Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-27gpq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-27T17:07:35.646Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Adverb code-switching among Miami's Haitian Creole–English second generation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 March 2010

BENJAMIN HEBBLETHWAITE*
Affiliation:
University of Florida
*
*Address for correspondence: Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, University of Florida, 301 Pugh Hall, PO Box 115565, Gainesville, FL 32611-5565, USAhebble@ufl.edu

Abstract

The findings for adverbs and adverbial phrases in a naturalistic corpus of Miami Haitian Creole–English code-switching show that one language, Haitian Creole, asymmetrically supplies the grammatical frame while the other language, English, asymmetrically supplies mixed lexical categories like adverbs. Traces of code-switching with an English frame and Haitian Creole lexical categories suggest that code-switching is abstractly BIDIRECTIONAL. A quantitative methodology that codes the language-indexation of the token in addition to the surrounding lexical items was used for all mixed (e.g. xYx/yXy, xYy/yXx, yYx/xXy) and unmixed (xXx/yYy) adverbs. Discourse position, especially the left-periphery, is found to be a significant factor in adverb code-switching. Sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic analyses which acknowledge the ‘low’ status of one language and the ‘high’ status of the other explain better the frequency of mixed English adverbs in a Haitian Creole frame and the rarity of mixed Haitian Creole adverbs in an English frame than a minimalist approach, such as MacSwan's (1999 and subsequent work), which uses phi-feature valuation and entails asymmetry without bidirectionality. While I provide confirmation for Myers-Scotton's (1993) Matrix Language Frame approach, I emphasize that trace bidirectional data need to be accounted for by a theory that is grounded in the sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic realities.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Carmen Silva-Corvalán, Ewa Jaworska, and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on and corrections to this article. Their constructive criticism and careful editing greatly improved this paper. I would also like to thank Carol Myers-Scotton and Margaret Deuchar for their correspondence, comments and encouragement. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Barbara Vance, Julie Auger, Laurent Dekydtspotter, Kevin Rottet, and Albert Valdman who helped lay a foundation for this research. All errors are my own.

References

Alexiadou, A. (2004). Adverbs across frameworks. Lingua, 114 (6), 677682.Google Scholar
Blanker, J. C. M., & Dubbeldam, J. (2005). Prisma woordenboek sranantongo/Prisma wortubuku fu sranantongo. Utrecht: Prisma.Google Scholar
Chan, B. (2003). Aspects of the syntax, pragmatics and production of code-switching – Cantonese and English. New York: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Chan, B. (2008). Code-switching, word order and the lexical/functional category distinction. Lingua, 118 (6), 777809.Google Scholar
Cinque, G. (1999). Adverbs and functional heads: A cross-linguistic perspective. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Cinque, G. (2004). Issues in adverbial syntax. Lingua, 114 (6), 683710.10.1016/S0024-3841(03)00048-2Google Scholar
DeGraff, M. (1993). Is Haitian Creole a pro-drop language? In Byrne, F. (ed.), Atlantic meets Pacific: A global view of pidginization and creolization, pp. 7190. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
DeGraff, M. (1997). Verb syntax in, and beyond, creolization. In Haegeman, L. (ed.), The new comparative syntax, pp. 6494. New York: Longman.Google Scholar
DeGraff, M. (2003). Against creole exceptionalism. Language, 79 (2), 391410.Google Scholar
DeGraff, M. (2005). Morphology and word order in “creolization” and beyond. In Cinque, G. & Kayne, R. (eds.), The Oxford handbook of comparative syntax, pp. 293–272. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
DeGraff, M. (2007). Haitian Creole. In Holm, J. & Patrick, P. (eds.), Comparative creole syntax, pp. 101126. London: Battlebridge Press.Google Scholar
Dehaene, S. D., Dupoux, E., Mehler, J., Cohen, L., Paulesu, E., Perani, D., an de Moortele, P.-F., Lehéricy, S., & Le Bihan, D. (1997). Anatomical variability in the cortical representation of first and second languages. NeuroReport, 8 (17), 38093815.10.1097/00001756-199712010-00030Google Scholar
Dejean, Y. (1993). An overview of the language situation in Haiti. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 102 (3), 7383.Google Scholar
De Rooij, V. (1996). Cohesion through contrast: Discourse structure in Shaba Swahili/French conversations. Amsterdam: IFOTT.Google Scholar
Eckardt, R. (1998). Adverbs, events and other things. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Ernst, T. (2002). The syntax of adjuncts. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Grosjean, F. (1997). Processing mixed language: Issues, findings and models. In de Groot, A. M. B. & Kroll, J. F. (eds.), Tutorials in bilingualism: Psycholinguistic perspectives, pp. 225254. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Harbour, D. (2008). Klivaj predika, or predicate clefts in Haitian. Lingua, 118 (7), 853871.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2001). The unfolding of the preposition and affix de in Latin, Gallo-Romance, French and Haitian Creole. Revue Roumaine de Linguistique, 46 (1–4), 4568.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2006). Sociolinguistic aspects of Haitian Creole in south Florida: The causes of the failure to develop the natural asset of biliteracy. Florida Foreign Language Journal, 3 (1), 5259.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2007). Intrasentential code-switching among Miami Haitian Creole–English bilinguals. Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University. [Available at Ann Arbor: ProQuest; http://proquest.umi.com.]Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2009a). Scrabble as a tool for Haitian Creole literacy: Sociolinguistic and orthographic foundations. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages, 24 (2), 275305.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2009b). L'asymétrie et la bidirectionnalité dans l'alternance codique du créole haïtien–anglais de la 2ème génération à Miami: L'influence sociolinguistique de la syntaxe bilingue. Cahiers de Linguistiques, 34 (2), 103126.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B. (2009d). The left-periphery in the code-switching of Miami Haitian Creole–English bilinguals: Discourse markers, conjunctions, coordinators, complementizers and wh-words. Ms., Univerity of Florida.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B., & Pierre, J. (2005). The gospel of Thomas in English, Haitian Creole and French. Gainesville, FL: Classic Editions.Google Scholar
Hebblethwaite, B., & Pierre, J. (2009). Une saison en enfer/Yon sezon matchyavèl. Gainesville, FL: Classic Editions. [Translation of Arthur Rimbaud's prose poem.]Google Scholar
Hilton, D. (2000). Pronominal clitics in Haitian Creole: Phonological or syntactic. In Carstens, V., Vicki, & Parkinson, F. (eds.), Advances in African linguistics, pp. 5159. Trenton: Africa World Press.Google Scholar
Howe, K. (1993). Haitian Creole as the official language in education and media. In Byrne, F. & Holm, J. (eds.), Atlantic meets Pacific: A global view of pidginization and creolization, pp. 291298. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Huang, S.-F. (1975). A study of adverbs. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Jake, J., & Myers-Scotton, C. (2009). Which language? Participation potentials across lexical categories in code-switching. In Isurin, L., Winford, D. & de Bot, K. (eds.), Multidisciplinary approaches to code-switching, pp. 207242. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Jake, J., Myers-Scotton, C., & Gross, S. (2005). A response to MacSwan (2005): Keeping the Matrix Language. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 8 (3), 271276.Google Scholar
Johnson, B. L., & Alphonse-Férère, G. (1972). Haitian Creole: Surface phonology. Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 2 (2), 3539.Google Scholar
Klavans, J. (1985). The syntax of code-switching: Spanish and English. In King, L. & Maley, C. A. (eds.), Proceedings of the Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, pp. 213231. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Klintborg, S. (1996). Linkers, fillers, tags and flags – code-switching of conjunctions and conversational signals among American Swedes. In Ureland, P. S. & Clarkson, I. (eds.), Language contact across the North Atlantic, pp. 199216. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.Google Scholar
