I have already noted […] the idea that there is some similarity between the speech of the master imitating the slave and that of the foreign tourist attempting to make himself understood. The comparison is drawn in more detail by Ferguson [Ferguson, C. F. 1971. “Absence of copula and the notion of simplicity: a study of normal speech, baby talk, foreigner talk and pidgins” in Hymes, D. (a cura di ) 1971. Pidginization and Creolization of Languages, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press] who compares baby talk in the sense of motherese, foreigner talk, ie the speech addressed to foreigners, and pidgins. He identifies a number of characteristics shared across these modes of communication, eg repetition, absence for copula, short MLU.
- Romaine (1988), a pag.76