Why Tetun Prasa is Not a Creole

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Why Tetun Prasa is

not a creoleZuzana Grekskov

University of Coimbra, Portugal

[email protected]


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Tetun in Timor-LesteTetun

Tetun Prasa

Tetun Lngua

Franca Tetun Dili

Tetun Terik

TetunFoho/Terik

TetunBelo/Ls


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What is a creole language? Thomason & Kaufman (1988 [1991]), Holm (2004) and

McWhorter (2005)

a language often derived from a pidgin which became a mothertongue of a certain community and is usually spoken in all aspectsof life

arose in a specific sociolinguistic context where more than two

languages were in contact. superstrate language versus substrate languages. vernacular languages that developed mostly throughout the 17th

and the 18th century in former European colonies as a result of alanguage contact between communities that lacked a commonlanguage.


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Sociohistorical backgroundThomason and Kaufman (1991:35): it is the

sociolinguistic history of the speakers, and notstructure of their language, that is the primarydeterminant of the linguistic outcome of languagecontact. [L]inguistic interference is conditionedin the first instance by social factors, not linguistic

ones.


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Origin of Tetun Prasa1) Tetun was diffused by missionaries from the Soibada

mission founded in 18982) Tetun was diffused as a lngua franca from Dili whenthe capital was transferred there from Lifau in 1769

3) It was the tribe of Belos that spoke Tetun and thenexpanded from its original area prior to the 17th

century and came to dominate the eastern part ofTimor (Thomaz 1974, 2002)


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Malay influence


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Portuguese in SE Asia


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Tetun in contact withPortuguese language

Malacca Creole Portuguese (MalCP)

Macau Creole Portuguese (MacCP) European Portuguese (EP) Bidau Creole Portuguese (BidCP)


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Creole in East Timor?

Creole languages were a result of the communicationneeds between two communities that lacked a common

language. This way, a new language a pidgin arose inorder to facilitate their communication. Gradually, thispidgin became a mother tongue of the community and

became a creole. But this was not the case of mixedlanguages.

In Timor-Leste, there was no need to create a new

language for the Portuguese and the Timorese being ableto communicate between each other.


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Tetun Prasa what language is it? Grimes (1997:52):creole = a language that has largely shifted

from its original source. Thomaz (2002:103): a Portuguese-influenced simplified form of

Tetun whose characteristics are close to those of creoles andcompares it to Lngua Geral in Brazil, which was not a creolizedform of Portuguese but rather a language of the Tupi-Guarani

family enriched with Portuguese loanwords (2002:69). Hull (1999:ix):a fully creolized form of Tetun and at the same

time as a hybrid language, basically Austronesian, but with aheavy Portuguese superstratum = English after the Norman

Conquest, which showed the massive French influence it hadundergone.


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Lexicon colloquial speech and media: ratio of Portuguese

borrowings can be as high as 75% for open class words

(Williams-van Klinken & Hajek 2009). informal urban speech, there are only 10 to 20% of

Portuguese loanwords (Williams-van Klinken & Hajek,

2009). In general, the ratio of lexical borrowings correlateswith the level of education and the proficiency in

Portuguese language.


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JBP: Beni, Ita nu'udargrupu dezenvolvimentu agrikultura lokl

saida makprinsipl liu ba Ita atu halo iha fulan ida-ne'e?Beni, what do you, as a part of the local agricultural development group, find the mostimportant to be done this month?

BE: Di'ak, obrigadu batempu,buatimportante mak ita halo noplanu ihafuturu makprimeiru, itasurvei ita-nia rain, rai ne'ebmak atu hala'oagrikultura nian, segundu, ita halo relasaun husu

apoiu ruma baajnsia ne'eb deit makrelevante, atu nune'e beleajuda ita-niagrupu, terseiru, ita tama ba kampu de servisu, ida-ne'e mak importante liu.

Well, thank you for the time. What is important that we do and plan in the future is, first,that we survey the soil that is going to be used for the agriculture, third, we will, most

importantly, do the fieldwork.


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Rezignasaun Xanana foImpaktu baEzekusaunOrsamentu Jeral Estadu 2014.Resignation of Xanana will impact the execution of the General State Budget2014

Esbosu Lei Imprensa Reprezenta Aspirasaun

Komunidade MediaDraft of the Press Laws represents an aspiration of the media community.

Komandu Geral PNTL Lansa Planu Estrategiku

PNTL

PNTL General Command launches a strategic plan for PNTL.

(all examples from Suara Timor Lorosae, February 11th 2014, pgs. 1-3)


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Lexicon in creole languages high number of foreign lexical elements is one of the most

salient characteristic of creole languages = the superstrate

language provides the overwhelming majority (75% to 95%)of a creoles vocabulary.

Tetun Prasa = most of its vocabulary is still native rather

than derived

McWhorter (2005:267): [L]exical mixture itself does notequate with creolization. Languages can borrow massive

amounts of lexicon and even morphology without evidencing

any traits that would suggest the label creole to anylinguist


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Structural featuresMcWhorter (2005:10): three characteristics that distinguish

creole from other languages in terms of structure:

little inflectional morphology no tones

semantically regular derivational morphology.

Languages spoken in Flores and Timor = present a very creole-like features =>McWhorter calls them Nonhybrid

Conventionalized Second-Language varieties NCSLs

(McWhorter 2011:246).


