any particular status, nor any particular legitimacy as long as specific functions are not assigned to it’.17

Ministry of Culture – The promotion of national languages is a responsibility of the Ministry of Culture, Classified Historical Heritage, National Languages, and Francophonie (Ministère de la Culture, du Patrimoine historique classé, des Langues nationales et de la Francophonie). The ministry is assigned to support the research on and the standardization of national languages, as well as their introduction in public life and school: ‘The leaders are responsible for: – implementing the […] government’s action plan for the promotion of national languages; – stimulating, coordinating, and monitoring research on the main national languages as well as on languages for local use; – promoting cooperation in studies and research on national or transnational languages; – developing an appropriate strategy for the introduction of national languages into public and official life; – facilitating the implementation and monitoring of the introduction of national languages into the formal educational system […]; – ensuring the standardization of texts in national languages; – encouraging and monitoring any initiative to ensure the training of different players in the promotion of national languages’.18

16 “L’objectif de faire des langues nationales sénégalaises des langues de culture et, par la même occasion, de donner plus de moyens et d’efficacité à l’éducation, à la modernité et aux efforts de développement, exige que ces langues soient écrites, introduites dans le système éducatif et utilisées dans la vie officielle et publique” (Decrees 5, rapport de présentation). 17 “Baptiser une langue comme langue nationale ne lui confère pas de statut particulier, ni aucune légitimité particulière, tant que des fonctions précises ne lui sont pas dévolues” (Cisée 2005, 106s.). 18 “La direction est chargée: – de mettre en œuvre […] le plan d’action du gouvernement en matière de promotion des langues nationales; – d’impulser, de coordonner et de suivre les recherches sur les principales langues nationales ainsi que les langues à usage localisé; – de favoriser la coopération en matière d’études et de recherches sur les langues nationales ou transnationales; – de développer une stratégie adéquate d’introduction des langues nationales dans la vie publique et officielle; – de faciliter la mise en œuvre et le suivi de l’introduction des langues nationales dans le système éducatif formel […]; – de veiller à la normalisation des productions en langues nationales; – d’encourager et de suivre toute initiative propre à assurer la formation des différents acteurs de la promotion des langues nationales“ (Decree 8, art. 22).

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Yet, conflicts of interest seem inevitable if the same institution is responsible for national languages and their international competitor French. Some voices state that the ministry favours the latter at the expense of the national languages (cf., e.g., Schiavone 2010, 211).

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Parliament and politics – French was the only language used in parliament until the defeat of the socialist party in 2000. Since then, national languages have been gaining ground. Today, a service for simultaneous translations guarantees that parliamentarians can also use their first language, notably Wolof and Pulaar. Interviews with ministers and other state authorities in the media, once exclusively in French, are increasingly given in Wolof. Politicians frequently use national languages to better reach their voters in their election campaigns, in which they also transfer Wolof persuasive discourse strategies to French and resort to Wolof slogans. Keywords in the electoral campaign of 2007, for instance, were Sellal ‘make pure’, Beesal ‘renew’, or Dooleel Senegal ‘give strength to Senegal’ (cf. Cissé 2005, 106; 2007b, 73; Samb 2008, 111; Schiavone 2010, 212s.; 2018, 24s.; 2022, 55–86; Larcher 2019, 151). Still, only French is used for official slogans, like the country’s motto un peuple, un but, une foi ‘one people, one goal, one faith’, and it is obligatory for any presidential candidate according to the constitution: ‘Any candidate for the presidency of the Republic must […] be able to write, read, and speak the official language fluently’.19

Administration – The official language of the administration is French, which engenders the contentious situation that documents are written in a language most citizens do not understand. Translations or translators are sometimes provided, and plurilingual citizens might also offer their help to compatriots who do not speak French. Orality is generally characterized by very flexible language use. Administrative staff naturally turn to national languages when talking to each other or with citizens unless they feel the need to demonstrate power. French might hence appear when the employees want to show superiority and authority vis-à-vis citizens or when citizens want to demonstrate their education vis-à-vis the staff (cf. Cissé 2005, 105). Justice – French is also the general language of justice. All legal texts are published in French and are rarely available in national languages. The constitution was already translated into Wolof in 1963, but initiatives of translating other legal texts have only existed on a private basis to this day (cf. Ndiaye 2022, 41). Wolof is widespread in courts,

19 “Tout candidat à la Présidence de la République doit [...] savoir écrire, lire et parler couramment la langue officielle” (C-SN, art. 28).

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and, especially in village courtyards, national languages are used to settle conflict (cf. Cissé 2005, 105), but they are not official: “Even when the judges transgress the law and speak in a national language –which can happen– it remains that the indictments, pleadings and judgments must be in French” (Ndiaye 2022, 40).

Some judges feel that “harder cases […] demand a more solemn attitude, which necessitates speaking ... French” (in Ndiaye 2022, 41). The criminal procedure code provides for translators if the accused person or witnesses do not understand French or if documents have to be translated: ‘An interpreter must be called in if the accused does not speak or understand French’.20 ‘In the event that the accused, the witnesses or one of them do not speak the official language sufficiently or if it is necessary to translate a document submitted to the proceedings, the president appoints an interpreter ex officio’.21

This seems to accommodate to people who do not speak French. Yet, a much more effective way to ensure their inclusion would be to allow them to simply use their language. This would prevent many misunderstandings, foster mutual understanding, and increase people’s confidence in the justice system as well as the system’s reliability: “In a courtroom, an interpreter is required for two speakers who could have spoken and understood each other without the intermediation of French. Not only is this costly in terms of money and time, but it contradicts common sense. Furthermore, the Senegalese law seems to give more attention to the use of French than to the comprehension of the litigant. From its perspective, it is better to call upon an improvised interpreter, whose command of the language is not guaranteed, who may have no command of legal technicalities, and who may be unaware of the context of the case, than to let the court and the litigant talk in a national language that both understand perfectly. […] Citizens find themselves disconnected from the law, turning away from state justice, deemed opaque, and resorting more naturally to customary institutions” (Ndiaye 2022, 40).

Religion – Religion is one of the crucial factors in the Wolofization of the country. Ethnic Wolof are primarily Muslim, and Wolof is the language used in many practices of Senegalese Islam besides Arabic and other national languages. Most Senegalese profess to Sunni Islam and belong to one of the Sufi orders (tariqa): to the large brotherhoods Tijaniyya from Maghreb (Tijanes) and the distinctly Senegalese Muridiyya (Murids) or to smaller brotherhoods like Qadiriyya, primarily spread in Casamance, or Layene. 30 % belong to the Murids, who have played a significant role in the Wolofization and use Wo 

20 “Il doit être fait appel à un interprète si l’accusé ne parle ou ne comprend pas la langue française” (CPP, art. 243). 21 “Dans le cas où l’accusé, les témoins ou l’un d’eux ne parlent pas suffisamment la langue officielle ou s’il est nécessaire de traduire un document versé aux débats, le président nomme d’office un interprète” (CPP, art. 309).

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lof as the primary religious language. Islamization and Wolofization hence go along in Senegal. About 5 % of Christians, especially Sereer and Jola, also use Latin, French, and national languages in religious contexts, and Senegalese practising animism, particularly in Casamance, their national languages (cf. Martin/Becker 1977e; Cissé 2005, 105s.; Kane 2007, 73; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 79; Schiavone 2018, 23). Economy – Speaking French is often correlated with a better income. It is required for most high-qualified jobs and is even helpful in simple jobs. Domestic servants speaking French are likelier to get positions with expatriates or wealthy families, who often pay them better than locals or poorer families. Literacy in French is another asset. Being able to read a shopping list in French or notes with tasks written down in French facilitates the work. Yet, Wolof is essential for more and more jobs too. In urban spaces, it is the language of business used in markets, taxis, and shops. It is also the language that dominates the economy in the groundnut basin. Wolof is very often indispensable, French not (cf. Daff 1996, 566; Thiam 1997, 150; Cissé 2005, 105; Schiavone 2010, 211s.; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 47; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 82; Larcher 2019, 151s.). Publicity – Publicity for expensive products directed to an elite primarily occurs in French. International flights are mainly sold in French, while travels to Mekka are advertised in Wolof. The homepage of Air Sénégal is offered in English and French, but flight announcements and inflight information are also communicated in Wolof, and this even when the flight is operated by Air France. International companies that want to run their advertising campaign in various French-speaking African countries prefer French. Yet, they often also make an effort to localize their publicity if they aim at the broad middle class, as national languages are far more effective than French when it comes to enticing clients to buy a product. French-Wolof code-switching is frequent in publicity for money transfers, mobile phones, and food. The chocolate type Chocopain, for instance, is advertised by the playful rhyming slogan Chocopain mooy sama copain ‘Chocopain is my friend’, and bouillon cubes of Maggi appear on a poster with a beautiful smiling black woman and two sentences, one in Wolof, one in French: Lii ci thiafka ci bep togg! MAGGI et moi, le secret du bonheur! ‘What gives flavour to all recipes! Maggi and me, the secret of happiness!’ (cf. Cissé 2005, 129; Schiavone 2010, 214; 2022, 87–102).  

3.3 Languages used in education Official teaching language – French is also the sole official teaching language. Though in his early career researcher on and defender of African languages, Senghor increasingly promoted French at their expense (cf. Cissé 2007a, 139). Upgrading them to replace French as teaching languages was not his aim:

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‘First of all, replacing French as the official language and as the language of instruction is neither desirable nor possible. […] In fact, we would need at least two generations to make one of our national languages an effective instrument for teaching science and technical subjects’.22

Senghor’s pro-French attitude was questioned by Senegalese intellectuals like Cheikh Anta Diop (1923–1986) or Ousmane Sembène (cf. 3.5 Film). Yet, the experiment of using national languages as official teaching languages in 1977 was not sustainable. Teachers were not trained for this, and didactic material was lacking (cf. Cissé 2005, 113). Bilingual teaching – Bilingual teaching is currently being tested again in some schools (écoles pilote) that start with the pupils’ first language and continuously increase the proportion of French. Projects for bilingual teaching include the initiatives School and National Languages in Africa (École et langues nationales en Afrique – ELAN) and Languages of Schooling in Basic Education in French-Speaking Sub-Saharan Africa (Langues de scolarisation dans l’enseignement fondamental en Afrique subsaharienne francophone – LASCOLAF). The Programme to Improve the Quality, Equity, and Transparency in Education and Training (Programme d’amélioration de la qualité, de l’équité et de la transparence – Éducation/Formation – PAQUET–EF) also expresses the intention to strengthen national languages (cf. Maurer 2010; Schiavone 2010, 210s.; MEN et al. 2018; Larcher 2019, 154s.; IFEF 2023b). Acquisition of literacy – Teaching in French starts at the age of seven in public schools and at the age of three in private confessional schools (16 %; cf. Cissé 2005, 127; MEN 2019, 33). The first years of school represent an introductory phase to French for the large majority of pupils, in which national languages are helpful for gaining literacy skills more quickly. The duty to provide literacy in national languages is even enshrined in the country’s constitution:  

‘All national institutions, public or private, have the duty to provide literacy to their members and to participate in the national effort to acquire literacy in one of the national languages’.23

Unofficial teaching languages – In preschool and primary school, the pupils’ proficiency in French is still limited and requires explanations in national languages, which can also be beneficial in secondary school. Some teachers state that they never use their pupils’ first languages in class (cf. Camara 2011, 26, 33), while others concede resorting to them in order to facilitate understanding:

22 “Tout d’abord remplacer le français, comme langue officielle et comme langue d’enseignement, n’est ni souhaitable, ni possible. […] En effet, il nous faudrait au moins deux générations pour faire d’une de nos langues nationales, un instrument efficace pour l’enseignement des sciences et des techniques” (in Decree 71, cf. also Dumont 1983, 207). 23 “Toutes les institutions nationales, publiques ou privées, ont le devoir d’alphabétiser leurs membres et de participer à l’effort national d’alphabétisation dans l’une des langues nationales” (C-SN, art. 22).

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‘if the pupils do not understand something in French [(lit.) do not understand with the language], one is often obliged to use Wolof (their mother tongue)’.24

National languages as teaching languages – To sum up, national languages appear outside the classroom in schools and universities, where they can be heard in cafeterias, corridors, and offices. Inside the classroom, national languages primarily function as auxiliaries to better allow the acquisition of French, and this in two ways. They smooth the transition from the language used at home to the language used at school, and they intervene to better convey content difficult to explain in French. Their acceptance as a crutch in acquiring French is better than their complete exclusion but does not foster their appreciation as languages on equal footing with French. If the aim were to challenge French as the language of social advancement, their use in secondary school and university would be primordial, as would be their requirement in allocating highly qualified positions. Languages taught – Projects of teaching national languages started in 1978, primarily with classes in Wolof and one in Serer. Law 91 emphasizes classes of national languages as an important factor of cultural and identity anchoring within the country. ‘The National Education is Senegalese and African: By developing the teaching of national languages, privileged instruments to give pupils a lively contact with their culture and to root them in their history, it forms Senegalese aware of their belonging and identity’.25

On the university level, Wolof, Pulaar, Jola, and Sereer can be studied at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (Faculté de Lettres et Sciences Humaines) of the Cheikh Anta Diop University (Université Cheikh Anta Diop – UCAD) since the 1970s (cf. Cissé 2005, 113). The consideration of national languages in university is an important step for training competent teachers of national languages and developing the prerequisites for using them as official teaching languages: ‘Political and pedagogic decision-makers must contribute to extending the teaching of national languages throughout the school and university curriculum in a first step and then, in a second step, to gradually moving on to teaching in national languages, starting with basic education’.26

24 “si les élèves ne comprennent pas avec la langue, on est souvent obligé de leur parler wolof (leur langue maternelle)” (in Camara 2011, 31). 25 “L’Éducation nationale est sénégalaise et africaine: Développant l’enseignement des langues nationales, intruments [sic] privilégiés pour donner aux enseignés un contact vivant avec leur culture et les enraciner dans leur histoire, elle forme un Sénégalais conscient de son appartenance et de son identité […]” (Law 91, art. 6). 26 “décideurs politiques et pédagogiques doivent contribuer à étendre l’enseignement des langues nationales dans tout le cursus scolaire et universitaire en un premier temps et dans un second temps passer progressivement à l’enseignement en langues nationales en commençant par l’éducation de base” (Daff 1998).

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Methodology and contents – Adequate schooling does not only imply using the pupils’ language but also requires adapting the methodology and contents to the local reality. When the first French school of Senegal opened in 1817 in Saint-Louis, French was taught as if it was a first language. Still today, the methodology of language teaching does not always take account of the fact that French is a second language for most pupils, though this would be of major importance for improving the French language level. The pupils’ sociocultural surroundings should also be considered when choosing the teaching contents. If colonial France taught Africans about their ‘Gallic ancestors’ (“nos ancêtres gaulois”), exemplified mathematics with fruits that do not grow in the colonies, and centred geography lessons on the European Alps or the Mediterranean Sea, it is clear that this neither fostered the understanding of the contents nor the pupils’ self-esteem. The missing adaption of the chosen contents to the environment remained a challenge in the French overseas departments even in the twentieth century, and this also holds true for some of the countries that became independent in 1960 (cf. Reutner 2005, 209–213). Yet, the will to adapt the curricula is perceptible. In Senegal, the already quoted Law 91 establishes the aim of rooting Senegalese pupils within their country and, at the same time, linking them with other African countries and the French-speaking world. A threefold anchoring as Senegalese, African, and French is the aim of the National Education, which requires schools to acquaint pupils with the history and culture of all three communities: ‘By providing in-depth knowledge of African history and cultures, of which it highlights all the richness and contributions to universal heritage, the National Education emphasizes the solidarities of the continent and cultivates the feeling of African unity. The National Education also reflects Senegal’s belonging to the cultural community of French-speaking countries, at the same time that it is open to the values of universal civilization and follows the major currents of the contemporary world: in this way, it develops the spirit of cooperation and peace between the people’.27

Conclusion – Formal education is dominated by French and continues the models introduced by France. The political will to rethink the contents and methods exists, but the realization is lacking. The didactic material for teaching French is not yet sufficiently adapted to the Senegalese situation and the material for teaching national languages is often a mere translation of the manuals used for teaching French. Creative teachers resort to national languages for transmitting knowledge but are not yet systematically trained for cross-linguistic teaching. The internet can help to develop and spread better pedagogical tools. The official language French, the national unifying language Wolof¸

27 “[…] Dispensant une connaissance approfondie de l’histoire et des cultures africaines, dont elle met en valeur toutes les richesses et tous les apports au patrimoine universel, l’Éducation nationale souligne les solidarités du continent et cultive le sens de l’unité africaine. L’Éducation nationale reflète également l’appartenance du Sénégal à la communauté de culture des pays francophones, en même temps qu’elle est ouverte sur les valeurs de civilisation universelle et qu’elle s’inscrit dans les grands courants du monde contemporain: par là, elle développe l’esprit de coopération et de paix entre les hommes” (Law 91, art. 6).

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and the pupils’ first languages should all be considered in teaching, which is not yet officially realized.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – Reading newspapers is not a common habit for most Senegalese, even if they are literate. Despite the low price and the frequent practice of sharing a newspaper between, on average, about ten people, many Senegalese cannot or do not want to afford one or have a look at one. The people who do read papers are concentrated in Dakar and Thiès, while information transfer occurs orally in many other places. The dominant language for newspapers is French, as the largest proportion of literate people can read it, while most people are not used to reading national languages. French newspapers are Le Soleil ‘The Sun’, the first daily in sub-Saharan Africa founded in 1933 with the name Paris-Dakar, as well as Il Est Midi ‘It is Noon’, Le Matin ‘The Morning’, Le Populaire ‘The Popular’, Le Quotidien ‘The Daily’, L’Obs(ervateur) ‘The Observer’, Sud Quotidien ‘Daily South’, or Walfadjri ‘Dawn’. Wolof newspapers are rare but increasing circulation. Examples are Dan doole ‘Use Strength’, Sopi ‘Change’, Taxaw ‘Stand up’, and the Wolof-Pulaar monthly Sofa ‘Soldiers, Protectors [Balanta group]’. Online newspapers are increasing. They are often produced and/or read by the Senegalese diaspora and have Wolof titles: Ferloo ‘Ferlo Desert [geographic zone in north-central Senegal]’ (www.ferloo. com), Leral ‘Make Clear, Bring to Light’ (www.leral.net), Nettali ‘Narrated, Reported’ (www.nettali.com), or Rewmi ‘Country’ (www.rewmi.com), for instance. Despite the Wolof titles, the articles on these pages are in French, while Defu Waxu (www.defuwaxu. com) is an example of a news portal actually in Wolof (cf. Wittmann 2006, 182; Samb 2008, 108; Sarr/Koumé 2015, 21, 33s.; Schiavone 2018, 29; CIA 2023b; RSF 2023). Radio: public – The first radio station in Senegal was founded by the French military in the 1930s in Dakar. Radio Dakar has increasingly gained ground since the 1950s. It mainly transmits in French but also offers local productions in national languages, mostly Wolof. A state-owned institution, Senegalese Television Broadcasting (Radiodiffusion Télévision Sénégalise – RTS) primarily used the official language until the 1990s. As an essential means of propaganda, it also made some use of Wolof for government announcements and speeches of President Senghor, for instance, and allowed messages of marabouts in Wolof, too (cf. Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 7s.). Radio: private – State-owned French-dominated media experienced a threefold crisis of legitimacy, identity, and efficiency in the 1980s. Their contents were increasingly questioned, they lost prestige, and many people could no longer identify with them as their programme was felt to favour the interests of an urban literate group at the expense of rural illiterates. The advent of free media in the 1990s massively changed the situation not only regarding the broadcast content but also as to the choice of the broadcasting languages, among which national languages were gaining ground. Commercial radio stations primarily use Wolof besides French. This holds, for example, for the pio-

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neer Sud FM, which also offers programmes in other languages in its regional substations: Pulaar in Saint-Louis, Sereer in Kaolack, and Jola or Maninka in Ziguinchor. Together with the second central commercial station Walf FM, it prompted the stateowned RTS to consider national languages more intensely in its programmes in order to keep its audience (cf. Samb 2008, 108–112; Schiavone 2010, 211; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 11s.; Dieng 2013, 50ss.; Correa 2015, 91). Radio: community radio – National languages other than Wolof are powerful in community radio. Unlike commercial radio, it is hardly regulated by law and thus has more freedom. Community radio stations also do not have to pay taxes but are neither allowed to generate income nor to use, for example, advertising. Yet, they are authorized to collect some money through broadcasting messages and announcements. Their finances depend on small contributions from the community and non-governmental organizations, which often leaves them in a precarious situation. Some communities set them up because they could not receive the signal of state-owned or commercial radio stations. However, community radio is also helpful for other municipalities, as it allows them to inform about local issues. The first community radio station was created in 1996 in Fissel (department Mbour) to promote community projects, organize the work of local associations, and facilitate exchange. Only fifteen years later, in 2011, one hundred and two community radio stations had already emerged, and the number is constantly growing. They address social issues like the fight against AIDS, cholera, and malaria, the treatment of women, improvement of local education, schooling, or agricultural techniques, and they foster the involvement of the local community in politics. The claim of community radio stations to reach the whole community and to guarantee plurality virtually requires the use of national languages; the regional limitation of community radio stations and the oral character of the medium facilitate their use. As a consequence, community radio is the medium where national languages are most present in terms of their proportion in broadcasting time and as to the plurality of languages chosen (cf. Samb 2008, 111s.; Dieng 2013, 46s., 52, 58, 62s.). Radio: cross-border transmission – Some Senegalese radio stations also have a crossborder impact. The station in Saint-Louis broadcasts in Hassaniyya, a minor language in Senegal but the primary language in bordering Arabic-speaking Mauritania. Other major transregional languages uniting Senegal and Mauritania are Pulaar and Wolof. Radio Kaolack broadcasts in English to include the people in the English-speaking Gambia, thus strengthening the confederation of Senegambia, though dissolved in 1989 as an official entity. African transregional languages uniting Senegal and the Gambia through their mediatic use are Pulaar, Maninka, and Wolof, while cross-border communication with Guinea-Bissau also uses Fula, Mandinka, and creole, with Guinea Maninka and Pular, and with Mali Maninka and Bambara (cf. Samb 2008, 107s.; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 83). Radio: valorization of national languages – Three aspects speak in favour of using national languages on the radio: the potential to foster the inclusion of all Senegalese, to elaborate the national languages, and to increase their economic value. First, as to inclusion, radio is an alien technology at first sight. This feeling of strangeness is intensified if

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the device speaks French, a foreign language for many Senegalese. The threshold is lowered if the listeners are addressed in their first language or at least in a language they are familiar with. People also pay more attention when being approached in their language. Radio programmes in national languages thus allow the inclusion of a wider audience in the discussion of regional and international issues. Second, the use of national languages for topics traditionally discussed in French requires the expansion of their vocabulary and contributes to their elaboration. The need to talk about refugees, for instance, engendered the word daw laxu ‘(lit.) run to hide’, the new reality of having journalists the word tasskatou xibaar ‘(lit.) news spreader’. Third, if national languages no longer only serve social interaction in rural areas or literacy purposes, their economic value grows. They call for journalists who have a good command of them and finally allow access to higher positions, which functions as an incentive to acquire more skills in them (cf. Samb 2008, 111). Television – Senegalese Television Broadcasting (RTS) started with television programmes in the 1960s and offers the channels RTS1, RTS2, and RSI (Radio Sénégal international) primarily in French, while the regional stations RTS3 are more diversified. The daily news is transmitted in Wolof (Xibaar Yi) and other national languages, also used in folkloric programmes, subtitled in French. The advent of free media saw a multiplication of TV channels, where French is still common, but other languages are used a lot too: in tfm (télévision futur média) and Walf TV, for instance, products of the media groups iGFM (with the already mentioned L’Obs, cf. www.igfm.sn) and Walfnet (with the already mentioned Walfadjri, www.walf-groupe.com). Political debates are usually broadcast in national languages, notably Wolof, also used by marabouts talking to their religious community on television. Radio and television are more strongly used in urban than rural centres due to the restricted availability of receptors and electricity. In total, 70.4 % of the Senegalese have access to electricity. Broadcasts in Wolof are watched or listened to by more people than programmes in French (cf. Cissé 2005, 106; Schiavone 2018, 28s.; Larcher 2019, 151; WB 2021). Internet – 43 % of Senegalese have access to the internet. French is the sole language used on official sites, but national languages have started to appear in other domains. Google has a Wolof interface, and the Wikipedia version in Wolof currently boasts 1650 entries authored by Wolof speakers living in Senegal and the diaspora. National languages are also widely used in social media like Facebook or in instant messaging and chat rooms, often code-switched with French (cf. Schiavone 2018, 29; WB 2021; OIF 2022, 154s.; Wikipedia 2023).  

 

3.5 Languages used in arts Literature: French – Many Senegalese authors wrote or write in French, among them Amadou Mapaté Diagne (1886–1976), Lamine Senghor (1889–1927), Bakary Diallo (1892– 1978), Birago Diop (1906–1989), Léopold Sédar Senghor (1906–2001), Abdoulaye Sadji

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(1910–1961), Malick Fall (1920–1979), Ousmane Sembène (1923–2007), Cheikh Hamidou Kane (*1928), Mariama Bâ (1929–1981), Cheikh T.B. Badiane (*1940), Aminata Sow Fall (*1941), Nafissatou Niang Diallo (1941–1982), Boubacar Boris Diop (*1946), Mame Seck Mbacké (1947–2018), Ken Bugul (‘(lit.) nobody wants her, the unwanted’, Mariétou Mbaye Biléoma, *1948), Khadi Fall (*1948), Khadi Hane (*1962), Fatou Diome (*1968), and last but not least Mohamed Mbougar Sarr (*1990), the first person from sub-Saharan Africa to be awarded the Prix Goncourt and this at the young age of thirty-one. Literature: national languages – National languages are most common in literary traditions associated with orality but also slowly conquering the written sphere. Boubacar Boris Diop, for example, wrote five novels and a play in French before switching to his first language. His novel Murambi, le livre des ossements ‘Murambi, the book of bones’ (2000) still treats the 1994 Rwandan genocide in French but also elaborates on the role of colonialism that changed social hierarchies and created new concepts of the enemy. Having stayed in Rwanda and talked to perpetrators and victims of the massacre, Diop finally decided to write his next novel Doomi Golo ‘The Children of the Monkey’ (2003) in Wolof: ‘This Rwandan experience has deeply disturbed me. I needed my language to reconcile with myself. Writing in Wolof established a very great distance from the French-speaking world, from the desire for hegemony, from political manipulations, from the CCF network, all this networking and its hidden agenda. There was a refusal to be used as an author by these underground forces and the desire to become myself again’.28

He also explains, ‘[w]riting in Wolof is a way to protect yourself from bad blows and spitting, a way to feel firm and reassuring ground under one’s feet’.29 In order to reach a broader audience and to have better publishing conditions (cf. Carré 2015), he translated his novel into French and published it under the title Les petits de la guenon ‘The Children of the Guenon [Old World Monkey, Cercopithecus]’ (2009). It also represents the first novel in Wolof to be translated into English. Film – Most films are shot in French, some in Wolof with French or English subtitles, and a few in other national languages. The film director, producer, and author of Sereer origin Ousmane Sembène, often called the father of the African film, uses French and Jola in Emitaï ‘Emitai [Jola deity]’ (1971), a film about the conflicts between the French and the Jola at the end of World War II. Most of his films use French and Wolof: Mandabi (1968), a portrait of a man who received a postal order from Paris and fights against the

28 “Cette expérience rwandaise m’a profondément perturbé. J’ai eu besoin de ma langue pour me réconcilier avec moi-même. Le fait d’écrire en wolof instaurait une très grande distance par rapport à la francophonie, à la volonté d’hégémonie, aux manipulations politiques, au réseau de CCF, tout ce maillage et ses arrière-pensées. Il y avait là le refus d’être utilisé en tant qu’auteur par ces forces souterraines et la volonté de redevenir moi-même” (Diop 2003, 109). 29 “Écrire en wolof est une façon de se mettre à l’abri des mauvais coups et des crachats, un moyen de se sentir sous ses pieds un sol ferme et rassurant” (Diop 2007, 169).

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bourgeoisie’s bullies when cashing it, Taaw (1970), a film about an unemployed man trying to provide a home for his girlfriend, Xala ‘spell, curse’ (1975, based on his 1973 novel), a persiflage on the modern African elite showing the vain attempts of a Senegalese businessman to free himself from the spell that made him impotent, Ceddo ‘The Outsiders [(lit.) Senegalese animists who live their authentic African traditions]’ (1977), a film that documents the resistance of non-Muslims to convert to Islam and was censored due to its anti-Islamic contents and/or spelling (5.2 Spelling: national languages), Camp de Thiaroye ‘Camp at Thiaroye’ (1987/9), a film about the background of the Thiaroye massacre, in which French troops killed protesting African conscripts, Guelwaar ‘Guel(o)war [Sereer precolonial dynasty]’ (1992), a film about regional and religious tensions revealed by events following on the confusion of a Catholic and a Muslim corpse. Music – While traditional Senegalese griots (Wol. gewel, Maninka jeli, Sereer kevel) use national languages in their traditional poems and music, modern music in the 1960s was primarily composed in French, English, or Spanish. The situation changed with the emergence of mbalax in the early 1970s. This popular music of Senegambia combines Sabar drumming with various African and Western pop rhythms. It is dance music that easily pleases the masses, is commercialized through entertainment shows on television and video clips, and can even be heard at family celebrations. As its singers often come from the tradition of Wolof griots and usually sing in Wolof, it represents a major factor in the country’s Wolofization. Prominent representatives are Thione Seck (1955–2021) and one of the best-known African singers: Youssou N’Dour (*1959). While at the beginning of his career, he sang in Spanish accompanied by Western instruments, nowadays he uses Wolof in his songs, for example, set ‘cleanliness’, a word that plays with homonymous seet ‘have a clean mind, examine’: set ci sa biiroo – set ci sa yaram – seet lingay waxoo ‘keep your heart clean – keep your body clean – examine what you say’. Set reappears in the name of the movement Set-setal, which unites young urban Senegalese in their fight for “cleaning” political behaviour to reach better living conditions. Music does not only foster Wolofization with mbalax, but Wolof also appears in modern music genres such as hip-hop and rap. Competing national languages are used for song lyrics too, Pulaar, for instance, by Baaba Maal (*1953) and other famous singers (cf. Drame 2005, 162–171; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 9; Abrahams 2013, 16; Schiavone 2018, 25s., 30).

4 Linguistic characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation Research gaps – The pronunciation of French in Senegal has been described on the basis of two observations: the integration of French borrowings in Wolof (cf. Dumont 1983; Adjeran/Ndao 2018) and the pronunciation of twelve speakers of Wolof living in Dakar, as recorded in the PFC project (cf. 5.2 Research projects and Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012).

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Due to the increasing Wolofization of Senegal, some of the analysed features might also appear with French speakers belonging to other ethnic groups. Their French, however, has not yet been systematically explored and probably has its own characteristics. In addition, variation also occurs within the group of ethnic Wolof, which has not yet been thoroughly investigated either. Mid vowels – The pronunciation of mid vowels in Senegalese French is influenced by a feature of the languages in contact, the feature of Advanced Tongue Root [ATR]. According to the position of the tongue root, [+ATR] and [–ATR] vowels can be distinguished. The former are realized as tense by the advancement of the tongue root, the latter as lax by its retraction. The [ATR] feature is particularly relevant for the pronunciation of mid vowels. While the high vowels /i, iː, u, uː/ are all pronounced [+ATR] and the low vowels /a, aː/ [–ATR], the realization of mid vowels varies according to this feature. The high-mid vowels and the central vowel /e, eː, o, oː, ə/ are pronounced [+ATR], the low-mid /ɛ, ɛː, ɔ, ɔː/ [–ATR]. Standard French, in turn, has distributional constraints for mid vowels. Generally speaking, low-mid vowels are more common in closed syllables and high-mid vowels in open syllables, though there are some exceptions. In final open syllables, for example, the mid front vowels can distinguish meaning and produce minimal pairs like allé [ale] ~ allais [alɛ]. Mid back vowels form minimal pairs particularly in closed monosyllables such as côte [kot] ~ cote [kɔt] or rauque [ʁok] ~ roc [ʁɔk], but they are also decisive in examples like beauté [bote] ~ botté [bɔte]. In other cases, they depend on the phonetic environment, which explains the high-mid vowel, for example, in chose [ʃoz] (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 50s.; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 126). Mid front vowels – The speakers analysed in the PFC corpus in some cases adhered to the proposition of the positional law (loi de position) that [ɛ] is generalized in closed syllables. Still, they deviate in others: cinquième and treize, for instance, were realized [sɛ̃nkjem] or [trez] instead of [sɛ̃nkjɛm] and [tʁɛz]. Senegalese speakers might also raise the low-mid front vowel /ɛ/ into [e], lower the high-mid /e/ into [ɛ], or realize it as [ə], as in basket [baske], botté [bɔtɛ], or décret [dəkre] instead of [baskɛt], [bote], and [dekʁɛ]. These changes can be explained with vowel harmony achieved through progressive or regressive assimilation. Wolof speakers usually realize [e] in words with [+ATR] vowels, and [ɛ] in those with [–ATR] vowels: e.g., piquais [pike] instead of [pikɛ] (also piquet [pike], beauté [boːte], découvrir [dekuvrir], église [eɡliz]), and botté [bɔtɛ], escarpée [ɛskarpɛ], étape [ɛtap], or protéger [prɔtɛʒɛ] instead of [bɔte], [ɛskaʁpe], [etap], and [pʁɔteʒe]. As a result, vowel harmony according to the [ATR] feature turns out to be more important than the French positional law in the case of mid front vowels (cf. Dumont 1983, 117s.; N’Diaye Corréard 2006, 11; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 52ss.; Daff 2017, 564). Mid back vowels – Mid back vowels, in contrast, are generally pronounced similarly to standard French, though some differences may occur. Vowel harmony according to the [–ATR] feature can be observed in radio [raɟɔ] instead of [ʁadjo]. The high-mid back /o/ might also lower into [ɔ] in closed monosyllables such as côte [kɔt], gnôle [ɲɔl], or rose [rɔz] instead of [kot], [ɲol], and [ʁoz]. Other differences concern vowel length, which is a distinctive feature in Wolof and can be used by Wolof speakers to support the distinc-

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tion of minimal pairs in French too, as in roc [rɔk] ~ raque [roːk] or pomme [pɔm] ~ paume [poːm] (cf. Dumont 1983, 117s.; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 55ss.). Low vowels – The opposition between the low front and back vowel no longer exists in many French-speaking countries. Speakers usually realize a central version, so former minimal pairs like patte [pat] ~ pâte [pɑt] or mal, malle [mal] ~ mâle [mɑl] are no longer distinguished. The same holds for most speakers in Senegal, where two aspects are noteworthy: First, the back vowel /ɑ/ is still attested, especially among mature speakers, so forms like marche [mɑrʃ] instead of [maʁʃ] appear. Second, the distinction of minimal pairs can be realized through vowel length, either combined with the same front vowel or with the realization of a back vowel: malle [mal] ~ mâle [maːl] or mâle [mɑːl] (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 57). Rounded vowels – The French rounded phonemes /y/, /ø/, /œ/ do not exist in the vowel systems of Wolof and other national languages. Borrowings from French into Wolof suggest that Wolof speakers usually perceive and realize the high rounded vowel /y/ as unrounded [i] or [u], i.e., the high vowels of their vowel system. The vowel is most often integrated as [i], as in minute [minit], piqûre [pikir], pulluler [pilyle], or usine [isin] instead of [minyt], [pikyʁ], [pylyle], and [yzin] but sometimes also as [u], as in sucre [sukr] or surtout [surtu] instead of [sykʁ] and [syʁtu]. Recent studies in the PFC project, however, have revealed that the analysed speakers mostly keep /y/ when speaking French, though the [–back] feature results in a less rounded articulation. The realization of /i/ as [y] rarely appears in the PFC corpus and can mainly be explained through assimilation, as in multiplier [myltyplije] instead of [myltiplije]. The mid front rounded vowels /ø/, /œ/ are often delabialized into their unrounded equivalents [e], [ɛ] or in the mid back vowel [o], and both can merge into a central high-mid [ɘ], as in creux [krɘ], creuse [krɘz], des jeunets [deʒɘne], jeûne [ʒɘn], milieu [miljɘ]; couleur [kulɘr], déjeuner [deʒɘne], or jeune [ʒɘn] instead of [kʁø], [kʁøz], [deʒøne], [ʒøn], [miljø]; [kulœʁ], [deʒœne], and jeune [ʒœn]. In the case of the substitution with the central high-mid vowel, the distinction between des jeunets and déjeuner or jeûne and jeune disappears (cf. Dumont 1983, 115; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 50–55; Daff 2017, 564; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 128). Nasal vowels – Wolof and other Senegalese languages do not have nasal vowels. Borrowings suggest that French nasals are substituted by their oral equivalents. In open syllables, the oral vowel tends to appear with the consonantal appendix [n], as in ceinture [sɛːntyr], ciment [siman], or continuer [kontinɥe] instead of [sɛ̃tyʁ], [simɑ̃], and [kɔ̃tinɥe]. In closed syllables, nasal vowels are more likely to denasalize completely, as in dimanche [dimaːs] or ordonnance [ɔrdɔnaːs] instead of [dimɑ̃ʃ] and [ɔʁdɔnɑ̃s]. In both cases, the oral vowel might be lengthened. Denasalization of /ɑ̃/ as [a] explains the written use of à ce moment instead of en ce moment. The speakers of the PFC sample, in contrast, distinguish nasal vowels, which may, however, change in quality: /œ̃ / and /ɑ̃/ were realized as [ɘ̃] and [ã] by nasalization of the oral vowels [ɘ] and [a]. The minimal pair brin [bʁɛ̃] ~ brun [bʁœ̃ ], no more vital in northern France due to the disappearance of [œ̃ ], is thus maintained in the form of brin [brɛ̃] ~ brun [brɘ̃]. The other two nasal vowels,

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/ɛ̃/ and /ɔ̃/, are more likely to retain their quality (cf. Dumont 1979, 367; 1983, 116; Boutin/ Gess/Guèye 2012, 57s.). Vowel length – Vowel length is not a distinctive feature in French but is relevant in languages in contact with it. Borrowings suggest that Wolof speakers might transfer this feature to French and use, for instance, affaire [afɛːr], cinéma [cinemaː], or sac [saːku] instead of [afɛʁ], [sinema], and [sak]. The pertinence of vowel length in Senegalese French is confirmed in the PFC project with the examples cited above in the paragraphs on mid front vowels (botté [bɔtɛ], beauté [boːte]), mid back vowels (roc [rɔk] ~ raque [roːk], pomme [pɔm] ~ paume [poːm]), and low vowels (malle [mal] ~ mâle [maːl], mâle [mɑːl]), and also occurs with nasal vowels (ceinture [sɛːntyr], dimanche [dimaːs], ordonnance [ɔrdɔnaːs]). On the graphical level, the French circumflex may be used to distinguish between the Wolof names Mbaye [mbaj] and Mbâye [mbaːj] (cf. Dumont 1983, 119s.). Glides – The three French glides /j/, /w/, and /ɥ/ are sometimes reduced to two, as Wolof only operates with /j/ and /w/ as phonological glides. The third glide [ɥ] is used as an allophone of /w/ before front vowels in Wolof. This might explain why the speakers analysed in the PFC project pronounced Saint-Louis [sɛ̃lwi] as [sɛ̃lɥi]. Glides might also be deleted as in depuis [dɘpi] or voyager [vɔjaʒɛ] instead of [dəpɥi] and [vwajaʒe] (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 57, 65). Fricatives: labial, alveolar, postalveolar – As to consonants, Wolof does not use the voiced fricatives /ʒ/, /z/, and /v/ nor the unvoiced postalveolar fricative /ʃ/. Therefore, the postalveolar fricatives /ʒ/ and /ʃ/ are sometimes realized as their alveolar equivalents [s] and [z], and [z] may even be replaced by [s], as in fromage [frɔmas], journal [surnal], changer [sɑ̃se], chef [sɛf], marché [marse], or riche [ris] instead of [fʁɔmaʒ], [ʒuʁnal], [ʃɑ̃ʒe], [ʃɛf], [maʁʃe], and [ʁiʃ]. The voiced labiodental fricative /v/ is often realized as [w], as in activité [aktiwite], cravate [karawat], élève [elɛw], grave [ɡraw], or vélo [welo] instead of [aktivite], [kʁavat], [elɛv], [ɡʁav], and [velo]. The PFC project confirms this type of substitution in some cases, but also illustrates that they are not practised by all speakers (Dumont 1983, 51s., 121; Daff 1996, 569; 2017, 564; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 60s.). Fricatives: rhotics – Like in other African varieties, also Senegalese speakers tend to pronounce an apico-alveolar trill [r] instead of the dorso-uvular fricative /ʁ/: corriger [kɔriser], d’accord [dakɔr], or radio [raɟɔ] instead of [kɔʁiʒe], [dakɔʁ], and [ʁadjo]. In Gorée, the dorso-uvular trill [ʀ] is generalized (cf. Dumont 1979, 367; 1983, 122; Boutin/Gess/ Guèye 2012, 61). Fricatives: velar – The velar fricative [x] does not exist in standard French but enriches Senegalese French. It appears especially in borrowings from Senegalese languages, as in xalam (also khalam) or makhtoumé (cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006, 11; Daff 2017, 564). Liquids – The lateral approximant /l/ is often devoiced or deleted after voiceless consonants, as in peuple [pɘpl̥ ] or [pɘp] instead of [pœpl]. In Wolof borrowings, it might, in turn, be added at the beginning of a word, as in abbé [labe], évangile [lewasil], or hospital

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[lɔpital] instead of [abe], [evɑ̃ʒil], and [opital], a phenomenon that can also be observed in some creoles (cf. also Dumont 1983, 122; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 58ss.). Plosives – The voiced plosives /b/, /d/, /ɡ/ are sometimes devoiced in final position, which might be linked to the fact that Wolof neutralizes the voicing opposition at the end of a word. The result are articulations like arabe [arap], club [kləp], habitude [abityt], or fatigue [fatik] instead of [aʁab], [klœb], [abityd], and [fatiɡ]. Borrowings in Wolof confirm this feature, as, for example, boutique [butiɡ] or politique [politiɡ] instead of [butik] and [politik]. Three plosives enrich the consonant inventory of French: the dorso-palatal plosives [c, ɟ] and the glottal stop [ʔ], as in entier [ãceje], radio [raɟɔ], or une étape [yn.ʔɛ.tap] instead of [ɑ̃tje], [ʁadjo], and [ynetap] (cf. Dumont 1983, 122s.; Boutin/ Gess/Guèye 2012, 58ss.). Phonotactics: epenthetic vowels – The Wolof syllable structure is CVC, so consonantal groups are neither used in initial nor final syllables. This feature is transferred to Senegalese French by the introduction of epenthetic vowels. Initial consonant groups are separated by bridging vowels in drap [darap], glace [galas], plume [pilim], or trahir [tarair] instead of [dʁa], [glas], [plym], and [tʁaiʁ]. Their pronunciation can also be facilitated by a prothetic vowel, as in stupide [ɛstypid] instead of [stypid], while paragogic vowels support the articulation of consonant groups in final position, as in boxe [boksɛ] or disque [diskɛ] instead of [boks] and [disk] (cf. Dumont 1983, 123s; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 61s.). Phonotactics: consonant deletion – Another way of reducing consonant groups is the deletion of one of the consonants, also observable in France: in initial groups, for instance, in psychologique [sikoloʒik] instead of [psikɔlɔʒik], and in final groups of plosives, plosive and liquid, or fricative and plosive in intact [ɛ̃tak], articles [artik], or activiste [aktivis] instead of [ɛ̃takt], [aʁtikl], and [aktivist] (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 62s.). Liaison – The use of the glottal stop [ʔ] prevents the liaison, as in très inquiet [trɛ.ʔɛ̃kje] or grand honneur [ɡrã.ʔo.nɘr] instead of [tʁɛzɛ̃kje] and [ɡʁɑ̃dɔnœr] (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 60). Stress – Wolof stresses the beginning of each word, French the end of each rhythmic group. French indicates stress through duration, while duration has a distinctive semantic function in Wolof, which marks stress through intensity. Some Senegalese use a French intonation, while others transfer the Wolof stress system to French, which results in a dynamic accent on the first syllable marked by intensity. French intonation is especially hard for speakers of Mande tone languages, as being used to having tones as a distinctive feature makes the adherence to the final intonation of French even more challenging (cf. Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 68ss.).

4.2 Morphosyntax Research gaps – Research on characteristics of French morphosyntax in Senegal is rare. The following survey depicts a few phenomena mentioned in the literature on Sen-

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egalese French. It is not exhaustive, as some of the features indicated in the other chapters on sub-Saharan French are also attested in Senegal but have not yet been systematically described for it. Moreover, as in other sub-Saharan areas, the extent to which the features occur varies according to the level of schooling. Articles and pronouns – Many languages in contact with French do not have articles and personal object pronouns or use them in another way. Therefore, their usage in Senegalese French might differ from standard French (cf. Dumont 1979, 370; Dryer 2005a/b). Verb forms – Wolof does not conjugate verb forms by inflection. The categories of person, aspect, and, if necessary, tense are marked by separate particles. Inspired by parallel Wolof constructions, the infinitive as form of “zero aspect” might appear more frequently in Senegalese than in hexagonal French, as in après revenir instead of après d’être revenu ou après son retour (cf. Dumont 1979, 370). Prepositions – Changes in the choice of prepositions are frequent. The preposition avec ‘with’, for instance, is used in constructions like avoir qqc. avec soi or être avec qqn instead of avoir qqc. sur soi and être chez qqn (i–ii). Diverging prepositional usage is especially common in expressions with semantically close equivalents that are combined with other prepositions, as in s’originer de qqc. instead of s’originer dans qqc., influenced by être à l’origine de qqc. (cf. Gontier 1979, 119; Daff 2017, 565): (i) Vous avez votre carte avec vous [instead of sur vous] (Daff 2017, 565).30 (ii) La clef est avec Moussa [instead of chez Moussa] (2017, 565).31

Verbal valency – Verbs that require a direct object in standard French might be used as intransitive verbs, as in pomper instead of pomper qqc. (i), an example encountered in Senegal like in other French varieties. Indirect transitive constructions might be realized as direct ones. An example also attested outside Africa, for example in Canada and Belgium (cf. PR, s.v.), is marier qqn, constructed like épouser qqn, instead of se marier avec qqn (ii, cf. also iii), which, in Senegal, shows Wolof influence (< wara takk; cf. Daff 1993, 281). Similarly, divorcer qqn appears instead of divorcer de qqn (iii). In turn, direct transitive constructions might be used as indirect ones, as in commenter sur qqc., empêcher à qqn, or s’accompagner avec qqn, instead of commenter qqc., empêcher qqn, and accompagner qqn (iv–vi). The preposition de might appear with verbs in their passive voice, while the bare infinitive would be used in standard French, as in être censé de faire instead of être censé faire (vii). The adding of de is also common in expressions whose semantically close equivalents require this type of construction, as in se rappeler de qqc. instead of se rappeler qqc., influenced by se souvenir de qqc. (cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v.; Daff 2017, 565):

30 ‘You have your card with you [instead of (lit.) on you]’. 31 ‘Moussa has the key [(lit.) the key is with Moussa]’.

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(i) J’étais à plat, il a fallu que je pompe [instead of que je gonfle le pneu] (Daff 2017, 565).32 (ii) Mes parents voulaient que je le marie [instead of que je me marie avec lui] (N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v. marier).33 (iii) Le mari que j’ai divorcé [instead of dont j’ai divorcé] a juré que je ne me marierais plus (N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v. divorcer).34 (iv) Tu n’as pas le droit de commenter sur le comportement [instead of commenter le comportement] des femmes d’autrui (Daff 2017, 564).35 (v) On peut pas empêcher aux femmes [instead of empêcher les femmes] de [participer] (2017, 564s.)36 (vi) Abdou s’accompagne avec moi [instead of Abdou m’accompagne] depuis plus de dix ans (Blondé/ Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.).37 (vii) Son papa est censé de lui donner [instead of censé lui donner] tout ce qu’elle veut (Daff 2017, 565).38

Pronominalization – A reflexive pronoun is added, for example, in se procréer des enfants instead of procréer des enfants (cf. Daff 2017, 565). Both changes between direct and indirect construction mentioned above can go along with a change in the use of the reflexive pronoun too: depronominalization occurs in ii, pronominalization in vi. Imperative and negation – Wolof and other national languages do not only have an impact on the way some verbs are constructed. They also influence the syntactic system of Senegalese French in general, as this is often modelled on them. Drawing the border between Senegalese French and Franwolof (cf. 5.1 Code-switching, code-mixing, and interlanguage) is not always easy. This applies especially to the following ways of expressing the imperative and negation: Since the Wolof imperative is formed with the particle ‑al, it is not uncommon to see this particle added to French words too, like in kontaanal! ‘be happy!’ (< content + al) instead of sois content! Negation is expressed with the particle ‑ul in Wolof, which explains kontaanul ‘he is not happy’ (< content + ul) and grawul ‘it doesn’t matter’ (< grave ‘bad’ + ul) instead of il n’est pas content and ce n’est pas grave. Grawul is primarily used in Wolof but may also be reintegrated into French and even alternate with Jola, as in Grawul I nonnom i ban ‘It doesn’t matter, I have already bought’, a sentence that can be heard on the market in Ziguinchor and combines French, Wolof, and Jola (cf. Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 149; Diatta 2018, 34). Existential marker – The reduction of the existential marker Il y en a in Y’en a is often presented as typical Senegalese as it occurs in basilectal French and français tirailleur. It even appears in the name of a Senegalese civil movement, Y-en a marre (cf. Schiavone 2018, 26s.), but is also common in other French varieties.

32 33 34 35 36 37 38

‘I had a flat tire, I had to inflate it’. ‘My parents wanted me to marry him’. ‘The husband I divorced […] swore I would never marry again’. ‘You have no right to comment on the behaviour of the wives of someone else’. ‘You cannot stop women from [participating]’. ‘Abdou has accompanied me for more than ten years’. ‘Her father is supposed to give her everything she wants’.

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4.3 Lexicon Research gaps – Senegalese lexicon is assembled in several dictionaries. The words attest to local lexical creativity but are not always restricted to Senegal; many of them transgress the Senegalese borders and can also be found in other sub-Saharan countries. The complete distribution of each word is not yet described. Even supraregional inventories only indicate some of the countries and often ignore others where the word can also be found. Especially in the case of some borrowings, the spelling is not yet stable, so different variants can be registered (cf. BDLP, s.v.; DDP, s.v.; Racelle-Latin 2004, s.v.). Innovation of form and meaning – Lexical enrichment occurs through internal and external procedures. Internal changes refer to the morphological and/or the semantic level within French. External ones concern borrowings from other languages that also affect the level of form and meaning (Reutner 2017a, 48–51). The following section classifies selected items registered in dictionaries or frequently quoted in literature according to these categories. Internal innovation of form – Lexical innovations of form that arise without the influence of national languages are realized through derivation, composition, and reduction. Hybrids apply these processes to items borrowed from other languages. Derivation – Derivation is particularly productive in the form of suffixation. Adjectives serve as basis for the derivation of verbs, for example, in absenter qqn ‘not to find the person one wanted to see’ (< absent ‘absent’ + ‑er) and enceinter qqn ‘to impregnate someone’ (< enceinte ‘pregnant’ + ‑er). Nouns are the basis for deriving others, for example, in essencerie ‘gas station’ (< essence ‘gas’ + ‑erie) and tablier ‘street vendor’ (< table ‘vendor stall’ + ‑ier), that coincides with its standard French homonym tablier ‘apron’. Other nouns are transformed into verbs by adding -er, while the same meaning would require verb (+ preposition) + noun constructions in standard French: amender ‘to impose a fine’ (< amende ‘fine’ + ‑er), beloter ‘to play belote’ (< belote ‘belote [card game]’ + ‑er), cadoter ‘to make a present’ (< cadeau ‘present’ + ‑ter), damer ‘to play checkers’ (< dame ‘checkers’ + ‑er), droiter ‘to turn right’ (< droite ‘right’ + ‑er), gréver ‘to go on strike’ (< grève ‘strike’ + ‑er), indexer qqn ‘to point at someone’ (< index ‘index finger’ + ‑er), or siester ‘to take siesta’ (< sieste ‘siesta’ + ‑er). Prefixation is less frequent than suffixation; an example is co-épouse ‘woman who has the same husband [in relation to another woman]’. A frequently cited example of parasynthetic derivation is dévierger ‘to deflower’ (< de- + vierge ‘virgin’ + ‑er), though it can also be found in some varieties of hexagonal French (cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Gontier 1979, 78–89; Dumont 1983, 179; Daff 1993, 278). Composition – Compositions combined with a hyphen include noun-noun combinations like (marchand‑)tablier ‘street vendor’ (< marchand ‘merchant’ + tablier ‘street vendor’) or the proper noun Petite-Côte ‘coastal section south-east of Dakar’ (< petite ’small’ + côte ‘coast’) and verb-noun combinations as, for example, garde-faune ‘watchman guarding the national park’ (< garder ‘to watch’ + faune ‘fauna’). Other nouns are con-

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nected through a preposition: arbre à palabres ‘large tree under which villagers gather to discuss community affairs’ (< arbre ‘tree’ + à + palabre ‘discussion’), cousin à plaisanterie ‘joking cousin, non-related person with whom one can associate and even make fun of without breaking the etiquette’ (< cousin ‘cousin’ + à + plaisanterie ‘joke’), or tour de thé ‘meeting of friends in which tea and cookies are served’ (< tour ‘tour’ + de + thé ‘tea’; cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Gontier 1979, 74s.; Dumont 1983, 180ss.). Reduction – Reduction occurs in the form of acronyms, clippings, blends, and backformation. The acronym Sonadis (< Société Nationale de Distribution) refers to the formerly common department stores created after independence to ensure the local supply. Typical clippings often apply to words that appear more frequently in Africa than in Europe, e.g., palu ‘malaria’ (< paludisme) or phaco ‘Phacochoerus aethiopicus, warthog’ (< phacochère). Senegalese blends include gardinier ‘person who takes care of the gardening’ (< gardien ‘guardian, caretaker’ + jardinier ‘gardener’), portugalais ‘Senegalese person who speaks a Portuguese-based creole’ (< portugais ‘Portuguese’ + sénégalais ‘Senegalese’), and Sénégambie ‘Senegambia’ (< Sénégal ‘Senegal’ + Gambie ‘Gambia’). Back-formation occurs in alphabète ‘literate person’ (< analphabète ‘illiterate person’; cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Gontier 1979, 90, 94, 96). Hybrids – The processes mentioned above might also be based on words borrowed from national languages, like Maninka (Man.), Sereer (Ser.), and Wolof (Wol.). The results are sometimes described as hybrids though the loanwords have already been integrated into French before serving as a basis for creating new words. As many supposedly French words have also been borrowed from other languages centuries ago, the delimitation of an item’s hybridity is vague and rather artificial. The following words could, therefore, also be classified as regular derivations and compositions. The Wolof borrowing toubab ‘white person’ (borrowed in Wolof from Arabic, cf. toubib ‘doctor’), for example, results in derivations such as toubabesse ‘white woman’, toubabiser ‘to become similar to white people, to whiten’, toubabisé ‘(pej.) Occidentalized African’, toubabé ‘worthy of a white person, in the manner of white people’, toubabité ‘totality of features that are supposed to characterize white people’, or toubabisme ‘imitation of the behaviour, customs, and manners of white people’. Other hybrids are formed with ‑erie, ‑eur, ‑iste, or ‑ien, like in dibiterie ‘place of restoration that offers grilled mutton’ (< Wol. dibi ‘grilled meat’ + ‑(t)erie), dibiteur ‘vendor of dibi’ (< dibi + ‑(t)eur), koriste ‘kora player’ (< Man. kora ‘stringed instrument with twenty-one strings that are plucked, African harp’ + ‑iste), xalamiste ‘xalam player’ (< Ser./Wol. xalam ‘stringed instrument with one to five strings that are plucked, African lute’ + ‑iste), or Senghorien ‘follower of Senghor’ (< Senghor + ‑ien). Modelled on democratie ‘rule of the people’ (< Gr. demos ‘people’ + ‑cratie ‘rule’), doolecratie ‘rule of strength’ (< Wol. doole ‘strength’ + -cratie ‘rule’) was applied by Abdoulaye Wade and his followers to the regime of Abdou Diouf, and later by opponents of Wade against Wade himself. An example of an English item used as a basis for hybrids is En. boy ‘young domestic servant’, which is widespread in many sub-Saharan countries and engendered derivations such as boyerie ‘annex for the apartment of the domestic servant(s)’ or boyesse ‘young female domestic servant’ (cf. Blondé/Du-

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mont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Gontier 1979, 79, 85; Dumont 1983, 178; Schiavone 2010, 216; 2017, 152; Adjeran/Ndao/Diouf 2018, 10). Internal innovation of meaning – Internal innovation of meaning occurs through meaning restriction, meaning extension, and meaning shift. In most cases, the standard meaning also persists so that the items are classified as meaning extensions in some other descriptions. The following classification only refers to the words’ specific meaning, regardless of whether the standard meaning is also common or not. Meaning restriction – Changes in meaning include adding semes to a given meaning so that the group of referents is restricted. Frequently cited examples are charbon ‘charcoal’ instead of ‘coal’, dépense ‘expenses for the purchase of provision [given by the husband to his wife or each of his wives]’ instead of ‘expenses’, Européen ‘European person of France, French person’ instead of ‘European person’, fréquenter ‘to attend school’ instead of ‘to attend’, médicament ‘medicine prepared by a healer’ instead of ‘medicine’, opérateur ‘person performing circumcision’ instead of ‘operator’, patate ‘sweet potato’ instead of ‘potato’, pot ‘tin can’ instead of ‘can’, tablette ‘board used by a marabout to write down prayers’ instead of ‘board’. The restriction of meaning is often realized through lexical absorption: charbon absorbs the meaning of charbon de bois, patate of patate douce, tablette of tablette coranique, etc. It also occurs in phrasal verbs like donner son tour ‘to spend the time with one of one’s wives [for a husband in a polygamous marriage]’ or être de tour ‘to spend the time with one’s husband [for a wife in a polygamous marriage]’ (cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Gontier 1979, 123s.; Dumont 1983, 186ss.; Daff 1993, 278s.). Meaning extension – In other cases, the group of referents is extended by the reduction of semes, as in bagages ‘objects people carry around’ instead of ‘luggage’, bifteck ‘grilled slice of meat’ instead of ‘grilled slice of beef’, condiment ‘ingredient’ instead of ‘condiment’, fonctionnel ‘functioning’ instead of ‘functional’, frère, sœur ‘male/female relative or friend of the same generation’ instead of ‘brother, sister’, uncle, tante ‘male/ female relative or friend of one’s parents’ generation’ instead of ‘uncle, aunt’ (cf. Gontier 1979, 112; Dumont 1983, 186). Meaning shift – Meaning can also change through metaphorical and metonymical processes. This is the case in bancs ‘school’ instead of ‘benches’ in faire les bancs ‘to go to school’ and sortir des bancs ‘to come from school’, or in creux ‘without money, in lack of liquidity [in relation to the period of a month when the income of the previous month is spent and the income of the current month has not yet been received]’ instead of ‘hollow’, as in le mois est creux. Other examples are ambiance ‘party’ instead of ‘atmosphere’, boule de neige ‘cauliflower’ instead of ‘snow ball’, couple domino ‘couple of a black and a white person’ instead of ‘domino couple’, drap ‘boubou, long wide robe’ instead of ‘cloth’, fête ‘gift brought to a celebration’ instead of ‘celebration’, goudron ‘tarred road’ instead of ‘tar’, guerrier ‘lout, bad boy’ instead of ‘warrior’, hivernage ‘rainy season’ instead of ‘winter time’, maquis ‘disreputable places of a city’ instead of ‘maquis’, payer ‘to buy’ instead of ‘to pay’, répondre ‘to go to a call, to present oneself to someone who asked for it’ instead of ‘to answer’, tête de nègre ‘black round toe shoes’ instead of ‘head of a black person’, transhumant ‘someone who changes the political party by op-

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portunism’ instead of ‘transhumant’, valise ‘gift of a husband to his wife after the wedding night’ instead of ‘suitcase’. Words might also lose their negative or pejorative connotation and be used neutrally, as in baraque ‘house made of boards [which might be nice]’ instead of ‘barracks, ramshackle hut [which is not nice]’, bureaucrate ‘clerk, office worker’ instead of ‘bureaucrat’, charlatan ‘diviner, healer’ instead of ‘charlatan, quacksalver’ (cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Dumont 1983, 188, 191; N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v.). External innovation – External innovations are borrowings from other languages. The primary source of borrowings is Wolof, but Jola, Maninka, Pulaar, Sereer, and Arabic are major donor languages, too. The borrowed items can essentially retain the foreign form or only adopt the foreign meaning translated into the receiving language or added to words already existing in this language. Borrowing of form – Borrowings in the area of music are goumbé ‘frame drum; rhythmic dance performed by the Lebu accompanying the sound of this drum’, sabar ‘big drum; rhythmic dance session to the sound of this drum’, or xalam ‘African lute’ from Wolof, and kora ‘African harp’ from Maninka. Examples in the area of rites are ndeup ‘animist ceremony performed by the Lebu for healing mental problems; dance accompanying this ceremony’ or rab ‘demon with beneficial or maleficent power’ from Wolof, and pangol ‘spiritual being’ from Sereer. Borrowings in the clothing area are boubou ‘traditional long wide robe’ and makhtoumé ‘small leather bag attached to a cord and worn around the neck’ from Wolof. People are characterized with the Wolof terms banabana ‘street vendor’ or toubab ‘white person’ and with the title given to a man of age to express veneration Maodo ‘(lit.) the greatest, the highest authority’ from Pulaar. Examples in the area of food and drinks include bissap ‘Hibiscus sabdariffa, roselle’, dibi ‘grilled meat’, guedj ‘salt-cured dry fish’, caldou ‘fish soup with rice from Casamance [associated with Jola]’, mafé ‘groundnut stew, rice with meat or fish served with a groundnut sauce [associated with Bambara]’, or the national dish tiep ‘rice with fish’ (< thiebou < thieboudienne < ceebu jen) from Wolof, and bounouk ‘palm wine’ from Jola. Arabic words are found in the area of town planning, as, for example, médina ‘populous district of Dakar’, and especially in the area of religion, as zakat ‘almsgiving, ten percent taxes collected by Muslim communities for the poor’ – a word that is in competition with the Wolof form asaka. The same holds for Arabic Eid al-Fitr, which is much less common than the Wolof borrowing korité ‘feast at the end of the fasting month of Ramadan’. The terminology of Sunni Islam also includes talibé ‘boy who studies the Koran, (lit.) seeker, student’, daara ‘Koranic school’, tariqa ‘Sufi order’. Another Arabic borrowing is miskine ‘poor, needy Muslim’, which is derived from the same Arabic word as standard French mésquin ‘petty’ (< It. meschino < Ar. miskin). Arabic Yalla! ‘Oh my God!; Come on!, Let’s go!, Hurry up!’ is frequently encountered as an interjection (< Ya [vocative] + Allah ‘Allah, God’). Items borrowed from Indo-European languages are, for example, lemon ‘lemonade’, moni ‘money’, nayiss ‘nice’, or boy ‘young domestic servant’ from English and pastel ‘pasta stuffed with fish, samosa’ or Signare ‘mixed-race lady, elegant and beautiful lady, [in reference to history cf. 2 French victory] mixed-race lady living with a white

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man’ (< senhora) from Portuguese (cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979, s.v.; Daff 1993, 280; 1996, 570s.; 2017, 565s.; N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v.; Sarr/Thiaw 2012, 11). Borrowing of meaning: loan translation – Loan translations from Wolof are frère de case ‘companion with whom one passed the initiation rites during the circumcision ceremony’ (< Wol. mbok mbar), petit père ‘uncle’ (< Wol. pāpa bun daw) and petite mère ‘aunt’, which is also a euphemism for the father’s co-wife in a polygamous marriage: “Ton père est de tour chez ta petite mère” (cf. Gontier 1979, 74; Daff 1993, 278s.). Borrowing of meaning: loan meaning – Loan meanings of Wolof are maison ‘family’ instead of ‘house’ (< Wol. kër), descendre ‘to end one’s working day’ instead of ‘to go downstairs’ (< Wol. wācc), savoir ‘to get to know’ instead of ‘to know’ (< Wol. xam), and travailler ‘to cast a spell’ instead of ‘to work’ (< Wol. liggééy). This also applies to phrasal verbs as éclaircir les idées de qqn ‘to explain to someone’ instead of ‘to clear someone’s ideas’ (< Wol. leeral; Gontier 1979, 118s.; Thiam 1997, 153; Ndiaye 2013, 129; Daff 2017, 565).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic attitudes and norms Attitudes towards languages – Beyond its colonial connotation, French is associated with positive values in Senegal. The French speech community is perceived as more reliable, sincere, hardworking, and honest than the Wolof speech community, while the national languages (including Wolof as a first language) are the most highly rated (cf. Diallo 2009, 206–209). Attitudes towards variation – Attitudes towards Senegalese features of French vary between appreciation and stigmatization and sometimes attest to purism and linguistic insecurity. It is evident that these attitudes primarily appear in people who have learned French at school, while those who have picked it up on the street are less sensitive to explicit language rules and more concerned with speaking French at all than with speaking good French: ‘Here, we would learn French as others would learn Jola, Bambara, or Pulaar elsewhere, by being immersed in the territories covered by these languages. French indeed seems to be brought back, in the Dakar situation, to the stage of an oral idiom, like all other languages of local multilingualism’.39

Appreciation – On the one hand, well-educated Senegalese often appreciate the linguistic characteristics of Senegal as a shibboleth, a marker of identity, and a sign of pride.

39 “Ici, on y apprendrait le français comme d’autres apprendraient le joola, le bambara ou le pulaar ailleurs, en se trouvant immergé dans les territoires couverts par ces langues. Le français semble en effet être ramené, dans la situation dakaroise, à un état d’idiome de l’oralité, à l’image de toutes les autres langues du multilinguisme local” (Thiam 1997, 152).

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Moreau/Thiam/Bauvois, for instance, conclude their study of Senegalese French by asserting: ‘far from being devalued, the productions are mostly the subject of positive appreciations’.40

The most salient feature on the phonetic level is the apical realization of /r/, an identity marker par excellence, while the uvular pronunciation [ʁ] is criticized as mimicking the French. Other identity markers seem to be the contracted pronunciation of je sais pas as [ʃepa] and words like vachement, though they are also common in hexagonal French (cf. Dumont 1979, 367; Ndao 2002, 52; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 48, 61). Stigmatization – On the other hand, the voices stigmatizing Senegalese French do not subside. They cling to the traditional rules of pronunciation and grammar and criticize, for example, the slow way of speaking French in Africa or lexical deviations from standard French (cf. examples in Ndao 2002, 55s.). In many cases, the criticism translates to self-loathing, shame, and an inferiority complex vis-à-vis those who observe the exogenous norm. It is one of the reasons for the hesitant codification of an endogenous norm, as this effort would require accepting the existence of an endogenous variety: ‘a possible codification of African French presupposes an implicit recognition, de facto, of a gap between the hexagonal French and African situations. Yet Africa is perhaps not yet linguistically mature enough to cut the umbilical cord that still links it to the former metropolis from that point of view. One does not emerge unscathed from a century of French colonial domination’.41

Purism – Similar to the competition between the Romance languages in the eighteenth century, in which each country stressed that its language was superior to the other ones, African countries also seem to compete over who has the best French. To prove their superiority vis-à-vis other African countries, the different nations often claim that their French most resembles hexagonal French (cf. examples in Ndao 2002, 54ss.). Such ideas contradict the comfort with one’s accent and are rather a sign of glorifying the exogenous norm and stipulating it as an ideal to strive for. Purism is evident in the hunt for errors in the discourse of politicians, as practised by the newspaper L’Actuel, and also in Senegalese students interviewed by Ndao (2002, 61s.) who criticize Côte d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso for having developed popular varieties of French (français populaire ivoirien – FPI and français populaire de Ouagadougou – FPO). Senegal, in contrast, boasts of having hosted the capital of the AOF, Togo and Benin (former Dahomey) are proud of having

40 “loin d’être dépréciées, les productions font majoritairement l’objet d’appréciations positives” (Moreau/Thiam/Bauvois 1998, 124). 41 “[…] une éventuelle codification du français d’Afrique suppose une reconnaissance implicite, de facto, d’un décalage entre les situations hexagonales et africaines. Or l’Afrique n’est peut-être pas encore assez mûre linguistiquement pour couper le cordon ombilical qui la lie toujours, de ce point de vue-là, à l’ancienne métropole. On ne sort pas indemne d’un siècle de domination colonial française” (Dumont 1990, 16).

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supplied most administrative staff to the AOF, and Benin is satisfied with its sobriquet ‘French quarter of Africa’ (“Quartier Latin d’Afrique”) – all attitudes that attest a pride in assimilation to France, its culture and linguistic norm, which goes along with linguistic purism. Especially in Senegal, purist attitudes might also attest to Senghor’s heritage, the legacy of a president so much committed to linguistic correctness that he even criticized a journalist for using the form un koraïste instead of un koriste (cf. Ndao 2002, 63; Aït-Hatrit 2004). Linguistic insecurity and hypercorrect forms – While some Senegalese communicate in carefree French without worrying about possible errors, the prevailing linguistic purism can result in linguistic insecurity that affects other people. The exogenous norm exerts intense pressure on many highly educated Senegalese: ‘For a long time we were made to believe that we must speak impeccable and high-level French so that communicating in this language becomes a curse […]. This makes people a little reluctant to use the language of Molière’.42

Hypercorrection appears in the form of stuffy terms that can be explained by the nature of language acquisition in school with sometimes outdated textbooks and learning material. ‘even among speakers using very elementary French, one can observe a very large number of terms belonging to very specialized vocabularies […], a perhaps immoderate taste for the word that sounds good’.43

Code-switching, code-mixing, and interlanguage – Both French and Wolof experience the intrusion of the competing language. When speaking Wolof, many Senegalese integrate French words, and when speaking French, Wolof words. The coexisting language might also be indirectly present through translations of sayings or proverbs. Some Senegalese even use entire statements in Wolof when speaking French, especially in the media. French-Wolof code-switching and -mixing is almost omnipresent in Senegal and especially frequent in urban areas. It is used in markets and families but also in administration, schools, the media, and advertising (cf. 3.2 Publicity). It is prevalent among adolescents and young adults of the well-educated middle class with a slight female predominance and among less educated men of the lower class. The typical reasons for code-switching and code-mixing also apply in Senegal, but there is another reason there:

42 “Pendant longtemps on nous a fait croire qu’il faut parler un français impécable [sic] et soutenu au point de communiquer avec cette langue devient une hantise […]. Ce qui fait que les gens ont une certaine réticence à l’idée d’utiliser la langue de Molière” (Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 167). 43 “[…] même chez les locuteurs parlant un français très élémentaire, on note un très grand nombre de termes appartenant à des vocabulaires très spécialisés […], un goût peut-être immodéré du mot qui sonne bien” (Dumont 1979, 368).

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“To speak French is desirable; to speak French too much is inappropriate. Most Senegalese do not wish to display that kind of admiration or closeness with the cultural ‘centre’ of colonial times” (Swigart 1994, 179).

The mixing is not necessarily limited to the major vehicular languages but can also relate to other national languages and even include three or more idioms (cf. 4.2 Imperative and negation). The mixed code expands the ways of language acquisition. French is no longer primarily acquired through the formal school system but also appropriated through listening to mixed discourses and participating in them, which results in a basilectal French with statements such as je débrouiller seulement ‘I am getting by’. The frequent code-switching creates a sort of interlanguage, sometimes described as franwolof or francénégalais (< français + wolof or sénégalais), with the variants franwol, franlof, francolof, and franc-wolof, as well as wolfran in case of a Wolof dominance (cf. Swigart 1994, 176; Thiam 1994, 13, 23; 1997, 149ss.; Cissé 2005, 105; Dreyfus/Juillard 2005, 177–254; Abolou 2012, 108–113; Boutin/Gadet 2012, 22; Boutin/Gess/Guèye 2012, 47s.; Diop 2016, 83; Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 90s., 108s.). Towards pluricentricity – Though the exogenous norm of hexagonal French is still the model many aspire to, it is only mastered by a very small elite. A prerequisite for developing an endogenous norm in a given language is its linguistic vernacularization. The vernacularization of French in Senegal has progressed in recent decades, despite the strong national competitor. The continuing Wolofization restrains the use of French in day-to-day life but does not impede it. Consequently, the coexistence of French and Wolof in urban centres is not only engendering a mixed code but also a nativized variety of French with phonological and morphosyntactic features from Wolof and a large inventory of lexical innovations.

5.2 Description and codification of linguistic characteristics Research projects – Some phonetic and morphological aspects of Senegalese French are described in the project Phonology of Contemporary French (Phonologie du français contemporain – PFC; cf. Durand/Laks/Lyche 2009; Durand 2009). Differential dictionaries – Lexical Senegalisms are not specifically considered in the Panfrancophone Lexicographic Database (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone – BDLP) but included in the Inventory of Lexical Characteristics of French in Sub-Saharan Africa (Inventaires des particularités lexicales du français en Afrique noire, cf. Racelle-Latin 2004). They are also assembled in differential dictionaries: in the Lexicon of French from Senegal (Lexique du français du Sénégal, cf. Blondé/Dumont/Gontier 1979) and in Heritage Words: Senegal (Les Mots du patrimoine: le Sénégal, cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006). Global dictionaries – Global dictionaries do not yet consider Africa to a due extent but are increasingly opening up to it. The Petit Robert (PR, s.v.), for example, currently

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includes about fifty words marked as regionalisms for sub-Saharan Africa and explicitly mentions Senegal in the entries bougnoule, diable, essencerie, gonfle, gouvernance, gouverneur, laptot, and mafé: bougnoule is explained as a pejorative form white Senegalese use to designate black Senegalese, diable in the expression Ce n’est pas diable! ‘It is not special!’ is marked as a regionalism for Canada and Senegal, essencerie is described as a word created by Senghor following the model of épicerie and marked as regionalism for Senegal and Canada, gonfle ‘swollen’ is listed as a regionalism for Senegal, alongside French regions, Switzerland, Louisiana, Canada, and Algeria, gouvernance ‘total of the administrative services of a region’ and gouverneur ‘person at the head of a region’ are explained as Senegalese realities, laptot ‘sailor, boatman [but ‘captive who could be hired as a sailor’ according to N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v.]’ is restricted to Senegalese and African ports, and mafé ‘groundnut stew’ explained as a word that originated in Senegal. The Dictionary of the French Academy (Dictionnaire de l’Académie française) registers essencerie, dibiterie, gouvernance, gouverneur, and primature ‘office of the prime minister’ with meanings restricted to Senegal (cf. DAF, s.v.). The latter is also included with a regional marker for Haiti, Maghreb, sub-Saharan Africa, Djibouti, and Madagascar in the Petit Robert, which gives Senghor as its creator: ‘word created by L. S. Senghor on Latin primas, primatis “who is in the first rank” […] following magistrature, nonciature’.44

Spelling: French – Senegal is one of the few French-speaking areas besides France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Quebec to have practised internal language policy through legislation on French. It has enacted a decree with several articles on the use of capital letters. The first word and all other nouns in the names of institutions, for example, must be capitalized. Senegal hence uses Cour Suprême and Conseil des Ministres, while the spelling in France would be Cour suprême and Conseil des ministres: ‘When the designated institution is unique in Senegal, the first letter of the nouns is capitalized as well as the first letter of the first word regardless of the nature of the word’.45

Spelling: national languages – Legislation on the spelling of national languages was already mentioned in 3.1. Here, it is noteworthy that the issue of codification may even have provoked the censorship of a film. Ousmane Sembène, who supported efforts to create a writing system in Wolof, refused to adapt the spelling in the title of his film Ceddo to the government codification (cf. 3.1 National languages: first group and 3.5 Film) and insisted on the spelling with a double d, while the Senegalese government codified 44 “mot créé par L. S. Senghor sur le latin primas, primatis ‘qui est au premier rang’ […] d’après magistrature, nonciature” (PR, s.v.). 45 “Lorsque l’institution désignée est unique au Sénégal, la première lettre des substantifs prend la majuscule ainsi que la première lettre du premier mot quelle que soit la nature de celui-ci” (Decree 75, art. 3).

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a single d. He polemicized against Senghor, whose first language Sereer does not use double consonants, and insisted on the double d despite the subsequent ban of the film (cf. Cissé 2005, 115). Conclusion – The Senegalese legislation and quarrel over spelling reveals two issues. First, Senegal has been more sensitive to language questions than other African countries, which testifies to the heritage of its first president Senghor. Second, spelling is not innocent but may hide ideological positions. Linguistic and extralinguistic issues are often intertwined and cannot be separated, not even in the case of spelling.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used in the public sphere – Language quality in the public sphere varies according to each domain and speaker. What is more constant is a substantial proportion of code-switching and the use of locally adapted French. Variety used in education – Senegalese teachers use Senegalisms. Some of them serve as a conscient sign of linguistic appropriation and identity, while others are due to inadequate language acquisition that is passed on to the pupils. In many cases, language proficiency remains insufficient: ‘mentioning the pupils’ low level in French remains a constant in Senegal’s history of teaching’.46

The language skills of teachers are often subject to critique that even comprises the way in which exam questions are formulated (cf., for example, Diop 2011). After the era of Senghor, in which school was selective and paid close attention to proficiency in French, every child should be enabled to successfully attend school. Many teachers were recruited regardless of their sometimes low competencies in French (cf. Adjeran/Ndao 2018, 81s., 166s.). Today, efforts are made to improve the French of teachers and, as a consequence, pupils. Average results in French dictation are again required in order to enter the Teacher Training School (École de formation des instituteurs – EFI). A teacher training student comments: ‘From now on, we know that we have no choice, we must master French if we want to enter the teaching staff’.47

The quality of teaching might also be enhanced by the Francophonie Institute of Education and Training (Institut de la Francophonie pour l’éducation et la formation – IFEF). 46 “l’évocation de la faiblesse de niveau des élèves en français reste une constante dans l’histoire de l’enseignement au Sénégal” (Fall 2003, 160). 47 “Désormais, on sait qu’on n’a pas le choix, il faut maîtriser le français si l’on veut entrer dans le corps enseignant” (in Larcher 2019, 153).

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The heads of states and government decided on its establishment during the XV Summit of the Francophonie in Dakar in 2014. It is headquartered in Dakar, was inaugurated in 2017, and has as one of its missions: ‘to propose and organize capacity building activities for teachers, supervisory staff, executives, and managers of the education system’.48

Variety used in the media – Senegalisms also occur in the media. N’Diaye Corréard (2006) are able to attest many of the Senegalisms they assembled with examples from newspapers. Passages published in Le Soleil include, for example, enceinter ‘to impregnate’ (i), payer ‘to buy’ (ii), and répondre ‘to go to a call’ (iii): “‘Enceinter une fillette est un viol’, a déclaré le chef de l’État” (Le Soleil 20/6/2004, cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v. enceinter).49 (ii) “Mes santiags par exemple, je les ai payés au Texas” (Le Soleil 26/8/192, cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v. payer).50 (iii) “Trois heures en mer, puis une longue route pour atteindre Fatick, […] voilà le calvaire que vit cette habitante des îles pour répondre chaque mois au magistrat” (Le Soleil 18/11/1998, cf. N’Diaye Corréard 2006, s.v. répondre).51 (i)

Students interviewed by Ndao (2002, 57) feel that journalists on national television have a good command of French, while journalists on private radio stations have less. Variety used in literature – The choice between French and African languages is a dilemma. Writing in the former colonial language involves the risk of cultural alienation, while choosing an African language entails the challenge of a limited audience. A possible way out is the linguistic appropriation of French through its Africanization as a sign of self-esteem, self-assertion, and identity. The use of indigenized French and the incursion of national languages into French texts can serve to mirror the Senegalese linguistic reality and take account of the country’s multilingualism, code-switching, and -mixing. Borrowings, partial or full statements in African languages, notably Wolof, and African locutions or proverbs translated into French invoke the Senegalese cultural background. The literary combination of French with African languages can be regarded as a form of reconciliation between different cultural universes – at least when occurring without significant hierarchical differences and the intention of ridiculing or stigmatizing the users of African features (cf. Reutner 2023b, 261ss.).

48 “Proposer et organiser des activités de renforcement des capacités des enseignants, des personnels d’encadrement, des cadres et gestionnaires du système éducatif” (IFEF 2023a). 49 ‘“To impregnate a young girl is a rape”, has declared the head of state’. 50 ‘My santiags [cowboy boots from the brand Santiag], for example, I bought them in Texas’. 51 ‘Three hours on the sea, then a long way to reach Fatick, […] that is the ordeal that this inhabitant of the islands goes through in order present herself to the magistrate each month’.

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Regionalisms: clothing, food, transportation, and spirituality – Texts from Senegalese writers sometimes resort to local forms. They may use them naturally without further comments or accompanied by explanations in the text, in footnotes, or in glossaries intended for readers who are not familiar with them. Marking expressions as in need of explanation implies a certain form of linguistic stigmatization (cf. Reutner 2023b, 256–261). Yet, it also serves as a courtesy to foreign readers that allows them to enlarge their lexical and often cultural competencies, as the localization of French does not only imply a different usage of French words (e.g., répondre in i) but primarily lexical items that designate, for example, particular types of clothing (e.g., samara in ii), food (e.g., futu, mafé in iii and chawarme in iv), means of transportation (e.g., Ndiaga-Ndiaye, Fula-Fula, and Matutu in v), or spiritual beings and practices (e.g., rab et ndeup in vi). (i) “[…] dis-leur de venir me répondre après la prière” (Sow 1991, 38).52 (ii) “[…] le pantalon, trop grand, tombant en accordéon sur ses samaras (1). […] (1) Sandales” (Sembène 1960, 37).53 (iii) “On y dégustait son ceebu jen aussi bien que le futu3 à saveur forestière, le mafé4 à la mode mandingue et le poisson braisé au feu de bois […] 3 – Futu: pain de bananes plantain pilées 4 – Mafé: sauce arachide – tomate – gombo” (Fall 1998, 126).54 (iv) “Ce dimanche-là, je pleurais presque pour un chawarme1 de chez Ali Baba […]. 1. Sandwich libanais très consommé à Dakar” (Hane 2015, 106).55 (v) “À la devanture des maisons, devant les étalages, dans les cours d’école, dans les taxis, dans les taxis clandos, les minicars, les minibus, dans les cars rapides, les Ndiaga-Ndiaye7, les FulaFula8, les Matatu9, sur les taxis-motos, partout, les gens criaient, commentaient, s’exclamaient, s’esclaffaient, sur ces faits divers. […] 7. Bus Mercedes utilisés pour les trajets urbains et interurbains qui tirent leur nom de la famille du transporteur. 8. Nom donné aux minibus à Brazzaville. 9. Minibus privés pour le transport en commun” (Ken Bugul 2014, 113).56 (vi) “Emprises de rab(5). […] Pour le contenter il faut organiser un ndeup(6). […] (5) Êtres invisibles au pouvoir bénéfique ou maléfique. (6) Danse d’exorcisme” (Bâ 1981, 213).57

52 ‘[…] tell them to come to see me after the prayer’. 53 ‘[…] the trousers, too big, falling into pleats on his/her samaras (1). […] – (1) Sandals’. 54 ‘We tried his/her ceebu jen there as well as the futu3 with its forest flavour, the mafé4 in Mandingue style and the wood-braised fish. […] – 3 – Futu: bread made of mashed cooking bananas – 4 – Mafé: groundnut sauce – tomato – okra’. 55 ‘This Sunday, I almost cried for a chawarme1 from Ali Baba. […] – 1. Lebanese sandwich people like to eat in Dakar’. 56 ‘In front of houses, in front of shop windows, in schoolyards, in taxis, in illegal taxis, mini coaches, minibuses, in fast coaches, Ndiaga-Ndiaye7, Fula-Fula8, Matatu9, on motorcycle taxis, everywhere, people shouted, commented, exclaimed, burst out laughing on these various facts. […] – 7. Mercedes bus used for urban and interurban journeys named after the family name of the operator. – 8. Name given to minibuses in Brazzaville. – 9. Private minibuses for public transport’. 57 ‘Rab(5) influences. […] To satisfy them, you have to organize a ndeup(6). […] – (5) Invisible beings with beneficial or maleficent power. – (6) Exorcism dance’.

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Regionalisms: institutions, people, and greetings – Specific designations also refer to institutions (e.g., daara in vii), people (e.g., taalibe in vii, also in the more common form talibé in viii, where it is accompanied by a strong cultural critique, tiaga in ix, or toubab in x–xi), as well as greetings in national languages (e.g., Diam Niali, Eni Segué, and Diamk am in xii) and foreign idioms (e.g., zai jian in xiii). (vii) “[…] son intention de m’envoyer comme taalibe1 à Wokaam, afin que j’apprenne le Coran. […] Le jour du départ pour le grand daara2 de Wokaam, tout le monde dans la maison s’était réveillé très tôt. […] 1. Taalibe: disciple d’une école coranique. 2. Daara: école coranique chez les Wolof” (Fall 1989, 13s.).58 (viii) “[…] après tout, il fallait bien que les corps de ces jeunes talibés1 errant dans les rues du pays, sans domicile fixe, livrés à eux-mêmes servent à quelque chose. […] 1. Au Sénégal, enfants confiés à un maître pour l’apprentissage du Coran, mais souvent exploités par ces derniers. Ils mendient dans les rues pour survivre ou entretenir leur maître, livrés à l’insécurité et la violence urbaine” (Sarr 2018, 108s.).59 (ix) “[…] cette fosse où l’on entasse les condamnés à mort: meurtriers, tiaga21, hommes et femmes adultères. […] 21. Prostituées” (Sarr 2017 [2014], 118).60 (x) “Ce détail me fit penser à l’autre empereur des Toubabs* qui avait répudié sa femme parce qu’elle ne lui donnait pas d’enfants. […] * Toubab: Blancs” (Sadji 1985, 75).61 (xi) “C’est facile, Tarman, de toujours me jeter à la figure que je suis un ‘Toubab1’. […] 1. Occidental de race blanche” (Kane 1995, 83).62 (xii) “[…] ces braves [les tirailleurs sénégalais], si terribles dans les combats, se pressaient de toutes parts à ma rencontre, souriant, me serrant les mains, me souhaitant les Diam Niali1 les Eni Segué2 les Diamk am3, etc. comme s’ils m’avaient connu depuis longtemps […]. 1. Bonjour en peulh. 2. « en bambara. 3. « en ouoloff” (Diallo 1926, 149).63

58 ‘His/her intention to send me to Wokaam as a taalibe1 to study the Koran. […] On the day of departure for the big daara2 in Wokaam, everyone in the house had woken up very early. […] – 1. Taalibe: disciple of a Koran school. – 2. Daara: Koran school among the Wolof’. 59 ‘[…] after all, it was quite necessary that the bodies of these young talibés1 wandering through the streets of the country, homeless, left to themselves, are useful for something. […] – 1. In Senegal, children entrusted to a master to study the Koran but often exploited by them. They beg in the streets to survive or support their master, exposed to insecurity and urban violence’. 60 ‘[…] this pit where they pile the condemned to death: murderers, tiaga21, unfaithful men and women. […] – 21. Prostitutes’. 61 ‘This detail made me think of the other emperor of the Toubabs* who had repudiated his wife because she didn’t give him children. […] – * Toubab: White people’. 62 ‘It’s easy, Tarman, to always throw in my face that I am a “Toubab1”. […] – 1. Occidental person of white race’. 63 ‘these brave people [the Tirailleurs Sénégalais], so terrible in the fight, hurried from all parts to meet me, smiling, shaking my hands, wishing me Diam Niali1, Eni Segué2, Diamk am3, etc. as if they had known me for a long time. […] – 1. Hello in Fula. – 2. Hello in Bambara. – 3. Hello in Wolof’.

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(xiii) “Wong tourna le dos. Je lui lançai un tonitruant zai jian1! […] 1. ‘Au revoir’ en chinois” (Hane 2015, 153).64

Glossaries – Other novels offer a glossary at the end of the book instead of footnotes. Badiane (1982a, 191–194; 1982b, 235–238) explains Wolof expressions in the order they appear in the book, Diallo (1981, 137–142) also includes internal innovations in her alphabetic glossary. Code-switching – Senegalese multilingualism, code-mixing, and code-switching are reflected in longer sections in other languages. They are directly translated in the text (i) or in footnotes (ii), where additional information might be given, too (iii): “Pourquoi serais-je éternellement tributaire de toi Fary? Li wone, woni na, le passé est révolu” (Diallo 1987, 171).65 (ii) “Sur ses doigts, il comptait. Astaghfirou Allah1! Astaghfirou Allah! cent fois. 1. Je me repens devant Dieu” (Hane 2011, 134).66 (iii) “Voici par exemple comment il tournait en dérision une Assemblée ‘nationale’ où il était interdit de parler les langues nationales: ‘La ńuy wax ca péncum réew ma, su ma leen ko tekkiloon tey jii ci wolof, ngeen gàdduy yat dàquileen1!’ […] 1. ‘Ce que ces gens disent en français, là-bas dans leur Assemblée nationale, et bien, si je vous le traduisais en wolof, vous n’auriez qu’une envie: leur tomber dessus à coups de bâton!’ Il n’a jamais nommé personne, mais il y a gros à parier qu’au-delà des députés, il pensait à Senghor, qui truffait ses discours de savantes formules grecques ou latines, voire de citations de Gide ou de Goethe” (Diop 2007, 115).67 (i)

Conclusion – Senegalese French is no longer a sole learner variety nor a mere copy of metropolitan French. An endogenous variety of French is currently emerging. It is proudly used in literature and other domains without the inferiority complex inherited from the past. Wolof, in contrast, has evolved as a serious competitor of French and is increasingly used outside the Wolof ethnic group. The deethnicization of Wolof and Wolofization of Senegal began centuries ago and gained momentum with the mobility of the population, the advent of free media, Wolof music, Islamization, and the increasing self-consciousness of Senegalese people born after independence. Wolof functions as a cohesive factor and unites the different ethnic groups in Senegal, though its strengthen-

64 ‘Wong turned his back. I hurled him a booming zai jian1! […] – 1. “Good bye” in Chinese’. 65 ‘Why would I eternally be dependent on you Fary? Li wone, woni na, those days are over’. 66 ‘He counted on his fingers. Astaghfirou Allah1! Astaghfirou Allah! a hundred times. […] – 1. I repent before God’. 67 ‘Let’s see, for example, how he made a mockery of a “National” Assembly in which it was forbidden to speak the national languages: “La ńuy wax ca péncum réew ma, su ma leen ko tekkiloon tey jii ci wolof, ngeen gàdduy yat dàquileen1!” […] – 1. “What these people say in French, down there at their National Assembly, well, if I translated it to you into Wolof, you would have one urge only: to knock them down with sticks!”. He has never named anyone, but it’s a good bet that he was thinking of Senghor, who peppered his speeches with erudite Greek or Latin expressions, even with quotes from Gide or Goethe’.

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ing comes at the expense of other national languages and also fosters glottophagy. It implies frequent Wolof-French code-switching and code-mixing, as well as strong influences on the Senegalese variety of French, and hence definitely contributes to giving Senegal its own linguistic identity that transcends colonial heritage. Acknowledgements: I am grateful to Carim Camara for his careful proofreading from a Senegalese perspective and his insightful answers to many questions on the current language situation. I would also like to thank Eartha Melzer for her language polishing and Monica Lehnhardt for her help with Table 1. Any shortcomings of this chapter are, of course, entirely my responsibility.

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Komlan Essizewa, Promise Dodzi Kpoglu, and Margot van den Berg

17 Togo Abstract: This chapter presents French as it is spoken in Togo. Taking the form of a survey, we first attempt to situate the French language within the Togolese sociolinguistic space. We recall the endogenous (indigenous)-exogenous characterization of the various languages, their geographical spread, and social distribution. We highlight the fact that the French language is an exogenous language; and that it is placed within a rich linguistic ecology. Consequently, functionally, it participates in a multidimensional multilingual arrangement. In this arrangement, two major endogenous languages, Ewe and Kabiye, due to the rather turbulent linguistic history of the country, play major stratal vehicular roles. This has influences not only on the language ideology and policies of the country but also on the linguistic features of the most ubiquitous exogenous language, French. The linguistic influences are observable on all levels of linguistic analysis, with a seeming ongoing process of nativization. The suggestion then is that this should be the right time for full-scale projects to document the grammar of this nativized variety. Keywords: Togo, linguistic ecology, multilingualism, French, nativization

1 Sociolinguistic situation One of the characteristics of African countries is their rich linguistic diversity (Zsiga/ Boyer/Kramer 2015, 201–205). In the case of Togo, the linguistic landscape consists of multiple indigenous languages as well as various European, Asian, and other African languages (Lasisi 1993, 1). These languages coexist in complex and shifting structures of multilingual communication that challenge traditional views of multilingualism in Africa. On the one hand, the multilingual language situation of Togo can be described in terms of the well-known trilingual model of multilingualism that is often considered typical of Africa (Batibo 2005, 17). In this three-term system of languages, there is one language that is considered the local community language, one language that is an “indigenous” lingua franca, and the third language is a European language that has national and international currency. French is the main European language in present-day Togo, and the two other languages depend on geographic location. For example, in the town of Aklakou in the South of Togo, children are educated in French, their parents speak Mina at the local market, and Kotafon is spoken at home if they are of Kotafon ancestry – both Mina (Gen) and Kotafon belonging to the Gbe cluster of languages that are part of the Kwa group of the Niger-Congo family. On the other hand, in the north, the indigenous linguae francae are Kabiye and Dagbani, and the third language is likely to be a Central Gur language. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-017

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However, multilingualism in Togo is often more complex than this three-way division. First, one could argue that Hausa is in competition with Mina and Kabiye, particularly in trading centres of the North where it is widely used as a lingua franca. In the North, Ewe and Kabiye are used in public schools as languages of instruction in addition to French, but furthermore, Arabic is the main language of instruction in Islamic schools. More importantly, the trilingual model fails to capture the common observation that individuals may use more than one language in the same social domain. Individuals may even switch between languages in the same utterance (cf. Essizewa 2007 for examples of codeswitching between Kabiye and Ewe). In some African countries such as Nigeria, for example, new languages have emerged out of these situations of high and intense language contact, as shown by Naijá (previously known as Nigerian Pidgin) for example. No new contact language has emerged in Togo. But there is variation in French, ranging from acrolectal French to mesolectal French. This is despite the spread of Mina as a lingua franca. Thus, to capture the context within which the French language evolves in Togo, one must appreciate the linguistic ecology of Togo. The estimated number of languages spoken in Togo varies from one scholar to another. According to Takassi (1983, 31), there are forty-four languages spoken in Togo. Afeli (2003, 120) reduces this number to about thirty languages. Ethnologue estimates the number of Togolese languages at thirty-nine, including French, French Sign Language, and Fulfulde (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa 2018, 24). GblemPoidi/Kantchoa (2012, 24) count thirty-seven languages, while they lower that number to thirty-three in their newly revised edition of 2018. Glottolog lists 53 languages of Togo (cf. Hammarström et al. 2023). In summary, each author distinguishes between languages and their varieties on different grounds, reflecting increased insights into language naming practices as well as advancements in linguistic research. As languages are known by many names by different groups and peoples, some authors mistakenly count the same language twice, assuming that the names, which could refer to the language on the one hand, and the people on the other, refer to different languages. The case of Waci is very informative: While Waci was generally regarded as a language in earlier works, it is currently regarded as a variety of Ewe (Kluge 2007). A second issue concerns the categorization of the languages. Commonly, languages in Togo are categorized as either indigenous or exogenous. This is however different from author to author. Thus, Fulfulde, also known as Fulani or Peul, is sometimes labelled as indigenous but at other times as exogenous. Also, the criteria for distinction are not always clear. For example, the Portuguese arrived in the region around the same time as the Ga, but the Portuguese language is generally regarded as an exogenous language, whereas the language of the Ga, that is Gen, but more commonly known in Togo as Mina, is typically viewed as indigenous. In the next sub-section, we do not dwell on these latter issues, as they are beyond the scope of this chapter. We instead concentrate on providing information on the geographical distribution of the languages and their roles within the Togolese sociolinguistic space, as this influences French as it is spoken in the country.

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1.1 Geographical distribution Present-day Togo is divided into five regions, ranging from Savannah in the north to Kara and Central in the middle, and Plateaux and Maritime in the south. In general, Mabia (Gur) languages are dominant in the north, while Kwa languages dominate in the south. Table 1 presents an overview of the languages distributed across the various regions. Table 1: Overview of languages per region (cf. Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa 2018, 399; RGPH 2010) Region

Population Area (km²) InhabiCapital tants/km²

Languages

Maritime 2,565,696 (with Lomé)

6,395

401

Lomé

Plateaux

1,363,997

16,974

80

Atakpamé Ifè, Igo, Ikposo, Aja, Fon, Kebu Fula

Central

610,140

13,182

46

Sokodé

Tem, Akaselem, Anii, Bago-Kusuntu, Delo, Adele, Ginyanga

Kara

759,825

11,631

65

Kara

Kabiye, Ditammari, Lama, Miyobe, Nawdm, Ntcham

Savannah

816,098

8,603

94

Dapaong

Moba, Gourmanchéma, Mampruli, Anufo, Biali, Bissa, Kusaal, Ngangam, Mbelime, Konkomba, Mossi

Ewe, Adangbe, Xwla Gbe, Xwela Gbe

Overviews such as Table 1 are, however, highly simplified representations of reality and should be treated with caution. Even though multiple languages are listed for each region, the total number of languages per region is higher if the languages are included that are not considered typical of the region. Due to migration (trade, education, marriage), the regions are actually more multilingual than suggested by the table. Furthermore, it should be noted that the present geographical distribution of the languages is different from the distribution in the past. The area has seen many drawings and redrawings of linguistic and ethnic boundaries, and this is reflected in the extreme geographical and genetic discontinuity of the linguistic map of the area that is now known as Togo (also cf. Dakubu 1997; Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa 2018). The most widely known historical example is perhaps the foundation of the southern town of Glidji, that is located some thirty kilometres from Lomé, the current capital. Glidji was founded in 1663 by the Ga ruling family, which fled from the Akwamu in present-day Ghana. There, the Ga became known as the Gen (Guin in French), and they merged with the Mina. It is their variety of Ewe that has become the commercial language of Togo – Mina women played an important role in the early stages of this process (cf. Dakubu 1997, 126; Bole-Richard 1983, 6). The Glidji case is to be distinguished from movements that occurred because of slavery. Slave raids were the cause of a lengthy period of instability in the northern regions in

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the nineteenth century. Many individuals, as well as groups, migrated to safer grounds, where they were assimilated by the communities that were already there. For example, speakers of a language called Simaí became part of the Siwu-speaking Akpafu, replacing their original language with Siwu (Dakubu 1997, 127). But then, examples such as these are rare; not because these migrations did not happen, but, as Dakubu points out, “[s]ince no knowledge of the earlier languages has remained, it is impossible to say how many languages totally disappeared and how many lost some of their speakers but survive elsewhere” (1997, 127).

The slave trade not only impacted the northern regions but also the southern region. From the fifteenth century onwards, Europeans erected forts and castles on the West African coast to facilitate trade. At the time, the Portuguese language became an important trade language on the entire west African coast. Its presence in the coastal region of present-day Togo was reinforced by the return of Portuguese-speaking Afro-Brazilians after manumission in the early eighteenth century and later, in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, by Afro-Brazilians who were looking for opportunities for advancement, but also to escape persecution by the Brazilian government. Afro-Brazilian families have gone on to have considerable influence on the economic and political life of Togo (Amos 2001). Between 1884 and 1960, the southern part of Togo known as Eweland experienced shifting and episodic colonial governance by the Germans (1885–1914), the British (1914–1919), and the French (1914/1919–1956). Furthermore, the League of Nations Mandate, the United Nations Trusteeship systems, and the Nazi-backed Vichy regime also played prominent roles (cf. Lawrance 2007, 3ss., for details). Thus, German, English, and French further diversified the already complex and variable linguistic landscape of the region.

1.2 Social distribution From a demographic perspective, the languages of Togo can be ordered as follows, based on numbers of speakers (cf. Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa 2018, 400s.): both Ewe and Kabiye have more than one million native speakers. Ewe native speakers represent the majority in the south and in the whole country. They are estimated to be 3 million people. Kabiye occupies the second position, and its native speakers are estimated to be 1,098,393 people. Tem, Moba, Nawdm, Gourmanchéma, Ikposo, Lama, Aja, Ifè, Ntcham, Fon (including Kotafon), and Fulfulde have more than one hundred thousand speakers. Konkomba, Anufo, Akebu, Akaselem, Ngangam, Ditammari, Xwla Gbe, Xwela Gbe, Mossi, Kebu Fula, and Adele have between twenty and one hundred thousand native speakers. Ginyanga, Anii, Miyobe, Mampruli, Bissa, Bago-Kusuntu, Igo, Delo, Adangbe, Biali, Mbelime, Dagbani, and Kusaal have less than twenty thousand speakers. The demographic composition of the population of Togo may have far-reaching consequences in terms of language maintenance and linguistic diversity. The majority of

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the population (60 %) is under the age of twenty-five (INSEED 2015, 5). Young adults are particularly mobile, moving to cities for education and jobs, where they encounter Mina and/or Kabiye, depending on the location. This can shape multilingual language practices, but it may also lead to language endangerment. It should be noted, however, that other factors such as socio-economic background, group membership, location, age, and gender also impact multilingualism. For example, many members of the generally affluent and influential Afro-Brazilian community only speak French and sometimes Portuguese (Amos 2001, 296). On the other hand, it may be the case that an elderly Kusasi woman from the village of Biankouri in the North is not as fluent in French as she is in Kusaal, as she may have encountered French only in primary school (cf. Hoogeveen/Rossi 2019, 9–30, for an overview of primary education in Togo). Furthermore, the different languages of Togo have various social meanings. While French, English, and Portuguese are generally associated with modernity and progress, they are also associated with feelings of exploitation, dishonesty, and foreignness. Depending on the location, the same holds for the languages that are used as regional linguae francae. Indigenous languages, on the one hand, are associated with authenticity, honesty and belongingness, and traditional wisdom and knowledge, but they are also regarded as backward, uneducated, obsolete, and a hindrance to economic progress. People are aware of the different and sometimes contradictory connotations of the languages, and they make use of them in conversation. For example, one of the participants in our research on codeswitching (van den Berg et al. 2017) commented that he did not want to use his indigenous language in the colour naming task as the objects were ‘too modern’ and ‘too nice’ to be characterized by a colour name that invokes the sense of murky water. Another example that illustrates the difference in social meaning of the various languages concerns language use in negotiations with taxi drivers and motorcycle taxis in Lomé. Speaking French in these negotiations causes the fare to go up.  

2 Linguistic history The linguistic history of French in Togo is closely linked to the school system under colonial rule. English, German, and two variants of Ewe were used in school during the period of German colonization (1884–1914). During the French and British occupation of Togo (1914–1920), English and Ewe were used in schools in the areas that were under British rule. In the French areas, only French was taught in schools. The first school during the French occupation of Togo was built in 1915 (cf. Afeli 2003, 19). After 1922, when the shared colonial rule of Togo by England and France came to an end, French colonizers continued their exogenous language policy, and they reinforced the position of French as the sole language of instruction (cf. Bafei 2011, 251).

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2.1 Introduction of French in Togo The introduction of French in Togo dates to the period of French colonization in Western Africa. French colonization in Togo came with a third educational system, as the Togolese had already been exposed to German and British educational systems prior to the arrival of the French (cf. Bunche 1934 for an early overview; Gbikpi-Benissan 2011; Lawrance 2000, among others, for more contemporary overviews). After the fall of Germany in World War I, Togo was considered an unexplored land. On 4 and 5 August 1914, Governor Von Doering sent a telegram to the Governors of Dahomey (current Benin) and Gold Coast (Ghana) to consider Togo as a neutral land. The two Governors refused, and this was followed by the invasion of Togo. On 7 August 1914, the British occupied Lomé, and on 8 August, the French took possession of Aného. By 27 August of that year, Togo was in the hands of the Allies. During the first partition, Lomé and Kpalimé were attributed to the British, who administered the areas for six years. In the second partition, which happened on 10 July 1919, France got back Lomé and Kpalimé. As compensation, France offered two portions of its Togolese territory to the British in the North. The official restoration of Lomé and Kpalimé to the French took place in October 1920. On 20 July 1922, the League of Nations Council ratified the agreement between the French and British. This marked the official occupation of Togo by France, and the delimitation of Togolese territory was reorganized. During the French administration, the Togolese education system underwent some crises. According to Lange (1989), there were two main causes. The first was related to the change of the language of education, and the second concerned the fact that German missionaries were expulsed from the country. The change of language was a hard knock because the schools situated in Lomé and Kpalimé had earlier abandoned German for English. This third change nevertheless marked the official introduction of French into Togo. According to Essizewa (2007, 40), when the French took over, the country was not considered a French colony. It was a separate entity, governed by a French High Commissioner. As Chumbow/Bobda (2000, 40) remark, this distinction was only theoretical because Togo was treated the same way as the other French colonial territories. French became the colonial language of instruction and administration, even though very few people could speak it. The French colonial administration imposed an educational system modelled on that of Metropolitan France, with French as the sole language of instruction. Togolese languages were looked down upon and were not allowed in the classroom. The main objective of the French administration during the colonial period, as described by Lange (1989, 46) was ‘to train as quickly as possible, the francophone workforce needed, in order to put in place a colonial administration’.1

1 “Former très vite le personnel francophone nécessaire à la mise en place de l’administration coloniale” (Lange 1989, 46).

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Togolese students from French colonial schools received degrees equivalent to that of Metropolitan France. In fact, it can be said without exaggeration that the Frenchification of the educational system in Togo began from the French colonial occupation, continued up to independence, and has endured, to some extent, to the present day.

2.2 Development of French in Togo To assert their domination in Togo, the French adopted a national education policy as soon as they arrived in August 1914. The aim of the policy was to impose the French language and culture while expelling the German missionaries from Togo. Thus, the development of the French language in Togo dates to its imposition as the only language of instruction in primary schools. Similarly, the contents of the curriculum, as well as the structures of the education system, were developed according to the expectations of the French. By subjecting the population to instruction in French, France intended to transmit its own culture to the Togolese (cf. Hamelin 2014, 17). With the aim of assimilating the Togolese, the French believed that education was one of the best means to attain this objective. They, therefore, created many schools, especially in the southern part of Togo, and this constituted the springboard for the development of the French language in Togo. As Turcotte puts it: ‘Indeed, the school is the surest way that a civilising nation can use to get a primitive population to adhere to their ideas so that they can bring them up to their level. The school is, in one word, the surest propaganda element of the cause and the French language, available to the government’.2

The Ewe language was thus eliminated from primary school. By 1922, only French was used in schools, and it was the only recognized language of official business (cf. Bafei 2011, 251). Indeed, to promote the language, the French imposed a system of education, which did not consider the local languages. Pupils were simply punished for using local languages at school. Students caught speaking a local language were given a dirty old animal skull to wear around the neck. It was called signal and constituted an insult and a shame. As Pastor Kpizing recalls, ‘Once registered in school, whether we liked it or not, we were forced to bury our maternal language, at least on the school compound, so we speak the language of the colonial master. Many can still remember the signal system. The enlightened person was therefore the person who despised the language and culture of his ancestors and took pleasure in the language of the colonial master’.3

2 “L’école est en effet, le moyen d’action le plus sûr qu’une nation civilisatrice ait d’acquérir à ses idées les populations encore primitives et de les élever graduellement jusqu’à elle. L’école est, en un mot, l’élément de propagande de la cause et de la langue française le plus certain dont le gouvernement puisse disposer” (Turcotte 1981, 51). 3 “Une fois inscrit à l’école, bon gré, mal gré, on était contraint d’enterrer la langue maternelle, du moins sur le territoire scolaire pour ne parler que la langue du colon. D’aucuns peuvent encore se souvenir du

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The period after 1920 was marked by French concern to spread the French language in Togo. Hence, schools were built in almost all administrative districts of the country. They also restructured the education policy, and created village, regional and complementary schools (cf. Marguerat 2003, 392). However, in the North of the country, few schools were built, as parents were reluctant to send their children, especially boys, to school. On the other hand, in the south, especially on the coastal lands, people expressed huge demands for school buildings. As Afeli puts it, ‘The 1920s was characterized by a huge development in the public school system’.4 This school system continued until the aftermath of World War II when, under the pressure of post-war events, the Togolese education system was harmonized with the French system. Thus, from 1915 to independence, there was a rapid development of primary education, which was accompanied by the emergence of secondary education and the consolidation of elite training. Consequently, at the end of the French era (before independence), Togo was the most educated country in French West Africa, with an average literacy rate of 24 % in 1950.  

3 External language policy This section deals with the legislation on French as the only official language in Togo, as well as with its use among public authorities, in education, and the media.

3.1 Legislation of French in Togo French became the official language in the first Constitution of the country (cf. Essizewa 2007, 41). Thus, at independence, the language issue was not a debate: French continued and continues to be the only official language for conducting government business.

3.2 Language used by public authorities We observe that French is mainly used by public authorities in Togo. However, individual representatives use, in addition to French, their native languages, especially in oral communication. Consequently, although French is the unmarked choice, authorities use their native languages depending on the interlocutor or the intended audience. The other choice is often Ewe, which is assuming the role of a lingua franca. Codeswitching seems nevertheless limited: Official representatives such as the president, ministers, système du “signale.” L’évolué était donc celui qui avait méprisé et la langue et la culture de ses ancêtres pour se plaire dans la langue du colon” (Kpizing 1992, 2). 4 “La période des années 20 est marquée par un très grand développement de l’enseignement public” (Afeli 2003, 207).

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members of parliament, or mayors use only French for their official speeches. French is also the only language used in official documents and correspondences, on road signs, banknotes, and stamps. It is a common language in multilingual official and unofficial meetings across the country (cf. Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa 2018, 406).

3.3 Languages used in education In many French-speaking countries, the education system is generally dominated by the use of one language, which is French (cf. Reutner 2017, 31ss.). In Togo, three languages are officially used in education, but not at the same levels. French is the only language of instruction. Children are taught in French from the first year onwards, even if they have little exposure to French prior to school entry. Hoogeveen/Rossi (2019) compare outcomes on learning tests in primary education across francophone Africa. They conclude that Togo does worse in French than most francophone countries, but it is better in maths (Hoogeveen/Rossi 2019, 24). Furthermore, they observe that the problem of low learning achievements emerges in the early grades (Hoogeveen/Rossi 2019, 24). Note that when Togo was under German rule, many schools offered instruction in Ewe. This development was part of the process of standardization that ultimately resulted in a high proportion of Togolese learning to speak, read and write the Ewe language. Ewe books and newspapers were commonplace in Lomé in 1910 (Lawrance 2000, 490). So, as Gbikpi-Benissan observes, ‘by becoming the only language of instruction in Togo, French took that function away from the Ewe language, one of its core functions under German rule’.5

In primary education, only French is used; English is introduced in Junior Secondary School as a compulsory subject, and French remains the core language of instruction; Togolese national languages (Ewe and Kabiye) are subjects of study at both Junior and Senior Secondary school levels (named collège and lycée, respectively), but not in all secondary schools in Togo – only a few schools, especially confessional schools, teach them as subjects. The two languages are optional subjects in the Junior Secondary School Certificate (Brevet d’Études du Premier Cycle) examination. They are also optional in the Senior Secondary school Certificate (baccalaureate) examination. In addition to the two colonial languages, German and Spanish are also introduced in Senior Secondary School for students whose main field of study is literature and arts. They also appear as optional subjects for students who major in sciences.

5 “En devenant la seule langue d’enseignement au Togo, le français enlevait à l’éwé une des fonctions qu’elle avait sous l’occupation allemande” (Gbikpi-Benissan 1990, 13).

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At the university level, French is the only language of instruction, apart from the departments of English, German, and Spanish, where instruction is done in those languages. Because of its importance in the world today, English is gradually being introduced as a component in other departments apart from the department of English. Ewe and Kabiye are taught in the department of linguistics, and Arabic is taught in the department of English as an optional subject. Today, Chinese is also taking ground in Togo. There is one Chinese institute (Institut Confucius) at the University of Lomé offering a bachelor’s degree in translation.

3.4 Language used in the media The media is one of the most important domains for the use of languages in multilingual countries. Because of the official status of French, it is the main language used in almost all domains of the media. Press – After independence, the first state newspaper was published in 1962. The paper was mainly written in French. A little portion, called Denyigba ‘homeland’, was nevertheless reserved for Ewe. In 1977, Kabiye was introduced in the newspaper, under the heading Dεcadε (modified later as Dε-εjadε ‘homeland’). Today, four languages (French, English, Ewe, Kabiye) are used in various newspapers, with French as the dominant language. In general, only one page is reserved for Ewe and Kabiye, and half a page for English in the official newspaper, Togo Presse. Private newspapers and magazines publish exclusively in French. French is also exclusively used in advertising both in print and on screen. Radio – The situation is different on the radio, where many languages can be heard in addition to French. The use of Togolese languages varies from one radio station to another. There are seventy-nine radio stations in Togo – two state radio stations and seventy-seven private radio stations. Ewe is most widely heard on radio, followed by Kabiye, Gen, Tem, and Moba. Some minority languages such as Adangbe, Anii, Biali, Delo, Adele, Ginyanga, Igo, Kusaal, Xwla Gbe, and Xwela Gbe are not used on the radio. An overview of radio stations and their languages can be found in Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa (2018, 428). Television – The most frequent languages on television are French, English, Spanish, and Arabic, and further Ewe, Gen, Kabiye, Tem, Ifè, and Ikposo. French is used on all channels, but the other languages differ per channel. On state television (Télévision Togolaise), broadcasting is in French, English, Ewe, and Kabiye. Ewe and Kabiye are given fifteen minutes of broadcasting on a daily basis; the rest is mostly French. Private television stations broadcast in French as well as other languages depending on the location of the intended audience and the type of television station. Commercial and regional channels broadcast in French, Ewe, Kabiye, and sometimes in Gen, Tem, Ifè, Ikposo, and Spanish, while religious channels will also use Arabic. A list of television stations can be found in Gblem-Poidi/Kantchoa (2018, 434).

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Internet – On the internet, French is the only language used across all the official Togolese websites. Some Togolese languages are used on social media, depending on the user and the intended audience.

4 Linguistic characteristics The linguistic features characteristic of Togolese French occur on all levels of linguistic analysis. Thus, there are many idiosyncratic features relative to phonetics and phonology, morphology, syntax, lexicology, semantics, and pragmatics of Togolese French. In this chapter, we restrict ourselves to some phonetic and phonological features, some syntactic features, and some aspects of lexicology.

4.1 Pronunciation Investigations into the phonetic and phonological features of French spoken in Togo have largely been undertaken within a comparative framework. The main concern has been to interrogate the crosslinguistic phonetic and phonological influences that can be noted. Thus, while Lafage (1985) focuses on juxtaposing the phonological systems of Mina and French in order to identify various influences, including the phonetic and phonological ones, Picron/Simon (2018), carrying out their investigation within the project Phonologie du Français Contemporain (cf. Durand/Laks/Lyche 2009), attempt to interpret the features noted of Togolese French as partially the result of influences from Mina. With increasing discussions on the similarities and differences that can be noted in the phonologies of the different varieties of French spoken on the continent, it can be argued that the phonological and phonetic features of Togolese French are better considered as the result of a process of nativization. (We use the term “variety” to refer to the intersubjective form of the language and not to any idiolectal variant, the practice of which Telep (2019) suggests the term style). Consequently, many of the phonetic and phonological features of Togolese French, taken from works cited above, align with features noted for varieties spoken elsewhere on the continent, while few seem idiosyncratic (cf. Nimbona/Steien 2019 for similarities between the phonological and phonetic features of various African French varieties, and de Mareüil/Boutin 2011 for a perceptive difference between some of the African French varieties). In this light, the features surveyed concern segmental features more than supra-segmental properties. This notwithstanding, sporadically, some few suprasegmental values are highlighted. We survey not only vowel, consonantal, and glide properties but also some phonological process and their relationship with syllable structures. Vowels – The vowel sounds inventory of Togolese French is the same as that of standard French i.e., a fifteen-unit system that has eleven oral sounds and four nasal sounds.

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Vowels: oppositions – However, like what pertains in standard French and other varieties, the opposition /a/ : /ɑ/ is not manifest. Thus, unlike in Belgian French for instance, where the opposition is realized as a durational contrast (cf. Hambye/Francard/ Simon 2003, 4), a distinction is not made between the vowels in the minimal pair pâte ‘pasta’ ~ patte ‘leg’, realized both as [pat] instead of, respectively [pɑt] and [pat]. Vowels: mid vowels – Another noteworthy characteristic of Togolese French is the pattern associated with central vowels, which is often referred to as the law of position (loi de position). There are notable exceptions to la loi de position in standard French. A systematic characterization of the exceptions in Togolese French is part of the work left to be done on the pronunciation of this variety. See Lenzen (2008) for a succinct overview of discussions involving la loi de position in central French and some southern varieties of French. The idea is that, in standard French, the middle vowels distribute such that the tendency is to produce mid-high vowels in open syllables, and mid-low vowels in closed syllables. Thus, in an open syllable, léger, sot, and peut will have a closed pronunciation (respectively [leʒe], [so], and [pø]), while in a closed syllable, légère, sotte et peuvent will have on opened pronunciation (respectively [leʒɛʁ], [sɔt] and [pœv], cf. Lenzen 2008, 7). In Togolese French as well, the tendency is to reduce the phonemic relevance of these oppositions, hence aligning with the standard French pattern. The manifestation of the loi de position is, however, only evident when the features of productions are concomitant with targeted features. Vowels: substitutions – Substitutions mainly concern rounded vowels. For instance, it is not rare for the high front rounded vowel [y] to be realized as the high front unrounded vowel [i]; for the mid-high front rounded vowel [ø] to be realized as the midhigh front unrounded vowel [e]; and for the mid-low rounded vowel [œ] to be realized as the mid-low front unrounded vowel [ɛ] as evidenced in the following examples: bureau ‘office’ can be realized as [biro] instead of [byʁo], des œufs ‘eggs’ as [deze] instead of [dɛzø], and cœur ‘heart’ as [kɛɹ] instead of [kœʁ]. Vowels: nasals – Nasal sounds also manifest the same characteristics. First, all four nasal vowel sounds of standard French can be observed in Togolese French as well. With acoustic correlates yet to be determined, unlike for other African varieties such as Cameroonian French (cf. Nkwescheu 2010), it is not possible to determine the stage of nasality that can be noted for nasal vowels of Togolese French. That which is evident, however, is that nasal sounds can also be substituted for each other. Thus, for instance, [ɛ̃] can be pronounced as [ã]; [ɔ̃] can sound as [õ], and [œ̃ ] can be realized as [ɛ̃]. The critical point is that the sounds produced differ from those of standard French, as shown in the following examples: invincible ‘invincible’ can be realized as [ãvãsibl̥ ] instead of [ɛ̃.vɛ̃. sibl], garçon ‘boy’ can be realized as [ɡaɹsõ] instead of [ɡaʁ.sɔ̃], and défunt ‘deceased’ can be realized as [defɛ̃] instead of [de.fœ̃ ]. Vowels: vowel harmony – A final comment concerning vowels in Togolese French involves their participation in assimilation processes. Vowel harmony usually concerns height and labial assimilation. The production of rhinocéros ‘rhinoceros’ [ʁinɔseʁɔs] by Togolese French speakers illustrates vowel height harmony. In the Togolese pronuncia-

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tion, the mid-low back vowel of the second syllable assimilates to the height of the nucleus of the following syllable [e] so that the mid-high back vowel is produced instead [ʁinoseʁɔs]. On the other hand, the pronunciation of déjeuner ‘lunch’ [deʒœne] illustrates labial harmony. In the Togolese pronunciation, the mid-high front vowel of the first syllable undergoes roundness effects so that its features assimilate to the labiality of the nucleus of the following syllable [œ]. Both vowels then assimilate to the height position of the nucleus of the last syllable, i.e. the mid-high front vowel. Thus, the word is pronounced as [dø.ʒø.ne]. Indeed, an alternate analysis of the latter production is to consider that the mid-low round vowel of the second syllable first assimilates to the height position of the vowel of the last syllable; then the mid-high front vowel of the first syllable assimilates the labiality of the nucleus of the second syllable. Although not without merit, as evidenced in the production of rhinocéros [ʁinoseʁɔs], vowel harmony in Togolese French seems too often to be of the regressive type, hence favouring a regressive analysis of déjeuner [døʒøne]. Consonants: /ʁ/ – Turning to consonants, the consonant phoneme that manifests the most idiosyncratic features vis-à-vis standard French and other African varieties is /ʁ/. In standard French, /ʁ/ is considered to either occur as [χ], when it occurs in the neighbourhood of an unvoiced obstruent, and [ʁ] elsewhere (cf. Léon 1966, 111ss.). Since Carton (1974, 30), it is considered that /ʁ/ can occur variably in spoken French in France, in two major ways: first, [r], which has the articulatory characteristic of involving the apex of the tongue and the alveolar region, and, second, [ʁ], which involves either the back of the tongue and the hard palate or the uvula. Boutin/Turcsan (2009, 7) note for Ivorian French eight different phonetic realizations of /ʁ/, which are neither associated with particular phonetic contexts nor sociolinguistic variables: an alveolar approximant [ɹ], an alveolar trill [r], a voiced fricative uvular [ʁ], an unvoiced fricative uvular [χ], a voiced pharyngal fricative [ʕ], an unvoiced pharyngal fricative [ħ], an unvoiced glottal fricative [h], and a uvular trill [ʀ]. This is in addition to the fact that /ʁ/ can also be elided, and the elision compensated for via vowel lengthening (Côté/Lamy 2012 observe a similar tendency for Canadian French). Togolese French seems to mirror the Ivoirian situation, albeit with its own peculiarities. First, like that which is noted for Ivoirian French, /ʁ/ can be elided, especially in coda position. The elision of /ʁ/ is often compensated for by vowel lengthening. Thus, fêtard ‘party animal’ will be realized as [fɛtaː] instead of [fɛtaʁ], pêcheur ‘fisherman’ as [pɛʃœː] instead of [pɛʃœʁ], and millionaire ‘millionaire’ as [miljɔnɛː] instead of [miljɔnɛʁ]. When /ʁ/ occurs, eight phonetic variants surface: an alveolar trill [r], a voiced alveolar tap [ɾ], an alveolar approximant [ɹ], a uvular trill [ʀ], an unvoiced fricative uvular [χ], an unvoiced pharyngeal fricative [ħ], an unvoiced glottal fricative [h], and a voiced glottal fricative [ɦ]. Thus, six of the eight phonetic realizations of /ʁ/ in Ivoirian French occur in Togolese French. Two phonetic realizations of Togolese French are, however, not noted for Ivoirian French: the voiced alveolar tap [ɾ] and the voiced glottal fricative [ɦ]. It can thus be considered that these variants are idiosyncratic values of Togolese French.

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Consonants: elisions – It is important to note that sound elision does not concern just /ʁ/ but can involve other consonants as well. Elision occurs typically in coda position and can involve simple as well as complex codas. Thus, words such as roc ‘rock’ and jeune ‘young’ can be realized as [ʁɔ] and [ʒœ] instead of [ʁɔk] and [ʒœn]. On the other hand, intact ‘intact’ and articles ‘articles’, which involve complex codas, can be produced as [ɛ̃tak] and [aʁtik] instead of [ɛ̃takt] and [aʁtikl] – [t] and [l] being the consonant sounds that are elided. It is to be noted that elision in coda position does not always coincide with word-final position as the examples above could suggest. Consonant elision in Togolese French can equally occur in word-median and onset position: jusqu’ici ‘so far’ can be realized as [ʒysisi] instead of [ʒyskisi], ex-mari ‘ex-husband’ as [ɛsmaɾi] instead of [ɛksmaʁi], livraison ‘delivery’ as [lirezɔ̃] instead of [livʁɛzɔ̃], and voilà ‘there is’ as [wala] instead of [vwala]. Consonants: epenthesis – In complex codas, especially in non-word-final positions, where elision does not occur, an epenthetic schwa can occur. Thus, in a word such as ex-femme ‘ex-wife’, the epenthetic schwa occurs after the last consonant of the coda of the first syllable, hence producing a resyllabified unit [ɛk.sə.fam] instead of [ɛks.fam]. Consonants: devoicing – Devoicing mainly concerns fricative sounds that occur in both onset and coda position. In onset position, a word such as gingembre ‘ginger’ can be realized as [ʃɛ̃ʃãbʁ] instead of [ʒɛ̃ʒɑ̃bʁ], and jaloux ‘jealous’ can be produced as [ʃalu] instead of [ʒalu]. In coda position village ‘village’ can be produced as [vilaʃ] instead of [vilaʒ], and église ‘church’ can be produced as [eɡlis] instead of [eɡliz]. This does not exclude other sounds such as voiced plosives undergoing devoicing. For instance, club ‘club’ can be pronounced as [klœb̥ ] instead of [klœb]. Indeed, it is not rare for the opposite, voicing of unvoiced consonants, to also occur. Therefore, oncle ‘uncle’ can be pronounced as [ɑɡl̥ ] instead of [ɔ̃kl], and difficile ‘difficult’ can be pronounced as [divisil̥ ] instead of [difisil]– in the latter case, both processes i.e. voicing [v] and devoicing [l̥ ], occur. The tendency is that, in post-vocalic position, a consonant is likely to undergo a phonological process. Consonants: assimilation – There are rare cases of assimilation involving consonants. This often involves the manner of articulation. Thus, for instance, plosives can assimilate to fricatives when they precede a fricative. Objet ‘object’ and absent ‘absent’ can be realized as [ɔβʒɛ] and [aβsɑ̃] respectively instead of [ɔbʒɛ] and [apsɑ̃]. More important, however, is the fact that, as with rhinocéros ‘rhinoceros’, assimilation is regressive and not progressive (cf. section on vowel harmony). Glides – Glides are often subject to dieresis. Thus, syllables in which glides occur can be divided into two different syllables when dieresis occurs. Consequently, scier ‘to saw’ and relier ‘connect’, which undergo dieresis, are pronounced as [si.je] and [ʁə.li.je] instead of [sje] and [ʁə.lje]. Prosody – Finally, the prosodic features of Togolese French have not been intensively investigated. Together with nasality, they represent some of the grey areas of inquiry into this endogenous French variety. Lafage (1985) represents one of the very rare studies into the domain. However, as she notes in her conclusion:

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‘The elite tend to produce intonation patterns that closely resemble those of ours [standard French], so that we are unable to note the differences…concerning the French spoken by the uneducated, we were unable to discover any stable structures’.6

4.2 Morphosyntax (Morpho-)Syntactic features of Togolese French occur on word, phrasal and clausal levels. Nominal phrase – Togolese French speakers typically use nominals (with number and gender marking often present) with the required determiners. As such, it is not uncommon to hear students say to their parents je vais à l’école ‘I am going to school’ in which case, like what pertains in standard French, the noun école ‘school’ occurs with the definite article. However, in the mesolectal variant, some peculiarities can be noted in the way bare nouns occur with determiners. First, it is not uncommon for Togolese speakers to use nouns without determiners, where it is not expected in standard French. For instance, speakers can use the nouns cabri ‘goat’ and couteau ‘knife’ instead of un cabri ‘a goat’ and du couteau ‘of a knife’, in the expression Cabri mort n’a pas peur de couteau ‘A dead goat does not fear the knife’, when one will expect the expression un cabri mort n’a pas peur du couteau in standard French. The omission of determiners, especially of the definite article, is the most frequent with nouns that are borrowed from the local language. In the construction manger gbekui, which means ‘to eat gbekui’, one can observe the non-occurrence of an article with the borrowed term gbekui, which refers to a local sauce made of leafy vegetables. Indeed, the omission of determiners has found space in some localized expressions. Thus, in the expression avoir façon blanc, which can be used to mean ‘to have Western manners’ instead of avoir des mannières des blancs, the article is most often omitted. Furthermore, even where articles occur with the noun, they can fulfil different grammatical functions than those that are noted in standard French. For instance, the definite article can occur to function as a possessive adjective. Lafage (1985, 410) reports that an employee can use the sentence le patron est venu ‘the boss has come’ instead of mon patron est venu ‘my boss has come’ to signal that his (the employee’s) boss has come. i.e., the definite article receives an adjectival interpretation. Finally, pronouns are also often correctly used. However, the adverbial pronoun y seems to be undergoing collocational restriction. It often occurs with the pronoun en. Thus, while it is difficult to hear a sentence such as il y est ‘he is there’ spoken by mesolectal users of the language, it is not uncommon to hear y en a marre instead of on en a marre ‘we are fed up’.

6 “Les élites tendent à réaliser des intonations assez proches de notre propre intonation pour que les différences ne nous soient pas audibles…en ce qui concerne le français des non-lettrés, nous n’avons pas été capable [sic] de découvrir des structures stables” (Lafage 1985, 223).

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Verb – Phrasal features are not limited to the noun phrase but can occur in the verb phrase as well. Generally, highly educated speakers of French have mastery of the linguistic features of standard French verb phrase. Idiosyncratic features that can be labelled as being typical of Togolese French are thus of the mesolectal variant. For instance, one can note the ubiquity of the use of the periphrastic future in referring to future events. Thus, between il va manger ‘he is going to eat’ and il mangera ‘he will eat’, a typical Togolese French speaker employs the latter to refer to the future activity. Another example of idiosyncrasy in the verb phrase concerns the expression of deontic modality. The tendency in Togolese French is to use the form faut without the impersonal third-person singular pronominal subject to express deonticity. Thus, to inform someone of the need to eat, a Togolese French speaker is likely to use the construction faut manger instead of il faut manger/tu dois manger ‘you must eat’. Argument structure can equally be concerned. For instance, a high school leaver can use the expression j’ai fréquenter instead of je suis scolarisé to mean ‘I have had formal education/I am literate’. Also, Noyau (2001, 67) notes that it is not uncommon to hear a Togolese teacher use the expression qui peut ∅ expliquer? instead of qui peut l’expliquer? ‘Who can explain it?’. In this latter instance, the direct object pronoun le that occurs in the standard French construction is not part of the Togolese construction. Prepositions – In most instances, prepositions occur along similar lines as in standard French. However, in some instances, where in standard French prepositions are expected to occur, in Togolese French, the prepositions can be elided. This concerns especially construction involving time nominals. For instance, speakers can use the expression il travaille trois heures instead of il travaille depuis trois heures (déjà) to mean ‘he has been working for trois hours already’. While in the standard French expression the preposition depuis ‘since’ occurs to function as the head of the phrase in which trois heures ‘trois hours’ is a dependent, in the Togolese French construction, it is not available. Given that a sentence such as *trois heures il travaille is not productive in Togolese French, it can be considered that absence of the preposition is proof of the fact that the verb travailler ‘to work’ in the construction is conceptualized as a transitive verb; trois heures ‘trois heures’ in the Togolese construction, therefore functions as a direct object of the verb, and not a dependent of a null prepositional head. Consequently, while, as mentioned above, in certain instances there can be reduction in argument structure, there also are constructions in which argument structure is extended. Negation – On the clausal level, one can mention the non-elision of the first part of the bipartite negation marker. Thus, unlike that which pertains in contemporary standard French, where ne is often elided, this is rarely the case in Togolese French. Conjunctions – Syntactic features can also concern coordinated, subordinate and relative clauses. Indeed, the fascinating thing about the features at this level involves the fact that prosodic features can intervene to convey grammatical information. For instance, it is not uncommon to have coordinating conjunctions elided, and these compensated for via prosody.

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4.3 Lexicon The lexicology and vocabulary of Togolese French also present interesting data for investigation. First, Togolese French has lexicalized many forms that are borrowings from indigenous languages (most borrowings are from Ewe and Kabiye) and exogenous languages (English, German, Portuguese, Arabic, Hausa etc). There is a current process of borrowing from Nouchi (an Ivoirian French variety) and Ghanaian Pidgin (a Ghanaian English variety) because of the intense contact between urban youth culture across the west-African sub-region (e. g., kpakpato ‘a gossip’, chalé ‘my guy’). More importantly, like what occurs in other varieties of African French, a large part of the vocabulary of Togolese French is the same as that of standard French. However, there are many aspects of the non-borrowed vocabulary of Togolese French that can be considered localized. Frequency effects – The first type of these lexical items involves terms originally of standard French but very commonly used within the Togolese context (e. g., bananeplantain ‘plantain’, karité ‘shea’). A second set concerns terms that are not commonly used in contemporary standard French but very commonly used in Togolese French. Typical examples are honnir ‘to shame publicly’ and cabri ‘billy-goat’, which are archaic forms in standard French. Meaning changes – Another case are words that have acquired new meanings within the Togolese context. This can involve words for which the semantics have been restricted (e. g., fréquenter ‘to go to school’ instead of ‘to frequent’) or words in which there is an extension of meaning (e. g., gâter ‘to spoil, to destroy’ instead of ‘to ruin’). Word formation – Another category are words that are derived via derivation processes that are productive in French but which refer to indigenous socio-cultural activities, like maraboutage ‘the act of influencing the course of physical activities by resorting to spiritual interventions carried out by a traditional priest’ (< marabout ‘traditional priest’ + ‑age), veuvage ‘widowhood rites’ (< veuve ‘widow’ + ‑age), re-enceinter ‘to get one’s spouse pregnant after a previous pregnancy’ (< re- ‘again’ + enceinter ‘to get pregnant’), and co-habitant ‘co-tenant in a compound house’ (< co- ‘co’ + habitant ‘resident’). Phraseologisms – An interesting group are collocations that are not available in standard French but which are very common in Togolese French. For instance, speakers use the expression porter de l’argent instead of avoir de l’argent sur soi to mean ‘to have money with oneself’, and porter son âge instead of faire son âge to mean ‘to look one’s age’. Finally, there are some rather unique idiomatic expressions, most of which refer to specific aspects of Togolese culture. For instance, cracher l’eau sur quelqu’un refers to the activity of blessing a child by sprinkling water on him especially during the traditional ceremony that introduces the child to the community. Also, souffler un feu refers to the act of blowing air on fire in a hearth. To conclude on the linguistic features of Togolese French, it seems that since Lafage’s enquiry (1985) and the few sporadic inquiries into specific domains, Togolese  

 

 

 

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French has further developed to acquire more stable features. The hypothesis is that the stability should be visible in not only the few features at the levels of linguistic analysis surveyed but also in the semantics and pragmatics as well. Thus, there cannot be any better time than now to launch full-scale projects to investigate the linguistic features of Togolese French. It should be interesting to understand how the features at the different interfaces of linguistic analyses interact to single out Togolese French as a variety distinct from (especially) other west-African French varieties.

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism Language attitudes towards French in Togo have not yet been investigated in a systematic manner in recent years. Lafage (1985, 58) notes that the choice of French in a conversation can be interpreted as a way of increasing one’s prestige. However, it is not always viewed in a positive manner. It can be interpreted as an act of arrogance, pretention, and self-betrayal: ‘According to popular morality, even if the cat wears human clothes, it still meows (if one pretends to be what one isn’t, one ends up betraying oneself)’.7

Based on our observations, we conclude that there is little evidence of people openly criticizing the local variety of French. At the same time, Togolese French receives little overt support or recognition. Note, however, that the spread of lexical innovations such as maraboutage and veuvage (cf. 4.3 above) to informal as well as formal domains (government, newspapers, and websites) can be interpreted as a form of covert recognition. Furthermore, borrowing and codeswitching can offer informative insights into linguistic purism. Essizewa (2009) observes that Ewe borrowings and Kabiye-Ewe codeswitching are commonly used in daily conversation in the Kabiye speech community, particularly in Kara and other urban areas. For most Kabiye speakers that were interviewed (but not the language purists), Kabiye-Ewe codeswitching is a preferred choice because it signals solidarity among the speakers. Essizewa (2009, 71) explains that “[t]his preference is even more pronounced than that for the use of Kabiye and French and/or Kabiye-French code-switching, because the former language contact, signaling solidarity among the speakers, is much more intense and intimate, than the latter” (2009, 71). Borrowings from indigenous languages such as Ewe, Kabiye etc. into French and code-

7 “Et la morale populaire affirme que même si le chat met des vêtements humains, il fait toujours miao (si l’on veut se faire passer pour ce que l’on n’est pas, on finit toujours par se trahir)” (Lafage 1985, 58, italics in the original).

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switching between French and the indigenous languages appear to be less frequent than French borrowings into indigenous languages (also cf. Amuzu 2013, 74; van den Berg et al. 2017, 355). This asymmetry suggests that even though there may not be overt attempts to preserve French from influence from African languages, the result is the same; speakers keep their languages separate. As to borrowings in the indigenous languages, Pere-Kewezima (2009, 209) observes that French or English borrowings, ‘borrowings from the “white language”’ (“les emprunts à la ‘langue du Blanc’”) in Kabiye and codeswitching are not appreciated, in particular in rural areas: ‘Moreover, in the villages of the Kabiye linguistic area, the elderly use the onomatopoeia sulɛsulɛ ‘manner to imitate the hard accent to speak European to designate the French language’; for them, the use of this language is difficult, since they do not understand it’.8

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Dictionaries – Two kinds of dictionaries can be noted for the French spoken in Togo. The first kind includes bilingual dictionaries that attempt to capture Togolese socio-cultural realities expressed in indigenous languages, in French. The results are the use of localized French to remain faithful to the worldviews being translated. In this respect, Rongier (1995)’s Dictionnaire français–éwé ‘French-Ewe dictionary’, and Rongier (2015)’s Dictionnaire éwé–français ‘Ewe-French dictionary’ are interesting sources. There are also French–Kabiye (CLNK/SIL-Togo 1999), Nawdm–French (Babakima 2013) dictionaries, among others. The second kind comprises monolingual dictionaries dedicated to capturing the peculiarities of the Togolese variety of French. In this regards, Lafage’s Dictionnaire des particularités du français au Togo et au Dahomey ‘A dictionary of the particularities of French in Togo and Dahomey’ (1975) stands out as the major reference. Grammars – Lafage (1985) remains the most influential grammar available on the French spoken in Togo. However, this work is restricted to the French spoken by Ewespeakers. Lafage’s work was written at a time when various language assistants (coopérants) from France found themselves working on local varieties of French in Africa. As such, the tendency is to identify the sources that are responsible for the divergence of the local variety from the standard language. Her work, therefore, takes on a very comparative approach. Noyau (2001) and Picron/Simon (2018) represent more recent attempts at characterizing various aspects of the variety of French spoken in Togo. They

8 “D’ailleurs, dans les villages de l’aire linguistique kabiyè, pour désigner la langue française, les personnes âgées ironisent en utilisant l’onomatopée sulɛsulɛ ‘maniere d’imiter l’accent dur parler européen’; pour eux, l’usage de cette langue relève plutôt d’un autre génie intellectuel puisqu’ils ne le comprennent pas” (Pere-Kewezima 2009, 209).

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are, however, restricted in scope, and do not capture the full range of linguistic properties instantiated by this French variety.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Usage – The linguistic characteristics described in 4 appear mostly in spoken language in informal contexts. They rarely occur in literature, official texts, school books, and newspapers (online or in paper) as far as we know, although certain frequently used words such as maraboutage and veuvage (cf. 5.1 and 4.3 above) are more likely to appear in these contexts than morphosyntactic features such as elision of coordinating conjunctions for example. Media that focus on the spoken word, that are less norm-oriented, and where the norms themselves are less well established, such as call-in talk radio or online social media platforms such as Facebook, TikTok and Instagram, among others, display more diversity. Conclusion – We would like to call for full-scale projects that document the lexicon and grammar of Togolese French as well as the on-line and off-line contexts in which it is used, across various age groups and different ethnicities, with various educational, social class, and regional backgrounds, and their language attitudes.

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Léon, Pierre (1966), Prononciation du français standard: aide-mémoire d’orthoépie à l’usage des étudiants étrangers, Paris, Didier. Marguerat, Yves (2003), Les stratégies scolaires au Togo à l’époque du mandat français: Le cours complémentaire de Lomé et la formation des élites modernes, Cahiers d’Études africaines 1–2, 389–408. Nimbona, Gélase/Steien, Guri Bordal (2019), Modes monolingues dans des écologies multilingues: les études phonologiques des français africains, Langue française 2, 43–59. Nkwescheu, Angéline Djoum (2010), La nasalisation dans le français camerounais: un processus marqué, Le français en Afrique 25, 361–375. Noyau, Collette (2001), Le français de référence dans l’enseignement du français et en français au Togo, Cahiers de l’Institut de Linguistique de Louvain 27, 57–73. Ouro-Wetchire, Issaka (2019), Language Policy and Planning: The Use of Togolese Languages in School, Lomé, Université de Lomé, Doctoral Thesis. Pere-Kewezima, Essodina Kokou (2009), Les mots français et anglais dans le lexique kabiyè, Particip’Action 1/1, 201–228 Picron, Gervaise/ Simon, Anne Catherine (2018), Le français parlé par les locuteurs togolais. Interférences entre le mina et le français, Aspects linguistiques et sociolinguistiques des français africains 72, 73–100. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. RGPH = Togolese Republic (2010), Recensement général de la population et de l’habitat, Lomé, Institut National de la Statistique et des Études Économiques et Démographiques. Rongier, Jacques (1995), Dictionnaire français-éwé: suivi d’un index français-éwé, Paris, Karthala. Rongier, Jacques (2015), Dictionnaire éwé-français, Paris, L’Harmattan. Takassi, Issa (1983), Inventaire linguistique du Togo. Atlas et études sociolinguistiques des États du Conseil de l’Entente (ASOL), Abidjan, Institut de Linguistique Appliquée d’Abidjan et Agence de Coopération Culturelle et Technique. Telep, Suzie (2019), Le français d’Afrique, de la variété au style: pour une approche anthropologique de la variabilité langagière en Afrique, Langue française 2, 77–90. Turcotte, Dennis (1981), La politique linguistique en Afrique francophone: une étude comparative de la Côte d’Ivoire et de Madagascar, Quebec, Université Laval. van den Berg, Margot, et al. (2017), Crosslinguistic effects in adjectivization strategies in Suriname, Ghana and Togo, in: Cecelia Cutler/Zvjezdana Vrzic/Philipp Angermeyer (edd.), Language Contact in Africa and the African Diaspora in the Americas, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 343–362. Zsiga, Elizabeth C./Boyer, One Tlale/Kramer, Ruth (edd.) (2015), Languages in Africa: Multilingualism, language policy, and education, Washington, Georgetown University Press.

Nélia Alexandre and Dominika Swolkien

18 Cabo Verde Abstract: In all African countries where Portuguese has established itself, it coexists with other languages, but in Cabo Verde it is in contact only with the local Creole. The particular settlement of Cabo Verde led to a unique sociolinguistic scenario in the context of Portuguese-speaking countries. This chapter highlights relevant aspects of the sociolinguistic situation –be it diglossic or bilingual– and the linguistic history of Portuguese in this country, as well as the external and internal language policy and some linguistic properties that are beginning to shape the emergent variety of Cabo Verdean Portuguese. This chapter illustrates these relevant features using examples taken from multiple sources (from legal to academic), thereby showing how dynamic the Portuguese language and its relation to Cabo Verdean Creole are. Keywords: Cabo Verdean Portuguese, diglossia, bilingualism, language contact, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation Background information – The archipelago of Cabo Verde, a republic that has been independent of Portugal since 1975, lies 570 miles west off the coast of Western Africa. Characterized by a dry sub-Saharan climate, the country covers an area of approximately 4,000 km2; its ten islands are divided into two groups: Maio, Santiago, Fogo, and Brava –the Leeward or Sotavento group– and Boavista, Sal, São Nicolau, Santa Luzia (uninhabited), São Vicente, and Santo Antão – the Windward or Barlavento group. Since the end of the one-party rule in 1991, Cabo Verde has been a stable parliamentary democracy. The Cabo Verdean economy is based on services, particularly in tourism, retail, construction, and transport sectors. Foreign economic development aid and immigrant remittances play an important role in the country’s 3,630 US$ gross domestic product per capita, and 35 % of the population still live below the poverty line (cf. WB 2021). The number of resident Cabo Verdeans totalled 491,233 in 2021 (WB 2021). The major urban centres are Praia, the capital of Cabo Verde on the island of Santiago, and Mindelo, on the island of São Vicente. The linguistic ecology of the country is characterized by two languages: on the one hand, there is Cabo Verdean Creole, a Portuguese-related contact language that emerged in the early sixteenth century and that is known by several other names such as Kriolu, Kriol, or Kabuverdianu; here, we will use the English glossonym Cabo Verdean Creole or simply Creole, since the text is only dealing with this Creole. On the other hand, we find Portuguese, more specifically the Portuguese spoken by Cabo Verdeans, named here as Cabo Verdean Portuguese. In fact, although it is not a nativized variety, Cabo Verdean  

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Portuguese is a local emergent variety of Portuguese, and it has some properties that differ from European Portuguese (cf. Mouta 2019, 26ss.). Both Creole, the first language of the overwhelming majority of the population, and Portuguese, the second language, are used in the entire territory (cf. Lopes 2016, 115), although the levels of competence in the second language differ depending on several factors. Creole is considered as the ‘we code’ while Portuguese is not the ‘they code’ (cf. Lopes 2011; 2016). Creole – Cabo Verdean Creole is the vehicular language of the population, used daily by all social classes in most communicative contexts. Out of 492,000 inhabitants, there are 478,000 first language users (74,000 monolinguals), while 14,000 use Creole as a second language, according to the last 2010 census (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). The number of second language users has been increasing: in 2019, 1.8 % of the population were foreigners, and 2.7 % held dual citizenship (cf. INE 2019, 38). Immigrants from non-Portuguese-speaking countries often master Creole only, despite having spent several years in Cabo Verde, but are nevertheless able to run successful businesses (e. g., the Chinese community). 62.6 % of the Cabo Verdean population is under 34 years of age (cf. INE 2019, 35), which contributes to the dynamic nature of linguistic ecology. Portuguese – In a survey involving 1,780 secondary school pupils, only 1.2 % of the respondents identified Portuguese as their first language (cf. Lopes 2016, 99). Although there are no systematic national statistics regarding the levels of proficiency in Portuguese, literacy levels (88.5 % for over 15-year-olds, 98.8 % for 15–24-year-olds, cf. INE 2019, 40) might be useful indicators of linguistic competence. There is a gap between rural (83 %) and urban (91.5 %) general literacy levels while only 42 % of the population over 65 years of age is literate – a clear vestige of the colonial past (cf. INE 2019, 40s.). A part of this group may have passive knowledge of Portuguese, especially due to exposure to the media (TV and radio). In 2017, compulsory schooling was extended from 6 to 8 years. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, with the establishment of several private and one state universities, higher education became more accessible to a wider public. As a result, in 2019, 42 % of the population had completed or attended primary school, 43 % secondary school, and 9.6 % had attended higher education institutions or held a university degree (cf. INE 2019, 43; significantly, women under 34 stay in school longer than men). We can assume that this trend will contribute to the growing numbers of bilinguals. Currently, however, the majority of the population does not use spoken Portuguese and rarely has a necessity to do so. Hence, the situation has been labelled as a medial diglossia, in which there is one language, Portuguese in this case, used mainly in official and formal writing, while the other language –Cabo Verdean Creole– dominates orality (see Lüdi/Py 1986, 18, quoted in Lopes 2018a, 142). The use of spoken Portuguese is usually (but not exclusively, as Creole has been extending to formal contexts) associated with formal/public domains such as interaction with bosses, authorities, and educated people on topics related to education, politics, administration, and religion, in more formal spaces and situations, such as classroom, official ceremonies, high-level professional meetings, and places of religious cult (cf. Lopes 2016, 116s.). In addition, individual cir 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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cumstances such as working for a Portuguese company or having regular interactions with relatives in Portugal often play a role in language use patterns. In 2015, 72.2 % of the population over 12 years of age could communicate in Portuguese (80.7 % in urban and 54 % in rural areas, cf. INE 2015). Thus, apart from a portion of monolinguals, the competence of speakers of Portuguese may vary from little passive knowledge to near-native speaker fluency, although these are rare cases. This spectrum of bilingualism is particularly visible among first-year university students whose competence may vary from A2 to C1 levels, though the majority is at B1–B2 levels according to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR). Note also that Cabo Verdean candidates for undergraduate studies in Brazilian universities must take a Portuguese foreign language certificate (Certificado de Proficiência em Língua Portuguesa para Estrangeiros – CELPE-Bras). Since Portuguese is acquired in a school context and competence in the language is associated with overall academic success, children of bilingual urban elites obtain higher grade averages and are more likely to study abroad. Finally, there is a restricted circle of upper-class urban families, particularly in Praia, often with dual Cabo Verdean and Portuguese citizenship, who use Portuguese at home, especially when talking to children.  

 

 

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of Portuguese and development of Cabo Verdean Creole In 1460, Portuguese explorers reached the uninhabited archipelago and established the first European settlement in the tropics. Some of the islands were only settled in the nineteenth century, while others, such as Santiago and Fogo, were occupied by the Portuguese and an ethnically diverse slave population right after their discovery. Hence, the settlement of Cabo Verde was carried out slowly and gradually over four centuries by linguistically and demographically varied groups. Correia e Silva (cf. 2002, 1s., 9–12, 16) identifies three main settlement cycles: firstly, the occupation of Santiago and Fogo islands in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, based on the Atlantic slave trade; secondly, in the seventeenth century, the occupation of the northern islands of Santo Antão and São Nicolau as well as the southern island of Brava, by local populations from Santiago and Fogo, who turned them into important agricultural assets and livestock pastures, where the slave trade had little economic impact; and thirdly, between the end of the eighteenth century and the mid-nineteenth century communities settled in São Vicente and Sal, driven by the difficulties in reproducing the agrarian societies installed on other islands and by the promotion of new colonization policies. Meanwhile, the islands of Boavista and Maio were effectively occupied during the eighteenth century, when their ports were opened to English and American ships.

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The occupation of the Cabo Verde islands was part of the Portuguese maritime expansion goals: trade (agricultural activities, such as sugarcane and cotton production, exports, and slave trade) and Christianization. Ideally located for the Atlantic slave trade, the islands of Santiago and Fogo grew prosperous throughout the sixteenth and until the mid-seventeenth centuries. Concerning the sociolinguistic setting, from 1460 to 1550 the main city in Santiago island and the first capital of the archipelago, Ribeira Grande (today Cidade Velha), was a place of multilingualism and intensive language contact (cf. Pereira 2006a, 170), where predominantly young slaves were particularly prone to language change and creation. Hence, new contact varieties emerged: a Lusophone pidgin (lingua franca for decades) that originated, in different periods, Upper Guinea Creoles, namely Cabo Verdean Creole, Guinea-Bissau Creole (Kriyol) and Casamance Creole in Senegal (cf. APiCS; Quint/Moreira 2019, 116). In 1582, 80 % of the population in Santiago were slaves (who often received manumission), and Cabo Verdean Creole was already the dominant language, while Portuguese was poorly represented, as it was restricted to a minority of Portuguese settlers (speaking different varieties of Portuguese) and to the elite group, comprised mostly of courtiers and high-ranking officials (cf. Carreira 1982, 397; 2000, 282). During these first two centuries, due to the presence of several different ethnic groups often speaking mutually unintelligible languages, the linguistic scenario was complex and included radical language contact of Portuguese with African languages (from the Niger-Congo linguistic family, especially those spoken in the macro-Sudan area, such as Wolof, Mandinka, Bambara, Fula, or Temne; cf. Rougé 2006, 63; Quint 2008, 34–44; Lang 2009), which were used, until, at least, the seventeenth century (cf. Soares 2006, 188). Therefore, Creole met the right conditions to emerge in a short time, and the first 150 years of Cabo Verde’s history were decisive to its formation (cf. Lang 1994, 103). Cabo Verdean Creole was already spoken by African slaves of different ethnic groups about 90 years after the archipelago was discovered and settled (cf. Peixeira 2003, 68). The language was used for trade and social relations in the surroundings of Guinea-Bissau, which stresses the importance the language already had. Mulattoes and Creoles from Santiago island were interpreters (línguas ‘(lit.) tongues’) for the island’s wealthy (cf. Carreira 1982, 67s.). Cabo Verdean Creole, the language of a mixed-race elite that started to emerge in the mid-sixteenth century (cf. Cabral 2018, 42) is most probably the first Atlantic Creole, but little linguistic data is available. In the mid-seventeenth century, Santiago, frequently attacked by other European powers (such as the English, French, and Dutch), lost trade privileges, and the centre of commerce was moved to the trading posts (praças) of Cacheu and Bissau in what is today Guinea-Bissau. This situation coincided with a gradual decline of Portuguese native speakers, who had departed to more lucrative colonies (e. g., São Tomé and Príncipe or Brazil). A progressive abandonment of the colony by the crown triggered the generalization of the use of Creole across social classes, clergymen included (cf. Soares 2006, 189,  

 

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194). As a consequence, the Sotavento varieties of Creole spread to the northern islands in ‘a silent growth of population’ (“um crescimento ‘silencioso’ de população”) characteristic of the second cycle of colonization (Correia e Silva 2002, 17). The early eighteenth century was a period of economic crisis and social unrest incited by local oligarchs of Santiago. At this time, lower-ranking officials were mixed-race Cabo Verdeans, and the extent to which they used Portuguese is disputable. However, changes occurred in the mid-eighteenth century: the increased presence of Portuguese administration, driven by modern colonialism and new economic policies, and the appeal to Portuguese peasants to settle in the Cabo Verdean Barlavento (in particular, Portuguese peasants from the overpopulated archipelagos of Azores and Madeira, and speakers of insular and centre-south dialects of Portuguese; cf. Cintra 1971; Raposo et al. 2013, 85–142). Thus, there was an increasingly more population characterized as white (branco), although the term was often used as a social and not ethnic or racial distinction. Their speech was probably one of the factors to explain today’s geography of Cabo Verdean Creole (cf. Lang 2014, 296; Swolkien 2013, 20; Swolkien/Cobbinah 2019, 172), but the entire issue of the impact of dialectal varieties of European Portuguese on the formation of northern (Barlavento) varieties of Cabo Verdean Creole requires further multidisciplinary studies. Since the end of the eighteenth century, there have been echoes of strong demeaning attitudes towards Creole, repeated criticism on the state of education in the colony, the omnipresence of Creole described as a ‘ridiculous jargon’ (jargão ridículo) and the phenomenon of ‘whites’ shifting from Portuguese to Creole, as the text below shows (cf. also Duarte 1998, 123; Veiga 2004, 83; 2009; Swolkien 2015, 82, among others): ‘The pure Portuguese language is [...] not used in informal conversations. [...] The indigenous do not speak any other language: they pray in Creole; the parish priests explain the Christian doctrine to them in Creole; and they speak in Creole to any authority who, not being from this country, needs an interpreter to comprehend them. The majority of those who live in ports understand Portuguese but do not speak it. [...] The whites themselves encourage its use, learning Creole as soon as they arrive from Europe, and then using it at home, educating their children to speak it almost to the exclusion of pure Portuguese. [...] Portuguese is still spoken during the meetings of men of some importance in the towns; but nhánhas [ladies] always speak Creole’.1

1 “A língua portuguesa pura é [...] desusada no trato familiar. [...] Os indígenas não falam outra linguagem: rezam em crioulo; os párocos lhes explicam a doutrina cristã em crioulo; e em crioulo falam eles a qualquer autoridade, que não sendo do país carece de intérprete para os entender. Os que habitam nas povoações marítimas pela maior parte compreendem o português, mas não falam. […] Os mesmos brancos animam este uso, aprendendo o crioulo logo que chegam da Europa, e usando-o depois no trato doméstico, educando os filhos a falarem-no quase com exclusão do português limpo. [...] Nas reuniões de homens de certa ordem ainda se fala português nas Vilas; porém as nhánhas falam sempre em crioulo” (Lopes da Lima 1844, 81, 109, quoted in Duarte 1998, 124).

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The fragment above suggests, on the one hand, an orality dominated by Creole and, on the other, a graded competence and use of Portuguese according to factors such as space (urban (ports) vs. rural), gender, and social class. The first primary school was established on the island of Brava only in 1847, but by the end of the nineteenth century, there were 45 primary schools in the archipelago (cf. Seibert 2014). The first secondary school opened in São Nicolau in 1866 under the aegis of the Catholic Church, and was transferred to São Vicente in the early twentieth century (cf. Carvalho 2011, 165; Neves 2017, 280). Although their impact was limited due to elitist school access, these schools facilitated the emergence of an intellectual elite and the consolidation of diglossia. The first documents prohibiting the use of Creole in schools were published at this time (cf. Carvalho 2011, 483).

2.2 Milestones of their further development The linguistic ecology of Cabo Verde during the twentieth century was dominated by a scenario of classical diglossia in the sense of Ferguson (1959), with Portuguese as a high variety and Creole as a low variety combined with low literacy levels. As explained in the previous section, Portuguese was the language of the colonial regime’s schooling administration. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, there were private teaching initiatives, notwithstanding the legal void regarding the regulation of private education (cf. Carvalho 2011). In 1917, Mindelo welcomed a high school free from Catholic orientation. In 1955, Praia had received a similar high school (though it started activities only in 1960). These schools, where future liberation leaders such as Amílcar Cabral and Abílio Duarte studied, were of great importance for the rising of a Cabo Verdean national identity and helped to build a small petit-bourgeois elite that often functioned as proxy colonizers for the empire (cf. Meintel 1984; Carvalho 2011). Beyond that, these high schools enabled the creation of the literary movements launched by the cultural magazines Claridade (in the 1930s), Certeza (in the 1940s), and Seló (in the 1960s, cf. Ferreira 1977; Carvalho 2011). These magazines published classical works of Cabo Verdean literature by Portuguese-writing authors such as Eugénio Tavares, Baltasar Lopes da Silva, Manuel Lopes, Jorge Barbosa, António Gonçalves, or Onésimo Silveira. They also published poetry in Creole, for example by Pedro Cardoso, Eugénio Tavares, and Sérgio Frusoni; at the same period, there was an extraordinary development of Cabo Verdean music genres such as morna, coladeira, and funaná, sang overwhelmingly in Creole. The expansion of school facilities, by the end of the regime of the New State (Estado Novo), was one of the political strategies to abate technical and scientific backwardness of the colony. In 1962, there were in total 208 primary, secondary, and technical schools in Cabo Verde (cf. Carvalho 2011, 134). However, despite improvements in education during the time of the Portuguese colonization, the education ministered solely in Portuguese was a privilege of the very few. We therefore find low literacy rates throughout

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the twentieth century, with approximately 75 % of illiterate population at the time of the independence, and thus disadvantaged in terms of social mobility (cf. Meintel 1984, 135; Afonso 2001, 119). On 5 July 1975, the independence of Cabo Verde from Portugal was officially recognized, bringing profound changes in the country’s economic and social structures. In the realm of education, intensive literacy campaigns in Portuguese were initiated, particularly in rural areas (cf. Afonso 2001, 120; Santos 2004, 79). The choice of the colonial language instead of Creole was justified, in part, by a total lack of didactic materials and by Amílcar Cabral’s pragmatic attitude towards Portuguese. He saw it merely as a communication ‘instrument’ and not a vehicle of culture, saying that ‘the Portuguese language is one of the best things that the Tugas [a pejorative name for the Portuguese (< Pg. português ‘Portuguese’)] have left us’.2 Cabral, however, did not discard future standardization and teaching in Creole or African languages: ‘We will do this but after having studied them well’ (cf. Leiria 2008, 90).3 In 1979, the first colloquium on the study and standardization of Creole, known as Colóquio do Mindelo, was organized in Mindelo by UNESCO. It set the basis for the first proposal of a spelling system and started a long path towards the officialization of Creole (cf. Veiga 2000b). Subsequently, in the early 1980s, a pro-Creole movement with a nationalistic orientation arose in Cabo Verde. It triggered the first modern descriptions of Cabo Verdean Creole (cf. Veiga 1982; Cardoso 1989), publications of poetry in Creole (e. g., Kaká Barbosa’s Vinti Xintidu Letrádu na Kriolu ‘Twenty feelings written in Creole’), the first novel written in the variety of Santiago (cf. Veiga 1987), as well as a series of works based on oral tradition (cf. several volumes of Tomé Varela da Silva’s folktales Na Bóka Noti ‘Nightfall’) or song collections by Nha Bibina Kabral and Nha Násia Gomi (cf. Lang 2005; Cardoso/Hagemeijer/Alexandre 2015). Also, the first experimental bilingual teaching programme was run in the 1980s. In the 1990s, the end of the one-party system and a transition towards a representative democracy and a more capitalist economy marked the demise of a politically committed basilectal Creole literature agenda (cf. Lang 2005, 92). Portuguese started to be seen in a more positive light as a means of internationalization in the increasingly globalized economic and political context. In 1992, the country joined the community of Portuguese-speaking African Countries (Países Africanos de Língua Oficial Portuguesa – PALOP) while in 1996, Cabo Verde became one of the founding member states of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa – CPLP) and the headquarters of the International Institute of the Portuguese Language (Instituto Internacional da Língua Portuguesa – IILP) was established in Praia. The last decade of the twentieth century was marked by the approval of the constitution in  

 

2 “O português (língua) é uma das melhores coisas que os tugas nos deixaram” (Cabral 1990, 59). 3 “Nós vamos fazer isso, mas depois de estudarmos bem” (Cabral 1990, 59).

