Language contact and Michif stress assignment

Abstract

This paper examines stress assignment in Michif, a contact language with its roots in French and Plains Cree, and spoken by a few hundred Métis today in Canada and the United States. The goal of this paper is twofold. First, to propose a first analysis of word stress in Michif, and second, to compare Michif word stress with Plains Cree and French word stress assignment systems, to see what the linguistic effects of that language contact have been. I show that the Michif stress system derives from both the Plains Cree and French stress systems. This shows that the contact of the two source languages has had implications on the new language, but also, that the new system is distinct from either, as lexical items from both Plains Cree and French vocabularies pattern in the same way. This is evidence against the commonly held view that Michif displays a split phonology based on language source (BAKKER 1997, BAKKER & PAPEN 1997, PAPEN 2003).

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