Pidgins and Creoles and Their Emergence

Seminar paper from the year 2015 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 1,0, University of Leipzig, language: English, abstract: TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.INTRODUCTION1 2.DEFINITIONS2 2.1PIDGINS2 2.2CREOLES3 3.THEORIES OF ORIGINS OF PIDGINS4 3.1.BABY-TALK-THEORY4 3.2.NAUTICAL JARGON THEORY6 3.3.PARALLEL DEVELOPMENT THEORY6 3.4.MONOGENETIC/RELEXIFICATION THEORY7 4.THE DEVELOPMENT FROM PIDGIN TO CREOLE8 4.1.JARGON STAGE8 4.2.STABILIZATION PHASE9 4.3.EXPANSION PHASE9 4.4.CREOLIZATION10 5.THE LIFE CYCLE OF CREOLES11 5.1.DE-CREOLIZATION AND THE POST-CREOLE CONTINUUM11 5.2.RE-CREOLIZATION13 6.CONCLUSION15 REFERENCES16 PLAGIARISM DISCLAIMER17 1.INTRODUCTION 'Chrismus time ah de time ob gladness, and de time ob goodwill, when de goodwill pirit tek hold ob we, we feget ebery libing ting bout de grudge we gat against wen ex doah neighbour; an we begins fe wish him all kinda nice something, cause we feel nice weself. [...]' (Todd, 2006: 100) This sequence of Jamaican Creole is only one of the diversity in the creole-speaking world. In my term paper I will examine the emergence of a Creole. I start with an outline of the definitions of Pidgins and creoles and how they relate to each other. I continue with the most known origins of Pidgins, which is followed by the four phases of development from a Pidgin to a Creole. Finally, I will introduce the topic of De- and Re-creolization. 2.DEFINITIONS 2.1.Pidgins Defining what is a pidgin and what is not is a challenging undertaking. Generally, a Pidgin is 'any combination and distortion of two languages as a means of communication.' (Sebba, 1997: 1) Pidgin English is defined as 'any lingua franca consisting of English and another language.' (Sebba, 1997: 1) It is a reduced language that arises through extensive contact between different groups of people who do not share a common language (Holm, 1988: 4). The Pidgin is strengthened because there is a need for these stated groups to communicate (for example for trade) but none of these groups learns the mother tongue of the other group (Holm, 1988: 4). Speakers of these groups can be divided into at least two groups: Speakers with less power are speakers of the substrate language. Mostly, they are accommodating by adopting words of speakers with more power, speakers of the superstrate language (Holm, 1988: 5). Furthermore, the superstrate speakers accept many of the emerging changes in order to facilitate communication and to become more comprehensible, simultaneously they do not try to speak as they do within their own group (Holm, 1988: 5).