Cover not available

Article published In: Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages
Vol. 29:1 (2014) ► pp.49–85

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
authorization required

Measuring analyticity and syntheticity in creoles

 | University of New England (Australia) and Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies
 | KU Leuven
 | University of Freiburg
Published online: 7 February 2014
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jpcl.29.1.02sie
Creoles (here including expanded pidgins) are commonly viewed as being more analytic than their lexifiers and other languages in terms of grammatical marking. The purpose of the study reported in this article was to examine the validity of this view by measuring the frequency of analytic (and synthetic) markers in corpora of two different English-lexified creoles — Tok Pisin and Hawai‘i Creole — and comparing the quantitative results with those for other language varieties.
To measure token frequency, 1,000 randomly selected words in each creole corpus were tagged with regard to word class, and categorized as being analytic, synthetic, both analytic and synthetic, or purely lexical. On this basis, an Analyticity Index and a Syntheticity Index were calculated. These were first compared to indices for other languages and then to L1 varieties of English (e.g. standard British and American English and British dialects) and L2 varieties (e.g. Singapore English and Hong Kong English). Type frequency was determined by the size of the inventories of analytic and synthetic markers used in the corpora, and similar comparisons were made.
The results show that in terms of both token and type frequency of grammatical markers, the creoles are not more analytic than the other varieties. However, they are significantly less synthetic, resulting in much higher ratios of analytic to synthetic marking. An explanation for this finding relates to the particular strategy for grammatical expansion used by individuals when the creoles were developing.
References (51)
Aboh, Enoch O. 2009. Simplicity, simplification, complexity and complexification: Where have all the interfaces gone? In Enoch O. Aboh & Norval Smith (eds.), Complex processes in new languages , 1–25. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Arends, Jacques. 2001. Simple grammars, complex languages. Linguistic Typology 5(2/3). 180–182.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Aston, Guy & Lou Burnard. 1998. The BNC handbook: Exploring the British National Corpus with SARA . Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Baker, Philip. 1995. Motivation in creole genesis. In Philip Baker (ed.), From contact to creole and beyond , 3–15. London: University of Westminster Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1997. Directionality in pidginization and creolization. In Arthur K. Spears & Donald Winford (eds.), The structure and status of pidgins and creoles , 91–109. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. No creolisation without prior pidginisation. In Terry Crowley & Jeff Siegel (eds.), Studies in creole linguistics in memory of Chris Corne, 1942-1999 (Te Reo 44) , 31–50. Auckland: Linguistic Society of New Zealand.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bakker, Peter, Aymeric Daval-Markussen, Mikael Parkvall & Ingo Plag. 2011. Creoles are typologically distinct from non-creoles. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 26(1). 5–42. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bardovi-Harlig, Kathleen. 2000. Tense and aspect in second language acquisition: Form, meaning, and use . Oxford: Blackwell. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bussmann, Hadumod, Gregory Trauth & Kerstin Kazzazi. 1996. Routledge Dictionary of language and linguistics . New York: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chaudenson, Robert. 2001. Creolization of language and culture (revised in collaboration with Salikoko S. Mufwene) . London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Craats, Ineke van de, Norbert Corver & Roeland van Hout. 2000. Conservation of grammatical knowledge: On the acquisition of possessive noun phrases by Turkish and Moroccan learners of Dutch. Linguistics 381. 221–314. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Danchev, Andrei. 1992. The evidence for analytic and synthetic developments in English. In Matti Rissannen, Ossi Ihalainen, Terttu Nevalainen & Irma Taavitsainen (eds.), History of Englishes: New methods and interpretations in historical linguistics , 25–41. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
DeGraff, Michel. 1999. Creolization, language change, and language acquisition: An epilogue. In Michel DeGraff (ed.), Language creation and language change: Creolization, diachrony, and development , 473–543. Cambridge, MA/London: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2005. Morphology and word order in ‘creolization’ and beyond. In Guglielmo Cinque & Richard S. Kayne (eds.), The Oxford handbook of comparative syntax , 293–372. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dixon, Robert M. W. 2007. Clitics in English. English Studies 881. 574–600. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Godfrey, John J., Edward C. Holliman & Jane McDaniel. 1992. SWITCHBOARD: Telephone speech corpus for research and development. IEEE International Conference on Speech, and Signal Processing, ICASSP-92 , 517–520.
