Linguists' most dangerous myth: The fallacy of Creole Exceptionalism
@article{DeGraff2005LinguistsMD, title={Linguists' most dangerous myth: The fallacy of Creole Exceptionalism}, author={Michel DeGraff}, journal={Language in Society}, year={2005}, volume={34}, pages={533 - 591} }
“Creole Exceptionalism” is defined as a set of beliefs, widespread among both linguists and nonlinguists, that Creole languages form an exceptional class on phylogenetic and/or typological grounds. It also has nonlinguistic (e.g., sociological) implications, such as the claim that Creole languages are a “handicap” for their speakers, which has undermined the role that Creoles should play in the education and socioeconomic development of monolingual Creolophones. Focusing on Caribbean Creoles…
179 Citations
Perspectives on Creole Genesis and Language Acquisition
- Linguistics
- 2007
Creolists tend to view the genesis of creole languages as more complicated than do other linguists. While most linguists define creoles as those languages which originate as pidgins and then acquire…
Language Acquisition in Creolization and, Thus, Language Change: Some Cartesian- Uniformitarian Boundary Conditions
- LinguisticsLang. Linguistics Compass
- 2009
This essay prescribes some broad ‘Cartesian-Uniformitarian’ boundary conditions for linguistic hypotheses about Creole formation and correct category mistakes that fail to distinguish explanations that apply to I-languages from explanations that applies to E(xternal)-languages and other social-group phenomena that I- languages are implicated in.
Contemporary Creoleness; or, The World in Pidginization?
- LinguisticsCurrent Anthropology
- 2010
“Creolization” has often been terminologically equated with “hybridization,” “syncretization,” and other terms referring to processes of mixture. Normative assumptions concerning categories of race,…
Creole exceptionalism in a historical perspective – from 19th century reflection to a self-conscious discipline
- Sociology
- 2013
Creoles are not typologically distinct from non-Creoles
- Linguistics
- 2017
Typological approaches involving the study of Creole languages have long triggered an unsettled dispute among creolists. Some claim that Creoles do not differ from non-Creole languages, and can only…
Engaging Language, Ideologies, And Linguistics In The Caribbean And Beyond
- Linguistics
- 2017
When linguists study languages that result from situations of contact—for example, Creoles, second language varieties, and mixed languages—they encounter a well-knit set of ideologies of oppression.…
SLA AND THE EMERGENCE OF CREOLES
- LinguisticsStudies in Second Language Acquisition
- 2010
Although the emergence of creoles presupposes naturalistic SLA, current SLA scholarship does not shed much light on the development of creoles with regard to the population-internal mechanisms that…
The myth of creole “exceptionalism”
- Linguistics
- 2014
Claims that the universalist approach to creole languages treats them as “exceptional” are misconceived and exact patterns of change repeat across multiple languages, while changes elsewhere are stochastic.
Delegitimising Creoles And Multiethnolects: Stereotypes And (Mis-)Conceptions Of Language In Online Debates
- Sociology
- 2017
Abstract:Youth languages in urban multicultural settings that are often labelled "multiethnolects" have received growing attention in the last two decades. In public debate, they are sometimes…
References
SHOWING 1-10 OF 292 REFERENCES
Creolization as Typological Change: Some Examples from Romance Syntax
- Philosophy
- 1985
SUMMARYIs 'creolization' a process that differs fundamentally from other kinds of linguistic change? Recent debate centers round Bickerto/i's 'Language Bioprogram Hypothesis' (LBH), according to…
The founder principle in creole genesis
- Philosophy
- 1996
SUMMARYIn this paper, the author discusses one of the aspects of creole genesis from a population genetics perspective, analogizing 'language' with 'population' (rather than 'organism', the tradition…
Creolization of language and culture
- Linguistics
- 2001
Creolization of Language and Culture is the first English edition of Robert Chaudenson's landmark text Des iles, des hommes, des langues, which has also been fully revised. . With reference to the…
Relexification: A reevaluation
- Linguistics
- 2002
According to one version of the Relexification Hypothesis, creole genesis is an instance of incomplete second-language acquisition whereby substrate speakers systematically fail to acquire the…
Creole Recitations: John Jacob Thomas and Colonial Formation in the Late Nineteenth-Century Caribbean
- History, Art
- 2002
John Jacob Thomas (1841-1889) was one of the leading members of a newly emergent intelligentsia in nineteenth-century Trinidad - a group that could be identified as both "Victorian" and…
The language bioprogram hypothesis
- LinguisticsBehavioral and Brain Sciences
- 1984
Abstract It is hypothesized that creole languages are largely invented by children and show fundamental similarities, which derive from a biological program for language. The structures of Hawaiian…
Language Creation and Language Change: Creolization, Diachrony, and Development
- Linguistics
- 2001
Research on creolization, language change, and language acquisition has been converging toward a triangulation of the constraints along which grammatical systems develop within individual…
Contribution à l'étude de la genèse d'un créole : l'Atlas linguistique d'Hai͏̈ti, cartes et commentaires
- Linguistics
- 1998
The purpose of the study is twofold : first, to elucidate the general processus of creolization of language in haiti ; second, to provide empirical input for further works. Our study centered on 20…
The worlds simplest grammars are creole grammars
- Linguistics
- 2001
It is often stated that all languages are equal in terms of complexity. This paper introduces a metric of complexity, determined by degree of overt signalling of various phonetic, morphological,…
African American Vernacular English: Features, Evolution, Educational Implications
- Linguistics
- 1999
Series Editor's Preface. Preface. Foreword. Acknowledgments. Part I: Features and Use. 1. Phonological and Grammatical Features of African American Vernacular English. 2. Carrying the New Wave into…