Beginner’s guide to Nigerian pidgin English.docVIP

Beginner’s guide to Nigerian pidgin English By Lola (Akinmade) ?kerstr?m On January 28, 2010 · 71 Comments All photos by author. Try these phrases on your Nigerian friends to gain quicker access into their world. I’ll admit. Whenever a foreigner spews a few words of Yòrubá to me, regardless of delivery quality, I instantly warm up, throwing them a cheesy grin of approval. This gesture shows they’ve made an effort to learn my tribal tongue, one of 521 estimated Nigerian languages they could have chosen from. If they open up with Pidgin English instead, I instantly perk up. Speaking Pidgin transforms them from visiting foreigner into one of hundreds of well integrated expatriates in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital. There’s a certain intimacy that this form of broken English emits; a down-to-earth, survivalist approach to everyday living and hustling in Africa’s most populous nation. Pidgin English is extremely popular in most parts of Africa, particularly West Africa, and has been accepted as the de-facto language of blue collar trade and merchants. Pidgin remains the “great” equalizer – a way of communicating on a base level that cuts through bullshit. Photo by author. With roughly 250 tribes speaking 521 languages and dialects, English is the country’s official business language. For citizens without easy access to higher education and white collar jobs, picking up a few words of English and mixing it with elements of their native tongues has been the default way of communicating across tribal cultures. Variations of Pidgin English can be found all over the world, from the Caribbean to China, and each comes with its own library of everyday words. As you travel across West Africa, the style of Pidgin spoken becomes more familiar, but still differs based on local language elements infused into it. Even if you don’t find yourself traveling to Nigeria in the distant future, try one of these phrases on one of your Nigerian friends, and fully bask in their glowing