Substrate Language Influence in Kriol: The Application of Transfer Constraints to Language Contact in Northern Australia

Abstract

Kriol, an English lexified creole language of northern Australia, is the primary language of the Roper River region in the Northern Territory. This thesis examines Roper Kriol for evidence of influence from the Indigenous substrate languages of that region. A method used only twice before in the field of pidgin and creole studies, the Transfer Constraints approach, is used to do this. In this way this thesis also aims to further test this theoretical construct. Chapter 2 provides the sociohistorical background to the emergence of Kriol in the Roper River region, which includes: demographic figures; description of contact in the pastoral industry; and a summary of language contact. This information leads to an identification of the timeframes for when the processes of transfer and levelling may have occurred. In each chapter to follow, the Roper River substrate languages are compared to find shared core features. Predictions are made based on the reinforcement principle of frequency as to the features that could be expected to have been retained during levelling of the stabilising pidgin and ultimately would be found in Kriol. A description of any corresponding Kriol feature follows. The availability constraints of perceptual salience and congruence are then examined in relation to English, in order to determine whether transfer to the preceding pidgin was constrained or not. The discussion also takes into consideration pidgins in the environment that preceded the creole, alongside other linguistic processes. Chapter 3 starts by examining the morphology of the verb complex and similarly chapter 4 examines the morphology of the nominal complex. Chapter 5 examines semantic category transfer in relation to the pronominal, TMA and case marking systems. Finally, chapter 6 provides an analysis of the nature of nominal modification for evidence of transfer of demonstrative, adjective, possession marking and number marking strategies.