Pidgins and Creoles

I just finished reading a book titled Bastard Tongues by Derek Bickerton. In it, he explores the origin of pidgin and Creole languages around the world, specifically in Africa, the Indian Ocean, the Caribbean, and Hawai’i. His theory, not unlike what Chomsky postulates, is that children are born with a “bioprogram” that allows them to create Creoles out of pidgin tongues, filling in missing aspects of grammar by similar methods used worldwide regardless of the substrate language or languages influencing the pidgin. He states, for instance, that most Creole languages have subject-verb-object (SVO) word order, like English.

Bickerton unfortunately does not, however, take into consideration Native North American so-called pidgins, such as those that have been traditionally called Mobilian (Trade) Jargon or Choctaw-Chickasaw Trade Jargon (once spoken in the Southeast and Mississippi Valley) and Chinook Jargon (once spoken in the Northwest). Mobilian in fact has an OsV word order (small ‘s’ indicating that the subject is optional and often not employed). Thus:

ete (eno) cãle.
wood (1S) cut
I cut the wood.

While many linguists and others have postulated that, what I now like to refer to as the Mobilian International Language (MIL)1, came about only after European contact, I agree with Drechsel (1997) who postulates that this “pidgin” language shows far more ancient origins. For one thing, the OsV word order is unknown to any of the modern languages of the Southeast, including Choctaw and Chickasaw (SOV), from which MIL is supposed to have arisen, and it certainly does not display the SVO word order that is common to all the European contact languages (Spanish, French, English). This OsV word order is, however, the word order of Proto-Muskogean. There is also the fact that, despite later contact with Spanish, French, and English, few words from these European languages entered MIL's vocabulary. Thus, I believe these facts point to MIL's roots going back long before European contact and probably having been used by various southeastern and Mississippian nations as a common trade language for centuries, along with Native American sign language.

While most pidgins and Creoles have come about through contact of indigenous languages with European colonial languages, I think it’s important to realize that not all of them have. In fact, Bickerton himself talks about Pidgin Hawaiian, not Pidgin English, having been in use in Hawai’i well before Pidgin English came about. This was because Hawai’i was already a long established progressive monarchy when Europeans and others first began arriving, and, well, if these immigrants wanted to communicate with Hawaiians, they needed to learn to communicate in Hawaiian the best they could. (Hawaiians, being in the dominant position at the time, were not about to learn English, Portuguese, Tagalog, or Japanese to communicate with these newcomers.) The result of this, before the American overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893, was Pidgin Hawaiian, which looked something like this:

(Bickerton 2008: 211)
Wau no ku’ai kela kapiki. (Pidgin Hawaiian)
I NEG buy that cabbage.
A’ole au e ku’ai aku i kela kapiki. (Bickerton)2
’A’ole au e kū’ai aku i kēlā kāpiki. (Hawaiian)
NEG 1S sell that cabbage.
I won’t sell the cabbage.

Note that the positive sentence pattern in Hawaiian would be: Kū’ai aku au i kēlā kāpiki, "sell 1S that cabbage," which is VSO. (Negative sentence structure in Hawaiian mandates changing its usual VSO word order.) But note that the Pidgin form is SVO, in line with Bickerton’s contention.

NOTES:

1. I find this a far better name than Mobilian (Trade) Jargon, for it expresses what Mobilian actually was, an "international" language used among many southeastern Nations, including the Biloxis, as a mode of communication for trade, joint ceremonial rituals, and politics in the context of intertribal regional alliances. It is important to note that, while most pidgins have negative connotations and are not highly regarded, the opposite was true of MIL. Southeastern nations had no negative attitude about using the pidgin, and, in fact, it is believed they often used the language among themselves in order to confuse or hinder communication with encroaching Europeans, who often thought MIL was actually Choctaw, Chickasaw, or some other language.

2. Why Bickerton or his editors did not employ the crucial macrons of Hawaiian orthography is a mystery to me, especially since he has lived and taught in Hawai'i and is writing about Hawaiian pidgin languages. Thus, I have included the macrons as they should appear underneath the macronless transcription appearing in his book.

References:

Bickerton, Derek. 2008. Bastard tongues: a trailblazing linguist finds clues to our common humanity in the world's lowliest languages. New York: Hill and Wang.

