Chapter published in:
Creole Studies – Phylogenetic Approaches
Edited by Peter Bakker, Finn Borchsenius, Carsten Levisen and Eeva Sippola
[Not in series 211] 2017
► pp. 345–368

The semantics of Englishes and Creoles

Pacific and Australian perspectives

| Roskilde University, Aarhus University
| Australian National University, Griffith University
| University of Western Sydney
| Aarhus University
This chapter provides a lexical-semantic comparison of a selection of Englishes and English-related creoles in the Australia-Pacific area. Faced with the conundrum in sociolinguistic classificatory practice and its contested categories: “language”, “creole”, “dialect”, “variety”, and “English(es)”, we will attempt to circumvent the problematic of metavocabulary by taking a new, two-pronged approach. Firstly, we rely on semantic primes, simple words meanings such as I, you, people, body, big, small, know, think, see, hear as our comparandum, and compare and contrast the lexicalizations of these basic meanings across our sample. Secondly, we utilize phylogenetic networks for visualizing our results and as a tool for forming new hypotheses. Our results provide counter-evidence to the claim that Melanesian and Australian creoles are “varieties of English”. In our sample, we find three basic types of relations. “Shared-core” types (Australian English v. New Zealand English); “closely related core” types (Hawai’i Creole v. Anglo Englishes); and “distantly related core” types (Tok Pisin v. Anglo English, Kriol v. Anglo English, or Yumplatok v. Anglo English). We measure our results against Scandinavian languages in order to explore the language-dialect question, and against Trinidadian – a Caribbean creole, in order to explore the extent of lexical-semantic areality. We conclude that current sociolinguistic metavocabulary is inadequate for representing the complexity of the new ways of speaking in the Australia-Pacific region, and we suggest a principled areal-semantic investigation of words based on semantic principles.
Keywords: Creole semantics, semantics of Englishes, areal semantics, language ideology, sociolinguistic classification
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 31 May 2017
https://doi.org/10.1075/z.211.15lev
References

References

Alleyne, M. C.
2014 A reformist approach to the “Creole” concept. Keynote address at the 20th Biennial Conference of the Society for Caribbean Linguistics, in conjunction with the Society for Pidgin and Creole Linguistics (SPCL) and the Associação de Crioulos de Base Lexical Portuguesea e Espanhola (ACBLPE), Holiday Inn Resort, Aruba, 5–8. August.Google Scholar
Ansaldo, U., Matthews, S. & Lim, L.
(eds) 2007 Deconstructing Creole [Typological Studies in Language 73]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bailey, C.-J.
1971 Trying to talk in the new paradigm. Working papers in Linguistics, University of Hawai’i at Manoa 4(2): 312–339.Google Scholar
Bakker, P., Daval-Markussen, A., Parkvall, M. & Plag. I.
2011 Creoles are typologically distinct from non-creoles. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 26 (1): 5–42. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Barker, F. & Lee, L.
1985 Waskia Dikseneri: Waskia, Tok Pisin, English. Ukarumpa, PNG: Summer Institute of Linguistics.Google Scholar
Beimers, G.
2009 A Grammar of Solomon Islands Pijin. PhD dissertation, The University of New England, Armidale.Google Scholar
Blommaert, J.
2013 Ethnography, Superdiversity, and Linguistic Landscapes: Chronicles of Complexity. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
Blommaert, J. & Rampton, B.
2011 Language and superdiversity. Diversities 13(2): 1–21.Google Scholar
Burridge, C. & Mulder, J.
1998 English in Australia and New Zealand: An Introduction to its History, Structure and Use. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Canagarajah, S. A.
2013 Translingual Practice: Global Englishes and Cosmopolitan Relations. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Chaudenson, R.
2001 Creolization of Language and Culture. London: Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Crowley, T.
1990 Beach-la-Mar to Bislama: The Emergence of a National Language in Vanuatu. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Devette-Chee, K.
