(off-list) Re: Creole languages (was Who is Eddy Peters?)

[James Smith]

What language is not a "creole" in the sense indicated
in these posts?  Is there a "pure" language?


--- "D. Ezra Johnson" <ezra_50 at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> >>I have long had the idea that English is the way
> it is because
> >>it's a creole, but I've never been able to get
> anyone to examine
> >>the idea seriously.
> >>Jim Landau
> >
> >Almost every linguist I know who does research on
> English
> ><knows> or <asumes> that English is a creole. I am
> mystified
> >by your comment.
> >
> >Bethany
>
> I know that in their 1988 book "Language Contact,
> Creolization, and Genetic
> Linguistics", Sarah Thomason and Terence Kaufman
> severely criticize the
> "English-as-a-creole" hypothesis.
>
> And in a course I took on language contact with
> Gillian Sankoff, the topic
> came up, and her opinion was that not many
> _creolists_ have ever taken this
> seriously.
>
> Maybe other linguists have found the idea more
> attractive. The gist of the
> argument is simply that the conditions necessary for
> creole formation were
> not even close to being met in the Middle English
> period.
>
> DEJ
>
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=====
James D. SMITH                 |If history teaches anything
SLC, UT                        |it is that we will be sued
jsmithjamessmith at yahoo.com     |whether we act quickly and decisively
                               |or slowly and cautiously.

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