Drechsel, Emanuel. 1997. Mobilian Jargon: linguistic and sociohistorical aspects of a Native American pidgin. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Hawai’i
What does it mean, anyway?

I was looking into the name "Hawai’i" to try and find its meaning, if there was one. I checked the Hawaiian Dictionary by Pukui and Elbert (1986). This is what they say:

Elsewhere in Polynesia, Hawai’i or a cognate is the name of the underworld or of the ancestral home, but in Hawai’i the name has no meaning.

However, in an interesting little book by Leinani Melville titled, Children of the Rainbow, Melville states that he was told by a Hawaiian elder fisherwoman named Ta Ruahine the following (almost oddly scientific) creation story which may give some clue to the name’s actual origin and meaning:

At commencement of the earth’s history this blazing globe, a rumbling, quivering, ball of fire, sprouted from the sun, containing all of its fertilizing elements. The spinning orb, screaming and crackling, raced through space whistling among the spheres, roaring in the wind, radiating light as it flashed through the night of its creation. It was directed to this dark abyss in the vast emptiness of space by the mind, the will, and the energy of [ke Akua] God. The fireball gradually slowed down, found anchorage in this pit of heaven which was destined to become its permanent home, and began revolving slowly in unending circular movements.

When the flaming globe found its orbit, lava, seething within the pumping bowels of its raging surface, attracted from the colder realms of outer space a blanket of clouds laden with moisture. The earth’s electrical magnetism caused a downpour of nectar from the firmament. Thus rain was born. Crystal raindrops cascaded in glistening sheets upon this jagged, treeless crater, drenched its raw plains and quenced its flames. The rains swept tempestuously on to bathe the expansive depths of the earth’s sizzling cradle. Thus the ocean was born from the water that washed clean this crater of heaven. And thus Havai’i received its name from the moisture which mercifully cooled the steaming terrain.

This apparently relates to the word hāwai, which literally means “to generate steam in an earth oven by pouring on water; to purify with water" (Pukui & Elbert 1986:62). The little particle i at the end means, among other things, "by means of." Thus, according to this story, the name Hawai’i apparently originates from hāwai + i = Hawai’i, or "by means of purifying with [rain] water." (With shortening of the long vowel, which can happen with compounds in Hawaiian, e.g., 'ōlelo, speak; mo’olelo, story).

By the way, as it's about time for me to get Kansas registration and license (since my California one expires next month), I'm hoping to get a personalized license plate, which in Kansas has a picture of a bison on it, and I want to put KAOLELO on it. This means "the language" in Hawaiian, ka + 'ōlelo. (Can't do the glottal stop or macron signs, but oh well.) I'm hoping nobody else in Kansas will have Hawaiian words on a bison license plate! (And, since front license plates are not required in Kansas, I'll leave my old California plate on it, lest anyone forget where I'm from!)

Citations:

Melville, Leinani (1969). Children of the Rainbow: The Religion, Legends, and Gods of Pre-Christian Hawaii. Wheaton: The Theosophical Publishing House.

Pukui, M. and S. Elbert (1986). Hawaiian Dictionary. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Makahiki Hou

I was looking through some of my old notes and handouts from when I took a Hawaiian class a few years ago and came across some seasonally appropriate material:

Makahiki is the traditional Hawaiian version of New Year. The Makahiki season begins with the first sighting of the constellation Pleiades, Makali’i, in late October or November and ends about four months later with the rising of the fourth new moon. It is the time when the god Lono-i-ka-makahiki reigns over the ancient god of war Kū, and the people enjoy peace and harmony. It is also the time for tax collection, thanksgiving, and feasting. There are various rites of purification and celebrations during the Makahiki season.

Once the Makahiki season ends, Lono(1) returns to Kahiki (Tahiti) and the time of Kū begins again, which is symbolic of the ali’i (chief) reasserting his power and imposing kapu (taboo) to be observed for the rest of the year.

Here is an ancient chant from the Makahiki season:

Nā ‘Aumākua

Nā ‘Aumākua mai ka lā hiki a ka lā ‘ākau
Mai ka ho’okui a ka hālawai
Nā ‘Aumākua ia Kahinakua ia Kahina’alo
Ia ka ‘ākau i ka lani
O kīhā i ka lani, ‘owē i ka lani
Nunulu i ka lani, kāholo i ka lani
Eia ka pulapula a ‘oukou, nā po’e o ka Pakipika
E mālama ‘oukou ia mākou
E ulu i ka lani, e ulu i ka honua, e ulu i ka pae ‘āina o ka Pakipika
E homai ka ‘ike
E homai ka ‘ikaika
E homai ka ‘akamai
E homai ka maopopo pono
E homai ka ‘ike pāpālua
E homai ka mana
‘Āmama ua noa.

