Datapoint Palenquero/Marking of pronominal possessors

Possessive adjectives consistently follow the noun they modify, and this despite the fact that in the superstrate their order is prenominal (cf. Spanish mi amigo vs. Palenquero amigo mi ‘my friend’). This difference in word order is probably due to substrate influence since Kikongo áami ‘my’ and similar possessive adjectives consistently follow rather than precede nouns. Palenquero si 'your' (amigo si 'your friend') also appears to be from Kikongo (cp. Kikongo zi 'your(PL)'), though nothing has been published yet on its etymology (Spanish is not a plausible source in this case).

The presence of a possessive adjective often serves to indicate that a code-switch has taken place (on the general difficulty of determining the exact locus of codeswitches in Palenquero, see Schwegler & Morton (2003)). Thus native speakers would immediately realize that the following statement contains two distinct codes, Spanish and Creole:

a ablá-mi ke amigo mí ta emfemmo.
'My friend [—> switch to creole] has told me that my friend is ill.'

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There are also alternative constructions to signal nominal possession, the most common one being the use of ri 'of', as in moná ri ele 'child of him/her' = 'his/her child'.

Values

Following word Frequency: 75.0%

Example 48-59:
¡Moná mi, miní aká!
¡Moná
son
mi,
my
miní
come
aká!
here
My son, come here!
Spanish: ¡Mi hijo (m'hijo), ven aquí!
Example 48-60:
Muhé sí é maluko.
Muhé
woman
sí
your
é
be
maluko.
ugly
Your wife is ugly.
Spanish: Tu mujer es maluca/fea.
Confidence:
Very certain

Adpositional phrase following the possessum Frequency: 25.0%

Example 48-61:
Moná ri ele a yegá ayé.
Moná
son/daughter
ri
of
ele
him/her
a
pst
yegá
arrive
ayé.
yesterday
His/her son/daughter arrived yesterday.
Spanish: El hijo / la hija de él/ella llegó ayer.
Confidence:
Certain