West Africa, English‐Based Pidgins and Creoles in

This entry is aimed at examining five varieties of English‐based West African pidgins and creoles (EWAPAC) comprising Cameroon Pidgin English (CPE), Ghanaian Pidgin English (GPE), Nigerian Pidgin English (NPE), Aku in The Gambia, and Krio in Sierra Leone; the focus is on lexis and grammar. The entry relies on the existing works on these varieties as well as on the author's knowledge of Nigerian Pidgin English for its data sources. The study establishes that English‐based West African pidgins and creoles draws its lexicon mainly from European languages especially English and from other West African languages. It is further revealed that although they all demonstrate certain syntactic similarities, there are some grammatical differences among the varieties. The entry concludes that four of the varieties (Cameroon Pidgin English, Nigerian Pidgin English, Aku and Krio) are structurally more highly identical to each other than Ghanaian Pidgin English.