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1992 and a profound reform of the educational system in a continuous battle against illiteracy.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation After fifteen years of a one-party regime from 1975 to 1991, a multi-party system was introduced in Cabo Verde, and in 1992, a new, democratically elected parliament approved the country’s first constitution (subsequently reviewed in 1995, 1999, and 2010). Article 9 of the constitution defines Portuguese as an official language, states that ‘the State fosters conditions to officialize the Cabo Verdean mother tongue, at par with the Portuguese language’,4 and affirms that ‘all the national citizens have the obligation to know the official languages and are entitled to use both of them’,5 the plural in ‘official languages’ necessarily referring to a future situation (cf. Rodrigues 2016, 424). Creole is clearly associated with national culture and identity, while Portuguese is the language of international relations: ‘the Cabo Verdean State maintains special ties of friendship and cooperation with officially Portuguese-speaking countries as well as with countries hosting Cabo Verdean emigrants’.6 The role of the state in promoting Creole is further highlighted by affirming that the state has ‘to indorse the defence, promotion and development of the Cabo Verdean mother tongue and to encourage its use in written communication’,7 and ‘to preserve, value and promote the mother tongue and the Cabo Verdean culture’.8 Resulting from article 9, several other decrees and resolutions promoting Cabo Verdean Creole have been approved (cf. 3.3 and 5). However, an overwhelming majority of the political measures laid down in the official linguistic legislation have not been executed yet, ‘particularly with regard to education, research, and officialization of the Cabo Verdean language’9 creating a significant gap between linguistic policy and daily practice (cf. Rodrigues 2016, 439). The legal framework still confers to Portuguese power and authority inherited from colonial times, hampering the access to

4 “O Estado promove as condições para a oficialização da língua materna cabo-verdiana, em paridade com a língua portuguesa” (C-CV, art. 9.2). 5 “Todos os cidadãos nacionais têm o dever de conhecer as línguas oficiais e o direito de usá-las” (C-CV, art. 9.3). 6 “O Estado de Cabo Verde mantém laços especiais de amizade e de cooperação com os países de língua oficial portuguesa e com os países de acolhimento de emigrantes cabo-verdianos” (C-CV, art. 11.6). 7 “Promover a defesa, a valorização e o desenvolvimento da língua materna cabo-verdiana e incentivar o seu uso na comunicação escrita” (C-CV, art. 78.3). 8 “Preservar, valorizar e promover a língua materna e a cultura cabo-verdianas” (C-CV, art. 7). 9 “[...] sobretudo no que diz respeito ao campo de educação, da investigação e da oficialização da língua cabo-verdiana” (Cardoso 2018, 145).

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effective social bilingualism of all citizens (cf. Batalha 2004, 107; Rosa 2010, 93, 125; Cardoso 2018, 132, 145).

3.2 Languages used in the public spheres Administration – Portuguese is used in official documents and correspondence, on road signs, banknotes, ID cards, and stamps. However, in speaking, Creole is overwhelmingly used in governmental offices and services such as tax offices, registrars, post offices, police stations, social security premises, municipalities, and courts. Notably, both in the Portuguese Embassy in the capital Praia and in the Portuguese consulate in Mindelo, Creole is used except when talking to Portuguese-speaking foreigners. This medial diglossia has been particularly clear during the Covid-19 pandemic. While notices, travel declarations, prevention leaflets, and text messages sent by the Social Security Office were written in Portuguese, oral information was transmitted in Cabo Verdean Creole, even in video messages on the government’s official Facebook page. Politics – Portuguese is still predominant in official, particularly televised, speeches of the president, prime minister, ministers, and members of parliament who are one of a few professional groups who speak Portuguese on a daily basis. Also ballots and official election websites are systematically written in Portuguese. However, Creole is expanding into the oral formal setting of the National Assembly: on a randomly chosen day in April 2019, over 25 % of the parliamentary debate was carried out in Creole (cf. Mouta 2019, 17). In 2011, the then prime minister of Cabo Verde, José Maria Neves, addressed the United Nations assembly in Cabo Verdean Creole. More recently, in March 2020, the president of the Republic, Jorge Carlos Fonseca, spoke to the nation both in Portuguese and Creole, announcing the country’s first-ever state of emergency due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Moreover, except for official debates on television and billboards with candidates and campaign mottos (which might be in both languages), political campaigns are run in Creole (cars with sound propaganda, candidates speaking at rallies, campaign songs). Companies – Top managers of large companies (aviation, ports, telecommunications, fuel sectors) and higher civil servants speak Portuguese during formal, often cross-departmental meetings, especially when foreigners or members of the government are present. However, it is usually only the leader who speaks in these contexts. Professional training (also in government institutions such as health centres) is carried out in Portuguese. Nonetheless, the training setting could be interpreted as an extension of the school classroom; moreover, content is often presented in PowerPoint slides in Portuguese while the speaker explains the topics in Creole. Also, there seems to be a generational difference in the frequency of use of Portuguese in professional contexts: the older generation (over 45) who studied abroad, especially in Portugal and Brazil, is less likely to use Creole than the growing number of younger professionals educated exclusively in Cabo Verde.  

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Jurisprudence – Judges and lawyers speak Portuguese during court proceedings when reading verdicts. Nevertheless, the penal code determines that ‘in oral procedural acts, the Cabo Verdean mother tongue may also be used’10 (cf. also Rodrigues 2016, 424). Moreover, the role of an ‘official interpreter’ for a not (yet) official language is mentioned, adding to the ambiguity of the current linguistic legislation. This is confirmed by a personal communication from a Cabo Verdean judge, who remembered a defendant speaking deep rural Creole from Santo Antão, which led the judge in Mindelo to ask a member of the public for a translation. Generally, pragmatism takes over any kind of negative attitude towards Creole: the penal code clearly states that the lack of full communication and understanding is sufficient reason to nullify a verdict (cf. PC, art. 118.7). Religion – The extension of Creole to even the most formal oral contexts in recent decades (cf. Mouta 2019, 27), which contradicts the traditional assessment of the country’s sociolinguistic settings as ‘diglossic’ (cf. Duarte 1998, 116; Veiga 2004, 82; Lopes 2017, 78), has been verified also in the domain of religion. Rodrigues refers that ‘[t]he priest only speaks Portuguese when he reads the book [the Bible]. But when he speaks to the people, it is in Creole’.11 This is well illustrated by the fact that, in April 2020, the Easter Sunday sermon was delivered by Cardinal Dom Arlindo Furtado in Creole. Finally, Creole is also used by Italian Catholic and American Protestant missionaries.

3.3 Languages used in education Teachers at all educational levels are another professional group that uses Portuguese regularly. However, Portuguese is not the only language of the classroom, as pupils use Creole not only in peer communication but also to address teachers. Moreover, as in other creole-speaking areas (cf. Reutner 2005, 209–231; 2017, 32), teachers systematically resort to Creole to explain more complex contents, especially in lower grades (cf. Cardoso 2018, 139; Rodrigues 2016, 429). Creole is used in schools outside the classroom in most situations, teachers’ room and meetings included (cf. Monteiro 2009, 100; Reis 2018, 175). At university level, teachers overwhelmingly use Portuguese to present their subjects, but students use Creole to talk amongst themselves and to address professors, particularly outside the classroom (Mota 2019, 50). Relevant legislation on language use in education includes the Education System Act (Lei de Bases do Sistema Educativo, cf. Decree-Law 2), which in 2010 announced the introduction of first language teaching in the educational system, but it has not yet had practical impact, and the Strategic Plan for Education 2017–2021 (Plano Estratégico da Educação), in which the government established, as one of its goals, ‘to value national

10 “Nos actos processuais orais poder-se-á ainda utilizar a língua materna cabo-verdiana” (PC, art. 118.2). 11 “Só quando ele [o padre] vai ler o livro é que fala em português. Mas quando vai falar com o povo, é em crioulo” (Rodrigues 2016, 432).

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languages: Cabo Verdean Creole and Portuguese through their teaching with differentiated methodologies and the development of linguistic studies’.12 The current educational framework is further laid down in the Educational System Act (Lei de Bases do Sistema Educativo) of 2018 (cf. Decree-Law 13). Apart from stressing the importance of learning foreign languages and of transmitting competencies in Portuguese, which should be mastered since preschool, the act interprets the mother tongue as a privileged manifestation of culture (art. 9.2), while article 10h declares ‘to deepen the knowledge and affirmation of writing in the national Cabo Verdean language, as the first language of communication, with the goal of its use at par with the Portuguese language’,13 clearly implying the introduction of Creole in the educational system. In the section dedicated to preschool education, article 17f states that one of its objectives is to ‘promote the learning of official languages’;14 this goal is repeated in relation to secondary education in article 25c, which promotes ‘to broaden the linguistic competences of official languages acquired in the previous stages of studies”,15 thus assuming a future standardization of Creole. In tune with the constitution, the act mentions ‘official languages’ despite the fact there is only one official language, and maintains a conceptual division between the first language related to culture and identity, but not to technical knowledge, which is associated with Portuguese as ‘an instrument of communication and study’.16 In several articles, the act mentions the teaching of two foreign languages to insert Cabo Verdean education into a plurilingual global context, while Portuguese is clearly perceived as a second language and should be taught as such, in line with the 2005 Resolution (cf. República de Cabo Verde 2005) and recommendations from the 1990s. Despite existing legislation aimed at promoting Creole within the realm of schooling, the educational system in Cabo Verde is a monolingual system in which Portuguese remains the only official means and subject of instruction, as Creole is not taught at any level of primary and secondary cycles despite numerous studies and recommendations (cf. Baptista/Brito/Bangura 2010). In higher education, Creole is taught in bachelor’s degrees in English and French, and there is a Degree in Cabo Verdean and Portuguese Studies to train future teachers of Portuguese, which offers courses in Cabo Verdean linguistics (cf. Mota 2019). These, however, are not complemented with contents on first language teaching methodology or curriculum design.

12 “Valorizar as línguas nacionais: a cabo-verdiana e a portuguesa, através do seu ensino, com metodologias diferenciadas e do desenvolvimento de estudos linguísticos” (República de Cabo Verde 2017, 34). 13 “Aprofundar o conhecimento e a afirmação da escrita da língua nacional cabo-verdiana, enquanto primeira língua de comunicação oral, visando sua utilização oficial a par da língua portuguesa” (Decree-Law 13, art. 10.1). 14 “[P]romover a aprendizagem das línguas oficiais” (Decree-Law 13, art.17f). 15 “[A]profundar e alargar as competências linguísticas das línguas oficiais adquiridas nos ciclos precedentes” (Decree-Law 13, art. 25c). 16 “[C]omo instrumento de comunicação e de estudo” (Decree-Law 13, art. 22h).

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Over the last twenty years, numerous studies and workshops dedicated to educational issues such as the need to improve textbooks and Portuguese teaching didactics, as well as the low level of competence in Portuguese as a trigger of school dropout (e. g., Lopes 2003, 253–263; 2018b, 85ss.; Reis 2018, 269) have been showing a trend of social criticism regarding proficiency in Portuguese of pupils and students at university level. What has been advocated is not only an improved methodology of Portuguese teaching but also an official status for Creole and its introduction in schooling, resulting in bilingual education (e. g., Veiga 2004, 92; Vieira da Silva 1994, 110; Baptista/Brito/Bangura 2010, 292; Lopes 2016, 389; 2018a, 165; Reis 2018, 38s.; Cardoso 2018, 139s.). However, scientific publications and recommendations have had hardly any impact on policymaking. Bilingual courses are currently run in the United States of America among Cabo Verdean diaspora, and a bilingual project was carried out in Lisbon (cf. Pereira 2006b). In Cabo Verde, an experimental bilingual literacy project took place in the 1980s, and from 2013–2016 a pilot bi-literacy teaching project was introduced in four schools (cf. Cardoso 2018). Nevertheless, with the change of the government in 2016, the project was stopped, and as per 2021, there is no bilingual teaching initiative in the country. A final issue is the recent rapid growth of enrolments in foreign schools such as the International French School Les Alizés and, especially, Portuguese private or state schools on the Cabo Verdean territory. In Praia, apart from the private Cabo Verdean Portuguese College (Colégio Português de Cabo Verde), there is the Portuguese state-funded Portuguese School (Escola Portuguesa), which opened in 2016 with just 22 pupils. In 2020, 800 pupils were enrolled, most of them Cabo Verdean native speakers. Another example of the rapid growth of these elite educational spaces is the Escola Portuguesa do Mindelo, a private cooperative institution that opened in 2016 with 40 pupils and had 183 pupils in 2020 despite a €100 monthly fee, which is close to the national minimum wage of €120. The schools hire preferentially European Portuguese native speaker teachers who, generally, have no knowledge of Creole and no educational orientation towards linguistic diversity and follow the teaching curricula of the Portuguese Ministry of Education, encouraging a Portuguese-only policy on the school grounds. This is perceived as an asset in a country without linguistic immersion, where the majority of children start acquiring Portuguese only at the age of six when they start school. Moreover, foreign schools offer diverse extracurricular activities in Portuguese throughout the day (while in Cabo Verdean schools, lessons occupy half a day with no extra activities, and their language normalization role is perceived as low), they are better organized and are perceived as providing high-quality education. It is likely that bilingual individuals who come from these institutions will have an impact on the future linguistic ecology of the country.  

 

3.4 Languages used in the media Printed material – Printed material such as informative leaflets, posters or notices (e. g., in health centres, hospitals, or municipalities) are written predominantly in Portuguese.  

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In marketing (e. g., advertising billboards), it is common to see texts in Creole, however, rarely following the officially approved alphabet. The more informal the linguistic landscape is, the more likely it is to be written in Creole (e. g., beer adverts, written notices in small commerce dominated by the Chinese, or murals in the neighbourhood such as Lixu li nau! ‘No rubbish here!’). Press – Printed newspapers (Expresso das Ilhas, A Nação) are published mostly in Portuguese (although an occasional article may appear in Creole). These are weekly papers and have a limited circulation of approximately 8,000 copies; two-thirds are sold in Praia (cf. Mouta 2019, 18). In an inquiry, only 4 % of the respondents admitted to reading printed newspapers; the majority of the inquired (above 15 years of age) could not name a single printed (59 %) or online (58 %) newspaper (cf. INE 2018). Radio – Apart from the national radio (Radio Cabo Verde – RCV), there are several private regional, community or church radios (e. g., PraiaFM or CrioulaFM). Radio was an important means to access information during colonial times and in the first decades of independence, especially in mountainous rural communities. Despite a lack of studies, we can assume that prolonged exposure to radio programmes exclusively in Portuguese during the colonial period might explain, in part, its passive comprehension among older, illiterate Cabo Verdean speakers. Today, radio programmes are predominantly in Creole (except for the news and Portuguese football commentaries widely listened to by older male speakers). With the rapid spread of electric grid and television, particularly during the last two decades, the importance of radio has diminished, especially among younger generations (cf. Alexandre/Swolkien forthcoming), and only 23 % of the population listen to the radio daily (cf. INE 2018). Television – In 2019, 83.3 % of the population had at least one TV set (cf. INE 2020). There is only one state channel (Televisão de Cabo Verde – TCV). Newscasters read the news in Portuguese, but there are programmes in Creole (e. g., Show da Manhã), and often both languages are used. Cabo Verdeans also have access to international channels in European Portuguese (Sociedade Independente de Comunicação – SIC, and Rádio e Televisão de Portugal – RTP África) and in Brazilian Portuguese (RedeGlobo and RecordTV Cabo Verde) as well as television via internet (in 2019, 30.8 % of Cabo Verdeans had a cable TV, cf. INE 2020). This creates a highly varied linguistic input with at least two languages (Creole and Portuguese). For instance, the TCV broadcasting station includes in its programming 6 shows that are exclusively in Portuguese, 5 shows both in Portuguese and in Cabo Verdean Creole, and 8 shows spoken only in Creole (cf. Mouta 2019, 95; Alexandre/Swolkien forthcoming). Internet – Cabo Verde has experienced a rapid increase in mobile telephone and internet coverage over the last decade. Despite high service prices and network instability, in 2019, 67 % of households had access to the internet, mainly via mobile networks (93 %). Adolescents (79.9 %) and young adults (83.7 %) are the most intensive internet users (cf. INE 2020), thus being responsible for a rapid penetration of written Creole on social networks such as Facebook or Viber. While official websites are written in Portuguese, mainly due to a lack of the codification of Creole, messages and comments on so 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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cial platforms are increasingly written in grassroots orthography in the mother tongue, especially by young users (who constitute over half of the population). The internet thus seems to be a major agent of change in language choice and attitude.

4 Linguistic characteristics Several authors acknowledge the existence of a variety of Portuguese spoken in Cabo Verde that comprises a set of linguistic features distinct from the European variety, which is taken as a model for educational purposes. It has been classified as an “indigenized variety of Portuguese spoken in Cape Verde” (Neves 2009, 1), with three different levels, namely formal, regional, and informal. The formal level refers to an elaborate language based on the written register, the regional level to standard Portuguese with local particularities, and the informal level to a ‘rudimentary Portuguese spoken by the popular classes at certain times’.17 The assumption of an emergent variety of Cabo Verdean Portuguese is not a consensual topic (cf. Mouta 2019, 26ss.): firstly, Cabo Verdean Portuguese is not a nativized variety in the sense Santomean, Angolan, and Mozambican varieties are (cf. Hagemeijer 2016), meaning that Portuguese is not acquired as a first language by the majority of speakers. Therefore, minimal exposure to Portuguese is not enough to ensure good and fast acquisition. Nevertheless, a new speech community has been growing since the independence, contributing to the current shape of the Portuguese spoken in Cabo Verde. Bilingual adult speakers and children that will (eventually) be bilingual in Creole and Portuguese are, precisely because of that, responsible for the emergence of this variety. Secondly, the linguistic ecology of Cabo Verde differs from other African Portuguese-speaking countries, which leads us to suggest that Cabo Verdean Portuguese is, synchronically, an unstable variety mirroring distinctive intermediate stages of language acquisition, depending on the age of the speakers, their level of instruction, and, especially, their exposure to and frequency of use of Portuguese. Thirdly, our knowledge of Cabo Verdean Portuguese is limited, since there is neither a reliable corpus nor quantified data to support our descriptions, although there are already visible efforts to describe it, mainly the morphosyntactic traits. As a result, we can only analyse and highlight tendencies that are intrinsically dependent on the nature of the language data we use. Fourthly, more recently, in particular in the past decade, Cabo Verdean Portuguese has been in increasing contact with Brazilian Portuguese (cf. 5). Moreover, Brazilian Portuguese influence on the Portuguese spoken in Cabo Verde has been systematically ignored by the educational system (with no explicit European Portuguese norm reinforce-

17 “[O] português rudimentar, falado pelas camadas populares em determinados momentos” (Neves 2007, 61).

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ment) and largely ignored by most linguists, while the population is, in general, much more receptive to Brazilian culture (especially to music, carnival, beauty standards, etc.) than to Portuguese. This situation may contribute significantly to more language instability and to boosting the remodelling of Cabo Verdean Portuguese grammar (also cf. Mouta 2019 on the role of Brazilian Portuguese in address forms). In sum, we assume that Cabo Verdean Portuguese is a special case of a non-nativized variety of the language since it is moving from a classical diglossic relationship with Cabo Verdean Creole to a more dynamic one, i.e. a linguistic scenario in which Portuguese and Creole are used in an increasingly intertwined manner. This porous diglossic situation yields an emergent variety that exhibits some phonological, morphosyntactic, and lexical features divergent from European Portuguese and presents a considerable number of features resulting from internal language change, first language transfer, and some influence of Brazilian Portuguese grammar due to recent contact.

4.1 Pronunciation If we have restricted information on the morphosyntax of Cabo Verdean Portuguese, we are even less acquainted with its phonetics, although, paradoxically, phonetic features diverging from European Portuguese are often taken as markers of non-native speakers, and, specifically, of African speakers of Portuguese. Vowels – Vowel opening from [ɨ] to [e] occurs in unstressed contexts such as meninos responderam [me̯ ˈninus reʃpoŋ̃ˈdeɾɐ̃u̯ ] or professora levou [pʁofeˈsoʁɐ leˈvo] instead of [mɨˈninuʒ ʁɨʃpõˈdeɾɐ̃w] or [pɾufɨˈsoɾɐ lɨˈvo]), from [u] to [o] in unstressed contexts such as gostaram [ɡosˈtaʀɐ̃u̯ ] or jogar [ʒoˈɡaɾ] instead of [ɡuʃˈtaɾɐ̃w] or [ʒuˈɡaɾ], and vowel closing from [a] to [ɐ] in unstressed pre-tonic syllables such as saltar [sɐɫˈtaɾ] instead of [saɫˈtaɾ] (cf. Neves 2009, 7–10). In general, the unstressed vowels are more audible in African than in European Portuguese (cf. Mateus/Andrade 2000). Vowel fronting is common as well. Typically, [ɨ] is replaced by [i] when it precedes a voiceless postalveolar fricative such as in eles [ˈeliʃ] or está [i̯ ʃˈta] instead of [ˈelɨʃ] or [ɨʃˈta] (cf. Neves 2009, 8). In Santiago island, there seems to be a non-distinction between the close central unrounded vowel [i] and the fronted [i], as in Senhor Gomes [siˈɲoɾ ˈɡomi] instead of [sɨˈɲoɾ ˈɡomɨʃ]. A certain level of vowel denasalization also occurs when the close back rounded nasal vowel [ũ] precedes a nasal consonant and becomes voiceless and very short, almost inaudible, as in um menino [u̥ ̃ ͜ mɨˈninu] instead of [ˈũ mɨˈninu] (cf. Neves 2009, 11). Consonants – Labialization is a common phonetic process in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, and the labiodental fricative [v] occurs as the bilabial fricative [β], as in estava [i̯ ʃˈtaβɐ] or você [βɔˈse] instead of [ˈʃtavɐ] or [vɔˈse] (cf. Neves 2009, 6). Cabo Verdean Portuguese also shows some instability of liquids, especially in the voiced trill /r/, which often occurs as a voiceless flap [ɾ] and elongates the preceding vowel, as in fazer [faˈzeːɾ̥ ]

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or jogar [ʒuˈɡaːɾ̥ ] instead of [fɐˈzeɾ] or [ʒuˈɡaɾ̥ ], cf. Neves 2009, 3). If /r/ is followed by a voiced uvular fricative [ʁ], it is omitted, as in fazer roda [faˈze ˈʁɔdɐ] instead of [fɐˈzeɾ ˈʁɔdɐ] (cf. Neves 2009, 3). In some islands (particularly Maio, Boavista and Santiago), the phoneme /r/ may occur both as a voiced and voiceless uvular fricative [ʁ̥ ] or [ʀ] in wordfinal positions, as in pensar [pẽˈsaʁ̥ ] or plantar plantas [pɨ̯ lɐ̃nˈtaʀ pɨ̯ lɐ̃tɐʃ] instead of [pẽˈsaɾ] or [plɐ̃ˈtaɾ ˈplɐ̃tɐʃ] (cf. Neves 2007, 156s.). The voiceless lateral fricative [ɫ], when in coda position and followed by a plosive consonant like /t/, is sometimes replaced by the dental/alveolar flap [ɾ̥ ], as in saltar [saɾ̥ ˈtaɾ] instead of [saɫˈtaɾ] (cf. Neves 2009, 6). Neves (2009, 11) concludes that phonologically “there are some characteristics common to all the islands, as is the case with the replacement of [ɨ] by [i] when followed by a voiceless postalveolar fricative or when the word is in final position”. However, in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, there are probably regional phonetic differences, presumably resulting mainly from different dialectal phonological properties of Creole (cf. Lang 2014) that are transferred to the phonology of Portuguese. In fact, to what extent the dialectal variation of the first language is responsible for the regional variation of the second language in the area of phonology is yet to be described. Given the indirect but intensive and growing contact with Brazilian Portuguese, it is possible that this variety also exerts a considerable influence on Cabo Verdean Portuguese. However, no comprehensive studies have yet been conducted in this area.

4.2 Morphosyntax In the past decade, the morphosyntax of Cabo Verdean Portuguese has been studied to a certain degree, although based on distinct sets of data. In fact, the partial description of the morphosyntactic component of the emergent Cabo Verdean Portuguese variety highlights the instability of a grammar whose speakers are in different stages of language acquisition and with uneven proficiencies of the written and oral components. Moreover, assuming that Cabo Verdean Portuguese is a variety acquired as a second language, its grammar naturally exhibits properties of second language acquisition. Capitalizing on the data presented in several studies and on two online corpora made available by the Centre of Linguistics of the University of Lisbon (Corpus Africa and VAPOR), we address, in the subsections below, subject pronouns and subject-verb agreement, number agreement in nominal phrases, interrogatives, nominal specification, object pronouns (third person), double object constructions, reflexives, and relative clauses. Subject pronouns and subject-verb agreement – In Cabo Verdean Portuguese overt subject pronouns are more frequent than null subject pronouns in European Portuguese, such as eu ‘I’ in example (i), and subject-verb agreement mismatch occurs in example (ii), with os professores [pl.] falou [sg.] ‘the teachers spoke’ instead of os professores [pl.] falaram [pl.] ‘the teachers spoke’; furthermore, both strategies are similar to what is described for Brazilian Portuguese (Lopes 2011, 409–491).

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“eu tenho dificuldade em definir com quem eu falo mais – porque eu levo uma vida muito – digamos assim – caseira” (Lopes 2011, 452).18 (ii) “cinquenta por cento dos alunos vêm de escolas onde os professores – ao longo da escola primária praticamente falou o crioulo com eles//” (Lopes 2011, 472).19 (i)

Note, however, that the subject-verb non-agreement in Cabo Verdean Portuguese depends on different linguistic and sociolinguistic variables and must not be taken as a general rule. This aspect is susceptible to the nature and structural type of the subject, its structural position and relative distance to the verb, its phonetic saliency, the speaker’s age, gender, level of education, and work, as well as the use of language in written or oral contexts (cf. Lopes 2011, 468s.). In addition, concerning the current state of Cabo Verdean Portuguese grammar, it is ‘premature to speak of stable variation vs. change in progress’20 since data is limited in quantity as well as in the variety of age groups so that the language profile of the informants has to be carefully chosen in future sociolinguistic research in order to cover differentiated variables, such as educational, economic, and social level of the informants, their environment (urban or rural), as well as younger age groups. Number agreement in nominal phrases – Number and gender agreement, which are mandatory in European Portuguese between the determiners and/or modifiers and the noun, are inconsistent in Cabo Verdean Portuguese (cf. Lopes 2011; Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018), as the number mismatch suas casa ‘their house’ instead of suas casas ‘their houses’ illustrates in opposition to os seus afazeres ‘their chores’ with number agreement in example (iii). (iii) “Regressam a 2 de Maio a suas casa, aos seus afazeres” (Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 245).21

Several factors have a significant effect on plural marking in Cabo Verdean Portuguese (cf. Jon-And 2011, 129–134). Specifically, plural marking is favoured by pre-noun position, as in muitos rapaz ‘many boy’ instead of muitos rapazes ‘many boys’, and animacy ([human] nouns) in ensinar as pessoas adultos a ler ‘to teach adult [pl.] people [pl.] to read’. Conversely, plural marking is disfavoured by singular nouns ending in , as in país ‘countries’ instead of países, expression of age, as in tenho uma irmã que é mais velha tem trinta e dois ano22 [instead of anos ‘years’], and words that only have a singular lexical correspondent in Cabo Verdean Creole, as in essa coisas ‘this things’ instead of essas coisas ‘these things’. Overall, there is a tendency of Cabo Verdean Portuguese to mark

18 ‘I have a hard time defining who I talk to the most – because I lead a very – let’s say – homely life’. 19 ‘fifty percent of the students come from schools where the teachers, throughout primary school, only spoke Creole to them’. 20 “é prematuro falar-se de variação estável vs. mudança em progresso” (Lopes 2011, 491). 21 ‘On May 2, they return to their homes, to their chores’. 22 ‘I have an older sister who is thirty-two years old’.

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the plural in the leftmost element of the nominal nucleus. This characteristic has been found in other varieties of Portuguese in Africa which have contact with Bantu languages, but this cannot be the case with Cabo Verdean Portuguese and Cabo Verdean Creole because there was never such contact (cf. Jon-And 2011, 135s.). Interrogatives – Based on data from spontaneous speech collected in Santiago and São Nicolau islands (cf. Lopes 2017, 20), partial interrogatives in Cabo Verdean Portuguese (i.e., those involving an interrogative pronoun) mainly follow the European Portuguese pattern. Nevertheless, a strategy of forming interrogatives that does not occur in European Portuguese emerges in Cabo Verdean Portuguese (cf. Lopes 2017, 154, 161, 166): the interrogative pronoun is immediately followed by a highlighter que, as illustrated in Quê que vocês acham? instead of O que é que vocês acham? ‘What do you think?’, Quem que eu fui procurar? instead of Quem é que eu fui procurar? ‘Who did I go looking for?’, or Onde que está a Ivandra? instead of Onde é que está a Ivandra? ‘Where is Ivandra?’, mirroring the canonical strategy in Cabo Verdean Creole as in Ken/kenha ki papia ku nha pai? ‘Who is it that talked with my father?’ or Kusé ki txiga? ‘What is it that arrived?’ (cf. Alexandre 2012, 79). Nominal specification –The nominal specification of Cabo Verdean Portuguese is similar to European Portuguese, involving a determiner in the pre-noun position that agrees in number and gender with the noun. However, we can identify other strategies competing in the noun domain in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, such as the resource to bare nouns (i.e. nouns determined by a zero article) as in example (iv), the use of singular nouns without definite singular articles expressing the generic such as aula ‘class’ instead of uma aula ‘a class’ (or aulas ‘classes’) in example (v), and the replacement of articles by demonstratives such as essa história minha ‘that story of mine’ instead of uma história minha ‘a story of mine’ in example (vi). (iv) “É preciso fazer Ø critica a Ø iluminação e a Ø barreira que devia ser refletora antes de apontar Ø dedo a Ø pessoas”.23 (v) “Há dias que temos aula de manhã e à tarde”.24 (vi) “a Isabel também vai ouvir essa história minha”25 (all adapted from Alexandre 2018, 158s.).

Object pronouns (third person) – In Cabo Verdean Portuguese the object pronoun system exposes the susceptibility of the pronoun paradigm, in particular for the third person forms, which still show Latin morphological cases, since it is common to find the preposition para ‘to/for’ followed by a strong third-person pronoun ele(s)/ela(s) ‘he/she/they [m. and f.]’ replacing lhe(s) ‘him/her, them’, as in eu nem, nem liguei para ele ‘I did not call him’ or in eu perguntei para eles ‘I asked them’ instead of lhe liguei or perguntei-lhe (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 254). The replacement of the direct transitive pronoun ‑o 23 ‘It is necessary to criticize the illumination and the protective barrier that should be reflective before pointing the finger at people’. 24 ‘On some days we have classes in the morning and in the afternoon’. 25 ‘Isabel will also hear my story’.

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(s)/‑a(s) ‘him/her/it, them’ by the indirect transitive form lhe(s) and vice versa is possible in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, although residual, as in se eu for lhe encontrar [instead of se for encontrá-lo] na sala ‘if I meet him in the room’ or in Pessoalmente admiro-lhe [instead of admiro-o] pelas suas capacidades ‘personally, I admire him for his skills’ (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 254). Double object constructions – These kinds of sentences are a direct reflection of Creole in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, since they are not acceptable in European Portuguese. Although they are not very common in the corpora, they occur in the speech of less educated people. For example, in O lobo pediu o macaco um figo ‘the wolf asked the monkey for a fig’ (Alexandre 2018, 155), the verb pedir ‘request’ selects a double object, none of them introduced by a preposition, just as in the Creole pattern Lobu pidi makaku un figu and instead of the European Portuguese model with a dative a ‘to’ as in O lobo pediu um figo ao macaco. In Cabo Verdean Portuguese, these constructions more frequently involve the preposition para ‘to/for’ instead of the dative a ‘to’, following a selection pattern with human nouns in Cabo Verdean Creole, such as in Djon da libru pa Maria ‘John gave Maria a book’, and leading to forms such as O sobrinho arrancou um pé de mandioca e deu para o lobo instead of O sobrinho arrancou um pé de mandioca e deu ao lobo ‘the nephew pulled out a manioc plant and gave it to the wolf’ (cf. Alexandre 2018, 154). Reflexives – Cabo Verdean Portuguese also shows instability concerning reflexive constructions. Most studies conducted on spontaneous oral data suggest that Cabo Verdean Portuguese tends to delete or not to select an overt reflexive pronoun (a se-type strategy) despite a reflexive reading, such as with the verbs formar, basear, or levantar as in O meu maior objectivo é formar [instead of formar-me] ‘my main goal is to graduate’, in geralmente baseamos [instead of baseamo-nos] no português ‘we usually rely on Portuguese’ or in eu levantei [instead of levantei-me] com boa disposição ‘I got up in a good mood’ (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 250). In these cases, the clitic pronouns me ‘myself’ or nos ‘ourselves’ that are selected by the verb in European Portuguese as coreferential with the subject of the sentence (eu ‘I’ and nós ‘we’ above) are not morphophonologically present although the action reverts to the subject. In Cabo Verdean Creole, the most overwhelming majority of transitive verbs, like pentia ‘to comb’, do not select a reflexive particle, and this null occurrence of se in reflexive constructions of Cabo Verdean Portuguese may be the output of first language transfer. It can be concluded that there are four different patterns of reflexive constructions in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, namely: the occurrence of se, known from European Portuguese, as in O governo reuniu-se com os estudantes ‘the government met with the students’, its omission, as in Os copos de vidro partiram [instead of partiram-se] no chão ‘the glasses broke on the floor’, its overgeneralization, as in As meninas deitaram-se [instead of deitaram] as bonecas ‘the girls laid the dolls’, and its double marking, as in Eu disse que a Ana se arranjou-se [instead of Ana se arranjou] para o baile ‘I said Ana got ready for the party’ (cf. Alexandre/Swolkien forthcoming). Relative clauses – Relative clauses in Cabo Verdean Portuguese have been studied more extensively than other topics probably because it is a sensitive grammatical com-

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ponent of (contemporary) European Portuguese grammar. Cabo Verdean Portuguese sometimes exhibits a relativization process called preposition-chopping, which consists of deleting the preposition selected by the verb of the relative clause. This is illustrated by examples such as há alguns professores que [instead of com quem] sempre nós tínhamos o hábito de falar o português,26 O dia que [instead of em que] eu quebrei o meu lente eu estava desesperada,27 or Faz umas coisas que [instead of de que] eu não gosto28 (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 258; Alexandre/Gonçalves/Hagemeijer 2011, 22). Apart from this common strategy, there is also another pervasive relative clause formation process: the relative element onde ‘where’, typically with locative meaning, is used in Cabo Verdean Portuguese with a generalized semantic value and functions as a universal locative relativizer (cf. Alexandre/Lopes 2022, 135). Thus, in (vii) onde ‘where’ heads relative clauses whose reference nouns (respectively, crioulo ‘Creole’, momentos ‘moments’, and reunião ‘meeting’) do not have a locative value. (vii) “eu passo para o crioulo – onde estou mais à vontade, há momentos onde há uma actividade or as situações formais são reuniões onde falamos em crioulo” (Alexandre/Lopes 2022).29

4.3 Lexicon Although not systematically described, the expressions recorded in some dictionaries of Portuguese as Cabo Verdean regionalisms show some degree of internal innovation affecting form or meaning, as well as external innovation through borrowing (cf. Reutner 2017, 48–51). Innovation of form – This category includes new words that come from derivational or compositional mechanisms already existing in Portuguese but not attested as such in the dictionaries. However, their meaning is predictable and easy to understand. For instance, the process of composition is productive in Cabo Verdean Portuguese, such as in água-da-dianteira ‘pre-delivery water breaks’ (< água ‘water’ + dianteira ‘front’) instead of (rebentar) as águas, água-de-lume ‘pure alcohol’ (< água + lume ‘fire’) instead of álcool puro, água-de-olho ‘tears’ (< água + olho ‘eye’) instead of lágrimas, or boca-da-ribeira ‘river mouth’ instead of foz (cf. Laban 1996, 106s.). Even though derivation is not very productive, there are examples of word formation through suffixation that do not follow the morphological derivation rules or the selection properties of the suffixes in European Portuguese, such as in planicidade ‘property of being plain’ instead of plano ‘plain’,

26 ‘There are some teachers with whom we were always in the habit of speaking Portuguese’. 27 ‘The day I broke my glasses I was desperate’. 28 ‘She/he does some things I do not like’. 29 ‘I switch to Creole – where I’m more comfortable, there are times when there’s an activity or the formal situations are meetings where we speak in Creole’.

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where the suffix ‑idade joins the noun planície ‘lowland’ instead of joining an adjective, or the suffix -ice in chaleirice ‘flattery’, which combines with the verb chaleirar ‘to flatter’ (cf. Mendes et al. 2016, 137). Other examples include nouns such as aldrabagem ‘deceit’ (< aldrabice ‘deceit’ + -em) and elogiação ‘praise’ (< elogiar ‘to praise’ + ‑ção), adjectives such as caladiço ‘silent’ (< calar ‘to remain silent’ + ‑iço), desapontador ‘disappointed’ (< desapontar ‘to disappoint’ + ‑dor), and inovativo ‘innovative’ (< inovar ‘to innovate’ + ‑ivo) instead of calado ‘silent’, desapontante ‘disappointing’, and inovador ‘innovative’, and verbs such as desbaralhar ‘to clarify’ (< des- + baralhar ‘to confuse’) or redentar ‘to redeem’ (< redentor ‘redeemer’+ ‑ar) instead of esclarecer or redimir (cf. Bacelar do Nascimento et al. 2008, 49ss.). Considering written productions of Cabo Verdean children who attend school years 4 and 6, examples are duecida ‘sickly’ instead of adoentada, and rodiar ‘circle’ instead of fazer uma roda, as adjective and verbal derivations of doente ‘sick’ and roda ‘circle’, respectively, or roda roda ‘circle’, as a process of reduplication (cf. Neves 2007, 123–126). Innovation of meaning – This category is defined as a process of semantic innovation, adding new meanings to an already existing word, such as galante ‘ugly, weird’ instead of ‘gallant’ or cutelo ‘high place, top of the hill’ instead of ‘cleaver’, sometimes in combination with a change of the syntactic category, such as sabe ‘good’ instead of ‘she/he knows’. Several words of Cabo Verdean Portuguese come from classical Portuguese, such as castelo ‘small round house with a conical roof typical in Africa’ instead of ‘castle’, fidalgo ‘restrained, elegant, delicate’ instead of ‘noble’, mantenha ‘good bye’ (< Que Deus vos guarde e mantenha! ‘May God keep you safe and protected’) instead of ‘sustain, protect’, nação ‘family, generation, relative, parentage’ instead of ‘nation’, pelourinho ‘market’ instead of ‘pillory’, or rocha ‘mountain’ instead of ‘rock’ (cf. Laban 1996, 105s.). External innovation – There is also lexical innovation through borrowing, such as grogue ‘rum’ (< Engl. grog ‘spirits (originally rum) mixed with water’), codé ‘younger son’ (< probably Mandinka korádén ‘to carry the child on the back’), and regionalisms like balaio ‘basket’ and xerém ‘rough cornflour’, both from the South of Portugal (cf. Machado 1990, 180; Laban 1996, 105s.). In Cabo Verdean Portuguese, lexical transfers from Creole are common as well. Written examples from students include cambou ‘got in’ (< Cr. kanba ‘to get in’), as in O figo cambou dentro da boca ‘the fig got in the mouth’, fluliou ‘threw’ (< Cr. fulia ‘throw’), as in O lobo marou o macaco e fluliou ‘the wolf tied the monkey and threw it’, and marou ‘tied’ (< Cr. mara ‘to tie’, Cardoso 2005, 100).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism As discussed in the previous sections, there is no consensus on the emergence of a national variety of Portuguese in Cabo Verde. Many Cabo Verdean stakeholders from dif-

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ferent social sectors such as politics, education, literature, medicine, and law, but especially the older ones, widely express their feelings against what they call bad use of the Portuguese language and, concomitantly, the expansion of Cabo Verdean Creole outside the family context. The testimonials of the group of leaders interviewed by Lopes (2011, 7) on the (quality of the) use of Portuguese in Cabo Verde underline the consciousness of the current linguistic situation, reporting that they speak Portuguese in their own way. In addition, many Cabo Verdean teachers think that the performance in Portuguese depends on the quality of teaching and varies depending on the level of education and/or personal commitment. Ondina Ferreira, a writer and retired teacher, is the voice for many of these people, emphasizing the need to value Portuguese in schools and provide quality education to young people. According to Ondina Ferreira, Portuguese must not be neglected in order to avoid negative impact on the academic success of young people and, consequently, the country’s future, due to its history and literary, cultural and linguistic value. Furthermore, Ferreira criticizes the fact that Portuguese is being increasingly undermined in Cabo Verde, as it is not used on a daily basis, to the benefit of Creole, and argues that this has serious consequences for the education of younger generations and, therefore, on the country’s development: ‘While in China the Portuguese language is learned ... Cabo Verde gradually tries to ban its daily use and its orality [...]. Well, when I see – on TV shows and in the statistics – the growing interest of the Chinese in learning our language, I am ecstatic and happy. But immediately after, I am assaulted by a kind of malaise when I think of the harm we self-inflict, by despising in schools this linguistic means, the most important one for the proper schooling and culture of our children and adolescents. […] As for us, here on the islands, we deliberately continue, or not, to lose this immeasurable wealth of which we are also the owners: the Portuguese language, one of the oldest Latin languages, and, above all, one of the most beautiful and cultured ones, in great expansion in the global world. We are losing it without pausing to think about the profound evil that is being caused to academia, to the technical, scientific development of the country. I would say that an evil feeling of linguistic self-destruction commands us. The catastrophic results are visible: students [are] increasingly poorly prepared, by teachers who do neither know how to speak nor write in Portuguese and, on top of that, are, generally, very little educated. [...] And, as if this is not enough, stubbornly, we continue to send students, some with the label of “good students” to graduate in Portuguese language universities. Unfortunately, most of our students do not even know how to write, let alone speak, express themselves in the common language. They are –as a general rule– unsuccessful because they do not understand what teachers say to them in class and also do not understand the concepts explained in the books’.30

30 “Enquanto na China se aprende a Língua portuguesa ... Cabo Verde tenta paulatinamente banir o seu uso quotidiano e a sua oralidade […]. Pois bem, ao ver – em programas televisivos, ao ler textos estatísticos – o crescente interesse dos chineses em aprender a nossa língua; fico extasiada e feliz. Mas logo de seguida, sou assaltada por uma espécie de mal-estar ao pensar no malefício que auto-infligimos, ao desprezar nas escolas, este veículo linguístico, o mais importante para a devida escolarização e cultura das nossas crianças e adolescentes. [...] Quanto a nós, aqui nas ilhas, continuamos deliberadamente, ou não, a perder esta incomensurável riqueza de que somos também donos: a Língua portuguesa uma das mais antigas línguas latinas e de todo, das mais belas e cultas, em grande expansão no mundo global. Estamos

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The presence of Creole in Cabo Verdean Portuguese is ubiquitous both in morphosyntax and lexicon. Furthermore, there is no (evident) social stigma associated with speaking non-standard Portuguese: firstly, the European Portuguese norm is a mirage with which an overwhelming majority of the population has no direct contact; secondly, Brazilian Portuguese with all its variations of social and geographical dialects is becoming steadily more entrenched in the daily linguistic ecology of Cabo Verde, but is largely ignored by legislation and the educational system; thirdly, second language Portuguese spoken by the majority of Cabo Verdeans is characterized by variation and instability depending on the individual position within the bilingual continuum. Finally, the general level of linguistic norm enforcement in Cabo Verde is low.

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Portuguese – As Cabo Verdean Portuguese is not an autonomous nativized variety, there are no dictionaries, grammars, or textbooks. Contrary to other varieties of Portuguese in Africa, especially in Angola and Mozambique, with publications going back to the 1970s (cf. project Bibliografias at the Eduardo Mondlane University in Mozambique, cf. CPLSE), studies on Portuguese in Cabo Verde are very recent (cf. Lopes/Oliveira 2018). Therefore, a collection of contemporary linguistic data of both spoken and written Cabo Verdean Portuguese and the creation of updated online databases providing systematic metadata are two of the main goals of current research. There are few existing online corpora (e. g., Corpus Africa, VAPOR, and corpora in dissertations such as Lopes 2011; Reis 2011; Mouta 2019) which span over the period of a quarter of a century, but do not always offer the speakers’ metadata and sometimes include literary works (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 243). Moreover, these descriptions do not permit assessment of a diachronic evolution of the language, and samples are not large enough to be representative. Finally, their analyses are usually done from a perspective of European Portuguese as the target grammar (e. g., Mendes et al. 2016), and explanations are often centred on language transfer from Cabo Verdean Creole (cf. Cardoso 2005, 125) and, less frequently, framed by universal principles of language change or second language acquisition.  

 

a perdê-la sem parar para pensar no mal profundo que se está a provocar nos estudos, no desenvolvimento técnico, científico do País. Diria que nos comanda um sentimento maligno de auto-destruição linguística. Os resultados catastróficos, estão à vista: alunos cada vez mais mal preparados, por professores que não sabem falar e nem redigir em português e ainda por cima, muito pouco cultos no geral. [...] E não bastando tudo isto, teimosamente, continuamos a enviar alunos, alguns, com rótulo de ‘bons alunos’ a formar em Universidades de Língua Portuguesa. Infelizmente, a maioria dos nossos alunos não sabe nem escrever e muito menos falar, expressar-se na Língua comum. São – regra geral – mal sucedidos, porque não compreendem o que os professores lhes dizem nas aulas e não compreendem também os conceitos explicados nos livros” (Ferreira 2019).

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The lexicon of Portuguese, as far as we know, has never been systematically studied and therefore is impossible to describe with (any level of) precision. The dictionaries of Portuguese (both Brazilian and European) do not have specific sections dedicated to national varieties of Portuguese; instead, they only register some lexemes as regionalisms from Cabo Verde. For example, in the dictionary Novo Aurélio (Ferreira 1999), cachupa ‘stew of pork meat and sausages, beans, corn and some vegetables [national dish]’, mancara ‘peanut’, and the above mentioned codé and cutelo (cf. 4.3) are described as being used in Cabo Verde specifically. The ongoing project on the Common Orthographic Vocabulary of the Portuguese Language (Vocabulário Ortográfico Comum da Língua Portuguesa – VOCALP), coordinated by the International Institute of Portuguese (IILP) and the Chair of Portuguese Language Eugénio Tavares (Cátedra Eugénio Tavares de Língua Portuguesa – CETLP), records 500 lexemes used in Cabo Verde, but without providing any information on their semantic value or etymology. So far, there have been no attempts to codify a national standard of Cabo Verdean Portuguese, but more linguists are trying to get funding to collect data in order to properly describe the variety and provide the formal instruments to study it. The Chair of Portuguese Language Eugénio Tavares embraces another project, the Corpus of the Educated Norm of Cabo Verdean Portuguese (Corpus da Norma Culta do Português de Cabo Verde – CNC-PCV), which aims to collect and describe data of educated speakers of Portuguese in Cabo Verde and, eventually, contribute to the establishment of a standard. The testimonials of the group of leaders interviewed by Lopes (2011) constitute a corpus for the preliminary analysis of what, according to Lopes, might be called the standard Portuguese of Cabo Verde. Cabo Verdean Creole – Cabo Verdean Creole’s first grammatical descriptions go back to the nineteenth century (cf. Coelho 1880–1886; Brito 1887; Schuchardt 1888; for a summary of the history of research cf. Lang 2018), and it has been the object of several modern studies, particularly on its Santiago variety, so far, the best described variety of Cabo Verdean Creole (cf. Veiga 1995; 2000a; Quint 2000; Baptista 2002; Pratas 2004; 2007; Alexandre 2009; 2012). The language displays a significant social continuum, and regional differences have become clearer by the last decade’s descriptions of other Cabo Verdean Creole varieties from Brava (cf. Baptista 2013), Maio (cf. Moreira 2014), Fogo (cf. Moreira 2020) in the Sotavento area, as well as Santo Antão (cf. Baptista 2014; Swolkien/Cobbinah 2019), and São Vicente (cf. Swolkien 2013; 2015) in the Barlavento area.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Spelling: Portuguese – With respect to spelling, the New Orthographic Convention for Portuguese (Novo Acordo Ortográfico da Língua Portuguesa), whose goal is to unify spelling among all the Portuguese-speaking countries, was approved in 2009 with a six-year transition period in which the new rules were used dispersedly in some departments of public administration and some online newspapers. The Convention

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was then ratified by Cabo Verde authorities in 2015. In practice, however, even educated speakers do not follow the new rules because, unlike in Portugal, there were neither awareness campaigns nor training courses for teachers and civil servants. In 2015, the then minister of culture, Mário Lúcio Sousa, declared the Convention mandatory in Cabo Verde but estimated that the old spelling would definitively disappear from the country only in 2020, which was not the case. According to the minister, this adaptation should be phased, and there should be a period of gradual implementation of the reform. A Supplementary Implementation Plan (Plano de Implementação Complementar) was going to be adopted and executed in an articulated manner, involving different agents such as the state, media, and educational institutions. The Government of Cabo Verde was going to promote information sessions for teachers, students, civil servants, journalists, and the diplomatic corps, among others (cf. s.a. 2015). Nevertheless, civil servants never received any guidance or advice on the correct spelling. Likewise, teachers did not receive clear guidelines for the use of European versus Brazilian Portuguese norms. For instance, school textbooks contain texts written in European Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, and by Cabo Verdean authors without any introduction or clarification as to the existence of different national standards. As a consequence, Brazilian spelling is used, as in É que você encontrou sua alma gêmea (Mouta 2019, 140), where the vowel of the stressed syllable is marked by a circumflex accent instead of the acute accent used in European Portuguese (gémea ‘twin’). Spelling: Cabo Verdean Creole – The phonological alphabet ALUPEC (Alfabeto Unificado para a Escrita do Cabo-verdiano) was introduced on an experimental basis in 1998 (cf. Veiga 2006) and permanently adopted in 2009 (cf. Decree-Law 8 and 67), but since it has never been introduced in education or widely diffused, its rules are ignored by a vast majority of the population. Variety used in the public sphere – The Portuguese spoken by Cabo Verdean civil servants and companies’ managers exhibits varying degrees of influence, from both European and Brazilian Portuguese, depending (among others) on the country where they have graduated and their individual idiolects. In public offices, higher civil servants confirmed, in personal communication, that the linguistic norm is rarely enforced and that the official writings often diverge from standard European Portuguese in several linguistic aspects (cf. 4). In the religious sphere, the influence of Brazilian Portuguese is growing, especially due to Brazilian pastors and YouTube evangelical programmes. The fact that many religious leaders are first language speakers of Cabo Verdean Creole and have acquired, to varied degrees, European and Brazilian Portuguese and, most probably, second-language varieties of Cabo Verdean Portuguese may lead to an emergence of a new variety that will not be the sum of any of the parts above. Variety used in education – The Cabo Verdean school system does not perform well in its normative role. School textbooks contain texts in Brazilian Portuguese without a systematic comparison of the differences between the Brazilian and European norm so that Brazilian influences such as in Ía convidar-te para ir dar-mos um passeio, ir até uma

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lanchonete beber um suco e deitar conversa fora31 (cf. Mouta 2019, 135ss.) occur, where Brazilian Portuguese lanchonete ‘coffee shop’ and suco ‘juice’ replace the European Portuguese expressions café/pastelaria ‘cafe or pastry shop’ and sumo ‘juice’. Moreover, teachers who are scientifically and pedagogically unprepared to deal with systematic transfer or interference from Creole to Portuguese, as a result of language contact, often ignore accuracy in Portuguese, as long as communication is ensured, and do not correct pupils (cf. Reis 2011, 491) so students produce texts with Creole elements, such as in um gato morto que se encontrava dentro de uma bolsa de plástico no canto inferior esquerdo,32 where Cr. bolsa de plástico ‘plastic bag’ corresponds to European Portuguese saco de plástico ‘bag’, although bolsa also exists in European Portuguese with the meaning ‘purse, handbag’. Nevertheless, in elite schools like Escola Portuguesa the variety of European Portuguese is enforced, and the teachers are preferably native speakers, promoting a (European) Portuguese-only policy on school grounds, both in and out of classrooms (cf. 3.3). Variety used in the media – In the media, too, Portuguese shows individual variation and no stable characteristics. First, if we take into consideration the speech of newscasters from main national news programmes, we find that most of them speak second-language Portuguese with high proficiency; some are closer to standard European Portuguese, while others show some influence from Brazilian Portuguese. Consequently, we can only define tendencies with variable frequencies and not a systemic and consistent variety of Portuguese. Second, in other TV programmes, communication is held in Cabo Verdean Creole, Cabo Verdean Portuguese (with variable use on the TCV channel), European Portuguese (specifically through the Portuguese broadcasting channel SIC), and Brazilian Portuguese (mother tongue of reporters from Brazilian channels, cf. 3.4). This creates a highly varied linguistic input in the second language with three different linguistic varieties. Brazilian Portuguese is particularly important given the exposure of preschool children to cartoons with Brazilian Portuguese dubbing and the high popularity of Brazilian soap operas. Also, the internet is responsible for a growing exposure to Brazilian Portuguese (through, for instance, YouTube content) since it is more common online than European Portuguese. European Portuguese seems to be strong only in printed newspapers, i.e. in formal writing, since in television and radio broadcasting, as well as in social media, Creole is commonly used even in writing, for example in the commentary boxes in online newspapers (cf. Mouta 2019, 18). This contrasts with colonial times, when radio programmes were almost exclusively in European Portuguese (cf. 3.4 above). Finally, spelling and grammatical errors in Portuguese made by journalists in online newspapers (e. g., A Semana, Expresso das Ilhas, A Nação), most of them non-native speakers, are often ridiculed by commentators who themselves rarely write in standard Portuguese but more often in Creole in grassroots orthography. This atti 

31 ‘I was going to invite you to go for a walk, go to a cafeteria for a drink [juice] and have a chat’. 32 ‘a dead cat that was in a plastic bag in the lower left corner’.

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tude, however, might be increasingly typical of older speakers and the small minority of speakers who actually read online newspapers. Variety used in literature – In Cabo Verde, the literary tradition in Portuguese goes back to 1856, with José Evaristo de Almeida’s novel O Escravo ‘The Slave’, whose action takes place in the first half of the nineteenth century. From a linguistic point of view, the Portuguese used in literature by Cabo Verdean authors, both during the colonial times and currently, has been modelled on European Portuguese. Cabo Verdean literature can be divided into two major phases (cf. Ferreira 1977, 26): before and after the Claridade journal, launched in 1936, which was responsible for the construction of what its founders Manuel Lopes, Baltasar Lopes da Silva and Jorge Barbosa call CaboVerdeanity (cabo-verdianidade) because its nine issues (until 1960) include poetic texts of oral tradition in Cabo Verdean but also texts in European Portuguese. Some Cabo Verdean authors prefer to write in Portuguese, combining it with Creole forms, and the dialogues of the characters of popular social class (in their majority) are built in harmony with their speech, which means that the interference of Creole is notable and constant (cf. Ferreira 1977, 61). For instance, Manuel Lopes inserted Creole words and phrases in Portuguese texts, such as nhô ‘mister’ (< Pg. senhor) and enterrou ele ‘she/he buried him’ (< Cr. ntera el instead of Pg. enterrou-o, cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 255). The novel Chiquinho, written in European Portuguese by Baltasar Lopes da Silva (ca. 1936), introduces several words and syntactic structures typical of Cabo Verdean Creole, as mantenhas ‘good bye’, codê [sic] ‘younger son’, léu-léu ‘light rain’, or the double object construction mando vocês umas pranchas instead of mando-lhes umas pranchas in “No Daisy mando vocês umas pranchas para um portal novo” ‘On Daisy I’ll send you some boards to a new gate’ (Caniato 1996, 140). Germano Almeida often uses the formal Creole forms of address nhô ‘mister’ and nha ‘lady’, or nouns as mafôr ‘stench’, as in o mafôr da lata de nove horas da casa de nha Maninha d’Orel ‘the stench of the nine o’clock tin [tins used by maids in Mindelo to throw excrements to the sea after 9 p.m.] at Ms. Maninha d’Orel’s house’ (Almeida 1994, 75). These Creole expressions are used to show a local language style, and lexical differences between Cabo Verdean and European Portuguese are visible enough for Cabo Verdean writers to introduce glossaries or footnotes in their novels explaining the meaning of some words (cf. Laban 1996, 108). Nevertheless, European Portuguese is still dominant in written literature, and two Cabo Verdean writers, the poet Arménio Vieira and the novelist Germano Almeida, were awarded the most important Portuguese literary prize, the Prémio Camões, in 2009 and 2018 respectively. Acknowledgement: Nélia Alexandre acknowledges the financial support of the Portuguese National Science Foundation (FCT), project UIDB/00214/2020, through the Center of Linguistics of the University of Lisbon.

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19 Guinea-Bissau Abstract: Guinea-Bissau is a highly multilingual country. Alongside over twenty African local languages, two main Romance varieties are in use: Portuguese, the official language, and Guinea-Bissau Creole, the main spoken vehicular variety. This chapter first gives an overview of the present-day linguistic situation in Guinea-Bissau before dealing in detail with the respective status and linguistic characteristics of Portuguese and Guinea-Bissau Creole in this West African country. Keywords: Atlantic languages, Mande languages, Guinea-Bissau, Portuguese, Upper Guinea Creole

1 Sociolinguistic situation The country – Guinea-Bissau is a country situated in Western Africa. Its territory is relatively small (ca. 36,000 km2) and is bordered by Senegal to the north, Guinea-Conakry to the east and south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. Today, some 1,900,000 people live in Guinea-Bissau, over 500,000 of whom inhabiting Bissau, the country’s capital. Linguistic landscape – Between 20 to 30 languages share Guinea-Bissau’s social space. They can be divided into five main groups: (i) Portuguese is the sole official language of the country, although it is spoken natively only by a tiny minority (probably less than 5 %); (ii) Guinea-Bissau Creole, a member of the Upper Guinea Creole cluster (cf. below 4), is the main national lingua franca, fluently spoken in 2008 by 90.4 % of the population (INE 2009, 36–39); (iii) various African local languages have been used for centuries throughout the country. They all belong to two branches of the Niger-Congo macrophylum: Mande (15 % of the total population), represented mainly by Mandinka, the traditional language of the kingdom of Gabu, and many Atlantic languages, the most spoken of which are Fula (Fula-Sereer family, dominant in the eastern hinterland, ca. 25 % of the total population), Balanta (22 %), Mandjak (8 %), Mankanya (3 %), Papel (9 %, all four belonging to the Bak family), and Biafada (Jaad family, 3 %). The remaining Atlantic languages are spoken by small communities representing each less than 2 % of the total population of the country: Baga Mboteni and Nalu (Naluic family), Bassari (Tenda family), Bijogo and Jola (Bak family), Kasanga, Kobiana and Nyun (Nyun-Buy family), Landoma (Mel family), and Sua (isolated); (iv) languages spoken by recent immigrant communities, such as (Lebanese) Arabic, Chinese, Wolof; (v) foreign languages (mostly taught at school), essentially French and English and (to a lesser degree) Spanish and Russian. Romance languages – In the section above, four languages can be held (at least from a lexical point of view) as Romance languages: Portuguese and Spanish (Ibero-Ro 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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mance), French (Gallo-Romance), and Guinea-Bissau Creole (a Portuguese-based Creole language). As a majority of children now go to school, more and more people have some command of Portuguese: 27.1 % could speak it at the end of the last decade (cf. INE 2009, 36ss.). However, in daily life Guinea-Bissau Creole remains the standard for oral communication: in urban settings, at least in the public sphere (e. g., streets, markets), more than 90 % of spoken interactions take place in this language (cf. Ichinose 2018, 155).  

 

 

2 Linguistic history Dynamics of local African languages before and during the arrival of Portuguese – Although most local languages found in Guinea-Bissau today were already present at the arrival of Portuguese, their respective demographic and cultural weights have considerably evolved through time. From a sociocultural viewpoint, an important dividing line separates the two big, now mostly Islamized, eastern communities, Mandinka and Fula, which were historically associated with strong political entities, from the remaining, mainly animist and more anciently established, Atlantic-speaking communities which, in the course of time, were either assimilated or pushed further west (i.e., towards the Ocean) by their powerful Mandinka and Fula neighbours. The Mandinka, who reached Guinea-Bissau in the Middle Ages due to the expansion of the Mande Empire of Mali, created a local kingdom, Kaabu (or Gabu, cf. Lopes 1999), which would engage later in active trade (including slave trade) with Portuguese. Kaabu was finally destroyed in 1867 by Muslim Fula, who then imposed and spread Islam on most of Eastern Guinea-Bissau (including the Mandinka-speaking areas). Mandinka (cf. below 4.3), which has been the main African vehicular south of the Gambia River since the arrival of the Portuguese in the area, has actually left a significant influence on Guinea-Bissau Creole (and other Upper Guinea Creoles). Arrival of the Portuguese and first development of Guinea-Bissau Creole – It is generally considered that the first contacts between the Portuguese and West Africans took place after the Portuguese navigators doubled Cape Bojador in 1437, and that the first Portuguese to reach Guinea-Bissau was Nuno Tristão in 1446. From that date, trade relationships began to develop between the newcomers and the local communities. Quite early, some Africans travelled to Portugal (both as slaves and freemen) and many times returned to Africa on Portuguese ships where they served as interpreters, frequently called línguas ‘(lit.) tongues’ or chalonas (< Mandinka ko lo na or kullona ‘learned man’, cf. Rougé 2004, 358; 1999, 62). In the meantime, some Portuguese, known as lançados ‘(lit.) exiles’, remained on the mainland, frequently marrying African women and making their way into the local social structures and networks. These first exchanges probably led to the emergence of a Portuguese-based Pidgin, which would be used between Portuguese and West Africans, both in Africa and in Portugal (Kihm/Rougé 2013; Naro 1978; Teyssier 1959, 227–250). Following the settlement of the islands of Cabo Verde (1460), the Portuguese kings issued a decree guaranteeing a zone of commercial exclu-

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sivity for the Portuguese Cabo Verdean merchants: this area, called the Captainship of Cabo Verde, encompassed a portion of the African shore extending from the mouth of the Senegal River to the present-day location of Freetown (Sierra Leone) and including all coastal areas of today’s Guinea-Bissau. At the end of the sixteenth century, the Portuguese established a first permanent settlement in Guinea-Bissau, namely the trading post of Cacheu in the 1590s, which was quickly followed by Bissau, Fá, Farim, Geba, and Ziguinchor (this last one now in Casamance, southern Senegal) during the first half of the seventeenth century (Carreira 1984, 19s.). These trading posts were generally peopled by a first nucleus of Christian Cabo Verdean settlers, whose dominant tongue would almost certainly already be a Portuguese-based creole, derived from the abovementioned Pidgin: it is probably that way that a creole language began to be spoken natively in Guinea-Bissau. Until the turn of the twentieth century, Romance-speaking communities in Guinea-Bissau comprised the following components: some few hundred Portuguese administrators and soldiers, born in Portugal and speaking Portuguese (the only written language of the Portuguese administration); at least several thousands of local kristons ‘(Catholic) Christians’ (< Pg. cristãos) – that is Cabo Verdean descendants or local Africans (in particular Nyuns, cf. Almada 1964 [1594]) who generally had adopted Christianity as their religion and Creole as their daily language and would mainly live in one of the Portuguese trading-posts. In other words, both Portuguese and Creole speakers only represented a small minority –probably around 1 or 2 %, at any rate no more than 5 %– of the country’s total population. Although Creole would probably be used, even at that time, by a much higher number of people as a second language for trading purposes, it is safe to think that by 1900, less than 10 % of Guinea-Bissauans would enjoy an active command of Creole, the only lexically Romance variety known outside the trading posts (Carreira 1984, 32–36). Colonial Portuguese empire at its fullest (1900–1973) – Until the end of the nineteenth century, the political control exerted by the Portuguese had remained loose and mostly limited to the main trading posts, sea routes, and waterways. For instance, around 1800, the Portuguese governors of Bissau and Cacheu still used to pay the local kings a yearly rent for the occupation of these cities (Carreira 1984, 29ss.). Things changed mainly due to the fact that the Portuguese government increasingly felt that, due to the competition of other European colonial powers, it would lose its grip on Guinea-Bissau if it proved unable to fully occupy and rule it. In spite of stiff resistance from many local communities, Portuguese complete control of the whole territory of Guinea-Bissau was achieved in the mid-1930s (Enders 1995, 82, 85), which prompted the development of Portuguese administration and hence the expansion of the Portuguese language throughout the territory. However, in 1963, under the leadership of Amilcar Cabral, a growing number of Bissau-Guineans (and Cabo Verdeans) began an independence war that was to last until 1974 against the Portuguese Empire in Guinea-Bissau. In the space of a few years, the rebellion gained momentum to such a point that it managed to control more than half of the territory. While Portuguese was retained as an administrative, written language by the independence fighters, Guinea-Bissau Creole was selected as the  

 

 

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main language for oral propaganda and military operations. This and the massive population displacements linked with the war contributed to a quick increase of the number of Guinea-Bissau Creole speakers and to the diffusion of this language to ever wider parts of the country. From the second half of the twentieth century onwards, Guinea-Bissau Creole turned to be the main lingua franca in most parts of Guinea-Bissau. After independence – Self-proclaimed in 1973 and officially recognized by Portugal in 1974, the independence of Guinea-Bissau did not cause significant changes regarding the official status of the languages of the country. To date, Portuguese remains the only official language.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Although the Constitution (cf. C-GW) does not explicitly inform about it, Portuguese remains to date the default official language of the country (Leclerc 2016; Lopes da Silva/ Jorge Sampa 2017, 233s.). Some legal texts refer to its prominent role, for example an appendix of the Civil Code reads that ‘[in cases of legal] arbitration, the process, procedures and discussions will be held in Portuguese’.1 Elsewhere, the Civil Code also mentions the fact that, in the event of a public consultation within the scope of a land concession, ‘a request should be broadcast by the national and local radio as well as in the two main mother tongues [in use] within the local community where the land is situated’,2 which implies that, at least in this case, the existence of languages other than Portuguese is taken into account by the lawmakers.

3.2 Languages uses in different domains Languages used by public authorities – Portuguese is the only language used in official documents and correspondence, on road signs, banknotes, and stamps. However, Guinea-Bissau Creole also has some visibility in the official or public sphere, in particular regarding health written advices, which seem to be systematically printed and made available both in Guinea-Bissau Creole and Portuguese in most medical units as well as in the streets. Languages used in education – Portuguese is the only school medium in governmental schools. Most books published in Guinea-Bissau are written in Portuguese. In prac1 “O processo e procedimentos e os debates da arbitragem terão lugar em (português) [sic]” (Decree-Law 9, Chapter V, Appendix [‘Anexo’]). 2 “[...] o requerimento será difundido pela rádio nacional e local e nas duas línguas maternas dominantes na Comunidade Local onde se localizar a terra em questão” (Law 5, Chapter V, section 33).

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tice, Guinea-Bissau Creole is also largely used in spoken interactions, in particular during breaks. Languages used in the media – Print media as well as official websites are generally only available in Portuguese, while TV and radio news are regularly broadcast in that language. On the other hand, many locally produced TV/radio broadcasts (including news) resort to Guinea-Bissau Creole. Note that in such broadcasts, the speakers often codeswitch between Guinea-Bissau Creole and Portuguese even while supposed to be speaking Guinea-Bissau Creole. In social media (e. g., Facebook), Guinea-Bissau Creole is also widely used and clearly dominant in private exchanges such as SMS chats. There are also many advertising posters in Guinea-Bissau Creole, both for commercial and for political purposes such as elections. Languages used in literature – Novels and book-length fiction published in GuineaBissau are usually written in Portuguese. Guinea-Bissau Creole is absolutely dominant in the domain of oral literature: it is in that language that traditional folktales and sayings are usually told and that a great majority of local songs are performed.  

4 Linguistic characteristics Portuguese – The official norm for Portuguese in Guinea-Bissau is standard European Portuguese. Portuguese is probably the home language of fewer than 5 % of the country’s population and is almost never heard in the streets. Therefore, it is quite difficult to characterize this variety. However, despite these limitations, a few features of GuineaBissau Portuguese can actually be observed, many of which are calques or influences from Guinea-Bissau Creole. Creole – As Guinea-Bissau Creole is actually the main Romance-based spoken language in Guinea-Bissau, it will be described in more detail than Portuguese in this section. From a phylogenetic point of view, Guinea-Bissau Creole is an Upper Guinea Portuguese Creole and displays strong relationships with Cabo Verdean and, to a lesser extent, Papiamentu, an Iberian-based Creole language spoken in the ABC islands (Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao) in the Dutch Caribbean (cf. Jacobs 2012; Quint 2000). Note that these relationships are not only due to the shared linguistic material inherited from Portuguese but also to the existence of a common ancestor, namely an Upper Guinea Portuguese-based Pidgin or Proto-Creole (or Proto-Upper Guinea Portuguese Creole), which must have been spoken along the shores of the Captainship of Cabo Verde (cf. Quint/ Moreira Tavares 2019, 124ss., 141s.; Quint 2000, 195–208). Guinea-Bissau Creole is one of the two members of the continental branch of Upper Guinea Portuguese Creole, the other one being Casamance Creole. Historically, Casamance Creole is an offshoot of Cacheu Creole (spoken in Guinea-Bissau), as the Portuguese factory of Ziguinchor was first settled by Cacheu kristons in the first half of the seventeenth century (Biagui 2018, 18). Today, although Casamance Creole and Guinea-Bissau Creole remain mutually intelligible, they also display significant differences (Biagui/Nunez/Quint forthcoming), due to:  

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first a specific Nyun adstrate in Ziguinchor and its surroundings, second the influence French and Wolof have been exerting on Casamance Creole since the inclusion of Ziguinchor in the French colonial empire –after it was sold by Portugal to France in 1886 (cf. Biagui 2018, 18)– and later in the Republic of Senegal, where Wolof is the main vehicular, third a stronger exposure to modern Portuguese in Guinea-Bissau Creole; and fourth a general dialectal levelling by the Bissau variety within the boundaries of Guinea-Bissau (cf. next section), which did not affect Casamance Creole as it is now spoken outside Guinea-Bissau. Traditional varieties of Guinea-Bissau Creole – Until the twentieth century, GuineaBissau Creole was mostly spoken as first language in the historical Portuguese factories of Bissau, Cacheu, Farim, and Geba, all founded between 1590 and 1650 (cf. above 2). Accordingly, each of these places developed its own local variety. However, the twentiethcentury expansion of Guinea-Bissau Creole throughout the country deeply affected the varietal landscape: the Bissau variety became the lingua franca in Guinea-Bissau and, within half a century, almost eradicated the remaining historical varieties. In 2020, at least three different varieties can still be observed in Guinea-Bissau: The Bissau variety is absolutely dominant, being spoken natively by at least 300,000 to 500,000 people and daily used by over 1,500,000 people living in Guinea-Bissau or originating from this country. The Cacheu and Geba varieties are spoken each by less than 10 elderly people (most of whom above 60 years old), all members of the tiny local kriston communities. Even among these people, the Bissau variety is today the main daily means of interaction and the few speakers left would best be described as heritage speakers, which means that Cacheu and Geba local varieties probably ceased to be actively used in these communities at least fifty years ago. Several factors seem to have contributed to their demise: firstly, the dominant status of Guinea-Bissau Creole and its steady expansion, secondly the relatively low linguistic distance between these creole varieties, which favoured dialectal levelling, and thirdly some specific historical circumstances which contributed to weakening the practice of Cacheu and Geba varieties: as a matter of fact, the Cacheu elders still remember that the old kriston community, settled near the river at a place named Basemar [baseˈmar] (< Pg. baixa-mar ‘low tide/water’), was forcibly displaced for health reasons by the Portuguese authorities, apparently in the 1940s, which led to the scattering of the creole-speaking families, and hence to the subsequent progressive loss of Cacheu specific creole variety. The Geba community suffered mostly from its economic collapse when, by the turn of the twentieth century, the Portuguese colonial authorities chose the close-by and recently founded city of Bafatá as an administrative centre for the inner part of the country, which prompted many Geba kristons to leave their community looking for better job opportunities. Today, Geba kristons are but a small minority (between 100 and 200 people) in Geba itself, where the majority of inhabitants are Mandinka speakers, who practise Bissau (not Geba) Creole as a second language. This tiny kriston community is a mere shadow of its former self, when Geba was a thriving river port: in 1841–1842 (cf. Carreira 1984, 34), there were 3,000 kristons (Pg. cristãos) in Geba, accounting for almost one half (46 %) of the total number (6,450) of  

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kristons in Guinea-Bissau at that time (note that the old port of Geba had a similar name –Basamar [basaˈmar] in the local creole variant– as the ancient kriston neighbourhood of Cacheu). By 2012, there did not seem to be any speaker left of Farim variety (cf. Quint/Moreira Tavares 2019, 121). On linguistic grounds, Cacheu Creole clearly clusters with Casamance Creole, historically an offshoot of the former (cf. previous section). The two varieties share both phonetic and lexical features and make up together the northern branch of Upper Guinea continental creoles (cf. Quint/Moreira Tavares 2019, 135– 139). Table 1: Some shared features between Cacheu and Casamance Creoles Meaning

Cacheu

Casamance

Bissau

Etymon

‘to come’

ben [bẽŋ]

beŋ [bẽŋ]

bin [bĩŋ]

Pg. vém [vɛ̃]3 ‘he comes’

‘big jar’

kantrera

kantilera

Pg. cantareira puti

‘to squat’

jokoní

jokoní

Pg. pote [ˈpɔti] Wolof jonkon

jungutú

Mandinka jòŋkótó

The linguistic originality of Geba Creole is harder to establish (Quint/Moreira Tavares 2019, 139ss.). From the few available evidence, Geba Creole seems to belong to the same grouping as the Bissau variety, namely the southern branch of Upper Guinea continental creoles. This goes contrary to what was said in previous works (e. g., Wilson 1962, vii), where Geba and close-by Bafatá are considered to make up an eastern branch of GuineaBissau Creole. Most data found by the present author in Geba in 2010 and 2019 among conservative local speakers are similar to the Bissau variety. As for Bafatá, the town is a recent foundation (much posterior to the first factories), and the local creole is the vehicular, Bissau-based variety spoken nowadays throughout the country. At any rate, the Geba variety has at least a few features of its own, such as the use of an asyllabic variant of the progressive marker, as in bu ka n bai! ‘You are not going!’ [bu ka ˈmbaj] instead of bu ka na bai! [bu ka na ˈbaj] in other varieties. New varieties of Guinea-Bissau Creole – As Guinea-Bissau Creole is nowadays spoken as a first or second language by a vast majority of Guinea-Bissau population, the inner-variation of Guinea-Bissau Creole is increasingly depending on two factors (Couto 1994, 51–57), the first of which being the contrast between native and non-native varieties. Actually, many people, in particular (but not only) in the rural areas, still acquire  

3 Unless otherwise specified, the phonetic transcriptions of Portuguese are based on Renaissance (or Classical) Portuguese, spoken between 1450 and 1650. It is from this stage of the language that a majority of Guinea-Bissau Creole Portuguese-derived items originate. For more details about the pronunciation of Renaissance Portuguese, cf. Teyssier 1980.

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a local African language in their family before being exposed to Guinea-Bissau Creole in schools –where Guinea-Bissau Creole is often dominant in spoken interactions with peers– or in urban settings. Such second language speakers obviously transfer various features of their first languages into the Guinea-Bissau Creole variety they practise. However, specific studies of these diverse second language varieties are still altogether missing. The second factor accounting for variation in today’s Guinea-Bissau Creole is the degree of exposure to Portuguese, the official language of the country and the main written medium of local schools (cf. 3.2). As expected, people who have a higher degree of education or enjoy political or administrative responsibilities in the society tend to make use of more Portuguese words and structures while speaking Guinea-Bissau Creole. At any rate, the influence of contemporary (or modern) Portuguese is pervasive and can be observed even among people with low schooling (or no schooling at all). Daily practice of Guinea-Bissau Creole reveals in particular that the use of palatal fricatives (theoretically absent from traditional Guinea-Bissau Creole, cf. Table 2) is solidly entrenched in a lot of idiolects (urban as rural, cf. Couto 1994, 72; Scantamburlo 1999, 128s.; 2013, 246), for example dixá [diˈʃa] (< Pg. deixar [dej’ʃaɾ]) ‘to let, to leave’ (with [ʃ]) is nowadays more commonly heard than the basilectal (or traditional) form disá [diˈsa], still dominant in Casamance Creole. It is also frequent for one and the same speaker to alternate, even in the same sentence, between traditional [sC] and Lusitanized [ʃC] realizations of /sC/ clusters, for example ‘to be [somewhere]’ can be indifferently pronounced sta [ˈsta] (< Renaissance Pg. estar [isˈtaɾ]) or xta [ˈʃta] (< modern Pg. estar [ɨʃˈtaɾ]). In other words, today’s spoken Guinea-Bissau Creole –in particular in the city of Bissau, where more than a quarter of the whole country’s population lives– is increasingly open to the linguistic influx of standard Portuguese as well as other international languages, mainly English and French. Guinea-Bissau rap texts provide good samples of this ‘new Guinea-Bissau Creole’: “Ora k-i na pasá/ningin ka ta rizixtí si xarmi/ela i ka di prasa [...]/Bu fasí-m dudu/bu pui N ka panhá pé di nha self di nha self/ Mona-Liza fora di kuadru./Kin ku dizenhá-u/dudu más di Pikasu”.4

In the above excerpt, influences from modern Portuguese are attested at all levels of grammar: on the phonetic level, for example, we find the voiceless palatal fricative /ʃ/ preceding a consonant (only [sC] realizations are allowed in this case in more conservative varieties, cf. above discussion of sta/xta) and the voiced alveolar fricative /z/ (unattested in conservative varieties, cf. Table 2) in rizixtí ‘to resist’ [ɾiziʃˈti] (< Pg. resistir [ʁɨziʃˈtiɾ]). On the morphological level, we find, for example, the feminine pronoun ela

4 ‘When she passes by/no-one can resist her charm/she is not from the capital […]./You drive [(lit.) made] me crazy/you turn me unaware of myself/[you are a] Mona-Lisa [who would have gotten] out of her frame./The one who created you [(lit.) drew you]/was more genial [(lit.) crazier] than Picasso’ (from Zaino Jawad 2018 – I would like to thank here Braima Sam Mendes for his help in transcribing the Creole text of this song).

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‘she’ (< Pg. ela), theoretically absent from Guinea-Bissau Creole grammar where there is no gender distinction for 3rd person singular pronouns (cf. Table 3). On the semantic level, we find, for example, the causative auxiliary fasí ‘to make’ (< Pg. fazer) used with dudu ‘to be crazy’ (< Pg. doido) while ‘traditional’ Guinea-Bissau Creole more frequently resorts to pui ‘to put’ (< Pg. põe/[archaic] poer) –also attested in the following sentence of the text– for analytical causative constructions. On the lexical level, we find, for example, xarmi ‘charm’ (< Pg. charme < Fr. charme). This text also contains the item self, a lexical borrowing from English. An accurate overview of urban spoken Guinea-Bissau Creole would definitely require dedicated variationist studies in order to better describe what hundreds of thousands of Guinea-Bissau citizens actually speak as their main language in the first quarter of the twenty-first century. Given the complexity of dealing with present-day linguistic variation and the scarcity of available sources, unless otherwise mentioned, the following presentation of Guinea-Bissau Creole is based on a conservative or ‘traditional’ version of the Bissau variety.

4.1 Pronunciation Portuguese – Portuguese being mostly spoken as a second (or third) language in GuineaBissau, its phonology is quite often heavily influenced by Creole (and locally also by other languages), mostly concerning vowels and prosody. As expected, the higher the degree of education, the closer the actual Portuguese pronunciation is to European Portuguese. Creole – In the most conservative varieties of Guinea-Bissau Creole (with limited influence from Portuguese), the vowel inventory includes /i/, /e/, /a/, /o/, /u/, and a central, unstressed schwa /ə/, whose occurrence is limited to unstressed syllables or particles, such as the relative marker /kə/ (also realized as [ki] or [ku], cf. below 4.2, Nuclear and complex sentences). Regarding consonants (cf. Table 2), the major differences with modern Portuguese are firstly the presence of /c/, /ɟ/, and /ŋ/, which can be traced back to both Renaissance Portuguese, as in corá ‘to cry’ [coˈɾa] (< Pg. chorar [tʃoˈɾaɾ]), jugu ‘game’ (< Pg. jogo [ˈdʒoɡu]), luŋa ‘moon’ [ˈluŋa] (< Pg. lũa [lũ(ŋ)ɐ]), and the African substrate: jakasí ‘to mix’ [ɟakaˈsi] (< Wolof jaxase), kocí ‘to pound (grain)’ [koˈci] (< Mandinka kócí), ŋoli ‘to look daggers at someone’ [ˈŋoli] (< Mandinka ŋùlu/ŋúndúndá); secondly the absence of voiced fricatives, as in baka ‘cow’ [ˈbaka] (< Pg. vaca [ˈvakɐ]), fasí ‘to do’ [faˈsi] (< Pg. fazer [fɐ ˈzeɾ]); and thirdly the absence of palatal fricatives, as in susu ‘dirty’ [ˈsusu] (< Pg. sujo [ˈsuʒu]), bas ‘down’ [ˈbas] (< Pg. baixo [ˈbajʃu]).

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Table 2: Phonemic chart of Guinea-Bissau Creole consonants (conservative varieties) Place of articulation Labial

Dental

Palatal

Velar

Unvoiced

p

t

c

k

Voiced

b

d

ɟ

ɡ

Fricatives

f

s

Nasals

m

n

ɲ

ŋ

Others

(w)

l/ɾ

j

(w)

Stops

As regards non-segmental features, Guinea-Bissau Creole seems to be a stress language (Andrade/Gomes/Teixeira 1999; Chapouto 2014, 17s.). In most cases, the stress falls either on the last or the penultimate syllable of the word and, in the Romance part of the lexicon, the stressed syllable is usually the same as in the Portuguese etymon, for example kasá ‘to marry’ [kaˈsa] (< Pg. casar [kɐˈzaɾ]) vs. kasa ‘house’ [ˈkasa] (< Pg. casa [ˈkazɐ]). As shown by the pair kasá vs. kasa, stress can be distinctive in Guinea-Bissau Creole. Note that Portuguese proparoxytonic items often become paroxytonic in Guinea-Bissau Creole by omitting the non-final post-tonic vowel or syllable, for example Pg. dívida [ˈdividɐ] Ś-S-S > Cr. dibra ‘debt’ [ˈdibɾa] Ś-S, Pg. fôlego [ˈfoliɡu] Ś-S-S > Cr. folgu ‘breath’ [ˈfolɡu] Ś-S, lágrima [ˈlaɡɾimɐ] Ś-S-S > Cr. larma ‘tear’ [ˈlaɾma] Ś-S.

4.2 Morphosyntax Portuguese – In spoken Guinea-Bissau Portuguese (generally second language varieties), for example in TV news, gender and number agreement are sometimes unsystematic. While, for instance, the realization of the standard Portuguese noun phrase, such as in estas duas casas bonitas ‘these two nice houses, (lit.) houses nice’, exhibits gender (feminine) and number (plural) agreement in all determiners and modifiers of the noun casas ‘houses’, the corresponding noun phrase has a strong probability to lack either gender or number agreement (or both) for at least one of the determiners in many lects of Guinea-Bissau Portuguese, e. g., when referring to casas [f.pl.] ‘houses’, alongside the standard Portuguese form bonitas [f.pl.], the adjective ‘nice’ is realized by some speakers as bonitos [m.pl.] (number agreement, no gender agreement), bonita [f.sg.] (gender agreement, no plural agreement) or bonito [m.sg.] (neither gender nor number agreement). Such lack of agreement is most probably a calque from Guinea-Bissau Creole, in which determiners and qualifiers usually do not agree with the noun neither for number nor for gender (cf. below).  

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Creole: Noun phrase – Guinea-Bissau Creole has two numbers, singular and plural. Guinea-Bissau Creole nouns are inflected for plural with Portuguese-derived morphemes ({‑s} after vowel, {‑is} after consonant): baka ‘cow’ (< Pg. vaca) > bakas ‘cows’, minjer ‘woman’ (< Pg. mulher) > minjeris ‘women’. There is also an associative plural (of African origin), used exclusively with human referents and coded by prenominal {ba}: ba Jon ‘John and his friends’ (Doneux/Rougé 1988, 33). For nouns coding for animates, gender can be expressed in three different ways: (i) lexically, as for example in rapás (< Pg. rapaz) ‘boy’ vs. bajuda ‘girl’ (< Nyun (Djifanghor) begid), (ii) using the Portuguese-derived morpheme {‑a}, for example beju ‘elderly man’ vs. beja ‘elderly woman’ or (iii) by means of the qualifiers macu ‘male’ (< Pg. macho) and fémia ‘female’ (< Pg. fêmea), for example fiju macu ‘son, (lit.) child male’ and fiju fémia ‘daughter, (lit.) child female’. Noun derivation is largely attested. It is exclusively suffixal and resorts to Portuguese-derived material, for example mininu ‘child’ (< Pg. menino) > mininesa ‘childhood’; bunitu ‘beautiful’ (< Pg. bonito) > bunitasku ‘beauty’; perá ‘to hope’ (< Pg. esperar) > peransa ‘hope’. Guinea-Bissau Creole has no exact equivalents of Portuguese (or other Romance) articles and frequently resorts to bare nouns, whose degree of (in)definiteness can only be inferred from the general context, for example omi ‘a/the man’ (cf. Truppi 2015, 126–138). Determiners and qualifiers of the noun normally do not agree with the noun neither for number, for example ki kabra ‘that goat’ > ki kabras ‘those goats’ nor for gender, for example omi bunitu ‘beautiful man’, minjer bunitu ‘beautiful woman’ (cf. Portuguese homen bonito vs. mulher bonita). The main indefinite determiner is un ‘a’ (< Pg. um), but a bare noun can also have an indefinite reading. There are two demonstratives: the proximal e ‘this’ (pronoun es ‘this one’ < Pg. esse) and the distal ki(l) ‘that’ (pronoun kil [sg.] ‘that one’, kilis [pl.] ‘those ones’ < Pg. aquele(s)). The contemporary numeral system closely follows Portuguese, for example dus ‘two’ (< Pg. dois), trezi ‘thirteen’ (< Pg. treze), sinkuenta ‘fifty’ (< Pg. cinquenta). For the numbers between eleven and nineteen, there used to be a more analytical system, for example des ku un ‘eleven, (lit.) ten and one’, des ku dus ‘twelve, (lit.) ten and two’, des ku tris ‘thirteen, (lit.) ten and three’, etc., now largely replaced by forms borrowed from modern Portuguese. The eleven-to-nineteen system (and other archaic features) is still retained in closely related Casamance Creole (Biagui/Nunez/Quint forthcoming; Biagui 2018, 245–260; Biagui/Quint 2013, 43). All determiners precede the noun: un kacur ‘a/one dog’, dus kacur ‘two dogs’, ki kacur ‘that dog’. Most qualifiers (= adjectives) follow the noun: kasa branku ‘white house, (lit.) house white’. Predicative qualifiers behave syntactically as verbs (cf. below Verb phrase). The personal pronouns are Portuguese-derived but quite different from standard Portuguese.

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Table 3: Main personal pronouns and possessives in Guinea-Bissau Creole Clitics

Free

Subject

Object

N

‑m

mi

bu

‑u, ‑bu

3rd sg.

i

1st pl. 2nd pl.

st

1 sg. 2

nd

rd

sg.

3 pl.

Portuguese etymon

Possessives

Clitic

Stressed

me, mim

nha

di mi

bo

vós

bu

di bo

‑l

yel

ele

si

di sil

no

‑nu

nos

nós

no

di nos

bo

bos

bos

vós

bo

di bos

e

elis

yelis

eles

se

di selis

Subject pronouns precede the verb: N bin ‘I came’, bu bin ‘you came’. Object pronouns follow the verb: N ojá-bu ‘I saw you’, N oj-elis (< N ojá + elis) ‘I saw them’. Free pronouns are mainly used after prepositions: ku bo ‘with you’, pa nos ‘for us’. They also provide the basic form to derive a specific series of topic pronouns, characterized by the prefix a-: ami [1st sg.] , abo [2nd sg.], anos [1st pl.] , abos [2nd pl.]; for 3rd persons, there is no prefix and the forms are the same as the corresponding free pronouns. Topic pronouns are most frequently used in front of a clitic subject pronoun in order to emphasize the identity of the subject: ami N kunsí Jon ‘I know John, (lit.) as for me, I know John’; compare with French moi je connais Jean). Alongside the six persons presented above, Guinea-Bissau Creole also makes use of 2nd person formal pronouns based on the roots nhu /ɲu/ ‘Sir, Mr.’ (< Pg. senhor) and nha /ɲa/ ‘Mrs., Madam’ (< Pg. senhora, Kihm 1994, 151s.). The use of these forms is much more reduced than in Cabo Verdean (Quint 2003, 160s., 218– 222). There are two series of possessives: clitic possessives are formally similar to subject clitics (exceptions: 1 st sg. clitic possessive nha < Pg. minha ‘[f.] my’, initial s- of the 3rd person clitic possessives si [sg.] and se [pl.] < Pg. seu [m.] ‘her/his’) and always precede the noun, as in nha karu ‘my car’, no karu ‘our car’. Stressed possessives, in contrast, are frequently used as pronouns, as in e karu pikininu, ma di selis más garandi ‘This car is small, but theirs is bigger’. Genitive constructions follow the pattern ‘possessum + di + possessor’, for example kabra di Joŋ ‘John’s goat, (lit.) goat of John’. Most oblique functions are expressed by means of prepositions, the most common of which are di ‘of/from’ (< Pg. de), ku ‘with’ (< Pg. com), na ‘in/at/on’ (< Pg. na < em ‘in’ + a ‘ the [f.]’ ), sin ‘without’ (< Pg. sem), te ‘until’ (< Pg. até), and pa ‘for/by’ (< Pg. para): i fasí-l pa si fiju ‘she/he did it for her/his child’. Creole: Verb phrase – The Creole verb is not inflected for person, for example N kantá ‘I sang’, bu kantá ‘you [sg.] sang’. Aspect is expressed by preverbal particles: The future/progressive na (N na kantá ‘I am singing/I will sing’), the general imperfective ta (N ta kantá ‘I sing’), and the perfective zero (N ø kantá ‘I sang’). Guinea-Bissau Creole

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contrasts action verbs on the one hand which, when inflected for perfective, usually have a past reference, as in N ø kantá ‘I sang’, from stative verbs on the other hand, whose perfective usually has a present reference, as in N ø sibí ‘I know’. Note that in Guinea-Bissau Creole, most predicative qualifiers behave as stative verbs: Maria ø bunitu ‘Mary is beautiful’. Two basic tenses are distinguished: present (zero marker), as in N ta kantá ‘I (use to) sing’, and past (postverbal ba < imperfect Portuguese suffix ‑va), as in N ta kantaba ‘I used to sing’. When a past verb combines with an object pronoun, the latter is inserted between the verb and the tense marker: N ta kantá-l ba ‘I used to sing it’. GuineaBissau Creole also has two voices, namely active, as in Jon ojá Maria ‘John saw Mary’, and passive, as in Jon ojadu ‘John was seen’; the passive ‑du suffix is derived from Pg. masculine past participle ending ‑do. There is an equative copula sedu ‘to be’ (< Pg. ser), with two basic inflected forms: the present i ‘am, is, are’ (< Pg. é ‘is’) and the past iéraba ‘was, were’ (< Pg. era ‘was’ + imperfect suffix ‑va). Verb negation is expressed through the preverbal particle ka (< Pg. nunca ‘never’): i bin ‘he came’ > i ka bin ‘he did not come’. Verb derivation is well developed. It resorts both to prefixes such as in mará ‘to tie’ (< Pg. amarrar) > inversive dismará ‘to untie’ and suffixes, as in pretu ‘to be black’ (< Pg. preto) > inchoative pret(i)sí ‘to become black’. From a Romance point of view, the most original derivational suffix is probably the causative marker ‑nt‑/‑nd‑: kabá ‘to finish, to be finished (intr.)’ (< Pg. acabar) > kabantá ‘to finish [something] (tr.)’; sintá ‘to sit down (intr.)’ (< Pg. sentar) > sintandá ‘to make [someone] sit (tr.)’; camí ‘to get drunk (intr.)’ > camintí ‘to make [someone] drunk (tr.)’. The causative marker is derived from Mandinka ‑ndi (Biagui 2018, 213; Biagui/Nunez/Quint forthcoming), possibly with an influence of Portuguese lexical pairs such as mamar ‘to suckle’ > amamentar ‘to nurse, to breastfeed’ (i.e., ‘to make [someone] suckle’, Kihm 1991, 59; 1994, 251s.). Reflexives and reciprocals are produced by means of analytical constructions involving the nouns kabesa ‘head’ and kurpu ‘body’ (reflexives), as in i matá kabesa ‘she/he killed herself/himself, (lit.) she/he killed head’ or in i labá kurpu ‘she/he washed herself/himself, (lit.) she/he washed body’; and the fixed collocation un utru ‘one another’ (reciprocal), as in e kirí un utru ‘they love each other’. Creole: Nuclear and complex sentences – In nuclear sentences, the basic order is SVO: Maria ojá Pidru ‘Mary saw Peter’. In double object constructions, the recipient precedes the patient (from Couto 1994, 105): Jon da Maria libru ‘John gave Mary the book, John gave the book to Mary’. Yes-no questions are optionally marked by nos, without any other syntactic change (from Scantamburlo 2002, 434): Nos Titu splorá bos? ‘Did Titus take advantage of you [pl.]?’ (2 Corinthians 12:18). Wh-questions are generally introduced by one of the following question words, all Portuguesederived: kal ‘which’ (< Pg. qual), kantu ‘how many/much’ (< Pg. quanto), ké ‘what’ (< Pg. quê), kin ‘who’ (< Pg. quem), kumá ‘how’ (< Renaissance Pg. coma), kal tempu/dia/anu/ora ‘(trad.) when, (lit.) which time/day/year/hour’ or kuandu ‘when’ (recently borrowed from Pg. quando), (n)undé or ndé ‘where’ (< Pg. onde). When fron-

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ted, these question words are generally followed by the focus marker ku ‘that’: Ké ku bo mistí? ‘What do you [pl.] want?’. Adverbial clauses are most often introduced by ora ku ‘when’ (+ prospective or habitual context, cf. the song excerpt in New varieties of Guinea-Bissau Creole above), anti(s) di ‘before’, dispús ku ‘after’, pa ‘so that’ (purposive) or ocá ku ‘when’ (+ past context): Ocá ku Maria cigá, i comá si mamé ‘When Mary arrived, she called her mother’. Complement clauses follow the verb. Utterance and manipulative clauses are distinguished through the use of different complementizers, kumá (< Renaissance Pg. coma ‘as’ and/or Mandinka kúma ‘word, speech’, Kihm 1987) and pa (< Pg. para ‘for’) respectively: Pidru falá Maria kumá i bai la ‘Peter told Mary that he went there’, Pidru falá Maria pa i bai la ‘Peter told Mary to go there, (lit.) Peter told Mary that she goes there’. Relative clauses follow their antecedent and make use of a universal marker ku/ki/kə (< Pg. que): Minjer ku ojá-m comá Maria ‘The woman who saw me is called Mary’, Minjer ku N ojá comá Maria ‘The woman whom I saw is called Mary’. Topicalization is mainly characterized by left dislocation as illustrated above for the topic pronouns. Focus constructions follow the pattern (i) + X + ku/ki/kə (< Pg. é + X + que) where X is the focus: I Pidru ku fasí-l ‘It is Peter who did it, Peter did it’.

4.3 Lexicon Portuguese – Both spoken and written Guinea-Bissau Portuguese resort to lexical items that are not attested (or at least not frequently) in standard European Portuguese (also see 5). Even such a formal text as the Civil Code (e. g., GW 2006, 655) makes ample use of the term tabanca ‘local community’ < Cr. tabanka, itself borrowed from ka-banka ‘fortification, palisade’, a word of the Atlantic language Temne spoken in Sierra Leone, which used to be one of the main vehiculars of the whole region and is one of the three main African substrates of Guinea-Bissau Creole (cf. Quint/Moreira Tavares 2019, 116, 125, 141; Quint 2008, 40–43; Rougé 1999, 61s.). Massa’s dictionary of Guinea-Bissau Portuguese (1996) also mentions borrowings or calques from Guinea-Bissau Creole, whose actual use remains to be ascertained, such as chamir ‘to get drunk’ (< Cr. camí, non-Portuguese origin) instead of Pg. embriagar-se; combosse/cumboça ‘co-wife’ (< Cr. kumbosa, itself from (antiquated) Pg. comborça ‘mistress’) instead of Pg. coesposa; fanado ‘young men’s traditional initiation (including circumcision)’ (< Cr. fanadu, itself from Pg. fanar ‘to amputate/to sever’); mancarra ‘peanut’ (< Cr. mankara, itself from Nyun) instead of Pg. amendoim (cf. Rougé 1988, 100; 2004, 333). Creole – Like many Sub-Saharan languages, particularly those belonging to the Niger-Congo phylum, Guinea-Bissau Creole possesses a rich array of so-called ideophones (Couto 1995; Quint/Biagui 2019; forthcoming; Truppi/Costa 2019), that is adverbials which combine specifically with one or a few verbs or qualifiers, whose meaning they intensify or specify.  

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Table 4: Some common Guinea-Bissau Creole ideophones and their associated verbs or qualifiers Verb/qualifier

Verb/qualifier + ideophone

branku ‘to be white’

branku fandan ‘to be white as snow, to be bright white’

kai ‘to fall’

kai bup ‘to fall heavily/suddenly’

kalá ‘to be silent’

kalá yem ‘to be completely silent’

kinti ‘to be hot’

kinti wit ‘to be very hot’

kumé ‘to eat’

kumé buk ‘to eat [sth.] all’

limpu ‘to be clean’

limpu pus ‘to be as clean as a whistle’

pretu ‘to be black’

pretu nok ‘to be jet/deep black’

sai ‘to get out’

sai fat ‘to come out suddenly’

Between 50 to 100 such ideophones have been identified so far in Guinea-Bissau Creole. The category of ideophones has no actual correspondent in Romance languages and is clearly an African feature of Guinea-Bissau Creole. At least 80 % of Guinea-Bissau Creole’s current lexicon derives from Renaissance or modern Portuguese, for example Cr. omi < Pg. homem, Cr. minjer < Pg. mulher ‘woman’. This proportion is still higher in the core lexicon (> 95 % of Swadesh 100-word list). However, there is also an important African component, consisting of two different layers (Quint/Moreira Tavares 2019, 124ss.): an African substrate on the one hand, shared by all Upper Guinea Portuguese Creoles and derived from the three main languages Mandinka (e. g., Cr. jubí ‘to look’ < juubee), Wolof (e. g., Cr. lokoti ‘to extract from a hole’ < lóqati) and Temne (e. g., Cr. polon ‘kapok tree’ < an-polon), which used to be –and still are– the most widespread vehiculars on the shores of the old Captainship of Cabo Verde (cf. above 2), and an African adstrate on the other hand, which depends on which local language is in contact with a given local variety of Guinea-Bissau Creole, for example Balanta and Papel in Bissau (Holm/Intumbo 2009; Intumbo 2007), Mandjak in Cacheu, or Mandinka in Geba.  

 

 

 

 

5 Internal language policy Standardization: Portuguese – There does not seem to be any officially defined norm for Guinea-Bissau Portuguese, and the Portuguese standard for the country is the European norm. Nevertheless, Brazilian Portuguese also exerts a significant influence on GuineaBissau Portuguese due to the numerous telenovelas or ‘TV series’ directly broadcast in this Portuguese variety throughout the Lusophone world. Standardization: Creole – Although the actual written use of Guinea-Bissau Creole shows recurring tendencies (e. g., the use of the letter to transcribe the phoneme /k/, contrasting with in Portuguese), it also displays a great amount of variation at  

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all levels (orthography, morphosyntax, and lexicon), largely due to the lack of formal teaching and the absence of an officially recognized standard. Description of linguistic characteristics: Portuguese – There have been some attempts to describe the peculiarities of Guinea-Bissau Portuguese, the most significant one being Massa’s (1996) bilingual Guinea-Bissau Portuguese/French dictionary: significantly, this book is exclusively based on written material (Massa 1996, xxv) and actually most non-standard Portuguese words mentioned in the dictionary are borrowings or calques from Guinea-Bissau Creole or African languages (cf. 4.3). Be that as it may, there is a growing body of written material (and in particular literature) directly produced in Portuguese by Bissau-Guineans (Calafate Ribeiro/Costa Semedo 2011), which should progressively lead to the emergence of a more stabilized local variety of Portuguese, at least in the domain of formal expression. Description of linguistic characteristics: Creole – Guinea-Bissau Creole grammar and lexicon have been described in detail by a considerable number of linguists (e. g., Biasutti 1981; Bull 1975; Chapouto 2014; Couto 1994; Doneux/Rougé 1988; Intumbo/Inverno/ Holm 2013; Kihm 1980; 1994; Mbodj 1979; Peck 1988; Rougé 1985; 1988; Scantamburlo 1981; 1999; 2002; 2013; Wilson 1962). Variety used in literature: Portuguese – Educated Guinea-Bissauans tend to use Portuguese as the main medium of written literature. However, this Portuguese is often peppered with Creole words and idioms, as for example by Abdulai Sila, one of the most famous Guinea-Bissau writers, who has published a novel entitled Mistida (1997), a Creole noun associated with various meanings such as ‘love, desire, duty’ (cf. Salvadori 2009, 183). Variety used in literature: Creole – Guinea-Bissau Creole is also used in literature, e. g., in comics (Júlio 1978; cf. also Kihm/Rougé 1988) and in film production (e. g., Gomes 1996). Whereas the available grammars and dictionaries tend to promote Creole orthographical standards contrasting with Portuguese, the written texts available in GuineaBissau Creole (literature but also advertisements) display much more interferences from Portuguese. For instance, in one and the same publication (Júlio 1978, 7), post-tonic [u] is alternatively written as recommended by most Creole reference books (e. g., Cr. diritu [diˈɾitu] ‘well’ < Pg. direito [diˈɾejtu]) or as in Portuguese (e. g., Cr. tudo [ˈtudu] ‘all’ < Pg. tudo [ˈtudu]). The Portuguese influence is also present in morphology, e. g., garandis diseñaduris ‘great cartoonists’ (in the kombersa di kunsada ‘introduction, (lit.) speech of the beginning’ of Júlio 1978), where the adjective garandis ‘great’ agrees in number (plural marker {‑s}) with the head noun diseñaduris ‘cartoonists’, an unusual phenomenon in spoken Guinea-Bissau Creole but reminiscent of the agreement rules followed by Portuguese (cf. above 4.2).  

 

 

 

 

 

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References Almada, André Álvares ([1594] 1964), Tratado breve dos Rios de Guiné e do Cabo Verde, do Rio de Sanagá até os baixos da Santa Ana, in: António Brásio (ed.), Monumenta missionária d’África Occidental, Lisbon, Agenda Geral do Ultramar/Academia portuguesa da história, 229–378. Andrade, Ernesto/Gomes, Alfredo/Teixeira, Inês (1999), Observações sobre o Sistema Acentual do Crioulo da Guiné-Bissau (CGB), in: Ernesto Andrade/Alain Kihm (edd.), Actas do Colóquio sobre Crioulos de base lexical portuguesa, Lisbon, Colibri, 135–140. Biagui, Noël Bernard (2018), Description générale du créole afro-portugais de Ziguinchor (Sénégal), Paris, Karthala. Biagui, Noël Bernard/Nunez, Jean-François/Quint, Nicolas (forthcoming), Casamance Creole, in: Friederike Lüpke (ed.), Oxford guide to the world’s languages: Atlantic, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Biagui, Noël Bernard/Quint, Nicolas (2013), Casamancese Creole, in: Susanne Michaelis et al. (edd.), Survey of Pidgin and Creole Languages, vol. 2: French-based, Portuguese-based and Spanish-based languages, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 40–49. Biasutti, Padre Artur (1981), Vokabulari Kriol-Purtugîs, Bafatá, Missão Católica de Bafatá. C-GW = Guinea-Bissau (1996), Constituição da República da Guiné-Bissau, Bissau, Assembleia Nacional Popular. Calafate Ribeiro, Margarida/Costa Semedo, Odete (edd.) (2011), Literaturas da Guiné-Bissau, Cantando os escritos da história, Porto, Afrontamentos. Carreira, António (1984), O Crioulo de Cabo Verde – surto e expansão, Lisbon, s.e. Chapouto, Sandra Marisa (2014), Contributo para a Descrição de Aspectos Fonológicos e Prosódicos do Crioulo Guineense, Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra, Master Thesis. Couto, Hildo Honório (1994), O Crioulo Português da Guiné-Bissau, Hamburg, Buske. Couto, Hildo Honório (1995), Exclusive particles (ideophones) in Guinea-Bissau creole, in: Philip Baker (ed.), From contact to creole and beyond, vol. 1, London, University of Westminster Press, 207–215. Decree-Law 9 = Guinea-Bissau (2000), Decreto-Lei 9/2000, de 25 de Setembro de 2000, Bissau, Assembleia Nacional Popular. Doneux, Jean-Léonce/Rougé, Jean-Louis (1988), En apprenant le créole à Bissau ou Ziguinchor, Paris, L’Harmattan. Enders, Armelle (1995), Histoire de l’Afrique lusophone, Paris, Chandeigne. Gomes, Flora (1996), Po di sangui, Bissau/Paris, Les Matins Films/Arco Iris/Cinétéléfilm. GW 2006 = Guinea-Bissau (2006), Código Civil e Legislação Complementar, Lisbon, Faculdade de Direito de Bissau/Centro de Estudos e Apoio às Reformas Legislativas (Universidade Amílcar Cabral). Holm, John/Intumbo, Incanha (2009), Quantifying superstrate and substrate influence, Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 24/2, 218–274. Ichinose, Atsushi (2018), Angústias e esperanças espelhadas num pequeno país africano: questões linguísticas da Guiné-Bissau, in: Paulo Feytor Pinto/Sílvia Melo Pfeifer (edd.), Políticas Linguísticas em Português, Lisbon, Lidel, 148–168. INE (2009), Características socioculturais, in: Terceiro Recenseamento Geral da População e Habitação, Bissau, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Intumbo, Incanha (2007), Estudo comparativo da morfossintaxe do crioulo guineense, do balanta e do português, Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra, Master Thesis. Intumbo, Incanha/Inverno, Liliana/Holm, John (2013), Guinea-Bissau Kriyol, in: Susanne Michaelis et al. (edd.), Survey of Pidgin and Creole Languages, vol. 2: French-based, Portuguese-based and Spanish-based languages, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 31–38. Jacobs, Bart (2012), Origins of a Creole. The History of Papiamentu and its African Ties, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter Mouton. Júlio, Fernando (1978), Kanfurbat Ko. Alunu numer 0020, Turma 100-B, sala B1, Bissau, s.e.

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Kihm, Alain (1980), Aspects d’une syntaxe historique. Études sur le créole portugais de Guinée-Bissau, Paris, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Doctoral Thesis. Kihm, Alain (1987), Créoles et croisement, in: José Terra (ed.), Homenagem a Paul Teyssier, Lisbon/Paris, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 235–260. Kihm, Alain (1991), Les constructions causatives en kriyol, Linx 25, 45–62. Kihm, Alain (1994), Kriyol Syntax: the Portuguese-based creole language of Guinea-Bissau, Amsterdam/ Philadelphia, Benjamins. Kihm, Alain/Rougé, Jean-Louis (1988), “Les Trois Irrécupérales” de Fernando Júlio. Édition critique d’une bande dessinée en kriol (Guinée-Bissau), Cahiers du LACITO 3, 107–177. Kihm, Alain/Rougé, Jean-Louis (2013), Língua de preto, the Basic Variety at the root of West African Portuguese Creoles: A contribution to the theory of pidgin/creole formation as second-language acquisition, Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 28/2, 203–298. Law 5 = Guinea-Bissau (1998), Lei 5/98, de 28 de Abril de 1998, Bissau, Assembleia Nacional Popular. Leclerc, Jacques (2016), Guinée-Bissau, Lois diverses à portée linguistique, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/CEFAN, http://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/Guinee-Bissau.htm (2/3/2023). Lopes, Carlos (1999), Kaabunké, Espaço, território e poder na Guiné-Bissau, Gâmbia e Casamance pré-coloniais, Lisbon, Comissão Nacional para as Comemorações dos Descobrimentos Portugueses. Lopes da Silva, Ciro/Jorge Sampa, Pascoal (2017), Língua portuguesa na Guiné-Bissau e a influência do crioulo na identidade cultural e no português, Revista Internacional em Língua Portuguesa 31, 231–247. Massa, Jean-Michel (1996), Dictionnaire bilingue portugais-français, Guinée-Bissau, vol. 1, Rennes, GDR 817 (CNRS) – EDPAL (Université de Haute Bretagne). Mbodj, Chérif (1979), Phonologie du créole de Guinée-Bissau, Dakar, Centre de Linguistique Appliquée de Dakar. Naro, Anthony J. (1978), A study on the origins of pidginization, Language 54, 314–354. Peck, Stephen Madry (1988), Tense, aspect and mood in Guinea-Casamance Portuguese Créole, Los Angeles, University of California, Doctoral Thesis. Pinto Bull, Benjamin (1975), Le créole de la Guinée-Bissau. Structures grammaticales, philosophie et sagesse à travers ses surnoms, ses proverbes et ses expressions, Dakar, Université de Dakar. Quint, Nicolas (2000), Le cap-verdien: origines et devenir d’une langue métisse, Paris, L’Harmattan. Quint, Nicolas (2003), Parlons capverdien, Paris, L’Harmattan. Quint, Nicolas (2008), L’élément africain dans la langue capverdienne/Africanismos na língua caboverdiana, Paris, L’Harmattan. Quint, Nicolas/Biagui, Noël Bernard (2019), Ideophones in Upper Guinea Creoles, paper presented at Societas Linguistica Europaea (SLE) – 52nd Annual Meeting, 21st–24th August 2019 in Leipzig. Quint, Nicolas/Biagui, Noël Bernard (forthcoming), Ideophones in Upper Guinea Creoles: a comparative study, Linguistic Typology at the Crossroads. Quint, Nicolas/Moreira Tavares, Karina (2019), The common African lexical core of Upper Guinea Creoles and its historical significance, Journal of Ibero-Romance Creoles 9, 115–161. Rougé, Jean-Louis (1985), Formation et évolution du lexique du créole portugais de Guinée-Bissau et de Casamance, Lyon, Université Lyon 2, Doctoral Thesis. Rougé, Jean-Louis (1988), Petit dictionnaire étymologique du kriol de Guinée-Bissau et de Casamance, Bissau, Instituto Nacional de Estudos e Pesquisa. Rougé, Jean-Louis (1999), Apontamentos sobre o léxico de origem africana dos crioulos da Guiné e de Cabo Verde (Santiago), in: Klaus Zimmermann (ed.), Lenguas Criollas de Base Lexical Española y Portuguesa, Frankfurt am Main, Vervuert, 49–67. Rougé, Jean-Louis (2004), Dictionnaire étymologique des créoles portugais d’Afrique, Paris, Karthala. Salvadori, Juliana Cristina (2009), Safando a Mistida: deslizamentos entre trilogia, romance e palavra, Scripta 13/ 25, 173–192.

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Scantamburlo, Luigi (1981), Gramática e dicionário da língua criol da Guiné-Bissau, Bologna, Missionaria Italiana. Scantamburlo, Luigi (1999), Dicionário do Guineense, vol. 1: Introdução e notas Gramaticais, Lisbon, Colibri/ Faspebi. Scantamburlo, Luigi (2002), Dicionário do Guineense, vol. 2: Dicionário Guineense-Português. Disionariu guinensipurtuguis, Lisbon, Colibri/Faspebi. Scantamburlo, Luigi (2013), O Léxico do Crioulo Guineense e as suas Relações com o Português: o Ensino bilingue Português-Crioulo Guineense, Lisbon, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Sila, Abdulai (1997), Mistida, Bissau, Kusimon. Teyssier, Paul (1959), La langue de Gil Vicente, Paris, Klincksieck. Teyssier, Paul (1980), Histoire de la langue portugaise, Paris, Presses Universitaires de France. Truppi, Chiara (2015), Bare Nouns among and beyond Creoles, A syntactic-semantic study of Kriyol Bare Noun Phrases based on a crosslinguistic comparison and the theoretical implications, Berlin, HumboldtUniversität, Doctoral Thesis. Truppi, Chiara/Costa, Patrícia (2019), On ideophones in Portuguese Creoles, paper presented at Societas Linguistica Europaea – 52nd Annual Meeting, 21st–24th August 2019 in Leipzig. Wilson, William André Amiral (1962), The Crioulo of Guiné, Johannesburg, Witwatersrand University Press. Zaino Jawad, José [artist name: As One 1820] (2018), Dudu, in: Orgasmo Cerebral, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=OW3LkVb1wlc (2/3/2023).

Middle Africa French Portuguese Spanish

Bernard Mulo Farenkia

20 Cameroon Abstract: The present chapter describes the ecology and dynamics of French in Cameroon, paying attention to its historical development, linguistic features, and social functions. It shows that the multiplicity of avenues to acquire the French language and the diversity of contexts in which and purposes for which it is used have, among other things, given a Cameroonian touch to the French language. It also showcases many aspects of the indigenization of French in Cameroon and the trends in action at various levels. Keywords: Cameroon French, history, ecology, indigenization

1 Sociolinguistic situation Situated in Middle Africa, Cameroon covers a surface of 475,442 km2 and has a population of over 27 million inhabitants (cf. WB 2021). It is bounded to the west by Nigeria, to the north-east by Chad, to the east by the Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and to the south by the Republic of Congo (Brazzaville). Cameroon has been referred to as “Africa in miniature” because “it is characterized by exceptional social and ethnic diversity” (Mbaku 2005, 1). It is a multicultural and multiethnic society, made up of over 250 ethnic groups, and a linguistic melting pot with two official languages, English and French, and over 250 local or indigenous languages. In this multilingual setting, the official languages have adapted and continue to adapt to Cameroonian speech and sociocultural realities, and this process has given birth to indigenized varieties that diverge in many ways from the European-based varieties of English and French. The linguistic landscape of Cameroon is very complex in terms of number, structural features and social functions, and distribution of the languages spoken. The two official languages, English and French, are used alongside more than 250 indigenous languages and two hybrid languages, Cameroon Pidgin English and Camfranglais. According to Eberhard/Simons/Fennig (2023), “the number of established languages listed for Cameroon is 288. Of these, 279 are living and 9 are extinct. Of the living languages, 273 are indigenous and 6 are non-indigenous”. The official languages are used in the administration, education, and diplomacy. French is the dominant language in terms of number of speakers. In the November 2005 population census results, the Anglophones make up 16.5 % of the population as against 83.5 % for the Francophones. The administrative map of Cameroon includes ten regions, of which eight primarily speak French: the Far North (with the capital Maroua), Northern (Garoua), Adamaoua (Ngaoundéré), West (Bafoussam), Littoral (Douala), Centre (Yaoundé), East (Bertoua), and South (Ebolowa) regions. The other two predominantly speak English: the NorthWest (Bamenda) and South-West (Buea). The official languages are acquired either in  

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-020

 

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educational settings, where acquisition starts generally in elementary school, or outside institutional settings, in natural interactions. The non-guided acquisition process mostly takes place in urban areas where the official languages function as linguae francae in interethnic communication, and this process is less subject to normative rules. The official languages are used in formal contexts, and they are perceived as more prestigious in the society than the other languages. The official languages function as languages of wider communication in urban settings because no local language can ensure nationwide and interethnic communication. Overall, English and French in Cameroon function as official languages, second/third languages, first languages, vehicular languages, etc. The indigenous languages fall within three of the four major language families of Africa, namely the Afro-Asiatic, the Nilo-Saharan, and the Niger-Kordofanian families. The Afro-Asiatic group is represented by languages such as Arabic Shwa (Far North) and Hausa (North). The Nilo-Saharan group is represented, by Kanuri (North). The Niger Kordofanian family is the most highly represented and languages belonging to this family include Ewondo (Centre), Basaa (Centre and Littoral), Mungaka (North-West), Ghomálá (West), Kenyang (South-West). The Khoisan family is not represented at all in Cameroon. It is difficult to establish the exact number of speakers of the local languages, since they are generally linked to ethnic groups and limited to specific geographical areas. A large number of the local languages have alphabets and writing systems. Nevertheless, very few of them are used in written communication, and they are mostly used in informal contexts. The two hybrid languages, Cameroon Pidgin English and Camfranglais, are used in non-official domains, and they enjoy little or no prestige in society. Cameroon Pidgin English was firstly employed towards the end of the eighteenth century as a communication tool between European traders and the local populations. Its structural features and social functions have been the focus of many studies (cf. Atindogbé/Fogwe Chibaka 2012; Mühleisen/Anchimbe 2012; Sala 2012; Schröder 2012; Ayafor/Green 2017). Other researchers have examined pragmatic aspects of Cameroon Pidgin English (cf. Nkwain 2014; 2016) as well as manifestations of its contacts with other languages spoken in Cameroon (cf. Echu 2003a). Also, many researchers have indicated that it is no longer exclusively a lingua franca in the English-speaking regions of Cameroon but a language of wider communication at national level. According to Ubanako Njende, “today, the language has become a veritable identity marker especially among English-speaking Cameroonians. Considering the popularity of the language (used in music, churches, law courts, markets etc.), the language has also become popular among Francophone Cameroonians” (2015, 511).

Moreover, researchers are “unanimous that Cameroon Pidgin English is the most widely spoken lingua franca in Cameroon” (2015, 511). Its influence is felt, according to Ekanjume-Ilongo, “in several major towns of the eight Francophone provinces where it is also widely spoken, and the two Anglophone provinces which initially used it. In urban as well as rural areas, Cameroon Pidgin

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English is used in churches, in marketplaces, in motor parks, in railway stations, in the street, as well as in other informal situations. In fact, this „no man’s language‟ continues to be very present in the daily socioeconomic lives of the Cameroon people, serving as a bridge between Cameroonians of various walks of life” (2016, 157).

Camfranglais is “a language variety spoken throughout the national territory by most educated youths who have attained secondary education. It is a created mixed language variety” (Kouega/Aseh 2017, 101). It has been developed by urban youths to talk about daily events of interest to them (e. g., dating, entertainment, sports, money, physical looks, etc.). It is also used by adolescent speakers as an icon of ‘resistance identity’ (cf. Vakunta 2008, 942). Today, Camfranglais is no longer exclusively used by the youths; it is becoming increasingly present in the discourse of Cameroonians of other social groups in many cities, thus functioning as a language of wider communication (cf. Zang Zang/ Bissaya Bessaya 2017, 91). Apart from the official languages, Cameroon Pidgin English and, to a certain extent, Camfranglais, that function as languages of wider communication, local languages such as Basaa, Duala, Fulfulde, Ghomálá, Hausa, Mungaka, and others are used as in-official vehicular languages “beyond ethnic boundaries, whether at local, regional, or national level” (Biloa/Echu 2008, 201).  

2 Linguistic history The present complex multilingual landscape of Cameroon stretches back to encounters between the local populations and Europeans and to successive colonial and postindependence language policies put in place. It is important to note, however, that before the arrival of colonial rulers, “some indigenous languages had already gained a considerable degree of prestige”. Such is the case of Fulfulde “which had been used for the dissemination of Islam in the three northern [regions] as far back as the seventeenth century” (Echu 2003b, 34). In 1472, Portuguese explorers arrived at the Bight of Biafra and sailed into the estuary of what is today the Wouri River. They named the river Rio dos Camarões ‘River of Prawns, River of Shrimps’, as they were struck by the large quantity of prawns and shrimps in this river. The name Camarões was then used as the name for the country in general and gradually changed to what is now Cameroon. In July 1884, Gustav Nachtigal, the German Commissioner for West Africa, signed agreements with several local chiefs on the Cameroon River (Wouri River). A German protectorate was established and administered until 1918. The language policy during the German colonial era encouraged the use of local languages in local and missionary schools for the purpose of education and evangelization. The local languages were also used in print media destined to a local readership. By contrast, the German language was used in public schools and in newspapers reserved for Germans. Although, the Germans practised, according to Zang Zang, a “segregationist promotion of languages” (2010, 84), their language policy still led to the promotion, at national and international level, of local languages, some of which were

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researched and taught at German Universities (cf. 2010, 88s.). Germany was defeated during World War I and lost the territory of Cameroon, which became a League of Nations mandate under British and French administrations. Britain and France divided Cameroon into two unequal parts: four fifths were mandated to France and the remaining fifth went to Britain. After World War II, Cameroon was converted to a UN Trust Territory, under French and British administrations. French and English, the languages of the new colonial masters, were used both in the areas of education and administration. Summarising the French colonial language policy, Echu points out that it consisted in a systematic neglect and persecution of local languages “carried out with vigour, until French became the sole language in use for education” (2003b, 35). Contrary to the Germans, “the French colonial administration assumed exclusive responsibility for the education of its African subjects” (2003b, 35). The British colonial administration practised a more tolerant language policy, encouraging the use of some indigenous languages (e. g., Bafut, Duala, Kenyang, Mungaka) alongside with English in schools. It was absolutely necessary to rely on indigenous languages since the British administrators governed through traditional rulers. French Cameroon became independent and the Republic of Cameroon (République du Cameroun) on 1 January 1960. British northern Cameroon joined the Federation of Nigeria, while British Southern Cameroons opted to join French Cameroon through a referendum. The union between British Southern Cameroons and the République du Cameroun was enacted on 1 October 1961 through the creation of a federation made up of two states called West Cameroon and East Cameroon. The government of that time opted for the policy of official bilingualism, with English and French as the official languages of Cameroon. This move appeared to be the most appropriate strategy to ensure national unity because the linguistic diversity of the country and the successive colonial language policies did not permit the emergence of an indigenous language to play the role of an official language.  

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation The constitution of the Republic of Cameroon establishes English and French as official languages: “The official languages of the Republic of Cameroon shall be English and French, both languages having the same status. The State shall guarantee the promotion of bilingualism throughout the country. It shall endeavour to protect and promote national languages” (Republic of Cameroon 2016, art. 1.3).

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3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Although the national language policy accords equal official status to French and English, official bilingualism in Cameroon is, in reality, a very imbalanced one: “French has a de facto dominance over English in the areas of administration, education and the media. In fact, it is not an exaggeration to say that French influence as expressed in language, culture and political policy prevails in all domains. […] The domination of French is due to the demographic factor, the fact that Francophones have continued to occupy top ranking positions in government and the civil service, and also because there is no effective language policy that guarantees the rights of minorities” (Echu 2003b, 39).

While there are very few officially bilingual (French/English) individuals, researchers (cf. Tabi Manga 2000; Meutem Kamtchueng/King Ebéhédi 2017) are unanimous that most Cameroonians are multilingual in various of indigenous languages. Although the constitution of 1996 guarantees the protection and promotion of local languages across the country, there is no local language with an official status, and very little is done to actually promote indigenous languages.

3.3 Languages used in education The national language policy recognizes the official languages as the languages for education, politics and administration, international relations, state media, and the judicial system. Based on official bilingualism, Cameroon has adopted two systems of education: the Francophone sub-system and the Anglophone sub-system (cf. Reutner 2017, 37ss.). There have been some initiatives regarding the teaching, research, and promotion of indigenous languages at post-secondary levels. Such initiatives include the creation of departments of African languages and linguistics at various public universities where intensive research on local languages is ongoing. Also noteworthy is the creation of the Department of Cameroonian Languages and Cultures at the Advanced Teachers’ Training College (University of Yaoundé) by a presidential decree on 3 September 2008. The mission of this academic unit is to train teachers who will ensure gradual introduction of the country’s linguistic and cultural heritage in the curricula of secondary and high schools. This political act seems to illustrate the ambition of the government to put in place a culture and language policy in line with the constitution of 1996 aimed at helping Cameroonians to become familiar with their “local” cultures and preparing them to embrace the world. It is also interesting to note that there are other languages used in education. They were introduced and promoted in many ways. German and Spanish, for instance, are taught as foreign languages in Francophone secondary and high schools and some state universities. The École normale supérieure de Yaoundé has units where German and Spanish teachers are trained. Italian and Chinese are also taught in some state universi-

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ties. Latin is used in Catholic seminaries, while Arabic is used as the language of instruction in Islamic schools in North Cameroon and some other parts of the country. The presence of some foreign words in the lexicon of French in Cameroon may be attributable to the presence of these foreign languages in the Cameroonian educational system. The impact of foreign media and cultural and artistic products, etc., may also be factored in.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – Local languages are not used in newspapers, a situation which is completely different from language practices in the print media during the German colonial era. In a study of language policies and their impact on the coexistence of languages in the media from 1884 to 1960, Zang Zang (2012, 21ss.) indicates that newspapers and books were published in some indigenous languages during the German colonial period, mostly for the purpose of evangelization and education. With respect to other media, observers indicate that the less dominant languages in the audiovisual media are present in creative works, movies, songs, as well as in the social media to convey pragmatic intents and stylistic effects which the official languages may not convey in a very effective way. Audiovisual media – The Cameroonian audiovisual landscape represents, to some extent, the country’s language policy: “French plays a significant role in the media in Cameroon. The position of this language was even further to be consolidated by the co-operation on FM-broadcasts that the state-run radio and its French counterpart, Radio France Internationale, RFI, were planning. The state-run national television and radio company Cameroon Radio Television, CRTV, reflects the official language policy of Cameroon, with programmes uniquely in French and English. Even the state-owned daily newspaper Cameroon Tribune is bilingual and is edited every day in French and once a week in English” (Rosendal 2008, 38).

With the creation of private TV and radio stations, this trend has been overtly reinforced: the French language is the dominant language in news broadcasts and shows. The local languages are used in the regional radio stations of the state-run Cameroon Radio Television (CRTV). At this level, languages widely spoken in each region are used, for example, in local news broadcasts, announcements, and shows. Community radios, non-profit organizations, and churches also make use of local languages. Camfranglais is used in some news broadcasts on the radio and in the state-run newspaper Cameroon Tribune (which has a column called “The Man in the Street”). The private newspaper The Messenger also publishes dialogues in Camfranglais. Cameroon Pidgin English is used in the regional stations of CRTV, in some private radios in the two English-speaking regions, as well as in news broadcasts of some private televisions in Douala (e. g., Equinox Television, broadcasting from the city of Douala, has a news broadcast called “Pidgin News”). Overall, airtime allocated to languages other than the official ones is very low.  

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The print media exclusively use the official languages, with French being the dominant language.

4 Linguistic characteristics French in Cameroon – At the beginning of this section, it is important to note that different modes of language acquisition, the sociolinguistic environment, ethnolinguistic contacts, socio-pragmatic intents, language policies, sociocultural exigencies and norms, have led to the emergence of an indigenized variety of French in Cameroon. By indigenization of French, we understand “its adaptation to the communicative habits and needs of its speakers in a novel ecology” (Mufwene 2009, 353). It is also necessary to indicate that French in Cameroon has multiple facets as it forms a continuum of sub-varieties ranging from the acrolectal variety at the one extreme to the basilectal variety at the other extreme. The acrolectal variety represents the norms of written French, which is identical or very close to Standard/Hexagonal French. It is used by well-educated individuals in formal contexts. Speakers of this variety could also use a lower variety in situations where Standard French could hinder understanding or would be perceived as ‘snob’. The basilectal variety is primarily practised by people with very low level of education, who mostly acquired French outside of the school environment, and school dropouts. Basilectal French is generally used in informal situations. In-between is the mesolectal variety, which is used by a vast majority of Cameroon French speakers and mostly semi-educated individuals. Used in informal and formal situations, this variety is characterized by a compendium of regional features resulting from the influence of local language patterns as well as indigenous social and pragmatic norms (cf. Biloa 2008, 234s.). It has developed into a quasi-autonomous system, commonly called Cameroon French. Camfranglais – One of the major changes that the French language has undergone in Cameroon, as a result of its contact with other languages and its different forms of acquisition and context of use, is the emergence of Camfranglais, a composite language primarily spoken by the youths in urban settings. Although its lexicon consists of words from Cameroonian languages French, English, Pidgin English, and other European languages such as Spanish and German, French is clearly the syntactic base of this new sociolect. It is characterized by the excessive simplification of morphological, lexical, and grammatical structures and the extensive use of neologisms. As a matter of fact, Camfranglophones create “and constantly transform this sociolect by manipulating lexical items from various Cameroonian and European languages, in an effort to mark off their identity as a new social group –the modern Cameroonian urban youth– in opposition to other groups such as the older generation, the rural population and the elite” (Vakunta 2008, 942).

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In the past decades, Camfranglais has been the focus of many scholarly works. Kouega’s (2003) study reveals that Camfranglophones use a wide range of techniques to create words. These include borrowing from French (e. g., attacher quelqu’un ‘to use mystical powers to stop someone from advancing in life’, écorce ‘talisman’), or English (ginger ‘hard, difficult’), coinages (e. g., poum ‘to sneak away’), shortening (e. g., lage ‘village’ < village), affixation (e. g., bend-skinneur ‘a motorcyclist who transports passengers’ < bendskin ‘to ben or curve downword, to stoop’ + (n)eur), inversion of syllables in a word (e. g., réfré ‘brother’ < frère), idiomatic formation (e. g., manger la terre ‘to swear’, lit. ‘to eat the earth’), reduplication (e. g., penya-penya ‘brand new’ < Duala penya ‘new’), compounding (e. g., taximan ‘taxi-driver’), blending (e. g., champicoter ‘to sip champagne’ < champ(agne) + picoter), meaning change (e. g., Bakassi ‘any dangerous place’ < Bakassi ‘Bakassi peninsula – place of the Nigeria-Cameroon conflict’, cf. Kouega 2003, 514–524). Ntsobé/Biloa/Echu (2008) examine structural features of Camfranglais. Meutem Kamtchueng (2016) found that Camfranglophones use a wide range of intensification devices in their discourse. These include single words (e. g., mal ‘very’ in la bunya du djo-ci est moo mal ‘the car of this man is very nice’; flop ‘many’ in flop de gars ‘too many boys’), reduplications (e. g., nyama nyama ‘very small’ in la nga du djo-là est nyama-nyama ‘the girlfriend of this man is very small’) and phrases (e. g., la magie seulement ‘very’ in mon pater a faim la magie seulement ‘my dad is very hungry’, cf. Meutem Kamtchueng 2016, 130–143). Mulo Farenkia/Tatchouala (2016) examine lexical creativity in the realization and intensification of compliments in Camfranglais. Research on the lexicon of Camfranglais has also led to the publication of glossaries and dictionaries of common words, phrase and usages (cf. Kouega 2013; Kamdem 2015). Camfranglais has been presented as a predominantly oral variety of French in Cameroon that is also primarily used in informal situations. Recent studies indicate, however, that it is increasingly used in online communication, where the written material is often a reflection of oral discourse, with, however, a considerable number of differences in spelling, since its orthography is not standardized (cf. Telep 2014).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.1 Pronunciation As indicated above, Cameroon indigenous languages belong to different language families, they are spoken in many different ethnic groups, and they have divergent pronunciation patterns. This diversity of accents has an impact on the phonetic and phonological features of French, since most of the individuals in Cameroon acquire French while already speaking their respective indigenous languages. Working on traces of the influence of local languages on French, some researchers have highlighted a sort of ‘Cameroonization’ of the French phonetic patterns and the emergence of ethnic and regional French accents in Cameroon. Mendo Ze (1990), for instance, identifies typical patterns of the Bamileke, nordiste, Beti, Bassa, and Anglophone ‘accents’ or ‘ways’ of producing some French phonemes. For instance, the accent of French-speaking Cameroonians

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from the northern regions (nordistes ‘northerners’) is characterized by a particularly stressed [r] sound (cf. Zang Zang 1998, 400), neutralization processes regarding [y] and [i] as well as [z], [s], [ʒ] and [ʃ] sounds. Also noteworthy is the behaviour of schwa, that tends to be systematically realized by Cameroon French speakers. This pattern seems to result from the influence of local languages, most of these languages being tonal.

4.2 Morphosyntax Cameroon French speakers have developed many grammatical and morphological patterns that diverge from those of Hexagonal French. The impact of local languages and incorrect appropriation of French are generally pointed out to justify the new trends. Intransitive verbs – With respect to verbs, some Cameroonians use some intransitive verbs like transitive verbs and vice-versa as in il faut la parler instead of il faut lui parler or je lui ai vu instead of je l’ai vu. Another feature worth mentioning is the use of the verb faire ‘to do’ with multiple meanings (e. g., faire instead of avoir as in il a fait l’accident ‘he had an accident’, faire instead of passer du temps as in je peux faire dix ans sans aller voir le minister ‘I can spend ten years without going to see the minister’). The verb faire is also used in many different collocations (e. g., faire la taille ‘to be on a diet’, faire la recette ‘to buy’, cf. Frey 1998, 146). Prepositions – Regarding the use of prepositions in French, examples show a tendency to change prepositions or simply omit some of them, as can be seen in the following examples from Biloa (2012, 129): Le matin, il faut enlever la viande dans le congélateur, La fumée sort dans l’usine de Maïscam. In both examples, the speakers use the wrong preposition (dans le congélateur instead of du congélateur and dans l’usine instead of de l’usine. Examples also abound where verbs that originally appear without prepositions in Hexagonal French are used with prepositions in Cameroon French (e. g., empêcher à quelqu’un de is used instead of empêcher quelqu’un de ‘to prevent someone from’). According to Biloa (2012, 129), this feature seems to be the result of the impact of Cameroonian local languages, since most of these languages have a very limited repertoire of prepositions, contrary to the French language. Relative clauses – Another striking grammatical feature is the construction of relative clauses where relativizers such as que, dont and où are wrongly used. Let us consider the following example from Biloa: voici le moto-taxi que je t’ai parlé ce matin. In this sentence, the relative pronoun should be dont because the verb parler here requires the preposition de (parler de: voici le moto-taxi dont je t’ai parlé). Biloa (2012, 131) argues that the inappropriate use of relative pronouns such as for example que, dont, or où may be due to transfer from local languages. We should also factor incorrect appropriation of the verbal system of the French language. Partitive articles – Other features concern the use of partitive articles in positive and negative sentences. It is common to hear Cameroon French speakers use sentences  

 

 

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like j’ai l’argent instead of j’ai de l’argent, je n’ai pas l’argent instead of je n’ai pas d’argent; gars, tu as la chance-hein! instead of gars, tu as de la chance-hein!; je veux boire l’eau instead of je veux boire de l’eau. The grammatical system of Cameroon French is also characterized by abundant change of grammatical categories (e. g., the noun cadeau ‘gift’ is used as a synonym for the adverb gratuitement ‘for free’ as in j’ai eu le livre cadeau ‘I got the book for free’ (cf. Biloa 2003, 123–174, for an in-depth analysis of the morphological features of Cameroon French). Interrogatives – Cameroon French has an impressive number of interrogative constructions that are clearly different from those of standard French in terms of structures and functions. One of these is the use of interrogative adverbs, which, as Assipolo (2012, 409–411) explains, are commonly used in Cameroon French at the end and not the beginning of interrogative sentences as in il va me faire quoi? instead of qu’est-ce qu’il va me faire?, tu m’appellais même pourquoi? instead of pourquoi m’appellais-tu?. A similar feature is the use of the conjunction donc at the beginning of interrogative sentences, as in donc tu n’as pas d’assurance? where donc is employed to ensure that the speaker understands the intention of the interlocutor, and to express surprise concerning a situation. Another example is the use of non at the end of interrogative structures to request for confirmation as in tu connais mon frère, non? ‘You know my brother, don’t you?’. Pragmatics – In recent years, many scholars have examined pragmatic and discursive aspects of Cameroon French. The topics covered so far include address terms (Mulo Farenkia 2010), speech acts/events such as compliments and compliment responses (Mulo Farenkia 2014), greetings (Mulo Farenkia 2008a), invitations and expressions of sympathy (Mulo Farenkia 2017), politeness strategies (Mulo Farenkia 2008b), discourse markers (Simeu 2016), and interactions about the sale of natural health products in public transport buses (Ngawa Mbaho 2018). These studies show that discourse in Cameroon French is marked by culturally and linguistically mixed patterns of communication and the emergence of new pragmatic strategies. A recent study (cf. Mulo Farenkia 2019) reveals that nominal address terms in Cameroon French involve linguistic creativity and pragmatic considerations. This study further reveals that the address system of Cameroon French consists, in general, of terms from Hexagonal French and indigenous languages and that the choices of these address terms are determined by the urge to meet communicative needs and regulate social relationships in accordance with sociocultural exigencies and norms. Another interesting pragmatic aspect of Cameroon French is the use of interjections such as ekié and aka: borrowed from local languages, these elements are used at the beginning of utterances to express surprise and indifference respectively. Also noteworthy is the abundant use of discourse markers such as hein, non, quoi, hein (cf. Biloa 2012), là (cf. Simeu 2017) at the end of utterances. This is a feature of oral French. Overall, factors such as multilingualism, multiculturalism, and multi-ethnicity influence the production, use and interpretation of pragmatic phenomena in Cameroon French.  

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4.3 Lexicon The vocabulary of Cameroon French is a melting pot of lexical items. In addition to words from Hexagonal French, words that are used in English, indigenous languages, Cameroon Pidgin English, Camfranglais, and other languages have become parts of the Cameroon French lexicon as well. While some researchers dwell on lexical peculiarities of Cameroon French in general (cf. Équipe IFA 2004; Zang Zang 1998; Tabi Manga 2000), others have focused on lexical items in domains such as politics (Nzesse 2009), sexuality (Fosso 1999), or nutrition (Bogni 2015). Overall, the studies currently available show that Cameroon French speakers create lexical items whose equivalents in French are either inexistent, inaccurate, or unknown in order to satisfy their communication needs. The lexical creativity of Cameroon French speakers is expressed through word-formation processes such as borrowing (e. g., bayam sellam ‘female retailer of food crops’ < Cameroon Pidgin English bayam sellam < Engl. buy + sell), shortening (e. g., asso ‘client’, as a short form for associé ‘associate’), compounding (e. g., long crayon ‘well-educated person’, a combination of long ‘long’ and crayon ‘crayon’, mettre long ‘to last’), affixation (e. g., cadeauter ‘to offer a gift’ < noun cadeau ‘gift’ and verb suffix ‑ter), or reduplication (cf. Biloa 2003; Fosso 1999). Reduplication consists in repeating the same lexical item several times in order to express intensification as in donne-moi mon argent là là là ‘give me my money immediately’, where là là là means ‘immediately’. Cameroon French speakers make use of techniques such as meaning transfer (e. g., je ne comprends pas ma tête ‘I don’t understand at all, (lit.) I don’t understand my head’), meaning restriction (e. g., passer un examen ‘to be successful in an exam, (lit.) to write an exam’), meaning extension (e. g., congélé ‘used car, (lit.) frozen’, avoir le cœur ‘to be courageous, (lit.) to have the heart’, essuyer les larmes de quelqu’un ‘to comfort someone, (lit.) to wipe someone’s tears’), or change of meaning (e. g., couper une bière ‘to share/have a drink, (lit.) to cut a beer’).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – There have been very negative perceptions of using local features in French in Cameroon, with some scholars considering them as “errors” or an impediment to attaining Standard French (cf. Mendo Ze 1990; 1999). Other researchers have highlighted its importance in social interactions in Cameroon, and there seems to be a consensus that these local features give French a distinctive character or a “Cameroonian way of using French” (cf. Tabi Manga 2000, 19; for more details cf. Drescher 2017, 528ss.). Variety used in literature – Contemporary French-speaking fictional writers make abundant use of language indigenization strategies and regional features to showcase their literary creativity and linguistic deviance and emancipation. Mongo Beti is one of those authors: his recourse to indigenized French is mostly illustrated in his three last

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novels L’Histoire du fou (1994), Trop de soleil tue l’amour (1999), and Branle-bas en noir et blanc (2000). Another example is Patrice Nganang who uses many local words and expressions in his novels Temps de chien (2001) and L’invention du beau regard (2005). New trends – It could be said that, as French continues to be the dominant language in multiethnic, multilingual, and multicultural Cameroon, new trends of appropriation will be inevitable. One of these trends may be the growing impact of some regional or ethnic sociocultural norms and the emergence of regional or ethnic-based varieties of French in Cameroon. Consequently, studies will still be needed that would give more detailed information about current facets, statuses, and functions of French in Cameroon.

References Assipolo, Laurain (2012), Esquisse d’une grammaire du français parlé au Cameroun: l’exemple de l’interrogation, in: Richard Laurant Omgba/Désiré Atangana Kouna (edd.), Utopies littéraires et création d’un nouveau monde, Paris, L’Harmattan, 405–420. Atindogbé, Gratien/Fogwe Chibaka, Evelyn (2012), Pronouns in Cameroon Pidgin English, in: Eric A. Anchimbe (ed.), Language contact in a postcolonial setting. The linguistic and social context of English and Pidgin in Cameroon, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter Mouton, 215–244. Ayafor, Miriam/Green, Melanie (2017), Cameroon Pidgin English. A comprehensive grammar, Amsterdam/ Philadelphia, Benjamins. Biloa, Edmond (2003), La langue française au Cameroun, Bern, Lang. Biloa, Edmond (2008), Le français au Cameroun: mon expérience de lexicographe au sein de l’équipe IFACAM, in: Claudine Bavoux (ed.), Le français des dictionnaires. L’autre versant de la lexicographie française, Bruxelles, De Boeck Duculot, 231–242. Biloa, Edmond (2012), Des traits syntaxiques et morphosyntaxiques des pratiques du français au Cameroun, Le français en Afrique 27, 121–136. Biloa, Edmond/Echu, George (2008), Cameroon: Official bilingualism in a multilingual state, in: Andrew Simpson (ed.), Language and national identity in Africa, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 199–213. Bogni, Téguia (2015), La gastronymie camerounaise, Revue Roumaine d’Études Francophones 7, 112–136. Drescher, Martina (2017), Cameroun, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 508–534. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, https://www.ethnologue.com/archive (2/3/2023). Echu, George (2003a), Influence of Cameroon Pidgin English on the Linguistic and Cultural Development of the French Language, Indiana University Linguistic Club Working Papers Online 3, 1–20. Echu, George (2003b), Coping with Multilingualism: Trends in the Evolution of Language Policy in Cameroon, Philologie im Netz 25, 31–49. Ekanjume-Ilongo, Beatrice (2016), An Overview of the Pidgin English in Cameroon, International Journal of Humanities Social Sciences and Education 3/2, 154–160. Équipe IFA (2004 [1983]), Inventaire des particularités lexicales du français en Afrique noire, Vanves, EDICEF/ AUF. Fosso, M. (1999), Créativité lexicale sur le campus universitaire de Yaoundé I: Étude du champ lexical de la sexualité, Le français en Afrique 13, 47–57. Frey, Claude (1998), Usages du verbe “faire” en français au Cameroun, Le français en Afrique 12, 139–161. Kamdem, Hector (2015), A dictionary of Camfranglais, Frankfurt am Main, Lang.

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Kouega, Jean Paul (2003), Word formation processes in Camfranglais, World Englishes 22/4, 511–538. Kouega, Jean Paul (2013), Camfranglais: A glossary of common words, phrases and usages, Munich, LINCOM. Kouega, Jean Paul/Aseh, Mildred (2017), Pidgin in creative works in English in Cameroon, Sustainable Multilingualism 10, 98–120. Mbaku Mukum, John (2005), Culture and Customs of Cameroon, Westport, Greenwood. Mendo Ze, Gervais (1990), Une crise dans les crises. Le français en Afrique noire. Le cas du Cameroun, Paris, ABC. Mendo Ze, Gervais (ed.) (1999), Le français langue africaine. Enjeux et atouts pour la francophonie, Paris, Publisud. Meutem Kamtchueng, Lozzi Martial (2016), La bindi nga que tu know-là nyass jusqu’à le feu sort seulement: Examining strategies of intensification in Camfranglais, International Journal of Language Studies 10/1, 125–148. Meutem Kamtchueng, Lozzi Martial/King Ebéhédi, Pauline Lydienne (edd.) (2017), Multilingualism as a model: Fifty-four years of coexistence of English and French with native languages in Cameroon, Frankfurt am Main, Lang. Mongo, Beti (1994), L’Histoire du fou, Paris, Julliard. Mongo, Beti (1999), Trop de soleil tue l’amour, Paris, Julliard. Mongo, Beti (2000), Branle-bas en noir et blanc, Paris, Julliard. Mufwene, Salikoko S. (2009), The indigenization of English in North America, in: Thomas Hoffmann/Lucia Siebers (edd.), World Englishes: Problems, Properties, Prospects, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 353–368. Mühleisen, Susanne/Anchimbe, Eric A. (2012), Gud Nyus fo Pidgin? Bible translation as language elaboration in Cameroon Pidgin English, in: Eric A. Anchimbe (ed.), Language contact in a postcolonial setting. The linguistic and social context of English and Pidgin in Cameroon, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter Mouton, 245–268. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (2008a), C’est comment, mon frère? Gars, laisse-moi comme ça! Des routines de salutation en français camerounais, Le Français en Afrique 23, 69–88. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (2010), Pragmatique de la néologie appellative en situation plurilingue: le cas camerounais, Journal of Pragmatics 42/2, 477–500. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (2014), Speech acts and politeness in French as a pluricentric language. Illustrations from Cameroon and Canada, Münster, LIT. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (2017), Pragmatique de la compassion et l’invitation en français au Cameroun, Saarbrücken, Éditions universitaires européennes. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (2019), Nominal address strategies in Cameroon French: between lexical creativity and pragmatics, in: Bettina Kluge/María Irene Moyna/Horst Simon (edd.), “It’s all about you”: New perspective on address research, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 353–353. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard (ed.) (2008b), De la politesse linguistique au Cameroun. Linguistic Politeness in Cameroon, Frankfurt am Main, Lang. Mulo Farenkia, Bernard/Tatchouala, Eugeune (2016), “C’est le popo hélélé” – “Ça me mo bad!” – Pragmatique de la créativité lexicale en camfranglais, in: Bernard Mulo Farenkia (ed.), Im/politesse et rituels interactionnels en contextes plurilingues et multiculturels. Situations, stratégies et enjeux, Frankfurt am Main, Lang, 205–224. Nganang, Patrice (2001), Temps de chien, Paris, Le Serpent à Plumes. Nganang, Patrice (2005), L’invention du beau regard, Paris, Gallimard. Ngawa Mbaho, Carline Liliane (2018), La vente de produits de santé dans les cars interurbains au Cameroun. Une analyse interactionnelle, Münster, LIT. Nkwain, Joseph (2014), Address strategies in Cameroon Pidgin English: A socio-pragmatic perspective, in: Eric A. Anchimbe (ed.), Structural and Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Indigenisation: On Multilingualism and Language Evolution, Dordrecht, Springer, 189–205. Nkwain, Joseph (2016), The socio-pragmatics of greeting rituals in Cameroon pidgin English, in: Bernard Mulo Farenkia (ed.), Im/politesse et rituels interactionnels en contextes plurilingues et multiculturels. Situations, stratégies et enjeux, Frankfurt am Main, Lang, 227–245.

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Ntsobé, André-Marie/Biloa, Edmond/Echu, George (2008), Le camfranglais: quelle parlure?, Frankfurt am Main/ Berlin, Lang. Nzesse, Ladislas (2009), Le français au Cameroun: d’une crise sociopolitique à la vitalité de la langue française (1990–2008), Le français en Afrique 24, 7–177. Republic of Cameroon (2016), Constitution of the Republic of Cameroon. Law n° 96–06 of 18 January 1996 to amend the Constitution of 2 June 1972, Yaoundé, Republic of Cameroon, http://confinder.richmond.edu/admin/ docs/Cameroon.pdf (2/3/2023) Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rosendal, Tove (2008), Multilingual Cameroon. Policy, Practice, Problems and Solutions, Gothenburg Africana Informal Series 7, 1–65. Sala, Bonaventure (2012), Reduplication in Cameroon Pidgin English, in: Eric A. Anchimbe (ed.), Language contact in a postcolonial setting. The linguistic and social context of English and Pidgin in Cameroon, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter Mouton, 191–214. Schröder, Anne (2012), Tense and aspect in Cameroon Pidgin English, in: Eric A. Anchimbe (ed.), Language contact in a postcolonial setting. The linguistic and social context of English and Pidgin in Cameroon, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter Mouton, 165–190. Simeu, Simplice (2016), Le français parlé au Cameroun: une analyse de quatre marqueurs discursifs, “là”, “par exemple”, “ ékyé” et “wéè”, Grenoble, Université Grenoble Alpes, Doctoral Thesis. Simeu, Simplice (2017), Le marqueur discursif “là” en français parlé au Cameroun, Cahiers du GREMS (Groupe de Recherches en Morphosyntaxe et Sémantique) 2, 269–290. Tabi Manga, Jean (2000), Les politiques linguistiques du Cameroun. Essai d’aménagement linguistique, Paris, Karthala. Telep, Suzie (2014), Le camfranglais sur Internet: pratiques et représentations, Le français en Afrique 28, 27–145. Ubanako Njende, Valentine (2015), Cameroon Pidgin English at the Service of Local Culture, Science and Technology, International Journal of Language and Linguistics 3/6, 510–515. Vakunta, Peter Wuteh (2008), On translating Camfranglais and other Camerounismes, META 53/4, 942–947. WB (2021), World Bank Open Data, Washington, World Bank, https://data.worldbank.org (2/3/2023). Zang Zang, Paul (1998), Le français en Afrique: le processus de dialectalisation du français en Afrique – le cas du Cameroun, München, Lincom Europa. Zang Zang, Paul (2010), La dégermanisation du Cameroun, Sudlangues. Revue électronique internationale de sciences de langage 14, 79–104. Zang Zang, Paul (2012), Cohabitation des langues dans les médias au Cameroun 1884–1960, Sudlangues. Revue électronique internationale de sciences de langage 18, 18–34. Zang Zang, Paul/Bissaya Bessaya, Thierry (2017), Le Camfranglais: une analyse de quelques relations lexicales, Argotica 1/16, 91–108.

Guri Bordal Steien

21 Central African Republic Abstract: The topic of this chapter is the French spoken in the Central African Republic. The main characteristic of the linguistic situation in the geographical area that today constitutes this country is diversity. Between 50 and 100 different languages are said to coexist in the area. Most individuals have varied linguistic repertoires and engage more often than not in translingual practices. Hence, people who speak French, in most cases those who have attended formal instruction, rarely use it in isolation but in combination with their other linguistic resources, namely with Sango, the lingua franca of the country. The chapter contains an updated overview of the linguistic situation in the Central African Republic, including topics such as mobility and computer-mediated communication, as well as a presentation of the main linguistic characteristics of French as it is spoken by Central Africans. Keywords: Central African Republic, French, Global South, translingual practices, varied repertoires

1 Sociolinguistic situation Recently, there has been a trend in sociolinguistic and related fields to question what is referred to as Northern epistemologies in research on language, that is knowledge that is created by researchers from the Global North and is, to a large extent, based on sociolinguistic realities in these areas of the world (cf. Pennycook/Makoni 2019, 8–18). For instance, several researchers have deconstructed the concept of named languages (e. g., “Banda”, “Sango”, “French”, etc.) as relevant categories for the description of linguistic practices among people with diverse linguistic repertoires sharing the same linguistic resources. Instead of referring to named languages, many scholars rather make use of concepts that take into account that “speakers flexibly combine linguistic features of whatever pedigree, in line with local perceptions of language” (Jaspers/Madsen 2019, 2), for instance translanguaging (Li 2017) or translingual practices (Canagarajah 2013). The linguistic situation in the Central African Republic is a good candidate for questioning Northern epistemologies in linguistic research; the geographical space that today constitutes the country has always been extremely linguistically diverse. People tend to have varied linguistic repertoires and draw fluidly on their diverse resources in their everyday communication. This might be particularly true for the population I am concerned with in this chapter, that is those who speak French. Anyone who has been to school and learned the former colonial language has acquired other languages before and potentially also after having learned French. Moreover, they would rarely, if ever,  

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restrain their linguistic practices to French only; translingual practices are the rule more than an exception (cf. Abdoulaye 2016, 332). Although I will focus on “the French spoken in the Central African Republic” in this chapter, I want to emphasize that I am aware that restraining the object of study in such a way has a certain Northern bias; understanding the linguistic situation per se would require an approach which places translingual practices at the very core of the analysis.

1.1 Geographical distribution The existing estimations of the number of languages spoken in the country conclude with different numbers: according to Eberhard/Simon/Fennig (2023), there are seventythree languages, while the International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF 2014, 113) operates with eighty languages. These divergent numbers show that counting the number of separate languages spoken in a given geographical area is a delicate enterprise, as what counts as a “language” or a “dialect” is often defined differently or underdefined – and one can ask if it makes any sense at all to conceptualize languages as countable and separated units (cf. Pennycook/Makoni 2019). Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the Central African Republic exhibits a large degree of linguistic diversity. According to the language map in Eberhard/Simon/Fennig’s (2023), Nilo-Saharan languages, such as Kabba, Ngam, Suma, Dagba, Geme, Vale, Runga, Sara, and Gula, dominate in the northern parts. In the rest of the country, languages of the Niger-Congo group, and more precisely the Adamawa-Ubangi and Bantu families are most common, namely Banda (in the East) and Gbaya (in the West). However, as stated by Blommaert (2010, vix), language is “something intrinsically and perpetually mobile, through space as well as time, and made for mobility”. Consequently, any language map would present an idealization of a reality that is much more complex. This is particularly true for the recent history of the Central African Republic, which is one of increased human mobility due to the intensification of political instabilities after the coup d’état of Seleka ‘(Sango) coalition’ movement in 2012. According to the UNHCR (2019), there were 600,136 internally displaced individuals in the country by 30 September 2019. Moreover, urbanization, and in particular migrations from the rest of the country to the capital Bangui, have characterized the demographic history of the country since the end of the nineteenth century. In 1950, around 14 % of the population lived in a city, compared to 2018 when more than 40 % of Central Africans resided in urban areas. According to the UN Urbanization Prospects, urbanization will continue, and by 2050, the majority of the population is predicted to live in cities (UN 2018). Therefore, due to different kinds of human mobility, all languages are likely to be spread around the country, with an intensification of linguistic diversity in urban areas. The lingua franca, Sango, is probably the language of the area with the widest geographical distribution as it is spoken by the majority of Central Africans; according to  

 

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OIF (2014) 93 % of the population speak it. French is also spoken all around the country by virtue of its status as the language of teaching in public schools (cf. 2, Establishment of French, and 3, Education).  

1.2 Social distribution There are, to my knowledge, few studies of language practices in rural areas of the country. One of the rare works on the topic is Roulon (1972) who focuses on the population of a rural village named Bobua. She finds that the 250 inhabitants of the village use Ngbaka as their family language. Everybody speaks Sango, a language they have learned by listening to the radio and in interaction with non-Ngbaka speakers. Sango is also used as a language of teaching during the first years of primary school in the village. Moreover, Roulon finds that only men speak French, as women tend not to participate in official contexts where French is used. Similar patterns regarding the social distribution of local languages, Sango, and French might still be found in some villages today, at the same time as mobility, instabilities affecting the access to education, and the recent development of digital communication might have influenced linguistic practices in rural areas. As regards social distribution of languages in urban areas, the existing studies are concerned with the capital Bangui (e. g., Abdoulaye 2016; Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016; Queffélec 1994). All studies emphasize the translingual nature of real-world linguistic practices in Bangui. Queffélec/Wenezoui-Déchamps/Daloba (1997) use the label francsango to refer to the mixed language variety of French-speaking citizens of Bangui, while Abdoulaye (2016, 320ss.) concludes that the simultaneous use of Sango and French is so deeply entrenched that it cannot be called code-switching; it is a new linguistic code. Ethnographic observations from my own fieldwork in Bangui in 2007 also point in the same direction as the observations of these authors: people sharing the same local languages often use these in combination with Sango, and people who speak French systematically combine it with Sango. The exception would be in interactions where there are participants who do not speak Sango. For instance, people obviously used French only while communicating with me, a European with limited Sango knowledge. At the same time as linguistic practices tend to be translingual, the social value of French is different from that of Sango and other local languages. Speaking French indicates being a part of the educated elite and is a condition sine qua non to obtain a political or administrative position (Lim 2016, 81).  

2 Linguistic history There are not many sources on precolonial linguistic history of the area that today is called the Central African Republic. However, the emergence of Sango has received some attention from scholars. Sango derives from Ngbandi, a language spoken by the

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people traditionally living by the Ubangi River. It emerged as a trade language before it became the main language of the Bangui region. Some scholars discuss whether it is a pidgin, a creole, or koiné (Pasch 1993), while others argue that the changes in the Ngbandi language do not differ from regular diachronic change (cf. Diki-Kidiri 1982 for a discussion). Establishment of French – French was introduced in the area at the end of the nineteenth century when the French colonizers established the colony Ubangi-Shari. The colony was officially founded in 1897 and got its first administrative division as well as its first government in 1906. According to Kalck (1974), Ubangi-Shari was the most ignored of all French colonies. There were few French colonizers present, and the development of French institutions was limited. This fact has probably had consequences on the establishment of French compared to more prioritized colonies in the sense that fewer people learned the language during the first years of colonial presence. The first few Central Africans who learned French came into contact with it through interaction with the few representatives of the colonial administration and the colonial army, consisting mainly of Western African soldiers. From 1912, missionaries were present on the territory, and they also participated in the dissemination of the French language (cf. Wenezoui-Déchamps 1994). Milestones of its further development – Since its introduction in the area, French has first and foremost been disseminated through school, as formal education always has been mainly French-mediated. The Central African public school system was established in 1911, an event which increased the number of French speakers in the country (Couvert 1983, 4). After World War II, school became obligatory (Caprile 1977, 114; Wenezoui-Déchamps 1994, 90). Although only a minority of the population actually had access to schooling, this political change obviously also was a milestone in the dissemination of French. As most people who speak French have learned it at school, the percentage of people having received formal education is a common way to estimate the number of Francophones. In 1988, a survey concluded that 37 % of the population has attended school and thus speaks French (Wenezoui-Déchamps 1994, 91). According to the estimation in the Atlas de la langue française published in 1995, 8 % of the population has at least 12 years of schooling and is what is referred to as “real Francophones” (Rossillon 1995, 83). The OIF bases its estimations of 2022 on the number of persons who are 10 years or older with literacy skills in French and concludes that this concerns 29 % of the population (OIF 2022, 30). As far as I know, there are no recent estimations of the number of Francophone Central Africans. However, seen in the light of the political situation in the country, the number of Francophones is probably decreasing. School is far from being the priority of the government (Songossaye 2018, 93), and there have been numerous strikes in the public sector, resulting in numerous années blanches ‘cancelled school years’.  

