14oC 70% Pidgin English
Arthur Hacker relates the origins of pidgin English
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Until many years after the founding of Hong Kong in 1841, the language barrier
created enormous problems for both the European traders and the merchants of the
Chinese Empire. In Imperial China it was illegal to teach a foreigner Chinese. When the Manchus ruled the Middle Kingdom during the Ching (Qing) Dynasty, it was a crime that carried with it the death penalty. All trade with the West was conducted either from Macau or from Canton (Guangzhou) where there was a tiny international enclave known as the Foreign Factories. Matteo Ricci, a young Jesuit, arrived in Macau in 1582. His mission was to convert the emperor of China to Christianity. However, the emperor was known as the Son of Heaven to the Chinese. Consequently, the prospect of persuading him to worship the rival Son of God was very slight. |
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| Other Roman Catholic missionaries followed Ricci, but it was not until 1807 that
the London Missionary Society sent Robert Morrison to Macau. Morrison was the first
Protestant missionary in China. He compiled the first English-Chinese dictionary and
was the first person to translate the Bible into Chinese. He also founded the Anglo-
Chinese College in Malacca where Protestant missionaries and traders could study
Chinese under the protection of the British flag. One of the students was Karl Gutzlaff, a Pomeranian saddle-maker turned missionary, who preached Christianity to the Chinese while selling them opium. He later became chief interpreter to Captain Elliot, the founder of Hong Kong. On a modest budget of $15 per month, he printed thousands of religious tracts which he gave to his converts to distribute. These venal rice-Christians sold them back to his printer, who resold them to Gutzlaff. This frustrated his grand design "to evangelize en masse a great nation." Except for missionaries, very few foreigners were fluent in Chinese. One notable exception was Sir George Staunton, head of the Honourable East India Company in Canton. He had learned the language from a Chinese Catholic priest on a long voyage from England in the Macartney mission, when Britain first attempted to establish diplomatic relations with China. Lord Macartney was getting nowhere in his mission to establish diplomatic relations with China, so he decided to send a letter directly to the Emperor Chien Lung (Qianlong). The letter had to be written in an elaborate court style in order to be acceptable, so Macartney persuaded a Chinese to compose the letter on condition that George Staunton would write a fair copy in Chinese. To everyone's amazement, Chien Lung granted Macartney an audience. George was only twelve years old at the time. Competent linguists like George Staunton were extremely rare so everyone else used pidgin English. Pidgin English is a strange mixture of English, Cantonese, Portuguese and Anglo-Indian slang. This multilingual baby talk was easy to learn. There were only about 500 words. It was a simple means of communication that worked. Words like chit, chow, char, cumshaw, josshouse, squeeze and ketchup are still used today, along with expressions like can do and long time no see. However, smellum wata (perfume) and cow-oil (butter) have vanished. A book with the snappy little title "Pidgin-English Sing-Song or Songs and Stories in the China-English Dialect" was published by a flower-flag-man (American) Charles G. Leland in 1876. It is a collection of ballads and stories written in pidgin English. I know from personal experience that it works having once inherited an aged amah (female servant) who came with a flat I rented. Ah Fun spoke no other language. Expressions like my boilum tea are easy enough to understand. My look-see one piecee man catchee chow-chow (I saw a man eating) is not so easy. |
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All images property of Arthur Hacker. For more from the History Man himself, Arthur Hacker is the author and illustrator of "British Hong Kong: Fact and Fable". Published by Lanyon Lanyon, and available from www.paddyfield.com |
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