Bislama is a Melanesian creole language, one of the official languages of Vanuatu. It is the first language of many of the "Urban ni-Vanuatu" (those who live in Port Vila and Luganville), and the second language of the rest of the country's residents. "Yumi, Yumi, Yumi", the Vanuatu national anthem, is in Bislama. Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... A creole language, or simply a creole, is a well-defined and stable language that originated from a non-trivial combination of two or more languages, typically with many distinctive features that are not inherited from either parent. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Map showing Melanesia. ... ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family. ... ISO 639-2 is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. ... ISO 639-3 is in process of development as an international standard for language codes. ... Not to be confused with the NATO phonetic alphabet, which has also informally been called the “International Phonetic Alphabet”. For information on how to read IPA transcriptions of English words, see IPA chart for English. ... Phonetics (from the Greek word φωνή, phone meaning sound, voice) is the study of the sounds of human speech. ... Unicode is an industry standard designed to allow text and symbols from all of the writing systems of the world to be consistently represented and manipulated by computers. ... This chart shows concisely the most common way in which the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is applied to represent the English language. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Map showing Melanesia. ... A creole language, or simply a creole, is a well-defined and stable language that originated from a non-trivial combination of two or more languages, typically with many distinctive features that are not inherited from either parent. ... Port Vila (population 29,356, coordinates ) is the capital city of Vanuatu. ... Luganville is the second largest city in the Republic of Vanuatu and is located on the island of Espiritu Santo. ... Yumi, Yumi, Yumi (We, We, We) is the national anthem of Vanuatu. ...

More than 95% of Bislama words are of English origin; the remainder combines a few dozen words from French, as well as some vocabulary inherited from various languages of Vanuatu, essentially limited to flora and fauna terminology.^[1] While the influence of these vernacular languages is low on the vocabulary side, it is very high in the morphosyntax. Essentially speaking, Bislama can be described as a language with an English vocabulary and a Melanesian grammar.^[2] The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ...

History

During the period known as Blackbirding, in the 1870s and 1880s, hundreds of thousands of Pacific islanders (many of them from the New Hebrides archipelago) were recruited to work on plantations, mainly in Queensland, Australia and Fiji. With several languages being spoken in these plantations, a Melanesian pidgin was formed, combining English vocabulary^[3] with grammatical structures typical of Melanesian languages.^[4] This early plantation pidgin is the origin not only of Bislama, but also of Tok Pisin of Papua New Guinea, Pijin of the Solomon Islands, and Torres Strait Creole north of Australia. Blackbirding refers to the recruitment of people through trickery and kidnappings to work on plantations, particularly the sugar cane plantations of Queensland (Australia) and Fiji[1] , as well as in the early days of the pearling industry in Broome. ... // The invention of the telephone (1876) by Alexander Graham Bell. ... // Development and commercial production of electric lighting Development and commercial production of gasoline-powered automobile by Karl Benz, Gottlieb Daimler and Maybach First commercial production and sales of phonographs and phonograph recordings. ... // This article is about crop plantations. ... Motto: Audax at Fidelis (Bold but Faithful) Other Australian states and territories Capital Brisbane Governor HE Ms Quentin Bryce Premier Peter Beattie (ALP) Area 1,852,642 km² (2st)  - Land 1,730,648 km²  - Water 121,994 km² (6. ... This article includes a list of works cited but its sources remain unclear because it lacks in-text citations. ... Pijin is a language spoken in the Solomon Islands. ... Torres Strait Creole (also Torres Strait Pidgin, Torres Strait Broken, Cape York Creole, Lockhart Creole) is a creole language spoken on several Torres Strait Islands (Queensland, Australia). ...

This pidgin started spreading over the Vanuatu archipelago at the turn of the XXth century, as the Blackbirders began to come back into their native islands: knowledge of this pidgin would facilitate communication not only with European traders and settlers, but also between native populations of remote islands within the archipelago. This is how Bislama was born, progressively evolving separately from other related pidgins from the Pacific.

Because Vanuatu is one of the most language-dense countries in the world (one count puts it at 113 languages for a land area the size of Connecticut state), Bislama usefully serves as a lingua franca for communication between ni-Vanuatu, as well as with and even between foreigners. Besides Bislama, most ni-Vanuatu also know their local language, the local language of their father and that of their mother, and their spouse, and formal schools are taught in English or in French. Lingua franca, literally Frankish language in Italian, was originally a mixed language consisting largely of Italian plus a vocabulary drawn from Turkish, Persian, French, Greek and Arabic and used for communication throughout the Middle East. ...

Over the past century or so, Bislama has evolved to what is currently spoken and written. Only recently (1995, with second edition in 2004) has the first dictionary of Bislama^[5] been published, and this has helped to create a uniform spelling of Bislama.

