Ibero-Asian Creoles: Comparative Perspectives

摘要

Current knowledge of contact languages is largely based on Creoles and pidgins with European lexifier languages giving the impression that these languages evolved due to colonisation. Although the evolution of Ibero-Asian Creoles is inevitably linked to the revolution in oceanic transportation and the global expansion of European trade which subsequently led to colonisation, contact between diverse ethno-linguistic groups occurred much earlier. Chinese, Malays, Indonesians, Arabs and Persians were trading in the Indian Ocean into which the Portuguese entered at the end of the 15th century and dominated in the 16th century. The Spanish followed the Portuguese in the early 16th century in these exploratory voyages which extended to the South China Sea.