C. has to be commended for having put together, in the five historical chapters, linguistic and sociohistorical data on Bislama that tremendously increases our knowledge not only of the pidgin of Vanuatu, but of the other Melanesian pidgins as well. This is a remarkable piece of historical linguistics...one is amazed at the richness of data that the author was able to unearth.
List of figures; List of tables; List of abbreviations; The language and its name; Language contact in the early years: 1265 - 1865; Language contact since 1865; Language contact and the Bislama lexicon; Beach-la-Mar to Bislama: Emergence of the grammar; More reent developments: More on substrate; superstrate; and independent development; Lukluk Bak:Recurrent themes; References; Bibliography