To the ancestral deities from the rising to the setting sun
From the zenith to the horizon
The ancestral deities who stand at our back and at our front
You who stand at the right side
A breathing in the heavens
An utterance in the heavens
Here are your descendants, the people of the Pacific(2)
Safeguard us
That we may flourish in the heavens
That we may flourish on the earth
That we may flourish on the islands of the Pacific
Grant us knowledge
Grant us strength
Grant us intelligence
Grant us the understanding
Grant us the spiritual insight
Grant us the power.
The prayer is lifted, it is free.(3)

The translation of the chant above is not my own, and as I was thumbing through the dictionary to find some unfamiliar words, it seems some poetic liberties were taken by the translator. For instance, although kīhā is translated as 'breathing' by this translator, the only dictionary entry I found defines it as 'belch.' A belch in the heavens?! Well, I guess breathing sounds better than belching, so I'll go along with this more poetic translation!

1. Lono is one of the four ancient gods brought from Tahiti and is associated with peace, fertility, and agriculture, the clustering of dark clouds, thunder, whirlwinds, waterspouts, earthquakes, and the Kona rain. This same god is known as Rongo on Rapanui (Easter Island; Hawaiian l = Rapanui and Tahitian r) and is the namesake of the Rongorongo hieroglyphic script of that island, which has not been deciphered.
2. I suspect this is altered from the traditional chant, since Pakipika for 'Pacific' was obviously borrowed from English in post-missionary times. Perhaps the original was simply moana or kai, 'ocean' or 'sea.'
3. This is a pre-missionary, or pre-Christian, ending of a traditional prayer.

Hau'oli Makahiki Hou! Happy New Year!

More Hawaiian

In case you haven’t realized by now, I’m a big fan of the fascinating Hawaiian language. As with the Amerindian languages, the more I study Hawaiian the more intriguing it gets! No language deserves to die, and Hawaiian is a good example of a language whose many nuances of thought and expression would be lost to us forever if it went extinct. I’m very glad that Hawaiian (and its close cousin Māori of New Zealand) has a strong, successful revitalization program that serves as a poster-child for indigenous language revitalization efforts everywhere.

I’ll here give an example of a typical "professional" attitude expressed not all that long ago toward Hawaiian (and I could add other indigenous [Amerindian] languages) based on old European superiority and ethnocentrism:

"There is a great want of generic terms in the language. This is a peculiarity that distinguishes it from the English, but not from other uncultivated languages. No people have use for general terms until they begin to reason, and the language of the Hawaiians shows that they have never been a thinking people…." (italics mine)

Now how’s that for a dose of ethnocentrism?!

That was written by a missionary reverend, Lorrin Andrews, in 1838 while studying and composing a grammar of the language. He was definitely a product of his times, in that anything non-European was essentially "savage" and "barbaric." (It was not, after all, Latin or Greek.)

Anyway, I was reviewing some Hawaiian grammar and thought I’d blog about a few of the more interesting aspects of this intriguing language.

First, there’s an interesting syntactic change between positive and negative statements:

a. Ua hele ‘oia.
PERF go HON-3S
He went.

but

Negative

b. A’ole ‘oia i hele.
NEG HON-3S PERF go
He did not go.

Note that, in a negative sentence, the subject pronoun comes before the verb instead of after (the usual) with a particle inserted. (Hawaiian is a VSO language, by the way. Particles form an important part of Hawaiian grammar [the ‘glue’ that holds the language together], and they often cannot be translated into English.) Notice that the perfective particle ua becomes i in the negative.

Semi-passive Construction

I also came across an interesting example of a type of "semi-passive construction" (for lack of a better term), i.e., the sentence appears to be both passive and active at the same time!

Ua aloha ‘ia au iā Ka-lalau.
PERF love PASS 1S to Ka-lalau.
I love Ka-lalau.

This is instead of the full active form:

Ua* aloha au iā Ka-lalau.

