Preposed Topic Specification in Berber: An Innovation Induced by Contact with Arabic

Abstract

This article deals with preposed topic specification in Berber and demonstrates how this pragmatic phenomenon was engendered by contact with Arabic by means of two grammaticalisation processes: replica grammaticalisation (Heine and Kuteva 2003), which led to the Type-1 topic specifier, whose borrowed matter has undergone light or heavy processing, and (ordinary) contact-induced grammaticalisation (Heine and Kuteva 2003), which led to the Type-2 topic specifier, whose matter was provided by Berber itself by means of system-internal developments. Furthermore, the article accounts for the functional parameter of contrast as being the probable trigger of the whole innovation process and hence corroborates Matras’ hypothesis (1998) regarding contrast as a motivating factor for borrowing.