Language Contact in New Zealand: A Focus on English Lexical Borrowings in Māori

• Authors: Marta Degani
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

In New Zealand a peculiar language contact scenario has emerged from the mutual influence between the indigenous Māori language and English (cf. Benton 1985). Sharing the fate of many indigenous languages, Māori was overwhelmed by an imperial power but it was not eradicated. What remained of Māori was indisputably affected by English, but Māori also left its traces on the variety of English that developed in New Zealand. While the lexical influence of Māori on English has already been the subject of various studies, the impact of English on Māori still remains to be accounted for to a large extent (cf. Harlow 2004). This paper explores the presence of English lexical borrowings in Māori by analyzing the one thousand most frequent Māori words in the Māori Broadcast Corpus (Boyce 2006). In particular, the study will consider which types of English loans emerge among the core vocabulary of Māori and how these loans have been integrated in the language.

Keywords

EN

language contact; New Zealand; lexical borrowing; Māori; Aotearoa

• Publisher: Komisja Nauk Filologicznych Polskiej Akademii Nauk, Oddział we Wrocławiu
• Journal: Academic Journal of Modern Philology
• Year: 2012
• Volume: 1
• Pages: 13-24

Contributors

author

Marta Degani

• University of Verona

References

• Belich, James (1998) The New Zealand Wars. Auckland: Penguin.
• Bellett , Donna (1995) “Hakas, hangis and kiwis: Māori lexical infl uence on New Zealand English.” [In:] Te Reo 38, 73–103.
• Benton, Richard (1985) “Māori, English, and Māori English.” [In:] John Pride (ed.) Cross-Cultural Encounters: Communication and Mis-communication. Melbourne: River Seine Publications, 110–120.
• Biggs, Bruce (1981) Complete English–Māori Dictionary. Auckland: Auckland University Press.
• Boyce, Mary (2006) A Corpus of Modern Spoken Māori. PhD thesis, Victoria University, Wellington.
• Coetsem, Frans van (2000) A General and Unified Theory of the Transmission Process in Language Contact. Winter: Heidelberg.
• Degani, Marta (2009) “Are they still warriors? Reflections on the use of Māori lexis in New Zealand English.” [In:] Marina Dossena, Domenico Torrett a, Annamaria Sportelli (eds.) Migration of Forms. Forms for Migration. Proceedings of the XXIII AIA Conference. Bari: Progedit, 53–71.
• Degani, Marta (2010) “The Pakeha myth of one New Zealand/Aotearoa. An exploration in the use of Māori loanwords in New Zealand English.” [In:] Roberta Facchinett i, David Crystal, Barbara Seidlhofer (eds.) From International to Local English – and Back Again. Bern: Peter Lang, 165–196.
• Degani, Marta, Alexander Onysko (2010) “Hybrid compounding in New Zealand English.” [In:] World Englishes 29: 2, 209–233.
• Deverson, Tony (1985) “Home Loans: Māori input into current New Zealand English.” [In:] English in New Zealand 33, 4–10.
• Deverson, Tony (1991) “New Zealand English lexis: the Māori dimension.” [In:] English Today 26, 18–25.
• Duval, Terry (1995) A Preliminary Dictionary of Māori Gainwords Compiled on Historical Principles. PhD thesis, University of Canterbury, Christchurch.
• Duval Terry, Koenraad Kuiper (2001) “Maori dictionaries and Maori loanwords.” [In:] International Journal of Lexicography 14: 4, 243–260.
• Harlow, Ray (1993) “Lexical expansion in Māori.” [In:] The Journal of the Polynesian Society 102: 1, 99–107.
• Harlow, Ray (2001) A Māori Reference Grammar. Rosedale, Northshore: Pearson.
• Harlow, Ray (2003) “Issues in Māori language planning and revitalization.” [In:] Journal of Maori and Pacific Development 4: 1, 32–43.
• Harlow, Ray (2004) “Borrowing and its alternatives in Māori.” [In:] Jan Tent, Paul Geraghty (eds.) Borrowing: A Pacific Perspective. Canberra: ANU Pacific Linguistics, 145–169.
• Harlow, Ray, Peter Keegan, Jeanett e King, Margaret Maclagan, Catherine I. Watson (2009) “The changing sound of the Māori language.” [In:] James N. Stanford, Dennis R. Preston (eds.) Variation in Indigenous Minority Languages, Amsterdam: Benjamins, 129–152.
• Ka’ai, Tania, John Moorfield (2009) “Ngā kupu arotau – eweri tāima loanwords in Māori 1842–1952.” [In:] Te Kaharoa 2: 1, 1–38.
• Kennedy, Graeme (2001) “Lexical borrowing from Māori in New Zealand English.” [In:] Bruce Moore (ed.) Who’s Centric Now? The Present State of Post-Colonial Englishes. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 59–81.
• Kennedy, Graeme, Shinji Yamazaki (2000) “The influence of Māori on the New Zealand English lexicon.” [In:] John Kirk (ed.) Corpora Galore: Analyses and Techniques in Describing English. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 33–44.
• King, Michael (2003) The Penguin History of New Zealand. Auckland: Penguin.
• Macalister, John (1999) “Trends in New Zealand English: some observations on the presence of Māori words in the lexicon.” [In:] New Zealand English Journal 13, 38–49.
• Macalister, John (2000) “The changing use of Māori words in New Zealand English.” [In:] New Zealand English Journal 14, 41–47.
• Macalister, John (2004) “Listening to proper nouns: social change and Māori proper noun use in New Zealand English.” [In:] New Zealand English Journal 18, 24–34.
• Macalister, John (2005) A Dictionary of Maori Words in New Zealand English. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Macalister, John (2006) “Of weka and waiata: familiarity with borrowing from te reo Maori.” [In:] Te Reo 49, 101–124.
• Mead, Hirini Moko (2003) Tikanga Māori. Living by Māori Values. Wellington: Huia.
• Moorfield, John (2011) Te Aka Māori-English, English-Māori Dictionary. Auckland: Pearson.
• Ngata, Hōri Mahue (1993) English–Maori Dictionary. Wellington: Learning Media.
• Ryan, Peter M. (1989) The Revised Dictionary of Modern Maori. Third edition. Auckland: Heinemann.
• Thomason, Sarah G., Terrence Kaufman (1991) Language Contact, Creolization and Contact Linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Whitney, William (1881) “On mixture in language.” [In:] Transactions of the American Philosophical Association 12, 1–26.
• Williams, Herbert (1971) A Dictionary of the Maori Language. Wellington: Owen Government Printer.