Fanakalo, a Bantu-lexified pidgin

Abstract This chapter provides an overview of Fanakalo pidgin, which is worthy of interest to Bantu language studies and to pidgin and Creole linguistics more widely. The pidgin is shown to have arisen through contact between Europeans and Nguni language speakers in the early 1800s. What makes it a pidgin is its relative simplicity, its hybridity, and a non-genetic affiliation to existing language groupings. Despite the large amount of its vocabulary that has come from Zulu, it is not really a Bantu language in syntax and morphology. While some of its morphology does draw upon Zulu, the pidgin is greatly reduced compared to Zulu morphology. On the other hand, while much of Fanakalo’s syntax coincides with that of a simple analytical English, most of its vocabulary and morphology cannot be described as English. The chapter illustrates these claims from analysis of the farming and mining registers of Fanakalo.