 

 

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3 External language policy The linguistic situation challenges the diglossic model of multilingual societies, according to which one language/variety with high prestige is used in official domains, while the use of languages with lower prestige is restricted to everyday communication (Ferguson 1959). As I will show in the following section, there are no domains of oral communication in which French is the exclusive language used. While local languages are mostly used in informal domains, both Sango and French are de jure and de facto languages of formal contexts. Legislation – The country has several political and social challenges, and the very existence of a state in the European sense of the word has been questioned (Lombard/ Carayannis 2015). Legislation as presented in official documents is thus not necessarily implemented. French has been an official language since the independence in 1960 until today. However, it was the only officially recognized language for only a short time; already in 1963, Sango gained the status of national language (Daloba 2008, 103). Today Sango is co-official with French, but the exact date when it gained this status is unclear as different sources give diverging dates. The following dates figure in the literature: 1984 (Abdoulaye 2016, 49) and 1991 (Daloba 2008, 103; Lim 2016, 81). Languages used by public authorities – While official texts are written in French, public authorities use both Sango and French in oral communication. Beyom (in OIF 2014, 114) estimates that French is used 51 % of the time in the army, 30 % in court, and 15 % in the health sector. In other words, French is used less often than Sango by public authorities and when French is used, it is likely to occur as part of translingual practices. Languages used in education – According to the Central African legislation, both French and Sango are languages of teaching. However, French dominates de facto. According to Beyom (in OIF 2014, 114), French is used 90 % of the time in teaching. This corresponds to the findings of an older study, that of Queffélec (1994, 101), who finds that Sango is only used when pupils do not understand explications in French. In a more recent study, however, Lim (2016, 83) states that Sango often is the main language of teaching during the first two years of primary school and that French progressively replaces Sango later in the school curriculum. Languages used in the media – Audiovisual and print media are marginal. Most people use the radio as their main source of information (Songossaye 2019, 134). French dominates in TV; 78 % of TV Centrafrique’s emissions are in French, and the Central African journals are 100 % in French (Beyom in OIF 2014). The main language of radio programmes is Sango; Beyom estimates that only 40 % of the Central African radio programmes are in French (in OIF 2014, 114). Language choice in computer-mediated communication (CMC) has not, as far as I am aware, been studied in detail. Studies from other French-speaking countries in sub-Saharan Africa, however, show that extended use of CMC can mean a breakthrough for local languages in the writing (Deumert/Lexander 2013). It is therefore plausible that Central Africans also tend to use Sango and/or  

 

 

 

 

 

 

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other local languages in addition to French in CMC, given the translingual nature of oral communication.

4 Linguistic characteristics According to Queffélec (1994), an endogenous norm of French has developed. This observation is supported by studies of linguistic features of French produced by Central African speakers in the domain of prosody, showing that the same characteristics are generalized across speakers with different sociocultural backgrounds (Steien/Yakpo 2020). There is thus evidence that a variety of French, with conventionalized local features, has emerged since the language was introduced in the Central African ecology. That said, the existing studies on linguistic features of French are based on limited samples and are from different periods of time. The literature is too sparse to permit a discussion of the expansion and the social indexicality of the different features attested. For instance, it is not clear which features socially index “typically Central African French” or “typically Banguissois” for listeners. Moreover, many of the features attested are found in other Francophone areas in Africa and seem to be more pan-African than particularities of the French spoken in the country (Nimbona/Steien 2019). The overview of linguistic features presented in the following sections should therefore be read as state of the art of what we know about its French rather than a sociolinguistic analysis of particularities.

4.1 Pronunciation Phonological characteristics have been object to several studies in the framework of the Phonologie du Français contemporain project (Durand/Laks/Lyche 2009). These studies are based on spontaneous speech produced by twelve speakers from Bangui that I recorded during a fieldwork in Bangui in 2007. The speakers are six women and six men between 28 and 59 years of age. All of them speak Sango in addition to one or more other local languages. The tendencies described in what follows characterize the speech of all of twelve speakers (Bordal 2012a; 2012b; Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016; Steien/ Boutin 2016). Vowels – The opposition /e/ : /ɛ/ in word-final open syllables is systematically maintained. The two words épée and épais are, for instance, a minimal pair and thus realized /epe/ and /epɛ/ respectively. Vowel harmony is another frequent characteristic of Central African speakers’ pronunciation. It mainly concerns the degree of openness of mid-vowels and might both open (étais [ɛtɛ]) and close them (intelligent [ɛ̃tiliʒɑ̃]). Consonants – The consonants /t/ and /d/ are palatalized before the closed front vowels /i/, e. g., petit [pøɟi], and /y/, e. g., habitude [abiɟyd], and sometimes before the closed back vowel /u/, e. g., tout [ɟu]. The word-final fricatives /z/ and /ʒ/ are sometimes,  

 

 

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although not systematically, devoiced in word-final position (/z/ > [s], /ʒ/> [ʃ]). Examples of this phenomenon are chose pronounced [ʃɔs] and âge realized [aʃ]. The behaviour of the phoneme /r/ is another interesting characteristic. First, /r/ also tends to be deleted in certain positions depending on whether it is occurring in syllablefinal position, before or after a vowel (V) or consonant (C), in word-internal (.) or wordfinal (#) position. In syllable-final postvocalic position, the /r/ is deleted in any word position: at the end of the word (VR#) as in salaire [salɛː], word-internally (VR.CV) as in parler [paːle] and when the /r/ is the first consonant of a complex coda (VRC), as in importe [ɛ̃poːt]. Moreover, there are examples of prevocalic deletions, such as Afrique pronounced [afik], though these are less systematic. Second, when the /r/ is realized, its phonetic nature is variable. Three allophones are attested: [r], [ʁ] and [ɽ]. As regards the choice of allophone, there are idiolectal differences; some speakers tend to favour one of the variants over the others. However, intra-idiolectal variation is also attested, for instance one speaker realizes the three variants in word-initial position: rauque [ʁɔk], ras [ra] and relier [ɽølje]. There is thus no evidence that the choice of allophone is related to the phonological environment of the consonant. Syllable structure – There is a strong tendency to favour CV-syllables. Different strategies are used to achieve CV-syllables in words with complex onsets or codas. In wordfinal position, simple codas are almost systematically deleted, as in the following examples: /b/ in arabe [ara], /t/ in suite [sɥi], /d/ in demande [d(ə)mɑ̃], /s/ in opératrice [ɔperatʁi], /n/ in Nadine [nadi]. Also, vowel insertions are attested, for instance in difficulté [difikylite]. Schwa – T here is no evidence of a schwa, conceived as a graphic that is prone to deletion in certain contexts. Vowels are systematically present in monosyllables (e. g., je, te, le) and in word-initial position (e. g., devenir). Word-finally, they are not pronounced: Centrafricain(e). In word-internal position, the presence of a vowel is word-specific, for instance appeler is realized with a word-internal vowel, while maint(e)nant has no internal vowel. Prosody – I have argued in several publications that French as it is spoken in the Central African Republic is a tone language (Bordal 2012a; Steien/Yakpo 2020). The main argument for this analysis is that there is a series of minimal pairs which are tonally distinguished, for instance the determinant and the pronoun ce, where the former has a high tone (H) and the latter has a low tone (L). Moreover, the domain of tonal attribution is the word, and not the accentual phrase as it is in Parisian French (Jun/Fougeron 2002). Content words have the tonal pattern /(L)H/. The H tone is systematically realized on the last syllable of the word, while the preceding syllables have L tones – the parenthesis represents no, one or more L tones depending on the number of syllables of the word. This pattern is systematically realized independently of the word’s position and the pragmatic meaning of the utterance in which it occurs. Different speech acts are prosodically expressed by various boundary tones, which are realized on the very last syllable of the utterance.  

 

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Cross-linguistic influences – The extent to which the phonology is influenced by phonological features of Sango and other Central African languages have been discussed in several works (Bordal 2012a; 2012b; Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016). Many of the phonological phenomena attested do indeed correspond to characteristics of Sango, such as the phonemic distinction between /e/ : /ɛ/, vowel harmony, palatalization, and tonal minimal pairs (Bordal 2012b). At the same time, these features are also found in many other African languages and Afro-European contact varieties. Instead of talking of cross-linguistic influences from one given named language, the influences of African languages in AfroEuropean contact varieties can be seen as an adjustment to the typological features that dominate in the larger area (Nimbona/Steien 2019).

4.2 Morphosyntax Morphological and syntactical features have been less systematically studied than phonetic and phonological ones in recent years. However, the few existing studies permit to shed light on some phenomena. Morphology – A characteristic is the use of a series of neologisms composed of stems and suffixes that do not necessarily figure together in other varieties of French. Based on a corpus of written language produced by Central African writers, Daloba (2008) gives an overview of some of these words. Most of the new words are nouns. For instance, the suffixes ‑eur/‑euse are found in nouns referring to human agents, such bégayeur ‘a person who stutters’, découcheur ‘an unfaithful person who sleeps outside of his home’ and exciseur ‘a person who practices excision’. New nouns are also derived by the suffixes -age that expresses an action (e. g., débroussage ‘to cut down trees in the jungle’), ‑aire that refers to a professional relation (e. g., promotionnaire ‘someone from the same cohort’), and ‑esse that is used to refer to a female agent (e. g., boyesse ‘a female servant’). New verbs are composed of a nominal stem and the suffix ‑er, for example ambiancer ‘spending a lot of time in bars’ and enceinter ‘to make a woman pregnant’. Concerning new adjectives, there are some created with nominal stems and the suffix ‑ique such as faunatique ‘which has to do with fauna’ and footballistique ‘that has to do with football’. Prepositions – Prepositions are a domain of great variation. This can be illustrated by examples such as the use of dans ‘in’ in sortir dans cette situation ‘getting out of this situation’ or envers ‘towards’ in sa réponse envers moi ‘his answer to me’ (Steien/Boutin 2016). The two prepositions dans and à can also be used interchangeably, as in these two constructions produced by the same speaker: dans l’État ‘in the State’ and à l’État ‘in the State’ (Steien/Boutin 2016). Moreover, the preposition avec ‘with’ might be used with ensemble ‘together’ in the construction ensemble avec ‘together with’ (Wenezoui-Déchamps 1994, 98). Adverbs – There is a tendency of post-posing short sentence adverbs, such as vraiment, quoi, aussi, and là (Queffélec 1994; Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016), as in the utterance  

 

 

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afin que tu puisses travailler aussi ‘so that you can work also’. Moreover, the adverb déjà ‘already’ is used to signal that something is finished: il est déjà là thus means ‘he has arrived’ and not ‘he has already arrived’ as would be the meaning of this construction in European French varieties (Wenezoui-Déchamps 1994). Auxiliaries – The auxiliary avoir ‘to have’ tends to be generalized with all verbs in present and past perfect. This has been attested with verbs, such as arriver ‘to come’ as in il avait arrivé à l’aéroport ‘he had come to the airport’ (Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016), tomber ‘to fall’ as in il a tombé par terre ‘he has fallen’ (Roulon 1972), intervenir ‘to intervene’, as in son frère a intervenu ‘his brother has intervened’ (Queffélec 1994). Negation – The negation is expressed by both ne and pas in spontaneous informal speech as opposed to in European varieties of French, where the ne is rarely present in everyday communication. In an informal conversation among two Central African friends, Steien/Boutin/Beyom (2016) find utterances such as tu n’arrives même pas ‘you do not even manage’ and tu ne pourras pas ‘you cannot’. Cross-linguistic influences – The role of cross-linguistic influences from other languages of the Central African ecology as regards the morphological and syntactic phenomena presented above is not thoroughly discussed. Most of the attested phenomena are rather analysed as results of the fact that French is to be acquired as an additional language in a formal setting. However, some direct cross-linguistic influences from Sango have been described. Wenezoui-Déchamps (1994) mentions, for instance, the construction La maladie l’a rattrapé ‘the sickness has taken him’, which is a direct translation from the Sango expression kobêla a gbû lo.

4.3 Lexicon As explained in 1.2, everyday linguistic practices among the French-speaking population tend not to be restricted to one named language, and words of French and Sango origin, therefore, constantly appear in the same conversations. Instead of analysing these phenomena as borrowings, that is as French loanwords in Sango and Sango loanwords in French, I rather treat them as an inherent characteristic of the translingual practices that constitute everyday communication. From an etymological point of view, one could obviously categorize words as being either French or Sango. However, from a synchronic meaning-making perspective, such a categorization makes little sense as speakers’ fluidity draws on their whole repertoire without considering the etymological origin of the different elements of it. In the following section, I will therefore only concentrate on some words with French origin which have gained another meaning than in European varieties of French (for more examples, cf. Queffélec/Wenezoui-Déchamps/Daloba 1997). Nouns – Queffélec/Wenezoui-Déchamps/Daloba (1997) notice that bandit ‘bandit’ is often used in the sense of ‘person who is vulgar or who has a bad education’, for in-

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stance in mon mari est un bandit ‘my husband has a bad education’. Moreover, individu ‘individual’ might be used as an insult in the sense of ‘bad person’, for instance in ne fréquente pas cette fille, c’est une individue ‘do not hang out with that girl, she is a bad person’. The word mouchoir ‘handkerchief’ is used as a generic term for a sheet of tissue, as is the case of the construction mouchoir de tête referring to a female headpiece (Queffélec/Wenezoui-Déchamps/Daloba 1997). As in many other areas in Africa, kinship terms, such as sœur ‘sister’ and frère ‘brother’ are not used solely to refer to biological relations but designate any person with whom you have a close relationship (Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016). Verbs – Examples of verbs whose meaning differ from European varieties of French are percevoir ‘to perceive’ used in the sense of ‘earning’, as in si tu perçois quatorze mille francs par mois ‘if you earn fourteen thousand francs per month’ and payer ‘to pay’ used synonymously with acheter ‘to buy’, as in tout ce que tu as payé doit rester là ‘everything you have bought needs to stay there’ (Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016). Adverbs – The negating adverb pas ‘not’ tends to generalize to all contexts. For example, it is used instead of aucun ‘none’, as in nous ne pouvons pas faire un bien ‘we cannot do anything good’ and instead of rien, as in the utterance tu ne pourras pas amener quelque chose ‘you cannot bring anything’ (Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016). The adverb vraiment ‘really’ is frequently used and one of its several usages is to express agreement and empathy, as in the following conversation (Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016): A: Je suis très touchée par ce qui se passe dans le pays ‘I am very touched by what is happening in the country’, B: Vraiment ‘really’. In this example, B employs the adverb to express that what A is saying is understandable and that he/she feels the same way (cf. Steien/Boutin/Beyom 2016). Interjection – The interjection merci ‘thanks’ is not only used to express gratitude, it also often occurs as a response to greetings, as in the following example: A: Bonjour Madame, comment ça va? ‘Good morning, Madame, how are you?’, B: Merci ‘Thanks’. In this conversation, the word merci is a conventionalized way of answering a greeting rather than an expression of gratitude.

5 Internal language policy As far as I know, language attitudes and ideologies in the Central African context have not been studied in detail. However, my own observations during my fieldwork in Bangui in 2007 permits some observations. For instance, local languages are often referred to as mother tongues, a notion that does not refer to linguistic competencies but rather to the speaker’s identity as member of the group speaking that language. Moreover, people also often express that they are proud of the Sango language and put forward the fact that the Central African Republic has an African lingua franca as opposed to some of the other Francophone countries in Africa (cf. Reutner 2017, 13s., for an overview).

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5.1 Linguistic purism During my fieldwork in Bangui conducted in 2008, I interviewed 30 inhabitants of Bangui with the aim of eliciting their language biographies. One of the questions I asked them was if they perceived differences between French as it is spoken in the Central African Republic compared to other Francophone areas, in Europe and in Africa, in order to get an understanding of the social indexicality they attributed to different ways of speaking French. Comparing their French to European Frenches, the participants of my study often evoked nativeness. Rather than conceptualizing their French as another variety with different prestige than European varieties, they characterized Europeans as native speakers and Central Africans as non-natives of French. The following quote by a 39 years old woman from Bangui named Préférence, is an emblematic example. ‘French people from France, they speak a bit faster, faster than Central Africans who speak French. And over there maybe it is their language, they are used (to it), well, they speak it most often. Well, they are good at it. They speak these languages at preschool, they speak fluently. Not for a Central African. That is what makes the difference, that marks the difference between the French who speaks French and the Central African who speaks French’.1

Préférence first evokes speech rate when she compares French spoken by Central Africans and people from France. According to her, French people speak faster than Central Africans, a difference she explains by the fact that the former are used to speak French and that they speak it from the preschool on. In other words, for her, the difference is one of habits and early exposure. However, she does not at any point evaluate the Central African way of speaking as bad or broken – her account is rather instrumental (Polzenhagen/Dirven 2008). Many of the participants actually express a rather instrumental view of language, which means they refer to it as a tool of communication more than a vector of strong positive or negative social indexicalities. In the next quote, a 50 years old man named Dieu-Merci, explains how he perceives differences between the way in which Central Africans and people from Francophone African countries speak French. As the other participants of the study, he is clear on the fact that there are perceptible differences and that accent might reveal the geographical origin of a person.

1 “Les Français de France, ils parlent un peu plus rapidement, plus rapidement que les Centrafricains qui parlent français. Et là-bas peut-être c’est leur langue, ils sont habitués, bon, ils parlent ça euh le plus souvent. Bon, ben, ils sont doués à ça. Ils parlent ces langues là au maternel, ils parlent couramment. Pas pour un Centrafricain. C’est ça qui fait la différence, qui marque la différence entre le Français qui parle le français et le Centrafricain qui parle français” (Steien 2008, locuteur RCA Bangui rcamp1 in the chapter “conversation guidée”).

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‘You meet a Central African somewhere, right away, you feel that he is a Central African. A Cameroonian at once I will say “oh no this one is a, a Cameroonian”. Well […] those from Western Africa, you know their French, it goes a bit […] into their languages, Wolof or Bateke or something like that. Well, they, they have their own French, but we only understand it anyways. At the very moment the person speaks to me you will understand from her that this is not a Central African. But a Central African when he speaks French, right away you feel that this is a Central African’.2

Dieu-Merci explains differences in accent between Africans from different countries who speak French by cross-linguistic influences from different languages, a phenomenon he verbalizes by the metaphor aller dans leurs langues ‘goes into their languages’. As Préférence, he manifests a rather instrumental view of language. First, he does not express any negative attitudes towards cross-linguistic influences; they are rather presented as facts of life. Second, he evokes comprehension right way. Although people from other African countries have their French, they understand each other anyway. He also seems to perceive that there is an easily identified Central African way of speaking French. However, nothing in his account indicates that he perceives this way of speaking as less prestigious than other Frenches. Although the views expressed in these excerpts are emblematic of the kind of accounts given by the 30 people I interviewed in Bangui and also correspond to a large extent to my more general experiences with language ideologies in the Central African Republic, they obviously offer only a limited glace into a complex and multiple topic. I will not state that linguistic purism does not exist there, or that an instrumental view of language prevails in all types of communities of practice. However, given the large degree of linguistic diversity, the fact that translingual practices are the default communication mode, and the limited presences of European Frenches in the ecology, purist ideologies might be likely to be less dominant here than, for instance, in France.

5.2 Description and usage of linguistic characteristics Description – Except for the scientific publications mentioned in 4.1–3, there are, to my knowledge, no dictionaries, grammars, or orthographies dedicated to French as it is spoken in the Central African Republic. Usage – As seen in section 4, there is evidence that a local variety of French has emerged since it was introduced in the area at the beginning of the nineteenth century.

2 “Vous tombez sur un Centrafricain quelque part, tout de suite, vous ressentez en lui que c’est un Centrafricain. Un Camerounais tout de suite, je vais dire ‘ah non ça c’est un, un Camerounais’. Bon ceux de l’Afrique de l’ouest là, savez leur français, ça va un peu dans leurs langues hein, wolof ou bien, batéké ou bien quoi tout ça là. Bon, eux ils ont leur français à part, mais seulement on se comprend quand même. Dès que la personne me parle tout de suite vous ressentez en elle que ça c’est […] pas un Centrafricain. Mais un Centrafricain quand il parle Français tout de suite, vous ressentez en lui que c’est un Centrafricain” (Steien 2008, locuteur RCA Bangui rcascm1 in the chapter “conversation guidée”).

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In section 5.1, I have shown that the speakers themselves are aware that their way of speaking may differ from how people speak French in other Francophone places. However, the presence of another norm that is conceived as more prestigious than the local one, is not obvious. Although Central Africans are conscious that they might talk differently from other Francophones, my hypothesis is that local features index neutrality rather than being stigmatized, or at least that the notion of standard versus nonstandard is understood more flexibly than in some other parts of the Francophone world. The French one encounters, be it on the radio, the television, or in interaction with people, tends, with some few exceptions, to be the local variety (cf. Steien/Boutin 2016). In other words, the French in the Central African Republic is, as long as the interlocutor speaks Sango and/or other Central African languages, a part of translingual practices and local linguistic characteristics are omnipresent in any context of interaction.

References Abdoulaye, Moussa (2016), Contact de langues et alternance codique sängö-français à Bangui, Nice, Université Nice Sophia Antipolis, Doctoral Thesis. Blommaert, Jan (2010), The sociolinguistics of globalization, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Bordal, Guri (2012a), Prosodie et contact de langues. Le cas du système tonal du français centrafricain, Oslo/Paris, University of Oslo/Université Paris Ouest Nanterre la Défense, Doctoral Thesis. Bordal, Guri (2012b), A phonological study of French spoken by multilingual speakers from Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, in: Randal Gess/Chantal Lyche/Trudel Meisenburg (edd.), Phonological Variation in French: Illustrations from Three Continents, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 23–43. Canagarajah, Suresh (2013), Translingual Practice, London/New York, Routledge. Caprile, Jean-Pierre (1977), Situation respective du français et des langues africaines en Afrique centrale, in: Joseph Hanse (ed.), Les relations entre les langues négro-africaines et la langue française, Paris, CILF, 108–137. Couvert, Claude (1983), La langue française en République centrafricaine, Paris, IRAF. Daloba, Jean (2008), La dérivation suffixale en français de Centrafrique, Le français en Afrique 23, 103–111. Deumert, Ana/Lexander, Kristin Vold (2013), Texting Africa: writing as performance, Journal of Sociolinguistics 17/4, 522–546. Diki-Kidiri, Marcel (1982), L’expansion du sango en Centrafrique, Lacito-documents. Afrique 8, 29–42. Durand, Jacques/Laks, Bernard/Lyche, Chantal (2009), Le projet PFC (phonologie du français contemporain): une source de données primaires structurées, in: Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks/Chantal Lyche (edd.), Phonologie, variation et accents du français, Paris, Hermès, 19–61. Eberhard, David M./Simon, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Ferguson, Charles A. (1959), Diglossia, Word 15/2, 325–340. Jaspers, Jürgen/Madsen, Lian Malai (2019), Fixity and Fluidity in Sociolinguistic Theory and Practice, in: Jürgen Jaspers/Lian Malai Madsen (edd.), Critical perspectives on linguistic fixity and fluidity: Languagised lives, New York, Routledge, 1–26. Jun, Sun Ah/Fougeron, Cécile (2002), Realizations of the accentual phrase in French intonation, Propus 14/1, 147– 172. Kalck, Pierre (1974), Histoire de la République centrafricaine: des origines préhistoriques à nos jours, Paris, BergerLevrault.

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Li, Wei (2017), Translanguaging as a practical theory of language, Applied Linguistics 39/1, 9–30. Lim, François (2016), Enseignement du français dans un contexte bilingue: cas de la République centrafricaine, in: Serge Borg et al. (edd.), L’Université en contexte plurilingue dans la dynamique numérique, Paris, Éditions des archives contemporaines, 81–85. Lombard, Louisa/Carayannis, Tataiana (2015), Making sense of the CAR: An introduction, in: Louisa Lombard (ed.), Making Sense of the Central African Republic, London, Zed, 1–16. Nimbona, Gélase/Steien, Guri Bordal (2019), Modes monolingues dans des écologies multilingues. Les études phonologiques des français africains, Langue française 202, 43–69. OIF (2014), La langue française dans le monde 2014, Paris, Nathan/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Pasch, Helma (1993), Phonological similarities between Sango and its base language: Is Sango a pidgin/creole or a koiné?, in: Salikoko Mufwene/Lioba Moshi (edd.), Topics in African linguistics, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 279–293. Pennycook, Allistar/Makoni, Sinfree (2019), Innovations and Challenges in Applied Linguistics from the Global South, London, Routledge. Polzenhagen, Frank/Dirven, René (2008), Rationalist or romantic model in globalization, Cognitive Linguistics Research 39, 239–295. Queffélec, Ambroise (1994), Appropriation, normes et sentiments de la norme chez des enseignants de français en Afrique centrale, Langue française 104, 100–114. Queffélec, Ambroise/Wenezoui-Déchamps, Martine/Daloba, Jean (1997), Le français en Centrafrique: lexique et société, Vanves, EDICEF. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rossillon, Philippe (1995), Atlas de la langue française, Paris, Bordas. Roulon, Paulette (1972), Étude du français et du sango parlés par les Ngabaka-ma’bo (R.C.A), Ethnies 2, 133–164. Songossaye, Mathurin (2018), Didactique de la langue française et de la littérature en contexte post-conflit centrafricain, Synergies Afrique des Grands Lacs 7, 91–102. Songossaye, Mathurin (2019), Émergence de la littérature dans l’espace audiovisuel centrafrican, Synergies Afrique des Grands Lacs 8, 133–143. Steien, Guri Bordal (2008), Enquête RCA Bangui, Base PFC Publique, Oslo/Paris, University of Oslo/Université Paris Ouest Nanterre la Défense, https://public.projet-pfc.net/enquetes.php?id=138 (2/3/2023). Steien, Guri Bordal/Boutin, Akissi Béatrice (2016), Variation in the Central African Republic: Stable and variable features in a multilingual speaker’s idiolect, in: Sylvain Detey et al. (edd.), Varieties of spoken French, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 441–448. Steien, Guri Bordal/Boutin, Akissi Béatrice/Beyom, Robert (2016), Variation in the Central African Republic. A speaker from Bangui, in: Sylvain Detey et al. (edd.), Varieties of spoken French, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 236–246. Steien, Guri Bordal/Yakpo, Kofi (2020), Romancing with tones: on the outcome of prosodic contact, Language 96/ 1, 1–41. UN (2018) = United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision, New York, United Nations, https://population.un.org/wup/ Country-Profiles/ (2/3/2023). UNHCR (2019) = United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees, Refugees from the Central African Republic, Geneva, UN Refugee Agency, https://data2.unhcr.org/en/situations/car (2/3/2023). Wenezoui-Déchamps, Martine (1994), Que devient le français quand une langue nationale s’impose? Conditions et formes d’appropriation du français en République centrafricaine, Langue française 104, 89–99.

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22 Chad Abstract: The Republic of Chad is a former French colony that became independent in 1960. Alongside standard French and Arabic, which are the official languages, about one hundred thirty local languages are spoken. In addition to its official status, standard French is the language of administration and education. It is mainly used by the elite in a professional setting. For everyday communication, the population uses local languages. When the use of French is necessary, a variety of French adapted to the morphosyntactic structures of the speakers’ first language is used, and words designating typically local concepts appear in this Chadian French. Keywords: Chad, French, sociolinguistics, language policy, language contact

1 Sociolinguistic situation The Republic of Chad is situated in the heart of the African continent and is bordered by Libya to the north, the Central African Republic to the south, Niger, Nigeria, and Cameroon to the west, and Sudan to the east. Chad’s population is estimated at 17 million people (WPR 2021) and is very unevenly distributed over the national surface. This situation is due to the very different climatic conditions from north to south. In fact, Chad has three climatic zones: a Saharan zone in the north with a true desert climate, which is almost entirely rainless and only very sparsely populated, a Sahelian zone in the centre with a brief wet season between June and September, which is moderately inhabited, and a subtropical zone in the south, which is densely populated and has a longer wet season from May to October/November. We thus observe a population density ranging from less than one inhabitant per km2 in certain northern regions to more than sixty inhabitants per km2 in the region of Logone Occidental in the south. The demographically most important cities are the capital N’Djamena (721,081 inhabitants), Moundou (135,167, region of Logone Occidental), Sarh (102,528, region of Moyen Chari), Abéché (74,188, region of Ouaddaï), Kélo (42,533, region of Tandjilé Ouest), Koumra (36,263, region of Mandoul), Pala (35,466, region of Mayo Kebbi Ouest), Am Timan (28,885, region of Salamat), Bongor (27,770, region of Mayo Kebbi Est), and Mongo (27,763, region of Guéra, cf. WPR 2021). Overview of the languages – About one hundred and thirty languages can be found in Chad (133 according to Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; 147 according to Hammarström et al. 2023). The local languages can be grouped into the Afro-Asiatic, the Niger-Congo (e. g., Tupuri in the Fianga area in the region of Mayo Kebbi Est), and the Nilo-Saharan phylum (e. g., Sara in the Koumra area in the region of Mandoul or Dazaga, commonly known as Gorane, which is spoken in the regions of Barh el Gazel, Batha, Borkou, Enne 

 

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di, Hadjer-Lamis, Kanem, Lac, and Wadi Fira). Some of the languages are not local: Arabic, with Modern Standard Arabic and the dialectal Chadian Arabic, Dagba spoken by non-native people in the Moyen-Chari region (e. g., in Maro, Sido, and Sarh), and Fulfulde, with its Nigerian (spoken for example in Dagana, Massakory, Rig-Rig), Bagirmi (spoken in Bokoro and Massenya), and Adamawa varieties (spoken in Mayo Kebbi Ouest), Hausa, a language of commerce or vehicular language, Sango, a cross-border vehicular creole from the Central African Republic, and French, which is the official language, the language of the elite, but, given that it is confronted with these different national languages, also struggling to maintain itself (cf. Djarangar Djita forthcoming, 14s.). African languages in general – According to Djarangar Djita (forthcoming, 523) and Eberhard/Simons/Fennig (2023), seven of the languages spoken in Chad are threatened with extinction because of their very low speaker numbers, namely Babalia Arabic spoken in N’Djamena and in the community of Bokoro, Buso in the community of Bousso (region of Chari-Baguirmi), Fongoro in the district of Fongoro (region of Sila), Goundo in the communities of Kélo and Laï (region of Tandjilé), Mabire in the village of Oulek, municipality of rural Mongo (region of Guéra), Masalit in the communities of Oum Hadjer (region of Batha) and Am Dam (region of Ouaddaï), and Noy in Bédaya, Koumra (region of Mandoul), Sarh, Djoli and Koumogo (region of Moyen-Chari). Three of the languages are considered dead, since no one speaks them anymore: Berakou, which was spoken in N’Djamena and in the rural district of Bokoro (region of Hadjer-Lamis) and which was abandoned in favour of Babalia Arabic, Horo, whose speakers have opted for Kle, a variant of Ngam (region of Moyen-Chari), and Muskum, which was spoken near Guelengdeng (region of Mayo Kebbi Est). Arabic and Sara – Dialectal Arabic, the language of commerce, is spoken in the country’s markets and adapted to the phonological and grammatical specificities of the languages the speakers use as their first language. Thus, there is not a single Chadian Arabic dialect, but there are several ones, such as Abéché Arabic, Ati Arabic, or Bongor Arabic, all being more or less inter-comprehensible. If dialectal Arabic is the lingua franca par excellence for Chadians, it is supported by Sara, which includes about twenty inter-comprehensible dialects, namely Bedjond, which is spoken in Bédiondo (region of Mandoul), Bemar, Dagba, Gam, spoken in Gama (region of Tandjilé), Gor, Goulay, Horo, Kere, Kaba, Laka, Mango, Mbay, Murum, Nar, Ngam, Ngambay, Pen, Sar, and Sara Kaba (cf. Djarangar Djita 1989, 19–22; Djarangar Djita fortcoming, 470s.). Sara is the first language of most localities in southern Chad and the northern part of the Central African Republic. In Chad, Moundou, Sarh, and Koumra are Sara-speaking towns (Sar, Ngambay). Sara is also the dominant language in N’Djaména alongside the Chadian dialect of Arabic. In Abéché, Maba and dialectal Arabic are the two main languages of communication. Local Arabic and Sara are the two dominant national languages in Chad. Besides Sara and Chadian Arabic, Gorane is also a language of wider communication with about 582,000 native speakers (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Djarangar Djita 2008).  

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French – Although being a neighbour of Libya colonized by the Italians, neither Italian nor Spanish or Portuguese are used in Chad as a communication tool. Of all the Romance languages, only French is spoken and written in Chad, a former French colony. We do not find a variety of French organized as a language in its own right as is, for example, the case of French in Abidjan. As a general rule, French is only used for professional activities, while for other situations, local Arabic or another national language is used. The main varieties of French are standard French, spoken by the educated elite, and commercial French, which is a variety of French learned orally on the job, a kind of French spoken by traders and craftsmen in large urban centres in an attempt to communicate with customers, especially foreigners. Another variety of French spoken in Chad is the so-called veterans’ French (français des vétérans). It is used by veterans of World War II, illiterate people who tried to reproduce the sounds they heard from their French colleagues (e. g., [bandi salaw] for Fr. bande de salauds ‘bunch of bastards’, [bandikõ] for bande de cons ‘bunch of idiots’). French is only used in everyday life when the interlocutor is a foreigner and does not speak local Arabic. Whether it is veterans’ French, standard French, or commercial French, it is about the efforts made individually by particular users to try to make themselves understood in a specific given situation. Thus, national languages have an obvious impact on the French spoken in Chad.  

2 Linguistic history French conquest – The strategic location of the Lake Chad basin, situated between Northern Africa with its Arab population and sub-Saharan Africa with its Black population, partly explains the desire of France to conquer these lands with the aim of establishing territorial continuity between its possessions in Northern, Western, and Equatorial Africa. Three armed columns left these three poles of the French colonial empire in Africa in an attempt to converge on Lake Chad. The first column led by Émile Gentil (1866–1914), who had already explored the route between 1897 and 1899, left Brazzaville in Equatorial Africa and moved south-north on the boat Leon Blot. The second column led by Paul Joalland (1870–1940) and Octave Frédéric François Meynier (1874–1961) left Senegal in Western Africa and headed west-east through the Niger Republic. The third column led by Fernand Foureau (1850–1914) left north-African Algeria and made the north-south route through the Sahara. On 22 April 1900, the Battle of Kousseri (Cameroon) between Rabih Fadlallah (1842–1900), often named Rabah, and the three French armed columns resulted in the death of both the French commander François-Joseph-Amédée Lamy (1858–1900) and Rabah, which led to the consolidation of both the territories of French Equatorial Africa (Afrique-Équatoriale Française – AEF) and those of French West Africa (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF). Mission accomplished, the north-south and westeast columns returned to their bases. Only the south-north mission, under the orders of Émile Gentil, remained in place. On 29 May 1900, Fort-Lamy was created, and part of the Lake Chad basin became the French territory called Chad.

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French period – The beginning of World War I in 1914 coincided with the end of the military conquest in Chad. On 27 November 1913, Aïn Galaka fell from the hands of the Senoussists (term derived from the Al-Sanoussi family), on 10 February 1914, Colonel Largeau, commander of the Military Territory, arrived in Arada and signaled the end of the Borkou Ennedi campaign, in July 1914, French troops from Kaouar (region of Bilma) occupied Tibesti. The French colonizer was now master of the territory, but it was not until 24 April 1923 that the ministers of war and the colonies issued a decree stipulating that French troops in Chad were no longer considered to be in operation. In 1925, France launched the cultivation of cotton in southern Chad (called Tchad utile ‘useful Chad’) and thus began the economic exploitation of the colony. Throughout this period of conquest of the territory, the French language remained in the inner circle of the military administration, and the indigenous population used their local languages. History of education – The formal education system was introduced by the French to French West Africa in 1903 and to French Equatorial Africa, including Chad, in 1911 (cf. Coudray 1998, 24). It is, in both territories, a three-tier system, with primary education, higher primary education, and federal schools, the affiliation between the systems on these two territories being ensured by the governors general, in particular JosephFrançois Reste, governor first in French West Africa, then in French Equatorial Africa. As for Chad in particular, the first French school was opened in 1911 in Mao, in the region of Kanem. From 1911 on, France organized education in French Equatorial Africa with the aim of training civil servants for the administration of the country. In 1930, ten primary schools and three vocational schools taught French programmes in French Equatorial Africa (cf. Guth 1990, 72ss.). Independence – On 11 August 1960, Chad became independent and retained French as its official language.

3 External language policy Legislation – The Constitution of the Republic of Chad, promulgated on 4 May 2018, stipulates in article 9 that ‘the official languages are French and Arabic. The law sets the conditions for the promotion and development of national languages’.1

As an official language, French is the language of education, politics, science, and administration. Arabic is also an official language, but it is not clear whether this stands for the

1 “Les langues officielles sont le français et l’arabe. La loi fixe les conditions de promotion et de développement des langues nationales” (C-DT, art. 9).

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dialectal Arabic that almost all Chadians understand or Modern Standard Arabic mastered by a small minority only. Languages used in education – In application of the constitution, Law 16 (2006) on the orientation of the Chadian Educational System stipulates that ‘education and training are provided in the two official languages, French and Arabic. Education and training can also be provided in national languages. Foreign languages intervene as teaching disciplines’.2

Languages used in the media: newspapers – After the announcement of the liberalization of the media landscape by the Chadian state in 1990, the written press, especially the private one, rapidly evolved to occupy the national public space. Today, at the national level, there are twenty-four French-speaking titles, among them one daily (Le Progrès), one bi-weekly (Info Tchad), eight weeklies, one monthly (Tchad et Culture), two bimonthlies, and eleven quarterlies. There are also ten Arabic-speaking titles that participate in the information, education, and entertainment of the Chadian population, seven of them published weekly, one bi-weekly, one bimonthly, and one quarterly (cf. HAMA 2021). Languages used in the media: audiovisual media – The Chadian Television (TV Tchad – TVT), created on 10 December 1987, and the Chadian National Radio Broadcasting (Radiodiffusion Nationale Tchadienne – RNT), created in 1955, are both located in N’Djaména, and are structures of the Chadian State. The audiovisual media did not take their first steps until 1994. Seventy-eight broadcasting authorizations have been issued to date by the High Authority for Audiovisual Media (Haute Autorité des Médias et de l’Audiovisuel – HAMA) to private national and international audiovisual media. Al Nasser TV and Electron TV (ETV), two private televisions, occupy the audiovisual media landscape. Twenty partner radios of Radio France Internationale (RFI) broadcast freely and legally, live and/or delayed, by satellite and/or internet, RFI programmes in French, Swahili, Hausa, Mandingo, English, and Portuguese, as well as bilingual musical compilations and fictions for learning French (cf. HAMA 2021).

4 Linguistic characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation The phonological system of standard French is not the same as that of Chadian languages. The speakers of these languages pass French through the phonological sieve of their first language. Pronunciation errors in French reveal the linguistic origin of the

2 “L’enseignement et la formation sont dispensés dans les deux langues officielles que sont le français et l’arabe. L’enseignement et la formation peuvent aussi être dispensés dans les langues nationales. Des langues étrangères interviennent comme disciplines d’enseignement” (Law 16, art. 5).

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speaker. In Sara languages, for example, any vowel in a nasal context is automatically nasalized, so that maman ‘mom’ will be pronounced [mãmã] instead of [mamã]. Furthermore, in most languages of Chad, [y] does not exist, so that sucrerie ‘sweetmeat’ will be pronounced [sikɾeɾi] instead of [sykʁǝʁi]. Moreover, the multiple oppositions between /e/, /œ/, /ǝ/, and /o/ are irrelevant. Depending on the language, speakers only realize [e] or [œ] for any of these four vowels, like in queue de bœuf, which can be pronounced [kedebe] or [kœdœbœ] instead of [kødəbœf]. The /o/ : /ɔ/ opposition is also irrelevant, like in Paul a posé le portail au potager pour le protéger, pronounced [polapoze leportaj opotaʒe purleproteʒe] instead of [pɔlapoze lǝpɔʁtaj opɔtaʒe puʁlǝpʁɔteʒe].

4.2 Morphosyntax Relative pronouns – In the Chadian languages, there is only one correspondent to the French relative pronouns qui, que, dont, où, namely the equivalent of French que ‘that’. Consequently, speakers find it difficult to properly place the different pronouns. We can therefore hear sentences like la chèvre que la patte est cassée est morte instead of la chèvre dont la patte est cassée est morte, or le village que Madjadoum a acheté la chèvre s’appelle Kemkian instead of le village où Madjadoum a acheté la chèvre s’appelle Kemkian, and even la chèvre dont Madjadoum a acheté est morte instead of la chèvre que Madjadoum a acheté est morte. This situation is due to the literal transposition of local tongues, as illustrated by the following cases. In Bedjond and Tupuri, the relatives [kɨ] (Bedjond) and [ɡa] (Tupuri) are used for all French relative pronouns (qui, que, dont, où). The Bedjond construction [kaɡɨkɨɨsɨdɔtɨkɨntǝtɨ] and the Tupuri construction [koomaaɡandohaytibehayɡo] ‘this wooden seat where you sit is broken, (lit.) this wood that you sit on his head is broken’ explain that instead of le siège en bois sur lequel/où tu es assis est cassé one can hear a French sentence like le siège (en bois) que tu es assis dessus est cassé. The relative [kɨ] in [kaɡɨkɨǝltaekɨntǝtɨ] ‘the wooden seat you are talking about is broken, (lit.) this wood that your mouth speaks of is broken’ in Bedjond also explains a French sentence like le siège en bois que tu parles est cassé instead of le siège en bois dont tu parles est cassé. Personal pronouns – The absence of the concept of gender in some Chadian languages leads to confusion in the use of the personal pronouns lui, la, and le. In most cases, la is considered to be the feminine opposed to its masculine correspondent lui, like in je la donne son livre instead of je lui [f.] donne son livre, according to the masculine form je lui [m.] donne son livre.

4.3 Lexicon Borrowings: general vocabulary – At the lexical level, French uses borrowings from national languages to designate typically local concepts, like the loans attalin ‘porter who

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loads or unloads goods or carries women’s groceries at the market’ in (i), and kassali ‘man or woman who collect laundry for hand washing and ironing for money’ in (ii) from Arabic, or tankoul ‘grewia bark juice sauce, (lit.) battered sauce’ from Sara in (iii). Phrasemes based on constructions taken from national languages can also be found, like attacher la figure ‘to look sad, (lit.) to tie the face’ from Sara in (iv). (i) “Appelez-moi deux attali pour me transporter les sacs” (Djarangar Djita 2014, 35).3 (ii) “Les kassali mélangent les habits des gens et les lavent à l’eau du fleuve” (Djarangar Djita 2014, 233).4 (iii) “Sauce dite gluante et élastique parce qu’elle colle et s’étire indéfiniment quand on la prend, la sauce longue ou tankoul est une spécialité des Sara du sud du Tchad (Sar, Goulaye, Ngam, etc.)” (Djarangar Djita 2014, 359).5 (iv) “Chaque fois que je rentre saoul, ma femme attache la figure mais je fais comme je ne l’ai même pas vue” (Djarangar Djita 2014, 53).6

Other typical loans are argui siko ‘locally produced brandy, made from dates in northern Chad’ probably from Gorane, diya ‘blood price’ from Chadian Arabic, bally bally ‘game of chance’ probably also from Chadian Arabic, banana ‘my friend’ from Massa, and mosso ‘I fell’ from Sara. Borrowings: onomastics – Local names are often derived from African languages and also used in French. They are indeed usually a whole contracted sentence, a message for life that is premonitory. For example, djarangar means ‘we will take power’ and djita ‘your proper power first, (lit.) your arm first’ in Bedjond. In the same way, ndjékéry probably means ‘the one who told you lies, the one who wants to bribe you’ and nétonon ‘something is there (to be discovered)’ in Ngambay. Portemanteaus – Other words are subject to morphological changes, such as portmanteaus like bananitude ‘set of cultural and spiritual values specific to the so-called banana population (the Massa, Mousseye and Marba or Azumeina, Zimé and Mesmé populations located both in Chad and Cameroon)’ (< banana ‘my friend’ + attitude), formed on the model of nègre ‘negro’ and négritude ‘negritude’, or clandoman ‘driver of a motorcycle or car not registered in the trade register and fraudulently acting as a taxi’ (< Fr. clandestin ‘person working underground’ + Engl. man).

3 ‘Call me two attali to carry me the bags’. 4 ‘The kassali mix people’s clothes and wash them in the water of the river’. 5 ‘Sauce called sticky and elastic because it sticks and stretches indefinitely when taken, the long sauce or tankoul is a specialty of the Sara of southern Chad (Sar, Goulaye, Ngam, etc.)’. 6 ‘Every time I come home drunk my wife looks sad [(lit.) ties the face] but I pretend I haven’t even seen her’.

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5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – In Chad, French is seen as the language of those who have had the opportunity to go to French school and to stay there long enough to perfect this tool of public administration. Speaking in broken French does not bother anyone. To be able to speak it, even badly, is seen as an effort to be praised. Description of linguistic characteristics – There are two scientifically rigorous works, written by Chadian linguists, that present the characteristics of the French spoken in Chad: a dictionary (Dictionnaire pratique du français du Tchad, Djarangar Djita 2014) and another book (Le français au Tchad, Ngabo Ndjerassem 2005). They highlight the impact of local languages and national culture on standard French but are not intended to codify any Chadian French. Variety used by public authorities – Politicians do not hesitate to use Chadian French so that their compatriots understand them, given that standard French, a foreign language, is not easy for everyone to understand. Variety used in education – At school, elementary school teachers regularly use Chadian French to make themselves understood by their young learners, who have difficulties to understand standard French, a foreign language (Djarangar Djita 1998, 87). Variety used in the media – The written press and the audiovisual media make extensive use of the particularities of Chadian French vocabulary, like argui siko in (i), bally bally in (ii), banana in (iii), bananitude in (iv), and clandoman in (v). “Le 21 juillet à Bardaï dans l’Ennedi, c’est une ambiance de fête. Les militaires ont perçu leur forfait. Le seul cabaret de la région est bourré de monde. Tout à côté, deux militaires sirotent le ‘argui siko’, boisson locale préparée à base de dattes. Un troisième prend place et demande qu’on le serve. On lui sert trois verres” (Le Progrès 563, 15/8/2000).7 (ii) “[...] l’un des inconnus explique […] qu’il a perdu au jeu de bally bally le matin 2 millions F CFA et comme il y a des policiers à la sortie, il n’a pas pu réclamer son argent” (Le Progrès 602, 9/10/ 2000).8 (iii) “Le ‘Banana’ (terme qui signifie ‘camarade’ en Massa, devenu une appellation péjorative) doit réagir contre les humiliations dont il est l’objet” (N’Djaména Hebdo 197, 24/8/1995).9 (iv) “[…] ses ressortissants doivent affirmer leur identité de ‘Banana’: la ‘Bananitude’” (N’Djaména Hebdo 197, 24/8/1995).10 (v) “‘Je n’avais pas d’autre choix que de devenir clandoman’ [dit] ce jeune homme de 28 ans, marié à 2 femmes et père de 2 enfants [qui] a pourtant suivi une formation de chauffeur-mécanicien. (i)

7 ‘21 July in Bardaï in Ennedi is a festive atmosphere. The soldiers received their package. The only cabaret in the region is packed with people. Nearby, two soldiers are sipping ‘argui siko’, a local drink made from dates. A third takes his place and asks to be served. He is served three glasses’. 8 ‘[...] one of the strangers explains […] that he lost 2 million CFA francs at the bally bally game in the morning and as there are policemen at the exit, he did not been able to claim his money’. 9 ‘The ‘Banana’ (a term which means ‘comrade’ in Massa, which has become a pejorative term) must react against the humiliations of which he is the object’. 10 ‘[…] its nationals must affirm their identity as “Banana”: “Bananitude”’.

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‘Je travaille chaque jour de 6h à 22h sans journée de repos’. Sa bête noire? C’est la police qui traque les clandos à tout bout de champ, nuit et jour” (L’Observateur 314, 26/1/2005).11

Variety used in literature – The particularities of French spoken in Chad are found in the literary productions of Chadians. In his novel Mosso (2011), Nétonon Noël Ndjékéry uses typically Chadian words, like mosso and diya (cf. 4.3, Borrowings: general vocabulary). The names of the subjects in the novel are often in Ngambay (e. g., Dendo), the first language of the author, a native of Moundou, Western Logone region. For the Sara people (including the Ngambay), the names speak or convey a message (cf. 4.3, Borrowings: onomastics).  

References C-DT = Republic of Chad (1996), Constitution de la République du Tchad, in: Jean-Pierre Maury (ed.), Digithèque de matériaux juridiques et politiques, Perpignan, Université de Perpignan, http://mjp.univ-perp.fr/constit/ td1996.htm (2/3/2023). Coudray, Henri (1998), Langue, religion, identité, pouvoir: le contentieux linguistique franco-arabe au Tchad, in: Centre Al-Mouna (ed.), Tchad: Contentieux Linguistique arabe-français, Actes du colloque de décembre 1997, N’Djamena, Centre Al-Mouna, 19–70. Djarangar Djita, Issa (1989), Description phonologique et grammaticale du bédjonde: parler sara de Bédiondo/ Tchad, vol. 1, Grenoble, Université Stendhal, Doctoral Thesis. Djarangar Djita, Issa (1998), Quel bilinguisme pour l’éducation de base au Tchad?, in: Centre Al-Mouna (ed.), Contentieux linguistique arabe-français, N’Djaména, Centre Al-Mouna, 87–100. Djarangar Djita, Issa (2014), Dictionnaire pratique du français du Tchad, Paris, L’Harmattan. Djarangar Djita, Issa (forthcoming), Ta langue, ça m’intéresse! Populations et langues du Tchad, N’Djaména, Al Mouna. Djarangar Djita, Issa, et al. (2008), Passons du Sara au Français, Moyen-Chari/Pendé/Sarh, Coopération suisse au Tchad – PDR-MC. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL, https://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Guth, Suzie (1990), Note de synthèse, Revue française de pédagogie 90, 71–97. HAMA (2021), Le paysage médiatique tchadien, N’Djaména, Haute Autorité des Media et de l’Audiovisuel, https://hamatchad.org/le-paysage-mediatique-tchadien/ (2/3/2023). Hammarström, Harald, et al. (2023), Glottolog 4.7, Jena, Max-Planck-Institut, https://glottolog.org/about (2/3/2023). Law 16 = Présidence de la République (2006), Loi N°16/PR/2006 portant orientation du système éducatif tchadien, N’Djamena, République du Tchad, https://www.humanitarianresponse.info/sites/www. humanitarianresponse.info/files/documents/files/loi_16_systame_acducatif_tchadien_2006.pdf (2/3/2023). Ndjékéry, Nétonon Noël (2011), Mosso, Gollion, Infolio.

11 ‘“I had no other choice but to become an illegal moto-taxi driver” [says] this young man of 28 years, married to two wives and father of two children [who] nevertheless trained as a driver-mechanic. “I work every day from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. with no day off”. His peeve? It is the police who hunt down the clandos all the time, night and day’.

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Ngabo Ndjerassem, Mbai-Yelmia (2005), Le français au Tchad, Nice, Institut de linguistique française/CNRS. WPR (2021), Chad Population 2021 (Live), Walnut, World Population Review, https://worldpopulationreview. com/countries/chad-population (2/3/2023).

Jean-Alexis Mfoutou, Ursula Reutner, and Philipp Heidepeter

23 Congo-Brazzaville Abstract: This chapter describes the situation of French in the Republic of the Congo. With two thirds of its population speaking French, it is the country with the second largest French-speaking percentage in continental Africa after Gabon. French is mainly acquired as a second language and coexists with more than sixty other languages primarily of the Bantu family. Most of these languages are restricted to their ethnic groups, while Lingala serves as vehicular language in the North and Kituba in the South. The French presence goes back to Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, the name-giver of Brazzaville. The country became a French colony in 1882 and hosted the capital of French Equatorial Africa as well as the Brazzaville Conference. Though Congo-Brazzaville gained independence in 1960, French is still the only official language. It is used in politics, administration, education, the media, and literature. Plans to promote Lingala and Kituba in these domains have mostly been unsuccessful. The Congolese variety of French is marked by phonetic, morphosyntactic, and lexical particularities. The French of less educated speakers is sometimes criticized and marginalized, whereas the use of lexical Congolisms in official speeches, and documents, school, the media, and literature is not subject to criticism. Keywords: French, Bantu, diglossia, vehicular languages, borrowing

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution General information – Congo-Brazzaville, officially named Republic of the Congo (République du Congo), is situated in the West of Middle Africa and shares borders with Gabon and Cameroon in the west, the Central African Republic in the north, the Angolan exclave province of Cabinda in the south, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the east. It covers an area of approximately 342,000 km2 and has a population of about 5.84 million. Major ethnic groups are Kikongo (40.5 %), Teke (16.9 %), and Mbochi (13.1 %, cf. CIA 2023; WB 2023). The flag of Congo-Brazzaville shows green, yellow, and red diagonal stripes. The official motto is ‘Unity – Work – Progress’ (Unité – Travail – Progrès). French – French is spoken by more than 3.18 million people, according to Ethnologue, with a large majority (3.17 million) of second-language speakers opposed to approximately 11,000 first-language speakers. The International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) provides a slightly higher number of nearly 3.52 million people able to actively or passively use French in oral communication regardless of their level of literacy (cf. OIF 2022, 21, 30). Compared to  

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-023

 

 

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previous OIF reports, the proportion has increased from 58 % in 2014 and 59 % in 2019 to 61 % in 2022 (cf. 2014, 17; 2019, 32; 2022, 30). This growth is also visible in older figures from 1980 (53 %) and 1993 (59 %, cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 39; Rossillon 1995, 83). Today, Congo-Brazzaville has the second-highest proficiency rate in continental Africa after Gabon (65 %, cf. OIF 2022, 30). French is spread all over the country but is particularly present in larger cities, where it is used in daily communication and working contexts and is more thoroughly acquired than in rural areas due to better schooling conditions (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 52; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 35ss.; GomaMalanda 2013, 171s.; Ndamba 2013, 238–244; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Vehicular Bantu languages – Most of the languages spoken in Congo-Brazzaville are Bantu. Kituba (H10A) and Lingala (C30B) are the most dominant and serve as vehicular languages in the country’s southern and northern parts, respectively. Kituba covers a smaller area than Lingala but has more speakers since the country’s South is more densely populated than the North. Both languages are primarily used in cities and along the principal axes of communication, such as rivers, roads, and railways. The victory of mostly Lingala-speaking militias in the civil war allowed Lingala to extend into Kitubaspeaking areas (cf. Massoumou 2001, 76s.; Calvet 2010, 151). Kituba – Kituba is spoken in the South of the country in the departments (départements) of Bouenza (434,925 inhabitants), Kouilou (129,398), Lékoumou (135,643), Niari (325,442), Pointe Noire (1,006,611), the southern part of Pool (332,934), and the southern quarters of Brazzaville (1,932,610). It is particularly spread along the railway from Brazzaville to Pointe-Noire via Dolisie, Nkayi, and Madingou, and it is also spoken in CongoKinshasa as a national language referred to as Kikongo in the constitution (↗24 CongoKinshasa). Ethnologue provides some 1.75 million speakers for Congo-Brazzaville. Given its status as a lingua franca in the South, the total number of first- and second-language speakers might be higher. Kituba arose in the nineteenth century when speakers of different Bantu languages came together in Pointe-Noire, a main site of the French slave trade, and developed a common language. It was used by the workers constructing the railway from Brazzaville to Pointe-Noire in the 1920s and thus expanded further. As a syntactically and phonologically simplified version of Kikongo (especially Kimanyanga, H16b), it is comprehensible within the Kikongo group and sometimes classified as a creole, though it did not emerge in the setting of plantation colonies. Alternative names are Monokutuba, Munukutuba ‘(lit.) I speak’, Kikongo-Kituba, Kikongo, and due to its historical and contemporary spreading with and along the railway, langue du chemin de fer ‘language of the railway’ (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 11ss.; Massoumou 2001, 77; Bokamba 2009, 51ss.; Mufwene 2009, 213; 2013; INS 2020a, 7; Tsoumou 2021, 119; Eberhard/ Simons/Fennig 2023). Lingala – Lingala is the lingua franca of the North and covers Cuvette (219,584), Cuvette-Ouest (102,724), Likouala (120,650), Plateaux (245,683), Sangha (120,650), the northern part of Pool, and the northern quarters of Brazzaville. It is particularly used along the Congo and the Ubangi River and their tributaries, and along the road axis between Brazzaville, Ouésso, and Souanké near the border to Cameroon and its connecting  

 

 

 

 

 

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roads towards the Koukouya highlands close to the border to Gabon, and also spoken in Congo-Kinshasa and the Central African Republic. Ethnologue provides some 213,000 speakers for Congo-Brazzaville, which appears too low again with regard to its geographical extension and status of lingua franca. As it emerged along the Congo River and its tributaries, where people with different linguistic backgrounds met for commercial activities, it is also known as langue du fleuve ‘language of the river’ (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 14; Massoumou 2001, 77; Meeuwis 2013; INS 2020a, 7; Tsoumou 2021, 120; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Vernacular Bantu languages – Apart from Kituba and Lingala, about sixty other Bantu languages are spoken in the country. Their exact number varies due to differences in distinguishing between languages and dialects. The Linguistic Atlas of Central Africa (Atlas Linguistique de l’Afrique centrale – ALAC) lists sixty-eight vernacular Bantu languages (cf. Dieu 1987, 16–19), Glottolog sixty-one, and Ethnologue fifty-four. The following presentation includes all languages that are indicated for Congo-Brazzaville in Glottolog (G) and Ethnologue (E) or marked for the country in the maps of the New Updated Guthrie List (NG, Maho 2009). Their designations follow Glottolog unless the other two sources unanimously suggest another name, which is closer to the autonym. In these cases, the Glottolog designation is only added in brackets. If the Glottolog designation differs in only one of the other sources, the deviating name is indicated in brackets. The languages belong to the following groups presented in descending quantitative order: Kikongo (H10), Teke (B70), Mboshi (C20), Bangi-Ntomba (C30), Ewondo-Fang (A70), Kaka (A90), Kele (B20), Makaa-Njem (A80), Mbete (B60), Ngondi (C10), Nzebi (B50), Shira-Punu (B40), and Tiene-Yanzi (B80). Languages within the same group are usually mutually intelligible (cf. Dieu 1987, 44–60; Massoumou 2001, 73; Tsoumou 2021, 116; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Hammarström et al. 2023; CIA 2023). Kikongo – The Kikongo group is the largest Bantu group in Congo-Brazzaville. Like the language Kituba derived from it, the group is spread in the South between the Atlantic coast and Brazzaville in Bouenza, Kouilou, Lékoumou, Niari, Pointe-Noire, and Pool. Its languages are Beembe (H11, Bembe in NG), Hangala (H111, only in NG), Kaamba (H112A, Kamba in NG), Doondo (H112B), Vili (H12), Kunyi (H13), Suundi (H131), Koongo (H16, San Salvador Kongo and South-Central Koongo in G, Kongo in NG), Yombe (H16c), and Laari (H16f, Laadi in NG). Teke and Mboshi – The Teke and Mboshi groups are of medium size. Teke languages are spoken in the southern departments of Bouenza, Lékoumou, and Pool, the central department of Plateaux, and the north-western department of Cuvette-Ouest. The group includes Teg(h)e (B71, Latege in G), Ngungwel (B72a), Tsaayi (B73a), Laali (B73b), Yaka (B73c, not in G), Tyee (B73d), Nzikou (B74a, Njyunjyu in NG) and Eboo (B74b, Boo in NG, presented together as Eboo-Nzikou in G), Ibali/Bali (B75, Kwa South in G), Kukuya (B77a, Kukwa in NG), and Fuumu (B77b). Mboshi languages can be found in the central departments of Cuvette and Plateaux and the north-western departments of CuvetteOuest and Sangha. The group includes Mboko (C21), Akwa (C22), Koyo (C24), Mbosi (C25), Likwala (C26), and Likuba (C27).

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Others – The other groups are smaller. The Bangi-Ntomba group covers parts of the northern department of Likouala as well as of Cuvette and Plateaux. It includes Loi-Likila (C31a), Bobangi (C32, Bangi in NG), and Moi (part of Bobangi according to NG). The Ewondo-Fang group is found in Sangha near the border to Gabon and Cameroon and is represented by Fang (A75). Languages of the Kaka group are spoken in Likouala and Sangha and comprise Pol (A92a, not in E), Pomo (A92b), Kweso (A92C, not in E, presented together as Pomo-Kweso in G), and Kako (A93). The Kele group is spread in Cuvette-Ouest, Lékoumou, Niaria, and Sangha with Ndasa (B201), Ngom (B22b), Mbangwe (B23), Wumbvu (B24), Kota (B25), and Mahongwe (B252, not in E). Makaa-Njem languages are restricted to Sangha and encompass Njyem (A84, Njem in NG), Bekwel (A85b, Bekwil in G), Mpongmpong (A86b, not in E), Mpiemo (A86c, not in E), Bomwali (A87), and Yambe (only G). Languages of the Mbete group are spoken in Cuvette-Ouest and Lékoumou and comprise Mbere (B61, MbereMbamba in G) and Ombamba (B62, Mba(a)mba in NG). The Ngondi group is present in the North and the Northern Centre (Cuvette, Likouala, Sangha) with Dibole (C101), Aka (C104, Yaka in G), Mbenga (C105, only in NG), Ngundi (C11), Bomitaba (C14), Enyele (C141, only in NG), Bondongo (C142, only in NG), Impfondo (C143, not in E), Bongili (C15), Lobala (C16, not in E), and Mikaya-Bambengangale-Baluma (only in G). The Nzebi group covers parts of Lékoumou and Niari, where Njebi (B52, Nzebi in NG) and Tsaangi (B53) are spoken. The ShiraPunu group can be found in the south-western part of the country (Bouenza, Kouilou, Niari) and includes Bwisi (B401), Punu (B43), and Lumbu (B44). The Tiene-Yanzi group is attested in the south-eastern part with Tiene (B81, not in E). Non-Bantu vernacular languages – Languages of the Ubangi family are spoken by only a few people in Likouala and Sangha. They include Baka (not in E), Mbandja, Monzombo, Ngbaka (only E), Ngbaka Ma’bo, and Sango, which is a co-official language in the Central African Republic, based on Ngbandi, and hence also sometimes described as a creole. The Gbaya languages Ngbaka Minagende, Ngombe-Bangandu (not in E), and North-West Gbaya are traditionally classified as Ubangian, too, while other classifications diverge, including the one in Glottolog (e.g., Moñino 2010). Finally, with Hausa (not in G), a Chadic language can be found, which is used by only a few speakers in CongoBrazzaville but functions as a crucial vehicular language in Niger and Nigeria (cf. Samarin 2013; Tsoumou 2021, 117; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Hammarström et al. 2023; ↗15 Niger; ↗21 Central African Republic).

1.2 Social distribution French – French is the language with the highest overt prestige, the only official language, and the language of most written texts. It is the language of choice when interlocutors do not share the same Bantu vehicular. It also serves the self-protection of people who may not want to reveal their ethnic origin through their language after the civil wars. The mastery of French depends on the region, age, education, and socioeconomic status. It is higher in urban than in rural areas. Especially there, French is mostly used

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as a second language, whereas in large cities, it is increasingly spoken within the family and represents a first language for some younger speakers. Thus, age is another decisive factor. Younger people tend to have higher competencies in French. Among 15-year-old teenagers from Brazzaville, for example, 88 % claimed to have an effortless written knowledge of it, and in the departments of Plateaux and Cuvette, younger speakers declared to use French more often than other groups. Other relevant factors are the level of education and the socioeconomic status that are often mutually dependent. French is primarily learned in school, so people who are able to attend school regularly and long enough are advantaged in its acquisition. They have better chances of reaching a higher socioeconomic status, as access to jobs, for example, in public administration generally depends on the mastery of French (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 28, 48s.; Massoumou 2001, 77; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 22s., 33–39; Mfoutou 2010b, 19; 2012, 20; Goma-Malanda 2013, 173; Ngamountsika 2013, 195–201; OIF 2014, 104; 2022, 42s.; Tsoumou 2021, 123s.). Social class and language variation – Illiterate speakers and those with a low level of formal education are also called francisants, and their basilectal French with many deviations from the standard is referred to as français mboka-mboka ‘dilettantish French’ (< Lin. mboka ‘village’). French speakers with a higher level of schooling use varieties referred to as français des longs bics ‘semi-intellectual French, (lit.) French of long ballpoints’ which are closer to standard French. Their group is the largest one and covers the mesolectal part of the continuum. Speakers with even fewer deviations from standard French usually attended university. Their acrolectal French is also called gros français ‘(lit.) big French’, and their use of Congolisms is mostly lexical (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 54–59; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. mboka-mboka). Vehicular Bantu languages – Lingala and Kituba are officially recognized as national vehicular languages and more present in the oral than the written medium. They are used for interethnic communication within their respective regions, for example, in the context of trade, religion, sketches, or music. Speakers of different vernacular languages choose Lingala or Kituba rather than French if they share one of them. While older people mostly use them as a second or third language, their increasing role in private contexts and families makes them the first language of more and more younger speakers. This is especially true in urban centres where people frequently switch from a vernacular language to Kituba or Lingala. Competence in Kituba or Lingala is not linked to social class or the level of education (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 35ss.; Bokamba 2009, 51; Mufwene 2009, 217; Tsoumou 2021, 119–124; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Vernacular languages – The vernacular languages are mostly restricted to rural areas with ethnolinguistic homogeneity. They are primarily spoken as first languages and considered as langues du village ‘village languages’ by their speakers, who usually also use Kituba or Lingala as a second language. Due to their often relatively small extension and their exposure to French, Kituba, and Lingala, their future is uncertain. People striving for a higher social status tend to neglect them in favour of the vehicular languages (cf. Tsoumou 2021, 125).  

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Double diglossia – The tripartition between French, the vehicular Bantu languages, and the vernaculars constitutes a double diglossia. French, the only official language and the only language used and understood all over the country, is the high variety in relation to all Congolese languages, while Kituba and Lingala represent high varieties with regard to the vernaculars. This double diglossia can further be specified into a triple diglossia when also considering the different varieties within French. The choice of a language or language variety within a specific situation may thus not only be ethnically and geographically but also socially marked (cf. Reutner 2005, 44–52; 2017, 52s.; Calvet 2010, 99; Mfoutou 2021a, 356s.; Tsoumou 2021, 122s.). Code-mixing – Despite the diglossic situation, code-mixing between French and Bantu languages can be observed to different degrees in several domains. It is common, for example, in daily communication, political speeches outside of parliament, publicity, literature, and even the judicial system (cf. Mfoutou 2012, 51). Other languages – English is taught as a foreign language in schools where Spanish and German occur to lesser degrees, too. Increased Chinese economic activities in the country have led to the attractiveness of Chinese as a language that also promises economic success and international perspectives (cf. Bagamboula 2022, 166).

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Pre-colonial situation – Most of the country’s territory was part of the ancient Kingdom of Kongo. Archaeological findings are rare, but the kingdom seems to have already existed around the year 1000. At the end of the fifteenth century, it was a centralized state with an area of almost 100,000 km2, approximately half a million inhabitants, a tax system, seashell currency, and a judicial system chaired by the king, as well as an army that ensured the kingdom’s regional power. Several smaller kingdoms surrounded the Kingdom of Kongo, including the rival Teke Kingdom (cf. Thornton 2020, 21s., 33s.). Portuguese and Dutch presence – The Portuguese explorer Diogo Cão (~1452–1486) landed at the mouth of the Congo River in 1483. The Portuguese Christianized local people and entertained peaceful relations with them. Apart from economic exchange, mainly slave trade, political and educational exchanges occurred with Congolese diplomats and students staying in Lisbon. At the end of the sixteenth century, contacts between local groups and the Dutch ended the Portuguese trade monopoly. As Protestants, the latter also represented a religious threat to the Portuguese Catholic mission. Besides economic and political conflicts, an alliance of the Kingdom of Kongo with the Dutch led to armed clashes from which the Portuguese emerged victorious in the second half of the seventeenth century. The beheading of King Vita a Nkanga (António I of Kongo, ~1617–1665) in the context of the Battle of Mbwila (1665) left the defeated Kingdom of Kongo without a leader. Different claims to the throne resulted in decades of civil war

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and the division of the state (cf. Hilton 1985, 50–53; Thornton 2020, 37–55, 97, 162–166, 182–186). Towards a French colony – In the nineteenth century’s Scramble for Africa, several European powers sought to secure access to the mouth of the Congo River, which was strategically important for transporting raw materials needed in the industrial age. Belgium established the Congo Free State (État indépendant du Congo) south of the river as a private territory of King Leopold II (1835–1909), which later became the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Portuguese made Cabinda a protectorate in 1885. French power was established north of the river. The Italian-French explorer and anti-slavery activist Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza (1852–1905) was already familiar with parts of the territory through former expeditions when he reached the Congo River in 1880 coming from the Léfini tributary to avoid the violation of Portuguese claims. In the same year, he signed a treaty with the Teke King Ilo (†1892), which placed the Teke Kingdom under French protection and prevented the Congo Free State from expanding northwards. Ilo also enabled the French to establish themselves upon an existing Teke settlement, later named Brazzaville in honour of Brazza. The French government approved the treaty between Brazza and Ilo in 1882 and thus gave birth to the colony of French Congo (Congo français). Brazza served as its first commissioner-general but was removed by the French government in 1897 due to the economically unsatisfying situation. In 1903, the colony was renamed Middle Congo (Moyen-Congo, cf. Coquery-Vidrovitch 1972, 31; 1985, 305; Birmingham 1976, 222). Colonial exploitation – Soon after Brazza’s dismissal and against his ideals, the French copied the cruel model of the Belgian Congo and conceded land to private companies. This concessionary regime (régime concessionaire) remained intact even after World War I, despite its economic failure and sporadic attempts of resistance against the brutal exploitation. In 1910 Brazzaville became the capital of the newly founded French Equatorial Africa (Afrique-Équatoriale française – AEF). Its colonization went along with the spreading of French. Locals working, for example, for the French military developed a pidgin variety of French known as français tirailleur ‘French of the infantry’. It integrated borrowings from local languages and granted its speakers a higher prestige compared to people without any knowledge of French. French also expanded through mission schools, where it was the only language pupils were allowed to use according to a decree from 1883. During this period, forcing pupils to wear a sack filled with animal bones or excrement around their necks was a common educational practice to punish them for committing errors in French or using other languages. Attempts of missionaries to establish the use of local languages in religious education were criticized by the colonial administration (cf. Coquery-Vidrovitch 1972, 197–219; 1985, 305–315; Queffélec/ Niangouna 1990, 9, 17–21; Mfoutou 2010b, 15s.; 2012, 31; Garnier 2013, 59).

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2.2 Milestones of its further development Political history – In 1944, the French Committee of National Liberation (Comité français de libération nationale – CFLN) under Charles de Gaulle (1890–1970) organized the Brazzaville Conference (conférence de Brazzaville). It invited the governors of Africa to discuss the future role of the French colonies and a change in Franco-African relationships, which should improve the rights of indigenous people. Like many other African countries, also Congo-Brazzaville became a French overseas territory (territoire d’outre-mer) in 1946, an autonomous republic within the French Union (Union française) in 1958, and it achieved its independence in 1960. However, conflicts between ethnic groups had not been resolved, so the subsequent political history has seen instability, military coups, and civil wars. Congo-Brazzaville soon took a socialist path under President Marien Ngouabi (1938–1977), who gained power after a military coup, Jacques Joachim Yhombi-Opango (1939–2020), who succeeded Ngouabi after his assassination, and Denis Sassou-Nguesso (*1943), who remained president until 1992. In the socialist context, the country’s name was changed to Popular Republic of the Congo (République populaire du Congo) from 1969 until the end of the socialist period in 1991. The return to a democratic multiparty system was not peaceful. The first civil war started in 1993 in the southern surroundings of Brazzaville between militias supporting President Pascal Lissouba (1931–2020) and the mayor of Brazzaville and later prime minister Bernard Kolélas (1933–2009), who was joined by militias supporting Sassou-Nguesso. The second civil war began in 1997, also involved the departments of Niari and Pool, and was won by Sassou-Nguesso, who continues to hold his regained power. The wars not only provoked economic difficulties and the rise of criminality, prostitution, teenage pregnancies, and HIV rates but also fostered illiteracy which, from a linguistic perspective, translates into a decrease in French skills (cf. Schachter Morgenthau/Creevey Behrman 1984, 638s.; Frère 2007, 120; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 16, 28; Calvet 2010, 92–96). Language planning: French – After independence, French was maintained as the only official language despite being the former colonizer’s language that not even ten percent of the population mastered fluently. The first constitution did not mention languages other than French. A law from 1961 guaranteed children the right to attend school free of charge, thus promoting the mastery of French, which was also the only language used in national television, founded in 1962 (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 17s.; Tsoumou 2021, 121). Language planning: Kituba and Lingala – The absence of other languages in public domains had both practical and ideological reasons: French was already established in administration and education, while Congolese languages were not sufficiently codified for these purposes and suffered from a lower prestige. Also, a consensus on which one to choose would have been hard to reach. These difficulties persisted when the socialist government tried to promote Congolese languages and developed several plans to introduce one of them as national language from 1974 onwards. The challenge of whether to choose Kituba as the vehicular language with most speakers in the country or Lingala

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with more speakers in neighbouring countries and thus being more efficient for international communication could not be solved, as either decision would have been perceived as hegemonic. With regard to teaching, Kituba and Lingala were partially introduced in schools for children and adults in the 1980s, which had been discussed since the beginning of the 1970s. Several thousand people gained literacy in one of these languages. However, due to a lack of political and parental willingness and financial resources and despite the creation of teaching material, it was not successful in the long run. The same applies to attempts during the 1970s to introduce newspapers in languages other than French, such as Bassali ya Congo ‘Workers of the Congo’ or the journal of the literacy campaign in the department of Pool Ntseengo ‘Hoe’. Despite these failures, Kituba and Lingala were officially recognized as vehicular languages in the socialist period and kept this status afterwards. In 2010, the country ratified the African Youth Charter (Charte africaine de la jeunesse), which also includes the will to promote African languages in schools, but no actual steps of implementation followed upon this ratification (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 18–22; Mfoutou 2010b, 20ss.; Brands 2016, 37; Tsoumou 2021, 116): ‘The member states take the following measures to promote and protect the moral and traditional values identified by the Community: […] to implement and intensify the teaching of African languages as an integral part of formal and non-formal education in order to accelerate economic, social, political, and cultural development’.1

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation French has been the only official language since the first constitution. Lingala and Kituba, referred to as Munukutuba, were added as national languages besides French for the first time in the constitution of 1992 (cf. C-CG 1992, art. 3). The constitutions of 2002 and 2015 maintained this status but changed the designation from Munukutuba to Kituba, so the article today states: ‘The official language is French. The national vehicular languages are Lingala and Kituba’.2

1 “Les États parties prennent les mesures suivantes pour promouvoir et protéger les valeurs morales et traditionnelles reconnues par la Communauté: […] mettre en œuvre et intensifier l’enseignement des langues africaines en tant que partie intégrante de la formation scolaire et non scolaire pour accélérer le développement économique, social, politique et culturel” (Decree 686, art. 20). 2 “La langue officielle est le français. Les langues nationales véhiculaires sont le lingala et le kituba” (CCG 2015, art. 4).

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The concept of national languages itself is not further legally defined (cf. Massoumou/ Queffélec 2007, 39), but children are granted the right to speak their ethnic language and required to respect the national languages: ‘The child may not be deprived of the right […] to speak the language of the ethnic group with those who are part of it’.3 ‘The child has to […] respect the national identity, languages, and values’.4

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Politics – French is the only language used in the national parliament and its regional equivalents (conseils départementaux). Speeches outside of parliament, for example, during electoral campaigns, are also held in languages other than French, and often include code-mixing (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 39s.). Administration – Administrative documents are written and accepted exclusively in French, even the permission to sell goods at public markets. Written translations of administrative texts do not exist, but decisions are often orally translated into Kituba and Lingala, especially when being broadcast via radio or television, so people with less proficiency in French can understand them. Kituba, Lingala, and vernacular languages are used in oral communication within the administration, particularly in rural areas. Vernacular languages are also spoken, for example, during interviews for statistical reports in order to facilitate the interviewees’ participation (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 39s.; Leclerc 2016). Judicial system – The official language of hearings and trials is French. Inofficially, the Bantu vehiculars are used not only by defendants but also by judges who sometimes repeat contents already uttered in French in the language of the defendants to guarantee their understanding (cf. Mfoutou 2012, 64–79). Beyond that, defendants and witnesses are granted the right of a translator if necessary: ‘A translator has to be called for if the defendant does not speak or understand the French language’.5 ‘In cases where the defendant, the witnesses, or one of both do not speak the French language sufficiently or where it is necessary to translate a document added in the debate, the president appoints a translator’.6

3 “[L]’enfant ne peut être privé du droit […] d’employer la langue du groupe ethnique avec ceux qui en font partie” (Law 4, art. 40). 4 “L’enfant doit […] respecter l’identité, les langues et les valeurs nationales” (Law 4, art. 46). 5 “Il doit être fait appel à un interprète si l’accusé ne parle ou ne comprend pas la langue française” (Law 1, art. 240). 6 “Dans le cas où l’accusé, les témoins ou l’un d’eux ne parlent pas suffisamment la langue française ou s’il est nécessaire de traduire un document versé aux débats, le président nomme d’office un interprète” (Law 1, art. 295).

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Translations primarily concern Kituba or Lingala, though the use of other languages also occurs, especially in rural areas (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 40). In case of arrests, the constitution grants the right to be informed in a language the arrested person can understand: ‘All arrested persons are informed about the motive of their arrest and of their rights in a language they understand’.7

Religion – Language use differs according to religion. In syncretic and animistic religious practices, vernacular languages prevail. Christian services and religious instruction in larger cities are offered in French, Lingala, and Kituba. In rural areas, Lingala, Kituba, and the vernacular languages dominate while French is rarely used. Public radio and television broadcast Christian programmes in Lingala. Revivalist churches also use English during prayer sessions. The services of the Muslim community are held in Arabic (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 27; Massoumou 2001, 75; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 41; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. prêtre). Workplace – French is the main office language, especially in urban contexts. Among construction workers, the employees of restaurants, shops, and markets, and in their communication with customers, Kituba, Lingala, and, especially in rural contexts, the vernacular languages are more common than French (cf. Goma-Malanda 2013, 173; Tsoumou 2019, 95; 2021, 125; Bagamboula 2022, 164; OIF 2022, 43). Public signs – Signs on public buildings, such as schools, universities, hospitals, or ministries, are written in French. The same applies to most signs on private estates, such as restaurants and shops, where languages other than French sometimes appear too (cf. Mfoutou 2012, 49s.). Advertising – French is used for advertisements, where Kituba, Lingala, and the vernacular languages may also occur to better reach consumers (cf. Mfoutou 2012, 50s.; Mbanga 2013, 38s.).

3.3 Languages used in education French is the only official teaching language. The unofficial use of Lingala, Kituba, and vernacular languages is attested in primary schools and, where present, in nursery schools (only in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire), preschools (only in the capitals of the departments), and secondary schools. These languages are used among pupils and between teachers and pupils when teachers try to better explain difficult concepts. Lingala and Kituba are not taught in schools but can be studied at the capital’s Marien

7 “Toute personne arrêtée est informée du motif de son arrestation et de ses droits dans une langue qu’elle comprend” (C-CG 2015, art. 11).

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Ngouabi University (Université Marien Ngouabi). Languages taught in schools apart from French are English and, to a lesser degree, Spanish and German. The acquisition of Chinese is becoming increasingly popular among the younger population for the economic prospects it provides (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 33; Tsoumou 2019, 95; OIF 2022, 140).

3.4 Languages used in the media Press – The transition to democracy led to the creation of many short-lived Frenchspeaking newspapers that were often ideologically close to a political party. Only a few survived the 1997 civil war, after which new newspapers were founded. Still today, newspapers are exclusively published in French: the daily pro-governmental Les Dépêches de Brazzaville ‘The Reports of Brazzaville’, the bi-weekly Catholic La Semaine africaine ‘The African Week’, and even newspapers with Congolese names such as the satirical magazine Epanza Makita ‘(lit.) Person Who Disturbs an Assembly’, for instance (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 31; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 42s.; Frère 2007, 119–124; Mbanga 2013, 35). Radio – Radio represents an essential source of information due to an illiteracy rate of almost 20 %, which is slightly higher among the female population. The public broadcaster Radiodiffusion Télévision Congolaise (RTC) was founded in 1962 and later renamed Centre national de Radio-Télévision congolais (CNRTV). It includes the radio channels Radio Congo and Radio Brazzaville, which mainly air in French but also in Lingala and Kituba. Vernacular languages are only marginally present in interviews or music. The situation is similar in private stations such as Digital Radio Télévision (DRTV) and Radio Liberté (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 17, 43; Mfoutou 2010b, 21; DRTV 2022; CIA 2023). Television and cinema – The public television channel Télé Congo primarily broadcasts in French. It also offers news in Lingala and Kituba, and especially Lingala also appears in cultural productions such as songs and sketches. Private channels either broadcast in French only, as in the case of VOX TV, or include some Kituba and Lingala, as in the case of DRTV. Cinematic productions are mostly imported from abroad. If they are not originally produced in French, they are usually presented with French subtitles in established cinemas, whereas makeshift cinemas may also show films in languages other than French without subtitles (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 32; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 43s.; DRTV 2022). Internet – French predominates in online contexts. Lingala and Kituba are used on Facebook and Twitter, but it remains unclear to which degree the users of the accounts are situated in Congo-Brazzaville or in other countries where these languages are spoken. The same applies to the authors of the rather small Lingala- and Kituba-speaking versions of Wikipedia, with 3,321 and 1,262 articles, respectively. A mixing of French and English marginally occurs in Facebook commentaries related to political interactions, in which English is mainly used for the expression of mockery, motivation, and happiness  

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but also for cursing or criticism (cf. Tsoumou 2019, 102s.; 2021, 125; Scannell 2022; Wikipedia 2023a/b). Literature and music – French dominates in novels, poetry, and theatre plays. Congolese languages mostly occur in orally transmitted tales, which are only sometimes written down (e.g., Nimy 2022a/b). As to music, Lingala is dominant in lyrics of songs often imported from Congo-Kinshasa (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 33; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 44s.).

4 Linguistic characteristics The following features are not equally common among all speakers due to different levels of formal education. Some are part of basilectal French, which is indicated, whenever possible, in the description of pronunciation and morphosyntax. These areas and the lexicon also include features that partially occur in other African varieties of French, too. In the field of lexicon, this applies, for example, to alphabétiseur, indexer, foula-foula, radio-trottoir, or taximan (cf. BDLP, s.v., and the examples in the other chapters of this volume).

4.1 Pronunciation Vowels – The nasal vowels /ɛ̃/, /œ̃ /, /ɔ̃/, and /ɑ̃/ are replaced by the corresponding denasalized vowel or, when followed by a consonant, by the denasalized vowel + [n] and, before [p]/[b], + [m]: besoin [bəzwɛ], galon [ɡalɔ], sergent [sɛʁzɑ]; engager [ɑnɡaze], lundi [lendi]; tomber [tombe], ton père [tɔmpɛʁ] instead of [bəzwɛ̃], [ɡalɔ̃], [sɛʁʒɑ̃]; [ɑ̃ɡaʒe] [lœ̃ di]; [tɔ͂ be], [tɔ͂ pɛʁ]. The rounded oral vowels /ø/ and /y/ can be realized as [e] or [i], as in eucalyptus [ekaliptys], which is also reflected in a different spelling as , or juge [ʒiʒ] instead of [økaliptys] and [ʒyʒ]. Such changes may be influenced by Bantu languages that neither have nasal vowels nor the rounded vowels /ø/ and /y/. They are especially common in the basilectal variety (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 34; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. écalyptus; 2012, 17; Elongo 2013, 103s.). Consonants – The voiced and unvoiced postalveolar fricatives /ʒ/ and /ʃ/ are sometimes pronounced as voiced and voiceless alveolar [z] and [s], as in sergent [sɛʁzɑ] or chercher [sɛʁse] instead of [sɛʁʒɑ̃] and [ʃɛʁʃe]. The uvular fricative /ʁ/ may be realized as the uvular trill [ʀ] or completely omitted as, for example, in briller [bije] instead of [bʁije]. Again, these deviations may be explained through the sound inventory of Bantu languages and can be found, above all, among basilectal speakers (cf. Mfoutou 2012, 17; Elongo 2013, 103). Suprasegmental level – Congolese speakers prefer CV syllables, so they may introduce an epenthetic [e], [ə], or [o] in CVC or CCV syllables to obtain a CVCV structure as, for example, in gré [ɡeʁe], guerre [ɡɛʁə], militaire [militɛʁə], Paul [polo], or trop [toʁo]

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instead of [ɡʁe], [ɡɛʁ], [militɛʁ], [pol], and [tʁo]. Vowel lengthening occurs, too. Its written realization appears, for example, in the commercial slogan Chacun son solola pour parler jusqu’àààààààà! ‘a chat for everyone to speak very long, (lit.) to speak until’. Both phenomena might be influenced by Bantu languages, in which CV syllables prevail and where long vowels contrast with short ones, though the [aː] in the slogan may also have an emphatic character (cf. Massoumou/Quéffelec 2007, 56; Mfoutou 2012, 17, 79s.).

4.2 Morphosyntax Determiners – Articles can be absent, as in y’a école pour noir [instead of pour les noirs], y’a école pour blanc [instead of pour les blancs] ‘there are schools for [the] black people, there are schools for [the] white people’. Partitives can be omitted, too, as in faire la [instead of de la] musique ‘to make music’ or avoir l’argent [instead of de l’argent] ‘to have money’, which can explained through direct translation from Bantu. The omission of articles might also be influenced by Bantu languages, which usually do not have definite and indefinite articles as a grammatical category (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. musique (faire la); 2012, 19, 137). Number and gender agreement – Mismatches may occur in number agreement, as in les gens, il instead of les gens, ils. The wrong gender is used, for example, in le jambe ‘the leg’, le raison ‘the reason’, une verre ‘a glas’, un femme ‘a woman’, or mon fille ‘my daughter’ instead of la jambe, la raison, un verre, une femme, and ma fille. Both deviations are characteristic of basilectal French and texts written by pupils. The lack of gender agreement in written contexts can be explained through homophony in the case of il/ils (cf. Ngamountsika 2006, 85s.; Nkoula-Moulongo 2016). Verb forms – The third-person singular is sometimes generalized, as in tu est [instead of tu es] un journaliste serieux [sic] ‘you are a serious journalist’. This tendency primarily occurs in the acquisition of French, as in c’est moi qui a [instead of ai] la parole ‘it is me who is allowed to speak’ or j’invitera [instead of j’inviterai] les gens ‘I will invite the people’. Irregular verb forms may be regularized, especially among speakers of basilectal French. The past participle of ouvrir ‘to open’, for example, is sometimes realized as ouvri instead of ouvert, thus following other verbs ending in -ir, such as sortir (cf. Loussakoumounou 2013, 220s.; Tsoumou 2019, 104). Subject and object pronouns – The subject pronoun is sometimes omitted in basilectal French. The direct object pronoun le can replace the indirect lui, as in je l’ai [instead of lui ai] dit ‘I have told him’ (cf. Ngamountsika 2006, 87; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 57). Relative pronouns – The relative pronoun que is often generalized for dont, à qui, and the pattern “preposition + lequel”: quelque chose que [instead of dont] tout le monde a besoin ‘something that everyone needs’, le garçon qu’on [instead of à qui on] a demandé ‘the boy we asked’, or le matelas que [instead of sur lequel] vous dormez ‘the mattress on which you are sleeping’. Interestingly, the opposite replacement occurs too, and may be explained as hypercorrection: leur pays dont ils [instead of qu’ils] disent aimer ‘their

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country which they claim to love’ (cf. Mfoutou 2007, s.v. dont; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 57; Loussakoumounou 2013, 223s.). Valency – Some transitive verbs may be used intransitively, as, for example fréquenter ‘to attend [school]’ instead of frequenter qqc. The pronoun se can be omitted or added, as in tailler ‘to clear off’ or s’accaparer de qqc. ‘to claim something’ instead of se tailler and accaparer qqc. (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, 51; Mfoutou 2007, 413). Prepositions – Prepositions may also deviate, as can be seen, for instance, in the replacement of à by pour, and of avec by à and chez: être pour [instead of à] qqn ‘to belong to s. o.’, confondre qnn à [instead of avec] qqn ‘to mistake s. o. for s. o. else’, or être chez [instead of avec] qqn ‘to be with s. o. [speaking of an object]’. Again, such usage also occurs in texts written by pupils (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v. chez/pour; Massoumou/ Queffélec 2007, 57 and s.v. confondre à; Nkoula-Moulongo 2016, 415, 418, 427). Adverbs – In standard French, beaucoup ‘much’ is combined with verbs and nouns linked by de. In Congolese French, it also occurs with adjectives and thus replaces très ‘very’: être beaucoup [instead of très] connu ‘to be very famous’, avoir beaucoup [instead of très] froid ‘to feel very cold’. This deviating use of beaucoup might be influenced by Bantu languages like Kikongo (Kik.), Kituba (Kit.), or Lingala (Lin.), where mà is used with nouns to mark a higher quantity, e.g., Lin. mà-fútà ‘much oil’, and with adjectives (in combination with mííngì < mà + íngì) to mark a higher intensity, e.g., Kit. mà-léémbe mííngì ‘very slow’, Lin. mà-lílì mííngì ‘very cold’ (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. beaucoup; 2009a, 54–67). Direct speech – In single cases, the author is mentioned directly after being quoted in press articles without using a linking verb (cf. Ngamountsika 2019, 67s.):  

 

 

 

“‘Les axes prioritaires du Fonds bleu consistent à supporter et promouvoir des projets le long du Fleuve Congo […]’, Jean-Yves Olivier [instead of a dit Jean-Yves Olivier]” (2019, 68).8

4.3 Lexicon Lexical innovation is very productive and often allows precious cultural insights. It is described in the following section along the axes of internal and external innovation (cf. Reutner 2017, 48–51). Internal innovation – Internal innovation is primarily realized through composition, derivation, blending, and abbreviation, as well as semantic restriction, extension, or shift. Composition – Composition through the combination of two nouns occurs, for example, in radio-trottoir ‘rumour’ (< radio ‘radio’ + trottoir ‘pavement’) or table-banc ‘ta-

8 ‘“The priority of the Fond bleu consists of the support and the promotion of projects along the Congo River”, [said] Jean-Yves Olivier’.

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ble-bench combination for pupils’ (< table ‘table’ + banc ‘bench’). Two adjectives are combined in tradi-moderne ‘mix of traditional and modern elements [speaking of music]’ (< traditionnel ‘traditional’ + moderne ‘modern’, cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v.; for more examples 2007, 414; 2012, 140–151). Composition through reduplication – A specific strategy of composition is the reduplication of the same element resulting in a new meaning, as in miam miam ‘meal, snack’ (< miam ‘(onomatopoetic) delicious’), terre-terre ‘collective rape’ (< terre ‘ground’), or toc-toc ‘moronic person’ (< toc ‘(onomatopoetic) dry sound’, cf. Mfoutou 2007, s.v.). This type of word formation might have been transferred to French from Bantu, where it is common (cf. Tsoumou 2021, 118, and examples such as kili-kili or mbokamboka below). Derivation: denominal – Derivations are based on both expressions used in hexagonal French and words previously borrowed from Bantu languages. Nouns from hexagonal French form the basis of other nouns in cases such as caméléonnerie ‘frequent change of opinion or political affiliation according to current circumstances’ (< caméléon ‘chameleon’ + ‑érie), pousse-pousseur ‘person transporting goods on a handcart’ (< pousse-pousse ‘handcart’ + -eur), rumeuriste ‘person passing on public rumours’ (< rumeur ‘rumour’ + ‑iste), or safraneur ‘owner of a Renault Safran car’ (< Safrane ‘car model by Renault’ + ‑eur). They are transformed into verbs through ‑(is)er in examples such as cabiner ‘to go to the toilet’ (< cabinet ‘toilet’) or scripter (un mot) ‘to search for the origin (of a word)’ (< script ‘script’), and are turned into adverbs with the suffix ‑ment, for instance, in (pleurer) crocodilement ‘(to cry) like a crocodile, (to cry) crocodile tears’ (< crocodile ‘crocodile’), promessoralement ‘(pej.) full of promises’ (< promesse ‘promise’), or véritement ‘in a truthful manner’ (< vérité ‘truth’). Special cases formed with erudite elements of Greek origin are guerrocratie ‘government based on war’ and guerrologie ‘science of war’ (< guerre ‘war’ + ‑cratie/‑logie). Examples of denominal derivation on the basis of previously borrowed Bantu expressions are mbébisme ‘anarchism’, mbébiste ‘anarchist’ and mbébalogique/mbébatoire ‘anarchic’ (< Fr. reg. mbéba ‘anarchy’ + ‑isme/ ‑iste/‑ogique/‑toire), as well as kili-kiliser ‘to cause trouble’ (< Fr. reg. kili-kili ‘mess, chaos’ + ‑ser), and songueur ‘slanderer (< Fr. reg. songui-songui ‘slander’ + ‑eur, cf. Queffélec/ Niangouna 1990, s.v.; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v.). Derivation: deverbal – Deverbal derivation into nouns occurs, for example, with the suffix ‑eur which is added to French and Bantu verbs, as in alphabétiseur ‘person teaching someone to read and write’ (< alphabétiser ‘to teach to read and write’) or boukouteur ‘person who diverts public funds for own profit’ (< Fr. reg. boukouter ‘to divert public funds for own profit’, cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v.). Derivation based on proper nouns – Derivation can also be based on proper nouns. The names of the politicians Bernard Kolélas, Pascal Lissouba, and Jacques Joachim Yhombi-Opango (cf. 2.2), of the founder of the Kimbanguism cult Simon Kimbangu (1889–1951), or the anti-colonial activist André Grenard Matsoua (1899–1942), who inspired the later Matsouanism cult, are combined with the suffixes ‑ien, ‑iste, ‑istique, or ‑isme in kolélasien ‘relating to Kolélas’, lissoubien ‘relating to Lissouba’, lissoubiste ‘sup-

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porter of President Lissouba’, yhombistique ‘method of Yhombi’, kimbanguisme ‘doctrine of Kimbangu’, and matsouanisme ‘doctrine of Matsoua’. Derivations from a geographical proper noun are congoliser ‘to Congolise’ (< Congo) and congolisation ‘Congolization’. The name of the Bembe ethnic group leads to the verb bêembéliser ‘to give a Beembe character so something’ and from there to surbêembéliser qqc. ‘to give an excessively Beembe character to something’ (< sur ‘over’ + bêémbe ‘Beembe’) and surbêémbélisation ‘action of giving an excessively Beembe character to something’ (cf. Mfoutou 2007, s.v.; 2012, 90s.). Blending – Two standard French expressions are blended, for example, in militueur ‘criminal militia member’ (< militaire ‘military’ + tueur ‘killer’). The blending of a Bantu borrowing and a standard French expression appears in dzikitature ‘power concentration’ (< Fr. reg. dzikita ‘string of pearls worn by women under their grass skirt to make their buttocks look larger’ + dictature ‘dictatorship’, cf. Mfoutou 2007, s.v.; 2012, 117). Abbreviation – Abbreviation occurs through initialisms and acronyms. Congolese initialisms are, for example, CBE ‘Evangelical Biblical Circle [society of young Congolese Protestants]’ (< Cercle Biblique Évangélique), CFCO ‘Congo-Ocean railway’ (< Chemin de fer Congo-Océan), or PCT ‘Congolese Party of Labour’ (< Parti Congolais du Travail). Acronyms are Colaphaco ‘collective of the Congolese associations of disabled people’ (< Collectif des associations des personnes handicapées du Congo), Minoco ‘Congolese flour mill [company]’ (< minoterie du Congo), or nibolek ‘(person from the) departments of Niari, Bouenza, and Lékoumou’ (< Niari, Bouenza, Lékoumou). Some of these abbreviations have generated derivations like cbéiste ‘member or supporter of the CBE’, nibolékien ‘related to the departments of Niari, Bouenza, or Lékoumou’, or p(é)c(é)tiste ‘related to the PCT, supporter of the PCT’ (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, 414–417; 2012, 151–178; 2013, 10 and s.v.). Semantic restriction and extension – Semantic change occurs in the form of semantic restriction, extension, and shift. Examples of restriction include cicatrices ‘light decorative incisions on the facial skin that allow identifying someone’s ethnic group’ instead of ‘scar’, légume ‘leaf vegetable’ instead of ‘vegetable’, or missionnaire ‘European missionary’ instead of ‘missionary’. Extension occurs, for example, in antilope ‘any hoofed animal with horns living in the bush’ instead of ‘antelope’ or (mon) enfant ‘(my) son/daughter/nephew/niece’ instead of ‘(my) child, (my own) son/daughter’ (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v.). Semantic shift – Examples of semantic shift include boire ‘not to know the answer to a question, not to understand something explained in school’ instead of ‘to drink’, brunir ‘to get brown [in the sense of a lighter skin colour]’ instead of ‘to tan, to get brown [in the sense of a darker skin colour]’, (deuxième) bureau ‘concubine, mistress of a married man’ instead of ‘(second) office’, cher ‘strict [speaking of a teacher or professor]’ instead of ‘expensive’, couiller ‘to have sexual relations with a woman’ instead of ‘to commit an error’, court-circuiter qqc. ‘to give an abrupt end to something’ instead of ‘to short-circuit something’, dribbler ‘to fool, to deceive’ instead of ‘to dribble [with a ball]’, fausser ‘to commit a mistake’ instead of ‘to fake’, Norvégien ‘person from the North of Congo-Braz-

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zaville’ instead of ‘Norwegian’, indexer ‘to point at’ instead of ‘to index’, main ‘arm’ instead of ‘hand’, manger ‘to profit’ instead of ‘to eat’, miner ‘to borrow [a piece of clothing] instead of ‘to mine’, patois ‘vernacular language [opposed to Kituba/Lingala]’ instead of ‘dialect [of French]’, payer ‘to buy’ instead of ‘to pay’, or vampire ‘agent of the national electric company responsible for cutting electricity in the households of defaulting debtors’ instead of ‘vampire’. Semantic shift also frequently occurs in the case of adverbs, as in trop ‘much, a lot’ instead of ‘too much’ and ‘very’ instead of ‘too’, which, however, is also attested in hexagonal varieties: danser trop [instead of beaucoup] ‘to dance a lot’ or être trop [instead of très] intelligent ‘to be very intelligent’ (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v.; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v.; 2010a/b, s.v.). Semantic shift: special cases – The adverbial en tout cas can be used in the sense of ‘really’ instead of ‘in any case’, as can be seen, for example, in En tout cas, mon cher, il y avait du monde ‘Really, my dear, there were a lot of people’ (Mfoutou 2015, 44). It also appears as an independent phrase to express affirmation, as in Nous avons bien mange. – En tout cas! ‘We have eaten well. – I agree!’. Meaning shift from a neutral to a positive or negative statement occurs in the idiomatic pattern “avoir + un(e)/le/la + body parts that do not exist in pairs”. The version with the indefinite article has a positive value, the version with the definitive article a negative one. So, avoir une tête ‘to be intelligent’ and avoir une bouche ‘to have a beautiful mouth’ instead of ‘to have a head/a mouth’ contrast with avoir la tête ‘to have an aching head, to be crazy’ and avoir la bouche ‘to be impolite, to speak aggressively’ instead of ‘to have the head/the mouth’ (cf. Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2009a, 39–49; 2015, 44). External innovation – External innovation includes loanwords and loan translations from Bantu and, less frequently, from English. Loanwords – Most expressions imported to French as loanwords come from Bantu. They mainly comprise nouns designating, for example, plants, animals, food, objects, places, people, religion, and concepts. Loans referring to plants are gombo ‘Abelmoschus esculentus, Okra’, kambala ‘Chlorophora excelsa, African teak’, koko and mfumbu ‘Gnetum africanum, African joint-fir liana’. Borrowings for animals are ndama ‘Bos taurus longifrons, West African humpless longhorn cattle’ and nkami ‘Dorylus nigricans, red army ant’. A remarkable semantic change in this field appears in Kongo ya sika ‘Heterotis niloticus, African arowana [sweet water fish]’ (< Lin. ‘(lit.) the new Kongo’). Some of these terms are equally relevant in the area of food, which also comprises loans such as foufou ‘manioc flour’, mungwélé ‘cooked manioc wrapped in a leaf’, or nzenga ‘piece of manioc sold in the streets’. The domain of objects and places is represented with the musical instruments lokolé ‘percussion instrument’ and nsambi ‘plucked string instrument’. Semantic changes in this field occur in foula-foula ‘small bus for (sub)urban public transport’ (< Kik. ‘(lit.) to blow one’s nose fast’), tanawa ‘armchair with a device to lay down the feet’ (< Laari tà nà wá ‘(lit.) speak, I listen to you’), and nganda ‘place to eat and drink, dating place’ (< Bantu ‘(lit.) fishermen’s/hunter’s camp’). Borrowings referring to people are ngaya ‘person wearing clothes that do not match well/that are old-fashioned’ and niangalakata ‘(pej.) stupid/useless person’, as well as designations for family members

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such as bokilo ‘member of the spouse’s family’, mbanda ‘spouse of the brother-/sister-inlaw’, and the title of respect ya/yaya ‘(lit.) elder’. Significant semantic changes in this area appear in koro-koro ‘member of a militia active in organized crime’ (< Lin. ‘(lit.) well-trained army soldier’), nguembo ‘person trying to attend events without paying’ (< Lin./Kit./Beembe ‘(lit.) bat’), or moundzoula (Sg.)/mindzoulas (Pl.) ‘grave robber’ (< Kik. mound-/mind- ‘human being’ + -dzula ‘exhuming’). A particularly noteworthy case in this field is Londonienne ‘young prostitute mainly working for white clients’, which is a suffixation of the Lingala verb londo ‘to dance in a circle’ but remotivated as ‘woman from London’. Borrowed religious vocabulary comprises dibundu ‘Catholic parish’, kilombo ‘group of Protestants characterized by high solidarity’, mabonza ‘voluntary or forced donation for a church or a militia’, or mbongui ‘place for religious, cultural, or educative gatherings’. Loans in the domain of concepts are, for example, kili-kili ‘chaos, mess’, ngouakou ngouakou ‘quarrel’, and madéso ya bana ‘bribe money’. Significant meaning changes in this field occur in mbéba ‘anarchy’ (< Lin. ‘(lit.) default, vice’), mboka-mboka ‘dilettantism, amateurishness’ (< Lin. mboka ‘(lit.) village’), songui-songui ‘slander’ (< Lin. songi ‘(lit.) to choose’). Verbal borrowing occurs, for example, in boukouter ‘to divert public funds for own profit’ (< Kik. kù-bùkutà ‘to chew’ + ‑er), adverbial borrowing in miké-miké ‘step by step, little by little’ (< Lin. ‘(lit.) thin, narrow, small’). Adjectives based on Bantu roots are inouable ‘incomprehensible’ (in- + Kik. wa ‘to hear, to understand’ + ‑able) and youkoutable ‘satiating, fulfilling’ (< Kik. ‑yukut‑ ‘satiating’ + ‑able). Loans from English include the nouns land ‘zone, territory’, planting ‘planting’, mamy wata ‘mermaid’ (< mummy water ‘mother water’), and taximan (Sg.)/taximen (Pl.) ‘taxi driver’, as well as the verb dayer ‘to die’ (< to die, cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v.; Massoumou/ Queffélec 2007, s.v.; Mfoutou 2007, s.v. and 417ss.; 2012, 112–136, 178–195). Loan translation – Examples of loan translations are the proverb Dieu ne dort pas ‘God does not sleep [referring to remorseless divine justice]’ (< Lin. nzàmbé à lààlàkà té/Kit. nzámbi ké làalàa vé) and the idioms faire la bouche ‘to be impolite, (lit.) to make the mouth’ (< Lin. kosala inwa/Kit. kosala monoko), avoir un œil/une oreille ‘to have a malfunctioning or aching eye/ear’, and avoir des yeux/des oreilles ‘to have big eyes/ears, to have good eyes/ears, to have a good sight/hearing’. The idiomatic pattern “avoir + un (e)/des + body part(s) that exist in pairs” is typical in Bantu, where the idiom using the singular is marked pejoratively and the plural variant laudatorily: Kit. ngé ké nà dì-ínù ‘you have an aching tooth’, ngé ké nà mà-énò ‘you have beautiful/solid teeth’, Lin. tátà à zâ ná lì-tójì ‘father has an aching ear’, tátà à zâ nà mà-tójì ‘father has good ears’ (cf. Mfoutou 2009a, 32–39; 2012, 137s.).

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5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic attitudes Criticism of the basilectal variety – The basilectal variety is clearly rejected. Its speakers may be perceived as ‘second class citizens’ (“citoyens de seconde zone”, Massoumou/ Queffélec 2007, 23), teachers may criticize it in schools, and its designation as français mboka-mboka is obviously pejorative: ‘The qualifier “mboka mboka” […] refers negatively to the village, to the lack of refinement, to tradition, in opposition to the city and to modernity. The mboka (village) is a rudimentary space without savoir vivre’.9

Purism – French speakers in Congo-Brazzaville are aware that their French differs from the variety used in France. The high prestige of, particularly, standard French and the negative evaluation of any kind of deviation is visible in a section of the newspaper La Semaine africaine titled Ne dites pas, mais dites ‘(lit.) don’t say but say’. This type of lists has a long tradition in French-speaking regions. The newspaper section in Congo-Brazzaville informs readers about the correct use, for example, of partitives, prepositions, the subjunctive mode, or adverbs, and reminds them of precise pronunciation (cf. Ngamountsika 2006, 82; 2013, 196; Mfoutou 2007, 485s.; Reutner 2017, 52). Confindent usage – The use of lexical Congolisms in different domains is rarely subject to criticism and is rather a sign of cultural and linguistic emancipation and self-confidence, especially in literature (cf. Elongo 2013, 105).

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Pronunciation and morphosyntax – The project Phonology of Contemporary French (Phonologie du français contemporain – PFC) does not include Congo-Brazzaville, but phonetical and morphosyntactic features of Congolese French can be found, for example, in Massoumou/Queffélec (2007), Mfoutou (2007), and Ngamountsika (2019). Lexicon: regional dictionaries – Congolese French is represented in the Panfrancophone Lexicographical Database (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone – BDLP) with 850 entries based on the dictionary of Massoumou/Queffélec (2007). Other general inventories of the country’s vocabulary are Queffélec/Niangouna (1990) and Mfoutou (2000; 2007). Specialized dictionaries assemble abbreviations (Mfoutou 2013) and the lexicon of nutrition (2009b), sorcery (2009c), sexuality (2010a), or school (2010b).

9 “Le qualificatif ‘mboka mboka’ […] renvoie négativement au village, au manque de raffinement, à la tradition, par opposition à la ville et à la modernité. Le mboka (village) est une espace rudimentaire où le savoir vivre fait défaut” (Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 55).

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Lexicon: global dictionaries – The Petit Robert marks seven entries as typical of Congo-Brazzaville. This makes sense for the meaning shift in visiter qqn ‘to visit someone’ (equally marked as Alsatian, Canadian, and Luxembourgish) and the borrowing taximan ‘taxi driver’ (equally marked as eastern French, Belgian, Maghrebin, and Malagasy), which are both also attested in the dictionaries mentioned above (e.g., Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, s.v.). In contrast, the ancient or regional meaning of déjeuner ‘breakfast’, dîner [substantive/verb] ‘(to have) lunch’, and souper [substantive/verb] ‘(to have) supper’ might be wrongly attributed to Congo-Brazzaville. They are equally marked for northern France, Belgium, Canada, Switzerland, Burundi, and Rwanda but not for Congo-Kinshasa. Yet, an attribution to the former Belgian colony seems more plausible, as the terms are also marked for the other former Belgian colonies Burundi and Rwanda in the Petit Robert and not marked for Congo-Brazzaville in any of the dictionaries of this country. In sum, the country is only weakly represented in the Petit Robert, and apart from two entries, probably even erroneously (cf. PR, s.v.).

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used in the public sphere – The French of higher-ranked politicians, judges, and prosecutors as members of the social elite is close to standard French but may display lexical Congolisms. They are included in official documents, which indicates their natural and unquestioned use. The terms table-banc and tradi-moderne, for example, appear in statistical reports. In orality, even basilectal French may occur in local administration as employees sometimes have quite low proficiency in French. The French used in Christian contexts is enriched with borrowings from Bantu. Lexical Congolisms from this domain are, for example, dibundu, kilombo, or mabonza. Bantu languages are sometimes combined with French in advertising to better win clients. This reaches from single expressions to longer passages, such as Lin. Masolo ‘talk, conversation’ or Masolo ya mopao ‘mega conversation, (lit.) talk of the boss’ in réseau téléphonique masolo à gogo ‘telephone network that allows you to talk as long as you want’ and Masolo ya mopao (5000) F = 300mn ou 10 jours ‘mega conversation for 5000 francs = 300 minutes or ten days’ (cf. Massoumou 2001, 75; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007, 39s., 58s., and s.v.; Mfoutou 2012, 50s., 64–79; INS 2020a, 11s.; 2020b, 27, 103). Variety used in education – The recruitment of teaching staff is mostly not linked to adequate training, so many teachers did not attend university and do not necessarily follow all rules of standard French. Congolisms from the domain of school include both technical terms, for example, alphabétiseur, and general school vocabulary such as boire, cher, fausser (un mot), or inouable (cf. Queffélec/Niangouna 1990, s.v.; Mbemba 2006, 7; Mfoutou 2010b, s.v.; cf. 4.3). Variety used in the media: newspapers – As newspapers make abundant use of lexical Congolisms, the dictionaries by Queffélec/Niangouna (1990), Massoumou/Queffélec (2007), and Mfoutou (2007) can illustrate most of their entries with media examples. The

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following quotes extracted from Mfoutou (2007) show some of the words explained in 4.3 as they appear in the newspapers La Semaine africaine, L’Observateur, and the satirical magazines Epanza Makita, La Corne enchantée, Le Choc, and La Rumeur, which was later renamed La Rue meurt: compositions (i), derivations (ii–v), blendings (vi), semantic shift (vii–xi), abbreviations (xii), borrowings (xiii–xvi, also mbéba in iv), and loan translations (xvii) from Congolese languages and, less frequently, from English (xviii–xix). “Je vous fais un don de tables-bancs!” (in La Rue meurt, February 1997, cf. 2007, s.v. tablebanc).10 (ii) “Pour cela, toutes ces caméléonneries sont possibles” (in La Rue meurt, February 1996, cf. 2007, s.v. caméléonnerie).11 (iii) “[O]n serait tenté de croire que le bon Dieu déserte l’Église chaque fois qu’il voit Sir Jordonne venir s’y agenouiller pour pleurer […] crocodilement” (in La Rue meurt, September 1997, cf. 2007, s.v. crocodilement (pleurer)).12 (iv) “Plus de guerrocratie! Plus de mbéba! De génocide!” (in La Rue meurt, February 1998, cf. 2007, s.v. guerrocratie).13 (v) “Si on pille, on vole, on viole et on kili-kilise?” (in La Rue meurt, April 1998, cf. 2007, s.v. kili-kiliser).14 (vi) “[…] la bataille contre la Dzikitature de Pascal Lissouba” (in La Rue meurt, September 2001, cf. 2007, s.v. dzikitature).15 (vii) “Nos deux bandits ont trempé leurs mains dans la merde jusqu’aux coudes” (in La Rue meurt, September 1997, cf. 2007, s.v. main).16 (viii) “[L]es fameux mili-tueurs ont abandonné la landrover sur place” (in La Rue meurt, February 1996, cf. 2007, s.v. mili-tueur).17 (ix) “[À] Owando on n’a pas parlé lari aux barricades, ni mbochi […], ni aucun patois” (in La Rumeur, March 1992, cf. 2007, s.v. patois).18 (x) “J’ai découvert deux intellos […] en train de se casser les méninges pour scripter le mot Bouenza, décidés de lui donner une étymologie française” (in La Rue meurt, March 1997, cf. 2007, s.v. scripter).19 (xi) “[S]inon, gare aux pinces des vampires sur les poteaux!” (in La Semaine africaine, July 2004, cf. 2007, s.v. vampire).20 (i)

10 ‘I donate table-benches to you’. 11 ‘Therefore, all types of chameleon-like change are possible’. 12 ‘One would be tempted to believe that the good Lord leaves the Church each time he sees Sir Jordonne kneeling down to cry like a crocodile’. 13 ‘No more warocracy! no more anarchy! no more genocide!’. 14 ‘If people pillage, steal, rape, and cause trouble?’. 15 ‘[…] the battle against the power concentration of Pascal Lissouba’. 16 ‘Our two bandits have soaked their hands up to the elbows in shit’. 17 ‘The famous criminal militia members have left the Landrover on site’. 18 ‘[I]n Owando, neither Laari was spoken on the barricades, nor Mbochi, nor any vernacular language’. 19 ‘I discovered two intellectuals racking their brains to search for the origin of Bouenza, determined to give it a French etymology’. 20 ‘Otherwise, watch out for the claws of the vampires on the poles’.

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(xii) (xiii) (xiv) (xv)

(xvi) (xvii) (xviii) (xix)

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“Les vocables des Tcheks, Niboleks, Norvégien sont interdits dans le souci de préserver l’unité nationale” (in La Rue meurt, February 1998, cf. 2007, s.v. nibolek).21 “En 1980, il entra au Tiers-Ordre franciscain, [et] anima le dibundu Saint Augustin” (in La Semaine africaine, December 1988, cf. 2007, s.v. dibundu).22 “[…] les korokoro pilleurs et violeurs” (in L’Observateur, June 2002, cf. 2007, s.v. korokoro).23 “[C]eux qui sont à la tête du pays doivent bannir le tribalisme et le régionalisme en même temps que le style ‘mboka-mboka’” (in Epanza Makita, August 2006, cf. 2007, s.v. mboka-mboka).24 “[L]es salaires se paient toujours miké-miké” (in La Corne enchantée, October 1995, cf. 2007, s.v. miké-miké).25 “Que le Dieu des dieux m’accueille. Amen. Dieu ne dort pas” (in Le Choc, March 1991, cf. 2007, s.v. Dieu ne dort pas).26 “Les employés de cette boîte […] conjugant le verbe dayer au pluriel” (in La Rue meurt, March 1997, cf. 2007, s.v. dayer).27 “[D]es guérisseurs proposent […] une tête de caïman pour honorer mamy water, la reine des sirènes” (in La Corne enchantée, January 1996, cf. 2007, s.v. mamy wata).28

Variety used in the media: social networks – Lexical Congolisms also appear in social networks such as Twitter or Facebook. Here particularly, code-switching is not restricted to French and Bantu languages but also includes English. The following examples display the use of the third-person singular verb form with tu (i) and a lack of diacritics in serieux, betise, etait (i–ii) as well as the English elements please, thank you my brother, God bless you and your family (i), we […] shall overcome […] (ii), and cowards (iii, cf. Tsoumou 2019 for more examples). (i)

“Please Brazza News , tu est un journaliste serieux , reste toujour proffessionnel , ne tombe pas dans la betise mon frere , ne gache pas tout , il en va de ta credibilite . sassou va partir mais ta credibilite doit rester. Thank you my brother. God bless you and your family” [sic] (2019, 104).29

21 ‘The words of the Tcheks [people coming from the region of Pool], the Nibolek [people coming from the regions of Niari, Bouenza, or Lékoumou], and the Norwegians [people from the North of the country] are forbidden in order to preserve national unity’. 22 ‘In 1980, he entered the Third Order of Saint Francis [and] led the Catholic parish of Saint Augustin’. 23 ‘[…] the pillaging and raping militia’. 24 ‘Those who lead the country must ban tribalism and regionalism along with the dilettantish style’. 25 ‘The salaries are still paid little by little’. 26 ‘May the God of gods receive me. Amen. God does not sleep’. 27 ‘The employees of this business conjugate the verb dayer in the plural’. 28 ‘Healers propose a caiman head to honour mummy water, the queen of the sirens.’ 29 ‘[Please] Brazza News, you are a serious journalist, always stay professional, don’t get stupid, my brother, don’t ruin everything, for the sake of your credibility. Sassou will leave, but your credibility has to stay. Thank you, my brother. God bless you and your family’.

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(ii) “Qui a dit a monsieur 8 % qu’il etait detenteur du permis d’occuper du Congo? […] We, the.people of Congo shall overcome the Nguesso1er dictatorship once for all! Vive le Congo Libre, Fier et Debout!” [sic] (2019, 108).30 (iii) “C’est tous cowards lol” (2019, 109).31  

Variety used in literature – Some literary works use hexagonal French and show regional characteristics mainly in proper nouns: the fable collection Guirlandes fanées ‘Fading garlands’ (2005, posthumous) by Patrice Joseph Lhoni (1929–1976), the poems in L’âme bleue ‘The blue soul’ (1971) by Jean-Pierre Makouta-Mboukou (1929–2012), or the theatre play La marmite de Koka-Mbala ‘The pot of Koka-Mbala’ (1966) by Guy Menga (*1935), for instance. Other works adapt French to the Congolese environment. This tradition goes back to Jean Malonga (1907–1985), one of the first Congolese authors to publish French works, as, for example, La légende de M’Pfoumou Ma Mazono ‘The legend of M’Pfoumou Ma Mazono’ (1973). It was continued by Sylvain Bemba (1934–1995) in his theatre play Un foutu monde pour un blanchisseur trop honnête ‘A damned world for an overly honest laundry worker’ (1979), Guy Menga in his poetry Cri bilingue ‘bilingual cry’ (2005), Henri Lopes (*1937) in his novels Le pleurer-rire ‘The crying-laughing’ (1982) and Le chercheur d’Afriques ‘The seeker of Africas’ (1990), Sony Labou Tansi (1947–1995) in his novel Les sept solitudes de Lorsa Lopez ‘The seven solitudes of Lorsa Lopez’ (1985), Jean-Alexis Mfoutou (*1960) in his novel Mon rêve du père ‘My dream of the father’ (2021b), Gabriel Okoundji (*1962) in his collection of poems Second poème ‘Second poem’ (1998), or the winner of the Grand prix littéraire d’Afrique noire, Alain Mabanckou (*1966), in his novel Bleu-Blanc-Rouge ‘Blue-WhiteRed’ (1998), as well as other works of these and further authors (cf. Thomas 1998, 462; Mfoutou 2012, 47; Bery 2013; Niossobantou 2013, 74; Pandi 2013, 51). Non-lexical Congolisms – Authors may use phonological and morphosyntactic features of basilectal French to portray a speaker’s social origin and low level of formal education. This does not necessarily ridicule them but can also be seen as an attempt to give higher visibility to marginalized groups and their language (cf. Ngamountsika 2006, 84; Elongo 2013, 96–105; Reutner 2017, 56s.; 2023, 252–255). Bemba (1979, 12, 29, 41), for example, illustrates the denasalization of vowels, the realization of /y/ as [i], and the omission of /ʁ/ in the spellings gouvernema ‘government’, jige ‘judge’, (je) requile ‘I move back’, and (ils) billent ‘they shine’ instead of gouvernement, juge, (je) recule, and (ils) brillent. He also includes deviations in gender (i–ii) and number (ii) as well as the use of partitives (ii) and participles (iii). (i)

“[Q]uel beau [instead of quelle belle] femme” (Bemba 1979, 25).32

30 ‘Who said to Mr. 8 % he had the right to occupy the Congo? We, the people of Congo shall overcome the Nguesso dictatorship once for all! Long live the free, proud, and upright Congo!’. 31 ‘They are all cowards, lol’. 32 ‘[W]hat a beautiful woman’.  

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(ii) “Les femmes il demande [instead of elles demandent] beaucoup l’argent [instead of d’argent]” (1979, 31).33 (iii) “Quand j’ai ouvri [instead of ouvert] les yeux […]” (1979, 11).34

Lexical Congolisms with mediation – Many authors use lexical Congolisms or even longer Bantu passages. Most of them translate or explain these elements in footnotes or directly in the text, which enables readers unfamiliar with Congolese French and/or the respective Bantu language to better grasp the content. Footnotes are used, for example, to clarify Bantu expressions like mandzakala ‘eighth day of the Laari week’, toko! ‘let’s go!’ (Malonga 1973, 11, 34, cf. Pandi 2013, 54–57), nguembo (Lopes 1990, 48), or ngongi ‘twin bells without clapper’ (Menga 2005, 9), or to translate a Koongo song (Tansi 1985, 27). Yet, not all Congolisms are made transparent in footnotes. Some authors leave internal and external innovations uncommented, as, for example, ya (Malonga 1973, 13), matsouanistes, or kimbanguistes (Tansi 1985, 124). Explanations in the text are used, for example, for nguembo (i) and foula-foula (ii) at their first appearance in Mfoutou (2021b) and for miner in Mabanckou (1998, 66). “Inutile de vous dire que les nguembos – ces personnes curieuses à l’affût de tout spectacle qu’elles pouvaient voir sans bourse délier – étaient venus nombreux” (2021b, 7).35 (ii) “Une des occupations caractéristiques des groupes consistait en l’organisation des voyages et des déplacements collectifs réalisés le plus souvent en foula-foula, ces petits cars ou minibus qui assuraient le transport en commun en zone urbaine et suburbaine” (2021b, 11).36 (i)

Lexical Congolisms without mediation – Some authors do not explain Congolese features, so the text may appear alien to some readers. In Lopes, for example, internal innovations such as radio-trottoir and Bantu elements like the interjection éhé ‘expression of pride’ remain uncommented (cf. 1982, 14, 36). The same applies to passages that alternate between French and Lingala in Okoundji (1998): “Qui est-elle? / Je dis qui est-elle? / oya boya, bana Mpana, léya ka mono! / Okondo ngoho ooooo! / ngoho ooooo! / silence de mâles / silence de fêmelles” (Okoundji 1998, 24).37

33 ‘The women, they ask for a lot of money’. 34 ‘When I opened my eyes […]’. 35 ‘Useless to tell you that the nguembos –these curious people on the hunt for every event they can see without untying their purse– had come in large quantities’. 36 ‘One of the characteristic occupations of these groups consisted in the organization of journeys and group trips mostly taken in foula-foula, those small buses or minibuses that provide public transport in the urban and suburban zone’. 37 ‘Who is she? / I say who is she? / Come [Sg.] come [Pl.], children of Mpana, come and see / you have lost weight, congratulations! / congratulations! / silence of the men / silence of the women’.

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Conclusion – In the last decades, Congolese authors have increasingly included Congolisms in literature, especially on the lexical level. They do not always feel the need to make them understandable for a non-Congolese audience, which indicates a relaxed, natural, and self-confident attitude vis-à-vis their variety of French.

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Niossobantou, Dominique (2013), Les niveaux de langue dans le théâtre congolais, in: Anatole Mbanga (ed.), Regards sur la langue française au Congo, Paris, L’Harmattan, 71–78. Nkoula-Moulongo, Solange (2016), La cohérence discursive dans les productions écrites des apprenants du secondaire en République du Congo: anaphores et connecteurs, Paris, Université Sorbonne-Paris-Cité, Doctoral Thesis. OIF (2014), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Nathan/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2019), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Okoundji, Gabriel (1998), Second poème, Paris, L’Harmattan. Pandi, Joseph (2013), La légende de M’Pfoumou Ma Mazono de Jean Malonga, un récit en français ou en “français congolais”?, in: Anatole Mbanga (ed.), Regards sur la langue française au Congo, Paris, L’Harmattan, 51–68. PR = Alain Rey/Josette Rey-Debove (edd.) (2022 [1967]), Le Petit Robert. Dictionnaire alphabétique et analogique de la langue française, Paris, Le Robert. Queffélec, Ambroise Jean-Marc/Niangouna, Augustin (1990), Le français au Congo (R.P.C.), Aix-en-Provence, Université de Provence. Reutner, Ursula (2005), Sprache und Identität einer postkolonialen Gesellschaft im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Eine Studie zu den französischen Antillen Guadeloupe und Martinique, Hamburg, Buske. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Reutner, Ursula (2023), Variation régionale et norme endogène dans la littérature africaine francophone, in: Gaston Kengue/Bruno Maurer (edd.), L’expansion de la norme endogène du français en Afrique francophone. Explorations sociolinguistiques, socio-didactiques et médiatiques, Paris/Philadelphia/ Cambridge, Archives, 249–265. Rossillon, Philippe (1995), Atlas de la langue française, Paris, Bordas. Samarin, William (2013), Sango, in: Susanne Michaelis et al. (edd.), Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online, Leipzig, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, https://apics-online.info/ contributions/59 (2/3/2023). Scannell, Kevin (2022), Indigenous Tweets: Lingála, http://indigenoustweets.com/ln/ (2/3/2023). Schachter Morgenthau, Ruth/Creevey Behrman, Lucy (1984), French-speaking tropical Africa, in: Michael Crowder (ed.), The Cambridge History of Africa, vol. 8, Cambridge et al., Cambridge University Press, 611–673. Tansi, Sony Labou (1985), Les sept solitudes de Lorsa Lopez, Paris, Seuil. Thomas, Dominic (1998), Sony Labou Tansi (1947–1995), in: Pushpa Naidu Parekh/Siga Fatima Jagne (edd.), Postcolonial African Writers, Westport, Greenwood, 460–465. Thornton, John K. (2020), A History of West Central Africa to 1850, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Tsoumou, Jean Mathieu (2019), English as an International Language: English/French Language Alternation in Politically Motivated CMC in Congo-Brazzaville, Journal of English as an International Language 14/2, 94–117. Tsoumou, Jean Mathieu (2021), Shaping sociolinguistic practices in Congo-Brazzaville, in: Pilar Morales Herrera/ Pilar Peinado Expósito/Yoana Ponsoda Alcázar (edd.), Estudios lingüísticos de jóvenes investigadores, Cuenca, Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, 115–128. WB (2023), Congo, Rep., Washington, World Bank, https://data.worldbank.org/country/CG (2/3/2023). Wikipedia (2023a), Wikipedia. Búku ya ndimbola, San Francisco, Wikimedia Foundation, https://ln.wikipedia. org/wiki/Lok%C3 %A1s%C3 %A1_ya_libos%C3 %B3 (2/3/2023). Wikipedia (2023b), Wikipedia. Luzâbu ya kimpwanza, San Francisco, Wikimedia Foundation, https://kg. wikipedia.org/wiki/Muk%C3 %A2nda_ya_ngudi (2/3/2023).  

 

 

 

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24 Congo-Kinshasa Abstract: This chapter highlights three aspects that give the direction of our reflection on the Democratic Republic of the Congo: It presents the country as a geographical and human framework, the multilingual context that determines the linguistic environment of the relationship between French and the local languages, and the French language itself. It describes the state and nature of this language that bears the marks of its contacts with other languages, the result of which is the sum of varieties that may be simple correctable deviations or an autonomous variety specific to this Congolese space. Keywords: French, Democratic Republic of the Congo, sociolinguistics, multilingualism, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation Covering 2,345,000 km2, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is the second largest country in Africa after Algeria. The immense territory is bordered to the west by the Angolan enclave of Cabinda (Portuguese-speaking) and the Republic of Congo (Frenchspeaking), to the north by the Central African Republic (French-speaking) and South Sudan (English- and Arabic-speaking), to the east by Uganda (English-speaking), Rwanda (French- and English-speaking), Burundi (French-speaking), and Tanzania (Englishspeaking), and to the south by Zambia (English-speaking) and Angola (Portuguese-speaking). With a population of almost 100 million inhabitants, the country stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Eastern Plateau and covers most of the Congo River basin. African languages – With its around 250 languages, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is characterized by the diversity and multiplicity of its linguistic landscapes. These can be grouped in three types: vernacular, vehicular languages, and national languages. Vernacular languages are the most numerous and serve as a means of communication and identification between members of the same ethnic group or tribe. They generally belong to peoples who occupy smaller territorial spaces (chieftainship, sector, and commune). Vehicular languages can be medium-spread and then be spoken by fairly large populations sharing geographical borders with more than two other ethnic groups, or widely-spread and then extend beyond the provincial borders for interethnic contact extending. The four constitutionally recognized national languages are Swahili, Lingala, Kikongo, and Tshiluba (Luba-Lulua). They divide the country into four linguistic regions: the Swahili-speaking region in the East (Katanga, Maniema, North- and South-Kivu, and the Oriental Province), the Kikongo-speaking region in the Centre (Bandundu and BasCongo), the Tshiluba-speaking region in the South (Kasai-Oriental and Occidental), and the Lingala-speaking region in the West (Equateur, Kinshasa, North-West of the prohttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-024

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vince Oriental; cf. Kilanga Musinde 2011, 55; Makomo-Makita 2013; zi Kabwiku 1985). Lingala has about 40 million speakers (20 million L1, 20 million L2) and is followed by Kikongo with 12,4 million (11,6 million L1, 800,000 L2), Swahili with 11,1 million (2 million L1, 9,1 million L2), and Tshiluba with 7 million (6,3 million L1, 700,000 L2, cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). French – In 2022, 51 % of Congolese were able to write and speak French (cf. OIF 2022, 33). For Congolese linguists faced with this mosaic of languages, it was time to establish a common language that would play the role of language of Congolese culture. Due to the absence of a single national language, the French language, although foreign, assumes a unifying function in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Although it does not assume all the communicative functions, it shares the various sectors of activity with the Congolese languages. In light of the above, there are three types of relationships between the different languages: relations of dominance between French and the national languages and between the latter and ethnic languages, relations of competition, marked by linguistic crossbreeding, and relations of complementarity, characterized by functional differentiation and assignment to different fields. From a constitutional point of view, French remains in the Democratic Republic of the Congo the only official language, the language of education, and the language of administration.  

2 Linguistic history The borders presented were recognized at the Berlin conference in 1885. In the course of its history, the country had contact with Portugal in the fifteenth century, which could have made it a Portuguese-speaking country. It could have also been an English-speaking country if Henry Morton Stanley (1840–1904), who discovered the mouth of the Congo at the time, had been there on behalf of England. But he was there on behalf of King Leopold II, King of the Belgians. It was through this means that the Democratic Republic of the Congo came into contact with the French language, which was to become its official language, whereas Flemish was unable to acquire this status (Kilanga Musinde 2011, 14). Kongo Kingdom – When the Independent State of Congo (État indépendant du Congo – EIC) was installed, several kingdoms and empires existed in the geographical space currently known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (République démocratique du Congo – RDC), such as the Kongo Kingdom as well as the Kuba, Lunda, and Luba Empires. While it is true that the kingdom and some of the empires brought together populations speaking varieties of a single language, if not a single language, others extended into spaces occupied by populations of different languages (Lunda, Tshiluba). Apparently, there were no major problems in the first category where there was intercomprehension between the populations speaking varieties of the same language. As for the kingdoms and empires whose boundaries covered several languages different from each other, it can be assumed that their population used forms of language that were

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comprehensible to each other. However, whether the kingdoms and empires were monolingual or plurilingual, it is obvious that in each royal court, there was a form of language that was specific to the court and taught to all persons working at or for the court (armies, corporations). Given that history textbooks are, in most cases, silent on the language problem, it is almost impossible to reconstruct the language policy of the entities that occupied the space of the Democratic Republic of the Congo before the establishment of the Independent State of Congo. Portugal, for example, maintained internal relations with the Kingdom of Kongo, with which it even exchanged ambassadors, but it is not said in what language the authorities of the Kongo Kingdom wrote to the Portuguese government, nor are the difficulties the Portuguese had in addressing the authorities of the Kongo Kingdom specified (cf. Kilanga Musinde 2011, 17s.). Congo Free State (1885–1908) – The problem of the use of Congolese languages in education and socio-cultural life arose from the early years of the Belgian occupation. Indeed, without evading it, the Belgian colonizers confronted it and found solutions in line with their options by adapting to the circumstances of each period. Confronted with the linguistic complexity of the Independent State of Congo, the Belgians multiplied decisions and legal acts in this matter. Here are a few of them: the Circular of 6 August 1887 prescribing the use of French in service relations with the natives and soldiers, the Circular 41 of 1 July 1895 reminding the state officials of the need to train vocabularies of the various indigenous dialects, the Circular 62 of 6 August 1895 laying down the rules to be followed for the spelling of the geographical names of the Congo, or the convention between the Holy See and the Independent State of Congo signed on 26 May 1906. While promoting the teaching of the Belgian national languages (Flemish and French), this convention also encouraged the study of the Congolese languages. The Decree of 4 May 1902 created agricultural and professional school colonies in Boma, Moanda, and New Antwerp (Nouvelle Anvers, today named Makanza). Two years after the creation of the Independent State of Congo, in 1887, French was adopted as the official language, the language of administration and justice, with evangelization being carried out in local languages. The use of French in education only came into play in 1902 with the creation of school colonies for orphans and abandoned children of various origins (cf. Kilanga Musinde 2011, 18). Belgian Congo (1908–1960) – In 1908, the Independent State of Congo gave way to the Belgian colony. The Belgian linguistic quarrel between the two communities did not spare the colony. Indeed, the Colonial Charter (or law of the Government of the Belgian Congo) promulgated on 18 October 1908 makes no explicit statements regarding the Congolese languages. However, it recognizes the equality between the two national and official Belgian languages (French and Flemish). All decrees and regulations of a general nature were to be drafted and published in French and Flemish. In 1910, after a meeting in Stanleyville (today named Kisangani) and Kisantu, the missionaries took the decision and initiative to introduce vernacular languages in primary schools. However, aware of the multiplicity of local languages, they first tried to gradually unify these languages around a few languages of larger expansion and then to develop them by codifying

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them. This is how languages with a national vocation have developed and asserted themselves. The Circular 68 of 24 May 1912 reminded the officials of the colony of the need to know the indigenous languages, which shows the concern of the Belgians to adapt to the realities of the country. The work of the Colonial Congress of 1920 and the Franck Commission of 1922 accentuated the teaching in vernacular languages. The law of 28 June 1935 regulates the use of languages in administrative matters. As of this year, French becomes the official language of the administration. On 23 March 1951, another circular from the Ministry of Colonies regulates again the use of languages in the Congo. A few years before independence, the Belgian Government publishes a royal decree creating the African Linguistic Commission. This commission intensifies linguistic research in the Belgian Congo and encouraged the opening of a department of African philology at the Lovanium University (today’s University of Kinshasa; cf. Kilanga Musinde 2011s.). Postcolonial period – The country acquired its independence in 1960 under the Name Republic of the Congo (Republique du Congo). The leader of the independence movement Patrice Lumumba became its first prime minister. Joseph-Désiré Mobutu took over through a coup d’état in 1965, changed the name of the capital Leopoldsville in Kinshasa in 1966, and the country’s name first in Democratic Republic of the Congo and then in 1971 in Zaïre. He promoted the Africanization of the country and erected a military dictatorship that came to an end after the First Congo War (1996–1997), ignited by refugees from the genocide in Rwanda, in which Laurent-Désiré Kabila overthrew Mobutu and became himself president of the country, which he renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo. In these turbulent times, Congolese legislation regarding the use of languages in the various sectors of social life is characterized, above all, by the absence of a clear language policy. Apart from a few isolated initiatives, the legislation is timid and even regressive in some respects compared to colonial legislation. This timid, daring nature of the legislation on the language question is illustrated by the Ordinance 174 of 17 October 1962 on the unification of structures and curricula in primary education, which purely and simply abolishes the use of national languages in education. From this ordinance onwards, the entire language policy of the ruling elite is characterized by a real gulf between “saying it and doing it”. The resolutions of the third conference of the heads of education (22–26 August 1966) advocated the principle of the development and dissemination of an indigenous language that would become the sole national language to be used for all purposes; the report of the first session of the Education Reform Commission (20 February–1 March 1968) had advocated Franco-Zairian bilingualism in primary school; the second session of the same commission calls for the introduction of regional languages in primary education; the Communiqué 253/59 of 1968 of the Department of Culture and Tourism decides on the promotion and diffusion of 4 national languages, but it omits to indicate the modalities of application of the decision; the Resolutions of the first ordinary Congress of the Popular Movement of the Revolution (Mouvement populaire de la révolution – MPR) in 1972, in turn, recommends the study of Zairian languages and their learning at all levels, but it is not accompanied by imple-

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menting measures. In accordance with the wish expressed by the seminar of linguists held in Lubumbashi in May 1974, the Department of National Education decided to reintroduce the national languages at the primary level. The national colloquium on authenticity in language matters in 1980 takes the same conclusions. The third ordinary Congress of the MPR held in 1982 noted the absence of a policy on the use of national languages. The Sovereign National Conference (Conférence nationale souveraine – CNS) bringing together all the nation’s active forces held from 1992 to 1993 recommended that the four national languages become official languages in the same way as French. This decision will remain a pious hope because it has never been implemented (Kilanga Musinde 2011, 21ss.). It emerges from this history that the post-independence legislation has obviously had the merit of reminding us from time to time of the existence of a real problem. Unfortunately, it did not dare to face it head-on for the future as did the colonial legislation, which had put significant financial resources for the initiation of a language policy worthy of a large country like the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The various actions undertaken did not lead to a language policy that was really applied and followed. The Observatory of Languages, the government’s advisory body on language policy, has proposed the main principles of legislation in this area: the need for a balance of functions that begins the redefinition of the functions recognized to languages based on the reality of the changing world, the imperative of a new language policy capable of making the Congolese languages languages of work and social communication, culture and individual training, administrative decisions, and education. On this basis are defined the axes of a new language policy for the country.

3 External language policy 3.1 Linguistic legislation The constitution of 1998 recognizes three official languages (French, English, and Swahili) and three national languages (Lingala, Kikongo, and Tshiluba). The other languages of the country are considered as part of the Congolese cultural heritage, whose protection and promotion the State has the mission to ensure. The constitution of 2003 makes French the only language with official language status, the constitution of 2006 adds Swahili, Lingala, Kikongo, and Tshiluba among the national languages and other local languages considered part of the Congolese cultural heritage that should be protected by the state. The new linguistic policy is one that sees the Congolese languages become working languages in public life, in an approach of complementarity with French, the official language. The four current national languages, recognized by the constitution, while dividing the country into four linguistic regions, will have to fulfill the same functions and have the same importance in each of their linguistic regions. Plurilingualism should henceforth appear not as a constraint but rather as a source and an asset for the

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development of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In a position of partnership with French, the Congolese languages can maximize the circulation of ideas, cultural products, and educational content. In this way, the sociolinguistic situation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo reflects a stratification and complementarity of three groups of languages and linguistic varieties. This stratification assigns a well-defined functionality to each group.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities French is officially the language used in all public matters. It is also widely used by the main religious cults in the country, especially in residential areas of urban centres. Nevertheless, the four vehicular languages Swahili, Lingala, Kikongo, and Tshiluba are also used, each in its respective region, as the language of justice and administration in the lower echelons with the persons who cannot speak French. They are also used in religious cults.

3.3 Languages used in education The introduction of Swahili, Lingala, Kikongo, and Tshiluba as the vehicles of primary education dates to the years 1974/1975. These languages are also systematically taught in the African Languages and Literature section of the university. The other sections of the Faculty of Letters and Humanities and the literary-oriented sections of the Higher Pedagogical Institutes provide for undergraduate students to study one of the vehicular languages transcending that of their province of origin. From the point of view of speakers, Swahili has the highest inscription rate, followed by Lingala, and finally Kikongo, and Tshiluba. French is taught from the third year of primary school onwards, after which it also becomes a language of instruction until university level. English is taught as a foreign language in secondary school and in the undergraduate years of different sections of the university. Its function as a teaching vehicle is registered only in the English section.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – French is used in the written press in the proportion of 97 %. Examples of French newspapers are Congo-Afrique and Le Potentiel. Other newspapers like Hodi are partially written in Swahili, while again others like Mwanashaba have names in Congolese languages but are mostly written in French (cf. OIF 2014, 122; Faïk 1979, 450; 1988, 22).  

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Audiovisual media – 60–70 % of the radio stations broadcast in French. Radio affects all sections of the population, while television is aimed at the intellectual or commercial bourgeoisie. Films that appear on television are in French, while an estimate made from the schedule of programmes shows that French occupies 60 to 70 % of the airtime (OIF 2014, 121). Cinema, theatre, and music – Cinema is more likely to be made by the younger generations; the films are almost all in French. Theatre, poetry recitals, and lectures are aimed only at a small audience of intellectuals and students. Theatre is animated by large but often ephemeral troops and almost all private initiatives. The language is mainly French, but efforts have been made to create a theatre in mixed language and Congolese languages. Congolese music has undergone an extraordinary development. Although, until about 1960, the languages used were French, Spanish, English, Lingala, and a few other Congolese languages, currently Lingala is being used in 90 % of the music produced, and French is almost no longer used in this field. The national anthem is in French, and all official records, lectures, and recitals of poems are always given in French.  

 

 

4 Linguistic characteristics The indicators of each variety are particularly related to the interference of the linguistic systems involved and are identifiable within the geographical limits coinciding with the boundaries of the languages used by the different user groups involved. Within each variety, depending on the speakers present, we observe a social variation of French in several readings that can be reduced to three levels: acrolectal French, which is the spoken language of the literate with possibly some local particularities and diversified registers, mesolectal French, spoken by the average literate marked by a very high rate of local particularities, and basilectal French, a circumstantial and ritualized use of a pidginized variety of French. All in all, all the varieties of French in this environment form part of a continuum whose poles are represented on the one hand by varieties that are identified or at least similar to normative French; on the other hand, by those that are similar to national languages or are identified with them. It is the fruit of French in the Congo, then of the French of the Congo to finally establish itself in Congolese French. Indeed, French is made up of a sum of elements from school French, features which are mixed with those of the local languages to which it is superimposed and those specific features which make this French different from other varieties of French spoken elsewhere. The documents that have served as a basis for the following description of the characteristics of French in the Democratic Republic of the Congo mainly include theses, dissertations, end-of-cycle works presented by students (1960–1985), the texts written by Bal (1976), Kilanga Musinde (1984; 2008), Faïk (1979; 1988), Faïk et al. (1988), and articles published in the journal Linguistics and Human Sciences of the Faculty of Letters of

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Lubumbashi. The exploitation of these different works on the French language in the Congolese space reveals particularities at the phonetic, morphosyntactic, morpholexicological, and lexicosemantic levels.

4.1 Pronunciation The material exploited resorts to the technique of surveys by recording either readings or spontaneous conversations (Kilanga Musinde 1976; 1984; Bwanga Zanzi 1980). In the analysis, linguistic statistics can be used to determine the most frequent traits to be considered as belonging to the structure of the variety described (Bwanga Zanzi 1980; Kilanga Musinde 1984). The exploitation of the results of work carried out on the determination of phonetic traits of updated French in the Congolese multilingual context gives us the following phonetic traits. Reduction of the phonetic system of standard French – The reduction of the phonetic system of standard French results from the neutralization of the most relevant oppositions of the French standard. The non-existent vowels in Bantu languages are reduced to the pronunciation of sounds that are close to them in Bantu phonological systems. The vowel system of French goes from 16 vowels to 5 (/i/, /u/, /e/, /o/, /a/) after neutralizing the unknown French vowels in the Congolese languages. The semi-vocalic system of French goes from 3 (/ɥ/, /j/, /w/) to two semi-vowels (/j/, /w/) by neutralizing /ɥ/ to /w/. Thus, lui is pronounced [lwi] instead of [lɥi]. The consonant system is reduced in the same way by neutralizing the two consonants /ʀ/ and /l/ which are reduced to the pronunciation of [l] and [r], e. g., près [pre] or [ple] instead of [pʁɛ] and radio [alaljo] or [aradjo] instead of [ʁadjo], that also shows a prothetic /a/ and the assimilation of [dj] > [lj]. Dislocation of consonant groups – The dislocation of certain consonant groups is produced by the introduction of an epenthesis vowel facilitating the articulation of the consonant group. This goes along with a tendency to reduce closed syllables in favour of open syllables. For example, film is pronounced [filim] instead of [film]. Disruption of the rules of accentuation and intonation – Normative French places the emphasis on the penultimate syllable. This is not the case in the speech of Congolese (average literate and students), who tolerate two more secondary accents. Moreover, there are pauses without a delimiting function, for example: ma cousine [ma ‖ kuzin] in place of [makuzin] or vous avez [vu ‖ zave] in place of [vuzave]. Formation of nasal complexes – The formation of nasal complexes is the result of the difficulty in pronouncing nasal vowels. This phenomenon is therefore observed after the denasalization of the nasal vowel with the following consonant being pronounced. It corresponds to the formula “N (nasal consonant) + consonant”, so, e. g., lampe is pronounced [laːmp] instead of [lɑ̃p], raconter is pronounced [rakoːnte] instead of [ʁakɔ̃te], and avion is pronounced [amvio] instead of [avjɔ̃]. These forms can be explained mostly by the phonological difficulties that the French language represents for the Congolese. The factors underlying these differences are of an intralinguistic nature related to the  

 

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articulatory proximity and the context in which the sounds appear, and of an interlinguistic nature related to the social environment and learning conditions.

4.2 Morphosyntax At this level, we encountered particularities due to internal difficulties in the language such as the confusion of similar forms on the formal and phonic level, the complexity of the grammatical rules, or the ignorance of the rules (divergence of agreement in gender and number, particular use of prepositions, confusion of the mechanisms of verb syntax). These peculiarities are manifested in a diverse manner depending on whether the speakers have reached a specific level of education (low or high). We illustrate these facts with some examples related to the use of some pronouns and prepositions. Personal pronouns – Standard French uses tu in the 2nd person singular and vous in the 2nd person plural in general. But there is a special case, that of the use of vous when an inferior speaks to a superior. This rule is non-existent in the Bantu languages. Therefore, tu vois is used equally when addressing a superior or an equal. Furthermore, confusion between the direct objects le/la and the indirect object lui can be found, for example Je l’ [instead of lui] ait dit toute la vérité, as is also the case with les and leur in the sentence Kosongo leur [instead of les] a battu très fort. Relative pronouns – Also the use of the pronoun que instead of avec laquelle/lequel can be found, for example La fille que [instead of avec laquelle] j’ai dansé avec hier est malade or Le garçon que [instead of avec lequel] j’ai mangé avec ce matin. Another confusion is being made between dont and d’où, which can be seen in the following example: Mukasa est allé à Kiswishi dont [instead of d’où] il est revenu. We also note the confusion between the pronouns en and y as in sentences like J’suis allé à Lubumbashi et j’y [instead of j’en] suis reparti hier. Prepositions – The preposition à is confused with the prepositions sur, dans, vers, de, and avec: Tous les étudiants sont assis sur [instead of à] leur place, Je suis resté dans [instead of à] l’hôpital, Dès que le bus est arrivé dans [instead of à] Likasi, Je pense de [instead of à] ce cadeau, or Jusqu’à ce qu’il s’habitue avec les [instead of aux] autres. Furthermore, de is replaced by dans, en, and des: Le progrès d’un pays résulte dans [instead of de] la technique, pour sauver le pays en [instead of de la] crise, or Il y a beaucoup des défauts instead of Il y a beaucoup de défauts. Also, en is replaced by dans like in Je suis dans la [instead of en] bonne santé, while pendant le is replaced by en: certains étudiants étaient absents en [instead of pendant les] vacances. As said for the phonetic level, morphosyntactic differences are faults but they can one day become deviations if they are maintained under present conditions.

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4.3 Lexicon Congolese French shows many aspects of lexical innovation, using elements of French and of the national languages. The innovation can affect the form or the meaning. Innovation of form is generated, for example, by composition, derivation, and clipping. Innovation of meaning is achieved by semantic extension, restriction or transfer, the latter again by the semantic processes of metonymy and metaphor (for an overview of the applied systematic, cf. Reutner 2017, 47ss.). Innovation of form – Monolingual composition creates new words from elements belonging to the French language, e. g., marché pirate ‘small street trade’ (< marché ‘market’ + pirate ‘pirate’, commissaire d’État ‘minister’ (< commissaire ‘commissioner + État ‘state’, femme libre ‘prostitute’ (< femme ‘woman’ + libre ‘free’) and chauffeur-cab ‘cab driver’ (< chauffeur ‘driver’ + cab ‘taxi’). Hybrid composition contains a combination of words from French and Congolese languages, e. g., maman muluba ‘prostitute’ (< Fr. maman ‘mother’ + Lub. muluba ‘a woman of the Luba tribe’). Derivation can be done by prefixing as in prédot ‘first gifts (money and drink) made to the parents of the fiancée, to make engagement official’ (Fr. dot ‘dowry’), by suffixation as in ambianceur ‘a person who likes parties’ (< Fr. ambiance ‘atmosphere’), enceinter ‘to make a girl pregnant’ (< Fr. enceinte ‘pregnant’), cadonner ‘to offer a gift to someone’ (< Fr. cadeau ‘gift’), prédoter ‘to make the engagement official’ (< Cong.Fr. prédot) and doter ‘to pay the dowry, which is all the goods in kind and in cash that the fiancé brings to the in-laws as a token of the alliance’ (< Fr. dot ‘dowry’). Hybrid suffixation combines a foreign radical with a French suffix, e. g., boyerie ‘annex used for the servant’s dwelling’ (< En. boy) and ziboulateur ‘corkscrew’ (< Kikongo ziboula ‘to open’ + eur). The example of dévierger ‘deflower’ is a case of parasynthetic derivation (< Fr. vierge ‘virgin’). An example of clipping is the blending abacost ‘short-sleeved jacket with a wide-open collar’ (< Fr. à bas le costume ‘down with the suit’). Semantic extension – A case of semantic extension is the example cadeau ‘gift’. In standard French cadeau means ‘a small present which is offered to someone to please’. In Congolese French, the sememe ‘sometimes with the idea of getting a favour in return’ is added. Another case of semantic extension is the word frère ‘brother’, which in addition to the meaning given to it in standard French, designates ‘any male person, belonging to the same clan, the same ethnic group, the same political party, the same religious community, the same village, the same nationality’. The example of sœur ‘sister’ is affected by an analogous extension. Semantic restriction – In Congolese French, some lexies undergo semantic restriction such as the nouns bulletin ‘report’ > ‘school report’, vacances ‘holidays’ > ‘school holidays’, poudre ‘powder’ > ‘cosmetic powder’, fil ‘thread’ > ‘sewing thread’ or the verbs préparer ‘to prepare’ > ‘to prepare a meal’, sortir ‘to go out’ > ‘to go out to drink and have fun with women’, importer ‘import’ > ‘to bring a mistress into his house’, descendre ‘to get out’ > ‘to export oneself, to sleep over, to spend the night at a mistress’ house’. From the time of the Second Republic, the following words have known semantic restriction:  

 

 

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animation (culturelle) ‘cultural animation’ > ‘public session where songs and dances are performed to the glory of the president of the Republic’, animateur, ‑trice ‘animator’ > ‘any person involved in cultural animation supporting a political party and promoting it’, citoyen ‘citizen’ > ’any person active in cultural animation’ and ‘any person of Zairian nationality’, région ‘region’ > ‘province’. Semantic transfer – The expression deuxième bureau ‘(lit.) second office’ is used to designate euphemistically ‘the woman that a married man maintains without his wife’s knowledge’. Other examples of semantic transfer by metonymy are politicien ‘politician’, which has taken the meaning of ‘lie’, mensonge ‘lie’, which has taken the meaning of ‘politician’, menteur ‘liar’, which has taken the meaning of ‘bad manager, corrupter’, and kaki ‘khaki’, which has taken the meaning of ‘khaki-coloured cloth’. Semantic transfer can also take place by metaphor. An interesting example is provided by the evolution of the term trou ‘hole’ in students’ French from Lubumbashi. After designating any opening (e. g., door, window), it came to designate, by metaphor, ‘the sexual organ of the woman’, then by metonymy, ‘the woman herself’. Another example is the word crayons ‘pencils’ which, metaphorically speaking, refers to ‘men’s shoes with tapered toes and high heels’. Semantic transfer also takes place in mobile ‘mobile’, which acquired the meaning of ‘gendarme’ because it was part of the expression brigade mobile ‘mobile brigade of the gendarmerie’.  

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – Is there evidence of people criticizing the local variety of French? Are there attempts to preserve French from the influence of African languages? The criticism of African influences in the Congolese French and of other forms diverging from the European Variety depends on the type of peculiarity. Especially if the words fill lexical gaps in French, they cannot be criticized. Even not using Congolese forms can generate criticism. A special example of this can be found during the period in the dictatorship of Mobutu that was characterized by a policy of authenticity (1972–1990). At this time, when one addressed a Zairian by calling him monsieur, he reacted by asking to call him citoyen ‘citizen’. One can object that the content given to the lexeme under political influence can empty itself with the change of regime to return to its standard content. This is possible in the diachronic perspective, but on the synchronic level, it is difficult to conceive. Usage and description of linguistic characteristics – The linguistic characteristics of French in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are used by some groups of the population who have little instruction in a private context. In an official context, public authorities use standard French. Authors, school, and media use standard French. But in a private context, the use of the variety of French with some phonetic and lexical differences should not make us think of the formation of a new norm in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Especially the school environment is characterized by resistance to any linguistic differentiation. But the work carried out within this framework showed that Con-

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golese French is not reducible to school French. “It consists of a panoply of varieties centered on the school variety and variable according to the socio-professional categories present. For certain categories of speakers, these varieties diversify according to the specific history of each user and the circumstances of production” (Kilanga Musinde 2009, 67). The existence of this variety is not given. It is not obvious; it is itself a hypothesis that remains to be verified (cf. Kilanga Musinde 1984, 185). This verification requires both a pure descriptive linguistic and sociolinguistic approach. In other words, the analysis will have to take into consideration all levels of language to isolate the characteristic features likely to allow a certain identification of these varieties and all the situations observable at the level of communication as well as the psychosocial determinants which come into play at the level of these selection and production situations. On the sociolinguistic level, the various supposed varieties must be considered not only as attributes of social categories and as indicators of social differences or cleavages but also as indices of identification of oneself and other users.

References Bal, Willy (1976), Le français et les langues africaines en situation de contact: note pour une problématique, Recherche sur les contacts de cultures 1, 15–27. Bwanga Zanzi, Jean-Pierre (1980), Description des constantes phonétiques du français parlé en milieux scolaires de Kisangani, Lubumbashi, Université de Lubumbashi. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Faïk, Sully (1979), Le français au Zaïre, in: Albert Valdman (ed.), Le français hors de France, Paris, Champion, 441–472. Faïk, Sully (1988), Le français au Zaïre, in: Sully Faïk et al. (edd.), La Francophonie au Zaïre, Lubumbashi, Impala, 5–40 (reprint of Faïk 1979). Faïk, Sully, et al. (ed.) (1988), La Francophonie au Zaïre, Lubumbashi, Impala. Kilanga Musinde, Julien (1976), Les interférences du phonétisme hemba dans le français des locuteurs hemba de Mambwe, Lubumbashi, Université nationale du Zaïre. Kilanga Musinde, Julien (1984), Le français des élèves des écoles secondaires à Lubumbashi. Structure et nature des différences, Linguistique et science humaines 27/1, 183–185. Kilanga Musinde, Julien (2008), L’état et la nature du français en milieu plurilingue de la République Démocratique du Congo, La Tribune internationale des langues vivantes 25, 44–50. Kilanga Musinde, Julien (2009), Le français et la littérature de langue française en contexte multilingue congolais. Structure et méthodologie de l’enseignement, Paris, L’Harmattan. Kilanga Musinde, Julien (2011), Renforcement de la langue française et de la Francophonie en République démocratique du Congo, Paris, Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Makomo-Makita, Jean-Claude (2013), La politique linguistique de la République Démocratique du Congo à l’épreuve du terrain: de l’effort de promotion des langues nationales au surgissement de l’interlangue, Synergies. Afrique des Grandes Lacs 2, 45–61. OIF (2014), La langue française dans le monde 2014, Paris, Nathan/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.

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Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des Francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. zi Kabwiku, Nsuka (1985), Langues nationales et éducation: langues nationales dans l’éducation formelle, in: Valentin-Yves Mudimbe (ed.), Actes du colloque national sur l’utilisation des langues nationales dans l’éducation et la vie socio-culturelle, Kinshasa, Centre de linguistique théorique et appliquée, 5–17.

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25 Gabon Abstract: Gabon is a small country on the African scale, with a strong urban population. French was actively introduced at the end of the nineteenth century, and Gabon is today the country with the highest percentage of French speakers in continental Africa. French has a well-established status as an official language used for administration, education, the media, and also day-to-day communication. With the exception of languages related to traditional religion and ancestor cults, many ethnic languages are endangered due to its strong presence. Some Gabonese languages like Fang, Punu, or Myene are promoted in specific contexts. Keywords: Gabon, French, ethnic language, language policy, sociolinguistics

1 Sociolinguistic situation Covering 267,667 km2, Gabon is a rather small country in Middle Africa, lying on the equator. It borders Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon to the north, the Republic of the Congo to the east and south and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. Gabon’s flag is a tricolour with three horizontal bands that do not use the Pan-African colours but green, yellow, and blue – colours that were later also introduced by Rwanda and allude to the forest, the sun or Equator, and the ocean, as well as to hope, wealth, and peace. The country’s motto is ‘Union, Work, Justice’ (Union, Travail, Justice). Most of its population lives in three main cities: the capital Libreville on the north bank of the Gabon Estuary, Port-Gentil on the Atlantic coast, and Franceville in the south-eastern part of the country. In these cities, the usage of French is most widespread, although almost all Gabonese people speak French, sometimes as their first language. According to the last census, the resident population amounts to 1.8 million, among them 1.45 million Gabonese and 353,000 foreigners (20 % of the total population). It tripled from independence in 1960 to 2013 and increased by 78 % in the last twenty years. It is quite a young population, with an average age of 26 years. 93 % of children from 6 to 16 are enrolled in school, with an advantage of urban areas (cf. DGS 2015). Three quarters of the people speak at least one Gabonese language, whereas only 12 % of foreigners but 90 % of rural dwellers do so. The administrative organization divides Gabon in nine provinces (provinces): Estuaire (with its capital Libreville), Woleu-Ntem (Oyem), Moyen-Ogooué (Lambaréné), Ogooué-Ivindo (Makokou), Ogooué-Maritime (Port-Gentil), Ogooué-Lolo (Koulamoutou), Haut-Ogooué (Franceville), Ngounié (Mouila), and Nyanga (Tchibanga). The provinces are organized in departments (départements), disctricts (districts), and cantons (cantons), each one including several groups of villages (regroupements de villages). The administrators are, respectively, the governor (gouverneur), the prefect (préfet), the sub-prefect (sous-préfet), the canton chief (chef de  

 

 

 

 

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canton), and the village chief (chef de village). These names already show the French and the local influences on both the administrative system and the lexicon. In order to sort out the different aspects of language distribution in Gabon, we first tackle their geographical and then their social character, which sometimes interact.