2011 Decreolization of Tok Pisin: Is there a Tok Pisin- to-English Continuum? Journal of the Linguistic Society of Papua New Guinea 29: 95–103.Google Scholar
Eades, D.
2013 Aboriginal Ways of Using English. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press.Google Scholar
Edwards, J.
2009 Language and Identity. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2013 Sociolinguistics: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: OUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Franklin, K. & Yapua, K.
2009 A Tok Pisin and West Kewa Common Usage Diglot Dictionary (Tok Pisin na Tok Kewa Dikseneri / Pisini Agaapara Adda Agaa Laapo I Buku). Ukarumpa, PNG: Summer Institute of Linguistics.Google Scholar
Goddard, C.
2009 The ‘communication concept’ and the ‘language concept’ in everyday English. Australian Journal of Linguistics 29(1): 11–25. Special issue Conceptualising Communication in Linguistics, M. Haugh & A. J. Liddicoat (eds). CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2011 Semantic Analysis – A Practical Introduction, revised 2nd edn. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Goddard, C. & Wierzbicka, A.
(eds) 2002 Meaning and Universal Grammar – Theory and Empirical Findings, Vols. 1–2 [Studies in Language Companion Series 60–61]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
2014 Words and Meanings: Lexical Semantics Across Domains, Languages, and Cultures. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Hagen, B.
1903 Vospominaniia o N. N. Miklukhe-Maklae u zhitelei bukhty Astroliabiia na Novoi Gvinee (Recollections of inhabitants of Astrolabe Bay in New Guinea about N. N. Miklouho-Maclay). Zemlevedenie 2–3: 245–252.Google Scholar
Hall, R. A. Jr.
1943 Melanesian Pidgin Phrase-Book and Vocabulary: With Grammatical Introduction. Baltimore MD: Waverly Press.Google Scholar
Hay, J., Maclagan, M. & Gordon, E.
2008 New Zealand English. Edinburgh: EUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Holm, J. A.
1988 Pidgins and Creoles, Vol. 1: Theory and Structure; Vol. II: Reference Survey. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
2000 An Introduction of Pidgin and Creoles. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Jourdan, C.
2002 Pijin: A Trilingual Dictionary. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.Google Scholar
2008 The cultural in pidgin genesis. In The Handbook of Pidgin and Creole Studies, S. Kouwenberg & J. V. Singler (eds), 359–381. London: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Jørgensen, J. N.
2008 Polylingual languaging around and among children and adolescents. International Journal of Multilingualism 5(3): 161–176. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kachru, B.
1992 World Englishes: Approaches, Issues and Resources. Language Teaching 25: 1–14. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kanas, J.
2001 Tu Kaen Bislama: Wan lukluk long nasonal langwis blong Vanuatu blong soem se i gat tu kaen Bislama we oli toktok long hem long Vila Taon. MA thesis, Vila: Yunivesiti Blong Saot Pasifik.Google Scholar
Keesing, R. M.
1988 Melanesian Pidgin and the Oceanic Substrate. Stanford CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Kirkpatrick, A.
2007 World Englishes: Implications for International Communication and English Language Teaching. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Kortmann, B. & Schneider, E.
2008 General Introduction. In Varieties of English: The Pacific and Australasia, Vol. 3, K. Burridge & B. Kortmann (eds), 1–8. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Lefebvre, C.
2004 Issues in the Study of Pidgin and Creole Languages [Studies in Language Companion Series 70]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(ed.) 2011 Creoles, their Substrates, and Language Typology [Typological Studies in Language 95]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2015 Relabeling in Language Genesis. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Levisen, C.
2012 Cultural Semantics and Social Cognition: A Case Study on the Danish Universe of Meaning. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2016 Postcolonial lexicography: Defining creole emotion words with the Natural Semantic Metalanguage. Cahiers de Lexicologie 2, Special issue Lexical Definition, A. Polguère & D. Sikora (eds) 35–60.Google Scholar
2017 The social and sonic semantics of reggae: Language ideology and emergent socialities in postcolonial Vanuatu. Language and Communicaton 52. Special issue Language Ideologies and Music in Contact Situations, B. Schneider, E. Sippola & C. Levisen (eds) 102–116.Google Scholar
Levisen, C. & Jogie, M. R.
