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Constraints on Language Variation and Change in Complex Multilingual Contact Settings
Edited by Bertus van Rooy and Haidee Kotze
[Contact Language Library 60] 2024
► pp. 87–119

Chapter 4
Investigating the complementiser that in the verb complementation of Black South African English

 | North-West University
This chapter explores the constraints that play a role in Black South African English (BSAfE) as a second-language (L2) variety of English in terms of the that/Ø-alternation in the verb complementation patterns of BSAfE. Previous research suggests that cross-linguistic influence (CLI) has a significant effect on this feature in BSAfE. This chapter aims to determine how CLI relates to other psycholinguistic and sociocognitive constraints. While BSAfE as an L2 variety demonstrates a lower rate of Ø-complementation than the first-language variety (L1), the findings of this study suggest that the importance of CLI may have been overstated in the literature, and shared constraints operate in both varieties in similar ways.
Keywords: that/Ø-alternation, verb complementation, Black South African English (BSAfE), second-language English (L2 English), White South African English (WSAfE), first-language English (L1 English), psycholinguistic constraints, sociocognitive constraints, cross-linguistic influence (CLI)
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The that/Ø-alternation and constrained language production
  • 3.Variables conditioning the that/Ø-alternation
  • 4.Methodology
    • 4.1Corpora
    • 4.2Data extraction and coding
    • 4.3Statistical analysis
  • 5.Discussion of findings
    • 5.1Overall frequencies of the that- and Ø-complementisers across corpora
    • 5.2Factors that condition the that/Ø-alternation in BSAfE and WSAfE
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 20 June 2024
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/coll.60.04par
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