Sinhala-English code-mixing in Sri Lanka A sociolinguistic study Published by LOT phone: +31 30 253 6006 Janskerkhof 13 fax: +31 30 253 6406 3512 BL Utrecht e-mail: [email protected] The Netherlands http://www.lotschool.nl Cover illustration: Bo tree, by Akila Daham Wettewe ISBN 978-90-78328-92-6 NUR 616 Copyright © 2009: Chamindi Dilkushi Senaratne. All rights reserved. Sinhala-English code-mixing in Sri Lanka A sociolinguistic study Een wetenschappelijke proeve op het gebied van de letteren Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen op gezag van de rector magnificus prof. mr. S. C. J. J. Kortmann volgens besluit van het College van Decanen in het openbaar te verdedigen op woensdag 1 juli 2009 om 10.30 uur precies door Chamindi Dilkushi Senaratne geboren op 25 juli 1972 te Colombo, Sri Lanka. Promotores: Prof. dr. P. C. Muysken Prof. dr. R. W. N. M. van Hout Manuscriptcommissie: Prof. dr. A.van Kemenade Prof. dr. W. M. Wijeratne (University of Kelaniya) Dr. U. Ansaldo (UvA) For ammi, thaththi, Akila and Sanjeewa CONTENTS Acknowledgements i List of figures & tables ii List of symbols & abbreviations v Part I BACKGROUND 1. Introduction and overview 1 1.1 Code-mixing in Sri Lanka 3 1.2 Definitions and terms 5 1.3 The present study 10 1.3.1 Respondents 11 1.3.2 Sociolinguistic analysis 13 1.3.3 Evaluative judgements on language varieties 13 1.3.4 Language analysis 14 1.4 Organization of the thesis 17 2. The Sri Lankan setting 21 2.1 Sinhala in the Sri Lankan setting 22 2.1.1 The historical context 24 2.1.2 The social context 27 2.2 The morphology of spoken Sinhala 39 2.3 The phonology of spoken Sinhala 42 2.3.1 The vowels 43 2.3.2 The consonants 43 2.4 The syntax of spoken Sinhala 44 2.4.1 Postpositions 44 2.4.2 Colloquial verbs 45 2.4.3 Articles 47 2.4.4 Emphatic forms and particles 48 2.4.5 Plural suffixes 49 2.4.6 Case markers 49 2.4.7 Affirmation and negation markers 50 2.4.8 Complementizers 50 2.5 Summary 51 2.6 Sri Lankan English (SLE) 52 2.6.1 The phonology of SLE 55 2.6.2 The morphology of SLE 56 2.6.3 The syntax of SLE 59 2.7 Conclusion 60 Part II THE SOCIOLINGUISTICS OF MULTILINGUALISM IN SRI LANKA 3. The sociolinguistic context 61 3.1 Respondents 61 3.1.1 Demographic characteristics of the sample 62 3.1.2 Domains of language use 65 3.1.3 Interlocutors and language use 67 3.1.4 Attitudinal characteristics of the sample 69 3.2 Conclusion 71 4 Evaluative judgments on language varieties in Sri Lanka: matched-guise results 75 4.1 Respondents 75 4.1.1 Demographic characteristics of the sample 76 4.1.2 Domains of language use 77 4.1.3 Interlocutors and language use 77 4.1.4 Attitudinal characteristics of the sample 78 4.2 Procedure and classification of data 79 4.3 Analysis 79 4.4 Conclusion 83 Part III CODE-MIXING 5 Code-mixing as a research topic 85 5.1 Previous views 85 5.2 Contemporary views 86 5.3 Sociolinguistic analyses 87 5.3.1 Gumperz 87 5.3.2 Kachru 90 5.3.3 Auer 96 5.3.4 Fasold 99 5.3.5 Heller 101 5.3.6 Conclusion 101 5.4 Psycholinguistic analyses 103 5.4.1 Grosjean 103 5.4.2 Conclusion 107 5.5 Structural analyses 108 5.5.1 Poplack 108 5.5.2 Myers-Scotton 112 5.5.3 Muysken 115 5.5.4 Conclusion 120 5.6 Language change 121 5.6.1 Thomason 121 5.6.2 Conclusion 124 5.7 Observations and challenges to contemporary views 125 5.7.1 Lone lexical items - borrowings or code-switches? 125 5.7.2 The MLF Model - challenges and observations 127 5.7.3 Equivalence and Free Morpheme Constraints- challenges and observations 129 5.8 Conclusion 130 6 Sinhala-English code-mixing: a structural analysis 133 6.1 Respondents 136 6.1.1 Demographic characteristics of the sample 137 6.1.2 Domains of language use 138 6.1.3 Interlocutors and language use 138 6.1.4 Attitudinal characteristics of the sample 139 6.1.5 Scaling the informants 139 6.2 Muysken’s (2000) CM typology 142 6.3 English elements in Sinhala sentences 144 6.3.1 Nouns and noun phrases 144 6.3.1.1 Singular nouns 144 6.3.1.2 Plural nouns 150 6.3.1.3 Noun phrases 156 6.3.1.4 Other cases 157 6.3.1.5 Summary 162 6.3.2 Modifiers, adverbs and adverbial phrases 163 6.3.2.1 Single word modifiers 163 6.3.2.2 Multi-word modifiers 166 6.3.2.3 Single word adverbs 167 6.3.2.4 Adverbial phrases 167 6.3.2.5 Summary 168 6.3.3 Verbs and verb phrases 169 6.3.3.1 Verb stems 169 6.3.3.2 Inflected verbs 173 6.3.3.3 Clipped verbs 174 6.3.3.4 Reduplicated verbs 175 6.3.3.5 Verbs phrases 175 6.3.3.6 Summary 176 6.3.4 Negations and politeness markers 176 6.3.5 Prepositional phrases 177 6.3.6 Discussion 178 6.4 Sinhala elements in English sentences 184 6.4.1 Nouns and noun phrases 185 6.4.1.1 Singular nouns 185 6.4.1.2 Plural nouns 185 6.4.1.3 Cultural, social and religious nouns 185 6.4.1.4 Constructions with Sinhala nouns as heads 186 6.4.1.5 Compound nouns 187 6.4.1.6 Noun phrases 190 6.4.1.7 Summary 190 6.4.2 Modifiers, adverbs and adverbial phrases 191 6.4.2.1 Constructions with Sinhala modifiers 191 6.4.2.2 Multi-word modifiers 193 6.4.2.3 Single word adverbs 195 6.4.2.4 Adverbial phrases 196 6.4.2.5 Summary 197 6.4.3 Verbs and verb phrases 197 6.4.3.1 Present tense verbs 197 6.4.3.2 Imperative verbs 198 6.4.3.3 Past tense verbs 198 6.4.3.4 Infinitive verbs 199 6.4.3.5 Reduplicated verbs 199 6.4.3.6 Summary 200 6.4.4 Expressions 200 6.4.5 Particles, interjections and quotatives 201 6.4.6 Affirmatives, negatives and disjunctions 205 6.4.7 Discussion 206 6.5 Conjoined sentences 207 6.5.1 Complex constituents 208 6.5.2 Long switches 211 6.5.3 Tag-switching 212 6.5.4 Syntactically unintegrated switches 214 6.5.5 Flagging 215 6.5.6 Embedding in discourse 218 6.5.7 Repetitions 233 6.5.8 Bidirectional switching 234 6.5.9 Discussion 235 6.6 Mixing types in the Sinhala-English corpus 235 6.6.1 CM 235 6.6.2 Borrowing 237 6.6.3 Sinhalization 237 6.6.4 Hybridization 238 6.6.5 Summary 245 6.7 Conclusion 247 7 Code-mixing devices 251 7.1 CM as the ‘expected’ code in Sri Lanka 251 7.2 CM as a foregrounding device 252 7.2.1 English elements in Sinhala sentences 252 7.2.2 Sinhala elements in English sentences 254 7.3 CM as a neutralization device 254 7.4 CM as a nativization device 254 7.5 CM as a process of hybridization 255 7.6 Conclusion 255 Part IV CONCLUSIONS AND APPENDICES 8 Summary and conclusions 257 Bibliography 261 Appendices 267 Appendix 1 The sociolinguistic questionnaire 267 Appendix 2 A sample of a recording 272 Appendix 3 A sample of the English text -Matched guise 273 Appendix 4 A sample of the Sinhala text-Matched guise 274 Appendix 5 A sample of the Sinhala-English mixed text - Matched guise 275 Appendix 6 A sample of the text with Sinhalizations - Matched guise 275 Appendix 7 Attitudinal questionnaire for the matched guise technique 276 Appendix 8 Bilingual data 279 Samenvatting (Summary in Dutch) 315 Curriculum Vitae 317 Acknowledgements I would like to extend my sincere appreciation and gratitude first and foremost to Prof. Pieter Muysken for the support, encouragement and guidance without which this thesis would not have been possible. I greatly appreciate the faith and confidence you placed in me. I am deeply grateful for all the meetings and discussions, which served as a constant source of motivation for me, and for the short and brief but very enlightening emails from which I benefited a lot. Thank you for having faith in me. I also wish to extend my sincere gratitude to Prof. Roeland van Hout for the insightful statistical analyses of my data in the sociolinguistic and attitudinal surveys, and for the guidance and support given to me throughout my study. Thank you for all the criticisms, comments and for reading my manuscript. Also, I wish to thank both Prof. Pieter Muysken and Prof. Roeland van Hout for assisting me in the Dutch translation of the summary. I wish to express my deepest gratitude to the Vice Chancellor of the University of Kelaniya for extending his support and guidance right throughout my project. I wish to thank Prof. W. M. Wijeratne of the Department of Linguistics at the University of Kelaniya for his insightful comments and for all the discussions on Sinhala which were immensely beneficial to me.