2015 The Trinidadian “Theory of Mind”: Personhood and postcolonial semantics. International Journal of Language and Culture 2(2): 169–193. Special issue Language and Cultural Values. Adventures in Applied Ethnolinguistics, B. Peeters (ed.).Google Scholar
Levisen, C. & Priestley, C.
2017 Social keywords in postcolonial Melanesian discourse: kastom ‘traditional culture’ and tumbuna ‘ancestors’. In Cultural Keywords in Discourse, C. Levisen & S. Waters (eds). 83–106.Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Makoni, S. & Pennycook, A.
2007 Disinventing and Reconstituting Languages. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
McWhorter, J.
1998 Identifying the creole prototype: Vindicating a typological class. Language 74(4): 788–818. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2005 Defining Creole. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Meakins, F.
2013 Gurindji Kriol structure dataset. In Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online. S. M. Michaelis, P. Maurer, M. Haspelmath & M. Huber (eds). Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.Google Scholar
Mesthrie, R. & Bhatt, R. M.
2008 World Englishes: The Study of New Linguistic Varieties. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mihalic. F.
1971 The Jacaranda Dictionary and Grammar of Melanesian Pidgin. Milton, Queensland: Jacaranda.Google Scholar
Moore, B.
2008 Speaking our Language: The Story of Australian English. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Mufwene, S.
2001 The Ecology of Language Evolution. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mühlhäusler, P.
1982a Etymology and pidgin and creole languages. Transactions of the Philological Society 80(1): 99–118. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
1982b Language and communicative efficiency: The case of Tok Pisin. Language and Communication 2(2): 105–121. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mühlhäusler, P., Dutton, T. E. & Romaine, S.
(eds) 2003 Tok Pisin Texts: From the Beginning to the Present [Varieties of English around the World T9]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mühlhäusler, P. & Nash, J.
2012 Norfolk Island: History, People, Environment, Language. London: Battlebridge.Google Scholar
Munro, J.
2011 Roper River Aboriginal language features in Australian Kriol. In Lefebvre (ed.), 461–487.Google Scholar
Nicholls, S.
2013 Cultural scripts, social cognition and social interaction in Roper Kriol. Australian Journal of Linguistics 33: 282–301. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Payne, A., Drew, D. E., Banala, N., Mattocks, R. & Mattocks, J.
2005 Kamano-Kafe’ Kemofo Agafa’e Dictionary for Kamano-kafe’ English Tok Pisin. Ukarumpa, PNG: Summer Institute of Linguistics.Google Scholar
Pedersen, I. L.
2003 Traditional dialects of Danish and the de-dialectalization 1900–2000. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 159: 9–28.Google Scholar
Peeters, B.
(ed.) 2006 Semantic Primes and Universal Grammar: Empirical Evidence from the Romance Languages [Studies in Language Companion Series 81]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Pennycook, A.
2006 Global Englishes and Transcultural Flows. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
2010 Language as a Local Practice. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Pennycook, A. & Otsuji, E.
2015 Metrolingualism: Language in the City. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Priestley, C.
2009 A grammar of Koromu (Kesawai) a Trans New Guinea language of Papua New Guinea. PhD dissertation, The Australian National University, Canberra.Google Scholar
Forthcoming. Koromu: A Papuan Language of Kesawai and Nearby Villages. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Romaine, S.
2000 Language in Society. An Introduction to Sociolinguistics. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Sakoda, K. & Siegel, J.
2003 Pidgin Grammar‬: An Introduction to the Creole English of hawai’i. Honolulu HI: Bess Press.Google Scholar
Sandefur, J.
1979 An Australian Creole in the Northern Territory: A Description of Ngukurr-Bamyili Dialects, Part1. Work Papers of SIL-AAB, Vol. 3. Darwin: Summer Institute of Linguists.Google Scholar
Schneider, E. W.
