The Speech of the Negros Congos in Panama

167 Pages·1989·13.62 MB·English

by  John M. Lipski

THE SPEECH OF THE NEGROS CONGOS OF PANAMA
CREOLE LANGUAGE LIBRARY (CLL)
A companion series to the
"JOURNAL OF PIDGIN & CREOLE LANGUAGES"
Editor: Pieter Muysken (Amsterdam)
Editorial Advisory Board:
Mervyn Alleyne (Kingston, Jamaica) Germán de Granda (Vallodolid)
Roger Andersen (Los Angeles) Ian Hancock (Austin)
Lionel Bender (Carbondale, Illinois) John Holm (New York)
Hans den Besten (Amsterdam) George Huttar (Dallas)
Derek Bickerton (Honolulu) Hilda Koopman (Los Angeles)
Norbert Boretzky (Bochum) Claire Lefebvre (Montréal)
Lawrence Carrington (Trinidad) Salikoko Mufwene (Athens, Georgia)
Hazel Carter (Madison) Peter Mühlhäusler (Oxford)
Frederic Cassidy (Madison) Robert Le Page (York)
Robert Chaudenson (Aix-en-Provence) John Rickford (Stanford)
Chris Corne (Auckland) Suzanne Romaine (Oxford)
Marta Dijkhoff (Willemstad, Curaçao) Pieter Seuren (Nijmegen)
Christiaan Eersel (Paramaribo) Dan Slobin (Berkeley)
Luiz Ivens Ferraz (Johannesburg) Norval Smith (Amsterdam)
Glenn Gilbert (Carbondale, Illinois) Albert Valdman (Bloomington)
Morris Goodman (Evanston) Herman Wekker (Nijmegen)
Volumes in this series will present descriptive and theoretical studies
designed to add significantly to our insight in Pidgin and Creole languages.
Volume 4
John M. Lipski
The Speech of the Negros Congos of Panama
THE SPEECH OF THE
NEGROS CONGOS OF PANAMA
by
JOHN M. LIPSKI
University of Florida
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
1989
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lipski, John M.
The speech of the negros congos of Panama.
(Creole language library, ISSN 0920-9026; v. 4)
1. Creole dialects, Spanish -- Panama. I. Title. II. Series.
PM7844.P3L5 1989 467'.97287 88-7617
ISBN 90 272 5224 6 (Eur.) /1-55619-049-2 (US) (alk. paper)
© Copyright 1989 - John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or
any other means, without written permission from the publisher.
Contents
1. Introduction: the negros congos of Panama
1.1 The negros congos of Panama 1
1.2 The congo ceremonies and games 2
1.3 Plan of study 8
1.4 Data collection 8
1.5 Linguistic preliminaries 9
2. Syntactic and semantic characteristics of congo
speech
2.1 Introduction 11
2.2 Morphological modifications 11
2.2.1 Verbal morphology 12
2.2.1.1 Regularization of irregular paradigms 14
2.2.1.2 Substitution of paradigmatic variants 15
2.2.1.3 Occasional modifications 16
2.2.1.4 Other aspects of the verbal system 17
2.2.2 Nominal morphology 18
2.2.3 Adjectival morphology 20
2.2.4 Pronominal morphology 21
2.2.5 Adverbial morphology 21
2.2.6 Prepositional morphology 22
2.3 Syntactic modifications 22
2.3.1 Use of subject pronouns 22
2.3.2 Position of subject pronouns 23
2.3.3 Elimination of prepositions 24
2.3.4 Syntax of the verb phrase 25
2.3.5 Syntax of negation 27
2.4 Semantic modifcations 27
2.4.1 Substitution of semantically opposite elements 29
2.4.2 Inversion through negative words 30
vi CONTENTS
2.4.3 Inversion through idiomatic expressions 30
2.4.4 Partial semantic displacement 30
2.5 The syntax of semantic inversion 31
2.6 Similarities with vestigial Spanish 31
3. Phonological characteristics of congo dialect
3.1 Introduction 39
3.2 Fixed phenomena 39
3.2.1 Neutralization of /r/ and 39
3.2.2 Neutralization of /1/, /d/, /r/ and 40
3.2.3 Pronunciation of /b/, /d/, /g/ 41
3.2.4 Pronunciation of syllable- and word-final /s/ 42
3.2.5 Pronunciation of word-final /n/ 43
3.2.6 Summary of fixed phenomena 43
3.3 Variable phenomena 43
3.3.1 Vocalic substitutions 44
3.3.2 Consonantal epenthesis 46
3.4 Formation of open syllables 47
4. Congo dialect and Panamian Spanish: phonology
4.1 Introduction 49
4.2 General phonetic characteristics 50
4.3 The archaic element 53
4.4 Word-final /n/ 54
4.5 Behavior of syllable-final /1/ and /r/ 57
4.6 Reduction of syllable-final /s/ 59
4.7 Pronunciation of /b/, /d/, /g/ 63
4.8 Summary 64
5. The possible African basis for congo speech
5.1 Introduction 67
5.2 The historical basis of congo dialect 68
5.3 Grammatical modifications 75
5.4 Phonetic modifications 92
5.5 Phonetic rhythm and paradigmatic considerations 101
5.6 Intonation of congo dialect speech 104
CONTENTS vii
5.7 Congo lexical elements 105
5.8 Summary 108
References 115
Appendix 129

