pidgin

"To communicate, the Africans borrowed some vocabulary from the British and incorporated their own pronunciation and syntax to form a pidgin thing. Over the generations, it became perfected and developed structure and grammar."

From BBC ● Feb. 15, 2025

Trying to free herself, she began to write in Hawaiian pidgin, a language she both grew up surrounded by and was told by others — including her mother — to avoid out in the world.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 18, 2023

The dialogue in both sections, sprinkled like parsley with pidgin Yiddish and Hebrew prayer, has a secondhand aura that is also unconvincing.

From New York Times ● Feb. 16, 2023

Wale and other lawmakers spoke at length, using a mixture of English, the official language, and the commonly spoken Melanesian pidgin.

From Seattle Times ● Dec. 5, 2021

The writing is in pidgin English and Spanish and Mandarin and then languages I have never seen.

From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee

His father, Derek Bickerton, an influential linguist specializing in pidgins and creoles, had a Ph.D. from Cambridge University but called himself a “card-carrying autodidact.”

From New York Times ● Dec. 17, 2022

It’s not all bad; I’ve got a whole new suite of creoles and pidgins that I’m enjoying, plus they’ve given me contractions.

From Slate ● Aug. 27, 2018

The traditional idea that creoles come from pidgins may be fascinating, but it risks seeming condescending—by positing that creoles have simpler grammars as a result.

From Economist ● Feb. 1, 2018

There were also, among others, 1,440 speakers of Somali and 370 of "Creoles and pidgins."

From Seattle Times ● May 15, 2012

When you and your friends come flyin' in at first-floor windows like pidgins, Mr. Ventimore, you must expect some notice to be took.

From The Brass Bottle A Farcical Fantastic Play in Four Acts by F. Anstey