| This dissertation examines lexical borrowing from Gallo-Romance into Ibero-Romance within a socio-historical framework. The study proposes a model in chapter one that integrates language internal factors with a macrolinguistic analysis of the social networks and discourse coalitions at work in eleventh- through thirteenth-century Ibero-Romance in order to elucidate the processes involved in the spread and assimilation of more than eighty Gallo-Romance loanwords selected for this study. Chapter two details the integrated borrowing model, including linguistic factors frequency, word class and semantics as well as the connections between speakers. The investigation argues that the historical circumstances favored two types of contact-induced change between members of the Gallo- and Ibero-Romance speech communities. One was through face-to-face contact due mainly to religious, political/military, and commercial population movement. Another type was indirect, through purpose-oriented coalitions. Chapter three demonstrates the first type of contact by tracing the three macrosocial networks, ecclesiastic, military and commercial, that contributed to the adoption and diffusion of a number of Gallicisms (e.g., capiscol, linaje, garnacha). These networks are identified by close examination of the notarial and legal documentation, which confirms the terms spread in correspondence with areas of Gallic population movement, generally from east to west as well as north to south as territories were repopulated during the Reconquest. Chapter four presents evidence that indirect contact among members of two discourse coalitions, that of the mester de clerecia composers and that of the Alfonsine collaborators, influenced the adoption and spread a number of loanwords (e.g., solaz and lisonjar). Detailed study of the poems created by the mester de clerecia and of the various learned works produced under the aegis of Alfonso X reveals the shared discursive goals, high level of erudition of these men and common stylistic features, including the use of Gallicisms. The investigation is one of the first on the history of the lexicon in Spanish to apply socio-historical models of social networks and discourse coalitions. The proposed model can be applied to other periods and contexts that resulted in borrowing and presents the utility of these modern sociolinguistic constructs to shed light on historical situations of contact. |
