Nativization

Nativization is the process through which in the virtual absence of native speakers, a language undergoes new phonological, morphological, syntactical, semantic and stylistic changes, and gains new native speakers. This happens necessarily when a second language used by adult parents becomes the native language of their children. Nativization has been of particular interest to linguists, and to creolists more specifically, where the second language concerned is a pidgin. It was previously thought by scholars that nativization was simply interlanguage fossilization, a step taken during second-language acquisition by learners who apply rules of their first language to their second. However, recent studies now suggest that nativization is simply another form of language acquisition. Several explanations of creole genesis have relied on prior nativization of a pidgin as a stage in achieving creoleness. This is true for Hall's (1966) notion of the pidgin-creole life cycle as well as Bickerton's language bioprogram theory. There are few undisputed examples of a creole arising from nativization of a pidgin by children. The Tok Pisin language reported by is one example where such a conclusion could be reached by scientific observation. A counterexample is the case where children of Gastarbeiter parents speaking pidgin German acquired German seamlessly without creolization. Broad treatments of creolization phenomena such as acknowledge now as a matter of standard that the pidgin-nativization scheme is only one of many explanations with possible theoretical validity. Additionally, the emergence of Nicaraguan sign language without a prior established set of symbols puts forth new questions regarding the process of nativization itself. It has been noted among many scholars that speakers adopt a few well-established strategies during the process of nationalization. These strategies are the generalization of grammatical rules and the transfer of features from other languages to the target language.