![]() ![]() Lexifier languages pass on the main word order patterns (besides the bulk of the lexicon), whereas substrate languages pass on grammatical features relating to valency and tense, aspect, and mood (TAM) categories (and phonological patterns). ![]() But when rigorously comparing a large number of these contact languages with each other (as in the Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures, ), a striking picture emerges: the structural variation is far from random, instead we notice that when it comes to the inheritance of grammatical features, there is a clear division of labor between the contributing languages, the substrate languages and the lexifier languages. Some creoles have obligatory subject pronouns, others do not some creoles mark the possessor in noun phrases, others do not some creoles have double-object constructions, others have indirect-object constructions, and so on. In this talk I start out from the observation that creole languages differ from one another in a great number of grammatical features.
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