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Article published In:
Language of Empire, Language of Power
Edited by Kees Versteegh
[Language Ecology 2:1/2] 2018
► pp. 128–146

Pidgin as a counterlanguage

Asian labour migrants and Arab employers speaking

| Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales

A close-up on the linguistic interactive scene between Arab employers and Asian migrants communicating today in Asian Migrant Pidgin Arabic shows that migrant talk and native Arabs’ foreigner talk are different but interdependent. Here, it appears that the interactants are constantly navigating across one of two continua which sometimes meet and overlap. Arabic Foreigner Talk is further analysed from the perspective of the linguistic strategies deployed by Arabs to exert power over the migrants: self-facilitating, excluding, and mocking strategies. However, from a tool of communication and/or exclusion, the pidgin is also becoming one of transgression used by both Arabs and the migrants to oppose their respective hegemonic cultures – that of the masters for the migrants, that of religion for the Arabs.

Keywords: Arabic Foreigner Talk, Pidgin Madam, Gulf Arabic Pidgin, Asian Migrant Arabic Pidgin, counterlanguage, linguistic accommodation, linguistic variation, linguistic continuum
Article outline
  • 1.The setting
  • 2.A close-up of the interactive scene
    • 2.1Two continua overlapping
    • 2.2The interdependence of the interactants
  • 3.Foreigner Talk strategies scanned
    • 3.1Self-facilitating strategies
    • 3.2Containing and excluding strategies
    • 3.3Collective mocking strategies
  • 4.Bridging, walling, expressing, or transgressing: Ingredients for a counterlanguage
  • 5.Assessment
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 9 November 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/le.18005.biz
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