Macau Pidgin Portuguese and Creole Portuguese: A continuum?

Abstract

This study examines the historical and grammatical relationships between Macau Pidgin Portuguese (MPP) and Macau Creole Portuguese (MCP). MPP emerged at the latest in the 18th century as a result of increased commercial involvement of the Chinese in/around Macau.

The extensive lexical and grammatical similarities between MPP and MCP suggest that MPP was based on MCP. Notwithstanding such shared features, MPP has features typically found in pidgins. The varieties of Portuguese spoken in Macau present a complicated linguistic scenario, with Portuguese as the administrative language, MCP as the local language for the Macanese and Christian Chinese; and MPP as the variety used by the Chinese. This paper develops the hypothesis that these varieties can be represented as a continuum, with varying degrees of (dis)continuity.