1.1 Geographical distribution Gabonese languages – All Gabonese languages are Niger-Congo languages that belong to the Bantu family, except for Baka, which is part of the Adamawa-Ubangi group and is spoken by around 3000 Pygmies. Ethnologue lists forty-four and Glottolog fifty languages for Gabon. Fang is most widely spread. It is a vehicular language in Equatorial Guinea and Gabon and also has speakers in southern Cameroon and north-western Congo-Brazzaville. In Gabon, 350,000 people use it, according to Ethnologue, in the area north of the Ogooué River. It primarily covers the provinces of Woleu-Ntem and Estuaire but also parts of Moyen-Ogooué, Ogooué-Ivindo, and Ngounié. Other major languages are Punu, with 152,000 users, and Njebi, with 120,000. Both are spoken in Ngounié, Njebi is also used in Ogooué-Lolo and Punu in Nyaga. Other languages are Latege (Teke-Tege in Ethnologue) with 90,000 speakers, Mbere and Myene with 45,000 each, Sira with 39,000, Sangu with 30,000, Kota with 25,000, Lumbu with 20,000, Wumbvu with 18,000, and Wandji with 10,000. Minor languages include Duma, Tsogo, Tsaangi, and Ngom. Several Gabonese languages can be classified as endangered because they only have 1,000 to 4,000 speakers: Bekwil, Bubi, Vili, Baka, Ndumu, Mbangwe, Barama, Kaningi, Kélé, Ndasa, Pinji, Osamayi, and Seki. Some ethnic groups use the same or a similar language, such as Myene, which gathers Mpongwe from Libreville, Orungu from Port-Gentil, Galwa from Lambaréné, Nkomi from Fernan-Vaz, as well as Ajumba and Enenga from Lower and Middle Ogooué (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Hammarström et al. 2023). Most areas are monoethnic zones, so the languages usually have their own territories, though they lose more and more native speakers (cf. Moussirou-Mouyama/de Samie 1996, 604; Boucher/Lafage 2000, XIII, XV; Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 119; Mouguiama-Daouda 2019b, 155). According to the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation international de la Francophonie – OIF), many Gabonese languages are doomed to a very shortterm extinction, except for Fang (30 %), Punu (12 %), and Njebi (9 %, cf. OIF 2014, 106). The Britannica gives similar percentages when indicating an ethnic composition of 29 % Fang, 10 % Punu, 9 % Njebi, and 4 % Mpongwe and Teke each (cf. Weinstein/Gardinien/van Hoogstraten 2023). Despite the high number of endangered languages with low speaker numbers, Renombo (2019, 55) predicts that ‘while French is important in Gabon due to its vehicular function, local languages still have fine days ahead’.1 According to Bagouendi-

1 “Si la prégnance du français au Gabon est ainsi importante, parce que servant de langue véhiculaire, il reste que les langues locales ont encore de beaux jours devant elles” (Renombo 2019, 55).

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Bagère Bonnot (2007, 143), 19 % of the students do not mind not using their ethnic language, but most students (45 %) regret or even feel ashamed (36 %) not speaking it, and 87 % wish they could be taught in an ethnic language (2007, 157). Besides these Gabonese languages, there are also languages of migrants, who represent about one fifth of the population, as Gabon is a host country for many people of foreign origin. Extension of French – The situation of French is quite different. As a current language in Gabon, French has been widely expanding for years and has 1.5 million speakers today, according to Ethnologue and OIF (Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; OIF 2022, 30). At the time of independence, in 1960, 47 % of Gabonese aged 14 and more spoke French, and 13 % could read and write French. The OIF reports state 61 % of French speakers in the country in 2014 (OIF 2014, 62), 66 % in 2018 (OIF 2018, 8), and 65 % in 2022 (OIF 2022, 30), which stands out as the highest percentage in continental Africa. Comparing her own data to those of Moussirou-Mouyama (1984), Mitchell (2004, 186) points out a very important increase in French while the Gabonese languages are decreasing. The use of French reaches 89 % in offices (vs. 69,2 % according to MoussirouMouyama), 95,4 % with superiors or teachers (vs. 59,2 %), and 42,2 % at home (vs. 1,5 %). At the same time, local languages drop to 0 % in offices, with superiors, and teachers. Even at home, the percentage decreases from 89,3 % to 31,2 %. Villages are the only context where local languages remain strong and the use of French only amounts to 5,5 % (for more details, cf. Mitchell 2004, 186). Although questions could be raised about the sample and the context of the inquiry, there is no doubt that French is more and more dominant in the country and that, despite declarations of intent and some experiments with local languages, French is spoken all over the country as an official, national, and vehicular language since no local language is fully widespread in Gabon. Thus, French is often considered a Gabonese language and remains the only language in the widely monolingual education system, despite some trials or experiments with ethnic languages (cf. 3.3). On top of that:  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

‘several studies have made clear that in many Gabonese families, French has been transmitted as mother tongue sometimes for three generations. It has become, in fact, the first language for some hundred thousand Gabonese, especially in large cities. It was introduced at least four centuries ago, has been transmitted as a mother tongue for at least 60 years’.2

In addition, many foreign people (cf. Boucher/Lafage 2000, XV) make Gabon a cosmopolitan country, especially Libreville and Franceville, which host numerous people from Western Africa and neighbouring countries like Equatorial Guinea, Mali, Benin, Senegal,

2 “Plusieurs études ont montré que dans de nombreuses familles gabonaises le français est transmis comme langue maternelle dans certains cas depuis trois générations. Il est devenu, de fait, la langue de première acquisition de centaines de milliers de Gabonais, principalement dans les grands centres urbains, introduit depuis 4 siècles au moins, transmis comme langue maternelle depuis au moins 60 ans” (Mouguiama-Daouda 2019b, 154).

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and Cameroon. They usually work as shopkeepers, taxi drivers, or home workers and use French as a vehicular language. Migrants of African origins account for more than one fifth of the population, according to OIF (2014, 106). Besides, non-African foreigners, all speaking French, are mostly Lebanese working in the commercial sector and French citizens, 9,000 of which are registered at the French Consulate and about additional 1,000 are non-registered. Urban and rural areas – Nevertheless, and that is a geographical as well as a social comment, French is more commonly used in urban areas (cf. Boucher 2000). For Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007, 52ss.), ethnic languages can be the only means of communication in villages and the countryside, where they have a socializing function (cf. 2007, 52), whereas in provincial cities, one or two major ethnic languages are dominating other ethnic languages, except in cases when speakers wish to avoid being understood by others (cryptic function), and in Libreville, French is the main means of communication and can be considered as a part of the social integration (cf. 2007, 59s.). Many statements, from mere observers, institutions, or advanced researchers go the same way: ‘According to the International Organization of La Francophonie, 80 % of the population could speak French and 99 % of the inhabitants of the capital could read, write, and speak French in 2010. If this is true, it would be the highest percentage of all African countries’.3  

 

According to the Gabonese Embassy in Morocco, French is the common language for young and urban people and is said to be the first language of about 30 % of the inhabitants of Libreville (AGM 2018). Thus, we may conclude, that French undoubtedly is an urban language and that the native city population uses French as their first language (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 67).  

1.2 Social distribution French is the vehicular language, whose acrolectal, mesolectal, or basilectal variety is used according to the situational context. Several parameters should be considered from a sociolinguistic point of view: age and education, the social environment, social class, and the topic of conversation. First, the age and education of the users. National languages are mostly spoken in villages by older generations and less educated people.

3 “Selon l’Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, 80 % de la population du pays serait capable de s’exprimer en français et 99 % des habitants de la capitale savaient en 2010 lire, écrire et parler le français. Si tel est le cas, il s’agirait de la plus forte proportion de tous les pays du continent africain” (Leclerc 2021).  

 

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‘[...] some vernacular languages as, for example, Latege, Kota, Mbere, and Sangu, are only used in two contexts, that is “at home” and “with the grandparents”. In other contexts, e. g., “with the father”, “with brothers and sisters” and “with playmates”, almost all dialogues are made in French’.4  

‘[...] there is no doubt that French becomes the basic language for young Gabonese people, but society regards good speakers of French with envy’.5

On the other side, the ethnic language is the language of Gabonese roots, symbolizing tradition through grandparents and older people (cf. Boucher 1999, 177). Second, the social environment also matters, as the usual speech behaviour obeys a spatial logic: French is used in public places like offices or shops, whereas local languages are used in private places, the family and the village, as well as in esoteric and cultural spheres (cf. Renombo 2019, 56). Third, the higher the social class, the higher the French monolingualism, as French covers all sectors (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 256). Many well-educated people and people working in shops, restaurants, hotels, administrative or private offices speak acrolectal French, while less educated ones use a mesolectal or even a basilectal variety. ‘The elite and Westernized class of the society use a prestigious variety of French or the acrolecte in formal situations. It is not uncommon for the same intellectuals to use, when in private or informal situations, the popular variety: the mesolect’.6

Fourth, the topic of conversation is of some importance too, as Gabonese are inclined to use local languages to speak about traditional culture or local religion, ancestor cult, Nganga or Bwiti practices (cf. 3.2). Obviously, ethnic languages are linked to traditional Gabonese or more widely African culture. For instance, in everyday usage, local languages like Fang, Punu, or Myene can be used on market places in Libreville in the area of Gabonese products, but they disappear as soon as the customers leave this area to buy foreign manufactured goods (Moussirou-Mouyama/de Samie 1996, 611). In short, Moussirou-Mouyama/de Samie (1996, 608s.) point out that French is used as the exclusive language of political, financial, and economic power, in large organizations, and as written language in schools, written media, letters, business and administrative relations, and modern technology. Local languages are only dominant in traditional contexts such as worship, rites, and folk culture.

4 “[...] pour plusieurs langues vernaculaires, en l’occurrence, le latege, le ikota, le lembaama et le isangu, la langue vernaculaire n’est plus sollicitée que dans deux contextes, à savoir ‘à la maison’ et ‘avec les grands-parents’. Dans les autres contextes, à savoir ‘avec le père’, ‘avec les frères et sœurs’ et ‘avec les camarades de jeux’, la quasi-totalité des conversations se font en français” (OIF 2014, 108). 5 “[…] il ne fait aucun doute que le français devient la langue de base des jeunes Gabonais mais la société octroie aux bons locuteurs de français un regard enviable” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 256). 6 “La classe élitiste et occidentalisée de la société utilise une variété de français de prestige ou l’acrolecte dans des situations formelles. Il n’est pas rare de voir ces mêmes intellectuels utiliser dans des situations de vie privée ou informelle la variété la plus populaire: le mésolecte” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 59).

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2 Linguistic history 2.1 Colonization The Portuguese reached Gabon in 1472 and developed trading activies in the following centuries. Their early presence is evident in the country’s name Gabon (< Pg. gabão ‘hooded coat [shape of the Gabon Estuary]’). Europeans actually entered Gabon in the middle of the sixteenth century, introducing slavery for three centuries until a treaty was signed in 1839 between the Mpongwe ruler Antchuwe Kowe Rapontchombo (~1780–1876, also named King Denis) and the French officer Bouët-Willaumez (1808– 1871). In 1849, the French freed the captives of the illegal Brazilian slave ship Elizia. They settled them in a place they called Libreville ‘(lit.) Freetown’, following the model of Freetown in today’s Sierra Leone. Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza (1852–1905, ↗23 Congo-Brazzaville) explored the Upper Ogooué, where the city called Franceville ‘(lit.) Frenchtown’ was founded in 1880. In 1882, Gabon became a French colony that was united with modern-day Congo-Brazzaville first in French Congo (Congo français) and then Middle Congo (Moyen-Congo) until 1906. In 1910, both zones were joined with the territories of today’s Central African Republic and Chad in the newly established French Equatorial Africa (Afrique-Équatoriale française – AEF). Although the first school in Gabon was an American Protestant school launched in Baraka (now Libreville 4th district), many Catholic missions were established. The school in Baraka was placed in 1894 under the auspices of the Paris Evangelical Missionary Society (Société des missions évangéliques de Paris). Matching the colonial assimilation option, the language in use was French. French culture and language were promoted through the colonial army, the colonial administration, and the educational system. Gabonese subordinate agents were trained in French. French was thus widespread on the coast side as well as inside the country, especially through schools. As stated in the Brazzaville Conference in 1944, any child entering a school in French Africa was meant to hear and use no other language than French. As a consequence, primary teaching in French became compulsory in 1949 and reached the population all over the country in a twofold way. On a vertical axis, French impacted people close to the colonial power, who indulged in an occidental behaviour, including language as a means of social promotion. On a horizontal axis, French expanded from large cities to medium ones, then to villages. The occidental culture and language diluted the traditional way of life and ethnic languages (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 64).

2.2 Independence The transfer of power between France and Gabon was held in French, on 17 August 1960, according to the first Constitution (drafted in 1959, applied in 1960). Léon M’ba (1902–1967) became the first president and served from 1961 till his death in 1967, though

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he would have preferred Gabon to be a French department rather than an independent country. He said in 1961: ‘Each Gabonese has two fatherlands: France and Gabon’.7 Omar Bongo Ondimba (1935–2009, Albert-Bernard Bongo before he became Muslim) replaced the former president and was in office from 1967 to 2009, with the support of France. He also said memorable sentences: ‘Africa without France is a car without a driver. France without Africa is a car without fuel’8 and ‘Gabonese people have a fatherland, Gabon, and a girlfriend, France’.9 His son Ali Bongo (*1959, born Alain-Bernard Bongo) became president when Omar died in 2009. He was re-elected in 2016, despite an opposition disagreeing with the so-called Bongo dynasty and its governance. Only the announcement of his re-election on 30 August 2023 provoked a military coup that led to his removal from power. It was greeted with joy by the population. Notwithstanding occasional dissent and the growing impact of China, Gabon has maintained strong relations with France since independence. A Department for the Promotion of the French Language and the Cultural and Linguistic Diversity (Direction de la promotion de la langue française et de la diversité culturelle et linguistique) was created in 2013 within the General Directorate of La Francophonie (Direction générale de la Francophonie) of the Gabonese Foreign Affairs Ministry (Ministère des Affaires étrangères, de la Francophonie et de l’Intégration régionale, cf. OIF 2014, 193). Gabon entered the network of Reading and Cultural Activities Centres (Centres de Lecture et d’Animation Culturelle – CLAC) in 1997 by signing an agreement between the Cultural and Technical Cooperation Association (Association de Coopération Culturelle et Technique – ACCT) and the Gabonese Ministry of Communication, Culture and Arts (Ministère de la Communication, de la Culture et des Arts). On this basis, the OIF enabled the launching of ten CLAC in Bitam, Lambaréné, Maokou, Okondja, Mouila, Ntoum, Koula-Moutou, Tchibanga, Oyem, and Franceville. In June 2019, the visit in Libreville of Louise Mushikiwabo (*1961), the then newly-elected secretary-general of the OIF, was an opportunity to express the will to strengthen the relationship between Gabon and the OIF.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Like many other African countries, the newly independent Gabon in 1960 did not consider introducing Gabonese languages in the administration or the education system: The numerous ethnic languages could not support national unity and any choice within 7 “Chaque Gabonais a deux patries: la France et le Gabon”. 8 “L’Afrique sans la France est une voiture sans chauffeur. La France sans l’Afrique est une voiture sans carburant”. 9 “Le Gabonais a une patrie, le Gabon, et une amie, la France”.

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those languages could have provoked a conflictual situation. In addition, the whole administrative structure was modelled around the French administration and the French language. So French was pragmatically kept as the official language, as stated in the first title on Republic and Sovereignty of the first Constitution of 14 November 1960, ‘The Gabonese Republic adopts French as the official language’.10

As far as language is concerned, this text was not modified until 26 March 1991 when the Constitution mentioned French as an official working language and added a line about national languages: ‘The Gabonese Republic adopts French as the official working language. Moreover, it is committed to the protection and promotion of national languages’.11

Despite twenty-four additional amendments from the first Constitution to present day, no constitutional change occurred concerning languages since 1991 (cf. LégiGabon), so many national languages do not enjoy official support: ‘Alongside quite widespread languages in rural areas, there are minority languages whose life is, to be frank, endangered in the short term’.12

Calvet (2019, 173), interviewed by Moussirou-Mouyama, also confirms that some languages in Gabon will disappear. A strong-willed policy could save them, but the past fifty years, proposals have only been sporadic and lacking in objectivity. Official support has merely been proposed for Myene because of its administrative and economic importance, for Njebi and Fang because of their speaker numbers, and for Tsogo because of its status as the language of the Bwiti, considered to be the national religion (cf. Mouguiama-Daouda 2019b, 154). In the end, the consequences are similar, whether on the public authority, the education, or the media. Another trend that came out in 2012 concerns English. Neither the Constitution nor any law article mentions anything about it. However, with the idea to enter the AngloSaxon world and to boost economic development, there was some governmental tendency to introduce English as a second working language, as the president’s spokesman Bilie By Nze said in October 2012, a few days before the Francophone Summit in Kinshasa:

10 “La République gabonaise adopte le français comme langue officielle” (C-GA 1960, art. 2). 11 “La République gabonaise adopte le français comme langue officielle de travail. En outre, elle œuvre pour la protection et la promotion des langues nationales” (C-GA 1991, art. 2). 12 “À côté des langues de diffusion relativement importantes en zone rurale, il y a des langues minoritaires dont l’existence, disons-le franchement, est menacée à court terme” (Mouguiama-Doauda 2019b, 156).

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‘We have already decided to introduce English from nursery school onwards. In the end, we will see how to make English the second working language in Gabon’.13

This option was discussed when President Ali Bongo met the Rwandan President Kagame in Kigali on 5 and 6 October 2012. According to Leclerc (2021), the idea was to adopt the Rwandan model and use English as an economic lever, setting aside that the Gabonese elites are not English-speaking and that Gabon lies in a French-speaking area. Still, this was not implemented immediately, and Mouguiama-Daouda (2019b, 151) said that, as Gabon has a different history from Rwanda, the country was not going to copy the Rwandan model. Flavien Enongoué, the Gabonese Ambassador to France, went in the same direction when he pointed out, in April 2019, the necessity of bilingualism or even multilingualism for the elite (briefly referring to the launching of a Confucius Institute aiming to teach Chinese), and stressed that by no way a stroke of the pen could weaken the French language in Gabon. In brief, English does not play any social role but may convey a feeling of modernity and create proximity with large English-speaking countries such as Nigeria, South Africa, or Namibia (for more details cf. OIF 2014, 62–65). Therefore, President Ali Bongo again knocked at the door of Commonwealth on 11 May 2021 when meeting the secretary-general in London. Finally, Gabon joined the Commonwealth, together with Togo, during the Commonwealth Summit 2022 in Kigali, despite a great deal of criticism.

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere French is the only written and spoken language used in official contexts like legislation, parliament, or public services. Nevertheless, depending on the different areas in Gabon, ethnic languages can be spoken when people, including civil servants, share the same local language (cf. Leclerc 2021). This can occur in medical contexts or in the Court of Justice, and, quite obviously, in African rites and ethnic cultures as vehicles of the patrimonial heritage (cf. Boucher/Lafage 2000, XVI; Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007). French is thus prevalent in administration. Forms, documents, and signage of all kinds are in French, and in French only: information documents, announcements, posters, letters, police releases, driving licences, car registration documents, residence permits for foreigners, certificates, banknotes, stamps, road signs, and nameplates. There is no translation in any Gabonese or foreign language as they have no official status in Gabon. A Njebi informer in Mitchell (2004, 185) points out a poster in the townhall of Libreville that states: ‘Please speak French’,14 a rule that some people consider embarrassing or even as

13 “C’est déjà décidé d’introduire l’anglais depuis la maternelle. À terme, nous allons voir comment faire de l’anglais la seconde langue de travail au Gabon” (in Leclerc 2021). 14 “Parlez français, s’il vous plaît” (Mitchell 2004, 185).

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a limit to the freedom of expression, even if they would usually speak French. Furthermore, all official speeches, oral interventions, or political talks are in French. However, propaganda may use local languages to make sure every Gabonese citizen can understand it, especially in the countryside and among elderly people. Religion can also be briefly mentioned within this chapter. Christian catechism is taught in French and Koran in Arabic. Traditional religions are closely linked to ancestral rites and usually use local languages. For instance, the Bwiti traditional practice (cf. 4.3) requires the use of local languages to the point that literature in French must borrow local words to talk about it. One example among others is La mémoire du fleuve by Dedet (1984), in which the author regularly uses words from the Tsogo (or Mitsogo) lexicon (bwiti bakowa, imbouiri), which he marks in italic print and/or provides with an attempt of translation.

3.3 Languages used in education The Gabonese education system widely follows the French model. French is used in the whole range of the curriculum from primary school to university. With no surprise, according to the Conference of Education Ministers of French-speaking States and Governments (Conférence des ministres de l’Éducation des États et Gouvernements de la Francophonie – CONFEMEN), who periodically realize national evaluations of students’ knowledge, Gabon performed very well in second year classes, behind Madagascar and Cameroon, and had the best results on the French test in fifth year classes (CONFEMEN 2008, 68). As for local languages, attempts were initiated as early as the 1970s to promote national languages in primary schools, but the concrete implementation didn’t follow and French still is the only teaching language in all schools. In 1983, the Board of Education and Training (Les États généraux de l’Éducation et de la Formation – EGEF) proposed to include national languages in the education system, and, in 1986, the CONFEMEN raised the possibility of using national languages in nursery schools. Some private Catholic schools (Immaculée Conception and Collège Bessieux) tried optional classes in ethnic languages with the support of the Raponda Walker Foundation, which seeks valorization and restoration of the national cultural heritage and fights for the introduction of national languages in schools (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 55, 73s.). In theory, all national languages were supposed to be taught in secondary schools. However, the Gabonese government could not get through the project, as many local languages are only spoken and some difficulties were linked to the planning and standardization of those languages. According to Leclerc (2021), the project has also encountered other difficulties due to the lack of qualified teachers. Beyond the Constitution, some law articles are very informative. In 2012, there was a renewed will to promote local languages:

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‘It is important now to modernize our mother tongues and their use in the Gabonese educational system’,15

a university teacher said, in line with the mainstream thinking that stresses the importance of local languages in education. As a reminder, in 1999, the UNESCO declared 21 February as International Mother Language Day. The only law partly related to languages is Law 21 of 11 February 2012, a general orientation for education, training, and research. Its second article states that: ‘Teaching and training in Gabon are compulsory. They are governed by the fee-free schooling principle within the limits of the State resources’,16

and agrees with the principle of secularism. Keeping in mind that French is the official language and the main teaching language, the articles 5 and 85 of this law give some place to local languages: ‘Curricula, training offers, infrastructures, teaching and training tools, depending on the levels, must allow, for this purpose, the appropriation of knowledge and skills for the training of social, societal, civic, and environmental citizenship [and] local languages’.17 ‘Languages must be instruments of information, training, and dialogue. They are also a core medium for the culture and values of each civilization within an interactive dynamic’.18

On 20 March 2012, Dominique Guy Noël Nguiéno, delegate minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Cooperation, Francophonie, Regional Integration, and the Gabonese Abroad (Ministère des Affaires étrangères, de la Coopération, de la Francophonie, de l’Intégration régionale et des Gabonais de l’étranger), asked for a linguistic cohabitation and highlighted French as a language of culture (langue de culture) that lives together with Gabonese national languages, both featuring the rich cultural and linguistic diversity in Gabon. Nevertheless, teaching of and a fortiori teaching in Gabonese languages seem up to now a marginal and private experiment. Only nine languages, including Myene and

15 “Il est important désormais d’orienter nos langues maternelles vers leur modernisation et leur utilisation dans le système éducatif gabonais” (Xinhua 2012). 16 “L’enseignement et la formation au Gabon sont obligatoires. Ils sont régis par le principe de gratuité, dans la limite des possibilités de l’État” (Law 21, art. 2). 17 “Les curricula, les offres de formation, les infrastructures et les équipements d’enseignement et de formation, doivent, à cet effet, permettre, selon les niveaux, l’appropriation des connaissances et des compétences en matière: – de formation à la citoyenneté sociale, sociétale, civique et environnementale; – de langues locales” (Law 21, art. 5). 18 “Les langues doivent être des instruments d’information, de formation et d’échanges. Elles constituent également un véhicule essentiel de la culture et des valeurs de chaque civilisation, dans une dynamique interactive” (Law 21, art. 85).

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Fang, among about fifty national languages have been tested in primary schools since 1975. Recently some national languages are introduced in secondary schools, especially Fang, Punu, and Myene. Some books have a pedagogical vocation and aim at teaching national languages, especially Fang, Njebi, Mbere, Myene, and Punu. The main ones are Rapidolangue by Hubert (1996), a series of learning books on national languages of Gabon, which is considered as a failure by Elibiyo (2016), as pointed out in his book title ‘Rapidolangue or the failure of Gabonese languages at school’. It is, according to him, an isolated attempt by the Raponda Walker Foundation to introduce Gabonese languages in Catholic schools, which has never worked out due to a lack of political will. Nevertheless, Rapidolangue books can be found in several bookshops in Gabon, whereas some supporters may advertise and try to sell their own local language booklets around shops in Libreville. Boucher (1999, 181) states that 32 % among the young residents of Libreville from 15 to 30 years old were in favour of introducing ethnic languages at school and 68 % disagreed, among them all people working in the education context. According to Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007), 87 % of students wish ethnic languages could be introduced in school programmes (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 157). The main question is which one(s). So French remains the only language used in education and becomes the native language for more and more young people. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot states that Gabonese decision-makers stand for French as the only institutional language: Ethnic languages are widely absent from schools and all classes are taught in French (2007, 55). For her too, the political will to support national languages is insufficient, especially in the national education system (2007, 75). On that point, it seems that nothing has really progressed since 2007. Considering foreign languages, English is a compulsory subject. It is taught as a second language from the sixth grade (i.e., secondary school, first year). Later, a third language is introduced in the fourth grade (i.e., secondary school, third year, cf. CONFEMEN 2008, 16). The third language can be Spanish, German, Arabic, or Swahili (cf. Leclerc 2021). English is also taught and used in international schools in Libreville, which are dedicated to rather wealthy people, such as the École franco-britannique and École Ruban vert, where all subjects are taught in English. There also used to be an American school, which is momentarily closed. Very few schooled Gabonese are able to speak English, as they do not live in an English-speaking environment. Actually, facing this situation sounds very demanding to the École franco-britannique, with most of the students being French speakers. Now, considering foreign languages:  

 

 

‘Teachers preparing for international diplomas in hard sciences, information and communication technologies, the valorization of local languages, or Bantu culture and civilization can benefit, by contract with the State, of peculiar advantages: of French; of English as soon as nursery school; of

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a second foreign language as soon as secondary school with Spanish, Arabic, German, Mandarin, Swahili, or Russian to choose from […]’.19

So, it seems there has been, for quite a long time, a declared political will to extend the teaching of foreign languages as soon and as widely as possible.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – Print media are in French only. Thanks to the freedom of the press from the 1990s on, around thirty different newspapers can be bought, such as L’Union, which used to be the only daily newspaper, close to the political authorities, as well as Matin équatorial, La Concorde, Le Moustique en colère, La Loupe, Bazooka, La Une, among many others. Some titles are in local language like Moutouki ‘(lit.) Thrift shop’, Le Douk-Douk ‘(lit.) The Small Knife [used for fighting]’, Le Nganga ‘(lit.) The Healer [cf. 4.3]’, but all texts are in French. Audiovisual media – The same holds for audiovisual media: Gabonese radio and TV programmes such as movies, documentaries, or various shows are broadcast in French, and the audiovisual world is dominated by programmes from France (cf. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 68). Some languages like Fang, Punu, Njebi, Latege, Mbere, Myene, Sira, and Kota are somewhat promoted, but only three of the six radio channels air a weekly programme in Gabonese languages (cf. Leclerc 2021). The main local languages are used for local news and various announcements such as notifications of death or for information campaigns when the administrative power wants to make sure to be understood by all. Besides, it is very easy to listen to Radio France Internationale in French or to Africa n°1 Gabon, since November 2018 Africa Radio. The recent development of the internet also facilitates access to TV channels in French for those who can afford it. But it is worth mentioning the high number of dish antennas inside the country, often on roofs that cover rather scanty dwellings. This situation cannot but reinforce the impact of French. Internet – With the exception of some private dialogues, French has the monopoly on information on websites. According to the World Bank, Gabon is today the sixth most performing African country in internet communication technologies, after Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa, Cabo Verde, and Botswana (cf. WB 2018). French enjoys a massive weight on this media too.

19 “Les promoteurs préparant aux diplômes internationaux dans les sciences dures, les technologies de l’information et de la communication, la valorisation des langues locales, la culture et la civilisation bantoue, peuvent bénéficier, dans un cadre contractuel avec l’État, d’avantages particuliers: de français; d’anglais dès le pré-primaire; d’une deuxième langue étrangère dès la sixième, au choix entre l’espagnol, l’arabe, l’allemand, le mandarin, le kiswahili ou le russe” (Law 21, art. 132).

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4 Linguistic characteristics Boucher/Lafage (2000, XXIII) point out three main groups of French users: a smaller and smaller group of older and illiterate people, using what is called “petit français”, a basilectal French, even if of much better quality than the one of other African countries; a second group of formally educated people who mainly speak the mesolectal variety including regional features; and a third group of highly educated people, using standard or academic French, i.e. the acrolectal variety, and potentially able to resort to lower lectal varieties when they feel so. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007, 68) also notices the popularization of Gabonese linguistic features through radio and TV broadcasts, working towards the use of a local standard.

4.1 Pronunciation As said above, most speakers with a high level of education use an acrolectal variety, similar to standard French, and no local accent can be noticed. Now, paying attention to spoken language, Boucher/Lafage (2000, XXXVI) state that there might be a slightly different pronunciation from one ethnic group to another. Given the large number of groups and their linguistic proximity, describing these differences could be long and difficult. This is the reason why they do not mention any IPA transcript in their work. Pronunciation of speakers in Ogooué – Nevertheless, Mouguiama-Daouda (2019a, 89) points out some phonetic features in the French of speakers in Ogooué. He says front and half-closed vowels are introduced, often instead of the schwa, as in pétit [peti], samédi [samedi], réligion [reliʒjɔ̃], rather than standard French [p(ə)ti], [samdi], [ʁ(ə)liʒjɔ̃]. The speakers in Ogooué do not neutralize the opposition /ɛ̃/ : /œ̃ / and still make a difference between brun [bʁœ̃ ] and brin [bʁɛ̃] (Mouguiama-Daouda 2019a, 89), which is not the case for Fang, Punu, or Sangu speakers (Massinga Kombila 2013, 230). Pronunciation of Fang, Punu, and Sangu speakers – Massinga Kombila describes different phonological systems, particularly those of Fang, Punu, and Sangu (2013, 195–239). He points out some consonant variations, for instance [ʒ] realized as [z], as in un jour [œ̃ zur] instead of [œ̃ ʒuʁ], or [ʃ] pronounced [s], as in chasser [sase] instead of [ʃase], and the realization of a dental [r] instead of the usual uvular [ʁ] of standard French. There are also frequent vowel variations, like [y] pronounced [i], as in député [depite] instead of [depyte] or in budget [bidʒe] instead of [bydʒɛ], which may appear graphically as in the Gabonese written press. In the same way, [ø] becomes [i], [e], or [ɛ], according to the phonological context. Thus, monsieur will be pronounced [misje] instead of [møsjø] and sénateur [senatɛr] instead of [senatœʁ] (2013, 224–228). Spelling – The local pronunciation not only changes the spelling in the case of budget. Also, e.g., degré, mousquetaire, or Catherine are sometimes written (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 130), (Ndemby 2011, 100), or , the latter being a frequent occurrence in school lists or teacher observations. Mixing up

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the front open vowel [a] and the back open nasal [ɑ̃] implies further spelling confusion as, for instance, à [a] l’occurrence instead of en [ɑ̃] l’occurrence (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 27), while mixing up [e] and [i] or [œ] and [ɛ] implies a possible confusion between sénateur and signataire, as mentioned in the original example in Massinga Kombila (2013, 229). Anyway, poor knowledge of written forms leads to surprising basilectal spellings, as *assouvissance instead of à suffisance. Moreover, those changes may induce a grammatical difference, as an identical pronunciation of [ə] and [e] blurrs the boundary between singular and plural when [lə] is pronounced [le] (le and les, Massinga Kombila 2013, 230). Those spellings can be mere occasional occurrences; nevertheless, they are a potential source of errors as soon as the writer slackens his or her attention or does not know the correct spelling.

4.2 Morphosyntax Some differences to the exogenous standard also appear in the morphosyntax, depending on the level of knowledge, the situation, and the attention paid to the spoken or the written forms. (In)direct transitive verbs – For instance, an indirect transitive verb can become direct transitive, as accoucher quelqu‘un instead of accoucher de quelqu‘un ‘to give birth to’ (i), assister quelque chose instead of assister à quelque chose ‘to attend something’ (ii), or permettre quelqu’un de instead of permettre à quelqu’un de ‘to allow someone to’ (iii). Merging or confusing the personal pronouns as objects can be linked to the issue of direct or indirect transitivity. In les en vouloir instead of leur en vouloir ‘to resent them’ (iv) and le penser instead of y penser ‘to think about it’ (v), the indirect transitive constructions en vouloir à quelqu’un and penser à quelqu’un are used as if they were direct: en vouloir quelqu’un and penser quelqu’un. (i) “Le médecin lui a dit qu’elle va accoucher les jumeaux” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, 3).20 (ii) “Ils racontent par exemple une bagarre qu’ils ont assisté” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 363).21 (iii) “[…] il sera difficile pour Diwekou de se faire Hara-kiri pour permettre ‘tonton’, dans la détresse, de survivre politiquement” (Le Moustique en colère 56, 8/9/2018).22 (iv) “[…] on ne peut pas les en vouloir” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 373).23 (v) “T’avais qu’à le penser plus tôt” (Otsiemi 2013, 54).24

20 ‘The doctor told her she was going to give birth to twins’. 21 ‘They report, for example, a fight they have witnessed’. 22 ‘[…] it will be difficult for Diwekou to commit Hara-kiri in order to allow “tonton”, in distress, to survive politically’. 23 ‘[…] you cannot be angry with them’. 24 ‘You should have thought of it sooner’.

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Valency, pronominal and causative constructions – Another common usage is the change of the verbal valency, which can lead to an absolute construction, as in fréquenter ‘to go to school’ instead of fréquenter quelque chose ‘to attend something’ (i) or préparer ‘to prepare a meal’ instead of préparer quelque chose ‘to prepare something’ (ii). A difference may occur with pronominal verbs. A non-pronominal verb can be used with a pronominal structure, as in se survivre instead of survivre ‘to survive’ (iii), and, vice versa, some pronominal verbs appear with a non-pronominal structure, as in garer instead of se garer ‘to park’ (iv). To end with, the factitive construction faire + verb is sometimes reduced to a single verb, as in miroiter instead of faire miroiter ‘to fool someone into believing something’ (v). “À l’époque, mon père travaillait et je fréquentais avec les petits Blancs, voilà pourquoi j’ai capté vite la langue” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 336).25 (ii) “Tu ne sais rien faire, même pas préparer” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, 331).26 (iii) “[…] plus de trente ans après les indépendances, le processus se survit sous d’autres formes […]” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 28).27 (iv) “Veuillez bien garer” (signpost on a car-park, Libreville, June 2019).28 (v) “[…] dame Banzolo leur miroitait des intégrations rapides à la Fonction publique” (Gabon Media Time, 20/9/2019).29 (i)

Most of these cases are not Gabonese idiosyncratic features but subregional usages that also exist in neighbouring French-speaking countries like Cameroon and Congo.

4.3 Lexicon Lexicon is another interesting aspect as it is directly linked to the social and cultural environment and the linguistic inventiveness of the Gabonese (or African) users of French. We consider those particularities as an enrichment of the French language as long as the creativity follows the lexical rules. It often resorts to the principles of external and internal innovation of form and meaning (cf. Reutner 2017, 47–51). External innovation – In the category of lexical borrowings from local languages, we can, for example, mention Tsogo bwiti ‘spiritual discipline that mixes animism and ancestor worship with Christian elements and uses the hallucinogenic effects of the iboga root for initiation rites, healing, and personal development’ (i), Myene kevazingo ‘rare wood, sometimes regarded as sacred by some local communities’ (ii), or Duala mapane

25 ‘In those days, my father was working and I went to school with the white children, that’s why I picked up the language quickly’. 26 ‘You don’t know how to do anything, not even how to prepare a meal’. 27 ‘[…] more than thirty years after independence, the process persists in other forms […]’. 28 ‘Please park well’. 29 ‘[…] lady Banzolo lured them with quick integration into the civil service’.

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‘slum’, a slang word of young people, which originally comes from Cameroon and is the regional equivalent of Pg. favela ‘Brazilian slum’ (iii). “Alors, qu’est-ce le bwiti? Une initiation? Une sorcellerie? Une spirée de danses et d’orgies? En réalité, le bwiti est ces trois choses à la fois” (Dedet 1984, 182).30 (ii) “Bien que valant beaucoup d’argent sur le marché international, particulièrement dans les pays asiatiques, le Kevazingo ne devrait bientôt plus être exploité au Gabon” (Gabon Review, 2/4/2019).31 (iii) “Notre combat est essentiellement axé sur l’amélioration des conditions de vie des populations en particulier ceux du Mapane” (Info 241, 9/1/2019).32 (i)

Innovation vs. standard French – Borrowings from local languages are often only partial synonyms as they usually convey a deeper local connotation compared to their French equivalent (cf. Benzakour 2000). This is the case of tchiza (unknown origin) and petite, both meaning ‘girlfriend’, of Mpongwe odika and chocolat indigène, both meaning ‘local seasoning made from mango kernels’, which is far from what chocolat ‘chocolate’ conveys in occidental culture. Similarly, féticheur, pejorative in France, is a partial synonym of nganga ‘spiritual healer’. Finally, some words are also borrowed from English, such as boy ‘servant’, which also has a different connotation compared to its standard French alternatives. Internal innovation of form – In the category of abbreviations, clando ‘illegal taxi’ (< clandestin ‘secret, illegal’, i) and PK ‘place named by its distance from a reference location (for instance from a large city exit)’ (< point kilométrique ‘(lit.) kilometre point’, ii) are commonly used. The same holds for derivations like charlatanisme ‘charlatan activity’ (< charlatan + ‑isme, iii) or se lunetter ‘to put on glasses’ (< lunettes ‘glasses’ + ‑er, iv), compound words as moto-benne ‘tricycle with a dumpster, usually used to remove the litter’ (< moto ‘motorcycle’ + benne ‘dumpster’, v), sous-région ‘group of several countries belonging to a geographically or economically homogenous area’ (< sous ‘sub’ + région ‘region’, vi), and hybridizations (combinations of a word or suffix, usually in French or English, with a local borrowing), as in bwitiste ‘person practising Bwiti’ (< Tsogo bwiti + ‑iste, vii) or kevazingogate ‘scandal after an illegal export of kevazingo’ (< Myene kevazingo ‘precious Gabonese wood’ + En. gate), built on the model of En. watergate and other x- + ‑gate (viii).

30 ‘So what is Bwiti? An initiation? A sorcery? A scrub of dances and orgies? In fact, Bwiti is all three of these things at once’. 31 ‘Although it is worth a lot of money on the international market, particularly in Asian countries, kevazingo should soon no longer be exploited in Gabon’. 32 ‘Our fight is essentially focused on improving people’s living conditions, in particular those of Mapane’.

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“Même les responsables ou conducteurs des véhicules administratifs n’ont pu résister à la tentation de se transformer en clandos” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, 112).33 (ii) “Pk6, […] à cheval entre le 3ème et le 6ème arrondissement de Libreville, est confronté à une insécurité grandissante [...]” (Gabonactu, 12/2/2019).34 (iii) “Sorcellerie, magie, charlatanisme, anthropophagie, tels sont les crimes recensés par le législateur au moment de la rédaction du code pénal” (Le Douk-Douk 153, 31/8/2018).35 (iv) “Commençons par les affaires en souffrance, dit-il, en se lunettant” (Otsiemi 2013, 154).36 (v) “[...] la moto-benne prend de l’ampleur” (L’Union 13034, 3/6/2019).37 (vi) “[…] selon certaines informations, le district de Meyo-Kyè est appelé à devenir un carrefour majeur pour les échanges dans la sous-région d’Afrique centrale” (Le Moustique en colère 56, 8/9/2018).38 (vii) “Toutes les confessions religieuses [...] avaient tenu à ne pas briller par leur absence: musulmans, catholiques, bouddhistes, orthodoxes, buitistes” (Ndemby 2011, 82).39 (viii) “Le ‘kévazingogate’, un trafic de bois précieux qui a provoqué un scandale politique au Gabon […]” (VOA, 22/5/2019).40 (i)

Additional examples can be found with broussard ‘person used to country life’ (brousse ‘bush’ + ‑ard), taximan ‘taxi driver’ (< taxi + man), tradipraticien ‘healer, traditional doctor’ (< traditionnel ‘traditional’ + praticien ‘practitioner’), and coupé-coupé ‘braised meat sold on the roadside’ (< coupé ‘cut’). Internal innovation of meaning – From a semantic point of view, we can point out changes of meaning, as in bottines ‘football cleats’ instead of ‘ankle boots’ (i) or pointe ‘elephant tusk’ instead of ‘spike’ (ii), changes of connotation, as vieux ‘old [always with a positive and respectful meaning]’ instead of ‘old’ (iii), restricted meanings with conjoncture ‘bad situation or circumstances’ instead of ‘any situation, good or bad’ (iv) or, on the contrary, extended meanings with frère, sœur ‘person of the same generation in the same family’, and by extension, ‘African person’ instead of frère ‘brother’/sœur ‘sister’ (v). (i)

“Dans dix jours (8 septembre), les Gabonais croiseront les bottines des Hirondelles du Burundi dans le cadre des éliminatoires de la CAN Cameroun 2019” (Le Douk-Douk 153, 31/8/2018).41

33 ‘Even the people in charge or drivers of the administrative vehicles could not resist the temptation to become illegal taxis’. 34 ‘Pk6, […] between the 3rd and 6th arrondissement of Libreville, is faced with growing insecurity […]’. 35 ‘Sorcery, magic, charlatanism, anthropophagy, these are the crimes listed by the legislator at the time of drafting the Penal Code’. 36 ‘“Let’s start with the unfinished business”, he says, putting on his glasses’. 37 ‘[…] the dumpster tricycle is gaining ground’. 38 ‘[…] according to some reports, the Meyo-Kyè district is set to become a major crossroads for exchange in the Central African sub-region’. 39 ‘All religious denominations […] were committed to not being notably absent: Muslims, Catholics, Buddhists, Orthodox, Bwitists’. 40 ‘The “kevazingogate”, a trade in precious woods that has provoked a political scandal in Gabon […]’. 41 ‘In ten days (8 September), the Gabonese will cross their football cleats with the Burundi Swallows as part of the qualifiers for the Africa Cup of Nations [Coupe d’Afrique des Nations – CAN] Cameroon 2019’.

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(ii) “Il avait été interpellé dans un motel de Libreville en possession de 4 pointes d’ivoire” (Gabon Review, 28/5/2019).42 (iii) “Nous étions chez Badinga, mon vieux de tout à l’heure” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, 389).43 (iv) “C’est la conjoncture: beaucoup de gens n’ont plus l’argent” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, 121).44 (v) “Nos informateurs ont manifesté des réactions contrastées par rapport aux parlers de leurs frères Africains” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 186).45

Other examples are mouiller la barbe ‘to bribe’ instead of ‘to wet the beard’, en langue ‘in the local language’ instead of ‘in language’, c’est comment? ‘what happens?’ instead of ‘how is it?’ (cf. 5.3), deuxième bureau ‘mistress, lover’ instead of ‘second office’, médicament ‘traditional medicine prepared by a healer’ instead of ‘medicine’, or payer ‘to buy’ instead of ‘to pay’. Statalisms and sub-regionalisms – According to Poirier’s definition (1995, 29), the words whose use is restricted to Gabon can be considered statalisms when they are ‘words that refer to local (or regional or national) realia; these realia are linked to fauna, flora, physical environment, food, housing, administration, political system, culture, etc.’.46 These forms are used by all people, Gabonese or not, speaking about Gabon, provided they know enough about the local culture and the local variety of French. Statalisms can express a regional reality as flora, like in okoumé ‘tree used in plywood manufacturing’ (okoumé is also known in France, but rather as an industrial wood than as a tree) and ngaba ‘giant fern’, or gentilics, like in Migovéen ‘inhabitant from Middle Ogooué’, Altogovéen ‘inhabitant from Upper Ogooué’, and Molvilois ‘inhabitant from the town Mouila’. Some others words describing local realia are songoh ‘traditional game using tokens logically arranged in pits according to the game rules’, a game that is found all over Africa with different names,47 and the above mentioned items odika, mapanes, and coupé-coupé. As in the case of morphosyntax, some of the items are also spread in neighbouring countries, like tchiza or okoumé, which can also be found in Cameroon. Others are widespread as pan-African linguistic features, as for example deuxième bureau and médicament, which are also attested for Benin, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Niger, Senegal, and Togo, or payer, which is also used in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Congo-Kinshasa, the Central African Republic, Côte

42 ‘He was arrested in a Libreville motel in possession of 4 ivory tusks’. 43 ‘We were at Badinga’s, my old friend from just now’. 44 ‘It’s the bad circumstances: Many people no longer have money’. 45 ‘Our informants showed contrasting reactions to the language of their African brothers’. 46 “[…] mots servant à désigner les realia locales (ou régionales, ou nationales); ces realia sont relatives à la faune, à la flore, à l’environnement physique, à l’alimentation, à l’habitat, à l’administration, au système politique, à la culture, etc.” (Poirier 1995, 29). 47 These include, among others, Kwa awalé in Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, and Togo, Kirundi ikibuguzo in Burundi, Zarma dili in Burkina Faso and Niger, Ewe/Fon adji in Benin and Togo, and French jeu à douze cases ‘twelve holes game’ in Côte d’Ivoire.

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d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, and Togo (cf. Équipe IFA 2004; Massoumou/Queffélec 2007; Boucher-Lafage 2000; Frey 2003).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic attitudes Usually, there is no criticism of African influences regarding the lexicon. It seems like, on the contrary, there is a will to keep tradition and culture, usually, but not only, through the use of ethnic languages. Considering French not only an international language, but also a Gabonese language, it should obviously adapt to local situations by lexical or semantic neologisms and borrowings from Gabonese languages to better refer to the local outside world, either because there is no appropriate word in standard French or because a borrowing or a neologism suits the context better (cf. 4.3.) Like in most African French-speaking countries, there is no explicit official position on forms diverging from standard French. Exogenous standard French is implicitly the only correct form, which should be used in formal contexts and taught in schools. Other forms are considered as not correct. Regarding this point on the level of accent, for instance, opinions can be quite different from one person to another. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007, 177) points out that about 65 % of the Gabonese speak French with no or just a slight accent, to which 56 % are indifferent, 34 % admirative, and 10 % highly critical and consider it as a loss of identity (2007, 179); this opinion seems stronger in the Fang area (2007, 183), where the verb gorger means ‘to speak with a standard French accent’. Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007, 194) states that Gabonese have a neutral or even positive attitude towards their possible accent, but she also notes that 52 % of them believe there is a negative attitude towards people speaking with a Gabonese accent (2007, 173). They think that standard French conveys some social prestige and is likely to foster social promotion (2007, 175). It appears anyway that using ‘good French’ is a positive factor. That could be the reason why the local accent is more depreciated in the lower social classes (2007, 175), as they are striving for a better social standing.  

 

 

 

 

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics There is no dictionary as such that would validate Gabonese lexical peculiarities. Gabon is also absent from both IFA (cf. Équipe IFA 2004) and the BDLP. The main work in this domain is the lexical inventory by Boucher/Lafage (2000) with a descriptive and polylectal point of view and no normative intention. Other publications are Bounguendza (2008) or Ditougou (2009). The latter was the subject of a study by Ondo-Mébiame/Ekwa Ebanéga (2011). Also, some research papers were initiated at the University of Paris 3 or the Omar Bongo University, such as Boutin-Dousset (1989) or Moussounda Ibouanga

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(2008). Boucher/Lafage (2000, XXIV) and Moussirou-Mouyama/de Samie (1996, 603s.) offer more references. Those works describe in a neutral way what is called gabonisms compared to standard French, with no intention to codify a national standard. Yet, they gather useful information if the public authorities decide to do so. Orthographic descriptions are usually included in those inventories: Boucher/Lafage (2000) in the above-mentioned book are precise on this aspect. They provide an orthography that regularly occurs in the corpus or the one that conforms to the French graphic structure, side by side with other orthographic options encountered in local spellings (Boucher/Lafage 2000, XXXIVs.). For instance, considering borrowings from local languages, bwiti may also be spelled bouïti, bouiti, buiti, or bwete, the four of them referring to Bwiti, gnémboué, gnémbwé, nyembwe, niembwe, or niamboue can all stand for ‘seasoning made from palm nuts or palm oil’, koumhou, kumhu, koumou, nkoumou, or nkumu for ‘meal made of minced vegetables’, quinqueliba, quinquiliba, quinquelibat, or kinkeliba for ‘small tree whose leaves have therapeutic effects’, and sapack or sapak for ‘sea fish of poor quality’. In the same way, well-integrated loans can be spelled differently as, for instance, jacquier or jaquier ‘Artocarpus heterophyllus, jackfruit tree’ with both spellings being registered in the PR (s.v.). As we can see, there is no fixed orthography for some words and different spellings may even occur in the same book, by the same author, as here with gnémboué and gnémbwé in Okoumba-Nkoghe (1989): “À peine s’était-il éloigné que se présenta un homme, avec un bâton de manioc lourd, avec un poulet au gnémboué” (Okoumba-Nkoghe 1989, 13).48 “Il y avait là pour sa gourmandise des silures préparés à l’étouffée dans une farine de concombre, des vers de raphia, un morceau de boa et un chat sauvage entier enroulé au gnémbwé” (Okoumba-Nkoghe 1989, 93).49

As far as grammar is concerned, academic French is the only officially correct form, as it is in all French-speaking African countries. To our knowledge, no particular grammar book was ever published, but here too, different research papers tackle Gabonese grammatical usage, for example Mbonzi (1998), Italia (2000), and Pambou (2003).

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics The usage of linguistic characteristics is rare, according to Boucher/Lafage (2000, XXXIII): ‘Due to its wide extension in national communication, French in Gabon is close to the variety used in the Hexagon, and this much more, it seems, as it is the case in other French-speaking African

48 ‘He was hardly away when a man came with a heavy cassava bar, with a gnémboué chicken’. 49 ‘There was, for his gluttony, catfish steamed in cucumber flour, raffia worms, a piece of boa, and a whole wildcat rolled in gnémbwé’.

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countries […]. It is nevertheless possible to notice, especially in written media, some linguistic distortions that are not easy to classify. In this case, only the high number of examples allows distinguishing the nature of the peculiarity and describing it’.50

Variety used by public authorities – Public authorities, for their part, normally use standard or academic French. Many of them have reached higher education and studied in France. However, they may use or have to use gabonisms (e. g., statalisms) to refer to realities that only exist in Gabon (or in Africa) or that are officially differently named. Examples are mentioned above, such as gouverneur de province, primature, kevazingo, or bwiti. Variety used in education – Regarding the language used at school, Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007, 63) remarks a gap between what the school system recommends, e. g., standard language, and the everyday usage of local French on the lexical, phonetic, and morphosyntactic level. Should the model be an academic and homogenous international standard French or the regional variety that takes into account the sociocultural and psychological features? Considering the linguistic needs of the people is an important argument to make a political decision on language in education. But as we have already said, the question has been asked, the answer is pending. What is now the teacher’s competence? Of course, it depends on the individual knowledge. Some of them use an international standard French, resorting, when needed, to statalisms. However, below are some examples derived from a thesis of Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot (2007). They show that there can be an unconscious mixing of exogenous and endogenous standards at university level, including students considering a teaching carrier and using en langue instead of en langue locale (i), se survivre instead of survivre (ii), or des instead of de (iii):  

 

“En effet, à l’intérieur de la famille, les participants parlent davantage en langue [en langue locale] quand il y a une occasion spéciale” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 126).51 (ii) “[...] plus de trente ans après les indépendances, le processus se survit [survit] sous d’autres formes” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 28).52 (iii) “Le manque des [de] travaux sur la diversité du plurilinguisme gabonais […] nous a incité à entreprendre une enquête à Libreville” (Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot 2007, 5).53 (i)

50 “Du fait de l’extension de son usage dans la communication nationale, la langue française au Gabon est proche de celle qui est pratiquée dans l’hexagone, bien plus, semble-t-il, que ce n’est le cas dans d’autres pays africains francophones […]. Il arrive cependant de percevoir, notamment dans la presse écrite, certaines distorsions délicates à cerner. Dans ce cas, seule la multiplication des exemples relevés permet de distinguer la réalité de l’écart et donc de le décrire” (Boucher/Lafage 2000, XXXIII). 51 ‘In fact, the participants speak more in the language [the local language] within the family when there is a special occasion’. 52 ‘[…] more than thirty years after independence, the process persists in other forms’. 53 ‘The lack of research on the diversity of plurilingualism in Gabon [...] has prompted us to conduct a survey in Libreville’.

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Variety used in the media – In the media, especially printed media, different language levels are used, depending on the newspaper. Some as L’Union, founded on 15 March 1974 and positioned as the state-power newspaper, use standard French, an acrolectal variety that nevertheless requires some unavoidable statalisms. The new born Bazooka and Le Douk-Douk, on their side, show many more particularities, as do Moutouki, Le Moustique en colère, or La Loupe, using at the same time quite a correct form of French. Other newspapers as Le Scarabée apply the mesolectal variety or forms that are obviously due to a deficient linguistic knowledge rather than to typing errors, whereas wrong occurrences and clumsy sentences are particularly numerous in Matin équatorial. We just provide some examples to give an idea of clumsy or wrong expressions that can be found in those newspapers: “Les problèmes de trésorerie […] ne sont pas prêts [instead of près] de connaître un épilogue” (Matin équatorial 451, 17/10/2018).54 (ii) “Que cachent les autorités gabonaises derrière la maladie d’Ali Bongo? Au tant [instead of autant] de questions qui attendre [instead of attendent] des réponses” (Le Scarabée 62, 12/12/ 2018).55 (iii) “Personnes [instead of personne] dans ce pays n’avait pu de brûle [instead of n’avait pu brûler] le respect à Rawiri de son vivant” (Le Scarabée 62, 12/12/2018).56 (iv) “Les détenus dont il est question ici [...] sont des Gabonais économiquement faible [instead of faibles]. C’est pour quoi [instead of pourquoi], nous avons pensé que, nonobstant le faite [instead of fait] qu’ils sont privés de liberté, ils ne demeurent pas [instead of il demeure] que ce sont des Gabonais” (Le Scarabée 62, 12/12/2018).57 (i)

Variety used in literature – Language particularities in literature often appear when the writers are trying to express local thought and reality (Moussirou-Mouyama/de Samie 1996, 611) through regionalisms, which can be introduced in different ways (cf. Reutner 2017, 56s.; 2023, 255–262): rompée (i), canneur (ii), and nganga (iii) are pointed out as gabonisms through a different font and provided with a translation or an explanation, whereas se confondre à (iv), concession (v), and demi carte photo (vi), are, right or wrong, presented as regular items. Despite variations, no equivalent in standard French is suggested: (i)

“Il devait rentrer chez lui à la rompée1 à 17 heures car c’était l’équipe de Koumba qui allait assurer la permanence de nuit durant le week-end. […] 1 Fin de la journée de travail” (Otsiemi 2013, 121).58

54 ‘The cash flow problems […] are not close to an epilogue’. 55 ‘What do the Gabonese authorities hide behind Ali Bongo’s illness? So many questions that are waiting for answers’. 56 ‘Nobody in this country could ruin the respect for Rawiri during his lifetime’. 57 ‘The prisoners in question here […] are economically weak Gabonese. This is why we thought that, despite the fact that they are deprived of their freedom, they are still Gabonese’. 58 ‘He should go home at 5 pm on the rompée,1 as Koumba’s team was going to be on duty at night over the weekend. […] 1End of the working day’.

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(ii) “Les policiers gabonais étaient connus comme des canneurs.2 C’était un cliché qui avait la vie dure. […] 2 Soûlards” (Otsiemi 2013, 148).59 (iii) “Hommes ou femmes cèdent volontiers au chantage de certains ngangas,3 véritables vendeurs d’illusions qui leur promettent souvent monts et merveilles. […] 3 Nganga: tradithérapeute, parfois féticheur ou même sorcier” (Mbazoo 2018, 11s.).60 (iv) “Les larmes du ciel se confondent à celles de ses yeux habités par un chagrin ineffable” (Mbazoo 2018, 81).61 (v) “Or nous, nous allions spontanément proposer nos services aux voisins nantis. Nous balayions leurs concessions, moyennant quelques pièces ou quelques vivres” (Mbazoo 2018, 56s.).62 (vi) “[...] la demi carte photo du patriarche était toujours à côté de la reine pour traduire le caractère transitoire et le côté éphémère du poste qu’elle occupait […]” (Ndemby 2011, 78).63

Considering what is a local norm and the real mistakes above apart, the problem lies in the question: Is it still a mistake to do what most people do? Reporting from both lexicon and grammar, rassurer que (instead of assurer que) is an interesting example, as it frequently occurs in many African countries and merges the double meaning assurer and rassurer in standard French. The answer partly depends on linguistic evolution and linguistic purism and makes the difference between description and prescription. The answer also depends on legal decisions; as there are none, the implicit rule is academic French, and the concrete usage is users’ habits.

References AGM = Ambassade du Gabon au Maroc (2018), Les ethnies et les langues, Rabat, Haute Représentation de la République gabonaise au Royaume du Maroc, https://www.ambagabon.ma/gabon/ethnies-et-langues (2/3/2023). Bagouendi-Bagère Bonnot, Diane (2007), Le français au Gabon: représentations et usages, Marseille, Université de Provence, Doctoral Thesis. BDLP = Claude Poirier et al. (edd.) (2001–2014), Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone, Quebec/ Paris, TLFQ/AUF, http://www.bdlp.org (2/3/2023). Benzakour, Fouzia (2000), Le français au Maroc. Le problème des doublets: entre dénotation et connotation, in: Danielle Latin et al. (edd.), Contacts de langues et identités culturelles, Quebec, Presses de l’Université Laval, 313–323.

59 ‘Gabonese policemen were known as canneurs.2 It was a cliché that was constant. […] 2Drunkards’. 60 ‘Men and women willingly give in to the blackmail of certain ngangas,3 veritable sellers of illusions who often promise them the moon and the stars. […] 3Nganga: traditional therapist, sometimes shaman or even sorcerer’. 61 ‘The tears of heaven merge with those of his eyes filled with indescribable sorrow’. 62 ‘But we, we would spontaneously go and offer our services to our wealthy neighbours. We would sweep their estates in exchange for some coins or some food’. 63 ‘[…] the patriarch’s half-card photo was always next to the queen to convey the transitory character and the ephemeral nature of the position she held […]’.

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Boucher, Karine (1999), Approche des représentations sociolinguistiques dans un groupe de jeunes Librevillois, Le français en Afrique 13, 173–192. Boucher, Karine (2000), Les voix de Libreville, in: Karine Boucher (ed.), Le français et ses usages à l’écrit et à l’oral. Dans le sillage de Suzanne Lafage, Paris, Presses de la Sorbonne nouvelle, 73–97. Boucher, Karine/Lafage, Suzanne (2000), Le lexique français du Gabon (entre tradition et modernité), Nice, Institut de linguistique française. Bounguendza, Eric Dodo (2008), Dictionnaire des gabonismes, Paris, L’Harmattan. Boutin-Dousset, Claudette (1989), Matériaux pour un inventaire des particularités lexicales du français au Gabon, Paris, Université Sorbonne nouvelle – Paris 3, Master Thesis. C-GA (1960) = Gabonese Republic (1960), Loi constitutionnelle n° 68/60 du 14 novembre 1960, promulgant la Constitution de la République gabonaise. Titre premier. De la République et de la souveraineté, Libreville, Assemblée nationale de la République gabonaise, http://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/33bbf3_ cdce60b847724cb1acd20f36315f5c4c.pdf (2/3/2023). C-GA (1991) = Gabonese Republic (1991), La Constitution de la République gabonaise. Loi n° 3/91 du 26 mars 1991. Titre premier. De la République et de la souveraineté, Libreville, Assemblée nationale de la République gabonaise, http://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/33bbf3_1ffd32a931ec4fb6b5db70703126b0ab.pdf (2/3/2023). Calvet, Louis-Jean (2019), Interview de Louis-Jean Calvet, realized by Auguste Moussirou-Mouyama, in: Flavien Enongué/Patrick Mouguiama-Daouda (edd.), La francophonie en procès. Quelques pièces gabonaises du dossier, Paris, Descartes, 171–175. CONFEMEN (2008), Vers la scolarisation universelle de qualité pour 2015. Évaluation diagnostique PASEC Gabon, Dakar, PASEC-CONFEMEN. Dedet, Christian (1984), La mémoire du fleuve, Paris, Phébus. DGS = Direction Générale de la Statistique (2015), Résultats globaux du Recensement Général de la Population et des Logements de 2013 du Gabon (RGPL-2013), Libreville, Bureau Central du Recensement. Ditougou, Lucien (2009), On est ensemble. 852 mots pour comprendre le français du Gabon, Libreville, Fondation Raponda Walker. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Elibiyo, Mexcent Zue (2016), Rapidolangue ou Flop des langues gabonaises à l’école, Saint-Denis, Edilivre. Équipe IFA (2004 [1983]), Inventaire des particularités lexicales du français en Afrique noire, Vanves, EDICEF/ AUF. Frey, Claude (2003), Identités lexicales et variétés de français en France et hors de France: tendances centripètes et centrifuges des formes et des cultures, in: Pierre Nobel (ed.), Variations linguistiques. Koinè, dialectes, français régionaux, Besançon, Presses universitaires de Franche-Comté, 165–190. Hammarström, Harald, et al. (edd.) (2023), Glottolog 4.7, Jena, Max-Planck-Institut, https://glottolog.org/about (2/3/2023). Hubert, Jacques (1996), Rapidolangue: Méthode d’apprentissage des langues nationales, vol. 1: fang, inzebi, lembaama, omyene, yipunu, Libreville, Raponda Walker. Italia, Magali (2000), Morphosyntaxe verbale dans des corpus de locuteurs basilectaux au Gabon, Marseille, Université de Provence, Master Thesis. Law 21 = Gabonese Republic (2012), Loi n° 21/2011 du 11 février 2012 portant orientation générale de l’éducation, de la formation et de la recherche, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/ CEFAN, https://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/gabon-loi-2011.htm (2/3/2023). Leclerc, Jacques (2021), Gabon, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/CEFAN, https://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/gabon.htm (2/3/2023). LégiGabon = Renaud Soulier (2021), L’essentiel du droit gabonais à la portée de tous. Les anciennes constitutions, https://www.legigabon.com/les-anciennes-constitutions (2/3/2023).

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Massinga Kombila, Mireille (2013), Le français au Gabon: émergence d’une norme endogène: le cas de la presse écrite, Pessac, Université Michel de Montaigne – Bordeaux 3, Doctoral Thesis, https://tel.archivesouvertes.fr/tel-01229034/document (2/3/2023). Massoumou, Omer/Queffélec, Ambroise Jean-Marc (2007), Le français en République du Congo, sous l’ère pluripartiste (1991–2006), Paris, EAC/AUF. Mbazoo, Chantal Magalie (2018), Sidonie, Libreville, La Maison gabonaise du Livre. Mbonzi, Jeannette Yolande (1998), La syntaxe du français des élèves du cours moyen de Libreville: cas de l’école publique Martine Oulabou, Libreville, Université Omar Bongo, Master Thesis. Mitchell, Rebecca (2004), Perceptions du français gabonais et distribution des langues au Gabon, Le français en Afrique 19, 177–191. Mouguiama-Daouda, Patrick (2019a), Le français des rives de l’Ogooué, in: Flavien Enongué/Patrick Mouguiama-Daouda (edd.), La francophonie en procès. Quelques pièces gabonaises du dossier, Paris, Descartes et Cie, 85–93. Mouguiama-Daouda, Patrick (2019b), Statut du français, développement de l’anglais et promotion des langues nationales, in: Flavien Enongué/Patrick Mouguiama-Daouda (edd.), La francophonie en procès. Quelques pièces gabonaises du dossier, Paris, Descartes et Cie, 147–159. Moussirou-Mouyama, Auguste (1984), La langue française au Gabon: contribution sociolinguistique, Paris, Université René Descartes – Paris 5, Doctoral Thesis. Moussirou-Mouyama, Auguste/de Samie, Thierry (1996), La situation linguistique du Gabon, in: Didier de Robillard/Michel Beniamino (edd.), Le français dans l’espace francophone, vol. 2, Paris, Champion, 603– 613. Moussounda Ibouanga, Firmin (2008), Pour une lecture des particularismes gabonais: cas de la ville de Mouila. Faits de langues et identitaires, Le Français en Afrique 23, 113–133. Ndemby, Peter (2011), Le dernier voyage du roi, Libreville, Odette Maganga. OIF (2014), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Nathan/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2018), La langue française dans le monde. Synthèse, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde. Édition 2022, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Okoumba-Nkoghe, Maurice (1989), Olendé, Une épopée du Gabon, Paris, L’Harmattan. Ondo-Mébiame, Pierre/Ekwa Ebanéga, Guy-Modeste (2011), Regard critique sur “On est ensemble. 852 mots pour comprendre le français du Gabon”, Lexikos 21/1, 337–358. Otsiemi, Janis (2013), African Tabloïd, Libreville, Jigal. Pambou, Jean-Aimé (2003), Les constructions prépositionnelles chez les apprenants de français langue seconde au Gabon: étude didactique, Marseille, Université de Provence, Doctoral Thesis. Poirier, Claude (1995), Les variantes topolectales du lexique français : propositions de classement à partir d’exemples québécois, in: Michel Francard/Danièle Latin (edd.), Le régionalisme lexical, Louvain-la-Neuve, De Boeck/AUPELF-UREF, 13–56. Renombo, Steve Robert (2019), L’hospitalité dans la langue, in: Flavien Enongué/Patrick Mouguiama-Daouda (edd.), La francophonie en procès. Quelques pièces gabonaises du dossier, Paris, Descartes et Cie, 39–84. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers un typologie pluridimensionelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Reutner, Ursula (2023), Variation régionale et norme endogène dans la littérature africaine francophone, in: Gaston François Kengue/Bruno Maurer (edd.), L’expansion de la norme endogène du français en francophonie. Explorations sociolinguistiques, socio-didactiques et médiatiques, Paris, Éditions des archives contemporaines, 255–262. WB (2018), Le Gabon: premier pays connecté aux TIC en Afrique centrale et de l’Ouest grâce à des investissements judicieux, Washington, World Bank, https://www.banquemondiale.org_fr_news_feature_2018_06_25_ gabon (2/3/2023).

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Weinstein, Brian/Gardinier, David/van Hoogstraten, Jan (2023), Gabon, in: Tracy Grant et al. (edd.), Encyclopedia Britannica, Chicago, Britannica Group, https://www.britannica.com/place/Madagascar (2/3/2023). Xinhua (2012), Gabon: la promotion des langues maternelles dans les établissements scolaires, BDP-Modwoam [Bongo doit partir-Modwoam], 12 February, https://www.bdpmodwoam.org/articles/2012/02/22/gabonla-promotion-des-langues-maternelles-dans-les-etablissements-scolaires/ (2/3/2023).

David Paul Gerards and Benjamin Meisnitzer

26 Angola Abstract: The presence of Portuguese in Angola begins with the arrival of Portuguese colonists in 1482/1483. It is Angola’s only official, supra-regional, and supra-ethnic lingua franca, its use having enormously increased in the last decades. Portuguese is becoming the first language of more and more Angolans, especially in urban areas and among younger speakers. This happens at the expense of Angola’s numerous autochthonous Bantu and Khoisan languages. The country is currently experiencing a linguistically conflictual situation. While social elites proclaim an orientation towards European Portuguese, most Angolans do not fully master this exogenous norm. Official language policy measures are sparse, and a partly divergent endogenous standard variety of Angolan Portuguese is emerging. Literature, media, schools, and public institutions as well as “ordinary” speakers thus find themselves in a field of linguistic tension that is still insufficiently explored. Keywords: Angolan Portuguese, exogenous norm, endogenous norm, language change, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages Portuguese – Portuguese is the uncontested supra-regional and supra-ethnic lingua franca in present-day Angola and also Angola’s language of international relations (cf. Zau 2011, 90). Speaker percentages are lower in rural than in urban areas (49 % vs. 85 % in 2014, cf. INE 2016, 51, 99s.), where, moreover, being a (young) first-language speaker of Portuguese is more and more synonymous with being monolingual in this language (cf. Cruz 2013, 145, 150s., 157; Miguel 22014, 13–18, 31; Undolo 2014, 136; Adriano 2015, 41s.). This tendency, though time-delayed, is also true of rural areas (cf. Zau 2011, 23s.). Angola is part of the African Countries with Portuguese as Official Language (Países Africanos de Língua Oficial Portuguesa – PALOP), the Lusophone countries, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa – CPLP). Bantu languages – With a total of forty-six languages (cf. Hammarström et al. 2023 and for a slightly lower number, Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023), Bantu languages are the most wide-spread autochthonous languages in Angola, and different Bantu languages are the numerically most important autochthonous languages in all eighteen provinces (cf. Figure 1; INE 2016, 51). Kikongo is the most spoken Bantu language in the  

 

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-026

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Figure 1: Predominant autochthonous languages according to province (INE 2016, 51)

northern provinces of Uíge and Zaire, as well as in the exclave province of Cabinda, where it is often referred to as Fiote or Ibinda. The central-western provinces of Bengo, Cuanza Norte, Cuanza Sul, Luanda, and Malanje share Kimbundu as the most important Bantu language, and Chokwe plays this role in the central-eastern provinces of Luanda Norte, Luanda Sul, and Moxico. In the south-western provinces of Benguela, Bié, Huambo, and Namibe, Umbundu is predominant. The same applies to Nkhumbi (Muhumbi) in the south-western province of Huila, to Kuanyama (Kwanhama/Oshiwambo) in the southern province of Cunene, and to Nyemba (Nganguela) in the south-eastern province

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of Cuando Cubango. Other important Bantu languages are Herero, Kibala, Lunda, Luvale, Mbangala, Mbunda, Nsongo, and Nyaneka. Khoisan languages – The second autochthonous language family (marginally) present in Angola is Khoisan. Northern Ju (!Kung) and North-Central Ju (!Kung-Ekoka) have 5,630 and 5,500 speakers, respectively (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). They are spoken in Cunene and Cuando Cubango in the bordering area with Namibia, as well as in the bordering provinces of Namibe and Huila. Kxoe (Khwe, Khwedam) has about 200 speakers in Cuando Cubango in the bordering region with Sambia. Kwadi, which became extinct at least forty years ago, was spoken in the South-west of Angola.

1.2 Social distribution of languages Portuguese – In 2014, when the last Angolan census was carried out (cf. INE 2016, 51), roughly 16.9 million of 23.7 million Angolans aged two or older (71 %) spoke Portuguese, although these numbers do not distinguish between first and second language speakers. The next Angolan census is planned for 2024 and the Angolan population is among the fastest-growing in the world. As of 2022, the total population of Angola is estimated to be 34.5 million (cf. Worldometers 2022). Competence in Portuguese is a conditio sine qua non for social ascent in Angola (Chavagne 2005, 36; Zau 2011, 90s.; Undolo 2014, 95; Adriano 2015, 40s.), this high status having led to a dramatic increase of Angolans with Portuguese as their first language. Although there exists, to the best of our knowledge, no data representative of the entire country, Cruz’s (2013, 110–134) results for the cities of Lubango and Huambo are most likely valid for Angola on a whole: Portuguese language proficiency is positively correlated with schooling, high socio-economic status, and with being white (also cf. Zau 2011, 90s.).  

Table 1: Percentages of speakers of Portuguese in Angola (1975–2014) Year

First language

Second language

1975

1–2 %

15–20 %

 

33 %

1985 1996 2014

 

 

26 %

?

 

71 %  

Table 1 –excerpted from Mendes (1985), Endruschat (1990, 31), Hodges (2004, 25), and INE (2016, 51)– provides a look at the evolution of speaker percentages of Portuguese in Angola. Although it needs to be regarded with caution due to the partial lack of distinction between first and second language speakers, it shows that since Angola’s independence in 1975 the percentage of speakers of Portuguese (both as first and second language) has

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increased enormously from 1–2 % first language speakers and 15–20 % second language speakers in 1975 to an overall percentage of 71 % in 2014. Autochthonous languages – Umbundu, Kikongo, Kimbundu, Chokwe, Nyemba, Nyaneka, and Kuanyama are the most spoken autochthonous languages. Nevertheless, the stigmatization of these and other autochthonous languages –referred to as linguistic neo-colonialism by Bernardo/Severo (2018, 223)– leads to their sharp decline especially but not only in urban areas. Speakers tend to avoid using them in public, but more and more also in familiar situations. They often have negative and skeptical attitudes towards their autochthonous languages, which is detrimental to their preservation. Table 2 provides the overall speaker numbers and percentages of the most important autochthonous languages spoken in Angola as of 2014. The percentages refer to the population share weighed against that of the entire country. The first seven autochthonous languages were once referred to as national languages in official Angolan terminology, even though in present-day Angola this term is often used for all autochthonous languages spoken in the country (cf. 2.2).  

 

 

Table 2: Speakers of autochthonous languages in Angola (INE 2016, 51, 99) Language

Number of speakers

%

Umbundu

5,449,819

22.96

Kikongo (including Fiote/Ibinda)

2,524,487

10.63

Kimbundu

1,855,951

7.82

Chokwe

1,553,019

6.54

Nyemba

739,070

3.11

Nyaneka

812,357

3.42

Kuanyama

537,533

2.26

Nkhumbi

502,881

2.12

Luvale

248,002

1.04

other autochthonous languages (including non-Bantu)

854,045

3.6

15,077,164

63.5

Multilingualism – According to the 2014 census (cf. INE 2016, 99), the overall number of Angolans aged two or older who speak more than one language is 9,020,404 (38 %). However, it does not give insights into which languages are mostly involved in bi- or multilingualism. Thus, no conclusions can be drawn with regard to how many of these speakers are plurilingual in autochthonous languages and Portuguese or in several autochthonous languages only.  

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2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of Portuguese The beginning of the Portuguese presence in Angola can be traced back to the arrival of the explorer Diogo Cão at the mouth of the Congo River in the Kingdom of Kongo in 1482/1483 (cf. Zau 2011, 94). At first, the relations between the few Portuguese colonists, whose settlements were limited to the coastline, and the autochthonous were peaceful to the extent that the two parties even entered into an initial alliance (cf. Fernandes/Ntondo 2002, 101; Zau 2011, 95; Adriano 2015, 34). Portuguese expansion slowly set off in the sixteenth century when the Portuguese king Dom Sebastião ordered the foundation of São Paulo de Luanda (1576), which is present-day Luanda. By the end of the sixteenth century, the colony comprised little more than Luanda itself, the city of Benguela, and some forts in the interior along the Kwanza River (cf. Inverno 2008, 120s.). The first phase of Portuguese presence mainly aimed at the exploitation of the colony in terms of natural resources (especially silver) and manpower through slavery (cf. Undolo 2014, 33s.; Inverno 2008, 120s.). Despite Portuguese being the official language, early colonization did not coincide with significant linguistic expansion. Instead, Kikongo, and later Kimbundu, played the role of vehicular languages between the Portuguese and the autochthonous. This is also supported by high rates of miscegenation, mixed children (mestiços) of Portuguese men usually being raised with the autochthonous language of their mothers (and/or of domestic servants) as their first language (cf. Inverno 2008, 120s.). Missionaries tended to use autochthonous languages in their schools (cf. Mingas 2000, 56). The seventeenth century is characterized by territorial expansion also helped by newly recruited Portuguese colonists from Brazil (cf. Chavagne 2005, 26s.), by a temporary territorial loss due to attacks by Dutch troops, and by a number of subsequent wars between the Portuguese and autochthonous tribes. The Portuguese language began to serve as a lingua franca between Portuguese traders and Angolan chiefs of the interior part of the country, even though Portuguese political control basically remained restricted to Luanda. Here, in turn, and except for some rare exceptions, Kimbundu continued to be the dominant language, also because a considerable number of Afro-Portuguese mestiços –and, in fact, Brazilians (cf. Chavagne 2005, 26s.)– started to occupy high positions in the military and in local administration (cf. Inverno 2008, 121s.). In the eighteenth century, Luanda continued to be mainly Kimbundu-speaking, with the vast majority of its estimated 7,204 inhabitants at the end of the century still being black (cf. Inverno 2008, 122). The marginal presence of the Portuguese language did not go unnoticed by the Portuguese themselves, who started to undertake first official steps –that is, an active language policy– in its favour. In this vein, ‘the Jesuit school [founded in 1584] was closed in 1760 as it was being considered responsible for the diffu-

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sion of Kimbundu’.1 Likewise, between 1764 and 1772, the Portuguese governor in Angola, Dom Francisco Inocêncio de Coutinho (1726–1780), stipulated that white families of Portuguese origin had to teach their children Portuguese and that they should also teach it to the indigenous (cf. Adriano 2014, 60). In doing so, Coutinho followed the language policy model of the decrees issued by Marquês de Pombal in 1757 and 1758 for Brazil. Despite some explorations of the southern part of the colony, no significant territorial advances were made in the eighteenth century, even though Benguela ‘was transformed into the main port for the export of slaves to Brazil’.2 The nineteenth century marks the beginning of what Inverno calls “the start of the African Empire” (2009, 102) and what Chavagne refers to as ‘the true colonization’ (“[l] a véritable colonization”, 2005, 26). Incited by the Brazilian independence in 1822 and the concomitant fear of a similar process in Africa, the Portuguese Crown drastically changed its colonial policies. Measures comprised the strengthening of the Portuguese language (fostered also by the construction of the first Portuguese public school in 1835 and the first theatre in Luanda in 1839), the intensification of commercial trade, and the establishment of planned settlements (povoamentos planeados), i.e., the establishment of a plantation economy. In addition, the Portuguese expanded territorial control through new settlements at the coast and by further exploring, and later populating, the hitherto neglected interior. Although the number of Portuguese settlers was still low in the first half of the century (between 1,000 and 2,000 in total, also cf. Bender 2013, 80, and Table 3 below), Portuguese was gaining some ground, particularly in the newly established plantations in the Moçâmedes area. For this area, there also are reports of the emergence of mixed languages such as Olumbali (possibly Kimbundu- and Umbundubased). An important landmark was the Berlin Conference of 1884/1885, distributing the African continent among the colonial powers. As a reaction, the Portuguese undertook numerous military campaigns in Angola, established a rudimentary infrastructure, and founded new settlements, especially in the Huila region (also cf. Chavagne 2005, 26s.). Despite the fact that uprisings in the south as a reaction to the reintroduction of slave trafficking –suspended between 1836 and 1842 and formally abolished in 1878 (but note that forced labour continued until 1962; cf. Chavagne 2005, 26ss.)– severely reduced the number of Portuguese colonists in the 1860s, their number in Angola had, at least in Luanda, doubled by the end of the century. At that time, local elites in such coastal areas had become completely bilingual. Nevertheless, even in Luanda, Portuguese was still a minority language in a polyglossic reality, its mastery in the interior remaining even more reduced. The continuing coexistence of Portuguese and African languages is at the origin of many of the features attested in present-day Angolan Portuguese (cf. 4 and Inverno 2008, 122ss.). 1 “Em 1760, a escola jesuíta foi encerrada, por ser considerada responsável pela difusão do kimbundu” (Inverno 2008, 122). 2 “[...] se ter transformado no principal porto de exportação de escravos para o Brasil” (Inverno 2008, 122).

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At the beginning of the twentieth century, and as represented in Figure 2, Portugal only controlled about 10 % of Angolan territory, mostly limited to the coast and to areas located near large rivers (cf. Inverno 2008, 124). In the first three decades of the century, Portugal succeeded significantly in expanding its territory. De jure, the autochthonous had access to the same political and civil rights as the colonists. Yet, de facto segregation was cemented by the fact that such rights were only granted if the person showed full assimilation, which meant that the person had to  

‘1.° know how to read and write the Portuguese language; 2.° possess the means necessary for their subsistence and that of their families; 3.° have good behaviour, attested by the administrative authority of the area in which they reside; 4.° differentiate themselves by their uses and customs from the usual of their race’.3

The mentioning of written proficiency in Portuguese refers to its ‘correct’ use in contrast to Bantu-influenced Portuguese pejoratively called pretoguês (< preto ‘black’ + português ‘Portuguese’, cf. Zau 2011, 101). Knowledge of Portuguese was, thus, directly associated to the ‘degree of civilization’. The autochthonous languages were forbidden in most official contexts in 1921 by the Portuguese governor of Angola, General Norton de Matos (cf. Chavagne 2005, 26s.). The legal basis for this policy was created by Decree 77, which banned all autochthonous languages from written and spoken use, for example in schools (Article 2) and in the catechism (Article 3; cf. Matos 1953, 103s.). Matos (1953, 91) justified these measures by saying that Bantu speakers had never developed a written language and that it would thus be advantageous if the “languages of Angola” were forgotten as soon as possible. In this regard, Cristóvão (2008, 51s.) speaks of “linguistic imperialism” modelled on the French Revolution. Still, all this should not obscure that in the 1920s Kimbundu continued to be the most widely used language in Luanda and its surroundings (cf. Inverno 2008, 125).

3 “1.° saber ler e escrever a língua portuguesa; 2.° possuir os meios necessários à sua subsistência e à das suas famílias; 3.° ter bom comportamento, atestado pela autoridade administrativa da área em que reside; 4.° diferenciar-se pelos seus usos e costumes do usual da sua raça” (Marques 2001, 26).

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Figure 2: Portuguese-controlled areas in 1906 (Chavagne 2005, 53)

In the 1950s –that is, seventeen years after the installation of the conservative, corporatist, nationalist, and autocratic New State (Estado Novo) in Portugal– a new massive wave of Portuguese colonists arrived in Angola for the re-establishment of the povoamentos planeados in the interior (cf. Table 3). At the same time, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 led to Portugal’s abandoning of the label colony (colónia) for Angola and to its renaming as overseas province (província ultramarina) in 1951 (Undolo 2014, 35). Pre-independency conflicts (or in Undolo’s 2014, 36, words, a ‘colonial war’, “guerra colonial”) arose in February 1961, even though the discriminatory Indigenous Statute (Estatuto do Indígena, an umbrella term for several laws aiming at the cultural assimilation of the autochthonous population in Portuguese colonies introduced between 1926 and 1954) was abolished in the same year. Especially in the coastal cities, the white elite –strongly influenced by the “[c]olonial propaganda [...] throughout the Estado Novo” (Inverno 2009, 117)– had taken over the public sector and important economic and political positions from the Afro-Portuguese population. This further incited repression of and discrimination against blacks and mestiços. At the same time, the agricultural settlements in the interior did not flourish as desired: many Africans fled the country due to warfare or left for the poor neighbourhoods (musseques) of the big coastal cities, the latter also being true of many colonists. All this contributed to urban melting pots composed of Angolans with different linguistic origins and of impoverished colonists. Such melting pots, where Angolans, at least to some extent, also had exposure to the Portuguese language, were the locus of linguistic koineization processes. In the interior, on the other hand, the African population remained basically uninfluenced by

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the Portuguese language until the 1970s, despite efforts by the Portuguese government to strengthen its linguistic presence. Here, the Portuguese also founded numerous settlements (aldeamentos) “often surrounded by barbed wire, where previously dispersed Africans populations were kept together” (Bender 2004, 264s., quoted from Inverno 2009, 129, her translation). This also contributed to the massive exodus of black and Afro-Portuguese Angolans to neighbouring countries, bringing about the necessity of importing labour force from linguistically different Angolan regions to the aldeamentos. As a consequence, in the interior, too, linguistic koineization started, but this time between different autochthonous languages. In fact, only 0.1 % of the population in the interior is reported to have made frequent use of Portuguese shortly before the Angolan independence in 1975, while 83 % had either no or only rudimentary knowledge of Portuguese (cf. Inverno 2008, 124–127; 2009, 114–120). Table 3 provides an overview of the diachronic changes in the ethnic composition of Angola’s population between 1845 and 1970:  

 

Table 3: Ethnic composition of Angola, 1845–1970 (Zau 2011, 100, our translation) 1845

1900

1920

1940

1950

1960

1970

African

99.9 %

99.7 %

99.3 %

98.1 %

97.4 %

95.3 %

93.3 %

Mestiço

0.01 %

0.06 %

0.18 %

0.75 %

0.72 %

1.1 %

1.57 %

White

0.03 %

0.02 %

0.48 %

1.2 %

1.9 %

3.6 %

5.1 %

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2.2 Milestones of its further development Angola declared independence from Portugal in November 1975. Agostinho Neto, leader of the Soviet-supported Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (Movimento Popular para a Libertação de Angola – MPLA), became the first president of the newly founded, one-party People’s Republic of Angola. Immediately after the declaration of the First Republic, a civil war broke out (1975–2002), which was especially bloody in rural areas and caused many white settlers to flee the country (cf. Adriano 2015, 34s.). Many African Angolans with very diverse ethnic and linguistic backgrounds, too, were forced to leave their war-torn areas of origin, heading for urban centres such as Lubango, Benguela, Lobito, and Luanda (for more background, cf. Undolo 2014, 37–47). The high number of internally displaced persons strengthened the role of Portuguese as a lingua franca (cf. Zau 2011, 90; Undolo 2014, 42). In 1991, with the fall of the Soviet Union and under pressure of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola – UNITA), the MPLA was forced to transform Angola into a democratic multi-party state, thus leading to the declaration of the Second Republic (cf. Undolo 2014, 45). With everything seeming to point towards a democratic

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transition, UNITA, however, refused to accept the results of the first free and fair elections in 1992. As a consequence, the atrocious fratricidal war flared up anew and a peace agreement between MPLA and UNITA was only reached in 2002 (2014, 46ss.). The economically important exclave of Cabinda in the north, where until today secessionist groups have a non-negligible influence, is still not fully pacified. As of 2002, forty years of nearly uninterrupted warfare had battered Angola to the core and continue to do so in highly unstable Cabinda. It thus comes as no surprise that in 2020, Angola had a poverty rate of 40.6 % (much higher in rural areas), was among the twenty countries worldwide with the lowest life expectancy in 2019, and figured among the twenty countries with the highest rate of malnutrition in the world in 2021 (cf. Statista 2022a; 2022b; 2022c). Economically, present-day Angola highly relies on exports of oil (coming mainly from the exclave of Cabinda in the north), gas, and diamonds. The main import and export partner of Angola is China, to the extent that nearly 300,000 Chinese citizens lived in Angola before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic (cf. PM 2019). Important hallmarks of language policy in postcolonial Angola include the foundation of the National Institute of Languages (Instituto Nacional de Línguas – INL) in 1979, initially led by the Angolan linguist Celeste Kounta (1936–1987). The goal of this institution was to research the situation of the autochthonous languages and to create objective conditions for putting them on an equal footing with Portuguese. In this spirit, the INL, shortly after its foundation, chose Chokwe, Kikongo, Kimbundu, Kuanyama, Nyemba, Umbundu and somewhat later Nyaneka as national languages (línguas nacionais; cf. Inverno 2008, 118). The concept of “national languages” in relation to Angola’s autochthonous languages is somewhat problematic: firstly –as the former Angolan President José Eduardo dos Santos put it– these languages are mostly limited to a regional radius (cf. Fernandes/Ntondo 2002, 18) and often spoken far beyond national borders (cf. Miguel 2008, 38). Secondly, the official term national languages, nowadays, seems to also be employed to refer to all of Angola’s autochthonous languages tout court (cf. Mingas 2000, 54ss.). In 1983, to take into account Neto’s political goal of promoting and equalizing Angola’s autochthonous languages, the institute was renamed Institute of National Languages (Instituto de Línguas Nacionais – ILN). Neto’s efforts, however, somewhat fizzled out after his term in office and there still is no clear national legal regulation policy concerning autochthonous languages by the government (cf. Sassuco 2016, 205; 3.1). One reason for this is that the autochthonous languages are spoken in very different regions and communicative contexts, which makes a fair and general language policy equally appreciating all autochthonous languages a difficult endeavour. In fact, until the enactment of Article 23 of the 2010 Constitution, citizens who did not speak or understand Portuguese were regularly discriminated against and disadvantaged by authorities in some parts of the country (cf. Leclerc 2021).  

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3 External language policy Although Angola’s external language policy takes into account both Portuguese and the autochthonous languages, Angola must be described as de facto monolingual in terms of language use in most of the public sphere (Bernardo/Severo 2018, 213ss.). This at least partly explains the stigmatization and decline of the autochthonous languages and explains Miguel’s (2008, 39) view of Angola as being a monolingual state with a bilingual or partly multilingual population.

3.1 Legislation In the Constitution of 1975 and its revisions of 1978, 1980, 1991, 1992, and 1995, there was no mention of or resolution on language(s). It is only in the Constitution of 2010 that Portuguese was established as the only official language: ‘The official language of the Republic of Angola is Portuguese’.4

The same article provides for state support for the use of Angola’s autochthonous languages and of the main languages of international communication: ‘The State shall value […] the use of the other languages of Angola, as well as the main languages of international communication’.5

The Constitution also states that no one may be disadvantaged or discriminated against on the basis of their language: ‘No one shall be prejudiced, privileged, deprived of any right or exempted from any duty by reason of his [...] language [...]’.6

Likewise, the state is obliged to protect and promote the languages of national identity and communication: ‘The following shall constitute fundamental tasks of the Angolan State: [...] Protect, value and dignify Angolan languages of African origin as cultural heritage and promote their development as languages of national identity and communication’.7

4 “A língua oficial da República de Angola é o português” (C-AO, art. 19). 5 “O Estado valoriza […] a utilização das demais línguas de Angola, bem como das principais línguas de comunicação internacional” (C-AO, art. 19). 6 “Ninguém pode ser prejudicado, privilegiado, privado de qualquer direito ou isento de qualquer dever em razão da sua [...] língua [...]” (C-AO, art. 23). 7 “Constituem tarefas fundamentais do Estado angolano: [...] Proteger, valorizar e dignificar as línguas angolanas de origem africana, como património cultural, e promover o seu desenvolvimento, como línguas de identidade nacional e de comunicação” (C-AO, art. 21).

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‘Citizens and communities have the right to the respect, appreciation, and preservation of their cultural, linguistic and artistic identity’.8

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Portuguese is the only language of authorities and administration in Angola and all laws and official decrees must be in Portuguese. For instance, the Consumer Protection Act of 2003 (Lei de Defesa do Consumidor) stipulates that instructions for use, descriptions of quality, quantity, composition, symbols, and dimensions, as well as other explanations, must be in Portuguese: ‘The offer and presentation of goods and services must ensure correct, clear, precise, ostensive information in the Portuguese language about their characteristics, quality, quantity, composition, price, guarantee, validity periods and origin, among other data, as well as the risks they present to the health and safety of consumers’.9

The same applies to the Road Traffic Regulations of 2008 (Código de Estrada), which states that road signs and markings –unless internationally recognized and valid– must be edited in Portuguese: ‘Inscriptions on road signs are written in the official language, except as provided for in international conventions’.10

The same holds of the Customs Code of 2006 (Código Aduaneiro), which determines that a custom tax procedure is invalid if the person does not speak Portuguese and has not been provided an interpreter: ‘The entire customs procedure is null and void if [...] no suitable interpreter has been appointed for the defendant or the person civilly liable where they do not understand Portuguese or cannot make themselves understood [or] where the defendant is deaf, mute, illiterate or does not know Portuguese’.11

8 “Os cidadãos e as comunidades têm direito ao respeito, valorização e preservação da sua identidade cultural, linguística e artística” (C-AO, art. 87). 9 “A oferta e apresentação de bens ou serviços devem assegurar informações correctas, claras, precisas, ostensivas e em língua portuguesa sobre suas características, qualidade, quantidade, composição, preço, garantia, prazos de validade e origem, entre outros dados, bem como sobre os riscos que apresentam à saúde e segurança dos consumidores” (Law 5, art. 20). 10 “As inscrições constantes nos sinais de trânsito são escritas na língua oficial, salvo o que resulte das convenções internacionais” (Decree-Law 5/2008, art. 6). 11 “É nulo todo o processo fiscal aduaneiro quando [...] não tenha sido nomeado intérprete idóneo ao arguido ou à pessoa civilmente responsável quando estes sejam desconhecedores da língua portuguesa ou

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According to Adriano (2014, 71), autochthonous languages are not used in government, health care, public institutions, or courts although the Constitution does recognize the right of every detainee to be informed of their rights in their own language and to defend themselves in their own language, with the assistance of an interpreter, if necessary: ‘Everyone deprived of his or her liberty shall be informed, at the time of arrest or detention, of the reasons for the arrest or detention and of his or her rights, in particular: [...] Communicating in a language he or she understands or through an interpreter’.12

3.3 Languages used in education The civil war left deep scars on the Angolan education system; nevertheless, the system is slowly recovering. Children start school at age six and the first four years of school are free of tuition. Primary school is six years and also focuses on developing and expanding expressive and communicative skills. Importantly, article 19 of the Angolan constitution provides for state support for the teaching and learning of Angola’s autochthonous languages and of the main languages of international communication: ‘The State shall value and promote the study [and] teaching […] of the other languages of Angola, as well as the main languages of international communication’.13

Likewise, the Angolan Education System Framework Law of 2001 (Lei de Bases do Sistema de Educação) stipulates that teaching in schools must be in Portuguese but that the education system also fosters and ensures measures to promote national languages: ‘Teaching in schools shall be imparted in Portuguese. The state shall promote and ensure the human, scientific, technical, material, and financial conditions for the expansion and generalization of the use and teaching of national languages’.14

não possam fazer-se compreender [ou] sendo o arguido surdo, mudo, analfabeto, desconhecedor da língua portuguesa” (Decree-Law 5/2006, art. 235). 12 “Toda a pessoa privada da liberdade deve ser informada, no momento da sua prisão ou detenção, das respectivas razões e dos seus direitos, nomeadamente: [...] Comunicar em língua que compreenda ou mediante intérprete” (C-AO, art. 63). 13 “O Estado valoriza e promove o estudo [e] o ensino […] das demais línguas de Angola, bem como das principais línguas de comunicação internacional” (C-AO, art. 19). 14 “O ensino nas escolas é ministrado em língua portuguesa. O Estado promove e assegura as condições humanas, cientifico-técnicas, materiais e financeiras para a expansão e a generalização da utilização e do ensino de línguas nacionais” (Law 13, art. 9).

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The latest modification of the same law, passed in 2020, further strengthens the autochthonous languages but also the promotion of measures for the teaching of the major international languages, especially English and French: ‘Without prejudice to that set forth in paragraph 1, the other languages of Angola may be used in the different Education Subsystems, under the terms to be regulated by means of a specific statute’.15 ‘The State promotes public policies for the insertion and massification of the teaching of the main international communication languages in all education subsystems, with priority for the teaching of English and French’.16

The laws cited above do provide a legal basis for the teaching of autochthonous languages in schools. In addition, Resolution 3 from 1987 –drafted after a commission of experts had concluded that despite high numbers of speakers, Bantu languages had suffered dialectalization and that their acquisition was incomplete (cf. Mingas 2000, 55)– approved alphabets and transcription rules developed by the ILN for Chokwe, Kikongo, Kimbundu, Kuanyama, Mbunda, and Umbundu. Nevertheless, de facto, Angolan education is, with very scarce exceptions, almost entirely in Portuguese (cf. Adriano 2014, 73) and multilingualism is still seen by most Angolans as a problem and a hindrance to education (cf. Bernardo/Severo 2018, 214ss.). Most curricula in schools are oriented towards Portugal and Portuguese, thus contributing little to the valorization of autochthonous cultures and languages. There are, however, first attempts to systematically introduce some autochthonous languages in the first two grades of Angolan primary schools: on the basis of Resolution 3 and of the Angolan Education System Framework Law, didactic materials were developed for the teaching of Chokwe (region of Luanda-Sul – Cidade de Saurimo), Kikongo (region of Mbanza Kongo), Kimbundu (region of Cuanza Norte), Kuanyama (region of Cunene – Cidade de Ondjiva), Nyaneka (region of Huila – Cidade de Lubango), Nyemba (region of Cuando Cubango – Cidade de Menongue), and Umbundu (region of Huambo – Cidade de Huambo) in order to promote their dissemination and use. This introduction began experimentally in 2007 in a total of 21 classes and with the help of 105 teachers, but a systematic implementation is still a long way off. A severe problem is that the autochthonous languages are taught as second languages. They are not means of communication in subject lessons, which thwarts the envisaged bilingual teaching (cf. Bernardo/ Severo 2018, 225–230). Finally, note that Protestant schools are pioneers in promoting the use of autochthonous languages, which finds an interesting parallel in the fact that these were already used by missionaries in their schools in colonial times (cf. Mingas 2000, 56;

15 “Sem prejuízo do previsto no n.° 1, podem ser utilizadas as demais línguas de Angola, nos diferentes Subsistemas de Ensino, nos termos a regulamentar em diploma próprio” (Law 32, art. 16). 16 “O Estado promove políticas públicas para a inserção e a massificação do Ensino das principais línguas de comunicação internacional, em todos os Subsistemas de Ensino, com prioridade para o ensino do inglês e do francês” (Law 32, art. 16).

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section 2.1). Foreign languages taught at school are especially English and French. At university level, the languages of teaching are Portuguese, English, and French.

3.4 Languages used in the media Press Law – The latest version of the Press Law (Lei de Imprensa), dating from 2016, stipulates that there must be a Portuguese version of all Angolan press publications: ‘All Angolan publications shall be issued in Portuguese, notwithstanding the fact that the respective editions may be bilingual’.17

Yet, national languages must be disseminated and defended by the press and information societies should disseminate information in the national languages: ‘For the purposes of this law, it shall be understood as being of public interest the information that has the following general purposes: [...] to contribute to the promotion of national and regional culture and the defence and dissemination of national languages; [...] media companies shall, as a rule, broadcast information in the official language and in the other languages of Angola’.18

Press – Newspapers are published in Portuguese. The major daily state-owned newspaper is Jornal de Angola, important private weekly newspapers are, for example, Semanário Angolense, O País, and A Capital. The Angolan state news agency (Agência Angola Press – ANGOP), founded in 1975, is a founding member of the Alliance of Portuguese Language News Agencies (Aliança das Agências de Informação de Língua Portuguesa – ALP, also cf. Arden/Meisnitzer 2013, 42). Radio – Angolan radio stations broadcast almost exclusively in Portuguese. However, the Press Law of 2017 (Law 1) has at least had the effect that in the last years some autochthonous languages have also found their way into the media, for example at the radio station Ngola Yetu ‘Our Angola’ which broadcasts the daily news in fourteen autochthonous languages (Chokwe, Herero, Kimbundu, Kikongo (with a special edition in Fiote), Kibala, Kuanyama, Lunda, Luvale, Mbangala, Nsongo, Nyaneka, Nyemba, and Umbundu). Television – Important TV stations are the state-run TPA 1 & 2 and TPA Internacional and the privately-run TV Zimbo, AngoTV, and Televisão Comercial de Angola. Angolan TV mainly broadcasts in Portuguese, but TPA also offers the daily news in eight autochtho-

17 “Todas as publicações angolanas devem ser redigidas em língua portuguesa, sem prejuízo de as edições respectivas serem bilingues” (Law 1, art. 41). 18 “Conteúdo de interesse público. Para efeitos da presente lei, entende-se como sendo de interesse público, a informação que tem os seguintes fins gerais: [...] contribuir para a promoção da cultura nacional e regional e a defesa e divulgação das línguas nacionais; [...] As empresas de comunicação social devem, em regra, veicular informação em língua oficial e nas demais línguas de Angola” (Law 1, art. 11/12).

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nous languages (Chokwe, Kimbundu, Kikongo (with a special edition in Fiote), Kuanyama, Nyaneka, Nyemba, and Umbundu; also cf. Adriano 2014, 141; Undolo 2014, 92). Many Angolans also frequently consume Brazilian television (e. g., RecordTV and TV Globo; cf. Arden/Meisnitzer 2013, 42), which may have an influence on Angolan Portuguese (cf. Cruz 2013, 170; Miguel 22014, 12 and introduction to section 4). Portuguese TV stations (RTP, RTP África and RTP Internacional) are also available but less frequently consumed than Brazilian ones. Internet – As to language use on the internet, Portuguese seems to clearly be the language of choice for most Angolans in almost all situations of online communication. Nevertheless, there do exist some platforms fostering the use of autochthonous languages, such as for instance the Facebook pages Kallun, Evalina, and Dicionário Ngola Yetu. The discussion language of these –not very actively used– platforms is, however, almost exclusively Portuguese.  

4 Linguistic characteristics This section gives an overview of the linguistic characteristics of Angolan Portuguese. It is both selective and simplifying, the latter in the sense that it abstracts away from potential inner-Angolan variation, which could, for example, be due to different constellations of bilingualism and multilingualism. Three further issues concerning the description of Angolan Portuguese should be noted. Firstly, it is still lacking a national, supraregional norm. Instead, it still is a highly unstable variety “in the making” that has not yet been prescriptively recorded (cf. Cabral 2005, 3; Undolo 2014, 283; section 5). To the best of our knowledge, thus, none of the linguistic characteristics to be presented is categorically used in Angolan Portuguese: speaker profiles are heterogeneous, with some speakers’ idiolects being more similar to European Portuguese and others’ being very distinct from it, a fact that seems to largely depend on social status and education (cf. Chavagne 2005, 277ss.). Secondly, research on Angolan Portuguese, particularly on phonetics, phonology, and lexis, is still in its infancy. Thirdly, many peculiarities of Angolan Portuguese are also typical of Brazilian Portuguese (cf. Gärtner 1997; Chavagne 2005, 274s.; Lipski 2008; section 3.4). This is important also with regard to the hypothesis that the restructuring of Brazilian Portuguese is due to Bantu contact (cf. Álvarez López/Gonçalves/Avelar 2018).

4.1 Pronunciation Angolan Portuguese presents, or rather can present (cf. Massiala 2019), a number of phonetic and phonological peculiarities that set it apart from European Portuguese. Oral vowels – Among others, Undolo (2017) lists the following peculiarities, which he ascribes to Bantu influence: differently from European Portuguese, centralized [ɨ] tends

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to occur in absolute final unstressed position only, being substituted by [e] elsewhere, as for example in presidente [preziˈdẽtɨ] instead of [prɨziˈdẽtɨ] (also cf. Chavagne 2005, 79ss., also for frequent substitutions of final [ɨ] by [i], which are also attested in Brazilian Portuguese). Stressed European Portuguese /e/ often corresponds to [ɛ] in Angolan Portuguese in cases such as beleza [beˈlɛza] instead of [bɨˈlezɐ]. The same tendency of vowel opening is true of stressed /o/, which in Angolan Portuguese often becomes [ɔ], as can be seen in the example of desgosto [deʒˈɡɔʃtu] instead of [dɨʒˈɡoʃtu] (also cf. Mingas 2000, 64; Chavagne 2005, 76). European Portuguese unstressed /a/ is often not elevated, leading to the realization of [a] instead of [ɐ] such as in casa [ˈkaza] instead of [ˈkazɐ] (also cf. Mingas 2000, 63; Chavagne 2005, 83; Gonçalves 2013, 164). The same holds of pretonic (and, though rarely, also posttonic, cf. Chavagne 2005, 78) unstressed /o/, which is [u] in European Portuguese, while usually remaining [o] in Angolan Portuguese, as can be seen in namorar [namoˈɾaɾ] instead of [nɐmuˈɾaɾ] (also cf. Gonçalves 2013, 164; Manuel 2015, 45). The latter tendency is also shared by Brazilian Portuguese. Nasal vowels – As for nasals, European Portuguese [ɐ̃] is –as in Brazilian Portuguese– generally substituted by [ã] in cases such as recanto [reˈkãtu] instead of [ʁɨˈkɐ̃tu] (also cf. Mingas 2000, 63). The denasalization of vowels, probably due to Bantu influence, is also attested, as shown in examples like banco [ˈbaku] and dente [ˈdete] instead of [ˈbɐ̃ku] and [ˈdẽtɨ] (cf. Chavagne 2005, 86ss.). Diphthongs – Massiala (2019, 84–90) shows that most European Portuguese diphthongs are frequently monophthongized in Angolan Portuguese at the expense of the second vocalic element, as for instance in primeiro [pɾiˈmeɾu] instead of [pɾiˈmɐjɾu] or soluções [soluˈsõʃ] instead of [suluˈsõjʃ] (also cf. Mingas 2000, 66; Chavagne 2005, 88ss.). Liquids – Several studies report a depalatalization or a delateralization of /ʎ/, resulting in forms such as olha [ˈɔlɐ]/[ˈɔjɐ] instead of [ˈɔʎɐ] (cf. Chavagne 2005, 105s.; Manuel 2015, 47; Massiala 2019, 91). As in Brazilian Portuguese and in European Portuguese, the rhotic, too, is subject to variation and can be realized as [ʀ], [ʁ], [r], [χ], or [ɾ], at least in simple onsets. Variation of complex onset and coda /ɾ/ is slightly reduced but [ʁ], [r], and [ɾ] are attested (cf. Massiala 2019, 92ss.). Chavagne (2005, 99ss.) also discusses rhotics, hypothesizing a future phonological merger of /ʀ/ and /ɾ/. Cases of lambdacism of /ʀ/ in examples such as carro [ˈkalu] instead of [ˈkaʁu] have been observed, paired by cases of rhotacism of /l/ such as faltar [farˈtar]/[faʀˈtar] instead of [fɐɫˈtaɾ] (cf. Chavagne 2005, 103ss.; Nzau/Venâncio/Sardinha 2013, 167; Sassuco 2016, 207). Nasals – The nasal palatal /ɲ/ is sometimes realized as [j] or [j]̃ in examples such as ̃ instead of [tɨʃtɨˈmuɲɐ] (cf. Massiala 2019, 90), alternating, in additestemunha [teʃteˈmuja] tion, with the uvular nasal [ɴ] (cf. Chavagne 2005, 106s.). Plosives – Another notable consonantic phenomenon of Angolan Portuguese is the Bantu-influenced pre-nasalization of plosives in cases such as banco [ˈmbaku] or dente [ˈndete] instead of [ˈbɐ̃ku] and [ˈdẽtɨ] (cf. Chavagne 2005, 95ss.; Sassuco 2016, 208). Sonorization of intervocalic voiceless plosives, especially preceded by nasalized vowels and sometimes also combined with consonant nasalization, seems to also be quite common and is exemplified by pente [ˈpende] instead of [ˈpẽtɨ] (cf. Sassuco 2016, 208). Importantly

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though, Chavagne (2005, 110ss.) also observes the devoicing of intervocalic voiced plosives, as, for instance, in lixado [liˈʃato] instead of [liˈʃadu]. Fricatives – The European Portuguese sibilants [s], [z], [ʃ], and [ʒ] are subject to manifold instabilities and different realizations in Angolan Portuguese. As in northern European dialects, Standard European Portuguese pre-vocalic [z] can be realized as [ʒ], as, for example, in outros ou [ˈo.tɾu.ʒu] instead of [ˈo.tɾu.zu] or, due to Bantu influence, as voiceless [s], that is, [ˈo.tɾu.su]. Standard European Portuguese pre-consonantal [ʃ] and [ʒ] in coda position, in turn, can be realized as semi-vocalic [j] in cases such as mas nem [mɐjˈnẽj] instead of [mɐʒˈnɐ̃j]. Another realization of Standard European Portuguese preconsonantal or absolute final coda [ʃ] attested is [s], as, for example, in basquete [bas ˈkɛtɨ] instead of [bɐʃˈkɛtɨ] or in depois [deˈpojs] instead of [dɨˈpojʃ], which is also typical of many Brazilian Portuguese varieties. Table 4, taken from Chavagne (2005, 110), shows the different realizations of Standard European Portuguese [s], [z], [ʃ], and [ʒ] attested in Angolan Portuguese. Table 4: Angolan Portuguese realizations of European Portuguese [s], [z], [ʃ], and [ʒ] (Chavagne 2005, 110) European norm

[s]

Angolan realizations

[s] [ʃ]

[ʃ] [ʂ] [ʃ]

[z] [s] [ʒ] [ç] [j]

[ʒ]

[z] [s] [ʒ] [ʐ] [ʒ] [ʃ]

[ç] [j]

Suprasegmental structure – With regard to syllable structure, Gonçalves (2013, 163) and Undolo (2014, 221ss.) note an increase of CV, presumably due to Bantu influence, by either suppressing coda consonants in cases such as mesmo [me.mu] and mulher [mu. ʎɛ] instead of [meʒ.mu] and [mu.ʎɛɾ], or by adding paragogic vowels in examples such as beber [be.be.ɾe] instead of [bɨ.beɾ], or epenthetic bridging vowels between two wordinternal syllables, which tend to copy the stressed vowel such as in ritmo [ˈri.ti.mu] instead of [ˈʁit.mu] (for the latter, also cf. Mingas 2000, 66; Sassuco 2016, 209; for more CV phenomena, cf. Chavagne 2005, 113ss.). The colloquial European Portuguese deletion of (especially word-final) unstressed vowels, such as in gente [ʒẽt] instead of [ˈʒẽtɨ], is not attested in Angolan Portuguese (cf. Mingas 2000, 65; Gonçalves 2013, 163). As for intonational features and prosodic phrasing, there are only a few respects in which Angolan Portuguese is different from both European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese. One such feature is the fact that Angolan Portuguese only has simple boundary tones whereas, under certain circumstances, both European and Brazilian Portuguese allow for complex ones (HL%, LH%, where H stands for high tone, L for low tone, and % for a tonal boundary, and later * for a pitch accent). In most other prosodic and intonational features, in turn, Angolan Portuguese aligns with at least one or even with both of the latter two varieties: Angolan Portuguese neutral declarative sentences, for instance, are similar to those of most Brazilian and European Portuguese varieties in employing a falling tonal contour H+L* L%. A feature with regard to which Angolan Portuguese only aligns with one of these two varieties, in turn, is tonal truncation in interrogatives. In

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this regard, Angolan Portuguese functions like most European Portuguese varieties in prohibiting it, whereas interrogative tonal truncation is widely attested in Brazilian Portuguese. For more information on intonational features and prosodic phrasing of Angolan Portuguese, the reader is referred to Santos (2020).

4.2 Morphosyntax Agreement – Within the noun phrase, Angolan Portuguese –just like Brazilian Portuguese– can (partially) lack overt number agreement on targets, leading to noun phrases such as os programa [instead of programas] ‘the programmes’ (cf. Inverno 2009, 153ss., 264ss.; Adriano 2014, 167ss.; Undolo 2014, 182ss.), which has been explained by contact with Bantu languages (cf. Mingas 2000, 66ss.; Chavagne 2005, 240s.). The same holds of gender agreement in cases such as meu [instead of minha] terra ‘my land’ or no mesmo [instead of na misma] barriga ‘in the same womb’. The use of morphologically masculine default forms instead of feminine ones seems to be most widely attested but the reverse gender mismatch pattern, as in primeira [instead of primeiro] filho ‘first son’, is also documented (cf. Mingas 2000, 70s.; Chavagne 2005, 242ss.; Inverno 2009, 163ss.; Adriano 2014, 204ss.). In the sentential domain, too, overt agreement between pre- and postverbal subjects and the verbal predicate can be lacking. In such cases, and unless an interlocutor is directly addressed (cf. Chavagne 2005, 236s.), the third person singular verb form can be used regardless of the person and number features of the subject in cases such as nós ficava [instead of ficávamos] cá ‘we stayed there’ and eu vai [instead of vou] dar ajuda ‘I will provide help’ (cf. Mingas 2000, 73ss.; Chavagne 2005, 234ss.; Inverno 2009, 247ss.; Adriano 2014, 216ss.; Sassuco 2016, 212). Once more, many of these references link this property (again reminiscent of Brazilian Portuguese) to Bantu influence. Pronouns – The collocation of object clitics possibly is currently generalizing towards proclisis in all contexts, and clitic climbing is being lost, which can be seen in examples such as te vejo ‘I see you’ and estão (a) se mentir ‘they are lying to each other’ instead of European Portuguese vejo-te and estão-se a mentir (next to unclimbed estão a mentir-se; cf. Gerards 2022, also cf. references therein for different opinions). Generalizing proclisis is, however, still masked by normative European Portuguese pressure, and one even finds hypercorrect enclitics such as in não vejo-te ‘I don’t see you’, instead of não te vejo. The third person dative pronouns lhe ‘him/her’ and lhes ‘them’ as well as the full pronouns ele(s)/ela(s) are substituting the accusative pronouns o(s)/a(s), which are being lost, as, for instance, in lhes mataram [instead of mataram-nos] ‘they killed them’ or mato ela [instead of mato-a] ‘I kill her’ (cf. Chavagne 2005, 227ss.; Inverno 2009, 174ss.; Adriano 2014, 403ss., 440ss.). In addition, there are hints that Angolan Portuguese is evolving towards a (partial) non-prodrop-language, which means that it prefers overt over zero subjects, as in eu falo [instead of falo] ‘I talk’ (cf. Teixeira 2012, 154–157). Invariable se can be used as a reflexive marker for all persons and numbers, as is exemplified by nós conseguimos se entender [instead of entender-nos] ‘we manage to understand each

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other’ (cf. Chavagne 2005, 231; Adriano 2014, 221), which, again, has been linked to Bantu influence (cf. Inverno 2009, 182). Note, however, that reflexive marking does not seem to be obligatory, with structures such as eu chamo [instead of chamo-me] ‘my name is’ being documented (cf. Gärtner 1997, 148; Chavagne 2005, 257). Finally, in the rare cases of climbed clitics, reflexive copies in base position are sometimes not deleted, as can be seen in me vou me casar ‘I will get married’ instead of (me) vou casar (cf. Chavagne 2005, 259; Miguel 22014, 92). In final infinitival causative constructions with para ‘for’, the strong accusative/dative mim ‘me’ can replace the nominative eu in examples such as para mim [instead of eu] mudar ‘for me to change’ (cf. Chavagne 2005, 229; Miguel 22014, 95). Differentiation between informal tu and more formal você seems highly instable (e. g., cf. Gonçalves 2013, 176s.). All Angolan Portuguese pronominal features are also typical of or at least attested in many Brazilian Portuguese varieties. Determiners – Definite articles, as in Brazilian Portuguese, can be omitted, especially –but not only (cf. Chavagne 2005, 250s.; Lipski 2008, 92s.)– in combination with the universal quantifier todo ‘all’, such as in todos [instead of todos os] livros ‘all books’, and with possessive determiners, such as in minha [instead of a minha] empresa ‘my business’ (cf. Adriano 2014, 432ss.). Grammatical gender – In Angolan Portuguese, some nouns such as apetite ‘appetite’ and guarda-chuva ‘umbrella’ that are masculine in European Portuguese can be feminine (cf. Undolo 2014, 191, 237, 252). Possessive constructions – Possessive constructions can present possessive doubling by postposed prepositional phrases, such as in sua boca dele ‘his mouth, (lit.) his mouth of his’ instead of a sua boca, or, as in many Brazilian Portuguese varieties, may contain a postposed prepositional phrase only such as in o partido dele ‘his party’ instead of o seu partido (cf. Vilela 1999, 181; Chavagne 2005, 259; Adriano 2014, 440ss.). Conjunctions and relative pronouns – The omission of simple complementizer and relative que is attested in structures such as é hoje [instead of hoje que] ele vai vir ‘it is today that he will come’ and há muitas mamãs estão [instead of que estão] a sofrer ‘there are many mothers who are suffering’ (cf. Chavagne 2005, 256; Adriano 2014, 422ss.; Campos 2016). In contrast, semantically specified conjunctions such as onde ‘where’ and embora ‘although’, just like in Brazilian Portuguese, appear to contain complementizing que more often in Angolan than in European Portuguese. This can be seen in examples of the type já sei onde que vou [instead of onde vou] trabalhar ‘I already know where I am going to work’ and havia tudo isso embora que houvesse [instead of embora houvesse] uma administração portuguesa ‘there was all this although there was a Portuguese administration’ (cf. Gonçalves 2013, 173s.; Adriano 2014, 431s.). Negation – The Angolan Portuguese verb phrase, too, displays deviations from European Portuguese. With regard to negation, and besides the simple pre-verbal marker não ‘not’, Angolan Portuguese, again aligning with Brazilian Portuguese, also employs bipartite negation by means of two separated instances of não such as não cresci com os meus pais não ‘I didn’t grow up with my parents’, with the last não being prosodically integrated into the sentence (cf. Inverno 2009, 275ss.). Negated imperatives –once more as  

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in Brazilian Portuguese– are frequently indicative such as não fala assim ‘don’t talk like this’ instead of employing the subjunctive não fale assim as in European Portuguese (cf. Chavagne 2005, 233; Inverno 2009, 237ss.; Undolo 2014, 175ss.). This tendency is not limited to imperatives, as can be seen in phrases such as não quero que sabem ‘I don’t want them to know’ instead of não quero que saibam (cf. Chavagne 2005, 231ss.; Adriano 2014, 292ss.; Undolo 2014, 171ss.; Campos 2016). Prepositions – Changes of subcategorization frames of five different macro-types are frequent (cf. Undolo 2014, 203ss.; Adriano 2015, 190ss.). Firstly, prepositions selected by the verb can deviate from European Portuguese, with em ‘in’ apparently –and just like in Brazilian Portuguese– developing towards a default prepositional marker such as in ir/chegar em ‘to go to/to arrive at’ instead of European Portuguese ir/chegar a (cf. Vilela 1999, 182ss.; Adriano 2014, 333ss.). Secondly, direct objects of some verbs that are transitive in European Portuguese can be prepositional objects in Angolan Portuguese, such as in avaliar sobre a.c. ‘to evaluate something’ and abolir com a.c. ‘to abolish something’ instead of avaliar a.c. and abolir a.c. (cf. Adriano 2014, 352ss.). Thirdly, the opposite development is also attested for some verbs such as assistir a.c. ‘to attend something’ and obedecer alguém ‘to obey someone’ instead of assistir a a.c. and obedecer a alguém (cf. Adriano 2014, 364ss.). Fourthly, Angolan Portuguese, once more similar to Brazilian Portuguese, sometimes displays encoding strategies different from European Portuguese for beneficiaries/recipients in the sense that these are not always governed by the dative morpheme a but by the prepositions em or para, such as in dar informação na/para a senhora ‘to give information to the woman’ instead of dar informação à senhora (cf. Adriano 2014, 337ss., 345s.). Fifthly, infinitival complements in verbal periphrases are often not introduced by prepositions, as can be illustrated with estar + infinitive ‘to be doing something’ and continuar + infinitive ‘to continue to do something’ instead of European Portuguese estar a/continuar a + infinitive (cf. Chavagne 2005, 252; Adriano 2014, 329). Differential object marking with a (often called prepositional accusative) can occur in contexts from which it is ruled out in European Portuguese, such as votem ao nosso candidato ‘vote our candidate’ instead of votem o nosso candidato (cf. Adriano 2014, 353s.; Gerards 2023). Cases of a non-normative addition of de in subordinate queclauses (dequeísmo) as well as opposite cases of a non-normative deletion of de in such clauses (queísmo), just like in Brazilian and also in colloquial European Portuguese, also occur. This can be seen in examples such as dizer de que [instead of que] ‘to say that’ and chegámos à conclusão que [instead of de que] ‘we came to the conclusion that’ (cf. Adriano 2014, 355ss., 376ss.). A further locus of instability are relative clauses, which, once more like in Brazilian and in colloquial European Portuguese, can display a lack of prepositional marking of the relativizer, such as in assisti ao filme que [instead of de que] me falaste ‘I attended the movie you told me about’, or the pronominal resumption of the relativized antecedent, such as in assisti (a)o filme que me falaste dele [instead of de que me falaste] ‘I attended the movie you told me about’ (cf. Adriano 2014, 380ss.; Hagemeijer 2016, 55ss.). Comparatives can feature either simple de or complex grading structures such as em relação a ‘in relation to’ to introduce the term of comparison, as can be seen

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in cases like é mais velho dele [instead of do que ele] ‘he is older than him’ and A Rosa acha a Bela mais simpática em relação à Marta [instead of do que a Marta] ‘Rosa finds Bela more likeable than Marta’ (cf. Undolo 2014, 193ss.). Verb forms – Irregular European Portuguese verb forms can be subject to analogical regularization in Angolan Portuguese in cases such as sento ‘I feel’, prefero ‘I prefer’, and sabo ‘I know’ instead of sinto, prefiro, and sei, or in esteje ‘I am/(s)he is’ instead of the European Portuguese subjunctive esteja (cf. Chavagne 2005, 237ss.). The most frequent existential is ter instead of the European Portuguese haver (cf. Adriano 2014, 320).

4.3 Lexicon As for the differential lexicon of Angolan Portuguese, Ribas (1997), Chavagne (2005, 144, annex 2), and Undolo (2014, 224ss.) list 4,500, 2,172, and 126 Angolisms, respectively. A discussion of the 709 Angolisms recognized in the Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporânea can be found in Sacanene (2019). Derivation – Especially with verbs, the prefix des‑ is more productive than in European Portuguese and can be found, for instance, in desconseguir ‘to fail’ (< des- + conseguir ‘to succeed’) and desafastar ‘to remove, to separate, to detach, to go away’ (< des- + afastar ‘to remove, to separate, to detach’, cf. Chavagne 2005, 168ss.). Hybrid forms that combine Bantu and Portuguese elements occur, too. In the verbal domain, Angolan Portuguese may present the verbalizing Bantu prefix a- such as in aresponder ‘to answer’ (< a- + responder, cf. Chavagne 2005, 170, 177ss.; Sassuco 2016, 209). Loan verbs are generally integrated into the ar-class, either with the Bantu verbal prefix ku- in examples such as (ku)xukulular ‘to cast a disdainful glance’ (< Kimbundu kuxukulula ‘to give a bad look’ + ‑ar) or without in examples such as xingar ‘to insult’ (< Kimbundu kúxinga ‘to insult’ + ‑ar) and banzar ‘to think, to imagine’ (< Kimbundu banza ‘to think, to imagine’ + ‑ar, cf. Chavagne 2005, 147). In the nominal domain, Angolan Portuguese can make use of the Bantu prefixes ki- and ka- to form augmentatives and diminutives; examples include kicasa ‘big house’, kivelha ‘very old’, kaloja ‘little shop’, and kapequeno ‘smallish’ (cf. Chavagne 2005, 172ss.; Sassuco 2016, 210). More Angolan Portuguese differential lexemes featuring derivational affixes can be found in Chavagne (2005, 168–188). Composition – Differential composition in Angolan Portuguese seems to be rather rare. Some examples are given in Chavagne (2005, 191s.) and include farinha-musseque ‘manioc flour’ (< farinha + Kimbundu museke ‘neighbourhood in the urban periphery’), cantalutismo ‘tendency to celebrate the political fight’ (< cantar ‘to sing’ + luta ‘fight’ + nominalizing suffix ‑ismo), and bate-boca ‘lively discussion’ (< bater ‘to hit’ and boca ‘mouth’). Reduction – A number of reductive morphophonological processes are attested in Angolan Portuguese (cf. Chavagne 2005, 133ss.). Among these are apocopation (e. g., panquê ‘food’ < panqueca ‘pancake (colloquial)’; also pancar ‘to eat’), syncopation (e. g., sô ‘mister [vocative]’ < senhor, sá ‘madam [vocative]’ < senhora), prothesis (e. g., vavó < avó  

 

 

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‘grandmother’), or a combination of several such processes (e. g., tuga ‘Portuguese’ < Portugal, turra ‘terrorist’ < terrorista, coche ‘a tiny little bit’ < poucochinho). Semantic change – Semantic change of lexical elements that also exist in European Portuguese is quite frequently noted in the literature. Examples include anexo ‘room, house’ besides ‘subsidiary building, annex’, deslocado ‘war refugee’ besides ‘out of place’, estreito ‘thin, skinny’ besides ‘narrow’, falar ‘to say’ besides ‘to talk, to speak’, gasosa ‘bribe [money], corruption’ besides ‘lemonade’, incomodado ‘ill’ besides ‘molested’, and proveniente ‘person from the area formerly controlled by UNITA, former UNITA fighter, war expellee’ besides ‘coming from’ (cf. Undolo 2014, 234–271). Beyond that, the local adverb aonde can mean ‘where to’ as in European Portuguese, ‘where’ (EPg. onde), and ‘from where’ (EPg. donde, cf. Adriano 2014, 425ss.). A further interesting point is what Chavagne (2005, 204ss.) tentatively calls ‘expletive’ (“explétif”) adverbs, among them só ‘only’ in diz só!, ?‘just say!’, and (a)inda ‘still’ in ouve ainda!, ‘listen [?]’. The precise function of such uses –due to Bantu influence (cf. Chimuku 2019, 53ss.)– is not yet clear, but an analysis in terms of modal particles may be promising (cf. Meisnitzer/Gerards 2016; Gerards/Meisnitzer 2017). Ainda has, however, an additional Angolan Portuguese-specific meaning ‘not yet’, which is clearly adverbial (cf. Inverno 2009, 285) and not amenable to a potential modal analysis. Loan words – Much of the differential Angolan Portuguese lexicon are loan words from Bantu languages, especially Kimbundu and Umbundu (cf. Vilela 1999, 180s.). Many of these loans designate extralinguistic realities typical of Angola and not found in Portugal, such as, for instance, flora and fauna, cuisine, as well as religious and cultural practices (cf. Ribas 1997; Chavagne 2005, 211ss.). Among the Bantu loan words repeatedly cited in the literature and considered generalized and stable (Chavagne 2005, 219ss.; for overviews of umbundisms, cf. Costa 2015; Cambuta 2018) are, for example, bué ‘much, a lot’ (also in colloquial/youth European Portuguese), cabaço ‘hymen, virginity’, candonga ‘illegal commerce’, caxinde (a medicinal plant), cota ‘the elder/respected person’, dendém (a type of palm-tree), imbamba ‘personal belongings, luggage’, kamba ‘friend’, kimbanda ‘healer, sorcerer, diviner’, kimbo ‘village’, maximbombo ‘bus, coach’, musseque ‘slum’ (also used in European Portuguese), and muxima ‘heart’. Loan translations – A case different from loan words are loan translations by means of which Portuguese lexical material is used to translate a Bantu lexeme or phrase. Some such cases are filho de mulher ‘daughter, (lit.) son of woman’ (< Kimbundu mona wa muhatu), instead of filha ‘daughter’, comeu meu dinheiro, ‘(s)he spent my money, (lit.) (s)he ate my money’ (< Kimbundu wadi kitadi kyami) instead of gastou [‘spent’] o meu dinheiro (cf. Sassuco 2016, 214s.). Another case is nominalized o mais-velho ‘the elder/respected person’ (cf. Undolo 2014, 257), which corresponds to the loan translation of cota (cf. above).  

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5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism There is no legal specification as to which is the officially preferred variety of Portuguese in Angola. The pan-Lusitan spelling reform of 1990 (Acordo Ortográfico) is not legally binding as Angola –though co-financing joint spelling projects– criticizes that it does not properly consider Afro-Lusitan varieties. Despite all this, European Portuguese generally has the highest overt de facto prestige in Angola. Its actual command, on the other hand, is limited among most Angolans, including teachers and other actors of high social status (also cf. 3.3 and 5.3). This means, in the first place, that beyond the lexicon endogenous usages deviating from the exogenous European Portuguese norm are often not even noticed by speakers themselves, including the most educated ones (cf. Adriano 2014, 134). If, however, deviations from European Portuguese are recognized as such, they often are subject to prescriptive criticism by institutions and speakers alike (cf. Adriano 2014, 115; Bernardo 2017, 45ss.). Especially in formal settings such as public speech and school contexts, speakers who do not adhere to the exogenous European Portuguese norm run the risk of being considered uncouth, coarse, poorly educated, and lacking intelligence (cf. Bernardo 2017, 52). Nonetheless, there are clear hints that Angola is currently undergoing a process of discursive change in this regard. A good example is the discussion of the term linguistic error in Adriano (2014, 104–144), who advocates a careful and self-confident re-evaluation of the prestige of differential Angolan Portuguese features as part of the formation process of an endogenous Angolan Portuguese norm (for an early precursor, cf. Marques 1990). Slowly, such expert discourse is also reaching a lay public, as witnessed, for instance, by a newspaper article published in 2021 in Jornal de Angola. Its (anonymous) author clearly calls for linguistic emancipation: ‘Linguistic dishonesty reigns in our society, an indoctrinated behaviour created by schools, which, from their own point of view, tend to define what is “wrong” and what is “right”. This hegemonic posture of [European] Portuguese violates the linguistic variety of Angolan Portuguese’.19

Such positions seem to strike more and more a chord with lay speakers, for whom Angolan Portuguese is gaining covert prestige: the reference status of European Portuguese is no longer taken for granted by many Angolans who begin to consider their Angolan Portuguese a marker of identity (cf. Zau 2011, 94–127; Miguel 22014, 16–21; Adriano 2015, 49– 92; also cf. Cruz 2013, 173s.) and even perceive European Portuguese as “elitist” (cf. Undolo 2014, 115s.). The ongoing process of sociolinguistic re-evaluation of Angolan Portu-

19 “Na nossa sociedade impera a desonestidade linguística, característica comportamental doutrinária construída pela escola, que tende a definir na sua óptica o ‘errado’ e o ‘certo’. Essa postura hegemónica do português estupra a variedade linguística do português angolano” (s.a. 2021).

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guese features is also reflected by the foundation of the privately-run Academia Angolana de Letras in 2016.

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics There are no prescriptive-normative works that would fix or let alone contribute to the formation of the currently emerging endogenous standard variety of Angolan Portuguese. There exist, to date, neither grammars nor orthographies of Angolan Portuguese, which also explains why endogenous developments are still often stigmatized and considered errors. Ribas (1997) is a singular descriptive dictionary of Angolan Portuguese and contains 4,500 Angolisms. The Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporânea contains a total of 709 Angolisms (cf. Sacanene 2019). Being a still highly unstable, emerging non-dominant variety of Portuguese, linguistic peculiarities of Angolan Portuguese are primarily collected in a quantitatively still very limited number of descriptive publications that strive to classify their use from the perspective of variational linguistics (e. g., Chavagne 2005; Inverno 2009; Adriano 2014; 2015; Undolo 2014; Massiala 2019; references in 4; the extremely useful online database Português de Angola, cf. Inverno/Figueiredo 2022). First attempts to evaluate variants collected in descriptive works as diasystematically neutral are made, for example, in the Gramática do Português (Gonçalves 2013). A problem in this regard is that even for linguistic features used in formal contexts there often is insufficient distinction between Angolan and Mozambican Portuguese. Undolo’s (2014, 288) urgent call for more descriptive work should, indeed, be taken seriously by the academic community, especially since the unmonitored formation process of an endogenous Angolan Portuguese norm has already and irreversibly begun.  

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Given the sparsity of specialized literature, it is for the most part difficult to evaluate which of the features described in 4 are used in public authorities, schools, the media, and literature – and, if so, to what extent. What is generally safe to say is that, contrary to official discourse, the use of differential Angolan Portuguese features is becoming more widespread at all levels. This increases the gap between the linguistic reality of everyday life and the doctrinal orientation towards European Portuguese. Variety used by public authorities – With regard to public authorities, we are not aware of any studies scrutinizing their use of differential Angolan Portuguese linguistic features. It is, however, expectable that at least some Angolan Portuguese differential features are making their way into both written and oral productions of public authorities – a hypothesis that needs to be verified or falsified by future research. Variety used in education – Undolo (2014) and Adriano (2015) are invaluable pioneering studies for the use of differential Angolan Portuguese features in schools. Adriano

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shows that Angolan teachers of Portuguese as well as Angolans studying towards such a degree often –and in many cases in their vast majority– use Angolan Portuguese forms deviant from European Portuguese in the domain of clitics and prepositions (cf. 4.2). For both teachers and students, Undolo (2014) comes to similar conclusions not only for the use of clitics but also for verbal mood selection, agreement, comparative structures, and government. On the other hand, Angolan teachers do see it as their task to eliminate Angolan Portuguese peculiarities from their students’ language use (cf. Adriano 2014, 115s.). The obvious discrepancy between doctrinal and real language use is one of the main reasons of the high academic failure in Angola (cf. Adriano 2014, 116s.; Bernardo 2017, 42s., 53). Variety used in the media – Many differential features of Angolan Portuguese are also attested in the media. This is documented in Adriano (2014), who, by way of analysing transcribed radio and TV programmes but without providing quantifications, shows that a wide array of morphosyntactic features of Angolan Portuguese are present in audiovisual media. Some examples are the lack of overt number and gender agreement within the noun phrase and between subject and verbal predicate, indicative mood selection instead of subjunctive, and differential patterns in the use of prepositions and in the collocation of clitics. A further important study is Massiala (2019), who shows that many phonic features of Angolan Portuguese are attested –and sometimes even constitute the major variant– in the formal speech of employees of the Angolan TV station TPA. This is true, for instance –and among many other features not listed here for reasons of space– of the monophthongization of diphthongs, the limitation of centralized [ɨ] to absolute final unstressed position, being substituted by [e] or [i] elsewhere, the realization of stressed European Portuguese /e/ as [ɛ] instead of [e] and of stressed /o/ as [ɔ] instead of [o], the realization of unstressed /a/ as [a] instead of [ɐ], the realization of /ɲ/ as [j]̃ instead of [ɲ], and the numerous allophonic realizations of /r/. Variety used in literature – To the best of our knowledge, there are no studies rigorously investigating the use of differential Angolan Portuguese features in literature. Many examples from different linguistic levels can be found in Chavagne (2005) and a list of examples of pronominal collocation deviating from European Portuguese in Angolan literature is presented in Miguel (22014, 91s.). By way of example, compare the following quotation from Jorge Macedo’s 1977 novel Gente do meu bairro: “quando isso conseguimos (um ou outro entre milhões) nos obrigam então renunciar nossos falares regionais” (Macedo 1977, 105, quoted from Chavagne 2005, 28).20

In this quotation, the verb obrigar lacks the prescriptively required preposition a and comes with a direct object nossos falares regionais instead. Likewise, the only prescriptively correct position of the pronominal clitic nos is enclisis to obrigam, i.e. obrigam-

20 ‘When we succeed (one or another among millions) they then force us to renounce our regional languages’.

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nos. Yet, in the quotation, nos is proclitic to the finite verb obrigam. With regard to the use of differential Angolan Portuguese features in literature, note, too, that it is unclear which features are used neutrally and are commonly accepted and which are used for humoristic means or to positively or negatively index different social groups. In this regard, one hypothesis could be that Angolan Portuguese lexical features are used ludically or are indexicalized most frequently in literature due to their increased saliency (cf. Chavagne 2005, 218s., but also cf. Macedo’s quotation above). As a final remark, it should also be borne in mind that Angolan literature, especially of international impact, is still very often published in Portuguese publishing houses and that some of the major Angolan publishing houses (e. g., Plural Editores Angola) are part of the Portuguese Porto Editora group. Both may well have a language purist side effect in the sense of linguistic modification by editors.  

References Adriano, Paulino Soma (2014), Tratamento morfossintáctico de expressões e estruturas frásicas do português em Angola, Évora, Universidade de Évora, Doctoral Thesis. Adriano, Paulino Soma (2015), A crise normativa do português em Angola, cliticização e regência verbal: que atitude para o professor e o revisor?, Luanda, Mayamba. Álvarez López, Laura/Gonçalves, Perpétua/Avelar, Juanito Ornelas de (edd.) (2018), The Portuguese Language Continuum in Africa and Brazil, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins. Arden, Mathias/Meisnitzer, Benjamin (2013), Plurizentrik und massenmediale Normen: der Fall des Portugiesischen, in: Aurelia Merlan/Jürgen Schmidt-Radefeldt (edd.), Das Portugiesische als Diasystem innerhalb und außerhalb des lusophonen Raums, Berlin, Lang, 19–52. Bender, Gerald J. (32013 [2004]), Angola sob o domínio português. Mito e realidade, Luanda, Mayamba [first edition: Nzila]. Bernardo, Ezequiel Pedro José (2017), Norma e Variação Linguística: Implicações no Ensino da Língua Portuguesa em Angola, Revista Internacional em Língua Portuguesa 32, 39–54. Bernardo, Ezequiel Pedro José/Severo, Christine Gorski (2018), Políticas linguísticas em Angola sobre as políticas educativas in(ex)cludentes, Revista da Abralin 17/2, 210–233. C-AO = Assembleia Constituinte (2010), Constitução da República de Angola, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https:// governo.gov.ao/fotos/frontend_1/editor2/constituicao_da_republica_de_angola.pdf (2/3/2023). Cabral, Lisender Augusto Vicente (2005), Complementos Verbais Preposicionais do Português em Angola, vol. 2, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Master Thesis. Cambuta, José (2018), Neologia do Português em Angola. A inovação lexical na Zona Linguística Umbundu, Lisbon, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Campos, Doriela Marisa Dias (2016), Estruturas de complementação verbal finita no português em Angola. Um contributo para a análise da variação linguística em variedades com normas não padronizadas, Évora, Universidade de Évora, Master Thesis. Chavagne, Jean-Pierre (2005), La langue portugaise d’Angola, Lyon, Université Lumière Lyon 2, Doctoral Thesis. Chimuku, Luís (2019), Valores semânticos de “só”, “ainda”, “ainda só”, “já” e “já sim” no Português de Angola: Proposta de exercícios práticos, Évora, Universidade de Évora, Master Thesis. Costa, Teresa Manuela Camacha José da (2015), Umbundismos no Português de Angola, Lisbon, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Cristóvão, Fernando (2008), Da Lusitanidade à Lusofonia, Coimbra, Almedin.

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Cruz, Arsénio da Silva (2013), Estudo comparativo entro o perfil linguístico do falante urbano do Lubango e do Huambo e suas implicações no ensino do português, Lisbon, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Decree-Law 5/2006 = Ministério das Finanças (2006), Código Aduaneiro, Decreto-Lei n° 5/06, Luanda, Republic of Angola http://www.ucm.minfin.gov.ao/cs/groups/public/documents/document/zmlu/mdmy/~edisp/ minfin032578.pdf (2/3/2023). Decree-Law 5/2008 = Ministério do Interior (2008), Decreto-Lei n° 5/08. Código de Estrada, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https://www.stac.co.ao/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/codigoestrada.pdf (2/3/2023). Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, Texas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Endruschat, Annette (1990), Studien zur portugiesischen Sprache in Angola (unter besonderer Berücksichtigung lexikalischer und soziolinguistischer Aspekte), Frankfurt am Main, TFM. Fernandes, João/Ntondo, Zavoni (2002), Angola: povos e línguas, Luanda, Nzila. Gärtner, Eberhard (1997), Coincidências dos fenómenos morfo-sintácticos do substandard do português do Brasil, de Angola e de Moçambique, in: Ruth Degenhardt/Thomas Stolz/Hella Ulferts (edd.), Afrolusitanistik – eine vergessene Disziplin in Deutschland, Bremen, Universität Bremen, 146–180. Gerards, David Paul (2022), Clitics in Informal Written Sources of Angolan Portuguese and their Similarity to Informal Brazilian Portuguese, in: Anja Hennemann/Benjamin Meisnitzer (edd.), Linguistic Hybridity. Contact-induced and Cognitively Motivated Grammaticalization and Lexicalization Processes in Romance Languages, Heidelberg, Winter, 15–46. Gerards, David Paul (2023), Differential Object Marking in the Romance Languages, in: Michele Loporcaro/ Francesco Gardani (edd.), Oxford Encyclopedia of Romance Linguistics, Oxford, Oxford University Press, https://oxfordre.com/linguistics/page/romance-linguistics/ (2/3/2023). Gerards, David Paul/Meisnitzer, Benjamin (2017), Überlegungen zur Vermittlung von Modalpartikeln im Fremdsprachenunterricht am Beispiel des Französischen, des Spanischen und des Italienischen, in: Daniel Reimann/Christoph Bürgel (edd.), Sprachliche Mittel im Unterricht der romanischen Sprachen: Aussprache, Wortschatz und Morphosyntax in Zeiten der Kompetenzorientierung, Tübingen, Narr, 329–360. Gonçalves, Perpétua (2013), O português em África, in: Eduardo B. Paiva Raposo et al. (edd.), Gramática do Português, vol. 1, Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 157–178. Hagemeijer, Tjerk (2016), O português em contacto em África, in: Ana Maria Martins/Ernestina Carrilho (edd.), Manual de linguística portuguesa, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 43–67. Hammarström, Harald, et al. (2023), Glottolog 4.7, Leipzig, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, https://glottolog.org (2/3/2023). Hodges, Tony (2004 [2001]), Angola: Anatomy of an Oil State, Oxford/Bloomington, Fridtjof Nansen Institute/ James Currey/Indiana University Press. INE (2016) = Ceita Camilo (ed.) (2016), Resultados definitivos do recenseamento geral da população e da habitação de Angola 2014, Luanda, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Inverno, Liliana (2008), A transição de Angola para o português: uma história sociolinguística, in: Fernando Tavares Pimenta/Luís Reis Torgal/Julião Soares Sousa (edd.), Comunidades imaginadas: nação e nacionalismo em África, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 117–129. Inverno, Liliana (2009), Contact-induced restructuring of Portuguese Morphosyntax in Interior Angola. Evidence from Dundo (Lunda Norte), Coimbra, Universidade de Coimbra, Doctoral Thesis. Inverno, Liliana/Figueiredo, Carlos (2022), Bibliografia Português de Angola, Maputo, Cátedra Português Língua Segunda e Estrangeira/Universidade Eduardo Mondlane, https://catedraportugues.uem.mz/ bibliography-search/1 (2/3/2023). Law 1 = Assembleia Nacional (2017), Lei n.º 1/17, Lei de Imprensa, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https://erca.co. ao/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/2017-DR-PACOTE-LEGISLATIVO-DA-CSOCIAL.pdf (2/3/2023). Law 13 = Assembleia Nacional (2001), Lei de Bases do Sistema de Educação, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https:// www.unicef.org/angola/relatorios/lei-de-base-do-sistema-de-educação-lei-nº-1301 (2/3/2023).

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Law 32 = Assembleia Nacional (2020), Lei n.° 32/20, Lei de Bases do Sistema de Educação, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https://www.ipls.ao/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Lei-3_20-de-12-de-Agosto-Lei-de-Bases-doSistema-de-Eucacao-e-Ensino-altera-a-Lei-17_16.pdf (2/3/2023). Law 5 = Assembleia Nacional (2003), Lei n.° 15/03 de 22 de Julho de defesa do consumidor, Luanda, Republic of Angola, https://wipolex.wipo.int/en/legislation/details/11008 (2/3/2023). Leclerc, Jacques (2021), Angola, in: L’aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/CEFAN, https://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/Angola.htm (2/3/2023). Lipski, John M. (2008), Angola e Brasil: vínculos lingüísticos afro-lusitanos, Veredas 9, 83–98. Macedo, Jorge (1977), Gente do meu bairro, Luanda, União dos Escritores Angolanos. Manuel, Félix Chinjengue Matias (2015), Aspetos do português falado em Benguela, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Master Thesis. Marques, A. H. de Oliveira (ed.) (2001), Nova História da Expansão Portuguesa: O Império Africano 1890–1930, vol. 11, Lisboa, Editorial Estampa. Marques, Irene (1990), Algumas considerações sobre a problemática linguística em Angola, in: Actas do Congresso sobre a situação actual da língua portuguesa no mundo – Lisboa 1983, vol. 1, Lisbon, Instituto de Cultura e Língua Portuguesa, 205–224. Massiala, Valério Guimbi Sunsa (2019), Variação fonético-fonológica do português de Angola: caraterísticas da variedade falada em Cabinda e suas implicações profissionais na TPA, Évora, Universidade de Évora, Master Thesis. Matos, Norton de (1953), A Nação una. Organização Política e Administrativa dos Territórios do Ultramar Português, Lisboa, Paulino Ferreira & Filhos. Meisnitzer, Benjamin/Gerards, David Paul (2016), Außergewöhnlich? Modalpartikeln im Spanischen, in: Daniel Reimann/Ferran Robles i Sabater/Raúl Sánchez Prieto (edd.), Angewandte Linguistik Iberoromanisch – Deutsch. Studien zu Grammatik, Lexikographie, interkultureller Pragmatik und Textlinguistik, Tübingen, Narr, 133–152. Mendes, Beatrice Correia (1985), Contribuição para o estudo da língua portuguesa em Angola, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Master Thesis. Miguel, Maria Helena (2008), Língua Portuguesa em Angola: Normativismo e Glotopolítica, LUCERE. Revista Académica da UCAN 4/5, 35–48. Miguel, Maria Helena (22014 [2003]), Dinâmica da pronominalização no português de Luanda, Luanda, Mayamba. Mingas, Amélia A. (2000), Interferência do Kimbundu no Português falado em Lwanda, Porto, Campo das Letras. Nzau, Domingos Gabriel Dele/Venâncio, José Carlos/Sardinha, Maria da Graça d’Almeida (2013), Em torno da consagração de uma variante angolana do português: subsídios para uma reflexão, Limite 7, 159–180. PM (2019), Os chineses que “aguentam” a crise de Angola, Macau, Plataforma Media, https://www. plataformamedia.com/2021/09/18/os-chineses-que-aguentam-a-crise-de-angola/ (2/3/2023). Resolution 3 = Conselho de Ministros (1987), Resolução nº 3/87 de 23 de Maio, Luanda, Republic of Angola, http://www.embaixadadeangola.org/cultura/linguas/set_lnac.html (2/3/2023). Ribas, Óscar (1997), Dicionário de regionalismos angolanos, Contemporânea, Matosinhos. s.a. (2021), A questão da variação linguística e a norma, Jornal de Angola, 17 January, https://www. jornaldeangola.ao/ao/noticias/a-questao-da-variacao-linguistica-e-a-norma/ (2/3/2023). Sacanene, Bernardo Sipiali (2019), Análise dos angolanismos no Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporânea, Diacrítica 32/2, 485–503. Santos, Vinícius Gonçalves dos (2020), Aspectos prosódicos do português angolano do Libolo: entoação e fraseamento, São Paulo, Universidade de São Paulo, Doctoral Thesis. Sassuco, Daniel Peres (2016), Pistas essenciais para um português de Angola, in: Ilka Boaventura Leite/Cristine Gorski Severo (edd.), Kadila: Culturas e Ambientes. Diálogos Brasil–Angola, São Paulo, Blücher, 199–217. Statista (2022a), Ranking of the 20 countries with the lowest life expectancy as of 2020, New York, Statista, https:// www.statista.com/statistics/264719/ranking-of-the-20-countries-with-the-lowest-life-expectancy/ (2/3/ 2023).

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Statista (2022b), Countries that are most affected by hunger and malnutrition according to the Global Hunger Index 2021, New York, Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/269924/countries-most-affected-by-hungerin-the-world-according-to-world-hunger-index/ (2/3/2023). Statista (2022c), Poverty incidence in Angola between March 2018 and February 2019, by area, New York, Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/1135200/poverty-incidence-in-angola-by-area/ (2/3/2023). Teixeira, Eliana Pitombo (2012), A representação do sujeito pronominal no português popular angolano, PAPIA 22/1, 141–159. Undolo, Márcio E. da Silva (2014), Caracterização da norma do português em Angola, Évora, Universidade de Évora, Doctoral Thesis. Undolo, Márcio E. da Silva (2017), Caracterização do sistema vocálico do português culto falado em Angola, Revista de Filología Románica 31/2, 181–187. Vilela, Mário (1999), A língua portuguesa em África: tendências e factos, Africana Studia 1, 175–191. Worldometers (2022), Angola Population, Dover, Worldometers, https://www.worldometers.info/worldpopulation/angola-population/ (2/3/2023). Zau, Domingos Gabriel Dele (2011), A língua portuguesa em Angola. Um contributo para o estudo da sua nacionalização, Covilhã, Universidade da Beira Interior, Doctoral Thesis.

Tjerk Hagemeijer

27 São Tomé and Príncipe Abstract: São Tomé and Príncipe, a small island state and former Portuguese colony in Western Africa, is historically a creole-speaking country that has shifted massively to Portuguese in the twentieth century. The rise of Portuguese, which is currently the main native and exclusive official language, has become a serious threat to the local creoles. Here we will discuss the diachronic development of the language situation and show that the Portuguese variety spoken on the islands has undergone substantial linguistic restructuring when compared to European Portuguese, posing serious challenges to the educational system. The postcolonial variety that emerged in a multilingual setting characterized by historical second language acquisition does not, however, show significant signs of Ausbau at present. However, while standard European Portuguese continues to enjoy prestige as the language of upward social mobility, there are also some signs of increasing acceptance of the local variety of Portuguese. Keywords: Portuguese, Creole, São Tomé and Príncipe, sociolinguistics, language planning

1 Sociolinguistic situation São Tomé and Príncipe is a small island state comprising the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe in the Gulf of Guinea. Its 2018 population is estimated at 211,000 (WB 2018). Portuguese is the most widely spoken (native) language, which is a unique situation for a former colonial language in Africa. According to the latest national census carried out in 2012, 98.4 % of the population over one year old speak this language, which corresponds to 170,223 people. In addition to Portuguese, three autochthonous creole languages, Forro (also known as (Lungwa) Santome or Creole of São Tomé), Lung’Ie (or Principense) and Ngola (or Angolar), as well as Cabo Verdean are spoken. In 2012, the percentages of speakers of these languages were respectively 36.2 %, 1.0 %, 6.6 %, and 8.5 %. Table 1 summarizes the numbers and percentages of speakers in the four censuses carried out after the country’s independence in 1975. While the census does not distinguish between first and second language speakers for any of the languages, it is evident that Portuguese is the dominant first language and that there are currently many Santomeans who are Portuguese monolinguals, especially among the younger generations, where the percentage of creole speakers is at its lowest (cf. Hagemeijer 2018, 178–181, for further discussion of the statistical data). Given that around half of the country’s population is under 18 years of age, the percentages of creole speakers are expected to decline further in an ongoing process of language attrition and loss, even though there are a few signs of renewed vitality of the major creole,  

 

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Forro (cf. 3). In the past, this language functioned as an additional lingua franca, but at present this role belongs exclusively to Portuguese. Table 1: Numbers and percentages of speakers per language in the postcolonial era in São Tomé and Príncipe (RGPH 1987; 1991; 2003; 2014)

1981

Total population Portuguese

Forro

Lung’Ie

Ngola

Cabo Verdean

96,661

60,519 (62.6 %)

54,387 (56.3 %)

1,533 (1.6 %)

–

–

94,907 (80.8 %)

69,899 (59.5 %)

1,558 (1.3 %)

–

–

136,085 (98.9 %)

99,621 (72.4 %)

3,302 (2.4 %)

–

–

170,223 (98.4 %)

62,707 (36.2 %)

1,753 (1.0 %)

11,377 (6.6 %)

 

1991

117.504

 

2001

137.599

 

2012

173.015

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

14,654 (8.5 %)  

As a consequence of the explosive growth of Portuguese over the last decades, it has become dominant in all the districts of the country, including in traditionally creole-speaking areas. The Forros, the Forro-speaking group, are mainly spread over the districts of Água Grande, Cantagalo, Lembá, Lobata, Mé-Zochi (São Tomé island), corresponding roughly to the northern half of São Tomé; the south-eastern district of Caué (São Tomé island) is traditionally the stronghold of the Angolares, where nowadays 50 % of the district’s population still speaks Ngola; active Lung’Ie speakers, the so-called Minu Ie ‘children [of the] island’, a much smaller number than indicated in the census, possibly at most a few hundred mostly elderly speakers (Agostinho 2015, 26), are found on the island of Príncipe. This island also has a proportionately large Cabo Verdean-speaking community (2,195 on a total population of 7,083, or 31 %). Although the descendants of Cabo Verdeans, who were part of the contract labourers of the twentieth century, are spread across the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe, there are still a couple of former plantations where they cluster together and speak their language.  

 

2 Linguistic history The uninhabited islands of São Tomé and Príncipe were discovered by the Portuguese in the second half of the fifteenth century. Permanent large-scale settlement of São Tomé, the main island, started in 1493 and led to a thriving sugar-producing plantation society during the sixteenth century. While Portuguese was the language of prestige, contact between Portuguese settlers and African slaves who had arrived from the surrounding African continent resulted in the formation of a pidginized variety based on Portuguese and African languages, which quickly expanded into what became Forro, a creole spok-

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en historically by the Forro group (Pg. forro ‘free slave’). Early varieties of this contact language were taken to the neighbouring islands of Príncipe, where it became known as Lung’Ie ‘(lit.) language of the island’, and Annobón (Equatorial Guinea), where it evolved into Fa d’Ambô ‘(lit.) speech of Annobón’, and also originated Ngola, considered a maroon creole (e. g., Ferraz 1979, 8–11; Hagemeijer 2011, 112–116). The collapse of the sugar cycle at the end of the sixteenth century led to an exodus of Portuguese planters. In the subsequent period, until the abolition of slavery in 1875, which marks a turning point in the history of the island state, the creoles must have been widely spoken whereas Portuguese was arguably restricted to the very small number of Portuguese inhabitants (Lucas 2015; Serafim 2000) and to those in close contact with the Portuguese administration, in particular the Forro elite. Mello e Almada provides an illustrative quote claiming that ‘all the Forros that do not have a certain position, or more or less frequent relations with the white colony, do not know Portuguese; and the native women, even those of the highest social classes, do not know our language or speak it badly’.1 Portuguese started superseding the creoles from the late nineteenth century on, to become the dominant first language in more recent times (Bouchard 2019b; Hagemeijer 2018). The introduction of coffee, in the late eighteenth century, and especially cocoa, in the early nineteenth century, ended the interregnum without a major export product since the sugar cycle of the sixteenth century. By the end of the nineteenth century, cocoa became the main export product, reaching its peak in the early 1900s, when São Tomé and Príncipe was among the world’s main cocoa producers (Hodges/Newitt 1988). However, the abolition of slavery, in 1869, and the formal abolition of the status of free slaves shortly thereafter, in 1875, seriously undermined the success of these labour-intensive cash-crops. The islands tackled the problem of labour shortage by massive recruitment of contract workers from other Portuguese colonies in Africa, Angola, Cabo Verde, and Mozambique (Nascimento 2000; Seibert 2006), whose Bantu- and Cabo Verdean-speaking populations added to the linguistic complexity of the islands. As mentioned by Rougé (1992, 173), the second language that the contract labourers would typically start to adopt in their new environment was Portuguese. First, they were mostly confined to the harsh conditions of the estates, where they worked six days a week and had at least some exposure to Portuguese, the dominant language among the (Portuguese) planters, whose number had also risen since the coffee and cocoa boom. In fact, the Portuguese constituted the main group of landowners, since the Santomean government denied Forro landowners access to contract workers (Seibert 2006, 47).  

1 “todos os [forros] que não têm uma tal ou qual posição, ou relações mais ou menos frequentes com a colónia branca, desconhecem o português; e a mulher nativa, até mesmo a que pertence à primeira das classes, não sabe a nossa língua ou a fala mal” (Mello e Almada 1929 [1884], 184).

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In this complex context, characterized by social divide, even among the Forros themselves, Portuguese kept expanding, mostly as an informal second language, since education was not a priority in the colonial period. Despite the gradually increasing number of primary schools in the colonial period in the twentieth century, the first national secondary school only began functioning in the 1960s (Pontes 2006). The urban elites would generally use Portuguese to promote and maintain their integration into the colonial structure (Mata 2010, 16s.), and in many homes parents would speak Portuguese to their children even, if it was often not their first language, in order to promote social advancement (e. g., Bouchard 2017, 192, 223). The large-scale transition from second language to first language Portuguese, on the other hand, is primarily a post-independence phenomenon. Access to education (in Portuguese) now became a universal right, despite all the shortcomings with respect to infrastructure, teachers, teacher training, etc. The end of the colonial era also promoted social mobility, and radio and television increased exposure to Portuguese. All in all, in the postcolonial period Portuguese overwhelmingly became the language of all communicative contexts (high and low) as well as the first language of the majority of the country’s inhabitants.  

3 External language policy Legislation – While the Constitution of São Tomé and Príncipe does not inform explicitly about official languages, Portuguese, being both the official and majority language, not only is the sole language effectively used in administration, politics, and education, but also dominates the printed and audiovisual media, as well as the internet and other technology, such as texting. Since independence in 1975, the creoles have often been referred to as ‘national languages’, which does not, however, correspond to any formal status. An official alphabet for the autochthonous creoles was approved in 2013 (Decree no 19) and published in the country’s State Journal (Diário da República) no 102, on 14 August 2014, but is not actively debated or used in society. In fact, this cannot be dissociated from the fact that the written production in these languages is very modest and for the most part limited to Forro, the majority creole (Cardoso/Hagemeijer/Alexandre 2015, 678). Despite the limited role of the creoles at national level, there is a decades-long academic research tradition on these languages, in the form of theses and dissertations, grammars and grammatical descriptions, journal papers, book chapters, dictionaries, and corpora (cf. Hagemeijer/Gonçalves/Afonso 2018, 68, for an overview). In the next paragraphs, we will briefly describe a number of contexts, most of which related to the higher domains of language use, in which the autochthonous creoles are currently used. Languages used in the public sphere – Politicians have often strategically used Forro in election campaigns in order to increase their popularity among certain groups of the population and in recent years a few politicians have occasionally (and controversially)

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used creole (Forro) in speeches in the public sphere, in an attempt to raise the public awareness of the language issue. As to religion, it is also common to find Church choirs using Forro, and the Protestant Wycliffe Foundation is in the process of preparing creole Bible translations. Languages used in education – In an attempt to fight the imminent language loss of Lung’Ie, the regional government of Príncipe has introduced this language as an extracurricular activity from preschool to high school. In education, Portuguese-related creoles in general and the local creoles in particular are nowadays briefly addressed as part of the school curricula, but no education takes place in these languages, not de jure nor de facto. Languages used in the media – While radio and television dedicate only a small amount of their broadcasting time to the creoles, there are currently news summaries in the three native creoles on the radio. Forro, in particular, is used for example in television publicity spots related to education, citizenship, and health, and in a television programme that addresses the knowledge and use of this language. The most important channel for creoles, especially Forro, continues to be music, since creole lyrics are still widely used and highly popular, although increasingly mixed with Portuguese or in Portuguese.

4 Linguistic characteristics Given the strongly multilingual past of São Tomé and Príncipe, related primarily to slavery and contract labour, as well as a history of Portuguese as a second language, it should come as no surprise that Santomean Portuguese presents lexical and grammatical traits that are distinct from (spoken) European Portuguese, the standard that is officially followed, and that the former variety exhibits a broad spectrum of variation. The degree of distinctiveness with respect to European Portuguese relies heavily on sociolinguistic variables, such as language use, age, schooling, and socioeconomic background. Santomean Portuguese is a young research field, since the bulk of the work on this variety was produced in the last 20 years. To the best of my knowledge, Lorenzino (1996, 446ss,) and Espírito Santo (1985, 258s.; 1998, 327–342) are the first authors to describe a number of lexical and grammatical aspects of Santomean Portuguese. Most work focuses on the urban variety of Santomean Portuguese, which is the daily reality of large part of the Santomean population and which we will discuss in the sections below. There is also some research on the heavily restructured subvarieties of Portuguese spoken in the town of Almoxarife (e. g., Figueiredo 2010) and on the former plantation Monte Café (e. g., Rougé 1992; Baxter 2002). However, these subvarieties have been increasingly merged with or absorbed by the more widespread form of Santomean Portuguese. Recently, the variety of Portuguese spoken on the island of Príncipe has also deserved some attention (cf. Santiago/Agostinho 2020, 55ss.). The Chair of Portuguese as a Second and Foreign Language of the Eduardo Mondlane  

 

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University in Mozambique publicly maintains a consultable online bibliography of work on Santomean Portuguese (cf. CPLSE).

