Keynote Address: Language contact and acquisition: Learning a new mixed language and Walpiri
Carmel O’Shannessy gave a keynote address at the 16th annual Symposium about Language and Society - Austin, held at the University of Texas Austin, April 11-13.
Abstract:
A new mixed language, Light Warlpiri, has emerged in a remote community in northern Australia. It is spoken by children and young adults in the multilingual community of Lajamanu and has developed within the last 30 years. Most verbs and the verbal morphology are from Aboriginal English or Kriol (AE/Kriol), while most nominal morphology is from Lajamanu Warlpiri (the variety of Warlpiri spoken in Lajamanu community). Nouns are drawn from both types of source language. An innovative auxiliary system has developed which draws on, but is not the same as, the systems in the source languages. But the system for indicating grammatical functions draws directly on the two typologically different source languages. Lajamanu Warlpiri uses case-marking in an ergative-absolutive system while AE/Kriol uses word order (SVO) in a nominative-accusative system. In Light Warlpiri these two systems meet.
The language ecology in the community is complex, and code-switching between languages is very common. Children growing up in the community learn the new language, Light Warlpiri, as their primary language, and also learn Lajamanu Warlpiri in their early years. Their learning situation raises the question of how they deal with very mixed input - to what extent do they show adult-like variation and patterning in the grammatical systems of each language? The study uses production and comprehension data to examine the children’s use of word order and ergative case-marking in each language.