Running head: PIDGIN ENGLISH IN CHINA 1

The History and the Development of Pidgin English in China

Monchi Liu

Colorado State University

PIDGIN ENGLISH IN CHINA 2

Introduction

At the period of Qing dynasty (1644–1912), a large number of foreigners came to China.

Because of the language barrier, foreign merchants could not sell their goods directly to ordinary

people, comprador groups were gradually emerging. A comprador means “a native-born agent in

China and certain other Asian countries formerly employed by a foreign business to serve as a

collaborator or intermediary in commercial transactions” (The American Heritage Dictionary,

2011). These people prompted the emergence of pidgin English and used it as one of the main

tools for communicating with foreign merchants. Pidgin English used to be used in coastal areas

of China for a long time. Pidgin and creole are closely related; however, these two are also very

large subjects. They can hardly be discussed within one paper, so this paper will mainly focus on

the pidgin English in China. It is worth exploring when and how pidgin English appeared in

China; where were the specific regions and in what context pidgin English was used; how did

pidgin English get developed in China and did Chinese pidgin English became a creole? And

finally, what is the current situation of pidgin/creole English in China? All these questions will

be explored under the following subtitles: The definitions of pidgin and creole, the history and

the development of pidgin English in China, and the current situation of pidgin English in China.

The Definitions of Pidgin and Creole

A pidgin language or just pidgin is essentially a simplified language used by non-native

speakers and developed to communicate on the basis of no common language between two

groups of people (Muysken, & Smith, 1995). The name pidgin came perhaps from pidgin

English word “business.” It is best known as Yang Jing Bang English in China. Pidgin English

was formed in Guangzhou (a southern coast city in China) in the 18th century and was the

working language used by British merchants to trade with Chinese people. Its vocabulary was
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based on English, with a mixture of Cantonese, Portuguese, Malay and a little Hindi, whereas the

grammatical structure is basically Cantonese (Shi, 1991). When the Cantonese spoke pidgin

English, they basically followed the phonetic rules of Cantonese and adapted words from other

languages, such as the word pidgin, although there is not a certain etymology of this word, its

most widely known origin is the pronunciation of the English word business in Cantonese (Shi,

1992).

By the 19th century, Shanghai became another Chinese foreign trade center, and pidgin

English began to pop up there. The pidgin English used in Shanghai was different to its use in

Guangzhou. When pidgin English appeared, China hadn’t promoted the Mandarin policy. In

terms of the geographical differences, the people in Shanghai and Guangzhou spoke different

dialects. Those two dialects were like two branches of a road and they pointed to two opposite

directions. In short, they were completely different dialects. People could not understand each

other by pronunciation. Thus, the pidgin Englishes developed from these two areas were

disparate. Yang Jing Bang is a place in old Shanghai, near The Bund. It was the center of

Shanghai’s foreign trade business in the last century. Pidgin English developed in that area. The

name of pidgin (Yang Jing Bang) English is also derived from it.

A creole language or just creole is “a pidgin language which has become the native

language of a group of speakers, being used for all or many of their daily communicative needs”

(Richards, Platt, & Platt, 1992). It can be differentiated from pidgins by one of the most

important distinctions: pidgins do not have native speakers, while creoles do (Muysken, &

Smith, 1995). According to Shi (1992), the word creole can be dated from to the Latin word

creāre (to produce); it became criar in Portuguese, which means to bring up or to raise; in

Brazilian Portuguese, the word evolved into crioulo, a term used to refer to native slaves, i.e., the
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children of African slaves born in Brazil; later, it expanded to refer to Europeans of African

descent in the American continent, and then further used to refer to these people’s living habits

and languages; the word finally became creole in English and créole in French, and slowly

turned to refer to a category of language.

