Non-Creole Features in the Verb System of Afro-Hispanic Languages: New Insights from SLA Studies

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to show how two commonly found linguistic features in Afro-Hispanic contact varieties can be explained as the result of advanced second language strategies and, for this reason, they do not necessary imply a previous creole stage for these languages. The features under inspection are lack of subject-verb agreement and the presence of non-emphatic, non-contrastive overt subjects. The current analysis recurs to recent findings in generative approaches to second language acquisition (SLA) to provide new insights into the nature of these syntactic structures.