Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development
Editor and Book Reviews Editor: John Edwards (St Francis Xavier University, Canada)
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Volume: 21 Number: 6 Page: 487–507
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'My Madam is Fine': The Adaptation of English Loans in Chichewa
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Silvester Ron Simango
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It is well known among sociolinguists that in any language contact situation one language tends to have sociopolitical dominance over the other, and that linguistic borrowing tends to flow from the more
dominant to the less dominant language. This paper presents evidence from English loans in Chichewa (Bantu) which shows that the recipient language is not a passive participant in the borrowing process:
the borrowing language makes various modifications to the loan words to make them fit the grammatical structure as well as cultural requirements of the recipient language. As a result of these modifications
some loan words assume new grammatical categories, meanings and usage.
© Multilingual Matters 2000
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