Linguistics

This article is concerned with the question of what the study of function words in pidgin and Creole languages can contribute to the study of pidgin and Creole genesis. Four main questions will be discussed: (a) to what extent could substratum languages have made a contribution to ...

... (2) Lou dibra, d'r guj schaÈfft! ``Don't speak, the man is (there)!'' [a stranger is listening] (3) Alle gimmel doff. ``All three (are) good.'' [=about cattle] (4) Die goja isch haggel doff, dia kennt-m'r lekaÈcha. ``The woman is very pretty, one could take her.'' ...

The Lengua de los Llanos represents a hitherto unknown Yokuts tribal dialect which was used to produce a catechism for the first Yokuts converts missionized at Misión Santa Cruz. The authors are in the process of studying the dialect used in the catechism, which, despite the fact that it is clearly a subdialect
of Northern Valley Yokuts, itself a dialect group forming part what could be called the Nuclear Valley Yokuts language, containing such well-described dialects as Yawlamni and Chukchansi, still contains sentences with words of uncertain meaning.

Assimilation is a phonological process in which a segment changes to resemble its neighbors more closely. In partial assimilation, the targeted segment takes on some, but not all, of the characteristics of the source segment. Total assimilation is the limiting case: the target becomes identical to the source. The antithesis of assimilation is dissimilation, discussed in another subentry in this entry.