(last updated 2009-09-09)

LANGUAGE SUBTAG REGISTRATION FORM

1. Name of requester: Pascal Vaillant
2. E-mail address of requester: pascal.vaillant at guyane.univ-ag.fr
3. Record Requested:

Type: variant
Subtag: pamaka
Description: Pamaka dialect
Prefix: djk
Comments: Pamaka dialect of the "Busi Nenge Tongo" English-based
Creole continuum in Eastern Suriname and Western French Guiana

4. Intended meaning of the subtag:

The variant subtag 'pamaka' is intended to mean the Pamaka dialect
of the Nenge English-based Creole language of Eastern Suriname,
mainly spoken in the valley of the Maroni river (border between the
Suriname and French Guiana).

English-based Creole languages have emerged in Suriname among maroon
communities (escaped slaves of African descent) since the early 18th
century. They depart from the mainstream English-based Creole of
Suriname, Sranan Tongo, by some linguistic innovations (such as
phonetic changes), and by a smaller influence of Dutch, language of
the former colonial power (1667-1975), and official language of the
country. Some dialects spoken in the Eastern parts of Suriname and
the Western parts of French Guiana are closely related to each other
and have been regarded as one single language with linguistic variants:
aluku, ndyuka, and pamaka. The Ethnologue language database maintained
by the SIL has an entry for "Aukan" (an alternate name of Ndyuka), and
refers to "Aluku" and "Paramaccan" as dialects. More recently, Goury
and Migge (2003) have referred to the language as "Nenge" and studied
its three variants.

Among the three dialects, Pamaka is mainly spoken in some settlements
along the Maroni river (border between Suriname and French Guiana) and
in neighbouring regions.

At present, the ISO 639 standard (reflecting the structure of the
Ethnologue database) has one three-letter code, 'djk' (from 'Djuka',
a variant name of "Ndyuka") and names the language Aukan. Leaving
aside the fact that the language code -somewhat inappropriately-
refers to the whole language by the name of its most important variant,
this fits with the widely accepted description of the aluku/ndyuka/
pamaka continuum as one language, distinct from Sranan Tongo or from
some other maroon Creoles (such as Saramaccan). This also leaves open
the possibility to use variant language subtags to refer more precisely
to the three dialects.

With the extension of literacy among the concerned populations, the
emergence of a local literature, and the recent use of digital corpora
by linguists and researchers, it is relevant to ask for the registration
of language tags or subtags able to identify the above-mentioned
language and its dialects.

5. Reference to published description of the language (book or article):

John Holm, 1989. Pidgins and Creoles. Vol. II: Reference Survey. Chapter
10, Section 2 ("Creole English in Suriname"). Cambridge (UK), Cambridge
University Press (Cambridge Language Surveys). p. 432-444.

Laurence Goury & Bettina Migge, 2003. Grammaire du nenge(e):
Introduction aux langues aluku, ndyuka et pamaka. Paris (France),
Éditions IRD.

Donald Winford & Bettina Migge, 2004. "Suriname creoles". In *A handbook
of varieties of English: Morphology and syntax*, E. Schneider (ed.), p.
482-516. Berlin (Germany), Mouton.

6. Any other relevant information:

(file created 2009-09-09)