Papers by Susanne Maria Michaelis
Creole language library, Oct 14, 2008
This paper proposes a new analysis of the formation of the TMA system of the Surinamese Maroon Cr... more This paper proposes a new analysis of the formation of the TMA system of the Surinamese Maroon Creoles based on a wide range of both contemporary and historical sources. The paper first provides a brief synopsis of the socio-historical context in which the Creoles of Suriname emerged and developed, and a broad overview of the TMA systems of those Creoles and of varieties of Gbe. It then discusses four processes that were involved in the emergence of the creole TMA system: substrate influence, internal change from a substrate calque, superstrate influence, and shift of form and category correlated with innovation. The p aper then concludes that Creole formation is to be considered as a gradual and multi-layered process (Arends 1993, Bruyn 1995), involving processes of language change that also operate in other so-called normal contact settings (Thomason & Kaufman 1988). * The research on the contemporary Creole and Gbe varieties was funded by NSF grant # SBR 930635 and NSF grant BCS-0113826. We would like to thank the numerous informants in Benin and Suriname/French Guiana who generously provided information on their native languages. We also thank two anonymous reviewers and Susanne Michaelis for comments on an earlier version. All remaining errors are the responsibility of the authors.
Grammatikalisierung in der Romania
Brockmeyer eBooks, 1996
Societies of strangers do not speak less complex languages, 2023
Many recent proposals claim that languages adapt to their environments. The linguistic niche hypo... more Many recent proposals claim that languages adapt to their environments. The linguistic niche hypothesis claims that languages with numerous native speakers and substantial proportions of nonnative speakers (societies of strangers) tend to lose grammatical distinctions. In contrast, languages in small, isolated communities should maintain or expand their grammatical markers. Here, we test these claims using a global dataset of grammatical structures, Grambank. We model the impact of the number of native speakers, the proportion of nonnative speakers, the number of linguistic neighbors, and the status of a language on grammatical complexity while controlling for spatial and phylogenetic autocorrelation. We deconstruct "grammatical complexity" into two separate dimensions: how much morphology a language has ("fusion") and the amount of information obligatorily encoded in the grammar ("informativity"). We find several instances of weak positive associations but no inverse correlations between grammatical complexity and sociodemographic factors. Our findings cast doubt on the widespread claim that grammatical complexity is shaped by the sociolinguistic environment.
Applicative constructions
Language Variation - European Perspectives VI
Texte - Konstitution, Verarbeitung, Typik
LINCOM Europa, 1996
This paper shows that in the domain of valency, creole languages show a substantial amount of con... more This paper shows that in the domain of valency, creole languages show a substantial amount of constructional calquing from their substrates. In all four construction types considered (ditransitive constructions, weather constructions, experiencer constructions, and motion constructions), one can demonstrate recurrent matches between substrate and creole structures (contrasting with lexifier structures) in different regions of the world and with different substrates.
cldf-datasets/apics: The "Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online" as CLDF dataset
Cite as Michaelis, Susanne Maria & Maurer, Philippe & Haspelmath, Martin & Huber, Magnus (eds.) 2... more Cite as Michaelis, Susanne Maria & Maurer, Philippe & Haspelmath, Martin & Huber, Magnus (eds.) 2013. Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. (Available online at https://apics-online.info)
In this paper, we argue that the ditransitive constructions in creole languages worldwide are bes... more In this paper, we argue that the ditransitive constructions in creole languages worldwide are best explained on the basis of influence from substrate languages in Africa and the Pacific region.