4.1 Pronunciation Research on three topics has been central in the domain of phonetics and phonology of Santomean Portuguese, namely diphthongs, vowels, and rhotics. Silveira (2013) and Silveira/Araujo (2018) show that Santomean Portuguese exhibits a strong tendency toward monophthongization, in particular of the most common diphthong , realized as [ɐj] in Standard European Portuguese, when it occurs in non-final position of nouns (e. g., peixe [ˈpɐjʃ(ə)], pronounced [ˈpeʃi] in Santomean Portuguese). While this phenomenon can be found in speakers from different sociolinguistic backgrounds, there are contextual constraints on monophthongization. For example, diphthongs in word-final position, in particular the inflectional suffix , which expresses the past perfect of verbs in ‑ar (e. g., pensei ‘I thought’), fail to undergo monophthongization. Passos (2018), focusing specifically on diphthong , further shows that both social (use of Forro, schooling) and linguistic (following context) variables are relevant to understand the observed variation. With respect to one of the distinctive properties of standard European Portuguese, pretonic vowel raising (e. g., porta [ˈpɔɾtɐ] ‘door’, porteiro [puɾˈtɐjɾu] ‘doorman’, fala [ˈfalɐ] ‘he/she speaks’, falar [fɐˈlaɾ] ‘to speak’), Nascimento (2018) concludes that this feature is far less pervasive in Santomean Portuguese and only to some extent correlated to the level of schooling. Consequently, in this domain this variety shows more affinity with Brazilian Portuguese, which lacks this feature. Nevertheless, vowel raising is a common feature of Santomean Portuguese. The European Portuguese schwa [ə] corresponding to in final and also in other positions, for instance, is often raised: fome [ˈfomi] ‘hunger’, or preposition de [di] ‘of, from’ (e. g., Lima Afonso 2009, 104). In her research on non-final and medial posttonic vowels, Gomes (2018) shows that vowel deletion occurs in one third of the contexts and finds that this can be assigned to different social and linguistic variables. Based on her data, she concludes that the Santomean variety is equidistant with respect to European and Brazilian Portuguese. The phonetic realization of the sounds that correspond to written and shows considerable variation in and across varieties of Portuguese. While most studies focus on European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese (e. g., Veloso 2015), the salient nature of rhotics in Santomean Portuguese has attracted the attention of several scholars. In an early mention of this phenomenon, Bragança (2004) observes that sometimes Santomeans, even those with a medium level of schooling, as he puts it, have difficulty distinguishing /ɾ/ and /ʀ/, and will pronounce both aranha ‘spider’ and arranha ‘he/she scratches’ with an /ʀ/, in the same fashion. This appears to correspond to the identification of a feature that has become much more widespread and is not related to a speaker’s socioeconomic level. Detailed work by Bouchard (2017; 2019a) and Pereira/Hagemei 

 

 

 

 

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jer/Freitas (2018) shows that the standard opposition between /ɾ/ () and /ʀ/ () is being neutralized in favour of a posterior realization [ʁ], in particular among the younger generations of speakers. This age-driven feature has therefore increasingly become a hallmark of Santomean Portuguese. In addition to the abovementioned features, other features, such as syllable restructuring into CV patterns, using processes of epenthesis, aphaeresis, and so on, can be readily identified (e. g., Lima Afonso 2009, 104–108), but are arguably less pervasive and less generalized than the features described above.  

4.2 Morphosyntax Morphosyntactic research has focused on number agreement in the noun phrase and on verb agreement. Based on spoken data, Brandão (2011; 2013) finds in her corpus-based variationist study that number agreement, which is obligatory in European Portuguese, is absent in on average 6.6 % of the occurrences in her data of Santomean Portuguese. She also found that number agreement correlates with schooling, since lower-educated Santomeans, with only 5 to 8 years of education, fail to produce agreement in 23.5 % of the contexts where agreement is required, a number that drops to 1.2 % in the case of individuals who enjoyed 12 to 15 years of education. When marked, number agreement tends to occur in prenuclear or in the leftmost position in the noun phrase (e. g., Essas casaØ bonitaØ ‘these beautiful houses’), therefore favouring marking on articles, demonstratives and possessive pronouns, and quantifiers. The linguistic variable ‘animacy of the head noun’ is shown to favour plural marking in the noun phrase. Works by Brandão/Vieira (2012) and Vieira/Bazenga (2013) further show that the absence of plural agreement marking on verbs in Santomean Portuguese occurs on average in 7.9 % of the cases in the corpus they analysed. Similarly to the results of the studies on number agreement above, less educated Santomeans show greater divergence with respect to standard European Portuguese, whereas highly educated Santomeans largely converge with the standard language. Syntactic studies on Santomean Portuguese have focused primarily on the restructuring of the selection properties of verbs, which is yet another domain characterized by considerable variation (e. g., Gonçalves 2010; 2016; Gonçalves/Duarte/Hagemeijer 2022; Hagemeijer et al. 2022). Once more, the level of schooling is usually an indicator of the degree of convergence or divergence with respect to European Portuguese. That being said, one of the salient features related to predicate restructuring consists of the loss of prepositions introducing oblique arguments of verbs, which hereby become direct transitive verbs, such as in Não conseguimos agradar Øo homem ‘We cannot please the man’, Ele entrou Øa pensão onde nós estávamos ‘He entered the pension where we were’ or Entrega senhor uma cerveja ‘Give him a beer’ instead of agradar ao homem, entrou na pensão, and entrega uma cerveja ao senhor (cf. Gonçalves 2010, 34, 38). In these examples, the verbs agradar, entrar, and entregar, which standardly select a prepositioned argu 

 

 

 

 

 

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ment, function as regular transitive verbs. The transitivization of entregar, in particular, yields a double object (Gonçalves 2016; Gonçalves/Hagemeijer 2022). Not surprisingly, the loss of prepositions is also a prominent feature of prepositional relativization structures (Alexandre/Gonçalves/Hagemeijer 2011). This strategy of preposition chopping, which contrasts with the standard strategy of pied-piping, is well attested in all varieties of Portuguese, but appears to be more pronounced in this variety, where it abundantly affects both argument and adjunct prepositional relativization, such as in É uma coisa Ø que a gente não cansa ‘It is something we don’t get tired of’ or Há uma coisa, pilão, Ø que costuma-se pisar o milho ‘There is a thing, the pestle, that is used to pound the corn’, where de respectively com are deleted (cf. Gonçalves 2010, 37). A further relativization strategy that is mostly restricted to lower-educated Santomeans and unique in the Portuguese language as a whole is the defective copy strategy (Alexandre 2012), whereby the antecedent of a prepositional relative clause is linked to a stranded preposition with an invariable 3rd person singular, masculine pronoun, where the antecedent is a singular, feminine noun, such as in A própria escola que eu estudei nele ‘The very school I studied at’ instead of em que or na qual (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves/Hagemeijer 2011, 18). Santomean Portuguese further exhibits a tendency toward the loss of 3rd person accusative clitic, o(s), a(s), which are replaced by dative clitic lhe(s), 3rd person strong pronouns ele(s), ela(s), or other strategies, such as null objects, as in Mesmo que ele tenha alguém fora, eu não lhe incomodo ‘Even if he has someone else, I don’t bother him with that’ or in Ele depois disse: “Se você não atacar ela, ela não ataca você” ‘He then said: “If you don’t attack it [snake], it won’t attack you”’ instead of não o incomodo and não a atacar (cf. Gonçalves 2010, 68; 2016, 44). The syntactic distribution of clitics may also diverge from European Portuguese, as illustrated by impersonal se above, although both varieties exhibit a basic enclitic pattern. In contexts standardly requiring proclisis (in the presence of negation, complementizers, focus adverbs, and so on) the data of both spoken European Portuguese and spoken Santomean Portuguese also show occurrences of enclisis, but with more instability in the latter variety. Reflexive clitics are often absent from the Santomean data, especially with certain semantic verb classes, such as predicates denoting intellectual experiences and body movement, such as in As pessoas estão a esquecer Ø da nossa língua ‘People are forgetting our language’ or A gente senta Ø lá, bebe uma cerveja ‘We sit down there, have a beer’ instead of esquecer-se de and senta-se (cf. Alexandre/Gonçalves 2018, 251s.; cf. also Mendes/Estrela 2008). Another salient property of the Santomean variety consists of substantial restructuring in its article system. Definite articles, in particular, are often absent from the structures in contexts where they would be mandatory in the European variety. This feature has been mentioned by several authors (Afonso 2008; Lima Afonso 2009; D’Apresentação 2013) and stands out from the available spoken data, but has not been systematically investigated. An example drawn from a written production of a 6th grade stu-

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dent (approx. 11–12 years of age) is Ø rola voou até junto deØ mãe dela ‘[the] pigeon flew toward its mother’ instead of a rola…junto da mãe (cf. D’Apresentação 2013, 34). A spoken example produced by a 27-year-old primary school teacher during an interview in 2008 for our corpus is aliás Ø minha mãe criou-me com Ø padrasto porque meu pai, minha mãe e meu pai separaram ‘by the way, my mother raised me with my stepfather because my father, my mother and father split up’ instead of aliás a minha mãe criou-me com o [meu] padrasto porque o meu pai, a minha mãe e o meu pai se separaram. Santomean Portuguese also presents a number of differences from European Portuguese in its use of pronouns. The common use of você ‘you (sg.)’ (e. g., Lima Afonso 2009) and to a lesser extent a gente ‘we’ contrasts with the standard use of tu ‘you (sg.)’ and nós ‘we’ in European Portuguese and shows similarities with Brazilian Portuguese, although the pronominal domain as a whole requires further research. To sum up section 4.2, Santomean Portuguese exhibits many grammatical features that are distinct from European Portuguese. However, with a few exceptions, many of these properties have not yet been object of detailed, quantitative studies. The innovative features with respect to the standard variety are the result of internal change, which is driven by language contact and historical second language acquisition, and primarily affects the functional domains of the language, such as number agreement, the most functional prepositions, clitics, and the article system. However, it should always be borne in mind that Santomean Portuguese is characterized by substantial variation across speakers and also speaker internal variation. In the domain of morphosyntax and syntax of this variety, different studies conclude that a higher level of education leads to convergence with the European norm, whereas at least some phonetic/phonological features, such as monophtongization and restructuring of the system of rhotics, appear to be less directly dependent on schooling and therefore sociolinguistically more transversal and widespread.  

4.3 Lexicon Compared to European Portuguese, Santomean Portuguese has incorporated a considerable number of borrowings, especially from Forro, which frequently refer to local flora and fauna, culinary, and cultural manifestations. These items and their description can often be found diffusedly in the work of Santomean authors whose writings deal specifically with aspects of the local culture (e. g., Espírito Santo 1998; 2001; Salvaterra 2009; Amado 2011) and are often the result of the complicity between the creoles and Portuguese. A few random lexical examples are izaquente ‘fruit of the Treculia Africana tree’, lagaia ‘civet cat’, machim ‘machete’, tonga ‘descendant of a contract labourer’, as well as the local dish calulu and the local dance bulauê. Other lexical items have acquired new meanings, such as banho, ‘bath’ in both European Portuguese and Santomean Portuguese, which additionally has gained the meaning of buying votes in exchange for gifts or money during the electoral process in the latter variety.  

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5 Internal language policy 5.1 Norm and practice European Portuguese, the followed standard, enjoys prestige in São Tomé and Príncipe and is not being questioned politically, i.e., there are currently no signs of linguistic Ausbau of the Santomean variety. Many speakers have only limited exposure to a norm close to the European norm, and being proficient in (European) Portuguese or speaking ‘good’ Portuguese is therefore considered a factor of social ascension and mobility, but can also be viewed locally as a manifestation of superiority (e. g., Afonso 2008; Pegado 2018) or lack of authenticity (Bouchard 2017). While local Portuguese represents of course the bulk of the linguistic input for most Santomeans in their daily life, contact with language forms closer to the European norm occurs especially through the written standard in education, the media, and higher education. The language situation is therefore on a limbo between a negative attitude toward the local use of Portuguese, typically associated with low linguistic self-esteem, and a slowly increasing acceptance of the local variety, which, according to Bouchard (2017), for example, is represented in growing perception of santomensidade ‘being Santomean’. Mata (2010, 13–33) discusses the complicity between the different languages used on the islands in connection to the national identity, arguing that language contact operates in two directions and that Portuguese spread from the upper classes in the city of São Tomé to the poor and often illiterate people in the suburban and rural areas. Espírito Santo (1998, 327–342) goes even further by making a distinction based on language use between the illiterate Forros, the Forros who completed intermediate levels of education (secondary school), and, although not explicitly mentioned, those who are higher educated. This tripartite proposal can hardly be upheld in the present, because school is compulsory and the levels of educational success in São Tomé and Príncipe are among the better ones in the African context, despite the many obstacles that still have to be overcome. These affirmations do, however, reflect the idea that there is a divide that stems from the colonial period between the Portuguese-speaking Forro elite and the lower class Forros whose Portuguese would be largely calqued on Forro. In this sense, the use of ‘good’ Portuguese functions as a symbol of class, status, and superiority. Espírito Santo (1998, 341) further mentions that the inhabitants of Príncipe have better command of Portuguese, a stereotype that is often heard on the islands but so far not supported by any scientific evidence. There is increasing awareness of the challenges that the linguistic situation faces due to the linguistic distance that often exists between European Portuguese and the local standard of Portuguese. This concern was raised by several of the communications delivered at the Colóquio Internacional sobre as Línguas Nacionais de São Tomé e Príncipe, held in October 2001 in the city of São Tomé. It is uncontroversial that a number of features found in local Portuguese are the result of deeply rooted societal language contact, in particular with Forro. Since Portuguese is now by and large the dominant lan 

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guage, with an ever-growing number of monolinguals, the focus appears to be gradually shifting away from the role of interference caused by (historical) language contact with the creoles to the actual difficulties faced by the educational system and programmes due to the distinctive properties of Santomean Portuguese. Over the years, educational materials have been produced in Portugal, involving collaborative projects of the Portuguese public sector (Camões – Instituto da Cooperação e da Língua, Instituto Português) and private organizations (Instituto Marquês de Valle Flôr, Gulbenkian). While improvements have been made in the sense that the programmes and materials nowadays take into account the local and African reality as part of the contents, Portuguese continues to be taught as a first language, without any specific attention to the Santomean linguistic reality (cf. Hagemeijer/Gonçalves/Afonso 2018). Therefore, several recent dissertations, most of which written by Santomean teachers who pursued their postgraduate degree in Portugal, focus on the de facto educational struggle between the local variety and the official language (e. g., Afonso 2008; Amado 2018; Cruz 2017; D’Apresentação 2013; Lima Afonso 2009; Pegado 2018), often questioning whether a second language approach wouldn’t produce better results than the current European Portuguese-based first language approach. While a different approach that takes into account the local norms of Portuguese may in fact produce better results, there are many other constraints that contribute to the difficulties that Portuguese teachers face, such as the limited availability of written media (books, newspapers, etc.) combined with the economic hardships endured by large sectors of the Santomean society.  

5.2 Description and usage of linguistic characteristics Santomean Portuguese is a young research strand that has attracted a growing body of scholars consisting of Santomean teachers and Santomeans intellectuals interested in and concerned about the language situation, as well as international researchers working on postcolonial varieties and language contact. This has originated corpus-based research on spoken and written language leading to the description and analysis of the grammatical features which we have briefly laid out in section 4. With respect to the lexicon, the dictionary by Massa/Massa (1998), with over 3,000 entries, is a broader attempt to compile the lexical specificities of Santomean Portuguese based on written sources. Furthermore, the International Institute of the Portuguese Language (IILP), a branch of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), is currently in the process of adding specific lexical items found in the different varieties of Portuguese, the so-called national orthographic vocabularies, with the collaboration of national teams of specialists, to the general Portuguese lexicon. In general, the attitude toward the Santomean variety is not explicitly prescriptive but rather one of recognition and highlights the need to overcome the problems, but always with European Portuguese as the plafond to be attained. Students do not suffer punitive measures nor are they ridiculed because of non-prescriptive language use or speaking a creole language.

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Despite the distinctive features described in research, the Santomean variety is little used outside of the spoken domain. Several Santomean authors, for instance Conceição Lima (e. g., 2006), Albertino Bragança (e. g., 1997), and Jerónimo Salvaterra (e. g., 1995), use both creole and local Portuguese lexicon and expressions in their literary work written in (standard) Portuguese. The solution that these authors typically adopt is the inclusion of a glossary where these expressions are explained to the reader. Unlike the situation in, for instance, Angola, which of course has a far more vigorous literary scene, local Portuguese is little used in the production of Santomean writers. One of the exceptions, is Albertino Bragança, whose fiction includes characters who express themselves in the local variety of Portuguese, for example Rosa in Rosa do Riboque e outros contos (1997). Another interesting example is Carta pá Apolinária ‘(lit.) a letter to Apolinária’ by Conceição Lima, an article published in the online newspaper Téla Nón ‘(lit.) our country’ in 2010, in which the author creates a character who writes a letter to a friend in the Diaspora in a version of heavily restructured local Portuguese. The letter nostalgically and critically evokes the current and past situation of the country, but simultaneously draws attention to the linguistic reality. This letter was later published with the European Portuguese translation in a collection of chronicles (Lima 2023, 66–77). A final example of the use of the local variety is the humoristic television programme Nós por cá ‘(lit.) We around here’), a popular sitcom which used to be broadcast by the Santomean national television (and is also available on Youtube) until a few years ago. This programme is unprecedented in that the actors systematically use the local variety of Portuguese (as well as fragments in creole) in the official media, which traditionally strongly adheres to European Portuguese. To conclude, the prestige the European variety continues to enjoy in São Tomé and Príncipe goes hand in hand with the growing acceptance and awareness of the local norms (and even the creoles), which has sparked a debate, especially within the educational sector, on new strategies to cope with a situation of diglossia between a spoken and a written norm.  

 

 

Acknowledgements: This work was developed within the project Possession and location: microvariation in African varieties of Portuguese (PTDC/LLT-LIN/29552/2017), sponsored by the Portuguese Foundation of Science and Technology (FCT). I am grateful to Beatriz Afonso and Caustrino Alcântara for filling me in with information they gathered in loco on some aspects of the current language situation.

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Espírito Santo, Carlos (1998), A coroa do mar, Lisbon, Cooperação. Espírito Santo, Carlos (2001), Enciclopédia fundamental de São Tomé e Príncipe, Lisbon, Cooperação. Ferraz, Luiz Ivens (1979), The creole of São Tomé, Johannesburg, Witwatersrand University Press. Figueiredo, Carlos (2010), A concordância plural variável no sintagma nominal do português restruturado da comunidade de almoxarife, São Tomé, Macau, Universidade de Macau, Doctoral Thesis. Gomes, Danielle (2018), Vogais em contexto postônico medial no português de São Tomé, in: Sílvia Brandão (ed.), Duas variedades africanas do português: variáveis fonético-fonológicas e morfossintáticas, São Paulo, Blucher, 159–176. Gonçalves, Rita (2010), Propriedades de subcategorização verbal no português de São Tomé, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Master Thesis. Gonçalves, Rita (2016), Construções ditransitivas no português de São Tomé, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis. Gonçalves, Rita/Duarte, Inês/Hagemeijer, Tjerk (2022), Dative microvariation in African varieties of Portuguese, Journal of Portuguese Linguistics 21/6, 1–39. Gonçalves, Rita/Hagemeijer, Tjerk (2022), Construções ditransitivas em contacto: o português de São Tomé e o forro, in: Carlos Figueiredo et al. (edd.), Novas dinâmicas do português: a África atlântica e o Brasil, Lisbon, Lisbon International Press, 303–340. Hagemeijer, Tjerk (2011), The Gulf of Guinea creoles: genetic and typological relations, Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 26/1, 111–154. Hagemeijer, Tjerk (2018), From creoles to Portuguese: Language shift in São Tomé and Príncipe, in: Laura Álvarez López/Perpétua Gonçalves/Juanito Avelar (edd.), The Portuguese language continuum in Africa and Brazil, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 169–184. Hagemeijer, Tjerk/Gonçalves, Rita/Afonso, Beatriz (2018), Línguas e políticas linguísticas em São Tomé e Príncipe, in: Paulo Feytor Pinto/Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer (edd.), Políticas linguísticas em português, Lisbon, LIDEL, 54–79. Hagemeijer, Tjerk et al. (2022), Goal arguments of ir ‘to go’ and chegar ‘to arrive’ in three African varieties of Portuguese, Journal of Portuguese Linguistics 21/8, 1–40. Hodges, Tony/Newitt, Malyn (1988), São Tomé and Príncipe. From plantation colony to microstate, London, Westview. Lima Afonso, Helena (2009), Interferências linguísticas: um contributo para o ensino da língua portuguesa em S. Tomé e Príncipe, Lisbon, Universidade de Lisboa, Master Thesis. Lima, Conceição (2006), A dolorosa raiz do micondó, Lisbon, Caminho. Lima, Conceição (2010), Carta pá Apolinária, Opinion article published in the newspaper Téla Nón, https://www. telanon.info/sociedade/2010/11/09/5639/carta-pa-apolinaria/ (2/3/2023). Lima, Conceição (2023), O mundo visto do meio, Lisbon, Caminho. Lorenzino, Gerardo (1996), Uma avaliação sociolinguística sobre São Tomé e Príncipe, in: Inês Duarte/Isabel Leiria (edd.), Actas do Congresso Internacional sobre o Português, vol. 2, Lisbon, APL/Colibri, 435–449. Lucas, Patrícia (2015), The demography of São Tomé and Príncipe (1758-1822): preliminary approaches to an insular slave society, in: João Paulo Oliveira e Costa (ed.), Anais de História de Além-Mar XVI, Lisbon, Centro de História de Além-Mar, 51–78. Massa, Françoise/Massa, Jean-Michel (1998), Dictionnaire Bilingue Portugais Français, Saint-Thomas et Prince, vol. 2, Rennes, Université Rennes 2 Haute Bretagne. Mata, Inocência (2010), Polifonias insulares: cultura e literatura de São Tomé e Príncipe, Lisbon, Colibri. Mello e Almada, Vicente (1929 [1884]), As ilhas de S. Thomé e Principe: notas de uma administração colonial, Boletim Geral das Colónias 5/43, 179–187. Mendes, Amália/Estrela, Antónia (2008), Constructions with “SE” in African varieties of Portuguese, Phrasis 2, 83– 107. Nascimento, Augusto (2000), Relações de poder e quotidiano nas roças de S. Tomé e Príncipe. De finais de oitocentos a meados do presente século, Lisbon, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Doctoral Thesis.

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John M. Lipski

28 Equatorial Guinea Abstract: Equatorial Guinea is the only officially Spanish-speaking nation in Africa and the only country in sub-Saharan Africa where Spanish is spoken natively or nearnatively by a significant proportion of the population. French and Portuguese are acknowledged as official languages but have few non-immigrant speakers. Fang, Bubi, and Ndowé are among the most prominent African languages spoken in Equatorial Guinea, which together with Pidgin English and the Portuguese-lexified creole Fa d’Ambú (Annobonese creole), make up the linguistic matrix of this small but territorially and ethnically complex nation. At the official level, only Spanish is used, although for most Guineans it is a second language. Equatorial Guinean Spanish has many consistently identifiable traits, as well as variation due to varying levels of individual proficiency. Keywords: Spanish, Fa d’Ambú, Fang, Pidgin English, Equatorial Guinea

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Spanish The Central African nation of Equatorial Guinea consists of the island of Bioko, former Fernando Poo, which contains the national capital, Malabo, the continental enclave of Mbini, former Río Muni (with regional capital Bata) between Gabon and Cameroon and including the nearby islands of Corisco, Elobey Grande, and Elobey Chico, as well as tiny Annobón Island, located in the Atlantic Ocean to the south of São Tomé. Equatorial Guinea is the only African nation where Spanish is an official language, although nearly all Equatorial Guineans speak one or more African or Afro-European creole languages natively (Lipski 1985a; 1985b); Granda (1984c) gives an early bibliography of studies on the languages of Equatorial Guinea. There are no reliable data on the proportion of Equatorial Guineans who are fluent in Spanish or their levels of proficiency, given the lack of official data, but on Bioko and the urban areas of Mbini this percentage is almost certainly at least 90 %, and even in the interior of Mbini a figure of around 70–80 % would probably not be unrealistic; this in effect places Equatorial Guinea at the forefront of African nations which have successfully implanted the former metropolitan language as an effective vehicle of national communication. Attitudes of Equatorial Guineans themselves towards the Spanish language have always been reported as positive (cf. Chirilă 2015; Gomashie 2019; Quilis 1983; 1988; 1989a; 1989b), although the fact that the data were collected by Spaniards linked to the educational system must be taken into consideration.  

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In many Equatorial Guinean households, the vernacular languages continue to hold sway, but Spanish is being used increasingly even among Guineans who share the same native languages. The reasons for this phenomenon are many and difficult to trace, but one important factor is the poignant search for national identity, the fact of being the only Spanish‑speaking nation in the midst of French‑, English‑ and Portuguese‑speaking neighbours, and of historically being a tiny and relatively unknown nation struggling to throw off the devastating effects of postcolonial destruction. Equatorial Guineans abroad often prefer to use Spanish even when they share a common vernacular language, reinforcing their identity as Equatorial Guineans and adopting the Spanish language as an unmistakable badge of national origin (Lipski 1985a; Gomashie 2019). Nistal Rosique (2006), at the time director of the Spanish cultural centre in Malabo, based on lower levels of proficiency in Spanish among younger speakers than among the country’s oldest residents, expressed concern for the continued vitality of Spanish in Equatorial Guinea. This discrepancy, also noted by Lipski (1985a; 2004) may be the lingering effect of the closing of the nation’s schools and the official rejection of Spanish in favour of the native language Fang during the Macías dictatorship (1968–1979). The results of an online survey conducted by Gomashie (2019) showed both positive attitudes towards Spanish and the increasing vitality of Spanish vis-à-vis the country’s autochthonous languages, even among the youngest citizens.

1.2 Indigenous languages and Pidgin English Fang – The largest ethnic group in Equatorial Guinea is the Fang (also known as Pamué), whose language is also spoken in Gabon and parts of Cameroon. The Fang language is described by Bibang Oyee (1990), Ndongo Esono (1989), and Nze Abuy (1975). Of all the African languages spoken in Equatorial Guinea, Fang is the only one frequently learned by non-native speakers from other ethnic groups, due both to its demographic prominence (being the native language of up to 85 % of the population) and its association with all government officials since independence. Fang is frequently heard in churches, in radio broadcasts, and in Equatorial Guinean popular music. Bubi – The indigenous language of the island of Bioko is Bubi, a language of the Bantu family. Early grammatical descriptions of Bubi are found in Abad (1928), Clarke (1848) and Juanola (1890); a modern account is given by Bolekia Boleká (1991; 2008). Six dialects have been documented for Bioko, all mutually intelligible according to Bubi speakers interviewed by the present author. The Bubi language continues to withstand displacement by Spanish, especially outside of Malabo, although it is listed as threatened, with the number of speakers decreasing (CIA). At the same time, hostility toward the Bubis by the dominant Fang group since the end of the colonial period has resulted in a disproportionate number of Bubi speakers leaving the country, with most going to Spain (Riochi Siafá 2016; Ugarte 2010), where continued retention of the Bubi language outside of the country is at risk.  

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Ndowé – The Ndowé language, also known as Kombe, is a Bantu language spoken widely along the coastal region of Mbini. Early descriptions are found in Chia (1976) and Fernández (1951); a contemporary study is Màmbo-Matala Esùwa/Oko Kongwe (2008). Most Ndowé speakers also speak at least some Fang, given the demographic predominance of the latter language. “Playero” languages – Other Bantu languages spoken along the coastal area of Mbini are referred to colloquially as Playero ‘beach’ languages, with Bujeba (also known as Bisio) being the most vigorous. The only published study is González Echegaray (1960). Seki or Baseke is another coastal Bantu language that is not endangered. It is mentioned by González Echegaray (1959, 74s.), but its use in Equatorial Guinea has not been studied. On the island of Corisco, off the south-western coast of Mbini, Benga is spoken. Early studies are Mackey (1855), Pérez/Sorinas (1928), and Salvadó y Cos (1891). Benga is regarded as threatened. Another threatened coastal language is Balengue (also known as Molengue), for which no studies exist. Fa d’Ambú – The language of Annobón is a Portuguese-lexified creole known as Fa d’Ambú ‘the language of Annobón’. Early descriptions are found in Barrena (1957), Vila (1891), and Zamora Loboch (1962); a contemporary account is Zamora Segorbe (2010), while Granda (1985a) and Zamora Segorbe (2009) offer a sociolinguistic profile. This language continues to be used not only on Annobón island but also in Malabo, given the large Annobonese population and their ethnic pride. Fa d’Ambú enjoys a high degree of mutual intelligibility with the creole of São Tomé, which is also spoken in Malabo by immigrants from the nearby nation of São Tomé and Príncipe. Pidgin English – A variety of West African Pidgin English, known locally as Pichinglis or simply Pichi, is widely used as a lingua franca throughout the island of Bioko, and especially in Malabo (Lipski 1992). An early description is Zarco (1938), and a contemporary account is given by Yakpo (2009; 2011). On Bioko, Pidgin English has generally been preferred as the interethnic lingua franca, despite fierce campaigns by Spanish missionaries and educators and complaints by many Equatorial Guineans, who scold their children for speaking Pichi. Pidgin English is not widely used in Mbini, except in Bata, due to the influx of residents of Bioko and of natives of Cameroon, Nigeria and other English‑speaking areas. Despite its prominence in Equatorial Guinea, Pidgin English is officially ignored within the country and is acknowledged only by linguists and missionary groups (a video version of the story of Jesus in Equatorial Guinean Pidgin English is available).

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of Spanish The history of Equatorial Guinea can be found in Ballano Gonzalo (2014), Bolekia Boleká (2003), Fegley (1989), Liniger-Goumaz (1979; 1988; 1989), Muakuku Rondo Igambo (2000),

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and Ndongo Bidyogo (1977). The territories that now form the Republic of Equatorial Guinea were first settled by the Portuguese, beginning in 1472 when the explorer Fernão do Pó landed on the island that came to be known as Fernando Poo (although the explorer himself had called it Formosa ‘beautiful’). Fernando Poo and the tiny and remote island of Annobón became Portuguese colonies in 1474. During the early period of European overseas exploration, Spain was officially excluded from Africa by the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), which gave Portugal exclusive rights in Africa. By the late eighteenth century, with well-established colonies in the Americas, the Philippines, and Northern Africa, Spain was still without a colonial presence in sub-Saharan Africa (Hahs 1980). At the same time, territorial disputes along the borders of the Portuguese colony of Brazil threatened Spanish sovereignty in South America. The South American disputes were resolved by the Treaty of San Ildefonso (1777), while the Treaty of El Pardo (1778) ceded to Spain the islands of Fernando Poo, including the nearby islands of Corisco, Elobey Grande and Elobey Chico, Annobón, and the continental region of Río Muni, with unspecified boundaries. From 1778 until the independence of Argentina in 1810, the “Spanish Territories of the Gulf of Guinea” were administered by the Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires, later coming under peninsular Spanish governance. Spain was slow to colonize the newly-acquired African territories, and the British were the de facto colonial power during the first half of the nineteenth century. In 1827, Great Britain negotiated with Spain in order to set up a joint anti‑slavery tribunal on Fernando Poo. The principal city of Fernando Poo was founded by Captain William Owen in the same year and was named Port Clarence (Martín del Molino 1993). During this time the British brought several thousand freed slaves from Sierra Leone, who established themselves in commerce and became known as Fernandinos (Sundiata 1972). As a result, contemporary Equatorial Guinean Pidgin English is more closely aligned with Sierra Leone Krio than with the Pidgin English of the Nigerian labourers who were later recruited for the cacao plantations. Eventual Spanish occupation was largely limited to Fernando Poo, whose capital was renamed Santa Isabel. Río Muni was not effectively colonized until after the Treaty of Paris (1900), which left Spain with only a tiny continental enclave of 26,000 km2 instead of the vast 300,000 km2 territory that had once been imagined.

2.2 Milestones of its further development From 1926 until 1959, Fernando Poo, Annobón, and Río Muni were united as the colony of Spanish Guinea (Guinea Española). In 1959, Spanish Guinea became a province of Spain, in a first move towards eventual decolonization, and some nascent and generally non-belligerent independence movements began to emerge. In 1968, Spain granted independence to the Republic of Equatorial Guinea, handing over a functioning school system, radio and television stations, printing presses, power generation stations, and other elements of the colonial infrastructure. Equatorial Guinea’s first president, Francisco Macías Nguema turned out to be a paranoid authoritarian who quickly distanced the

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country not only from the former colonial power but also from neighbouring African countries. All Spanish-derived place names were replaced by African names: Santa Isabel became Malabo, Annobón became Pagalu (the Fa d’Ambú word for ‘father rooster,’ which Macías claimed was his praise-name), and Fernando Poo became Masie Nguema Biyogo, Macías’ own newly Africanized name. Macías expelled most foreigners and demanded that all citizens take African names. By 1975, all schools were closed, and Macías attempted, unsuccessfully, to eradicate the use of Spanish and make his native Fang the country’s official language. In 1979 Macías was overthrown in a military coup by his nephew Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, who has ruled the nation since that time. The island of Fernando Poo was renamed Bioko and Annobón returned to its original name, while the other African place names were maintained. In 1985 Equatorial Guinea joined the Francophone Africa monetary zone and adopted the Central African Franc as its currency, and French became one of the nation’s official languages and is now taught in schools. The arrival of many French speakers from neighbouring countries, especially Cameroon and Gabon, has resulted in spoken French becoming part of the Equatorial Guinean linguistic landscape. The inclusion of Portuguese as an official language beginning in 2007 is reinforced by the large number of residents from São Tomé and more recently from Cabo Verde, who in addition to their Portuguese-derived creole languages also speak Portuguese. However, Spanish continues to be the dominant national language and is increasingly used even among speakers from the same ethnic groups, alongside or in preference to African languages or Pichinglis (Pidgin English). The discovery of large petroleum resources and their subsequent exploitation has made Equatorial Guinea one of Africa’s primary oil-producing countries. The nation’s oil industry is largely managed by English speakers, mostly from the United States, and numerous Anglicisms are making their way into Equatorial Guinean Spanish.

3 External language policy Legislation – The constitution of Equatorial Guinea as amended in 2012 declares Spanish and French as the nation’s official languages, while autochthonous languages (unspecified) are acknowledged as ‘components of the national culture’ (“integrantes de la cultura nacional”, Equatorial Guinea 2012, art 4). It is not clear whether Pidgin English (which demonstrably arrived from abroad) or Fa d’Ambú (which may have been formed on Annobón) enjoy official acknowledgement, although in practice the latter language is prominent in music and broadcasting. Although not mentioned in the constitution, Portuguese was added by presidential decree as a third official language in 2010 (Equatorial Guinea 2010), in a bid to join the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (Comunidade de Países de Língua Portugesa), although membership in that community was only granted in 2014.

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Languages used by public authorities – Spanish is the only language used routinely by public authorities in Equatorial Guinea, in speeches and in written communication, although the government maintains websites and other information services in French, Portuguese, and English. All public documents and signs are in Spanish, as are postage stamps. Only the Central African Franc banknotes and coins are in French. The Equatorial Guinean president, Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, has given international interviews in French, but while in Equatorial Guinea he uses only Spanish in public speeches and interviews. Languages used in education – Since colonial times, Spanish has been the exclusive language of instruction in Equatorial Guinean schools (Álvarez 1950; Castro Antolín 2005; Negrín Fajardo 1993; Ruiz Martínez 2003). This includes the branch campus of Spain’s National Distance Education University (Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia – UNED) as well as the recently-inaugurated national university of Equatorial Guinea. In some rural schools, teachers in the lower grades may occasionally use a local language to ensure effective communication, but such usage is not officially sanctioned. French is a required school subject, and the French government sponsors the Instituto Francés de Guinea Ecuatorial and the La Concorde French school in Malabo and the Maison Leopold Sedar Senghor in Bata, all with the purpose of promoting the French language. Since 2015, Portuguese is also taught in some schools. Languages used in the media – Printed newspapers, all of which use only Spanish, have an erratic history in Equatorial Guinea. The pro-government weekly Ébano dates back to the colonial period, while La Gaceta de Guinea Ecuatorial appeared more recently. Most newspapers and magazines only appear in digital editions. Equatorial Guinea has several AM, FM, and shortwave radio stations. Except for one station maintained by the Catholic religious order Claret (Misioneros Hijos del Inmaculado Corazón de María), all are government-owned or affiliated (Radio Asonga is owned by the current president’s son). Some of these stations also have internet streaming capabilities. Spanish is the primary language, but local programmes in Fang, Bubi, Fa d’Ambú, Ndowé, and Bisio are heard daily. Radio France Internationale maintains a transmitter in Malabo with programmes in French, and the BBC World Service has an English-language transmitter in Malabo. The national government maintains one television station in Malabo and another in Bata. A third station, TV Asonga (also owned by the president’s son) is also located in Malabo. All broadcast nearly exclusively in Spanish. Internet communication is increasingly available in Equatorial Guinea, although social media platforms are not always accessible. The Equatorial Guinean government maintains websites in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and English, as does the national radio and television network Radio Televisión de Guinea Ecuatorial (RTVGE). Radio and television broadcasts, which are entirely in Spanish except for the lyrics of some music, are streamed on the internet, and the nation’s newspapers and magazines are nearly exclusively available in digital form.

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4 Linguistic characteristics Early comments on the Spanish of Equatorial Guinea are found in Castillo Barril (1964; 1966; 1969) and González Echegaray (1951; 1959). Comprehensive studies are found in Bibang Oyee (2002), Lipski (1984; 1985a; 1985b; 1987; 1990; 2000; 2004; 2008; 2014), and Quilis/Casado Fresnillo (1992a; 1995), with more general observations by Esquerra Guereña (1987), Granados (1986), Granda (1984a; 1986–1987; 1988b), and Mohamadou (2008).

4.1 Pronunciation Final /s/ – Syllable- and word-final /s/ is strongly pronounced, as in northern Spain. In particular, there is no aspiration to [h] as found in Andalusia, the Canary Islands, and much of Latin America, but word-final /s/ is occasionally deleted. This is particularly true in verbs in the first person plural ending in ‑mos, in which the /s/ carries no grammatical function, and in which /s/ was routinely lost in literary imitations of Africans’ Spanish from earlier centuries (Lipski 1986a; 1986b; 1986c; 1988). An example is Nosotros pagamo[s] luz y no hay luz ‘We pay for electricity and there is no electricity’ (Lipski 1990, 60). Granda (1984b) attributes the resistance of final /s/ in Guinean Spanish to bilingual contact with Fang. Intervocalic /d/ – Spanish intervocalic /d/ is uniformly pronounced as a stop [d] or even a tap [ɾ], and almost never as a fricative or approximant [ð], as is found in monolingual Spanish of other nations (Lipski, forthcoming). As a result, the pronunciation of todo ‘all’ is very similar to that of toro ‘bull’, and the pronunciation of cada ‘each’ similar to that of cara ‘face’. This trait is shared by most second-language learners of Spanish around the world, since the stop-fricative alternation of /b/, /d/ and /g/ is not common in other languages. Final /l/ and /r/ – Syllable- and word-final /l/ and /ɾ/ are routinely distinguished, despite the fact that Bantu languages do not distinguish these sounds, and most have no rhotics at all. This stands in contrast to the many literary imitations of Africans, in which the tendency to pronounce /ɾ/ as [l] in all positions is characteristic. Very occasionally word-final /ɾ/ or /l/ disappear in Guinean Spanish, for example El padre del seño[r] paga el dote donde familia de la muje[r] ‘The groom’s father pays the dowry to the bride’s family’ (Lipski 1990, 59). According to Granda (1984b), the resistance of final liquids is due to bilingual contact with Fang. Single /ɾ/ and trill /r/ – Most Equatorial Guineans do not distinguish between Spanish single /ɾ/ and trill /r/; at times the tap is pronounced instead of the trill, e. g. ce[ɾ]ao for ce [r]ado ‘closed’ (Lipski, 1990, 60), although the opposite change is more frequent, and has even been imitated in literature: el que no trrabaja no come ‘he who doesn’t work doesn’t eat’ (Ndongo Bidyogo 1987, 71). This feature is rarely mentioned but is immediately apparent to outside observers. Granda (1984b) regards it as exemplary of interfer 

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ence from Fang, but in fact, most Guinean Spanish speakers do not consistently distinguish the two rhotic phonemes. Word-final /n/ – Word-final /n/ is rarely velarized to [ŋ], although this sound is frequent in word-final position in most native Guinean languages, and the velarization of final /n/ in the Spanish Caribbean has sometimes been mistakenly attributed to African influence. Assignment of tones – One common strategy, observed among most Equatorial Guineans when speaking Spanish is the more or less systematic assignment of a different tone to each syllable, often at odds with the simple equation “tonic stress = high tone” and “atonic syllables = low tone” (Lipski 2016). This is because in the indigenous languages of the country, with the exception of Fa d’Ambú, every vowel carries a lexicallydetermined tone, either high or low. When speaking Spanish, the tones rarely are used consistently, so that a given polysyllabic word as pronounced by a single speaker may emerge with different tonal melodies on each occasion. What results is a more or less undulating prosody of high and low tones, at times punctuated by mid tones and rising/falling contour tones. Such a pronunciation is radically different from the more usual intonational patterns in native varieties of Spanish, where the pitch register varies smoothly and gradually across large expanses of syllables, and where a syllable-by-syllable tonal change rarely or never occurs. To the European ear, a syllable-based tonal alternation as produced by an African learner of Spanish causes a sing-song cadence and may blur the intonational differences between statements and questions. In the absence of a perceptible stress accent, syllable-level tonal shifts may obliterate such minimal pairs as trabajo ‘[I] work’ ~ trabajó ‘[he/she] worked’. Intervocalic /j/ – Intervocalic /j/ is weak and frequently disappears, especially in contact with front vowels, as in ellos [ˈe(j)os] ‘they’, gallina [ɡaˈ(j)ina] ‘hen’, etc. Fricative /x/ – The posterior fricative /x/ receives a variable realization, ranging from a velar fricative [x] to the uvular [χ] found in much of Spain. /θ/ : /s/ – The distinction between /θ/ and /s/, found in most of Peninsular Spain (e. g., casa [ˈkasa] ‘house’ vs. [ˈkaθa] ‘hunting’) is unstable and variable for most Equatorial Guinean Spanish speakers, even at the individual level. This may reflect the fact that during the colonial period, Guineans received linguistic input both from administrators from northern Spain, where the distinction is absolute, as well as from cacao planters from Valencia, whose Spanish varieties at the time neutralized both phonemes to [s].  

4.2 Morphosyntax Equatorial Guinean Spanish has few consistent grammatical traits, since speakers’ abilities range from essentially native-level fluency to only a partial command of Spanish. Average speakers (e. g., those who have not lived in a Spanish-speaking country or who  

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have no other special contact with Spanish) typically exhibit some or all of the following traits. Formal subject pronouns – It is frequent to hear the formal second-person singular subject pronoun usted combined with verbal endings corresponding to the familiar second-person singular tú, e. g., usted sabes ‘you know’, usted dices ‘you say’. This may stem from the fact that during the colonial period, Spaniards almost always addressed Guineans of all ages as tú (most frequently through the verb endings, with reduced use of overt subject pronouns), while it was expected that Guineans address Spaniards as usted. Granda (1990) also comments on the apparently excessive use of overt subject pronouns, even when the accompanying verb morphology makes these pronouns redundant, since Spanish is a null-subject language. Granda implicates the obligatory presence of overt subjects in the native languages of Equatorial Guinea. Subject-verb agreements – There are some fluctuations in subject-verb agreement, with the use of the third-person singular form as default a common option, as occurs in many creole languages and vestigial dialects of Spanish, as well as in vernacular nonstandard Brazilian Portuguese, for example: yo tiene [tengo] ‘I have’, nosotros trabaja [trabajamos] ‘we work’. A typical example is Desde los cinco años [yo] lleva [llevo] en España ‘I have lived in Spain since I was five years old’ (Lipski 1990, 60). Occasionally the third-person plural copula son is used as invariant verb, much as once occurred in AfroCuban speech Nosotros son [somos] lo mimo, pero el combe y el ndowé no son iguales ... porque no llama todos combes ‘We are the same but Combe and Ndowé are not the same, because not all are called Combes’ (Lipski 1990, 57). Prepositions – Errors and omission of common prepositions such as de ‘of, from’, a ‘to, at’, and en ‘in, on’ are frequent; en is often used with verbs of motion, as in Voy en [a] Bata ‘I’m going to Bata’, which according to Granda (1988a) represents interference from Fang. Noun-adjective agreement – Equally sporadic are noun-adjective agreement lapses, both in gender and number: Cada vez que llegamo[s], la casa está cerao [cerrada] ‘every time we arrive, the house is closed’ (Lipski 1990, 60). Subject-pronoun-verb discrepancies – Many Guineans do not systematically distinguish between the two second-person plural pronouns vosotros (familiar) and ustedes (formal), and may also combine ustedes with a verb form corresponding to vosotros, e. g., ustedes tenéis ‘you (pl.) have’, with the opposite configuration of vosotros with an ustedes-type verb being much less common. Other subject pronoun-verb discrepancies also occur from time to time; Bibang Oyée cites examples such as Yo quisiera(s) que me saludes a todas las familias de usted ‘I would like you to greet all of your families’, tengo el honor de comunicarle que yo tenías [yo tenía] que venir ‘I have the honour of informing you that [I] had to come’ (2002, 29). The present author has recorded examples such as nosotra[s] las mamá[s] bailabas [bailábamos] asi ‘we mothers danced like that’ (Lipski 1990, 60).  

 

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4.3 Lexicon In general, the Equatorial Guinean Spanish lexicon reflects the Peninsular Spanish colonial past, with addition of words from local languages (González Echegaray 1959; Nsue Otong 1986), e. g., balele ‘a typical Fang dance’, fritambo ‘small antelope’, malamba ‘alcoholic drink made from sugar cane’, mvet ‘stringed instrument’, ngom ‘a Fang percussion instrument’, topé ‘palm wine’. Nguendjo Tiogang (2007; 2010) offers a comprehensive analysis and gives details on the morphological formation of neologisms, while Casado Fresnillo (1998), Onomo-Abena (1998), and Quilis/Casado Fresnillo (1992b) give a general overview. Quilis (1989b) describes the Guinean lexicon referring to coffee production, and Granda (1985b) comments on Pidgin English words found in the Fa d’Ambú creole of Annobón, e. g., baba waya ‘barbed wire’, dévul ‘devil mask’, ígil ‘seagull (eagle)’, machi ‘match’. A few words of Latin American origen also occur, e. g., chap(e)ar ‘cut weeds with a machete’, malanga ‘a tuber vegetable’, ñankué ‘masked dancer’, tumba ‘a large drum’, possibly dating to the nineteenth century exile of rebellious Cubans to Fernando Poo (Aranzadi 2012; Balmaseda 1869; Granda 1985c; Valdés Infante 1898).  

 

 

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – During the colonial period and even in recent times, there have been negative comments by Spaniards regarding Guineans’ abilities in Spanish (summarized in Schlumpf 2016), always characterized as imperfect approximations to international norms. Linguistically-oriented studies such as Castillo Barril (1964; 1966; 1969) described specific areas of putative interference from African languages, while others simply contained harsh criticisms, for example: ‘The Spanish spoken by the indigenous people is in general just like the babbling of a three-year-old child. They don’t know how to conjugate verbs or how to analyse any Spanish sentence’.1

A noteworthy exception to such criticism was González Echegaray who noted that: ‘Spanish, as spoken by the black people, constitutes a very interesting special modality that is worthy of study, especially with respect to phonetics and syntax’.2

Research – The only comprehensive study of Equatorial Guinean Spanish written by a Guinean (Bibang Oyee 2002), while not critical of the local varieties of Spanish, has the word “interference” in its title, and is mostly a verbatim repetition of the writings of that author’s former teacher, Antonio Quilis, as published in Quilis/Casado Fresnillo (1995). 1 “El castellano de los indígenas es por regla general el mismo que puede balbucir un niño de tres años. No sabe lo que es conjugar un verbo ni analizar una frase cualquiera en castellano” (Madrid 1933, 145). 2 “el castellano, puesto en boca de los negros, constituye una especial modalidad muy interesante y digna de estudio, especialmente en lo que afecta a la fonética y a la sintaxis” (1951, 106).

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There are no official pronouncements about linguistic purism or standardized Spanish usage. Lipski (2008; 2014) makes the case for considering Guinean Spanish as a cohesive dialect cluster rather than a pastiche of individual approximations to a target language. In the inaugural bulletin of the Equatorial Guinean Academy of the Spanish Language (cf. below), Larre Muñoz, a Spaniard teaching in Bata, joins his compatriots in disagreeing with the notion of a cohesive Equatorial Guinean dialect of Spanish. With respect to most of the traits enumerated by Granda, Lipski, and Quilis, he asserts that ‘For Guinean speakers with considerable linguistic competence they would be errors’3 and claims that the true model for Guinean Spanish is the speech of central and northern Spain. The article includes a photograph of what appears to be a roadside sign posted by the language academy and listing “incorrect” Guinean Spanish expressions together with “correct” replacements. In the same issue, Antonio Eneme, a Guinean writer, insists that young Guineans should continue to use their native languages proudly, including in official settings: ‘speaking one’s own language is not detrimental. Nor are the mother tongue and the official language incompatible; the first identifies us, and the second opens for us the doors to the world’.4

Avoro Nguema Ebana (2017) makes the case for including Equatorial Guinean culture in Spanish-language pedagogical materials, although there is no indication that this has occurred. Description of linguistic characteristics – There are no dictionaries, grammars, or orthographies of Equatorial Guinean Spanish. The studies cited in Section 4 give a comprehensive account of Spanish as currently spoken throughout Equatorial Guinea. Although Bibang Oyee (2002) and Quilis/Casado Fresnillo (1995) comment on possible interference from native Guinean languages, no recent linguistic study based on contemporary data (i.e., not simply commenting on secondary sources) casts Equatorial Guinean Spanish in a negative light or as anything less than a complete language. Equatorial Guinea has an official Academy of the Spanish language (Academia Ecuatoguineana de la Lengua Española), founded in 2013; in 2016 it became affiliated with Spain’s national academy of language, joining the official academies of the world’s other Spanish-speaking nations (also the United States and the Philippines). Variety used by public authorities – Public authorities in Equatorial Guinea strive to employ educated dialect-neutral varieties of Spanish, but in addition to the inevitable phonetic traits shared by almost all Guineans (e. g. intervocalic occlusive pronunciation of /d/ as [d] or [ɾ] rather than the approximant [ð], partial neutralization of /ɾ/ and /r/, syllabic tones), many Guinean officials have been recorded using the formal pronoun usted with verb forms corresponding to tú, and the familiar second-person plural pronoun vosotros with verb forms corresponding to the formal pronoun ustedes, as well as occa 

3 “para hablantes guineanos de gran competencia lingüística serían errores” (2017, 22). 4 “El hablar su propio idioma no es perjudicial. Tampoco hay incompatibilidad entre la lengua materna y la oficial. La primera nos identifica y la segunda nos abre las puertas al mundo universal” (2001, 25).

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sional lapses of subject-verb and noun-adjective agreement. Since these traits are almost never explicitly commented on by Guineans (with the exception of the descriptive pamphlet by Bibang Oyee 2002 and the comments by Larre Muñoz 2017, neither of which is widely disseminated), they pass unnoticed when used in public speeches. Variety used in the media – Equatorial Guinean radio and television personnel speak Spanish with the phonetic traits common to most Guineans, but rarely employ any of the vernacular morphosyntactic traits mentioned above. Variety used in literature – With the exception of a few recent volumes of poetry or folk tales, all literature written by Equatorial Guinean authors is in Spanish (Lewis 2007; Ndongo Bidyogo 1984; Ngom 1993; 1996). Some authors have incorporated lexical Africanisms as used by Equatorial Guineans, but with very few exceptions, none of the phonetic or morphosyntactic traits characteristic of Equatorial Guinean Spanish appear in works by Guinean authors, although Granados (1986) points to some apparent interference in the novel Ekomo by María Nsue Angüe (1985). Among the few instances where Guinean authors have deliberately incorporated linguistic traits peculiar to Equatorial Guinea, in his early novel Cuando los combes luchaban, Leoncio Evita gives a sentence in pidginized Spanish meant to represent the character’s use of Pidgin English, referred to as inglés feo ‘ugly English’ (1953, 43). At another point the author gives the word pañole (a Guinean word for Spaniards, derived from españoles), indicating that the character spoke ‘without pronouncing correctly’ (“sin acabar de pronunciar bien”, 1953, 62). More recently, Donato Ndongo-Bidyogo, in the novel Las tinieblas de tu memoria negra (1987), has a character who speaks ‘in his Spanish’ (“en su castellano”, 1987, 73) use a trill instead of the flap, as well as an uninflected infinitive rather than a finite verb, for example “el trrabajo diggnificarr al hombrre” ‘work dignifies man’ (1987, 73). In the novel Áwala cu sangui by the Annobonese author Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel, there are a few examples of characters’ using Equatorial Guinean Spanish traits, for example, the formal second-person singular pronoun usted with a verb form corresponding to the familiar pronoun tú: “Perdone mi jefe, pero como usted no me habías dado la orden […]” ‘Pardon me, sir, but since you [formal] didn’t give [informal] me the order’ (2000, 3).

References Abad, Isidoro (1928), Elementos de la gramática bubi, Madrid, Corazón de María. Álvarez, Heriberto Ramón (1950), Cómo educa España en Guinea, Revista Geográfica Española 24, s.p. Aranzadi, Isabela de (2012), El legado cubano en África. Ñáñigos deportados a Fernando Poo. Memoria viva y archivo escrito, Afro-Hispanic Review 31/1, 29–60. Ávila Laurel, Juan Tomás (2000), Áwala cu sangui, Malabo, Pángola. Avoro Nguema Ebana, María Teresa (2017), La cultura de Guinea Ecuatorial en la enseñanza de la lengua española para extranjeros y nativos. Libro del alumno, Madrid, Letras de Autor. Balmaseda, Francisco Javier (1869), Los confinados a Fernando Poo e impresiones de un viage a Guinea, New York, La Revolución.

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Ballano Gonzalo, Fernando (2014), Aquel negrito del África tropical: el colonialismo español en Guinea (1778– 1968), Madrid, SIAL. Barrena, Natalio (1957), Gramática annobonesa, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos. Bibang Oyee, Julian (1990), Curso de lengua fang, Malabo, Centro Cultural Hispano-Guineano. Bibang Oyee, Julian (2002), El español guineano: interferencias, guineanismo, Malabo, s.e. Bolekia Boleká, Justo (1991), Curso de lengua bubi, Malabo, Centro Cultural Hispano-Guineano. Bolekia Boleká, Justo (2003), Aproximación a la historia de Guinea Ecuatorial, Salamanca, Amarú. Bolekia Boleká, Justo (2008), Lingüística bantú a través del bubi, Salamanca, Universidad de Salamanca. Casado Fresnillo, Celia (1998), El léxico español de Guinea Ecuatorial como crisol de continentes, in: Celia Casado Fresnillo (ed.), La lengua y la literatura española en África, Melilla, V Centenario de Melilla, 69–95. Castillo Barril, Manuel (1964), El español en la Guinea Ecuatorial, Español Actual 3, 8–9. Castillo Barril, Manuel (1966), La influencia de las lenguas nativas en el español de la Guinea Ecuatorial, Madrid, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Castillo Barril, Manuel (1969), La influencia de las lenguas nativas en el español de Guinea, Archivo de Estudios Africanos 20, 46–71. Castro Antolín, Mariano (2005), La enseñanza pública en Santa Isabel: 1896, 1902, Vic (Barcelona), Ceiba. CIA = Central Intelligence Agency (2019), The CIA World Factbook 2019–2020, New York, Skyhouse Publishing. Profile of Equatorial Guinea, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ek.html (2/3/2023). Clarke, John (1848), Introduction to the Fernandian tongue, Berwick-on-Tweed, Cameron. Chia, Emmanuel Ngues (1976), Kom tenses and aspects, Georgetown, Georgetown University, Doctoral Thesis. Chirilă, Elena-Magdalena (2015), Identidad lingüística en Guinea Ecuatorial: diglosia y actitudes lingüísticas ante el español, University of Bergen, Master Thesis, http://bora.uib.no/bitstream/handle/1956/9967/133303017. pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y (2/3/2023). Eneme, Antonio (2010), ¿Qué hablan los jóvenes guineanos?, Boletín Informativo de la Academia Ecuatoguineana de la Lengua Española 1, 25 (2/3/2023). Equatorial Guinea (2010), Portuguese will be the third official language of the Republic of Equatorial Guinea, Malabo, Government of the Republic of Guinea, https://www.guineaecuatorialpress.com/noticia.php? id=703&lang=en (2/3/2023). Equatorial Guinea (2012), Ley fundamental de Guinea Ecuatorial, Nuevo texto de la Constitución de Guinea Ecuatorial, promulgada oficialmente el 16 de febrero de 2012. Con los textos de la Reforma Constitucional aprobados en referéndum el 23 de noviembre de año 2011, Malabo, Government of the Republic of Guinea, https://www.refworld.org/pdfid/3ae6b4e220.pdf (2/3/2023). Esquerra Guereña, Raimundo (1987), El español en el África negra, África 2000. Revista de cultura 2/2/1, 4–8. Evita, Leoncio (1953), Cuando los combes luchaban (novela de costumbres de la Guinea Española), Madrid, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Fegley, Randall (1989), Equatorial Guinea, an African tragedy, New York, Lang. Fernández, P. Leoncio (1951), Diccionario español-kômbè, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos. Gomashie, Grace A. (2019), Language vitality of Spanish in Equatorial Guinea: language use and attitudes, Humanities 8/1, 33, https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/8/1/33/pdf (2/3/2023). González Echegaray, Carlos (1951), Notas sobre el español en África, Revista de Filología Española 35, 106–118. González Echegaray, Carlos (1959), Estudios guineos, vol. 1: Filología, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos. González Echegaray, Carlos (1960), Morfología y sintaxis de la lengua bujeba, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos. Granados, Vicente (1986), Guinea: del “falar guineu al español ecuatoguineano”, Epos 2, 125–137. Granda, Germán de (1984a), Perfil lingüístico de Guinea Ecuatorial, in: s. ed., Homenaje a Luis Flórez: estudios de historia cultural, dialectología, geografía lingüística, sociolingüística, fonética, gramática y lexicografía, Bogotá, Instituto Caro y Cuervo, 119–195.

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Granda, Germán de (1984b), Fenómenos de interferencia fonética del fang sobre el español de Guinea Ecuatorial: consonantismo, Anuario de Lingüística Hispánica 1, 95–114. Granda, Germán de (1984c), Las lenguas de Guinea Ecuatorial: materiales bibliográficos para su estudio, Thesaurus 39, 170–192. Granda, Germán de (1985a), Sociolingüística de un microespacio criollo‑portugués de Africa (Annobón), Lingüística Española Actual 7, 277–292. Granda, Germán de (1985b), Préstamos léxicos del pidgin english en el criollo portugués de Annobón, Estudios Románicos 1, 101–112. Granda, Germán de (1985c), Un caso de transferencia léxica intercolonial: Cuba-Fernando Poo (Bioko), Anuario de Letras 23, 131–159. Granda, Germán de (1986–1987), La lengua española en el África subsahariana: estudio histórico-lingüístico, Cuadernos del Sur 19/20, 3–20. Granda, Germán de (1988a), Origen y configuración de un rasgo sintáctico en el español de Guinea Ecuatorial y en el portugués de Angola, Anuario de Lingüística Hispánica 4, 81–98. Granda, Germán de (1988b), El español en el África subsahariana, Africa 2000 3/2/7, 4–15. Granda, Germán de (1990), El español de Guinea Ecuatorial. Sobre un fenómeno sintáctico: la marcación en superficie de los pronombres personales sujeto, Thesaurus 45, 81–98. Hahs, Billy Gene (1980), Spain and the scramble for Africa: the Africanistas and the Gulf of Guinea, Albuquerque, University of New Mexico, Doctoral Thesis. Juanola, Joaquín (1890), Primer paso a la lengua bubí, Madrid, Pérez Dubrull. Larre Muñoz, Mikel (2017), La situación del español de Guinea Ecuatorial: diagnóstico y tratamiento, Boletín Informativo de la Academia Ecuatoguineana de la Lengua Española 1, 20–24, https://drive.google.com/ file/d/0Bzw2m52otTsRVlZSeVhGdV9kRkU/view (2/3/2023). Lewis, Marvin (2007), An introduction to the literature of Equatorial Guinea: between colonialism and dictatorship, Columbia, University of Missouri. Liniger-Goumaz, Max (1979), Historical dictionary of Equatorial Guinea, Methuen, Scarecrow. Liniger-Goumaz, Max (1988), Brève histoire de la Guinée Équatoriale, Paris, L’Harmattan. Liniger-Goumaz, Max (1989), Small is not always beautiful: the story of Equatorial Guinea, Totowa, Barnes & Noble. Lipski, John (1984), The Spanish of Malabo, Equatorial Guinea and its significance for Afro-Hispanic studies, Hispanic Linguistics 1, 69–96. Lipski, John (1985a), The Spanish of Equatorial Guinea, Tübingen, Niemeyer. Lipski, John (1985b), Contactos hispano‑africanos: el español guineano, Anuario de Letras 23, 99–130. Lipski, John (1986a), A test case of the Afro‑Hispanic connection: final /s/ in Equatorial Guinea, Lingua 68, 357–370. Lipski, John (1986b), A new look at Afro‑Hispanic phonology, in: Osvaldo Jaeggli/Carmen Silva-Corvalán (edd.), Studies in Romance linguistics, Dordrecht, Foris, 121–135. Lipski, John (1986c), Modern African Spanish phonetics: common features and historical antecedents, General Linguistics 26, 182–195. Lipski, John (1987), Fonética y fonología del español guineano: implicaciones para la dialectología hispánica, Africa 2000 2/2/1, 9–17. Lipski, John (1988), Contactos hispano‑africanos en África y el Caribe, in: Robert Hammond/Melvin Resnick (edd.), Studies in Caribbean Spanish dialectology, Washington, Georgetown University, 50–65. Lipski, John (1990), El español de Malabo: procesos fonéticos/fonológicos e implicaciones dialectológicas, Madrid/ Malabo, Centro Cultural Hispano-Guineano. Lipski, John (1992), Pidgin English usage in Equatorial Guinea (Fernando Poo), English World Wide 13, 33–57. Lipski, John (2000), The Spanish of Equatorial Guinea: research on la Hispanidad’s best-kept secret, Afro-Hispanic Review 19, 11–38. Lipski, John (2004), The Spanish of Equatorial Guinea, Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 8, 115–130.

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Lipski, John (2008), El español de Guinea Ecuatorial en el contexto del español mundial, in: Gloria Nistal Rosique/Guillermo Pié Jahn (edd.), La situación actual del español en África, Madrid, Casa de África/ SIAL, 79–117. Lipski, John (2014), ¿Existe un dialecto “ecuatoguineano” del español?, Revista Iberoamericana 248/249, 865–882. Lipski, John (2016), “Toned-up” Spanish: stress → pitch → tone(?) in Equatorial Guinea, in: Cristina Tortora et al. (edd.), Romance Linguistics 2013. Selected papers from the 43rd Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 233–255. Lipski, John (forthcoming), Equatorial Guinea Spanish non-continuant /d/: more than a generic L2 trait, in: Rajiv Rao (ed.), Spanish phonetics and phonology in contact: Studies from Africa, the Americas, and Spain, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins. Mackey, James (1855), A grammar of the Benga language, New York, Mission House. Madrid, Francisco (1933), La Guinea incógnita. Vergüenza y escándalo colonial, Madrid, España. Màmbo-Matala Esùwa, Prospero/Oko Kongwe, Evaristo (2008), Gramática moderna de la lengua ndowe, Barcelona, Instituto de Estudios Ndowe. Martín del Molino, Amador (1993), La ciudad de Clarence: primeros años de la actual ciudad de Malabo, capital de Guinea Ecuatorial, 1827–1859, Malabo, Centro Hispano-Guineano. Mohamadou, Aminou (2008), Acercamiento al “espaguifranglés”, el español funcional de Guinea Ecuatorial, Cauce 31, 213–229. Muakuku Rondo Igambo, Fernando (2000), Guinea Ecuatorial: de la esclavitud colonial a la dictadura nguemista, Barcelona, Carena. Ndongo Bidyogo, Donato (1977), Historia y tragedia de Guinea Ecuatorial, Madrid, Cambio 16. Ndongo Bidyogo, Donato (1984), Antología de la literatura guineana, Madrid, Nacional. Ndongo Bidyogo, Donato (1987), Las tinieblas de tu memoria negra, Madrid, Fundamentos. Ndongo Esono, Salvador (1989), Gramatica fang, Madrid, Instituto de Estudios Africanos. Negrín Fajardo, Olegario (1993), Historia de la educación en Guinea Ecuatorial: el modelo educativo colonial español, Madrid, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia. Ngom, Mbaré (1993), La literatura africana de expresión castellana: la creación literaria en Guinea Ecuatorial, Hispania 76, 410–418. Ngom, Mbaré (1996), Diálogos con Guinea: panorama de la literatura guineoecuatoriana de expresión castellana a través de sus protagonistas, Madrid, Labrys 54. Nguendjo Tiogang, Isascar (2007), La creación léxico y semántica en el español de Guinea Ecuatorial, Madrid, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Doctoral Thesis. Nguendjo Tiogang, Isascar (2010), El esquema parasintético como recurso neológico en el español guineoecuatoriano, Tonos. Revista Electrónica de Estudios Filológicos 19, https://www.um.es/ tonosdigital/znum19/secciones/estudios-15-esquema.htm (2/3/2023). Nistal Rosique, Gloria (2006), El caso del español en Guinea Ecuatorial, in: s. ed., Enciclopedia del Español en el Mundo: Anuario del Instituto Cervantes 2006–2007, Madrid, Instituto Cervantes, 73–76. Nsue Angüe, María (1985), Ekomo, Madrid, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia. Nsue Otong, Carlos (1986), Guineanismos o español de Guinea Ecuatorial, Muntu 4/5, 265–268. Nze Abuy, Rafael María (1975), La lengua fań, o Nkobo fań, Barcelona, Claret. Onomo-Abena, Sosthéne (1998), La dialectisation de l’espagnol en Guinée Equatoriale: le cas de El Retorno del exiliado de Juan Balboa Boneke, Syllabus. Série Lettres et Sciences humaines 1/6, 101–121. Pérez, Gaspar/Sorinas, Lorenzo (1928), Gramática de la lengua benga, Madrid, Corazón de María. Quilis, Antonio (1983), Actitud de los ecuatoguineanos ante la lengua española, Lingüística Española Actual 5, 269–275. Quilis, Antonio (1988), Nuevos datos sobre la actitud de los ecuatoguineanos ante la lengua española, Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica 36/2, 719–731. Quilis, Antonio (1989a), La actitud de los guineanos ante la lengua española, África 2000 4/2/10s., 76–83.

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Quilis, Antonio (1989b), Léxico español del café en Guinea Ecuatorial, in: s. ed., Homenaje a Alonso Zamora Vicente, vol. 2: Dialectología. Estudios sobre el romancero, Madrid, Castalia, 237–242. Quilis, Antonio/Casado Fresnillo, Celia (1992a), Fonología y fonética de la lengua española hablada en Guinea Ecuatorial, Revue de Linguistique Romane 56/2, 71–89. Quilis, Antonio/Casado Fresnillo, Celia (1992b), Spanisch: Areallinguistik IV. Afrika, in: Günter Holtus/Michael Metzeltin/Christian Schmitt (edd.), Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik, vol. 6/1: Aragonesisch/ Navarresisch, Spanisch, Asturianisch/Leonesisch, Tübingen, Niemeyer, 526–530. Quilis, Antonio/Casado Fresnillo, Celia (1995), La lengua española en Guinea Ecuatorial, Madrid, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia. Riochi Siafá, Juan (2016), Redes migratorias e inserción laboral de los guineoecuatorianos, Madrid, Sial. Ruiz Martínez, Ana María (2003), La enseñanza del español como lengua extranjera en Guinea Ecuatorial y la interferencia de las lenguas indígenas, in: Manuel Pérez Gutiérrez/José Coloma Maestre (edd.), El español, lengua de mestizaje y la interculturalidad. Actas del XIII Congreso Internacional de la Asociación para la Enseñanza del Español como Lengua Extranjera, ASELE (Murcia, 2–5 de octubre de 2002), Murcia, Universidad de Murcia, 762–770. Salvadó y Cos, Francisco (1891), Colección de apuntes preliminares sobre la lengua benga, Madrid, Pérez Dubrull. Schlumpf, Sandra (2016), Hacia el reconocimiento del español de Guinea Ecuatorial, Estudios de Lingüística del Español 37, 217–233. Sundiata, Ibrahim K. (1972), The Fernandinos: labor and community in Santa Isabel de Fernando Po 1827–1931, Evanston, Northwestern University, Doctoral Thesis. Ugarte, Michael (2010), Africans in Europe: the culture of exile and emigration from Equatorial Guinea to Spain, Urbana, University of Illinois Press. Valdés Infante, Emilio (1898), Cubanos en Fernando Poo: horrores de la dominación española en 1897 a 1898, La Habana, El Fígaro. Vila, Isidro (1891), Elementos de la gramática ambú o de Annobón, Madrid, Pérez Dubrull. Yakpo, Kofi (2009), A grammar of Pichi, Berlin/Accra, Isimu Media. Yapko, Kofi (2011), Lenguas de Guinea Ecuatorial: de la documentación a la implementación, Oráfrica. Revista de oralidad africana 7, 13–28, https://www.academia.edu/979089/Lenguas_de_Guinea_Ecuatorial_de_la_ documentaci%C3%B3n_a_la_implementaci%C3%B3n (2/3/2023). Zamora Loboch, Miguel (1962), Noticia de Annobón, Fernando Poo, Diputación Provincial. Zamora Segorbe, Armando (2009), Breve aproximación a la sociolingüística del Fá d’Ambô en Guinea Ecuatorial, Oráfrica, Revista de Oralidad Africana 5, 71–112 https://www.raco.cat/index.php/Orafrica/article/ download/136803/186992 (2/3/2023). Zamora Segorbe, Armando (2010), Gramática descriptiva del fa d’ambô, Barcelona/Malabo, Centros Culturales Españoles de Guinea Ecuatorial. Zarco, Mariano de (1938), Dialecto inglés‑africano o broken english de la colonia española del Golfo de Guinea, Turnhout, Proost.

Eastern Africa French Italian Portuguese

Gélase Nimbona and Anne Catherine Simon

29 Burundi and Rwanda Abstract: Burundi and Rwanda are among the few African countries where French coexists with a small number of languages, namely Kirundi (in Burundi), Kinyarwanda (in Rwanda), Swahili, and more recently English in a progressively increasing position with the entry of these countries into the East African Community. This chapter offers an updated presentation of the linguistic characteristics of French as it is spoken and written by Burundians and Rwandans, taking into account the fact that French was imported by Belgian colonizers. It also gives an overview of the trends in action at various levels, including the competition with English since the integration into the East African Community and the importance of schooling policies. Keywords: French, Burundi, Rwanda, sociolinguistics, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 French Burundi and Rwanda – Burundi (officially the Republic of Burundi) and Rwanda (officially the Republic of Rwanda) are neighbouring countries located where the African Great Lakes region and East Africa converge. They are among the few African countries where French is spoken alongside a small number of languages: Kirundi (in Burundi) or Kinyarwanda (in Rwanda), English, Swahili and a few other African languages. They can be considered as twin countries in terms of history, language, and culture. The particularity of multilingualism in Burundi and, to a lesser extent, Rwanda, lies in their urban Balkanization (cf. Mazunya 2011, 144), although the social language distribution is organized and perceived differently in the two countries. Burundi – Burundi joined the East African Community in 2007. Its entry into this community, whose official languages are English and Swahili, changed the perception and status of languages. The position of English has been reconsidered in education, and Swahili became a language to be taught. However, French continues to play a privileged role as the leading official language. Kirundi is read and spoken by 95.1 % of the population, French by 8.5 % (12.8 % of the literate population), English by 3.1 % (7.2 % of the literate population) and Swahili by less than 1 % according to the 2019 census (for English, the 2008 census, cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Rwanda – In Rwanda, the war of 1994 and the victory of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) allowed the return of refugees from mainly English-speaking countries: Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. It was imperative to find a language of instruction that  

 

 

 

 

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-029

 

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took into account the new social configuration. English was given official language status alongside French and Kinyarwanda (Ntakirutimana 2014a, 126s.) and was introduced into the education system in 1996. A French-English bilingual education system was in place until 2008, when, mainly for political reasons, English became the sole language of instruction from the fourth year of primary school onwards. Nowadays, French is totally absent from the curriculum in primary education and its place is marginal in secondary education (Ntakirutimana 2014a, 127s.). It has turned into a language of limited importance. The government justifies this situation by the integration into the East African Community in 2007 and into the Commonwealth in 2009. According to the 2019 general population census in Rwanda, Kinyarwanda is spoken by 93.7 % of the population, English by 12.3 %, French by 5.9 %, and Swahili by less than 1 % (cf. Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Looking at the Burundian and Rwandan populations as a whole, French and English are used by a minority of people. The apparent multilingualism with French and English thus only concerns official contexts of language use (Valdman 1979, 9). French has remained the language of the intellectual elite, learned at school and used in formal situations. Kirundi or Kinyarwanda remain the only everyday languages: in daily exchanges, Burundians and Rwandans feel no need to use any other language. They only use French or another language (English or Swahili) when the communication situation compels them to do so (Nimbona/Simon 2016, 115; Munyankesha 2011, 141). The use of French is therefore very limited and the low rate of French speakers is due to the massive use of Kirundi/Kinyarwanda in daily life. It is also explained by historical and political factors (cf. 2).  

 

 

 

1.2 Kirundi and Kinyarwanda Burundi and Rwanda – In Burundi, Kirundi is the only language used in rural areas and understood throughout the country. In Rwanda, Kinyarwanda remains the national language shared by almost the entire population (Munyankesha 2011, 135). The number of speakers of these languages are estimated at 12 million for Kirundi and at 12,3 million for Kinyarwanda (Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). The monolingualism that characterized the two countries before colonization is infrequent and even inexistent in the rest of the African continent. Kirundi and Kinyarwanda are the national languages and the only native languages of Burundians and Rwandans. They are spoken by all the ethnic groups of these countries: Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa, this socio-ethnic composition being identical in both countries.

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‘The explorer and later the colonizer did not find anywhere in Africa compact cultural and linguistic blocks. Two exceptions: Rwanda and Burundi. A population of the same ethnic composition, with a significant population density, speaks the same language on both sides of the Akanyaru’.1

Kirundi and Kinyarwanda are Bantu languages. In the classification of Guthrie (1948), they are classified as D61 and D62 (group 60). In many recent classifications, they belong to the J60 zone, which groups together the Bantu languages of the African Great Lakes Region (adapted from Bukuru 2003, 1). Since the division of Africa at the Berlin Conference (1885) did not follow linguistic and cultural boundaries, the zone of inter-comprehension is wider than the political boundaries of today’s states. Kinyarwanda and Kirundi are also in use in border regions of Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. These languages are very close to other languages in the African Great Lakes Region, like Kiha, Kihangaza, and Kishubi. They have a very high degree of mutual intelligibility (between 75 % and 85 %, according to Bright 1992, 118; Bukuru 2003, 1) and are actually considered to be dialects of the same language (Bukuru 2003, 1; Kagame 1960, 8; Rodegem 1973, 23; Kimenyi 1976, viii) which has no generic name (Bukuru 2003, 1). On the BBC and the Voice of America (VOA) radio stations, Kinyarwanda and Kirundi are considered as one language. For example, broadcasting programmes transmitted by BBC and VOA towards the populations of Burundi and Rwanda in their native tongue(s) would not separate Kirundi and Kinyarwanda as different languages. The translation of the introduction to the respective programmes of BBC and VOA could be “the following programme is in the Kirundi and Kinyarwanda LANGUAGE (mu rurimi rw-ikiruúndi n-ikinyarwaanda)” and not “in the Kirundi and Kinyarwanda LANGUAGES (muu ndími z-íkiruúndi n-íkinyarwanda)” (Bukuru 2003, 1s.). Although they are highly mutually intelligible, Kinyarwanda and Kirundi are still considered two distinct languages. Spelling and pronunciation are different and speakers recognize each other through their way of speaking.  

 

1.3 Swahili Swahili (also Kiswahili) is another African Bantu language in contact with French in Burundi and Rwanda. Swahili is widely spoken in East Africa where it functions as a vehicular language. It is often a second language, used for commercial and political exchanges. The development of Swahili in the East African region is associated with Arab trade and the expansion of Islam in the 1800s (Mukuthuria 2009). The East African coast has long served as a stopover on the route to India. Trading posts were developed from 1 “L’explorateur et plus tard le colonisateur, ne rencontrent nulle part en Afrique des blocs culturels et linguistiques compacts. Deux exceptions: le Rwanda et le Burundi. Une population de même composition ethnique, d’une densité démographique significative, parle une même langue des deux côtés de l’Akanyaru” (Shyirambere 1978, 2s.).

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which explorers entered the continent (Stanley 1879, 102). The caravans of these explorers included porters and interpreters, often of mixed races, who had learned European languages at the trading posts or on the ships. Swahili was originally a mixed language consisting of the Bantu dialect of the coast to which Arabic, Persian, Hindi, and European words were added (Lacger 1959, 347). This language developed rapidly: from lingua franca, it became a language of international trade along the East African coast (Mukuthuria 2009, 40). Burundi and Rwanda – In Burundi, the Muslims faced a fierce resistance in 1886 and remained on the shores of Lake Tanganyika for trade (Gahama 1983, 238). In Rwanda, the use of Swahili as a vehicle of the Muslim religion began with the arrival of Germans in the nineteenth century and the foundation of Kigali in 1908 (Lacger 1959, 347s.). Later, the Germans contributed to the development of this language in Burundi and Rwanda: Swahili became the official language and language of instruction in public schools throughout the territory of German East Africa (Deutsch Ostafrika), which included present-day Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda (Mulaudzi/Mbori 2008, 19; Ngorwanubusa 2013, 28; Ntakirutimana 2012, 8). The situation changed after the defeat of the Germans in World War I. The territory of Rwanda-Urundi (Rwanda and Burundi) came under the control of Belgium and increased importance was given to the local languages, Kinyarwanda and Kirundi. Swahili, associated with Islam, faced the same discrimination as the religion it conveyed (Amidu 1995, 85). After the independence, Swahili did not develop anymore. Nowadays, the use of Swahili is less than 1 % although it is, alongside English, the working language of the East African Community, of which Burundi and Rwanda are members. As Mulaudzi/Mbori (2008, 26s.) argue, the socio-economic integration of the East African Community will promote the development of Swahili. Burundi – Swahili has remained mainly located in urban neighbourhoods with a Muslim tendency, such as the Buyenzi and Asian neighbourhoods in Bujumbura, and in regions along Lake Tanganyika such as Rumonge and Nyanza-Lac in the South of the country. In contrast with other agricultural regions, people in these areas also live from fishing and trade with their Swahili-speaking neighbours in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Tanzania (Mazunya 2011, 144). These regions saw the return of thousands of Burundians repatriated from Tanzania between 2005 and 2010. Rwanda – Rwanda is home to many returnees from countries where Swahili is the national language or lingua franca, such as Kenya and Tanzania.  

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French From 1898 to 1916, Burundi and Rwanda were under the protectorate of Germany as part of the vast territory of German East Africa. The Germans imposed Swahili as the language of instruction and administration throughout the country. They exercised in-

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direct administration by resorting to the local political organization (Tidy/Leeming 2001, 136). However, education was largely in the hands of Catholic missionaries, who were free to integrate other languages into their teaching without the approval of the colonial authority. At the seminary in Kabgayi, Rwanda, French was used as the language of instruction (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 28s.). This surprising situation can be explained by the links between Catholic missionaries and Leopold II, King of the Belgians, who controlled neighbouring Congo. Belgium inherited the territory of Rwanda-Urundi in 1916. The Belgian colonial authority officially introduced French into the education system, first sparingly (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 33): Swahili was kept as the main language of instruction until 1923, with French being taught from the fourth grade onwards (Gahama 1983, 246). When Belgium received a mandate from the League of Nations to govern the territory of Rwanda-Urundi in 1924, the colonial authority administratively united it with Belgian Congo in 1925. The education system was modelled on that of Belgian Congo and entrusted to Catholic missions. From 1930, French replaced Swahili as the second language of instruction (Rurangirwa 2011, 110). It was learned at the elementary school only. Indeed, the colonizer considered that French would be a source of pride and pretension among the natives: ‘A black man who knows French easily becomes an uprooted person, he quickly believes himself to be equal to the white man and even superior to the white man’.2

To keep a grip on the local population, the emphasis was put on evangelization and professional, not linguistic, training.

2.2 Milestones of its further development Education was reformed in 1948: learning French became less elitist and opened up to a wider population (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 34ss.). Curricula were Europeanized. French was introduced as the language of instruction from the first year of primary school. This reform was due to international pressure to prepare the colonies for autonomy through the learning of an internationally reaching language (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 34s.). Moreover, the indigenous people rejected the paternalism of the ecclesiastical and colonial authorities (Depaepe 2010, 17) and sought at all costs to educate their children in French, as this language was the key to knowledge and the springboard for social advancement (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 36). Finally, these indigenous demands coincided with the criticism of the monopoly of Catholic education in favour of a secular education system (Depaepe 2010, 17). Between 1948 and 1960, secular secondary schools and university centres such as Lovanium in Kisantu (1947) or the Official University of Congo and

2 “Un Noir qui connaît le français devient facilement un déraciné, il se croit rapidement l’égal du Blanc et même supérieur au Blanc” (De Jonghe 1931, 89).

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Rwanda-Urundi (Université officielle du Congo et du Rwanda-Urundi) in Élisabethville (1956), now Lubumbashi, were established. On the other hand, newspapers were created in French such as Temps Nouveaux d’Afrique founded in 1954 by the White Fathers in Bujumbura and aimed at all French speakers in Rwanda, Burundi, and Eastern Congo (Shyirambere 1978, 109). Education was strongly reinforced during this period preceding the independence in 1962. However, this strong interest in education could not be fully satisfied due to the lack of French-speaking indigenous executives. In conclusion, the duration of linguistic colonization was very short. Both countries gained their independence in 1962. The leaders of the young countries relied on French, an international language, to legitimize their sovereignty in the concert of nations. They kept the Europeanized educational structures left by the former colonial power. In Rwanda, French was the medium of instruction at all levels of education from the fourth year of primary school (Ntakirutimana 2012, 10). But the education system faced many difficulties during the first post-independence era. In fact, in contrary to Burundi, Rwanda experienced the departure of the colonizer and the exodus of a part of the population that had learned French and could easily take on administrative functions. Specifically, the attempted assassination of a Hutu sub-chief in 1959 triggered a wave of killings of Tutsis by Hutus and marked the beginning of the Rwandan revolution. In Burundi, the learning of French was generalized from the first year of primary school and French became the pillar of education. Interest in school and learning French was growing among the disadvantaged population, who considered knowledge of French as the key to power and freedom. At that time, intellectuals speaking an international language were considered to hold social capital. In the imagination of Burundians and Rwandans, the “peasant” refers to the way of life in the countryside and is associated with illiteracy, ignorance, and a lack of culture and civility (Murengerantwari 2016, 45). A “peasant” is someone who speaks only his local language, who ‘speaks only one language like a cow’ (Kir./Kin. avuga ururimi rumwe nk’inka). These aspirations of the people were only partially fulfilled, because the countries suffered from a lack of teaching materials, qualified human resources and school infrastructure. The teaching of French therefore remained elitist. The success of French was called into question by the Pan-African movement that was growing in the 1960s. Pan-Africanism promotes the total independence of the African continent: national languages were promoted at the expense of French. Elementary school reforms in Burundi (1973) and Rwanda (1979) supported the rehabilitation of national languages and cultures in order to prepare pupils to develop rural areas (Niyongabo 2005, 10; Ntakirutimana 2012, 11). In Burundi, Kirundi was declared the language of instruction at all levels of elementary school, while French was introduced from the fifth grade onwards (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 41). Unlike in Rwanda, Kirundization was never applied to secondary education.

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A new changeover can be observed from 1990 in Burundi and 1991 in Rwanda: governments restored French in education to meet the aspirations of parents. At that time, French was still perceived as the language of prestige, openness to the world and social consideration. However, this renewed confidence in the French-language education system quickly faded: the civil war in Burundi, which was triggered by the assassination of the democratically elected President Melchior Ndadaye in October 1993 and the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 opened a period of uncertainty for the development and future of French. Burundi experienced a socio-political crisis from 1993 to 2005, which deteriorated the learning of French. Many teachers were assassinated or forced into exile. The government used unqualified teachers, which contributed to a gradual decline in the quality of French proficiency. In 2007, the entry of Burundi and Rwanda into the East African Community imposed a new framework for languages, as this community includes mainly English-speaking countries (Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda). In Burundi, the Law 1/31 of 2014 stated that the institutional functions hitherto assumed by French could also be carried out in English. The teaching of English was strengthened, and Swahili entered the Burundian school system. Burundi started reforming the education system towards a system comparable to that of other East African Community countries. This reform resembled the Kirundization of 1973 and aimed to train entrepreneurial citizens who are directly useful in their living environment, with an emphasis on science, technology, and entrepreneurship, at the expense of languages. This education system proved counterproductive and the success rate in national tests and the state examination fell year by year. Attributing this state of affairs to a lack of mastery of French, Decree 100/78 put French back in the forefront of education in 2019. The place of French for the future is far from certain, insofar as its learning, like that of English or other languages, is virtually non-existent at post-basic level in sections other than the “Languages” section.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Burundi and Rwanda functioned under a similar functional French-Kirundi/Kinyarwanda bilingualism until recently. Nowadays, French and English are official alongside the national languages. Burundi – In Burundi, the Constitution states that ‘the national language is Kirundi. The official languages are Kirundi and all other languages determined by law’.3 But the Law 1/31 of 2014 specifies that ‘the official languages are Kirundi, French, and English.

3 “La langue nationale est le Kirundi. Les langues officielles sont le Kirundi et toutes autres langues déterminées par la loi” (C-BI 2018, art. 5).

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Swahili is used as the language of regional communication’.4 The same Law determines which language is used in education, administration, media, justice, diplomacy, etc. Rwanda – In Rwanda, the Constitution states that ‘the national language is Kinyarwanda. The official languages are Kinyarwanda, French, and English’.5 However, a decision by the Council of Ministers in 2008 made English the sole medium of instruction, which strengthened its position (Rurangirwa 2013, 41) and reduced the vitality of French in the institutional sphere.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Although French is one of the official languages of both countries, its use in public administration varies greatly. Written communication: Burundi – In Burundi, written administration is dominated by French. More than 80 % of the written documents are in French (Mazunya 2011, 144) and few are written in Kirundi, which is the predominant spoken language. Bukuru (2008, 6s.) shows that even in the fields of agriculture and health, where policies are aimed at Kirundi-speaking people, documents and books are published in French. That said, article 5 of the country’s Constitution states that all official texts must have a Kirundi version, which is not yet effective in all areas. Major advances are observed in the field of justice. Indeed, while Burundian legislation was published in French by foreign experts, a National Legislation Service responsible for the translation of legal texts has been created and all legal texts published from 18 March 2006 onwards are written in French and Kirundi (Mazunya/Bigirimana/Habonimana 2014, 94). A situation of diglossia is observed between Kirundi and French: Kirundi dominates in the basic jurisdictions while French is more frequent in the higher or specialized jurisdictions, due to the cases handled and the quality of the litigants (Mazunya/Bigirimana/Habonimana 2014, 94). The same diglossia exists in public administration. Kirundi is much more widely used in the territorial administration called collinaire (cf. 4.3), while French remains the working language of the Council of Ministers and the language in which reports and correspondence between department heads are drafted. English is also an official language but official texts are not yet published in this language. For example, the text of the Constitution adopted in 2018 has been published in French and Kirundi. No survey is available on the use of English in the administration, but we believe that it is widely used in particular in correspondence and working relations with the East African Community  

4 “Les langues officielles utilisées au Burundi sont le Kirundi, le Français et l’Anglais. Le Kiswahili est utilisé comme langue de communication régionale. D’autres langues peuvent être introduites par la loi” (Law 1/31, art. 5). 5 “La langue nationale est le Kinyarwanda. Les langues officielles sont le Kinyarwanda, le Français et l’Anglais” (C-RW 2003, art. 5).

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and in diplomatic exchanges with other English-speaking countries. The Law 1/31, which sets the status of languages, states that ‘the languages used as communication tools in cooperation are Kirundi, French, English, and Swahili in accordance with the regulations and international and regional treaties to which Burundi is a signatory’.6

The choice of language in diplomacy would therefore depend on the language of the recipient. Interestingly, we note the presence of English, although still rare, on road signs. The survey conducted by Bukuru shows, for example, that 72.7 % of the signs on the Bujumbura-Kobero road linking Burundi and Tanzania via the northern provinces are written in French, 17.2 % in Kirundi, 5.72 % in English, 3.49 % in Swahili, and 1.07 % in Arabic (Bukuru 2008, 24). In conclusion, the administrative and political sphere of Burundi is still characterized by functional Kirundi-French bilingualism with a predominance of written French. Written communication: Rwanda – In Rwanda, the choice of English as the sole medium of instruction affects the spread of French in other areas. Although French remains present in the different sectors of national life, its importance is diminishing. With regard to official texts, Ntakirutimana (2014a, 128) notes that the official gazette of the Republic of Rwanda continues, with rare exceptions, to be published in three languages: Kinyarwanda, French, and English. French –as English and Kinyarwanda– is also used on official documents such as passports, certificates, prescriptions, and memos, except for identity cards and driving licences, which are only in Kinyarwanda and English. In fifteen out of twenty-eight public institutions investigated by Ntakirutimana (2014a, 128), acknowledgement stamps are in French. In the area of justice, the directory of codes and laws of Rwanda is written in French. However, in practice, written documents (e. g., bills of indictment) are written in either French or English depending on the language affiliation of the person involved. The current situation is probably a stage of linguistic transition from French to English. Rurangirwa (2013, 39) observes a profound reform of the administrative structures: their names are used in their English and Kinyarwanda translations, but rarely in French. These elements indicate that French no longer has a real place in Rwanda’s administrative and political apparatus. Oral communication: Burundi – Official speeches are to this day delivered in Kirundi or French, and those pronounced in Kirundi are generally translated into French. Oral communication: Rwanda – The use of both French and English is limited to written communication in Rwanda, with oral communication being in Kinyarwanda and depending entirely on the language skills of civil servants.  

 

 

 

 

 

6 “Conformément à la réglementation et aux traités internationaux et régionaux dont le Burundi est signataire, les langues utilisées comme outils de communication dans la coopération sont le kirundi, le français, l’anglais et le kiswahili” (Law 1/31, art. 16).

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Digital communication: Burundi – The language primarily used by Burundi on the web is French, as the work of Bigirimana (2008) shows. Government websites are 83 % in French and no site is exclusively in Kirundi. Almost twelve years after Bigirimana’s work and thirteen years after Burundi’s integration into the East African Community, the situation has remained the same: French is favoured in the communication of prestigious institutions (Presidency of the Republic, Parliament, and Senate). With the exception of the text of the Constitution published in French and Kirundi, all other official texts are in French only. French is also the official language of communication on social networks: messages posted on the Facebook and Twitter accounts of the Presidency of the Republic and the Prime Minister are almost exclusively in French, with a few messages in Kirundi. Digital communication: Rwanda – An examination of the official sites of Rwandan state institutions (Presidency, Parliament, and Ministries) reveals that English is used in communication on the internet, sometimes with Kinyarwanda. Only the “Laws and Regulations” domain presents official texts in three languages (Kinyarwanda/English/ French). Some texts in French are available on the Rwanda Development Board website. On social networks (Facebook and Twitter accounts of institutions), English and Kinyarwanda are used at the expense of French.  

3.3 Languages used in education French still dominates the educational system in Burundi, but not in Rwanda. Burundi – In Burundi, the position of French is attacked, but not in a frontal way (Ngorwanubusa 2013, 39). Burundi’s entry into the East African Community in 2007 prompted the authorities to reconsider the position of English, but the education system is still built on French. French is taught from the first year and shares with Kirundi the status of language of instruction in basic school under article 2 of the Decree 100/78 of 2019. Articles 4 and 5 of this decree define the subjects taught in Kirundi and those taught in French. More specifically, article 4 states that Kirundi is the language of instruction in the first (1st–2nd years) and second (3rd–4th years) cycles of basic education, except for mathematics, which is taught in French from the fourth year onwards. According to article 5 of the same decree, French is the language of instruction from the third cycle (5–6 years) except for entrepreneurship, humanities, arts and physical and sports education, which are taught in Kirundi. The official basic education curriculum specifies that French becomes the exclusive language of instruction from the fourth cycle of basic education (7th, 8th, and 9th years). English may become a language of instruction for schools where the required conditions are met on the day a decree sets these conditions. In the private sector, a small number of schools with predominantly English-language curricula are being established, particularly in Bujumbura. The Decree 100/78 mainly concerns elementary schooling. Today, French retains its function as the language of instruction at secondary and higher education levels (Mazunya/Bigirima-

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na/Habonimana 2014, 93). With the exception of the English departments of the University of Burundi and the École Normale Supérieure (ENS), and in a few emerging private universities with predominantly English-speaking programmes, French remains the vehicle of knowledge in higher education in Burundi. Rwanda – In Rwanda, French has lost its role in education since 2008. From being the language of instruction, i.e. a second language, it has become a language to be taught, i.e., a foreign language. Kinyarwanda is used in the first three years of primary school. English is taught from the first year of primary school and is the language of instruction from the fourth year on. This choice for English has had an impact on the teaching of French and other languages. Ntakirutimana (2014a, 128) reports that since the reform, the English department of the National University of Rwanda is the only one to count a reasonable number of students. The departments of French and African languages and literature no longer attract students, which is explained by Rurangirwa’s (2013) analysis of language markets. This has led to the merger of these two departments into the Department of Modern Languages, which no longer focuses on the teaching, of languages but on their professional use, such as translation, interpretation, publishing and creative writing. According to Rurangirwa (2013, 48), there are no longer courses in French in private universities and teachers who are not proficient in English are dismissed. Meanwhile, as Ntakirutimana (2014b, 161) observes, even in the research domain, local publications in French are not only restricted but also forbidden. For illustration, according to the same author, Rwanda Journal, a journal of the National University of Rwanda does not accept articles in French; English is the only acceptable language for all academic works.

3.4 Languages used in the media Beyond the political will to promote the English language in the two countries, the target population of the various types of media differs from a socio-demographic point of view, and so does the language. The local written media favours for example French in Burundi, as it targets educated, literate, French-speaking people, while the local audiovisual media favours Kirundi, as it targets the large group of Kirundi speakers. Unlike in Rwanda, French still plays a privileged part in all media in Burundi. There is also a certain overlap between the distribution of languages and the modality (written vs. spoken) at least in the local media. Print media: Burundi – Although Burundi entered into the East African Community, where the official languages are English and Swahili, English has not settled yet in the language usage of institutions and the country remains essentially French-speaking. Almost the entire intellectual elite has been trained in a purely French-speaking system; their cognitive schemas function essentially in French. The print media is thus clearly dominated by French (Bukuru 2008, 19): out of eleven print newspapers in 2020, eight are written in French (Le Renouveau du Burundi, Journal Iwacu, Écho du Sanctuaire, Net

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Press, Burundi Eco, Voix de l’Enseignant, La Voix des Communes Burundaises, Jimbere Magazine), two are published in Kirundi (Ubumwe, Ndongozi), and one is published in both Kirundi and French (Intumwa, which is affiliated to the ruling party since 2005 and whose publication is no longer available to the general public). The French-language newspapers address all the sensitive issues of society and are aimed at intellectuals. The newspapers written exclusively in Kirundi are rare and stand apart from the others, in terms of readership and content: the traditional newspaper Ubumwe is fed by the government and Ndongozi by the Catholic Church. To this day, there are no English nor bilingual English-French newspapers in Burundi. However, English is beginning to appear in the online press. Out of twenty-one online media identified, thirteen are published in French (Burundi Net, Umuringa, Journal Inkuru, AkezaNet, Mbwira, Ejo, Burundi24, NetPress, Journal Iwacu, Jimbere Magazine, Burundi Eco, Burununga News, Arib Info), three in Kirundi (NAWE, Indundi, Burundi Sport), two are bilingual French-Kirundi (Itara Burundi, La Nova News), two are published in English (Region Week, Burundi Times), and one is trilingual French-Kirundi-English (Ejo heza news). French online newspapers are aimed at Burundians in the diaspora and at foreign readers. Even English-language newspapers contain articles written exclusively in French. Print media: Rwanda – In Rwanda, for historical and political reasons, English tends to overtake French in institutional communication, including in virtual communication. Part of the population is English-speaking and comprises speakers who evolved in mainly English-speaking countries and who repatriated after the 1994 genocide. The country’s leadership team belongs to this population. The Rwandan written press is multilingual and varied, although the majority of the newspapers favour the national language Kinyarwanda. A survey conducted by Ntakirutimana (2014a, 129) shows that out of forty-eight newspapers in the country, twenty-four are published in Kinyarwanda, five in French and five in English. Among the multilingual newspapers, twelve are trilingual (Kinyarwanda/French/English) and two are bilingual (Kinyarwanda/French). Audiovisual media: Burundi – Whereas the print media is clearly dominated by French, the audiovisual sector in Burundi is dominated by Kirundi. This tendency is observed on all of the twenty-five radio stations, two public and twenty-three private, broadcasting in Bujumbura, the former capital of the country and currently the economic capital, and in the provinces as well as on the three television channels, one public and two private. The trend for radio stations is to favour Kirundi (60–70 % of airtime) over French (20–30 %), Swahili (0–10 %), and finally English (0–5 %). Some radio stations reserve fifteen to twenty-five hours of programmes to French. Others broadcast only in Kirundi and restrict the use of French to news bulletins. The so-called community radio stations operating in the provinces do not use any other language than Kirundi. In the Burundian public media, French remains important. On the second channel of the national radio (with an international dimension), French takes up 56 % of broadcast time against 31 % for Swahili and 13 % for English (Mazunya/Bigirimana/Habonimana 2014, 93). On the public education-oriented radio Nderagakura, French covers 76 % of broadcasting time, alongside Kirundi (16 %), English (2.6 %), and Swahili (3.4 %, cf. Bukuru  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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2008, 12), which shows once again the prominent role of French in the school domain. National television offers a variety of programmes in the four national languages, but French remains predominant. Indeed, national television serves as a relay to rebroadcast foreign or international channels, particularly France 24 and TV5 Monde (Mazunya/Bigirimana/Habonimana 2014, 93). The other two private television channels, however, offer a limited use of French, restricted to news bulletins. Audiovisual media: Rwanda – French is used less on radio and television in Rwanda than in Burundi and the local audiovisual channels are dominated by Kinyarwanda. Ntakirutimana analyses twenty-seven radio stations in Rwanda including sixteen private, seven public and four international ones, as well as public television. With the exception of national radio and television, local stations broadcast almost exclusively in Kinyarwanda; French is only used during news bulletins. On national television, broadcasts are mainly in English (42.7 %) and Kinyarwanda (36.8 %), with fewer broadcasts in French (14.4 %) and Swahili (6.1 %, Ntakirutimana 2014a, 129).  

 

 

 

4 Linguistic characteristics The French spoken in Burundi and Rwanda was imported by Belgian colonizers who used a variety characterized by some differences with standard French (Francard 2010; Hambye/Simon 2009). In addition, this imported variety of French was exposed to Kinyarwanda and Kirundi, the first languages of the local populations. In this section, we examine possible linguistic interferences due to languages in contact, that is ‘the imprint of the heritage language on the target language, possibly at all linguistic levels’.7 These interferences should not be seen as errors caused by insufficient mastery of French, but rather as variants of the regional varieties of French spoken in Burundi and Rwanda (Nimbona/Simon forthcoming).

4.1 Pronunciation Recent phonological studies confirm the influence of African languages on the phonological structure of French spoken in various African countries (Bordal 2009; Boutin/Turcsan 2009; Bordal 2012; Boutin/Gess/Guèbe 2012; Lyche/Skattum 2012; Picron/Simon 2018). Burundi – Nimbona/Simon (forthcoming) describe the phoneme inventory of French in Burundi, based on spoken data collected following the protocol of the Phonologie du Français Contemporain (PFC) project (Durand/Laks/Lyche 2014). A series of pho-

7 “L’empreinte laissée par la langue d’origine dans la langue-cible, possiblement à tous les niveaux linguistiques” (Gadet/Ludwig 2015, 57).

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netic and phonological features distinguish French spoken in Burundi from standard French pronunciation (Lyche 2010). Vowels – At the level of the vowels system, Nimbona/Simon (2022) observe four typical features. First, vowel lengthening compensates for the loss of the /a/ : /ɑ/ opposition. Speakers distinguish pattes [pat] ‘paws’ and pâtes [pɑt] ‘pasta’ by lengthening the vowel that would correspond to /ɑ/ in pâtes [paːt]. As this phenomenon is typical to Belgian French (Hambye/Simon 2009, 107), the authors conclude that this feature is due to the influence of Belgian French that was imported into Burundi. Second, there is the neutralization of the rounding feature of the front vowels /y/, /œ/ and /ø/, so that /œ/ and /ø/ are neutralized for example in an expression like des jeunets so that [deʒøne] can be found next to the standard pronunciation [deʒœne]. A nonstandard variant with an unrounded [e] is also observed, as in [deʒene]. The same holds for /i/ and /y/, for example in reliure [ʁəljyʁ] which, besides to its standard form, is variably pronounced as [ʁəlijyʁ] or as [ʁəlijiʁ]. Additionally, the authors observe a simplification of the alternation of the middle vowels and a tendency to confuse close-mid and open-mid vowels. Therefore, the expected opposition in the minimal pairs épée ‘sword’ [epe] ~ épais ‘thick’ [epɛ] or paume ‘palm’ [pom] ~ pomme ‘apple’ [pɔm] is not observed in Burundian French. Nimbona/Simon (2022, 494) attribute both features to the influence of Kirundi, because Kirundi does not have rounded front vowels and does not exploit the close-mid vs. open-mid timbre opposition /e/ : /ɛ/ and /o/ : /ɔ/. Third, they observe a total or partial denasalization of the nasal vowels. In the case of partial denasalization, the denasalization of the vowel leads to the prenasalization of the following consonant, like in champion ‘champion’, pronounced [ʃampjo] or [ʃampjɔ̃] instead of [ʃɑ̃pjɔ̃], and profonde ‘deep’, pronounced [pʁɔfɔnd] instead of [pʁɔfɔ̃d]. As Kirundi has no nasal vowels, they attribute this denasalization to the influence of Kirundi. They also observe a systematic anteriorization of the vowel /ɑ̃/, realized [ã], and a systematic realization of un /œ̃ / as [ã]. Both variants can be observed in the sentence il y avait un conflit ‘there was a conflict’ [iljavɛãkɔɱfli] instead of [iljavɛœ̃ kɔ̃fli]. Another example for the realization of /œ̃ / as [ã] can be found in entre ‘between’ [ãtʁə] instead of [ɑ̃tʁ]. Fourth, in Burundian French, contrary to standard French, the schwa is almost always inserted in certain contexts. The mute [ə] has a 100 % occurrence rate in monosyllabic words at the beginning of a sentence and is also frequently realized at the end of longer words where it can remain silent in standard French, for example in le village de Beaulieu [ləvilaʒədəboljø] instead of [ləvilaʒdəboljø], and a 96.4 % occurrence rate in sequences of monosyllabic words, for example in je me suis retourné ‘I looked back’, pronounced [ʒəməsɥiʁətuʁne] instead of [ʒməsɥiʁətuʁne]. Semi-vowels – The semivowel /ɥ/ is replaced by the corresponding vowel [y], such as in muette ‘mute’ [my.(w)ɛt] instead of [mɥɛt] or depuis ‘since’ [dəpy] instead of [dəpɥi], or by the velar semivowel /w/ such as in huit ‘eight’ [wit] instead of [ɥit]. In cases where standard French recommends syneresis for /j/ and /ɥ/, Simon/Nimbona (2022, 499s.) observe a generalized tendency towards dieresis in Burundian French so that muette [mɥɛt] is pronounced [my.(w)ɛt] and épier [epje] is pronounced [epi.je]. Two factors explain this pronunciation. On the one hand, dieresis is also a major trend observed in Bel 

 

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gian French (Hambye/Simon 2009, 105s.), which may have been imported in Burundi by the colonizers. On the other hand, dieresis may be reinforced by transfer from Kirundi, where a vowel alone cannot constitute a syllable in the internal or final position of a word. Consonants – Burundian French is characterized by two consonantal phenomena. First, the above-mentioned vowel denasalization most often leads to the prenasalization of the following consonant. In addition to the consonants of standard French, French spoken in Burundi thus also includes prenasal consonants. Nimbona/Simon (2022, 496) attribute this fact to the influence of Kirundi, which integrates prenasal consonants into its phonological system. These prenasal consonants are homorganic in Kirundi, that is their nature depends on the following oral consonant: The nasal consonant /n/ is realized [n] before dentals [d, t, s, z], [m] before bilabials [p, b], [ɱ] before labiodentals [f, v], and [ŋ] before velar [ɡ, k]. Accordingly, in Burundian French cinq ‘five’ will be variably pronounced [sɛŋk] or [sɛ̃k], vin blanc ‘white wine’ [vɛmblɑ̃] or [vɛ̃blɑ̃] and infect ‘vile’ either [ɛɱfɛɡt], [ɛ̃fɛkt], or [ɛ̃fɛɡt]. Second, we encounter several phonetic variants of the phoneme /ʁ/, including variants that have not been observed in the varieties of French in Côte d’Ivoire (cf. Boutin/ Turcsan 2009), Burkina Faso (cf. Prignitz/Boutin 2010), Togo (cf. Picron/Simon 2018), and Niger (cf. Busà 2018). In particular, we observe the uvular trill [ʀ] that has been described in Belgian French by Hambye (2005) and is distinguished from uvular fricative [ʁ] by its highly irregular vibrations, which are marked by sharper noise bands and by two or three peaks of intensity often unequal in intensity (Hambye 2005, 221). Burundian French also admits fricative variants observed in standard French, like the unvoiced uvular [χ]. Nimbona/Simon (2022, 498) give some examples of the fricative realization in rauque ‘raucous’, realized [ʁɔk] with the same fricative [ʁ] as in standard [ʁok], or quatre ‘four’, realized [katχ] instead of [katʁ], of the fricative trill in rat ‘rat’, realized [ʀa] instead of [ʁa], or of the velar approximant [ɰ] in quarante ‘forty’, realized [kaɰant] instead of [kaʁɑ̃t]. As in other African varieties, the consonant /ʁ/ in Burundian French is also frequently subject to deletion, like in fêtard ‘party boy’, realized as [fɛtaː] instead of [fɛtaʁ]. Prosody – Recent studies investigated the suprasegmental characteristics of African French. In many varieties, like French in the Central African Republic (Bordal 2012), Côte d’Ivoire (Boutin/Turcsan 2009), Mali, or Senegal (Bordal/Skattum 2014), speakers produce accentual prominences on each lexical word. This is not the prosodic norm in French, where the accentuation domain is postlexical (or phrasal). Nimbona (2014) investigated prosody in Burundian French and discovered more similarities with standard French: Burundian speakers segment their speech into rhythmic groups. They furthermore apply accentuation rules typical of standard French, like “no-clash” (i.e., avoid successive accented syllables and group accentual phrases: e. g., une journée chaude ‘a hot day’ is not realized as [ynʒuʁˈneˈʃod], but as [ynʒuʁneˈʃɔd] like in standard Frech) and “align-XP” (i.e., adopt a phrasal domain of accentuation: e. g., un grand terrain ‘a large field’ is not realized as [œ̃ ˈɡʁɑ̃tɛˈʁɛ̃], but as [œ̃ ɡʁɑ̃tɛˈʁɛ̃] like in standard French, cf. Nim 

 

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bona 2014, 270–283; Nimbona/Simon 2016, 124–128). On the other hand, Burundian French resembles other African varieties in that it does not apply a secondary accentuation system (i.e., on initial word syllables). This tendency to develop a phrasal (vs. lexical) prosody has been analysed as a cross-linguistic influence of Kirundi. Rwanda – To our knowledge, there are no empirical phonetic studies on French spoken in Rwanda. We report here a series of interferences from pronunciation to spelling which concern the vowel system (Shyirambere 1978, 192–195). In Rwandese French, some nasal vowels are denasalized, as for example in mésentente ‘disagreement’ [mezɑ̃tɑ̃t], whose spelling reflects the pronunciation [mezatɑ̃t], or en marche ‘on the move’ [ɑ̃maʁʃ], whose spelling indicates the pronunciation [amaʁʃ]. Some rounded vowels are pronounced unrounded, like in amusement ‘fun’ [amyzəmɑ̃], whose spelling reflects the pronunciation [amizəmɑ̃], or in je vous assure ‘I assure you’ [ʒəvuzasyʁ], whose spelling indicates the pronunciation [ʒəvuzasiʁ]. Finally, Rwandan written French has vowel insertions that reflect the pronunciation, like in (ils) inspirent ‘(they) inspire’, whose spelling indicates the pronunciation [ɛ̃sipiʁ] instead of [ɛ̃spiʁ], or in un second scrutin ‘a second ballot’, whose spelling indicates the pronunciation [səkʁytɛ̃] instead of [skʁytɛ̃]. These vowel alterations are difficult to interpret because of the historical context in which they were observed. Shyirambere points out that they are mainly observed among schoolchildren or among people with little education (1978, XV). Given that French was introduced in Rwanda through school, it is possible that these modifications are due to the insufficient mastery of French. Non-standard spelling is not typical of a variety socially valued in written communications and corresponding to legitimate established uses in the Rwandan French-speaking community. It developed during the post-independence era, when Rwanda experienced the departure of the colonizer and the exodus of a part of the population that had learned French and could easily take on administrative functions (cf. 2.2 above). It has been observed that the differences between African varieties of French reflect differences observed between the first languages of the speakers (Avanzi/Bordal/Nimbona 2014, 1315). Based on the comparison of Kirundi and Kinyarwanda, we assume that Rwandan speakers would adopt the same phonological behaviour as Burundian speakers, because the first languages of the speakers are quite similar and the process of implantation of French has been the same.

4.2 Morphosyntax Burundi – The work of Frey (1996, 19s.) and Reutner (2017, 44–47) has uncovered several phenomena of morphological variation: modification of grammatical gender (e. g., la combi ‘the van’ instead of le combi), pronominalization of non-pronominal verbs (e. g., se sympathiser ‘to sympathize’ instead of sympathiser, se connaître avec ‘to know somebody’ instead of connaître) or, on the contrary, the depronominalization of pronominal verbs (e. g., doucher ‘to take a shower’ instead of se doucher), the use of indirect instead  

 

 

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of direct object complements (e. g., appeler à qqn ‘to phone someone’ instead of appeler qqn), or the use of verbs in a factitive sense without resorting to the pseudo-auxiliary faire ‘to make’ (e. g., miroiter instead of faire miroiter ‘to promise’, déguerpir instead of faire déguerpir ‘to get out’). However, we still need corpus analysis of a larger amount of attested data in order to establish an inventory of the morphosyntactic particularities of Burundian French. Corpus analysis must be complemented by sociolinguistic analysis, since some characteristics identified as regional by scholars are judged by local speakers as errors due to a lack of mastery of the grammatical rules of French (cf., e. g., Reutner 2017, 47, il le demande ‘he asks him’ instead of il lui demande). Rwanda – Shyirambere (1978, 197) analysed errors in the formation of conjugated verbs (e. g., nous vûmes ‘we saw’ instead of nous vîmes), feminine and plural French nouns (les argents ‘money’ instead of l’argent) as due to a lack of mastery of the grammatical rules learned at school. The same is true of the mastery of syntax. Consequently, it can be assumed that morphosyntax interference is rare. A corpus-based analysis would be necessary to describe better the morphology and grammar of this variety of French.  

 

 

 

4.3 Lexicon The influence of local culture and language on the lexicon is weaker in Burundi and Rwanda (Shyirambere 1978, 416) than in other African countries like Cameroon or Côte d’Ivoire. Frey estimates the degree of identity between the French of Burundi and standard French at 97 % (1996, 17). This is because French is learned at school, a normative institution par excellence, that does not tolerate code mixing, and is almost exclusively used in formal spheres of communication. Nevertheless, we find some loan words from local languages, other languages, other varieties of French, as well as words formed by innovation or semantic extension, restriction, and conversion (cf. Reutner 2017, 47–51). Loan words from local languages – Lexical regionalisms mainly concern the political, administrative, socio-economic or cultural realities specific to a given linguistic community, or the natural realities specific to the territory where this community lives. The words referring to them are frequently limited to the national territory and are often borrowed from local languages. In Burundi, we find borrowings from Kirundi, such as mushingatahe ‘wise, honest, responsible man’, muganuro ‘national sowing festival’, rugo ‘enclosure’, or ubuntu ‘humanism, kindness, compassion, wisdom, generosity’, irengarenga ‘amaranth’. In Rwanda, there are words borrowed from Kinyarwanda such as amacunda ‘buttermilk’, amarwa ‘cassava flour drink’, or umuganda ‘community work’, or isogi ‘bitter amaranth’. Words borrowed from local languages frequently give rise to neologisms by lexical derivation, mainly by suffixation (Kadlec 2008, 24): buyoyism ‘political attitude corresponding to the positions taken by President Buyoya’ (< Buyoya + ‑ism) and buyoyiste (< Buyoya + ‑iste) or ndadayism ‘relating to President Ndadaye’ (< Ndadaye + ‑ism) are derived from proper nouns. There are also verbs such as sussur 

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uker ‘to be/feel warm’ (< Kirundi gususuruka ‘to be/feel warm’ derived from Kirundi. These terms can be found in scholarly works and official texts. Loan words from other languages – Words borrowed from Swahili or other African languages spoken in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo include for example zamu ‘guardian’ (< Swahili), ndagala ‘dry small fish’ (< Swahili ndagaa), mushikaki ‘skewer’ (< local dialect of Swahili), and chikwange ‘cassava stick’ (< Lingala kwanga). Words of Arabic origin include soko ‘market’, barza ‘terrace’, and of English origin boy ‘young indigenous domestic’, with the derived nouns boyesse ‘young female domestic’ and boyerie ‘housing reserved for the boy near his employer’s house’. Some of these words are used in Rwanda, Burundi, and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. They were allegedly introduced during the colonial period, notably by the Congolese soldiers who maintained public order at the beginning of the Belgian colonization (Shyirambere 1978, 417s.). Their use is frequently observed among poorly educated speakers in the street, vendors or domestic staff of expatriates, or among non-Burundian/Rwandan speakers. They are likely to be perceived negatively, and an educated Burundian/Rwandan speaker will avoid using them. Lexicon from languages of former colonizers – Belgicisms are an important part of the French lexicon in Burundi. Out of thirty-one particularisms inventoried by Frey (1996, 22), fifteen are labelled as Belgicisms, for example athénée ‘high school’, auditoire ‘classroom’, doubler ‘repeat (a class)’, or minerval ‘tuition fees’. In Rwanda, there are also Canadianisms like élévateur ‘lift’ or pâte à dents ‘tooth paste’ (Jouannet 1984, 26s.). Interestingly, German colonization left no trace in the lexicon, with the exception of the word heller ‘monetary unit created in 1904’ (cf. Kadlec 2008, 23). Innovations – A range of processes are used for the creation of new words in Rwanda and in in Burundi (cf. Jouannet 1984; Frey 1996; Knop-Kostková 2013 for detailed accounts): derivation applied to borrowed words (e. g., dehutizing ‘losing one’s Hutu status’ < de- + Hutu + ‑izing, burundiser ‘to replace expatriates by Burundian staff’ < Burundi + ‑iser), suffixation of French words (e. g., sûretard ‘security officer’ < Fr. sûret(é) ‘safety’ + ‑ard [pejorative suffix]), compound words (e. g., taxi-moto ‘motorcycle taxi’ < Fr. taxi ‘taxi’ + moto ‘motorcycle’, taxi-vélo ‘bicycle taxi’ < Fr. taxi ‘taxi’ + vélo ‘bicycle’), merging of phrases (e. g., Fr. tenir en considération ‘take into account’ < mixing tenir en compte and prendre en considération), truncations (e. g., abacost ‘men’s jacket without collar made of light fabric’ < Fr. à bas (le) costume ‘down the suit’, flavo < flavoquine, referring to a brand of medicine against malaria), lexicalization of proper names, like registered trademarks (e. g., colgate ‘toothpaste’, omo ‘soap powder’). Semantic change – Some French expressions extended or specialized their meaning: colline ‘hill’ does not only refer to an elevation of the ground, but is also a statalism for ‘geographical, social, administrative, and political entities’. Conversely, the meaning of the word mèches ‘locks’ is restricted to that of ‘synthetic hair’. Such semantic shifts in meaning are frequent: in Burundi, cochonner ‘to dirty’ means ‘not to honour an appointment, to make a bad move on someone’, in Rwanda, the verb progresser ‘to progress’ means ‘to find a mistress’.  

 

 

 

 

 

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5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – In speakers’ representations, the standard French in Burundi and Rwanda should not differ from the regular standard French that is learned at school and used in formal communication contexts. Speakers’ language skills in French are judged according to their mastery of school norms and any variant is likely to be perceived as an error. Speakers do not distinguish between different registers of language, ranging from academic to colloquial French, as is also the case in other African countries such as Côte d’Ivoire. Descriptions of French spoken in Burundi and Rwanda distinguish categories of speakers based on the degree and quality of their schooling. First, speakers of acrolectal level use a variety of French close to standard French (français de référence). According to Frey, the acrolectal level is that of cultivated speakers in Burundi (1996, 14s.). Yanzigiye/Niyomugabo (2013, 192) note for Rwanda that acrolectal speakers use grammatically and stylistically correct French in their written communication. Whether they are occasional or everyday speakers, they all speak academic French (as spoken at school), which is the norm in Rwanda. Second, Frey described speakers at the mesolectal level in Burundi as non-university-educated speakers who do not have a wide linguistic repertoire or as educated speakers when their metalinguistic attention to speech decreases. Speakers of basilectal French make up the third group. Frey notes that French is not widespread, as it is only used by the poorly educated milieu of street vendors, domestic staff and those who left school too early in non-urban areas (cf. Frey 1996, 16). In Rwanda, this basilectal variety is referred to as kinyafrançais and is practised by speakers ‘who do not affect any intellectuality and use a code-mixing French with Kinyarwanda’.8 Speakers at this level in Rwanda are not far from those in Burundi. Variety used by public authorities – French used by public authorities is mostly written or written-to-be-spoken. In official public speeches or legislative texts, we find a sustained French register that tends towards the standard. In many political speeches in Burundi, words in Kirundi are clearly identified as loan words and translated into French. In the following example, President Ndayishimiye uses and translates ikizira from Kirundi, but also omits the preposition de ‘from’, compulsory with the verb éradiquer ‘eradicate’ in standard French: “les colonisateurs ont éradiqué [de] la conscience du citoyen Burundais le principe fondamental de ‘ikizira’ – le sens de l’interdit” (Ndayishimiye 2021).9

8 “Ce kinyafrançais ne peut pas être évité […] et il est légitime. Il désigne une variété du français actuellement utilisée au Rwanda […] par ceux qui ne se piquent d’aucune intellectualité et qui consiste en un mélange de français et de kinyarwanda” (Gafaranga 1984, 197, quoted in Yanzigiye/Niyomugabo 2013, 197). 9 ‘the colonisers eradicated [from] the consciousness of the Burundian citizen the fundamental principle of “ikizira” – the sense of the forbidden’.

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In radio and television broadcasts, politicians usually avoid the use of local language terms, but sometimes even politicians who are more comfortable speaking in French commit variants typical of second language speakers (cf. Mougeon/Nadasdi/Rehner 2010; Preston/Bayley/Escalante 2022, 3) and use non-standard forms considered obligatory in standard French, as for example à instead of de in: “mais aujourd’hui, nous sommes en train, petit à petit, à [instead of de] évoluer vers une indépendance économique”.10

Variety used at school – Yanzigiye/Niyomugabo (2013, 193s.) give the example of teachers or trainee students in Rwanda, who prepare their teaching in correct French but are not comfortable speaking beyond their course notes. When they have to give explanations to their students, they encounter serious difficulties in their oral expression and often resort to Kinyarwanda to provide in-depth explanations. Given the problems that the education system currently faces in Burundi, it seems to us that the mesolectal level described for Rwanda also applies to Burundian speakers of French. Nowadays, speakers that benefited from school teaching by European speakers or by well-trained local instructors express concerns about the declining quality of French language learning. They are worried about the fact that French language, despite being the language of instruction, is no longer well taught or mastered and is being “invaded” by the local languages. Variety used in the media – An examination of articles published in three newspapers (Le Renouveau, Iwacu, and BurundiEco) shows that, in general, the print media avoid using terms borrowed from local language as much as possible. Indeed, apart from the names of people or places and shop signs, Kirundi terms are generally only used in passages of reported speech of public authorities, as gasekebuye ‘construction type which emerged recently in Burundi and which is a sign of wealth’ in example (i). They also appear to mention themes of community activities, as in example (ii), where the translation of the theme into French is given with the original Kirundi version in parenthesis. “Le Ministre Ndirakobuca a mis en garde les commissaires des marches de la mairie: ‘Celui qui a été nommé commissaire d’un marché espérant ou croyant qu’il va construire une belle villa communément appelée Gasekebuye avec l’argent du contribuable, qu’il démissionne, qu’il arrête! Je dis assez!’” (Iwacu, 26/3/2021).11 (ii) “M. Ndoricimpa a rappelé le thème de cette année ‘Ignorer la protection de l’environnement, c’est trahir la biodiversité et ne pas se tenir debout face au changement climatique’ (kutitaho (i)

10 ‘but today we are moving, little by little, towards economic independence’. The example is taken from the Mosaïque political talk show of 4 July 2021, broadcast by Radio Isanganiro every Sunday at 9 am. 11 ‘Minister Ndirakobuca warned the commissioners of the town hall steps: “Whoever has been appointed as a market commissioner hoping or believing that he will build a beautiful villa commonly known as Gasekebuye with taxpayers’ money, let him resign, let him stop! I say enough!”’.

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kugarukira ibidukikije ni uguhemekira ibinyabuzima o kudahangana n’ibihe)” (Le Renouveau, 25/6/2021).12

Variety used in literature – Many Burundian writers, poets, and novelists mention concepts in their works using loan words from Kirundi, as for example in Kayoya (1970), Nahimana (2006), and Ngorwanubusa (2012). Generally, at the first occurrence of the concept, the authors propose different definitions or synonyms that they consider equivalent. In the rest of the text, they continue to use the loan word in Kirundi. For example, Kayoya (1970, 8) looks at the values of Ubuntu, which he defines as ‘humanism, kindness, compassion, wisdom, generosity’ (“humanisme, gentillesse, compassion, sagesse, générosité”), or Ubuvyeyi, which he defines as ‘maternity, paternity, dignity of a mother and a father’ (“maternité, paternité, dignité de la mère et du père”), Ubupfasoni, which he defines as ‘politeness, nobility of birth, nobility as a way of life, honesty, kindness’ (“politesse, noblesse d’origine, noblesse de vie, honnêteté, gentillesse”), or Iteka, which he defines as ‘grace, benefit, favour, free gift, respect that an inferior receives from his superior, divine favours’ (“don, bienfait, faveur, don gratuit, respect qu’un inférieur reçoit de son son supérieur, faveurs divines”). These terms convey human values that are important for the future of the community, particularly values that, according to him, constitute the pillars of traditional Burundian society. Once the terms have been defined, the author freely uses them in Kirundi: “La grave maladie, me disait-on, est celle de vouloir créer un monde qui oublie Un monde qui oublie la mort. Un monde qui finit avec la mort. La vie qui serait vie en se passant de la préoccupation des hautes valeurs humaines: Ubuntu, Ubuvyeyi, Ubupfasoni, Iteka” (Kayoya 1970, 41).13

The Rwandan author Scholastique Mukasonga is published in Paris, and her novel Notre-Dame du Nil (2012) was awarded the Prix Renaudot. Even in this European context, the language she uses in her novels in French is strongly enriched by the local Kinyarwanda language. In the excerpt below, we observe the presence of the Kinyarwanda/Kirundi terms irengarenga and isogi, as well as the term boy borrowed from English and the term ndagala borrowed from Swahili (cf. 4.3):

12 ‘Mr Ndoricimpa recalled this year’s theme “Ignoring environmental protection is a betrayal of biodiversity and a failure to stand up to climate change”’. 13 ‘The terrible disease, I was told, is the one consisting of a will to create a world which forgets / A world forgetful of death. A world which ends with death. Life which would be life in full neglect of concerns for great human values: Ubuntu, Ubuvyeyi, Ubupfasoni, Iteka’ (Kayoya 1970, 41).

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“Dès que je rentrerai chez moi pour les vacances, avec ma mère, on préparera de vraies bananes, on surveillera le boy quand il les épluchera et les mettra à cuire dans l’eau et des tomates. Et puis, ma mère et moi, on y ajoutera tout ce qu’on peut: des oignons, de l’huile de palme, des épinards irengarenga très doux et des isogi bien amers, des petits poissons séchés ndagala. Avec ma mère et mes sœurs, on se régalera” (Mukasonga 2012, 60).14

The use of loan words (or alternance codique as it is coined by Boizette 2020, 9) allows the author to refer genuinely to cultural, historical, political and social values. She, and other authors, prefer not to translate the loan words so as not to impoverish their meaning. In this way, they try to express the depth of their being. Conclusion – In conclusion, it is difficult to say whether speakers would recognize an endogenous standard French that would allow them to identify and classify varieties. The standard for French in Burundi and Rwanda is the school standard. These Frenchspeaking communities have not established their own grammars or dictionaries. The grammar and spelling taught at school are identical to the standard French. The structural discrepancies observed in language use are perceived either in terms of errors arising from a lack of mastery of the grammatical and spelling rules, or in terms of linguistic interference with the first language of speakers (cf. Nimbona 2014; Nimbona/Simon 2022). The main source of variation lies in the strengthening or weakening of the education system. The education system has recently become less strict, which explains the discomfort of speakers from the older generation, who have experienced a more elitist training compared to the current education system, which they consider weakened. These speakers, who can be described as purists, are nostalgic of the past and they still associate the success of their children’s lives with the mastery of the French language. They see it as the key to knowledge and the future. For these speakers, particularly in Burundi, an intellectual who does not master French is not an intellectual.

References Amidu, Assibi Apatewon (1995), Kiswahili, a Continental Language: How Possible Is It? (Part I), Nordic Journal of African Studies 5/1, 84–106. Avanzi, Mathieu/Bordal, Guri/Nimbona, Gélase (2014), The Obligatory Contour Principle in African and European Varieties of French, Interspeech, 1312–1316, http://www.isca-speech.org/archive/interspeech_2014 (2/3/2023). Bigirimana, Jean-Baptiste (2008), Le kirundi face aux langues “étrangères” sur la toile: fracture numérique ou/et violation du droit linguistique?, https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:155565795 (2/3/2023). Boizette, Pierre (2020), Les conditions de la mondialisation d’une œuvre francophone africaine, COnTEXTES, http://journals.openedition.org/contextes/9402 (2/3/2023).

14 ‘As soon as I come home for holidays, my mother and I will prepare real bananas, watch the boy as he peels and cooks them in water and tomatoes. And then my mother and I will add everything we can: onions, palm oil, very sweet amaranth spinach and bitter amaranth, small dried ndagala fish. We will enjoy ourselves with my mother and my sisters’.

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Bordal, Guri (2009), Phonologie, variation et contact de langues: quelques aspects de la prononciation du français parlé à Bangui en République centrafricaine, Le français en Afrique 25, 375–388. Bordal, Guri (2012), Regard sur la prosodie du français d’Afrique à la lumière de la L1 des locuteurs, in: Anne Catherine Simon (ed.), La variation prosodique régionale en français, Louvain-la-Neuve, De Boeck Supérieur, 179–198. Bordal, Guri/Skattum, Ingse (2014), La prosodie du français en Afrique – traits panafricains ou traits la langue première? Le cas de locuteurs natifs de quatre langues: sango, bambara, wolof et tamasheq, in: Jacques Durand et al. (edd.), La phonologie du français: normes, périphéries, modélisation. Mélanges pour Chantal Lyche, Paris, Presses universitaires de Paris Ouest, 119–152. Boutin, Béatrice Akissi/Gess, Randall/Guèbe, Marie-Gabriel (2012), French in Senegal after three centuries. A phonological study of Wolof speakers’ French, in: Randall Gess/Chantal Lyche/Trudel Meisenburg (edd.), Phonological Variation in French: Illustrations from Three Continents, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 45–71. Boutin, Béatrice Akissi/Turcsan, Gabor (2009), La prononciation du français en Afrique: la Côte d’Ivoire, in: Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks/Chantal Lyche (edd.), Phonologie, variation et accents du français, Paris, Lavoisier, 131–152. Bright, William (ed.) (1992), Oxford encyclopaedia of Linguistics, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Bukuru, Denis (2003), Phrase Structure and Functional Categories in the Kirundi Sentence, Dar es Salaam, University of Dar es Salaam, Doctoral Thesis. Bukuru, Denis (2008), Évaluation de l’usage du kirundi dans les secteurs de la vie nationale. État des lieux et perspectives, Bujumbura, Unesco. Busà, Veronica (2018), La production de /R/ chez les locuteurs de Niamey: une première enquête de terrain, Rome/ Paris, Sapienza Università di Roma/Université Paris Nanterre, Doctoral Thesis. C-BI = Présidence de la République (2018), Constitution de la République du Burundi of 2018, Gitega, Republic of Burundi, https://www.presidence.gov.bi/le-burundi/constitution (2/3/2023). C-RW = Présidence de la République (2003), Constitution de la République Rwandaise, 2003, Kigali, Republic of Rwanda, http://www.ilo.org/dyn/natlex/docs/WEBTEXT/64236/65274/F03RWA01.htm (2/3/2023). Decree 100/78 = Présidence du Burundi (2019), Décret no.100/078 du 22 mai 2019 portant fixation des langues d’enseignement et échelonnement des langues enseignées à l’École Fondamentale, Gitega, Republic of Burundi, https://www.presidence.gov.bi/2019/05/31/decret-n100078-du-22-mai-2019-portant-fixationdes-langues-denseignement-et-echelonnement-des-langues-enseignees-a-lecole-fondamentale (2/3/2023). De Jonghe, Édouard (1931), L’Enseignement des indigènes au Congo belge, Bruxelles, Institut colonial international. Depaepe, Marc (2010), Sous le signe du paternalisme: les politiques éducatives au Congo belge, 1908–1960, in: Benoît Falaize/Charles Heimberg/Olivier Loubes (edd.), L’école et la nation: Actes du séminaire scientifique international Lyon, Barcelone, Paris, 2010, Lyon, ENS. Durand, Jacques/Laks, Bernard/Lyche, Chantal (2014), French Phonology from a Corpus Perspective: The PFC Programme, in: Jacques Durand/Ulrike Gut/Gjert Kristoffersen (edd.), The Oxford Handbook of Corpus Phonology, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 486–497. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International. http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Francard, Michel (2010), Variation diatopique et norme endogène. Français et langues régionales en Belgique francophone, Langue française 167/3, 113–126. Frey, Claude (1996), Le français au Burundi. Lexicographie et culture, Paris, EDICEF. Frey, Claude (2017), Burundi, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 535–551. Gadet, Françoise/Ludwig, Ralph (2015), Le français au contact d’autres langues, Paris, Ophrys.

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Gafaranga, Joseph (1984), Le Kinyafrançais, fils légitime et unique du kinyarwanda et du français, Études rwandaises 2/1, 196–212. Gahama, Joseph (1983), Le Burundi sous administration belge, Paris, ACCT/Karthala/CRA. Guthrie, Malcolm (1948), The Classification of the Bantu Languages, London, Oxford University Press. Hambye, Philippe (2005), La prononciation du français contemporain en Belgique: variation, normes et identités, Louvain-la-Neuve, Université catholique de Louvain, Doctoral Thesis. Hambye, Philippe/Simon, Anne Catherine (2009), La prononciation du français en Belgique, in: Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks/Chantal Lyche (edd.), Phonologie, variation et accents du français, Paris, Lavoisier, 95–130. Jouannet, Francis (1984), Le français au Rwanda. Enquête lexicale, Paris, SELAF. Kadlec, Jaromír (2008), Particularités lexicales du français au Burundi, Écho des études romanes 4/1, 19–27. Kagame, Alexis (1960), La langue du Rwanda et du Burundi expliquée aux autochtones, Kabgayi, s.e. Kayoya, Michel (1970), Sur les traces de mon père. Jeunesse du Burundi à la découverte des valeurs, Bujumbura, Lavigerie. Kimenyi, Alexandre (1976), A Relational Grammar of Kinyarwanda, Los Angeles, University of California, Doctoral Thesis. Knop-Kostková, Markéta (2013), La position et les particularités du français dans les anciennes colonies belges, Olomouc, Palacký University, Master Thesis. Lacger, Louis de (1959 [1939]), Le Ruanda ancien et moderne, Namur, Grands Lacs. Law 1/31 = Assemblée nationale du Burundi (2014), Loi no.1/31 du 3 novembre 2014 portant Statut des Langues au Burundi, Gitega, Republic of Burundi, https://assemblee.bi/spip.php?article835 (2/3/2023). Law 100/19 = Assemblée nationale du Burundi (2013), Loi no 100/19 du 10 septembre 2013 portant Organisation de l’Enseignement de Base et Secondaire, Gitega, Republic of Burundi, https://assemblee.bi/spip.php? article588 (2/3/2023). Lyche, Chantal (2010), Le français de référence: Éléments de synthèse, in: Sylvain Detey et al. (edd.), Les variétés du français parlé dans l’espace francophone. Ressources pour l’enseignement, Paris, Ophrys, 143–165. Lyche, Chantal/Skattum, Ingse (2012), The phonological characteristics of French in Bamako, Mali, in: Randall Gess/Chantal Lyche/Trudel Meisenburg (edd.), Phonological Variation in French: Illustrations from Three Continents, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 73–101. Mazunya, Maurice (2011), Les défis linguistiques au sein de l’East African Community: cas de l’identité francophone du Burundi, Les Cahiers de l’Orient 103/3, 141–146. Mazunya, Maurice/Bigirimana, Concilie/Habonimana, Alexis (2014), La langue française au Burundi, in: Alexandre Wolff (ed.), La langue française dans le monde 2014, Paris, Nathan/Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie, 92–95. Mougeon, Raymond/Nadasdi, Terry/Rehner, Katherine (2010), The Sociolinguistic Competence of Immersion Students, Bristol, Multilingual Matters. Mukasonga, Scholastique (2012), Notre-Dame du Nil, Paris, Gallimard. Mukuthuria, Mwenda (2009), Islam and the Development of Kiswahili, Journal of Pan African Studies 2/8, 36–45. Mulaudzi, Phalandwa/Mbori, Obwang’i (2008), Kiswahili and ethno-political stability in Kenya and Rwanda, Language Matters 39/1, 18–28. Munyankesha, Pascal (2011), Quel avenir pour le français dans la nouvelle politique linguistique du Rwanda?, Les Cahiers du GRELCEF 2, 135–143. Murengerantwari, Richard (2016), Les politiques linguistiques du Rwanda de 1962 à nos jours, Vienna, Universität Wien, Masters Thesis. Nahimana, Salvator (2006), Yobi, l’enfant des collines, Paris, Harmattan. Ndayishimiye, Évariste (2021), Message de SE le Président à l’occasion de la célébration du 59ème anniversaire de l’indépendance du Burundi, Gitega, Présidence de la République, https://www.presidence.gov.bi/ category/discours (2/3/2023). Ngorwanubusa, Juvénal (2012), Les années avalanche, Bruxelles, Archives & Musée de la littérature.

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Ngorwanubusa, Juvénal (2013), La littérature de langue française au Burundi, Bruxelles, Mode Est-Ouest/ Archives & Musée de la Littérature. Nimbona, Gélase (2014), Étude contrastive de la prosodie du kirundi et du français. Analyse des transferts prosodiques du kirundi au français parlé au Burundi, Louvain-la-Neuve, Université catholique de Louvain, Doctoral Thesis. Nimbona, Gélase/Simon, Anne Catherine (2016), Le phrasé et l’accentuation du français parlé au Burundi: un cas de transfert prosodique positif, Langages 202, 113–136. Nimbona, Gélase/Simon, Anne Catherine (2022), La prononciation du français au Burundi: influence du français de Belgique et du kirundi, Journal of Language Contact 15/1, 481–511. Niyongabo, Jacques (2005), Étude sur la problématique de l’éducation au Burundi, Bujumbura, Forum pour le renforcement de la société civile, https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/handle/2152/4516 (2/3/2023). Ntakirutimana, Évariste (2012), La langue nationale du Rwanda: plus d’un siècle en marche arrière, Quebec, Observatoire démographique et statistique de l’espace francophone. Ntakirutimana, Évariste (2014a), La langue française au Rwanda, in: Alexandre Wolff (ed.), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Nathan/Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie, 125–131. Ntakirutimana, Évariste (2014b), La dynamique des langues dans l’enseignement supérieur au Rwanda. De nouveaux enjeux, une nouvelle dynamique, Synergies Afrique des Grands Lacs 3, 155–163. Picron, Gervaise/Simon, Anne-Catherine (2018), Le français parlé par les locuteurs togolais. Interférences entre le mina et le français, in: Oreste Floquet (ed.), Aspects linguistiques et sociolinguistiques des français africains, Rome, Sapienza Univeristà, 73–100. Preston, Dennis R./Bayley, Robert/Escalante, Chelsea (2022), Variation and Second Language Acquisition: Recent Developments and Future Directions, in: Robert Bayley/Dennis R. Preston/Xiaoshi Li (edd.), Variation in second and heritage languages: crosslinguistic perspective, Amsterdam/Philadelphia, Benjamins, 1–13. Prignitz, Gisèle-Carrière/Boutin, Béatrice Akissi (2010), Conversation à Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso): parenté à plaisanterie entre Gurma et Yatenga, in: Sylvain Detey et al. (edd.), Les variétés du français parlé dans l’espace francophone. Ressources pour l’enseignement, Paris, Ophrys, 269–282. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rodegem, Firmin (1973), Anthologie Rundi, Paris, Colin. Rurangirwa, Straton (2011), Les politiques linguistiques du Rwanda de 1899 à 1994. Du début au commencement, Saarbrücken, Éditions universitaires européennes. Rurangirwa, Straton (2013), Les Droits et les Marches Linguistiques au Rwanda, Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies 2/1, 38–53. Shyirambere, Spiridion (1978), Contribution à l’étude de la sociolinguistique du bilinguisme kinyarwanda et français au Rwanda, Paris, SELAF. Stanley, Henry M. (1879), À travers le continent mystérieux, tr. Ms H. Loreau, Paris, Hachette. Tidy, Michael/Leeming, Donald (2001), A History of Africa 1840–1914, vol. 2: 1880–1914, London, Arnold. Valdman, Albert (1979), Avant-propos, in: Albert Valdman/Robert Chaudenson/Gabriel Manessy (edd.), Le Français hors de France, Paris, Champion, 5-18. Yanzigiye, Béatrice/Niyomugabo, Cyprien (2013), Pratique sociale du français au Rwanda, Synergie Afrique des Grands Lacs 2, 189–197.

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30 Djibouti Abstract: As in other parts of Africa, French is the most widely used Romance language in Djibouti, the only French-speaking country in Eastern Africa. After a brief presentation of the sociolinguistic landscape, this chapter discusses the historical factors leading to the establishment of the French language in this region of the world and its continuance, for sociopolitical reasons, after independence. As a result, French has a non-negligible presence in some social spheres (schools, in particular), which is a guarantee of a certain degree of prestige, unlike the one attached to the first languages of Djiboutian speakers. In conclusion, we see that French is experiencing some (in particular lexical) variations due to its contact with other national languages, although the appropriation of French remains limited in Djibouti, in contrast to what can be observed elsewhere in Africa. Keywords: Djibouti, French, linguistic change, language appropriation, language policy

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Afar and Somali The languages of the indigenous people are Somali and Afar, two Cushitic languages, the first of which belongs to the Chamito-Semitic family and the second to the Afro-Asiatic phylum. Both are the vernacular languages of the two main communities in Djibouti, bearing the corresponding names: Afars and Somalis. On the national scale, they belong to two clearly distinct geographical areas: in the North, the regions where Afar is spoken, and in the South, the Somalophone area. Afar benefits from a strong geographical dispersion given that three quarters of the national territory is Afar (cf. Figure 1). Despite the geographical dominance of the Afar region, due to a concentration of population in Djibouti City with almost 60 % of Djiboutians living there, and a general strong demographic imbalance (around 77 % of inhabitants in the South-East against 23 % in the North-West), Somali has the largest number of first-language speakers (cf. INSTAD 2018). Indeed, the estimated number of Somali native speakers is 597,000 compared to only 199,000 Afar speakers (Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). But it is in terms of vehicularity that the real domination of Somali appears clearly:  

 

 

‘In this field, Somali occupies the dominant position, probably even before French. A sort of imperialism of this language even originated in the capital, which is populated mainly by Somalis. One of the polyglossic functions of this domination is the emergence of the lexeme Djiboutian which designates the regional variety of Somali spoken in Djibouti. The uniqueness of the language thus designated removes the other minority languages from the linguistic reality. Another of these polyglossic functions is the asserted rejection of the language of the Other, both among the Afars and the Somahttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-030

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lis. Under these conditions, members of both communities prefer to address the Other either in their mother tongue or in French’.1

1.2 Arabic Djiboutian Arabic, with its two varieties Suuqi and Haqmi, has been imported mainly by Yemeni traders from south-western Yemen. It is probably the oldest established imported language in this territory (Morin 1982, 1) and has now become the first language of the third language community beside Afar and Somali in Djibouti. With the exception of the town of Obock and its surroundings, marked by the very recent and massive arrival of Yemeni migrants fleeing the war, it is spoken almost exclusively in the capital. Compared to the other two native languages, it has fewer speakers, with an estimated 78,800 Arabic speakers (Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). In spite of its low demography, it should be noted that in its Suuqi variant, which is widely used in the capital’s commercial centres, it is also a language that is spoken by communities with different first languages: “‘Demographic weakness [...] is made up for by the economic strength of this community, all of whom originated from Yemen’ (Coubba 1993, 18). The mother tongue is used in the family and in relations with other members of the same linguistic community. Each can recognize another’s dialectal origins, as characteristic features are not totally blurred when different Arabic speech forms come into contact. This community has also been instrumental in the propagation of a form of trade Arabic used in relations with speakers of other mother tongues (Afar and Somali)” (Simone-Senelle 2005, 655).

Djiboutian Arabic is confined to everyday use and not represented in public areas. Djiboutian Arabic is not taught, has no written tradition, and is completely excluded from the media and the official discourse. It suffers from the diglossia with standard Arabic, the official language, that benefits from a long written tradition which the local Arabic is lacking. As Djiboutian Arabic is in permanent contact with the languages spoken in the city’s neighbourhoods and markets, it is more subject to the phenomenon of borrowing, whereas standard Arabic is less inclined to the phenomenon of linguistic mixing, as it is fixed, mainly written, and almost felt to be sacred because of the weight of Islamic traditions.

1 “Dans ce domaine, le somali occupe la position dominante, sans doute même avant le français. Une sorte d’impérialisme de cette langue prend même naissance dans la capitale peuplée très majoritairement de Somalis. Un des fonctionnements polyglossiques de cette domination est l’émergence du lexème djiboutien, qui désigne la variété régionale de somali parlée à Djibouti. Le caractère unique de la langue ainsi désignée évacue de la réalité linguistique les autres langues minorées. Un autre de ces fonctionnements polyglossiques est le rejet affirmé de la langue de l’Autre, aussi bien chez les Afars que chez les Somalis. Dans ces conditions, les membres des deux communautés préfèrent s’adresser à l’Autre soit dans sa langue maternelle soit en français” (Dumont/Maurer 1995, 88).

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Figure 1: Map of Djibouti © Samatar Abdallah Doualeh

1.3 French and foreign languages French – French is the official language of Djibouti together with Arabic. It is the primary language in administration, education, and media, and perceived as the most prestigious language in the country. According to the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF),

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50 % of the population or 508,000 inhabitants in 2022 is French-speak speaking (cf. OIF 2022, 94). Other data indicate only 32 % of the over 15-year-olds in 1993, with 24 % first-language speakers and 8 % who learned it as a second language (cf. Rossillon 1995, 36). Foreign languages – In addition to the local languages, there are foreign languages with unequal political status and prestige, as we shall see below: Ethiopian languages (especially Amharic and Oromo) are the languages of the region (the Horn of Africa) whose presence is most notable because of the high level of illegal immigration that the country has been confronted with since its independence and owing to the many bilateral agreements with Ethiopia, most of whose commercial imports pass through the port of Djibouti. Furthermore, the importance of English has increased in the past two decades, notably due to the installation of the only American military base in Africa as part of the fight against terrorism and piracy, the multiplication of private companies requiring English skills, and the growing success of private English-speaking educational institutions. Finally, the economic and trade agreements signed with China, whose military presence in Djibouti is growing, with the recent opening of a base (near the capital) with a capacity for 10,000 Chinese soldiers, guarantee some visibility to the Chinese language in the social field and even, albeit still timidly, in a few professional areas, in particular the industrial sector.  

 

 

 

2 Linguistic history 2.1 The establishment of French Surrounded by English- and Arabic-speaking countries, Djibouti is the only Frenchspeaking state in the Horn of Africa. With a surface area of 23,000 km2 and a population of less than one million inhabitants, the country remains, partly due to its geographical location, little known not only in the world but, at times, even within French-speaking institutions. Historically, together with several neighbouring regions, it constitutes what has been known since ancient Egypt as the ‘Land of Punt’ (Pays de Pount) and is a country from which the ancient Egyptians imported various trade products like gold, incense, or myrrh (Oberlé/Hugot 1985, 55s.). However, it was not until the second half of the nineteenth century that France, the second colonial power at the time, took a growing interest in this part of the world: firstly, to counter the expansionism of the English, who had been living in the Gulf of Aden since 1839 (Joint-Daguenet 1992, 11s.). Secondly, for economic and commercial reasons in the context of the ongoing colonial expansion, France signed two important “peace treaties” with the country’s local ethnic group. Afar Sultans ceded their territory for financial compensation, giving France the coastline of Adaeli to Ambado in the treaty of 9 April 1884 and donating Ras Ali, Sagallo, and Rood Ali by the act on 21 September 1884. Subsequently, a treaty between the French diplomat and founder of Djibouti

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Léonce Lagarde and the chiefs of Goubet-ElKharab and Ambado on 26 March 1885 cemented France’s rights in the area. The emergence of Djibouti in the 1880s was largely based on the geostrategic and economic interest that the country represented for France. It became a gateway city very early on, and the construction of the Djibouti-Ethiopian railway, completed in 1917, was a determining factor in the drawing of the borders of this new colony (Imbert-Vier 2011, 125). Along with the exploitation of the saltworks (Dubois 2003, 127), it enabled France to establish itself durably in the Horn of Africa. The economic growth of the city at the time attracted the main ethnic groups that make up the city today: Somalis, Afars, and Arabs from Yemen. It is in this context that the first two public schools for girls and boys were born, belonging to two religious orders, financially supported by the colonial administration: the Capuchin Friars (1884) and the Franciscan Sisters of Calais (1889) the primary aim was to convert the local population to Catholicism, missionary schools played a more or less indirect and important role in the establishment of the French language: However, Jules Ferry’s laws on education, promulgated 1881/1882 in France and establishing the principle of compulsory, free and secular schooling, as well as the law of separation of churches and state (1905) had disastrous consequences on missionary schools, many of which were condemned to close immediately, notably for lack of financial means (Dubois/Soumille 2004, 88–102). In 1907, a committee of the Alliance Française, a private law association whose main objective was to spread the French language worldwide, took charge of the education given to the “natives”, but its action was stopped, as was that of the Congregational schools, in 1922, since it was working with secular Brothers due to a lack of qualified personnel (Pénel 2017, 195). In the same year, the public school was born. As World War I had affected private schools (like the missionary schools) very negatively, it was agreed, following heated debates within the colony’s administration, to set up public education. This was a further step in the affirmation of French versus the languages spoken by the people first concerned, as Pénel points out: ‘For a long time, the issue of knowledge of local languages or at least Arabic was considered a necessary skill for teachers. From 1922 onwards, one could no longer even mention or refer to the languages of pupils in any way, if not very occasionally; Article 10 (Title I) of the internal regulations of the decree of 27 October 1922 imperatively states: “The French language shall be the only language used in school”. This decision would remain in vigour for decades and it would take a very long time for it to become an important pedagogical problem again, after independence’.2

2 “Pendant longtemps, la question de la connaissance des langues locales ou au moins de l’arabe a été considérée comme une compétence nécessaire pour les enseignants. À partir de 1922, on ne pourra même plus évoquer les langues des élèves ou s’y référer d’une manière ou d’une autre, si ce n’est d’une manière très épisodique; l’article 10 (Titre I) du règlement intérieur de l’arrêté du 27 octobre 1922 déclare impérieusement: ‘La langue française sera seule en usage dans l’école’. Cette décision restera en vigueur des

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2.2 Milestones in further development At the end of World War II, Djibouti became a French overseas territory. Djiboutians became full citizens and obtained the possibility to elect territorial assemblies and send representatives to the metropolitan assemblies. However, the ‘learning of democracy’ (“l’apprentissage de la démocratie”, Oberlé/Hugot 1985, 117) was achieved at the cost of ethnic tensions and sporadic bloody clashes which marred the desire for autonomy of many social groups. A first referendum on the country’s independence, held in 1958, kept Djibouti in the French fold. The sporadic political unrest culminated in General de Gaulle’s stopover in August 1966. A new statute for the territory was prepared in Paris and adopted by the parliament in December 1966. Voters were to vote by referendum on 17 March 1967 for the status of autonomy or independence. The results were a victory for those in favour of remaining within the French assembly. At the end of the ballot, Djibouti, formerly known as French Somaliland (Côtes françaises des Somalis – CFS) officially became French Territory of the Afars and the Issas (Territoire français des Afars et des Issas – TFAI). This did not prevent the persistence of political and social tensions that remained strong during the following decade. The pro-independence momentum of local political parties was at its height when a final consultation of the population by referendum in May 1977 was organized: this time, the votes for independence won a large majority. Independence was proclaimed on 27 June 1977, giving birth to the current Republic of Djibouti, one of the last countries to be decolonized by France (Oberlé/Hugot 1985, 136–154). After independence, despite the stated commitment to preserve national unity through the integration of all ethnic components, the establishment of institutions was extremely slow and marked by strong tribal rivalries: the country’s constitution was not written until 1992, in a climate of civil war between Issas and Afars. At the political level, although the preamble of the constitution proclaims an ‘attachment to the principles of democracy and human rights’3 and the ‘determination [of the Djiboutian people] to establish a rule of law and pluralist democracy’,4 in practice, multi-party politics is prohibited, and the ruling party has remained the same since independence (Dubois 1997, 253). For the past two decades, in a context of anti-terrorist struggles and the war against piracy, Djibouti has been a haven of peace and, due to its geographical location, has become a strategic crossroads for the world:

décennies durant et il faudra fort longtemps pour que cette question redevienne un problème pédagogique important, après l’indépendance” (Pénel 2017, 195). 3 “[…] l’attachement aux principes de la démocratie et des Droits de l’Homme” (C-DJ 1992, Pmbl.). 4 “[…] détermination [du peuple djiboutien] à établir un État de Droit et de Démocratie pluraliste” (C-DJ 1992, Pmbl.).

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‘Djibouti has for some years concentrated the military presence of international powers and attracts foreign investment from all over the world. The diplomatic games played there are particularly revealing of the evolution of the international system. This island of tranquillity of 23,200 km², in a region shaken by conflicts, hosts French, American, Japanese, European and soon Chinese, Saudi and perhaps Russian troops. The most powerful states have taken up positions there to fight piracy, terrorism or, more recently, as a rear base in the war in Yemen. Djibouti also represents a major economic asset. Although this territory generates no wealth, it could play a role as a regional platform and a centrepiece in the economic integration project supported by Beijing. An international garrison, a platform for maritime correspondence and regional logistics, Djibouti, the forgotten country, is now at the heart of the new great international game’.5

The economic opportunities of such a situation should not, however, obscure the dangers of what some call ‘the trade of military bases’ (“le commerce des bases militaires”, Martineau 2018) which can jeopardize, among other things, the country’s sovereignty.

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation As mentioned above, the political management of languages in Djibouti is diglossic in the sense that it distributes the social functions of languages very unevenly. Officially, Djibouti is bilingual Arabic-French as stipulated in the constitution: ‘The State of Djibouti is a democratic, sovereign, united, and indivisible Republic. It ensures equality before the law for all without distinction of language, origin, race, sex, or religion. It respects all beliefs. Its motto is “Unity – Equality – Peace”. Its principle is government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Its official languages are: Arabic and French’.6

5 “Djibouti concentre depuis quelques années la présence militaire des puissances internationales et attire les investissements étrangers du monde entier. Les jeux diplomatiques qui s’y jouent sont particulièrement révélateurs des évolutions du système international. Cet îlot de tranquillité de 23 200 km², dans une région agitée par les conflits, accueille les troupes françaises, américaines, japonaises, européennes et bientôt chinoises, saoudiennes et peut-être russes. Les plus puissants États y ont pris place afin de lutter contre la piraterie, le terrorisme ou, plus récemment, comme base arrière dans le cadre de la guerre au Yémen. Djibouti représente également un atout économique majeur. Bien que ce territoire ne produise aucune richesse, il pourrait jouer un rôle de plate-forme régionale et une pièce maîtresse dans le projet d’intégration économique, soutenu par Pékin. Garnison internationale, plateforme de correspondance maritime et logistique régionale, Djibouti l’oublié se trouve désormais au cœur du nouveau grand jeu international” (Le Gouriellec 2016, 13). 6 “L’État de Djibouti est une République démocratique, souveraine, une et indivisible. Il assure à tous l’égalité devant la loi sans distinction de langue, d’origine, de race, de sexe ou de religion. Il respecte toutes les croyances. Sa devise est ‘Unité – Égalité –Paix’. Son principe est le gouvernement du peuple, par le peuple et pour le peuple. Ses langues officielles sont: l’arabe et le français” (C-DJ, art. 1).

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Also, in order to be eligible for election to the National Assembly, the organic law on elections requires language skills in French or Arabic: ‘Any Djiboutian is eligible to stand for election to the National Assembly who is aged 23 or over, has the right to vote, and is able to read, write, and speak French or Arabic fluently’.7

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Legislative reality – In reality, however, it is an unbalanced and unequal bilingualism, a bilingualism that is more of symbolic nature: ‘As a result of the Republic’s membership of the League of Arab Countries, it was decided that Djibouti would move towards bilingualism and that initially all official documents would have a bilingual French-Arabic character. In fact, the headings of official letters and all correspondence are bilingual; on the number plates of Djibouti vehicles, the two numbering systems appear side by side. But that’s about it’.8

Moreover, the French version of the constitution prevails over its translation into Arabic: ‘This Constitution shall be submitted to a referendum. It shall be registered and published in French and Arabic in the Official Gazette of the Republic of Djibouti, the text in French will prevail’.9

As a general rule, laws are first drafted in French and then translated into Arabic. The official gazette (Journal official), which records all laws enacted, is only available in French on the internet. Administration – In the Djiboutian administration, French is the working language. Administrative documents (e. g., memorandum, organization chart, work report, internal regulations, press release) are always written in French. Work meetings are also held in French, but informal exchanges between office staff are often conducted in their first language. A sort of functional division of languages does indeed exist in the administrative field: switching from one language to another is common practice depending  

7 “Est éligible à l’Assemblée Nationale, tout Djiboutien âgé de 23 ans révolus, ayant la qualité d’électeur et sachant lire, écrire et parler couramment le français ou l’arabe” (Organic Law, art. 11). 8 “Du fait de l’adhésion de la République à la Ligue des pays Arabes, il fut décidé que Djibouti marcherait vers un bilinguisme et que dans un premier temps tous les documents officiels auraient un caractère bilingue français-arabe. De fait, les en-têtes des lettres officielles et de toute la correspondance sont bilingues; sur les plaques minéralogiques des véhicules djiboutiens figurent côte à côte les deux systèmes de numération. Mais c’est à peu près tout” (Dumont/Maurer 1995, 85). 9 “La présente Constitution sera soumise à un référendum. Elle sera enregistrée et publiée en français et en arabe au journal officiel de la République de Djibouti, le texte en français faisant foi” (C-DJ, art. 89).

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on whether it is a written or oral communication. In writing, exchanges are monolingual: the State addresses its citizens in French, the official language, who are generally obliged, in turn, to use French when applying for a job, filing a complaint, or writing a letter of motivation or of complaint, in order to benefit from public services. On the other hand, orally, when dealing with employees (e. g., when seeking information), it is perfectly possible to address all State services in one’s own language. It should be added that public notices, street signs, and road signs which are the responsibility of the State are almost always bilingual French-Arabic, and are thus more in line with the bilingualism claimed in the constitutional text. President and National Assembly – With regard to official speeches, the use of one language rather than another depends on parameters like theme, circumstances, target audience, location, or language skills of the speaker, which can be combined: speeches and interviews with the president of the Republic, who is always of Somali ethnicity, are mainly in French and Somali. Exceptionally, the same speech may also be delivered in standard Arabic on special occasions, for example during religious holidays. During his tours in the regions of the country, some adaptation can be observed depending on the audience: to Afar citizens in the North he speaks in French, to Somali speakers in the South in Somali. At the National Assembly, the debates are exclusively in French, which serves as a vehicle between representatives with different first languages. French as an escape route – The question of languages in Djibouti often crystallizes the ethnic tensions that have been running through society since its beginnings: French appears in such a context as a kind of escape route, a means of ensuring a certain national cohesion:  

‘A French-speaking island lost in an Arabic-speaking ocean, Djibouti has resolutely chosen the French language as the means of expression of its national identity and its political sovereignty vis-à-vis its neighbours. […] This deliberate choice is also justified, in the eyes of the Djiboutian authorities, by internal considerations within the country itself, since French is perceived by all political leaders as a very powerful instrument of national unity, the true cement of the Djiboutian nation’.10

10 “Ilôt francophone perdu dans un océan arabophone, Djibouti a résolument choisi la langue française comme moyen d’expression de son identité nationale et de sa souveraineté politique vis-à-vis de ses voisins. […] Ce choix délibéré se justifie aussi, aux yeux des autorités djiboutiennes, par des considérations d’ordre interne au pays lui-même puisque le français y est ressenti par tous les responsables politiques comme instrument très puissant de l’unité nationale, le véritable ciment de la nation djiboutienne” (Dumont 1990, 81s.).

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3.3 Langues used in education Apart from foreign languages taught as subjects in their own right, general and technical education in Djibouti is unilingual. French is both a subject and the only medium of instruction in schools. The curricula for basic education and secondary education emphasize this respectively: ‘French serves a dual purpose. It is both a language of instruction and a language of teaching, and its mastery is a prerequisite for successful learning. Consequently, the teaching of French must allow natural communication at a very early stage, both oral and written’.11 ‘As a language of instruction, French is both a subject to be taught and a vehicle for all learning. Thus, it takes on a transdisciplinary dimension and participates in the psychological and cognitive development of the pupil. The mastery of French is therefore a prerequisite for academic and social success’.12

This has a non-negligible impact on the amount of time allocated to this subject, from primary school to high school. In Table 1, we reproduce, in part and as an example, the weekly hourly volume of primary education: Table 1: Distribution of lesson hours for primary school (Cripen 2012, 6) Cycle 1

Cycle 2

1st year

2nd year

3rd year

4th year

French

14h

12h30

10h30

8h30

Mathematics

4h

4h30

4h30

4h30

History-Geography

0

1h40

1h40

1h40

Experimental Sciences

0

1h

1h

1h

Manual and Technical Education

2h

1h

40m

40m

Physical and Sports Education

2h20

1h40

1h

1h

Arabic

0

0

4h

6h

Islamic Education

2h

2h

1h30

1h30

11 “Le français répond à une double finalité. Langue enseignée et langue d’enseignement à la fois, sa maîtrise conditionne la réussite des apprentissages. Par conséquent, l’enseignement du français doit permettre très tôt une communication naturelle tant à l’oral qu’à l’écrit” (Cripen 2012, 16). 12 “En tant que langue d’enseignement, le français est à la fois matière à enseigner et vecteur de tous les apprentissages. Ainsi, il revêt une dimension transdisciplinaire et participe par là-même au développement psychologique et cognitif de l’élève. La maîtrise du français conditionne donc sa réussite scolaire et sociale” (Cripen 2015, 15s.).

