A Cross-linguistic Comparison of Copular Predication: Some Basic Assumptions Revisited

This paper explores the syntax of copular predication within and across the varieties of Cape Verdean Creole bringing new insights about the morpho-syntactic properties of the copula with respect to functional and lexical categories. The behavior of the copula will be shown to reflect both superstratal, substratal and universal influences present in other languages. Furthermore, the study of copular predicates in which the copula is absent will reveal the specific underlying conditions in which such type of predicates occurs. A cursory typological study of semi-creoles such as AAVE and other non-creole languages will show that the same underlying conditions are present in a number of other world languages. Finally, a theoretical analysis will account for two types of copular predicates in Cape Verdean Creole: the first part highlights the distributional properties of the Cape Verdean copula within and across varieties. The second part illustrates copulaless predicates and the conditions under which they occur