1. Introduction: the negros congos of Panama
1.1 The negros congos of Panama
Of all the cultural manifestations of Panamanian society, which is
richly endowed with a wide range of folkloric traditions, perhaps the
most curious and the least understood is the phenomenon of the negros
congos of the Caribbean coast. The congo ceremonies, which take place
during Carnival season each year, combine a historical component (the
reference to the history of black slaves in Panama), a Hispanic compo­
nent (the music and to a certain extent the dancing), and an African
aspect (the drumming and the costumes). The congo ritual presupposes
the existence of a cofradía or brotherhood of initiates, which finds its
antecedents both in Hispanic society, where religious brotherhoods and
societies abound, and in African cultures, where daily activities are cir­
cumscribed by family and tribal ties and by fraternal organizations.
The congo rituals have been extensively studied by investigators
from numerous disciplines, including anthropology, history, musicology
and folklore, with the aim of tracing the historical origins of the congos
in Panama, determining the extent of the Hispanic and indigeneous
penetration in this essentially African phenomenon, and assessing the
impact of the congo society on the daily life of the black residents of the
Caribbean coast of Panama. In the linguistic dimension, less is known
about the congo groups, due largely to the fact that one of the compo­
nents of the congo games is the use of a special dialect mode, distinct
from regional popular Spanish, the so-called hablar en congo. This
dialect, based on popular Spanish, has been so modified and deformed
as to inhibit its comprehension by non-initiates, and most
anthropologists and folklorists have been content to signal only a few
salient aspects of this speech mode, without determining regional,
2 THE SPEECH OF THE NEGROS CONGOS OF PANAMA
idiolectal or sociolinguistic variation. Only in recent years have trained
linguists attempted the study of the congo groups, generally as a compo­
nent of more general investigations of the congo society, and no large-
scale survey has yet come forth.1 The present monograph therefore has
a double goal, within the framework of shedding further light on the cul­
tural manifestations of the negros congos: (1) to offer a comprehensive
description of the congo dialect of the Costa Arriba area of Colón pro­
vince; (2) to evaluate the diachronic evolution of this speech mode, in
particular its possible origin as an Afro-Hispanic creole, and to assess
the importance of this dialect for general theories of creolization of lan­
guages and of African influence on Latin American Spanish.
1.2 The congo ceremonies and games
The evaluation of the social function and the historical veracity of
the congo ceremonies is best left to the numerous anthropologists who
have studied Panaman's Afro-colonial populations. Suffice it to say, at
this point, that the congo rituals appear to be a reinactment of unique or
typical events in the history of African slaves in colonial Panama.2 These
events include slave uprisings, both individual and in larger groups, the
cruel actions of slave masters, and the formation of cimarrón or Maroon
societies governed by African laws and traditions, as palenques or for­
tified Maroon communities were established.3 It is beyond the scope of
the present study to speculate on the historical accuracy of the events in
question, but it is evident that whether or not they represent discrete,
identifiable events or merely prototypical situations, these dramatic rep­
resentations are direct reflections of the social conditions under which
black slaves lived and worked in colonial Panama. Given that the Afri­
can presence in Panama covers a period of more than 450 years, while
slavery was only abolished in the middle of the last century, there exists
a wide range of possible interpretations of the congo rituals, and the
complex series of games and ceremonies which have evolved as a con­
temporary expression of Afro-Panamanian culture.
Congo groups are found in the Costa Arriba (to the east of Colón,
up to Santa Isabel), in the Costa Abajo (to the west of Colón) and in
some towns in the interior;4 the present study, however, is limited to a