Research on contact languages and language contact has been on the rise since the publication of Thomason & Kaufman (Reference Thomason and Kaufman1988) and growing interest in (linguistic) hybridity. Despite definitive advances, research has nevertheless proceeded on a narrow empirical base focusing on European-influenced contexts in the Atlantic region due to researchers’ restricted linguistic competences and limited research agendas, and traditions that privilege structural linguistic issues of a language from a diachronic perspective. By nature, contact settings are linguistically and socially diffuse, making it difficult to rely solely on traditional descriptive linguistic methods. Despite paying lip service to the centrality of the social context for understanding contact settings, research has tended to proceed with relatively little concern for variation, meanings, and functions. Rich traditions that focus on understanding heterogeneity in language (practices), such as linguistic anthropology, the sociology of language, interactional sociolinguistics, and quantitative sociolinguistic tools are often ignored. This is unfortunate, since they offer suitable research methods that, when combined with descriptive linguistic methods, allow for a more fine-grained and comprehensive approach to discovering linguistic phenomena that fall outside of conventional notions of ‘a language’ (Lüpke & Storch Reference Lüpke and Storch2013; Migge & Léglise Reference Migge and Léglise2013). The present volume represents a definite step forward in that it draws much needed attention to the opportunities offered by branching out into new linguistic contexts and new analytical approaches.
The book consists of an introduction (pp. 1–5), six original papers (pp. 7–169), and an area, language, and subject index (pp. 171–78). The introduction discusses the heavily biased nature of research on contact languages and outlines some (negative) effects of this situation. They argue that the terminology (and theories) developed on the basis of European-influenced contact languages ‘risks denying non-Indo European non-West African contact varieties the status of worthwhile objects of enquiry’ (p. 2) and makes existing typologies, frameworks, and theories restrictive. However, while an empirically more inclusive approach will surely be beneficial, it is important to remember that terminology has been subject to intense debates since the field's inception and is far from unanimously accepted. The last part of the introduction discusses the papers of the volume.
The first chapter by Emanuel Drechsel outlines a comprehensive methodology for systematically exploiting written historical attestations in order to trace extinct contact languages and applies this methodology to the investigation of the extinct eighteenth-century Maritime Polynesian Pidgin (MPP). Drawing on Mühlhäusler's (Reference Mühlhäusler1997) philological guidelines and the ethnography of speaking, Drechsel demonstrates how systematic comparative social and linguistic analysis of written records from European observers, combined with information on the regions' and the writers' social and linguistic backgrounds, are instrumental in comprehensively reconstructing historical contact settings and their linguistic outcomes. His sample analysis of three texts written during adjacent time periods focusing on different parts of the Pacific reveals that there were different varieties of MPP that, despite simplification, closely resemble Polynesian languages. MPP was used throughout the eastern Pacific between French and British early explorers and Polynesians (Society Islanders) and among the latter on land and on American and European ships traveling in the region from the late 1760s.
The second chapter by Anthony Grant reconstructs an extinct pidgin from the Micronesian Island of Tobi (western Carolines) based on a narrative about two years’ captivity (1832–1834) written by a shipwrecked American sailor. It documents ‘just over 130 words and 46 sentences’ (p. 42) of a contact medium used between speakers of three mutually intelligible languages: Tobian, Palauan, and English. Based on comparison with what is known about modern Tobian, Grant shows that while morphologically clearly reduced, the language used in the narrative resembles that of Tobian and to a lesser extent English, although it is not intelligible to speakers of modern Tobian.
Mohammad Almoaily's chapter investigates a currently existing contact language, Gulf Pidgin Arabic (GPA), used in several countries of the Arabian Gulf between Arabic speaking employers and Asian workers and among the latter. His quantitative analysis of five morphosyntactic variables in sociolinguistic interview data from sixteen speakers of GPA investigates the impact of speakers’ first languages (Bengali, Punjabi, Malayalam) and the amount of time spent in Arab countries. The study demonstrates that overall speakers do not use Gulf Arabic (GA) variants nor do they, for the most part, employ strategies from their native language. Length of residence also has only a slight effect on patterns of variation as ‘long-term GPA speakers are still far from GA’ (p. 82). This suggests to him that universal processes rather than substrate and superstrate varieties shaped GPA grammar and that GPA speakers target GPA rather than GA norms. The latter (though not the former) finding supports current theories of creole and pidgin genesis (e.g. Siegel Reference Siegel2008). While this is the kind of investigation needed, the results could be further enhanced by a comprehensive analysis of the social context of interaction (nature of interactions, social relationships, precise inputs, variation across contexts, etc.) in order to determine the processes and mechanisms of change. Since the creation of contact languages is not a unitary process, it will be interesting to see what the analysis of other variables will reveal.
Rajend Mesthrie's fine chapter focuses on the South African pidgin Fanakolo, which initially emerged in the early 1800s in contact between speakers of Xhosa, Afrikaans, and English in the Eastern Cape region and then served as a basis for the development of the contact vernaculars in the Natal region, which are closely associated with sugar plantations and Indian indentured labor (1860s) and gold mining (1870s). Fanakolo's lexicon consists of 70% Zulu and 30% Afrikaans and English, but its structures do not closely resemble Zulu. His analysis of seven morphosyntactic features demonstrates that Fanakolo's grammar ‘leans more towards a basic English’ (99) in terms of word order and temporal categories, but there are also unique features that suggest that processes other than substrate influence were at work.
Kofi Yakpo & Pieter Muysken move the focus to the South American country of Suriname, which is to date mostly known for its family of European-West African contact vernaculars but which also houses Asian diaspora contact vernaculars such as Sarnámi/Hindustaans that result from koinéization ‘of several closely related languages spoken in the present-day Indian federal states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand’ (p. 102). Following an overview of contact scenarios and processes and a presentation of the history and development of language contact in Suriname with a focus on the case of Sarnámi, they discuss linguistic data pertaining to linguistic convergence. Based on a comparative analysis of stimuli-based narrative data obtained from speakers of Sarnámi and other diaspora Indian varieties and descriptions of these relevant Indian languages, they show that the Sarnámi verbal system results from processes characteristic of koinéization (mixing, leveling, reallocation). Contact with Dutch and Sranantongo is driving the functional reinterpretation of SVO word order in Sarnámi and extensive code-mixing and borrowing has led to intricate intertwining between these three systems.
The final chapter by Kees Versteegh critically examines the role of the linguistic input on the linguistic nature of contact varieties. Following a detailed review of research on foreigner-directed speech, he examines the commonly held assumption that in early stage learner varieties, including contact languages, verbal notions are realized by the least marked or unmarked verb form. His analysis is based on an analysis of verbal expressions used in Arabic-foreigner directed speech and early child language. Evidence coming from data involving communication between Arabic speakers and Asian and European foreigners and literary representations of the latter suggests that the types of verbal forms adopted depend on both the nature of the contact setting and the verbal interactions. Since giving orders, or rather directives, plays an important role in many interactions and also in parent-child speech, imperative forms rather than base or fully inflected forms are initially used as the main verbal form in contact vernaculars such as GPA or Pidgin Madam in Lebanon and to a lesser extent in early child language. What appear to be infinitival forms are in fact often derived from related forms, so-called directive infinitives.
This collection of articles features a broad range of historical and contemporary contact settings and methodological approaches highlighting the exciting possibilities that a broader empirical basis offers for enhancing critical reflection on existing terminology and typologies. It is a must for both students of pidgins and creoles and language contact researchers more widely who are looking to venture off the well-beaten track.