Name

The name of Bislama (previously also spelled "Bichelamar") comes via the 19th century word "Beach-la-Mar" from French "bêche de mer" sea cucumber, which itself comes from an alteration of the Portuguese "bicho do mar".^[6] In the mid-nineteenth century, sea cucumbers were also harvested and dried at the same time that sandalwood was gathered. The name came to be associated with the kind of pidgin that came to be used by the local laborers between themselves, as well as their English-speaking overseers. Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... Orders Subclass Apodacea  Apodida  Molpadiida Subclass Aspidochirotacea  Aspidochirotida  Elasipodida Subclass Dendrochirotacea  Dactylochirotida  Dendrochirotida The sea cucumber is an echinoderm of the class Holothuroidea, with an elongated body and leathery skin, which is found on the sea floor worldwide. ... The branches of a young sandalwood tree found in Hawaii Sandalwood (Chandanam) is a fragrant wood, and the name may be applied to any of a number of woods. ...

Grammar

Two frequent words in Bislama are "long" and "blong", which take the place of many prepositions in English or French.

"Long"

Long as 'next to', 'by', 'beside' etc...
Stoa long haos: The store next to the house.

long as 'at' or 'to'
Mi bin stap long ples ia bifo: I have been to this place before.
Mi stap long stoa: I am at the store.

long as 'in'
Jea long haos: The chair in the house.

Long holds many other related meanings, and is sometimes used in improvisation.

"Blong"

Originally from Eng. "belong", blong takes the place of 'of' or the genitive case in other languages. Just like Eng. of, it is one of the most widely used and versatile words in the language, and can indicate possession, country of origin, defining characteristics, intention, and others.

Buk blong mi: The book that belongs to me, my book

Man blong Amerika: Man from America, American.

Hemi woman blong saiens. She is a woman of science, She is a scientist.

Man blong trink: Man of drinking i.e. a drinker

Verbs

Verbs in Bislama do not conjugate. Usually they consist of a stem word borrowed from English, French or Melanesian languages and on many transitive verbs the ending -em, -im, or -um, depending on vowel harmony. There is a past tense and a future tense marker that usually goes at the beginning of the sentence or next to the verb. For example: A transitive verb is a verb that requires both a subject and one or more objects. ... Vowel harmony (also metaphony) is a type of long-distance assimilatory phonological process involving vowels. ...

Mi wantem bia I want beer.

Mi bin wantem bia I wanted beer (bin=past tense marker, borrowed presumably from the English form of to be "been")

Bambae/Bae mi wantem bia I will want beer. (Bambae/Bae=future tense marker, borrowed presumably from the English "by and by")

Nouns

The plural is formed by putting "ol" before the word: bia=beer. Ol bia = "beers". When used with numbers, the singular form is used. 2 bia, 3 bia, etc...

Pronouns

Bislama features dual, trial, and plural personal pronouns as well as an inclusive and exclusive we (inclusive meaning I + you, exclusive meaning I + he/she/it/they, not you). Following are the Bislama plural personal pronouns, in italics the English transliteration where useful to understand/remember, and the grammatical category.

Singular

• mi : I, me
• yu : you
• hem : him, her

Dual

• yumitufala : (you me two fella) - us, inclusive (you and me)
• mitufala : (me two fella) - us, exclusive (me and someone else)
• yutufala : you two
• tufala/tugeta : those two

Trial

• yumitrifala : (you me three fella) - us three, inclusive (you two and me)
• mitrifala : (me three fella) - us three exclusive (us three)
• trifala/trigeta : those three

Plural

• yumi : us inclusive (all of us)
• mifala : us exclusive (that person and me)
• yufala : all you
• ol/olgeta : all of them

Pronouns do not decline. In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns and adjectives to indicate such features as number (typically singular vs. ...

Aspect markers

no : not

hem i no kakae yam = he doesn't eat (a, the) yam

nomo : no/any more (placed before the predicate)

hem i nomo kakae yam = he doesn't eat (a, the) yam any more

nomo : only / doesn't but

hem i kakae yam nomo = he only eats yam

neva : never

hem i neva kakae yam = he never eats yam

jes : shows an action that has just occurred

mifala i jes wekap = we just woke up

stat : start, commencement of a process

hem i stat kukum kumala = he/she has started to cook sweet potatoes

stap : ongoing or habitual action

hem i stap kukum kumala = he/she is now cooking sweet potatoes / he/she usually makes sweet potatoes

gogo : continual action

hem i kukum kumala gogo = he/she keeps on cooking sweet potatoes / he/she continually cooks sweet potatoes

bin : (been) - completed action

hem i bin go long Kanal = he has gone to Luganville (principal city in Santo)

finis : finished, past tense (when before object)

hem i finis kakae = he is finished eating

finis : already (when after object)

hem i kakae finis = he has already eaten

mas : must

hem i mas kakae = he must eat

traem : try

hem i traem singsing = he tries to sing

wantem : want

hem i wantem go long Kanal = he wants to go to Luganville

save : can, know

mi save toktok langwis bislama = I can speak Bislama

sapos : (suppose) if

sapos yumitufala i faenem pig, yumitufala i kilim hem i ded = if we find a pig, we'll kill it

