Marking statements of fact in early pidgins

Dados Bibliográficos

ID14860331
AutoresKees Versteegh (0009-0003-1322-3967, University of Nijmegen, autor correspondente)
Ano2022
Volume37
Fascículo1
Páginas53-71
Data de publicação2022-03-23
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Pidgin and Creole Languages (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0920-9034 • E-ISSN: 1569-9870
EditoraJohn Benjamins Publishing Company (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1075/jpcl.00086.ver
OpenAlexW4220884782
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas23

The particle fi is used in Classical Arabic as a local and temporal preposition, ‘in’. In the contemporary Arabic dialects, it has the same meaning, but in addition it is used in some dialects as an existential, ‘there is/are’. In a number of Arabic work-related pidgins, such as Gulf Pidgin Arabic and Pidgin Madame, fi has acquired new functions. It does not only denote nominal predication, location, and possession, but is also used in combination with verbal forms. Several proposals have been made to explain this use of fī . Avram (2012) regards fī as a progressive aspect marker, while Potsdam & Alanazi (2014) deny the verbal nature of the construction and regard fī as a copula. Bakir (2014) analyzes fī as a marker of verbality of the predicate. The present paper suggests that the general function of fi is to mark the link between topic and focus as assertive rather than modal and looks for parallels of this use in a few other work-related pidgins

Arabic · Copula (linguistics · Linguistics · Parallels · Pidgin · Possession (linguistics · Predicate (mathematical logic · Sociology · Computer Science · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Language, Linguistics, Cultural Analysis · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation