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Chapter 35 - Germanic Contact Languages

from Part V - Language Contact and Nonstandard Varieties

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 March 2020

By
Paul T. Roberge
Edited by
Michael T. Putnam  and
B. Richard Page
Michael T. Putnam
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
B. Richard Page
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
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Summary

Historically, language contact has taken place under conditions of trade, imported slave and contract labor, military service, conquest, colonialism, migration, and urbanization. The linguistic outcomes are determined in large part by the social relations among populations — including economic, political, and demographic factors — and by the duration of contact. In some times and places, interactions between linguistically heterogeneous groups have generated (depending on one’s theoretical orientation) new languages or radically different language varieties. This article examines the formation of contact languages — understood here primarily as pidgins, creoles, and bilingual mixed languages — the history of which involves a Germanic language in a significant way.

Keywords

language contactcontact languagejargonpidgincreolebilingual mixed languagesinterlanguage
Type
Chapter
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The Cambridge Handbook of Germanic Linguistics , pp. 833 - 864
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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