Crossing East: Proud to Speak Pidgin, Brah
Pidgin scholar Lee Tonouchi reads from one of his books on the subject, Living Pidgin: Contemplations on Pidgin Culture CrossingEast.org hide caption
Producer Dmae Roberts shares an audio postcard of some Hawaiians who are proud to speak pidgin -- a home-grown version of English with words and phrases borrowed from Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Portuguese, Hawaiian and other languages brought to the islands over the centuries.
Lee Tonouchi, a pidgin scholar and author of books on the island chain's unique language, believes pidgin has its own intellectual foundation:
"The perception is the pidgin talker is going to be perceived as less intelligent than the standard English talker," he says. "When I was in college, after I discovered guys writing in pidgin, I said 'Heck yeah, I can do this pidgin creative writing.' Eventually I did my 30-page research papers in pidgin. I did my master's thesis in pidgin."
Voices in the broadcast piece include Domingo Los Banos, Espy Garcia, Lee Tonouchi, Kent Sakoda and Jeffrey Siegel.
Living Pidgin
