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Variable plural marking in Jamaican Patwa and Tok Pisin: A linguistic perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2016

Ekaterina Bobyleva
Ekaterina Bobyleva*
Affiliation:
University of Amsterdam
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Abstract

This article is concerned with plural marking in two English-lexified creoles, Jamaican Patwa and Tok Pisin. In addition to bare plurals, these creoles possess two overt strategies of plural marking—a free-standing morpheme and the suffix -s. The analytic and inflectional plural markers occur according to different linguistic constraints. It appears that the creoles use two conceptually and typologically different number marking systems — that of set noun languages, based on the opposition between singleton and collective sets, and that of singular object noun languages, based on the opposition between singular and plural individuals. This poses problems for the definition of the lexical semantics of the creole nouns if one assumes the existence of cross-linguistic differences. The analysis proposed here is based on the universalist approach to lexical semantics. Under this approach, individuated and collective (set) interpretations of plurals are encoded in the noun phrase structure.

Résumé

Résumé

Cet article traite du marquage du pluriel dans deux créoles à base lexicale anglaise, le patwa jamaïcain et le tok pisin. En plus des pluriels non marqués, ces créoles possèdent deux stratégies manifestes pour marquer le pluriel : un morphème autonome et le suffixe -s. Les marqueurs analytiques et de flexion du pluriel se produisent selon différentes contraintes linguistiques. Il semble que les créoles utilisent deux systèmes conceptuellement et typologiquement différents, soit celui fondée sur l’opposition entre les ensembles singuliers et collectifs et celui basée sur l’opposition entre les individus singuliers et pluriels. Cela pose le problème de la sémantique lexicale des noms créoles si l’on suppose l’existence de différences translinguistiques. L’analyse proposée ici est fondée sur l’approche universaliste de la sémantique lexicale, selon laquelle les interprétatations individualisées et collectives des pluriels sont codifiées dans la structure du syntagme nominal.

Keywords

creolenumber markingpluralitynounlexical semanticscréolemarquage du nombrepluraliténomsémantique lexicale
Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique , Volume 56 , Issue 1 , March 2011 , pp. 37 - 60
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Linguistic Association/Association canadienne de linguistique 2011 

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