Featuring an international contributor list, this long-awaited and broad-ranging collection examines the key issues, topics and research in pidgin and creole studies.

-A comprehensive reference work exploring the treatment of core aspects of pidgins/creoles, focusing on the questions that animate creole studies -Brings together newly-commissioned entries by an international contributor team -Accessibly structured into four sections covering: the character of pidgins and creoles; the relation of pidgins/creoles to other language phenomena and other languages; issues in pidgin/creole genesis; and the role of pidgins/creoles in society -Provides a valuable resource for students, scholars and researchers working across a number linguistic disciplines, including sociolinguistics, historical linguistics, and the anthropology of language

"A most informative handbook on pidgin and creole languages. Superbly edited, and written by the preeminent scholars in the field." Armin Schwegler, University of California, Irvine