Bislama is the national language of Vanuatu, the world's most linguistically diverse nation with at least 80 actively spoken Oceanic languages used by about 200,000 people. Bislama began as a plantation pidgin based on English in the nineteenth century, but it has since developed into a unique language with a grammar and vocabulary very different from English.

It is one of very few national languages for which there is no readily available reference grammar. This book aims to fill this gap by providing an extensive account of the grammar of Bislama as it is used by ordinary...