Kroll, J. F., & De Groot, A. M. B. (eds.) (2005). Handbook of bilingualism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Larson, R. (1988). On the double object construction. Linguistic Inquiry, 19 (3), 335391.Google Scholar
Lefebvre, C. (1998). Creole genesis and the acquisition of grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
MacSwan, J. (1999). A minimalist approach to intrasentential code switching. New York: Garland.Google Scholar
MacSwan, J. (2000). The architecture of the bilingual language faculty: Evidence from intrasentential code switching. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 3 (1), 3754.Google Scholar
MacSwan, J. (2005). Codeswitching and generative grammar: A critique of the MLF model and some remarks on “modified minimalism”. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 8 (1), 122.Google Scholar
Mahootian, S. (1993). A null theory of codeswitching. Ph.D. dissertation, Northwestern University. [Available Ann Arbor: ProQuest; http://proquest.umi.com.]Google Scholar
Manninen, S. (2000). Why adverb is a lexical case: Evidence from Finnish. Linguistics in Potsdam, 6, 133–54.Google Scholar
Meuter, R. (2005). Language selection in bilinguals: Mechanisms and processes. In Kroll & De Groot (eds.), pp. 349–370.Google Scholar
Mougeon, R., & Beniak, E. (1991). Linguistic consequences of language contact and restriction: The case of French in Ontario, Canada. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Myers-Scotton, C. (1993). Dueling languages: Grammatical structure in codeswitching. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Myers-Scotton, C. (2002). Contact linguistics: Bilingual encounters and grammatical outcomes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Nishimura, M. (1997). Japanese/English code-switching. New York: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Perani, D., Dehaene, S., Grassi, F., Cohen, L., Cappa, S. F., Dupoux, E., Fazio, F., & Mehler, J. (1996). Brain processing of native and foreign languages. NeuroReport, 7 (15–17), 24392444.Google Scholar
Perrot, M.-E. (2005). Le chiac de Moncton: Description synchronique et tendances évolutives. In. Valdman, A., Auger, J. & Piston-Hatlen, D. (eds.), Le français en Amérique du nord, pp. 307326. Québec: Presses de l'Université Laval.Google Scholar
Pollock, J.-Y. (1989). Verb movement, universal grammar, and the structure of IP. Linguistic Inquiry, 20 (3), 365424.Google Scholar
Portes, A., & Schauffler, R.. (1994). Language and the second generation: Bilingualism yesterday and today. International Migration Review, 38 (4), 640661.Google Scholar
Prince, E., & Pintzuk, S. (2000 [1983]). Bilingual code-switching and the open/closed class distinction. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics (PennWPL), 6 (3), 237257. [Reprint of the original 1983 article.]Google Scholar
Radford, A. (1997). Syntactic theory and the structure of English: A minimalist approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Rehner, K., & Mougeon, R. (1997). Use of restrictive expressions JUSTE, SEULEMENT, and RIEN QUE in Ontario French. Revue de l'ACLA/Journal of CAAL, 19 (1–2), 89109.Google Scholar
Rizzi, L. (1997). The fine structure of the left periphery. In Haegeman, L. (ed.), Elements of grammar: Handbook in generative syntax, pp. 281337. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Samuelsdorff, P. (1998). Pronouns, adpositions, “adverbs” and the lexicon. In Olbertz, H., Hengeveld, K. & García, J. S. (eds.), The structure of the lexicon in functional grammar, pp. 267278. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Sohmer, R. (with contributions from Jackson, D., Katz, B., & Warren D.). (2005). The Haitian community in Miami-Dade: A growing the middle class supplement. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program.Google Scholar
Stepick, A. (1992). The refugees nobody wants. In Grenier, G. & Stepick, A. (eds.), Miami now: Immigration, ethnicity and social change, pp. 5782. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida.Google Scholar
Stepick, A. (1998). Pride against prejudice: Haitians in the United States. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.Google Scholar
Stepick, A., Stepick, C., Eugene, E., Teed, D., & Labissiere, Y. (2001). Shifting identities and intergenerational conflict: Growing up Haitian in Miami. In Rumbaut, R. & Portes, A. (eds.), Ethnicities: Children of immigrants in America, pp. 229266. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Torres, L. (2002). Bilingual discourse markers in Puerto Rican Spanish. Language in Society, 31 (1), 6583.Google Scholar
Treffers-Daller, J. (1994). Mixing two languages: French–Dutch contact in a comparative perspective. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Treffers-Daller, J. (2005). Evidence for insertional codemixing: Mixed compounds and French nominal groups in Brussels Dutch. International Journal of Bilingualism, 9 (3–4), 477508.Google Scholar
Tremblay, M. (2005). Back en français acadien: archaïsme ou innnovation? In Brasseur, P. & Falkert, A. (eds.), Français d'Amérique: Approches morphosyntaxiques, pp. 262273. Paris: L'Harmattan.Google Scholar
Valdman, A. (1988). Diglossia and language conflict in Haiti. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 71, 6780.Google Scholar
Valdman, A. (2007). Preface & introductory remarks on Creole. In Valdman, A., Iskrova, I., Pierre, J. & André, N. (eds.), Haitian Creole–English bilingual dictionary, pp. ixxxii. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Creole Institute.Google Scholar
Yoon, K. (1992). New perspective on intrasentential code-switching: A study of Korean–English switching. Applied Psycholinguistics, 13 (4), 433449.Google Scholar
Zéphir, F. (1997). Haitian Creole language and bilingual education in the United States: Problem, right or resource? Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 18 (3), 223237.Google Scholar