I’m really not sure what the semantic difference is here between the active and this “semi-passive” form. If there are perchance any native speakers out there reading this, e kōkua mai! (help!)

Particle ai

This particle has been called a linking particle, anaphoric particle, or resumptive pronoun:

a. Ua holo mākou i laila.
PERF ride 1P-EXC to there
We rode there.

b. I laila mākou i holo ai.
to there 1P-EXC PERF ride AI
It was there that we rode to.

In sentence b, in order to topicalize the location ‘there’, the anaphoric or resumptive ai is used to refer back to the fronted topic i laila.

ka wā a Paka’a i ha’alele aku ai iā Waipi’o.
DET time of Paka’a PERF leave thither AI Waipi’o
The moment when Paka’a left Waipi’o.

There is a cognate ai in Tongan, another Polynesian language:

Ko e fefine na’e tokoni ‘a Sione ki ai.
PRED DEF woman PAST help ABS John to AI
It is the woman John helped (to her).

According to Christopher Baker (no date),

"Resumptive pronouns normally occur in ‘logical’ positions. For example, [the example above] from Tongan has the resumptive pronoun ai following the preposition ki ‘to’. In Hawaiian, though, the resumptive pronoun does not occur in its ‘logical’ position; it occurs after the verb in the post-verbal aspect marker position. The resumptive pronoun of Tongan and Hawaiian are indeed cognates. The positions in which they occur are simply not the same. The ai in Hawaiian is only found in one position, i.e., the same position as the post-verbal aspect marker; it is never found in nominal position as in Tongan."

Finally, here’s an example of a long, complex Hawaiian sentence:

Ā loa’a nā wa’a, he mau kaulua,
when get DEF-PL canoe, INDEF group double-outrigger
ho’i maila lākou ā pae ma Wai-kīkī
return here-then 3P and land at Wai-kīkī
ho’omākaukau ka holo ā holo nō ia lā;
prepare DEF sailing and sail indeed this day
ia wā ho’olā’au mai ‘o Kou, kekahi wahine
this time urge here HON Kou another woman
a Ka-welo e holo pū i Kaua’i
of Ka-welo to sail together to Kaua’i
hō’ole aku-la ‘o Ka-welo.
refuse there-then HON Ka-welo

‘When [they] had gotten the canoes, double-outriggers, they returned and landed at Wai-kīkī, made preparations for sailing, and sailed on this day; at this time Kou, another wife of Ka-welo, urged that she sail also to Kaua’i; Ka-welo refused [her].’

Pau hana.

* Ua is glossed as perfective. Hawaiian is largely an aspectual language, often making no clear and definite distinction between present and past tense, though it does distinguish between whether an action is complete or incomplete.

Examples above from (1) Hawaiian Grammar by Elbert & Pukui, 1979 and (2) a paper titled Hawaiian Relative Clause Structure by Christopher Baker (online; no date).

Another ōlelo no’eau


Okay, so I've been listening to Mark Keali'i Ho'omalu's CD "Call It What You Like" in the car lately driving around Lawrence and it's definitely got me in a Hawaiian mood. As any of you who've followed my blog know, I occasionally try to find tidbits of wisdom, proverbs, or stories from the languages I'm studying. (Notice I don't use the past tense "studied." I mean, do we ever really finish "studying" a language, whether it's a new foreign language or our own mother tongue? I think learning a language is a lifelong process and a lifelong endeavor. I point that out to my students of Spanish who think they'll "study" Spanish for one or two semesters and then they'll know it and be done with it. That just makes me want to quote Nelson on the Simpsons and say, "Ha ha!")

Anyhow, Hawaiian. Here is the latest ōlelo no’eau ("important saying" or proverb) from Hawai'i:

Maka'ala ke kanaka kahea manu.
alert DEF man call bird

A man who calls birds should always be alert.

The ancient Hawaiian ali'i, chiefs, wore capes and headdresses crafted by weaving in thousands of tiny bird feathers. The Kanaka Kahea Manu, bird-caller, would imitate bird calls to attract birds to him. When they approached, he would pluck out a small number of their feathers and let the birds go. Once he called the birds, he had to stay alert and be prepared to move quickly to catch them when they came near. This proverb advises one who wishes to succeed to be alert to opportunities and seize them when they arise.

