Although pidgins and creoles were long the neglected step-children of linguistics because they were thought to be marginal, and not real full-fledged languages, they have now emerged as the centre of attention for a number of reasons.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 1

[…] some issues of interest to those who study pidgins and creoles: namely, whether these languages are to be regarded as dialects (ie socially and linguistically subordinate varieties) of the language which appears to contribute most of their lexicon (ie superstrate, lexifier language or lexical base).
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 3

Despite the progress made in the field of pidgin-creole studies many still believe that pidgins and creoles are parasitic rather than independent linguistic systems, which are the result of random mixing. […] Part of the problem in this attitude has been the lack of descriptive models for dealing with highly variable and rapidly changing systems. The existing categories of linguistic analysis are biased towards the description of autonomous, discrete language systems.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 7

[…] one characteristic of creoles is that they tend to have particles to express tense and aspect distinctions. Pidgins normally use adverbial expressions.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 41

[…] the main difference between a pidgin and creole lies in terms of the feature referred to as vitality.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 42

[…] pidgins and creoles share six features. That is, they lack standardization, historicity , and autonomy, but are reduced, mixed languages with de facto norms.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 42

[…] pidgins and creoles are developing systems which may overlap in terms of the structural complexity reached at any point in their life-cycle depending on their functions.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 47

[…] a pidgin arising from interlingual contact may become a creole if used as native language, and then a creole-continuum develops as the creole continues to co-exist with its lexically related standard.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 182

It has been claimed that pidgins and/or creoles share a number of features in common with first and second language acquisition. The comparisons which have been made relate both to similarities in particular linguistic structures found in child and pidgin/creole grammars, and to similarities in process, eg developmental stages which characterizes acquisitional phases or strategies which learners apply to construct rules and grammars.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 204

I have stressed at several stages the tendency for pidgins and creoles to opt for grater analyticity and transparency of encoding, ie one form – one meaning […]. Given the semantic-pragmatic and syntactic isomorphism of the creole prototype, one could argue that if it is in some respects better suited to basic communicative needs.
- Romaine (1988), Pag. 268