Both the pidgin and creole languages are not technically strictly defined, and the

differences between them are not quite clear. But it does not prevent linguists from classifying

them. In general, if two languages are not from the same language family, but speakers of these

languages frequently encounter each other in different situations, then people who speak those

languages need to try to establish a common language for communication. If it is restricted by

certain social factors, such as lack of trust, disparity of status, insufficient time and frequency of

communication, neither party can master the language of the other, and the final common

language will often be pidgin (Shi, 1991). In the case of unequal social status, the language of the

high-status party often provides most of the words in the pidgin language, while the language of

lower-status party affects the phonetic, semantic and syntactic aspects (Todd, 1984). The

language of the former is usually referred to as the superstrate language, while the latter is called

the substrate language (Holm, 1989). A pidgin language is neither a variant of the superstrate

language, nor a relative to the substrate language. It is an independent language and was created

in order to meet some kind of special communication needs.

Creoles often develop from pidgin languages. Originally, a pidgin is a simple language

formed in response to limited communication. When the group who speaks pidgin as the only

communication tool produces the next generation, the pidgin become the second generation’s

mother tongue. Since it is the first language, it is necessary to deal with all kinds of complicated

communication situations. The original content of the pidgin language would certainly not be
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sufficient, the vocabulary, the syntax and the pragmatic system would expand rapidly, forming

the creole language (Shi, 1992).

The History and the Development of Pidgin English in China

Pidgin English experienced long development in China. This section discussed the

emergence and the evolution of pidgin English at various stages of history.

The Forerunner of Pidgin English – Canton-Portuguese

During the period of Opium Wars I and II (1839–1860), as the major communication

language between the Qing government and the western powers, English was formally

introduced into China and gradually developed into an important tool for trade, diplomatic and

cultural exchanges. However, as early as the early 18th century, a popular pidgin was found in

the port city of Guangzhou, namely, Canton-Portuguese (Ji & Chen, 2002). Pidgin English and

Canton-Portuguese are both pidgin languages. As a language for trade purposes, the Canton-

Portuguese was born after the Portuguese colonialists invaded Macao in the 16th century, mainly

serving bilateral trade. Since the Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach Guangzhou, the

Portuguese language was first blended with Cantonese. This blended language gradually

developed into a common language between the Portuguese and the people from Macao (Macao

belonged to Xiangshan county, Guangdong province in the Ming dynasty, 1368–1644). More

specifically, Canton-Portuguese, which is a hybrid language of Portuguese, English, Hindi,

Malay and Cantonese, was initially limited to Macao (Shi, 1991). It gradually became spoken in

the whole Guangzhou area. Initially, it was mainly sailors, Chinese and foreign businessmen and

compradors who used this kind of Canton-Portuguese, which is neither Chinese nor a western

style language. Later, the language became a major communication tool for foreign missionaries

and local coolies and shopkeepers (Yi, 2005).

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This language lasted three hundred years, and it didn’t disappear until the 19th century

(Shi, 1991). From the early 19th century to the Opium Wars, when the English-speaking

colonialists became the main traders in Guangzhou, Shanghai, and other treaty ports, Portugal’s

position had deteriorated in China. Thus, it followed that Canton-English became the new pidgin

language and gradually replaced Canton-Portuguese, becoming the main foreign language of

China’s foreign relations at that time. But there is no doubt that Canton-Portuguese has had an

important impact on Canton-English, and the academic community almost unanimously believes

that Canton-Portuguese is the predecessor or parent of Canton-English (Yi, 2005).

The Pidgin English of Early Qing Dynasty – Canton-English

During the period of Guangzhou’s foreign trade in the 1760s to the 1850s, Canton-

English was a unique language of business transactions between Chinese people and native

English-speakers in Guangzhou (Ji & Chen, 2002). Since pidgin and pigeon have the same

pronunciation, some people also called pidgin English pigeon English (Ge Zi English, using the

Chinese word for pigeon) in China.