2007 Postcolonial English: Varieties around the World. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schuchardt, H.
1883 Ueber das Melaneso-Englische. Kreolische Studien V. Wien: In Commission bei Carl Gerold’s Sohn.Google Scholar
Schultze-Berndt, E., Meakins, F. & Angelo, D.
2013 Kriol. In English-Based and Dutch-Based Languages, S. M. Michaelis, P. Maurer, M. Haspelmath & M. Huber (eds), 241–251. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Sharifian, F.
2006 A cultural-conceptual approach and world Englishes: The case of Aboriginal English. World Englishes 25(1): 11–22. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Shnukal, A.
1988 Broken: An Introduction to the Creole Language of Torres Strait. Canberra: Dept. of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University.Google Scholar
Sebba, M.
1997 Contact Languages: Pidgins and Creoles. London: Macmillan. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Siegel, J.
2008 The Emergence of Pidgin and Creole Languages. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Singler, J. V.
1990 Pidgin and Creole Tense-Mood-Aspect-Systems [Creole Language Library 6]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Smith, G. P.
2003 Growing Up with Tok Pisin: Contact, Creolization, and Change in Papua New Guinea’s National Language. London: Battlebridge.Google Scholar
Spolsky, B.
2014 The Languages of the Jews: A Sociolinguistic History. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Stewart, W. A.
1965 Urban negro speech. Sociolinguistic factors affecting English teaching. In Social Dialects and Language Learning. Proceedings of the Bloomington, Indiana, Conference 1964, R. W. Shuy (ed.), 10–18. Champaign IL: National Council of Teachers of English.Google Scholar
Sterzuk, A.
2011 The Struggle for Legitimacy: Indigenized Englishes in Settler Schools. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
Thomason, S. G.
2001 Language Contact: An Introduction. Edinburgh: EUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Tomas, S.
2004 Yaame (tambu). In C. Priestley. Unpublished data files on the Koromu language.Google Scholar
Troy, J. F.
1994 Melaleuka: A History and Description of New South Wales Pidgin, 2 Vols. PhD dissertation, Canberra: The Australian National University.Google Scholar
Tryon, D. T.
1987 Bislama: An Introduction to the National Language of Vanuatu. Canberra: Dept. of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University.Google Scholar
Tryon, D. & Charpentier, J.-M.
(eds) 2004 Pacific Pidgins and Creoles: Origins, Growth and Development. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Vandeputte-Tavo, L.
2013 New technologies and language shifting in Vanuatu. Pragmatics 23(1): 171–181. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Velupillai, V.
2003 Hawai’i Creole English. A typological Analysis of the Tense-Mood-Aspect System. Houndmills: Palgrave MacMillan.Google Scholar
2015 Pidgins, Creoles and Mixed Languages: An Introduction. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Wierzbicka, A.
2013 Imprisoned in English: The Hazards of English as a Default Language. Oxford: OUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Zipp, L.
2014 Educated Fiji English: Lexico-grammar and Variety Status [Varieties of English around the World G47]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 5 other publications

Hill, Deborah
2020.  In Studies in Ethnopragmatics, Cultural Semantics, and Intercultural Communication, ► pp. 33 ff. Crossref logo
Kornacki, Paweł
2019. A Look at Tok Pisin save: A Lexical Verb and an Aspectual Marker in a Cultural Context. Anglica. An International Journal of English Studies :28/2 ► pp. 79 ff. Crossref logo
Levisen, Carsten
2020.  In Studies in Ethnopragmatics, Cultural Semantics, and Intercultural Communication, ► pp. 169 ff. Crossref logo
Levisen, Carsten
2021.  Pæn, flot, dejlig, and lækker . International Journal of Language and Culture 8:1 Crossref logo
Levisen, Carsten & Sophia Waters
2017.  In Cultural Keywords in Discourse [Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 277], ► pp. 1 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 02 march 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.