Greenbaum, Sidney (ed.). 1996. Comparing English worldwide: The International Corpus of English . Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Greenberg, Joseph H. 1960. A quantitative approach to the morphological typology of language. International Journal of American Linguistics 26(3). 178–194. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin. 2011. The indeterminacy of word segmentation and the nature of morphology and syntax. Folia Linguistica 45(1). 31–80. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hockett, Charles F. 1954. Two models of grammatical description. Word 101. 210–231.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Holm, John & Peter L. Patrick (eds.). 2007. Comparative creole syntax: Parallel outlines of 18 creole grammars . London: Battlebridge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Inoue, Aya. 2007. Copula patterns in Hawai‘i Creole: Creole origin and decreolization. In Magnus Huber & Viveka Velupillai (eds.), Synchronic and diachronic perspectives on contact languages , 199–212. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. . Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kellerman, Eric. 1995. Crosslinguistic influence: Transfer to nowhere? Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 151. 125–150. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Klein, Wolfgang & Clive Perdue. 1997. The basic variety (or: Couldn’t natural languages be much simpler?). Second Language Research 131. 301–347. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kusters, Wouter. 2003. Linguistic complexity: The influence of social change on verbal inflection . Utrecht: LOT.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. Complexity in linguistic theory, language learning and language change. In Matti Miestamo, Kaius Sinnemäki & Fred Karlsson (eds.), Language complexity: Typology, contact, change , 3–22. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Matthews, Stephen & Virginia Yip. 1994. Cantonese: A comprehensive grammar . London/New York: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
McWhorter, John. 2007. Language interrupted: Signs of non-native acquisition in standard language grammars . Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Michaelis, Susanne, Philippe Maurer, Martin Haspelmath & Magnus Huber (eds.). 2013. Atlas of pidgin and creole language structures online . Munich: Max Planck Digital Library. [URL].
Miestamo, Matti. 2009. Implicational hierarchies and grammatical complexity. In Geoffrey Sampson, David Gil & Peter Trudgill (eds.), Language complexity as an evolving variable , 80–97. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mosel, Ulrike. 1980. Tolai and Tok Pisin: The influence of the substratum on the development of New Guinea Pidgin . Canberra: Australian National University (Pacific Linguistics B-73). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Morales, Rodney. 1988. The speed of darkness . Honolulu: Bamboo Ridge Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mufwene, Salikoko S. 2001. The ecology of language evolution . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Muysken, Pieter & Norval Smith. 1995. The study of pidgin and creole languages. In Jacques Arends, Pieter Muysken & Norval Smith (eds.), Pidgins and creoles: An introduction , 1–14. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nichols, Johanna. 2009. Linguistic complexity: A comprehensive definition and survey. In Geoffrey Sampson, David Gil & Peter Trudgill (eds.), Language complexity as a variable concept , 110–125 . Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Parkvall, Mikael. 2008. The simplicity of creoles in a cross-linguistic perspective. In Matti Miestamo, Kaius Sinnemäki & Fred Karlsson (eds.), Language complexity: Typology, contact, change , 265–285. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Romaine, Suzanne. 1988. Pidgin and creole languages . London: Longman. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sapir, Edward. 1921. Language: An introduction to the study of speech . New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schwegler, Armin. 1990. Analyticity and syntheticity: A diachronic perspective with special reference to Romance languages . Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Seuren, Pieter A. M. & Herman Wekker. 1986. Semantic transparency as a factor in creole genesis. In Pieter Muysken & Norval Smith (eds.), Substrata versus universals in creole genesis , 57–70. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Siegel, Jeff. 2003. Substrate influence in creoles and the role of transfer in second language acquisition. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 251. 185–209. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. The emergence of pidgin and creole languages . Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012. Accounting for analyticity in creoles. In Bernd Kortmann & Benedikt Szmrecsanyi (eds.), Linguistic complexity: Second language acquisition, indigenization, contact , 35–61. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Smith, Geoff P. 2002. Growing up with Tok Pisin: Contact, creolization, and change in Papua New Guinea’s national language . London: Battlebridge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt. 2009. Typological parameters of intralingual variability: Grammatical analyticity versus syntheticity in varieties of English. Language Variation and Change 21(3). 319–353. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt & Nuria Hernández. 2007. Manual of information to accompany the Freiburg Corpus of English Dialects Sampler (‘FRED-S’) . URN: urn:nbn:de:bsz:25-opus-28598 . Freiburg: University of Freiburg. [URL] (20 September, 2013.)
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt & Bernd Kortmann. 2009. Between simplification and complexification: Non-standard varieties of English around the world. In Geoffrey Sampson, David Gil & Peter Trudgill (eds.), Language complexity as an evolving variable , 64–79. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2011. Typological profiling: Learner Englishes versus indigenized L2 varieties of English. In Joybrato Mukherjee & Marianne Hundt (eds.), Exploring second-language varieties of English and learner Englishes: Bridging a paradigm gap , 167–187. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Trask, Robert L. 1993. A dictionary of grammatical terms in linguistics . London/New York: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wekker, Herman. 1996. Creolization and the acquisition of English as a second language. In Herman Wekker (ed.), Creole languages and language acquisition , 139–149. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (18)

