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13 - Contrasting the NPs of Indian Ocean French Creoles

from Part III - The Development of Syntax

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2025

By
Georges Daniel Véronique
Edited by
Dany Adone  and
Astrid Gabel
Dany Adone
Affiliation:
Universität zu Köln
Astrid Gabel
Affiliation:
Universität zu Köln
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Summary

Veronique’s paper compares the use of bare and determiner marked NPs in Indian Ocean Creoles (IOC) which consists of Seychelles, Mauritian and Reunion Creoles. These three main IO Creoles share closely related overt indefinite, definite, demonstrative and plural determiners and the use of bare NPs. Réunion Creole is the only IO Creole which has a specific use for prenominal markers: definite singular lo, definite plural lé and indefinite plural dé. The three Creoles exhibit many similarities in the expression of nominal reference but they do not grant the same categorial status to markers -la and sa. As such the paper discusses the significance of this difference for nominal reference in the three languages involved. It concludes that grammatical affinities between IO Creoles do not exclude functional differences due inter alia to the grammaticalization of definite determiners.

Keywords

semantic and pragmatic definitenessspecificityindividuationnumbergenericitybare NPnominal referenceIndian Ocean Creoles
Type
Chapter
Information
The Evolution, Acquisition and Development of Syntax
Insights from Creole Languages and Beyond
 , pp. 233 - 254
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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