The result of decreolization is to create a continuum of intermediate varieties between creole and superstrate. If this process is sufficiently long and intense, the continuum may be progressively eroded at its creole end. The result may be a synchronic state in which the most conservative variety is already considerably different from (and considerably closer to the superstrate than) the original creole […].
- Bickerton (1981), a pag.47