Contact-induced restructuring of Portuguese morphosyntax in interior Angola

475 Pages·2010·10.8 MB·English

LILIANA CRISTINA CORAGEM INVERNO

Contact-induced restructuring of
Portuguese morphosyntax in
interior Angola
Evidence from Dundo
(Lunda Norte)

FACULDADE DE LETRAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE COIMBRA
— 2009 —
LILIANA CRISTINA CORAGEM INVERNO

Contact-induced restructuring of
Portuguese morphosyntax in
interior Angola
Evidence from Dundo
(Lunda Norte)

Dissertação de Doutoramento em Letras, área de
Línguas e Literaturas Modernas, especialidade de
Linguística Portuguesa, apresentada à Faculdade de
Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, sob a orientação
do Professor Doutor John A. Holm.

FACULDADE DE LETRAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE COIMBRA
— 2009 —

Para a minha família, que fez tudo
para eu que pudesse ter alguma coisa
Table of Contents

Acknowledgements i
List of Tables iii
List of Figures iv
List of Maps iv
List of Pictures iv
Abbreviations and symbols v
Abstract vii

Chapter 1: Introduction
1.0. Introduction 1
1.1. Angola: brief country profile and sociolinguistic background 1
1.2. Lunda Norte: preliminary sociolinguistic description 10
1.3. Object of study and aims of the dissertation 16
1.4. Structure of the dissertation 21
1.5. Data sources and data collection methodology 22
1.5.1 Dundo Vernacular Portuguese 22
1.5.2. European Portuguese 26
1.5.3. Cokwe 27
1.6. Symbols, abbreviations and terminology 31

Chapter 2: Overview of the literature
2.0. Introduction 32
2.1. Angolan Vernacular Portuguese: a state of the art 32
2.1.1. Reference works in linguistics 33
2.1.2. General works about varieties of Portuguese around the world 35
2.1.3. AVP in Portuguese grammars and handbooks 44
2.1.4. Works on Angolan Bantu languages 50
2.1.5. Linguistic descriptions of Angolan Vernacular Portuguese 55
2.2. Contact Linguistics 72
2.2.1. Key concepts in pidgin and creole linguistics: introduction 72
2.2.2. Contact linguistics: the theoretical foundations 75
2.2.3. Continuum of contact language varieties and partial restructuring 80
2.3. Summary and conclusions 82

Chapter 3: A sociolinguistics history of Angola and Lunda Norte
3.0. Introduction 84
3.1. Portuguese overseas expansion until the discovery of the Congo 84
3.2. Early contacts with the Angolan region (1482-1565): the Congo and Ndongo 86
kingdoms
3.3. The founding of Luanda: the early days of the colony of Angola 91
3.4. The Dutch capture of Luanda and Brazilian rule of the colony 95
3.5. Angola in the 18th century 97
3.5.1. The development of Luanda 97
3.5.2. The exploration of the South 99
3.6. The 19th century and the start of Portugal’s African empire: the case of Angola 102
3.7. The 20th century and the effective colonization of Angola 109
3.7.1. The pacification wars, the Republic and the early years of the Estado 109
Novo (1900 – 1940)
3.7.2. From the 1950s to 1975 114
3.8. The sociolinguistic setting in Lunda Norte: 19th century to the present 118
3.9. Summary and conclusions 130

Chapter 4: Contact-induced tendencies in DVP’s noun phrase
4.0. Introduction 132
4.1. The noun phrase in EP and Cokwe: internal structure and inflectional 134
categories
4.1.1. European Portuguese 134
4.1.2. Cokwe and the languages of the Bantu branch 140
4.2. Contact-induced tendencies in DVP’s noun phrase 153
4.2.1. Number: variable marking and agreement 153
4.2.2. Gender: variable marking and agreement 163
4.2.3. Person markers 173
4.2.3.1. Neutralization of case contrasts 174
4.2.3.2. Proclitic word order of object person markers 178
4.2.4. Possession: post-nominal word order 184
4.2.5. Topics for further research 189
4.2.5.1. Omission of definite article 189
4.2.5.2. Demonstratives 192
4.3. Summary and conclusions 194

Chapter 5: Contact-induced tendencies in DVP’s verb phrase
5.0. Introduction 198
5.1. The verb (phrase) in EP and Cokwe: internal structure and inflectional 199
categories
5.1.1. European Portuguese 202
5.1.2. Cokwe and the languages of the Bantu branch 206
5.1.2.1. Person and number in Cokwe 209
5.1.2.2. Infinitive in Cokwe 213
5.1.2.3. Present tense in Cokwe 214
5.1.2.4. Past tenses in Cokwe 217
5.1.2.5. Future tenses in Cokwe 212
5.1.2.6. Perfective vs. imperfective aspect in Cokwe 224
5.1.2.7. Habitual aspect on Cokwe 226
5.1.2.8. Frequentative aspect in Cokwe 226
5.1.2.9. Mood categories in Cokwe: indicative, subjunctive and 227
imperative
5.1.2.10. Periphrastic verb forms in Cokwe 229
5.2. Restructuring of TMA categories in DVP 231
5.2.1. The infinitive: two competing marking strategies 231
5.2.2. Replacement of the subjunctive by the indicative 237
5.2.3. Preference for future and progressive analytic verb forms 240
5.2.4. Single imperative verb form in both affirmative and negative contexts 243
5.3 Person-number inflections and variable subject-verb agreement in DVP 247
5.3.1. First person singular (1SG) 248
5.3.2. Second person singular and plural (2SG/PL) 249
5.3.3. First person plural (1PL) 253
5.3.4. Third person plural (3PL) 256
5.4. Variable verb-predicate agreement 264
5.5. Sentential negation strategies in DVP 266
5.5.1. Single pre-verbal marker 268
5.5.2. Multiple negation 271
5.5.2.1. Negative concord (não V n-word) 273
5.5.2.2. Bipartite negation (não V não) 275
5.5.2.3. Resumptive negation 283
5.5.3. Ainda ‘yet’ as a negative and imperfective aspect marker ? 285
5.6. Further research 288
5.6.1. Lexical marking of TMA categories in DVP 289
5.6.2. Existential ter ‘to have’ 293
5.6.3. Omission of the preposition a in periphrastic constructions 297
5.7. Summary and conclusions 302

