Intentional language change and the connection between mixed languages and genderlects

Abstract

This paper links genderlects and mixed languages. Both may have their roots in a gender dichotomy, where two distinct populations come together and blend into a new one, with different linguistic consequences. Mixed languages are generally assumed to be the result of deliberate or conscious language change and often come about as the result of an act of identity, connected to the birth of a new social or ethnic group. Societies or ethnic groups that are the result of mixed marriages may develop a mixed language or a genderlect. I show that there is a connection between the two, as proven in one specific case: a mixed language developed into a genderlect over several centuries. Typically, mixed languages combine elements from two languages with results that are so unusual that they are clearly not the result of normal language change, i.e. they are not outcomes of regular transmission between generations. Certain combinations found in genderlects show parallel patterns, for example in having personal pronouns or deictic elements that derive from other languages. Comparative evidence based on structural parallels suggests that some such genderlects (though not necessarily all) derive from deliberate changes by earlier generations. In this paper, I also investigate whether there is a link between societies with socially quite different roles for men and women, and societies with a genderlect, and find that such a link does not seem to exist.