3 ms·

Wait, the pidgin dialects that I've known have always been the more complex merger of 2+ languages, plus additional invented slang. More complex, not less. Edit

by solve 13y ago

Wait, the pidgin dialects that I've known have always been the more complex merger of 2+ languages, plus additional invented slang. More complex, not less. Edit: Apparently, linguists now want us to call the more advanced pidgins "creole languages", although there is some debate about the distinction: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language This idea, that learning English alone is simpler than the multiple languages that some countries learn in school, hints at the core of the language learning problem. A skilled employee in the US learns not 1, but 3 languages: - Conversational English, slang, unwritten idioms. - Then, he re-learns the extensive grammar rules and vocabulary, well beyond what's normally used in conversation (i.e to a grammar nazi level.) - Then, again he completely relearns English in the context of the connotations and phrases of professional business language. (Many non-native English speakers are in complete disbelief that this variation even exists.) All of this occurs over decades of schooling and on-the-job learning.

simonebrunozzi 13y ago
Hey solve, I think that pidgin are easier than English, and this is why: they are intended to use in a very simple and effective way. A full language, like English, has much more complex phrasing.
- solve 13y ago
  Yes, this is the dictionary definition. In this case, I believe that pidgin has turned into a bit of a contronym. I could be misinformed though.
  - simonebrunozzi 13y ago
    I agree, it's a bit confusing.
  - stan_rogers 13y ago
    The difference is that a pidgin is a temporary, makeshift language to facilitate communication between peoples who speak different languages natively, whereas a creole is a language that people actually live in. The word "pidgin", though, often gets attached to a temporary patois and remains attached even after the language progresses to a creole. Sometimes a pidgin will hang around even after the conditions that created it have gone away. The South Seas English pidgin hung around as a regional lingua franca for a long time, partly because it was handy even when not dealing with English speakers, and partly because it was a mark of distinction among the people that the English in Australia had exploited. Eventually, though, it did creolize -- Tok Pisin came from that pidgin, but it is not a pidgin any longer. Hawaaiian Creole English (the academic name for the language) is still generally referred to by its speakers as "Pidgin", even though the progression from pidgin to creole was documented almost as soon as the first plantation immigrants had kids old enough to talk. (Many African creoles are similarly still called "Pidgin" by their speakers, even though the language is not a pidgin per se.) The parents of those children spoke a pidgin; the words were mostly English (with the odd word drawn from Japanese or one of the Philippine languages by concensus), but the grammar was extremely simplified and the structure (head-first, head-final, etc.) tended to reflect the speaker's native tongue. You can trade and get work done in a pidgin, but you can't communicate with much subtlety, and the kids needed something they could chat in. The kids (all young children are linguistic geniuses compared to us older folk) quickly developed grammar that was consistent and had rules. You could speak the language well, or speak it badly. It's difficult to make a grammatical error in a pidgin; errors are mostly about vocabulary. A creole, on the other hand, is a real language. You can get all of the words right, but still make mistakes -- mistakes of the sort that the yellow big ball would be in English. Dey bin stay buy in Hawaaiian Creole is "they were buying" ("bin" puts it into the past tense and "stay" makes it continuous/progressive); dey stay bin buy is gibberish (it would mean something like "they are still finished buying").

by solve 13y ago

simonebrunozzi 13y ago

Hey solve, I think that pidgin are easier than English, and this is why: they are intended to use in a very simple and effective way. A full language, like English, has much more complex phrasing.

solve 13y ago
Yes, this is the dictionary definition. In this case, I believe that pidgin has turned into a bit of a contronym. I could be misinformed though.
- simonebrunozzi 13y ago
  I agree, it's a bit confusing.
- stan_rogers 13y ago
  The difference is that a pidgin is a temporary, makeshift language to facilitate communication between peoples who speak different languages natively, whereas a creole is a language that people actually live in. The word "pidgin", though, often gets attached to a temporary patois and remains attached even after the language progresses to a creole. Sometimes a pidgin will hang around even after the conditions that created it have gone away. The South Seas English pidgin hung around as a regional lingua franca for a long time, partly because it was handy even when not dealing with English speakers, and partly because it was a mark of distinction among the people that the English in Australia had exploited. Eventually, though, it did creolize -- Tok Pisin came from that pidgin, but it is not a pidgin any longer. Hawaaiian Creole English (the academic name for the language) is still generally referred to by its speakers as "Pidgin", even though the progression from pidgin to creole was documented almost as soon as the first plantation immigrants had kids old enough to talk. (Many African creoles are similarly still called "Pidgin" by their speakers, even though the language is not a pidgin per se.) The parents of those children spoke a pidgin; the words were mostly English (with the odd word drawn from Japanese or one of the Philippine languages by concensus), but the grammar was extremely simplified and the structure (head-first, head-final, etc.) tended to reflect the speaker's native tongue. You can trade and get work done in a pidgin, but you can't communicate with much subtlety, and the kids needed something they could chat in. The kids (all young children are linguistic geniuses compared to us older folk) quickly developed grammar that was consistent and had rules. You could speak the language well, or speak it badly. It's difficult to make a grammatical error in a pidgin; errors are mostly about vocabulary. A creole, on the other hand, is a real language. You can get all of the words right, but still make mistakes -- mistakes of the sort that the yellow big ball would be in English. Dey bin stay buy in Hawaaiian Creole is "they were buying" ("bin" puts it into the past tense and "stay" makes it continuous/progressive); dey stay bin buy is gibberish (it would mean something like "they are still finished buying").