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The considerable number of hours, compared to the rest of the subjects, also reflects the desire of those involved in the education system to ensure that the basic skills required in French are acquired as early as possible, so that learning in other subjects can continue. The same exclusive use of French is noted at the University of Djibouti where, with the exception of foreign language courses, all academic teaching is in French. It is clear that the Djiboutian languages are excluded from the field of education. Nevertheless, since the end of the 1990s, a law was discussed to introduce the national languages into schools, but the project has remained a dead letter due to a lack of human and material resources: ‘1) Education and training is provided in the official languages and in the national languages. 2) A decree issued by the Council of Ministers sets out the modalities of education in French, Arabic, Afar, and Somali’.13

In French classes, the attitude towards the local languages varies from one level to another. In primary school, for example, the new teaching guide for teachers recommends the use of standardized French in the classroom and prohibits the use of other languages: ‘care should be taken to produce correctly constructed sentences and avoid the use of familiar vocabulary. You must always express yourself in French’.14

In secondary education however, the question of linguistic variation and the use of national languages as aids for learning French is clearly raised in official texts (Cripen 2015, 15s.).

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media – As far as the written press is concerned, there is only one newspaper in Djibouti which appears in French (La Nation) and one in Arabic (Al Qarn). The choice to publish in the country’s two official languages reflects the political will to overcome ethnic tensions and rivalries by providing information in exogenous languages, since these media belong to the Djiboutian state. Due to a very low literacy rate, the rather low circulation of the newspaper limits the presence of French in this area. Audiovisual media – The Radio and Television of Djibouti (Radio Télévision de Djibouti – RTD) is also a state medium and made up of seven channels. This time, however, the national languages are not excluded, as it broadcasts in national languages (except

13 “1) L’éducation et la formation sont dispensées dans les langues officielles et dans les langues nationales. 2) Un décret pris en Conseil des ministres fixe les modalités de l’enseignement en français, en arabe, en afar et en somali” (Law 96, art. 5). 14 “il convient de veiller à produire des phrases correctement construites et d’éviter l’emploi d’un vocabulaire familier. Il faut s’exprimer toujours en français” (Cripen 2019, 5).

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dialectal Arabic) and official languages. Afar and Somali are dominant and each has a channel that broadcasts news and cultural programmes. As for French, it is reduced to the bare minimum: apart from the television news in French, which is less than half an hour long and broadcast twice a day by the first three channels, and channels 4 and 6, which continuously broadcast French-speaking films and cartoons (or those dubbed into French), RTD’s French-language production is almost nil and is on its own a good illustration of the decline of French in Djibouti. In terms of information and entertainment, the massive presence of foreign and paying French-speaking channels (e. g., Tv5, Canal+, M6) constitutes an alternative to the local media for those who have the means to subscribe to them.  

4 Linguistic characteristics No studies have been published on the phonetics, morphology, syntax, and lexicon of the French spoken in Djibouti since Maurer’s thesis (1993). In any case, this represents a continuum ranging from elementary French, over occasional French and regional French to prestigious French. Elementary French – When we speak of “elementary French”, we refer to a variety that is the result of a limited educational background, most often an incomplete primary schooling. It is exchanged in very specific communication situations, for example in sales or while offering various services, and is essentially used for episodic contacts with French expatriates or French-speaking foreigners. The limited language skills of the speakers prevent them from using it in other circumstances. It does not have a marked vehicular function, which takes place for those who use it in their first language, mainly Somali or dialectal Arabic. Occasional French – What we call “occasional French” meets the same communication needs as elementary French and allows contact with foreigners for commercial purposes. However, this French can also be used, and this is its specific character, for more “private” purposes: for example, in situations where one wants to hide something from a non-French-speaking Djiboutian or to seduce girls. Just like elementary French, it is not used for vehicular communication. Regional French – When referring to “regional French”, we mean the language used by individuals with a more complete educational background, mostly with a secondary school leaving certificate. It is used in all areas of everyday life, while the speakers are often unaware that they do not use standard French and only exceptionally claim a divergence. Most often, they proclaim their conformity to the “French of France” and recognize only with difficulty any particularities, referring to them as an irregular and individual phenomenon. The use of this variety also functions as a marker of social categorization, because of the prestige attached to the use of the French language. Prestigious French – Prestigious French is a variety used by speakers credited with an educational level at least equal to those using regional French. It is traditionally de-

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fined as belonging to the acrolecte, or to standard French, even though in Djibouti, several features deviate from the forms usually appearing in the respective situations linked to representational functions. It is used in formal settings, such as television or written news, political speeches, or interviews with official persons figuring in their functions. Continual shift – Another feature is the continual shift from one language register to another, from the sustained to the familiar in discourses that usually do not accommodate this kind of stylistic variation. The gap between the lower and higher varieties in this continuum is relatively small, probably much more than in West African countries. The mode of appropriation of French plays a major role: the vast majority of speakers having learned French in a school setting and not informally, the gap is narrowed from the bottom up. At the same time, we do not seem to detect these phenomena of hypercorrection in prestigous French, which are characteristic of the corresponding productions in other parts of French-speaking Africa: the gap is also reduced from the top down. Codic alternation and mixed discourse – In Djibouti, alternation always appears in the educated part of the population, increases with the degree of schooling, and peaks among speakers who also have a very good command of standard French. While this seems like a paradox, subjects who have long attended school, very often the only place where French is spoken and to which the Djiboutian languages do not have access, are undergoing a process of acculturation, the main signs of which are the loss of whole sections of the national languages and that they are used to speaking about certain subjects in French, for example, sport, work, love relationships, or politics. Thus, without anything changing from a statutory point of view, shifts are taking place at the corpus level, leading to functional overlaps. French then competes with the Djiboutian languages in certain areas which are said to be private and which are normally the prerogative of the first languages. It is these functional overlaps that allow the emergence of a mixed discourse and allow us to speak of a real continuity which we shall call, to distinguish it from the previous one, conviviality. In Djibouti, there is a very important place for mixed discourse, as the following examples show: Maad waalatay? T’as laissé les enfants seuls à la maison?! Maxaa ku qaatay?15 Ii waran saaxiib, sidee tahay? Comment vont les enfants? Et tes parents? Xaajiyadii sidey tahay?16

15 ‘Did you go crazy? You left the kids home alone?! What’s gotten into you?’. 16 ‘Tell me about yourself my friend, how are you? How are the children? And your parents? How is your wife?’.

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4.1 Pronunciation We will limit ourselves to recording the most noticeable and easily perceptible phenomena and consider the possible repercussions on the other components of the language. The first remark that can be made about phonetic variation in elementary French is that it is undoubtedly of lesser magnitude than that reaching the morphological, syntactic, or lexical domains. Djiboutians are generally very proud of what they call their French accent, which they consider to be much better than that of other French-speaking African countries, and an examination of these elementary forms would tend to prove them right. Nasal vowels – Thus, while national languages do not have nasal vowels, it could be hypothesized that many vowels would be nasalized and followed by a nasal consonant (as éléphant [elefan] instead of [elefɑ̃]). However, even among those speakers whose competence is at the lower end of the continuum, real nasal vowels are produced in greater numbers than nasalized vowels. An examination of the contexts suggests that nasalized vowels tend to be realized in the final position like in as [elefan], but this phenomenon is not entirely general. /ə/ and /ø/ – The absence of /ə/ and /ø/ in the Djiboutian languages could also be a major source of interference, making it possible for both phonemes to be realized as [e]. However, except for elementary French, the realization of /ə/ or /ø/ is already close to realizations conforming to the standard French pronunciation. In the forms of prestige French we note the centralization of [e] which is sometimes pronounced [ə] as for écriture [əkɾityʁ] instead of [ekʁityʁ], in a phenomenon which we interpret in the first instance as hypercorrection, the mute [ə] of French being often realized [e] in elementary French as for petit [peti] instead of [pəti]. Rhotics – In the Djiboutian languages, the rhotic consonant is rolled as [r]. However, the usual standard French [ʁ] is clearly attested in elementary French, in a frequency in our opinion higher than the apical [r]/[ɾ]. The position of the rhotic seems to have an influence on the realization: the intervocalic position as in Arabe ‘Arabic’ (realized as [aɾab] instead of [aʁab]) or after occlusive consonants as in travail ‘work’ (realized as [tɾavaj] instead of [tʁavaj]) seems to favour apical realization, whereas the initial position, as in Ramadan (realized as [ʁamadɑ̃] like in standard French), or the final position, as in Afar (realized as [afaʁ] like in standard French), are favourable to uvular realization. Absence of /p/, /v/, /z/ and /ʒ/ – Another feature is the frequent use of [b] instead of [p] as for papa [baba] instead of [papa], which does not exist in Arabic, Afar, or Somali. Here again, however, the phenomenon is context-related, and the same speaker can use both variants. It is also possible to record the realization of [f] instead of [v] (e. g., voici [fwasi] instead of [vwasi]) and [s] instead of [z], (e. g., base [bas] instead of [baz]), which can be explained with the fact that the voiced variants do not exist in any of the three languages of the country.  

 

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4.2 Morphology Morphological paradigms – A characteristic of elementary French is the reduction of morphological paradigms. A number of subject-verb agreements are not realized in the present tense, which may indicate a lack of knowledge of conjugations. This leads to the generalization of the use of the form sont, followed by the most frequent verbal form of the verb that should be conjugated (ils sont parle instead of ils parlent ‘they speak’, parle being the most common phonic form of the verb in the present tense). We see here the generalization of a system of auxiliaries which makes it possible to limit the paradigmatic variation of the verb être ‘to be’ alone, followed by an invariable or at least generalized form. In occasional French, there is a better knowledge of conjugation paradigms, at least for the indicative, the only conjugation mode used, and in regional French, the subjunctive is widely attested as well as the conditional. Presenters – A limited vocabulary range in elementary French leads to notable syntactic peculiarities such as the frequent use of nominal sentences and the extension of the use of y’a/y’a pas and c’est/c’est pas presenters, which go far beyond their use in standard French. While in French they are used simply to assert existence, and are therefore relative to a being, they are used in elementary French to deny or actualize a fact or a process, as in y’a pas parler, y’a connait instead of il/elle ne parle pas, il/elle connaît. In occasional French, the better knowledge of conjugation paradigms leads to the elimination of the extensive use of presenters. Personal pronouns – The pronominal system is also greatly simplified in elementary French, with a total absence of object pronouns as well as feminine pronouns. From a syntactical point of view, this paradigmatic reduction is not without consequences. It leads to the extension of the use of personal forms such as on or il. The absence of the series of object pronouns leads to the very frequent use in elementary French of transitive verbs in an absolute way, without object complement, e. g., les gens regardent [la television] instead of les gens la regardent [la television]. Speakers not possessing the pronoun capable of avoiding repetition prefer to do without the complement altogether rather than repeat the nominal complement, which is felt to be superfluous and useless for communication. This phenomenon is accentuated by the absence of the adverbial pronoun en ‘it’, which also generates absolute uses, e. g., les gens parlent [de qqc.] instead of les gens en parlent [de qqc]. In occasional French, the personal system is also much more complete, concerning the forms of the subject pronouns, as the forms of the object pronouns are still relatively little used and the absolute use of transitive verbs therefore continues to exist to a large extent. In regional French, the object series has been completed but for the subject pronouns, the reduction of forms to a single masculine gender persists, the feminine forms being little used. Thus, eux ‘them’ frequently replaces elles ‘them’ in speech. The absolute use of transitive verbs is becoming rare. Relative pronouns – Still in the field of pronominal morphology, the category of relative pronouns is also reduced to its simplest expression, qui ‘which’ in elementary  

 

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French. Recourse to the parataxis is therefore frequent in elementary French because of this deficiency. Subordination is used very little, if at all, which excludes any structure of indirect speech. In occasional French, the use of relatives is more important with constructions in que ‘that’ and even in où ‘where’, even if it sometimes remains poorly mastered. In regional French, the use of subordination is generalized, with complementary subordinate propositions constructed with indicative and/or subjunctive. Circumstantial propositions diversify with the appearance of oppositional propositions (même si ‘even though’, alors que ‘while’). The relative dont ‘of which’ appears and, in this context, it is not surprising to see the use of reported speech in an indirect way. Punctuants (discourse markers) – The most interesting discursive phenomenon is undoubtedly the appearance in occasional French of forms that we will call punctuants in accordance with the work of Diane Vincent (1986), who cites among these forms for example là ‘there’, tu sais ‘you know’, n’est-ce pas ‘don’t you’, je veux dire ‘I mean’, or vois-tu ‘do you see’. In occasional French, the punctuation marks comme ça ‘like this’ and là ‘there’ are very noticeable. Comme ça ‘like this’ acts as a point of reference in the course of the sentence, causing a slowing down of it, giving rhythm to the speech, like a beacon breaking the linearity of the discourse. We call this feature “focusing” when the words are in the middle of the sentence. Placed in the final position, they signal to the interlocutor the end of the speaking turn and participate in the co-guiding of the turns, according to Cosnier’s formula (1989). These punctuators can also be used in a final function, which we will call “eluding”. For occasional French speakers, French is still a foreign language that is poorly mastered. Faced with difficulties of expression, subjects shorten a sentence due to a lack of the linguistic means necessary to complete it. The punctuator then functions as a connector of cooperation, inviting the interacting person to fill in the gaps in the discourse.

4.3 Lexicon Djibouti’s regional French particularities bring into play all types of lexical creation, presented in the following text according to Reutner (2017, 47–51) in semantic and morphological innovation, as well as loanwords and loan translations. Semantic innovation – Semantic transfer occurs for example in court ‘small, (lit.) short’ instead of petit, long ‘big, (lit.) long’ instead of grand, or trop ‘very, (lit.) too’ instead of très can be found. Other examples include the verb se tenir ‘to be well, (lit.) to hold, to stand’ for bien se porter and se raconter ‘to remember a particular episode, (lit.) to tell oneself’ instead of se souvenir d’un épisode particulier. Morphological innovation – In the case of morphological neologisms, we can identify creations by derivation, for example in khater ‘chewing khat’, khateur/khateuse ‘person who chews khat often’, khatage ‘the action of chewing khat’ derived from khat, dévierger ‘to take virginity’, enceinter ‘to impregnate’, or by composition, as in the case of bras cassé ‘to be fired’.

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Loanwords and loan translations – The two most represented categories are loanwords and loan translations. For the former, we found examples from Arabic such as cadi ‘judge’, imam ‘imam’, madrasa ‘Koranic school’, mabraze ‘place where khat is consumed’, and choufer ‘to keep an eye on’ (< Ar. chouf ‘to look at’), and Somali such as mirgane ‘to get high by consuming khat’ or ‘state of consciousness caused by khat’, charchari ‘import-export trader’, diri ‘women’s clothing’, and fouta ‘men’s loincloth’. All these borrowings are morphologically integrated and take the masculine or feminine gender according to the gender in the original language. Loan translations are examples such as avoir des virages dans l’estomac ‘suffering from diarrhoea, (lit.) to have turns in the stomach’ (< Som. waan shummayaa), casser une langue ‘to speak a language poorly or wrongly, (lit.) to break a tongue’ (< Som. afjabin), étouffer quelqu’un ‘to annoy someone, (lit.) to suffocate someone’ (< Som. naqas ku dhajjin), le film est rentré ‘the film has begun, (lit.) the film has come in’ (< Som. filinkii wuu soo galay), or verser du miel ‘to be a cheater or hypocrite, (lit.) to pour honey’ (< Som. af macaan), can be found.

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – All statements produced in formal contexts respect the exogenous norm. The Djiboutian varieties of French are the subject of a somewhat stigmatizing discourse, even if they are formulated in a humorous manner. It is therefore not surprising to hear, in many everyday conversations, the expression français frappé ‘tortured French, (lit.) struck French’, pronounced with a strong rolled /r/ to underline the ridiculous nature of the speaker. Equally common is the designation of local forms as français fatigué ‘chaotic French, (lit.) tired French’, the adjective fatigué being a carbon copy of the Somali term khaatiyaan, borrowed from Arabic and also meaning ‘tired’ and ‘chaotic’. It is generally among literate speakers (teachers in particular) that we encounter the most violent reactions to the now classic phrase ce n’est pas du français! ‘this is not French’ or even c’est du n’importe quoi ‘that’s nonsense!’. Description of linguistic characteristics – As mentioned above, Djibouti’s forms of the use of French are not the subject of particular attention, which is particularly evident in the absence of university research on this subject. A booklet on the lexical particularities of Djibouti (Kassim Mohamed/Larocca 2015) is worth mentioning, a twentypage glossary published by the French Institute, of which just eight pages list terms, with only an explanation of the meaning, without any details on the contexts of use. Apart from Maurer’s early work (1993), this booklet, although largely incomplete, is the only document to present some data on the variation of French in Djibouti. There are no dictionnaries or grammars of Djiboutian French. Variety used by public authorities – Djibouti’s political discourse, in the broadest sense, generally varies according to particular parameters (e. g., oral/written channel, recipient(s), place, subject). In official writings (e. g., laws, decrees, circulars, presidency and government sites), the international standard of French is strictly observed, as well  

 

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as in speeches prepared in advance and read on major occasions, for example on Independence Day, which are nothing more than verbalized writing. It is rather in spoken language, in more spontaneous uses of language (e. g., unprepared interviews, heated debates in national assembly session) and where there is low supervision, that some more accepted Djiboutian forms of French (khat and its semantic field, recourse to the Somali phatic enn ‘hum’ for example) may arise. An overlap in style is sometimes observed with the transition from formal address forms (vouvoiement) to informal ones (tutoiement) for various reasons, the first being undoubtedly that the formal address form is non-existent in the Djiboutian languages. The awareness among some politicians of a deviation from the norm in their way of speaking is also notable. From the use of a rolled [r] in a national context, probably as an identity marker, some spokespersons may switch to a [ʁ] in the French-language media by exaggeratedly punctuating their speeches with a phatic “euh”, a phenomenon of hypercorrection originating in a linguistic insecurity felt in the presence of speakers often qualified as “native” and perceived as unbeatable expert models. Variety used in education – School, that is secondary education, is at the moment the only area where the question of the standard of French is acutely raised. As stated in the curriculum, the teaching of French aims to ‘take into account the language practices and socio-cultural identity of the learner in a plurilingual and pluricultural context where French is a second language’.17 The systematic study of the language in high school, while remaining generally attached to standard French, which serves as an absolute reference, nevertheless very explicitly takes Djiboutisms into account, which are supposed to be the subject of reflection in class with the students:  

‘The study of language remains essential in high school in that it allows the student to consolidate the linguistic bases necessary for the understanding and production of different types of written and oral discourse. In particular, the phenomenon of contact between languages (French and the national languages), which is often a source of interference, must be taken into account in the pupils’ productions. It is an opportunity to pose with the pupils the limits of acceptability of Djiboutian forms, which are normal and admissible in some contexts, debatable in others’.18

This is a strong and original way of putting at a distance pedagogical practices that have always been in place, in Djibouti and in French-speaking Africa in general. In short, a tolerance for the local forms of French which, in the French textbook for the grade 10

17 “Tenir compte des pratiques langagières et de l’identité socioculturelle de l’apprenant qui évolue dans un contexte plurilingue et pluriculturel où le français est langue seconde” (Cripen 2015, 16). 18 “L’étude de la langue reste indispensable au lycée en ce qu’elle permet à l’élève la consolidation de bases linguistiques nécessaires à la compréhension et à la production de différents types de discours écrits et oraux. Il s’agit notamment de prendre en compte, à partir des productions des élèves le phénomène de contact des langues (le français et les langues nationales), souvent source d’interférences. C’est l’occasion de poser avec les élèves les limites de l’acceptabilité des formes djiboutiennes, normales et admissibles dans certains contextes, discutables dans d’autres” (Cripen 2015, 16).

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for example, provides an opportunity for a comparative didactic approach aiming at enabling pupils to look into the matter of linguistic norm and variation. Examples include Il piétine pour rentrer chez lui ‘he walks home, (lit.) he stamps home’, with a semantic shift in the verb piétiner ‘to stamp’ meaning here ‘to walk’, or L’heure est tombée ‘It’s late, (lit.) The hour has fallen’ a copy of the Somali phrase saacadu way dhacday for Il est tard ‘It’s late’ (Cripen 2013, 14s.). Considering the examples in the textbook and the accompanying pedagogical documents, the linguistic variation in French seems to occur more in speech than in writing, owing in part to the normative school practices, and is more acceptable when it only affects the lexicon and phonetics rather than morphology and syntax. Variety used in the media – The survey carried out in 1992 on the use of Djiboutisms in the written press (La Nation) showed the use of some forms of regional French (cf. Maurer 1993). We noticed then that for five issues over five weeks, we found only eighteen lexical particularisms attested in writing. The most frequent category was that of borrowings, which were regularly put in inverted commas, underlining that their integration into French was not well achieved and that they were considered as xenisms. These words were not always integrated orthographically, with sequences of two successive s (as in malaama ‘Koranic school’) or with the use of the digraph . It even happened that the meaning of the borrowing was explained, for audiences who were mostly Djiboutians. Massively we can consider that these lexemes were felt by the writers to be foreign to French, falling under another norm. The terms used in inverted commas were those belonging to the lexical field of khat, the practice of consuming this plant being widespread among the population as a whole. In 2020, the situation is almost the same, except that particularisms are becoming rarer. In the August issues, where five per week have been published, we found none. When looking through the older issues of the current year, the variation, often lexical, appears most of the time in the “Society/Culture” section of the newspaper. In about twenty articles in this section, published between January and July of this year, we found sixteen particularisms. We only mention those that were not mentioned in the previous paragraphs. The most frequent neologisms found have been borrowings from Afar, such as gad ‘traditional Afar song’ or kassow ‘Afar poem’, Arab, for example Waqfs ‘Islamic endowment’, English (e. g., Krich [En. garage] boy ‘boy who collects money on the city buses’), and Somali with examples like dhalinyaro ‘young people’, assajog ‘born in the town of Ali-Sabieh’, wadad ‘(pej.) marabout’, kouli ‘construction worker’, qaaci ‘vintage song’, googa ‘riddle’, Xeer Ciise ‘legal corpus of the Issas tribe among the Somalis’. We have also found the derivations divorçable ‘a person who can be left after marriage for a valid reason according to custom’ and Djiboutois ‘archetype of Djiboutian’. Variety used in literature – Djiboutian literature does not hesitate to make use of what is called “Djiboutism”, without necessarily being aware of these uses or demands. A novel by Mouna-Hodan Ahmed (2002), which has been quite successful in the country, features for example a glossary of terms deemed to be non-transparent for a non-Djiboutian audience by the author at the end. This part is included without any explanation  

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that could help the reader, but its mere presence testifies to the awareness of a deviation from standard international French. The majority of Djiboutian writers, including the emblematic Abdourahman Wabéri, are generally satisfied with a few footnotes clarifying the intended meaning of each occurrence. Let us mention two realms that are recurrent in Djiboutian literature and which are referred to in a number of Djibouti literary works: the euphoric herb that energizes the lives of Djiboutians khat appears in many works and as a portemanteau in the title of the novel by Abdallah Houssein Ali (2018) Khatastrophe, l’euphorie d’un instant ‘Khatastrophe, a moment’s euphoria’. Nomadism and life in the bush is the other realm striking in literature with special vocabulary, such as for example Heelo/Sadexley ‘types of traditional Somali dances’, gabey ‘poem’, okal ‘wise man of a family, a village, a tribe’, gorof ‘milk jug’, toukoul ‘traditional house, hut’, or xeer ‘customary law’. In this respect, we should mention the novel by Omar Guedi Ali (2013), Paix et lait dans le monde ‘Peace and Milk in the World’, whose title is a copy of the Somali Nabad iyo caano, a traditional greeting (or invocation depending on the context) of the people of the bush, milk referring to prosperity and a state of abundance in this case.

References Ahmed, Mouna-Hodan (2002), Les enfants du khat, Paris, Sépia. C-DJ = République de Djibouti (1992), La constitution de la République de Djibouti, Djibouti, Secrétariat Général du Gouvernement, https://www.presidence.dj/PresidenceOld/constitution.htm (2/3/2023). Cosnier, Jacques (1989), Les tours et le copilotage dans les interactions conversationnelles, in: Robert Castel/ Jacques Cosnier/Isaac Joseph (edd.), Le Parler frais d’Erving Goffman, Paris, Minuit, 233–244. Coubba, Ali (1993), Djibouti: une nation en otage, Paris, L’Harmattan. Cripen (2012) = Centre de Recherche, d’Information et de Production de l’Éducation Nationale (2012), Curriculum de l’enseignement fondamental, Djibouti, Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale et de la Formation Professionelle, http://www.cripen.dj/ressources/programmes-enseignement-base-2012 (2/3/2023). Cripen (2013) = Centre de Recherche, d’Information et de Production de l’Éducation Nationale (2013), Français, Djibouti, Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale et de la Formation Professionelle. Cripen (2015) = Centre de Recherche, d’Information et de Production de l’Éducation Nationale (2015), Curriculum de l’enseignement secondaire, Djibouti, Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale et de la Formation Professionelle, http://www.cripen.dj/ressources/programme-seconde (2/3/2023). Cripen (2019) = Centre de Recherche, d’Information et de Production de l’Éducation Nationale (2019), Caravane de Français. Guide du maître (Première année), Djibouti, Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale et de la Formation Professionelle, http://www.cripen.dj/ressources/guides/guide-maitre-francais (2/3/2023). Dubois, Colette (1997), Djibouti 1888–1967. Héritage ou frustration?, Paris, L’Harmattan. Dubois, Colette (2003), L’or blanc de Djibouti. Salines et sauniers (XIXe–XXe siècle), Paris, Karthala. Dubois, Colette/Soumille, Pierre (2004), Des chrétiens à Djibouti en terre d’islam (XIXe–XXe siècles), Paris, Karthala. Dumont, Pierre (1990), Le français langue africaine, Paris, L’Harmattan. Dumont, Pierre/Maurer, Bruno (1995), Sociolinguistique du français en Afrique francophone, Vanves, EDICEF. Eberhard, David M./Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Guedi Ali, Omar (2013), Paix et lait dans le monde, Paris, Pantheon.

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Houssein Ali, Abdallah (2018), Khatastrophe, l’euphorie d’un instant, Namur, Soleil levant. Imbert-Vier, Simon, (2011), Frontières et limites à Djibouti durant la période coloniale (1884–1977), Marseille, Université Aix-Marseille 1, Doctoral Thesis. INSTAD (2018) = Institut National de la Statistique de Djibouti (2018), Enquête djiboutienne auprès des ménages pour les indicateurs sociaux, Djibouti, Republic of Djibouti, http://www.instad.dj/accueil.php (13/6/2023). Joint-Daguenet, Roger (1992), Aux origines de l’implantation française en Mer Rouge, Paris, L’Harmattan. Kassim Mohamed, Souad/Larocca, Christiane (2015), Le français de Djibouti, petit inventaire, Djibouti, Institut français de Djibouti/Université de Djibouti, https://fr.calameo.com/read/004255541d773bc59cb36 (2/3/2023). Law 96 = Président de la République (2000), Loi n° 96/AN/00/4èmeL portant Orientation du Système Educatif Djiboutien, Journal officiel 15, http://www.mensur.gov.dj/Textes/Textes%20fondamentaux/Loi%20n% C2%B02000-96%20portant%20orientation%20du%20syst%C3%A8me%20%C3%A9ducatif% 20djiboutien.pdf (2/3/2023). Le Gouriellec, Sonia (2016), Djibouti dans le jeu international, Esprit. Les États désunis d’Amérique 10, 13–16. Martineau, Jean-Luc (2018), Djibouti et le “commerce” des bases militaires: un jeu dangereux?, L’Espace politique 34/1, https://journals.openedition.org/espacepolitique/4719#:~:text=51Le%20commerce%20des% 20bases,principales%20arm%C3%A9es%20de%20la%20plan%C3%A8te (2/3/2023). Maurer, Bruno (1993), Le français et les langues nationales à Djibouti: aspects linguistiques et sociolinguistiques, Montpellier, Université Montpellier 3, Doctoral Thesis. Morin, Didier (1982), Aspects du multilinguisme djiboutien, Northeast African Studies 4, 1–8. Oberlé, Philippe/Hugot, Pierre (1985), Histoire de Djibouti: des origines à la République, Paris, Présence africaine. OIF (2022), La langue française dans le monde, Paris, Gallimard/Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. Organic Law = Président de la République (1992), Loi organique n° 1/AN/92 relative aux élections, Journal officiel 1 du 16/7, https://www.presidence.dj/PresidenceOld/org1.2.htm (2/3/2023). Pénel, Jean-Dominique (2017), L’école à Djibouti: 1884–1922, vol. 1, Paris, L’Harmattan. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Rossillon, Philippe (1995), Atlas de la langue française, Paris, Bordas. Simone-Senelle, Marie-Claude (2005), Djibouti/Eritrea, in: Kees Versteegh et al. (edd.), Encyclopedia of Arabic Language and Linguistics, vol. 1, Leiden, Brill, 654–656. Vincent, Diane (1986), Que fait la sociolinguistique avec l’analyse du discours et vice versa, Langage et société 38, 7–17.

Gudrun Ledegen

31 France: Réunion and Mayotte Abstract: This chapter starts by considering the sociolinguistic situation of the two islands of Réunion and Mayotte, detailing first the geographical and social distribution of their languages, as well as the linguistic history of French. It provides information on the cohabitation of French with the other language(s): on the one hand, Reunionese Creole with its great affinity to French, and on the other hand, Shimaore, a Swahili dialect, and Kibushi, a Malagasy dialect. External language policy concerning legislation, public authorities, education, and the media forms the third block of the chapter, the linguistic characteristics of French presented for each island according to the different linguistic domains the fourth block. Finally, the internal linguistic policy is analysed: the reactions of linguistic purism are examined through the descriptions and uses of the variety of French, as attested, for example, in metalinguistic works and literature. Keywords: plurilingualism, French, Franco-Creole, Shimaore, Kibushi

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages Réunion – The sociolinguistic situation of Réunion mainly brings together two languages: Reunionese Creole and French. The French language is geographically attested all over the island, due to the increased schooling since the departmentalization of 1946, and more specifically since the 1970s. It is second or first language in parallel with Creole in the majority of cases. Mayotte – French is the only official language in Mayotte, spoken by more than 60 % of the people 14 of age or older (INSEE 2007), following increased investment by the state, and in particular the National Education system since 1980. The elders do not practise it or very little, the French language being widely seen as the language of the Mzungus ‘(lit.) white people, Metropolitans’. They use their first language with an oral tradition, Shimaore, the first language of two thirds of the population, and also the lingua franca of the population of Mayotte, or Kibushi, spoken by about one third of the speakers, mainly located in the South and West of the island. Indeed, Mayotte, unlike the three other islands of the Comoros archipelago, has this second first language of Sakalave origin from the North of Madagascar, the only Malagasy dialect, a Malayo-Polynesian language, spoken outside its island of origin, Kibushi. Shimaore is more widely spoken on the island, in its Mahorian variant, but other variants from the neighbouring Comorian islands also occur: Shindzwani (Anjouan Shimaore), Shingazidja (Grande Comore Shimaore), and Shimwali (Mohéli Shimaore). Finally, other languages are present on the is 

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land, namely Arabic (taught at the Koranic school and used as a liturgical language), a Hindi language, Shihindi ‘(litt.) the idiom spoken by the Indians’, and Reunionese Creole (cf. Laroussi 2009b, 22s.).

1.2 Social distribution of languages: post-diglossia situation Réunion – The relationship between French and Creole has long been described using the classical diglossic scheme: “two genetically and structurally related languages of unequal social status and complementary distributions” (Ferguson 1959, 325s.). Institutionally, French, the official language as on the rest of the national territory, used in education and the media, constitutes the “high language”. But especially in the last thirty years, it has also gained a certain place in family practices. Moreover, Creole, the “low language” in this pattern, which is still widely used today, has gained strong social legitimacy over the last decade in the media and in the school environment. Diglossia thus seems to be a thing of the past, even if it should be noted that this dichotomous vision does indeed remain in the representations of the speakers (Ledegen/Simonin 2010, 106s.). However, as noted by Oakes (2013) the greater valorization of Creole and the decrease in diglossia on the island will not necessarily lead to a balanced French-Creole bilingualism. His study of university students in Réunion reveals that Creole is considered by them more as a marker of identity, at a symbolic level therefore, than as a means of communication to be transmitted (cf. also Reutner 2005 for Guadeloupe and Martinique). As a matter of fact, the rate of transmission is remaining very low (Ipsos 2009, 10s.), thus heralding a future language shift rather than a maintenance of both languages, for the future middle and upper classes that these university students will train. Mayotte – French, the language of administrations and schools, also called Shizungu ‘(lit.) language of the whites’, conveys ambiguous representations: language of colonization, colonial language or language that made kafir ‘unfaithful’. However, given its weight in the linguistic market, it has become the “language of bread”, the one that allows one to find a job, the modern language. The high value given to French is felt to be to the detriment of local languages: ‘You see, there is a risk of losing this culture / this value of the Mahoran language [...] because there is an influence there is the school there is the media there is everything that is done to make French as the language: well / the most important in relation to the others, so that too / to the detriment of the Mahoran language’.1  

 

 

 

 

 

1 “Vous voyez on risque de dans un certain temps de perdre hein / cette culture / cette valeur de la langue mahoraise […] parce que il y a une influence il y a l’école il y a les médias il y a tout ce qui est fait pour euh faire le français comme la langue euh: bon / la plus importante par rapport aux autres donc que ça aussi / au détriment de la langue mahoraise” (Laroussi 2015, 37).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Moreover, the sociolinguistic cohabitation between the three main languages of the island is characteristic of an embedded diglossic situation (Beniamino 1997, 129), i.e. an overlapping of two diglossias (cf. sandwich-position-diglossia; Reutner 2017, 53): French/ Shimaore on the one hand, and Shimaore/Kibushi on the other. This situation would be conducive to the discontinuity between language productions in French and the other languages, leading to the maintenance of a standardized French but also to the emergence of a mixed discourse characterized by discursive interference (cf. Beniamino 1997). In fact, contact between the different languages of Mayotte is increasing through its use in the media (television or radio), in formal or informal discussions of everyday life, and on social networks and billboards (cf. Maturafi 2019). Mixed discourse is a phenomenon that is very present on the island, through the processes of borrowing and alternating codes, particularly among the younger generations but also more widely: ‘When we speak to an old friend, we use a Shimaore which is not good but very pleasant: those who speak it have the impression of finding the words very well. We speak a medley: we respect the Swahili part grammatically by mixing in French words. That’s the way to be “in”. The more it goes on, the more French words there are in the sentences’.2

Réunion and Mayotte – To sum up, as the relationship between the languages present becomes less rigid, ordinary practices diversify greatly: local languages are maintained as the usual language of communication, while giving ground to French, which also has familiar registers, and the different languages present are increasingly mixed and hybridized especially in youth speech, but not only (cf. 5.1).

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Réunion – Virgin of all human occupation until 1665, Réunion was colonized by successive waves of immigration, which were at the origin of its multiethnic population. From 1665 onwards, the French arrived with Malagasy, Indian, and Portuguese women from India. The Africans, mostly slaves, arrived massively from 1715 with the emergence of the coffee culture, followed by the sugar cane culture. It is in this particular context that Reunionese Creole was born. The particular situations in which all creoles are born share three points:

2 “Quand on parle à un ancien camarade, on emploie un shimaoré qui n’est pas bon mais très plaisant: ceux qui le parlent ont l’impression de très bien trouver les mots. On parle un medley: on respecte grammaticalement la partie swahili en y mêlant des mots français. C’est ça la façon d’être ‘in’. Plus ça avance, plus il y a des mots français dans les phrases” (Cassagnaud 2009, 207).

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‘a) a lasting unequal contact; b) a socio-cultural rupture, often accompanied by a geographical break (deportation into slavery, long-term commitments) but not always; c) a heterogeneity of the dominated affected by this rupture. [...] The conjunction [of these three points] explains the rarity of creolization, which should not be confused with the acceleration of linguistic change due to intense contacts’.3

The abolition of slavery in 1848 led to the arrival of many workers from southern India, Chinese immigrants as agricultural workers and Indians from northern India of the Muslim religion who came to trade. Then, with the departmentalization of Réunion in 1946, the increased arrival of metropolitan French people began. Until World War II, the French language norm in Réunion was carried by the caste of the Gros Blancs ‘(lit.) big Whites’, a colonial ruling class with cultural legitimacy and political power. Their archaic variety of French, an actual witness to Bourbonnais French, characterized by a set of conservatisms, was the reference standard until departmentalization. Today it only survives in the private sphere and no longer participates in the definition of the local norm (Beniamino/Baggioni 1993, 157), unlike in the Mauritian society where this standard of the Grands Blancs ‘(lit.) tall Whites’, as they are called there, is still in evidence today, beside other varieties of French. This group had a strong sense of linguistic security: ‘They had little doubt that they had a complete mastery of the normative system and thus their superiority (linguistic and otherwise) over other social groups. And this sense of linguistic security explained the tolerance of this group towards Creole’.4

This Gros Blanc French has been replaced in its function as standard by the here called metropolitan variety. Exposure to the culture and language practices of the metropolis has indeed increased considerably, and the symbolic weight of this model has been intensified by increasingly frequent exchanges. Mayotte – The history of Mayotte is at the crossroads of Swahili civilizations, the Bantu world of Eastern Africa, Muslims coming mainly from the Shiraz and the Arabian Peninsula, as well as Malagasy. Its French history begins in 1841, with the Malagasy Sultan Andriantsoly, who, driven out of his kingdom in July 1832, took refuge with the Sultan of Mayotte, Boina Kombo. Sultan Andriantsoly eliminates the Sultan of Mayotte and seizes the island of which he proclaims himself sovereign. He seeks the support of a foreign power in his confrontation with the sultans of the Comoros and chooses France (cf. Cassagnaud 2010, 1s.). In 1976, Mayotte distinguished itself from its sister islands (Grande Comore, Mohéli and Anjouan), which voted in favour of the independence of the Comoros, and decided to remain within the French Republic: it would become a territorial

3 “a) un contact inégalitaire durable; b) une rupture socio-culturelle, souvent accompagnée d’une coupure géographique (déportation en esclavage, engagements de longue durée), mais pas toujours; c) une hétérogénéité linguistique des dominés affectés par cette rupture” (Kihm 2005, 2). 4 “[Ils] ne doutai[en]t guère de [leur] maîtrise complète du système normatif et donc de [leur] supériorité (linguistique entre autres) sur les autres groupes sociaux. Et ce sentiment de sécurité linguistique expliquait la tolérance de ce groupe envers le créole” (Beniamino 2008, 158).

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collectivity. Thus, although it has been French for a long time, the use of French is concentrated, in these early days, in the higher classes, before settling more widely on the island by investing in the school from the 1980s, then from the departmentalization of 2011. Within just one generation, French has entered the ordinary family circle in Mayotte.

2.2 Milestones of its further development Réunion: advent of an endogenous standard – Réunion became a French overseas department in 1946; this change in status led, however, only from the 1970s onwards, to a “catch-up policy” with the mainland: thus, rapid transformations took place, notably a clear influence on the sociolinguistic landscape (cf. Beniamino/Baggioni 1993, 157s.). One might have thought, with the rapid and profound changes that have taken place in Réunion over the last thirty years, that the current sociolinguistic landscape would have seen a significant expansion in the use of French and a dramatic reduction in the use of Creole. Since departmentalization, French, which has gained much ground through schooling and the media, is still the language of academic and social success. Moreover, there is evidence of the sociolinguistic tendency among the middle classes (and especially mothers) to no longer transmit Creole. As a result, some young people now have only passive competence in Creole, and French has entered the family and private sphere. However, French is also increasingly sharing the public sphere with the Creole language, which is still widely spoken in Réunion by both old and young people. Besides the emergence of an endogenous French norm (cf. Manessy 1997, 223s.), playing with alternation is also practised by speakers ‘who have a very good command of the standard French norm. In this case, they are conscious and testify to a norm that is at least implicit’5 (Beniamino 2008, 160). Indeed, departmentalization has led to the creation of a lower middle class: ‘for whom –in its intellectual fringe– the power to create and / or propose a “Reunionese standard” was an issue in symbolic terms. The competition for cultural-linguistic hegemony was no longer played out according to socio-ethnic differentiations but strictly following a socio-cultural stratification. The assertion of an endogenous norm was therefore a major challenge in relation to an extremely influential French norm’.6  

 

5 “[…] qui ont […] une très bonne maîtrise de la norme standard du français. Dans ce cas, ils sont conscients et témoignent d’une norme au moins implicite” (Beniamino 2008, 160). 6 “[…] pour qui – dans sa frange intellectuelle – le pouvoir de créer et/ou de proposer une ‘norme réunionnaise’ était un enjeu en termes symboliques. La compétition pour l’hégémonie culturelle-linguistique ne se jouait plus selon des différenciations socio-ethniques mais en suivant strictement une stratification socioculturelle. L’affirmation d’une norme endogène était donc un enjeu majeur par rapport à une norme hexagonale extrêmement prégnante” (Beniamino 2008, 159).

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Thus, diglossia with French as the “high language” and Creole as the “low language” is evolving towards more institutionalized bilingualism. Mayotte: French as a Mahoran language – The Research Group on Multilingualism in Mayotte (Groupe de Recherche sur le Plurilinguisme à Mayotte – GPRM), headed by Laroussi (2009a), has been conducting research on the multilingual situation in Mayotte for several years: while parents who are generally non-Francophone may still oppose ‘French, an imported or even colonial language, to local languages, identified as languages of identity’7 (Laroussi 2009b, 44), young Mahorais, who have been in school, include French in their definition of identity: to the question ‘so being a Mahorais for you means speaking which languages?’,8 one of the informants replies: ‘to be Mahorais / for me is […] to speak well Shimaore and to speak French / both’.9 Thus, for them, French contributes to the definition of the Mahoran identity (Cassagnaud 2010, 53s.) and is perceived as “the language of openness to the modern world, of development and social success”.10 It is even becoming, alongside local languages, the first language of some young people for a generation: ‘French, once excluded from the family sphere, is beginning to be present there’11 (Laroussi 2015, 27s.). This phenomenon is more noticeable in urban areas (Petite Terre, Mamoudzou and its surroundings) where contact between various communities favours its use. However, according to many informants, this valorization of French by the state apparatus, among others, is to the detriment of local languages, which remain excluded from the education system and thus suffer devaluation, stigmatization, and undervaluing (Laroussi 2009b, 44).  

 

 

 

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation As Réunion and Mayotte are parts of France, the language policy applied there corresponds to the legal reality of France. French is the official language of the country and each of its departments: ‘The language of the Republic is French’.12

7 “français, langue importée voire coloniale aux langues locales, identifiées comme langues identitaires” (Laroussi 2009b, 44). 8 “alors être mahorais pour toi c’est parler quelles langues?“ (Laroussi 2009b, 44). 9 “être mahorais / pour moi […] c’est bien parler le shimaoré et parler le français / les deux” (Laroussi 2009b, 44). 10 “la langue d’ouverture sur le monde moderne, du développement et de la réussite sociale” (Cassagnaud 2010, 53). 11 “Le français, autrefois exclu de la sphère familiale, commence à y être présent“ (Laroussi 2015, 27). 12 “La langue de la République est le français” (C-FR, art. 2).  

 

 

 

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All national texts of the Republic are applicable there, subject to the adaptations provided for by the Code of Education of 2 August 1984 on the powers of each region (Code de l’éducation – CE), which concern complementary educational and cultural activities relating to the knowledge of regional languages and cultures. In this process, Creole has radically changed its status in the twenty-first century. After a long period of struggle for its use, particularly strong during the 1960s and 1980s, when the Reunionese Communist Party’s (Parti communiste réunionnais – PCR) endeavour for autonomy was combined with the action of Reunionese intellectuals and students, official recognition by the state came into play in the 2000s. It resulted in Creole being granted the status of language of France (“langue de France”) in 2000 by the Overseas Territories Framework Act (Loi d’orientation pour l’outre-mer – LOOM), which implies that the Loi Deixonne of 1951, a law that allows the teaching of regional languages, is also applicable to them: ‘The state and local authorities shall encourage respect, protection and maintenance of the knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities based on their traditional ways of life and which contribute to the conservation of the natural environment and the sustainable use of biological diversity’.13 ‘The regional languages in use in the overseas departments are part of the linguistic heritage of the Nation [; they] benefit from the strengthening of policies in favour of regional languages in order to facilitate their use’.14

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Administration – In the local administration of Réunion and Mayotte, the Regional and the General Council, as well as in the National Assembly and the Senate, only French is recognized and used. The same applies to written communications in all government offices, police stations, etc. In oral communications of administrative nature and in matters of justice, the only language used is French, although Creole and local languages are logically used in oral communications of an informal nature. Advertisements – In Réunion and Mayotte, respectively, Creole, Shimaore, and Kibushi are often used in advertisements (written, radio, and television) to promote traditional and local products, but also for modern objects that are highly valued by young people, such as mobile phones.

13 “L’État et les collectivités locales encouragent le respect, la protection et le maintien des connaissances, innovations et pratiques des communautés autochtones et locales fondées sur leurs modes de vie traditionnels et qui contribuent à la conservation du milieu naturel et l’usage durable de la diversité biologique” (LOOM, art. 33). 14 “Les langues régionales en usage dans les départements d’outre-mer font partie du patrimoine linguistique de la Nation [; elles] bénéficient du renforcement des politiques en faveur des langues régionales afin d’en faciliter l’usage” (LOOM, art. 34).

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3.3 Languages used in education Réunion – Education is provided from primary school to university (which has a teacher training institute since 1992), including two agricultural colleges. Like in France, teaching is entirely in French. Only in kindergarten, Creole has been permitted for a long time; complementary facultative courses exist in primary and secondary school, but the offer somewhat exceeds the demand (Adelin/Lebon-Eyquem 2009, 45). The almost exclusive teaching of the French language and the import of the metropolitan pedagogical mould is obviously a source of pedagogical difficulties for children who speak Creole as a first language and French as a second language. The school authorities estimate that between 25 % and 30 % of pupils experience difficulties in French. However, since the LOOM of 2000, the Department of Réunion has been legally entitled to give a place to the teaching of Creole, as stated in the Code of Education of 1984:  

 

‘The Regional Council shall determine, after the opinion of the Committee for Culture, Education, and the Environment, the complementary educational and cultural activities relating to the knowledge of regional languages and cultures, which may be organized in schools within the competence of the region. These activities, which may take place during the opening hours of the establishments concerned, are optional and may not replace or prejudice the education and training programmes defined by the state’.15

This possibility did not immediately meet with the expected enthusiasm. Since the 1970s, violent debates on the place of Creole in school have been going on. People of Réunion have always been used to the idea that Creole should be banned from school because it was detrimental to the teaching of French (Gueunier/Genouvrier/Khomsi 1978; Prudent 2005, 370). In November 2009, an Ipsos survey revealed that 47.3 % of the respondents said they were in favour of using Creole at school, but 42.7 % were against it, and 10 % were undecided. Prudent, in an interview, thus clearly underlines the anomaly between reality and pedagogy:  

 

 

‘Réunion is the DOM that speaks the most Creole, but this daily practice does not correspond to a real enthusiasm for the pedagogy of the language’.16

15 “Le conseil régional détermine, après avis du conseil de la culture, de l’éducation et de l’environnement, les activités éducatives et culturelles complémentaires relatives à la connaissance des langues et des cultures régionales, qui peuvent être organisées dans les établissements scolaires relevant de la compétence de la région. Ces activités, qui peuvent se dérouler pendant les heures d’ouverture des établissements concernés, sont facultatives et ne peuvent se substituer ni porter atteinte aux programmes d’enseignement et de formation définis par l’État” (CE, art. 4433-25). 16 “La Réunion est le DOM qui parle le plus créole, mais cette pratique quotidienne ne correspond pas à un véritable enthousiasme pour la pédagogie de la langue” (Schulz 2008).

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Although it may seem difficult to teach a non-standardized language at first glance, solid research exists to support these practices. It has been undertaken since the 1970s at the University, and the teaching of Creole has taken shape within the Licence Créole at the University (Adelin/Lebon-Eyquem 2009, 44). Finally, the Certificate of Aptitude for Secondary School Teachers (Cértificat d’aptitude de l’enseignement du second degré – CAPES) was created for Creole in 2001 (CAPES de langues et cultures regionals – option créole, cf. Prudent 2001; Reutner 2005, 75–130), and Creole is taught within the Master in Professions of Teaching, Education and Qualification (Métiers de l’Enseignement, de l’Éducation et de la Formation – MEEF). However, as Oakes points out: “Considering France’s reputation concerning the teaching of regional languages, it is perhaps no surprise that while some progress has been made, the recent measures to integrate Creole into schools have also been described as largely symbolic” (2013, 32).

Mayotte – Although Mayotte has been French since 1841, investment in the education system and its infrastructure dates back to the 1980s only. In 2001, Mayotte became a vice-rectorate (under the authority of a rector of a metropolitan academy) and in 2020, a full-fledged academy was established, with an administrative and pedagogical organization in line with the establishments in metropolitan France, and the same examinations (brevet and baccalaureate). University education is currently still organized in the form of a University Centre for Qualification and Research (Centre universitaire de formation et de recherche – CUFR) whose diplomas are carried by 4 metropolitan universities. The evolution towards a full-fledged university is planned in the coming years. The history of mass public schooling in Mayotte is relatively recent in an education system that has been gradually introduced since the 1980s: ‘The number of students has risen from some 2,900 in 1973 (7 % of the population at the time) to more than 56,500 in 2002 (35 %)’.17  

 

Although the enrolment rate for children of compulsory age (6–16 years) was 92 % in 2002, many indicators are still well below that of metropolitan France. School failure is very high, since in 2001, more than 50 % of young people left the education system without any qualifications (vs. 7 % in metropolitan France). There is a significant educational backwardness in the first level (31 % vs. 7 % in metropolitan France), as well as in the second level (46 % vs. 38 % in metropolitan France). The examination results remain very low: 51 % passed the general baccalaureate (vs. 84 % in metropolitan France), and 60 % passed the technological baccalaureate (vs. 77 %). One of the main obstacles is that students have greater difficulties in French, which penalizes them in other subjects. Reading skills are called upon in statements in mathematics, for example, as first lan 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

17 “On est passé ainsi de quelques 2 900 élèves en 1973 (7 % de la population d’alors) à plus de 56 500 en 2002 (35 %)” (INSEE 2004, 1).  

 

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guages are absent from school. The investment by the French state in the education system, undeniably synonymous with modernity, also brings disadvantages, as Wolff/Watin have pointed out for Réunion, showing an important parallel situation: ‘But if this forced techno-modernization sets the island on the road to development, it is accompanied by strong acculturation and produces many effects. By promoting salaried employment, it forces any idle population to cram into huge shantytowns on the outskirts of towns in the hope of finding work. By making schooling compulsory on the hexagonal model, it stigmatizes failure at school. By spreading a metropolitan lifestyle, it participates in the negation of [local] identity’.18

Moreover, also within the Mahorian education system, there is a complex relationship that the Mahorians maintain with the French language, “the language of the Mzungus”, a relationship that reflects the one between the Mahorian and metropolitan communities. Two opposing currents are evident: ‘one identity-oriented, aspiring if not to the promotion, at least to the preservation of endogenous languages and cultures, the other assimilationist, turned towards the unique use of the exogenous language, French, considered as the only means of social promotion’.19

This is all the more true as the recent departmentalization constitutes one of the motivations for learning French: ‘[French] is a language of Mayotte because institutionally already. The vast majority of Mayotte struggles to become French / for it to become French we can’t speak a language other than French, so we have to: that’s institutionally, right?’.20  

 

For Mayotte, we summarize here the three scenarios, drawn up by Mori (2018), that could arise from now on: (i) the maintenance of diglossia with the non-use of indigenous languages at school in a standardized manner, (ii) the introduction of indigenous languages in primary school as experienced in the Seychelles, Réunion, and Mauritius

18 “Mais si cette techno-modernisation forcée engage l’île sur les rails du développement, elle s’accompagne d’une forte acculturation et produit de nombreux effets. En valorisant l’emploi salarié, elle oblige toute population désœuvrée à s’entasser dans d’immenses bidonvilles au pourtour des villes dans l’espoir d’y trouver du travail. En rendant la scolarité obligatoire sur le modèle hexagonal, elle stigmatise l’échec scolaire. En diffusant un mode de vie métropolitain, elle participe à la négation de l’identité [locale]” (Wolff/Watin 2010, 7). 19 “[…] l’un identitaire aspirant sinon à la promotion, du moins à la préservation des langues et cultures endogènes, l’autre assimilationniste, tourné vers l’usage unique de la langue exogène, le français, considéré comme le seul moyen de promotion sociale” (Colombiès 2009, 164). 20 “[le français] c’est une langue de Mayotte parce que institutionnellement déjà. Mayotte lutte en grande majorité pour qu’elle devienne française/pour qu’elle devienne française on peut pas parler une autre langue que la langue française donc il faut que: ça c’est institutionnellement hein” (Laroussi 2009b, 43).

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(Mori 2018, 126), and (iii) a polynominal model. Scenario (i) keeps the indigenous languages in a non-valued status, and the non-transmission to new generations will lead to language shift (an evolution that is still feared in Réunion, particularly among the island’s upper social classes according to Oakes 2013). Scenario (ii) poses the problem that before bringing an indigenous language into schools, it must become a regional language, which in France implies a standard spelling, the standardization of the written forms of Shimaore and Kibushi, and a grammar as well as a dictionary that enables the transmission of linguistic rules (phonetic-phonological, morphological and syntactic) to teachers (Laroussi 2009a, 239). The final option (iii) arises in view of the variety of forms of indigenous languages on the territory. Mayotte could draw inspiration from the case of Corsica, where bilingual primary schools exist, although Corsica does not have a standardized form of the language to be transmitted within the education system. The Corsicans have established a polynomial model and thus a recognition of pluralism in their language. For Marcellesi (1984), a polynomial language is a language ‘whose unity is abstract and results from a dialectical movement and not from the simple ossification of a single norm’.21 It should also be remembered that Reunionese Creole does not yet have a unified script, unlike that of the Antilles, and that this graphic variation works very well (Ledegen 2017, 79s.).

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media: Réunion – All newspapers are published in French, while playing a few titling games with Creole, as do the three generalist newspapers Journal de l’Île de la Réunion (JIR), the Quotidien de La Réunion, and Témoignages (online). Print media: Mayotte – The written media in Mayotte operate in French and are represented by a weekly, L’Insulaire, and a bi-weekly, Kwezi. Audiovisual media: Réunion – French Broadcasting for Overseas Territories (Radiotélévision française pour l’outre-mer – RFO) provides public service broadcasting in French. It retransmits programmes from France Télévision and broadcasts a regional programme. Antenne-Réunion, a private channel, shares the television market with RFO. The opening of the media space (1976–1986) brought about a major change in the situation. Previously the Creole language and the alternation of languages were confined to family and familiar use and were hardly attested to in the media.22 Radio Freedom (14 July 1981) and then Télé Freedom broke the state monopoly on radio and television, and innovated by leaving more and more space for Creole and public expression, mainly through interactive programmes. At present, Creole language and the mixtures prac21 “[…] dont l’unité est abstraite et résulte d’un mouvement dialectique et non de la simple ossification d’une norme unique” (Marcellesi 1984, 314). 22 Previously, Creole, when it was used on air, only appeared in interactive programmes with local comedians, revealing the devalued status then given by radio actors (Idelson 2004).

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tised in a natural way are present in programmes distributed at prime time (television news, interactive, cultural or entertainment programmes). These new media practices, which legitimize “ordinary” Réunionese practices, are changing linguistic practices and representations and, as a result, Réunion’s collective identity (Ledegen/Corré 2005). Audiovisual media: Mayotte – The oral media in Mayotte operate in French and occasionally in Shimaore and Kibushi. Radio-Mayotte deploys French, Shimaore, and Kibushi. The station is fully bilingual (about 60 % French and 40 % Shimaore). Shimaore is used more in the evenings. News programmes use both languages in the same proportions. Finally, two private radio stations (Mayotte Web Radio, Radio Machaka) broadcast in Shimaore. RFO, the French national overseas network, which broadcasts programmes from France 2, France 3, and la Cinquième, presents daily local television news in French and a weekly news broadcast in Shimaore. Télé-Mayotte broadcasts news programmes in Shimaore, including a 20-minute edition every working day. There are also society magazines in Shimaore, which look at political and social news; some programmes are offered in French and Shimaore versions, half each.  

 

4 Linguistic characteristics In this chapter, particularities of French are presented for each island, for the different linguistic domains, that are pronunciation, morphosyntax, and lexicon.

4.1 Pronunciation Réunion – Relatively little work has been done on the French spoken in Réunion. The thesis of Carayol (1977) provides an in-depth description of the phonology and phonetics, and the international project on the Phonology of Contemporary French (Phonologie du français contemporain – PFC)23 is a very welcome update of this work, making it possible to draw up trends that are evolving or maintaining trends that already evolved. We present here the particularities of the pronunciation of Reunionese French as they emerge from the PFC corpus of Réunion (PFC-Réunion), while highlighting the evolution of this variety of French since the survey of Carayol (1977). In addition, we present the dual influence on Réunion French of both Creole, the first language of the speakers, and standard French, which constitutes the standard of reference. Vowels – Like in the case of southern French, the vowel system of Reunionese French does not have the distinctive opposition between half-closed and half-open mid23 The project provides multiple recordings and analyses, phonetic and phonological, but also, in a didactic component, lexical and syntactic, based on a reading of a list of words and a text, a guided and free interview, on multiple points of inquiry throughout the French-speaking world (cf. Durand/Laks/Lyche 2002; 2009).

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dle vowels. The law of position (loi de position) is therefore systematically applied: in open syllable, the middle vowels are half-closed and in closed syllable, they are halfopen: piquer [pike] ‘to sting’ and piquais [pikɛ] ‘I stung, you stung’ are both realized as [pike] with a close-mid [e]. Autre chose [otʁəʃoz] ‘another thing’ is realized as [ɔtʃɔz]. As far as nasal vowels are concerned, Carayol (1977) still indicated the opposition between the nasal vowels /œ̃ / and /ɛ̃/ (e. g., brun [bʁœ̃ ] ‘brown’ vs. brin [bʁɛ̃] ‘sprig, wisp’), but in current usage this feature is no longer attested, as the vowel /œ̃ / is disappearing like in Parisian French. Consonant inventory – The consonant inventory of Reunionese French is hardly different from that of standard French, apart from the absence of the palatalized nasal [ɲ], still attested in Carayol (1977), which is now systematically replaced by [nj]. What attracts our attention in the consonant system is the strong tendency to simplify consonant groups, a common trait in most varieties of oral French that has a very high frequency here, and the behaviour of the phoneme /r/ which is one of the main characteristics of the phonology of Reunionese French. Consonant groups – Consonant groups at the end of words are simplified by deleting all but the first consonant of the group, as in minister [ministʁ] ‘minister’ realized as [minis]. These pronunciations, which astonish the interviewer when found in a list of words or a text reading, are attested with high frequency in Réunion, and are not very marked sociolinguistically: the elision of post-consonantal liquids, for example, occurs on average in 56.7 % of cases when reading the text, and in 84.2 % of cases during the guided interview (Bordal/Ledegen 2009, 188). This very frequent elision also affects consonant groups that are less frequently simplified in other varieties of French, such as the simplification of the final consonant group in journaliste [ʒuʁnalist] ‘journalist’ realized as [ʒuʁnalis]. The generalization of group simplification could be attributed to the influence of Creole, whose canonical syllable is the consonant-vowel syllable. /r/ – The behaviour of /r/ is undoubtedly the most distinctive feature of the pronunciation of Reunionese French: /r/ is likely to be elided at the end of the syllable (coda) and modifies the phonetic characteristics of the vowel preceding it, by lengthening (e. g., journée [ʒuʁne] > journée [ʒuːne] ‘day’) and/or changing quality; thus, the middle vowels are more closed when followed by /r/ than by other consonants, and /a/ is posteriorized (e. g., parc [paʁk] > parc [pɑːk] ‘park’). In addition, the palatal vowels before the word ending are likely to be coloured by a vowel element whose realization is close to that of the schwa (e. g., cire [siʁ] > cire [siːə] ‘wax’, Bordal 2006). A comparison with Carayol’s survey shows that this fall of /r/ (at the time only attested after the velar vowels [u], [o] and the central [a]) has become generalized. It is interesting to note that this trend is contrary to the trend towards the convergence to the reference French attested on other points. Conclusion – To sum up, in segmental terms, the Reunionese variety is characterized by the systematic application of the law of position and the strong tendency towards consonant simplifications. The behaviour of the phoneme /r/ also constitutes a particularity of the pronunciation of this variety: it tends to be elided after the vowel  

 

 

 

 

 

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and modifies the syllabic nucleus. Moreover, a comparison with Carayol’s study (Ledegen 2007a) has shown the replacement of an old standard of French by the contemporary French standard, the reference standard after departmentalization and especially the catch-up policy implemented in the 1960s and 1970s (Beniamino/Baggioni 1993; Fioux 1999; Ledegen 2004). The presence of this new norm does not prevent Reunionese French from remaining, through its coexistence with Creole, ‘in contact with its phonetic “memory”, the influences of the Creole fighting the tendency to align with the norms of standard French’.24 Mayotte – Until now, there is very little work devoted to the French of Mayotte in any of the usual fields (phonetics/phonology, lexicon, syntax, discourse). Research mentions in passing marked pronunciations by masters or interviewees: a very descending intonation at the end of the declarative (Mori 2018), the rolling apical [r], and the variable realization of the [y] as [i], its unrounded palatal equivalent (distribue [distribi] instead of [distʁiby] ‘distribute’), or as [ɥi] (sur [sɥir] instead of [syʁ] ‘upon’, peinture [pɛ̃tɥir] instead of [pɛ̃tyʁ] ‘painting’, cf. Saïd 2017, 82; Maturafi 2019; Jary 2017).

4.2 Morphosyntax Réunion – Since the 2000s, the French of Réunion has also been examined in its syntactic aspects through the large oral corpus on Linguistic Varieties of Réunion (Variétés Linguistiques de la Réunion – Valirun, cf. Ledegen 2007a; 2007b; 2016). In the particular situation of languages in contact in Réunion, French and Creole influence each other; separating this intersystemic variation from the intrasystemic variation proves to be an extremely delicate undertaking in a situation of contact between a Creole language and its source language (Ledegen/Léglise 2007; Ledegen 2007a; 2007b). For example, for the direct use of indirect object clitics (and vice versa) in French, the interferential explanation with Reunionese Creole is indeed a possible hypothesis. Creole has only one paradigm of forms for object clitics: li èm ali ‘he loves her’, li mazine ali ‘he thinks about her/him’. On the other hand, the object clitic can easily be omitted (Cellier 1985). But this absence of object clitics is also widely attested in metropolitan French (Gadet 1989; Lambrecht/Lemoine 1996; Larjavaara 2000), albeit with a certain sociolinguistic marking, which is by no means the case in Réunion. It should be noted that the vast majority of syntactic traits in variation in general are considered in Reunionese society –especially by teachers– as interference phenomena with Creole. The main syntactic traits of Reunionese French listed below stand out from other varieties by their unmarked sociolinguistic status and/or by their high frequency. Most of them are described, in metropolitan French, as ‘unconventional’ (“inconventionnel”, cf. Larjavaara 2000, 10) or

24 “[…] en contact avec sa ‘mémoire’ phonétique, les influences du créole combattant les tendances à l’alignement sur les normes du français standard” (Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 88).

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‘popular’ (“populaire”, Gadet 1992, 65), as ‘typical faults [...], social markings, which some people learned to avoid at a very young age, under the influence of families and schools’.25 Our attestations of these phenomena (Ledegen 2007a; 2007b; 2016; Ledegen/ Léglise 2007), on the other hand, show that they are all part of a “habitual”, unmarked use in Réunion, an objective norm. Features – The subjunctive is frequently omitted, as in dites instead of disiez in il faut que vous me dites ‘you must tell me’ (PFC-Réunion). Non-standard indirect in situ interrogative is more often used than with est-ce que: it is realized behind the verb savoir ‘to know’ (or connaître, its variant in regional French), with c’est and the monosyllabic words starting in Qu-, most of which are quoi (Ledegen 2007a; 2016), as in Jc c koi mé javé pa rèalizé sur le coup! instead of Je sais c’est quoi mais j’avais pas réalisé sur le coup! ‘I know what it is but I didn’t realize it at the time’ (SMS-Réunion). There is frequent omission of the conjunction que ‘that’, as in Jspr il sera marseillais kom le papa instead of J’espère [qu’] il sera Marseillais comme le papa ‘I hope [that] he will be Marseillais like the father’, as well as in fo jmnte a lapart? instead of faut [que] je monte à l’appart ‘I have to go up to the apartment?’ (SMS-Réunion). The direct object pronouns le, la, les, en, and y are frequently omitted, as in perso jtrouv manifik! instead of perso(nnellement) je [le] trouve magnifique ‘personally I find it beautiful!’, as well as in Parcke g djà trouvé une pour moi. a la plaine d grègues instead of Parce que j’ [en] ai déjà trouvé une pour moi. à la Plaine des Grègues ‘Because I have already found one for me. at la Plaine des Grègues’ (SMS-Réunion). The use of the direct object pronoun for the indirect object pronoun, and vice versa, is also attested, as in Soi tu lenvoi un msg en disan:ca yé ta réuci instead of Soit tu l’[lui] envoies un message en disant ça y est tu as réussi ‘Either you send it a message saying: That’s it. You made it’ (SMS-Réunion). There is a frequent omission of the indirect object preposition à ‘to’, as in Salam, 2mand maman si el a recu les crédi stp? instead of Salam, demande [à] maman si elle a reçu les crédits stp? ‘Salam, ask mummy if she has received the credits please’ (SMS-Réunion). Finally, double negation might come from contact with Creole, as it is less attested in non-Creole speaking areas, as in j’ai pas vu personne instead of j’ai vu personne ‘I have not seen anybody’, on the example of Creole na pwin person? ‘is there anybody there?’. Mayotte – The interviews conducted in the numerous sociolinguistic researches of the Research Groupe on Multilingualism in Mayotte also reveal common syntactic features with other contexts of Francophonie, including Réunion. We find the omission of the subjunctive, as in faut qu’ils vont être intelligents instead of il faut qu’ils soient intelligents ‘they have to be intelligent’ (Colombiès 2009, 146). The auxiliaries être and avoir vary, as in j’ai déjà habitué maintenant instead of je me suis déjà habitué maintenant ‘I have already got used to it now’ (Cassagnaud 2009, 180), moi chui grandi instead of moi j’ai grandi ‘I have grown up’ (Canavatte 2009, 134). The use of the direct object pronoun

25 “fautes typantes […], des marquages sociaux, que certaines personnes ont appris très jeunes à éviter, sous l’influence des familles et des écoles” (Blanche-Benveniste 1997, 41).

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for the indirect object pronoun, and vice versa, is also attested: je les apprends à parler un petit mahorais instead of je leur apprend à parler un petit mahorais ‘I teach them to speak a little mahorais’ (Cassagnaud 2009, 183).

4.3 Lexicon Réunion – The lexical domain is the one where the typological proximity between French and Creole seems to express itself most strongly. Indeed, as the genesis of Reunionese Creole was largely based on the popular and/or dialectical French spoken by the first settlers, the situation in Réunion is marked by the coexistence of two linguistic systems, French and a Creole with a lexical base in French, between which the osmoticity of the lexicons is strong: ‘In the creole-speaking areas, for example, the considerable osmoticity between French and creole means that almost all French lexemes can be “Creolized” and that, in the other direction, almost all creole terms can appear in French. Added to this are the problems caused by the fact that 95 % of the creole “lexical material” is of French origin’.26  

The first to explore the lexical field was Carayol (1985), a work which was then continued by Beniamino/Baggioni (1993) and Beniamino (1996), who, within the framework of the Association of Partially or Entirely French-Speaking Universities – University of French-Language Networks (Association des universités partiellement ou entièrement de langue française-Université des réseaux de langue française – AUPELF-UREF) programmes, compiled an inventory of the lexical particularities of Reunionese French, based on this data and other complementary corpus. These data, augmented, also appear in the Panfrancophone Lexicographical Database (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophones – BDLP). Examples – The particular uses of the variety of Reunionese French include units with a much higher frequency than in standard French, as for example cancrelat ‘cockroach’, lever ‘start to grow’, manger ‘meal’, vitement ‘quickly’. It also shows innovations of meaning as for example abuser ‘to harm’, battre ‘to chop’, bonbon ‘cake’, and tort ‘twisted, crooked’, and innovations of form with derivations like causement ‘talk’ (< causer ‘to talk’), compound words like accordéon à bouche ‘harmonica’, argent-femme seule ‘single mother’s allowance’, baba-figue ‘banana flower’, and innovative verbal phrases: battre un carré ‘to take a walk’, faire un compte avec ‘to take into account’, mettre un bois ‘to shut someone up’. There are also borrowings from Creole, like for example baba ‘baby’ oder fonnkèr ‘poetry’ (< Fr. fond du cœur ‘bottom of my heart’). 26 “Dans les aires créolophones par exemple, la considérable osmoticité entre français et créoles fait que presque tout lexème français peut être “créolisé” et que, dans l’autre sens, la quasi-totalité des termes créoles peut apparaître en français. S’ajoutent à cela les problèmes que suscite le fait que 95 % du “matériau lexical” créole est d’origine française” (Chaudenson 1993, 391).  

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Mayotte – Research on Shimaore-French language contacts (Maturafi 2019) shows the extent of reciprocal borrowings, as in the two borrowings from Shimaore already mentioned mzungu ‘white people’ (m ‘people’ + zungu ‘white’) and shizungu ‘language of the whites (shi ‘language’ + zungu ‘white’). There is also codic alternance between the two languages, particularly in youth talks (Cassagnaud 2007), also known as shimaozungu ‘(lit.) Shimaore of the white people’ (< Shimaore + Mzungu, cf. Maturafi 2019).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism Interferences – As often in situations of language contact, linguistic purism manifests itself on the French islands of the Indian Ocean. Thus, the phenomena of French-Creole contact (but also the simple features of “ordinary French”, unknown to its own speakers) are often disregarded, particularly by teachers –Reunionese/Mahorean and Metropolitan– and directly attributable to the interferential forms produced by speakers of Creole, Shimaore, and Kibushi ‘who have not internalized standard French and who do not control its grammar’.27 Gaillard (1992) is a prototypical example of such a publication for Réunion, addressed to teachers. Code-switching and linguistic continuum – Daily communication is characterized by frequent code-switching and code-mixing, especially among young people, fully assuming these mixing practices (Ledegen 2002; Ledegen/Richard 2007). Thus, the observer is often confronted with the difficulty in determining in which language a conversation is taking place: ‘Well, it’s true that in terms of language, we speak French, and well, we let the Creole words go in it. That’s it. You mix it up. It’s a little mix anyway. Especially for, for today’s youth. Voilà. Uh, I think it’s good, at least, well, they still keep the Creole and well, they speak French too’.28

Indeed, there is a particular affinity between French and Creole, represented by the linguistic continuum that organizes linguistic production as a rainbow of uses and not as a strict separation between the varieties present, organizing itself, gradually, between two poles constituted by standard French and basilectal Creole, the variety of Creole furthest removed from French. A considerable number of linguistic elements are in common and

27 “[…] qui n’ont pas intériorisé le français standard et qui n’en contrôlent pas la grammaire” (Prudent 2002, 65). 28 “Bon, c’est vrai que dans le langage, on parle français, et ben, on laisse partir des mots de créole, dedans. Voilà. On mélange. C’est un petit mélange de toute façon. Surtout pour, pour les jeunes d’aujourd’hui. Voilà. Euh, je trouve que c’est bien, au moins, bon ben, ils gardent quand même le créole et ben, ils parlent français aussi” (Bordal/Ledegen 2009, 182).

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the differentiation only concerns a limited number of elements (Ledegen 2012),29 allowing a relative intercomprehension between the two poles of the continuum. The various changes in the status and use of Creole and French go hand in hand with a relaxation of attitudes towards the two languages and their mixture. Hybridization – Mixing practices have become more widespread: the comparison of records established in 1978–1980 in the framework of the Linguistic Atlas of Réunion (cf. Carayol/Chaudenson/Barat 1984), with today’s corpora (2002–2008, Valirun) shows that mixing is taking place more often and in a more diverse way (Ledegen 2003). In the “youth talks”, both Reunionese and Mahorese, a hybridization between French and languages in contact is fully at work, particularly among school youth. These “young” linguistic practices are innovative in two particular aspects. On the one hand, the ingredients of the mixed languages and varieties (i.e., a mixture of Creole or Shimaore/ Kibushi, French –more particularly used by young people and in familiar situations– and some English terms) are particular. Familiar French, absent from the sociolinguistic landscape of previous generations, starts being appropriated by these young people and used by them in situations of identity communication, both familiar and playful. This appropriation of colloquial French, logically more established in Réunion than in Mayotte, thus redistributes the linguistic cards. On the other hand, in Réunion, the young people stand out for their attitudes and representations of the linguistic mix that they claim as their identity, unlike their parents, who often mix as well but never claim it. Thus, the practices of young Reunionese speakers are fully illustrative of the relaxation of diglossia, which was still intensely present in Réunion in the 1970s. This change is now in its infancy in Mayotte, with diglossia and glottophagous French even more established, but on the verge of being swept away by the younger generation.

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Réunion – The local variety of French has its own dictionaries. This first work (Carayol 1985) was continued by Beniamino (1996), an inventory of the lexical particularities of French, therefore with a differential logic, noting all the terms that differentiate Reunionese French from standard French. Its dissemination has been confined mainly to the university public, which finds it useful for research purposes (e. g., on literature, cf. be 

29 It is interesting to note that some statements can thus be perceived as either Creole or French. These areas that are attributable to both languages at the same time are transcribed in the Linguistic Varieties of Réunion (Variétés Linguistiques de la Réunion – Valirun) oral database, by using the “floating” transcription (Ledegen 2012) to signify that the interpretation is double. Note for example the following terms of a teacher i fo redmande a papa or a maman in kayé / i(l) faut redemande à papa ou à maman un cahier. Located in a Creole passage, this quote could be in French (the [i] may be as much the ordinary pronunciation of il in spoken French), but it could just as well be a statement in acrolectal Creole (the [i] may be the pre-verbal clue to the Creole system). There is no clear-cut clue here.

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low). Furthermore, it is available online via the website (www.bibliotheque.auf.org) and is of great use in the school and media environment. As indicated above, for pronunciation, there is only the thesis of Carayol (1977). In terms of syntax, no description has been published, but many kinds of research exist (cf. 4.2). For Creole, a grammar and two dictionaries exist: Armand (1987), Baggioni (1987), and Cellier (1985). Especially with the CAPES de créole (cf. 3.3), Creole is entering a slow but sure process of graphization and standardization. Mayotte – Since there is no research yet on the linguistic particularities of French used in Mayotte, no dictionary nor grammar are at disposal. As for Shimaore and Kibushi, two dictionaries (Blanchy 1996; Gueunier 2016) exist, and different methods for learning Shimaore, including grammatical presentations (Maandhui 2001; Atoui 2006; Cornice 1999). The major association of teaching and promotion of both regional languages of Mayotte founded in 1998, Shimaorais Méthodique (SHIME), also develops different types of material (cf. Spelo 2021).

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Réunion – The discourse of public authorities, education, and the broadcast on media take place essentially in Standard French. As for other less formal media programmes, Reunionese French and Creole occur (Ledegen/Simonin 2010). As for literature, it differed very little from French literature until the early 1970s: all other forms of expression were seen as necessarily vernacular, often “folklorized”, even though research on literature (Magdelaine-Andrianjafitrimo 2008) clearly establishes the indispensable interaction between Creole-speaking and French-speaking production, oral and written, whose work on languages and orality continues in theatrical expression or fonnkèr, the Creole word used in society for ‘poetry’. From the 1970s onwards, militant works in French and Creole emerged, giving voice to the “muzzled” (e. g., Antoir et al. 2004), including one of Réunion’s major authors, Axel Gauvin with novels like Faims d’enfance (1987), L’Aimé (1990), or Train fou (2000). If Klinkenberg (2001) has expressed the wish to all so-called peripheral Francophones to live in the common French language as co-owners and not as tenants, this is what Axel Gauvin achieves in all his novels, demonstrating “linguistic security that can go as far as jubilation”30 (Bavoux 2004, 108). He mixes words and expressions from regional French and Creole (a hundred in all in Train fou, for example) in his writings, some of which are made explicit by marking, while others are not marked:  

‘I will have, as a bonus, the joy of being able to say: “It was a beautiful tifine” (Creole word which, as you don’t know, means “cocktail”, and comes from the English tea-fine) [...]’.31

30 “preuve d’une sécurité linguistique qui peut aller jusqu’à la jubilation” (Bavoux 2004, 108). 31 “J’aurai, en prime, la joie de pouvoir dire: ‘C’était un beau tifine’ (mot créole qui, comme vous ne le savez pas, signifie ‘cocktail’, et qui vient de l’anglais tea-fine) […]” (Gauvin 2000, 110).

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Mayotte – For Mayotte, the same tensions exist between written and oral productions, and languages in co-presence. Indeed, we find this same play with languages in Nassur Attoumani’s novels, for example, where he enamels his texts with words in Shimaore, while completing them with a footnote, or in his plays with entire statements in Shimaore (this is the case in La Fille du polygame, which begins with a song). For this author, the use of Shimaore ‘grows according to the degree of orality of the text, reaching its climax in the song. The variety and importance of the forms of orality –common or even familiar registers, dialogues, songs– make it clear that, in the context of Mayotte in particular, literality is not reduced to the written word or the book. It is then necessary to redefine the concept of literature in an endogenous way or to substitute the concept of oraliture for it’.32

One of the founding fathers of French-language literature in Mayotte, Abdou Salam Baco, also points out this necessary redefinition: ‘In the case of Mayotte, I’m not sure that literature can have any influence on people. Because Mayotte is a society with oral traditions, the written word is a new phenomenon that will take time to establish itself as a channel for transmitting messages. When this is said, then it is easy to understand why the Mahorais do not like to read too much and prefer to dance and listen: listen to the elders telling tales and legends around a fire; listen to music; listen to the news on the radio and watch the news on television’.33

Conclusion as an opening – For Réunion, it is the societal changes that took place after the departmentalization in 1946 that set in motion the major sociolinguistic upheavals of the 1970s, which are currently leading to a more peaceful coexistence of Creole and French, not without some fears of a language shift (Oakes 2013), particularly among the island’s upper social classes. For Mayotte, the history of the coexistence of languages has been played out mainly since the 1980s through the investment of the French state in the field of education, and especially since the departmentalization of 2011. However, it seems to be played out at an accelerated rhythm and there is a great urgency to consolidate an institutionalized and balanced multilingualism, and to work for the safeguard-

32 “croît en fonction du degré d’oralité du texte, atteignant son climax dans la chanson. La variété et l’importance des formes de l’oralité –registre courant voire familier, dialogues, chansons– font comprendre que, dans le contexte de Mayotte en particulier, la littérarité ne se réduit pas à l’écrit ou au livre. Force est alors de redéfinir le concept de littérature de façon endogène ou de lui substituer le concept d’oraliture” (in Cosker 2018, § 6). 33 “Pour le cas de Mayotte, je ne suis pas sûr que la littérature puisse avoir une quelconque influence sur les gens. Parce que Mayotte étant une société à traditions orales, la chose écrite est un phénomène nouveau qui prendra du temps avant de s’imposer comme canal de transmission des messages. Quand on a dit cela, on comprend alors aisément pourquoi les Mahorais n’aiment pas trop lire, et préfèrent danser et écouter: écouter les anciens raconter des contes et légendes autour d’un feu; écouter de la musique ; écouter les informations à la radio et regarder le journal à la télévision” (in Cosker 2018, § 26).

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ing of endangered local languages in front of the hegemonic trend of French. Indeed, the sociolinguistic representations prevailing in the two islands often still echo the ‘centuries-old sociolinguistic cycle [...] which admirably reflects the language fetishism [cf. Bourdieu/Boltanski 1975] and the ideology of linguistic unification [cf. Milroy/Milroy 1985] that accompanied and supported the construction of the nation-state and which, fundamentally, tolerate neither competition (a single national language) nor deviation (obsessive respect for the norm)’.34

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34 “cycle sociolinguistique pluriséculaire […] qui traduit admirablement le fétichisme de la langue et l’idéologie de l’unification linguistique […] qui ont accompagné et soutenu la construction de l’État-Nation et qui, fondamentalement, ne tolèrent ni concurrence (une seule langue nationale), ni déviance (respect obsessionnel de la Norme)” (Boyer/Prieur 1996, 57).

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LOOM = Secrétariat général du Gouvernement (2000), Loi n° 2000-1207 du 13 décembre 2000 d’orientation pour l’outre-mer, Paris, République française, https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/loda/id/ LEGIARTI000006386399/2021-04-01/?isSuggest=true (2/3/2023). Maandhui, Ousséni (2001), Parlons shimaore, Mamoudzou, Baobab. Magdelaine-Andrianjafitrimo, Valérie (2008), Littératures de La Réunion, littératures plurielles, Hommes et Migrations 1275, 188–197. Manessy, Gabriel (1997), Norme endogène, in: Marie-Louise Moreau (ed.), Sociolinguistique. Concepts de base, Bruxelles, Mardaga, 223–225. Marcellesi, Jean-Baptiste (1984), La définition des langues en domaine roman. Les enseignements à tirer de la situation corse, in: s.a. (edd.), Sociolinguistique des langues romanes, Aix-Marseille, Université de Provence, 309–314. Maturafi, Lavie (2019), Le français et le shimaoré à Mayotte. Influences réciproques, Montpellier, Université Paul Valéry-Montpellier 3, Doctoral Thesis. Milroy, James/Milroy, Lesley (1985), Authority in language. Investigating language prescription and standardisation, London, Routledge. Mori, Miki (2018), L’avenir linguistique de Mayotte par rapport à la politique linguistique, l’éducation plurilingue et la forme écrite des langues autochtones: la perception des étudiants du premier cycle, Carnets de Recherches de l’océan Indien 1, 113–130. Oakes, Leigh (2013), Beyond diglossia? Language attitudes and identity in Reunion, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 34/1, 30–45. PFC = Chantal Lyche/Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks (edd.) (2002–), Phonologie du français contemporain, Paris, Université Paris Nanterre, https://www.projet-pfc.net (2/3/2023). PFC-Réunion = Chantal Lyche (2006), Enquête Île de la Réunion, in: Chantal Lyche/Jacques Durand/Bernard Laks (edd.) (2002–), Phonologie du français contemporain, Paris, Université Paris Nanterre, https://research. projet-pfc.net/enquetes.php?id=140 (2/3/2023). Prudent, Lambert-Félix (2001), La reconnaissance officielle des créoles et l’aménagement d’un Capes dans le système éducatif de l’Outre-Mer français, Études créoles 24/1 (Lambert-Félix Prudent (ed.), Cultures, langues, société. CAPES créole(s): le débat, Paris, L’Harmattan), 80–109. Prudent, Lambert-Félix (2002), Couple domino et français jambé d’leau: variations en genres, en couleurs et en langues autour de Frantz Fanon et Mayotte Capécia, in: Dominique Berthet (ed.), Vers une esthétique du métissage?, Paris, L’Harmattan, 63–87. Prudent, Lambert-Félix (2005), Interlecte et pédagogie de la variation en pays créole, in: Lambert-Félix Prudent et al. (edd.), Du plurilinguisme à l’école. Vers une gestion coordonnée des langues en contextes éducatifs sensibles, Bern, Lang, 359–378. Reutner, Ursula (2005), Sprache und Identität einer postkolonialen Gesellschaft im Zeitalter der Globalisierung. Eine Studie zu den französischen Antillen Guadeloupe und Martinique, Hamburg, Buske. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Saïd, Sinina (2017), Enseignement, apprentissage et acquisition du français en milieu scolaire multilingue au nord de Mayotte: Situation et perspectives, Angers, Université d’Angers, Master Thesis. Schulz, Hervé (2008), Un créole omniprésent, décomplexé et tranquillisé, L’Express, 11 January, https://www.lexpress.fr/region/un-creole-omnipresent-decomplexe-et-tranquillise_473812.html (2/3/2023). SMS-Réunion = Gudrun Ledegen (2014), Corpus CoMeRe cmr-smslareunion-tei-v1: Grand corpus de sms provenant de la Réunion, in: Thierry Chanier et al. (edd.), CoMeRe Repository: Corpora of Computer-Mediated Communication in French, Clermont-Ferrand et al., Université Blaise Pascal et al., https://repository. ortolang.fr/api/content/comere/v3.3/cmr-smslareunion.html (2/3/2023). Spelo, Rastami (2021), Présentation, Mamoudzou, SHImaorais MÉthodique, http://shime.free.fr/association. php (2/3/2023).

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Valirun = Gudrun Ledegen (to appear), Valirun. Variétés Linguistiques de La Réunion, Paris, Collections de Corpus Oraux Numériques/COCOON, https://cocoon.huma-num.fr/exist/crdo/ (2/3/2023). Wolff, Éliane/Watin, Michel (2010), Introduction, in: Éliane Wolff/Michel Watin (edd.), La Réunion, une société en mutation, Paris, Economica Anthropos, 5–15.

Ursula Reutner, Philipp Heidepeter, and Marc Chalier

32 Madagascar and Comoros Abstract: French is only spoken by a quarter of the population in Madagascar and Comoros, primarily in urban and educated circles, while almost everyone uses Malagasy and Comorian. Both countries were once French colonies and experienced a troubled history after independence, which Madagascar gained in 1960 and Comoros in 1975. French serves as a co-official language besides Malagasy in mainly Christian Madagascar and besides Comorian and Arabic in mainly Muslim Comoros. It enjoys a privileged status in administration, education, written media, and literature. Malagasy and Comorian are used in parliament debates and audiovisual media, too, and Malagasy also appears in official texts, newspapers, literature, and as a taught subject. Malagasy and Comorian French show phonetic, morphosyntactic, and lexical particularities, which are better described for the former than for the latter, especially on the lexical level. Deviations from standard French are generally evaluated negatively but sometimes also seen positively. They do not only occur in oral communication but also in media and literature. Keywords: Madagascar, Comoros, French, sociolinguistics, language planning

1 Sociolinguistic situation 1.1 Geographical distribution of languages Madagascar – The Republic of Madagascar is located in the Indian Ocean off the Mozambican coast. It has a surface of 587,000 km2 and a population of approximately 25.7 million, with more people living in rural than urban areas. The flag’s colours originate from the Merina Kingdom with a white vertical band on the left next to a red and green horizontal band on the right. ‘Love, fatherland, progress’ (Amour, patrie, progrès) is its motto, and Malagasy and French are its main languages (cf. INSTAT 2021a; 2021b, 17). Malagasy – Malagasy is an Austronesian language and has eleven dialects, according to Ethnologue, and twelve, according to Glottolog: Antankarana, Bara, Masikoro, Merina (also called Plateau Malagasy), Northern and Southern Betsimisaraka, Sakalava, Tandroy and Mahafaly-Antanalana (presented together as Tandroy-Mahafaly in Ethnologue), Tanosy, Tesaka, and Tsimihety. With more than 7.5 million speakers, the Merina dialect from the Central Highlands is not only the most spoken variety but also the basis of standard Malagasy (cf. Turcotte 1981, 19; Bavoux 1993, 174; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023; Hammarström et al. 2023). French – French has 5.54 million speakers, according to the latest census, and 5.25 million with only a minority (30,000) of first language speakers, according to Ethnologue. The International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-032

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la Francophonie – OIF) provides a considerably higher number of nearly 7.73 million speakers, which corresponds to 26 % of a population predicted at 29.2 million by the United Nations in 2019. Compared to previous OIF reports, the proportion has augmented from 20 % in 2015 and 2019. The level of French spoken is higher in urban (47.2 %) than rural areas (17.8 %). The region with the highest percentage of French speakers and the only one with more than fifty percent is Analamanga (55.7 %), which comprises the capital Antananarivo. It is followed by the regions of Atsinanana (40.6 %), Vakinankaratra (33.3 %), Diana (31.7 %), Bongolava (28.4 %), Alaotra Mangoro (27 %), Ihorombe (22.1 %), Haute Matsiatra (21.4 %), Sava (16.9 %), Amoron’i Mania (16.6 %), Boeny (16.3 %), Analanjirofo (12.6 %), Sofia (12.3 %), Itasy (12.2 %), Betsiboka (11.7 %), Anosy (9.9 %), Atsimo Andrefana (9.8 %), Vatovavy Fitovinany (8.3 %), Atsimo Atsinanana (6 %), Menabe (5.7 %), Androy (5.3 %), and Melaky (4.9 %, cf. OIF 2014, 17; 2019, 32; 2022, 30; INSTAT 2021b, 17s.; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). English – Approximately 1.9 million people speak English in Madagascar. Like French, it is rather spread in urban (19.8 %) than rural areas (5.4 %) and promoted by private teaching institutes that only exist in cities (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662; INSTAT 2021b, 17). Other languages – Smaller ethnic groups that make up 2 % of the urban and 0.3 % of the rural population use languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Gujarati, Korean, Malay, Réunion Creole, Swahili, and Comorian. Chinese is not only present because of Chinese immigration since the 1990s but is also taught by the Confucius Institute located at the University of Antananarivo since 2008 and its branch offices spread all over the country (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662s.; INSTAT 2021b, 17; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Comoros – The Union of the Comoros is situated in the Indian Ocean, midway between northern Mozambique and northern Madagascar. The country consists of the three main islands Grande Comore (Ngazidja), Mohéli (Mwali), and Anjouan (Ndzwani). Geographically, also Mayotte belongs to the archipelago, while politically, it is part of France (↗31 France: Réunion and Mayotte). The three islands forming the political Comoros have an area of 1,861 km2 and a population of 888,456. The country’s flag uses Muslim symbols through a green triangle with a white crescent on the left. It also shows four stars representing the islands of the archipelago, which reappear in the yellow, white, red, and blue horizontal stripes on the right. Its official motto is ‘Unity, Solidarity, Development’ (Unité, Solidarité, Développement), and Comorian, French, and Arabic are its main languages (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 660; WB 2022a). Comorian – Comorian is a Bantu language closely related to Swahili (G44 in the Guthrie classification). It is commonly called Shikomori ‘language of Comoros’ or Shimasiwa ‘language of the archipelago’ and has at least four vernacular dialects that are mutually intelligible: Ngazidja (also Shingazidja), which is the vernacular language of Grande Comore and the vehicular language of all islands, Mwali (also Shimwali) and Ndzwani (also Shindzwani), which are spoken in Mohéli and Anjouan, and Maore, which is the language of Mayotte (cf. Ahmed-Chamanga 2011, 19; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 663s.).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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French – French has approximately 218,000 speakers (24.9 %), according to Ethnologue, most of which use it as a second language (216,000). The OIF indicates similar proportions, although again based on diverging total numbers: 25 % (196,000 of 770,000 speakers) in 2014 and 26 % (237,000 of 907,000 speakers) in 2022. The cultural and political division within the archipelago is mirrored in the linguistic situation: French is weaker in the Union of the Comoros, where the socioeconomic status has deteriorated since independence and the importance of Arabic and English has increased, than in French Mayotte, where it is spoken by almost two thirds of the population (61.6 %, cf. Ahmed-Chamanga 2011, 21; OIF 2014, 17; 2022, 30; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 663; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Arabic – Arabic is primarily spread as the language of Islam. Its presence is higher in each island’s capital than in rural areas where Koran schools are rare (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 675). Other languages – Chinese, Gujarati, Hindi, and Malagasy were introduced through migration and are mostly restricted to their respective communities. Another essential language is Makhuwa, the primary language of neighbouring Mozambique (↗35 Mozambique). Swahili historically served as a lingua franca in Comoros but is currently used by approximately 1,000 speakers only (< 1 %, cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 664; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023).  

 

 

 

 

1.2 Social distribution of languages Madagascar – Madagascar is characterized by a diglossia with French as the high and Malagasy as the low variety. As everyone speaks Malagasy and only a minority French, conflicts are inevitable (cf. Reutner 2005, 51s.). Malagasy – Malagasy is the first language of almost all Malagasy (99.9 %) and the language of daily life (cf. INSTAT 2021b, 17). French – French is mainly used as a second language and is especially spread in urban areas where the level of education is generally higher. The importance of education in mastering French is visible in the latest census, where age is a decisive factor. The relatively small proportion among 3 to 5-year-old children (4.8 %) confirms that French is rarely used as a first language at home. The increase in numbers from children aged 6 to 10 (13.1 %) via children and teenagers aged 11 to 14 (24.4 %) and 15 to 17 (29.8 %) to young adults aged 18 to 25 (31.1 %) indicates that French is mainly acquired through school. The percentage is lower among speakers older than twenty-five (27.5 %), which may go back to a lack of schooling among older generations. Gender, in turn, is no decisive factor, as the data display only slightly higher percentages for male (24.1 %) than for female speakers (23.1 %). The use of French in day-to-day communication depends on the speakers’ socioeconomic status and is particularly common in educated and wealthy circles. Proficiency in French is required for leadership positions and employment in science and technology (cf. Bavoux 1993, 184; INSTAT 2021b, 17, 25, 34, 41; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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English – English is perceived as a language of high prestige. It is mostly acquired through school, as indicated by the age distribution increasing from children aged 3 to 5 (0.5 %) and 6 to 10 (1.1 %) via adolescents from 11 to 14 (6.9 %) and 15 to 17 (12.8 %) to young adults between 18 and 25 (14.1 %), and decreasing among those older than twenty-five (9.7 %). Again, the proportion is only slightly higher for male (8.4 %) than for female speakers (8 %, cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662; INSTAT 2021b, 17). Comoros – Comoros is characterized by a triglossia with French and Arabic as different kinds of high varieties vis-à-vis Comorian as low variety. Prior to French colonization, Arabic served as a high variety together with Swahili, whose presence has declined (cf. Tirvassen 2008, 212; Ezaldine 2021). Comorian – Comorian is the first language of almost all Comorians, so its dialects, especially the vehicular Ngazidja, dominate in oral everyday communication. French – French is the language of a privileged elite and mostly restricted to written and official contexts. Though it is often required for the labour market, most Comorians do not really master it. Its use as a first and daily language is rare (cf. Full 2006, 686; Tirvassen 2008, 212; Soihili 2011, 180; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023). Arabic – Arabic is not a first language, and most Comorians do not sufficiently master it to hold a conversation. Thus, it is mostly restricted to the religious context. Its importance, however, is growing through the efforts of Islamists in recruiting followers from Comoros, the country’s membership in the Arab League, and a rising number of business leaders and young intellectuals trained in Arab countries (cf. Ahmed-Chamanga 2011, 21; Chauvet 2015, 79; Toyin/Daniel 2016, 260; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 664ss.; Walker 2019, 385s.; Ezaldine 2021). English – English enjoys high prestige, especially among young Comorians, who appreciate it for enabling them to communicate beyond the French-speaking world. Yet, speaker numbers remain low since teaching institutions are rare (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 664).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 Linguistic history 2.1 First European contacts Pre-European history – Madagascar was populated around the fifth century by Austronesians from Indonesia. They first set up villages near the coast, from where they traded with people from Comoros and the African mainland, and only gradually settled the interior from the eleventh century onwards. In this period, Islamized Swahili-speaking groups from the mainland reached Madagascar. Together with Arab traders who docked in Madagascar’s ports, they spread Islam on the northern and eastern coast between the eleventh and sixteenth centuries. While artefacts from various areas show shared cultural practices across Madagascar, the political organization varied regionally. Larger state-like administrative structures emerged from the seventeenth century onwards.

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The Merina dynasty, originating in the Central Highlands, became the most influential local power. The Comorian archipelago, in contrast, was inhabited through migration from continental Africa: Mayotte probably in the fifth century and all four islands by the tenth century. Muslim groups from the African mainland also introduced Islam in Comoros and constructed mosques from the eleventh century onwards. Subsequently, political alliances and trade relations between these groups and Comorian chiefs caused a change in the political organization and the creation of sultanates (cf. Chittick 1977, 220–225; Esoavelomandroso 1984, 604–608; Dewar/Wright 1993; Radimilahy 1998, 26; Adelaar 2006, 83–88; Randrianja/Ellis 2009, 20, 28, 53–62; Hooper 2011, 220; Allibert 2015, 5s., 24, 30; Rombi 2022). First contacts with Portuguese, British, and Dutch in Madagascar – The contact with Europeans started in 1500 when the Portuguese under the command of Diogo Dias (before 1450–after 1500) reached Madagascar and called it Ilha de São Lourenço. They had no considerable interest in the island but tied economic relations with the population of the north-western coast while attacking Arab trading posts. In the first half of the sixteenth century, shipwrecked Portuguese sailors entertained a temporary settlement in Tolagnaro on the southern coast, which could not resist indigenous attacks and was soon given up. In the seventeenth century, Malagasy groups sold enslaved people to British and Dutch traders in exchange for firearms. A British trading post in south-western Saint-Augustin could not be maintained for long in the 1640s, whereas a British-American post was successfully established in 1691 on the north-eastern island of Sainte-Marie (cf. Bastian 1952, 242s.; Chittick 1977, 226; Radimilahy 1998, 33; Brown 2000, 31s.; Bialuschewski 2005, 403–406; s.a. 2023). First contacts with French in Madagascar – First French contacts in Madagascar go back to 1602 when two French ships anchored in the bay of Saint-Augustin and exchanged goods with the local population. In 1642, the French East India Company (Compagnie française des Indes orientales) founded the first permanent trading post in Tolagnaro, which the French named Fort-Dauphin. During the following thirty years, contacts with Malagasy people living on the coast modestly spread French, but attempts at further colonization did not succeed. When the local population attacked Fort-Dauphin and killed most garrison soldiers in 1674, France formally abandoned the island until 1811. This neither excluded further miscarried attempts of settlement during the eighteenth century in Fort-Dauphin and in the north-eastern bay of Antongil nor the successful creation of trading posts, for example in Toamasina. French was still spoken to some extent, especially by fleeing pirates who sought shelter in Madagascar (cf. Bastian 1952, 244; Deschamps 1972, 76; Bavoux 1993, 173; 2000, 18; Bialuschewski 2005, 401; Rasoloarison 2014, 6; Kent 2023). First contacts with Europeans in Comoros – The Portuguese were also the first Europeans to reach Comoros. When they arrived in 1505, they did not take too much interest in it either but spread Portuguese to a certain degree through contacts with the local population. Growing Dutch, English, and French trade activities in the Indian Ocean increased the rivalry between the islands. British ships were especially welcome in the

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harbour of Anjouan, which stimulated a considerable command of English among many islanders in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, an affinity for British culture, and the presence of a British consulate until 1865 (cf. Newitt 1983, 144–158; Walker 2019, 374– 382).

2.2 Foundation of missions and colonies French and British missionaries – King Radama I (~1793–1828) promoted the modernization and Westernization of Madagascar from 1811 onwards. He intensified the contact with French and British missionaries and granted them an education monopole in 1820. The London Missionary Society not only operated more than 1,000 churches and schools but also codified and standardized the Merina dialect. Conflicts between Malagasy authorities and Europeans resulted in the closing of the mission schools and the expulsion of foreigners in 1857 under Queen Ranavalona I (~1782–1861). Teaching was then provided in the Merina dialect, which also served as the island’s official language. After Ranavalona’s death, her son Radama II (1829–1863) reallowed the presence of foreigners and signed a treaty of friendship with France in 1862. The coexistence of French and British missionaries triggered rivalry between French Jesuits, who ran French-only schools mostly in the coastal areas, and British Protestants, who opened their schools mainly in the Central Highlands and taught in English and Malagasy (cf. Turcotte 1981, 18; Deschamps 1985, 523; Bavoux 1993, 174; 2000, 18s.; Rasoloarison 2014, 7). French conquest of Madagascar – A treaty of 1841 between King Tsimiharo from Northern Madagascar and the governor of Réunion conceded the control of the Antankarana Kingdom to the French in exchange for protection against the Merina hegemony. With reference to this treaty, the entire island became a French protectorate in 1882. This extension of the French territory incited the resistance of prime minister Rainilaiarivony (1828–1896) and a war between French and Malagasy troops. The island was conquered by the French in 1895 and was officially turned into a colony in 1896. Malagasy resistance continued until 1899 in some regions and rose again in 1904/1905 (cf. Turcotte 1981, 18; Deschamps 1985, 529–538; Bavoux 2000, 19; Randrianja/Ellis 2009, 155s.; Rasoloarison 2014, 7ss.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662, 669). Linguistic colonization of Madagascar – After the conquest, French became obligatory in governmental and mission schools. In primary education, it was only taught while Malagasy remained the main teaching language, whereas in secondary education, it became the only teaching language:

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‘In primary schools, the different subjects of the programme, with the exception of French, are taught in Malagasy’.1

British mission schools tried to undermine the teaching of French, so the French governor Joseph Gallieni (1849–1916) had to remind them to include it with a minimum of fifty percent of the schedule. Few pupils attended secondary school, which aimed at preparing locals for posts in the colonial administration. Therefore, the fluent mastery of French was an elitist feature, and Malagasy kept its importance. The first Malagasy newspaper Teny Soa ‘Kind words’ began its work in 1866, and Malagasy poems, originally an oral genre, were printed. Malagasy became even more visible when Gallieni founded the Malagasy Academy (Académie Malgache) in 1902 and made the Medina dialect an official second language language besides French. Only the discussion of political contents in Malagasy was forbidden, so Malagasy national activists created a Frenchlanguage newspaper for their cause in 1923. This did not hinder Malagasy literature from experiencing a further boost with authors like Esther Razanadrasoa (1892–1931), who published novels in Malagasy under the pseudonym of Anja-Z and edited the Malagasy literary journal Tsara Hafatra ‘Good Message’, Ny Avana Ramanantoanina (1891– 1940), whose works criticize French colonialism, and above all Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo (1901–1937), who wrote in French and Malagasy and also translated French poems into Malagasy. His poetry influenced subsequent authors and constituted the beginning of bilingual publications with Presque-Songes/Sari-Nofy (1934 in French/1960 bilingual) and Traduit de la nuit/Nadika tamin’ ny Alina (1935/1960, cf. Esoavelomandroso 1976; Turcotte 1981, 18; Deschamps 1985, 523, 529–538; Fremigacci 1986, 397; Fox 1990, 35, 40–79; Rabearivelo 1990a/b; Rambelo 1991, 127; Bavoux 1993, 174; 2000, 18s.; Adejunmobi 1994, 5; Randrianja/Ellis 2009, 155s.; Rasoloarison 2014, 7ss.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662, 669; Kent 2023). Political and linguistic colonization of Comoros – The first of the Comorian islands to come under French protectorate was Mayotte (1841). The French access to Grande Comore was facilitated by a treaty between Sultan Said Ali ben Said Omar al Maseyili (†1916) and Léon Humblot (1852–1914), who purchased major parts of the island in 1885. The entire archipelago became a French protectorate in 1886, and French consequently served as the language of administration and education. The islands were initially administered by the governors of Mayotte in 1912 (cf. Halidi 2018, 409; Walker 2019, 382).

1 “Les diverses matières du programme, à l’exception de la langue française sont enseignées en langue malgache dans les écoles du premier degré” (JOMAD, art. 12).

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2.3 Independent countries Towards independence – Madagascar and Comoros became part of the French Union (Union française) as overseas territories (territoire d’outre-mer – TOM) in 1946 and shared this status until 1958 when they started following different paths. Madagascar voted for becoming an autonomous republic within the French Community (Communauté française) in a referendum and reached independence in 1960, the so-called Year of Africa. Comoros, in turn, did not join this momentum and only gained partial autonomy in 1961. After secessionist tendencies during the 1960s and protests in 1973, the TOM preponed a referendum on self-determination from 1978 to 1974. The islands of Grande Comore, Mohéli, and Anjouan voted for independence. In contrast, Mayotte chose to remain French after a conflict between the pro-French soroda activists (< soldat ‘soldier’) and the serrer-la-main ‘(lit.) to shake hands’ supporters of independence. As a result of the referendum, Comoros achieved independence in 1975 and still claims Mayotte as part of its national territory. The political division is only one of the aspects that manifest the distinctiveness of all four islands also known as insularism (cf. Cadoux 1969, 20; Turcotte 1981, 6; Gow 1984, 680; Dumont 2005, 518; Bernardie-Tahir 2011, 16; Randrianja/Ellis 2009, 177–181; Marson 2011, 97; Halidi 2018, 406). Political development in Madagascar – The prime minister of the autonomous Malagasy Republic, Philibert Tsiranana (1912–1978), became president of the First Republic of Madagascar (1960–1972). His pro-French government produced dissatisfaction, especially with regard to the educational system, which finally gave rise to a nationalist revolution primarily led by pupils, students, and workers. It brought about the dissolution of parliament in 1972 and a military dictatorship under Gabriel Ramanantsoa (1906–1979). A coup in 1975 marked the beginning of the socialist Second Republic (1975–1992) under Didier Ratsiraka (1936–2021). The Third Republic (1992–2010) was characterized by frequent changes of government and political instability: Ratsiraka lost his power in 1993, regained it in 1997, and lost it again in the election of 2001 against the former mayor of Antananarivo, Marc Ravalomanana (*1949). The new mayor of Antananarivo Andry Rajoelina (*1974) initiated violent protests and became president of the Fourth Republic in 2010 (cf. Turcotte 1981, 6, 10, 15; Bavoux 2000, 20; Marcus 2004; Blum 2011, 62–69; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 675). Linguistic development in Madagascar – The First Republic fixed the formal co-officiality of Malagasy and French. Parliamentary debates took place in both languages, with simultaneous translations in both directions being provided, and the mastery of either Malagasy or French was sufficient for civil servants until 1965. French enjoyed a privileged status in the educational, administrative, and juridical spheres, but Malagasy was not excluded. A law from 1967, for example, explicitly allowed its oral use in trials. A significant change came with the process of Malagasyzation (malgachisation), which started with the 1972 revolution and aimed at promoting Malagasy language and culture while rejecting the former colonizer’s language. Malagasy became the dominant language in education between 1978 and 1995. In courtrooms, French was only used with

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foreigners and for written judgements since Malagasy vocabulary had not yet been sufficiently developed. The number of newspapers in French decreased. Some monolingual ones, like Lumière, shut down because of political pressure, and bilingual ones, such as Madagascar-Matin, were rare. Consequently, the press landscape was primarily marked by Malagasy. Radio broadcasting in French was reduced to two hours per day in 1976, and plans were made to replace films imported from France or presented with French subtitles by Malagasy productions. Literature written in Malagasy experienced a further boost with the foundation of the Malagasy poetry association Faribolana Sandratra ‘Society to Promote Malagasy Poetry, (lit.) Circle to Elevate [Malagasy Poetry]’ in 1982. In sum, however, the project of Malagasyzation failed. A lack of resources, planning, and, in the case of education, adequate teaching material and teacher training hampered its implementation. It caused a further decline in the quality of education and an even greater distance between the majority of the population and the French-speaking elites. Malagasyzation has been negatively retained in the collective memory until today. Its decisions were revised after the end of the Second Republic when French was re-installed as the primary language of jurisdiction and education (cf. Cadoux 1969, 20; Bemananjara 1978, 538; Turcotte 1981, 6, 11s., 15s.; Gow 1984, 680, 687; Rambelo 1991, 123s.; Randrianja/Ellis 2009, 177–181). Political development in Comoros – Also in Comoros, the history after independence is marked by political instability, coups, regime changes, and an ongoing economic and political dependency on France. The first Comorian president Ahmed Abdallah (1919– 1989) only remained in office for a few months. A coup shifted the power to Saïd Mohamed Jaffar (1918–1993) and shortly after to Ali Soilih (1937–1978). The latter was supported by the French mercenary Bob Denard (1929–2007), who also participated in following coups in exchange for a position as de facto vice-ruler. Soilih pursued the country’s Arabization but was killed during the coup of 1978 when Abdallah regained control with Denard’s help and ran an authoritarian regime until his violent death in 1989. Saïd Mohamed Djohar (1918–2005), half-brother of former president Soilih, emerged victorious from the first election without military intervention in 1990. He was in charge until the coup of 1995, which was organized once again by Denard. In 1996, Mohammed Taki Abdoulkarim (1936–1998) won the elections and remained president until his death. A short interregnum under Tadjidine Ben Said Massounde (1933–2004) ended with a military coup by Azali Assoumani (*1959), who opposed the independence of Anjouan supported by Massounde and kept his position as president until 2006. Between 2006 and 2016, Ahmed Abdallah Mohamed Sambi (*1958) and Ikililou Dhoinine (*1962) served as presidents till Assoumani returned to office (cf. French 1997; Walker 2019, 383ss.).

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3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Madagascar – The official languages of Madagascar have changed several times since independence. The First Republic officialized Malagasy and French in 1960 (i), while the Second Republic removed all references to languages in 1975 (cf. Cadoux 1989, 25). Despite the failure of Malagasyzation, the Third Republic declared Malagasy as the sole official language in 1992 (ii) but added French and English in 2007 (iii). The Fourth Republic re-established Malagasy-French bilingualism in 2010 (iv). (i) (ii) (iii) (iv)

‘Malagasy and French are the official languages of the Republic of Madagascar’.2 ‘Malagasy is the national language’.3 ‘Malagasy, French, and English are the official languages’.4 ‘The official languages are Malagasy and French’.5

Comoros – Changes in the official languages also occurred in the different constitutions of Comoros. The first one of 1977 did not mention official languages at all. The second one of 1978 declared French and Arabic as co-official (i), the third one of 1992 added Comorian (ii), and the fourth one of 1999 refrained from fixing official languages. The current fifth constitution of 2001, revised in 2018, restored trilinguism but uses shikomor instead of comorien (iii, cf. C-KM 1977; 1996; 1999). (i) ‘The official languages are French and Arabic’.6 (ii) ‘The official languages are Comorian, national language, French, and Arabic’.7 (iii) ‘The official languages are Shikomori, national language, French, and Arabic’.8

3.2 Languages used in the public sphere Politicians: debates and speeches – Formal speeches of politicians are generally given in French in Madagascar, where they are sometimes opened in Malagasy, and are held in Comorian in Comoros, where they occasionally begin in Arabic. Discussions in the par-

2 “Le malgache et le français sont les langues officielles de la République malgache” (C-MG 1960, art. 2). 3 “Le malgache est la langue nationale” (C-MG 1992, art. 4). 4 “Le malagasy, le français et l’anglais sont les langues officielles” (C-MG 2007, art. 4). 5 “Les langues officielles sont le malagasy et le français” (C-MG 2010, art. 4). 6 “Les langues officielles sont le français et l’arabe” (C-KM 1978, art. 2). 7 “Les langues officielles sont le comorien, langue nationale, le français et l’arabe” (C-KM 1992, art. 2). 8 “Les Langues [sic] officielles sont, [sic] le Shikomor langue nationale, le français et l’arabe” (C-KM 2018, art. 9).

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liaments of both countries primarily occur in Malagasy and Comorian (cf. Turcotte 1981, 15s.; Soihili 2011, 177; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 673s.; Ezaldine 2021). Politicians: electability and oath – Electability in Comoros is legally linked to language proficiency. The regulations differ according to the office. Candidates for the national parliament and village or district chiefdom only have to master one official language (i–ii), while (vice-)mayors are required to read and write at least two of them (iii). The same applies to governors, for whom proficiency in Comorian and another national language is obligatory (iv). Older versions of the constitution required the country’s president and the vice-presidents to take their oath of office in Comorian (v), while the current version does not specify the language of the oath (cf. C-KM 2018, art. 57). ‘Candidates for the Union’s Assembly must [...] know how to read and write Comorian, French, or Arabic perfectly’.9 (ii) ‘To be appointed village chief or district chief, it is necessary […] to know how to read and write the national language or one of the official languages of the Union of the Comoros’.10 (iii) ‘Candidates for the functions of mayor or vice-mayor have to know how to read and write at least two of the official languages of the Union of the Comoros’.11 (iv) ‘Candidates for the election of the governor of an island have to […] know how to read and write Comorian and one of the two (2) other official languages’.12 (v) ‘Before taking office, the president of the Union and the vice-presidents take their oath in front of the constitutional court with the following formula and in Comorian: “I swear before Allah, the Clement and very Merciful, to fulfil the duties of my office faithfully and honestly, to only act in the general interest, and in the respect of the Constitution”’.13 (i)

Public authorities: buildings – Public buildings in Madagascar have signs in Malagasy and French. English sometimes also occurs, as in the case of the Public Health Ministry. In Comoros, the signs of official buildings are written in French and Arabic but not in Comorian (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 674; MPH 2023). Public authorities: identity documents – The passport of Madagascar is written in Malagasy, French, and English, whereas the Comorian one uses French and Arabic only (cf. Figure 1). Comoros also states that any official language can be used for acts related to civil status:

9 “Les candidats à l’Assemblée de l’Union doivent […] savoir lire et écrire parfaitement le shikomori, le français ou l’arabe” (Law 17, art. 8). 10 “Pour être nommé le chef du village ou le chef de quartier, il faut […] savoir lire et écrire en langue nationale ou une des langues officielles l’Union des Comores” (Decree 30, art. 4). 11 “Les candidats aux fonctions de maire ou d’adjoint au maire doivent savoir lire et écrire au moins deux des langues officielles de l’Union des Comores” (Decree 78, art. 198). 12 “Les candidats à l’élection du Gouverneur d’une île doivent […] savoir lire et écrire le shikomori et l’une des deux (2) autres langues officielles” (Decree 78, art. 175). 13 “Avant d’entrer en fonction le président de l’Union et les vice-présidents [sic] prêtent serment devant la Cour constitutionnelle selon la formule suivante et en comorien: ‘Je jure devant Allah, le Clément et le très Miséricordieux de fidèlement et honnêtement remplir les devoirs de ma charge, de n’agir que dans l’intérêt général et dans le respect de la Constitution’” (C-KM 2001, art. 13).

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‘Acts of civil status are written in one of the official languages’.14

Figure 1: Covers of the Malagasy and the Comorian passport (cf. Visaindex 2023a/b)

Public authorities: written communication – In both countries, documents such as administrative correspondences, reports, or service regulations are mainly written in French, and this especially on the national level. On the regional and municipal level, documents in Malagasy or Comorian may occur too. Both languages are used besides French for posters and flyers that inform citizens about justice and health issues, for example. In Comoros, Arabic can appear in religious formulas, for example, in obituaries published by state institutions (cf. Turcotte 1981, 12ss.; Randriamasitiana 2004, 217; Chaudenson 2006, 1988; Soihili 2011, 176s.; Waldburger 2013, 263; Hricová 2015, 31; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 673s.). Public authorities: oral communication – Citizens can approach public authorities in French and Malagasy or Comorian, and proficiency in both languages is required to obtain posts in public administration. The oral communication between employees and citizens, as well as among employees, mostly takes place in Malagasy and Comorian (cf. Soihili 2011, 176s.; Waldburger 2013, 263; Hricová 2015, 30s.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 673s.).

14 “Les actes de l’état civil sont rédigés dans une des langues officielles” (Law 10, art. 16).

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Public authorities: online communication – The homepages of the parliament, the presidency, and ministries are mainly written in French in both countries. Parallel versions in Malagasy and Comorian do not exist. In Madagascar, however, the French pages may contain Malagasy elements such as downloadable documents on the parliament’s site, news on the page of the Ministry of Justice, or quotes of the president on the start page of the presidency. In social media, state institutions from Madagascar, such as the presidency, usually communicate in Malagasy. Only a few of them make an exception, for example the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In Comoros, in contrast, the language use on Facebook and Twitter is usually restricted to French (with one single tweet in Comorian, cf. Gouvernement Comores 2018 and also Waldburger 2012, 153ss.; Antenimierampirenena 2022; MAE 2022; PdR 2022; PRM 2022; MJ 2023). Judicial system: laws and contracts – Laws are published in the official gazette in Malagasy and French in Madagascar and in French only in Comoros. Notarial acts in Comoros have to be written in the official languages (cf. Randriamarotsimba 2017, 673): ‘Notarial acts are, under penalty of being declared null and void, written in the official languages in one and the same context’.15

Judicial system: trials – The development of juridical terminology gradually enables Malagasy to replace French in the juridical context in Madagascar. Judgements, for example, are written in Malagasy only. In Comoros, civil law judgements are drawn up in French, and those of religious jurisdiction in Arabic. The latter have to be translated into French if they go to a further instance of civil law. Oral communication in the courtroom occurs in Malagasy in Madagascar as long as all involved parties speak it. French and Comorian are used in Comoros, where questions can be asked in both languages and have to be translated into one of them if uttered in a third language (cf. Turcotte 1981, 16; Rambelo 1991, 123s.; Soihili 2011, 177; Hricová 2015, 30s.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 673s.): ‘The parties and their defendants, even if they are foreigners, can ask questions […]: these have to be formulated in or translated into French or Comorian; the same applies to the answers given to them’.16

Religion – In Madagascar, Christian religious services and education primarily use Malagasy, which dominates in rural areas and coexists with French in larger cities. Many Malagasy also preserve traditional animistic beliefs and the veneration of ancestors, where they use Malagasy. Religious ceremonies of the Comorian Muslim majority are held in Arabic (cf. Rambelo 1991, 124; Randriamasitiana 2006, 59; Soihili 2011, 175; Golden 2014).

15 “Les actes notariés sont, à peine de nullité, rédigés en langues officielles dans un seul et même contexte” (Decree 28, art. 26). 16 “Les parties et leurs défenseurs, même s’ils sont étrangers, peuvent […] poser des questions: celles-ci doivent être formulées ou traduites en langue française ou comorienne; il en est de même des réponses qui leur sont faites” (CPC, art. 749).

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Military – Malagasy dominates the internal communication between soldiers enrolled in Madagascar’s army and their instruction. French is occasionally used, too, especially among higher-ranked officials (cf. Turcotte 1981, 14s.).

3.3 Languages used in education Official teaching languages – Teaching in public schools and university is generally done in French. Exceptions include the teaching of foreign languages in both countries and the first two years of primary school as well as the subjects Malagasy and sometimes religious education in Madagascar. Since not all pupils master French, it may sometimes be more of a blocking factor than an effective medium for the transmission of knowledge, as seen by high rates of academic failure. Before primary school, some Comorian children attend Koran schools. Their teaching is based on the original religious texts in Arabic, which is therefore considered the official teaching language (cf. Ahmed 2005, 448s.; Chauvet 2015, 77–82; Hricová 2015, 35s.; Lacoste/Leignel 2016, 206; Mohamed 2017, 36; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 675). Unofficial teaching languages – Teachers and pupils often unofficially resort to Malagasy and Comorian. These languages allow a higher fluency in discussions and a better understanding of explained concepts than French, which is not always sufficiently mastered. Plans for official bilingual teaching and related teaching materials have been made in Madagascar but never implemented. In Koran schools, Comorian is unofficially but systematically applied for teaching beyond reciting religious texts. A reform project of 2007 had the goal of making the use of Comorian in education official. However, teaching material has not been released, Comorian had not been sufficiently standardized, and financial resources were lacking (cf. Turcotte 1981, 8s.; Rambelo 1991, 125; Babault 2005, 113; Gastineau/Rafanjanirina 2008; Jaberg 2012; Chauvet 2015, 79ss.; Lacoste/ Leignel 2016, 206; Barbier 2016; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 675). Languages taught – French is taught in both countries. Malagasy is taught in Madagascar but not Comorian in Comoros, where Arabic is taught in some primary schools and most secondary schools. The teaching of English starts in primary school in Madagascar and in secondary school in Comoros, though public school teachers are not always well prepared for it. The situation is different in private schools such as the American School or the Vision Valley School, which are based in Antananarivo and not accessible for most children due to high school fees. The teaching of English for adults is assured in Madagascar, for example, through offers by the English Teaching Programme (ETP) or the National Centre for the Teaching of the English Language (Centre national d’enseignement de la langue anglaise – CNELA). Chinese is taught in Madagascar through the offices of the Confucius Institute in Antananarivo and other cities, though high fees hinder its broader acquisition (Ahmed 2005, 449; Hricová 2015, 35s.; Ratsiazo 2015; Lacoste/Leignel 2016, 206; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 662s.).

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3.4 Languages used in the media Press – French is the primary language of newspapers in both countries. It appears in monolingual general newspapers such as Les Nouvelles or Le Quotidien from Madagascar and La Gazette des Comores and Habari Za Comores ‘What is the news in Comoros’ from Comoros, with the latter using only French despite its Comorian name. It also prevails in specialist journals, online media like Madagascar Tribune or Comores Actualités, and bilingual newspapers like the French-Malagasy Le Citoyen, La Dépêche, L’Express de Madagascar, or Midi Madagasikara from Madagascar and the French-Arabic Al-Watwan from Comoros. In Madagascar, monolingual Malagasy newspapers are particulary spread in rural areas, as for example Ao raha ‘There is something going on’, Gazetiko ‘My newspaper’, and Tia Tanindrazana ‘Patriotic’, and tend to be cheaper than the ones in French. In contrast, newspapers in Comorian do not exist (cf. Bemananjara 1978, 538; Turcotte 1981, 12; Gow 1984, 687; Rambelo 1991, 125; Soihili 2011, 178; s.a. 2012; Waldburger 2012, 166; Hricová 2015, 31s.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 676). Radio – All of the official languages are spoken on the radio. Madagascar’s public radio station Radio Nationale Malagasy entertains one channel in French and one in Malagasy. Monolingual private radio stations use Malagasy (e.g., Radio Don Bosco, Radio Fahazavana), French (e.g., Radio Fréquence Plus, Radio Paradisagasy), or both languages (e. g., Dago Radio Sound, La Radio des Jeunes). In Comoros, the public channel Office de radio et télévision des Comores (ORTC) is aired in all three official languages but predominantly in Comorian, while the private channel MRV Radio Océan Indien offers contents in French and Comorian (cf. Turcotte 1981, 11; Rambelo 1991, 126; Soihili 2011, 178; Waldburger 2012, 164s.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 676). Television and cinema – Madagascar’s public channel Télévision Malagasy/Televiziona Malagasy and private channels, such as Dream’In TV or Viva TV, transmit in French and Malagasy (cf. TVM 2022). Recently, contents in Malagasy (e.g., ARTFX 2022) and the translation of French or English productions into Malagasy have been increasing, but also the presentation of films produced in English or Asian languages without any subtitles. French is the most common language on Comorian television, especially for films and documentaries. The public channel ORTC-TV also broadcasts programmes in Comorian in the evening hours, Koran recitations in Arabic, and the news bulletin in all three languages (cf. ORTC 2022; also Turcotte 1981, 11s.; Rambelo 1991, 126s.; Randriamasitiana 2006, 65; Soihili 2011, 178s.; Waldburger 2012, 165s.; Hricová 2015, 31; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 676). Internet – In Madagascar, Malagasy and French appear on Facebook and Twitter, and some Twitter accounts almost exclusively use Malagasy (e.g., Global Voices 2022, cf. also Scannell 2022). In Comoros, French dominates on social media, where Comorian, English, and Arabic only play minor roles. Comorian is rare on Twitter but exists, as can be seen, for example, in a thread around a Special Shikomori Day (Journée spéciale Shikomori) during which Comorians were asked to use their language (cf. Djamnasi 2020). Online comments to YouTube videos and newspaper articles occur in French, Malagasy,

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and Comorian, including code-mixing (cf. Waldburger 2012, 153–163, 166, 169; MBRSG 2014, 31; Hricová 2015, 45). Literature and music – In Madagascar, novels, poems, and song lyrics are produced in both Malagasy and French. Some authors, among them Jacques Rabemananjara (1913–2005), the creator of Madagascar’s first modern theatre play in French (Les dieux malgaches, 1947), and Hajasoa Vololona Picard Ravololo (*1956) write in French only but are sometimes influenced by Malagasy genres such as the metaphorical and love-related poetry hainteny ‘(lit.) knowledge of words’. Others almost exclusively use Malagasy, among them Clarisse Ratsifandrihamanana (1926–1987), Elie Rajaonarison (1951–2010), or Jean Verdi Salomon Razakandrainy (1913–1978), more commonly known as Dox. Again others chose or choose both languages, like Georges Andriamanantena (1923– 2008), Esther Nirina (1932–2004), Esther Randriamamonjy (*1933), Michèle Rakotoson (*1948), Jean-Luc Raharimanana (*1967), or Bodo Ravololomanga. Some of them also published bilingual works (e.g., Ravololomanga 1996; Rajaonarison 1999; Nirina 2004; Andriamanantena 2005). In Comoros, French prevails in poetry and prose, for example, in works by Mohamed Toihiri (*1955), Saïndoune Ben Ali (*late 1960s), or Soeuf Elbadawi (*1970). Theatre plays are sometimes performed in Arabic but usually in French (e.g., Hamada Hamza 2010), for example, through the Théâtre Djumbé founded in 2005 by Soumette Ahmed (*1983). Authors like Salim Hatubou (1972–2015) increasingly translate traditional oral Comorian tales into French (e.g., Hatubou 1994). The latter is also on the rise for song lyrics (cf. Adejunmobi 1994, 5; 1998, 404; Galibert 2001, 429; Clockers 2011, 15; Shango Lokoho 2011, 87ss.; Soihili 2011, 179s.; s.a. 2016; Riffard 2019, 217s.).

4 Linguistic Characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation Vowels – Malagasy and Comorian have fewer vowel phonemes than French. They only use /i, u, e, o, a/ as oral vowels and, only in Comorian, /ĩ, ũ, ã/ as nasal vowels (cf. Lafon 1991, xi; Ahmed-Chamanga 1992, 16; Biddulph 1997, 6). Therefore, the pronunciation of the schwa /ə/, the low-mid vowels /ɛ/ and /ɔ/, the rounded vowels /ø/, /œ/, and /y/, and nasal vowels may differ from standard French, especially among inexperienced speakers. The schwa /ə/ is sometimes realized as [e], as in devenir [deveniɾ] or petit [peti] instead of [dəvəniʁ] and [pəti]. The opposition /e/:/ɛ/, relevant in minimal pairs such as fée [fe] ~ fait [fɛ], is not always realized, and /ɛ/ may raise into [e] in Madagascar, as in il est laid [ilele] instead of [ilɛlɛ]. The opposition /o/:/ɔ/, visible in minimal pairs such as saule [sol] ~ sol [sɔl], is neglected in favour of /o/ in Comoros, and /o/ may be lowered into [ɔ] in Madagascar, as in rose [ɾɔz] instead of [ʁoz]. /ɔ/ can also be realized as [u] in Comorian French, as in docteur [dukuteɾa] instead of [dɔktœʁ]. The front rounded vowels /ø/ and /œ/ are often pronounced [e] in Comoros, as in docteur [dukuteɾa] instead of [dɔktœʁ], while /y/ is realized as [i] or [u], as in du pain [dipe] or sucre [sukaɾi] instead of [dypɛ͂ ]

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and [sykʁ]. The pronunciation of du pain [dipe] also shows the denasalization of nasal vowels, which tend to be replaced by oral variants: /ɛ̃/ may be realized in Comoros as [ɛ], /ɑ̃/ as [a(n)], and /ɔ̃/ as [o], as in pain [pɛ], pan [pa], France [faɾantsa], or pont [po] instead of [pɛ̃], [pɑ̃], [fʁɑ̃s], and [pɔ̃] (cf. Burr 1990, 796; Bavoux 1993, 181; Jatteau 2017, 3; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 677). Consonants – Not all French consonants occur in the local languages, which again affects the pronunciation of French in both countries. The alveolar fricatives /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ exist in Comorian but not in Malagasy, so the French oppositions /ʃ/:/s/ and /ʒ/:/z/ are not always maintained in Madagascar. This leads, for example, to the pronunciation of chaussette as [sosɛt], [ʃoʃɛt], or even the hypercorrect form [soʃɛt] instead of [ʃosɛt]. The standard French uvular fricative /ʁ/ does not exist in Malagasy and Comorian and is often realized as alveolar trill [r] or alveolar tap [ɾ] even among speakers of the social elite, which results in pronunciations such as réaliser [ɾealize], récurrent [ɾekyɾɑ̃], or intégrer [ɛ̃teɡɾe] instead of [ʁealize], [ʁekyʁɑ̃], and [ɛ̃teɡʁe]. The absence of the semiconsonant /ɥ/ in Malagasy and Comorian makes it difficult for speakers to distinguish between /ɥ/ and /w/ in pairs such as lui [lɥi] ~ Louis [lwi] or buée [bɥe] ~ bouée [bwe]. Final consonants that are silent in standard French are sometimes pronounced, as in Malagasy French porc [pɔʁk] instead of [pɔʁ], which might go back to the dominant written material used in the acquisition of French at school (cf. Bavoux 1993, 181; 2000, s.v. porc; Babault 2001, 132; UNO 2016; Jatteau 2017, 2; ACMC Radio 2022). Suprasegmental structure – On a prosodic level, speakers, especially those from the Central Highland of Madagascar, may have a lexical instead of an oxytonic stress. In addition, the syllable structure of the local languages is different from French. Comorian, for example, is a Bantu language with mostly CV syllables, so speakers may insert epenthetic vowels to avoid CVC structures and CC clusters, as in docteur [dukuteɾa], sucre [sukaɾi], tôle [toli], or tour [tuɾu] instead of [dɔktœʁ], [sykʁ], [tol], and [tuʁ] (cf. Bavoux 1993, 181; Jatteau 2017, 3).

4.2 Morphosyntax Madagascar – Determiners are sometimes omitted, as in donne-moi crayon [instead of un/le crayon]. Prepositions may differ too, as in the choice of a possessive avec instead of à and the use of depuis as an adverb: la lettre est avec [instead of à] moi and il reste là depuis [instead of depuis longtemps]. The adverb moins, if connected to a noun phrase, can be postponed to it in Malagasy French when referring to time and then replaces presque, as in il est huit heures moins instead of il est presque huit heures, while in standard French it precedes the noun phrase and is connected to it by the preposition de. The standard French coordinative structure of a first-person plural that involves the speaker [person] + et moi can be substituted by nous deux [person], as in nous deux Lydie instead of Lydie et moi. Regarding pronouns, the demonstrative pronoun ça is added to sinon, as in tu ferais bien d’aller en cours, sinon ça [instead of sinon] tu vas te faire mal voir, while

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the relative pronoun dont is rare and most often replaced by que, as in les agissements que [instead of dont] la démocratie répugne, or by où, as in l’université où [instead of dont] le recteur est le premier garant. The interrogative pronoun qui can be matched with the plural form of a verb, as in qui ont [instead of qui a] voté pour qui? Non-pronominal verbs like exploser or divorcer are sometimes pronominalized into s’exploser and se divorcer. Regarding tense and mode, the indicative may be preferred to the subjunctive, as in nous attendons que la majorité suivra [instead of suive], and the sequence of tenses can deviate, as in on a senti que ça va [instead of allait] barder or elle lui répondit que la commande a été [instead of avait été] faite (cf. Burr 1990, 796; Bavoux 1993, 182; 2000, 23 and s.v.; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 678). This might be explained as follows: ‘[W]hat is sometimes analysed as a refusal to follow the rules of the “sequence of tenses” maybe shows a type of utterance peculiar to the Malagasy speaker, explicable only from their perception of the speech act. Everything happens as if the speaker’s position in relation to his utterance, differently said the time of the speaker, was not determined once and for all but changed during the utterance’.17

Comoros – Comorian speakers may replace the preposition à by the conjunction que, as in je préfère l’équipe nationale que [instead of à] ma femme. The demonstrative determiner can be substituted by a pronoun, as in avec elles deux [instead of ces deux], which, however, is a poetic example and might thus also display a deliberate deviation. The infinitive is used instead of the past participle in the newspaper headline Les Comores m’a tuer [instead of m’ont tué]!, which might also simply be an orthographical error influenced by homophony. The same example shows a number mismatch between the plural form les Comores and the singular verb form. However, it is uncertain if and to what degree such single observations based on selected primary sources such as poetry (Beckett 1995, 180), newspapers (Issoufa 2022), or YouTube interviews (s.a. 2022) can be generalized.

4.3 Lexicon Internal innovation – Innovations without external influence primarily occur as new forms originating in derivation, composition, reduction, and reduplication, and as new meanings that come up through meaning extension, restriction, and shift (cf. Reutner 2017, 48–51). These categories are illustrated in this section with examples from Madagascar and Comoros that have been extracted from dictionaries (Bavoux 2000; PR), re-

17 “[C]e qu’on analyse parfois comme un refus de se plier aux règles de la ‘concordance des temps’ relève peut-être d’un type d’énonciation propre au locuteur malgache, explicable seulement à partir de sa perception de l’acte d’énonciation. Tout se passe comme si la position du locuteur par rapport à son énoncé, autrement dit le temps du locuteur, n’était pas déterminé une fois pour toute, mais changeait en cours d’énoncé” (Bavoux 1993, 182s.).

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search studies (Bavoux 1993, 182; Babault 2001, 134s.; Randriamasitiana 2004, 218; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 677), and primary literature (RFI 2020). Some of the internal innovations are also attested for other African varieties of French, as for example primature and radio-trottoir; the same holds for the external innovation taximan (cf. BDLP, s.v., and the examples in other chapters of this handbook). Derivation, composition, and reduction – Derivation occurs in Malagasy French tabaqueux ‘colonist cultivating tobacco’ (< tabac ‘tobacco’) and primature ‘function of the prime minister’ (< primas ‘first’ + -ture), for instance. Malagasy compounds are formed with a preposition, for example, in the case of arbre à pain ‘Artocarpus altilis, breadfruit tree’ (arbre ‘tree’ + à + pain ‘bread’) or blouse de nuit ‘female nightdress’ (< blouse ‘blouse’ + de + nuit ‘night’) and without in épicerie-bar ‘grocery store where alcohol is sold and consumed’ (< épicerie ‘grocery store’ + bar ‘bar’), inter-îles ‘between Madagascar and the neighbouring islands’ (< inter ‘between’ + îles ‘islands’), jus-concert ‘musical event where only non-alcoholic beverages are sold’ (< jus ‘juice’ + concert ‘concert’), or radio-trottoir ‘public rumour’ (< radio ‘radio’ + trottoir ‘pavement’). Reduction occurs through blending and ellipsis. Blending appears in Malagasy French examples like frangache ‘hybrid French-Malagasy code’ (< français ‘French’ + malgache ‘Malagasy’) or présicomex ‘president of the executive committee of a local administrative unit’ (< président ‘president’ + comex ‘executive committee’), ellipsis in cinq-cinq ‘(very) good, (lit.) fivefive’ (< cinq sur cinq ‘good, (lit.) five out of five’), which is supported by the popularity of reduplication in Madagascar. Reduplication – Reduplication of lexemes is used in Madagascar for intensification in depuis depuis ‘for a long time, (lit.) since since’ instead of depuis longtemps. It may also serve to weaken the single form, as in brun-brun ‘a little black, (lit.) brown-brown’ or vieux-vieux ‘a little old, (lit.) old-old’. Reduplication also exists in Malagasy, and some cases such as combien combien? ‘how much per piece?, (lit.) how much, how much?’ may even be direct calques (cf. also below chouchou in the section of plants, aye-aye in animals, fokafoka in people, and risoriso in politics and economy). In Comoros, the adjective proprochain ‘after next’ (< pro- + prochain ‘next’) shows the reduplication of the first syllable of prochain, which might originate in the interpretation of pro- as a prefix within a process of semantic reanalysis (cf. Reutner 2020, 171s.; 2023a, 126s.). It is attested, for example, in mardi proprochain ‘Tuesday after next Tuesday’ or la semaine proprochaine ‘the week after next week’ instead of mardi en huit and dans deux semaines. Meaning extension and restriction – Extension of meaning occurs in Madagascar, for example, in cabri ‘goat’ instead of ‘young goat’ or missionnaire ‘person with a mission’ instead of ‘person with a religious mission’, restriction in canne ‘sugar cane’ instead of ‘cane’, soixante-quinzard ‘person who participated in the 1975 strike’ instead of ‘1975er’, or faire double-montée/monter à double ‘to climb on a bicycle together’ instead of ‘to make double climb, to climb double’. Meaning shift – Semantic shift can be explained by metaphorical processes in Malagasy French expressions such as allemand ‘Malagasy person from the South of the island’ instead of ‘German’, which reveals a perceived adherence of the southern popula-

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tion to values attributed to Germans, baisé ‘damn’ instead of ‘fucked’, déballage ‘desire for political transparency’ instead of ‘unpacking’, or tourner la langue ‘to speak well’ instead of ‘to turn one’s tongue’, and in Comorian French items such as cortège ‘traffic jam’ instead of ‘procession’, Monsieur Météo ‘person who tells the same stories repeatedly without being aware of it’ instead of ‘weather presenter’, or tactile ‘bald man’ instead of ‘touch-screen’. Metonymical shift occurs in Malagasy nouns like bassin ‘public lavatory’ instead of ‘pool, pond’, linge ‘clothes’ instead of ‘cloth’, margouillat ‘Phelsuma laticauda, gold dust day gecko’ instead of ‘Agama agama, red-headed rock agama [type of lizard]’, sorbet ‘ice cream’ instead of ‘sorbet’, or in the verb rester ‘to live, to reside’ instead of ‘to stay’, as well as in Comorian nouns like terrain ‘airport’ instead of ‘land, ground, soil’ or designations of footwear based on its material, its function, or the occasion it is used: gommes ‘(rubber) sandals’ instead of ‘gum’, chauffeurs ‘shoes’ instead of ‘heaters’, and cérémonies ‘suit shoes’ instead of ‘ceremonies’. The antithetical shift in d’aucuns ‘nobody’ instead of ‘some’ in Malagasy French is influenced by standard French aucun ‘nobody’. External innovation – External innovation mainly occurs through borrowing from the countries’ co-official language(s). The following examples have been extracted from dictionaries (Bavoux 2000; PR), research studies (Fox 1990, 26; Gadet/Ludwig 2015, 14; Hricová 2015, 38s.), and primary sources such as newspapers (Jaberg 2012; Verneau 2021) and literature (Toihiri 1985, 25, 41, 58, 91, 94; Hatubou 1994, 33; Beckett 1995, 34, 116, 122, 195, 225; Mahavanona 2008, quoted from Ranaivoson 2019, 75s.; Wadjih 2011, 54). The selected nouns borrowed from Malagasy and Comorian are related to the domains of plants, animals, environment, housing, nutrition, objects, people, politics, economy, religion, spirituality, and culture. Borrowings also concern other parts of speech like verbs or interjections and other languages like Arabic and English. They also form the basis of new words, sometimes described as hybrids. Plants – The domain of plants includes loans from Malagasy like chouchou ‘Sechium edule, chayote’, filao ‘Casuarina equisitifolia, coastal she-oak’, hofika ‘Dioscorea bulbifera, air potato’, longoza ‘Aframomum anguistifolium, wild cardamom’, raphia ‘Arecaceae, raffia palm’, and ravenala ‘Ravenala madagascariensis, traveller’s tree’ in Madagascar. Animals – Malagasy designations for animals are, for example, aye-aye ‘Daubentonia madagascariensis, aye-aye lemur’, indri ‘Indri indri, indri lemur’, maki ‘Lemur catta, ring-tailed lemur’, souimanga ‘Cinnyris sovimanga, sunbird’, and tenrec ‘Tenrec ecaudatus, tailless tenrec’. Environment and housing – The domain of environment and housing contains Malagasy loans like ambanivolo ‘countryside’ and tavy ‘slash-and-burn technique’ as well as Comorian ones like daho ‘apartment’, mraya ‘quarter, village’, nyumba ‘house’, and vala ‘shed, hut’. Nutrition – Borrowings referring to nutrition in Malagasy French include koba ‘bread made of rice flour and groundnut’, macatia ‘small round sweet bread’, romazava ‘national dish made from jugged meat, leaves, vegetables, and rice’, or toque ‘liqueur

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made from sugar cane or distilled fruits’, as well as the more abstract items kéré ‘famine’ and sacafe ‘meal’. Comorian borrowings in this domain are, for example, vary ‘rice’ or vourga ‘alcoholic drink made from coconut’. Objects – Objects are designated by borrowings from Malagasy, such as fatapère ‘traditional stove’, filanzane ‘sedan chair’, lambabena ‘piece of silk traditionally used as a shroud’, lambahoany ‘printed piece of cotton’, and rabane ‘raffia matting’, or from Comorian, such as dawo ‘mat’, miridjo ‘wooden bowl’, as well as bwibwiyi ‘prayer veil’, chiromani ‘female piece of clothing that covers a woman’s body, hair, and potentially face’, and koffia ‘traditional Comorian headgear for men’. People – Borrowings from Malagasy referring to people are, for example, andriana ‘aristocrat’, bezali ‘person from Réunion’, fahavale ‘highwayman’, fokafoka ‘strange or mad person’, fokonolona ‘totality of inhabitants of the same village, district, or canton’, gadralave ‘prisoner’, karane ‘person with Indian origin living in Madagascar, Indian shopkeeper’, madinika ‘poor person’, manambola ‘rich person’, mpilalao ‘actor or dancer in a hira gasy’ (cf. Culture below), or zanamalate ‘mixed race person from the east coast, descendant of pirates and European traders’. Loans from Comorian in this field are mze ‘respectful title for addressing elderly men, (lit.) old (man)’ or wazoungou ‘white person’. Politics and economy – The domain of politics and economy includes loans from Malagasy like fanjakana ‘central political or administrative power’, risoriso ‘black market’, or tanambao ‘working class district’. Religion and spirituality – The area of religion and spirituality contains Malagasy borrowings such as fihavanana ‘wisdom based on solidarity and the longing for social peace’, ombiache ‘soothsayer, seer’, and zorofirarazana ‘corner of prayers’, as well as Comorian ones like msihiri ‘mosque’ and swala ‘prayer’. Culture – Malagasy items from the domain of culture are linked, for example, to theatre, dance, and musical instruments: hira gasy ‘traditional improvisational theatre’, salegy ‘popular danse from the coast’, kabôsy ‘wooden plucked string instrument’, or valiha ‘tube zither made of bamboo [national instrument of Madagascar]’. Comorian loans in this field are frequent in the context of the anda ‘traditional marriage ceremony [that lasts several days and consists of a religious act, a dowry, the presentation of jewellery, chants, and ritual dances performed by different groups of participants]’: for example, aadjlisse ‘public prayer to announce the dates of a wedding’, twarabu ‘performance of songs during the anda’, and the names of different dances such as ajalico la mabélé ‘dance performed by women through the entire village or quarter to express joy’, bora ‘dance performed by close family members’, oukoumbi ou maravo ‘dance performed by women when the bride comes out in her wedding dress’, or sambé ‘circle dance for men’. Other borrowings – Borrowings also include verbs like pétraquer ‘to stay seated on one’s heels without doing anything’ (< petraka ‘to sit down’ + ‑er) in Malagasy French, or interjections like the Comorian swear-word kodo ‘fuck!, shit!’ for the expression of anger and irritation, which is now even frequently used as equivalent to putain!, merde! in Mar-

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seille due to migration from the archipelago. Items borrowed from other languages occur in Madagascar, for example, with taximan ‘taxi driver’ from English and séga ‘dance in 6/ 8 meter performed with the feet not leaving the ground, which originated in the period of slavery’ from Swahili, which is equally used in other Indian Ocean states. In Comoros, Arabic is present in religious borrowings, for example, kuluhu wallah ‘versicle for the death’, Shahada ‘Muslim profession of faith, (lit.) account, testimony’, or sirate ‘path [of God]’. Loans may also be the basis of hybrid derivations with French affixes, as in the Malagasy French examples bôgôsité ‘male beauty’ (< bôgôssy < Fr. beau gosse ‘handsome boy’ + ‑ité) or fahavalisme ‘organized crime’ (< fahavale ‘highwayman’ + -isme).

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic attitudes Awareness of variation – Not all speakers of Malagasy French are aware of the fact that they use a variety that differs from standard French. Still, they do not necessarily react negatively when being made aware. For example, a speaker simply answered ‘happy to learn it’ (“heureuse de l’apprendre”) after being informed that depuis depuis is particularly Malagasy and does not occur in standard French. Other speakers, in turn, are more conscious of their variety. Some of them evaluate it positively, some negatively (cf. Babault 2001, 134). Regionalisms: positive evaluations – The attitude towards regionalisms is positive, for example, when the influence of Malagasy dialects on the pronunciation of French is described as musical (i) or when the use of the trill [r] is perceived as being specific to the elite of Antananarivo (ii). This pronunciation has an identity function, especially among male speakers who use it as a way to express manliness, which is also attested for Maghreb countries (cf. Bavoux 1993, 181s.; Babault 2001, 138s.): ‘The dialectal variants are very musical / for example someone from the province of Majunga or Diego / when he speaks French / there is this intonation of his dialect that enters there a little bit’.18 (ii) ‘In Antananarivo, many people / especially the bourgeois tend to roll the r […] well, I think that it is a sign of: of snobbism’.19 (i)

Regionalisms: negative evaluations – Besides these positive evaluations, regional particularities are also evaluated negatively. In Madagascar, the attitude towards [r] men-

18 “[L]es variantes dialectales sont très musicales / par exemple quelqu’un de la province de Majunga ou de Diego / quand il parle le français / il y a un peu cette intonation de son dialecte qui entre là-dedans” (Babault 2001, 131). 19 “[À] Tananarive beaucoup de gens / surtout les bourgeois ont tendance à rouler les r […] bon je crois que c’est un signe de: de snobisme” (Babault 2001, 132).

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tioned above has a negative spin when the pronunciation is described as snobbish (ii), the Merina accent is sometimes stigmatized, and the use of regionalisms is discouraged in school. The latter can be seen in the case of a teacher who assumed that écolage ‘school fee’ was not an officially existing term. The interviewee only accepted the item when finding out that it is even registered in a global dictionary, which shows a strong normative orientation and the blind trust in traditional lexicography (cf. Bavoux 2000, s.v. écolage; Babault 2001, 133–139, also for more examples). ‘I consulted the dictionary because it rubs me up the wrong way / I had thought that it didn’t exist / officially / I was surprised because I said to my pupils that it didn’t exist’.20

Value of correct French – Statements in both countries reveal that correct French is highly important for some speakers. Apart from complaints about a general decline in the quality of Malagasy French, which were articulated in the context of the OIF summit held in Antananarivo in 2016 (cf. Barbier 2016), particularly the residents of port areas are vehemently blamed for committing ‘grammatical errors that hurt the ears’.21 Comorian members of the social elite, in turn, are expected to speak flawless French. The mistakes that President Assoumani committed while speaking French in the presence of international media were politically instrumentalized against him. For his critics, these mistakes brought shame to Comoros as French has long been present in the country and children acquire it early: ‘The Comorian president has to pull himself together […]. It is not the shame of a nation if someone has made mistakes in a language that is not his or hers, the shame is that we belong to Francophonie, that we share a common history with this language for quite some time. We learn it from the cradle of school. To continue making basic mistakes would seem to have a twisted spirit. Everyone makes mistakes in a language that is not his or hers, but French is ours’.22

5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Phonology and morphosyntax – Studies on phonological and morphosyntactic features are rare for Madagascar and even rarer for Comoros. Neither country is considered in the Phonology of Contemporary French project (Phonologie du Français Contemporain – PFC, cf. Durand/Laks/Lyche 2009).

20 “[J]’ai consulté le dictionnaire parce que ça me fait tiquer / moi j’avais cru que ça n’existait pas / officiellement / j’étais étonnée parce que j’ai dit à mes élèves que ça n’existe pas” (Babault 2001, 135s.). 21 “[D]es fautes de grammaire qui blessent les oreilles” (Babault 2001, 131). 22 “Le président Comorien doit se ressaisir […]. La honte pour une nation ce n’est pas parce que quelqu’un a commis des fautes dans une langue qui n’est pas la sienne, la honte est notre appartenance à la Francophonie, notre histoire avec cette langue depuis fort longtemps. Nous l’apprenons depuis le berceau scolaire. Continuer à en faire des fautes basiques semblerait avoir un esprit tordu. […] Tout le monde commet des fautes dans une langue qui n’est pas la sienne mais le français est le nôtre” (Ezaldine 2017).

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Differential dictionaries – The lexicon of Malagasy French is described through the dictionary of Bavoux (2000). Its more than thousand entries also constitute the basis for the 264 expressions of Malagasy French in the Panfrancophone Lexicographical Database (Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone – BDLP, cf. BDLP-Madagascar). In turn, there is no dictionary of Comorian French, and the country is not represented in the BDLP. Global dictionaries – The Petit Robert (PR) includes ten meanings marked for Madagascar, often in combination with other regions: arbre à pain (also marked for Antilles, Réunion, Mauritius, and New Caledonia), canne (also Antilles and Mauritius), chouchou (also Mauritius and Réunion), linge (also Canada, Antilles, Réunion, and Mauritius), margouillat (also New Caledonia, Réunion, and Mayotte), missionnaire (also Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa), primature (also Haiti, Maghreb, sub-Saharan Africa, and Djibouti), radio-trottoir (also Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa), rester (also south-western, central, and northern France, Belgium, Canada, Northern Africa, New Caledonia, Seychelles, Réunion, Antilles, and Gabon), and taximan (also Eastern France, Belgium, Maghreb, and Congo-Brazzaville). For ten other words, the PR indicates a Malagasy etymology: filao, filanzane, rabane, raphia, ravenala, souimanga, tanrec, and the lemur species aye-aye, indri, and maki. In the case of ravenala, it additionally provides the Malagasy French pronunciation [ʀavnal] besides standard French [ʀavenala]. Not one single meaning is marked for Comoros in PR. Even the adjective comorien is not registered as an entry, though malgache and other adjectives derived from country names are listed.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used by public authorities – The governments’ official internet sites and Facebook presences use standard French in both countries. The oral French of public authorities shows deviations from standard French, the degree of which varies according to the speakers’ proficiency levels. Items related to the local environment also occur (cf. Turcotte 1981, 13ss.). Variety used in education – Some teachers in both countries do not speak standard French as they have not learned it themselves. Many also use regionalisms that are equally attested among pupils and more easily accepted in oral than in written contexts (cf. Babault 2001, 137; Randriamarotsimba 2017, 674; WB 2022b). Variety used in the media – The French in the newspapers of both countries is larded with regionalisms. In Madagascar, d’aucuns is used, for example, in “Certes d’aucuns n’objectent”23 or “D’aucuns n’ignorent que des dissensions ont pris naissance”24 (Bavoux 2000, s.v.). French in Comorian news portals includes code-switching with Arabic (i) and

23 ‘Certainly nobody objects’. 24 ‘Nobody ignores that dissensions have come up’.

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Comorian (ii). Beyond that, articles written in French may omit silent consonants, as in En d’autre terme [instead of d’autres termes] (i), and place commata unconventionally as in l’échange […], est aussi appellé or et aussi, le fait divers (iii, also in the constitution, cf. footnote 8). The same example also displays a tendency towards incomplete sentences, which, however, might constitute a deliberate stylistic decision (cf. Bavoux 2000, 17; Waldburger 2012, 167–170): “Et de vous rappeler à travers ce hadith authentique du Prophète Mohammed […] selon lequel et je cite: ‘celui qui marche avec un injuste et le soutient alors qu’il sait que celui-ci est injuste, alors il est sorti de l’Islam’. En d’autre terme et en arabe: ‘Mane mashaa ma-an dhwaalimin liyuqawwiyahu wa huwa ya-anlamu an-nahu dhwaalimun, faqade haradja an-ni Al-Islam’” (Hassani 2022).25 (ii) Pourquoi aux lycées les enseignants n’osent pas frapper les élèves? Parce que wahirema watsoremoi wajaou, mana walé lycée tsi wanatsa, wanagouvou. Vavo ma foundi w oriya. Par contre, primaires aou choni, wanatsa wa voulimiloi tou halini (Mitterand 2022).26 (iii) “L’échange de l’Euro contre le Franc Comorien(Fc), est aussi appelé achat de Fc contre l’Euro. Dans la loi de l’offre et de la demande: lorsque la demande est élevée, l’offre aussi augmente de prix. Ce qui vérifie mon hypothèse du titre de ce poste. Et aussi, le fait divers qui a conduit à un ajout de 2000fc au lieu de 1000 fc pour échanger 100 €” (Hassane 2022).27 (i)

Variety used in literature – Some authors use standard French that only shows local colour in the form of proper nouns: toponyms, for example, designating Malagasy mountains and rivers like Ambatomiatendro, Angavo, Ankaratra, or Managareza (cf. Ramarozaka 1991; Nirina 1998, 70). Other authors go further and sprinkle their French with regional vocabulary, especially borrowings from Malagasy, Comorian, and Arabic. One option for doing so is to use them naturally without giving any explanation. Another choice is to mediate them through purely linguistic translations or even further explanations offered in the text, footnotes, or glossaries. In all scenarios, the items are sometimes graphically marked (cf. Beckett 1995, 18; Carpooran et al. 2010, 93; Ranaivoson 2021, 82s.; Reutner 2023b, 256–261). Regionalisms only graphically marked – Borrowings are in some cases naturally inserted into the text and only highlighted through italics, as, for example, hofika or zorofirarazana from Malagasy (i–ii) and miridjo from Comorian (iii): 25 ‘And to remind you through this hadith of Prophet Mohammed […] according to whom and I quote: “He who walks with an unjust and supports him while he knows that this person is unjust, he has abandoned Islam”. In other words and in Arabic: “Mane mashaa ma-an dhwaalimin liyuqawwiyahu wa huwa ya-anlamu an-nahu dhwaalimun, faqade haradja an-ni Al-Islam”’. 26 ‘Why do teachers in secondary school not dare to beat pupils? Because wahirema watsoremoi wajaou, mana walé secondary school tsi wanatsa, wanagouvou. Vavo ma foundi w oriya. In contrast, primary aou choni, wanatsa wa voulimiloi tou halini’. 27 ‘The exchange of Euro against the Comorian Franc (CF) is also called purchase of CF against Euro. According to the law of supply and demand: When the demand is high, the price of the supply increases, too. Which confirms my hypothesis of the title of this post. And also the news snippet which led to an addition of 2000 CF instead of 1000 CF to change 100 €’.

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“Nous n’en sommes pas encore à tromper notre faim par les baies toxiques de hofika” (Mahavanona 2008, quoted from Ranaivoson 2019, 76).28 (ii) “Regarde, elles sont bien situées vos églises, n’est-ce pas? Juste au zorofirarazana, au coin nordest, réservé aux ancêtres” (Rakotoson 1984, 20).29 (iii) “Le lendemain, au moment où Bouc allait partir, les animaux lui ont donné trois miridjo remplis de miel” (Wadjih 2011, 54).30 (i)

Regionalisms translated in the text – Other authors consider that readers may not be familiar with the regional items and provide help for their understanding. For example, they add translations in the text, as in the French repetition of direct speech in Malagasy (i–ii) or in the French version of a Comorian song given in brackets (iii): (i) “Hosika, hosika, miala ‘ty! Dégage sale bête, dégage!” (Rakotoson 2002, 106).31 (ii) “Masima, masima, Andriananahary e Masina, masina, mitahy anay… Que tu sois béni, Seigneur, que tu sois béni, Toi qui nous protèges” (Rakotoson 2002, 197).32 (iii) “La mère de M’safoumou, frappée par cette mort, alla voir Hachim et entonna ce chant: ‘Wayili watsiyo wu hoza (Deux qui ne sont plus donnent du chagrin) / Zila n’dizo ya djowurenda (C’est ce qu’il t’aurait fait!) / Dhuja…’ (Lève-toi!)” (Hatubou 1994, 102).33

Regionalisms explained in footnotes – Another strategy of mediating cultural and linguistic particularities to readers is using footnotes that provide a translation or further information. Morphosyntactic deviations such as elles deux in a Comorian poem (i) or lexical borrowings such as bwibwiyi, chiromani, and twarabu from Comorian (ii) are merely translated. Explanations that go beyond the pure translation are given for loans such as valiha (iii) from Malagasy, the traditional tale openings allahalélé and gombbé from Comorian (iv), or religious borrowings such as shahada or sirate from Arabic (v– vi): (i)

“Je t’aimerai au-dessus d’un sentiment égoïste / Même si ma solitude est triste / Je n’ai qu’un souhait: sois heureuse / Même si c’est avec elles deux1 […] 1. ‘Elles deux’: son sentiment égoïste et sa solitude” (in Beckett 1995, 180).34

28 ‘We are not yet at the point of deceiving our hunger with the toxic berries of hofika’. 29 ‘Look, they are nicely located, your churches, aren’t they? Just at the zorofirarazana, in the north-eastern corner, reserved to the ancestors’. 30 ‘The following day, when Bouc [‘(lit.) male goat’] was about to leave, the animals gave him three miridjo filled with honey’. 31 ‘Hosika, hosika, miala ‘ty! Clear off, dirty beast, clear off!’. 32 ‘Masima, masima, Andriananahary e Masina, masina, mitahy anay… Praised shall you be, Lord, praised shall you be, You who protects us’. 33 ‘M’safoumous’s mother, hit by this death, went to see Hachim and started singing this song: “Wayili watsiyo wu hoza (Two who do not exist anymore give grief) / Zila n’dizo ya djowurenda (This is what he would have done to you!) / Dhuja…” (Stand up!)’. 34 ‘I will love you beyond a selfish feeling / Even if my loneliness is sad / I only have one wish: be happy / Even if it is with these two1 […] / 1. “These two”: His selfish feeling and loneliness’.

