| The present mixed-methods dissertation examines the language contact situation in Northern Belize, where Spanish is in intense contact with English and Belizean Kriol. I specifically analyze three linguistic phenomena -- intervocalic rhotics, bilingual light verb constructions and mixed determiner phrases -- while attending to concomitant sociolinguistic factors in an effort to unravel patterns of language use, language change and innovation in Northern Belize.;For rhotics, intervocalic rhotic neutralization was found to be a variable rather than a global phenomenon; thus, no evidence was found of a merged retroflex approximant category. For bilingual light verb constructions, results showed that stativity, verb frequency and passivization do not restrict the incorporation of 'hacer + V' in code-switched discourse, revealing that these syntactic innovations are not constrained by these linguistic factors. For the examination of semantic categories, results revealed that several domains were favorable contexts for English-origin nouns. The openness of semantic domains to English-origin nouns was particularly attested in the speech of translanguagers. For gender assignment, the analysis showed that the Spanish gender distinction was only neutralized in mixed discourse; hence, revealing a composite mechanism specifically induced by code-switching. I argue that sociolinguistic factors such as speakers' positive attitudes toward CS, their identification with bilingual language practices, and a low degree of normativity are factors that have contributed to the innovative use of Spanish/English CS in Northern Belize.;Overall, results revealed that contact Spanish in Northern Belize exhibits crossgenerational stability (i.e., rhotics and gender assignment do not reveal convergence), linguistic innovation (bilingual light verb constructions), and synchronic convergence (gender assignment in mixed determiner phrases). The instantiation of convergence and/or elements of creolization in the CS data support recent work that advocates for a re-evaluation of monolingual notions and perspectives of code-switching and bilingualism. |
