Foreigner Talk and the Origins of Pidgin Portuguese

Abstract

In this study it is argued that what Naro (1978) calls the Reconnaissance Language (RL) was not a pidgin language but simply an instance of foreigner talk (FT). Historical evidence is presented from which it can be reasonably inferred that Portuguese FT must have existed before the RL was purportedly formed. Moreover, it is claimed that if the Portuguese in fact taught African captives simplified Portuguese, which is not entirely supported by the facts, the strategies and patterns from which they would have drawn, to simplify their language and teach it to the Africans, arguably stem from FT strategies that already existed in Portuguese. By simply assuming that Portuguese FT strategies existed at the time of the Portuguese seaborne expansion, all the features of Naro's RL are accounted for. Consequently, positing something like an RL, i.e., a code consciously developed by the Portuguese court to teach to African captives who were prospective interpreters, becomes unnecessary.