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(ii) “Twarabu1 / La foule immense / La femme en chiromani2 / Ou les grand-mères / En bwibwiyi3, le noir fidèle de nos mères […] 1. Le Twarabu est le dernier gala qui clôt toutes les cérémonies du grand mariage. 2. Le chiromani est la robe traditionnelle en forme de tente que portent les Comoriennes. Il permet à la femme de se couvrir la tête et de se voiler le visage. 3. Le bwibwiyi est une robe noire que portent les musulmanes très strictes. Le visage est complètement couvert par un voile noir” (in Beckett 1995, 195).35 (iii) “Valiha2 […] 2. Nom d’un instrument à cordes très populaire à Madagascar” (Rabearivelo [1935] 1990b, 100).36 (iv) “Allahalélé (1)! Je vais vous conter des histoires; un conte est mensonge. […] Allahalélé! Personne ne dit ‘gombbé’ (2)? Personne? […] (1) Formule qui correspond à ‘Il était une fois’. Dans ‘Allahalélé’, nous trouvons ‘halé’ qui veut dire ‘contes’ mais aussi ‘longtemps’. (2) Nous avons demandé le sens de ce mot à des personnes âgées, mais la réponse est presque la même: ‘on a toujours répondu au conteur par ce mot’” (Hatubou 1994, 11).37 (v) “Je me souviens toujours de ces temps de jeunesse / Nous avons toi et moi appris la Shahada3 / Et répété souvent tous les grands noms d’Allah […] 3. Shahada est un mot arabe qui signifie ‘le témoignage’ et renvoie à la profession de foi islamique” (in Beckett 1995, 116).38 (vi) “Le Miséricordieux, à toi la gloire / En toi nous espérons matin et soir / Guide-nous sur la sirate2 par ton pouvoir / Le jour où l’on ne saura ni manger ni boire […] 2. La sirate est le chemin droit dont il est question dans la Fâtiha” (1995, 225).39

Regionalisms graphically marked and explained in footnotes – Some works display multiple strategies to highlight regionalisms. The combination of graphical marking through italics and explanations in footnotes is particularly frequent. Again, the footnotes include mere translations, as in the phrase Mano ahoana ianareo e? from Malagasy (i) or the borrowings anda, dawo, and vary from Comorian (ii–iv), and further explanations, as for kéré and tavy from Malagasy (v–vi), koffia from Comorian (vii), or Subhana Allah

35 ‘Twarabu1 / The immense crowd / The woman in the chiromani2 / Or the grandmothers / In the bwibwiyi3, the faithful black of our mothers […] / 1. The Twarabu is the last gala that ends all ceremonies of the big marriage. / 2. The chiromani is the traditional dress in form of a tent that Comorian women wear. It allows the woman to cover her head and to veil her face / 3. The bwibwiyi is a black dress which very strict Muslim women wear. Their face is completely covered by a black veil’. 36 ‘Valiha2 […] / 2. Name of a very popular string instrument in Madagascar’. 37 ‘Allahalélé (1)! I will tell you stories; a tale is a lie. […] Allahalélé! Nobody says “gombbé” (2)? Nobody? […] / (1) Formula that corresponds to “once upon a time”. In “Allahalélé”, we find “halé” which means “tales” but also “a long time”. / (2) We have asked old people for the meaning of this word, but the answer is almost the same: “We have always answered the narrator with this word”’. 38 ‘I always remember these times of youth / We have, you and I, learned the Shahada3 / And often repeated all the big names of Allah […] / 3. Shahada is an Arabic word which means “the testimony” and refers to the Muslim profession of faith’. 39 ‘The Merciful, glory to you / In you we hope in the morning and in the evening / Guide us on the sirate2 by your power / The day when we will neither know how to eat nor to drink […] / 2. The sirate is the right path treated in the Fatiha [the first Surah of the Koran]’.

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from Arabic (viii). Sometimes, the graphical marking can also occur through quotation marks, as in kuluhu wallah from Arabic (ix): “‘Mano ahoana ianareo e?’ (1) […] (1) Traduction: Comment allez-vous?” (Rakotoson 1984, 19).40 (ii) “Et Fatima, est-ce que ton oncle qui est à Madagascar et qui n’a pas encore fait son Anda (2), estce qu’il se trouvait à Majunga ou ailleurs? […] (2) The grand mariage” (Toihiri 1985, 98s.).41 (iii) “Il dormait par terre sur un dawo (1) […] (1) Natte” (1985, 25).42 (iv) “Ils quittent leur pays pour venir manger le vary (2) des Malgaches […] (2) Riz” (1985, 91).43 (v) “[L]e jour où on parla de kéré4, on crut qu’on s’était trompé de region […] 4 Terme employé pour designer la famine dans le Sud, region sèche, alors que la region tanala est au contraire très humide” (Mahavanona 2008, quoted from Ranaivoson 2019, 76).44 (vi) “Les tavy2 n’ont jamais autant fleuri en cette année de disette [...] 2 Culture sur brûlis, théoriquement interdite” (Mahavanona 2008, quoted from Ranaivoson 2019, 75).45 (vii) “Au lieu de porter son koffia (1) […], il couvrit son chef d’un chapeau […] (1) Bonnet blanc que portent les Comoriens et ressemblant aux toques des chefs cuisiniers” (Toihiri 1985, 94).46 (viii) “Quelle foule! Subhana Allah3! […] 3. Petite formule religieuse en arabe” (Wadjih 2011, 58).47 (ix) Avez-vous lu la prière des morts? Avez-vous récité les ‘kuluhu wallah’ (3) devant les tombes? C’est bien, que Dieu vous bénisse! […] (3) Verset qu’on lit pour les morts” (Hatubou 1994, 33).48 (i)

Glossaries – Other works offer a glossary at the end of the volume, as, for example, Meitinger/Marimoutou (1998), Nirina (1998), Picard (1998), or Mahavanona (1999) in Madagascar, and Elbadawi (2007) in Comoros (cf. Ranaivoson 2021, 82s.). Conclusion – Literature from both countries often transmits cultural realities through regionalisms. Many authors mark them graphically, translate them, or even ex-

40 ‘“Mano ahoana ianareo e?” (1) […] / (1) Translation: How are you?’. 41 ‘And Fatima, was your uncle who is in Madagascar and who hasn’t made his Anda (2) yet, was he in Majunga or elsewhere? […] / (2) The big marriage’. 42 ‘He slept on the ground on a dawo (1) […] / (1) Mat’. 43 ‘They leave their country to come and eat the vary (2) of the Malagasy […] / (2) Rice’. 44 ‘[T]he day when we talked of kéré4, we thought we were in the wrong region […] / 4 Term used to designate the famine in the South, a dry region, while the Tanala region is very humid in contrast’. 45 ‘The tavy2 have never bloomed so much in this year of famine […] / 2 Slash-and-burn farming, theoretically forbidden’. 46 ‘Instead of wearing his koffia (1), he covered his head with a hat […] / (1) White headdress that Comorian men wear resembling the hats of kitchen chefs’. 47 ‘What a crowd! Subhana Allah3! […] / 3. Small religious formula in Arabic [(lit.) praise be to Allah]’. 48 ‘Have you read the prayer of the dead? Have you recited the “kuluhu wallah” (3) in front of the graves? It is good, may God bless you! […] / (3) Verse that is read for the dead’.

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plain their background. By doing so, they inform readers who are unfamiliar with the countries about Malagasy and Comorian daily life, history, and culture. This conscious use of regionalisms contributes to the higher acceptance of deviations from hexagonal French and can be seen as a sign of pride in regional identity. Acknowledgements: The authors are grateful to Tiana Noëlle Rakotondravony for her translations from Malagasy and her information on contemporary language use in Madagascar and to Julia Kölling for her proofreading.

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Hassani, Abdou (2022), Mais, où sont nos Ulémas dans une telle anarchie?, Habari Za Comores, 6 June, https://www.habarizacomores.com/2022/06/mais-ou-sont-nos-ulemas-dans-une-telle.html (2/3/2023). Hatubou, Salim (1994), Contes de ma Grand-Mère (Contes Comoriens), Paris, L’Harmattan. Hooper, Jane (2011), Pirates and Kings: Power on the Shores of Early Modern Madagascar and the Indian Ocean, Journal of World History 22/2, 215–242. Hricová, Lucia (2015), Situation linguistique et évolution du français contemporain dans l’archipel des Comores, Olomouc, Palacký University Olomouc, Master Thesis. INSTAT (2021a), Résultats définitifs du RGPH-3 2018. Troisième Recensement Général de la Population et de l’Habitation, Antananarivo, Institut national de la statistique, https://www.instat.mg/p/resultatsdefinitifs-du-rgph-3-2018-troisieme-recensement-general-de-la-population-et-de-lhabitation (2/3/2023). INSTAT (2021b), Troisième recensement général de la population et de l’habitation. Rapport thématique sur les résultats du RPGH-3. Thème 02: Compétences linguistiques et scolarisation à Madagascar, Antananarivo, Institut national de la statistique, https://www.instat.mg/documents/upload/main/INSTAT-RGPH3_ CompetencesLinguistiquesetScolarisation_Fev-2021.pdf (2/3/2023). Issoufa, Djamal Eldine (2022), Les Comores m’a tuer!, Habari Za Comores, 30 July, https://www. habarizacomores.com/2022/07/les-comores-ma-tuer.html (2/3/2023). Jaberg, Samuel (2012), La maîtrise du français faiblit à Madagascar, Swissinfo, 20 December, https://www. swissinfo.ch/fre/societe/influence-linguistique_-la-ma%C3%AEtrise-du-fran%C3%A7ais-faiblit-%C3%A0madagascar-/31063744 (2/3/2023). Jatteau, Adèle (2017), Phonologie du comorien, Paris, Université Paris 8, https://lgidf.cnrs.fr/sites/lgidf.cnrs.fr/ files/images/phono.comorien.pdf (2/3/2023). JOMAD = République Française, Arrêté modifiant le règlement annexé à l’arrête du 14 février 1916, portant réorganisation de l’enseignement officiel des indigènes dans la colonie de Madagascar et Dépendances, Journal Officiel de Madagascar et Dépendances 2231, 142–159. Kent, Raymond K. (2023), Madagascar, in: Tracy Grant et al. (edd.), Encyclopedia Britannica, Chicago, Britannica Group, https://www.britannica.com/place/Madagascar (2/3/2023). Lacoste, Philippe/Leignel, Lionel (2016), L’éducation aux Comores. Un modèle français en phase de lente hybridation, Revue Tiers Monde 3, 197–221. Lafon, Michel (1991), Lexique français-comorien, Paris, L’Harmattan. Law 10 = Présidence de la République (1984), Loi n° 84-10 du 15 mai 1984 relative à l’état civil, Africa Laws, https://www.africa-laws.org/Comores/civil%20law/Loi%20n%C2 %B0 %2084-10 %20du%2015 %20mai% 201984 %20relative%20 %C3 %A0 %20l%27 %20Etat%20civil.pdf (2/3/2023). Law 17 = Présidence de la République (2014), Loi n°14-017/AU, relative à l’élection des représentants de la nation, in: Jacques Leclerc (2022), Aménagement linguistique dans le monde, Quebec, Université Laval/CEFAN, https://www.axl.cefan.ulaval.ca/afrique/comores-lois_div.htm (2/3/2023). MAE 2022 = Ministère des Affaires étrangères de la République de Madagascar (2022), Page officielle du Ministère des Affaires étrangères, Antananarivo, Ministère des Affaires étrangères de la République de Madagascar, https://www.facebook.com/diplomatie.gov.mg/ (2/3/2023). Mahavanona, Hery (1999), Urgence d’écriture, Saint-Paul, Grand Océan. Mahavanona, Hery (2008), D’eau et de larmes, in: Hery Mahavanona, Cauchemar de chlorophylle, Antananarivo, Tsipika, 108–115. Marcus, Richard R. (2004), Political Change in Madagascar: Populist democracy or neopatrimonialism by another name?, ISS Paper 89, 1–20. Marson, Magali Nirina (2011), Introduction à une littérature en archipels. Les « COM’OR », un champ littéraire spécifique: “natif natal”, in: Jean-Luc Raharimanana/Magali Nirina Marson (edd.), Les Comores: une littérature en archipel, Lecce, Alliance française, 89–119. MBRSG (2014), Citizen Engagement and Public Services in the Arab World: The Potential of Social Media. Arab Social Media Report, Dubai, Mohammed Bin Rashid School of Government, https://www. arabsocialmediareport.com/UserManagement/PDF/ASMR6_En_Final.pdf (14/3/2022).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Guilhem Florigny, Elissa Pustka, and Joëlle Perreau

33 Mauritius and Seychelles Abstract: This chapter compares the (socio‑)linguistic situation of the French language in Mauritius and Seychelles, two island states of the Indian Ocean. While both countries share similar colonial histories of successive French and British occupation, the role of French varies greatly between the countries. In Mauritius it is now largely used as a second language and in Seychelles as a third language. Furthermore, a local variety of Mauritian French has long been attested, whereas there have been few descriptions of French in Seychelles, mainly due to its limited use. The first sections of the chapter compare the sociolinguistic situation of French in both Mauritius and Seychelles from a synchronic and diachronic perspective and review the language policy prevailing in both countries. The linguistic characteristics of French in Mauritius and Seychelles will be presented (phonology, morphosyntax, and lexicon). The last part of the chapter will focus on internal language policy, particularly language purism in the diglossic contexts in which French appears with Creole and English, as well as the effective use of French in these countries: its presence in the public domain, in the media, and in literature. Keywords: varieties of French, Mauritius, Seychelles, creole-speaking countries, FrenchCreole diglossia

1 Sociolinguistic situation Mauritius – The Republic of Mauritius is an archipelago that comprises, besides the main island of Mauritius, the islands of Rodrigues, Agalega, the Chagos archipelago, St. Brandon, and Tromelin, with the latter four constituting the “outer islands”. While St. Brandon and Tromelin are uninhabited, the Agalean population (around 300 people) is totally Creole-speaking, as were the inhabitants of the Chagos archipelago, who were deported from these islands to Mauritius and Seychelles in the late 1960s (Vine 2011, 35). On Rodrigues Island, the last national census (MCSO 2011) indicates that only 351 people spoke French at home, from a total population of 39,869. Most Rodriguans nevertheless use French as a second language. As few Mauritians speak French except the inhabitants of Mauritius island, we will focus on Mauritius island in this chapter. The Constitution of Mauritius of 1968 distinguishes four “communities”, confirmed by the 2018 constitution: “the population of Mauritius shall be regarded as including a Hindu community, a Muslim community and a Sino-Mauritian community; and every person who does not appear, from his way of life, to belong to one or other of those communities shall be regarded as belonging to the General Population, which shall itself be regarded as a fourth community” (C-MA 2018, section 31/2, 3). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-033

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In 1972, the majority of the population were Hindus (52 %), while 17 % were Muslims and 3 % were Sino-Mauritians (cf. MCSO 1972, 2). The rest of the population –white people (descendants of colonists), Creoles (descendants of Slaves), and people of colour (descendants of free ‘mixed people’)– form part of the ‘General population’ (29 %, cf. MCSO 1972, 2; Stein 2017, 77). The last national census of 2011 abandoned the criteria of religion when analyzing language use. In this census, 51,214 of 1,236,817 respondents (4 %) declared that they used French as a language ‘usually spoken at home’ (cf. MCSO 2011, 81). In contrast, 87 % used Creole, 5 % Bhojpuri, and 0.5 % English. Most of the other languages spoken in Mauritius have been present since the French colonization (like the Dravidian languages, Tamil and Telugu) or imported through British colonization of the Indian subcontinent (as Hindi, Urdu, Marathi, Gujarati) or from Southern China (Hakka, Cantonese, and Mandarin). There is an important difference between the urban and rural zones with regards to French as a first language: 7 % of the urban population speak French at home on a regular basis compared with only 3 % in rural areas. As only one language could be marked in the questionnaire by the participants, the results obscure that most Mauritians regularly use more than one language: according to Atchia-Emmerich (2005, 90), 90 % of the population has a good knowledge of French. Originally, French was the first language (L1) of White ‘Franco-Mauritians’ and people of colour representing about 2 %–3 % of the population (cf. Carpooran 2013, 76). White men are generally early bilinguals with Creole (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 44; Stein 2017, 80). According to the 2011 census, the percentage of French-speaking people is particularly high in three regions: first, along the west coast at the South of the capital Port Louis (in Tamarin 36 %, Albion 34 %, Flic-en-Flac 28 %, and Grande Rivière Noire 27 %), second, in the North of the island (Grand-Baie 22 % and Cap Malheureux 12 %), and third, in the centre (around Beau Bassin/Rose Hill 10 %–14 %, Curepipe 10 %, and QuatreBornes 11 %–13 %, cf. MCSO 2011, 87–90). Bosquet-Ballah (2017, 253) uses the term ‘Francophone isles’ (“îlots francophones”) in this context:  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

‘If we rely on figures related to urban regions, we must agree with Baggioni and Robillard […] and admit that French is an urban language, but the figures relating to areas of rurbanization illustrate a Francophone dynamic emanating from areas traditionally described as rural. […] More than a reflection of this urbanization, French is a symbol that is constructed just as much as one’s social wealth, to indicate a rewarding way of life that seems to be characteristic of rurbanization’.1

The concept of rurbanization referred to in the quote is a process through which rural areas tend to adopt social practices and activities that are traditionally associated with

1 “Si on se fie aux chiffres relatifs aux régions urbaines, force est de constater qu’il faut donner raison à Baggioni et Robillard […] en admettant que le français est une langue urbaine, mais les chiffres relatifs aux espaces marqués par la rurbanisation illustrent d’une dynamique francophone émanant des zones traditionnellement qualifiées de rurales. […] Plus que le reflet de cette urbanisation le français est un symbole que l’on érige tout autant que sa richesse sociale, pour signaler un mode de vie valorisant qui semble être caractérisé de la rurbanisation” (Bosquet-Ballah 2017, 251ss.).

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urban areas. This can be prompted by individual migration of urban populations to rural areas and/or an overt planning of residential developments. In addition to the White descendants of colonists, a new group of Francophone speakers has emerged since the 1980s: new speakers of French, called néofrancophones (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 70ss.; Carpooran 2013, 86s.). These are either those who speak French as their first language, whose parents had it as a second or third language and transmitted it to their children, or those parents who decided to switch from another language to French and transmitted it to their children. Mauritius has been a member of the Commonwealth since its independence on 12 March 1968, and it joined the International Organization of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) in 1970. Seychelles – The Republic of Seychelles is an archipelago made up of 116 islands in the Indian Ocean north of Réunion, Mauritius, and Madagascar. This small island state covers an area of 455 km2 over a total area of 1.4 million km2. The 116 islands are classified according to their geological nature: around forty of the islands are granite islands, while over 70 are formed of coral. Secondly, the archipelago is divided into Inner Islands and Outer Islands, according to the distance of the islands from the main island of Mahé. The Inner Islands are clustered around the main islands of the archipelago: Mahé, Praslin, La Digue, and Silhouette. This first group comprises forty-three islands, forty of which are granite and three coral. The Outer Islands are made up of five distinct subgroups: the Farquhar Archipelago, the Southern Coral Archipelago, the Alphonse Archipelago, the Aldabra Archipelago, and the Amirantes Archipelago. About thirty-three of the 116 islands are inhabited. Most of the Seychelles population is found on the four largest islands, namely Mahé, Praslin, La Digue, and Silhouette. In June 2021, the Seychelles National Bureau of Statistics (2021, 1) estimated the Seychelles population at 96,762: 49,259 men and 47,503 women. A variety of ethnicities are represented as a result of the periods of colonization the archipelago has undergone. In 1770, the first inhabitants of Seychelles spoke French, and above all Creole, learned or acquired from their islands of origin: Isle de France (Mauritius) and Bourbon (Réunion, cf. Guébourg 2004). Chaudenson argues that the origin of these first Seychellois explains the Creole spoken in this archipelago: ‘Seychelles Creole, while being close to Mauritian, shares many traits with Réunion Creole’.2 Creole was spoken from when Seychelles was first settled, in contrast to the situation of the other neighbouring islands. After this first settlement, the archipelago experienced periods of emigration as well as immigration in some years, but neither the departure of many of the French settlers after the abolition of slavery nor the following arrival of enslaved people freed from slave ships had much influence on the Creole spoken on the islands. Seychellois Creole remains predominantly French in terms of its lexical origin.

2 “Le créole seychellois, tout en étant proche du mauricien, partage bon nombre de traits avec le réunionnais” (Chaudenson 1995, 30).

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Interestingly, Seychelles did not experience the sugar agribusiness in the same way as Mauritius and Réunion in the nineteenth century. The islands therefore do not have a large Indian population (cf. Chaudenson 1979a, 35). It is the absence of the Indian and Chinese ethnic groups that gives the Seychellois population a stronger African influence compared to Mauritius and Réunion. Hence, the Indian and Chinese languages are not among the first major languages of the archipelago. French colonization (1756–1814) thus gave Seychelles two main languages: French, spoken by the settlers, and Creole, spoken by the rest of the inhabitants (cf. Bollée 1993, 85; Parent 2018, 40ss.).

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of French Mauritius – Mauritius was discovered in the Middle Ages by the Arabs and used, from the beginning of the sixteenth century, as a stopover by Portuguese sailors. The first settlers were Dutch (1598–1710), then French (1715–1810), before the island was taken over by Great Britain (1810–1968). Several other population groups arrived during these colonial periods: enslaved populations from Africa, Madagascar, and India (1721–1835), indentured workers from India (1835–1923), Chinese merchants (at the end of the nineteenth century), and from the second half of the twentieth century onwards new immigrants came from Rodrigues, Seychelles, Réunion, and France (the latter two bringing with them other varieties of French). Contact between French settlers and enslaved people resulted in a new population group of Creoles, who spoke less French than the Whites but more than the other groups (cf. 1.1). From 1721 onwards, new settlers came directly from the North-West regions of France, while others came from the neighbouring Bourbon Island (now known as Réunion). They brought two varieties of French to the island: dialects from North-West France (normand, poitevin, etc.) and administrative French (cf. Carpooran 2013, 78). Seychelles – In Seychelles, French has been in use since the first French settlers arrived in 1770. The first inhabitants of Seychelles were ‘fifteen whites, seven slaves, five Malabars, and a Negress’3 coming from Isle de France (Mauritius) island (cf. Callandre 2011, 743), with Malabar referring to the south-western coast of India (Malabar Coast), which has given the Mauritius French/Creole word malbar to designate Indian people pejoratively (cf. Carpooran 2019, 786). The case of Seychelles, and to a lesser extent that of Rodrigues, is more complex than Réunion and Mauritius as, although they are unequal in importance, immigrants came from both Bourbon and Isle de France. Though occupation of the archipelago began in 1770, the early years of the new colony were arduous, and most of the first settlers did not stay. Hence, in 1787, the Ordinance states that

3 “Quinze blancs, sept esclaves, cinq malabars et une négresse” (Seychelles National Archives 1770).

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concessions should be given ‘as much as possible […] only to Creoles from Isle de France and Bourbon islands, as well as those from Seychelles islands’.4

2.2 Milestones of its further development Mauritius – Mauritius was a French colony for almost a century (1715–1810) until it was handed over to the British, following the capitulation of the colony on 3 December 1810. Nevertheless, it was only in 1814 that the Treaty of Paris (Traité de Paris) was signed by Louis XVIII, officially assigning the Mauritius islands to the British Empire. However, Article 8 of this Treaty indicated that the French settlers could keep their properties, their religion, and their language (cf. Toussaint 1969, 398; Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 25). The British, who had taken the island as a means to stop the ransacking of their ships by French corsairs and to halt the advance of the French in India, had no particular interest in developing the colony. Thus, they replaced the administration of the island but let the French settlers keep their way of life. It was only in 1831 that a first document relating to the use of English in the colony was sent by the Colonial Office to the Governor of Mauritius (cf. Toussaint 1969, 400s.). This mainly concerned the judiciary system and commanded that all communication in French should be sent together with a proper translation in English. Ten years later, on 25 February 1841, another Order-in-Council indicated that only documents written in English would be considered originals, while those written in French would be regarded as translations, showing a shift between the use of the two languages. No official decision was made in Mauritius on the language of education during most of the British colonial period. It was only in 1941 that the Ward Report indicated that English should be the sole language of instruction of the Mauritius colony, starting from the fourth year of primary school. The 1957 Education Ordinance (cf. Republic of Mauritius 1957) maintained this policy, which is still in force in Mauritius today, though Mauritius gained independence in 1968 and became a Republic in 1992 (cf. Touboul 2010, 55s.). Seychelles – Following the capitulation of Mauritius (then Isle de France) to the British in 1810 (from which Seychelles was administered) and the Treaty of Paris in 1814, Seychelles became a British colony, but governance of Seychelles was still carried out from Mauritius. Jean-Baptiste Quéau de Quinssy, administrator of Seychelles during French colonization, was given the same role by the British in 1814. He played an important role in the survival of the French language in Seychelles. Lionnet (1987, 74) explains that there was no mass immigration of settlers after the Treaty of Paris and that Seychelles –too small and too insignificant– was never a settlement colony for Great Brit-

4 “[Il faut ne donner des concessions] autant que faire se pourra [...] qu’à des créoles des Isles de France et de Bourbon et à ceux des isles Seychelles” (in Chaudenson 2013, 35).

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ain, who had acquired the islands solely as a means to stop French corsairs raiding British ships. Thus, Seychelles was largely left to its own devices: governed by the same laws as before, while the colonists and their descendants were able to continue to live in the French style, as they had done under French governance. Hence, the languages spoken in the archipelago remained French and Creole. English gradually made an appearance, but the indifference of the colonial administration in the early years of colonization gave French a good head start. On 31 August 1903, the archipelago became a full colony of the British Crown and cut all administrative links with Mauritius, but this did not result in many changes to the language policy of the British in the archipelago. It was only in the 1940s that the British began to increase the influence of their language, namely by imposing it as the sole medium of instruction in public schools (Parent 2018, 43). Hence, towards the end of British rule, English had established itself as the colony’s first written language and as its second most spoken language. On 29 June 1976, the United Kingdom granted independence to Seychelles. After independence, a revision of the Constitution began, and one of the key changes concerned languages. Promoting a “balanced bilingualism” (Barthélémy 2009, 162), Seychelles chose two official languages: English and French. The ruling coalition government of the new State chose for Seychelles to become a member of both the Commonwealth and the OIF in 1976. In addition, after a coup d’état in 1977, the new government, under the presidency of France-Albert René, made Creole the third official language alongside English and French in the new Constitution of 1979 (cf. Rispail/Colin 2000; Barthélémy 2009, 162s.).

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Mauritius – While many languages have been used simultaneously on Mauritius island since colonial times (mainly Creole, Bhojpuri, and French as first languages), Mauritius does not have an official language de jure (cf. Carpooran 2003, 25–31 and 201–204). De facto, the language used for public administration has been English since independence, as it was under British colonial rule (cf. Kriegel 2017, 609). In addition, the use of French is allowed in parliament, as stated in the Article 49 of the Constitution of Mauritius: The official language of the Assembly shall be English, but any member may address the chair in French (C-MA 2016, art. 49).

This is the sole mention of languages in the legislation of Mauritius. Seychelles – English, French, and Creole were all widely used in Seychellois society before independence in June 1976. English enjoys privileged social recognition, being

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the main language of administration, education, and commerce. French was the language of the Church and of the bourgeoisie. Creole was the language of the family and of oral communication. However, in the Constitution of Seychelles, English was the only designated official language of the National Assembly. French and Creole were simply recognized as the two other languages of the country, and their use was ‘authorized’. The Constitution of the Republic of Seychelles promulgated on 18 June 1993 declares, in its very first pages, that “[t]he national languages of Seychelles shall be Creole, English and French” (C-SC 1993, art. 4). Later versions of the constitution confirmed this status. Mauritius and Seychelles – Both Mauritius and Seychelles are members of the Commonwealth and of the OIF. They also form part of the South African Development Community (SADC), which officially uses three languages (English, French, and Portuguese), and of the Indian Ocean Commission (Commission de l’océan Indien – COI), an institution regrouping all south-western Indian Ocean islands (namely Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Réunion, and Seychelles), which uses French as its sole language of communication. The French Alliance (Alliance Française), a French association created in France in 1883 for the promotion and diffusion of French, is present in both countries. The French Alliance of Mauritius (Alliance Française de Maurice) was founded in 1884 and is the oldest one in the world outside France, while Seychelles’ French Alliance was created in 1956. French is also promoted in Mauritius through the French Institute of Mauritius (Institut français de Maurice – IFM), which was born from the Charles Baudelaire Cultural Centre (Centre Culturel Charles Baudelaire) in 2010. This institute also hosts the office of the Cooperation and Cultural Action Service (Service de Coopération et d’Action Culturelle – SCAC) of the French Embassy, which helps Mauritian students wishing to pursue their studies in France.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities While English is the language of public administration and economics in both territories, French is only used in these fields if the correspondents, investors, or organizations are French-speaking. Creole, the first language of almost the entire population in both countries, predictably dominates oral communication in the field of politics. In Seychelles politics, French and English are only used when necessary – if the audience is not entirely Seychellois. At the National Assembly, the language of oral communication is Creole, but English is used in the writing of official documents and orally for the reading of Bills and other formal functions. In Mauritius, official representatives (the president, the prime minister, other ministers, elected deputies, mayors, etc.) mainly use Creole during official speeches and addresses to the Mauritian population, but French and English may also be spoken. Hindi and/or Bhojpuri are also used in some Hindu religious gatherings (cf. Eisenlohr 2004, 69ss.). In Seychelles, however, although French is the third official lan-

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guage, it is rarely used in official communication (around 5 % according to Confait 2010, 257s.). As previously stated, English is the official language de facto in Mauritius, but some documents may also be bilingual, with French appearing as a second language. This is the case for Civil Status documents: birth, marriage, and death certificates, national identity cards, and passports. All other documents are exclusively written in English. In Seychelles, French appears in the second position after English on passports, while English is the sole language used on other official Civil Status documents. In the area of justice, Seychellois and Mauritians are free to choose the language in which they want to communicate; judgements are rendered in English in Mauritius (cf. Carpooran 2005, 121). However, both Seychellois and Mauritian law are in English but also, in certain aspects, French, as the Napoleonic Code (Code Napoléon) still applies. Several Seychellois and Mauritian lawyers also receive training in French-speaking countries.  

3.3 Languages used in education Mauritius – French was taught in Mauritius since the beginning of French colonization but was to be used together with English from the end of the nineteenth century (cf. Toussaint 1969, 421s.). It was only in 1941 that the Ward Report indicated that English should be the sole language of instruction in the Mauritius colony from the fourth year of primary school, the use of the child’s first language being tolerated during the first three years. This was enacted in the Education Ordinance of 1944 and reiterated in the 1957 Education Ordinance, which is still in force today, with English being the official language of instruction (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 31). French and Mauritian Creole are still used as support languages from the beginning of primary education up to tertiary education. The 1957 Ordinance on Primary Education (cf. PC 1957) states that: “In the lower classes of Government and aided primary schools up to and including Standard III, any one language may be employed as the medium of instruction, being a language which in the opinion of the Minister is most suitable for the pupils. In Standards IV, V, and VI of the Government and aided primary schools, the medium of instruction shall be English, and the conversation between the teacher and pupils shall be in English; provided that lessons in any other language taught in the school shall be carried on through the medium of that language” (PC 1957, art. 43).

Hence, at preprimary level, there is no official language of education. Three languages are mainly used by the teachers: Mauritian Creole, French, and English (cf. AuleearOwodally 2010, 20ss.). French is taught as a mandatory subject from the first to the sixth year of primary school, together with English, mathematics, sciences, history, and geography in both government and private-aided schools, such as the Roman Catholic Authority (RCA)

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schools (cf. Rughoonundun-Chellapermal 2017, 156; Natchoo 2018, 2). Other languages are taught as optional subjects, namely Asian languages (Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, Telugu, Marathi, Arabic, and Modern Chinese). Mauritian Creole and Bhojpuri have also been introduced as optional languages since 2012. At secondary level, both French and English appear as mandatory taught subjects from the first to the fifth years, ending with the School Certificate delivered by Cambridge Assessment International Education. French literature is also offered as an optional subject for the fourth and fifth years of secondary education. Mauritian students can then choose French as a main or subsidiary subject for the last two years of secondary education, leading to the Higher School Certificate from the same institution (cf. Sonck 2005, 42). At tertiary level, English is still the official language of instruction, though some institutions, like the University of Mauritius or the Mauritius Institute of Education, indicate that some programmes may have a few modules taught in French, mainly in French studies, in Law and Management (University of Mauritius), or in Teachers’ Education (Mauritius Institute of Education). The University of Mauritius and the Open University both offer a BA (Honours) in French, while the former also offers an MA in French literature and an MA in French language (linguistics). Students may also apply for an MPhil/ PhD in French/French-speaking literature or in linguistics, the dissertation/thesis for which is written in French. Some modules in Law and Management are also taught in French at the University of Mauritius, while the Mauritius Institute of Education offers various programmes for the teaching of French, mainly the Teacher’s Diploma (Primary or Secondary), the B.Ed. (Honours) Programme, and the Postgraduate Certificate in Education. Outside the Mauritian system of education, around 5,000 students are engaged in studies at French institutions at the primary or secondary level (like the Lycée Labourdonnais, the Lycée des Mascareignes or the École du Nord), where French is the medium of instruction. These schools lead to the obtainment of the baccalauréat of the State of France. French is also used as the medium of instruction at tertiary level in satellite campuses of French universities based in Mauritius (Paris 2 Pantheon-Assas University). The Université des Mascareignes, a public university, was also founded in 2013 from a partnership between the Ministry of Education and the University of Limoges in order to create a French-speaking public university in Mauritius. Seychelles – French has been taught in Seychellois schools since the French colonization but was replaced by English as medium of instruction in 1944 under British rule. Teaching in French was reduced in 1981 when the Seychellois government promoted Kreol Seselwa as a national language. French was reintroduced in preprimary school in 1997, after fifteen years of absence in basic education (preprimary and lower primary cycles: the first three years of primary education, cf. Perreau 2007, 95ss. and also Noyau 2009a). It is now taught as a subject from preprimary to tertiary education levels, and French teaching and learning are encouraged by the French embassy and French Alliance (cf. Fox 2005, 266s.).

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Consequently, the three national languages are taught in the Seychelles education system. They occupy different statuses at different stages of the curriculum. They are either offered as taught subjects (i.e., they share the same status as all other curriculum subjects such as science or mathematics with specific timetables) or as the teaching medium (language officially designated to teach a specific subject: all concepts, knowledge and skills are available in that language), or used as a supporting language in other subjects where another language is prescribed as the medium (Seychelles Ministry of Education 1994, reviewed in 1998). In the Seychellois education system, Creole is predominant from the start of preprimary (crèche) both as a taught subject and as the medium of instruction. It is then gradually replaced by English, which has a growing presence from the beginning to the end of the school curriculum. Hence from the third year of primary school, English becomes the medium of instruction for all the basic subjects in the curriculum and is maintained as a compulsory subject throughout schooling up to post-secondary level. Like English, French is used for learning some basic language activities like greetings and social interactions in the first year of crèche. It is introduced as a subject only for oral comprehension to begin with, as it is not until the second year of crèche that pupils begin to engage in reading and writing activities. French is present throughout primary education up to post-secondary level as a taught subject and serves as a support language at all levels. The three private schools of the country (Independent School, International School, and École Française) all have English and French in their curricula. The three languages are also present at university level. English is the primary administrative language, but both French and Creole can also be used for administration as well as for teaching, learning, assessment and research. The University of Seychelles offers a BA in French (in partnership with the University of Réunion), as well as bilingual Bachelors and Masters programmes in collaboration with the Université Paris 1 – Panthéon Sorbonne in Sustainable Tourism Management. Students can choose to write their final thesis in either French or English. English and French modules are also offered to all other students at the University as academic support.

3.4 Languages used in the media Print media: Mauritius – French plays an important role in the Mauritian press. Indeed, the most important daily and weekly newspapers are written in French: Le Mauricien, L’Express, Le Week-end, Le Défi, and 5-Plus Dimanche. The weekly newspapers La Vie Catholique from the Mauritian Catholic Church is also mainly written in French. Most of the other magazines (daily, weekly, and monthly ones) are also mainly written in French. Print media: Seychelles – French is barely present in the Seychellois media. It makes up just 6.6 % of written press articles (cf. Kriegel 2017, 615s.), which are predominantly written in English. The two main newspapers in Seychelles, The Nation (launched in  

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1976) and Today (launched in May 2011), have articles written in French on particular days of the week and about specific news items. It is in L’Écho des Îles, a monthly magazine published by the Catholic Church, that French holds the most prominent position. The Seychelles News Agency (launched in 2014), an online, government-funded text and photo news service, mainly writes in English and French as it targets a global audience. French shares almost equal space with English in this online news service. Audiovisual media: Mauritius – French is also the dominant language of the TV station Mauritius Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) and of the local private radio stations Radio One and Radio Plus. For this reason, French is considered as ‘the country’s second institutional language (in fact de facto semi-official language) behind English’.5 While French and English were the main languages of the national MBC television and radio channels up until the 1990s, Asian languages (mainly Hindi, Hindustani, Urdu, Tamil, and Mandarin) have also been present since then, while Mauritian Creole and Bhojpuri are solely used for cyclone warnings. The democratization of the audiovisual media at the beginning of the twenty-first century, with the appearance of private-owned radio stations like Radio One and Radio Plus, opened the door for Mauritian Creole, which is now widely used on all radio stations. This has forced the national MBC to create radio programmes and stations in Creole, as well as a Creole TV channel (Chaine Créole). The arrival of satellite TV in the 2000s has nevertheless strengthened the role of French as the dominant language of the audiovisual media in Mauritius, and most operators (the private-owned Canal+ and Parabole, and the publicly-owned My-T) broadcast French channels. Audiovisual media: Seychelles – Audiovisual media (radio and TV) predominantly use Seychellois Creole. French appears in some TV serials, but today Seychellois people are more exposed to French through the satellite channels broadcast in the archipelago. The Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) is the main national television station. It ensures that the three national languages are equally used in its daily programming. The daily news is presented in French at 6pm, in English at 7pm and in Creole at 8pm. Films, documentaries, and shows are available in all three languages. TeleSesel is the second national television station, and most of its programmes are in Creole. French and English are used in specific instances. TV5 is offered to all Seychellois for free, and all Cable/Satellite TV packages include a great number of French channels (Canal+, TF1, M6, etc.). This has helped give more exposure and access to French programmes. Two main radio stations are offered by the SBC. As with television, each language occupies an average of 33 % of the programming on the first station, SBC AM. The second station, Paradise FM, uses predominantly English and Creole, but French programmes are growing in number and popularity with the audience: there are three main programmes entirely in French produced by local Radio presenters every week. Two other  

5 “La deuxième langue institutionnelle du pays (en fait langue semi-officielle de facto) derrière l’anglais” (Carpooran 2013, 78).

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private local radio stations are K-Radio and Pure FM; these use mostly Creole and English. French is used for news and specific moments on both stations. Radio France Internationale (RFI) also broadcasts in French and is accessible to the whole Seychelles population. Internet: Mauritius – Websites of the Mauritian State and governmental organizations are written in English, although they may include documents in French (e. g., reports on education on the website of the Ministry of Education). Other institutions and Mauritian enterprises are free to use French and/or English on their websites. Mauritians also use different languages in an informal way on the internet, with an undisputable use of French, English, and Mauritian Creole (cf. Rajah-Carrim 2009, 493). This can be seen in comments on online versions of newspapers, on Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and all other social media. Internet: Seychelles – On the internet, the Seychellois government websites are mainly in English apart from a few where some French can be found for specific occasions, events, or speeches. Seychellois communicate mainly in Creole and English on social media platforms. French is sometimes used by Seychellois French teachers or the more Francophone and Francophile individuals among the local population.  

4 Linguistic Characteristics 4.1 Pronunciation Vowels: Mauritius – Before /z/, /n/, and /v/, we find [ɔ] in Mauritian French (in contrast to [o] in standard French), for example, rose ‘rose’ [ʁɔz] instead of [ʁoz], jaune ‘yellow’ [ʒɔn] instead of [ʒon], mauve ‘mauve’ [mɔv] instead of [mov] (cf. Carpooran 2013, 82). This characteristic is limited to speakers who are White and people of colour, who belong to higher social milieus. Vowels: Seychelles – As is the case in Mauritian French, most vowels in Seychelles French are more closed than in standard French. For example, the open-mid /ɛ/ is replaced by the close-mid /e/ in most cases (cf. Kriegel 2017, 617). One of the main differences from the vowels of Mauritian French is that Seychelles regional French is characterized by the nasalization of vowels when followed by nasal consonants, as is also the case for Seychellois Creole (cf. Kriegel 2017). For example, l’amour ‘the love’ would be pronounced [lɑ̃mu:r] instead of [lamuʁ]. Some rounded vowels are sometimes replaced by their non-rounded counterparts: for example, vocabulaire ‘vocabulary’ [vokabilɛ:r] instead of [vɔkabylɛʁ]. Consonants: Mauritius – The most salient characteristic of Mauritian French is the lenition of /r/ (cf. Chaudenson 1979b, 578), in particular its vocalization and elision. The preceding vowel can be lengthened (e. g., port ‘harbour’ [pɔː] instead of [pɔʁ], cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 86), and /a/ can be posteriorized towards [ɑ], so the pronunciation of patte [pat] is close to that of pâte [pɑt] (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 86). Furthermore,  

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some final consonants are realized in Mauritian French in contrast to standard French: for example, canot ‘small boat’ [kanɔt] instead of [kano], fouet ‘whip’ [fwɛt] instead of [fwe] (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 86), cerf ‘stag’ [sɛ:rf] instead of [sɛʁ], porc ‘pig’ [pɔ:rk] instead of [pɔʁ]. Otherwise, consonant clusters are reduced: for example, contact ‘contact’ [kɔ̃tak] instead of [kɔ̃takt], spécialiste ‘specialist’ [spesjalis] instead of [spesjalist], catéchisme ‘catechism’ [kateʃis] instead of [kateʃism]. In addition, it is quite common for anterior plosives to be realized as nasals after a nasal vowel (progressive assimilation), for example, jambe ‘leg’ [ʒãm] instead of [ʒɑ̃b] (cf. Chaudenson 1979b, 578). Before high vowels and glides, the anterior plosives are palatalized to [s] or [ʃ]: tuer ‘to kill’ [tsɥe] instead of [tɥe], partir ‘to leave’ [paʁtsiʁ] instead of [paʁtiʁ] (Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 86), petit ‘small, little’ [pətʃi] instead of [pəti] (Carpooran 2013, 82). Consonants: Seychelles – The lenition of /r/ in Seychellois French can also be observed, as in hélicoptère ‘helicopter’ [elikoptɛ:] instead of [elikɔptɛʁ] or histoire ‘story’ [istwa:] instead of [istwaʁ], leading to the previous vowel being more open and lengthened. The sequence ‘vowel+R’ at the end of a syllable is also realized with a diphthong, as can be seen in the example vocabulaire ‘vocabulary’ mentioned above. In syllableinitial position, the realization of /r/ resembles /w/, and it also tends to disappear in implosive position, for example, in grande ‘big (fem.)’ [ɡwɑ̃d] instead of [ɡʁɑ̃d], and croire ‘to believe’ [kwaʁ] instead of [kʁwaʁ] (cf. Chaudenson 1979b, 597). The non-vocalic hissing consonants /ʃ/ and /ʒ/ are often replaced by the sibilant consonants /s/ and /z/ due to contact with Creole, as is also the case in some varieties of Mauritian French (cf. Kriegel 2017, 617). The apico-alveolar /t/ and /d/ are also subject to assibilation, mostly when placed before /i/, /y/, and /j/ (cf. Kriegel 2017, 617) and the /d/ can also disappear in some cases, as in the pronunciation of adjectif ‘adjective’ [aʒektif] instead of [adʒɛktif] (Noyau 2009b). The /l/ also tends to be elided in syllable-final consonant clusters. For example, the word exemple ‘example’ is pronounced [eɡzɑ̃p] instead of [ɛɡzɑ̃pl].

4.2 Morphosyntax Determiners – On the syntactic level, Mauritius French and Seychellois French are characterized by the omission of determiners or confusions between gender, as shown in examples (i–iii) for Mauritian French. Kriegel (2017) also provides some examples for Seychellois French (iv), which is confirmed by the oral corpus of Noyau (2009b) (v). Furthermore, in both varieties, an additional determiner can also be observed, which is not required by the syntactic structure of the sentence, like in (vi). (i)

“Il y a Ø bhojpouri [instead of le bhojpouri] qui va venir comme ça” (Ludwig/Henri/BruneauLudwig 2009, 193).6

6 ‘There is Bhojpuri that will come like that’.

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(ii) “Je crois que les résultats vont être plus catastrophiques pour Ø français [instead of le français]” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).7 (iii) “Auparavant je pensais qu’il y aurait eu Ø interférence français [instead of une interférence], entre Ø français et Ø créole mauricien [instead of le français et le créole mauricien]” (2017b, s.p.).8 (iv) “Ils ont pas beaucoup de difficultés à apprendre Ø russe, Ø allemand, Ø anglais, Ø italien [instead of le russe, l’allemand, l’anglais, l’italien]; c’était Ø créole et Ø anglais [instead of le créole et l’anglais]” (Kriegel 2017, 618).9 (v) “Pour Ø découverte [instead of la découverte] […] et puis les enfants ont été sur Ø objectif [instead of l’objectif]” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).10 (vi) “Il y a de différents [instead of différents] professeurs” (2009b, s.p.).11

Gender – There are also confusions between masculine and feminine determiners, probably imputable to the absence of gender in Mauritian and Seychelles Creole. In Seychelles, we find une office [instead of un office (bureau)] ‘an office’, une nouvelle intérêt [instead of un nouvel interêt] ‘a renewed interest’, la service publique [instead of le service public] ‘public services’, le meilleur école [instead of la meilleure école] ‘the best school’ (cf. Kriegel 2017, 618). Some examples from Mauritius can also be found (i–iii). (i) “La [zwazo] [instead of l’oiseau] apporte manger pour ses petits enfants” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).12 (ii) “Le chien ris le chat son [ke] [instead of sa queue]” (2010, s.p.).13 (iii) “Ça aide l’enrichissement au niveau de la vocabulaire [instead of du vocabulaire]” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).14

Absence of agreement – The absence of agreement in gender and number is also observed in both Mauritian and Seychellois French. Many occurrences of absence of agreement in gender can be found in Mauritian French varieties (i–v), even in primary school teachers’ discourse (iv–v). As in Mauritius, the same is also observed in Seychelles (vi– xi), even in teachers’ discourse (xi). “Madame X elle est enseignant [instead of enseignante]” (Ludwig/Henri/Bruneau-Ludwig 2009, 193).15 (ii) “Promotion géant [instead of géante]” (2009, 193).16 (iii) “Les prix le plus fou fou fou [instead of les plus fous]” (2009, 193).17 (i)

7 ‘I think that the results will be more catastrophic for French’. 8 ‘I previously thought there would be interference between French and Mauritian Creole’. 9 ‘They do not have much difficulty learning Russian, German, English, Italian; it was Creole and English’. 10 ‘For discovery (activities) […] and then the children have focused on the objective’. 11 ‘There are different teachers’. 12 ‘The bird brings food for her children’. 13 ‘The dog pulls the cat’s tail’. 14 ‘It helps to enrich the vocabulary’. 15 ‘Miss X, she is a teacher’. 16 ‘Huge promotion’. 17 ‘The most crazy deals’.

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(iv) “Comme tout [instead of toute] bonne maman” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).18 (v) “Ça empêche bon développement côté langues anglaise et français [instead of française], des exposés oral [instead of oraux]” (Florigny 2017a, s.p.).19 (vi) “Leur créole c’est à base portugais [instead of portugaise]” (Kriegel 2017, 618).20 (vii) “Des efforts spéciales [instead of spéciaux]” (2017, 618).21 (viii) “Langue français [instead of française]” (2017, 618).22 (ix) “Des petits [instead of petites] comptines” (2017, 618).23 (x) “Le français reste quand même la langue de communication plus fréquent [instead of fréquente]” (2017, 618).24 (xi) “Même parfois il y a des élèves qui viennent avec les autres vocabulaires […] parce que les grands-parents lui a [instead of ont] dit toutes ces choses-là” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).25

The absence of agreement in number between the subject and the verb (or its auxiliary) can be seen in both varieties. In the last example above (xi), we can see that the singular pronoun is used, though the noun it refers to is plural. The first example below is taken from a teacher’s discourse in Mauritius (i). The same phenomenon can also be observed in Seychelles (both examples are again taken from teachers’ discourse, ii–iii). (i) “Il y a des concepts que l’enfant ne peuvent [instead of peut] pas […]” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).26 (ii) “Parce que les enfants a [instead of ont] beaucoup de vocabulaire” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).27 (iii) “Les familles ne met [instead of mettent] pas dans leur enfant qu’il faut lire le français” (2009b, s.p.).28

Fluctuating use of auxiliaries – The use of auxiliaries also tends to fluctuate greatly in both Mauritian and Seychellois regional varieties, whether with regard to the auxiliary used, or the tense. The three examples below illustrate an incorrect use of the auxiliaries être and avoir in Mauritian French: while avoir has been used instead of être in (i), être is used instead of avoir in (ii) and (iii). The fourth example, taken from Seychelles French, shows that the correct auxiliary has been used but not with the correct verb tense in that context (iv).

18 ‘As any good mother’. 19 ‘This prevents good development concerning English and French languages, oral presentations’. 20 ‘Their creole is Portuguese-based’. 21 ‘Special efforts’. 22 ‘French language’. 23 ‘Little nursery rhymes’. 24 ‘French nevertheless stays the most frequent language of communication’. 25 ‘Sometimes, some pupils come with other words […] because their grandparents have told them these things’. 26 ‘There are concepts that the child cannot […]’. 27 ‘Because children have a lot of vocabulary’. 28 ‘Families (parents) do not tell their children that they need to read French’.

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(i) (ii) (iii) (iv)

“Après j’ai [instead of je suis] parti jardin d’enfants” (Tirvassen 2000, 137).29 “La maman est [instead of a] fini de partir” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).30 “Le chat est [instead of a] réussi Ø monter sur l’arbre” (2010, s.p.).31 “Elle est [instead of était] déjà dans l’école […] ce matin” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).32

Fluctuating use of prepositions – Prepositions also tend to be used differently from standard French in both varieties. Different cases of fluctuating prepositions can be seen in Mauritian French. The first example (i) illustrates an omission of the preposition à, while the others (i–v) show swapping between prepositions. While de is used instead of à in the examples (ii) and (iii), à is present instead of en in (iv) and comme instead of à in (v). (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v)

“Le canard peut donner à manger Ø [instead of à] ses petits” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).33 “Leur maman vient lui donner de [instead of à] manger” (2010, s.p.).34 “Je leur encourage de [instead of à] parler le français” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).35 “On est en train de retourner à l’arrière [instead of en arrière]” (2017b, s.p.).36 “Tu vas être pareil comme lui [instead of à lui]” (Chady 2018, 108).37

The same can be observed in Seychelles French. Example (i) shows that avec can be used in place of de, while example (ii) illustrates that sur can be used in lieu of de (du is a contraction of the preposition de and the article le). The same construction parler sur can be found in Mauritian French and standard French too, though parler de is considered the correct form (this can be seen for standard French in Gadet et al. 1995, 369). As in Mauritian French, the example (iii) shows that de is used instead of à. The final example (iv) from Seychelles shows that the preposition de has been inserted in a noun phrase between the noun and its adjective, which is not allowed in standard French. “J’ai parfois entendu des commentaires avec des personnes [instead of (venant) de personnes]” (Kriegel 2017, 618).38 (ii) “On parle sur le [instead of du] fruit” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).39 (iii) “Les parents n’encouragent pas de [instead of à] lire” (2009b, s.p.).40 (iv) “Vocabulaire à travers la langue de créole [instead of la langue créole]” (2009b, s.p.).41 (i)

29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

‘Then, I went to the kindergarten’. ‘The mother is already gone’. ‘The cat has succeeded in climbing the tree’. ‘She was already in school this morning’. ‘The duck can give food to its children’. ‘Their mother comes to bring them food’. ‘I encourage them to talk in French’. ‘We are going backwards’. ‘You will be like him’. ‘I have sometimes heard comments from people’. ‘We talk about the fruit’. ‘Parents do not encourage reading’. ‘Vocabulary through creole language’.

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Different forms of definite, partitive, and contracted determiners – Both Mauritian and Seychelles French alternate between uses of determiners that are not attested in standard French. Different examples taken from Mauritian French are shown below. The first one illustrates the use of the definite article determiner le instead of the contracted article du, which is imposed by the syntax of this sentence (i). In the second sentence, the definite article l’ is used in place of the preposition d’ (ii). “Je suis en train de les amener vers l’anglais… ou vers le français, dépendant le sujet [instead of du sujet] que je suis en train de faire” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).42 (ii) “Je vais donner plus l’emphase [instead of d’emphase] sur la langue” (2017b, s.p.).43 (i)

In Seychelles French replacement of the contracted article determiner du with the preposition de can be seen (i). (i)

“Au niveau de concours [insteaf of du concours] c’est-à-dire des examens” (Kriegel 2017, 618).44

Confusion of clitic direct and indirect objects – There are many attestations of confusions in the use of clitic pronouns used as direct or indirect objects in Mauritian French. While there seems to be confusion between direct and indirect objects (i–iii), the last example illustrates a case when the indirect object pronoun en appears together with the noun phrase it should be replacing (iv). Similar confusion does not seem to exist in Seychelles regional French; it was not found in the corpora we analysed. (i) (ii) (iii) (iv)

“Je vais la [instead of lui] dire” (Chaudenson 1979b, 579).45 “Le bon chien arrive et lui [instead of le] tire par la queue” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).46 “Je leur [instead of les] encourage de parler le français” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).47 “Si on faisait disons mandarin, latin, ou quelque chose d’autre que l’enfant pourra s’en servir [instead of se servir] après” (2017b, s.p.).48

Reflexive pronouns – Reflexive pronouns also seem to be used in a different manner in Mauritian and Seychellois French varieties to that of standard French. In both territories, they can be either omitted (ii–iv) or used when not necessary (analysed as hypercorrections due to linguistic insecurity by Kriegel 2017, 619), as in the following examples from Mauritius (i–ii) and Seychelles (iii–iv). Example (ii) could be considered as a calque from Mauritian Creole li anvole, example (iii) as a calque from Seychellois Creole I an-

42 ‘I am bringing them towards English … or French, depending on the subject I am teaching’. 43 ‘I will put more emphasis on the language’. 44 ‘At the concours level, that is, the exams’. 45 ‘I will tell her’. 46 ‘The good dog comes and pulls him by the tail’. 47 ‘I encourage them to speak French’. 48 ‘If we learn, for example, Mandarin, Latin or something else that the child will be able to use afterwards’.

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nan bann zanfan ki rakont bann zistwar ki pa zanmen fini, while the last example (iv) could be considered as a calque from English. (i) “Un oiseau se grimpe [instead of grimpe] sur le ‘pie’” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).49 (ii) “Il envole [instead of s’envole]” (2010, s.p.).50 (iii) “Il y a des enfants qui racontent des histoires qui ne Ø terminent pas [instead of ne se terminent pas]” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).51 (iv) “Si on Ø adressait [instead of s’adressait à] une personne dans une office” (Kriegel 2017, 619).52

Relative pronouns – Omission, displacement, or erroneous use of relative pronouns can also be seen in Mauritian and Seychelles French. The first three examples from Mauritian French show an omission of the relative pronoun (i–iii). The fourth example, again from Mauritian French, shows that the que should have been after peut-être in standard French (iv). Omission of the relative pronoun can also be observed in Seychelles French (v), and incorrect use of such a pronoun is also attested (vi). (i) “Peut-être Ø [instead of peut-être que] dans quelques années on saura” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).53 (ii) “Du moment Ø [instead of Du moment où] il fait une classe de science, Ø [instead of où] il sait pas dire le mot en anglais, c’est le créole” (2017b, s.p.).54 (iii) “Si on met les sujets en créole, peut-être Ø [instead of peut-être que] ça va les aider” (Chady 2018, 98).55 (iv) “Peut-être dans les p’tites classes que [instead of peut-être que dans les p’tites classes] ça fait interférence” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).56 (v) “Il faut Ø [instead of Il faut que] la maîtresse leur donne le vocabulaire” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).57 (vi) “Il y a des enfants que leur histoire [instead of dont l’histoire] mélange des différents choses” (2009b, s.p.).58

Interrogation – Indirect interrogation structures also tend to be replaced by the insertion of direct interrogation pronouns in Mauritian (i–iii) and in Seychelles French (iv). (i)

“Le chat voulait regarder qu’est-ce qu’i y avait [instead of ce qu’il y avait] dans le nid” (Florigny 2010, s.p.).59

49 ‘A bird climbs (itself) on the tree’. 50 ‘It flies away’. 51 ‘There are children who would tell stories which do not end’. 52 ‘If we addressed someone in an office’. 53 ‘Perhaps in a few years we will know’. 54 ‘When he has a science class, when he doesn’t know how to say the word in English, it’s Creole [he uses]’. 55 ‘If we put the subjects in Creole, perhaps it will help them’. 56 ‘Perhaps that it creates an interference in lower classes’. 57 ‘The teacher needs to give them the vocabulary’. 58 ‘There are some children whose story mixes up different things’. 59 ‘The cat wanted to see what was inside the nest’.

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(ii) “Il n’arrive pas à comprendre qu’est-ce qui est français, qu’est-ce qui est Kreol Morisien [instead of ce qui est français, ce qui est Kreol Morisien]” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).60 (iii) “Ils ne savaient pas c’est quoi [instead of ce qu’est] ‘pollute’” (2017b, s.p.).61 (iv) “Après on fait des structures qu’est-ce que c’est [instead of ce que sont les structures]” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).62

Omission of the Direct Object Complement – Omission of the Direct Object Complement is quite frequent too in both Mauritian (i–iv) and in Seychelles French (v). (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v)

“Non, j’ai pas fait [instead of je l’ai pas fait]” (Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 94).63 “Il y a le méchant chat qui Ø [instead of les] surveille lui aussi” (Florigny 2017b, s.p.).64 “Nous n’avons pas d’enfants qui Ø ont [instead of qui l’ont] choisi” (2017b, s.p.).65 “Moi je Ø [instead of le] décourage” (2017b, s.p.).66 “Après, j’avais changé Ø [instead of je l’avais changé]” (Noyau 2009b, s.p.).67

Complex forms (demonstratives or deictics) – Though complex forms of demonstratives and deictics are attested in standard French, it is their excessive use in Mauritian French (and erroneous use with regards to standard French syntax) which makes their use particular to this variety (iii). (i) “C’est à cause de ça même [instead of de ça] qu’ils sont partis!” (Antoine 2019, s.p.).68 (ii) “Attends un coup-là [instead of Attends un coup/attends voir]” (2019, s.p.).69

4.3 Lexicon This section presents mainly the lexical characteristics of Mauritian French, due to the lack of research on the lexical characteristics in Seychelles regional French. Most examples were found in the following publications: Baggioni/Robillard (1990), Robillard (1993), Nallatamby (1995), and BDLP-Maurice (2005). Archaisms and regionalisms – Mauritian French has kept many archaisms from the maritime lexical field. For example, the verb hisser/risser ‘to pull, (lit.) to hoist’ is preferred to the standard French tirer and the verb virer ‘to turn, (lit.) to veer’ to tourner.

60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69

‘He does not understand what is French, what is Mauritian Creole’. ‘They did not know what is “pollute”’. ‘Afterwards, we see what the structures are’. ‘No, I did not do it’. ‘The bad cat observes them too’. ‘We do not have children who have chosen it’. ‘I discourage it’. ‘Then, I have changed it’. ‘It’s because of that that they left’. ‘Wait a minute’.

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Mauritian French has, like Mauritian Creole, kept many archaisms from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century French northern and western dialects. For example, the verb kap/e ‘to abscond’ instead of standard French échapper (e. g., in caper l’école [instead of faire l’école buissonière] ‘skipping school’) comes from a French dialect verb écaper ‘to skip’ (cf. Baker/Hookoomsing 1987, 137). The verbs gober and mailler ‘to catch’ also come from eighteenth-century French, while standard French would prefer attraper ‘to catch’. The noun pinegette ‘young girl, impertinent and somewhat annoying’ (< pinéguette ‘little girl or sassy young girl, flirtatious, proud, impertinent, and somewhat annoying’, cf. CNRTL, s.v.) comes from north-eastern dialects and is marked as a regionalism in standard French. The same applies to the word formation construction pied + fruit name (composition without preposition) used to name fruit trees in Mauritian French, which also comes from French dialects (e. g., the Angevin dialect), like in pied-banane ‘banana tree’ or pied-mangue ‘mango tree’ instead of standard French bananier and manguier. Some words also originate from Southern French varieties like cabri ‘goat’, while standard French would prefer chèvre. Borrowings from Asian and Austronesian languages – Many words have also been borrowed from other languages, especially in the lexical field of food (including edible plants) and cooking. A large part of them has been borrowed from Malagasy, such as brède ‘edible green leaves’ (< Mal. bred), ourite/hourite ‘octopus’ (< Mal. horita), and macatia ‘brioche’ (< Mal. makatia). Many other words have been borrowed from Indian languages like Tamil (Ta.), Bhojpuri (Bh.), and Hindi (Hi.), as for example elaïti ‘cardamom’ (< Ta. ēlakkāy), rougaille ‘rougaille’ (< Ta. urugay), dhal pouri ‘yellow split peas wraps [Mauritian recipe]’ (< Hi./Bh. dholl pouri), cari ‘curry’ (< Hi./Bh. curry), tawa ‘frying pan’ (< Hi./Bh. tawaa), badja/badia ‘Indian salted donut’ (< Hi./Bh. badja), roti/farata ‘Indian wheat flatbread’ (< Hi./Bh. roti/paratha), and chatini ‘chutney’ (< Hi./Bh. chatni). These are absent in Seychelles, as there was no migration of Indian indentured labourers. Mauritian French has also borrowed words from southern Chinese languages, mainly Fokkien/Hokkien (Ho.), Hakka (Ha.), and Cantonese (Ca.): saw mai/boulette chouchou ‘Chinese steam dumplings’ (< Ho. sio mai), niouk yen ‘chayote dumplings’ (< Ha. niouk yen), mee foon ‘rice vermicelli’ (< Ca. bee hoon), hakien ‘spring roll’ (< Ho. hakien), siew kiow ‘Chinese dumpling soup’ (< Ca. sui kow), and mine(s) ‘Chinese noodles’ (< Ca. mein). Seychelles French, in contrast, has not been influenced by Chinese migration. Borrowings from Indo-European languages – Other words were borrowed from European languages between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries when sailors from different countries formed mixed crews on ships. Words from Portuguese (Pg.) are lalo ‘gombo/okra’ (< Pg. calalu), bringelle ‘eggplant’ (< Pg. bringella), margoze ‘bitter melon/balsam pear’ (< Pg. (a)margoza), chouchou ‘chayotte’ (< Pg. chuchu/chuchuzeiro), and gingeli ‘sesame’ (< Pg. gergelim). Other words are borrowed from English (cf. Florigny 2010, 138), such as cross-here ‘pedestrian crossing’, dissertation, dustbin, godam ‘garage, junk room’ (< En. go down), kitchen-paper, laptop, license ‘driving licence’, municipalité (< En. municipality), pen-drive ‘USB stick’, and tissue. Seychellois regional French has also borrowed many words from English due to its massive use  

 

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beginning with primary education, such as library, staffroom, timetable, or waiting room (cf. Lejeune 2012, 33s.). Borrowings from creole – Mauritian French has borrowed many words through daily contact with Mauritian Creole, such as gâteaux de l’huile ‘fried snacks [general name]’ (< Cr. gato-delwil), queue d’oignon ‘chive’ (< Cr. lake-zwagnon), queue d’ail ‘garlic chive’ (< Cr. lake-lay), také ‘(light) switch’ (< Cr. take), rane ‘rubbish/no-good’ (< Cr. rann), dipain frire ‘fried bread’ (< Cr. dipin frir), gâteau piment ‘chilli popper’ (< Cr. gato-pima), glaçon râpé ‘ice lollipop’ (< Cr. glason-rape), and plok ‘dumbass, (lit.) penis’ (< Cr. plok). Seychellois regional French also borrows some words from Seychellois Creole, as, for example, karkasay ‘rock crab’ (< Cr. karkasay, also present in Mauritian Creole, cf. Carpooran 2019, 561), sipay ‘coconut crab’ (< Cr. sipay, also present in Chagossian Creole, cf. Carpooran 2019, 1338). There are also some words that have been borrowed from Seychellois Creole, themselves borrowed from East-African languages, mostly for names of traditional musical instruments, like mouloupa ‘tube zither instrument’ (< Cr. mouloumpa < Swahili mbulumbumba), zez ‘stick zither instrument’ (< Cr. zez, also present in Chagossian Creole, < Nyamwezi zeze/tzetze/dzendze), and makalapo ‘ground harp’ (< Cr. makalapo, also present in Mauritian Creole, < Makua makalamu). Another example of word with double borrowing is tyakoula ‘light meal’ (< Cr. tyakoula < Swahili chakula ‘food’). Semantic innovations: meaning – Many words originating from French have kept the same morphological form but changes can be seen in terms of semantic content, such as in the superlative adverb mauvais ‘very’ (< ‘bad’), the adjective cocasse ‘pretty’ (< ‘comical’, cf. Atchia-Emmerich 2005), or the noun makro ‘bastard’ (< Fr. maquereau ‘pimp’). Semantic innovations: form – At the morphological level, composition by juxtaposition is very common in Mauritius French, for example in gâteau-coco ‘coconut cake’, gâteau piment ‘chilli popper’, poisson-gingembre ‘ginger fish’ (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 96), and biscuit manioc ‘biscuit made from cassava flour’. Other words of Mauritian French are compound nouns based on brèdes, mangue, and other food terms (cf. Nallatamby 1995 62, 77s., 158, 194s., 203; Kallichurn 2007, 9, 60, 115, 124). Brède is the common name for all plants which have edible green leaves. It can be found in expressions such as brèdes chinois/brèdes de Chine ‘pak choï’, brèdes chouchou ‘chayote leaves’, brèdes cresson ‘watercress’, brèdes épinards ‘spinach’, brèdes giraumon ‘pumpkin leaves’, brèdes malbar ‘amaranth leaves’, brèdes martin ‘black nightshade’, brèdes petsaï ‘napa cabbage’, brèdes songes ‘taro leaves’, brède-tom-pouce/brède-blanc ‘Chinese white cabbage’, and pie brède-mouroungue ‘moringa’, whose leaves (brèdes-mourongue) and stems (baton-mouroungue) are both edible. Mangue is combined with proper nouns, as in mangue Adèle, mangue Aristide, mangue Baissac, mangue Collard, mangue Dauphiné, mangue Figette, mangue Gelée, mangue José, mangue la Corde, mangue Maison rouge, mangue pétrole, mangue Rosat, mangue sabre, mangue Torche, or mangue Victoria. Goyave can be found in designations for different fruits, such as goyave de Chine ‘Chinese guava’, goyave de France ‘French guava’, and goyave gargoulette ‘Chinese guava’. Other compounds in this area are banane-gingeli ‘gingeli banana’, gateau-gingeli ‘sesame

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balls’, caca pigeon ‘crispy fried snacks’, baguette fromage ‘cheese sticks’, bol renversé ‘magic bowl’, and mine frit ‘fried noodles’. Interjections – Some interjections are used specifically in certain varieties of Mauritian French (namely, those used by white people and people of colour). Hence, using these interjections immediately allows the Mauritian listener to identify and classify who is speaking (i–v, examples from Antoine 2019, cf. 5.3). In (i), toi ‘you’ is a disjunct pronoun that cannot be translated literally. In (v), ayo is a Creole interjection that is commonly used in Mauritian French. Its meaning depends on the context and the intonation with which it is said. It can then be used to express fear, joy, excitement, regret, or anger. Some swear-words like graine ‘nutsack’ (< Fr. graine ‘seed’) or foutour ‘cum’ (< Fr. foutre) are also used by some specific groups. (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v)

“Ce sont des transfuges, toi!”.70 “Mais ils ont leurs raisons pour avoir fait ça, toi”.71 “Ils n’en pouvaient plus du non-respect des valeurs et des principes au MMM, toi”.72 “Ne fais pas ta comique avec moi, donc! [instead of Ne te moque pas de moi, voyons].73 “Ayo! je sais ce que tu vas dire”.74

5 Internal language policy 5.1 Linguistic purism Mauritius – As the focus of the Mauritian population is more on the opposition between French and Creole, communication takes place on a continuum between these two languages (cf. Chady 2018, 143ss.). Many Mauritians may have difficulties in establishing a boundary between the two languages: ‘The contact, almost literal, between French and the other languages leads to difficulties in maintaining the boundaries between French and Creole especially’.75

Moreover, although once Mauritians consider that they are speaking in French, they may not distinguish between standard French and the Mauritian regional variety of French, and they may not even be aware that the variety they speak is not the standard

70 ‘Those are turncoats!’. 71 ‘But they have their reasons for doing that’. 72 ‘They were fed up with the disrespect of values and principles within MMM’. 73 ‘Well, don’t make fun of me!’. 74 ‘I know what you are going to say’. 75 “le contact, au sens presque littéral du terme, entre le français et les autres langues entraîne une difficile gestion des frontières entre le français et le créole surtout” (Tirvassen 2000, 139).

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one. Analysis of both teachers and journalists showed that informants were not always able to systematically establish the boundaries between French varieties (Tirvassen 2000, 135). Tsang Mang Kim (1977, 63) observed that the Mauritian French variety had already attained autonomy in the 1970s and called it franglien, a portmanteau word created by him from français ‘French’, anglais ‘English’ and créole mauricien ‘Mauritian Creole’. This influence of English and Mauritian Creole on Mauritian French is corroborated by later studies (cf. Tirvassen 2000; Kriegel/Ludwig/Henri 2009; Ludwig/Henri/BruneauLudwig 2009; Carpooran 2013; Fon Sing 2020; Pustka/Bellonie/Fon Sing 2022). Carpooran (2013, 77) stresses that standard French had previously been (and probably still is) the reference point while the Mauritian French variety (or varieties) has (have) been stigmatized up to now. Thus, Mauritians may not yet have a sufficiently positive attitude towards it, meaning that it requires legitimization. Nevertheless, the literature on Mauritian French varieties (cf. Baggioni/Robillard 1990; Ledegen/Lyche 2012) considered the variety spoken by the White population of the island to be the prestige variety up until the 1980s, given the socioeconomic status of this group inherited from colonial times. The rapid economic growth of the Mauritian population since then is likely to have changed that fact, most Mauritians climbing the social ladder having switched to standard-like French (variété standardisante ‘standardizing variety’ as developed by Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 65) as their first language. Baggioni/Robillard indicate that this variety has a ‘tendency to align with the standard French prestigious exogenous norm, both with regards to lexicon and to syntax and phonetics’.76 Nevertheless, all authors note the existence of local French varieties, which seem quite difficult to differentiate with regard to the intricate socioeconomic, cultural, and identity questions surrounding them. Seychelles – The plurilingual policy of Seychelles brings with it some confusion for a few speakers. Seychellois people tend to do a lot of code-switching and code-mixing in all conversations, though they are encouraged to speak standard varieties (cf. Perreau 2007, 97ss.). Quality of teaching is a focal point, as shown by the organization of extra training for language teachers, while the number of teaching periods dedicated to each of the two European languages, especially French, is currently being reviewed. As tourism is the pillar of the Seychelles economy, the country’s aim is to have a population that can speak ‘recognizable’ French and English, and its education curriculum and syllabus are prepared so that both languages maintain their standards.

76 “tendance d’alignement sur le français standard, norme de prestige exogène, tant en ce qui s’agit du lexique que de la syntaxe ou de la phonétique” (Baggioni/Robillard 1990, 65).

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5.2 Description of linguistic characteristics Mauritius – There are no written dictionaries or grammars for Mauritian French, though there are a few inventories of Mauritian French lexicons (cf. Rauville 1967; Baggioni/Robillard 1990; Robillard 1993; Nallatamby 1995). Apart from Baggioni/Robillard’s book (1990), there have been very few scientific papers describing Mauritian French (cf. Carpooran 2013; Ledegen/Lyche 2012; Ledegen/Pruvost 2004; Pustka/Bellonie/Fon Sing 2022). Seychelles – A national variety of French has not yet been defined and accepted. Hence, dictionaries or grammars of Seychelles regional French do not exist. The only document where French appears is the trilingual dictionary Diksyonner trileng, Kreol Seselwa, Français, English (Gillieaux 2017) with a focus on definitions and translations from Seychellois Creole to standard French and standard English.

5.3 Usage of linguistic characteristics Variety used in administration – Mauritian French does not appear in official texts as these documents are exclusively written in English. Variety used at school – Mauritian French does not appear either in primary or secondary textbooks, as these focus on standard French. French (in all its oral varieties) is widely used as a support language from pre-primary to tertiary education. However, it does not seem clear whether teachers and children are aware of the difference between standard French and Mauritian French, as the focus is mainly on the opposition between French and Mauritian Creole, as previously stated (cf. Tirvassen 1999, 7ss.; Florigny 2010, 52ss.; 2015, 57ss.). Variety used in the media – Standard French is promoted the most by the media in Mauritius. Thus, all newspapers written in French make use of this variety, though mistakes may be found in some of them. Standard French is also the variety favoured by TV and radio presenters when the programme is in French, though Mauritian French can be heard when listeners participate or are interviewed. Mauritian French is used in theatre productions together with Mauritian Creole by troupes like Komiko (vaudeville theatre). It is also used by comedians such as Vincent Duvergé on Pop.TV or Christophe Saint-Lambert on Radio One to stigmatize or make fun of particular social groups. Fon Sing (2020) analyses the morphosyntactic traits of Mauritian French extracted from parodic sketches published in the written press. His theory is that these traits are present in all Mauritian French varieties, while some phonetic and prosodic traits may be linked to specific sociolinguistic groups. We show below some of the linguistic characteristics present in such a pseudo-conversation between two women, here talking about politics. It is mainly through the lexicon that Mauritian French varieties appear in these sketches (i–v).

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“Ce sont des transfuges, toi! Ou plus exactement des vendeurs [instead of vendus]” (Antoine 2019, s.p.).77 (ii) “Ce sont des gens qui étaient pleins avec [instead of en avaient marre de] leur parti et qui sont allés dans un autre” (2019, s.p.).78 (iii) “Ne fais pas ta comique avec moi [instead of Ne te moque pas de moi] donc!” (2019, s.p.).79 (iv) “Ils ont fait ça pour avoir leur boutte [instead of leur part (du gâteau)]” (2019, s.p.).80 (v) “Arrête de causer n’importe donc [instead of dire n’importe quoi]” (2019, s.p.).81 (i)

Code-switching – As many Mauritians are bilingual, it is very common to switch from one language to another in the same sentence/discourse. In the example below, the code-switching to English is imposed by the fact that the English expression cannot be translated into French and metaphorically indicates that an elected member would move to the other side of the parliament, thus leaving a political party to join another one (i). (i)

“Écoute, ce ne sont pas des députés qui ont cross the floor pour aller rejoindre le gouvernement” (Antoine 2019, s.p.).82

Variety used in literature: Mauritius – Mauritian French appears on a continuum with Mauritian Creole in different literary texts written by authors like Mérédac (1880– 1939), Cabon (1912–1972), Noyau (1911–1984), de Souza (*1949), Siao (*1953), and Lagesse (*1968). Most of the occurrences of Mauritian French in those texts are linked to lexicon (i–x, cf. 4.3 for some of the words). (i) “Tu sais [instead of tu connais] le prix?” (Mérédac 1926, 21).83 (ii) “Mais non, un rien du tout, plus misère [instead of pauvre] que le tendrac qui est obligé de manger des couroupas [instead of escargots] pour ne pas crever de faim!” (1926, 35).84 (iii) “Ça veut faire le zézère! [instead of Ça joue les amoureux!]” (1926, 37).85 (iv) “C’est les cris des pics-pics” (Noyau 1971, reedited in Noyau 2012, 267).86 (v) “[J’]entamais une descente suivie par des méandres longs, interminables au cours desquels marchands ambulants, de dipain frire, gâteaux piments, dholl-purees ou de glaçon râpé, n’avaient aucune chance de me voler des secondes de pause” (Siao 2017, 77).87

77 ‘Those are turncoats! Or more exactly they are sell-outs/hacks!’. 78 ‘These are people who got tired of their (political) party and went to another one’. 79 ‘Don’t make fun of me’. 80 ‘They did it to have their share (of the cake)’. 81 ‘Stop talking nonsense’. 82 ‘Listen, these are not deputies who have crossed the floor to join the government’. 83 ‘You know the price?’. 84 ‘But no, a nothing at all, poorer than a tenrec who is forced to eat snails so as to not starve’. 85 ‘It plays lovers!’. 86 ‘It is the pic-pic’s song’, pic-pic designates a species of bird, the Mauritis grey-white eye (Cr. zozo maniok, Lat. Zosterops mauritianus). 87 ‘I began a descent followed by long, endless meanders during which peddlers of fried bread, chilli cakes, dholl-purees or grated ice cubes, had no chance of stealing my break seconds’.

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(vi) “L’enfant espiègle, la pinegette que j’étais, tenait son poste de garde” (2017, 132).88 (vii) “Rajkoomar G. découvre au beau milieu de son ‘carreau’ de chouchou [instead of champs de chayotte]” (Lagesse 2019, 35).89 (viii) “Il y a un marchand de bringelles [instead of aubergines] à Gokoola” (Lagesse 2020, 17).90 (ix) ‘Graine, John, tu n’as plus huit ans! Tu devrais cesser d’être désolé tout le temps, foutour. […] Quel gopia [instead of imbécile] irait à de tels extrêmes pour une éleveuse de cabris [instead of chèvre]” (2020, 45).91 (x) “Ce Gordon est un vrai plok! […] Ce baise-sa-maman de Ramchand essaie de nous assassiner. […] J’ai toujours dit que ce makro de Gordon n’était pas fréquentable, dit Maude en mâchant un biscuit manioc. Tu sais ce que j’ai trouvé dans le godam?” (2020, 87).92

Syntactic structures of Mauritian French may also be found sometimes. In the first example, we can observe that some elements have been elided, namely the subject c’ and the verb être and the relative pronoun que. In the second example, the demonstrative pronoun ça is used instead of the interrogative est-ce que. Both examples below could also be considered calques from Mauritian Creole (i–ii). “Alors, vrai [instead of c’est vrai que], tu vas sortir par ce temps-là? [instead of par ce temps?]” (Mérédac 1926, 25).93 (ii) “Eh ben! où ça que [instead of où est-ce que] vous voyez qu’on va mettre des réserves à GrandGaube?” (1926, 29).94 (i)

Language used in literature: Seychelles – Seychellois authors have, on their own initiative, written in English, French, and Creole, as was the case with Abel Antoine (1934– 2004), who is considered to be the father of Seychellois literature. Seychellois authors write mainly in Seychellois Creole, though some also produce texts in French, like Magie Faure-Vidot (*1958) with Flamme mystique (2011), or in English, like Hazel de Silva Mugot (*1947) in Black Night of Quiloa (1971). Seychellois regional French occasionally appears in literature through lexicon borrowed from Seychellois Creole, such as karkasay, sipay (i), makalapo, zez, mouloupa (ii), or tyakoula (iii, cf. 4.3): (i)

“Et désirant jouer avec les karkasay J’ouvre mes bras aux sipay” (Faure-Vidot 2011, 30).95

88 ‘The mischievous child, the young annoying girl that I was, kept watch’. 89 ‘Rajkoomar G. found in the middle of his chayotte field […]’. 90 ‘There is an eggplant seller in Gokoola’. 91 ‘For fuck’s sake, John, you are no more eight years old! You should stop being sorry all the time, shit! What dumb guy would go to such extremes for a goat breeder’. 92 ‘This Gordon is a real asshole (…) This mother-fucker Ramchand is trying to kill us […] I always said that Gordon, this bastard, had a bad reputation, said Maude while chewing a cassava biscuit. You know what I’ve found in the storage room?’. 93 ‘So, it’s true you are going out in such weather?’. 94 ‘So! Where do you think we will be able to put the stocks in Grand-Gaube?’. 95 ‘And wishing to play with the karkasay crabs / I open my arms to the sipay crabs’.

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(ii) “Je n’entends plus le ‘makalapo’ se lamenter […] Sans toi, mon ‘zez’ n’a plus son ré […] Je te promets un baiser Comme auparavant sous le majestueux ‘mouloupa’” (Ally 2011a, 11).96 (iii) “Il ne connait pas L’heure du ‘tyakoula’” (Ally 2011b, 12).97

Acknowledgements: The authors are grateful to Hannah Meurice for proofreading and Aneesa Vel for translations from Seychellois Creole.

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Mauro Tosco

34 Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia Abstract: Although Italian is no longer (and has not been for a long time) an active player among the languages of the Horn of Africa, the contribution of Italian to the lexicon of the local languages has been substantial. In all countries that from the second part of the nineteenth century until the end of World War II were directly under Italian rule, semantic fields ranging from mechanics to cuisine and from housing to clothing are replete with Italian loans (overwhelmingly nouns). Italian is not an official language in any country of the area; instead, a numerous and active Italian community played a central role in economic life. As a consequence, Italianisms tend to occur in low registers and in semantic fields belonging to everyday’s modern lexicon, where they face competition from English and Arabic. A central role in the diffusion of Italian loans was played geographically by Eritrea and linguistically by Tigrinya, as can be easily seen by the overall similarity of the loans across widely diverging languages of different language groups. Keywords: Italian, Africa, loanwords, borrowing, purism

1 Sociolinguistic situation Most languages of the Horn belong to the Afro-Asiatic macrofamily and specifically to either the Semitic, Cushitic, or Omotic group. Eritrea – In Eritrea, nine (with Dahalik ten) languages are spoken, all of them AfroAsiatic (either Semitic or Cushitic) or Nilo-Saharan. The Semitic languages are Tigrinya and Tigre, as well as Arabic and Dahalik: Arabic is recognized as an official language alongside Tigrinya but it is more a language of culture rather than spoken by an endogenous community; Dahalik has been in recent years discovered and studied (cf. Simeone-Senelle 2006) but has not been recognized yet. Cushitic is represented by Saho and its close cognate Afar (East Cushitic), as well as by Bilin (Central Cushitic) and, along the areas bordering Sudan, Beja (North Cushitic). The Nilo-Saharan languages are Nara and Kunama. Ethiopia – Almost 90 languages are spoken in Ethiopia, almost all of them Afro-Asiatic, either Semitic, Cushitic, or Omotic, as well as a few languages belonging to different groups of the Nilo-Saharan macrofamily. The Semitic languages comprise Tigrinya as well as Amharic and many other (demographically) “minor” languages such as Harari, various so-called Gurage varieties, and the threatened Argobba. Central Cushitic languages (or Agaw) comprise Awngi, Xamtanga, and the highly endangered Qimant; East Cushitic languages Afar and Saho, as well as the highland varieties (with Sidamo –the biggest language of the group– Hadiyya, Libido, Gedeo, Kambaata, Alaba-K’abeena, Burji), the Oromoid group (among which Oromo, but also Konso and other poorly-investihttps://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-034

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gated varieties), the Omo-Tana group (whose most important representative is Somali, but comprising also Dhaasanac, Arbore, and Bayso), and “Dullay” (different dialects or maybe languages, among which Gawwada and Ts’amakko). The Omotic group consists of around thirty languages such as, for example, Wolaytta or Gamo-Gofa-Dawro; they are restricted to Ethiopia and some of them are poorly investigated. The Nilo-Saharan languages of Ethiopia account for maybe 1 % only of the total population; they are spoken by small communities along the Sudanese and South-Sudanese border and belong to widely divergent families of the phylum, such as the Surmic, Koman, and Gumuz languages; quite a few languages are endangered. Somalia – Somalia notoriously has a much simpler ethnolinguistic situation, with Somali as the major and almost the only language, but small Bantu-speaking minorities (i.e. parts of the Niger-Congo macrofamily) are present in the south, together with many Somali “dialects” (a few of them linguistically languages of their own from the point of view of mutual intelligibility), such as Maay (partially recognized nowadays), Dabarre, Tunni, Jiiddu, and maybe others. Quantitative distribution of local languages – A very small subset only of all the aforementioned languages is discussed in this chapter. They are among the major languages of each country and also those for which more data is available. They are probably also those where Italian had an influence earlier and for a longer time. In part the choice is also due to practical considerations: “Minor” languages have been added where data are available and others, such as Dhaasanac and Gawwada, on the basis of the personal knowledge and working experience of the author. They may nevertheless be considered representative of the lexical influence of Italian in comparatively peripheral and remote areas. They are Amharic (Amh.), Oromo (Or.), Somali (Som.), Tigrinya (Tna.), Afar, Wolaytta, Konso, Saho, Gawwada, Dhaasanac, and Harari (cf. Figure 1). Their demographic and sociolinguistic status is widely different. Still, none of these African languages is endangered with extinction, and all are in regular use in their respective ethnic groups. Amharic is spoken by 57 million people worldwide and 21 million as a first language in Ethiopia, where it represents the only real interethnic medium of the country, though Oromo with its 25 million speakers has the highest number of first-language speakers in the country. Oromo is also spoken by 41,600 people in Somalia and 37 million people worldwide. Somali has 7.8 million speakers in Somalia, slightly less than 5 million in Ethiopia, and 18.6 million speakers worldwide. Tigrinya is used by more than 4 million in Ethiopia, 3.1 million in Eritrea, and 9.8 million speakers worldwide. Afar has approximately 1.9 million speakers in Ethiopia, 431,000 in Eritrea, and 2.5 million worldwide. Wolaytta is the language of 1.5 million firstlanguage speakers in Ethiopia and 2.4 million worldwide. The following languages lag well behind: Konso has approximately 250,000 first-language speakers in Ethiopia, Saho is spoken by 235,000 speakers in Eritrea, 32,800 in Ethiopia and has approximately 271,180 speakers in total, Gawwada follows with approximately 70,000 speakers in Ethiopia and 85,000 worldwide. Dhaasanac has around 50,000 speakers in Ethiopia and around 60,000 worldwide. Harari, spoken only in the town of Harar in Eastern Ethiopia, has less than 26,000 speakers (cf. RE 2008 for the number of speakers in Ethiopia according to the Ethio 

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pian census of 2007; Eberhard/Simons/Fennig 2023 for the number of speakers in Eritrea, Somalia and worldwide).

Figure 1: Approximate location of the local languages © Mauro Tosco

Italian – Italian is not actively spoken by an endogenous community in any part of Eastern Africa. Discussing the role of Italian in Eastern Africa is essentially an exercise in historical linguistics and in lexicography, given the (at times impressive)1 lexical layer of

1 Although the present author has called the influence of Italian in the Horn ‘weak’ (Tosco 2008a), this must be contextualized: it is certainly weak in comparison to the longer and still active role of English, French or Portuguese in other parts of Africa, but it has been very important in the Horn itself.

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Italian origin in many indigenous languages of the Horn. The existence of an Italianbased pidgin in Eritrea, as claimed by Habte-Mariam (1976), has found wide resonance (it is listed, for example, in Holm’s 1989 worldwide survey of pidgins and creoles). Sadly, it has never been further investigated and substantiated, and its very existence remains highly doubtful. Speaking about the Italian loans in Tigrinya, Beyene stresses the fact that ‘the Italian we are talking about is not the one which was taught in the few Italian schools, but another very special Italian learned at the workplaces: we are talking of a “simplified Italian”. [...] It was the local workers who decided to learn Italian from their employers’ mouths. Therefore, through the efforts of both parties, that Italian was born which we may call “simplified” and which was especially used in contacts between the employer and the local worker’.2

Note in this regard the use of the past: a ‘simplified’ (semplificato) form of Italian ‘was used’ (veniva usato). Although this is never made clear in the (few) sources on the subject, several Italian loans are likewise more a relic of the past, to be dug from older speakers, than part and parcel of the spoken languages of today. Finally, no data is available on Italian as a second language; it was fairly popular in Somalia before 1990 and the civil war, and was actively used in Mogadishu as a medium at the Somali National University and in contact with the numerous expatriate Italian community. The informal acquisition of Italian by Somali speakers has been investigated by Banti (1990). Banti’s study reveals a simplified form of Italian, extremely variable across speakers, but makes it clear that in no case an Italian pidgin was in use or even incipient. No data is available on the variety of spoken Italian, especially in the past, by the Italian communities in Eastern Africa. Anecdotal evidence has it curiously devoid of regional influences. All in all, it is safe to say that Italian is not a major player anymore among the foreign languages of the Horn.

2 Linguistic history Eritrea – Always remembering that languages per se are never in contact (speakers are), the direct involvement of Italy as a political entity in Eastern Africa can be assigned a rather precise chronology: it started in 1869 when the Rubattino shipping company bought the Assab Bay (nowadays in southern Eritrea) from the local sultan. Eritrea became officially an Italian colony in 1882, and it was actually conquered a few years later as a consequence of the Mahdist revolution in Sudan and the turmoil following the

2 “l’italiano di cui stiamo parlando non è quello che è stato insegnato nelle poche scuole italiane, ma è un altro italiano, tutto particolare, imparato sul luogo di lavoro, stiamo parlando di ‘un italiano semplificato’. [...] Furono i lavoratori indigeni a decidere di imparare la lingua italiana dalla bocca dei loro datori di lavoro. Così dallo sforzo di ambo le parti nacque quell’italiano che possiamo definire ‘semplificato’ che veniva usato specialmente nei contatti tra il datore di lavoro e il lavoratore indigeno” (Beyene 2011, 115s.).

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death of King Yohannes of Ethiopia. In 1885 the Italians conquered Massawa on the coast and a few years later the highlands and the towns of Keren and Asmara, the latter becoming later the Eritrean capital. Most Italian immigration to Eritrea dates from the Fascist period. After World War II, Eritrea was federated with Ethiopia in 1950, but the federation was dissolved unilaterally by Ethiopia in 1962. The war between Eritrean liberation movement (e.g. the Eritrean Liberation Front – ELF) and Ethiopian forces started in 1961 and ended only in 1991 with the collapse of the communist regime in Ethiopia. This paved the way to the independence of Eritrea, which was declared in 1993. Ethiopia – Although the presence of speakers of Italian and the political role of Italy over the country dates back to the nineteenth century, the direct occupation of Ethiopia within Italian East Africa (Africa Orientale Italiana – AOI) lasted only a few years, from the invasion of Ethiopia in 1936, through the short-lived occupation of British Somaliland in 1940, until the end of military operations and of the Italian rule in Eastern Africa in November 1941. After the war, the Ethiopian Empire was restored and Emperor Haile Selassie remained in power until its deposition on 12 September 1974 (he died the following year). The People’s Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, actually a Marxist-Leninist oneparty dictatorship, lasted until 1991. While under the previous regimes Ethiopia had always been a highly centralized state, the present-day Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia is made up of (at least officially) largely autonomous ethno-linguistic regional states. Somalia – In late 1888, Sultan Yusuf Ali Kenadid (Som. Yuusuf Cali Keenadiid) entered into a treaty with Italy and made his Sultanate of Hobyo, on the tip of the Horn, an Italian protectorate; this was followed the next year by a similar agreement with the Majeerteen Sultanate. In 1893, the Sultan of Zanzibar agreed to grant Italy the protectorate over the whole Somali coast. Indirect rule was the norm for a long time, again through private companies. Italy ruled it directly first in 1896, and then from 1905 onwards. Actual interest in Somalia and immigration of Italians into the country came much later from the 1920s onwards and the rise to power of Fascism. After the collapse of the Italian Empire and the British occupation, at the Potsdam Conference (1945) Italy was given trusteeship over its former Somali colony until independence (1 July 1960). Then this part of Somalia joined with the former British Somaliland in the Somali Republic in 1969. From 1969 until the end of the military dictatorship by Mohamed Siad Barre (Som. Maxamed Siyaad Barre) the state was called Somali Democratic Republic. Since then the country has been ravaged by civil war. The Federal Republic of Somalia has nowadays at least nominal sovereignty over what was Italian Somalia, while former British Somaliland makes up the self-declared and internationally unrecognized Republic of Somaliland. Italian Settlers – The number of Italians was far from negligible in absolute terms: just from January to July 1936 over 131,000 Italians settled in Ethiopia. In a way, Eritrea was always “the” Italian colony in Africa. Most Italians in East Africa lived in Eritrea, and most of them in Asmara, the capital, where just before World War II Italians made up for more than half the population. The number of Italians suffered a first drop after

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war but was mostly affected, much later, by the socialist and nationalistic economic policies of Somalia and Ethiopia and the ensuing civil war in Eritrea and Somalia. Spread of Italian – In the Horn as elsewhere, linguistic influence spread from towns: just as in Somalia many Italian loans were typical of Mogadishu, also the spoken Tigrinya of Asmara was especially rich in Italianisms (Voigt 2007, 223). Due to the limited role of education in colonial Italy (cf. 3, Education), the spread of Italian was mostly the result of informal contact; it is further very probable that many Italian words were carried into Somalia and Ethiopia by Eritreans rather than directly through contacts with Italians: e. g., Eritrean colonial troops had early been dispatched to Somalia, where they certainly made a contribution to the spread of Italian. It must be stressed that in many cases Italian loanwords have reached many local and peripheral languages not directly but through the intermediacy of the major languages of the respective countries. Non-governmental contacts with Italy – Obviously, speakers of Italian (and of the minority languages which usually were the first native languages in most areas of what was to become Italy) had been present in the area well before the late nineteenth century: traders, missionaries, explorers and adventurers, just to mention a few categories, had long been involved in the Horn of Africa. Nor has contact with speakers of Italian ever been discontinued, given the presence of tiny communities of expatriates or descendants of Italian immigrants, and the continuing economic and political involvement of Italian enterprises and NGOs.  

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation Eritrea – Italian is not mentioned in the constitution of any country of the Horn. The Eritrean constitution mentions languages in its articles on national symbols (art. 4), and on equality under the law and fair trial (art. 14 and 17). Specifically, it guarantees “[t]he equality of all Eritrean languages” (C-ER, art. 4.3). Ethiopia – In the Ethiopian constitution, Italian isn’t mentioned either, but languages play a bigger role, being part and parcel of the constitution’s definition of the “Nations, Nationalities and Peoples” (C-ET, art. 8.1) of the country and their rights (a preliminary analysis of the language policies of Eritrea and Ethiopia can be found in Savà/Tosco 2008). In particular, the Constitution gives Amharic the status of “working language of the Federal Government” (C-ET, art. 5.2), while stating that “Members of the Federation may by law determine their respective working languages” (C-ET, art. 5.3). The Constitution explicitly provides that “[e]very Nation, Nationality, and People in Ethiopia has the right to speak, to write and to develop its own language; to express, to develop and to promote its culture; and to preserve its history” (C-ET, art. 39.2). Finally, among the criteria defining the “Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples”, it is noteworthy that the Constitution explicitly mentions a “mutual intelligibility of language” (C-ET, art. 39.5).

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Somalia – The first Somali constitution of 1960 did not mention language. Starting from the constitution of the Somali Democratic Republic (ratified 25 August 1979), Somali is the only national and official language. The Provisional Constitution of the new Federal Republic of Somalia (adopted 1 August 2012) has Somali as the only official language (specifying that both Maay and Maxaa-tiri are recognized varieties) and Arabic as a second language (C-SO, art. 5). The same applies (without mentioning different varieties of Somali) to the constitution of the internationally unrecognized Republic of Somaliland.

3.2 Languages used by public authorities Eritrea – Tigrinya and Arabic are the two official languages of the country. Ethiopia – In the present Ethiopian constitution, Amharic –formerly the only official language of Ethiopia– has been downgraded to the role of federal working language (cf. C-ET, art. 5.2)3 although it remains de facto the interethnic medium of the country. Different languages are the “working language” of many of the single federal states of the country (C-ET, art. 5.3), but no official or national language is mentioned. Many languages are undergoing both status and corpus planning and are used locally in public education and administration. Somalia – After having been provided with its current Latin-based orthography, Somali became in 1972 the only official language of the country. A certain role has at least officially been granted in recent years to Maay (C-SO, art. 5), a Somali variety widely used in the South.

3.3 Languages used in education In all the Italian colonies, indigenous people had limited access to separate elementary schools, which were often entrusted to missions and whose level was generally very low.4 They were especially geared towards the colonial troops (the Ascari) and their families; the offspring of mixed couples who had been recognized by Italian fathers were admitted to Italian schools, but starting in 1938 and with the promulgation in Italy of racial laws, great care was given to separate Africans from Europeans. Nowadays Italian is still present in education through the Italian schools in Addis Ababa and (closed in 2020) Asmara, run by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. The Italian school in Mogadishu has been closed since the civil war.

3 In February 2020 the inclusion of four more federal working languages (Afar, Oromo, Somali and Tigrinya) was announced. 4 Pankhurst (1962) is a detailed history of education in Ethiopia and Eritrea and provides a rich account of foreign and indigenous schools before World War II.

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Among the local African languages, Amharic, Tigrinya, and Somali have de jure or de facto official status at the country level. Afar, Oromo, and Harari (alongside again Tigrinya and Somali) are used at the regional level in Ethiopia. Saho (and, again, Afar) are at least officially recognized as minority languages in Eritrea (together with all the other languages of the country except the newly discovered Dahalik; cf. above). All these are written languages and are used in broadcasting and education. The status of others is more uncertain: Wolaytta is to a certain extent used as a written medium and in education in the zone (a subdivision of a regional state) of the same name of Ethiopia, while the written status of Konso is incipient and to all practical extents non-existent in the case of Gawwada and, especially, Dhaasanac. Moreover, as anticipated, Amharic is the most common interethnic language in Ethiopia and still the preferred medium in education. Oromo and Somali are widely used in the Oromo and Somali regional states and Somali is of course the language of administration and education in Somalia and Somaliland; Tigrinya plays much the same role in Eritrea. English, and to an extent Arabic, dominate in higher education, and both languages are widely used in international relations and commerce.

3.4 Languages used in the media Neither in Eritrea, Ethiopia, nor Somalia does Italian play any role in the media. Official and minority languages, as well as English and Arabic, are widely used.

4 Linguistic characteristics The lexical influence of Italian in the Horn is certainly impressive; e. g., Beyene (2011) lists 178 Italian loans for Amharic and 698 items for Tigrinya.5 A major hindrance to the task of recovering the full extent of Italian influence is obviously given by the absence of  

5 These numbers are to be taken with much care: often, Beyene lists as separate entries different forms of the same Italian word, or different meanings for the same loan. Only a few of these double entries have been taken off in my calculations. Finally, the very semantics of certain loans seems to point to Italian words known among the speakers of Tigrinya rather than Italian loans which really entered the Amharic or Tigrinya language. The author says that ‘it is necessary nevertheless to stress at once that, while a few Italian terms complete the contemporary Tigrinya vocabulary, others are used instead only in alternation with true Tigrinya terms’ (“[È] necessario, tuttavia, sottolineare subito che mentre alcuni termini italiani integrano il vocabolario moderno tigrino, altri, invece, vengono usati solamente in alternanza con autentici termini tigrini”, Beyene 2011, 115); he also claims, on the other hand, that ‘the following Italian terms that are part of the Tigrinya vocabulary have been collected by reading Tigrinya monolongual dictionaries, as well as Tigrinya-English and English-Tigrinya-Arabic dictionaries’ (“i seguenti termini italiani facenti parte del patrimonio di vocaboli della lingua tigrina sono stati raccolti leggendo dei dizionari tigrini monolingue, vocabolari tigrino-inglese e inglese-tigrino-arabo”, Beyene 2011, 116). Similarly, Kane’s (1990)

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good, reliable dictionaries (and quite often, even descriptions) of many languages. If Armbruster’s (1910) Amharic dictionary does not contain any Italian loans, a few are reported in Leslau’s (1964) short analysis of the Amharic lexicon. Similarly, data on Italian loans in other languages invariably comes from modern sources.

4.1 Pronunciation The phonology of Italian loans in Somali has been dealt with by Mioni (1988) and later by Tosco (2008a), and the phonology of Italian loans in Saho by Banti/Vergari (2008). No similar study exists for other languages. Vowels – Italian loanwords are usually easily recognizable for their final vowel; for example, Amh. polis6 or kinin can come from either English or French police and quinine, not from It. polizia and chinino. The latter, instead, is the source of Tna. känina or kənina or Saho kaniina, which also stand for ‘pill’ in general. Moreover, many short bisyllabic Italian loans have been borrowed with no or minimal phonological changes. Being vowel-ending, Italian loans are easily recognizable in Amharic and Tigrinya, while in languages that allow (as Somali) or even prescribe final vowels in nouns (such as Oromo, Gawwada, and typically the Highland East Cushitic languages), they mix with any other noun. Vowel quality remains largely unchanged; in the modern Ethiosemitic languages /ə/ or /ɐ/, usually transcribed ä, often stands for an unstressed /e/ (itself subject to a local or positional and dialectal variation in quality) in Italian loans, as in Tna. alǧäbra ‘algebra’ (It. algebra), forästali ‘forester’ (It. forestale), ǧälato ‘icecream’ (It. gelato), and ǧässo ‘plaster’ (It. gesso). /i/, especially if unstressed, is often reduced to /ɨ/ (usually transcribed ə) in the same languages, as in Tna. bəskoti ‘biscuit’ (It. biscotto) or əmbätito ‘sandwich’ (< It. (panino) imbottito; spoken Italian often uses the English loan or variants of it). Alternation between /ə/, /ɐ/ and /ɨ/ is also possible, as in Tna. parčälla or parčilla ‘lot, plot’ (It. parcella). Vowel length is phonemic in Cushitic and Omotic languages; stressed vowels in Italian tend to be phonetically long in open syllable, and they are often reanalysed as long in loans: Som. atleetiko ‘athletics’ (It. atletica), or armaajo ‘wardrobe’ (It. armadio). Consonants – The general pattern involves, of course, the phonological adaptation to the target language and the substitution of phonemes not present in it. In the case of

authoritative Tigrinya-English dictionary lists even a few Italian toponyms, Italian shop signs in Asmara and Italian abbreviations (cf. 4.3). 6 Examples from languages not written in a Latin-based alphabet are reported in their traditional transcription system; this is the case of Amharic, Harari, and Tigrinya. The official Latin-based orthography is followed in the case of Afar (also in the very name of the language, which is also spelt ‘Afar in linguistic literature or Qafar [ʕafar]), as well as for Oromo, Saho, Somali, and Wolaytta. The transcription of unwritten languages (such as Gawwada and Dhaasanac) follows the original sources, and the same is done for Konso. In doubt, IPA transcription follows.

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Italian loans, the most obvious candidates for substitution are the palatal lateral approximant /ʎ/ ( in Italian orthography) and the alveolar affricates /ts/ and /dz/ (a single phoneme in many varieties and both written in Italian orthography). The former is a particularly rare phoneme in Italian and it generally becomes /lj/, for example in Somali (orthographically ). In a parallel way, the Italian palatal nasal stop /ɲ/ (orthographically – which has found its way into the orthography of Saho and occasionally in Somalia for writing minority languages, such as Maay) is changed into /nj/ where not present (as in Somali, where it is orthographically expressed as ): Som. luulyo ‘July’ (It. luglio), juunyo ‘June’ (It. giugno). Affricates – The alveolar affricates /ts/ and /dz/ (both in Italian orthography and for most speakers a single phoneme) are generally absent in the Horn; upon borrowing, they lose their stop component and become alveolar fricatives, as in Saho biyassa ‘bus station’ (It. piazza ‘square’), Tna. bronzo and Som. boronso ‘bronze’ (Giama/Angelin 1986, 7) from It. bronzo (/brondzo/), and Som. maarso ‘March’ (It. marzo /martso/). The alveo-palatal affricates /dʒ/ and /tʃ/ (orthographically and ) are often preserved, but the latter can shift to /ʃ/, especially where /tʃ/ is absent in the target languages (as in Somali); Som. farmashiyo ‘drugstore’ (It. farmacia) and Tna. fəšo, fəčo ‘office’ (It. ufficio) are cases in point. Another possibility is the change to /s/, as in Amh. siminto and Oromo simintoo ‘cement, concrete’ from It. cemento. Plosives and fricatives – Other possible sound substitutions involve the change /p/ > /b/ where the target lacks /p/ (as in Somali), yielding for example, Som. boroobagando vs. Amh. and Tna. propaganda from It. propaganda (which seems a more plausible source than English). /v/ is quite rare in the languages of the Horn and often shifts to /f/ or /w/ in Somali, the choice being apparently lexically-governed, as in arkiifiyo ‘archive’ (It. archivio) vs. wiisito ‘medical examination’ (It. visita). In the languages of Ethiopia and Eritrea /v/ changed instead to /b/, as in Amh. bäranda and Tna. bärända/bäranda ‘veranda; balcony’,7 from It. veranda. This greater amount of phonological adaptation is typical of older loans. The constant influx of foreign words (not only from Italian) has led in both Amharic and Tigrinya to the phonologization of /v/, as shown, for example, by Tna. valvola ‘valve’ (It. valvola), vaniliya ‘vanilla’ (It. vaniglia), värničä ‘paint’ (It. vernice), vazälina ‘vaseline (petroleum jelly)’ (It. vaselina, Beyene 2011, 137) and many others. The change is well attested in Saho, as in baalijja ‘suitcase’ (It. valigia), baazo ‘vase’ (It. vaso), betro/ bitro ‘glass’ (It. vetro) against Tna. valija, vazo, and vetro, and point to an early diffusion in Italian Eritrea and their later adaptation to the phonology of the donor language only where contact with Italian was greater. Ejectives – The use of ejective consonants in loans is rare but attested, as in Tna. asqaṭla ‘box’ from It. scatola and boṭoloni ‘battalion’ (It. battaglione). As reminded by Ban7 Unless specifically indicated, the following general dictionaries and lists of loans are the sources of the loans: Afar: Parker/Hayward (1985), Amharic: Leslau (1976), Kane (1990), Oromo: DOR (1996), Mekuria (1998), Saho: Vergari/Vergari (2003), Banti/Vergari (2008), Somali: DSI (1985), Zorc/Osman (1993), Tigrinya: Kane (2000), Wolaytta: DWA (1991).

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ti/Vergari (2008, 92), in a few cases influence or direct influence from Arabic may be suspected, as in Harari ṭrūmba (Leslau 1959, 295) and Saho thurumba (/t’urumba/) ‘trumpet’ from It. tromba. Syllable Structure – Languages of the Horn usually have very simple syllabic structures, with only one consonant being allowed word-initially and word-finally, and clusters being reduced to two elements word-internally. Cluster simplification is therefore rampant in loans, and it can involve the formation of an initial CV syllable through vowel harmony, as in Tna. kärädensa ‘cupboard’ (It. credenza) and färänka ‘Franc’ (It. franco), Saho ferentaayo ‘crusher’ (< It. frantoio ‘olive-press’), or in Som. kalaasifikatoore ‘classifier’ (It. classificatore). Still, non-canonical clusters are well attested in loans; Som. shentraal ‘telephone exchange’ from It. centrale ‘central’ (Caney 1984), Tna. astronomo ‘astronomer’ (It. astronomo), and kontroband ‘smuggling’ and kontrobandista ‘smuggler’ all violate the ban on three-consonant clusters. The corresponding Somali word, kontarabaan ‘smuggling’, shows the dropping of the final syllable of the source (It. contrabbando). In Somali, the final syllable /do/ of the Italian source could have been reanalysed as an instance of the Somali feminine article ‑da. Dropping of the final syllable is attested in Somali also for rimoor ‘trailer’ (It. rimorchio; -kii is the Somali masculine anaphoric article), and dropping of the initial syllable in Tna. formatorä ‘informant; spy’ (It. informatore) and Amh. šugamano ‘towel’ (< It. asciugamano, reported in Tesfu Dires 2012). Prosody – Stress reanalysis, with stress being displaced from the antepenultimate to the penultimate syllable is also common; in Somali only the last and the penultimate syllables can bear accent, yielding such forms as kataloogo /kataˈloːɡo/ ‘catalogue’ from It. catalogo /kaˈtaloɡo/. Epenthesis – An initial vowel is often inserted before an initial cluster. The epenthetic vowel is either /i/ in Somali (as in istaatistiko ‘statistics’, It. statistica), or /a/ or /ɨ/ (usually transcribed ) in Tigrinya and Amharic. A few Tigrinya examples from Kane’s (2000) dictionary include: aspasəla ‘brush’ (It. spazzola), asbela ‘safety pin’ (It. spilla), asbašo, ašbašo ‘spice’ (It. spezia), əskopa ‘broom’ (It. scopa), əstuko ‘stucco’ (It. stucco). Som. kaambe or iskaambe ‘prawn; lobster’ (It. scampo) shows two ways of dealing with initial clusters: either through an initial vowel or simply through dropping of the initial consonant of the loan. Gemination – Gemination, which is phonemic in both Italian and most languages of the Horn (be them Semitic, Cushitic or Omotic), can still be dropped or added with apparently no principled reason. We therefore find Tna. bolonä ‘bolt’ for It. bullone, and, to the contrary, Tna. and Saho bambulla for It. bambola ‘doll’.

4.2 Morphosyntax Nouns – In Somali the most salient rule affecting many Italian loans is the change of final ‑a (the marker of feminine singular nouns in Italian) to ‑o. This is a productive and

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fully automatic rule of Somali, and affects loans as well as the indigenous lexicon, yielding such forms as jeneestiko ‘gymnastics’, from It. ginnastica, anteeno ‘aerial’ from It. antenna, farmashiyo ‘drugstore’ from It. farmacia and many others. ‑a is restored before affixes or clitics (for example, a determiner, such as the article), yielding, for example, farmashiyada ‘the drugstore’. Nouns ending in ‑o are feminine in Somali if singular (while they may be either masculine or feminine if plural), and therefore the Italian gender is preserved in such loans. Nouns ending in ‑o – As ‑o is the prototypical ending of masculine singular nouns in Italian, the end result would be that most, if not all, Italian loans in Somali could end up being feminine nouns in ‑o. While this is actually the case in kataloogo ‘catalogue’ mentioned above, or shoobero ‘strike (work stoppage)’ (< It. sciopero), more commonly Italian masculine loans have their final ‑o (or ‑e, another typical ending of masculine singular nouns) changed to ‑i or less frequently to ‑e, as in Som. dokumenti ‘document’ (< It. documento or plural documenti), or still simply dropped – a possibility which applies also to Italian feminine nouns, as in Som. dishibiliin ‘discipline’ (< It. disciplina – unless, with less probability, En. discipline is the source). Nouns ending in ‑e – Final ‑e of Italian masculine singular nouns stands better chances of being preserved, as ‑e is also a masculine ending in Somali; this is especially the case of human entities, ‑e being in Somali a masculine suffix for the doer of an action; the final vowel of the loan can also be changed according to the rules of the recipient languages, as in Som. fashiiste ‘Fascist’ (< It. fascista, which can be both masculine or feminine). Nouns ending in -i – Many Italian loans have a final ‑i in Amharic and Tigrinya, making it impossible to ascertain if the singular or the plural form (‑i being the prototypical ending of masculine plural nouns) was the source. An origin from the Italian plural is well possible in the case of many products usually sold by weight or in packages, for example, Tna. mändärini ‘tangerine’ (It. mandarino, ‑i) or makkaroni ‘macaroni’ (It. maccheroni, the singular maccarone being obvioulsy rare). In certain languages, like Saho, these loans are actually collectives from which singulatives may be derived. Nominal derivation – Loans are always overwhelming nouns, and Italian loans in the Horn are no exception. Italian morphemes have not made it into the target languages as such, but only as part of loans, as in the case of Som. telefooniisto ‘telephone operator’ (reported in Caney 1984), Amh. gommista ‘tire dealer’ and Tna. idrawliko ‘plumber’ (< It. telefonista, gommista, and idraulico, respectively). Autonomous nominal derivation through Italian affixes is unknown, although Tigrinya has kontrobandista ‘smuggler’ alongside kontrobando ‘smuggling’, whose source is It. contrabbando. Kontrobandista, reminiscent of Spanish contrabandista, could be an autonomous formation, because Italian has contrabbandiere for ‘smuggler’. Another curious case is Som. boyesso – apparently a local formation from English boy and the Italian feminine derivative ‑essa (as in dottore, dottoressa ‘doctor’) to which Somali final -a to -o (as discussed in the beginning of this chapter) applied. The term is (or was) in wide use to refer to a female housekeeper, especially working among expatriates. While boy, with the meaning of

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‘male housekeeper’ is found in both the DSI (1985) and Zorc/Osman (1993), boyesso is not reported (although it certainly is or was more common). Verbs – A few direct verbal loans have been reported, but they are almost always doubtful. Cases such as Amh. and Tna. färämä ‘to sign’ derive of course from firma ‘signature’, which is a loan from It. firma. The verb itself is not a loan, as is easily shown by the fact that it is perfectly adapted to the pattern of Semitic “sound” verbs. The same applies to Tna. mättärä ‘to measure in metres’ from metro, mätro ‘meter’ from It. metro (which is much more widespread, cf. Saho mitro, as well as other Italian loans for measures, such as Tna. etari ‘hectare’ < It. ettaro). I assume the same to be true of Tna. astarärä, astäräzä ‘to iron’ (Beyene 2011, 117), Tna. galvana ‘to galvanize’ (Beyene 2011, 124), and kašana ‘to cook’ (Beyene 2011, 127) from It., respectively, stirare, galvanizzare and cucinare. None of them is reported in dictionaries. Amh. saldare ‘to weld’ (Beyene 2011, 104) is identical to the infinitive (the citation form) of It. saldare and is highly doubtful. The case of Tna. mastika ‘to chew’ (Beyene 2011, 130) is probably a mistake: mastika and the like is common all over Ethiopia and Eritrea (and it is duly reported by Beyene too) for ‘chewing gum’ and is of course an Italian loan from mastica ‘he/she/it chews’. An example among many is Saho mastikka. The loan probably had its origin in the Horn, since Italian itself, in its various spoken and official forms, uses different words (but masticante is reported, e.g., in Sicily). Not different is the case of It. fischia ‘he/she/it whistles’ which gave Tna. fiska ‘whistle’, and spread to Saho fiska and all the way south to Gawwada fiška8 and Konso fiškaa.9 The case is not too much different from Saho istiraare from It. stirare ‘to iron’, but borrowed as a noun (‘ironing’), and from which a “true” Saho verb has been derived with a causative affix: istiraarishe ‘to iron’. As an instance of an indirect verbal noun, Saho borrowed the Tigrinya verb marrasha ‘to march’ (itself derived from It. marciare or more probably the noun marcia) and adapted it to Saho morphology as imirrishe ‘to march’. Finally, Tna. täkwänatärä ‘to bargain’, maybe originally, as per Beyene (2011, 135) from It. contrattare, is obviously internally derived with a reciprocal/reflexive extension tä-. More intriguing is the case of It. correggere ‘to correct’, which is probably the source of Amharic korräjä ‘to crib at school; to cheat in exams by copying the answers from someone else’s paper’ (but Kane 1990, 1399, has it coming from French corriger) and, with a peculiar semantic shift, of Gawwada korraj ‘to introduce Amharic loanwords, to mix one’s language with Amharic’ (as done by Gawwada who attend school). Very few verbs are derived from Italian loans in Somali, and none has been borrowed directly. For example, baraafuun ‘perfume’ traces its origin to It. profumo. From barafuun the transitive verb barafuumee ‘to perfume’ and the adjective/stative verb barafuumaysan ‘(to be) perfumed’ are derived.

8 The Gawwada data derives from field studies of the author (cf. Tosco 2021 for a grammatical description and Tosco 2022 for a Gawwada dictionary). 9 The Konso data was collected by Ongaye Oda Orkaydo (Dilla University, Ethiopia).

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Adjectives – A few Italian adjectival loans are reported: Tesfu Dires (2012) reports bulo ‘blue’ from It. blu; Saho has aranšooni ‘orange colour’ (It. arancione) and Tna. lilla (in alternation with the regular adjectival derivation liläway) for ‘lilac’ (It. lilla). That colour terms, especially ‘blue’, may be borrowed, is not surprising, considering how many African languages are “stage 4” languages in Berlin/Kay’s (1969) famous basic colour terms theory, and blue itself has been reported as a loan, for example from English, in Bantu languages, such as Ndebele (Davies/Davies/Corbett 1994) and Chichewa (Davies et al. 1995).10 Adverbs – As it always happens in language contact, adverbs of confirmation or negation are easily borrowed; cases in point are Saho abbosto ‘okay’, from It. a posto, and biya! ‘get out!’ from via! and many others. Lexicalized expressions – In certain cases an Italian expression has been borrowed and lexicalized as a single word, as in Tna. bellaroba ‘peddler, hawker’ from It. bella roba ‘nice stuff’ – obviously a typical peddler’s call, makä from It. macché, an emphatic negation translatable as ‘obvioulsy not!’, Amh. mamma, əmmamma ‘mother!’ (term of address for one’s mother or for an elderly woman) from It. mamma (Kane 1990, 1122), and Tna. mamay from It. mamma mia!, roughly ‘oh my!’ (Beyene 2011, 130), bärnentä ‘nothing at all!’ (It. per niente), and even mawardatumbo ‘hey, look!; just have a look!’ from It. ma guarda tu un po! (reported in Kane 2000).11 Again, the persistence and diffusion of such material in the spoken language of today remains unknown.

4.3 Lexicon Impact of Italian loans – The lexical enrichment brought by Italian to the languages of the Horn involves a great number of semantic fields, with a preference for those of everyday speech: the role of Italian in higher registers has been hampered by the standardization and lexical enrichment of Amharic and Tigrinya and, since 1972, of Somali (cf. 5, Puristic attitudes). This may explain the relatively small number of Italian loans in “official” dictionaries and in studies based upon higher registers of the language (such as Caney 1984 for Somali). Due to the spread of Italian words through major languages (cf. 2, Spread of Italian), many loans are widespread across the area irrespective of the local language and the actual historical contact of Italians with the indigenous peoples. As such, Italian loans are a true areal feature; e. g., Italian loans represent 3.3 % of items in the “Modern World” semantic field in Gawwada (Tosco 2009, 134), a comparatively small and remote language of the Ethiopian South-west. Still, a few Italian loans found in Gawwada have not been recorded so far in other languages. Furthermore, many Italian  

 

10 For Ethiopia, a fairly typical stage 4 language (without “blue”) is Dhaasanac, whose colour system is investigated in Tosco (1999). 11 A very strange case is It. nell’ (the preposition in followed by the masculine singular article) found in a Tigrinya literary source as nell and duly reported by Kane (2000, 1303).

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loans have probably disappeared or are on the verge of falling into disuse due to the influence of local languages or more trendy competitors as lexical donors. Yet, words that have become obsolete or have been replaced at the centre, may have been preserved at the periphery. The Italian loans in languages such as Konso, Gawwada and Dhaasanac, in the Ethiopian South-west, belong here, while the sheer lack of data makes it impossible to list many other words and languages. Before presenting a few semantic fields where Italian loans are found, it must be stressed that the following list is far from being complete and that most loans are present in much more than a single language. Food and cuisine – Not surprisingly, food and cuisine have been a major field of lexical Italian influence. Som. formaajo or farmaajo, from It. formaggio, apart from being the nickname of Maxamed Cabdullahi Maxamed “Formaajo”, President of Somalia until 2022, is the common word for ‘cheese’ and equally undisputed are the much more common baasto from It. pasta and suugo from It. sugo ‘sauce’. Much the same loans occur in other languages of the Horn, as in Amh. and Tna. (Beyene 2011, 124) formajo, Amh. and Tna. pasta, Or. paastaa, and Tna. sugo. Within the same semantic field Italian is the source of Tna. piyati and Saho biyatti ‘dish, plate’ (It. piatto) and farketta ‘fork’ (It. forchetta), as well as of Amh. and Tna. primo and Amh. sekondo and Tna. sakondo (Beyene 2011, 106s., 134) from It. primo/secondo ‘first; main course’. Another example among many is It. caramella ‘candy’, as in Amh. kärämella, Tna. karamila, karamäla (Beyene 2011, 105, 126), Saha koromella and, in the extreme South-west, Dhaasanac karambela (Tosco 2001, 510). Once again, data for the huge stretch of land (and the different languages therein) all the way from the Ethiopian highlands to the lower Omo River is missing. Tigrinya has borrowed It. menta ‘mint (the aromatic plant)’ twice, both as mänta (the plant) and as menta ‘mint-flavored confection’ (the diminutive mentina is maybe more common in Italian in this meaning). Italian loans are common for many other food items and staple which were imported or marketed by Italians. Here the list is almost endless. A few are Tna. ačäto ‘vinegar’ (It. aceto), fajoli (Beyene 2011, 122) and Saho faajoli ‘bean(s)’ (< It. fagioli), Tna. karčofi ‘artichoke(s)’ (< It. carciofi, Beyene 2011, 126), karroti ‘carrot(s)’ (It. carota; but Amharic has instead the English loan carrot as karot), kastaňa (Beyene 2011, 127) from It. castagna ‘chestnut’, kawlo kapuči (Beyene 2011, 127) and Saho kabučči ‘savoy cabbage’ from It. (cavolo) cappuccio, kawlofiyori ‘cauliflower’ (Beyene 2011, 127) as well as Saho kawlofiyoori ‘cauliflower’ from It. cavolfiore, and even Saho banaana ‘banana’ (alongside muuz, from Arabic) and sambarsaano, the name of an elongated type of plum tomatoes called in Italian San Marzano after their place of origin. Tomatoes themselves are in Tna. komidara, komodoro or still komodara (Beyene 2011, 128) and in Saho komodooro ‘tomato’ (It. pomodoro): the same consonant changes in such a typologically and genetically different language as Saho points of course to an origin and diffusion from Tigrinya. Words that are not reported in Amharic and Tigrinya, such as Saho kawlo ‘cabbage’ (It. cavolo) can safely be assumed to be (or have been) existent at some point at least among certain speakers. Amh. and Tna. bira and Saho birra ‘beer’ from It. birra obviously belong here, too (Som. has instead biir, which can be assumed to be a loan

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from English). Nor is the list restricted to everyday staple and food, and it runs from Tna. šəkkorya ‘chicory’ to šəbrəya ‘face powder’ (It. cipria) passing through Tna. grafoni ‘carnation’ (It. garofano, plural ‑i) and Saho laama ‘razor blade’ (It. lama ‘blade’) and countless others. Even more basic items can be subject to borrowing from Italian, as seen in Tna. bani and Saho baani ‘(European-style) bread’ from It. pane and the more specific Tna. kasetta ‘sandwich bread’ from It. (pane a) cassetta. Clothing and fabrics – Clothing is another obvious and rich source of loans. Amh. and Tna. kalsi from It. calze is the common word for ‘socks’ and is found as far south as Wolaytta kalssiyaa, Gawwada kalse and Konso kaalsita; Som. iskaalso seems rather to come from the adjective scalzo ‘barefoot’. In the same semantic area, we find among many more Amh. kanatera or kanitera ‘undershirt’ (It. canottiera), Tna. kaməša, kaməča ‘shirt’ (It. camicia), Amh. and Tna. pijama (Beyene 2011, 132) ‘pyjamas’ (It. pigiama), Tna. kappa ‘cape’ (It. cappa), Saho banthallooni ([bantˈalloːni]), manthallon ([mantˈallon]) ‘trousers, pants’ (It. pantaloni), and rajjibetto ‘bra’ from It. reggipetto (somewhat obsolete), Amh. and Tna. tuta (Beyene 2011, 107, 136) and Som. tuute ‘overalls’ (It. tuta), Amh. kravat from Italian or French) and Tna. krabata, kravata ‘necktie’ (It. cravatta), or kolletta, kwalletta ‘collar’ (It. colletto) and velo ‘(bridal) veil’ (It. velo). With clothing, also the names of fabrics came from Italian, as in the case of Tna. lino ‘linen’ (It. lino), and väluto ‘velvet’ (It. velluto) and even lana ‘wool’ (It. lana). Nor is the list of materials limited to fabrics: Tna. ačayo ‘steel’ (It. acciaio) and ačido ‘acid’ (It. acido) are just two among many. Furniture and housing – Furniture and housing make another important area where Italian loans dominate. It. villa has become Tna. vila and Saho villa; It. bagno ‘bath; bathroom’ is found in Amh. baňňo, Tna. baňo and Or. baanyoo; It. armadio ‘wardrobe’ entered as such in Amharic (Tesfu Dires 2012, 21) and in Somali as armaajo; It. comodino ‘night table’ is komodino or komädino in Amharic and komodino in Tigrinya, which also shows It. comò ‘chest of drawers’ as komo. We can further list Tna. dobyo ‘double bed’ (It. doppio), kančalo (and Saho kanshello) ‘gate’ (It. cancello), koridäyo ‘corridor’ (It. corridoio), Saho farnello ‘cooking stove’ (It. fornello), and many others. Health – Health comes next, especially again in Eritrea, with such words as Tna. ernəya ‘hernia’ (It. ernia), barella ‘gurney’ (It. barella), bäntičətä ‘appendicitis’ (It. appendicite), farmača ‘drugstore’ (and the corresponding Som. farmashiyo mentioned in 4.1 and 4.2) but in competition with English-derived farmasi, kallo ‘callus’ (It. callo), čərätto ‘Band-Aid’ (It. cerotto), rajji (and Saho raajji) ‘X-rays’ (popular It. raggi), and of course Saho asbidaale and Som. isbitaal ‘hospital’ (It. ospedale). Military, police and security – The military, police and security are still another semantic area with many Italian loans, although many of them, as kumpanəya ‘company’, from It. compagnia, are obsolete and Amharic generally prefers English to Italian as a source of loans here. One of the most common among Italian loans (and possibly one of the earliest, as shown by the great amount of phonological adaptation) is Tna. wardiya ‘watchman’ from It. guardia, in use all across the Horn of Africa. Vergari/Vergari (2003) report for Saho bandeera ‘flag’ (It. bandiera), and bosolo ‘cartridge’ (It. bossolo). The first

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one is very common, as shown by Amh. bandira or bandera, to which one can add arma ‘insignia’ (It. arma), medalya ‘medal’ (It. medaglia), mina ‘mine’ (It. mina), šabola or šamla ‘saber’ (It. sciabola), fäšale ‘officer’ (It. ufficiale). For Tigrinya, we have bəraššo ‘canteen’ (It. borraccia), blokko or bulocco ‘checkpoint’ (It. (posto di) blocco), kambo or kampo ‘military field’ (It. campo ‘field’), kaporalä ‘corporal’ (It. caporale), kärarmata ‘tank’ (It. carro armato), karikatorä ‘firearm magazine’ (It. caricatore), kasko ‘pith helmet’ (It. casco), kazerma ‘barracks’ (It. caserma), koprifokko ‘curfew’ (It. coprifuoco), kubbanya ‘company’ (It. compagnia), ronda ‘patrol’ (It. ronda), trikolata ‘barbed wire’, apparently from It. ‘reticolato’, and also šälla ‘prison cell’ (It. cella) and karšäli or karšäli ‘jail’ (the latter also the name of a neighbourhood in Addis Ababa) from It. carcere. Very possibly also Saho jubba ‘jacket’ (It. giubba) belongs here. Of course, many loans have found their way all over the area: It. bomba ‘bomb’ is the source of Amh., Tna. and Harari bomba (Leslau 1959, 295) but also of Or. boombii, etc., and It. tenda ‘tent’ is found a bit everywhere, as in Tna. and Saho tenda. A few loans have been recorded in the far south, witnessing probably an earlier more general use: It. caccia ‘fighter plane’ (lit. ‘hunt’) is found in Gawwada as kaač’č’a ‘big, long-distance plane’ and It. giberna ‘cartridge pouch’ as č’apparna in Gawwada and ʄaɓɓeernaa in Konso. Gaming and free time – Gaming and free time are another area of Italian influence, ranging from colloquial Amh. jitoni ‘table football’ from It. gettone ‘token’ (a pre-paid token is often needed in order to operate it), to Amh. kärämbolla from It. carambola ‘carom (a cannon in billiards/pool)’ and Tna. steka (Beyene 2011, 135) from It. stecca ‘billiard cue’. Tigrinya further has lotärya ‘lottery’ (It. lotteria), dado ‘die’ (It. dado) and pallo ‘goalpost (in football)’ (It. palo), to which one may add, from the extreme South-west of Ethiopia, Dhaasanac koorti (Tosco 2001, 512) ‘playground’ maybe from It. corte ‘courtyard’. In general, the semantic field of football (soccer) is replete with Italian loans, as witnessed for Saho by albitro ‘referee’ (It. arbitro) and rizzerba ‘reserve’ (It. riserva). Other words in the field of gaming and free time are Amh. banko and bankoni ‘counter; bar’ (It. banco, bancone) and əsteka ‘carton (of cigarettes)’ (It. stecca). Mechanics – Mechanics is another major field: while a few Italian words may be dwindling out of use (cf. 5), the field is still replete with Italian loans. A few are quite generic words: It. pompa ‘pump’ has entered unchanged in Amharic and Tigrinya as pompa and in Oromo as boombaa, but it is also found in Gawwada as paampa and Konso as poompaa. Likewise, It. tubo ‘tube’ is found as such in Amharic and Tigrinya, and It. molla as Tna. molla ‘spring’. Other quite generic items include Saho martello ‘hammer’ (It. martello), and kashshabiito and Tna. kačavitä ‘screwdriver’ (It. cacciavite), Amh. morsa ‘vise’ (< It. morsa, in Tesfu Dires 2012, 37), and a score of loans in Tigrinya, among which: bimbo ‘plumb bob’ (It. piombo ‘lead’), binsa ‘pliers’ (It. pinza), bitä ‘screw’ (It. vite), kalibro ‘calibre’ (It. calibro), torniyo ‘lathe’ (It. tornio), and simply motorä ‘engine’ (It. motore), which, maybe reinforced by English motor, is obviously widespread and occurs, for example, in Or. motoorii, to end with rota ‘wheel’ (It. ruota). Vehicles and related items – Italian has entered the car vocabulary massively. A few loans are duly mentioned in Corbeil’s (1991, s.v.) visual and tecnical Amharic dictionary:

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gabina ‘cockpit’ – apparently from a northern variety of Italian where standard cabina is voiced to gabina, sponda ‘gate of a dump truck’ from It. sponda, lit. ‘shore’, and portobägaliya ‘luggage rack’ from It. portabagagli ‘luggage/roof rack’. But many others are in use, such as parawəlt ‘bumper’ (It. paraurti), färäfango ‘fender, mudguard’ (It. parafango), fresiyon ‘clutch’ (either from French friction or It. frizione, but more probably from the latter), awtobus ‘bus’ (< It. autobus rather than from English, as suggested by the initial diphthong), and its semantically related fermata ‘bus stop’ (It. fermata), and kamiwon or kamiyon ‘lorry, truck’ (more probably from Italian than from French camion. In Italian it is the usual word, with penultimate stress; autocarro is restricted to the formal and bureaucratic registers). Incidentally, another example of a French word borrowed through Italian is possibly Saho balafon ‘ceiling made of wood planks’ from French plafond, while a case of English word entering through Italian is Som. baar ‘bar, cafe’. Tigrinya has probably even more: again barafango ‘fender, mudguard’ (It. parafango), batärya ‘battery’ (It. batteria), bänzina or benzin ‘gasoline’ (It. benzina), bollo ‘car tax sticker’ (It. bollo), čəngolo ‘continuos track (in tanks or tractors)’ (It. cingolo), dinamo ‘generator’ (It. dinamo), follo ‘neutral (gear)’ (It. folle), librätto ‘car registration’ (It. libretto), luči ‘(car) lights’ (It. luci), kandella ‘spark plug’ (It. candela ‘candle’), kəlawdo ‘trial’ (It. collaudo), kučənäto ‘bearing’ (It. cuscinetto), patänti ‘driving licence’ (It. patente), radyatorä ‘radiator; grille’ (It. radiatore), sinǧəya or sənǧəya ‘(drive) belt’ (It. cinghia), rimorkiyo ‘trailer’ (It. rimorchio), from which the regular adjective rimorkəyawi ‘trailerable’ is derived. For Saho one may add, among many, aččilatoore ‘accelerator, gas pedal’ (It. acceleratore), marmetta ‘muffler’ (It. marmitta), and firaashsha ‘turn signal’ (It. freccia ‘arrow’). Finally, Amh. aeroplan, ayroplan and awroppəlan ‘airplane’ (and similar words in other languages; but Somali prefers dayuurad, an Arabic loan) are very possibly from It. aeroplano – maybe together with English. Within the same semantic field, Italian loans in Somali reported by Caney (1984) –and therefore attested in writing– include: kushineeto ‘bearing’ (It. cuscinetto), moollo ‘spring’ (It. molla), mooto ‘motorbike’ (It. moto), taargo ‘plate’ (It. targa) and again rimoor ‘trailer’ (It. rimorchio). It. macchina (strictly speaking ‘machine’, but ‘car’ in spoken Italian) is the general word for ‘car’ in Ethiopia and Eritrea, as in Amh. mäkina and Tna. makina (Beyene 2011, 130), Saho makiina and Or. makinaa (alongside in Oromo native konkolaataa). From the same stem we further have Tna. mäkanika ‘mechanics’, and mäkaniko ‘mechanic’, while mäkayen, proposed as a translation of Italian macchinario ‘machinery’ by Beyene (2011, 129), is simply the Tigrinya plural of mäkina. Somali has instead either gaadhi ‘car’ in the North or the older Italian loan baabuur in the South (< It. vapore ‘steam’ – in the sense of ‘steamboat’; but the word has probably come through Arabic, and French vapeur is a possible alternative source). Babur is also found in Tigrinya and is translated by Kane (2000, 1151) as ‘any steam-driven machine’. In Somali, baabuur and gaadhi score approximately the same result on a Google search and both are known also in Oromo, at least in peripheral dialects: Leus/Van de Loo/Cutter (1992, 29) report both babura and gari for Borana Oromo. Equally widespread is It. bicicletta ‘bicycle’, as in Som. bushkuleeti, bushkaleeti, Saho bishkiletta ‘bicycle’, Amh. bisik-

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let (Leslau 1964, 13), etc., to which one may add Or. pidaalee ‘pedal’ (It. pedale), Tna. katena and Saho kaateena ‘chain’ (It. catena). It. gomma (lit. simply ‘gum, rubber’ but in general use for ‘tire’ alongside official pneumatico) has been the source of Amh., Tna. and Saho gom(m)a, as well as of the already mentioned Amh. and Tna. gom(m)ista ‘tire dealer’ from It. gommista. Instead, Som. goome (listed in Zorc and Osman but not in the DSI) means ‘gum’ or ‘plastic’ in general, while for ‘tire’ the English loanword taayar is used, and for the ‘tire dealer’ taayarle has been created with the suffix ‑le (on the model of such native words as barafle from baraf ‘ice’ for ‘ice-seller’). From traffic to swear words: Italian in everyday speech and in the low registers – The vocabulary of traffic and roads is well represented in loans: ‘traffic police(man)’ is taraafiko in Somali and taraafik in Saho (It. traffico), to which, always for Saho, one may add among many marshabeedi ‘sidewalk, pavement’ (It. marciapiede), binto or bunto ‘bridge’ (It. ponte), and the more interesting jiirafiyoori ‘roundabout’ from It. girafiori, lit. “turnflowers” – a neologism of Eastern Africa, since the word is unknown in Italy (rotatoria is the word), and roundabouts with a flowerbed in the middle were common in colonial Eritrea. All in all, it is evident that Italian loans may be subsumed under the general label of everyday modern vocabulary. Not otherwise could one explain the borrowing of such general terms as, randomly chosen, Amh. pippa ‘pipe’ (It. pipa), Tna. bussola ‘compass’ (It. bussola), dizäňo ‘design; applique’ (< It. disegno ‘drawing’), dita ‘wealthy person; capitalist’ (< It. ditta ‘enterprise’), piyano (and Or. piyaanoo) ‘piano’, and Saho karta ‘map’ (It. carta), fabrika ‘factory’ (It. fabbrica), etc. It. borsa ‘purse’, as in Amh. borsa and Som. boorso, is found all over the Horn, and the same applies to It. pacco, as in Tna. bako ‘packet, box’, Amh. bakko or bakkᵂä ‘(cigarette) pack; packet’, Saho baakko, Or. baakkoo ‘box, packet’. It. corrente for ‘electricity’, as in Tna. kᵂarenti, Amh. korränti and Som. koronto, is equally widespread – in Somali actually the official, written word for ‘electricity’ (although in competition with reflexes of En. light in the North). It. posta ‘post; mail’ entered Somali as boosto and Tna. as busṭa (from which the adjective busṭawi ‘postal’ is derived); in this case, phonological and semantic proximity further led to the merge of It. busta ‘envelope’ and posta ‘post; mail’. We thus find Tna. posṭa, Or. poostaa and Saho bustha ([bust’a]) both as ‘envelope’ and as ‘post, mail’. At least in Eritrea, the influence of Italian has led to the occasional borrowing of expressive items of colloquial speech, such as Tna. bägamido or bägamindo ‘idler, bum’ (It. vagabondo) – the latter the source of Saho bagaamindo and from which in Tigrinya the abstract bägamindonnät ‘vagrancy’ has been derived. Italian greetings are represented by Saho čaaw and Tna. čaw ‘goodbye (informal)’ from the world-famous ciao (originally Venetian and in Italian also ‘hello’) and Tna. brunto? ‘hello?’ in phone calls (It. pronto?); substandard Italian is represented, for example, by Tna. kasotti from It. cazzotto ‘fist punch’, and even items from vulgar speech have been borrowed, as in Tna. sega ‘handjob’ (It. sega, lit. ‘saw’) and Saho offankuulo ‘fuck off’ from It. vaffanculo. Politics, culture and science: Italian in the high registers – Semantic fields belonging to “high” registers, from politics to culture, are more typical of written registers and thus in principle easier to spot, but as anticipated also much less represented in dictionaries –

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being much more subject of course to puristic tendencies. An analysis of Tigrinya revolutionary lexicon (Beyene 1987) shows the general absence of loans from Italian, the only exception being kalamita ‘calamity’ from It. calamità (Beyene 1987, 10) – hardly a technical political term. In Somali, alongside internal neologisms, political and journalistic vocabulary is largely drawn from Arabic, and in Amharic and Tigrinya from English. Scientific and technical vocabulary is only a very partial exception; apart from kimiko ‘chemistry’ (It. chimica), fisiko ‘physics’ (It. fisica), and dinaamiko ‘dynamics’ (It. dinamica), which are reported by Caney (1984), the following are listed in Giama/Angelin’s (1986) preliminary chemical dictionary: entalbiyo ‘enthalpy’ (It. entalpia), entrobiyo ‘entropy’ (It. entropia; note the non-canonical three-consonant cluster in Somali), injineeriyo ‘engineering’ (It. ingegneria), laamayeeri ‘metal sheet’ (It. lamiera), metaloorjiyo ‘metallurgy’ (It. metallurgia), and teknolojiyo ‘technology’ (It. tecnologia). Giama/Angelin (1986) stems from Italian work at the Somali National University in the 1980s, and it is unclear whether these loans ever left the campus. Furthermore, a few of them could also be English loans Somalicized through the final feminine ending ‑o of many other similar Somali words.

5 Internal language policy Puristic attitudes – It is common that official or standardized languages often display puristic attitudes which downplay the role of loanwords, or simply do not list many words used in spoken language. This is especially true of Amharic, less so of other languages. The puristic attitudes of Amhara intellectuals vis-à-vis foreign words were already apparent in Amlak (1958, 122s.), who commented on the linguistic side of the Italian occupation of Ethiopia lamenting the ‘temporary fashion of profuse mingling of Italian with one’s Amharic conversation’; for this author borrowing ‘is a real menace to the existence of Amharic and it would be wise to devise some remedy before the situation gets out of hand’. As anticipated in 3.2–3.3, for the minority languages of Ethiopia and Eritrea standardization is an ongoing process;12 in the case of Ethiopia, it may involve the substitution of loans from Amharic, formerly the only official language, while Italian loans, being ideologically “inoffensive”, could in principle fare better. Where they lose ground to new words it is precisely because of their early introduction through the intermediacy of Amharic (cf. Tosco 2008b): thus, Oromo has officialized siyaasaa, from Arabic siyāsa, for ‘politics’, and shunned politikaa, originally from It. politica but borrowed –or felt to have been borrowed– through Amharic polätika (as in Tigrinya) or

12 A few attemps at standardization had already been made in the first part of the twentieth century by missionaries in both Ethiopia and Eritrea and later by the Etiopian government during the Communist period (cf. Tosco 2020 for a curious attempt by the Italian Army at writing Oromo during World War II).

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politika, and which entered, for example, Wolaytta as polotikaa. Somali uses the same Arabic loan of Oromo as siyaasad. Description of linguistic characteristics – Sadly, while Italian loans have been the object of a few articles, there is no comprehensive study for any language of the Horn. An exception is the excellent analysis of 309 Italian loans in Saho by Banti/Vergari (2008), on the basis of their own fieldwork, colonial sources, Vergari/Vergari’s (2003) Saho vocabulary and modern Saho schoolbooks. Tesfu Dires (2012) tries to disentangle the origin of loans from English, French and Italian in Amharic by looking at the matches and substitutions necessary to account for the Amharic form. The data stem from long-time Amhara emigres in Italy and consist of 212 items, many of them not reported in other sources. All in all, Tesfu Dires lists 405 loans, mainly from Italian and English, quite a few from French and still a few others of unknown origin. Beyene (2011) contains a list of Italian loans in Amharic and Tigrinya preceded in both cases by a short history of the language and country. Hoffmann (2013) presents a good discussion of the influence of Italian in its former colonies and contains very rich lists of Italian loans, taken from other sources. Voigt (2007) gives a useful resume of the available data. Demise of Italian loans due to lexical competition with English or Arabic loans – In a few cases, the Italian loanwords are obsolete or have been downright lost in contemporary Italian (e. g., reggipetto ‘bra’ is today reggiseno, but also comò ‘chest of drawers’, giberna ‘cartridge pouch’ and others listed in 4.3 have an ancient flavour). In case of competition, Italian loans in Eastern Africa are often retreating against a loan from English or an established Arabic word. For example, Som. konto ‘bill; check’ from It. conto is reported by Caney (1984), but the common word is rather xisaab from Arabic. Three other examples from Somali include iskool ‘school’ from It. scuola (cf. also Saho askoola) vs. iskuul from En. school; kaartoolino ‘postcard’ from It. cartolina vs. kaadh from En. (post) card; or still garawaati ‘necktie’ from It. cravatta vs. tay from En. ‘tie’. Interestingly, both the DSI (1985) and Zorc/Osman (1993) list garawaati only (and Zorc/Osman 1993 only kaartoliino). In the net, either garwaati or garaabati are apparently more common. Google (accessed on 1 February 2019) reports about 35,100 instances of iskoolka,13 against 141,000 (a ratio of 1:4) for iskuulka (and as many as 316,000 for the native counterpart, dugsiga). The figure is all the more interesting when one considers that the Italian area of influence was traditionally much bigger than the English one (which was restricted to Somaliland): the Italian loan is obvioulsy felt as peripheral, older or simply outfashioned. It may also happen that more peripheral languages retain Italian loans which are lost in languages more apt to borrowing from other sources, as in Saho banka ‘bank’ from It. banca, against, for example Amh. bank and Som. and Tna. banki, presumably all from En. bank.  

13 Searching for a Somali noun in its articulated forms (in these cases, with the masculine determinative article ‑ka or its allomorph ‑ga) helps avoiding possible homography with forms in other languages.

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Demise of Italian loans due to technological development – The case of a simple demise through technological innovation is different: the whole field of car mechanics, for example, once replete with Italian loanwords, is obviously bled by technological development (as well as shifting cultural and economic influence): it is no surprise that Amh. balistra or balestra (Beyene 2011, 103) from It. balestra ‘leaf spring’ (first meaning: ‘crossbow’) or Som. karburatoore from It. carburatore ‘carburetor’ (but Amh. karburetär) will share the fate of the items they denote. Tigrinya has lättorina ‘Diesel railcar’ from It. littorina, whose very name is reminiscent of Fascist times (being derived from Fascio Littorio, although the railcar itself and its name lingered on in Italy well into the 1970s). Italian trademarks – This leads to the role of Italian trademarks which came into general use in the Horn for denoting industrial products. A general remark here is that the specificities affecting the import of foreign commodities in the Horn (characterized by the general scarcity of hard currency and heavy import taxes) produce here as elsewhere a longer life span of foreign products and names. At the same time, these words, albeit of general use, typically belong to the informal registers and rarely make their way into dictionaries and the written media – which makes their detection and recording all the more difficult. A few examples include a word found in Oromo as lunchiinaa and in Gawwada as lonʧ’e for ‘bus’, while their possible equivalents in other Ethiopian languages have not been recorded. The word derives from Leoncino (lit. ‘lion-cub’), a model of medium-weight truck manufactured by O.M. between 1950 and 1968 and occasionally still circulating in the Horn. More exotic examples include, for example, /katʃ(tʃ) aˈmalle/ and the like, widely used for ‘bus’ and derived from Cacciamali, a coachbuilder company specializing in buses, active in Italy from 1947 to 2010 and still present in Ethiopia. Beyond Ethiopia and the area of direct Italian influence, It. Balilla (the popular name of Fiat 508, the first Italian compact car, produced by Fiat between 1932 and 1937) is recorded as such for ‘small car’ in Saho and simply for ‘car’ in the Afar language of Djibouti – clearly making its way from the North through the Afars of Eritrea or, more simply, through car retailing, which was once dominated by Italians. To the same area of automotive industry belong Tna. Topolino (Beyene 2011, 136), from It. Topolino (lit. ‘little mouse’, both the Italian name of Mickey Mouse and the nickname of the first versions of Fiat 500, built from 1936 to 1955), and Amh. Sečanto (Beyene 2011, 107), from It. Seicento (‘six hundred’, Fiat 600 being a popular car manufactured from 1955 to 1969). A few Italian proper names and acronyms reported in Kane’s (2000) Tigrinya dictionary have probably all but disappeared by now: they run from sedawo ‘Asmara light and power company’ from the initial letters of It. Servizio Elettrico Dell’Africa Orientale ‘East Africa Electric Service’, to the Asmara Italian-owned clothing store onəsta (It. All’Onestà ‘To Honesty’). Conclusion – Eritrea, and linguistically Tigrinya, certainly played a central role in the diffusion of Italian loans all over Eastern Africa, mainly through the colonial army (Banti/Vergari 2008, 76s.). Too great is the similarity of Italian loans among different languages, even geographically quite apart (like Somali), in terms of phonological treatment and semantic fields, and too rich has been the lexical impact of Italian on Tigrinya

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to admit any other explanation – although (as aptly reminded by Banti/Vergari 2008, 74) Arabic may have been the actual source (or a co-source) of several older Italian loans. While it is very doubtful that Italian is still an active donor of lexical material and a source of linguistic influence, a great deal of what entered the languages spoken by the peoples once touched, for good or bad, by the Italian colonial enterprise is there to stay. Much has been discovered, and much more remains to be unearthed.

References Amlak, Bemnet Gabre (1958), Foreign Borrowings into Amharic, Ethiopia Observer 2, 121–123. Armbruster, Carl Hubert (1910), Initia Amharica, vol. 2: English-Amharic Vocabulary, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Banti, Giorgio (1990), Sviluppo del sistema verbale nell’italiano parlato da somali a Mogadiscio, in: Giuliano Bernini/Anna Giacalone Ramat (edd.), La temporalità nell’acquisizione di lingue seconde, Milano, Angeli, 147–162. Banti, Giorgio/Vergari, Moreno (2008), Italianismi lessicali in Saho, Ethnorêma 4, 67–93. Berlin, Brent/Kay, Paul (1969), Basic Color Terms. Their Universality and Evolution, Berkeley, University of California Press. Beyene, Yaqob (1987), Terminologia marxista-leninista in tigrino, Rassegna di Studi Etiopici 31, 5–21. Beyene, Yaqob (2011), I prestiti italiani in amarico e tigrino, Rassegna di Studi Etiopici 3, 97–140. C-ER = State of Eritrea (1997), Constitution of Eritrea, in: International Labour Association/Organisation internationale du travail (ed.), Documents, Geneva, United Nations, https://www.ilo.org/dyn/natlex/docs/ ELECTRONIC/50149/90331/F-85322205/ERI50149%20Eng.pdf (2/3/2023). C-ET = Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (1995), Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, Federal Negarit Gazeta of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia 1, 21 August, 2–38, https://ethiopianembassy.be/wp-content/uploads/Constitution-of-the-FDRE.pdf (2/3/2023). C-SO = Federal Republic of Somalia (2012), Provisional Constitution, in: International Labour Association/ Organisation internationale du travail (ed.), Documents, Geneva, United Nations, https://www.ilo.org/ dyn/natlex/docs/ELECTRONIC/94693/127230/F-662147619/SOM94693.pdf (2/3/2023). Caney, John Charles (1984), The Modernisation of Somali Vocabulary, with Particular Reference to the Period from 1972 to the Present, Hamburg, Buske. Corbeil, Jean-Claude (1991), Amharic-English Visual Dictionary, Addis Ababa, Ministry of Education/Educational Materials Production and Distribution Agency. Davies, Ian/Davies, Christine/Corbett, Greville (1994), The basic colour terms of Ndebele, African Languages and Cultures 7/1, 36–48. Davies, Ian, et al. (1995), The basic colour terms of Chichewa, Lingua 95, 259–278. DOR (1996) = Akkaadaamii Afaan Saboota Itoophiyaatiin ‘Language Academy of the Peoples of Ethiopia’ (1996 ‘2004’),14 Galmee Jechoota Afaan Oromoo ‘Dictionary of the Oromo Language’, Finfinnee ‘Addis Ababa’, Akkaadaamii Afaan Saboota Itoophiyaatiin. DSI (1985) = Francesco Agostini/Annarita Puglielli et al. (1985), Dizionario Somalo-Italiano, Rome, Cooperazione Italiana allo Sviluppo.

14 Here and in a few other cases the publication year found in the source is in accordance with the Ethiopian calendar (Ǝnkutataš). Its equivalent according to the Gregorian calendar follows here between single quotation marks.

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DWA (1991) = Tophphiyaa Doonatu Xinaatiyaanne Pilggettaa Ooso Keettaa ‘Centre for the Study and Research of the Ethiopian Languages’ (1991 ‘1999’), Wolayttatto Qaalatu Amaaratto Birshshettaa ‘Wolaytta-Amharic Dictionary’, Addisaaba ‘Addis Ababa’, Addisaaba Yuniversttiyaa ‘Addis Ababa University’. Eberhard, David/Simons, Gary F./Fennig, Charles D. (edd.) (262023 [1951]), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Dallas, SIL International, http://www.ethnologue.com (2/3/2023). Giama, Moxamed/Angelin, Luciano (1986), Dizionario italo-somalo di termini tecnico-scientifici relativi ai processi e agli impianti chimici, Mogadishu, Jaamacadda Ummadda Soomaaliyeed ‘Università Nazionale Somala’. Habte-Mariam, Marcos (1976), Italian, in: Marvin Lionel Bender et al. (edd.), Language in Ethiopia, London, Oxford University Press, 170–180. Hoffmann, Saul (2013), Il lascito linguistico italiano in Dodecaneso, Libia e Corno d’Africa: L2, pidgin e prestiti, Pavia, University of Pavia, Bachelor Thesis. Holm, John (1989), Pidgins and Creoles, vol. 2: Reference Survey, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Kane, Thomas Leiper (1990), Amharic-English Dictionary, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz. Kane, Thomas Leiper (2000), Tigrinya-English Dictionary, Kensington, Dunwoody. Leslau, Wolf (1959), An Analysis of the Harari Vocabulary, Annales d’Éthiopie 3, 275–298. Leslau, Wolf (1964), Toward a History of the Amharic Vocabulary, Journal of Ethiopian Studies 2, 12–20. Leslau, Wolf (1976), Concise Amharic Dictionary, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz. Leus, Ton/Van de Loo, Joseph/Cotter, George (1992), An Oromo-English Vocabulary, Debre Zeyit, s.e. Mekuria, Hinsene (1998 ‘2006’), Galmee Jechoota Afaan Oromoo-Amaaraa-Inglizii. Oromo-Amharic-English Dictionary, Finifinnee ‘Addis Ababa’, Commercial Printing Enterprise. Mioni, Alberto M. (1988), Italian and English Loanwords in Somali, in: Annarita Puglielli (ed.), Proceedings of the Third International Congress of Somali Studies, Rome, Il Pensiero Scientifico, 36–42. Pankhurst, Richard (1962), The Foundations of Education, Printing, Newspapers, Book Production, Libraries and Literacy in Ethiopia, Ethiopia Observer 6/3, 241–290. Parker, Enid M./Hayward, Richard J. (1985), An Afar-English-French Dictionary (with Grammatical Notes in English), London, School of Oriental and African Studies. RE (2008) = Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, Population Census Commission (2008), Summary and Statistical report of the 2007 Population and Housing Census, Addis Ababa, United Nations Population Fund, https://www.ethiopianreview.com/pdf/001/Cen2007_firstdraft(1).pdf (2/3/2023). Savà, Graziano/Tosco, Mauro (2008), “Ex Uno Plura”: the uneasy road of the Ethiopian languages towards standardization, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 191, 111–139. Simeone-Senelle, Marie-Claude (2006), Some characteristics of Dahalik: a newly discovered Afro-Semitic language spoken in Eritrea, in: Siegbert Uhlig (ed.), Proceedings of the XVth International Conference of Ethiopian Studies. Hamburg July 20-25, 2003, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 861–869. Tesfu Dires, Rahel (2012), Osservazioni sui prestiti dalla lingua italiana, inglese e francese alla lingua amarica, Trieste, University of Trieste, Bachelor Thesis. Tosco, Mauro (1999), The Color Terms of Dhaasanac, in: Marcello Lamberti/Livia Tonelli (edd.), Afroasiatica Tergestina. Papers from the 9th Italian Meeting of Afroasiatic (Hamito–Semitic) Linguistics, Padova, Unipress, 381–392. Tosco, Mauro (2001), The Dhaasanac Language, Cologne, Köppe. Tosco, Mauro (2008a), A case of weak Romancisation: Italian in East Africa, in: Thomas Stolz/Dik Bakker/Rosa Salas Palomo (edd.), Aspects of language contact. New theoretical, methodological and empirical findings with special focus on Romancisation processes, Berlin/New York, De Gruyter Mouton, 377–398. Tosco, Mauro (2008b), Introduction: Ausbau is everywhere!, International Journal of the Sociology of Language 191, 1–16. Tosco, Mauro (2009), Loanwords in Gawwada, a Cushitic language of Ethiopia, in: Martin Haspelmath/Uri Tadmor (edd.), Loanwords in the World’s Languages. A Comparative Handbook, Berlin, De Gruyter Mouton, 124–141.

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Tosco, Mauro (2020), The “Busta dell’Ascari”: war propaganda in Oromo in Latin script from 1940, Kervan 24/1, 39–63. Tosco, Mauro (2021), A Grammar of Gawwada, Cologne, Köppe. Tosco, Mauro (2022), A Gawwada Dictionary, Cologne, Köppe. Vergari, Moreno/Vergari, Roberta (2003), A Basic Saho-English-Italian Dictionary, Asmara, Sabur. Voigt, Rainer (2007), Italian language in Ethiopia and Eritrea, in: Siegbert Uhlig (ed.), Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, vol. 3: He–N, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 222–224. Zorc, R. David/Osman, Madina M. (1993), Somali-English Dictionary with English Index, Kensington, Dunwoody.

Gregório Domingos Firmino

35 Mozambique Abstract: The chapter focuses on the situation of Portuguese in Mozambique by showing how it was introduced in the country as a colonial language and describing the consequences of its adoption as an official language and symbol of national unity after independence. It points out that Portuguese is undergoing a process of nativization, by which new ways of usage are becoming naturalized, even though the traditional model related to European Portuguese is still recognized. Keywords: Mozambique, Portuguese, sociolinguistics, officialization, nativization

1 Sociolinguistic situation Mozambique is a multilingual country with Portuguese and several African languages as main languages. The local languages belong to the Bantu language family and, therefore, display structural similarities. There are also speakers of other languages, such as some Asiatic languages, for instance, Hindi, Urdu, or Gujarati, spoken as heritage languages by communities of emigrants and their offspring, or English, given the traditional links between Mozambique and neighbouring countries, such as South Africa, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, and Tanzania, all of them English-speaking. Besides, there is a community of expatriates moving around international organizations whose day-to-day languages are English and sometimes other European languages. Speaker numbers – The number of speakers with Portuguese as their first language has steadily grown (from 1.2 % in 1980 to 16.6 % in 2017), and this is the case mostly in urban settings among a younger generation. Also, nearly a third of the population (30.8 % in 2017 vs. 23.2 % in 1980) has learned it as a second language through the school system. In consequence, almost half of the citizens speak it nowadays (47.4 % vs. 24.4 % in 1980), while another half claim not to know it at all, which means that they live in an environment where a local language suffices (50.3 % in 2017 vs. 75.6 % in the 1980). African languages are decreasing in usage, but still present within the overwhelming majority of the population who acquired them as their first language (from 98.8 % in 2008 to 81.1 % in 2017). This situation leads to a new pattern of learning Portuguese. While traditionally Portuguese was mastered via schooling and not learned like African languages in informal home contexts, there are now citizens, mostly in urban areas, learning Portuguese outside the school environment in informal home contexts (cf. INE 2019, 94 and Figure 1).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-035

 

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Figure 1: Speakers of Portuguese and local African Languages1 1980 1997 2007 N=11,634,583 N=12,536,778 N=N/A Portuguese L1 with or without African languages L2 1.2 %  

2017 N=22,243,373

6%

10.4 %

16.6 %

 

 

 

African language L1 and Portuguese L2

23.2 %

33 %

39.9 %

30.8 %

African language L1 without Portuguese

75.6 %

61 %  

49.7 %

50.3 %

Portuguese total

24.4 %

39 %

50.3 %

47.4 %

African language (L1) total

98.8 %

94 %

89.6 %

81.1 %

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Portuguese – Portuguese is mostly used in high domains, including formal settings, such as official functions and school activities, making it the language of upward mobility and social prestige. It is therefore associated with social elites, who distinguish themselves within society, among others, by their competence in this language. Additionally, its implantation is characterized by imbalances in terms of area of residence (urban residents are more likely to know and use Portuguese), gender (men are more likely to know and use Portuguese), and age (the younger generation is more likely to know and use Portuguese). However, its use is gradually spreading, mainly among educated young people or urban dwellers, beyond the traditional social elites, due to the state policy of Portuguese’s officialization and nationalization, and to the massification of education after independence in 1975, which has mostly been conducted in Portuguese. Also, the multiethnic environment of the urban centres favours the expansion of the use of Portuguese since it has been used as the link language in the country. African languages – The local languages all belong to the Bantu language group and are mostly used as first languages in home or family domains and in contexts of intraethnic communication all over the country, predominantly in rural areas. Most Mozambican citizens are speakers of one of them. Each local African language is spoken in a specific ethnic territorial domain, meaning that none of them covers the entire territory of Mozambique or crosses over ethnic boundaries, even though there might be bilingual citizens with fluency in a local language other than their own ethnic language. Consequently, no single local language functions as a link language in the entire Mozambican territory, a role that is fulfilled by Portuguese. In contrast to urban settings, where speakers of Portuguese, African languages and foreign languages may be found, rural areas tend to be monolingual, with one of the local African languages being overwhelmingly predominant.

1 Adapted from Conselho Coordenador do Recenseamento (1983), Firmino (2000, 8–13; 2002, 82), Chimbutane (2012, 5–20), and INE (2019, 82–87). As usual in this type of census data, notice that the information refers to citizens who are five years old or older.

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Figure 2 presents them with the size of their speech communities both in relative and absolute numbers, the provinces where they can be found and the number proposed in the classification of Bantu languages by Guthrie (1967), except for Mwani (kimwani), which is currently recognized as a variety within the Swahili language group (G40). The most spoken local language is Makhuwa (emakhuwa), predominantly used in the northern provinces of Cabo Delgado, Nampula, and Niassa. In the provinces of Cabo Delgado and Niassa, African languages such as Makonde (shimakonde), Mwani, and Yao (ciyao) are also widely spoken. The second most spoken local language is Xichangana (sometimes called Tsonga, which is however an ambiguous term since it may also refer to a cluster of several varieties), found predominantly in the south of the country, mainly in the province of Gaza. It is also widely known as a second language in other provinces in the south, namely Inhambane, Maputo and Maputo City, and part of a linguistic continuum, including Ronga (xironga), spread in the province of Maputo, and Tswa (citshwa), used in the province of Inhambane. The third largest local language is Nyanja (cinyanja), mainly spoken in the provinces of Niassa and Tete. Lomwe (elomwe) is mainly used in the province of Niassa and, alongside Chuwabu (ecuwabo) and Sena (cisena), also in the province of Zambézia. In the central provinces of Manica and Sofala, Ndau (cindawu) and Sena are the predominant languages. Either one of the two is a constellation of dialects, which sometimes are viewed as independent languages, such as Tewe (ciwutewe) or Manyika (cimanika). In the south of the country, Chopi (cicopi) and Gitonga, spoken in the province of Inhambane, are also important in some coastal areas. Figure 2: Main local African Languages (adapted from INE 2019, 82) Language

L1 Speakers (5 years or older) Province N = 22,243,373

Makhuwa (P31)

26.1 % – 5,813,083

Cabo Delgado, Nampula, Niassa

Tsonga (S53)

8.6 % – 1,919,217

Gaza, Inhambane, Maputo, Maputo City

Nyanja (N31a)

8.1 % – 1,790,831

Niassa, Tete

Lomwe (P32)

7.1 % – 1,574,237

Niassa, Zambézia,

Sena (N44)

7.1 % – 1,578,164

Manica, Sofala, Tete, Zambézia

Chuwabu (P34)

4.7 % – 1,050,696

Zambézia

Ndau (S15)

3.8 % – 836,038

Manica, Sofala

Tswa (S51)

3.8 % – 836,644

Inhambane

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11.8 % – 2,633,088 Other African languages, e. g., Chopi (S61), Gitonga (S62), Makonde (P23), Manyika (S13a), Mwani (G40), Nyungwe (N43), Ronga (S54), Tewe (S13b), Yao (P21)  

Total

 

81.1 % – 18,031,998  

Cabo Delgado, Gaza, Inhambane, Manica, Maputo, Maputo City, Niassa, Sofala, Tete

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Other languages – As to other languages spoken in the country, their role and use are minor and restricted to narrow home or office environments. Some of them, such as Asiatic languages like Hindi, Urdu, Konkani, Gujarati, or languages from other African countries, such as Kinyarwanda or Rundi, from Rwanda, Burundi, or the Democratic Republic of the Congo, fulfil the role of heritage languages in the confines of home or family domains, among immigrant settlers and their descendants. Other languages, such as English or French, are used in international contacts, or within international organizations such as embassies or NGOs. Given its status as a major global language, English has many speakers in the country. It is the most important foreign language taught in schools, but some of the speakers have learned it informally in neighbouring countries, such as South Africa, where emigration from Mozambique is common.

