They just fade away

Language death and the loss of phonological variation

Datos Bibliográficos

ID7901649
AutoresRobin Sabino (0000-0002-4027-2743, Auburn University, autor de correspondencia)
Año1994
Volumen23
Número4
Páginas495-526
Fecha de publicación1994-09-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaLanguage in Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0047-4045 • E-ISSN: 1469-8013
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0047404500018170
OpenAlexW2124474248
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas6
Referencias citadas31

Using data from four sets of alternating forms in a moribund Dutch-lexicon creole, this article addresses the characteristics of variation in moribund languages, and “the usefulness of variationist approaches in the description and analysis” of them (Drechsel 1990:552–53). The analysis shows how variable phonological rules continue to exist in a dying language, even after large numbers of words have been bled from the rules' inputs, thereby providing support for Dressler's hypothesis of lexical fading (1972). A three-stage scenario of rule loss is proposed to account for the fact that, in the Negerhollands case, there is substantially greater phonological variation at the level of the community than at the level of the individual. (Obsolescence, phonological variation, phonological change, creole languages, Virgin Islands, Negerhollands

Creole language · Lexicon · Linguistics · Obsolescence · Phonological rule · Phonology · Variable (mathematics) · Variation (astronomy) · Computer Science · History · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Mathematics · Philosophy · Spanish Linguistics and Language Studies · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation