Language Death and Subject Expression: First-person-singular subjects in a declining dialect of Louisiana French

Abstract

Louisiana French is undergoing gradual language death. In such situations, it is common to find increased variability and rapid change, as speakers use the language less often and in fewer domains (Wolfram 2004; Palosaari and Campbell 2011). These processes have been observed in the pronominal system of Louisiana French (Rottet 1996; Girard 2013), with both phonological and morphological sources of variation leading to an exceptionally large inventory of first-person-singular forms in the French of the Pointe-Au-Chien Indians of Pointe-Aux-Chênes, Louisiana. Using data from a translation task, we examine the range of forms used by French speakers from this community varying in age and fluency. We note a sharp distinction in forms used by fluent versus non-fluent speakers, with the latter making use of the non-clitic form mon. To answer the question of why mon is so common amongst non-fluent speakers in this task, we apply insights from the field of second language acquisition, considering the systems of these non-fluent speakers as autonomous and systematic. We ultimately propose a potential interaction between the previously documented phonological and morphological patterns observed in this community, influencing in the forms observed.

Modelling stylistic variation in threatened and under-documented languages

“…The evidence presented here demonstrates that stylistic variation remains identifiable among the last remaining speakers of a threatened language that has suffered acute domain loss, and adds support to studies showing similar tendencies in the case of "dialect death" too (e.g. Carmichael 2017;Carmichael and Gudmestad 2019). While not appropriate for every context without modification (see Blainey 2017), this article has also demonstrated that the adoption of standard variationist methods constitute a useful heuristic tool for a more robust analysis of variation across the entire stylistic range among speakers of threatened languages.…”

A variationist analysis of first-person-singular subject expression in Louisiana French

“…The patterns in Figures 1 and 2 echo some previous findings and challenge others. To begin with, we identified the same twelve forms that occurred in data elicited from a translation task in Carmichael and Gudmestad (2019), suggesting internal validity of this dataset and the particular forms that are in common use in this community regardless of task type. We also see many of the variants identified in previous work on Louisiana French, although the rates at which they appear differ in various ways.…”

“…Twelve 1sg subject forms have been documented in the variety of Louisiana French spoken in Terrebonne and Lafourche Parishes (Carmichael & Gudmestad, 2019). Phonological variation in the clitic pronoun je 'I' includes realization as [ʒə] or [ʃə], as in other varieties of French, and less common allophones [sə], [zə], and [hə].…”