Cited by 18 other publications

Olguín Martínez, Jesus
2025. The interaction of irrealis markers and blocking effects in counterfactual conditionals: theoretical implications. Linguistic Typology 29:2 ► pp. 361 ff. DOI logo
Biber, Douglas, Tove Larsson & Gregory R. Hancock
2024. The linguistic organization of grammatical text complexity: comparing the empirical adequacy of theory-based models. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 20:2 ► pp. 347 ff. DOI logo
Kirk, John
2022. Irish English as a World English. Frontiers in Communication 7 DOI logo
Danae Perez, Marianne Hundt, Johannes Kabatek & Daniel Schreier
2021. English and Spanish, DOI logo
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt
2021. Uncovering the Big Picture. In English and Spanish, ► pp. 184 ff. DOI logo
Röthlisberger, Melanie & Benedikt Szmrecsanyi
2019. Dialect Typology: Recent Advances. In Handbook of the Changing World Language Map, ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Röthlisberger, Melanie & Benedikt Szmrecsanyi
2020. Dialect Typology: Recent Advances. In Handbook of the Changing World Language Map, ► pp. 131 ff. DOI logo
Szmrecsanyi, Benedikt & Melanie Röthlisberger
2019. World Englishes from the Perspective of Dialect Typology. In The Cambridge Handbook of World Englishes, ► pp. 534 ff. DOI logo
Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, Emma Moore, Linda van Bergen & Willem B. Hollmann
2019. Categories, Constructions, and Change in English Syntax, DOI logo
Bogolyubova, Olga, Polina Panicheva, Roman Tikhonov, Viktor Ivanov & Yanina Ledovaya
2018. Dark personalities on Facebook: Harmful online behaviors and language. Computers in Human Behavior 78 ► pp. 151 ff. DOI logo
Kouwenberg, Silvia & John Victor Singler
2018. Creolization in Context: Historical and Typological Perspectives. Annual Review of Linguistics 4:1 ► pp. 213 ff. DOI logo
Blasi, Damián E., Susanne Maria Michaelis & Martin Haspelmath
2017. Grammars are robustly transmitted even during the emergence of creole languages. Nature Human Behaviour 1:10 ► pp. 723 ff. DOI logo
Haspelmath, Martin & Susanne Maria Michaelis
2017. Analytic and synthetic. In Language variation – European perspectives VI [Studies in Language Variation, 19], ► pp. 3 ff. DOI logo
Röthlisberger, Melanie, Jason Grafmiller & Benedikt Szmrecsanyi
2017. Cognitive indigenization effects in the English dative alternation. Cognitive Linguistics 28:4 DOI logo
Bakker, Peter
2016. Creoles as hybrid languages. <i>WORD</i> 62:4 ► pp. 228 ff. DOI logo
Good, Jeff
2015. Paradigmatic complexity in pidgins and creoles. Word Structure 8:2 ► pp. 184 ff. DOI logo
Siegel, Jeff
2015. The role of substrate transfer in the development of grammatical morphology in language contact varieties. Word Structure 8:2 ► pp. 160 ff. DOI logo
[no author supplied]
2015. Pidgins, Creoles and Mixed Languages [Creole Language Library, 48], DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 13 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue