Interfaces and Domains of Contact-Driven Restructuring (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics, Series Number 168)

The Afro-Hispanic Languages of the Americas (AHLAs) present a number of grammatical similarities that have traditionally been ascribed to a previous creole stage. Approaching creole studies from contrasting standpoints, this groundbreaking book provides a new account of these phenomena. How did these features come about? What linguistic mechanisms can account for their parallel existence in several contact varieties? How can we formalize such mechanisms within a comprehensive theoretical framework? How can these new datasets help us test and refine current formal theories, which have primarily been based on standardized language data? In addressing these important questions, this book not only casts new light on the nature of the AHLAs, it also provides new theoretical and methodological perspectives for a more integrated approach to the study of contact-driven restructuring across language interfaces and linguistic domains.

Sandro Sessarego is Associate Professor of Linguistics in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Texas at Austin and a member of the Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice. He works primarily in the fields of contact linguistics, sociolinguistics, syntax and human rights. He has published a number of books on law and linguistics; his most recent one is Language Contact and the Making of an Afro-Hispanic Vernacular (2019, Cambridge).