Creoles' Morphology

[Nachtswalbe]

I have heard that creole morphologies are somehow "simpler" than those of other languages (McWhorter) or a simplified version of the lexifier's grammar. Is there any truth to these assertions?

[Darren]

I have heard that creole morphologies are somehow "simpler" than those of other languages (McWhorter) or a simplified version of the lexifier's grammar. Is there any truth to these assertions?

Yeah, it’s one of the defining features of creoles; they tend to be highly isolating and regular. Generally this means they won’t have any irregular morphology and most grammar is shown through separate words. For example, Tok Pisin only has one grammatical verbal suffix (transitive -im), and marks all TAM through particles like past tense bin, completive aspect pinis, optative laik. All of these derive from English words, but without any irregularity or complex morphology.

[Nachtswalbe]

Are creoles evolving inflections through grammaticalization?

[Otto Kretschmer]

Are creoles evolving inflections through grammaticalization?

All creoles are less than 400 years old, there was not enough time for grammaticalization to take place. But it could take place and fairly quickly.

In Jamaican Patois you have an "a" as a progressive marker so something like "Mi a nyam di kiek" could easily turn into "Mi anyam di kiek" and "Mi dan nyam di kiek could turn into "Mi danyam di kiek" or even later into "Midanyam di kiek"

[Linguoboy]

Are creoles evolving inflections through grammaticalization?

All creoles are less than 400 years old, there was not enough time for grammaticalization to take place. But it could take place and fairly quickly.

Both those statements are arguable. In fact, before Whorter came along, it was essentially an axiom of linguistics that the natural process of linguistic evolution would obscure the creole origins of a language to the point where it could no longer be distinguished from a non-creole based on strictly linguistic criteria. That is, the only way to be able to say whether a language was creole in origin is to know something about its history first. Obviously, we know little about the history of most languages in the world. And although colonialism spawned numerous creoles, it's not clear that it's the only method of creating them. A natural disaster that caused members of several different linguistic groups to band together for survival could have a similar effect. As for grammaticalisation, I'm not sure what your assertion that four centuries is "not enough time" is based on. How long did it take Romance languages to grammaticalise an innovative future tense? Or Korean?

[Nachtswalbe]

A natural disaster that caused members of several different linguistic groups to band together for survival could have a similar effect

Zompist uses this for Old Hanying particularly.

Trade pidgins like sabir, Russenorsk and that RussoChinese one in the frontiers of Russia and China are another example.

These tend not to last as areas of maritime trade or land frontiers become administered by empires which impose standard languages

[Nachtswalbe]

Has anyone used APiCs before?

[Creyeditor]

Yes

[Otto Kretschmer]

Is it possible for a creole language NOT to be highly isolating? Like, if the creole is spoken by people who had previously spoken two agglutinative languages, is it possible that the resutting pigeon language evolves agglutination over the course of 2-3 generations/

[Linguoboy]

Is it possible for a creole language NOT to be highly isolating? Like, if the creole is spoken by people who had previously spoken two agglutinative languages, is it possible that the resutting pigeon language evolves agglutination over the course of 2-3 generations/

I suppose it's possible, but I don't think we've seen it. Look at, say, Chinook Jargon or Mobilian Jargon. The lexifer languages were highly agglutinating/inflecting, but the resulting pidgins were highly analytical and remained that way.

[Nachtswalbe]

Is it possible to tell if a dialect/language is decreolized like AAVE is alleged to be

[Otto Kretschmer]

Any ideas how an English-based creole with a strong influence of Chinese or Indian languages might be like? Most English based creoles have a West African substrate from languages like Igbo, Yoruba, Akan and Wolof, Tok Pisin has Austronesian substrate.

[Ares Land]

Yes; have a look at Singlish. It's English-Malay-Sinitic based.

[bradrn]

Is it possible for a creole language NOT to be highly isolating? Like, if the creole is spoken by people who had previously spoken two agglutinative languages, is it possible that the resutting pigeon language evolves agglutination over the course of 2-3 generations/

Kituba is a creole between two Bantu languages which retains Bantu noun class marking and has a well-developed TA system.

Perhaps a more interesting case is the supposedly Tupian language Cocama, which has been claimed to be an old ‘abrupt creole’ — one resulting from imperfect adult language learning rather than one descended from a pidgin. (A more famous case of such is Afrikaans.) If so, it would be fairly complex for a creole: it is easy to find words like ikuatakapa and yumatitakura, with three bound suffixes each. I remember seeing vaguely similar suggestions for Palikur, which would be fairly interesting given its extreme grammatical complexity. But it’s unclear to what extent such ‘abrupt creoles’ are comparable to the more usual type.

Is it possible to tell if a dialect/language is decreolized like AAVE is alleged to be

If it were, there wouldn’t be such controversy about AAVE. (Or Cocama, for that matter.)

[Nachtswalbe]

Singlish morphology isn’t too different from English

[Ares Land]

Singlish morphology isn’t too different from English

There are several registers: the 'highest' registers aren't terribly different from standard English, but others are closer to a creole.

[Linguoboy]

Singlish morphology isn’t too different from English

There are several registers: the 'highest' registers aren't terribly different from standard English, but others are closer to a creole.

Is like dat one ah?

[Nachtswalbe]

Singlish morphology isn’t too different from English

There are several registers: the 'highest' registers aren't terribly different from standard English, but others are closer to a creole.

Is like dat one ah?

Point taken

[Nortaneous]

Is it possible to tell if a dialect/language is decreolized like AAVE is alleged to be

If it were, there wouldn’t be such controversy about AAVE. (Or Cocama, for that matter.)

I'm not aware of any real controversy. AAVE is descended from Southern American English and split in the 20th century. It retains many obvious and recognizable features of Southern dialects and does not have the distinctive features of US creoles like Gullah. Maybe there's an argument from the verbal system, but arguments for the creole origin of the distinctive elements of the AAVE verb phrase would have to take care to distinguish features that developed in creoles with shared inheritance of features of Southern dialects that have since been lost due to convergence with the standard among white Southerners.

[Nachtswalbe]

Cape Verdean Crioulo, the oldest surviving Creole, seems to retain tense/aspect inflectional markings.

The base form of the verb in the present tense lacks any markings.

However, the past tense has a mandatory -ba marker.
For example, note the past tense-perfective aspect:
M' dába
1sg. give-PST.PRF

In the progressive aspect-past tense, the -ba shifts onto the progressive marker
M' stába tâ da

This has me wondering if creoles have any major syntactical changes as well?
This paper covers Haitian Creole syntax, particularly #9 onwards