Linguistics 492/792-2: LANGUAGE CONTACTRequirements & Syllabus: Fall Term, 2006Instructor: Sarah G. Thomason: 1169 Undergraduate Science Building; tel. (61)5-2018;email: [email protected] hours: T 1:30-2:30, W 10:00-11:30, and by appointment.Textbook: Language Contact (Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press and Washington,DC: Georgetown University Press), by me. Don’t buy this book! I will give each student acopy. (BUT if you drop the course during the add/drop period, you have to give the bookback.)REQUIREMENTS:Active participation in classroom discussions, including leading discussions on one ormore topics; a proposal (2-5 pages, plus bibliography) for the final term paper; a full firstdraft of the term paper; the final term paper; and classroom presentations on students’ongoing research. The term paper proposal will not be graded, but failure to hand it in ontime will result in a one-half grade reduction in the course grade for each week the proposalis late. Students will be required to revise the proposal, if necessary, until it is satisfactory.The first draft of the term paper also won’t be graded, but again, failure to hand it in ontime will result in a one-half grade reduction in the course grade for each week the proposal islate. (Of course I won’t reduce grades in cases of documented unforeseen emergencies, suchas illness or a death in the family. I will also consider granting extensions if a student informsme several weeks in advance of a deadline of an anticipated scheduling difficulty.) The finalterm paper will count for half of the course grade, class presentations and participation forthe other half.Students should meet with me to discuss their ideas for term projects, or to get ideas incase they don’t have any. Office hours are good for this purpose, but it’s also easy to findother meeting times; outside of class, I’m generally easiest to reach by email.Students may work in teams of two on the term paper and on discussion-leading assign-ments.ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: I will give an E to any assignment on which there has beencheating of any kind, for instance plagiarism. If you’re not sure what counts as plagiarism,ask me.SYLLABUS:The schedule below is approximate. Some topics might take more time, some might takeless—it depends on how much time students want to spend discussing specific topics. Theschedule is also incomplete, because it doesn’t include student presentations on their ownresearch, except for the final end-of-term presentations of term projects.This class will be run as a seminar: aside from brief lectures designed to provide ageneral orientation for each topic, students will be responsible for initiating and carrying onthe discussion. In general, after the first class meeting, classes will begin with a brief overview1of the topic given by the instructor, followed by general discussion, questions and problemsraised by students. In some (not all) sessions, designated students will be responsible forleading the discussion of readings. As the term goes on, more and more class time will bedevoted to students’ discussion of their own research projects.WEEK-BY-WEEK SCHEDULE:1, Sept. 6: Overview of the course; overview of language con-tact: Who, when, where, what then?Textbook, Ch. 1.2, Sept. 13: Social settings: How do languages get into contact? Howlong do they stay in contact?Textbook, Ch. 2; students should begin doing indepen-dent reading, with a view to coming up with a topic fortheir own research projects. (This reading and other in-dependent research activity will continue throughout theterm; it won’t be mentioned again in the syllabus.3, Sept. 20: Multilingualism in nations and individuals.Textbook, Ch. 3; Fran¸cois Grosjean, Life with two lan-guages: an introduction to bilingualism (Harvard Univer-sity Press, 1982), chs. 1, ‘Bilingualism in the world’ (pp.1-41), and 4, ‘The bilingual child’ (pp. 167-227); PeterHans Nelde, ‘Language conflict’, in Florian Coulmas, ed.,The handbook of sociolinguistics, pp. 285-300 (Blackwell,1997).4-7, Sept. 27 - Oct. 18: Contact-induced language change. In week 5 studentswill probably begin to give short oral presentations, withhandouts, on their research.Textbook, Ch. 4; Malcolm Ross, ‘Contact-induced changein Oceanic languages in North-West Melanesia’, in Alexan-dra Aikhenvald & R.M.W. Dixon, eds., Areal diffusion andgenetic inheritance: problems in comparative linguistics,pp. 134-166 (Oxford University Press, 2001); AlexandraAikhenvald, Language contact in Amazonia (Oxford Uni-versity Press, 2002), ch. 1:1-17; Gillian Sankoff, ‘Linguisticoutcomes of language contact’, in J.K. Chambers, PeterTrudgill, & Natalie Schilling-Estes, eds., The handbook oflanguage variation and change, pp. 638-668 (Blackwell,2002); Donald Winford, ‘Contact-induced change: classi-fication and processes’, Diachronica 22:373-427 (2005).6, Oct. 11: PROPOSAL FOR TERM PAPER DUE.27, Oct. 18: Linguistic areas.Textbook, Ch. 5; Lyle Campbell, Terrence Kaufman,& Thomas C. Smith-Stark, ‘Meso-America as a linguis-tic area’, Language 62:530-570 (1986); Jouko Lindstedt,‘Linguistic Balkanization: contact-induced change by mu-tual reinforcement’, in Dicky Gilbers, John Nerbonne &Jos Schaeken, eds., Languages in contact, pp. 231-246(Rodopi, 2000).8, Oct. 25: Contact-induced language change: mechanisms.Textbook, Ch. 6; S. Thomason, ‘Language contact anddeliberate change’, forthcoming in Language Contact 1/1;Carol Myers-Scotton, ‘Code-switching’, in Florian Coul-mas, ed., The handbook of sociolinguistics, pp. 217-237(Blackwell, 1997).9-10, Nov. 1-8: Contact languages I: Pidgins and creoles.Textbook, Ch. 7; John R. Rickford & John McWhorter,‘Language contact and language generation: pidgins andcreoles’, in Florian Coulmas, ed., The handbook of soci-olinguistics, pp. 238-256 (Blackwell, 1997); Carol Myers-Scotton, Contact linguistics: bilingual encounters andgrammatical outcomes, ch. 6, ‘Lexical borrowing, split(mixed) languages, and creole formation’, pp. 233-294(Oxford University Press, 2002); Salikoko Mufwene, ‘Thelegitimate and illegitimate offspring of English’ (2006).11, Nov. 15: Contact languages II: Other mixed languages.Textbook, Ch. 8; Peter Bakker & Maarten Mous, ‘In-troduction’, in Bakker & Mous, eds., Mixed languages:15 case studies in language intertwining (Amsterdam:IFOTT), pp. 1-11; Joseph H. Greenberg, Joseph H., ‘Arethere mixed languages?’, in A. A.