Chapter 6: Final conclusions
6.0. Introduction 312
6.1. From AVP to DVP: the partial restructuring of a vernacular 312
6.1.1. The sociolinguistic evidence 313
6.1.2. The linguistic evidence 318
6.2. Theoretical implications 320
6.3. Further research 322

References 325
Appendix I: Pictures from Dundo and its surrounding areas I
Appendix II: Speakers’ sociolinguistic information IX
Appendix III: Linguistic corpus sample XI
Acknowledgements
The first two and a half years of the writing of this dissertation were
probably the most difficult years of my entire life. This is not the place to discuss the
reasons as to why this is so, but it is certainly the most appropriate place to
acknowledge the support of those who helped me get through this particularly
difficult period:
John Holm, to whom I have a debt of gratitude that goes beyond the support,
patience, insightful comments, criticisms, suggestions and help that I have received
from him not only during the long and intense period of writing the dissertation but
since I first met him in 1998; I am proud that I have been his student and fortunate
to be his friend;
Michael Pye, whose generosity seems to know no limits; I cannot thank him
enough for having let me invade his office to write the very last pages of this
dissertation and for helping me go through them when my exhausted brain got lost
in translation;
Dominika Swolkien, my colleague and friend, with whom I wrote my first
paper and shared the stage-fright of facing an audience of linguists for the first time;
she has always been there for me, giving me her unflagging friendship and support
as well as her sharp and insightful comments on my work;
Ana Flor Neves, who always seems to know what to tell me when I am lost in
my very complicated theories about ridiculously easy things; her absolute lack of
prejudice and her utmost sincerity make her a unique human being;
All the DVP speakers in Dundo, for their willingness to cooperate with my
research, but above all for showing me that it was relevant to them;
Alan Baxter and Jürgen Lang, for the interest they have always shown for my
work, their support and exchange of ideas; all my linguistics professor at the
Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, for being an inspiration to me
during my undergraduate studies and always being available to discuss my
research;
Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, for awarding me the PhD grant
SFRH/BD/22865/2005 which provided me with the necessary funding to support
me while I wrote the dissertation and to spend six-months as a visiting research
student at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS),

i
where I conducted library research and attended a number of seminars on African
linguistics.
My family, for having taught me to fly, for having always supported me even
when they could not quite understand the direction I was taking and for having
taught me that no matter how high or far you can fly there always comes the time to
come back to your nest;
Finally, João, my partner, for all the love, respect and support that he has
given me over the past thirteen years, but above all for having been able to love me
for what I am rather than what I do and also for having helped me learn things about
myself that I did not even know existed;

ii
List of Tables
TABLE 1. Ethnolinguistic groups in Angola (Bantu and Non-Bantu) 3
TABLE 2. Angolan population by province 4
TABLE 3. Age distribution of Portuguese as mother tongue in Angola 8
TABLE 4. Assessment of Cokwe’s language vitality 15
TABLE 5. Abbreviations and symbols used in the transcriptions of DVP data 25
TABLE 6. Demographics in the District of Moçâmedes (1854 and 1864) 103
TABLE 7. Population of the colony of Angola (1897-1930) 112
TABLE 8. The population in the cities of Angola according to race in 1930 113
TABLE 9. Racial composition of the Angolan population (1940-1970) 114
TABLE 10. Urban population in Angola (1940) 116
TABLE 11. Urban population in Angola (1950) 116
TABLE 12. Urban population in Angola (1955) 116
TABLE 13. Level of proficiency in Portuguese (rural areas in Angola) 118
TABLE 14. Frequency of use of Portuguese (rural areas in Angola) 118
TABLE 15. Person markers in EP 135
TABLE 16. Nominal thematic classes in European Portuguese 138
TABLE 17. Adjectival thematic classes in European Portuguese 138
TABLE 18. Noun class system in Cokwe 145
TABLE 19. Semantics of noun classes in Cokwe 146
TABLE 20. Sex-based gender oppositions in Cokwe 148
TABLE 21. Free [+ human] subject markers in Cokwe 150
TABLE 22. Person-number categories and markers in Cokwe verb forms 151
TABLE 23. Object person markers in DVP 175
TABLE 24. Possessive determiners in Cokwe 186
TABLE 25. Demonstratives in EP and DVP 193
TABLE 26. TMA inflectional morphemes and categories in EP 204
TABLE 27. Major TMA categories in Portuguese (Dahl 1985) 205
TABLE 28. Person-number morphemes and categories in EP verb forms 206
TABLE 29. Person-number categories and markers in Cokwe verb forms 210
TABLE 30. TMA categories and markers in affirmative verb forms in Cokwe 230
TABLE 31. TMA categories and markers in DVP 247
TABLE 32. Variable subject-verb agreement patterns in DVP 303
TABLE 33 Summary of key morphosyntactic tendencies in AVP and DVP and 320
relevant sociolinguistic factors

iii