Inflectional complexity in creoles: Evidence from APiCS
Inflectional morphology has been a key ingredient in assessing complexity in creole languages. It... more Inflectional morphology has been a key ingredient in assessing complexity in creole languages. It has been claimed that synchronically creoles strikingly show a lack of inflectional morphology, thus giving rise to morphologically extremely simplified languages. (McWhorter 2001, Good 2012, Duval-Markussen 2014, Siegel et al. 2014). In this paper, I will challenge this view by drawing on data of the Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures (Michaelis et al. 2013). I will consider the following morpheme types: tense-aspect markers, case markers, and definite articles: (1) Ternate Chabacano (Spanish-based, Philippines; Sippola 2013) Ta yudá éle su marído IPFV help 3SG 3.SG.POSS husband 'She helps her husband.' (2) Korlai (Portuguese-based, India; Clements 2013) Pedru su kadz tidoy kadz Pedru su Pedru GEN house both house Pedru GEN 'Pedru's house' 'both of Pedru's houses' (3) Haitian Creole (French-based, Caribbean; Fattier 2013) kay la avyon an ti fi a house DET plane DET little girl DET 'the house' 'the plane' 'the little girl' The main misconception which has given rise to the idea that creoles lack inflectional morphology is the fact that scholars have implicitly or explicitly based themselves exclusively on spelling conventions in deciding whether a morpheme is an affix or a free morpheme (see e.g. Siegel et al. 2014). But the imperfective marker, the genitive case marker, and the definite article written as separate words in the cited examples above can be interpreted as affixes. I will consider two criteria for affixhood: (i) uninterruptibility and (ii) morphonological idiosyncrasies. In example (1) from Ternate Chabacano, nothing can intervene between the imperfective marker ta and the verb stem. The same holds for the genitive case marker su and the possessor in example (2) from Korlai. In example (3) from Haitian Creole, the definite article shows morphonological variation depending on the phonological shape of its host: la, an, a. Instances of tense-aspect affixes are abundant in the creole languages in APiCS, and affixed case markers and definite articles also occur repeatedly. Thus, I argue that creoles have lost most of their lexifiers' inflectional marking, but have gained at the same time a considerable degree of complex morphology through unusual accelerated grammaticalization processes.
Stabilisation of the lexicon in an emerging jargon: The development of signs to express animate referents in a sign language contact situation
Sign Multilingualism, 2019
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The atlas of pidgin and creole language structures, 2013
Gender distinctions in personal pronouns
The atlas of pidgin and creole language structures, 2013
Focus particle 'also
The atlas of pidgin and creole language structures, 2013
Introduction Karsten Schmidtke-Bode iii 1 Can cross-linguistic regularities be explained by const... more Introduction Karsten Schmidtke-Bode iii 1 Can cross-linguistic regularities be explained by constraints on change? Martin Haspelmath 2 Taking diachronic evidence seriously: Result-oriented vs. source-oriented explanations of typological universals Sonia Cristofaro 3 Some language universals are historical accidents Jeremy Collins 4 Grammaticalization accounts of word order correlations Matthew S. Dryer 5 Preposed adverbial clauses: Functional adaptation and diachronic inheritance Holger Diessel 6 Attractor states and diachronic change in Hawkins's "Processing Typology" Karsten Schmidtke-Bode 7 Weak universal forces: The discriminatory function of case in differential object marking systems Ilja A. Seržant 8 Support from creole languages for functional adaptation in grammar: Dependent and independent possessive person-forms Susanne Maria Michaelis Contents 9 Linguistic Frankenstein, or How to test universal constraints without real languages Natalia Levshina 10 Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence: A synthesis
Ein Weltatlas der Kontaktsprachen
Typological Studies in Language, 2008
This paper examines genitive objects in a range of familiar European languages, in particular Ger... more This paper examines genitive objects in a range of familiar European languages, in particular German, English, Latin, French and Italian. Three initial examples are given in (1)-(3) (in each case, the genitive object is in boldface). (1) French Claire fleurit le balcon de géraniums. 'Claire plants the balcony with geraniums.' (2) Latin (Lucilius 272) quarum et abundemus rerum et quarum indigeamus 'of which things we have too many and of which we have too few' (3) German Michael gedenkt der gemeinsamen Jahre. 'Michael thinks of the years spent together.' * An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Drittes Bamberger Romanistisches Arbeitsgespräch, 12 April 1997. We thank the participants for useful discussion, especially Annegret Bollée, Peter Koch, and Max Grosse.
Instrument relative clauses
Order of Relative Clause and Noun
The world atlas of language structures, 2005
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Papers by Susanne Maria Michaelis