Description:
This book presents a comprehensive account of the word-formation patterns of an English-based creole language, Sranan, as found in its earliest sources, and compares them with the patterns attested in the input languages. It shows that the emergence of the patterns involved a variety of sources and mechanisms and was characterised by the absence of superstrate derivational affixes, the use of free morphemes as derivational markers and of compounding as the major word-formation strategy. The findings render untenable theoretical accounts of creole genesis based on one explanatory factor
This book presents a comprehensive account of the word-formation patterns of an Englishbased creole language, Sranan, as found in the earliest sources of this language, and compares them systematically with the patterns attested in the input languages. The findings are discussed in the light of recent creolisation theories and a number of important conclusions are drawn about the nature of creole word-formation, as well as about the role of second language acquisition, universals, substrates and superstrates in the emergence of the creole lexicon and creole languages in general.