Convergence and the Formation of Afrikaans

Abstract

As a phenomenon to be explained, convergence in historical linguistics is substantively no different than in creolistics. The general idea is that accommodation by speakers of “established” languages in contact and the formation of new language varieties both involve a process of leveling of different structures that achieve the same referential and nonreferential effects. The relatively short and well-documented history of Afrikaans presents an important case study in the competition and selection of linguistic features during intensive language contact.

Cognate arguments and the Transitivity Requirement in the history of English

“…evidence for the tR is provided through the availability of cognate objects with unergative verbs (unergative verbs, according to other approaches, should not project an object position) and of null objects with transitive verbs. we will argue that cognate subjects - similar to verbal agreement in the case of null subjects - can be treated as evidence in favor of the Subject position Requirement or epp (contrary to Roberge 2002and Cummins & Roberge 2004, 2005see below).…”

“…Transitivity Requirement: "an obj position is always included in Vp, independently of lexical choice of V. tR is the internal argument counterpart to the epp" (Roberge 2002;Cummins & Roberge 2004, 2005).…”

“…this hypothesis has its basis in the extended projection principle (epp) - and its modifications according to the Minimalist program (cf., for instance, Sigurðsson 2007, 2011 nikolaos laVidas and its direct object counterpart principle, the transitivity Requirement (tR) (Roberge 2002and Cummins & Roberge 2004, 2005. 3 according to the epp, a subject position is required in all cases - and can be covered with different mechanisms, for instance, through the verbal agreement; see, among others, alexiadou & anagnostopoulou 1998. the tR claims that an object position is always present, even in the case of an intransitive verb.…”

“…In section 3.2, we show that the changes in null arguments are in the opposite direction of the development of cognate arguments (loss of null expletive subjects and null referential objects vs. use [and productivity] of cognate expletive subjects and overt referential objects), and that the cognate arguments cannot be analyzed as a replacement mechanism for null arguments. In section 3.3, we propose an alternative hypothesis, according to which both cognate objects and subjects are linked to changes in the aspectual system of english; this hypothesis can be valid if cognate nouns are used to check aspectual features lp lVi 243 - see Roberge (2002), Cummins & Roberge (2004, 2005, and horrocks & Stavrou (2010), among others. In section 4, we conclude the main findings and remarks of this study.…”

“…In section 4, we conclude the main findings and remarks of this study. 5 Roberge (2002) and Cummins & Roberge (2004, 2005 have argued that null and implicit objects can be attributed to the tR, just as null subjects (empty categories in subject position, pro) are due to the epp. according to the tR hypothesis (see 1), the object position is always syntactically present in a similar way as the subject position.…”