Kali’na NP’s in contact. Variation or linguistic change?

Résumé En

This paper aims to describe nouns phrases (NPs) based on the analysis of an heterogeneous corpus involving Carib spoken in French Guiana (Kali'na) in contact with French (mostly) but also some French based Creoles. A special focus will be given on NPs with determiners (DET) and especially demonstratives (DEM), however, in order to understand the use of these determiners, information will also be provided on bare nouns. Different types of NPs will be described: Kali’na NPs, French NPs, but also mixed NPs as most corpora are interactions where speakers use a plurilingual mode that matches the concept of “insertional language mixing” (AUER 1999) that differ from codeswitching that has more pragmatic functions (even if codeswitching sometimes occur in the corpora). Insertional language mixing can be related to “frequent codeswitching” (POPLACK 1981) or to “codeswitching as the unmarked choice” (MYERS-SCOTTON 1993). In such interactions “it is intuitively clear that the ‘matrix language’ (to use a term coined by C.M. SCOTTON) of most clauses” is Kali’na (AUER 1999:8). There is an asymmetry in the use of the languages involved with a “dominant” language in the sense that most words and morphemes used are in Kali’na.