Pour une étude du parler à Saint-Martin : l’exemple des pratiques verbales de lycéens plurilingues

To the extent that the constant migratory flows in the French-Dutch Caribbean island of St. Martin may explain the contact between different forms of English, they also provide strong evidence of the wealth of languages which this study does not attempt to simplify but rather to organise. The linguistic repertoire of St. Martin is complex and consists of several languages, including a dialectical form, West Indian English, which is itself composed of micro-variants spoken in the different parts of the island where it is found. The principal aim of this study is to increase understanding of the hitherto little-studied “Saint-Martin Talk” through the example of the language used by high school students on St Martin, who are taught in French, during their classroom exchanges. We will explore the degree to which one can consider “Saint-Martin Talk” to be essentially a form of English-based Creole (EBC) and not a specifically French-based Creole (FBC). For this we will maintain two hypotheses. On the one hand, we will suppose that EBC forms part of a language continuum which borrows a certain number of linguistic components from the contact languages (English, Creole, French). On the other hand, we will hold that EBC has nevertheless remained a relatively autonomous mode of speech, in particular in the expression of certain linguistic forms which are not derived from the contact languages. The principal difficulty encountered in the study of language forms derived from contact languages is the clear demarcation of the set of rules involved in the combination of a word or an expression, as well as that of their relationships to the context in which they are used. Even though this is a difficult question for which there is perhaps no clear answer, in order to clarify those elements which derive from any particular language, we will study the proposed language forms on two complementary levels. The first concerns mainly form: here we are interested in minimal units, whether they are non-meaningful (phonology) or meaningful (morphology), as well as the ways in which the word groups studied are combined (syntax). The second, lexis, is more concerned with the content. It hinges on the phonological, morphological and syntactical components, but also on the semantic component (for which we are seeking to determine the language(s) from which the features of the principal characteristics are drawn) and on the context from which these components draw some of their interpretation. The corpora have been established from recordings made in class with pupils during their group work. All the transcriptions are of interactions between five groups of pupils (composed of dyads or triads). The exchanges provide an opportunity to alternate between French and English during the session, although the final productions required in each of the situations must be expressed in French. The analysis of language forms used by the high school students offers some very interesting perspectives on which future studies in this as yet under-researched field of “Saint-Martin Talk” could build. The border between contact languages is more porous than ever ; however, this study shows that “Saint-Martin Talk” is essentially also an EBC. Our research confirms many cases of phonological, morphological and syntactical uses which can be traced specifically to African American English, EBC and FBC, standard English and standard French, all in the course of the same utterance. Even more than the other components, the lexis appears to confirm the influence of the contact languages, from which it simultaneously borrows the phonological, morphological and semantic characteristics of one or another of these languages. It must be noted that the presence of contact languages changes the relationship between the signified and the signifying, of which the phonic and graphic forms derive from different languages. In the light of this, we can validate the two starting hypotheses. “Saint-Martin Talk” is composed of a language continuum which borrows its components (phonological, morphological, syntactical and lexical) from all the contact languages (English, Creole, French). The second hypothesis, according to which “Saint-Martin Talk” may produce some original language forms is here only partly validated. This study allows us to attest to the liveliness of the processes at work in the development of the students’ utterances, which are not simply language alternation (English, Creole, French), but exhibit a continuum of languages, including dominant languages, although the link to any particular language is always highly questionable