Culture BBC adds "Pidgin English" to its roster of foreign-language editions - It can't be April Fool's Day again already, can it?!

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-40975399

A new language service for digital platforms in English-based Pidgin for West and Central Africa has been launched by the BBC World Service.

Pidgin is one of the most widely-spoken languages across the region, even though it is not officially recognised.

The launch is part of the World Service's biggest expansion since the 1940s, following a government funding boost announced in 2016.

Pidgin will soon be joined by 10 more new services in Africa and Asia.

The WS also plans to offer more mobile and video content and a greater social media presence.

It will also enhance its television services across Africa, including more than 30 new TV programmes for partner broadcasters in sub-Saharan Africa.

Arabic and Russian programming will also be boosted in the 2020 project.

What is Pidgin?

• A mix of English and local languages enabling people who do not share a common language to communicate
• West African Pidgin English was a language of commerce spoken along the coast during the Atlantic slave trade in the late 17th and 18th Centuries.
• Widely used in Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea
• Primarily an oral language, without a standard agreed written form.

On the one hand, I think I can see where they're coming from with this decision, but on the other hand...

Why dem dey call Hurricane human being name

Di biggest storm wey United States of America never see for 13 years don land for Texas.

Dis Hurricane Harvey don scatter plenty houses and tori say e even don kill five people.

Hurricane Matthew wey bin happen for 2016 kill plenty people and scatter house join wen e happen.

Harvey and Mattew na human being name, so how hurricane dey take get dia name sef? In short, why dem dey give hurricane name at all?

...what in the actual living fuck.

 

[El Garbage]

Dey dem muy new favverit nys soaca fo'shar, I naw aint gun red dey nomal BBCs anmoar.

 

[HG 400]

I'm only familiar with PNG pidgin but this shit honestly looks more like a transcribed accent. I don't see any foreign words at all.

 

[Trilby]

Man, even the Crocs from Pearls Before Swine are more articulate.

The denizens of the Okefenokee Swamp from Walt Kelly's Pogo are also quite well articulated in their colorful speech.

 

[HG 400]

Kill-kill wey be genocide fit happen, you heard it here first.

 

[BF 388]

Hahhahaha best line ever

"Niger also ban anybody from killing donkey inside di county."

Why China dey chop African Donkey

https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/tori-41097857

 

[Dysnomia]

I sometimes read Nigerian news sites for laughs and various info. The comment sections usually look just like this. You get used to it after awhile. Like hearing a certain accent all the time. It does sound funny at first. But once you've seen and heard enough of it it kinda of loses that and becomes more normal. It's obviously useful to a lot of people in Africa and not impossible for a native English speaker to understand. It's better than having to deal with many local languages you may have never even heard of. Some people don't realise how linguistically diverse Africa really is. They don't all talk click.

What I learned about language in anthropology (pre SJW days) was that it doesn't matter if we can understand them. What matters is that they can understand each other. This was used to explain what the development of neolithic languages may have been like. But you can apply this rule to any language dead or still living.

Hahhahaha best line ever

"Niger also ban anybody from killing donkey inside di county."

Why China dey chop African Donkey

https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/tori-41097857

This is actually becoming a huge problem because donkey skin is being used for some Chinese traditional snake oil nonsense and they've had to import it from Africa. There have been crackdowns but the Chinese need their donkey skin for whatever the hell they think it cures.

 

[The Nothingness]

Will the clicking language that some African cultures have be next?

 

[BF 388]

Will the clicking language that some African cultures have be next?

You mean this?

 

[r00]

surely if you can read pidgin english you can read english?

"UEFA dey investigate PSG on top buy-buy of player" is more complicated than "UEFA investigate PSG on top buy of player".

 

[Diesel Boogaloo]

"UEFA dey investigate PSG on top buy-buy of player" is more complicated than "UEFA investigate PSG on top buy of player".

But the latter is not proper Pidgin, it's not how they speak, I mean: dat no be how dem dey speak.

I'm only familiar with PNG pidgin but this shit honestly looks more like a transcribed accent. I don't see any foreign words at all.

Except for the most common function words, I don't see many deviations from English spelling for the common vocabulary between the two languages, at least compared to Belize Creole someone posted earlier, or Haitian Creole. The latter two languages ditched their parent languages' spelling systems entirely (since both English and French spelling got retarded after centuries) and spell things phonetically. Maybe dialectal differences within WA Pidgin (it's spoken over a wide area, in comparison Belize and Haiti are just really tiny countries) make any spelling reform attempts futile.

 

[MalWart]

Will the clicking language that some African cultures have be next?

I personally can't wait until full articles are written in Morse Code.

 

[Trilby]

I personally can't wait until full articles are written in Morse Code.

Wouldn't mind that, really.

 

[AnOminous]

I personally can't wait until full articles are written in Morse Code.

I can't wait until every article is just BIX NOOD repeated over and over again, and this is considered really progressive, and you're a racist if you don't like it.