By the way, that definite article ke reminds me of something. Do any ōlelo Hawai'i kine out there know the answer to this question? It appears other Polynesian languages have only one form of the definite article, such as Tahitian and Māori te. Hawaiian, however, has two: ke and ka. I know ke is used most often before nouns beginning with a vowel or the letter k (e.g., ke ala, ke kanaka) and ka is used before nouns beginning with all other consonants, including glottal stops (e.g., ka hula, ka 'aina). But why do a few words beginning with p (e.g., pā, dish and po'o, head) require ke instead of ka before them? So far I've found no good answers in the dictionaries or grammar books I have. Has this phenomenon even been studied? (Aw, it must have been!)

Ā hui hou.

"...Early Hawaiian monumental architecture was comparable to ... the Maya or the early Egyptians...

since all appeared to have linked temple construction to economic, political and ritual development."

Maui's Oldest Temple, Pi'ilanihale Heiau, named for its famous Chief Pi'ilani, has now been dated to 1214 and is 400 years older than previously thought. It measures larger than a football field and stands 12 meters in height.

Archaeologica (link at right) has an interesting article from Discovery News on this temple and what it reveals about the Polynesian past.

Here are some highlights of the article:

"The most elaborate temples featured altars, oracle towers, offering pits, palisades, drum houses, and god or ancestral images carved from wood or stone."

"At some events there would have been human sacrifice, the killing of hundreds of pigs, the sounds of music and drumming, and the smell of burning fires."

"Members of the chiefly class were allowed into sacred areas of the temples, but they had to get in prostrate positions or lie down, sometimes for hours, as a sign of submission and respect for the chief."

Interesting stuff! By the way, James Michener's Hawai'i is quite well researched and offers a fascinating description of early Hawaiian (and Polynesian) culture and life right on up to the "colonizing" by Christian missionaries and the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy by US businessmen, descendants of these missionaries.

Question: Does anyone know where the name Hawai'i comes from?

Ancient Hawaiian Chant

I came across this oli ho'ohanohano ali'i or chant for revering the chief. It is not for dancing. The chanters were probably accompanied only by the sound of a single drum. It gives a sense of the reverence paid to the ancient (god-like) chiefs:

Nō ka lani ka moku, ka honua,
Ka uka, ka moana, nō ka lani,
Nona ka pō, nona ke ao,
A nona ke kau, ka ho’oilo, ka makali’i,
Ka malama, ka huihui hōkū lani e kau nei.

Here is my attempt at a translation:

For the Chief the island, the earth,
The mountains, the sea, for the Chief,
For him the darkness, for him the light,
And for him the seasons, the winter, the summer,
The moon, the clustered stars placed in the heavens.

Chant from Spoken Hawaiian by Samuel Elbert, 1970. The translation is mine.

Hawaiian Proverb

Thought I'd end the week with a Hawaiian proverb:

I ka ‘ōlelo nō ke ola, i ka ‘ōlelo nō ka make.
In words is life, in words is death.

In ancient Hawai'i, a kahuna 'ana'ana could pray someone to death or counter another's death prayer. The proverb is a reminder that words can either heal or destroy people, so we'd better be careful with our words.

Language Myth #1:
Hawaiian has no word for snow

False. Hawaiian does indeed have a word for snow, and ice. The word is hau. Granted such cold weather words are never needed in most of Hawai’i, but the ancient Hawaiians were certainly aware of the white stuff on the Big Island of Hawai’i where Mauna Kea is covered with it each year. (In fact, Mauna Kea means "white mountain" and was so named by the Hawaiians for its winter coat.) When snow covers the mountain, the Hawaiians say

Ua kau ka hau
PF rest DEF snow
Snow is resting [on it]

If the Hawaiians want to specifically distinguish snow from ice, they use hau kea, white hau. To distinguish frost from snow, they can use the word hau’oki, cut snow or ice. The term poke hau (sliced hau) is used for ice cubes.

A poetic term for ice is used in some stories:

Wai pū’olo i ka lau lā’au
Water wrap in DEF leaf tree
Water wrapped in the leaves of trees

since ice was carried from Mauna Kea down to the lowlands in ancient times.

The Māori of New Zealand also have much experience with snow. Their word is huka, which is cognate with the Hawaiian hu’a (an example of the Hawaiian habit of turning Polynesian k into a glottal stop), meaning froth or foam (of a beach).

From Pila Wilson, University of Hawai'i.