POST-CREOLE CONTINUUM
POST-CREOLE CONTINUUM A chain of language varieties which arises linking a CREOLE (also known as the BASILECT) to its SUPERSTRATE language (also known as the ACROLECT) via intermediate varieties referred to collectively as the MESOLECT: for example, the Jamaican post-creole continuum, ranging from Jamaican creole proper to a Jamaican standard English based on standard BrE. The following are Guyanese English Creole forms for standard English I gave him: Basilect Mi gii am; Mesolect A giv im; Acrolect A geev him. The differences between coexistent varieties in such a continuum are generally greater than might be expected in a community with ‘normal’ processes of dialect formation, particularly in terms of the amount and degree of syntactic and semantic variation. A post-creole continuum may develop when, after a period of relatively independent linguistic development, a post-pidgin or post-creole variety comes under a period of renewed influence from the superstrate (the relexifier language, or principal source of vocabulary). This is generally described as decreolization.
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Post , post1 / pōst/ • n. a long, sturdy piece of timber or metal set upright in the ground and used to support something or as a marker: follow the blue po… post- , post- comb. form of POST6 as in post-communion (liturg.) part of the Eucharistic service following the communion XV (— medL.); post-date affix a late… Variety , variety •banditti, bitty, chitty, city, committee, ditty, gritty, intercity, kitty, nitty-gritty, Pitti, pity, pretty, shitty, slitty, smriti, spitty… Standard , STANDARD A prestigious and uniform variety of a LANGUAGE: the literary standard, standard English. The application of the term to language dates from… Post-climax , Skip to main content
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POST-CREOLE CONTINUUM