Appendix 1: An annotated guide to Bislama exponents of semantic primes
Carsten Levisen · 2024
An annotated guide to Bislama exponents of semantic primesIn this annotated guide, I will present and discuss each exponent of semantic primes in Bislama, addressing also their patterns of allolexy (variants) and combinatorics.Research on the styles and types of Bislama often fall into discussions on (i) the urban/rural divide, (ii) the Anglophone/Francophone school-based subcultures, and (iii) levels of debasilectalization/Anglicization.In the core vocabulary, however, there is very little difference in these styles and types.I will, when relevant, discuss various short forms, and occasionally also draw on Tok Pisin (bislama blo Mosbi), and Pijin (bislama blo Solo).(This guide is based on the work of Levisen 2014Levisen , 2016a;; and Levisen et al. 2017.)• mi is the sole exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as both 'I' and 'me': consider mi mekem nogud samting 'I did something bad' and nogud samting i stap hapen lo mi 'bad things are happening to me'.• yu is the exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as 'you'.• man is the exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as 'someone'.The word man in Bislama colexifies a number of important basic concepts (for a discussion, see Section 5.5), and, for instance, Bislama man can also mean 'man'.Both Bislama and Anglo English distinguish semantically between 'man' and 'someone', but in Bislama the two concepts are colexified.To compare, the main Tok Pisin exponent is wanpela.• samting is the sole exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as both 'something' and 'thing(s)': consider samting nogud i hapen lo mi 'something bad happened to me'; fulap nogud samting i hapen lo mi 'many bad things happened to me'.• ol man (alternative spelling olman) is the main exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as 'people'.This exponent is lexically related to the exponent for man 'someone' (see Section 5.5), and is in some contexts also realized as 'man'.In Solomons Pijin, the exponent is pipol, and in Bislama pipol can also be found.It serves as an occasional allolex.To compare, the Tok Pisin exponent is manmeri.• bodi is the exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as 'body'.• kaen is the sole exponent for the prime that in Anglo English is realized as 'kind' or 'kinds': consider wan kaen man 'one kind of people'; tu kaen man 'two kinds of people'.