Mutilated English

Moribund Pidgin is Mutilated English

Letter to the Editor V September’s issue of PIM, Mr. Harry Dawkins contributed a very interest ing: article in defence of this moribund Sgin, and as I read It, Mr. Dawkins deavoured to prove that Pidgin, being conglomeration of words from diverse irces can live and expand, even to such extent as to become a universal iguage. He contends, to prove his esis, that all the great modern iguages, particularly English, are igins. English he describes as a eco-Latin-Teutonic Pidgin. [ am not really interested in the fate Pidgin as much as in his dialectics, lich I shall attempt to confute, fhe first point is that Pidgin must be rather large collection of words derived •m many outside sources. J. J. irray’s “Book of Pidgin English” is >re or less accepted as a standard thority. This book contains 1,760 words Pidgin. Of these 1,560 are grossly dilated English words; 330 are native rds for trees, plants, fish and animals, ligenous in New Guinea, and about 10 • Malay and German. The average live can, some with difficulty, under nd the English pronounciation of these 60 words. f these facts be accepted, then the leal conclusion is that Pidgin is just dn English less its syntax, but still a Igin language in as much as English elf is a “Greco-Latin-Teutonic Pidgin.” vould like to show that English is not Pidgin. dr. Dawkins states that somewhere in ! dim and distant past, there sprang in India a basic foundation language, is Centum language was divided into Itic, Teutonic,- Hellenic and Italic. The >ple of the first two were undoubtedly ; more virile as they travelled further d chose tougher, colder countries, reloped a fluent expressive speech sely related to that mother tongue »m India. This speech, perpetuated the present day may be heard in the mric-Welsh and Breton; Goedelic-Irish d Manx; and Gaelic in the Stornaways. »m the Teutonic arose the rich, mellow glish of the Tudors, of Shakespeare, the Bible and of Churchill. Some rds were added by the Normans (whose iguage was more closely joined to the etonic than the French), and later ne French, during the time of the ench-loving Stuarts.

L.atin and Greek, the classical languages, re laboriously built-up, artificial iguages, developed by scholars to whom e written word was a fetish. Their rfect conjunctions and declensions, an omination to all schoolboys, has been fried through the ages by priests and Molars but even in the time of the ghty Roman Empire, it never became e language of' even Italy itself.

Now, my contention is that English and elsh are living virile languages, not ad classical languages and that indreds of Welsh words are the same those that were used in that mother ngue in India. Dictionaries are a

modern innovation, compiled by gents like Dr. Johnson who was a profound Greek and Latin scholar, but whose knowledge of the Celtic and Teutonic tongues took a very secondary place, and therefore it was quite natural for him to assume that nearly all English words were derived from Classical sources.

Borrow was a great student of languages, but even he could blunder occasionally. As Mr. Dawkins quotes— the word “Cymraeg” which Borrow stated was derived from Cape “Comorin” in India. “Cymry” was Celtic which first became a household word in Wales during the fighting under Cunedda as late as 400 AD and meant, and still means, “Comrade.”

The English of England, and America and South Africa and Australia is a pure, but enriched language spoken by millions, but a few doddering thousands here in the SW Pacific are trying to foist on a defenceless people 1,500 horribly mutilated but English words, because we prefer to say to the house-boy “Go-go-go-go-go”, instead of "Go two miles”, or some idiot thinks he has found a new Esperanto because he can make himself understood to a Frenchman in the New Hebrides.

If he went to Paris he would find that practically every shop-assistant spoke English.

When Mr. Dawkins comes to Madang we will find a quiet corner in the Club and argue in Pidgin.

I am, etc.,

Dafydd Ap Rhys.

Madang, NG.

October 1, 1953. fl Ml'. Lewis Jones, MA, Dip. Ed., accompanied by his wife, has arrived in Suva to take up duty as Director of Education. He joined the Colonial Service in 1930, and served in the RAF 1939-44, reaching the rank of Squadron-leader. He is 44.