Palenquero origins
A tale of more than two languages
Mikael Parkvall | Stockholm University
Bart Jacobs | Jagiellonian University Krakow
Palenquero is a Spanish-lexified creole spoken in Columbia. We argue that existing hypotheses regarding its birth
are problematic in several regards. This article addresses the inconsistencies in these hypotheses and provides an alternative,
more coherent account. More precisely, we take issue with the following three claims: (a) Palenquero is the result of a
two-language encounter; (b) it has its roots in a West African Afro-Portuguese proto-variety; (c) an ancestral form of the creole
emerged in the port city of Cartagena. We then set out to present our own, more economical, formation scenario, according to which
Palenquero was formed in the early 1600s in the linguistically heterogenous maroon communities of the Cartagenan hinterlands.
Keywords: Palenquero, Cartagena, maroonage, Kikongo, creolisation, El Palenque de San Basilio, Spanish-lexified creoles, Portuguese-lexified creoles, pidginisation
Published online: 15 July 2020
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.19019.par
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.19019.par
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