Tây Bồi Pidgin French

Tây Bồi (Template:Langx), or Vietnamese Pidgin French, was an extinct pidgin once spoken by non-French-educated Vietnamese, typically those who worked as servants in French households or milieux during the colonial era. Literally, it means "French (Tây) [of- or spoken by] male servants (Bồi)". During the French colonization period, the majority of household servants for the French were male. The term is used by Vietnamese themselves to indicate that the spoken French language is poor, incorrect and ungrammatical. The French government/colonizers or protectors opened French public schools (from pre-kindergarten through the Baccalaureat II) staffed by all native French speakers to take care of their compatriots/expatriates' children's education. Vietnamese children were admitted as well if they could pass the entrance examination tailored to their age and grade level. The Vietnamese elite class spoke French, and those with French Baccalaureat diplomas could attend French universities in France and in its colonies. After France's withdrawal from Indochina in 1954, Tây Bồi ceased to be used as a common language as standard French was used and is believed to have become extinct around the 1980s.

Etymology

Bồi is the Vietnamese phonetic spelling of the French word "boy" (from the English word), which refers to male household servants (it also means "to add" as a verb in Vietnamese, which incidentally refers to how this pidgin worked).

History

Tây Bồi formed in the 1860's around Saigon as French colonial officials in Vietnam began interacting with the local population. Those who could afford to learn French did if they interacted with the French often. But some were too poor to afford education couldn't learn French and so to allow them to communicate with the French a pidgin formed in. Most of these poor people were servants, low level administrators, soldiers or other such low class workers.

The language began to decline after the French withdraw from Vietnam after the First Indochina War. After this lack of use, warfare (along with Communist suppression of French) decreased the amount of speakers further. The last evidence of Tây Bồi being used was documented between 1975 and 1980. Before it went extinct Tây Bồi was viewed as irrelevant by the French and speakers were hesitant to speak about it after the French withdraw, because of this it is poorly attested in surviving research.

Phonology

Consonants

		Bilabial	Labio-Dental	Dental	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Velar	Uvular
Plosive	Voiceless	p		t̪ (ṭ)	t		k
	Voiced	b		d̪			g
Fricatives	Voiceless		f	θ		ʃ		χ
	Voiced		v	ð		ʒ	ɣ
Laterals				l
Trills					r			ʀ
Nasals		m		n	n		ŋ
Semivowels		w				ɥ

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
			Unrounded	Rounded
Close	i			u
Mid	e̞	ə	ɤ	o̞
Open Mid	ɛ			ɔ
Near-open		ɐ
Open		a

Tones

Tây Bồi contains the same 5 tones as the Southern dialects of Vietnamese being the High-level, High rising, Low-level, Mid-rising, and Low-rising tones.

Features

Tây Bồi had an SVO word order just like Vietnamese. Verbs were used in the infinitive with tense implied mostly through context. Its grammar and syntax are in general the same as Vietnamese grammar and syntax.

Lexicon

In Tây Bồi was a French lexifier pidgin with minimal influences from Vietnamese, Chinese Pidgin English, Japanese and a Portuguese Creole (though which one specifically isn't specified). Tây Bồi also sees a significantly reduced amount of words with many copulas being removed and words gaining several closely related meanings.

Examples

Tây Bồi	Standard French	Literal English	Standard English
		Me hunger	I am hungry
	Ma tasse	Me cup	My cup
	Il a la permission de se reposer	Him have permission rest [noun]	He has permission to rest
	Demain, je retourne à la campagne	Tomorrow me return [noun] countryside	Tomorrow, I return to the countryside
	Si vous ne me payez pas, j'arrêterai de travailler	You not money, me stop work [noun]	If you don't pay me, I'll stop working
	Monsieur est content d'aller danser	Mister happy to go to dance	The gentleman is happy to go dance
	Il la frappe	Him her to hit	He hits her
	Bon, n'y va pas	Good, not to go	Good, don't go
	Je ne travaillerai pas	Not work [noun]	I won't work
	Assez, je n'en sais rien	Enough, not to know	Enough, I don't know
	J'ai compris ce que tu as dit	Me understood you to speak	I've understood what you've said

(Bickerton 1995: 163) [1]

See also

• French Indochina
• French language
• Vietnamese language
• Butler English, a similar phenomenon in colonized India