Doubly articulated consonants and complex onsets in the Creole languages of the Gulf of Guinea

Authors

  • Gabriel Antunes de Araujo

Keywords:

Phonology, Syllable, Portuguese-based Creoles Languages, Gulf of Guinea.

Abstract

In this paper, I introduce and describe a typology of consonants with double articulation (DA) and complex onset (CO) position in four Portuguese-based Creole languages from the Gulf of Guinea: Santomé (cst), Principense (CP), Angolar (CA) and Fá d’Ambô (CFA ). Although they share a common ancestor – the Proto-creole of the Gulf of Guinea – these four languages
differ in relation to tolerance of complex onsets, and in terms of the characteristic of the elements that can occupy this position, although they all permit doubly articulated consonants. This
variance has brought about a reorganization of the respective phonological systems, with co excluded from Angolar, Principense and Fá d’Ambô, and several elements allowed in Santomé. In addition to complex onsets, Santomé also allows supercomplex onsets, which are absent in all the other languages in the family. Thus, I demonstrate that McWhorter’s (2001) hypothesis of ‘simplicity of Creole languages’ cannot be applied to the group of Portuguese-based Creole languages of the Gulf of Guinea, as these languages contain complex consonants and syllabic structures, allowing them to be classified as typical, according to the typology of Maddieson
(1984) and Klein (2007), that is, languages with between 18 and 35 distinct consonant and vowel elements.

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Published

2016-04-04

How to Cite

Araujo, G. A. de. (2016). Doubly articulated consonants and complex onsets in the Creole languages of the Gulf of Guinea. Estudos Linguísticos (São Paulo. 1978), 40(1), 316–325. Retrieved from https://revistas.gel.org.br/estudos-linguisticos/article/view/1398

Issue

Section

Línguas Indígenas e Africanas