Contact Linguistics. Chap

Features borrowed Example

Introduction of new phones Emergence of opposition Indirect borrowing

or phonemic distinctions between /v/ and /f/ in ME. via loanwords
.

Loss of phonemic distinctions. Merger of /l/ and /l´/ in Substratum plus

Czech under German influence. Borrowing.
9.1.1. Constraints on phonological borrowing.

On the whole, phonological borrowing, even under heavy lexical borrowing appears to be quite rare, and subject to strong constraints. In his discussion of phonological “interference,” Weinreich pays attention mostly to constraints on substratum influence (1953:22). But one of his structural constraints - "the existence of suitable 'holes in the pattern' or 'empty cases' may apply equally well to borrowing situations. The constraint may be formulated as follows for borrowing:

Phonological constraint 1 (Borrowing):
The existence of gaps in the phonemic inventory of the recipient language facilitates the importation of new phonemes or phonemic oppositions that fill such gaps.

The phonemicization of voiced fricatives and affricates in opposition to their respective voiceless counterparts in Middle English, as described above, fits this scenario. The change was further facilitated by the fact that these phones already existed in Middle English, as non-distinctive allophones.

Cases involving the borrowing of phonological rules under conditions of close typological fit can also be found. Thomason & Kaufman (1988:97) provide examples such as the borrowing of a neutralization rule and allophonic rules among Mayan languages (Campbell 1976:184-185). All such innovations are facilitated by the fact that they fit well with the phonological structure of the recipient language.
We might propose the following constraint for such cases:


Phonological constraint 2 (Borrowing):
Borrowing of phonological rules is facilitated when such changes do not affect the basic phonemic inventory, and are restricted to patterns of allophonic distribution.

It should be noted once more that new phonological features are sometimes introduced into a TL by shifting speakers and then imitated by native speakers. It’s difficult to say how typological constraints like the above affect the extent to which native speakers are willing to incorporate such innovations in these cases. Recall also that, in cases involving intense contact and a high degree of bilingualism, the transfer of phonological features and rules may not be subject to such typological constraints. An example is the diffusion of several Turkish phonological features, including vowel harmony, into Asia Minor Greek (Thomason & Kaufman 1988:94, citing Dawkins 1916). It isn’t clear whether these types of diffusion can be described as “borrowings” in the strict sense of that term. On the whole, there is need for much more research on the constraints that govern the diffusion of phonological features, whether due to “borrowing” or to substratum transfer.

9.2. Impact of lexical borrowing on morphology.

In cases where words are borrowed along with affixes, new morphological patterns may also be introduced, and may or may not become productive. Examples include the borrowing of singular and plural pairs like focus/foci and formula/formulae from Latin into English. It is clear from examples like these that lexical change due to contact can involve varying degrees of structural change as well. We saw earlier that heavy lexical interference can introduce new phones or phonemic distinctions into the recipient language. It can also introduce new morphemes or morphological processes.

The borrowings from French discussed earlier also had some impact on English morphology, particularly on derivational processes. Several derivational affixes were imported along with French words, and several of these were extended to use with native stems. Thus, borrowings such as dis-connect, de-flee, en-rich, em-bolden, etc., yielded new prefixes. Similarly, items like conspir-acie, cert-ify, charit-able, declar-acioun, statu-ette etc, yielded a variety of suffixes, some of which became relatively productive as early as the Middle English period itself. For instance, the adjective-forming suffix -able, introduced along with loans like equatable, legible, potable, etc., was soon extended to native stems to yield words like spekable, knowable etc, and has become very productive. Abstract noun-forming suffix -erie, introduced in loans like flatterie, robberie, chivalry etc. was also attached to native stems to yield words like aldermanrie, husbondrie, etc. Table 5 gives some idea of the variety of suffixes that entered ME via French loan words (Source: Dalton-Puffer 1994).


Table 5. Examples of Romance suffixes entering ME through French loanwords.


Abstract noun suffixes: Agentive noun suffixes.