According to the generation of people who spoke Canton-English and the status of it,

Canton-English can be divided into three periods. First, the initial period of interaction between

the Chinese and English languages. Since the 1640s, English began to appear in the Guangzhou

port area, and the growing trade between China and Britain needed a language that both sides

could understand (Ji & Chen, 2002). This was the direct reason for Canton-English. Second, the

formative period of Canton-English. At the end of the 17th century, the British East India

Company established a commercial pavilion in Guangzhou and established regular trading

relations with the late Qing government in the first half of the 18th century (Yi, 2005). As an

indispensable trade language, the importance of Canton-English became more and more obvious.
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Third, the establishment of the dominant position of Canton-English. Before the Opium Wars,

Britain was the main trade country with the Qing government. Additionally, Guangzhou was the

only foreign treaty port at that time, which provided the language and geographical advantages

for the dominant position of the establishment of Canton-English. From the 1750s–1850s,

Canton-English was steadily and rapidly replacing Canton-Portuguese as a lingua franca of

foreign trade (Yi, 2005). It also became the only foreign language for many Chinese young men

in Guangzhou at that time, and eventually became the dominant trade lingua franca of the late

Qing dynasty (Ji & Chen, 2002). Canton-English had a strong usability. Oral communication was

its purpose; grammar, words and pronunciation were based on Cantonese (Shi, 1991). As the

forerunner of pidgin English, Canton-English, though very irregular and limited in scope, helped

the Chinese young men in the late Qing dynasty to learn and use English. Moreover, it played an

extremely important role in the elimination of the language barrier of communication between

China and the western countries, the further development of the trade and commerce, and the

evolution and maturity of pidgin English (Yi, 2005).

Annotated English using Chinese Characters

The second stage of the pidgin English development was to annotate the pronunciation of

Chinese to English language, in other words, people mark English words with similar

pronounced Chinese characters (Ji & Chen, 2002). After the Opium War, with the opening of

five ports (Guangzhou, Shanghai, Xiamen, Fuzhou, and Ningbo), the foreign trade center started

to move north in the late Qing dynasty, and English was no longer suitable for people in

Shanghai and Ningbo areas. According to Robert Thom’s account in Chinese and English

Vocabulary in 1843, there were few people with knowledge of English at treaty ports other than

Guangzhou; local people believed that in order to promote the foreign exchange of the northern
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port cities, it was necessary to annotate the Chinese language in English, so as to quickly

cultivate the foreign trade of these port cities. (Yi, 2005). Thus, the annotated English language

began to replace Canton-English, gradually becoming the mainstream of pidgin English. Robert

Thom’s Chinese and English Vocabulary introduced a new method for learning pidgin English.

In order to facilitate the learners to study efficiently, the book is arranged in the order of English

alphabetical, Chinese homophonic characters and Chinese translation; although this annotated

method was not regulated, it helped Chinese people to master pidgin English quickly, for

example, one thing is annotated as wen-ting, bring it is annotated as bi-ling-yi-de, and please is

annotated as bi-li-shi (Ji & Chen, 2002).

Pidgin English in Shanghai

Since the middle of the 19th century, Shanghai had developed into China’s largest trading

port, and pidgin English had been developing unprecedentedly. The Yang Jing Bang river in

Shanghai was the dividing line of British and French Concessions, and it was also the place

where foreign and Chinese merchants gathered and traded. Chinese merchants traded with

westerners on both sides of the river with their pidgin English interspersed with Shanghai dialect

(Shi, 1991). A language named after the local name of a river, Yang Jing Bang English (Pidgin

English), was born in Shanghai at this time. It is worth mentioning that all the Chinese pidgin

Englishes, including Canton-English and annotated English, were known as Yang Jing Bang

English in China later in history (Ji & Chen, 2002). Shanghai pidgin English is a special kind of

language that mixes English and Shanghai dialect. For example, roof window is interpreted as

lao-fu-ti-cang in Shanghai dialect; ti-cang means windows which are able to be seen straight to

the sky. In this pidgin word, roof is pidginized as lao-fu because of the similarity of its

pronunciation. Other examples of this mixing of English and Shanghai dialect include the
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English word cement and the pidgin English word si-men-ting, toast and tu-si, butter and bai-tuo,

cashmere and kai-si-mi, and the like. Some of them are still used by the native Shanghainese

these days, and they also have had a profound impact in Shanghai dialect. This kind of pidgin

language used in Shanghai was caused by the opening of ports and commerce. The frequent

business activities further promoted the popularity of pidgin English. Pidgin English peaked in

the 1880s with the rising status of Shanghai in China’s external relations, and even in the 1940s

there were still quite a few people using pidgin English (Yi, 2005).