Internal variation

Dialects exist, based mainly on different pronunciations in different areas which stem from the different sounds of the native languages. The future tense marker can be heard to be said as: Bambae, Mbae, Nambae, or Bae. There are also preferences for using Bislama or native words that vary from place to place, and most people insert English, French, or local language words to fill out Bislama. So in the capital city it is common to hear 'computer'; in other places you might hear 'ordinateur'.

Melanesian Creole Comparison

Literature and samples

The longest written work in Bislama is the recently completed Bible. This Gutenberg Bible is displayed by the United States Library of Congress. ...

Yumi, Yumi, Yumi

Further reading

• Camden, Pastor Bill. 1979. Parallels in structure of lexicon and syntax between New Hebrides Bislama and the South Santo language as spoken at Tangoa. Pacific Linguistics, A-57:51-117.
• Charpentier, Jean-Michel 1979. Le pidgin bislama(n) et le multilinguisme aux Nouvelles-Hébrides. Langues et Civilisations à Tradition Orale 35. Paris: SELAF.
• Crowley, Terry. 1990. Beach-la-Mar to Bislama: The emergence of a national language in Vanuatu. Oxford Studies in Language Contact. Oxford: Clarendon Press. xxi + 422pp.
• Crowley, Terry. 1995. An illustrated Bislama-English and English-Bislama dictionary. Vila: Pacific Languages Unit and Vanuatu Extension Centre, University of the South Pacific. (Revised 2004.) vii + 478pp. * Builds on the work of Camden (1977) and other sources to provide a very comprehensive modern dictionary of modern Bislama, together with a comprehensive English index.
• Darrell T. Tryon and Jean-Michel Charpentier. 2004. Pacific Pidgins and Creoles: Origins, Growth and Development. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2004. xix + 559 pp. Hardcover ISBN 3-11-016998-3.

Terry Crowley (1953-2005) was a linguist specializing in Oceanic languages. ... Terry Crowley (1953-2005) was a linguist specializing in Oceanic languages. ...

References

1. ^ Charpentier, Jean-Michel 1979. Le pidgin bislama(n) et le multilinguisme aux Nouvelles-Hébrides. Langues et Civilisations à Tradition Orale 35. Paris: SELAF.
2. ^ Camden, Pastor Bill. 1979. Parallels in structure of lexicon and syntax between New Hebrides Bislama and the South Santo language as spoken at Tangoa. Pacific Linguistics, A-57:51-117.
3. ^ In addition, whaling captains who picked up workforce from Africa and the Pacific Islands had already developed some sort of pidginized English. Modern Bislama bears a striking resemblance to Pidgin Englishes of West Africa^{[citation needed]} (where the slave trade was also active at one time); it is possible that Bislama is one branch of an evolution of pidgins from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries^{[citation needed]} when the first truly global trading system began.
4. ^ For this whole section, see:
   Darrell T. Tryon and Jean-Michel Charpentier. 2004. Pacific Pidgins and Creoles: Origins, Growth and Development. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. xix + 559 pp.
   Crowley, Terry. 1990. Beach-la-Mar to Bislama: The emergence of a national language in Vanuatu. Oxford Studies in Language Contact. Oxford: Clarendon Press. xxi + 422pp.
5. ^ Crowley, Terry. 1995. An illustrated Bislama-English and English-Bislama dictionary. Vila: Pacific Languages Unit and Vanuatu Extension Centre, University of the South Pacific. (Revised 2004.) vii + 478pp.
6. ^ "bêche-de-mer", American Heritage Dictionary, 2000

Terry Crowley (1953-2005) was a linguist specializing in Oceanic languages. ... Terry Crowley (1953-2005) was a linguist specializing in Oceanic languages. ... The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (AHD) is a dictionary of American English published by Boston publisher Houghton-Mifflin, the first edition of which appeared in 1969. ...

External links

Bislama language edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

• Bislama dmoz directory
• Tam Tam news in Bislama; also sound samples of news broadcasts in Bislama in MP3 format
• Vanuatu Daily Post - news in English and Bislama
• A bibliography of Bislama, from an Australian National University website
• A short description of Bislama from a University of New England (Australia) website
• Pidginise Your English: How to speak Bislama