Page 192 - Communication Cultural and Media Studies The Key Concepts

POLYSEMY/POLYSEMIC

PIDGIN

A synthetic, simplified language of a type that sometimes develops
between groups who lack a language in common, in order to facilitate
contact between them. Many recorded examples of pidgins involve
contact between an invading European colonial or mercantile power,
and Indigenous communities. Initially the pidgin serves primarily for
contact between the groups for quite specialised purposes such as
trade. In these circumstances the pidgin borrows key vocabulary items
from the language of the invading power to cover crucial areas of
meaning such as number or livestock. This borrowed vocabulary is
used with a highly simplified grammar in which word order is fixed,
inflections are dropped, fewer prepositions are used, and so on.
Pronunciation is likely to owe much to local sound patterns.
However, it is possible for the restricted purposes of the original
pidgin to become extended, even after the withdrawal of the colonial
power, if the pidgin proves useful for communication between local
communities, especially where these communities speak mutually
unintelligible languages. In Cameroon on the west coast of Africa
there are at least two hundred vernacular languages for a population of
less than eight million. Although French and English are maintained as
official languages, there also exists an important link language –
Cameroon Pidgin English – which is common amongst all sectors of
the population, is widely distributed amongst the two hundred ethnic
groups and has been spoken in the area for at least 150 years. Under
such conditions quite significant developments can take place within
the pidgin, increasing its complexity and extending its functions,
including its use for written communication.
See also: Dialect

Further reading: Mulhauser (1986); Todd (1984)

POLYSEMY/POLYSEMIC

Refers to the ability of a sign to have multiple meanings. This concept
recognises that meaning is not reproduced by referral to an essence,
but rather is achieved through the difference of one sign from another.
Furthermore, the polysemic nature of the sign confirms that there is
no natural relation between its components, the signifier and the
signified, but rather that this relationship is arbitrary. To take the

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