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Possessive constructions1. possessor + POSS (-(ni)nia) + possessum

2. possessum + possessor + POSS (-(ni)nian)

= two factors affecting them: the alienability/inalienability of the possessor

the lexical nature of the possessor (pronominal versus

nominal).

Tetun Terik does not require any possessive marker,

weather the possessor is nominal or pronominal = simple

juxtaposition possessor + possessum (gloss) (Hull &Eccless 2005:36).


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POSS with preposed pronominal possessors

only Tetun Prasa makes use of a possessive marker with

preposed pronominal possessors = possibly influenced by

a creole (Esperana 2001:33) similar construction also found in restructured varieties of

Malay and Portuguese spoken in the region:

Paauw (2008:408): Ambonese Malay (AmbM) - possessive

marker pung, e.g. antua pung rambut = 3S.FORMALPOSS hair her hair.

Hull and Eccles (2005:20) that the possessive marker -nia

used in Tetun Prasa originated indeed in Malay punya andthen assimilated to the 3S personal pronoun.


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POSS with preposed pronominal possessors similar parallel in all Asian varieties of Creole Portuguese,including Malacca CP, Macau CP (Batalha 1959:188) and

Bidau CP.

Baxter (1988:91-93): Malacca CP - two possessive markers:

=> sa: follows the possessor (possessor + sa + possessum)

=> di: precedes the possessor (possessum + di +

possessor) sa is possibly a contracted form of Port. sua 3S.POSS.FEM

= her (Rgo 1998:66) or of Port. vossa/nossa

2S.HON.FEM/1P.FEM = your/our (Baxter 1988:92-93), di

comes from Port. de of, from


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Plural marking1. no plural marking

2. postposing the native definite pluralmarker sira they3. the Portuguese plural markers/-es4. reduplication as found in Malay/Indonesian5. the Tetun Terik plural suffixr/-n


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(1) Hau b sosa fahi1S go buy pig

Im going to buy pigs. (Costa 2015:53)

(2) ema estudante tkniku agrikultura siraperson student technical agriculture PLtechnical students of agriculture (JBP_0005)

(3) ita-nia atividades loroloron ()2S.HON-POSS activity.PL RDP-dayyour everyday activities (JBP_0014)

(4) seluk seseluk (other - others)hotu hotu-hotu (everything everybody)ai-fuan fruit ai-fufuan fruits

(5) ema emar person - peoplebelu belun friend - friends


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Conclusions both sociolinguistic and linguistic aspects

the number of lexical borrowings nor the innovative

grammatical features are determinant = many scholars

believe that the grammar of creole is not necessarily much

different from non-creole languages.

McWhorter (2005:???): creole is not only a linguistic class but

also a sociohistorical one. Thomason and Kaufman (1991:214): we need to interpret

linguistic facts based on social context.

=> Tetun Prasa is indeed a rather unusually complex

contact language/variety which emerged within aheterogenous linguistic context.


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ReferencesALBUQUERQUE, DAVI BORGES DE. 2011. Esboo gramatical do Tetun Prasa: lngua oficial de Timor-Leste. Braslia:Universidade de Brasla MA thesis.BATALHA, GRACIETE NOGUEIRA. 1959. Estado actual do dialecto macaense. Separata da Revista portuguesa de filologia, vol.IX, 1958. 177-213. Coimbra: Casa do Castelo.BAXTER, ALAN NORMAN. 1988.A Grammar of Kristang (Malacca Creole Portuguese). Canberra: Australian NationalUniversity.

BAXTER, ALAN NORMAN. 1990. Notes on the Creole Portuguese of Bidau, East Timor.Journal of Pidgin and CreoleLanguages 5:1. 1-38.COSTA, LUS. 2015. Lngua Ttum Contributos para uma Gramtica. Lisbon: Edies Colibri.DURAND, FRDRIC. 2010. Histria de Timor-Leste da Pr-Histria Actualidade/Istria Timor-Leste nian husi Pre-Istria tooAtualidade. Lisboa: Lidel.ESPERANA, JOO PAULO T. 2001. Estudos de Lingustica Timorense. Aveiro: SUL Associao de Cooperao para o

Desenvolvimento.GRIMES, CHARLES.E. ET AL. (1997).A guide to the people and languages of Nusa Tenggara. Kupang: Artha Wacana Press. 13HIMMELMANN, NIKOLAUS P. 2005. The Austronesian languages of Asia and Madagascar: typological characteristics. TheAustronesian Languages of Asia and Madagascar, ed. by Alexander Adelaar and Nikolaus P. Himmelmann, 110-181. Londonand New York: Routledge Language Family Series.HOLM, JOHN. 1989. Pidgins and creoles: Volume II Reference Survey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.HOLM, JOHN. 2004.An introduction to pidgins and creoles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.HULL, GEOFFREY. 1993.Mai Kolia Tetun: a course in Tetum-Praa, the Lingua Franca of East Timor. North Sydney: AustralianCatholic Relief and Australian Catholic Social Justice CouncilHULL, GEOFFREY. (1999). Standard Tetum English Dictionary. Sydney: Allen & Unwin in assoc. with University of WesternSydney Macarthur.


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Thank you!Obrigadu barak!

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Why Tetun Prasa is Not a Creole