Krio/Pidgin (Cluster) Language Page

1 CLASSIFICATION AND WHERE SPOKEN

Krio and Pidgin are English-based creole languages. Krio is spoken in Sierra Leone and also around Banjul in the Gambia, as well as on the island of Ngueyma Byogo in Equatorial Guinea. Pidgin is spoken in Cameroon, the southeast quadrant of Nigeria, Ghana, and Togo.

2 NUMBER OF SPEAKERS

UBS (1982) notes 1,014,000 speakers of Krio in Sierra Leone. Hays (1977) also notes 3,000 speakers in The Gambia. Figures for Nigeria, Cameroon, and Ghana are harder to come by; Reinecke (1979) reports that in Ghana (population 18.1 million) Pidgin English "is widespread except in the north, but held in lower repute than in Nigeria and Cameroon." In Nigeria, with its 61.5 million people, Pidgin English is also widespread in the southeastern quadrant and elsewhere "in urban centers and along trade routes," spoken by as many as 10-15 million. In Cameroon (population 14.7 million), Pidgin English is concentrated in what was formerly West Cameroon (population one/two?? million) and adjacent areas of former East Cameroon, especially along the coast. This would suggest that Cameroon has more than one million speakers. Grimes (1996) cites an estimate of 2 million mainly second language speakers. A mutually intelligible variety of Pidgin English is also spoken on Fernando Po.

3 DIALECT SURVEY

No formal dialect survey of these languages has come to our attention, but Dwyer states (personal communication, 1983) that Krio and the Cameroon and Nigerian Pidgins are mutually intelligible, although they should be definitely taken as separate languages as far as materials are concerned.

4 USAGE

Krio is an official language of Sierra Leone and has wide usage as a second language. Elsewhere, Pidgin is a lingua franca, although there are pockets of first-language speakers in Nigeria and coastal Cameroon. Sierra Leone regularly broadcasts radio and television programs in Krio. Pidgin broadcasts are heard in Nigeria.

5 ORTHOGRAPHIC STATUS

Sierra Leone Krio has a dictionary (Fyle and Jones 1980) which is recognized as representing standard Krio spelling. No standard orthography exists for the Pidgins.

6 SETS OF LEARNING MATERIALS

Dwyer suggests that three sets of materials (Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and Cameroon) would be in order, due mainly to cultural reasons.