2 Linguistic history 2.1 Establishment of Portuguese The presence of Portuguese in Mozambique is necessarily related to the overseas expansion as the Portuguese navigators ventured all over the New World and eventually landed in what is now part of Mozambican territory in the fifteenth century (cf. Newitt 2005, 54). However, planned actions for the colonization of Mozambique only developed when Portugal was asked to prove effective administrative and authoritative occupation of the territory after the settlement reached by colonial powers in the Berlin Conference in 1885. Essentially, this agreement challenged Portuguese historical claims over vast territories in Africa, since most of them were not under Portuguese occupation, as defined in the Berlin Conference. A European power could claim colonial rights only by securing occupation, by making treaties with indigenous leaders, flying of the flag, or establishing an administration with law and order maintained by a police force (cf. Craven 2015, 43). However, lack of resources and political turmoil prevented Portugal, then a monarchy, from fully complying with the decisions taken at the Berlin Conference. The Portuguese monarchical regime was overthrown in 1910, and the Republicans, who came to power, turned the colonial question into a matter of national pride. For them, colonies became an issue of national interest, as would be noted in the pursued colonial policies, more so after the installation of the New State (Estado Novo), a Republican dictatorship regime that ruled Portugal from 1933 to 1974 (cf. Baiôa/Fernandes/Ribeiro de Meneses 2003, 5s.). Under the New State an overall policy was designed and implemented to guarantee full political and administrative control of Mozambique and establish appropriate conditions for a viable colonial economic exploitation of the territory. Nevertheless, again due to a lack of resources, Portugal could not initially undertake the exploitation by itself and

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decided to grant administrative and economic rights over parts of the Mozambican territory to chartered companies, except for the southern part, which became a reservoir of manpower for the then booming mining industry in South Africa. Gradually, however, Portugal managed to impose a unified administrative organization of the colony. Legislative measures to stimulate the colonial exploitation of the territory were enacted, including the termination of concessions granted to chartered companies in central and northern Mozambique, the introduction of new labour legislation to attract investment through a supply of cheap labour (cf. Newitt 2018, 113), and the reorganization of the administration of the colony. In Lourenço Marques (renamed Maputo in 1976), which in 1898 had become the capital of the colony (cf. Melo 2013, 74), a major bureaucratic infrastructure was installed to support the administration of the colonial state as well as the economic activities, now intensified by contacts with South Africa (cf. Newitt 1995, 382), as shown by the construction of the port and railway system that interconnected the city to Transvaal (South Africa). Lourenço Marques became a major harbour city requiring trained skilled workers, and the shortage of white Portuguese settlers forced the colonial authorities to employ native people. Since the training of this native population included mastery of Portuguese (and in some cases, also English), this situation led to the emergence of signs of use of Portuguese among a segment of the local African community, which can be viewed as the foundation phase of the implantation of the language in the territory, according to the dynamic model proposed by Schneider (2007, 33). In fact, at the beginning of the twentieth century, a group of Afro-Europeans and Africans emerged, the assimilated (assimilados), to whom Portuguese citizenship was granted, contrary to most Africans, considered as natives (indígenas, cf. Newitt 2018, 114–121). A fundamental requirement for acquiring the status of assimilado was knowledge of Portuguese, which meant that the assimilation policy set an important and lasting precedency: the emergence of a state and social ideology that connected upward social mobility among the African population to competence in the Portuguese language. This situation consolidated over time, as the economy expanded and spurred the enlargement of the bureaucratic sector. However, the limitations imposed by the discriminatory colonial system would not allow the enlargement of the class of assimilados, and, therefore, knowledge of Portuguese within the African local population was limited (cf. Firmino 2011, 107). In addition, mastery of Portuguese by the assimilados would not mean relinquishing the use of local languages in their daily activities. African languages were their main language of socialization, and the use of the Portuguese language was restricted to institutional settings or interactions with Portuguese settlers, even though there were some cases where Portuguese would be used in the households of assimilados.

2.2 Milestones of its further development Mozambique achieved its independence on 25 June 1975, when the nationalist movement of the Liberation Front of Mozambique (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique –

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FRELIMO) which had launched a liberation war for ten years (1964–1974) reached a cease-fire agreement with Portuguese colonial authorities and came to power. In 1975, Portuguese was spoken by a minority group of Mozambicans, mostly in urban centres, for whom it was a second language, learned formally in school. Since knowledge of Portuguese correlated with formal education and rewarding jobs in the city, it was associated with urbanization, social prestige, and upward mobility. This social value of the language was reinforced after independence by its maintenance as the official language and adoption as a major symbol of national unity. As a result, Portuguese became the main language used in public environments, including daily informal urban interactions. There were also cases of Portuguese becoming the primary medium of communication in home and family exchanges. State authorities also conducted policies that encouraged the expansion of the use of Portuguese, for instance, by publicly warning citizens against the use of local languages in state institutions, such as with ‘it is expressly obligatory to speak the official language’ (“é expressamente obrigatório falar a língua oficial”, cf. Rosário 1982, 64), a sign displayed in many state offices. The expansion of education and launching of literacy campaigns, in which Portuguese was the only medium of instruction, also enhanced a wider use of the language. Arguably, the choice of Portuguese as official language and as a symbol of national unity may be seen as a natural outcome, given the lack of common local African link languages due to the linguistic diversity prevailing in the country, the history of its use in official communication, and the fact that it was the distinctive language of the educated elites who were to be co-opted to run the new state. However, the most important motivation which enhanced the officialization of Portuguese is related to the promotion of an ideology designed to raise national consciousness in Mozambique (cf. Firmino 2011, 108). In independent Mozambique, like during the liberation war against Portuguese colonialism, the government under FRELIMO attempted to raise this consciousness in order to create a united society in which all citizens, regardless of divisive elements such as for example region, ethnicity, race, gender, or religion, were called to be part of and participate in nation-building tasks (cf. Paredes 2014, 146). Such a society was predicated on the adoption of Portuguese as a symbol of national unity. It was part of an overall state policy to create a new breed of man, locally known as New Man (Homem Novo), a new supra-ethnic national citizen belonging to and participating in the construction of a new nation in Mozambique (cf. Farré 2014, 202). As people used it in many different situations, Portuguese went beyond the mere role of a political and administrative tool to become a normal language of daily use in urban centres. Consequently, the number of speakers of Portuguese rose significantly. In fact, there is an assumption that Mozambique has done more for the expansion of the Portuguese language in the years after independence than colonial Portuguese authorities did during the entire colonial period (cf. Ferreira 1988, 38). As Mia Couto, a wellacclaimed Mozambican writer, has said:

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‘In reality, the Mozambican authorities did not change their language policy and Portuguese remained in its condition of being a unifying and official language. Nowadays Portuguese is more spoken in Mozambique than it was spoken around the time of independence. The Mozambican government has done more for the Portuguese language than the five hundred years of colonization. But it did not do so for the sake of a project called Lusophony. Neither did it so to demonstrate anything to others or blame the former colonizer. It did it for its own national interest, for the protection of internal cohesion, for the construction of its own interiority’.2

3 External language policy 3.1 Legislation After independence, Mozambican authorities adopted Portuguese as the official language. Initially, no legal provision was made to formalize this choice. In fact, the first constitution, approved in 1975, does not make a reference to languages, besides the fact that the official version was written in Portuguese. Only the second constitution, approved in 1990, would clearly state the role of Portuguese and the local African languages, named national languages, but with no further mention to other languages spoken in the country, as shown in article 5: ‘1. In the Republic of Mozambique, the Portuguese language is the official language. 2. The State values the national languages and promotes their development and increasing utilization as vehicular language and in the education of the citizens’.3

The third and current constitution, approved in 2004, still maintains that ‘in the Republic of Mozambique the Portuguese language is the official language’,4 but emphasizes, in reference to local African languages, that

2 “Na realidade, as autoridades moçambicanas não mudaram a sua política linguística e o português permanecia na sua condição de língua oficial e unificadora. Fala-se hoje mais português em Moçambique que se falava na altura da Independência. O governo moçambicano fez mais pela língua portuguesa que os quinhentos anos de colonização. Mas não o fez por causa de um projecto chamado lusofonia. Nem o fez para demonstrar nada aos outros ou para lançar culpas ao antigo colonizador. Fê-lo pelo seu próprio interesse nacional, pela defesa da coesão interna, pela construção da sua própria interioridade” (Couto 2009, 192s.). 3 “1. Na República de Moçambique a língua portuguesa é a língua oficial 2. O Estado valoriza as línguas nacionais e promove o seu desenvolvimento e utilização crescente como línguas veiculares e na educação dos cidadãos” (C-MZ 1990, art. 5). 4 “Na República de Moçambique a língua portuguesa é a língua official” (C-MZ 2004, art. 10).

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‘the State values national languages as a cultural and educational patrimony and promotes their development and increasing utilization as vehicle of our identity’.5

Clearly, Portuguese is not officially regarded as a national language, even though it is assuming the role of a link language and a symbol of national languages. On the contrary, none of the local African languages functions as a link language, but all of them are named in the constitution as national languages, representing ‘our identity’ (nossa identidade) as stated in article 9. Public narrative also tends to consider them as national languages, while, in fact, they are used as ethnic and regional languages. As argued by Firmino (cf. 2002, 276), the conclusion is that Portuguese is officialized but not nationalized (despite being the symbol of national unity), while local African languages are nationalized (despite being ethnic regional languages) but not officialized (even though they are used as remedial medium of instruction in some rural primary schools).

3.2 Languages used by public authorities As the official language and symbol of national unity, Portuguese is widely used in virtually all public domains where the notion of Mozambican state-nation needs to be upheld. Therefore, all official functions are conducted in Portuguese at all levels of governance, even though there are now signs of sporadic and ancillary use of local languages, for example in public institutions such as hospitals, in communication campaigns such as for HIV or Covid-19 prevention, or in political rallies, which are situations in which most of the participants have little or no knowledge of Portuguese. This is even more likely to occur in rural areas, where people are less likely to know Portuguese, which forces the use of the predominant local language. For instance, politicians, who in their day-to-day business often resort to Portuguese and shy away from local languages, are more likely to use them or have their speech translated when they are running for office or trying to impress their rural constituency in electoral campaigns. However, in general, Portuguese is the language of politics and governance, and, therefore, the primary language used for example in public administration, bureaucratic affairs, courts, or political rallies.

3.3 Languages used in education The primary language of instruction in all schools at all levels is Portuguese, the official language, learned by most pupils as a second language, and, in most rural areas,

5 “O Estado valoriza as línguas nacionais como património cultural e educacional e promove o seu desenvolvimento e utilização crescente como línguas veiculares da nossa identidade” (C-MZ 2004, art. 9).

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as a foreign language. In 2003, a curriculum reform allowed the introduction of bilingual education in some schools, where local African languages are used as a medium of instruction. Bilingual education allows the use of the local language in the first three years of school, alongside Portuguese, which is taught as a subject. After three years, under the assumption that the children have enough competence in Portuguese for academic purposes, there is a switch and Portuguese is used as medium of instruction (cf. INDE 2003, 31s.). As Portuguese is the main language of instruction in all schools, translanguaging (cf. García/Wei 2014, 20) is common, mostly in rural areas, whereby forms of local languages are used to clarify messages conveyed in Portuguese during teaching activities.

3.4 Languages used in the media Press – All major newspapers, such as Notícias, O País, Savana, Canal de Moçambique, Zambeze, Desafio, are written in Portuguese. Local African languages are not visible at all in the written press. Radio – Radio Mozambique (RM), the main radio station, broadcasts the major programmes in Portuguese. It has regional/provincial substations running programmes in local languages. However, most of them are translations of programmes originally transmitted in Portuguese, which means that this language is, in fact, Radio Mozambique’s main medium of communication. Many of the other radio stations such as Rádio Miramar, Rádio SFM, and Rádio Índico also use Portuguese as their main broadcasting language. Television – Television broadcasts are also in Portuguese, both in state stations, such as Televisão de Moçambique (TVM), and in private stations, such as Soico Televisão (STV), TV Miramar, or TV Sucesso. However, TVM has recently launched programmes in African languages, which are transmitted by regional substations. Recently, the use of local languages has increased due to the need of making announcements intended to raise awareness of Covid-19 to a wider public.

4 Linguistic characteristics Portuguese has been embraced as a significant tool for the conduct of state affairs and as a legitimate symbol for imagining a united nation. Also, it is becoming part of the social life, mainly in urban areas, where, for the first time, there is a generation of first-language speakers of Portuguese. As it becomes implanted in society, Portuguese is undergoing a process of nativization. This process also entails structural deviations, shown by the emergence of a local accent, lexical borrowings, and phonological, morphological, and syntactic changes (cf. Schneider 2007, 40, for English; Reutner 2017, 35–41, for French). The Portuguese language is acquiring new structural features,

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which are functional and logical only in the context of its use in Mozambique. As a result, a mix of varieties of Portuguese is emerging, correlating with region, ethnicity, social status, or even the first language of the speakers. Overall descriptions of the features of all emerging varieties of Portuguese in Mozambique are lacking, and, therefore, a comprehensive account of the linguistic characteristics cannot be presented. However, based on some available studies, such as Firmino (2002; 2011) or Gonçalves (2010), the chapter elaborates on some of the salient features, in comparison with the standard European Portuguese, which is supposed to be the model in Mozambique.

4.1 Pronunciation Phonological interference – One distinctive aspect of the Portuguese spoken in Mozambique in comparison to European Portuguese is related to the influence of the phonological system of Bantu languages. For instance, in Makhuwa there is no phonological contrast between voiced and devoiced stops. Stops may be devoiced or aspirated. As a result, first-language speakers of Makhuwa will tend to pronounce all voiced stops as devoiced consonants, thus modifying the phonemic distinction between voiced and devoiced stops found in standard European Portuguese, as in debate ‘debate’ [tepati], dedo ‘finger’ [tɛtu], or barato ‘cheap’ [paɾatu] instead of [debati], [dɛdu], or [baɾatu]. Similarly, first language speakers of Gitonga are used to a phonological system with a velar fricative [ɣ], which is not part of the phonological system of Standard European Portuguese. Consequently, they tend to transfer this feature to the closest consonant found in Portuguese, namely, the velar voiced stop [ɡ]. Thus, Gitonga speakers are recognizable by “fricativizing” the velar stop in their use of Portuguese, as in apagar ‘erase’ [apaɣaɾ], agora ‘now’ [aɣɔɾa] or gato ‘cat’ [ɣatu] instead of [apaɡaɾ], [aɡɔɾa] or [ɡatu], a phenomenon that also may occur similarly in standard European Portuguese, but only as an allophonic variation of the phoneme /ɡ/ in intervocalic positions. Note that most often the phoneme /r/ is realized as a tap [ɾ], but in some instances, it may be realized as a trill [r], especially by some speakers whose first language is Xichangana. Syllable re-structuring – In standard European Portuguese, only CV, CVC, and CCV syllable structures are possible, as in caro ‘dear’, ‘expensive’, which is CV-CV, or gritar ‘to scream’, which is CCV-CVC. Bantu languages, on the contrary, allow only (C)V syllables. As a result, native speakers of Bantu languages are not used to consonantal clusters or syllables ending in consonants. Therefore, some speakers of Portuguese tend to insert epenthetic vowels to break consonantal clusters or close a syllable with a vowel, transforming all of them in CV-syllables. Examples include bruto ‘crude, gross, stupid’ [burutu], Frelimo (cf. 2.2) [fɛrelimu], or acreditar ‘believe’ [akɛriditari] instead of the standard European Portuguese pronunciations [bɾutu], [fɾɛlimu] or [akɾɛditaɾ].

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4.2 Morphosyntax Overgeneralization of the masculine gender – Some speakers of Portuguese in Mozambique often fail to make gender distinctions, showing a tendency to overgeneralize the masculine gender, especially in long sentences, as for example in Frelimo não está parado ‘Frelimo is not standing still’ instead of Frelimo não está parada. Modification of grammatical distinctions in address forms – Some speakers of Portuguese do not follow common morphosyntactic patterns that have pragmatic effects in standard European Portuguese, as in the case of the distinction between formality and familiarity in address forms. In Mozambican Portuguese there are signs of its loss, as in the sentence A morte só nos tirou a tua voz. Tenha paz ‘Death only took us your voice. Rest in peace’. In standard Portuguese, the speaker has a choice for using both forms, but not in the same sentence or linguistic interaction. Therefore, tua voz, which denotes closeness, intimacy, or informality, should not be used with tenha paz, which shows formality, reverence, or respect. In standard European Portuguese, the sentence should be either A morte só nos tirou a tua voz. Tem paz or A morte só nos tirou a sua voz. Tenha paz. In fact, address pronominal forms are in a process of change, as in the distinction between tu and você, both referring to second person singular but with different verbal agreement and distinctive pragmatic effects. Most speakers of Portuguese tend to use the form você, but with the verbal agreement referring to tu, as in você foste à festa? ‘did you go to the party?’, instead of tu foste à festa? (with second person singular verbal agreement) or você foi à festa? (with third-person singular verbal agreement), the two possible options, which differ only in terms of pragmatic effects. The sentence using tu implies closeness, intimacy, or informality, while the one using você suggests formality, reverence, or respect. Passives with indirect objects – In standard European Portuguese, the passive construction allows only a patient to become a subject. Unlike in Bantu languages, the benefactive/recipient argument is not allowed to become the subject, which, however, appears in Mozambican Portuguese probably due to Bantu influence. Some examples are Os filhos são escondidos a verdade pela mãe ‘The truth is hidden to the sons by the mother’, which in standard European Portuguese should be A verdade é escondida aos filhos pela mãe, or A criança foi dada pão ‘bread was given to the child’, which in standard European Portuguese would be O pão foi dado à criança. In both cases, an equivalent sentence in a Bantu language would be grammatical. Use of object pronouns – Some speakers of Portuguese in Mozambique also overgeneralize the use of pronouns referring to indirect objects in instances where, in the European Portuguese standard, pronouns referring to direct objects are used. An example is eu vi-lhe ontem ‘I saw him yesterday’ instead of the standard European Portuguese form Eu vi-o ontem, or Ele trouxe-lhe para a terra ‘He brought him to the land’ instead of the standard European Portuguese sentence Ele trouxe-o para a terra.

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4.3 Lexicon Portuguese in Mozambique also developed a special vocabulary, partially due to influence from Bantu languages like Ndau (Nd.), Gitonga (Git.) or Xichangana (Xich.), as shown in borrowings and grammatical changes. Borrowings from Bantu – Like in the case of phonological features, the use of elements from local African languages is a salient lexical characteristic. Some of the lexical items may be used widely across the country, while others are common only in some regions. Some instances include words used to express mutual solidarity and assert local identity among interlocutors or, such as khanimambo ‘thank you’, a borrowing from Xironga and Xichangana, widely known and used in the country. In other cases, borrowings refer to endogenous entities not found in Europe, such as massala, a local fruit from a tree scientifically known as Strychnos spinosa. There are also cases of borrowings referring to practices arising from the local social, economic, and political atmospheres. These are words whose original meaning in Bantu languages has been redefined to express local realities. This is the case for pandar ‘to find a way around, to get by’ (< Xich. kupanda ‘to get by’), in reference to efforts one, especially the youth, has to undertake to make a living, marandza ‘gold digger woman’ (< Xich. kurandza ‘to like, to love’), in reference to women who have relationships not for love but only for the sake of living off their partners, dumba-nengue ‘informal market, street market, (lit.) trust your leg’, as sellers often have to run away from the police (< Xich. kudumba ‘to trust’ + nenge ‘leg’), and tchunga-moyo ‘informal market, street market, (lit.) brave heart’, equally explainable again with the sellers who often have to run from the police (< Nd. kutchunga ‘to be brave’ + moyo ‘heart’). Other borrowings – Some of the words becoming common in local Portuguese may have other sources besides interference from Bantu languages. Contacts with neighbouring countries, mainly South Africa, soap operas from Brazil or artistic interactions, for instance, with Angolan musicians, are bringing new lexical items into Mozambican Portuguese, some with ephemeral influence, others with permanent impact. Examples include txilar ‘to celebrate, to party’ and rochar ‘to have a musical failure, to have a failure in musical career’, both imported from Angolan Portuguese, jurado ‘member of the jury’ from Brazilian Portuguese, or car wash ‘place where cars are washed’ and bottle store ‘shop where drinks are sold’, both imported from South African English. Word formation – Some intransitive verbs, such as nascer ‘to be born’, tend to be transitivized and also change the meaning, in this case to ‘to give birth’, like in the sentence nasceu dois filhos na África do Sul ‘she has given birth [lit. born] to two sons in South Africa’. Due to interference with Bantu languages, the meaning of the verb nascer is associated with similar verbs in these languages, such as Xich. kupswala or Git. guvelega ‘to give birth’. These verbs are transitive and therefore require direct objects. Semantic changes – Portuguese in Mozambique is also transformed by the fact that lexical items develop new meanings and usage. For instance, there are cases of semantic transfer, as with cabrito, originally meaning ‘goat’, but metaphorically meaning ‘corrupt

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person’, and with the corresponding verb cabritar ‘to be like a goat’ and ‘to bribe’. Thus, a sentence like Este polícia é um cabrito e está a cabritar ‘(lit.) This policeman is a goat and is now acting like a goat’) is understood as ‘The policeman is corrupt and is extolling bribes’. This usage follows a local aphorism saying that o cabrito come onde está amarrado ‘the goat eats the grass around where it is tied’. There are also cases of meaning expansion, as with dormir ‘to sleep’, originally used in reference to animate entities, but now expanded in Mozambican Portuguese to refer to inanimate objects, such as cars, as shown in O carro dormiu lá fora durante a noite ‘The car slept outside during the night’ instead of O carro ficou lá fora durante a noite ‘The car stayed outside during the night’. This can again be explained with the influence of Bantu languages, where a corresponding verb refers to both animate and inanimate objects.

5 Internal language policy Linguistic purism – Like any other language, Portuguese in Mozambique is not a homogeneous entity, and can be viewed as a continuum of varieties, ranging from basilectal forms, further removed from European Portuguese to acrolectal forms, also with some nativized forms, but closer to the European Portuguese standard. These acrolectal linguistic forms are still perceived as the perfect Portuguese, and supposedly taught and enforced in schools. Thus, the European model is still dominant in schools, public administration, political life, and media, but not totally followed. Authorities and social elites view standard European Portuguese as the perfect way of speaking the language. The consequence is that standard European Portuguese forms regarded as “purer” are used alongside “less pure” nativized forms. Portuguese is undergoing transformation, mostly because there is a social re-creation of the language as it is no longer regarded as a colonial language, and because it is incorporating innovative forms of usage on the basis of resources available in the European linguistic model, as well as in local languages, under the influence of the local political, economic, social and cultural context. Therefore, nativization does not necessarily imply the rejection of the European standard per se, but its social re-evaluation, according to local Mozambican norms of the appropriate use of the language. Description of linguistic characteristics – Wider recognition and use of local forms are prevented by the fact that systematic descriptions of forms of Portuguese are not available, including, therefore, reference material such as descriptive and prescriptive grammars or dictionaries. Reference material used, for instance, in the schools is based on the European model and imported from Portugal. In fact, there are no indications of locally instigated corpus planning attempts to support the use of Portuguese. The only attempt at corpus planning is the case of the spelling reform underway, which is a proposal induced from outside by Portugal and Brazil, as a joint Portuguese-speaking countries action (cf. Garcez 1995, 159). However, there is academic work both inside and outside the country attempting to provide a linguistic description of Portuguese spoken in

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Mozambique. For instance, there is now a project underway, which aims at describing the lexicon of Mozambican Portuguese and creating a Dictionary of Mozambican Portuguese, named Dicionário do Português de Moçambique (DiPoMo, cf. Faculdade de Letras e Ciências Sociais 2021). Variety used by public authorities – In general, public authorities use Portuguese based on the European model, which shows up for example in public statements, official records, or public announcements. However, forms of local Portuguese are also commonly noticed, mainly in oral discourse or within local and lower levels of public administration. Variety used in education – According to official guidelines and assumptions socially shared, the language is taught and used in the classrooms following the European Portuguese standard as the reference. However, since the language is undergoing a process of change and indigenized forms of use and usage are expanding, the European Portuguese standard is not thoroughly followed. Many citizens, including teachers, are exposed to local forms of the language, and, consequently, they are not fully aware of the European Portuguese standard. In fact, in some circumstances, what is socially perceived as the European (white) way of speaking Portuguese, for instance, in the form of accent, locally referred to as ‘white accent’ (sotaque de branco), is not well received and people tend to shy away from it. This negative attitude ends up fostering local ways of speaking Portuguese. Therefore, a conflict emerges: school programmes and teaching materials espouse the European standard, while most teachers and students are socially compelled to use Mozambicanized Portuguese (cf. Robate 2006, 61–71). Variety used in the media – Forms of Portuguese used in the media are, in general, close to the official linguistic model, that is, standard European Portuguese. Variety used in literature – In general, Mozambican writers tend to follow the European standard, but often resort to nativized forms as a resource to localize their work in the Mozambican context, fulfilling not only communicative purposes but mostly symbolic functions. In fact, the use of nativized forms of Portuguese by Mozambican writers has always been the distinctive hallmark of Mozambican literary identity. For example, Mia Couto, a famous Mozambican writer, is known for recreations of nativized forms of Portuguese in his fictional literary work (cf. Gaspar/Santos/Diogo 1994; Gonçalves 2000, 217ss.). Examples of recreations in Mia Couto’s work include lexical innovations such as amalgamation of words (animaldades < animal ‘animal’ and maldade ‘wickedness’), unusual combinations of prefixes and suffixes (incompletar ‘to incomplete’), which is inexistent in standard European Portuguese, or unusual derivations such as sofrência ‘suffering’ instead of the standard European Portuguese form sofrimento. Other examples include the titles of short stories by Suleiman Cassamo (cf. Cassamo 2016, 24–51), such as Ngilina, tu vai morrer ‘Angelina, you will die’, in which the nativization is shown by the use of Ngilina, the local form of the Portuguese name Angelina, and the use of third person singular verbal agreement with the second person singular ‘tu’, as well as Laurinda, tu vai mbunhar ‘Laurinda, you will suffer’, again using the third person singular verbal agreement combined with the second person singular ‘tu’, and in addition the borrow-

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ing of the Ronga verb kumbunya ‘work hard, suffer’, or Madalena, xiluva do meu coração ‘Magdalena, flower of my heart’, with the borrowing of the Ronga noun xiluva ‘flower’.

References Baiôa, Manuel/Fernandes, Paulo Jorge/Ribeiro de Meneses, Filipe (2003), The political history of twentiethcentury Portugal, e-JPH 1/2, 1–18. C-MZ (1990) = República de Moçambique (1990), Constituição da República de Moçambique, Boletim da República 1/44, https://gazettes.africa/archive/mz/1990/mz-government-gazette-series-i-supplementdated-1990-11-02-no-44.pdf (2/3/2023). C-MZ (2004) = República de Moçambique (2004), Constituição da República de Moçambique, Boletim da República 1/51, https://www.masa.gov.mz/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Constituicao_republica_ mocambique.pdf (2/3/2023). Cassamo, Suleiman (2016), Regresso do morto, São Paulo, Kapulana. Chimbutane, Feliciano (2012), Panorama Linguístico de Moçambique: análise dos dados do III recenseamento geral da população e habitação de 2007, Maputo, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Conselho Coordenador do Recenseamento (1983), Recenseamento geral da população: Informação Pública, Maputo, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Couto, Mia (2009), Luso-Agonias – A Lusofonia entre viagens e crimes, in: Mia Couto (ed.), E se Obama fosse africano? e outras interinvenções, Lisbon, Caminho, 183–198. Craven, Matthew (2015), Between law and history: The Berlin conference of 1884–1885 and the logic of free trade, London Review of International Law 3/1, 31–59. Faculdade de Letras e Ciências Sociais (2021), Projecto DiPoMo – Dicionário do Português de Moçambique, Maputo, Universidade Eduard Mondlane, http://www.flcs.uem.mz/index.php/noticias/155-projectodipomo-dicionario-do-portugues-de-mocambique (2/3/2023). Farré, Albert (2014), Assimilados, régulos, homens novos, moçambicanos genuínos: a persistência da exclusão em Moçambique, Anuário Antropológico 2014/2, 199–229. Ferreira, Manuel (1988), Que futuro para a língua portuguesa em África?, Linda-A-Velha, ALAC/A Preto e Branco. Firmino, Gregório (2000), Situação Linguística de Moçambique, Maputo, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Firmino, Gregório (2002 [1995]), A “questão linguística” na África pós-colonial: o caso do português e das línguas autóctones em Moçambique, Maputo, Promédia. Firmino, Gregório (2011), Nation-statehood and linguistic diversity in the postcolony: The case of Portuguese and indigenous languages in Mozambique, in: Eric A. Anchimbe/Stephen A. Mforteh (edd.), Postcolonial linguistic voices: Identity choices and representations, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 99–117. Garcez, Pedro M. (1995), The debatable 1990 luso-brazilian orthographic accord, Language Problems and Language Planning 19/2, 151–178. García, Ofelia/Wei, Li (2014), Translanguaging: Language, bilingualism and education, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan. Gaspar, Ana Blaser/Santos, Ana Lúcia/Diogo, Carla Ivone (1994), Inovação lexical nos textos de Mia Couto, Revista Internacional de Língua Portuguesa 12, 58–63. Gonçalves, Perpétua (2000), Para uma aproximação língua-literatura em Português de Angola e Moçambique, Via Atlântica 4, 212–223. Gonçalves, Perpétua (2010), Génese do Português de Moçambique, Lisbon, Nacional-Casa da Moeda. Guthrie, Malcom (1967), Comparative Bantu: An introduction to the comparative linguistics and prehistory of Bantu languages, Farnborough, Gregg. INDE (2003), Plano curricular do ensino básico, Maputo, Instituto Nacional para o Desenvolvimento da Educação/Ministério da Educação.

824

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INE (2019), IV Recenseamento geral da população e habitação 2017. Resultados definitivos, Maputo, Instituto Nacional de Estatística. Melo, Vanessa de Pacheco (2013), Urbanismo português na cidade de Maputo: passado, presente e futuro (Portuguese urbanism in the city of Maputo: past, present, and future), Urbe. Revista Brasileira de Gestão Urbana 5/1, 71–88. Mondlane, Eduardo (1976, 1969), Lutar por Moçambique, Lisbon, Sá da Costa. Newitt, Malyn (1995), A history of Mozambique, Bloomington/Indianapolis, Indiana University Press. Newitt, Malyn (2005), A history of Portuguese overseas expansion. 1400–1668, London/New York, Routledge. Newitt, Malyn (2018), A short history of Mozambique, Johannesburg/Cape Town, Jonathan Ball. Paredes, Marçal de Menezes (2014), A construção da identidade nacional moçambicana no pós-independência: sua complexidade e alguns problemas de pesquisa, Anos 90 21/40, 131–161. Reutner, Ursula (2017), Vers une typologie pluridimensionnelle des francophonies, in: Ursula Reutner (ed.), Manuel des francophonies, Berlin/Boston, De Gruyter, 9–64. Robate, Simião Artur (2006), Currículo de formação de professores primários na disciplina de língua portuguesa em Moçambique: Um repensar de seus fundamentos teóricos, Piracicaba, Universidade Metodista de Piracicaba. Rosário, Lourenço (1982), Língua portuguesa e cultura moçambicana: De instrumento de consciência e unidade nacional a veículo e expressão de identidade cultural, Cadernos de Literatura 12, 58–66. Schneider, Edgar (2007), Postcolonial English. Varieties around the world, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Overview Country Key Facts Language Index Linguistic Subject Index General Subject Index Person Index

Ursula Reutner

36 Country Key Facts Algeria Inhabitants: 41,3 million* Area: 2,4 million km2 Capital: Algiers State: People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria Independence: 1962 Official languages: Arabic, Tamazight Other languages (e. g.): Nilo-Saharan (Songhay: Korandje), Indo-European (Romance: French)**  

French speakers: 33 %*  

Angola Inhabitants: 35 million Area: 1,2 million km2 Capital: Luanda State: Republic of Angola Independence: 1975 Official language: Portuguese Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Umbundu, Kikongo, Kimbundu, Chokwe, Nyemba, Nyaneka), Khoisan  

Portuguese speakers: 72 %  

* Numbers are tricky. The numbers of each country’s inhabitants are constantly changing and the speaker percentages depend on who is counted as a speaker. Looking for a common denominator to characterize all countries similarly, this overview is based on sources available for all countries. They are presented in the introduction (Quantitative distribution, p. 2, and Country key facts, pp. 13s.). For some areas, more detailed or recent information may exist and can be found in the chapters on the individual countries. ** For better orientation, the language groups always follow the same order, regardless of their importance in the country. Please refer to the individual chapters for the relevance of each language group in the respective area and for a more complete panorama of the language situation in general. Also note that the classification of some languages is still discussed. Songhay, for example, was traditionally regarded as Nilo-Saharan, whereas the current trend is to consider it distinct. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-036

828

Ursula Reutner

Benin Inhabitants: 12.9 million Area: 112,622 km2 Capital: Porto-Novo State: Republic of Benin Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Fulfulde – Benue-Congo: Ede/Yoruba – Gur – Kwa/Gbe: Fon, Gen), Nilo-Saharan (Songhay)  

French speakers: 34 %  

Burkina Faso Inhabitants: 22.1 million Area: 274,200 km2 Capital: Ouagadougou State: Burkina Faso Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Berber: Tamasheq – Chadic: Hausa), Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Fulfulde – Mande: Dyula, Bissa – Gur: Mooré, Gourmanchéma, Lyélé, Sissala), Nilo-Saharan (Songhay)  

French speakers: 24 %  

Burundi Inhabitants: 12.5 million Area: 27,830 km2 Capital: Gitega (political), Bujumbura (economic) State: Republic of Burundi Independence: 1962 Official languages: Kirundi, French, English Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Swahili)  

French speakers: 9 %  

Country Key Facts

829

Cabo Verde Inhabitants: 580,000 Area: 4,033 km2 Capital: Praia State: Republic of Cabo Verde Independence: 1975 Official language: Portuguese Other language: Creole (Kabuverdianu) Portuguese speakers: 90 %  

Cameroon Inhabitants: 27.2 million Area: 475,440 km2 Capital: Yaoundé State: Republic of Cameroon Independence: 1960 Official languages: French, English Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Chadic: Hausa), Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Fulfulde – Bantu: Basaa, Ewondo – Adamawa-Ubangi: Tupuri, Gbaya), NiloSaharan (Saharan: Kanuri)  

French speakers: 41 %  

Canary Islands Inhabitants: 2.2 million Area: 7,500 km2 Capital: Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria State: Kingdom of Spain Autonomous community: 1982 Official language: Spanish Other language: Silbo Gomero Spanish speakers: 92 %  

830

Ursula Reutner

Central African Republic Inhabitants: 5.4 million Area: 622,984 km2 Capital: Bangui State: Central African Republic Independence: 1960 Official languages: French, Sango Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Ngombe – Adamawa-Ubangi: Banda, Gbayi), Nilo-Saharan (Central Sudanic: Sara)  

French speakers: 29 %  

Ceuta Inhabitants: 82,000 Area: 18.5 km2 Capital: Ceuta State: Kingdom of Spain Autonomous city: 1995 Official language: Spanish Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Semitic: Arabic – Berber: Tamazight)  

Spanish speakers: 92 %  

Chad Inhabitants: 17.2 million Area: 1,284,000 km2 Capital: N’Djamena State: Republic of Chad Independence: 1960 Official languages: Arabic, French Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Chadic: Buduma, Masa), Niger-Congo (Adamawa-Ubangi: Tupuri), Nilo-Saharan (Saharan: Dazaga, Tedaga – Maban: Maba, Masalit – Fur – Eastern Sudanic: Tama – Central Sudanic: Bongo-Bagirmi/Sara)  

French speakers: 13 %  

Country Key Facts

Comoros Inhabitants: 822,000 Area: 2,235 km2 Capital: Moroni State: Union of the Comoros Independence: 1975 Official languages: Shikomori, French, Arabic Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Swahili), Austronesian (Malayo-Polynesian: Malagasy/Kibushi)  

French speakers: 26 %  

Congo-Brazzaville Inhabitants: 5.9 million Area: 342,000 km2 Capital: Brazzaville State: Republic of the Congo Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Kituba, Lingala)  

French speakers: 61 %  

Congo-Kinshasa Inhabitants: 95.9 million Area: 2,344,858 km2 Capital: Kinshasa State: Democratic Republic of the Congo Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Lingala, Kikongo, Swahili, Tshiluba)  

French speakers: 51 %  

831

832

Ursula Reutner

Côte d’Ivoire Inhabitants: 27.5 million Area: 322,463 km2 Capital: Yamoussoukro (political), Abidjan (economic) State: Republic of Côte d’Ivoire Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Mande: Bambara, Dyula, Maninka – Gur: Lobi – Senufo – Kwa: Anyin, Baoulé, Ébrié, Attié, Abé – Kru: Bete, Grebo)  

French speakers: 34 %  

Djibouti Inhabitants: 1.1 million Area: 23,200 km2 Capital: Djibouti State: Republic of Djibouti Independence: 1977 Official languages: Arabic, French Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Cushitic: Afar, Somali)  

French speakers: 50 %  

Equatorial Guinea Inhabitants: 1.7 million Area: 28,051 km2 Capital: Malabo (current), Ciudad de la Paz (under construction) State: Republic of Equatorial Guinea Independence: 1968 Official languages: Spanish, French, Portuguese Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Fang, Bubi), Creole (Annobonese/Fa d’Ambú)  

Spanish speakers: 74 %, French speakers: 29 %  

 

Country Key Facts

833

Eritrea Inhabitants: 3.6 million Area: 117,600 km2 Capital: Asmara State: State of Eritrea Independence: 1991 Official languages: Tigrinya, Arabic, English Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Semitic: Tigre – Cushitic: Afar, Beja, Saho), Nilo-Saharan (Kunama), Indo-European (Romance: Italian)  

Ethiopia Inhabitants: 120.3 million Area: 1,104,300 km2 Capital: Addis Ababa State: Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia Liberation: 1941 Official languages: Amharic, Afar, Oromo, Somali, Tigrinya Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Semitic: Harari – Cushitic: Awngi, Xamtanga, Saho, Konso – Omotic: Wolaytta), Nilo-Saharan (Gumuz), Indo-European (Romance: Italian)  

Gabon Inhabitants: 2.4 million Area: 267,667 km2 Capital: Libreville State: Gabonese Republic Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Fang, Punu, Njebi, Latege, Mbere, Myene, Sira, Sangu, Kota – Adamawa-Ubangi: Baka)  

French speakers: 65 %  

834

Ursula Reutner

Guinea Inhabitants: 13.5 million Area: 245,857 km2 Capital: Conakry State: Republic of Guinea Independence: 1958 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Pular, Kissi – Mande: Maninka, Susu, Kpelle)  

French speakers: 27 %  

Guinea-Bissau Inhabitants: 2.1 million Area: 36,125 km2 Capital: Bissau State: Republic of Guinea-Bissau Independence: 1974 Official language: Portuguese Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Balanta, Biafada, Fula, Mandjak, Mankanya, Papel – Mande: Mandinka), Creole (Kriyol)  

Portuguese speakers: 62 %, French speakers: 15 %  

 

Libya Inhabitants: 6.8 million Area: 1,759,540 km2 Capital: Tripoli State: State of Libya Independence: 1951 Official language: Arabic Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Berber: Nafusi, Ghadames, Tamasheq), Nilo-Saharan (Saharan: Tedaga), Indo-European (Romance: Italian)  

Country Key Facts

835

Madagascar Inhabitants: 28.9 million Area: 587,041 km2 Capital: Antananarivo State: Republic of Madagascar Independence: 1960 Official languages: Malagasy, French French speakers: 26 %  

Madeira Inhabitants: 251,000 Area: 801 km2 Capital: Funchal State: Portuguese Republic Autonomous region: 1976 Official language: Portuguese Portuguese speakers: 100 %  

Mali Inhabitants: 21.9 million Area: 1,240,192 km2 Capital: Bamako State: Republic of Mali Independence: 1960 Official languages: Bambara, Bobo (Bomu), Bozo, Dogon, Fula (Fulfulde), Hassaniyya, Kassonke (Xaasongaxango), Maninka, Minyanka (Mamara), Senufo, Songhay, Soninke, Tamasheq Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Wolof – Mande: Yalunka – Gur: Mooré), Indo-European (Romance: French)  

French speakers: 17 %  

836

Ursula Reutner

Mauritania Inhabitants: 4.6 million Area: 1,030,700 km2 Capital: Nouakchott State: Islamic Republic of Mauritania Independence: 1960 Official language: Arabic Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Berber: Tamasheq, Zenaga), NigerCongo (Atlantic: Pulaar, Wolof – Mande: Soninke, Bambara), Indo-European (Romance: French)  

French speakers: 13 %  

Mauritius Inhabitants: 1.3 million Area: 2,040 km2 Capital: Port Louis State: Republic of Mauritius Independence: 1968 Official language: English Other languages (e. g.): Creole (Morisien, Rodriges), Indo-European (Indic: Bhojpuri – Romance: French)  

French speakers: 73 %  

Mayotte Inhabitants: 257,000 Area: 400 km2 Capital: Mamoudzou State: French Republic Overseas department: 2011 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Shimaore), Austronesian (Malayo-Polynesian: Malagasy/Kibushi)  

French speakers: 63 %  

Country Key Facts

837

Melilla Inhabitants: 83,000 Area: 12.3 km2 Capital: Melilla State: Kingdom of Spain Autonomous city: 1995 Official language: Spanish Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Semitic: Arabic – Berber: Tamazight)  

Spanish speakers: 92 %  

Morocco Inhabitants: 37 million Area: 716,550 km2 Capital: Rabat State: Kingdom of Morocco Independence: 1956 Official languages: Arabic, Amazigh Other languages (e. g.): Indo-European (Romance: French, Spanish)  

French speakers: 36 %  

Mozambique Inhabitants: 32 million Area: 799,380 km2 Capital: Maputo State: Republic of Mozambique Independence: 1975 Official language: Portuguese Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Bantu: Yao/Ciyao, Makonde/ Shimakonde, Mwani/Kimwani, Koti/Ekoti, Makhuwa/Emakhuwa, Lomwe/ Elomwe, Chuwabu/Ecuwabo, Nyanja/Cinyanja, Nyungwe/Cinyungwe, Manyika/Cimanika, Tebe/Ciwutewe, Ndau/Cindawu, Barwe/Rue, Sena/ Cisena, Tswa/Citshwa, Tsonga/Xitsonga/Xichangana, Ronga/Xironga, Chopi/ Cicopi, Tonga/Gitonga)  

Portuguese speakers: 70 %  

838

Ursula Reutner

Niger Inhabitants: 25.3 million Area: 1,267,000 km2 Capital: Niamey State: Republic of the Niger Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Semitic: Arabic – Berber: Tamasheq, Tamahaq, Tamajaq – Chadic: Hausa, Buduma), Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Fulfulde – Gur: Gurmanchéma), Nilo-Saharan (Songhay: Zarma, Tasawaq – Saharan: Kanuri, Tedaga)  

French speakers: 13 %  

Réunion Inhabitants: 861,000 Area: 2,500 km2 Capital: Saint-Denis State: French Republic Overseas department: 1946 Official language: French Other language: Creole (Rénioné) French speakers: 88 %  

Rwanda Inhabitants: 13.4 million Area: 26,338 km2 Capital: Kigali State: Republic of Rwanda Independence: 1962 Official languages: Kinyarwanda, French, English, Swahili Other language: Niger-Congo (Bantu: Kirundi) French speakers: 6 %  

Country Key Facts

839

São Tomé and Príncipe Inhabitants: 223,000 Area: 964 km2 Capital: São Tomé State: Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Principe Independence: 1975 Official language: Portuguese Other languages (e. g.): Creole (Santome/Forro, Principense/Lung’Ie, Angolar/Ngola, Kabuverdianu)  

Portuguese speakers: 91 %  

Senegal Inhabitants: 16.9 million Area: 196,722 km2 Capital: Dakar State: Republic of Senegal Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Atlantic: Jola, Pulaar, Sereer, Wolof – Mande: Maninka, Soninke), Creole (Casamancese)  

French speakers: 26 %  

Seychelles Inhabitants: 99,000 Area: 445 km2 Capital: Victoria State: Republic of Seychelles Independence: 1976 Official languages: French, English, Creole (Seselwa) French speakers: 53 %  

840

Ursula Reutner

Somalia Inhabitants: 17 million Area: 637,657 km2 Capital: Mogadishu State: Federal Republic of Somalia Independence: 1960 Official languages: Somali, Arabic Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Cushitic: Maay, Dabarre, Jiiddu, Tunni), Niger-Congo (Bantu: Mushungulu, Swahili), Indo-European (Romance: Italian)  

Togo Inhabitants: 8.7 million Area: 56,785 km2 Capital: Lomé State: Togolese Republic Independence: 1960 Official language: French Other languages (e. g.): Niger-Congo (Gur/Grusi: Kabiye – Kwa/Gbe: Ewe)  

French speakers: 41 %  

Tunisia Inhabitants: 12.2 million Area: 163,610 km2 Capital: Tunis State: Republic of Tunisia Independence: 1956 Official language: Arabic Other languages (e. g.): Afro-Asiatic (Berber: Tamazight), Indo-European (Romance: French)  

French speakers: 52 %  

Language Index Abé 222, 832 Abidji 222 Abron 222 Abure (also Abouré) 222 Adamawa-Ubangi 484, 498, 552, 829s., 833 Adangbe 393s., 400 Adele 393s., 400 Adioukrou 222 Afar 11, 669–688, 783s., 789ss., 804, 832s. Afro-Asiatic 11, 13, 85s., 194, 291, 339, 341, 470, 497, 669, 783, 828ss., 832–838, 840 Agni (see Anyin) Aguna 169 Aizi (also Ahizi) 222 Aja 169–186, 393s. Ajra 169 Ajumba 552 Aka 510 Akaselem 393s. Akebu 394 Akwa 509 Akye (see Attié) Alaba-K’abeena 783 Alada 169 Alladian 222 Alsatian 348, 527 Amazigh 31, 44–64, 71, 87, 119, 149, 156, 161ss., 837 Amharic 11, 91, 672, 783–803, 833 Ana 169 Angolar (also Ngola) 609ss., 839 Anii 170, 182, 393s., 400 Ano 222 Antankarana 717 Anufo 393s. Anyin (also Agni) 222, 225 Arabic 4–11, 23–40, 44–67, 71–82, 85–91, 107, 149– 163, 210, 242–259, 266–281, 289–312, 319–329, 337–374, 392, 400, 407, 447, 470, 474, 497–503, 517, 537, 560, 562, 646, 651, 660, 670–685, 692, 717–744, 761, 783–805, 827, 830–834, 836ss., 840 – Algerian ~ 23, 25, 31, 37s. – Chadian ~ 498, 503 – Classical ~ 24, 44s., 53, 61, 149, 158, 292, 305s. – Libyan ~ 85, 88–91 – Mauritanian ~ (see Hassaniyya)

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-037

– Modern Standard ~ 27, 31, 44ss., 53, 56s., 65, 85, 292, 498, 501 – Moroccan ~ (see Darija) – Tunisian ~ 23, 71s., 76–83 Argobba 783 Atlantic 194, 242, 293, 339s., 447s., 460, 828s., 834–839 Attié (also Akye) 222, 832 Austronesian 12s., 717, 772, 831, 836 Avikam 222 Awngi 783, 833 Ayizo 169 Baatonum 170ss., 181s., 184 Badyara 241, 339, 341, 352 Bafut 472 Baga 241s., 447 Bainuk (also Bainouk) 344, 352 Bak 339s., 447 Baka 510, 552, 833 Balanta 338ss., 344, 352, 359, 447, 461, 834 Bali (also Ibali) 509 Bambara 11, 210, 224s., 232, 243, 265–282, 290, 293s., 339, 341, 343, 361, 374s., 383, 416, 832, 835s. Bamileke 476 Banda 483s., 830 Bandial 339s. Bantu 430, 484, 507–531, 544s., 552, 562, 579–601, 611, 626s., 631, 645s., 694, 718, 733, 784, 796, 809–821, 827–840 Baoulé 210, 222, 224, 228, 234, 832 Bara 717 Barwe (also Rue) 837 Basaa 470s., 829 Basque 348 Bassa 476 Bassari (also Oniyan) 241, 252, 339s., 352, 447 Bayot 339s., 344, 352 Bayso 784 Bedik (also Ménik) 339, 341, 344, 352 Bedjond 498, 502s. Beembe 509, 525 Beja 783, 833 Bekwel (also Bekwil) 510, 552 Benga 627 Benue-Congo 828

842

Language Index

Berakou 498 Berber 24, 46, 71s., 74s., 85s., 119, 149s., 161ss., 291s., 294, 319, 339, 341, 344, 828, 830–838, 840 Bete 210, 224, 228, 234, 832 Beti 476, 479 Betsimisaraka 717 Bhojpuri 754, 758s., 761, 763, 765, 772, 836 Biafada 447, 834 Biali 170, 182, 393s., 400 Bijogo 447 Bilin 783 Birifor 224 Bissa 194s., 202, 206, 393s., 828 Bobangi 510 Bobo (see Bomu) Boko 169, 182 Bomitaba 510 Bomu (also Bobo) 11, 266, 835 Bomwali 510 Bondongo 510 Bongili 510 Bongo-Bagirmi 830 Bozo 11, 266, 270, 835 Breton 348 Bubi 552, 625s., 630, 832 Buduma 319s., 322, 830, 838 Burji 783 Buso 498 Bwisi 510 Camfranglais 469ss., 474ss., 479 Cantonese 754, 772 Castilian 107, 115, 122s., 125ss., 129, 131, 137, 153 Catalan 348 Cerma 194, 202, 224 Chadic 319, 510, 828ss., 838 Chamito-Semitic 669 Chaouia (also Shawiya, Tachawit) 24s., 48 Chenoui (also Shenwa) 24s. Chichewa 796 Chinese (see also Mandarin, Cantonese) 270, 301, 320, 383, 400, 447, 473, 518, 559, 672, 718s., 730, 756, 761, 772 Chokwe 580, 582, 588, 592s., 827 Chopi (also Cicopi) 811, 837 Chuwabu (also Echuwabo) 811, 837 Cicopi (see Chopi) Cimanika (see Manyika) Cindawu (see Ndau)

Cinyanja (see Nyanja) Cinyungwe (see Nyungwe) Cisena (see Sena) Citshwa (see Tswa) Ciwutewe (see Tewe) Ciyao (see Yao) Comorian (also Shikomori) 2, 7, 11, 717–720, 726–743, 831 Corse 348 Creole (also Kreol, Kriol, Kriyol, see also Angolar) – Annobonese ~ (also Fa d’Ambú) 6, 625, 627, 629, 634, 832 – Atlantic ~ 416 – Cabo Verdean ~ (also Kabuverdianu) 2, 5, 12, 339, 341, 344, 413–439, 451, 458, 609ss., 829, 839 – Casamancese ~ 12, 339–373, 416, 449–457, 839 – Caribbean ~ 347, 451 – Guinea-Bissau ~ 2, 5, 12, 338, 344, 361, 416, 447–462 – Gulf of Guinea ~ 12 – Mauritius ~ (also Morisien) 2, 7, 12, 753–779, 836 – Principense ~ (also Lung’Ie) 2, 6, 12, 609s. – Réunion ~ (also Rénioné) 2, 7, 12, 691–710, 718 – Rodrigues ~ (also Rodriges) 12, 836 – São Tomé ~ (also Santome, Forro) 2, 6, 12, 609– 618, 839 – Seychelles ~ (also Seselwa) 2, 7, 12, 755, 761, 766, 776, 839 – Sierra Leonean ~ (also Krio) 243, 339, 341, 344, 628 – Upper Guinea ~ 12, 339, 344, 416, 451 Cushitic 669, 783, 791, 793, 832s., 840 Dabarre 784, 840 Dagaare 194, 202, 206 Dagba 484, 498 Dagbani 391, 394 Dahalik 783, 790 Dan 224 Darija (also Tunisian Arabic) 23, 44–63, 149–162 Dazaga 497, 830 Defi 169 Delo 393s., 400 Dhaasanac 784, 790s., 796s., 799 Diakanka (see Jahanka) Dialonké (see Yalunka) Dibole 510 Dida 224 Diola (also Dyola, see Jola)

Language Index

Dioula (see Dyula) Ditammari 170ss., 182, 393s. Djimini 224 Dogbo 169, 172 Dogon 11, 194, 266, 835 Doondo 509 Dravidian 754 Duala 471s., 476, 567 Dyola (also Diola, see Jola) Dyula (also Dioula, Jula) 9, 194–204, 206, 214, 224s., 234, 243, 828, 832 Eboo 509 Ébrié 222, 832 Echuwabo (see Chuwabu) Ede 169s., 183s., 828 Ega 222 Ejamat 339s. Ekoti (see Koti) Elomwe (see Lomwe) Emakhuwa (see Makhuwa) Enenga 552 English 1, 6s., 11–17, 23ss., 28. 33, 47s., 54ss., 71–79, 85, 97, 102, 134, 162s., 169, 173s., 180ss., 210, 213, 225, 244, 254s., 259, 270, 272, 289, 320, 338s., 343, 348, 356, 361, 363s., 374, 394ss., 399s., 407, 409, 413, 423, 447, 454s., 469–475, 479, 501, 512, 517s., 524s., 528s., 537s., 541ss., 559, 562s., 567s., 592s., 625–630, 634, 636, 643s., 646, 649–655, 660, 663, 672, 687, 708, 718ss., 722, 726s., 730s., 736, 738, 753s., 757–764, , 770, 772s., 775–778, 783, 790ss., 794, 796, 798–803, 809, 812s., 820, 828s., 833, 836, 838s – Cameroon Pidgin ~ 134, 469ss., 474s., 479 – Canarian Pidgin ~ (also Pichingle) 124 – Equatorial Guinean Pidgin ~ (also Pichinglis) 625– 629, 634, 636 – Ghanaian Pidgin ~ 407 – Nigerian Pidgin ~ (also Naijá) 628 Enyele 510 Ewe 186, 391–409, 569, 840 Ewondo 470, 509s., 829 Fa d’Ambú (see Creole) Fang 509s., 552–570, 625–633, 832s. Flemish 538s. Fon 169–188, 393s., 569, 828 Fongoro 498 Foodo 170

843

Forro (see Creole) Franco-Provençal 348 Francsango 485 Frangache 735 French – big ~ (gros français) 511 – business ~ 300 – dilettantish ~ (français mboka-mboka) 511, 525s. – of “little Negros” (français petit-nègre) 225, 256, 281, 315 – of long ballpoints (français des longs bics) 511 – hexagonal ~ 197, 208ss., 215, 261, 368, 371, 375ss., 475, 477ss., 745 – oral ~ 277, 478, 703, 740 – skirmishers’, riflemen’s ~, ~ of the infantry (français tirailleur) 225, 256, 281, 339, 341, 346s., 370, 513 – struck ~ (français frappé) 685 – tired ~ (français fatigué) 685 – written ~ 194, 214, 475, 651, 658 Fula (also Peul) 9, 11s., 266, 338–383, 416, 447s., 834 Fulfulde 11, 13, 169, 194–207, 266–281, 293, 319–332, 343, 392, 394, 471, 498, 828s., 835, 838 – Adamawa ~ 484, 498, 552, 829s., 833 – Bagirmi ~ 498, 830 – Borgu ~ 170s., 182 – Nigerian ~ 498 Fur 830 Fuumu 509 Galician 132 Galwa 552 Gawwada 784–804 Gban 224 Gbaya 484, 510, 829 Gbayi 830 Gbe 169s., 183s., 391, 393, 828, 840 Gbesi 169 Gbin 224 Gedeo 783 Geme 484 Gen (also Mina) 169, 172, 182, 391ss., 400, 828 German 97, 102, 254, 272, 394ss., 399s., 407, 471, 473, 475, 512, 518, 562s., 766 Ghadames 85, 834 Ghomálá 470s. Ginyanga 393s., 400 Gitonga 811, 818, 820, 837 Godié 224

844

Language Index

Goulay 498 Goundo 498 Gourmanchéma 194s., 199, 202s., 319s., 322, 393s., 828 Grebo 832 Greek 118, 384, 522 Grusi 840 Gubeeher 339s. Gujarati 718s., 754, 809, 812 Gula 484 Gumuz 784, 833 Gun 169, 172, 174, 181s., 186 Gur 169s., 183s., 194, 221s., 224, 341, 391, 393, 828, 832, 835, 838, 840 Gurma 195s. Guro 224 Gusilay 339s. Hadiyya 783 Hakka 754, 772 Hangala 509 Hangaza (also Kihangaza) 645 Haqmi 670 Harari 783s., 790s., 793, 799, 833 Hassaniyya 11, 45, 134, 266, 291–314, 339–360, 835 Hausa 194, 319–332, 343, 392, 407, 470s., 498, 501, 510, 828s., 838 Herero 581, 593 Hindi 646, 692, 719, 754, 759, 761, 763, 772, 809, 812 Hwe 169, 172 Ibali (see Bali) Ifè 169, 393s., 400 Igo 393s., 400 Ikota (see Kota) Ikposo 393s., 400 Impfondo 510 Indic 836 Indo-European 1, 13, 86, 341, 372, 374, 772, 827, 833s., 836s., 840 Isangu (see Sangu) isiNdebele (see Ndebele) Italian 2s., 5–10, 14s., 21, 23, 73, 85–91, 473, 499, 641, 783, 797, 800–805, 833s., 840 Jaad 339, 341, 447 Jahanka (also Diakanka) 241 Jalunga (see Yalunka) Jamsay Dogon 194 Jiiddu 784, 840

Jola (also Diola, Dyola) 5, 337–375, 447, 839 Jula (see Dyula) Kaamba 509 Kaba (also Kabba) 484, 498 Kabiye 391–409, 840 Kabuverdianu (see Creole) Kabyle 24, 40 Kako 510 Kambaata 783 Kanika 224 Kanuri 319, 322s., 326, 470, 829, 838 Karon 339s. Kasanga 339s., 447 Kassonke (see Xaasongaxango) Kebu Fula 393s. Keerak 393s. Kele (also Kélé) 509s., 552 Kenyang 470, 472 Khoisan 13, 470, 579, 581, 827 Kibala 581, 593 Kibushi 691, 693, 697, 701s., 707ss., 831, 836 Kiha 645 Kihangaza (see Hangaza) Kikongo (see Kongo) Kimbundu 580–601, 827 Kimwani (see Mwani) Kinyafrançais 661 Kinyarwanda 2, 6, 11, 643–663, 812, 838 Kirundi (see Rundi) Kishubi (see Shubi) Kissi 241s., 252, 255, 834 Kiswahili (see Swahili) Kituba 6, 12, 507–524, 831 Kle 498 Kobiana 339s., 447 Kodia 224 Kombe 627 Kongo (also Kikongo) 6, 507ss., 518, 521, 537–542, 546, 579, 582s., 588, 592s., 827, 831 Koniagui (see Wamey) Konkomba 393s. Kono 241s. Konso 783–799, 833 Konyanka 241 Koongo 509, 531 Korandje 827 Kordofanian 470 Koro 224

Language Index

Kota (also Ikota) 510, 552, 555, 563, 833 Kotafon 391, 394 Koti (also Ekoti) 837 Kouya 224 Koyaga 224 Koyo 509 Kpelle 241s., 252, 259, 834 Kreol, Krio, Kriol, Kriyol (see Creole) Krobu (also Krobou) 222 Kru (also Krou) 194, 221s., 224, 832 Kuanyama 580, 582, 588, 592s. Kugere-Kuxinge 339s. Kukuya 509 Kulango (also Koulango) 224 Kunama 783, 833 Kunyi 509 Kuranko 241 Kusaal 393ss., 400 Kuwaataay 339s. Kwa 169s., 221s., 391, 393, 509, 569, 828, 832, 840 Kweso 510 Laalaa (also Lehar) 339s., 344, 352 Laali 509 Laari 509, 524, 528 Lama 393s. Landoma 241s., 447 Latege (also Tege) 509, 552, 555, 563, 833 Latin 8, 57, 86, 118, 151, 266, 301, 356, 378, 384, 430, 434, 474, 769, 791 Lehar (see Laalaa) Lele 241 Libido 783 Likuba 509 Likwala 509 Lingala 6, 12, 507–525, 531, 537s., 541ss., 660, 831 Lobala 510 Lobi 224, 832 Lobiri 194, 202 Loi-Likila 510 Lomwe (also Elomwe) 811, 837 Luba-Lulua (also Tshiluba) 6, 537s., 541s., 831 Lukpa 170s., 182 Lumbu 510, 552 Lunda 538, 581, 593 Lung’Ie (see Creole) Luvale 581s., 593 Lyélé 194, 202s., 206, 828

845

Maay 784, 789, 792, 840 Maba 498, 830 Maban 830 Mabia 194, 393 Mabire 498 Mahafaly 717 Mahongwe 510 Mahou 224 Makhuwa (also Emakhuwa) 719, 811, 818, 837 Makonde (also Shimakonde) 811, 837 Malagasy 2, 7, 11, 691, 717–745, 772, 831, 835s. – Plateau ~ (see Merina) Malayo-Polynesian 691, 831, 836 Malinké (see Maninka) Mamara (also Minyanka) 11, 266, 835 Mampruli 393s. Mandarin (see also Chinese) 97, 563, 754, 763, 769 Mande 194, 221, 223s., 242, 293s., 339s., 343s., 368, 447, 828, 832, 834ss., 839 Mandinka 247, 338–361, 416, 433, 447–461, 834 Mandjak 339s., 344, 352, 447, 461, 834 Maninka (also Western Maninkakan, Malinké) 5, 11, 224, 228, 235, 241–244, 252, 255s., 259, 261, 266s., 282, 338s., 343, 352, 361, 364, 372, 374, 832, 834s., 839 Mankanya 339s., 344, 352, 447, 834 Mann (also Mano) 241 Manya 241 Manyika (also Cimanika) 811, 837 Maore (also Shimaore) 691–710, 718, 836 Maraka (see Soninke) Masa 830 Masalit 498, 830 Masikoro 717 Maxi 169s. Mbandja 510 Mbangala 581, 593 Mbangwe 510, 552 Mbato (also Mbatto) 222 Mbay 498 Mbelime 170, 393s. Mbenga 510 Mbere 510, 552, 555, 562s., 833 Mbete 509s. Mboko 509 Mboshi 509 Mbunda 581, 592 Mel 447 Ménik (see Bedik)

846

Language Index

Merina (also Plateau Malagasy) 717, 722s., 739 Mina (see Gen) Minyanka (see Mamara) Mixifore (also Mikiforè) 241 Miyobe 393s. Mlomp 339s. Moba 393s., 400 Mokole 169 Monzombo 510 Mooré (also Mossi) 9, 194–211, 222, 339, 341, 393s., 828, 835 Morisien (see Creole) Movolo 170 Mozabite (see Tumzabt) Mpiemo 510 Mpongmpong 510 Mpongwe 552, 567 Mungaka 470ss. Muskum 498 Mwali (also Shimwali) 691, 718 Mwani (also Kimwani) 811, 837 Myene 552, 555, 558, 561s., 566s., 833 Nafanan (also Nafana) 224 Nafusi 85, 834 Naijá (see English) Nalu (also Nalou) 241, 447 Nara 783 Nateni 170, 182 Nawdm 393s. Ndasa 510, 552 Ndau (also Cindawu) 811, 820, 837 Ndebele (also isiNdebele) 796 Ndut 339s., 344, 352 Ndzwani (also Shindzwani) 691, 718 Neyo 224 Ngam 484, 498 Ngambay 498, 503, 505 Ngangam 393s. Ngazidja (also Shingazidja) 691, 718 Ngbaka 485, 510 Ngbandi 510 Ngola (see Angolar) Ngom 510, 552 Ngombe 510, 830 Ngundi 510 Ngungwel 509 Niger-Congo 11, 13, 194, 221, 242, 292s., 339ss., 343, 391, 416, 447, 460, 484, 497, 784, 827–840

Nilo-Saharan 11, 13, 85, 194, 319, 470, 484, 497, 783s., 827–830, 833s., 838 Njebi 509s., 552, 558s., 562s., 833 Njyem 510 Nkhumbi 580, 582 N’ko 194, 339, 341 Nkomi 552 Noon 339s., 344, 352 Nouchi 221, 224, 227–237, 407 Noy 498 Nsongo 581, 593 Ntcham 393s. Ntomba 509s. Nuni 194, 202s. Nyaneka 581s., 588, 592ss., 827 Nyanja (also Cinyanja) 811, 837 Nyemba 580, 582, 588, 592ss., 827 Nyun 447, 452, 457, 460 Nyungwe (also Cinyungwe) 811, 837 Nzikou 509 Nzima 222 Occitan 348 Ombamba 510 Omotic 783s., 791, 793, 833 Oniyan (see Bassari) Oromo 11, 672, 783s., 789–792, 799s., 802ss. Orungu 552 Palor 339s., 344, 352 Papel 339s., 447, 461, 834 Papiamentu 451 Peul (see Fula) Phela 169 Phla 169 Pidgin English (also Pichingle, Pichinglis, see English) Pol 510 Pomo 510 Portuguese 1–8, 11–14, 95–109, 115, 119s., 125, 128, 130ss., 134, 151, 169, 173s., 182, 255, 338s., 343, 346, 371, 374, 392, 394s., 407, 413–439, 447– 462, 499, 501, 537s., 579–605, 609–619, 625– 630, 722, 759, 767, 772, 785, 809–822, 827, 829, 832, 834s., 837, 839 – African ~ 107, 426 – Angolan ~ 579, 584, 594–605, 820 – Black ~ (Pretoguês) 585

Language Index

– Brazilian ~ 107, 425–428, 435, 437s., 461, 594–599, 614, 617, 633, 820 – Cabo Verdean ~ 413, 424, 426–433, 435–438 – Guinea-Bissau ~ 451, 456, 460ss. – Madeiran ~ 95, 103, 106s. – Mozambican ~ 603, 819–822 – Renaissance ~ 453, 455 – Santomean ~ 613–619 Prakrit 150 Pretoguês (see Portuguese) Pulaar 5, 12, 290, 293, 298–307, 312, 337–375, 836, 839 Pular 12, 241ss., 252, 255s., 258s., 338ss., 343, 361, 834 Punu 509s., 552, 555, 562ss., 833 Qimant 783 Raxe 170 Rénioné (see Creole) Riffian (see Tarifiyt) Rodriges (see Creole) Romance 1ss., 7–18, 73, 80, 86s., 108, 115, 120s., 138, 151, 339, 341, 376, 447, 449, 451, 456s., 459, 461, 499, 669, 827, 833s., 836s., 840 – Gallo-~ 448 – Ibero-~ 447s. Ronga (also Xironga) 811, 823, 837 Rue (see Barwe) Rundi (also Kirundi) 2, 6, 11, 569, 643–663, 812, 828, 838 Runga 484 Russian 97, 447, 563, 766 Saafi-Saafi 339s., 344, 352 Saharan 43, 829s., 834, 838 Saho 783s., 790–804, 833 Sakalava 717 Sango 2, 6, 11s., 275, 483–498, 510, 830 Sangu (also Isangu) 552, 555, 564, 833 Santome (see Creole) Sara 484, 497s., 502s., 505, 830 Sarakolé (see Soninke) Saxwe 169, 182 Se 169 Seki 552, 682 Semitic 85s., 90s., 339, 341, 669, 783, 793, 795, 830, 833, 835, 837s.

847

Sena (also Cisena) 811, 837 Senufo (also Sénoufo, Syenara) 11, 224, 228, 266, 274 832, 835 Sereer 5, 337–379, 447, 839 Seselwa (see Creole) Seto 169 Shawiya (see Chaouia) Shenwa (see Chenoui) Shihindi 692 Shikomori (see Comorian) Shimakonde (see Makonde) Shimaore (see Maore) Shimwali (see Mwali) Shindzwani (see Ndzwani) Shingazidja (see Ngazidja) Shizungu 692, 707 Shubi (also Kishubi) 645 Siamou 194 Sidamo 783 Silbo Gomero 117, 123, 138, 829 Sindhi 150 Sira 552, 563, 833 Sissala 194, 203, 828 Siwu 394 Somali 11, 669s., 677, 679s., 682, 685–688, 784, 786, 789–796, 798, 800–804, 832s., 840 Songhay 11, 194, 266s., 270ss., 274s., 827s., 835, 838 Soninke (also Maraka, Sarakolé) 5, 11, 241, 266, 272, 289s., 293s., 298–303, 308, 311s., 337–352, 835s., 839 Soso (see Susu) Spanish 2–8, 11, 14, 21, 23, 25, 47ss., 55s., 97, 107, 115–142, 147–164, 254s., 301, 320, 364, 399s., 447, 467, 473, 475, 499, 512, 518, 543, 562s., 625–636, 829s., 832, 837 – Atlantic ~ 116, 122, 140 Sua 447 Sudanic 830 Suma 484 Supyire 835 Susu (also Soussou, Soso) 241–261, 338s., 341, 344, 834 Suundi 509 Suuqi 670 Swahili (also Kiswahili) 6s., 11, 501, 537s., 541s., 562s., 643–655, 660, 692s., 718ss., 738, 773, 811, 828, 831, 838 Syenara (see Senufo)

848

Language Index

Tachawit (see Chaouia) Tachelhit 46 Tagwana 224 Tala 169 Tama 830 Tamahaq 25, 838 Tamajaq 838 Tamasheq 11, 85, 194, 266s., 271, 274s., 319, 322s., 326, 828, 834ss., 838 Tamazight 4, 11, 23–26, 29–32, 37s., 56, 150, 154– 158, 161–164, 827, 830, 837, 840 Tamil 754, 761, 763, 772 Tandroy 717 Tanosy 717 Tarifiyt (also Riffian) 46, 163 Tasawaq 319s., 322, 838 Tedaga 85, 319s., 322, 830, 834, 838 Téén 224 Tege (see Latege) Telugu 754, 761 Tem 170, 182, 393s., 400 Temne 416, 460s. Tenda 339s., 447 Tesaka 717 Tewe (also Ciwutewe) 811, 837 Tiene 509s. Tigre 783, 833 Tigrinya 11, 783s., 786, 788–805, 833 Tofin 169 Toli 169 Toma 241s., 252 Tonga 837 Toura 224 Tsaangi 510, 552 Tsaayi 509 Ts’amakko 784 Tshiluba (see Luba-Lulua) Tsimihety 717 Tsogo 552, 558, 560, 566s. Tsonga (also Xitsonga) 811, 837 Tswa (also Citshwa) 811, 837 Tuareg 85 Tubu (also Toubou) 85 Tumzabt (also Mozabite) 25 Tunni 784, 840

Tupuri 497, 502, 829 Tyee 509 Umbundu 580, 582, 584, 588, 592ss., 601, 827 Urdu 754, 761, 763, 809, 812 Vale 484 Vili 509, 552 Waama 170, 182 Waci 169, 392 Wamey (also Koniagui) 241s., 252, 339s., 344, 352 Wandji 552 We 224 Weme 169 Wolaytta 784, 790ss., 798, 803, 833 Wolof 2, 5, 243, 275, 290–294, 298–302, 305–314, 322, 337–384, 416, 447, 452–455, 461, 494, 835s., 839 – Gambian ~, Lebu ~ 339s. Worodougou 224 Wumbvu 510, 552 Xaasongaxango (also Kassonke, Xasonga) 11, 266, 339, 341, 344, 835 Xamtanga 783, 833 Xevie 170 Xichangana 811, 818, 820, 837 Xironga (see Ronga) Xitsonga (see Tsonga) Xwela 393s., 400 Xwla 393s., 400 Yaka 509 Yalunka (also Dialonké, Jalunga) 241, 339, 341, 344, 352, 835 Yambe 510 Yao (also Ciyao) 811, 837 Yom 170s., 182 Yombe 509 Yoruba 169–172, 181ss., 186s., 828 Zarma 319–323, 326, 329, 332, 569, 838 Zenaga 292, 339, 341, 836

Linguistic Subject Index abbreviation (see also initialism, acronym) 82, 212, 311, 521, 523, 526, 528, 567, 791 absorption 372 acrolect 276, 279s., 392, 475, 511, 543, 554s., 564, 573, 661, 681, 821 acronym (see also abbreviation, initialism) 82, 161, 212, 231, 372, 523, 804 address – construction 128 – form 427, 439, 686, 819 – system 478 – term 478, 796 adverb 36, 128s., 185, 208s., 233, 276, 278, 304, 460, 478, 490ss., 521s., 524ss., 616, 733, 773, 796 affix, affixation 186, 234, 476, 479, 600, 738, 794s. affricate 89, 126s., 230, 792 allomorph 90, 260, 803 allophone 184, 366, 489 approximant (see also consonant) 403, 631, 635, 657 – lateral ~ 89, 367, 792 archaism 106, 127, 129, 771s. article (see also determiner) – definite ~ 90, 328, 405, 769 – indefinite ~ 457, 520, 524 aspect 105s., 208, 369, 458 aspiration 127, 158s., 631, 818 assimilation 90, 104, 110, 126s., 161, 274, 365, 402ss., 544, 765 autonym 9, 13, 509 auxiliary (see verb) basilect 47, 57, 59, 216, 370, 377s., 419, 454, 475, 511, 519s., 526s., 530, 543, 554s., 564s., 661, 707, 821 bilingualism 11, 24ss., 32s., 35s., 38, 50–56, 60, 68, 71, 73s., 76, 78, 82, 88, 120, 128, 150s., 157, 162s., 181, 193, 199, 202s., 229, 237, 252, 265, 267, 270ss., 280s., 293, 298–301, 319s., 323s., 337, 357, 409, 413ss., 419, 421, 424, 426, 435, 462, 472ss., 501, 530, 540, 559, 584, 589, 592ss., 631s., 644, 649, 651, 654, 675ss., 692, 696, 701s., 723, 725s., 730ss., 754, 758, 760, 762, 777, 810, 817 blending 372, 476, 521, 523, 528, 546, 735 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-038

borrowing (see also loan, loanword) 37ss., 45, 59–67, 81s., 90, 106, 174, 186, 189, 215, 234, 258, 267, 273, 277, 289, 292s., 301, 305ss., 312s., 330, 332, 343, 347s., 364–368, 371–375, 381, 405, 407ss., 432s., 455, 457, 459s., 462, 476, 478s., 491, 502ss., 507, 513, 522–528, 566s., 570s., 617, 659s., 662s., 670, 685, 687, 693, 706s., 736ss., 741ss., 772s., 778, 783, 791s., 795–803, 817, 820, 822s. boundary tone 489, 596 causative 455, 459, 598, 795 clause (also phrase) – adverbial ~ 130, 134, 460 – completive ~ 460 – coordinated ~ 81, 406 – relative ~ 60, 129, 406, 428, 431s., 460, 477, 599, 616 – subordinate ~ 60, 81, 231ss., 406, 599, 684 clitic (also enclitic, proclitic) 106, 128, 274s., 431, 458, 597s., 604s., 616s., 704, 769, 794 coda 230, 274, 403s., 428, 489, 595s., 703 code – -mixing 12, 47, 53, 67, 337, 370, 377, 384s., 512, 516, 661, 707, 732, 775 – -switching 12, 67, 78, 82, 258, 314, 337, 356, 362, 370, 378, 380s., 384s., 409, 485, 529, 707, 740, 775, 777 codification 5, 10, 24, 66, 173, 212, 227s., 265s., 339, 344, 351s., 376, 378s., 425, 436, 504, 514, 539, 722 cognition 273, 653 colinguism 322 collocation 259, 405, 407, 459, 477, 597, 604 communication (see also oral, written) – audiovisual ~ 56 – computer-mediated ~ 483, 487 – digital ~ 73, 81, 485, 652 – everyday ~ (also daily, day-to-day) 483, 487, 491, 497, 508, 512, 551, 707, 719s. – formal ~ 149, 661 – informal ~ 67, 72, 181, 200, 243, 337 – interethnic ~ 242, 246, 267, 470, 511 – international ~ 244, 515, 589, 591s. – intra-ethnic ~ 810 – mass ~ 176, 250, 272 – multilingual ~ 201, 391

850

Linguistic Subject Index

– national ~ 572, 625 – official ~ 200, 760, 814 – online ~ (also internet ~) 476, 563, 594, 630, 729 – peer ~ 422 – regional ~ 650 – verbal ~ 76 comparative 59, 129, 208, 598, 604 composition, compound 134, 187s., 259, 371s., 432, 476, 479, 521s., 528, 546, 552, 567, 600, 660, 684, 706, 734s., 772s. conditional 62, 81, 185, 208, 233, 277, 328, 683 conjunction 109, 304, 406s., 410, 478, 598, 705, 734 consonant (see also approximant, fricative, nasal, plosive, rhotic, tap, trill) – cluster 89, 454, 731, 765, 793, 802, 816 – final ~ 59, 80, 159, 703, 733, 765 – intervocalic ~ 89, 160, 595s., 631s., 635, 682, 818 – prenasal ~ 656s. – silent ~ 56, 733, 740 – voiced ~ 59, 80ss., 89, 126, 159, 206, 367s., 403s., 427s., 454ss., 519, 596, 682, 800, 818 – voiceless ~ (also devoiced ~, unvoiced ~) 59, 80, 89, 104, 126s., 184, 206, 367s., 403s., 427s., 454, 456, 489, 519, 595s., 657, 818 convergence 124, 615, 617, 703 conversion 209, 659 copula (see verb) creole, creolization 2, 5ss., 10–13, 255, 275, 339, 341, 368, 372, 508, 510, 694 cross-linguistic 359, 490s., 494, 658 cursing 519 decreolization 344 deglutinization 90 denasalization (see also vowel) 327, 366, 427, 519, 530, 544, 595, 656ss., 733 derivation 12, 24, 37, 61, 63, 81s., 91, 106, 130–134, 138, 149, 186, 197, 209, 234, 308, 313, 329, 343, 346, 371–374, 407, 432s., 449, 457–461, 485, 490, 500, 503, 509, 521ss., 528, 546, 567, 600, 629, 636, 659s., 684, 706, 734s., 738, 740, 794– 798, 800s., 804, 822 despirantization 89 determiner (see also article) – demonstrative ~ 185, 734 – possessive ~ 328, 598 devoicing (see consonant) diacritic 529

dialect 12, 23, 25, 28, 36, 40, 44ss., 56, 59, 72, 80, 85s., 88s., 95, 103, 105, 108, 119, 124, 134, 138s., 141, 147, 149s., 155, 161, 169, 224, 234, 241, 257, 266, 290s., 293s., 305, 307, 343, 417, 428, 435, 452, 484, 498, 501, 509, 539, 596, 626, 633, 635, 645s., 660, 670, 680, 691, 717s., 720, 722s., 738, 756, 772, 784, 791, 800, 811 diathesis 328 dictionary (see also lexicography) – differential ~ 278s., 379, 740 – global ~ 379, 527, 739s. dieresis 656s., 404 diglossia 71s., 85, 147, 149ss., 162, 164, 172, 175, 186s., 193, 267, 344, 413s., 418, 421s., 427, 487, 507, 512, 620, 650, 670, 675, 692s., 696, 700, 708, 719, 753 – double, embedded ~ 162, 344, 512 digraph 687 diphthong, diphthongization 104s., 109s., 595, 604, 614, 765, 800 discourse marker 210, 215, 277, 478, 684 divergence 72, 79, 409, 615, 680 endogenous (see norm, variety) epenthesis (see vowel) euphemism 375, 547 exogenous (see norm) frequency 127, 134, 278, 309, 314, 327, 407, 421, 426, 438, 682, 703s., 706 fricative (see also consonant) 80ss., 89, 104, 110, 126s., 159, 184, 206, 213, 257, 303, 367s., 403s., 427s., 454ss., 488, 519, 596, 631s., 657, 733, 792, 818 fricativization 818 gemination 89, 159, 352, 793, 455ss., 502 gender 36, 58, 60s., 81, 90, 233, 258, 405, 429s., 520, 530, 545, 597s., 604, 633, 658, 683, 685, 765s., 794, 819 glide (see also semiconsonant, semivowel) 80, 89, 91, 257, 367, 401, 404, 765 glottophagous 708 Guthrie classification 645, 718 homophony 90, 520, 734 hybridity, hybridization 39, 61ss., 81, 186s., 190, 234, 371s., 469s., 546, 567, 600, 693, 708, 736, 738

Linguistic Subject Index

hypercorrection 183, 206, 215, 257, 376, 520, 597, 681s., 686, 733, 769 imperative 81, 159s., 370, 378, 541 initialism (see also abbreviation, acronym) 523 interference 35s., 49, 59s., 79, 117, 207s., 257, 265, 273, 275, 278, 438s., 462, 543, 619, 633–636, 655, 658s., 664, 682, 686, 693, 704, 707, 818, 820 interjection 106, 186, 215, 277, 374, 478, 492, 531, 736s., 774 interlanguage 207, 273, 369, 377 intonation 80, 125, 293, 368, 405, 544, 596s., 632, 704, 738, 774 intransitive (see verb) inversion (see also word order) 127s., 278, 280, 476 koiné, koineization 486, 586 L1, L2 (see language) labelling, label 392, 406, 414, 434, 485, 586, 660, 801 lambdacism 257, 595 language (see also lingua franca, oral, vehicular, vernacular, written) – autochthonous ~ 71, 347s., 579–594, 626, 629 – endangered ~ 72, 551s., 558, 627, 711, 783s. – extinct ~ 118, 320, 469, 498, 552, 581, 784 – first ~ (also L1) 2, 15, 23, 25, 27, 36, 39, 60, 97, 109, 122, 149s., 161, 181, 183, 193ss., 200, 205, 207s., 214, 243, 245, 253, 256s., 265s., 271, 273ss., 282, 289–293, 298, 302s., 322, 330s., 337, 343s., 351, 354, 357–363, 375, 380, 414, 422s., 426ss., 431, 437, 452, 454, 497s., 501, 505, 507, 511, 538, 553s., 579, 581ss., 609, 611s., 619, 655, 658, 664, 669s., 672, 676s., 680s., 691, 696, 698, 702, 717, 719s., 754s., 758ss., 775, 784, 809s., 817s. – acquisition 79, 207, 376s., 379, 426, 428, 435, 475, 609, 617 – contact 13, 17, 86, 88, 147, 161, 169, 241, 392, 409, 413, 416, 438, 497, 617ss., 707, 796 – ideology 391 – market (see linguistic) – shift 266, 692, 701, 710 – national ~ 5s., 10, 23, 25, 27s., 32, 38ss., 46, 63, 169, 175s., 179s., 193–205, 210, 213ss., 227ss., 241– 261, 265–273, 280, 296, 298ss., 302, 304, 308, 311s., 314, 319s., 322–326, 329, 331, 337ss., 341–344, 351–364, 370, 375, 377s., 381, 383s.,

851

399, 472s., 487, 498–503, 508, 514ss., 537–543, 546, 554, 558, 560ss., 570, 582, 588, 591ss., 612, 629, 644, 646, 648ss., 654s., 669, 679, 681s., 686, 711, 726s., 759, 761ss., 789, 815s. – polynominal ~ 701 – second ~ (also L2) 1s., 10, 14, 25, 35s., 71, 73, 77, 79, 82, 97, 102, 193, 214, 242–245, 252, 254, 256s., 265, 271, 273s., 282, 300, 320, 331, 341, 344, 359, 414, 423, 428, 435, 437s., 449, 452ss., 456, 464, 507s., 511, 538, 562, 581s., 592, 609, 611ss., 617, 619, 625, 631, 645, 647, 653, 662, 672, 686, 698, 719, 723, 753, 760, 786, 789, 809ss., 814, 816 – taught ~ 10, 23s., 32s., 38, 47, 68, 77, 88, 118, 140, 162, 180ss., 202, 213s., 254, 260, 272, 289, 295, 320, 358s., 395, 400, 423, 447, 472s., 500, 512, 517s., 539, 542, 560ss., 570, 592s., 619, 629s., 643, 647, 652s., 662, 664, 670, 678, 692, 699, 717s., 722, 730, 760ss., 786, 812, 817, 821s. – teaching ~ (also ~ of instruction) 10, 32, 43, 53s., 72ss., 77s., 157, 180, 201ss., 213s., 228, 247, 265, 270ss., 301, 323, 356ss., 392, 395ss., 399s., 474, 517, 542, 560s., 630, 643s., 646ss., 652s., 662, 678, 722, 730, 757, 760s., 816s. – tonal ~ 207, 275, 339 law of position (see positional law) lexical availability 138, 160s., 163 lexicography (see also dictionary) 62, 130, 137, 236, 526, 706, 739s., 785 liaison 59, 80, 230, 275, 327, 368 lingua franca (see also language) 2s., 15, 23, 47, 73, 193, 195, 200, 222s., 225, 242–245, 251, 253, 256, 265ss., 273, 291ss., 348, 391s., 395, 398, 416, 447, 450, 452, 470, 483s., 492, 498, 508s., 579, 583, 587, 609, 627, 646, 691, 719 linguistic – ecology 2, 17, 391s., 413s., 418, 424, 426, 435 – identity 135, 385 – insecurity 58, 66s., 211, 260, 330, 375, 377, 686, 769 – landscape 102, 183, 199, 222, 270, 279, 391, 394, 425, 447, 469, 537, 629 – market 653, 692 – quarrel 539 liquid 127, 230, 367s., 427, 595, 631, 703 literacy 59, 72, 74, 77, 136, 150, 203, 228s., 242, 244, 249–255, 266, 272, 279, 297, 301, 323, 338, 356s., 362, 398, 414, 418s., 424, 486, 507, 515, 679, 814

852

Linguistic Subject Index

loan (also loanword, see also borrowing) 36ss., 59, 61, 80s., 85s., 88, 90s., 106s., 117, 131, 133s., 209s., 267, 281s., 308, 311ss., 329, 372, 374, 491, 502s., 524s., 528, 600s., 659–664, 684s., 736ss., 742, 783, 786, 788, 790–805 – meaning 375 – translation 375, 524s., 528, 601, 684s. lusophony 461, 579, 815 mesolect 47, 57–68, 279s., 325, 392, 405s., 475, 511, 543, 554s., 564, 573, 661s. metaphor 129ss., 188, 259, 373, 494, 546s., 735, 820 metonymy 130, 259, 373, 546s., 736 minimal pair (see also opposition) 231, 365s., 402, 488ss., 632, 656, 732 mismatch 428s., 520, 597, 734 monolingualism 2, 11, 23, 25, 28, 71, 77s., 123, 149, 157, 199, 217, 243, 267, 270, 272, 292, 301, 323, 409, 414s., 423, 539, 553, 555, 579, 589, 609, 619, 631, 644, 677, 725, 731, 810 monophthongization 104s., 109, 595, 604, 614, 617 multilingualism 1, 3, 15, 23s., 28, 30, 43, 51, 55, 97, 155, 162, 171, 173, 179, 199, 201, 224, 241–244, 261, 266s., 273s., 289, 322, 324, 329, 337s., 375, 381, 384, 391–395, 399s., 416, 447, 469, 471, 473, 478, 480, 487, 537, 544, 559, 582, 589, 592, 594, 609, 613, 643s., 654, 696, 705, 710, 809 nasal – consonant 59, 89, 126, 303, 427, 544, 595, 657, 682, 703, 764s., 792 – vowel (see vowel) nasality 104, 402, 404 nasalization (see also vowel) 303, 327, 366, 502, 595, 682, 764 negation 274, 278, 370, 378, 406, 459, 491, 598, 616, 705, 796 neologism 39, 58, 213, 259, 308, 310s., 329, 475, 490, 570, 634, 659, 684, 687, 801s. neutralization 126, 159, 258, 367, 477, 544, 564, 614, 632, 635, 656 norm – endogenous ~ 10, 211, 213, 279, 282, 328, 330, 375, 377, 488, 579, 695 – exogenous ~ 58, 67, 579, 685, 775 number 36, 61, 428ss., 456s., 462, 520, 530, 545, 597, 604, 615, 617, 633, 734, 766s.

object (see also clitic) – direct ~ 105s., 127s., 208, 368, 406, 520, 604, 659, 705, 771 – indirect ~ 128, 208, 545, 704ss., 769, 819 occlusive (see plosive) onomastics (see also toponym, toponymy) 127, 337, 503 onomatopoeia 234, 409, 522 onset 72, 184, 196, 404, 489, 595 opposition (see also minimal pair) 35, 126, 159, 327, 366, 368, 402, 488, 502, 544, 564, 614, 656, 702s., 732s. oral – communication 7, 10, 53, 169, 171, 277, 314, 398, 448, 487s., 507, 516, 651, 677, 697, 717, 728s., 759 – language 57, 128, 150, 330, 332 palatalization 104, 109, 327, 488, 490, 703, 765 paragoge (see vowel) parasynthesis 371, 546 partitive 186, 477, 520, 526, 530, 769 passive – [grammar] 303, 313, 369, 459, 819 – [linguistic competence] 130, 133, 195, 224, 414s., 425, 507, 695 phrase (see clause) phraseme 503 phraseologism 407 pidgin, pidginization 225, 315, 346, 392, 397, 407, 416, 448s., 486, 513, 543, 610, 636, 786 pitch 207, 231, 596, 632 plosive (also occlusive, stop, see also consonant) 80, 89, 104, 126, 158, 368, 404, 428, 456, 595s., 631, 682, 765, 792, 818 pluricentricity 10s., 378 plurilingualism 2, 9ss., 212, 221, 224, 227, 267, 322, 331, 354, 423, 539, 541, 572, 582, 686, 691, 696, 775 polyglossia 85, 584, 669 polynomy (see language) positional law (also law of position) 230, 364s., 402, 703 pragmatics 401, 408, 478 prenasalization (see consonant) preposition 36, 60, 106, 185, 207s., 215, 231s., 258ss., 275, 280, 304, 369, 371s., 406, 430ss., 458, 477, 490, 520s., 526, 545, 598s., 604, 614–617, 633, 661, 705, 733ss., 768s., 772, 796

Linguistic Subject Index

presenter 683 prestige (see also variety) 1, 27, 31, 49, 65, 137, 163, 172s., 211, 320, 344, 347, 360, 408, 470s., 493, 510, 513s., 570, 602, 609s., 618, 620, 649, 669, 672, 680, 682, 775, 810, 814 – high ~ 487, 526, 720 – low ~ 57, 172s., 418, 487, 719s. pronominalization (see verb) pronoun (see also clitic) – adverbial ~ 405, 683 – demonstrative ~ 276, 733, 778 – indefinite ~ 128 – interrogative ~ 430, 734 – object ~ 106, 258, 369, 406, 428, 430, 458s., 520, 683, 705s., 769, 819 – possessive ~ 105, 127, 615 – reflexive ~ 370, 431, 769 – relative ~ 60, 258, 477, 502, 520, 545, 598, 683, 734, 770, 778 – subject ~ 81, 258, 428, 458, 520, 633, 683 proper noun, proper name 37, 61, 151, 209, 231, 371, 522s., 530, 659s., 741, 773, 804 prosody 125, 138, 205, 207, 231, 233, 275, 307, 404, 406, 455, 488s., 596ss., 632, 657s., 733, 776, 793 prothesis (see vowel) quantifier 598, 615 reanalysis (see also remotivation, reinterpretation) 90, 345, 735, 791, 793 reduplication 276, 433, 476, 479, 522, 734s. reflexive (see pronoun, verb) regionalism 107–110, 135, 140, 189, 379, 381s., 432s., 436, 569, 574, 659, 738–745, 771s. reinterpretation (see also reanalysis, remotivation) 345 relative (see clause, pronoun) remotivation (see also reanalysis, reinterpretation) 525 rhotic (see also consonant) 206, 230s., 274, 327, 337, 367, 376, 402, 595, 614, 617, 631s., 682 rhoticism 595 sandhi 104 schwa (see also vowel) 183, 206, 230s., 257, 274, 327, 365, 404, 455, 477, 489, 564, 614, 656, 703, 732 semiconsonant, semivowel (see also glide) 104, 656, 733

853

sentence – complex ~ 455, 459 – declarative ~ 596 – interrogative ~ 125, 185, 478 – nuclear ~ 455, 459 – simple ~ 272 seseo 126, 135, 141, 159 slang 211, 224, 227, 234, 236 308, 311, 314, 567 sociolect 227, 475 speech 58, 80, 104s., 108ss., 116, 120, 124, 127–133, 135, 137–141, 150, 159, 189, 209, 211, 215, 231, 261, 279, 327, 374, 408, 417, 426, 430s., 438s., 460, 462, 469, 478, 488s., 493, 521, 544, 555, 611, 633, 635, 657, 661s., 670, 677, 683s., 687, 693, 734, 736, 742, 796, 801, 811, 816 – formal ~ 604 – informal ~ 491 – public ~ 227, 602, 630, 636, 661 – act 478, 489, 734 spelling reform 602, 821 statalism 63, 67, 569, 572s., 660 stigmatization 65, 124, 127, 172, 216, 314, 375s., 381s., 495, 582, 589, 603, 685, 696, 700, 739, 775s. stop (see plosive) stress 80, 275, 337, 368, 456, 632, 733, 793, 800 subjunctive 81, 526, 599s., 604, 683s., 705, 734 subordination (see clause) suffix, suffixation 37, 106, 129s., 187, 215, 234, 259, 371, 432s., 457, 459, 479, 490, 522, 525, 546, 567, 600, 614, 659s., 794, 801, 822 superlative 773 swear word 737, 801 syllable – closed ~ 206, 365s., 402, 544, 703 – open ~ 365s., 402, 488, 544, 703, 791 – stressed ~ 104, 274, 437, 456 – structure 216, 339, 368, 489, 519, 596, 733, 793 – unstressed ~ 455 syneresis 656 tap (see also consonant) 80, 403, 631, 733, 818 tense 81, 105, 128, 159s., 208, 233, 276s., 280, 328, 330, 365, 369, 459, 683, 734, 767 terminology 45, 63, 101, 107, 123, 130ss., 138, 252, 266, 314, 374, 582, 729 toponym, toponymy (see also onomastics) 88, 100, 110, 129, 131, 138, 151, 270, 292, 294, 741, 791 transitive (see pronoun, verb) translanguaging 483, 817

854

Linguistic Subject Index

translingual 483–488, 491, 494s. triglossia 172s., 344, 720 trill (see also consonant) 80, 89, 206, 274, 367, 403, 427, 519, 631, 636, 657, 733, 738, 818 valency (see also verb) 207s., 369, 521, 565s. variety (see also acrolect, basilect, mesolect, oral, written) – archaic ~ 694 – conservative ~ 454ss. – educated ~ 95, 104s., 109 – emergent ~ 413s., 426s., 818 – endogenous ~ 189, 376, 384, 404, 579, 603 – high ~ 65, 172, 418, 512, 720 – indigenized ~ 426, 469, 475 – learner ~ 10, 384 – local ~ 67, 81, 265s., 408ss., 414, 452, 461s., 494s., 547, 569, 609, 618ss., 634, 708, 753 – low ~ 57, 172s., 418, 719s. – marginalized ~ 57 – national ~ 433, 436, 776 – nativized ~ 378, 391, 413, 426s., 435 – oral ~ 476, 776 – pidginized ~ 543, 610 – postcolonial ~ 609, 619 – prestige ~ 137, 775 – regional ~ 23, 108, 122, 428, 572, 655, 669, 767, 774 – settler ~ 95 – simplified ~ 225 – standard ~ 105, 225, 579, 603, 617, 775 – unstable ~ 426, 594 – urban ~ 348, 613 vehicular 2, 11, 45, 52, 172, 179, 181, 241–245, 255, 320, 337s., 341, 344, 348, 378, 391, 414, 447s., 452s., 460s., 470s., 498, 507–516, 537, 542, 552ss., 583, 645, 669, 680, 718, 720, 815 verb – auxiliary ~ 216, 455, 491, 659, 767 – copula ~ 81, 459, 633 – intransitive ~ (see also valency) 62, 81, 276, 369, 477, 820 – irregular ~ 207, 313, 520, 600 – reflexive ~ (also pronominal ~, pronominalized ~ ) 62, 370, 521, 566, 658, 734 – serial ~ 207s.

– transitive ~ (see also valency) 62, 208, 231s., 276, 303, 307, 370, 406, 431, 477, 521, 565, 599, 615, 683, 795, 820 vernacular 1s., 11, 45, 72, 76, 80s., 163, 193, 241, 243s., 378, 509–512, 516ss., 537, 539s., 555, 626, 633, 636, 669, 709, 718 vowel (see also denasalization, nasalization) – central ~ (see schwa) – epenthetic ~ 257, 337, 368, 404, 519, 544, 596, 615, 733, 793, 818 – high ~ (also front ~ ) 206, 213, 274, 365s., 403, 488, 565, 632, 656, 765 – high-mid ~ (also close-mid ~, half-closed ~) 183, 206, 365s., 402s., 564, 656, 702s. – low ~ (also open ~) 89, 257, 365ss., 565 – low-mid ~ (also open-mid ~, half-open ~) 204, 230s., 365, 402s., 656, 702, 732, 764 – mid ~ (also high-mid ~, low-mid ~) 80, 337, 365, 402, 488 – nasal ~ (see also nasalization) 35, 59, 80, 104, 230s, 326, 366s., 401s., 427, 502, 530, 544, 565, 595, 656ss., 682, 703, 732s., 765 – oral ~ 35, 59, 80, 230, 366, 519, 594, 732s. – paragogic ~ 104, 109, 368, 596 – posttonic ~ 595, 614 – pretonic ~ 595, 614 – prothetic ~ 368, 544, 600 – rounded ~ 183, 206, 213, 231, 274, 337, 366, 402, 427, 519, 656, 658, 732, 764 – stressed ~ 104, 110, 596, 791 – unstressed ~ 111, 327, 427, 596 – harmony 90, 257, 365, 402ss., 488, 490, 793 – length 89, 291, 365ss., 791 – lengthening 313, 403, 520, 656 word order (see also inversion) 36, 127s., 184, 278, 280, 303 written – communication 10, 76s., 201, 314, 337, 420, 470, 630, 650s., 658, 661, 677, 697, 728 – language 137, 176, 196, 314, 328ss., 449, 490, 555, 585, 619, 758, 790s. xenism 37, 687

General Subject Index Abidjan 226, 230, 234ss., 267, 499, 832 Abron 225 ACCT (see Association) acculturation 115, 120, 130, 314, 681, 700, Addis Ababa 789, 799, 833 advertisement (also publicity) 78, 229, 250, 270, 356, 361, 377, 462, 512, 517, 613, 697 AEF (see Africa) Africa (see also South) – Proconsularis 8s. – French Equatorial ~ (Afrique-Équatoriale française – AEF) 226, 499s., 507, 513, 556 – French West ~ (Afrique-Occidentale française – AOF) 174, 188, 196, 226, 246s., 268, 294s., 298, 323, 337, 347, 376s., 398, 499s. – German East ~ (Deutsch Ostafrika) 646 – Horn of ~ 672s., 783, 786ss., 790–798, 801, 803s. – Italian East ~ (Africa Orientale Italiana – AOI) 86, 787 – Scramble for ~ 513 African (see Charter, Commission, Community, Movement, Portuguese, Society) AIDS (see HIV) Akjoujt 291 Alexandria 8s. Algeria 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 15, 23–40, 43s., 48, 68, 75, 290s., 321, 344, 349, 379, 499, 537, 827 Algiers 827 Alliance – for the Republic (Alliance pour la République – APR) 350 – of Portuguese Language News Agencies (Aliança das Agências de Informação de Língua Portuguesa – ALP) 593 – French ~ (Alliance française) 300, 673, 759 Almoravid 344 ALP (see Alliance) Alps 359 Alsace 347, 527 America 2, 16, 98, 107, 115s., 121, 126, 128–133, 140, 628, 645 – Latin ~ 14, 115, 128s., 138s., 302, 631 – South ~ 98, 628 – United States of ~ (USA) 16, 424 ancestor cult 551, 566, 571, 729 Andalusia 120–125, 129, 147, 154, 627 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-039

Angola (see also Movement, Union, War) 2–8, 11, 13, 98, 435, 537, 579–605, 611, 620, 827 animism 355, 517, 729 Anjouan 691, 694, 718, 722, 724 Annobón 6, 610s., 627ss., 634 Antananarivo 718, 724, 730, 738s., 835 Antilles 133, 701, 740 AOF, AOI (see Africa) APR (see Alliance) Arabic 147s. Arabization 23–29, 32ss., 39, 43, 46, 50–54, 57, 67, 73, 75, 86, 88, 289, 291, 296–299, 725 Argentina 628 arts 10, 64, 307, 362 Asia 9, 117 Asmara 787ss., 804, 833 assimilation 26, 65, 120, 131, 180, 211, 347, 376, 394, 448, 556, 585s., 700, 813 Association – of Editors and Publishers of Newspapers in National Languages (Association des éditeurs et publicateurs de journaux en langues nationales) 203 – of Partially or Entirely French-Speaking Universities – University of French-Language Networks (Association des universités partiellement ou entièrement de langue française-Université des réseaux de langue française – AUPELF-UREF) 706 – of Ulamas (Association d’Oulémas) 26 – Cultural and Technical Cooperation ~ (Association de Coopération Culturelle et Technique – ACCT) 557 – Italian ~ of Repatriates from Libya (Associazione Italiani Rimpatriati dalla Libia) 87 Atar 291, 295, 300 Atlantic (see Ocean) AUPELF-UREF (see Association) Austria 15s. autonomous – city (ciudad autónoma) 152–157, 161, 830, 837 – community (comunidad autónoma) 3, 115, 122ss., 139, 152s., 829 – region (região autónoma) 96ss., 101, 138ss., 835 Azer 294 Azores 101, 105, 115, 417 Balkanization 643 Bamako 267, 270–274, 278, 835

856

General Subject Index

Bangui 484ss.,488, 492ss, 830 banknote 176, 199, 234, 399, 421, 450, 559, 630, Baraka 556 Bata 625, 627, 630, 633, 635 Battle – of Danki (1549) 345 – of Kousseri (1900) 499 – of Mbwila (1665) 512 Baul 341 Belgium 1, 3, 6, 15s., 369, 378, 513, 527, 646s., 740 Benin 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 15, 169–190, 320s., 343, 347, 376s., 396, 553, 569, 828 Berberophony 30 Berlin – Agreement (1911) 49 – Conference (see Conference) Bettie 225 Bible 422, 612 Bidhan 291 Bioko 625ss., 629, 634 Bissau 416, 447, 449, 452, 454, 461 Boavista 413, 415, 428 Bocos Island 346 Bondoukou 225 Botswana 4, 8, 13, 564 Brava 413, 415, 418, 436 – Ribeira ~ 95, 98, 107 Brazil 14, 98, 107, 416, 421, 583s., 628, 820s. Brazzaville (also see conference) 2, 469, 499, 507ss., 511, 513s., 517s., 831 British 1, 48, 96, 98ss. 337, 345s., 394ss., 472, 628, 721ss., 753s., 757s., 761, 787 Bujumbura 646, 648, 652, 654, 828 Burkina Faso 2–5, 8s., 11, 13, 193–216, 222, 224, 322, 347, 376, 569, 657, 828 Burundi 2–8, 11, 13, 15, 527, 537, 643–664, 812, 828 business 27, 50, 77, 109, 150, 210, 249, 251, 259, 299s., 343, 355, 397, 414, 529, 555, 568, 598, 720, 816 Bwiti 555, 558, 560, 566s., 571s. Cabinda 6, 8, 12, 507, 513, 537, 580, 588 Cabo Verde 2–5, 8, 11s., 15, 107, 115, 344, 346, 413–439, 448s., 451, 461, 563, 611, 629, 829 Cabo-Verdeanity (cabo-verdianidade) 439 Caesarea 8s. Cameroon 2ss. 6, 8, 11s., 189, 293, 322, 328, 343, 469–480, 497, 499, 503, 507s., 510, 551s., 554, 560, 566–569, 625–629, 659, 829

Camões – Institute (see Institute) – Prémio ~ 439 Canada 16, 346, 369, 379, 527, 740 Canary Islands (also Canaries) 2–5, 8, 11, 13s., 98ss. 106s., 115–142, 631, 829 Cape Bojador 448 CAPES (see certificate) captives 130, 225, 556 Capuchin 673 Cap-Vert 341, 346 Carthage (also Carthago) 8s. Casablanca 47s. Casamance 12, 339, 343, 348, 350, 355, 373, 416 449–454, 457 Castilian 99, 115, 117, 119s., 131, 135 Catalan 99, 119 Catholic 26, 134, 153, 173, 245, 343, 363, 418, 422, 449, 474, 512, 518, 525, 556, 560, 562, 568, 630, 647, 654, 760, 762 – Monarchs 115, 121, 152 Cayor 341, 345, 348s. CEDEAO (see Community) CEFR (see European) Central African Republic 2ss., 6, 8, 11, 13, 275, 278, 469, 483–495, 497s., 507, 509s., 537, 556, 569, 657, 830 Certificate (see also education, school) – of Aptitude for Secondary School Teachers (Certificat d’aptitutude au professorat de l’enseignement du second degré – CAPES) 699, 709 – Portuguese Foreign Language ~ (Certificado de Proficiência em Língua Portuguesa para Estrangeiros – CELPE-Bras) 415 Ceuta 3ss., 8, 11, 13, 48, 147–164, 830 CFA (see Community) CFLN (see Committee) CFS (see Somaliland) Chad 2ss., 6, 8, 11, 13, 15, 196, 343, 469, 497–505, 556, 569, 830 Charter – African ~ of Human and Peoples’ Rights 249 – African Youth ~ (Charte africaine de la jeunesse) 515 – Colonial ~ 539 – European ~ for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML) 156

General Subject Index

– National ~ of Education and Training (Charte nationale d’éducation et de formation du Maroc – CNEFM) 46, 67 China 117, 270, 320, 434, 557, 588, 672, 754 Chinese 130, 270, 400, 414, 425, 434, 447, 473, 512, 588, 672, 675, 694, 718, 756, 772s. Christian (see also Catholic, church, Protestant) 25, 147, 149, 154s., 305, 355, 417, 449, 512, 517, 527, 556, 560, 717, 729 Christianization 152, 416 church 174, 404, 425, 525, 528, 612 Cidade Velha (also Ribeira Grande) 416 cinema (see also dubbing, subtitle) 56s., 302, 309, 366, 518, 543, 731 circumcision 373, 375, 460 Ciudad de la Paz 832 classroom 47, 139, 214, 271, 326, 357, 396, 414, 421s., 438, 660, 679, 822 CNEFM (see Charter) Coalition – Caballas ~ (Coalición Caballas) 155 – for Melilla (Coalición por Melilla – CpM) 154ss. cocoa 611, 222, 225 coffee 106, 222, 225, 611, 634 COI (see Commission) coladeira 418 colonialism 13, 30, 58, 65, 100, 321, 331, 723, 814 colony 1, 3, 6, 13, 27, 86s., 100s., 117, 174s., 180, 196, 225, 244, 246, 268, 294, 319ss., 337, 346, 348s., 358, 396, 416ss., 486, 497, 499s., 507s., 513s., 527, 539s., 556, 583s., 586, 609, 611, 628, 647, 673, 717, 722, 756ss., 760, 786s., 789, 803, 812s. Commission 121, 308, 325, 540, 592 – African Linguistic ~ 540 – Education Reform ~ 540 – Franck ~ 540 – Indian Ocean ~ (Commission de l’océan Indien – COI) 759 Committee – French ~ of National Liberation (Comité français de libération nationale – CFLN) 514 – Morrocan Action ~ (Comité d’action marocaine) 49 Commonwealth 559, 644, 755, 758s. Community – African Financial ~ (Communauté Financière Africaine – CFA) 199, 234, 270 – of Portuguese Language Countries (Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa – CPLP) 419, 579, 619, 629

857

– East African ~ (EAC) 643s., 646, 649–653 – Economic ~ of West African States (Communauté Économique des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest – CEDEAO) 198, 209 – French ~ (Communauté française) 49, 87, 226, 321, 724 Comoros 2–8, 11, 13, 691, 694, 717–745, 759, 831 Company – of Senegal (Compagnie du Sénegal) 346 – Dutch West India ~ (Geoctrooieerde Westindische Compagnie – GWC) 346 – French East India ~ (Compagnie française des Indes orientales) 721 Conakry 243–261, 834 CONFEMEN (see Conference) Conference – Algeciras International ~ (1907) 48 – Berlin ~ (1884–1885) 246, 268, 538, 584, 645, 812 – Brazzaville ~ (1944) 202, 507, 514, 556 – of Educational Ministers of the States and Governments of Francophony (Conférence des ministres de l’Éducation des États et gouvernements de la Francophonie (CONFEMEN) 560, 562 Congo – Belgian ~ (Congo Belge) 513, 539s., 647 – -Brazzaville 2–6, 11, 13, 507–532, 552, 556, 740, 831 – -Kinshasa 2–6, 8, 11, 13, 508s., 519, 527, 537–548, 569, 831 – Middle ~ (Congo Moyen, also French Congo, Congo français) 513, 556 corona (see Covid-19) Corsica 9, 701 cosmopolitan 235, 554 Côte d’Ivoire 2–5, 8s., 11, 13, 189, 197, 205s., 221–237, 243, 322, 330, 347, 376, 569, 657, 659, 661, 832 cotton 225, 234, 416, 500, 737 court, courtroom 77, 120, 179, 197, 244, 246, 251, 355, 422, 487, 539, 560, 724, 727, 729 Covid-19 (also corona) 210, 421, 588, 816s. co-wife 374, 460 CPLP (see Community) CpM (see Coalition) Creta 9 Curaçao 98, 451 Cyrenaica 8s., 86s. Cyrene 8s.

858

General Subject Index

Dahomey (see Benin) Dakar 213, 267, 338, 341ss., 347s., 360, 364, 371, 374s., 381s. decolonization 46, 51, 117, 247s., 250, 320, 628 deethnicization 350, 384 democracy 28, 75s., 87, 101, 122, 175, 182, 187, 197, 273, 321s., 325, 413, 419, 514, 518, 587, 674s. democratization 27, 74s., 137, 189, 321s., 325, 763, department (see overseas) departmentalization 691, 694s., 700, 704, 710 dictatorship 101, 136, 272, 523, 530, 540, 547, 626, 724, 787, 812 Diourbel 338, 346, 349 Djibouti 2–8, 11, 13, 379, 669–688, 740, 832 DOAG (see Community) DOM (see overseas) Duala 471s., 567 dubbing 56, 79, 438, 680 Dutch 337, 345s., 416, 451, 512, 583, 721s., 756 EAC (see Community) ECRML (see Charter) Education (see also certificate, school) – Francophonie Institute of ~ and Training (Institut de la Francophonie pour l’éducation et la formation – IFEF) 380 – Languages of Schooling in Basic ~ in Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa (Langues de scolarisation dans l’enseigment fondamental en Afrique subsaharienne francophone – LASCOLAF) 357 Egypt 4, 8s., 13, 56s., 86s., 297, 302, 672 ELAN (see school) ELF (see Front) Élisabethville (see Lubumbashi) elite 1, 24, 27s., 32s., 45ss., 50, 56, 58, 60, 65ss., 74, 95, 104, 131, 188s., 193, 202, 213, 243, 246ss., 254, 266, 292, 314, 325, 330, 348s., 356, 364, 378, 398, 405, 415s., 418, 424, 438, 475, 485, 497ss., 527, 540, 555, 559, 579, 584, 586, 611s., 618, 644, 653, 720, 725, 733, 738s., 810, 814, 821 Empire – British ~ 100, 757 – Ghana ~ 294, 345 – Kuba ~ 538 – Luba ~ 538 – Lunda ~ 538 – Mali ~ 267s., 282, 294, 448

– Mande ~ 448 – Roman ~ 8s., 73, 86 England 395, 538 English 135, 319, 415s. Eritrea 3s., 7s., 10s., 13, 86, 91, 783–805, 833 Eswatini 4, 8, 12 Ethiopia 3s., 7–13, 86, 88, 91, 350, 672, 783–805, 833 ETP (see Programme) Europe 2, 10, 16, 43, 48, 95s., 115s., 147, 156, 320, 347, 371, 493, 820 European – Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (see Charter) – Framework of Reference (CEFR) 415 – Union (see Union) evangelization 471, 474, 539, 647 Facebook 57, 110, 205, 362, 410, 421, 425, 451, 518, 529, 594, 652, 729, 731, 740, 764 fascism 787, 794, 804 Fatick 338, 341, 343, 349, 381 Fernando Poo (see Bioko) Fez 47ss., 64 film (see also cinema, dubbing, subtitle) 337, 347, 357, 363s., 379s., 462, 544, 684 flag 14, 102, 119, 349, 507, 551, 718, 812 Flemish 99 FLN (see Front) Florentine 99, 119 flyer 728 Fogo 413, 415s., 436 Fort – Dabou 225 – -Dauphin (see Tolagnaro) – -Lamy 499 – Victoria Grande ~ (Fuerte de Victoria Grande) 152 Four Communes (Quatre Communes) 347s. Fourth Shore (Quarta sponda) 86 France 1, 3s., 7–13, 16, 24, 33, 38, 48ss., 54, 65s., 68, 72, 74, 76, 82, 96, 187s., 196s., 206, 221, 225ss., 230, 246ss., 254, 256, 267s., 272, 276–279, 294, 302, 310, 314, 321, 326, 346–349, 355, 358s., 366s., 372, 376, 378s., 395ss., 403, 409, 452, 472, 493s., 499ss., 526s., 551–574, 672ss., 680, 691–711, 718, 721s., 725, 740, 755–761, 764, 773 Franceville 551, 553, 556s. Franciscan 529, 673 Francization 50, 296

General Subject Index

Franco-Arab 324 Freetown 449, 556 FRELIMO (see Front) Fresco 225 – Rio (see Rufisque) Front – Eritrean Liberation ~ (ELF) 787 – Mozambican Liberation ~ (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique – FRELIMO) 813s. – National Liberation ~ (Front de Libération Nationale – FLN) 26, 28, 30 – Rwandan Patriotic ~ 643 funaná 418 Funchal 95–107, 835 Gabon 2–6, 8s., 11, 13, 322, 328, 469, 507–510, 551– 574, 625s., 629, 740, 833 Galam 346 Gallic ancestors (nos ancêtres gaulois) 359 Gambia 4, 8, 13, 338, 343, 348, 361, 371 gender 73, 107, 171, 274, 290, 395, 418, 429, 719, 810, 814 genocide 362, 540, 649, 654 Genovese 99s. German (see also Africa, Company) 99, 395–399, 471–474, 660, 736 Germany 16, 96, 396, 472, 646 Ghana 4, 8, 13, 15, 196, 222, 225, 268, 393, 396 Gitega 828 Global South (see South) globalization 25, 28, 115, 135 glorification 1, 376 glottophagy 342, 385 gold 64, 225, 345, 672, 736 – coast 225, 396 Google 183, 205, 362, 800, 803 Gorée 346ss., 367 Grand Bassam 225 Grande Comore 691, 694, 718, 723s. griot 307, 332, 364 groundnut basin, groundnut cultivation 341, 349, 356 Guanchinet 99 Guinea 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 224, 241–261, 321s., 338, 343, 347, 361, 416, 834 – Equatorial ~ 2ss., 6, 8, 11–14, 469, 551ss., 611, 625– 636, 832

859

– -Bissau 2–5, 8, 11ss., 242, 338, 344, 361, 416, 447– 462, 834 – Spanish ~ (Guinea Española) 628 Gujarati 718s., 754, 809, 812 Gulf of – Aden 674 – Guinea 12, 99s., 609, 628 Haiti 379, 740 Halpulaar 343, 351 Haratin 291, 293, 295 Hassanophone 292, 294, 299 Hawaii 98 hegemony 100, 120, 174, 182, 362, 515, 602, 695, 711, 722 Herero 581, 593 HIV (also AIDS) 361, 514, 816 hospital 32, 312s., 330, 367, 424, 517, 798, 816 human rights 176, 249s., 586, 674 humour 281, 301, 605, 620, 685 Hutu 644 identity 31s., 39, 44, 46s., 53, 62, 65, 95, 109s. 135, 141, 186s., 189, 199, 227, 235, 247, 251, 343, 357, 360, 375, 379, 381, 384, 420, 423, 458, 470, 475, 492, 570, 590, 602, 626, 659, 686, 692, 696, 700, 702, 708, 738, 775, 816, 820 – literary ~ 822 – national ~ 27, 31, 51, 176, 244, 252, 418, 516, 589, 618, 626, 677 – regional ~ 96, 107, 109, 745 ideogram 14 IFEF (see Education) illiteracy 25, 38, 82, 88, 97, 136s., 177, 196, 204, 214, 255, 270, 326, 360, 371, 419s., 425, 499, 507, 511, 514, 518, 564, 590, 618, 648 India 645, 693s., 756s. Indian (see also Ocean) 56, 117, 692ss., 737, 754, 756, 772 Indonesia 720 Instagram 410, 764 Institute – Camões ~ (Instituto Camões) 619 – Cervantes ~ (Instituto Cervantes) 13 – Confucius ~ 400, 559, 718, 730 insularism 724 intellectual 46s., 49, 51, 56, 66s., 76, 101, 188, 227, 295, 298, 314, 325, 330, 346, 355s., 418, 543,

860

General Subject Index

616, 619, 644, 648, 653s., 664, 695, 697, 720, 802 intellectuality, intellectualization 266, 651 intensification 121, 476, 479, 484, 584, 735 intercultural 17, 64, 68, 156, 158, 338 interethnic 224, 537, 784, 789s. intergenerational 224 internet 10, 56s., 68, 79, 169, 183, 205, 229, 359, 361, 401, 425s., 438, 501, 563, 594, 612, 630, 652, 676, 740, 764 Islam (see also mosque) 26s., 29, 31, 53, 61, 63, 65, 77, 87, 149, 151, 246s., 290, 298s., 301, 322, 324, 342, 344, 355, 363, 392, 448, 471, 474, 645s., 670, 678, 687, 719ss., 836 – Sunni ~ 322, 342, 349, 355, 374 Islamist 45, 720 Islamization 24, 245, 324, 345, 355, 384, 448, 720 Istiqlal (see Party) Italian (see also Africa, Association, Somaliland) 4, 7, 15, 73, 85–89, 99, 119, 422, 499, 513, 783, 786– 789, 796s., 802, 804 – racial laws (Leggi razziali) 789 Italy 1, 3, 16s., 86ss., 91, 786–789, 801, 803s. ivory 225, 345, 569 Jesuit 583, 722 Jew, Jewish (see also Sephardi) 74, 86, 147–154 Jolof 341, 345–349 Judaism 150 Kabyle 25, 29 Kabylia 24s., 29, 31 Kaffrine 338, 341 Kaolack 338, 341, 343, 349, 361 Kédougou 338, 343 Kenya 1, 4, 8, 13, 643, 646, 649 Keren 787 Kiffa 294s., 300 Kigali 546, 559, 838 Kimbanguism 522s. Kingdom – Alawite ~ 147 – Antankarana ~ 722 – Kaabu (also Gabu) ~ 447s. – Kongo ~ 512, 538s., 583 – Merina ~ 717, 721 – Mossi ~ 196 – Sereer ~ 345 – Takrur ~ 345

– Teke ~ 512 – United ~ (UK) 25, 96, 98, 758 – Walo ~ 345 Kinshasa 2, 537, 540, 558, 831 Kirundization 648s. Kolda 338, 343 Kong 225 Konkani 812 Koran 45, 53, 56, 64, 254, 259, 307, 320, 323, 374, 719, 730s. Koranic school (see madrasa) Koumbi Saleh 294 Kuba 538 La Baule 321 Lake – Great ~s 643, 645 – Chad 499 – Tanganyika 646 Lançados 345, 448 LAS (see League) Las Palmas de Gran Canaria 124, 138, 140, 829 LASCOLAF (see Education) Layene 355 League – of Arab States, Arab ~ (LAS) 85, 297s., 676, 720 – of Nations 394, 396, 472, 647 Lebanese 57, 344, 447, 554 Leptis Magna 9 Lesotho 4, 8, 13 Liberia 3s., 8, 13, 224s. Libreville 551–574, 833 Libya (see also Association, Revolution) 3ss., 8, 10s., 13, 44, 85–91, 197, 497, 499, 834 Lisbon 16, 96, 105, 108, 119, 424, 428, 512 Lomé 15, 393, 395s., 399s., 840 Louga 338, 341, 349 Lourenço Marques (see Maputo) Luanda 827 Lubumbashi 541, 544s., 547, 648 Luxembourg 527 Madagascar 2–8, 11, 13, 379, 560, 691, 717–745, 755s., 759, 835 Madeira 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 16, 95–111, 115, 131s., 417, 835 madrasa (also Koranic school) 37, 74, 295, 297, 305, 324, 338, 685, 687, 692 Maghreb (see also Union) 23ss., 43–49, 56s., 63, 68, 71, 75, 81, 119, 290, 298, 343, 355, 379, 527, 738, 740,

General Subject Index

Maio 413, 415, 428 Malabo 625–630, 832 Malagasyzation 724ss. Malawi 4, 8, 13, 809 Mali 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 202, 205, 243, 265–282, 291s., 294, 337, 343, 347, 361, 448, 553, 570, 657, 835 Maltese 74, 86 Mamoudzou 696, 836 manliness 738 Maputo (also Lourenço Marques) 811, 813, 837 marabout 26, 295, 343, 349, 360, 362, 373, 407s., 410 Maradi 325 market – [labour market] 54, 62, 65, 72, 211, 720 – [marketplace] 55, 96, 117, 119, 132, 172, 177, 185, 251, 282, 312, 355, 370, 377, 391, 433, 448, 470, 498, 503, 516s., 546, 555, 567, 660, 662, 670, 701, 737, 820 Marrakech 47 Massawa 787 Matam 338, 343 Matsouanism 522s. Mauritania 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 43s., 118, 289–315, 337, 343, 345, 347s., 361, 836 – Caesariensis 8s. – Tingitana 8s. Mauritius 2–8, 11ss., 15, 563, 700, 740, 753–779, 836 Mayotte 2–8, 11, 13, 691–711, 718–724, 740, 836 mbalax 349, 363s. Mbini (also Río Muni) 625, 627 Mboul 345 MDyC (see Movement) Medina Sidonia 152 Mediterranean Sea 43, 57, 100, 107, 147s., 320, 359 Mekka 356 Melilla (see also Coalition) 3–5, 8, 11, 13, 48, 147–164, 837 melting pot 157, 469, 479, 586 Memphis 9 Methodist 174 MFDC (see Movement) Middle – Ages 86, 115, 118, 448, 756 – Congo (see Congo) – East 24, 343 migration 1, 25, 71, 98, 148, 152s., 221s., 243s., 246, 266, 291, 294, 348, 393s., 484, 719, 721, 738, 755, 772

861

Mindelo 413, 418–424, 439 missionary 26, 48, 121, 173s., 246, 310, 396s., 422, 471, 486, 513, 523, 539, 556, 583, 592, 627, 647, 673, 722, 788, 802 mistress 460, 523, 546, 569, 660 mockery 209, 310, 384, 518 Mogadishu 786, 788s., 840 Mohéli 691, 694, 718, 724 monocultural 17 Moor 100, 290–297, 300, 302, 305ss., 314, 339s., 343 morna 418 Morocco 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 43–69, 100, 117, 134, 147s., 151, 153, 290s., 344, 554, 837 Moroni 831 mosque 53, 61, 63s., 299, 721, 737 Mossi 195s., 206, 222 Moudjeria 291 Movement – for Dignity and Citizenship (Movimiento por la Dignidad y la Ciudadanía – MDyC) 155 – of Democratic Forces of Casamance (Mouvement des forces démocratiques de Casamance – MFDC) 351 – Pan-African ~ 648 – People’s ~ for Progress (Mouvement du Peuple pour le Progrès – MPP) 198 – Popular ~ for the Liberation of Angola (Movimento Popular para a Libertação de Angola – MPLA) 587 – Popular ~ of the Revolution (Mouvement populaire de la révolution – MPR) 540 Mozambique 2ss., 7s., 11, 13, 15, 435, 611, 614, 718s., 809–823, 837 MPLA, MPP, MPR (see Movement) multiculturalism 43, 120, 469, 478, 480 multiethnicity 469, 480, 693 Murid (also Muridiyya) 349, 355 music (see also coladeira, funaná, griot, mbalax, morna, rap, reggae, song) 57, 59, 103, 204, 258, 267, 302, 307, 310, 312, 337, 342, 349, 364, 374, 384, 418s., 427, 470, 511, 518ss., 522, 543, 613, 626, 629s., 687, 710, 732 Muslim 26–29, 45, 50s., 54, 61–64, 74, 147–155, 163, 245, 259, 289, 299, 305s., 322, 337s., 355, 363, 374, 448, 517, 557, 646, 694, 717s., 721, 729, 738, 753 myth 65–67, 99, 331 Mzungu 691, 700, 707

862

General Subject Index

Nahda 24 Namibia 4, 8, 13, 559, 581 nativization 74, 82, 227, 377, 391, 401, 413, 426s., 435, 809, 817, 821s. Ndar (see Saint-Louis) N’Djamena 15, 497s., 501, 830 Négritude 350, 503 Néma 291 neo-colonial 297, 326, 582 Netherlands 15s. New Caledonia 740 New State (Estado Novo, 1933–1974) 418, 586, 812 Nhara 346 Niamey 319s., 325–328, 331, 838 Niger 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 196, 202, 226, 247, 319–332, 343, 347, 497, 499, 510, 569s., 657, 838 Nigeria 1, 4, 8, 13, 172, 183, 222, 224, 319s., 343, 392, 469, 472, 497, 510, 559, 627 nomad 85, 290s., 293, 296s., 319, 342, 688 Norway 16 Nouadhibou 289, 296s., 300, 303 Nouakchott 289, 292, 296s., 300ss., 306, 836 novel 68, 110, 141, 188, 216, 235, 260s., 281, 303, 309, 331, 362s., 383, 419, 439, 451, 462, 475, 480, 505, 519, 530, 604, 636, 663, 687s., 709s., 723, 732 obituary 728 Ocean – Atlantic ~ 8, 43, 95, 100, 107s., 115, 121, 124, 133, 194, 225, 242, 246, 291, 293, 337, 415s., 447, 509, 537, 551, 625 – Indian ~ 2s., 100, 274, 707, 717s., 721, 738, 753, 755, 759 OIF (see Organization) Oran 23, 25s. Organization – Educational, Scientific and Cultural ~ (UNESCO) 72, 118, 252ss., 281, 419, 561 – International ~ of La Francophonie (Organisation internationale de la Francophonie – OIF) 13, 24, 47, 75, 194, 202, 224, 228s., 248, 289, 299, 344, 350, 484ss., 507s., 552ss., 557, 559, 671s., 718ss., 739, 755, 758s. – of the French Protectorate in the Sherifian Empire (Organisation du protectorat français dans l’Empire Chérifien) 49 – United Nations ~ (UN, UNO) 4, 7, 394, 421, 472, 718 Ouagadougou 195, 199, 201, 376, 828

overseas – department (département d’outre-mer – DOM) 358, 695, 697, 836, 838 – province (província ultramarina) 586 – territory (territoire d’outre-mer – TOM) 349, 514, 724 Palestinian 33, 57 PALOP (see Portuguese) Pan-Africanism 14, 197, 247, 273s., 278, 282, 488, 551, 570, 648 PAQUET–EF (see Programme) parliament 118, 129, 201, 226, 228, 244, 269, 300, 337, 347, 353, 399, 420s., 512, 516, 559, 652, 674, 717, 724, 727, 729, 758, 777 Party – Congolese ~ of Labour (Parti Congolais du Travail – PCT) [Congo-Brazzaville] 523 – Democratic and Social ~ of Ceuta (Partido Democrático y Social de Ceuta – PDSC) 155 – Democratic ~ of Guinea (Parti démocratique de Guinée – PDG) 247s., 255 – Nationalist ~ of Independence (Istiqlal) [Morocco] 49 – Nigerien Progressive ~ (Parti progressiste nigérien – PPN) 321 – People’s ~ (Partido Popular – PP) [Spain] 155 – Reunionese Communist ~ (Parti communiste réunionnais – PCR) 697 – Senegalese Democratic ~ (Parti Démocratique Sénégalaise – PDS) 350 – Socialist ~ of Senegal (Parti Socialiste du Sénégal – PS) 350 – Spanish Socialist Workers’ ~ (Partido Socialista Obrero Español – PSOE) 155 PASEC (see Programme) passport 299, 651, 727s., 760 paternalism 647 PCR, PCT, PDG, PDS, PDSC (see Party) PDSEB (see Programme) Persian 646 Phoenician 86, 152 piracy 672, 674s. pirate 546, 675, 721, 737 PISE (see Programme) place of sovereignty (plaza de soberanía) 152s. pluriculturalism 686 Podor 346

General Subject Index

poem, poetry 39, 59, 101, 123, 301s., 307, 332, 363, 418s., 519, 530, 543, 636, 687s., 706, 709, 723, 725, 732, 734, 742 politeness 478, 663 Port – -Gentil 551s. – Louis 754, 836 Porto-Novo 169, 174, 181, 828 Portugal 1–5, 8, 11–16, 95–111, 120s., 151, 413, 415, 419, 421, 433, 437, 448–452, 538s., 585ss., 592, 601, 619, 628, 812s., 821 Portuguese (see also Alliance, Certificate, Community) 1, 15, 96–102, 115, 119, 126, 130, 151, 173s., 225, 337, 346s., 349, 392, 415–439, 447–449, 452, 471, 512s., 539, 556, 583–605, 610s., 628, 693, 721, 756, 812ss. – Afro-~ 583, 586s. – -speaking African countries (Países Africanos de Língua Oficial Portuguesa – PALOP) 419, 579 postcolonialism 74, 221, 241s., 247, 588, 609s., 612, 619, 626 poster 356, 424, 451, 559, 728 PP, PPN (see Party) Praia 413, 415, 418–425, 829 prejudice 107, 592, 698 Programme – Education and Training Sector ~ (Programme sectorial de l’éducation et de la formation – PSEF) 213 – English Teaching ~ (ETP) 730 – Investment ~ for the Education Sector (Programme d’investissement pour le secteur de l’éducation – PISE) 271 – National Reading ~ 109 – of Analysis of the Educational Systems of the CONFEMEN (Programme d’analyse des systèmes éducatifs de la CONFEMEN – PASEC) 272 – to Improve the Quality, Equity, and Transparency in Education and Training (Programme d’amélioration de la qualité, de l’équité et de la transparence – Éducation/Formation – PAQUET– EF) 357 – Regional Education Authority’s Reading ~ 109 – Strategic Development ~ for Basic Education (Programme de développement stratégique de l’éducation de base – PDSEB) 213 – Tripoli ~ (Programme de Tripoli) 28 propaganda 325, 360, 397, 421, 450, 560, 586

863

prostitution 514 protectorate 46–50, 53, 74, 174, 196, 345, 471, 513, 646, 722s., 787 Protestant 422, 512, 523, 525, 556, 592, 613, 722 province (see overseas) PS (see Party) PSEF (see Programme) PSOE (see Party) publicity (see advertisement) Puerto Rico 116 Punic 86, 152 purism, purist 10, 65, 82, 107, 115, 135, 188, 193, 211, 234s., 260, 279, 330, 337, 375s., 408, 433, 479, 493s., 504, 526, 547, 574, 602, 605, 634s., 661, 664, 685, 691, 707, 753, 774, 783, 796, 802, 821 Rabat 47s., 837 race 87, 249, 346, 374, 383, 416s., 585, 675, 737, 814 racism 349 radio – community ~ 204, 255, 325, 361, 474, 654 – rural ~ 255 railway – Abidjan-Niger ~ 222 – Congo-Ocean ~ 508, 523 – Dakar-Niger ~ 347 – Djibouti-Ethiopian ~ 673 rap 364, 454 Reconquest (Reconquista) 26 Red Sea 8 reggae 197 religion (see also Bwiti, Catholic, Christian, Protestant, Islam, Murid, Muslim, Tijane) 26s., 36–39, 45, 47, 53s., 56, 61–64, 87, 119, 149s., 152s., 163, 172ss., 245s., 249, 254, 259, 267, 293, 297s., 301, 305ss., 322, 324, 337, 342, 355, 361, 363, 374, 400, 414, 422, 437, 449, 511ss., 517, 524s., 542, 546, 551, 555s., 559, 564, 567s., 571, 601, 612, 630, 646, 673, 675, 677, 694, 720, 728ss., 735– 738, 742, 744, 754, 757, 759, 814 restaurant 270, 329, 517, 555 Réunion 2–8, 11ss., 691–711, 718, 722, 740, 755s., 759, 762, 838 revivalist 517 Revolution – Carnation ~ (Revolução dos Cravos, Revolução de Abril, 1974) 101 – French ~ (Révolution française, 1789–1799) 585

864

General Subject Index

– Libyan ~ (1969) 87 – Mahdist ~ (1881–1899) 786 – Rwandan ~ (1959–1962) 648 Ribeira Grande (see Cidade Velha) Río Muni (see Mbini) River – Congo ~ 509, 512s., 537, 583 – Gambia ~ 341, 448 – Komoé ~ 225 – Kwanza ~ 583 – Ogooué ~ 552 – Omo ~ 797 – Senegal ~ 267, 291, 293, 295, 306, 346, 449 – Ubangi ~ 486, 508 – Wouri ~ 471 Romani 149s. Romania – nova 8 – submersa 8 Rufisque 346s. rule – direct ~ 346s. – indirect ~ 347, 787 rural exodus 31, 51, 349 Russian 675 Rwanda 2–8, 11, 13, 363, 527, 537, 540, 551, 559, 570, 643–664, 812, 838 Sahara 56, 117, 265, 296, 499 – Western ~ 4, 8, 12, 43, 291 Saint – -Augustin [Madagascar] 721 – -Denis [Réunion] 838 – -Louis (also Ndar) [Senegal] 295, 338, 341, 343, 346–349, 359, 361, 367 Sainte Marie – [Gambia] 348 – [Madagascar] 721 Sakalave 691 Sal 413, 415 Saloum 341, 346, 349 Saly Portudal 346 San – Antonio [Canary Islands] 133 – Pedro [Côte d’Ivoire] 225 Santa – Cruz [Madeira] 95–99 – Cruz de Tenerife 116, 124, 126, 829 – Fe de Bogotá 133

– Isabel [Equatorial Guinea] 628s. – Luzia [Cabo Verde] 413 Santiago 413–439 Santo Antão 413, 415, 422, 436 São – Nicolau [Cabo Verde] 413, 415, 418, 430 – Tomé and Príncipe 2ss., 6, 8s., 11ss., 107, 416, 609– 620, 625, 627, 629, 839 – Vicente [Cabo Verde] 413, 415, 418, 436 – Vicente [Madeira] 95ss. Sassandra 225 Saudi Arabia 297 Say 324 School (see also certificate, education) – Koranic ~ (see madrasa) – and National Languages in Africa (École et langues nationales en Afrique – ELAN) 180s., 229, 357 seashell currency 512 secularism 322, 561 Sédhiou 338, 343 Seleka 484 Senegal 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 134, 183, 196, 198, 205, 224s., 236, 242s., 275, 292–295, 322, 337–384, 416, 447, 449, 452, 499, 553, 569s., 657, 839 Senegambia 293, 361, 364, 372 Sephardi (see also Jew, Jewish) 149s., 153 sexuality 479, 526 Seychelles 2–8, 11ss., 15, 563, 700, 740, 753–779, 839 sharia 38, 61, 299 Shiraz 694 shop 32, 243, 270, 292, 306, 310, 312s., 355, 382, 438, 517, 555, 562s., 600, 662, 791, 820 Sicily 89, 795 Sierra Leone 1, 4, 8s., 13, 224, 243, 348, 449, 460, 556, 628 sign – administrative ~ 178s., 814 – road ~, street ~ 32, 138, 177s., 199, 270, 322, 399, 421, 450, 559, 590, 635, 651, 677 Signare 346, 374 Sine 346, 348 Sisters of Calais 673 sketch 511, 518, 776 slave trade, slavery 12, 99s., 133, 173, 225, 246, 345s., 393s., 415s., 448, 508, 512s., 556, 583, 611, 613, 628, 694, 721, 738, 755s. slogan 26, 32, 133, 154, 186, 201, 226, 250, 261, 353, 355, 520

General Subject Index

social media (see also Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube) 57, 68, 73, 79, 362, 401, 410, 438, 451, 474, 630, 729, 731, 764 Society – London Missionary ~ 722 – Paris Evangelical Missionary ~ (Société des missions évangéliques de Paris) 556 – of African Missions of Lyon (Société des missions africaines de Lyon) 174 – Wesleyan Missions ~ 174 Sofala 811 Somalia 3s., 7–13, 783–805, 840 Somaliland – British ~ 787 – French ~ (Côtes françaises des Somalis – CFS, see also Djibouti) 674 – Italian ~ 86, 803 – Republic of ~ 787, 789s. song 39, 56, 118, 131, 186, 189s., 201, 234, 280, 307, 363s., 419, 421, 451, 454, 460, 474, 518s., 531, 547, 632, 687, 710, 732, 737, 742, 777 South – Global ~ 17, 483 – Africa 1, 4, 8, 13, 98, 559, 564, 759, 809, 812s., 820 – Sudan 4, 13, 537, 784 Spain 1-5, 8, 11, 13, 16, 25, 43, 48, 50, 100, 115–142, 147–164, 626, 628, 630–635, 829s., 837 Spanish (see also Guinea, Party, Treaty, War) 15, 44, 47ss., 55, 120, 122ss., 129, 136s., 140, 147–157, 626–630, 634, 794 spices 225 stamp 10, 107, 176, 199, 270, 399, 421, 450, 559, 630, 651, 687 stereotype 23, 162, 618 subtitle 57, 280, 361, 363, 518, 725, 731 Sudan 4, 8, 13, 196, 291, 347, 416, 497, 537, 783, 786 – French ~ (Soudan français, see also Mali) 196, 347 – South ~ (see South) Suez crisis (1956–1957) 87 Sufi 26, 36, 322, 355, 374 sultanate 48ss., 64, 152, 672, 694, 721, 723, 786s. Switzerland 16, 379, 527 Syria 9, 33, 297, 344 Tamatave (see Toamasina) Tambacounda 338, 343 Tangier 47–50 Tanzania 1, 4, 8, 13, 537, 643, 645s., 649, 651, 809 Tenkodogo 196

865

territorial collectivity (collectivité territoriale) 694s. Territory – French ~ of the Afars and the Issas (Territoire français des Afars et des Issas – TFAI, see also Djibouti) 674 – overseas ~ (see overseas) – trust ~ 472 TFAI (see Territory) theatre 274, 309, 519, 530, 543, 584, 732, 737, 776 Thiès 338, 341, 343, 349, 360 Tijane (also Tijaniyya) 355 TikTok 410 Timbo 246 Tingis (see also Tangier) 8s. Tlemcen 23, 48 Toamasina (also Tamatave) 721 Togo 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 15, 172, 376, 391–410, 559, 569s., 657, 840 Tolagnaro (also Fort-Dauphin) 721 TOM (see overseas) tourism 2, 72, 96ss., 102, 116, 134, 152, 413, 540, 762, 775 transatlantic 115, 225, 246 transcultural 17, 338 Trarza 348 Treaty – Franco-Spanish ~ (1912) 47 – Methuen ~ (1703) 100 – of Alcáçovas-Toledo (1479) 120 – of Bardo (1881) 73 – of El Pardo (1778) 628 – of Fez (1912) 49 – of Madrid (1912) 49 – of Paris (1763) 346 – of Paris (1783) 346 – of Paris (1814) 757 – of Paris (1900) 628 – of San Ildefonso (1777) 628 – of Tangier (1844) 48 – of Tordesillas (1494) 120, 628 Tricolour 349, 551 Tripoli 28, 87s., 834 Tripolitania 85ss. Tukulor 293, 343, 345 Tunis 87, 840 Tunisia 2–5, 8, 11, 13, 23, 44, 71–82, 290s., 840 Turkish 23, 56, 86, 324 Tutsi 644, 648s. Twa 644

866

General Subject Index

Twitter 518, 529, 652, 729, 731 Ubangi-Shari (see Central African Republic) UDCE (see Union) Uganda 4, 8, 13, 537, 643, 649 UK (see Kingdom) UN, UNESCO, UNO (see Organization) Union – African ~ 7 – Arab Maghreb ~ 44, 298 – Democratic Ceutan ~ (Unión Democrática Ceutí – UDCE) 155 – European ~ (EU) 116 – French ~ (Union française) 226, 247, 514, 724 – Iberian ~ (Unión Ibérica, União Ibérica) 131 – National ~ for the Total Independence of Angola (União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola – UNITA) 587 UNITA (see Union) Upper Volta (Haute Volta, see Burkina Faso) uranium 321 urbanization 71, 348, 484, 754, 814 USA (see America) Vandal 86, 117 Venezuela 98, 116s., 133, Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires (Virreinato del Río de la Plata) 628 Vichy regime 394 Victoria 839 Visigoth 152 Vox 155 Walo (see also Kingdom) 306, 341, 346, 348s. War – American ~ of Independence ~ (1775–1783) 346 – Angolan Civil ~ (1975–2002) 587s., 591 – Angolan ~ of Independence (1961–1974) 586 – Burundian Civil ~ (1993–2005) 649 – Congolese Civil ~s [Congo-Brazzaville] (1993–1994, 1997–1999) 508, 510, 512, 514, 518

– Djiboutian Civil ~ (1991–1994) 674 – Eritrean Civil ~s (1972–1974, 1980–1981) 788 – Eritrean ~ of Independence (1961–1991) 787s. – First Congo ~ [Congo-Kinshasa] (1996–1997) 540 – Guinea-Bissau ~ of Independence (1963– 1974) 449 – holy ~ 48 – Indo-Pakistani ~ (1947) 153 – Italo-Turkish ~ (Guerra italo-turca, 1911–1912) 86 – Mozambican ~ of Independence (1964– 1974) 813s. – Napoleonic ~s (1803–1815) 100, 347 – Rwandan Civil ~ (1990–1994) 643 – Sahara ~ (1975–1991) 296 – Seven Years’ ~ (1756–1763) 26, 346 – Somali Civil ~ (1981–) 786–789 – Spanish-Moroccan ~ (1859–1860) 152 – World ~ I 347, 396, 472, 500, 513, 646, 673 – World ~ II 48, 225, 247, 295, 347, 363, 398, 472, 486, 499, 674, 694, 787ss., 802 Western Sahara 4, 8, 13, 43, 291 West Indies 98, 121 Wikipedia 362, 518 Wolofization 337, 342, 348, 350, 355, 363s., 377, 384 workplace 243, 245, 517, 786 Yamoussoukro 832 Yaoundé 469, 473, 829 Yatengo 196 Yemeni 670 YouTube 437s., 620, 731, 734 Zaïre (see Congo-Kinshasa) Zambia 4, 8, 13, 537, 809 Ziguinchor 338, 343, 346, 370 Zimbabwe 4, 8, 13, 809 Zinder 320

Person Index Abdallah, Ahmed (1919–1989) 725 Abdelaziz, ben Hassan (1881–1943) 48 Abdelhafid, ben Hassan (1876–1937) 48 Abderrahmane, ben Hicham (1778–1859) 48 Abdoulkarim, Mohammed Taki (1936–1998) 725 Abel, Antoine (1934–2004) 778 Adiaffi, Jean-Marie (1941–1999) 237 Ahmed, Soumette (*1983) 732 Akoto, Paul Yao (*1938) 237 Almeida, Germano (*1945) 439 Al-Qaddafi, Muammar (1942–2011) 87 Andriamanantena, Georges (1923–2008) 732 Andriantsoly (Tsi Levalou, †1847) 694 António I of Kongo (Vita a Nkanga, ~1617–1665) 512 Assoumani, Azali (*1959) 725, 739 Ávila Laurel, Juan Tomás (*1955) 636 Bâ, – Amadou Hampâté (1901–1991) 281 – Mariama (1929–1981) 363 Badiane, T.B. (*1940) 363 Bakary, Djibo (1922–1998) 321 Balbo, Italo (1896–1940) 86 Balzac, Honoré de (1799–1850) 68 Bandaman, Maurice (*1962) 237 Barbosa, Jorge (1902–1971) 418, 439 Bédié, Henri Konan (*1934) 228 Bemba, Sylvain (1934–1995) 530 Ben Ali, Saïndoune (*1960s) 732 Ben Badis, Abdelhamid (1889–1940) 26 Ben Jelloun, Tahar (*1947) 68s. Benfodil, Mustapha (*1968) 39 Bento de Gouveia, Horácio (1901–1983) 110 Berlusconi, Silvio (1936–2023) 87 Beti, Mongo (Alexandre Biyidi Awala, 1932– 2001) 479 Bhêly-Quénum, Olympe (*1928) 190 Boccaccio, Giovanni (1313–1375) 119 Boina Kombo II, bin Amadi (ruling 1829–1832/ 36) 694 Bongo Ondimba, – Ali (Alain-Bernard Bongo, *1959) 557, 559 – Omar (Albert-Bernard Bongo, 1935–2009) 557 Boni, Tanella (*1954) 237 Boudiaf, Mohamed (1919–1992) 30 Bouët-Willaumez, Louis Édouard (1808–1871) 556 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110628869-040

Boumedienne, Houari (1927–1978) 27, 29 Bourguiba, Habib (1903–2000) 74 Bouteflika, Abdelaziz (1937–2021) 30s., 37 Boutros-Ghali, Boutros (1922–2016) 350 Bragança, Albertino (*1944) 614, 620 Brazza, Pierre Savorgnan de (1852–1905) 507, 513, 556 Cabon, Marcel (1912–1972) 777 Cabral, Amilcar (1924–1973) 418s., 449 Cairasco de Figueroa, Bartolomé (1538–1610) 141 Camara, Laye (1928–1980) 68 Cão, Diogo (~1440–1486) 512, 583 Cardoso, Pedro (1890–1942) 418 Cassamo, Suleiman (*1962) 822 Cissé, Souleymane (*1940) 267 Colbert, Jean-Baptiste (1619–1683) Compaoré, Blaise (*1951) 197s. Conté, Lansana (1934–2008) 244, 248, 253 Couchoro, Félix (1900–1968) 190 Coulibaly, Micheline (1950–2003) 237 Couto, Mia (*1955) 814 da Recco, Nicoloso (~1327–1364) 119 Daddah, Moktar Ould (1924–2003) 290 Dadié, Bernard Binlin (1916–2019) 235, 237 Damiba, Paul-Henri Sandaogo (*1981) 198 Daoud, Kamel (*1970) 39 de Gaulle, Charles (1890–1970) 321, 514 Defferre, Gaston (1910–1986) 226 Denard, Bob (1929–2007) 725 Dhoinine, Ikililou (*1962) 725 Diabaté, Massa Makan (1938–1988) 281s. Diagne, – Amadou Mapaté (1886–1976) 362 – Blaise (1872–1934) 347 Diallo, – Bakary (1892–1978) 362 – Nafissatou Niang (1941–1982) 363 Dias, Diogo (before 1450–after 1500) 721 Diawara, Fatoumata (*1981) 267 Dib, Mohammed (1920–2003) 39 Diendéré, Gilbert (*1960) 197s., 209 Diome, Fatou (*1968) 363 Diop, – Anta (1923–1986) 357 – Birago (1906–1989) 362

868

Person Index

– Boubacar Boris (*1946) 363 – Lat Dior (1842–1886) 346 Diori, Hamani (1916–1989) 321 Diouf, Abdou (*1935) 228, 337, 350s., 372 Djaout, Tahar (1954–1993) 39 Djebar, Assia (1936–2015) 39 Djohar, Saïd Mohamed (1918–2005) 725 Duarte, Abílio (1931–1996) 418 Duvergé, Vincent (*1995) 776 Elbadawi, Soeuf (*1970) 728, 744 Espinosa, Agustín (1897–1939) 125, 141 Evita Enoy, Leoncio (1929–1996) 636 Fadlallah, Rabih (1842–1900) 499 Faidherbe, Louis (1818–1889) 347s. Fall, – Aminata Sow (*1941) 363 – Khadi (*1948) 363 – Malick (1920–1979) 363 Fanon, Frantz (1925–1961) 348 Faure-Vidot, Magie (*1958) 778 Feraoun, Mouloud (1913–1962) 39, 68 Ferry, Jules (1832–1893) 673 Fonseca, Jorge Carlos (*1950) 421 Foureau, Fernand (1850–1914) 499 Frusoni, Sérgio (1901–1975) 418 Gallieni, Joseph (1849–1916) 723 Gauvin, Axel (*1944) 709 Gbagbo, Laurent Koudou (*1945) 234, 237 Gentil, Émile (1866–1914) 499 Gomi, Nha Násia (1925–2011) 419 Gonçalves, António Aurélio (1901–1984) 418 Guedi Ali, Omar (*1965) 688 Guerra, Ángel (José Betancort Cabrera, 1874– 1950) 142 Guerra Navarro, Francisco (1909–1961) 142 Guingané, Jean-Pierre (1947–2011) 216 Hadrian (76–138) 9 Hama, Boubou (1906–1982) 331 Hane, Khadi (*1962) 363 Hatubou, Salim (1972–2015) 732 Henry the Navigator (1394–1460) 99, 101 Houphouët-Boigny, Félix (1905–1993) 226, 237, 349 Hugo, Victor-Marie (1802–1885) 39, 68 Humblot, Léon (1852–1914) 723

Ilo (†1892) 513 Isidore of Seville (Isidorus Hispalensis, 560– 636) 118 Issa, Ibrahim (1929–1986) 331 Jaffar, Saïd Mohamed (1918–1993) 725 Joalland, Paul (1870–1940) 499 Kabila, Laurent-Désiré (1939–2001) 540 Kaboré, Roch Marc Christian (*1957) 198 Kabral, Nha Bibina (1900–1985) 419 Kafando, Michel (*1942) 198 Kagame, Paul (*1957) 559 Kane, Hamidou (*1928) 363 Kayoya, Michel (1934–1972) 663 Keïta, – Salif (*1949) 267 – Sundiata (~1217–1255) 294 Kenadid, Yusuf Ali (Yuusuf Cali Keenadiid, 1837– 1911) 787 Ken Bugul (Mariètou Mbaye Biléoma, *1948) 363 Kérékou, Mathieu (1933–2015) 175, 187 Khadra, Yasmina (Mohammed Moulessehoul, *1955) 39 Khatibi, Abdelkebir (1938–2009) 68 Kimbangu, Simon (1889–1951) 522 Koité, Habib (*1958) 267 Kolélas, Bernard (1933–2009) 514, 522s. Koulibaly, Isaïe Biton (*1949) 237 Kountché, Seyni (1931–1987) 321 Kourouma, Ahmadou (1927–2003) 234, 237 Lacheraf, Mostefa (1917–2007) 27 Lagarde, Léonce (1860–1936) 673 Lagesse, Pascal (*1968) 777 Lamy, François-Joseph-Amédée (1858–1900) 499 Leopold II (1835–1909) 513, 538, 647 Lhoni, Patrice Joseph (1929–1976) 530 Lima, Conceição (*1961) 620 Lissouba, Pascal (1931–2020) 514, 522s. Lopes da Silva, Baltasar (1907–1989) 418, 439 Lopes, – Henri (*1937) 530s. – Manuel (1907–2005) 418, 439 Louis – IX (1214–1270) 346 – XIV (1638–1715) 346 – XVIII (1755–1824) 757 Lumumba, Patrice (1925–1961) 540

Person Index

Ly, Harouna-Rachid (*1960) 315 Lyautey, Louis Hubert Gonzalve (1854–1934) 49

Noyau, René (1911–1984) 777 Nsué Angüe, María (1945–2017) 636

Maal, Baaba (*1953) 364 Mabanckou, Alain (*1966) 530 Macías Nguema, Francisco (Mez-m Ngueme, 1924–1979) 628 Makouta-Mboukou, Jean-Pierre (1929–2012) 530 Malonga, Jean (1907–1985) 530 Mamani, Abdoulaye (1932–1993) 331 Mammeri, Mouloud (1917–1989) 39 Marques da Silva, António (*1931) 110 Massounde, Tadjidine Ben Said (1933–2004) 725 Matsoua, André Grenard (1899–1942) 522 M’ba, Léon (1902–1967) 556 Mbacké, Mame Seck (1947–2018) 363 Menga, Guy (*1935) 530 Mérédac, Savinien (Auguste Esnouf, 1880– 1939) 777 Meynier, Octave Frédéric François (1874–1961) 499 Mfoutou, Jean-Alexis (*1960) 530 Millares, – Agustín (1863–1935) 142 – Luis (1861–1925) 142 Mimoun, Rachid (1945–1995) 39 Mitterrand, François (1916–1996) 321 Mobutu, Joseph-Désiré (1930–1997) 540, 547 Mohammed V of Morocco (1909–1961) 50 Mollien, Gaspard Théodore (1796–1872) 246 Mukasonga, Scholastique (*1956) 663 Mushikiwabo, Louise (*1961) 557 Mussolini, Benito (1883–1945) 86

Okoundji, Gabriel (*1962) 530 Ouattara, Alassane (*1942) 228 Ouologuem, Yambo (1940–2017) 281

Nachtigal, Gustav (1834–1885) 471 Nahimana, Salvator (*1956) 663 Ndadaye, Melchior (1953–1993) 649, 659 Ndayishimiye, Évariste (*1968) 661 Ndiaye, Ndiadiane (14th century) 345 Ndjékéry, Nétonon Noël (*1956) 505 Ndongo-Bidyogo, Donato (*1950) 628, 636 N’Dour, Youssou (*1959) 364 Neto, Agostinho (1922–1979) 587 Neves, José Maria (*1960) 421 Nganang, Patrice (*1970) 480 Ngorwanubusa, Juvénal (*1953) 663 Ngouabi, Marien (1938–1977) 514, 517 N’Guessan, Marius Ano (†2010) 237 Nirina, Esther (1932–2004) 728, 744 Nouhou, Idi (*1964) 331

869

Perestrelo, Bartolomeu (1400–1457) 99 Pérez Armas, Benito (1871–1937) 142 Pérez Galdos, Benito (1843–1920) 141 Picard Ravololo, Hajasoa Vololona (*1956) 732, 744 Plautus, Titus Maccius (254–184) 86 Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus, 23–79) 118 Quéau de Quinssy, Jean-Baptiste (1748–1827) 757 Quesada, Alonso (1886–1925) 141 Rabearivelo, Jean-Joseph (1901–1937) 723 Rabemananjara, Jacques (1913–2005) 732 Radama – I (~1793–1828) 722 – II (1829–1863) 722 Rahal, Abdellatif (1922–2014) 27 Raharimanana, Jean-Luc (*1967) 732 Rainilaiarivony (1828–1896) 722 Rajaonarison, Elie (1951–2010) 732 Rajoelina, Andry (*1974) 724 Rakotoson, Michèle (*1948) 732 Ramanantoanina, Ny Avana (1891–1940) 723 Ramanantsoa, Gabriel (1906–1979) 724 Ranavalona I (~1782–1861) 722 Randriamamonjy, Esther (*1933) 732 Rapontchombo, Antchuwe Kowe (King Denis, 1780– 1876) 556 Ratsifandrihamanana, Clarisse (1926–1987) 732 Ratsiraka, Didier (1936–2021) 724 Ravalomanana, Marc (*1949) 724 Ravololomanga, Bodo 732 Razakandrainy, Jean Verdi Salomon (Dox, 1913–1978) 732 Razanadrasoa, Esther (Anja-Z, 1892–1931) 723 René, France-Albert (1934–2019) 758 Rimbaud, Arthur (1854–1891) 68 Roume, Ernest Nestor (1858–1941) 174 Sadji, Abdoulaye (1910–1961) 362 Said Ali, ben Said Omar al Maseyili (~1855–1916) 723 Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de (1900–1944) 39, 68 Salam Baco, Abdou (*1965) 710

870

Person Index

Salifou, André (*1942) 331 Sall, Macky (*1961) 198, 351 Salvaterra, Homero Jerónimo (*1957) 620 Sambi, Ahmed Abdallah Mohamed (*1958) 725 Sams’K Le Jah (Karim Sama, *1971) 197 Sangaré, Oumou (*1968) 267 Sankara, Thomas (1949–1987) 197s. Sarr, Mohamed Mbougar (*1990) 337, 363, 383 Sassou-Nguesso, Denis (*1943) 514 Seck, Thione (1955–2021) 364 Sefrioui, Ahmed (1915–2004) 68 Sékou Touré, Ahmed (1922–1984) 241, 247, 321 Selassie, Haile I (Tafari Makonnen, 1892–1975) 787 Sembène, Ousmane (1923–2007) 347, 357, 363, 379 Senghor, – Lamine (1889–1927) 362 – Léopold Sédar (1906–2001) 337, 349ss., 356s., 360, 362, 377, 379s., 630 Siad Barre, Mohamed (1919–1995) 787 Siao, Salette (*1953) 777 Sila, Abdulai (*1958) 462 Silveira, Onésimo (1935–2021) 145 Sissako, Abderrahmane (*1961) 267 Sissoko, Oumar (*1945) 267 Soglo, Nicéphore Dieudonné (*1934) 175, 187 Soilih, Ali (1937–1978) 725 Sousa, Mário Lúcio (*1964) 437 Souza, Carl de (*1949) 777 Stanley, Henry Morton (1841–1904) 538 Tadjo, Véronique (*1955) 237 Tall, Omar Saidou (~1795–1864) 345 Tansi, Sony Labou (Marcel Ntsoni, 1947–1995) 530

Tavares, Eugénio (1867–1930) 419, 436 Toihiri, Mohamed (*1955) 732 Traoré, – Ibrahim (*1988) 198s. – Moussa (1887–1941) 272 – Rokia (*1974) 267 Tristão, Nuno (†~1446) 448 Tsiranana, Philibert (1912–1978) 724 Varela da Silva, Tomé (*1950) 419 Vaz Teixeira, Tristão (1395–1480) 98, 101 Verlaine, Paul (1844–1896) 68 Verneau, René (1852–1938) 117 Viana, Antonio de (1578–1650) 141 Vieira, Arménio (*1941) 439 Waberi, Abdourahman (*1965) 688 Wade, – Abdoulaye (*1926) 351s., 372 – Karim (*1968) 351 Yacine, Kateb (1929–1989) 27, 39 Yaméogo, Maurice (1921–1993) 196s. Yayi, Thomas Boni (*1952) 175, 186s., 190 Yhombi-Opango, Jacques Joachim (1939–2020) 514, 522 Zarco, João Gonçalves (1390–1471) 98s., 101 Zola, Émile (1840–1902) 39, 68 Zongo, Norbert (1949–1998) 216