The Reasons of the Emergence of Pidgin English

“The emergence and development of pidgin English is closely related to the political and

economic plunder of western powers in China. It played an important role in China’s foreign

trade, diplomatic and cultural contacts in the late Qing dynasty” (Ji & Chen, 2002). Due to these

pidgin Englishes, the foreign relations of China in the late Qing dynasty were successfully

carried out. The reasons can be summarized as follows.

First, since 1723, the late Qing government imposed a ban on foreign language teaching,

which prohibited foreigners from teaching English to Chinese people, and the Chinese people

were also not allowed to teach foreigners Chinese; anyone who violated the policy were

denounced as traitors (Yi, 2005). Although the Qing government regarded Chinese as a fine

language and despised foreign languages, it did not prevent Chinese people from learning and

imitating foreign languages. Thus, the invention of pidgin English did not violate the laws of the

Qing government.

Second, the difficulty for foreigners learning Chinese had accelerated the emergence of

pidgin English (Shi, 1991). In the eyes of westerners, Chinese characters are very difficult to

understand, and it is almost impossible to remember a large number of Chinese characters that
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seem to have no real connection to meaning; it takes a lot of time to understand different phrases,

and the effects of learning are not very good (Yi, 2005). Restricted by the education conditions at

that time, teaching materials for Chinese were not yet available, which made it more difficult for

foreigners to learn Chinese.

Third, the economic benefits brought by foreign trade were the direct causes of the

emergence of pidgin English (Ji & Chen, 2002). In order to communicate directly with foreign

merchants and get more profit, some Chinese businessmen actively learned and imitated English.

Because there was no specific place to study foreign languages, the Chinese who wanted to

communicate with foreigners could only take advantage of every opportunity. They stayed at the

dock, bank and other places where foreigners often hung out, only to learn a few words (Yi,

2005). The pidgin English was once considered a low-grade language to English native speakers,

but in order to trade with Chinese people and make good profits, foreign merchants soon began

to accept and actively learn pidgin English (Ji & Chen, 2002). The potential market demand led

to the heyday of pidgin English in the 1880s.

The Current Situation of Pidgin English in China

With the deepening of Chinese and foreign contact, China’s English learning developed

rapidly in the late 19th century. The career of the major use group of pidgin English, the

comprador, is mainly centered around foreigners. They needed to complete complicated work

that required a high English proficiency level. But pidgin English no longer met their needs. At

this time, pidgin English showed the tendency of decline (Ji & Chen, 2002).

Nowadays, with the popularization and development of English education, students

generally begin to learn standard English from primary school. More and more people can

communicate in fluent, standard English with native English-speakers for multiple purposes.
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Besides, some parents with financial ability tend to send their children to study abroad, most of

those countries they choose are English-speaking countries, such as the United States, Australia,

and Britain. Consequently, those children who choose to come back to China will ideally at least

have advanced level English ability. Nobody speaks pidgin English in China anymore and the

existence of pidgin English in the modern Chinese society makes no sense. However, in the

dialects of those original treaty ports cities, such as Shanghai and Guangzhou, the trace of pidgin

English can still be found. For example, the pidgin English word si-men-ting (cement) has been

incorporated into Shanghai dialect. People are still using it in its original sense and there are

hundreds of these kinds of words in the Shanghai dialect. In the sense of creole, those pidginized

dialects cannot be defined as creole English in China. Because the second generation of those

who learned the original pidgin English only know a few words about it and they are not able to

comprehensively use pidgin English as an independent language system. The only thing that

pidgin English left behind is just a few words with no connections between them.

Conclusion

The development of Shanghai created an unprecedented platform for the development of

pidgin English and injected strong catalysts; in turn, as an important medium of communication

between China and foreign countries, pidgin English, contributed a lot to the internationalization

of Shanghai and the globalization of China.

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