Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.2007, Page 100

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GENDER IN LANGUAGE CONTACT: EVIDENCE
FROM FAROESE-DANISH AND CATALAN-SPANISH
for substantives and adjectives: masculine
and feminine (when talking about pro-
nouns, also neuter should be considered).
The usual gender markers for substantives
in each language are the following ones
(Lloret & Viaplana, 1998; Clua, 2003):
(I) Catalan:
Masculine: -[0] [‘gat-Ø] cat
Feminine: -[3] [‘kaz-D] liouse
Spanish: Masculine: -[0] ['gat-o] cat
Feminine: -M [‘kas-a] house
There is also a set of other gender markers
for substantives which are not as usual as
the previous ones:
(2)
Catalan:
Masculine:
-[u] ([‘amu], owner), -[o] ([‘dia], day),
-[us] ([‘tipus], type), -[i] ([bi’yDti], moustache),
-[is] ([‘brindis], toast), -[s] ([‘fons], bottom)
Feminine:
-[u] ([‘fotu],photo), -[us] ([‘benus], Venus),
-[i] ([‘dozi], dose), -[is] ([‘glotis], glottis),
-[s] ([‘eliks], helix), -[0] ([‘kal], cabbage),
Spanish:
Masculine:
-[a] ([‘dia], day), -[e] ([o’Poe], oboe),
-[i] ([‘taksi], taxi), -[is] ([‘brindis], toast),
-[s] ([‘toraks], thorax), -[0] ([li’mon], lemon)
Feminine:
-[o] ([so’prano], soprano), -[e] ([‘prole], progeny),
-[i] ([me’tropoli], metropolis), -[is] ([‘dosis], dose),
-[0] ([‘kruØ], cross)
In general, cognate words have the same
gender in Catalan and Spanish: casa-casa,
f. ‘house’, paret-pared, f. ‘wall’, boca-
boca, f. ‘mouth’, armari-armario, m. ‘cup-
board’, peix-pez, m. ‘ftsh’, llapis-lápiz, m.
‘pencil’, etc. However, in some cases, Cata-
lan and Spanish cognates show different
genders, for instance: dent (Cat.), m. - dien-
te (Sp.), f. ‘tooth’. These cases normally
correspond to words that in one and/or the
other language take one of the more alter-
native gender markers presented in (2). Due
to this fact and also to the contact language
situation, when bilingual speakers face this
different behavior in both languages may
get influence from one or the other lan-
guage and thus they may use the wrong
gender, which is made apparent through the
agreement with articles or adjectives.
The speakers of the present study belong
to three different age groups (children,
young adults and adults) in two different
districts in Barcelona, differing in the
amount of Spanish usage. Considering
these six groups, we will see whether any
kind of relationship can be established
between the characteristics of the group of
speakers and their behavior as regards to
gender assignment in the case of such
cognate words. And in a more general view,
we will try and account for the speakers’
decisions considering semantic, morpholo-
gical or phonological criteria.
2.3. Meeting point in the study ofgender
in Faroese and Catalan
Both studies presented in this article contri-
bute differently to an explanation of gender
assignment in a language contact situation.