PIDGIN
A
pidgin is an artificial language derived from the mixture and
simplification of two languages to allow the communication between
groups without a common language.
They are mainly created with trade purposes and for business necessities - however, other situations can enable the emergence of pidgins as well
A
Pidgin functions as a lingua franca for its speakers and do not have
native speakers. Their grammatical structure are simplified and reduced
in comparison with the grammars of their source languages. The main
characteristics of a Pidgin are:
-lack of surface grammatical complexity;
-lack of morphological complexity;
-preference for semantic transparency;
-reduction in vocabulary;
-phonological simplicity
They usually take out most of their vocabulary from the language with most prestige. Although they are lexically and grammatically influenced by their source languages, pidgins are not intelligible for speakers of these languages.
According to Peter Bakker:
"Pidgins are languages lexically derived from other languages, but which are structurally simplified, especially in their morphology. (...) they are the subject of language learning, they have structural norms, they are used by two or more groups, and they are usually unintelligible for speakers of the language which the lexicon derives". (Bakker,1994:25)
The origin of the term Pidigin is controversial and uncertain; however, the most accepted explanation is that the origin of the word is related to a Chinese corruption of the word business.
CREOLE
A
Creole is a complete language, developed from a pidgin, with the status
of a mother tongue to a speech community. To form a Creole the
vocabulary, pronunciation and grammatical structures of two or more
languages are blended in disproportional ways, originating a new system.
It´s
important to emphasize that, differently from a Pidgin, a Creole is a
mother tongue. A Pidgin becomes a Creole (in a process called
creolization) when the language gain complexity and is claimed as mother
tongue by a speech community.
Muysken and Smith (1994)
states that a Creole is different from a ordinary language as the
Creole origin is well detectable in time and the Creole language isn´t
the gradual transformation of other language, receiving lexicon from one
language and grammatical structure from other.
ELLO ´s website offers
a interesting map with examples of pidgins and creoles around the
world. The American colonization context is marked by the development of
several pidgins and creoles, they are adopted by communities formed by
European, American and African individuals. In this context, the
development of pidgins and creoles is mainly related to commercial
purposes as the slave trade and production in plantations.
The map below, retrieved from the ELLO´s website, show a series of Pidgins and Creoles around the world.
